The Legislature: major deadlines - UPDATED

Friday marked the last day for delegates to introduce non-appropriating bills; the Senate's deadline was Monday.

Next Wednesday, Feb. 28, meanwhile, is the deadline for bills to escape their house of origin.

Besides racetrack table games and teacher pay raises, other issues on the move include:

* ABORTION (Update): The Senate Judiciary Committee sent the full Senate a pending measure this that aims to tighten the state's parental notification law, after making several changes (here's a link to the penultimate version).

*ATVs (Update): Senate Judiciary also advanced the bill that would ban all-terrain vehicles from paved roads and bar passengers from single-rider models. The committee made a few technical changes, while rejecting an attempt to delete the passenger ban provision.

* DRUG COSTS (Updated): The House Finance Committee amended Gov. Joe Manchin's pharmaceutical advocate bill -- so much so that the administration is more or less disowning the result, as The Associated Press' Tom Breen reports.

The governor proposed the legislation just ahead of today's deadline after signs of its demise emerged earlier this session, Gov. Joe . AP reported earlier on House Finance's initial work on the bill Thursday.

* JUDGES: The Senate Judiciary has pared down the proposed list of additional circuit court judges from seven to four, much to the chagrin of lawmakers from Kanawha and Monongalia counties and the Eastern Panhandle. MetroNews also has the story.

* REHABILITATION CENTER: The future of the West Virginia Rehabilitation Center in Insitute has become a cause of concern for local lawmakers, as The Charleston Gazette finds.

* POP TAX (Update): House Finance has also reverted Manchin's proposed soft drink tax repeal into a study resolution. WVU officials had predicted that fate for Manchin's bill. Several school programs benefit from the tax's revenue, which hit nearly $15 million last year. The industry is hoping lawmakers will reconsider before next week's crossover deadline.

* SCHOOL FUNDING: MetroNews is tracking a Senate measure that would increase the share of property tax revenue that counties could keep for their school systems.

* STEALING SCRAP: Nearly every state has seen thieves brazenly make off with copper and certain other metals in various forms: power lines, telephone wires, plumbing, even mausoleum door hinges. The House of Delegates has sent the Senate a bill that would hold the buyers of hot metal accountable to deter thefts.

* EYEWITNESS IDENTIFICATIONS: It may not prove a major bill, but I examined a measure endorsed by the Senate Judiciary Committee that seeks to create a uniform and fair process for conducting photo and in-person lineups. The bill has been endorsed by The Innocence Project, which counts three West Virginia cases among 146 wrongful convictions blamed at least in part on bad witness IDs.

(I covered all three of the state's cases, back in the day. At least two also involved the late Fred Zain. For better or worse, I've probably written more articles about Zain than anybody else on the planet...)

* WRAP-UP (update): The Legislature's Office of Reference & Information also has posted its weekly summary.