State troopers worked 14% more hours to cover protests, and long string of night meetings
By Paul Hammel
Nebraska Examiner
LINCOLN — The 2023 session of the Nebraska Legislature had an unprecedented string of debate-extending filibusters, as well as more night sessions than ever.
And the prime-time hour discussions, that sometimes extended to 11 p.m. and beyond, came with a cost.
Figures from the legislative accounting office indicate that expenses for staffing college-aged pages and the red-coated sergeants of arms that help keep order in the legislative chambers rose 23% in 2023 compared to the last 90-day session in 2021.
Overtime payments for the clerk’s office, revisor of statutes, legislative fiscal office and sergeants of arms this year were more than double what was spent in 2021.
The Nebraska State Patrol devoted 14% more hours providing security during the session, which included a couple of nights when the galleries had to be cleared due to unruly spectators.
Twenty extra state troopers, reportedly, were deployed one night to handle the throng of protesters objecting to the abortion/trans right measure, Legislative Bill 574. Six people were arrested.
The figures do not include salaried employees of legislative offices, who do not get overtime pay but may get compensatory time for the late hours.
‘There was a lot of strain’
“There was a lot of strain on them this session,” State Sen. John Arch, the Speaker of the Legislature, of legislative staffers.
“They’ve got work ethic like you wouldn’t believe,” said the Clerk of the Legislature, Brandon Metzler, of his staff’s willingness to work nights and rearrange schedules.
The state senators — who do not get overtime pay — also deserve credit, according to Arch, for forgoing time with family and friends to get work done.
“When the votes came late at night, they were there,” the Speaker said.
At least 25 of the 49 legislators in the one-house Unicameral are needed to have a quorum and conduct business.
The Legislature typically has some night meetings each session, usually near the end of a session when there’s a logjam of bills that need to get over the finish line.
Night sessions started earlier
But usually it’s a handful or so of late nights. This year, night sessions were held over 10 weeks, with late nights beginning on March 28, only the 51st day of the scheduled 90-day session.
The 10- to 13-hour work days were an effort to work around a series of time-consuming filibusters launched by Omaha Sens. Machaela Cavanaugh and Megan Hunt in protest of a bill — eventually amended and passed — that banned gender-affirming surgeries and called for regulating puberty blockers and hormones for minors.
Filibusters usually last eight hours during first-round debate, meaning that if the Legislature wanted to tackle more than one first-round debate a day, it had to work into the night. That often meant advancing one bill, then beginning another at night, to chip away at the next eight-hour debate.
Arch said that he and his staff calculated how many hours it would take to pass bills when putting together the 10-week-long stretch of night sessions.
‘We were counting hours’
“We were counting hours,” he said. “I tried to give everyone advance warning — as much advance notice as I could — that we were going late.
“I was careful. I didn’t want to run extremely late every night so we didn’t put too much stress on legislative staff,” Arch said.
Lunch breaks at noon were shortened from 90 minutes to 60 minutes, to provide more time for floor debate. And a nightly supper break lasted only 30 minutes, with dinner provided by lobbyists so, Arch said, senators could stay in the Capitol and continue working.
The night sessions continued every week starting March 28 and continued nearly every day. The exception was the last day of the week when lawmakers traditionally work through lunch and adjourn in early- or mid-afternoon to facilitate long drives home for rural senators.
Metzler said the latest night lasted till 11:30 p.m.,
He pointed out that while senators got to return home when a night session ended, workers in the clerk’s office, bill drafters and fiscal offices usually had at least another hour’s worth of work to document what happened that day and get ready for the next.
“There were a lot of late nights,” he said. “It was hard on all of us.”
Expenses compared
Expenses for 90-day sessions in 2021 and 2023
Pages: $98,871 vs. $105,458
Sgt. at arms: $43,987 vs. $67,792s
Sgt. at Arms overtime: $944 vs. $2,220
Clerk’s Office overtime: $3,975 vs. $11,867
Revisor Office overtime: $4,435 vs. $8,117
Fiscal Office overtime: $2,636 vs.$4,710
Nebraska State Patrol/Capitol Security
Logged 4,193 hours in 2021 covering the Legislature vs. 4,789 in 2021.
One-third of the hours troopers logged this year were for those not regularly assigned to the Capitol, illustrating the need for extra personnel.
The hardest cost to calculate, Arch said, was for the stress put on senators and staff from being away from their families.
“They were in the Capitol working,” he said. “I’m so appreciative of their work.”
Arch, in his speech at the end of the session, noted the dedication of legislative staff during the session. He said that 2,000 amendments were introduced, 900 fiscal notes were prepared and 1,158 motions — most associated with extending debate in a filibuster — were filed.
No one wants a repeat in 2024
The Speaker said that in discussions with fellow senators, no one wants to see a repeat of the rancor and hard feelings generated by the 2023 session, which dealt with controversial and emotional issues, ranging from abortion to gun rights and from tax breaks to voter ID.
Speaker Arch said he’s encouraged that some senators are meeting over the summer to build stronger relationships.
“That goes a long ways,” Arch said.