Senate makes amendment to third-party food delivery bill
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Indiana senators made minor changes to few bills Thursday — but more significantly altered a bill cracking down on third-party food delivery services like GrubHub and Uber Eats.
House Bill 1279 is intended to make it easier for dissatisfied restaurants to get out of contracts with delivery services, and to block those services from offering a restaurant’s food without its consent.
But it initially would’ve let a restaurant void its contract within 72 hours of telling delivery services of its intent, regardless of the contract’s terms. Lawmakers pulled back slightly, approving an amendment enforcing cancellation after a contract’s notice period is up, or 72 hours if there’s no time period specified in the contract.
“I believe in the freedom of contract and free enterprise,” amendment author Sen. Spencer Deery, R-West Lafayette, said. Stakeholders, he added, were actually more interested in “follow-through” after a cancellation.
The amendment therefore says delivery services need to take down all menus and ordering options, and stop all delivery activities, within the time frame specified in a contract or the 72 hours. The bill itself allows restaurants to sue if delivery services don’t comply.
Lawmakers also approved a smaller tweak meant to ensure internet companies and search engines don’t get caught up by the proposal.
The Senate could consider the bill for final adoption as soon as Monday. Upon passage, it would need to return to the House for approval of the new edits before going to the governor’s desk.
Nearing the finish line?
With less than a month left until the end of the legislative session, a number of large bills — including priority measures and ones that have sparked controversy — are still in the works or have stalled altogether.
House Speaker Todd Huston said he’s “comfortable” with progress made so far on bills that are important to both his chamber and the Senate.
“We’re talking about all of those bills,” he said Thursday. “We’re having conversations around all of them.”
Lawmakers face their next set of deadlines in early April.
In the House, bills must be finalized in committee on April 11, then amended by the full chamber by April 13. Representatives have to greenlight bills to the governor or back to the Senate by April 17.
The Senate has until April 13 to advance bills from committees. Those measures then have to be amended by April 17 and voted out of the chamber by April 18.
Some bills will still need concurrence votes or hashed out in conference committees before being sent to the governor for a signature or veto.
As for the state’s next two-year spending plan, Senate Pro Tem Rodric Bray said Thursday his caucus likely won’t reveal its version of the state budget until sometime around April 12.
Senators plan to vote on the budget by April 18 — one day before the release of the state’s next revenue forecast. After that, leaders in the House and Senate will work together to finalize the plan before the April 29 Sine Die deadline, when all legislative work must come to a close.
“We’re already in some conversations (with the House) about what that (budget) looks like,” Bray said, adding that — despite desire in years prior to end the session a few days early — state lawmakers will likely be at the Statehouse closer to their final deadline. “You can’t make those decisions, of course, until the revenue forecast comes in, but we’ll do as much work as we can leading up to that. It is a very quick turnaround when we’ve got a north-of-$40-billion budget to sort out.”