Amendment 1 will be the sole amendment on the March 5 primary ballot.
The constitutional amendment seeks to simplify the process of passing municipal bills through the legislature.
On March 5, Alabamians will go to the polls to vote on a legislative priority for the state’s 67 counties. Amendment 1, the only statewide constitutional amendment scheduled to appear on the Primary ballot, seeks to eliminate a longstanding and complicated procedural barrier to the adoption of local legislation.
Since 1984, Alabama’s Constitution has required that no legislation be considered by the state legislature until both annual state budgets have been approved and given to the governor. However, an exception in the law allows the Legislature to address other things ahead of budgets by passing a Budget Isolation Resolution (BIR) with a vote of “not less than three-fifths of a quorum present.”
The language of this exception has been construed in a variety of ways throughout the years, causing widespread confusion and inconsistencies in the adoption of local law.
If Amendment 1 is adopted by a majority of Alabama voters in March, it will exempt future local bills and proposed local constitutional amendments from the BIR process, while also ratifying existing local laws enacted before March 5, 2024.