States Move to Assess Impact of New Laws in Wake of Pandemic, BLM & George Floyd

State legislators want to use racial impact statements, akin to so-called fiscal impact statements, to predict how much money proposed laws will cost or save to predict how a particular measure might harm—or help—racial and ethnic groups or widen racial disparities, reports Pew Stateline. Maine, Maryland and Virginia approved the use of such statements this year. About a dozen other states have similar legislation pending.

While racial impact statements could be attached to bills dealing with health, education or other topics, and not just criminal justice, critics say they are unnecessary because legislative committees, and sometimes government agencies, already scrutinize bills to assess their likely effects. Some conservative opponents even argue that race-based decision making is unconstitutional. And attaching a racial impact statement to a bill is no guarantee that legislators will heed its findings. A 2015 Associated Press analysis of Iowa’s racial impact law found that in some cases, bills that were expected to exacerbate racial disparities passed anyway. The analysis of 61 racial impact statements issued since 2009 showed that six of 26 bills with statements predicting a disparate racial impact had become law. However, bills that were rated as having no effect or a mitigating effect on minority incarceration rates were nearly twice as likely to pass.