The budget is all but done. Important immigration legislation has already been signed into law, and high-profile energy reform legislation appears well on its way to passage.
But as the 2026 General Assembly hits crossover day Monday, there’s still a lot hanging in the balance and a lot, that if it doesn’t clear one chamber or the other by the end of the day today, that could see its chances severely dimmed.
Bills are never really dead in Annapolis if they have enough support, from the right people, behind them. But crossover is the day by which bills are supposed to move from their originating chamber across the hall — from the House to the Senate, or vice versa — if they are to be guaranteed a hearing, at least, in the other chamber.
Even then, there are plenty of hurdles to a bill’s final passage. But crossover day is one of the most noteworthy.
A proposed $70.8 billion budget for fiscal 2027 passed the Senate last week and has already been approved by the House Appropriations Committee. Few changes are expected to the bill, which closes a $1.5 budget gap without raising taxes and with few new programs, when it hits the House floor later this week.
Likewise, House and Senate leaders have agreed on much of a sweeping energy bill that has passed the House already and is being considered in the Senate. Passage of the bill is a priority for lawmakers who, for a second year in a row, face voter anger over soaring energy bills. The Utility RELIEF — Reducing Energy Load Inflation for Everyday Families — Act is expected to save the average homeowner at least $150 on their utility bills over the course of a year.
The Utility RELIEF Act, House Bill 1532, swept in a number of smaller bills from various lawmakers. But it also left out many proposals, lowering their odds of passage with crossover looming, unless the Senate amends the comprehensive bill to scoop up stragglers. But that is not expected.
“We have a lot of pieces of this package. And so there are going to be places where the two bills likely have a little bit of differences that we’ll work through,” said Senate President Bill Ferguson (D-Baltimore City) on Friday. “But I would say on the whole, we are committed to the fundamental goal of making sure that there is at least $150 different of annual savings for your everyday Marylanders.”
The goal of the legislation is to lower energy bills, with a mix of provisions on everything from data centers and solar panels to transmission lines and utility rate-setting.
But plenty of ideas seem to have been left on the cutting room floor. That includes the Break STRIDE Act, which would repeal a statute intended to encourage gas pipeline replacements, but which consumer advocates believe has led to overspending, hurting customers. It also includes the SAVINGS Act, which would require utilities to submit cost containment plans, subject to review by the Maryland Public Service Commission.
Also scorned is a proposal backed by the Exelon power companies in Maryland, which would expressly allow them to build and operate power generating stations and recover their costs from ratepayers. The companies said they were aiming to build and operate solar farms with battery energy storage. But lawmakers and advocates expressed skepticism about the impact on ratepayers.
Some bills involving environmental issues are also moving forward — or at least made the crossover cutoff. The Senate passed a bill Friday regulating the amount of harmful PFAS, known as “forever chemicals,” within sewage sludge that is ultimately spread on farm fields. The bill stalled last year after disagreement with wastewater utilities.
PFAS are human made compounds that have been used in nonstick pans, firefighting foams, carpets and more. They don’t readily degrade in the environment and they end up in human bodies, where they can cause cancer and other ailments. Keeping PFAS away from crops, therefore, is considered a priority.
But another environmental bill is stalled as crossover looms. Though Senators appropriated $1.2 million in the budget for the CHERISH Our Communities Act, which would require new considerations of environmental injustice during permitting for certain facilities, the bill has yet to advance out of committee.
‘Fired up, ready to go’
Criminal justice reform advocates can already claim a major victory in this session: Passage of a bill, signed into law last month by Gov. Wes Moore (D), banning formal agreements between Immigration and Customs Enforcement and local law enforcement agencies, so-called 287(g) agreements.
But some lawmakers and advocates joined a rally at Lawyers Mall on Friday to emphasize getting rid of the so-called 287(g) program isn’t enough. The rally led by the immigrant advocacy group We Are CASA sought to push for at least two more pieces of legislation to protect Black and Latino immigrants: the Community Trust (Senate Bill 791/House Bill 1575) and Data Privacy (Senate Bill 504/House Bill 711) acts.
The House version of the Data Privacy Act, sponsored by Del. Lorig Charkoudian (D-Montgomery), passed the House 94-35 on Saturday, a weekend session as House members churned through scores of bills aiming to beat the crossover deadline. The bill proposes to close loopholes in the state’s current Public Information Act and prohibit a business from selling personal data of an individual “for the purpose of immigration enforcement.”
The Senate version sponsored by Sen. Clarence Lam (D-Anne Arundel and Howard) is sitting in the Senate Finance Committee, where it got a hearing last month, but has not received a vote.
Lam also sponsored the Community Trust Act that seeks to prohibit law enforcement agencies and jails from detaining individuals based on immigration status unless there was a judicial warrant to do so. Local officials would not be allowed to act based on administrative warrants from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, the Justice Department “or any successor agency.”
Some sheriffs traveled to Annapolis on Feb. 26 to argue the bill would hamper law enforcement from working with federal authorities. Some of those sheriffs also testified with the same message that day before the House Judiciary Committee on the House version sponsored by Del. N. Scott Phillips (D-Baltimore County).
Phillips joined rallygoers Friday and was “fired up, ready to go!”
Phillips expressed frustration on the lack of action with the Community Trust Act, which is stalled in the Judiciary Committee, noting that the ICE budget of about $80 billion represents more than Maryland’s proposed $70.8 billion for next year.
ICE has the funding “to go out and do this … work,” Phillips said. “We spent a lot of time on 287(g) and that was good. We needed to do that. I think Community Trust is the second piece that also needs to be done.”
In terms of criminal justice reform for youth, the Senate passed legislation earlier this month to reduce the number of offenses that automatically send youth to adult court. But the House version of the bill has been sitting in the Judiciary Committee since a hearing last month, as the committee waited on taking any action until seeing what the Senate would do.
Moore’s housing package
Two of Gov. Wes Moore’s (D) three-pronged housing agenda have or are likely to clear the crossover hurdle – while the last piece is currently languishing in committee.
Senate Bill 325, delaying the payment of certain fees to county officials for the development of new housing and creating what’s called “vesting rights” for developers, was approved by the Senate last week on a 35-10 vote. The House on Friday passed its version of the bill 124-7.
It’s the second attempt on the legislation that Moore hopes will let developers have more certainty on what local building regulations they will be subjected to. Housing officials say developers are often deterred or unable to finish housing projects because they have to adapt to new building requirements in the middle of construction.
“Vesting rights” legislation last year initially aimed to tie housing development to areas with high job growth, a proposal that immediately came under fire from the Maryland Association of Counties because it limited county government say over some housing decisions. That bill did not get its first hearing until March, and was heavily rewritten, replacing the administration’s proposal with language that granted vesting rights for developers, among other measures.
That both chambers approved their versions of the bill before crossover greatly increases its chances this year.
Another piece of the housing package this session has also cleared the crossover hurdle.
House Bill 894 and Senate Bill 389 would encourage new housing development around transit-oriented locations by restricting parking minimums and other local decisions in specific situations. The House approved its version Saturday on a 94-32 vote, and the Senate will likely vote on it Monday.
Meanwhile, bills aiming to encourage the development of smaller homes by prohibiting local jurisdictions from placing restrictions on how small a lot or house could be, are stuck in committee.
House Bill 239, titled the Starter and Silver Homes Act, had its bill hearing in front of the Economic Matters committee on Feb. 12, but still awaits committee approval. Meanwhile, Senate Bill 36 had a hearing with the Education, Energy and the Environment Committee on Feb. 17, but still hasn’t been voted out either.
As part of the governor’s priority legislation, there is a greater chance that those bills will still get worked on even after crossover – such was the case for the vesting rights bill last year. But much like the 2025 vesting rights bill, it can be a challenge to get complicated bills over the finish line with just three weeks left in session.
LEAD act
Most bills in the five-piece legislative package aimed to boost resources for times when people with autism, dementia, and other disabilities wander or run off, known as the LEAD act, are gaining ground and some have cleared the crossover hurdle.
The bills aim to create a more comprehensive system of resources to help in “elopement” situations — when someone wanders off from a caregiver.
One prong of the LEAD act – House Bill 1117, which would have required Maryland Medicaid and other state programs to cover the cost of monitoring devices by classifying them as “medical equipment” – got out of the House Health Committee Saturday, but not before being heavily amended because of the high cost of the initial proposal. A fiscal note with the bill said costs could be as high as $8.6 million a year.
The amended bill authorizes state advisory groups on dementia and autism to “recommend the use of Elopement response devices as safety tools for certain individuals who are at risk of elopement.” The bill’s main sponsor, Del. Lesley J. Lopez (D-Montgomery), admitted that it’s “not in the same type of posture that it came in with,” but said it was the “strongest compliment we could come up with to go with the other elopement bills.”
“It does not have any mandates for coverage, for insurers, anything like that,” she said. “So, it simply says these types of devices can be assistive in plans for people with Alzheimer’s and people who are autistic … For example, in an IEP (Individualized Education Program), a teacher can take this into account.”
The amended bill won preliminary approval from the full House Monday.
The House on Saturday unanimously passed House Bill 1000, to expand currently required school mapping to cover a mile radius around the school grounds including any bodies of water. The House also gave preliminary approval Saturday to House Bill 1434, which would require state health officials to create a caregiver resource webpage. It could come up for a final vote Monday,
Two pieces of legislation in the LEAD act have all been approved by their originating chamber — one would boost police training for elopement cases, while the other would allow schools to coordinate with parents on using locating devices for kids with a tendency to elope.
— This story was updated on Monday, March 23, to correct and update the status of House Bill 1117.
