INDIANAPOLIS — Gov. Mitch Daniels is using his final session as governor to push an expansive agenda that includes more money for state fair stage collapse victims and a statewide smoking ban, but his support for contentious "right-to-work" legislation appears likely to crowd out other issues.
Daniels' plan focuses as much on preparing downtown Indianapolis for the rush of football fans that will flood the city for the Super Bowl as wonkier topics, including overhauling local governments and fighting lengthy, pricey college stints that weigh students in debt.
The legislative agenda he outlined Friday is filled popular measures such as a statewide smoking ban that could win easy approval, but it is capped off with the most divisive issue lawmakers will face next year: making Indiana the 23rd state to ban unions and employers from negotiating contracts that mandate workers pay labor fees.
That decision did not come lightly, he said.
"It's not without a lot of thought, not without a lot of study and not without some reservation that I've decided Indiana and its future would be well-served by this bill," the Republican governor told members of the Downtown Kiwanis Club of Indianapolis Friday.
House Minority Leader Patrick Bauer, D-South Bend, who led House Democrats on a five-week walkout earlier this year said his caucus would fight "right-to-work" but did not say how.
"I will tell you we reserve the right to do what all great democracies do and that is fight the tyranny of the majority when they tramp down the minority," Bauer said Friday after Daniels' speech.
Republicans outnumber Democrats 37-13 in the Senate and 60-40 in the House, so Democrats' only possible tactic appears to be another walkout during the 2012 session. But Bauer will not say specifically what Democrats plan to do to block the measure.
Second perhaps only to the labor battle, the February 5 Super Bowl appears likely to shape the 2012 session. Daniels said he wants to speed through legislation to crack down on human sex-trafficking before fans flood Indianapolis and also is supporting a new smoking ban. House Speaker Brian Bosma, R-Indianapolis, said Thursday that a smoking ban should be passed before the Super Bowl in light of the Indianapolis City-County Council's initial failure to pass a measure this week.
Daniels also floated a compromise in response to the state fair stage collapse in August that killed seven and injured dozens of others. The state would send more money to the victims under Daniels' proposal, but he did not say how much beyond the $5 million in payouts the state has already made. Rep. Ed DeLaney, D-Indianapolis, is seeking to raise the state's liability cap above $5 million.
The governor's 2012 plan lacks some of the sweep of earlier sessions during his tenure where he won a $3.8 billion, 75-year lease on the Indiana Toll Road, put the state on daylight saving time and overhauled the state education system.
Other items on Daniels 2012 to-do list: collecting sales tax from online retailers, asking voters whether to approve new taxes to pay for mass transit in central Indiana and reducing how long students stay in college as a way to avoid "credit creep" as they pile on more courses and more student loan debt.
And, of course, Daniels is giving one last try for an old chestnut: overhauling local government. Plans to reduce the number of county and township officials have met with strong opposition from the Legislature in the past.
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