Fall 2021 Newsletter – Updates from Senator Nicole Poore

Friends and neighbors,

The second leg of the 151st General Assembly is only a few short months away! In the meantime, I want to share a few legislative and community updates with you.

In this email, you’ll find updates on legislation I sponsored, local DelDOT projects, and two historic events that acknowledge and celebrate Delaware’s women’s suffragists.

As always, please do not hesitate to reach out with any questions, comments, community concerns, or just to say hi. I can be reached by email at nicole.poore@delaware.gov, on Facebook, or by calling my Senate office at (302) 744-4164.

Thank you,

Nicole Poore
Senator, 12th District

Legislative Updates

In Delaware, our regular legislative session runs each year from the second Tuesday in January through June 30. To watch recordings of past proceedings, click here.

SB 12 Signed by the Governor

SB12 will expand the SEED scholarship program to working adults looking to develop new skills through Delaware Tech’s non-credit workforce development programs or its academic credential courses.

SB 123 Signed by the Governor

SB 123 expands the death benefit to all surviving spouses of persons killed in the course and scope of employment in order to ensure that all surviving spouses, including those who decide to remarry, are treated equally under Delaware’s Workers’ Compensation laws.

HB 125 Signed by the Governor

HB 125 adds Delaware to a growing list of states banning “ghost guns”, firearms made at home with kits or 3D printers to avoid background checks.

HB 122 Signed by the Governor

HB 122, also known as the Jamie Wolf Employment Act, ends the unfair practice of paying people with disabilities at a lower rate than Delaware’s minimum wage.

DelDOT Update

All Way Stop Control Pilot – Delaware Street and Sixth Street

Project Description: The existing traffic signal is being evaluated for removal and the traffic signal will be converted to an all-way stop control as part of a one-year pilot study.

Project Justification: In 2016, a traffic engineering study concluded that the existing traffic signal was not warranted based on traffic volumes and crash trends. The study also found that all-way stop control operations should satisfy safety concerns, operational expectations, and field condition considerations.

Project Timeline: Scheduled to begin on November 5, 2021.

Project Update: New stop signs, warning signs, and pavement markings will be installed along both Delaware Street and Sixth Street. Motorists should expect delays leading up to the conversion date, due to the presence of flaggers for the installation of signing and pavement markings.

Lane Closures on St. Georges Bridge for Deck Repairs

Deck repairs will be made to both directions of the St. Georges Bridge.

Project Timeline: The northbound lane closure will begin on Monday, November 8 from 7 a.m. and is scheduled to conclude by midnight on Wednesday, November 24, pending weather. The southbound lane closure will begin at 7 a.m. on Monday, November 29 and is scheduled to conclude by midnight on Friday, December 24, pending weather.

Message boards will be posted and detour signage will be posted for motorists.

Click here for more info

Dedication of the Equal Suffrage Study Club Historical Marker in Delaware City

The Equal Suffrage Study Club was founded in 1914 by and for Black women advocating for women’s voting rights and the inclusion of Black women in the suffrage movement. Earlier this month, we celebrated the Club’s ties to the 12th District.

As one of the most active suffrage organizations in the state, the Club led many lobbying efforts, marches, and community outreach initiatives. On April 13, 1920, with the encouragement of two Delaware suffragettes, Florence Bayard Hilles and Alice Dunbar-Nelson, a verbal resolution in support of the 19th Amendment was passed by the Club right here in the 12th District, at a colored schoolhouse formerly located near the site of a newly erected historical marker along the Michael N. Castle Trail.

It was an honor to join Rep. Longhurst, Jackie Griffith, and Dick Carter to recognize the work and leadership of the Equal Suffrage Study Club, Mrs. Bayarad Hilles, and Mrs. Dunbar-Nelson, to secure our right to vote, advance women’s equality, and make our state a better place for all women.

Where to find the marker: South of Kathy’s Crab House along the Mike Castle Bike Trail in Delaware City.

Unveiling the Delaware Women’s Suffrage Centennial Monument at Legislative Hall

Looking back 101 years, the ratification of the 19th Amendment seems so obvious to us now. But like all rights won by women, our right to vote did not come without a fight.

Brave women, strong women, like Mary Ann Shadd Cary, Alice Dunbar-Nelson, Blanche Stubbs, Ethel Black and so many others whose names we know and whose names have been forgotten to time fought and fought hard to have their voices heard.

They were shunned. They were arrested. They took up legal action again and again and were told to sit down and shut up.

Nevertheless, they persisted.

Earlier this month, we celebrated their determination and their legacy that has allowed women not only to be empowered, but in power, with the dedication of a monument at Legislative Hall.

SB-120

Significant legislation sponsored or co-sponsored by Senator Poore during the 2015 session.

SB-120

Sponsor[s]: Marshall

Co-sponsor[s]: Blevins, Bush-weller, Ennis, Hall-Long, Henry, McBride, McDowell, Peterson, Poore, Sokola, Townsend

This portion of the “Regulatory Transparency Act of 2015” requires agencies to develop a regulatory flexibility analysis when proposing to amend or develop new regulations. Agencies must consider, where feasible, means of reducing burdens on small businesses and individuals through means, such as establishing less stringent requirements and deadlines, establishing performance standards in lieu of design standards, considering small business and individual exemptions. No regulatory change may be proposed without a flexibility analysis.

Status: Signed into law

SB-113

Significant legislation sponsored or co-sponsored by Senator Poore during the 2015 session.

SB-113

Sponsor[s]: Marshall

Co-sponsor[s]: Blevins, Bushweller, Ennis, Hall-Long, Henry, McBride, McDowell, Peterson, Poore, Sokola, Townsend

This portion of the “Regulatory Transparency Act of 2015” mandates state agencies submit a regulatory impact statement describing anticipated effects of new regulations on businesses and people as well as costs with the Registrar of Regulations. It also requires agencies to describe, if possible, less costly alternatives and requires the registrar to transmit impact reports to the committees of competent jurisdiction in the General Assembly.

Celebrating success with Delaware Bio

Celebrating success with Delaware Bio

Delaware_Bio

I was honored to be chosen as a public servant recipient of the Delaware Bio Award at a banquet last month.

I was pleased to work with Sen. Bethany Hall-Long and Rep. Mike Barbieri to secure the passage of Senate Bill 118, which passed unanimously in the General Assembly last year. The legislation helped Delaware anticipate some of the regulatory issues biosimilars present ahead of their introduction to the market.

When a range of groups, from the Arthritis Foundation to the International Cancer Advocacy Network, testified that biosimilars offer the hope of breakthroughs in treatment, I wanted to make sure Delaware was ready.

The biomedicine and pharmaceutical industries are a big part of our state economy, and they do important work here and around the globe to improve lives and public health. We should be incentivizing ingenuity and I believe that when the FDA deems a drug safe, we should help make it available to the people who need it.

With SB 118, we strived to strike the appropriate balance between giving doctors flexibility in treating patients freely with a need for them to provide guidance to pharmacies as to how to dispense these new medications. Because of the uniqueness of these drugs – which are made from living cells – the automatic substitution for a generic drug can’t always work. That’s why this bill requires physicians and pharmacists to share data through dispensation records and substitution tracking.

I thank Delaware Bio for the award and I am humbled by it, because I know it took the hard work of a lot of people – from the public sector to industry experts to medical professionals – to get this groundbreaking legislation passed through our General Assembly unanimously.

HB-373

Some significant legislation sponsored or co-sponsored by Senator Poore during the 2014 session.

Major overhaul of Worker’s Compensation law to control the rate of premium growth in Delaware. Changes include a 33 percent reduction in medical costs, phased in over three years, that sets absolute cost caps as a percentage of Medicare per-procedure allowables, and increases independence for the state’s Ratepayer Advocate and the committee charged with overseeing cost-control practices of carriers.

HB-96

HB-96 – Act To Amend Title 26 of the Delaware Code Relating to the Jurisdiction of the Public Service Commission and Public Utilities Providing Telecommunication Services

Senate Sponsor[s]: Bushweller

Senate Co-sponsor[s]: Blevins, Ennis, Peterson, Poore, Venables

Synopsis: Make changes to telecommunication regulation and services by reducing Public Service Commission oversight of some competitive services while maintaining PSC oversight of basic service and placing caps on rate increase for basic services at 10 percent per year for five years, effective 1 Jan. 14 and at 5 percent per year starting 1 Jan. 2019, including individual residential local exchanges, creates the Delaware Broad- band Fund, paid through a 3 1/2-year assessment on service providers, to help support and enhance broadband services in public schools and libraries and to expand broadband services into under- or un-served rural areas. It also amends sections of existing telecommunications law to provide consistency and allows the use of alternative technologies if the PSC orders extensions of a utility’s facilities.

Status: Signed