By CHERYL FRANK

Legislative Action

Oversight or insight

MOBIL OIL is in court, arguing that the Illinois Department of Revenue overstepped its rule-making authority by insisting state sales tax statutes apply to the crude oil used to run the corporation's refineries. The department ns the intent of the statute includes such a tax; Mobil says there is no clear statutory authority. In this dispute, the Illinois Supreme Court will decide if the rule follows the intent.

This dispute illustrates the broader issue of legislative oversight: whether the legislature should spend more time overseeing the executive agencies which administer statutes.

Legislative oversight is most often focused on the administrative agencies, considered by some a fourth branch of merriment. While commentators call for agencies to reduce regulations, they often want more detail in statutes or in legislative proceedings to document legislative intent. But the more detail in the law, the less flexibly the rules can lie written to apply to varying circumstances. Though laws are not forever, many are passed only after years of haggling. If they were even more detailed and a change were needed, there might be little inclination for legislators to undo their compromise.

To clarify intent either through more detailed laws or exhaustive oversight of administrative rules, legislators will need to devote more time to the process.

A major step in legislative oversight was taken in 1977 when the General Assembly created the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules (JCAR), composed of 16 legislators with a staff headed by an executive director (P.A. 80-1035). In creating JCAR to preside over the processing and review of all agency rule-making, the legislature wanted a tool to seal its grip on the implementation of state laws. By 1978, the rule-making agencies numbered about 100 and had produced reams of rules seldom "cleared" with the legislature. At the time, Rep. Harry "Bus" Yourell (D., Oak Lawn), co-sponsor of the 1977 JCAR legislation, described the situation as one of "runaway agencies and haphazard rule-making." Thenceforth it would be organized and scrutinized; JCAR would make agencies demonstrate the need for and fiscal impact of rules, and existing rules would be overhauled for conformity to legislative intent. All rules were to be written with consistency and clarity.

The work of JCAR and other oversight efforts was recently dissected by more than 50 professionals involved in all areas of Illinois public policy analysis. They were invited to the Illinois Assembly on Legislative Oversight which met in Zion on January 7-9 to study the state-of-the-art of legislative oversight and to make recommendations for change.

This was the thirteenth in a series of conferences on different policy topics over the last 20 years to be hosted by the Institute of Government and Public Affairs of the University of Illinois. The Zion oversight conference was organized by Sen. Prescott Bloom (R., Peoria), a former chairman of JCAR, and it was funded by legislative oversight agencies. The staff included Samuel K. Gove, director of the institute, and James D. Nowlan, director of the Public Administration Program, University of Illinois Department of Political Science.

The conference acknowledged that "there has been little systematic evaluation of the Illinois General Assembly's capacity for, and effectiveness in, providing legislative oversight," but that legislative oversight is an "important function and responsibility of the legislative branch." Participants generally found oversight to be critical to the legislative process, considering the new challenges to state government with less money: federal block grants, the "New Federalism" and the demand for reduced redtape.

Although the conference affirmed the "sunset" concept of "periodic termination, re-enactment, or modification [of agency or program statutes] through intensive review and evaluation," it recommended that the current "sunset committee [the Select Joint Committee on Regulatory Agency Reform] be reconstituted as a strictly legislative unit, including legislative appointment of public members, to better integrate it into the operations of the General Assembly." The committee is now composed of seven legislators, five public members appointed by the governor, the director of the governor's Bureau of the Budget, and the chairman of the legislature's Economic and Fiscal Commission.

Other recommendations on legislative oversight made at the conference include:

•  More legislative negotiation and planning with federal officials on how to spend block grants and other federal funds.

•  Specified time in the legislative calendar for oversight of laws and rules for possible amendment or repeal.

•  Reestablishment of biennial sessions for policy matters (second year for budget only).

•  A stronger role for standing legislative committees.

•  Limits on conference committee powers (amendments must be "germane" to the bills).

•  Periodic review of all mandates.

•  Quorum requirement for oversight agencies when taking official votes.

•  Increased commitment from individual legislators in oversight proceedings, including more review of JCAR recommendations.

•  Development of a citizens' guide to legislative oversight.

On the general question of how specific a statute should be, the conference determined that "effective sustained oversight requires that legislation be written as carefully as possible, and that public acts provide clear purposes, objectives, and sufficiently detailed provisions so that performance can be properly evaluated." Some say assessing performance goes beyond judging that a rule follows the intent of the law; appraising performance should include the law itself as it affects the lives and livelihoods of citizens.

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In short, detailed public policy, whether in law or rule, should be written in the "sunshine" of debate and be subject to the "sunset" of repeal.

If legislators elect to write more detailed law, they risk more controversy and stumbling blocks to compromise. Lobbyists already pressure the parties, the committees, the legislators and the media, but ultimately, the legislature makes decisions via majority votes. It cannot serve all interests all the time, especially in the face of barebones budgeting.

Some say the public is best served through broad strokes of lawmaking, supplemented by the finer touches of agency rule-making; others advocate intricate and less impressionistic laws, perferring a Rembrandt to a Renoir.

When JCAR was created over four years ago, its mission was to erase the outdated rules, scale down regulation and openly exhibit the rule-making process to public comment. This move was seen by some as a rightful recouping of legislative power, but to others, it was just another manifestation of the legislative and executive branches competing in the broadening arena of state power. Ultimately, it is the judicial branch which delineates the separation of powers, as in the Mobil case.

The hope has been that JCAR will successfully mediate between the legislative law and the executive rule in order to avoid needless legal entanglement. Rep. Jim Reilly (R., Jacksonville), a charter member of JCAR and its chairman since last fall, says, "Overall, JCAR is working well. At first there was a lot of opposition. . . . The rule-making process has improved. Agencies upgraded staff working on rules to avoid embarrassment." The biggest problems now? Reilly said there must be increased coordination among all oversight agencies (JCAR, sunset committee, audit commission and auditor general), and follow-through is needed on oversight recommendations.

The Zion conference favored enlarging the canvas for legislative oversight — not surprising, since legislative participants outnumbered any other group at the conference. One participant, Kenneth E. Mitchell, who is JCAR assistant director, said he believes JCAR has accomplished much: volumes of rules were subjected to intense review and comment; the public has participated more than before in the process; and rules are now accessible.

State legislators, through oversight, are attempting in part to eliminate any "surprise" effects of the laws they approve. But just as U.S. congressmen are sometimes surprised at the effect of federal laws (for example, the change in social security benefits for college students created a mad dash of high school seniors to college registrar's offices before the cutoff this spring), so are Illinois legislators (for example, the unexpected interpretation that a new law allowed anyone to own a machine gun).

If legislating is an art, it is rarely simple; and the galleries are filled with competing interests. Legislative oversight may serve to strengthen the General Assembly's power over executive implementation of its legislation — including appropriations — and at the same time it may bring more insight to the legislature.

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