Rep. Bill Bush

This Act adds one more member, a licensed health care professional knowledgeable in the screening and identification of domestic violence cases appointed by the Council, to the Fatal Incident Review Team of the Domestic Violence Coordinating Council. The Act also updates language regarding victims of domestic violence to include survivors. This Act also makes technical corrections to conform existing law to the standards of the Delaware Legislative Drafting Manual.

This Act makes clear that a retail licensee may only purchase authorized product from an importer, also known as wholesaler, except that a retail licensee may purchase up to 20 gallons a day from a premises licensed to sell for off-premises consumption. This Act also clarifies that off-premises licensees may sell untapped kegs for off-premises consumption.

This Act modernizes the process and requirements for issuance of liquor licenses for off premises consumption. The current process and requirements do not consider population growth. Minimum distance requirements are enhanced while increases in population growth will now be considered to arrive at a safety and convenience balance. This Act also grandfathers existing licensees into the current process.

This Act ratifies the National Crime Prevention and Privacy Compact, 34 U.S.C. §40316 (formerly cited as 42 U.S.C. § 14616), a requirement that allows Delaware to join the Compact as a Party State. The Compact serves as the infrastructure by which states can exchange criminal records for noncriminal justice purposes according to the laws of the requesting state and provide reciprocity among the states to share records without charging each other for the information.

This bill would allow Delaware residents two new deductions from personal income tax. The first is a deduction from taxable income of up to $2,500 for contributions to a “529” College Savings Plan. The second is a deduction from taxable income of up to $5,000 for contributions to a “529A” Savings Account – a special account for meeting the needs of certain individuals with disabilities. Under this Act, a Delaware resident taxpayer would be eligible for the deduction regardless of whether they made a contribution to a 529 or 529A plan sponsored by the State of Delaware or another state or institution, so long as the plans met federal criterion.

This Act protects consumers from paying high prices for prescription drugs by ensuring competition in the marketplace by doing the following: 1. Prohibiting a pharmacy benefit manager from requiring or providing an incentive for an insured individual to use a pharmacy in which the pharmacy benefit manager has an ownership interest. 2. Requiring that a pharmacy must be owned by a pharmacist or by a majority of pharmacists if owned by an artificial entity. This ownership requirement is modelled on the same requirement in North Dakota law, enacted in 1963, which has kept North Dakota prescription prices among the lowest in the country and provides North Dakotans with more pharmacies per capita than the national average and a high level of care from locally owned pharmacies. This ownership requirement does not apply to current holders of a permit to operate a pharmacy or to hospital pharmacies that furnishes services only to patients and employees.

This Act establishes in-person early voting in Delaware beginning January 1, 2022. Registered voters will be allowed to vote in-person during at least 10 days before an election, up to and including the Saturday and Sunday immediately before the election at locations determined by the State Election Commissioner. This Act also charges the State Election Commissioner with determining whether such voting should occur by voting machine or paper ballot. All other procedures relating to conducting voting are the same as for general election voting. Further, this Act requires that for statewide elections there must be at least 1 in-person polling place in each county, and an additional location in the City of Wilmington.

This bill would increase the maximum weekly benefit amount that would be payable to claimants seeking unemployment compensation benefits from the Delaware Division of Unemployment Insurance from $330 a week to $400 a week. The funds necessary to pay the increased weekly benefit amounts would be paid from the Unemployment Trust Fund. This bill would also freeze the taxable wage base used by employers to determine what portion of employee’s wages are subject to unemployment insurance tax assessments, for the period July 1, 2019 to October 29, 2020, to allow the Division of Unemployment Insurance and the Unemployment Compensation Advisory Council to analyze whether to revise the taxable wage base formula into the future.

This Concurrent Resolution recognizes September 2019 as "Prostate Cancer Awareness Month" in the State of Delaware

This resolution urges the Director of the Delaware Division of Public Health to designate Alzheimer's Disease and other dementias as public health issues.