CONCORD — The titles of bill requests for the 2013 legislative session will be published on the General Court’s website by the end of the week.

Concerns were raised this week that the titles and short summaries have not been published as they have in years past. The bill request period of sitting House members who won their primaries began Sept. 17 and ended Wednesday.

In past years, the title and short summary of bills were available at the end of every week, and in recent years nearly every day with the advent of the Legislature website.

Some accused House Speaker William O’Brien of delaying the release of the titles until after the November election for political reasons, among them Democratic Leader Terie Norelli of Portsmouth.

“Ovide Lamontagne and Bill O’Brien have a secret agenda that they are trying to hide from the public,” Norelli said. “The people of New Hampshire deserve to know what is really in the Ovide-O’Brien secret agenda, which seems to include extreme ideas like cutting state aid to public schools, revoking insurance coverage for birth control and taking away abortion rights from women.”

But House Chief of Staff Greg Moore said that is not the case. He said a Republican representative questioned whether the information had to be published and “we began discussions with the Office of Legislative Services about whether or not the titles should be made public under existing (House) rules.”

Moore said House counsel Ed Mosca was asked to review the issue and determined the titles should be published.

“We’re just waiting for a written opinion,” he said. “With the closing (of the bill filing period) today, we expect they will be on the website Thursday or Friday.”

He said the goal was always to follow the House rule.

The House rule states, “The Office of Legislative Services shall identify legislative services requests in language that makes clear the intent of the bill. LSRs, with the name(s) of the sponsor(s), shall be published by the Office of Legislative Services. The speaker of the House shall adjudicate any disagreement concerning the publication of LSRs that may arise between bill sponsors and the Office of Legislative Services.”

Lawmakers have always had the option of making their request private, but few do. Others file requests with titles such as “Seeking good government.”

The finished bills are not available until just before the session begins in January and then some are not ready until later in January.

All elected House members have another opportunity to file bill requests from Nov. 13 until Dec. 7. The Senate filing period is always after November and often does not have an end date.

The early filing period for bill requests was intended to give the Office of Legislative Services additional time to produce the bills which the last two years have numbered over 1,000 each year.

Publishing the requests allow lobbyists, journalists, citizens and fellow legislators to ask questions about the proposals and for some to suggest improvements.

Many bill requests change substantially during the bill writing process and many are withdrawn. Last year more than 100 were withdrawn before the session began.

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Garry Rayno may be reached at grayno@unionleader.com.