Tensions And Filings High, Bill Bill Count Low In 2017

WFSU | By Jim Ash

Published May 5, 2017 at 2:47 PM EDT

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A record amount of legislation was filed ahead of the 2017 session, but few bills have passed in the waning days.

Miami Herald

Optimistic lawmakers flooded the Capitol with a record number of bills this spring.

A record amount of legislation was filed ahead of the 2017 session, but few bills have passed in the waning days.

Credit Miami Herald

But the 2017 session is coming in for a bumpy landing with only a relative handful of proposals passing both chambers.

Nearly 3,000 bills were filed before session, beating a 1991 record. Much of that had to do with a new House rule requiring lawmakers to file hometown spending projects as separate legislation.

But by midday on the penultimate day of session, only 170 bills and two proposed constitutional amendments have passed both chambers, the least in recent memory.

The number of bills signed into law after two months of work? According to Lobby Tools, the legislative tracking service --- nine.