Senate Bill 73 is scheduled for a hearing in the Senate Financial Institutions and Technology Committee on Tuesday, March 28, at 9:30 am in the North Hearing Room at the Ohio State Capitol. This is the third hearing on the bill and the committee will only be taking opponent testimony.
Written and in-person testimony will be allowed, there is no virtual testimony option. The hearing was announced this morning and you can find the notice of the hearing HERE.
For those who are testifying in-person or submitting written testimony, you must send a copy of your testimony and a completed Witness Slip to nick.butcher@ohiosenate.gov. The witness slip and testimony must be sent no later than 24 hours prior to the start of the committee hearing.
As you recall from our previous alerts on the bill, SB 73 exempts farm equipment but is still applicable to construction, industrial and outdoor power equipment. We have had meetings with individual members of the committee to discuss our concerns and the need for a more comprehensive non-road exemption covering all products equipment dealers sell. Senators have been very receptive to our concerns so far, but they need to hear from dealers directly.
If you can testify in-person, that would be great. However, submitting written testimony urging the senators to adopt a comprehensive exemption would be very persuasive at this point to convince the members of the committee to amend the bill.
Talking points include:
- Support the Right to Repair, Not to Modify
- Safety of our employees, customers and the general public is paramount
- This bill is intended for household consumer goods, not heavy equipment that is heavily regulated by federal law
- Allowing unfettered access to embedded software is not necessary for repair and would jeopardize safety, emissions criteria, durability of equipment
- Everything necessary for repair is already widely available and accessible for heavy equipment
- The industry is committed to self-repair and has formalized that commitment in the memorandum of understanding between the major stakeholders in our industry. A legislative mandate is not necessary because a private sector solution already exists