Arise’s Dev Wakeley provides updates from the first half of the Alabama Legislature’s 2025 regular session as lawmakers are on spring break this week.

In good news, lawmakers passed a paid parental leave bill on Thursday! SB 199 will introduce paid leave for new parents who work as teachers or state employees. The bill now goes to the governor for her signature. We also saw important progress on untaxing groceries last week as the House voted 103-0 for HB 386. This bill would reduce the state sales tax on groceries from 3% to 2%, building on the momentum of the 1-cent reduction that Arise members’ advocacy helped secure in 2023.

Dev also warns that SB 84, which would authorize junk health plans, remains alive at the State House. We need to continue to oppose this bill and advocate instead for Medicaid expansion as a real solution to close Alabama’s coverage gap.

Hi, I’m Dev Wakeley, Alabama Arise’s worker policy advocate, here with this week’s legislative update.

We got big news this week as more than 200 Arise members got together at the State House to advocate for positive policy change that benefits people who have the least resources in the state. We spoke with legislators all across the state about good bills that we want to see pass and bad bills that we want to stop. And we made some significant progress.

The biggest news from the past week was the passage of HB 327 and SB 199, which are the companion bills that will provide paid parental leave for state employees, for teachers in Alabama’s high schools, and for two-year college employees. These bills are sponsored by Rep. Ginny Shaver in the House and by Sen. Vivian Figures in the Senate, respectively.

This is a first-in-class bill throughout the South. It provides eight weeks of paid leave for mothers and two weeks of paid leave for fathers. It’s available for childbirth, for adoption of a child under the age of 3, and, unfortunately, in cases of miscarriage or stillbirth as well. This is the best in the South by far. It’s a great bill, and we’re really excited to see this pass.

We are going to see it signed by Gov. Kay Ivey. This is one of her legislative priorities, and this is a bill that Arise has been advocating for over a year now. Great to see that pass.

In other developments, we also saw a bill to knock another cent off the state portion of the grocery tax pass out of the House entirely. This bill is sponsored by Rep. Danny Garrett. It’s a great bill. Groceries shouldn’t be taxed, and we love to see this bill moving forward. We hope to see full passage of it.

In unfortunate developments, we’re seeing some movement by a junk health plan that will do nothing to benefit Alabamians and, in fact, will make real change via full comprehensive Medicaid expansion more difficult. That bill, SB 84, is something we’re hoping to stop. We had hundreds of our members speak with their legislators about the need to engage in real change and not allow corporations to paper over the health care problems that Alabamians are facing.

To know a little more about what we’re doing on a regular basis, please follow us on social media. Visit our website, and you too can become an Arise member and advocate for positive change in Alabama.

We’re going to keep working, and we’re going to see more wins just like the ones we saw this past week.

Thanks. I appreciate your time. See you soon.