This has been the summer where Americans returned to travel, and took their chances with COVID19 meeting them on the road.
Vacations, family reunions and conventions are all coming back on calendars…and none too soon for Convention and business travel destinations like Atlanta.
Thankfully, massive events like Dragon Con and the national gathering of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), are back on the docket, filling rooms, airplane seats and rental cars, as well as hotel/motel tax coffers, long lean and ailing during this seemingly endless pandemic.
But ALEC, which recently graced Atlanta’s Convention District and the downtown Hilton, represents much more than a large convention bang…
Washington, D.C., Capitol Hill and our federal government are in many ways no longer the place to go for solutions. Massive spending and big programs…yes, but often those billions, fast becoming trillions, don’t actually correct or even make a major impact on the problem which they are intending to solve.
Increasingly, innovation and fresh ideas and solutions are coming from city halls, county governments and state legislatures…each bound to balanced budgets, and accustomed to trying to do more with less.
ALEC is a nonprofit and nonpartisan organization of primarily conservative state legislators and members of the private sector, who draft and share model legislation, for distribution, adoption and later implementation among state governments.
And though ALEC provides the forum for state legislators and lobbyists to collaborate on model bills, not every bill or innovation emanates from conservative states.
The model Georgia followed in implementing Voter I.D. for Absentee Ballots, part of the Georgia Voter Integrity Act of 2021, came from state law in Minnesota. That Blue State country for those keeping score.
ALEC is a right-leaning think tank, often focused on reducing government regulation and taxation, while also combatting illegal immigration and weakening labor unions. Approximately 200 of ALEC’s model bills make their way into law each year around the nation.
Unlike our U.S. Congress, where Representatives and Senators serve year-round, the vast majority of state legislatures are citizen led bodies, with part-time public servants, and General Assembly sessions of finite length, such as Georgia’s 40-legislative day calendar, typically spread across roughly 90-120 calendar days.
As society and the challenges facing our nation have become more complex, greater expertise is needed, and part-time lawmakers alone cannot be expected to be an expert on every topic.
The ALEC model allows private sector input, as lobbyists also often supply during legislative sessions. But with a wide-range of proof points, ALEC can point to model laws on subjects such as Voter Identification (Voter I.D.), which have broad public support, minimal cost to implement and actually WORK.
And active ALEC members and state legislators also often rise up after their service in the organization. As of December 2013, ALEC had more than 85 members of Congress, and 14 then current or former Governors who were also ALEC alumni.
The chairmanship of ALEC rotates, the enterprise has nine Task Forces which generate model bills such as the ALEC Public Safety and Elections Task Force.
ALEC is a think-tank which again produces a product, now at work in dozens of states. The model bills are often pre-vetted for potential court challenge and tweaked after implementation by the early state adopters.
Bill drafted by the Task Forces must be approved by ALEC’s Board of Directors, which is composed exclusively with state legislators, before being designated as a model bill. The group has an impressive board of advisors, filled by credentialled academics and former Cabinet members of multiple White House Administrations.
ALEC has its critics, and has been accused of being a climate change denier. This nation welcomes a wide range of political speech and opinion, ALECs simply leans in favor of less and smaller government, and greater individual responsibility.
Though my own calendar and travel commitments prevented me from sitting in on ALEC here in Atlanta this year, I can easily say given all the needs we have here and in other states which I do not expect D.C. to meet or solve…we can ALL use a few more smart ALECs.
