Times of Northwest Indiana
Lawmakers' pet peeves should not always lead to new laws.
State Rep. Duane Cheney, irritated about having to sit through commercials at the movie theater, wants to require the cinemas to post the actual time the movie starts.
He is not alone in his irritation. Earlier this year, lawmakers in Connecticut, Illinois, New York City and Michigan introduced similar legislation.
But the solution should be to show up at the movie theater a little later, not create a new law.
Cheney's proposal for a new law on movie times is much like the push for a state law that created a $25 fine for throwing a lighted cigarette out the car window. That law came about because a lighted cigarette blew into a lawmaker's car window and landed on his lap.
There are bigger issues to deal with than these.
Far better would be to address issues like highway funding, education, balancing the budget, economic development, election reform and property taxes.
When Gov. Mitch Daniels unveiled his Major Moves initiative this summer, he proposed some creative financing to make up for a highway construction funding shortfall. Among his ideas was to sell or lease the Indiana Toll Road and use the revenue for a variety of uses, including other highway construction work.
Now that's a real issue the lawmakers will need to tackle in their next session.
So is improving the quality of education in Indiana. After years of reforms, too many of Indiana's public schools are still failing.
Property tax reform is on everyone's mind, of course. What can be done to help homeowners whose property tax bills have jumped for a variety of reasons, the reassessment being only one of them?
And how about economic development? Indiana's economy isn't picking up steam as fast as it should.
Secretary of State Todd Rokita is proposing election reforms that include setting up pilot projects to test voting centers instead of requiring a separate polling place for each precinct. That, too, should be addressed in the next legislative session so the tests can be conducted in the 2007 elections.
These issues should be much more important legislative priorities than requiring movie theaters to post the time the move actually starts.