Rep. Kerri Harris

This Act provides clarification that all individuals currently or prospectively serving as mentors to one or more students through a mentoring program under the Department of Education must submit to state and federal criminal background checks, and that they are subject to continued criminal record monitoring for 1 year.

This Act establishes an automatic enrollment feature for newly hired state employees in the State’s 457(b) deferred compensation retirement plan. The Board may, through a plan amendment, modify the definition of a covered employee. Under the Act, a predetermined percentage of an employee’s salary will be automatically deducted from each paycheck and contributed to the 457(b) plan upon hire. This Act allows new employees to opt out at any time prior to the commencement of automatic withdrawals, which normally commences 90 days after hire. If an employee does not opt out of automatic enrollment during this 90-day period, the employee will be enrolled and contributions will commence. The employee will thereafter have an additional 30 days to opt out and request a refund of any contributions. Refund requests must be submitted no later than 120 days after the date of hire. Employees under a collective bargaining agreement are not subjected to auto-enrollment but are able to participate if should they elect to do so. This Act takes effect 10 days after the date of publication in the Register of Regulations of a notice from the State Treasurer that the Office of Management and Budget has certified to the State Treasurer that necessary payroll upgrades necessary to implement this Act have been completed.

This Act requires that all veterinarians report any suspected cruelty to animals to the Office of Animal Welfare or the appropriate reporting authority. Veterinarians must complete mandatory reporting training every 6 years and attest that they have completed mandatory training in any application for licensure or licensure renewal. The Board of Veterinary Medicine may impose disciplinary sanctions for violations of this Act. All reports provided by a veterinarian under this Act are confidential and may only be disclosed under specific circumstances. Under this Act, the Office of Animal Welfare and any other enforcement agency responsible for investigating animal abuse must adopt confidential procedures to protect the identity of the veterinarian making a report.

This Act modernizes Delaware law by adding modern medical treatment options biologics or biosimilars to the step therapy exception process. The current law was passed before biosimilars were widely available. Biosimilars are to biologics what generic drugs are to traditional drugs once their exclusivity expires. This revision adds an exclusion to step therapy protocol exceptions for interchangeable biologics and biosimilars.

Maddy summaryThis bill designates the month of May as "Veterans Month" throughout the State of Delaware. The primary mechanism of the legislation is to amend the Delaware Code to officially recognize this specific time frame for honoring military veterans. Once enacted, the change serves as a formal state acknowledgment rather than creating new laws or funding. It directly affects the state's official records and calendar designations without altering existing programs or benefits.

This Act repeals the ability of school districts to increase tax rates by up to 10% when recalculating the district’s rate of taxation after a general reassessment. This Act does not repeal the requirement under § 1916(b) of Title 14 that a school district recalculate the district’s rate of taxation after a general reassessment, but instead of the 10% maximum, limits the amount of money a district can collect as a result of increases in the fair market value of real property to an amount that is equal to or less than the sum of all of the following: 1. The actual operating revenue derived by the tax levied in the fiscal year immediately preceding the general reassessment. 2. A percentage that is equal to the average growth rate in taxable property in the district since the previous reassessment. This Act also allows school districts to increase a tax approved in a referendum election under Chapter 19 of Title 14 by up to 2% annually without a referendum if the district’s operational reserve balance is not more than 10% of the district’s annual revenue and it is not the same fiscal year that the rate of taxation is recalculated after a general reassessment. This authority will allow school districts to maintain services for students by gradually adjusting to challenges such as inflation, enrollment changes, and increased student needs. Under this Act, the new recalculation equation under § 1916(b) of Title 14 applies beginning for the fiscal year following the next general reassessment and a school district cannot begin to increase tax rates by no more than 2% without a referendum until after the next general reassessment or for fiscal year 2031, whichever is earlier. This Act does not do any of the following: • Allow school districts to levy an additional tax that is more than 2% without an approved referendum. • Change the differences under current law for tax rates for vocational-technical districts. Under current law and this Act, vocational-technical districts are required to use the same calculations as other school districts when recalculating the rate of taxation after a general reassessment. However, the tax authority for vocational-technical districts is under Chapter 26 of Title 14, not Chapter 19, so the authority to annually increase a tax rate by 2% does not apply to vocational-technical districts. This Act also makes the following corresponding and technical changes to Chapter 19 of Title 14: • Revises the definitions in § 1901 by adding “general reassessment” and “reassessed” as defined terms and updates the definition of “district” to reflect current school district boundaries. • Clarifies that if Chapter 26 applies to a school district, the ability of a district to levy an additional tax under § 1902(a) does not apply to that district. • Technical corrections to conform existing law to the standards of the Delaware Legislative Drafting Manual.

This Act makes it a crime to knowingly manufacture, sell, offer to sell, transfer, or possess a vehicle security circumvention device, or to aid or permit another to use a vehicle security circumvention device. This Act also requires individuals to report a lost or stolen vehicle security circumvention device to a law enforcement agency within 48 hours of becoming aware of the loss or theft. This Act does not include a special penalty as the Chapter already provides a penalty for misdemeanors, which includes a fine not less than $28.75 nor more than $115, or imprisonment not less than 30 days nor more than 90 days, or both. Additionally, for each subsequent offense the person shall be fined not less than $115 nor more than $230, or imprisoned not less than 90 days nor more than 6 months, or both. This Act requires a greater than majority vote for passage because § 28 of Article IV of the Delaware Constitution requires the affirmative vote of two-thirds of the members elected to each house of the General Assembly to create a new crime within the jurisdiction of the Court of Common Pleas, Family Court, or Justice of the Peace Court.

This Act removes a requirement for a parent to provide a birth certificate as part of the uniform public school registration process. A parent may instead provide other proof of age or date of birth.

This Act clarifies that quorum does not define the identity of a public body. Under rules of parliamentary procedure like Mason’s Manual or Robert’s Rules of Order, quorum is used to determine whether enough of a body is present to conduct business. Under Delaware’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), quorum is used to determine whether a public body is holding a “meeting” as defined under FOIA and therefore required to comply with open meeting requirements. However, quorum is not, under parliamentary procedure or FOIA, dispositive to determining the identity of the public body that is meeting. The governing document that creates the body determines the identity of the body under parliamentary law and that, in addition to an examination of the actual public business being conducted, will guide answers to questions about the identity of the public body for purposes of FOIA.

This Joint Resolution directs the Department of Education to compile and submit a comprehensive report regarding the workforce data and compensation of education support professionals for the most recent school year. The report must identify staffing levels, vacancies, average wages paid, and the number of employees earning below a $40 hourly wage threshold. The Department is further required to recommend pay scales that align with a minimum living wage and submit its findings to the General Assembly and relevant state offices by November 2, 2026.