Chapter 33 Filing and Next Steps

Below is the Department of Education’s provisionally adopted Rule Chapter 33, and the summary of comments on the proposed rule and DOE responses.  These documents were filed with the Secretary of State yesterday and filed with the Legislative Council this morning.  PLEASE NOTE 2 THINGS:

It’s up to the Legislature to decide whether it will accept the provisionally-adopted rule for review this session.  I have attached the letter we sent to the Director of the Legislative Council urging the Legislature to do that.  I’m not sure who at the Legislature makes that decision, but I’ll talk with the Education Committee chairs this afternoon to see if they can influence the decision.  Sen Langley and Rep Richardson have, in the past, expressed their support in taking on the rules this session, but I don’t know if that is a guarantee that it will happen.
Not all legislators have received the provisionally adopted rules yet, so they will not be familiar with the content.  They’ll receive the packet once the Council accepts the filing, and you are welcome to share these documents with legislators.  I’m not distributing this directly to all Education Committee members at this point because I don’t want to create confusion about whether the Legislature is officially accepting them for review or not.

I have also attached an unofficial document that shows the changes we made in the Department’s first proposed rule, in response to public comments (“Ch 33 Revised from Comment 2.6.12.doc”).  It’s marked up like a piece of legislation, with underlines showing language added to the proposed rule (except for the title, which is underlined anyway) and strike-throughs showing deletions.  This document is not part of the official rule-making process, but I thought it would be helpful in your review.  The italicized language at the end of each amended section indicates what Comment Number in the “Comments and Responses” document the change responds to.

Thank you all, again, for your work on this rule.


Deborah C. Friedman
Director, Policy and Programs
Maine Department of Education
23 State House Station
Augusta, Maine 04333


Chapter 33: Rule Governing Physical Restraint and Seclusion (pdf)
Chapter 33: Rule Governing Physical Restraint and Seclusion Revised from Comments (pdf)
Rule Chapter 33 Comments and Response (pdf)
Memorandum (pdf)