Fwd: Instrument attributes -- identifier

[Sean McGrath]

All,

Fwd'ed from Ronda Tentarelli @ Washington State Legislature.

Sean

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Tentarelli, Ronda <Ronda.Te...@leg.wa.gov>
Date: Tue, Nov 22, 2011 at 6:23 PM
Subject: Instrument attributes -- identifier
To: "sean.m...@gmail.com" <sean.m...@gmail.com>

Washington’s usage may not be helpful to this enterprise, but its uniqueness may raise some issues.

 

We split what we call the prefix (HB, SB) from the number. The prefix indicates the version of the instrument that went to the second house and, in Washington, the number conveys the type of instrument. Let’s take HB 1234.

 

HB = original

SHB (if there is one) = committee version of the bill. You could have 2SHB, 3SHB, as well.

EHB (if there is one) = version as amended on the floor in the first house (I remember you didn’t want to worry about this sort of thing too much). You could have 2EHB, ESHB, etc.

 

Washington reserves ranges of numbers for instrument types.

 

1000-3999 for House bills (amend the state statutes)

4000-4199 for House joint memorials (memorialize Congress or the President to do x about y)

4200-4399 for House joint resolutions (proposals to amend the state constitution).

4400-4599 for House concurrent resolutions (business of the House and Senate, e.g., cutoff dates, joint rules).

4600-4999 for House resolutions (congratulations fine public servant, House rules).

 

5000-7999, 8000-8199, 8200-8399, 8400-8599, 8600-8999 are the equivalents on the Senate side. Plus, numbers 9000-forward are reserved for gubernatorial appointments requiring confirmation by the Senate.

 

Not to mention which the name of the actual document is different – we lead with the number and the other information trails. You could have something like 1000-S.E as the name of the document that is the engrossed substitute House bill. And we have a very tangled naming convention for amendments.

 

http://dlr.leg.wa.gov/tld/results.aspx?ID=21&params=2011,1008&desc=Text%20of%20a%20Legislative%20Document:%202011%20(2011) will give you an idea of how complicated this gets in Washington State. If you go there, click the link for “Tree View” above the document list to see these computer-ish names.

 

All this is to say that we might consider splitting the prefix from the number when we talk about the identifier.

 

Ronda Tentarelli
Applications Support Group Manager
Legislative Service Center
Washington State Legislature
360.786.7151
ronda.te...@leg.wa.gov