What are state lawmakers doing that actually affects your daily life? Lots! Find out with Front Door Politics: jargon-free, non-advocacy state house news at www.frontdoorpolitics.com.

early parole limitations: The mandatory early parole bill that became law last year—only to become a political lightning rod in last fall’s campaign season—has been amended.

Sex offenders and offenders against children may no longer be eligible for early supervised release. The committee of conference on Senate Bill 52, sponsored by Sen. Peter Bragdon (R-Milford), has also recommended returning a great deal of authority to the state’s Parole Board.

Rather than the 2010 blanket provision requiring all inmates to be released to community supervision nine months before their sentences expire, the Parole Board would decide which inmates should be released early. The board would also decide how long a person who re-offends while under community supervision should be recommitted to prison, whereas last year’s prison reform law limited the sentence to 90 days.

Many victims and victim rights groups have voiced their preference that sexual predators and violent offenders be released early for a period of supervised transition back into their communities instead of going straight from prison to a life of freedom without supervision. Lawmakers, however, have called it an “oversight” that last year’s Senate Bill 500 (which was co-sponsored by Bragdon) did not exclude violent criminals from the early release program.

parental notification veto: On June 15, Gov. Lynch vetoed a parental notification law for minors seeking abortions. It was a bold strike of the pen, since House Bill 329 passed both the House and Senate by the two-thirds majority needed to override a veto—and with room to spare.

Lynch said in his veto message that he supports the concept of parental notification, but not as written in this bill. “(A)ny law must make reasonable allowances for cases where that is not possible. I am particularly troubled by the lack of an exception for the victims of rape, incest and abuse. If the legislature works with me on this change and the other limited, common-sense changes outlined in this message, I would sign parental notification legislation.”

The House and Senate will likely exercise their option to override his veto when they meet next on Wednesday or Thursday, June 22 or 23.

rail transit authority: Also on June 15, Lynch vetoed a bill that would weaken the N.H. Rail Transit Authority, the original purpose of which was to establish commuter rail or similar forms of passenger rail service for the Granite State, particularly transit between Lowell, Mass., and Manchester.

That mission would be reduced to a study under House Bill 218, sponsored by Rep. Dan McGuire (R-Epsom). Among many reductions of the RTA’s authority and funding, HB 218 also eliminates a confidentiality clause that currently applies to any negotiation correspondence, trade secrets obtained by the study, or cost estimates of projects to be put out to bid.

House Bill 218 passed the Senate with a barely veto-proof margin of 16-8. But it fell far short of the two-thirds majority needed to override a veto in the House, where the original roll call vote on the legislation was 190-119.

N.H. Supreme Court: leave the AG alone: While the governor has been exercising his veto powers, the N.H. Supreme Court has issued its own advisory decision to shut down a House initiative. In an ironic twist, the House’s method of fighting federal health care reform as unconstitutional, itself, was deemed unconstitutional by the state Supreme Court.

The House and Senate both introduced legislation this year to fight the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act signed into law by President Obama last year. The Senate took a moderate tack, simply urging Attorney General Michael Delaney to join more than two dozen states in a lawsuit that many believe will end up at the U.S. Supreme Court. The House was more aggressive, voting to require Delaney to join the suit.

The Senate requested an opinion from the high court on the constitutionality of the House bill (HB 89). Their response came recently with a unanimous opinion declaring it was a breach of the state Constitution for the legislature to order the state’s attorney general to take such action.

“It is the executive, not the legislative branch, in which the Constitution vests the ‘supreme executive’ authority to determine whether it is in the public interest to litigate a particular matter,” the court’s opinion reads.

House Bill 89 had been laid on the table.

budget: House and Senate budget writers came to an agreement late last week on a proposed revenue and spending plan that totals about $10.2 billion.

Key to negotiations was a Senate agreement to cut 10 cents per pack from the state’s cigarette tax. This concession was granted on the condition that total revenue from cigarette taxes not fall below the levels achieved in the current biennium, which ends June 30. If it does fall below, the tax will increase again in 2013.

For school funding, communities can expect to see the same amounts of state aid in the next two years as they received under the current budget. This will no doubt relieve some towns and anger others, depending on whether they had been expecting increases or cuts. Future changes to the funding formula will be made according to student numbers, poverty rates, and special needs.

The University System of New Hampshire, on the other hand, suffers an unequivocal blow, losing nearly 50 percent of its state funding for the next two years.

The full legislature will vote on the agreement on Wednesday or Thursday, June 22 or 23. Assuming it passes both chambers (no further amendments are allowed at this time), House Bills 1 and 2 will go to Gov. Lynch.

His support or opposition to the bills is unclear at this time, although he had clearly been hoping for more funds. The spending plan allocates about $250 million less than what he had set forth in his own budget proposal this winter.