CAPITAL IDEA:

A few days in Nashville open visitor’s eyes to how they get things done.

NASHVILLE — In the venerable, column-adorned chamber of the state Senate Wednesday, a polite debate led to that body’s approval of a bill allowing guns in parks — and in the state Capitol, too.

On the Internet at about t he same time, a video surfaced of a state senator calling someone trailing him with a smartphone camera a choice word.

Those will be the headliners, the stories that define April 1, 2015, in the life of our state’s governance. Yet t hey don’t begin to comprehend t he scope of what goes on here on a daily basis during the legislative session, with a mishmash of committees and subcommittees, and lobbyists and legislators walking the drab carpet of the windowless, subterranean Legislative Plaza, where the real work gets done, across t he street from the state Capitol.

It’s the process by which t hose bi l ls make t heir way to the larger setting. It’s how the sausage gets made.

(To be sure, it ’s only t he version of sausagemaking t hat t he public gets to see. Aside from the conversations that invariably happen in the hallways, we must remember last month’s revelation of secret pre-meetings that help guide bills even be-

fore they reach committee calendars.)

In this year’s legislative session, which started in earnest in February and probably has a not her month to go, almost 3,000 bills were filed — counting both House and Senate versions of the same measures. Just to get a full up-or-down vote on t heir respective f loors, those bills have to travel a weekslong route through various committees.

Just ask Insure Tennessee supporters how difficult that can be.

The place has its own vernacular. A bill can be “rolled to the heel” in committee, which means that it’s punted to the end of the agenda. (It’s confusing, it should be noted, when ‘heel’ is often pronounced ‘hill.’) A “fiscal note” specifies how much the legislation will cost.

Committees can go into “recess,” but it’s not playground time or any meaningful break — it’s just to allow a “witness,” who is really just someone who backs or opposes the bill, to speak.

Legislative Plaza has its own cafeteria, its own shoeshine stand, its own ATM, its own airport-like security lines.

Shortly after the gunsin-parks vote on the Senate floor Wednesday morning, members of the Senate’s Finance, Ways and Means committee meandered to the committee room. Sen. Doug Overbey, a Maryville Republican, said he i ntended to plow through the entire agenda — that’s a “calendar” here — before the end of the day. He promptly called on the first item, which dealt with compressed natural gas.

It was approved and moved on to the next committee. Soon after, Overbey called on Sen. Reginald Tate, D-Memphis, to present a bill.

Tate l aug hed , t hen spoke. “Thank you, Mr. Chair — which one was it?”

Down t he hall, i n a smaller committee room that was standing room only for spectators, t he House Criminal Justice Committee started some 28 minutes late.

Allison Glass, the Memphis-based director of Healthy and Free Tennessee, spoke out against a bill that would add meth to the drugs for which a mother could be charged if her baby is born addicted to it. “This legislation expands a law that is not working,” she said. The bill passed committee.

Families of crime victims sat on the front row holding portraits, encouraging committee members to pass a law that would allow prosecutors to present photos of victims to jurors. Shelby County Dist. Atty. Gen. Amy Weirich is among those pushing for the bill, which received a favorable recommendation from the committee. (Weirich was among those walking the Legislative Plaza hallways Tuesday and Wednesday, advocating for a variety of bills.)

Rep. Antonio Parkinson, D-Memphis, fended off a challenge from Rep.

R-Morristown, who raised concerns about Parkinson’s bill that would allow neighborhood associations, among other groups, to seek a restraining order on repeated criminals to prevent t hem from reentering their neighborhoods.

Goins was uneasy about giving t he associations power that residents who don’t live in associations have. But the bill passed committee. “Model legislation,” Parkinson said after the committee, pausing after speed-walking out of the room.

It could go to another committee as early as sometime next week.

Seventeen of them met just on Wednesday, another day in the legislative marketplace known as lawmaking in Nashville.

Goins,

Tilman