42 MAY / JUNE 2020 GOVERNMENT RELATIONS Indiana General Assembly Adjourns sine die for 2020 Indiana lawmakers concluded all legislative business for the 2020 Indiana General Assembly session late into the evening on March 11. This date was several days earlier than the legislative calendar dictated for the end of session, but widely anticipated based on comments from leadership at the start of session. For the 2020 session, legislators introduced 903 bills concerning topics from education and healthcare to financial institutions and general business. Of those 903 bills, 168 bills passed both the House and Senate to be eligible for the governor’s signature into law. The 2020 “short session” was not without issues that brought forward a significant amount of debate. Among topics that garnered attention were landlord tenants’ rights, hospitals and the cost of healthcare, a variety of education-related issues and a bill to temporarily preserve coal-fired power plants. The IBA and its membership were not without a multitude of bills to work through for the short two-and-a-half months the General Assembly was in session. The IBA Government Relations Team ultimately monitored over 100 different bills during the 2020 session. The most important bill for the IBA this session was HEA 1109, a bill that addressed two unanticipated problems that arose from the passage of two separate bills from the 2019 session (HEA 1123 and HEA 1664). HEA 1109 reaffirmed that financial institutions, along with all Indiana businesses, were not required to register with the attorney general’s office for simply soliciting business via telephone contact. HEA 1109 was amended at the outset to include language to repeal a law enacted from last session that created the unintended restriction on how credit reports were furnished if certain data inputs were incorrect. HEA 1109 was also declared an emergency act, meaning that upon passage and signature by the governor, the bill immediately became law in Indiana without waiting until the July 1 effective date typical of new laws. At the time of this summary, the bill has been signed by the governor. In addition to HEA 1109, the IBA continued to work on longstanding challenges related to the Uniform Consumer Credit Code. Both HEA 1353 and SEA 395 address various components of the UCCC. HEA 1353 clarifies a provision from last year’s HEA 1136 as it relates to the applications of the new delinquency fee, and SEA 395 attempts to address the issues with origination/pre-paid finance charges and having to perform a refund calculation if the borrower pays off early. Arguably, the new change alleviates this concern as long as the loan is above $4,000, which permits a lender to charge an origination fee up to $200 without having to refund with an early payoff. Origination fees on loans below $4,000 are based on a tiered structure. While an improvement, this will need additional legislative work moving into next session. Finally, the IBA worked through a number of bills that were either of significant concern to our industry if passed, or unintentionally problematic. Many of these unintentionally problematic bills were addressed through amendments. The bills that the IBA identified as significant concerns were stopped. The most notable of these was SB 444, a bill that would have lifted the current cap state-chartered credit unions currently adhere to, which is based on a percentage (20%) of total assets. The bill died as a result of it not receiving a hearing in the committee to which it was assigned. The IBA would like to extend a special thanks to the many legislators and bankers who worked toward satisfactory outcomes on issues of concern to the banking industry. The effort and engagement put forward by so many ensures Indiana continues to be a state in which financial institutions can continue to serve our customers and have positive impacts on our communities and the broader economy. HB Dax Denton Senior Vice PresidentGovernment Relations Indiana Bankers Association ddenton@indiana.bank @ibagovrelations Eric J. Augustus Vice President-Government Relations Indiana Bankers Association eaugustus@indiana.bank
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