AUGUSTA — Maine's business leaders and labor unions are pushing decidedly different agendas in the current legislative session, which should wrap up in April.
Reining in insurance costs is a top priority for both the Maine State Chamber of Commerce and the Portland Regional Chamber.
Union leaders, meanwhile, are pushing bills to raise the minimum wage and guarantee paid sick leave to more workers.
Both camps are keeping an eye on the evolving state budget, and business groups, in particular, are eager to see what form the latest tax-reform plan will take.
On the insurance front, Chris Hall of the Portland Regional Chamber said he has "some optimism" that the Legislature may create a high-risk pool this year to separately insure the sickest Mainers and cut costs for other consumers.
That idea has repeatedly been rejected in the past, but Hall says support for it may be building.
The National Federation of Independent Business would like to see the Legislature improve the insurance market for small businesses by redesigning how rates are calculated, but action on that may be a long shot, said David Clough of the federation.
Clough said the NFIB is fighting a bill that would combine the individual and small-group insurance markets because that effectively would force small businesses to subsidize individual policyholders.
For its part, the Maine Merchants Association is fighting a bill that would allow political activists to circulate petitions at shopping centers. The organization believes retailers should be free to use their discretion on private property, according to Curtis Picard of the association.
Picard said his group is trying to change a 2007 law requiring that developers set aside $40,000 to study the economic impact of each large prospective retail project. The change would allow city and town governments to waive that requirement with the approval of local voters.
Also high on the business agenda, said Dana Connors of the Maine State Chamber of Commerce, is the search for a new way to pay for the state's Dirigo Choice insurance program, which now relies on subsidies from commercial insurers.
"Nobody's advocating that we throw those people out in the street," Connors said, but he said the existing funding mechanism is problematic.
Hall said taxes in Maine are still "way too high," but he is not overly optimistic that the Legislature will embrace a tax-reform plan this year.
Some lawmakers are trying to modify a failed 2007 plan that would have expanded the sales tax to pay for cuts in income taxes and property taxes.
"If we were going to see this happen it probably needed to happen right out of the box" when the legislative session began Jan. 2, Hall said.
Connors is a bit more optimistic, arguing that tax reform may gain momentum if lawmakers combine a broader sales tax with cuts in other taxes and stronger limits on government spending. The existing caps can be overridden by majority vote, and Connors said the state needs "spending limits with a higher threshold" for an override.
On the labor side, the Maine State Employees Association is watching the Legislature's budget deliberations to track the possible elimination of state jobs, according to Tim Belcher, the executive director there.
The state-workers' union also is fighting efforts in the Legislature to force state workers to pay part of the premium on their state-sponsored health insurance, Belcher said. As it stands now, state workers pay no premium on their own insurance and 40 percent of the premium for dependent coverage.
"That's certainly a key issue for us," Belcher said.
On an unrelated issue, the MSEA is working with the Maine Education Association, which represents teachers and other educators, to roll back a penalty the Legislature imposed in the early 1990s on state workers...
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