April 14, 2023
“Every accomplishment starts with the decision to try.
– President John F. Kennedy
Dear Friend,
The Maryland General Assembly recently concluded the 445th Legislative Session and I am extremely proud of what we accomplished to move every Marylander forward. Unlike in years past, this session was particularly successful because the Legislature had a true partner in the Governor’s mansion, and I am eager to build upon our successes.
Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decisions in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association Inc. v. Bruen and Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health, I am proud to say my colleagues and I worked swiftly to protect Marylanders from gun violence and to ensure reproductive rights are safeguarded. As Chairman of the Judicial Proceedings Committee, my top priorities this session included public safety, protecting reproductive rights, and expanding housing and rent protections. I am also proud to have been the lead sponsor of several pieces of monumental legislation which will be signed into law later this summer. Finally, apart from our legislative successes, I am happy to report the District 20 Team was able to secure more than $2.5 million in capital investment for community organizations in our district.
An overview of some of the most important issues the Maryland General Assembly addressed during the 2023 Legislative Session is provided below. I hope you find the contents of this letter informative. As always, please feel free to contact me if I can ever be of service to you.
The Judicial Proceedings Committee Continues to Lead the Way
This was my fourth year as Chairman of the Judicial Proceedings Committee. As Chair, I have sought to address systemic inequity and implement long-overdue reforms. This session we continued to do just that.
Protecting Reproductive Freedom and Justice:
Though the Supreme Court, through its decision in Dobbs, removed the egis of constitutional protection for the right to choose, we here in Maryland have taken several significant steps to protect access to reproductive health care. This session we passed a constitutional amendment to enshrine the protections of Roe into the Maryland Constitution; we moved to require all four-year public schools of higher education to provide 24/7 access to reproductive services; we protected sensitive reproductive healthcare information; and we passed legislation to protect patients and providers from the criminal, civil, and administrative consequences of other states for the simple act of providing reproductive health care here in Maryland.
- Protecting Maryland patients and providers from out-of-state entities seeking to penalize access to reproductive care in Maryland—The Reproductive Health Protection Act (SB859).
- Enshrining the fundamental right to reproductive freedom in the Maryland Declaration of Rights (SB798).
- Establishing the Protected Health Care Commission and prohibiting the disclosure of certain reproductive healthcare information (SB786).
- Requiring access to reproductive health care at certain public higher education institutions, including the University System of Maryland, Morgan State University, and Saint Mary’s College of Maryland (HB477).
Gun Safety – Violence Reduction & Public Safety
Public safety and the implementation of sensible gun safety measures continued to be at the forefront of our agenda in the Judicial Proceedings Committee, and to that end, we passed several measures focused on reducing gun violence across the state.
Gun Safety
Gun violence continues to plague every corner of our state and the Supreme Court’s Bruen decision has moved our nation and our State in the wrong direction by making it harder for states to set guardrails around concealed carry permits. As a result, we are witnessing more guns in public sensitive spaces like grocery stores, places of worship, and nursing homes. Objectively, when more guns are procured legally and brought into public, more guns are also lost or stolen, increasing the prospect those weapons will be used in violent crime. More guns lead to more gun violence and more gun-related injuries. We passed several bills to address this critical issue, including:
- Prohibiting individuals from carrying firearms in public and in sensitive locations (SB1).
- Strengthening the standards for obtaining a concealed carry permit and increased penalties for those who illegally possess firearms (HB824).
- Bolstering our gun safety storage laws, ensuring gun owners properly store firearms unloaded and away from children (SB858).
- Enabling the Maryland State Police Gun Center to track firearms surrendered under peace orders (SB185/HB3).
Violence Reduction & Public Safety
This session I successfully advocated for the allocation of $86M in public safety and victim services enhancements, including $40M in increases to support domestic violence victims and rape crisis centers.
I was also the chief sponsor of legislation that will authorize the Attorney General to prosecute police-involved incidents that result in the death of an individual, bringing further transparency and accountability to our criminal justice system (SB290/HB857).
Expanding Protections for Renters:
Building on the work we did last year to stave off an impending eviction crisis following the end of COVID relief funds, this session we passed a number of additional measures to protect renters amidst a continually volatile market:
- Requiring landlords to be licensed in order to evict a tenant, thereby preventing landlords from renting substandard housing while still having full rights to evict (SB100/HB36).
- Preventing landlords from penalizing or evicting tenants solely because the tenant has summoned law enforcement on one or more occasions (SB450/HB215).
- Prohibiting landlords from denying housing to persons with disabilities who have authorized service dogs (SB535/HB608).
Providing Civil Relief for Survivors of Child Sex Abuse:
- Our state has reckoned with the atrocities associated with child sex abuse for decades. This session we passed the historic Child Victims Act (SB686/HB1), which strikes down time limitations for bringing a civil lawsuit against organizations that harbored abusers. This Act provides a path for survivors of sexual abuse as minors to seek monetary relief at any time during their life.
- We also passed a bill which expanded the definition of “person in a position of authority” in our law to include camp counselors, coaches, scoutmasters, and others, closing a loophole that allowed for persons in those positions to engage in sexual conduct with a minor under their supervision (SB21/HB226).
- In response to recent advances in technology, we also passed a measure to expand existing laws prohibiting the possession of child pornography to include a prohibition on intentionally accessing with intent to view an online stream of child pornography, closing a loophole and ensuring that prosecutors have the tools necessary to respond to these heinous acts (SB226/HB233).
Protecting our State’s Most Vulnerable:
This session saw major advancements in civil rights as the Maryland General Assembly passed a number of bills that build on our state’s nondiscrimination, human trafficking, and hate crime laws, including:
- Advancing healthcare coverage and services for LGBTQ+ Marylanders (SB460/HB283).
- Extending the Maryland Lynching Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s charter for two additional years (SB478/HB339).
- Prohibiting juveniles from being criminally prosecuted for certain offenses when there is reason to believe they are a victim of sex trafficking or human trafficking (SB292).
- Ensuring victims of hate bias incidents have additional civil remedies available and providing additional opportunities for restorative justice to communities of color and other marginalized groups (SB5).
- Expanding civil rights enforcement actions by passing a bill providing the Attorney General broad authority to protect Marylanders from bias and discrimination based on the full panoply of categories protected under State and federal law: race, color, religion or creed, sex, age, ancestry or national origin, marital status, physical or mental disability, sexual orientation and gender identity, genetic information in employment, and familial status and source of income in housing (SB540).
Additional Major Legislative Initiatives
Melanie Diaz Sprinklers Save Lives Act: Our community experienced a devastating tragedy earlier this year. On February 18th a fire tore through the Arrive high-rise apartment complex in downtown Silver Spring, resulting in one fatality and multiple injuries. Hundreds of residents were displaced and approximately 89 apartment units have been condemned. My heart goes out to the family and friends of Melanie Diaz, the vibrant and promising young woman who lost her life, and those whose lives have been turned upside down by this tragedy.
In her honor, and to prevent tragedies like this in the future, I sponsored SB970 which requires certain high-rise buildings to install automatic sprinkler systems by January 1, 2033. High-rise buildings that are not protected by automatic sprinkler systems are required to include a notice in any lease agreement indicating that the building is not protected by a complete automatic sprinkler system. Though we were able to get this measure out of the Senate the House was unable to take action due to the time constraints of our short 90-day session.
Expanding Protections for Low-Wage Workers: For employees who earn less than $15/hr, a non-compete or conflict of interest provision that restricts their ability to enter into an employment contract with a new employer or to become self-employed in the same business or trade is null and void. This session we passed SB591 to prohibit non-compete/conflict of interest clauses in employee contracts who earn 150% of the MD minimum wage, raising the previous threshold for a non-compete clause.
Investing in Maryland Values through a Responsible and Balanced Budget for Fiscal Year 2024: The core role of the Maryland General Assembly in any legislative session is passing a balanced State budget for the next fiscal year. Even as federal funding from the COVID-19 pandemic goes away and the Board of Revenue Estimates projects lower revenue through Fiscal Year 2024, we were able to make responsible investments to benefit our State’s residents and economy. We ultimately enacted a $63.1 billion budget (HB200 and HB202) that invests heavily in Maryland values, including:
- $14B in Medicaid funding to provide healthcare coverage to 1.5 million residents;
- $8.7B for Maryland public pre-k to 12 schools, an increase of 9.1%, in addition to another $900 million as a down payment on the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future;
- $250M to combat the climate crisis, including $160M to support State parks and forests, $60M for Chesapeake Bay restoration, $15M for tree planting, and $15M for projects under the Climate Solutions Now Act of 2022;
- $200M available for new mass transit and transportation infrastructure throughout the State to allow flexibility should Maryland be awarded competitive federal grants;
- $200M for tax relief for Maryland’s veterans and working families;
- $86M in public safety and victim services enhancements, including an additional $46M above the statutorily required amount to fund police aid and to $40M in increases to support domestic violence victims and rape crisis centers; and
- $2.85B in cash reserves, including $2.5B in the Rainy Day Fund and over $350M in the General Fund, with ongoing general fund revenues projected to exceed ongoing expenditures by over $150M in FY24.
Expanding Opportunity for Working Families: Maryland’s working families continue to bear the brunt of inflationary pressures and a slowing economy. Although federal funding and the temporary expansion of benefit programs to support vulnerable Americans during the COVID-19 pandemic are ending, Maryland is stepping in to alleviate the burden that these families and individuals face. A livable, family-sustaining wage is foundational to reducing the impacts of poverty. That is why the MGA set our State on the path to a $15 an hour minimum wage in 2019 and expedited its statewide implementation to January 1, 2024, this Session (SB555/HB549). In addition, the MGA made the expansion of Maryland’s Earned Income and Child Tax Credits permanent (SB552/HB547), understanding that equitable tax relief will help to eliminate childhood poverty in our State. Finally, access to banking and capital is vital for generational wealth building. The Access to Banking Act will alleviate bank desserts in low- to moderate-income communities throughout the State (SB550/HB548).
Developing a National Model for an Equitable Recreational Cannabis Market: After Maryland voters overwhelmingly approved a constitutional amendment to legalize adult-use recreational cannabis last November, the Maryland General Assembly began working hard to craft legislation to set up an equitable framework for regulation, licensing, and taxation of adult-use recreational cannabis. The legislative framework passed reflects a commitment to repair the injustices to communities caused by the failed war on drugs and set a national model for the implementation of a legal market, learning from other states’ policies that have undertaken similar initiatives (SB516/HB556). It ensures that small cannabis businesses are supported by being eligible to apply for a license without needing a brick-and-mortar facility, while lowering application costs and reserving licenses for individuals who live in disproportionately impacted areas of the State. The legislation also unifies the regulations for cannabis so regardless of whether an individual is using cannabis recreationally or medically, it will be regulated in the same fashion. Finally, the bill sets aside millions of dollars for the communities most harmed by the failed war on drugs.
Reforming the Maryland 529 Prepaid College Trust: Coming into Session, we knew that one key area where to address was the Maryland 529 Prepaid College Trust. Families who invested in that type of Maryland 529 account received incorrect and confusing information that led many of them to make once-in-a-lifetime college enrollment decisions based on that faulty data. That is why we reformed the Maryland 529 program. We passed legislation overhauling Maryland 529 by abolishing the board and transferring administrative authority to the State Treasurer’s Office; creating a claims process for impacted account holders; and incentivizing the phase-out of the Prepaid College Trust in favor of other Maryland 529 plans that have consistently performed without issue (SB959).
Reestablishing Maryland as a Leader on Offshore Wind: Offshore wind is a vital component of a diverse renewable energy generation portfolio that will create grid resilience and lead to lower energy prices for ratepayers. The benefits of offshore wind go far beyond greenhouse gas reductions and include economic benefits ranging from job creation to manufacturing investments. The Promoting Offshore Wind Energy Resources (POWER) Act that passed the General Assembly this Session has the potential to spur billions of dollars of investment in the emerging green economy, thereby creating thousands of family-sustaining jobs, and establishing Maryland as an economic hub for the entire East Coast (SB781). The legislation sets an ambitious new target of 8.5 gigawatts of energy for offshore wind generation, analyzes economically efficient transmission planning to get that energy onto land, and establishes a novel procurement process that benefits Marylanders.
Protecting Maryland’s Environment for Future Generations: One of the most critical responsibilities facing the legislature each year is to ensure the stewardship of Maryland’s natural resources for generations to come. A number of critical conservation programs have lingered without update for decades, which we addressed this Session through two bills. First, we meaningfully updated Maryland’s Forest Conservation Act (FCA) for the first time since 1991 in order to achieve a “no-net-loss” of forest standard while giving local jurisdictions much-needed flexibility to align forest conservation needs with local land use priorities (SB526/HB723). Second, we tapped into available federal funding for conservation efforts that we had previously been unable to access by modestly raising fees for hunting licenses for the first time in over three decades (SB327/HB983). Additionally, the General Assembly took the first steps to ensure that the industry is a genuine stakeholder in recycling programs and mitigate the costs passed on to local governments by establishing a producer responsibility program for packaging materials (SB222).
Bringing Record Capital Investments Back to District 20
Senatorial Scholarships
Every student heading to a state college or graduate school from District 20 is eligible for my senatorial scholarship (if you are not sure if you reside in the 20th Legislative District, you can go to www.mdelect.net to check).
We are now accepting applications for scholarships. Please find instructions and detailed information about how to apply for a scholarship through my office by visiting WillSmithforMaryland/Scholarship. Applications are required to be completed and returned with all required documentation to my office by May 29, 2023. Funds will be applied to the Fall 2023 and Spring 2024 semesters.
Thank you for the profound honor of serving you in the Maryland Senate. While I am proud of the progress we are making together, I know our work is not done. I look forward to our continued success together. Please stay in touch with me via social media or email!
All the best,
William C. Smith, Jr.
Chair, Judicial Proceedings Committee
Maryland State Senator (District 20)