{"version":1,"type":"rich","provider_name":"Libsyn","provider_url":"https:\/\/www.libsyn.com","height":90,"width":600,"title":"Susan Fox on Legislative Week and the Legislative Services Division","description":"State lawmakers are in Helena this week for the first-ever Legislative Week, a five-day series of training sessions, interim committee meetings, and social events aimed at fostering \u201ccross-pollination\u201d among legislators, according to the Legislature\u2019s website. Legislative Week is born of a study resulting from the 2019 session\u2019s Senate Bill 310, which seeks to gauge the potential of holding annual legislative sessions, rather than the current biennial session schedule. Susan Fox, executive director of the nonpartisan Legislative Services Division, joined Montana Free Press editor-in-chief John S. Adams for a Montana Lowdown podcast discussion about what she expects \u2060\u2014 and does not expect \u2060\u2014 to take place during Legislative Week. Fox also reflects on her 30 years of experience working in Legislative Services, noting an increase in partisanship, and declining opportunities for new legislators to grow into leadership positions.  \u201c[Legislators] don\u2019t have time to mature like they used to,\u201d she tells Adams. \u201cAnd I remember in the past, leaders ... would slowly work their way up to committee chairmanship, and then they might, in another session or two, become a whip, and then become a leader. But they don\u2019t have time to do that now \u2014 you just have to get in and start [leading].\u201d Fox also says she\u2019s seen a lack of understanding between those legislators tasked with drafting the state\u2019s budget and those who develop policies, a dynamic that helped lead to the passage of Senate Bill 310.  \u201cBudget and policy are kind of two different tracks,\u201d Fox says. \u201cAnd [legislators] really feel like it\u2019s disjointed. The budget people don\u2019t understand the policy people, and the policy people don\u2019t understand the budget.\u201d The SB 310 study explores the prospect of annual sessions with alternating focuses on the state budget and policy-related law.  Fox\u2019s conversation with Adams is featured on this week\u2019s Montana Lowdown Podcast, a production of Montana Free Press. ","author_name":"Montana Lowdown","author_url":"https:\/\/montanafreepress.org","html":"