As the Alabama Legislature convened Monday for another special session, it marks the tenth time in the past decade that a governor has called lawmakers back to Montgomery outside the regular calendar.

Here’s a look at what brought them back each time.

2015: General Fund budget crisis

Governor Robert Bentley called lawmakers back after vetoing a cut-heavy General Fund budget that would have slashed roughly $200 million from state agencies. The rainy day borrowing from the Alabama Trust Fund that had propped up state government since 2012 had finally run dry. Bentley proposed a $310 million tax increase package. Legislative leaders recessed for three weeks and then resurrected the same budget he had already vetoed. Nothing passed.

2015: Budget, take two

With the fiscal year starting October 1 and still no budget, Bentley called a second session. Lawmakers hammered out a patchwork compromise that averted a government shutdown but fell well short of the structural revenue fix Bentley had pushed for.

2016 — Medicaid funding and the lottery

Medicaid faced an $85 million shortfall. Bentley called lawmakers back and pushed a lottery bill that would have sent $100 million annually to Medicaid. The Senate passed it 21-12, but the House couldn’t get there. The fallback was a $640 million bond issue backed by Alabama’s BP Deepwater Horizon settlement, which kept Medicaid funded for two more fiscal years. The lottery died again.

2019 — Rebuild Alabama gas tax

Ivey called a special session the day after her State of the State address to pass a 10-cent gas tax increase, the state’s first in 27 years. The three-bill package passed quickly.

2021 — First Special Session: Prison construction

Facing a federal DOJ lawsuit over unconstitutional prison conditions, Ivey called lawmakers back to authorize a $1.3 billion prison construction plan funded by state bonds, General Fund dollars, and $400 million in federal COVID relief money.

2021 — Second Special Session: Post-census redistricting

Delayed census data pushed redistricting into a special session. Lawmakers drew new congressional, state legislative, and school board maps in five days. The congressional map was immediately challenged as a Voting Rights Act violation, launching the Allen v. Milligan litigation that continues today.

2022 — ARPA funds, first tranche

Ivey called lawmakers back to appropriate $772 million in remaining federal relief funds. The session produced over $276 million for broadband expansion, plus major investments in water and sewer infrastructure.

2023 — First Special Session: ARPA funds, second tranche

Another $1.06 billion in federal funds needed appropriation. Ivey used the same tactic as 2019: State of the State one day, special session the next. The money went to healthcare, broadband, infrastructure, and repaying the final $60 million owed to the Alabama Trust Fund from the Bentley-era borrowing.

2023 — Second Special Session: Court-ordered redistricting

After the Supreme Court ruled in Allen v. Milligan that Alabama’s map likely violated the Voting Rights Act, the Legislature drew new maps that a federal court rejected as non-compliant. A court-appointed special master drew the maps used in the 2024 elections instead.

2026 — Redistricting, again

Monday’s session follows the Supreme Court’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais. The Legislature will prepare contingency maps and special primary election procedures in case the court lifts the injunction blocking Alabama from redrawing its districts before 2030.

The pattern

Three distinct forces have driven Alabama’s special sessions over the past decade. The Bentley-era sessions were born from a structural budget collapse the Legislature couldn’t or wouldn’t fix through new revenue.

The Ivey-era spending sessions used tightly controlled special sessions to move high-dollar legislation quickly with minimal floor debate.

And the redistricting sessions have been driven by court deadlines and Supreme Court decisions, with the Legislature’s maps rejected or overridden in two or three attempts.

Sawyer Knowles is a capitol reporter for Yellowhammer News. You may contact him at [email protected].

As of Monday, with six days left in the season, hunters checked 12,666 wild turkeys in Arkansas.

That’s a increase of 1,334 gobblers, approximately 12%, checked during the 2025 spring season. The 2025 official tally of 11,332 gobblers was a 24% increase over 2024.

These stats are noteworthy because they illustrate a consistent uptick in hunter success, which should represent corresponding growth in the statewide turkey population. The growth trend also rebuts complaints that Arkansas intentionally suppresses hunter success by opening its spring turkey season too late, after gobblers are reputably less vocal.

Anecdotal observations are situational and specific to a particular time and location. They are not scientific, but field reports are all we have to evaluate turkey behavior in the field. Two hunters in northern Grant County told us on Tuesday that they worked vocal gobblers on the last week of the season in turkey management zone 2. One of the hunters, Alan Thomas of Conway, said that a strutting gobbler, with a subordinate in tow, hung up about 75 yards away.

“I had my gun up for 27 minutes,” Thomas said. “I needed him to come about 12 or 15 more steps, but he wouldn’t do it, and I wasn’t going to shoot that far.”

Thomas said he might have considered taking the shot with tungsten super shot loads. Nevertheless, he said he was satisfied with the experience because he gets more satisfaction from working a bird in close than merely tagging a bird.

Thomas said he hunted in a small section of hardwoods where the open ground story created very long sight lines.

“Turkeys love it,” Thomas said. “That kind of habitat is great for turkeys, but it’s not great for hunting. They can see a long way.”

Thomas’s hunting companion worked a different gobbler that bellowed for a very long time. The companion abandoned the effort after the bird went silent. He gathered his gear and found the gobbler strutting in the middle of a nearby road.

Our point is that for every hunter who is disgruntled over what they believe to be unfair season dates, there are at least 12,666 other hunters who are happy. Others, like Thomas, worked birds that they didn’t kill.

Still, it’s easy to see why some hunters resent our spring turkey season structure. Before our season opens, many Arkansans hunt in states that have more liberal seasons. They hire guides and kill three gobblers in Texas in March. They have success in Mississippi and Alabama in March. March is the peak of breeding season, when it is easiest to work a gobbler.

Then they come home and get humbled.

The spring season in south Arkansas opens April 13. It opens April 20 in north Arkansas. That is after the peak of the breeding season. Arkansas doesn’t have as many turkeys as other southern states. That combination makes Arkansas a harder place to kill turkeys. Many hunters are proud of that because killing a turkey here is quite an achievement.

Missouri, the gold standard for turkey hunting, opened its spring season April 20, on a Monday. That is the standard to which Arkansas aspires. It is achievable on a smaller scale because we are a smaller state with a fraction of the turkey habitat that Missouri has.

I wish I could make sense of turkey gobbling behavior. I have had some epic hunts with very vocal gobblers late in the season, including on the closing day. I’ve had them slip in silently on opening day, and I’ve had them walk up so loudly crunching sticks and leaves that I was initially alarmed that another hunter was stalking my calls.

Once, at a camp in southeast Arkansas, Sheffield Nelson and I watched a gobbler stroll through the middle of camp gobbling non-stop in the middle of a hot day. Mostly, my experience in Arkansas involved one or two gobblers traveling apart from hens. They are generally not loquacious birds, and they only gobbled after I provoked them with aggressive calling.

That frustrates hunters who are accustomed to working multiple gobblers in other states. Some feel entitled to that degree of activity.

For turkey hunting, Arkansas is the big leagues. The birds themselves are a big reason for that, but our late season structure contributes to the difficulty level.

I haven’t killed a gobbler this season, but I tip my cap to the many others that did.

A Delaware bill creating a film production tax credit cleared its first hurdle May 6, advancing out of the House Revenue & Finance Committee.

Several states offer film and television production tax credits and other incentives to lure projects, often to boost jobs, tourism and visibility.

Delaware does not – at least for now.

The proposal mirrors a recommendation in Delaware’s 5% operational spending growth and accompanying revenue plan, released alongside Gov. Matt Meyer’s proposed fiscal year 2027 budget, and would put the state in line with most of the country.

ICYMI: Delaware looks at $10M film tax credit. Will it bring Hollywood money?

What does the bill do? 

Backed by House Majority Leader Kerri Evelyn Harris, this House bill would create a new film production tax credit for the First State.  

Delaware remains one of a few states that does not already have a film tax credit or a similar incentive in place, according to the Dover Democrat.  

This means that spending in these sectors – from hotel stays to equipment rentals – is going to other states.  

And while other revenue streams have served and continue to serve Delaware well, Harris said, it is also crucial to ensure the state is positioned “for the next generation of economic growth.” 

The bill would offer eligible productions – including films, TV shows and video games — a nonrefundable tax credit equal to 30% of qualified expenses, usable against personal income and corporate taxes.