A bill that would give police officers the authority to order others to stay 25 feet away from investigation and incident scenes is eligible for a final vote in the Indiana Senate.

House Bill 1186 was authored by Rep. Wendy McNamara, R-Evansville, and passed through the House, then the Senate Corrections and Criminal Law Committee. It was heard on second reading in the Senate Monday.

The sponsor of the bill, Sen. Aaron Freeman, R-Indianapolis, presented an amendment to align the distances that non-police personnel could be kept from both investigation and emergency incident scenes, reducing the 150 feet proposed for emergency incident areas to 25 feet as is proposed for investigation scenes.

However, Sen. Greg Taylor, D-Indianapolis, questioned Freeman, asking why the two have to be treated the same.

Freeman answered that the Indiana Code should be consistent.

“I don’t think our citizens should have to carry around a code book to figure out how they perform their conduct,” Freeman said.

Taylor opposed the amendment, saying it was “counterproductive,” but the amendment was adopted.

A bill dealing with the separation of siblings in child placement unanimously passed the Senate Chamber 49-0. House Bill 1169 is authored by Rep. Donna Schaibley, R-Carmel, and was presented to the Senate by co-sponsor Sen. Kyle Walker, R-Lawrence.

The bill would require the Department of Child Services and courts to consider the placement of siblings together at all times within foster care or trial placement.

The final item of the meeting was House Bill 1557, which relates to “inventory of lost farmland.” Rep. Kendall Culp, R-Rensselaer, authored the bill while Sen. Jean Leising, R-Oldenburg, was a sponsor and presented the bill to the Senate.

The bill would require the Department of Agriculture to do an inventory covering the years from 2010 to 2022 and identify the primary causes of farmland reduction.

“Agriculture is truly a big business in Indiana, $31 billion every year annually. We are the eighth largest in agricultural exports in our state, and so what this bill is about is making sure that we have a handle on maintaining a fair amount of agricultural land,” Leising said.

It passed 47-2.