For the first time since 2019, House and Senate Democrats have reached an agreement on joint rules to guide their work in the legislative session that began six months ago, a package of changes that could significantly reprogram the rhythms of the Legislature.

House Speaker Ronald Mariano and Senate President Karen Spilka said Monday that negotiators had come to terms on a new set of rules focused on making the Legislature more efficient and transparent, after a particularly chaotic end of session last year. The conference report could be adopted as soon as Thursday, when both branches are in session.

“Back in January, the speaker and I came out together, independently though, putting a priority on resolving joint rules. We heard loud and clear that the people want us in the Legislature to move bills more efficiently, more transparently, and give more access to the public,” Spilka told reporters Monday afternoon after a meeting with Mariano, Gov. Maura Healey and Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll.

Last summer, lawmakers failed to finish significant work by the usual July 31 deadline, but eventually got many priorities across the finish line during a time of year that had been off-limits for major lawmaking for decades. One of the most significant changes to the rules is allowing lawmakers to continue work on major bills into campaign season, as they needed to last year.

Democrat negotiators have failed to agree on a final package of joint rules in each of the prior two sessions, leaving the House and Senate operating under 2019-era policies extended on what was supposed to be a temporary basis.

“Neither one of us liked the way it ended July 31 of last year, so it was pretty easy to get our attention and that commitment really was, they were independent of each other. We just knew it was time to make this thing work. And we did,” Mariano said.

In its version of the rules package, the Senate proposed allowing the Legislature to reconvene formal sessions past July 31 in the second year of the two-year session only to take up reports from conference committees formed before that date, while the House version would also allow action in that window on gubernatorial amendments, veto overrides and new spending bills. The final language agreed to in the compromise follows the House language: allowing formal action on conference committee reports formed before the end of July, any new spending bills, and gubernatorial vetoes or amendments.

Almost two hours after Mariano and Spilka announced the agreement, lead negotiators Senate Majority Leader Cindy Creem and House Majority Leader Michael Moran provided greater details of their accord.

“Among the reforms are longer public notice periods for hearings, mandatory committee hearing livestreaming and archiving, an earlier reporting deadline for joint committees, the recording and posting of committee votes, new requirements for bill summaries, and rules ensuring more timely public access to conference committee reports,” a fact sheet provided by Creem’s office said.

Public hearings of joint legislative committees must be announced 10 days in advance, up from the current three days, and those committees will be required to produce a complete schedule of hearings within three weeks of committee appointments. All committee votes are to be publicly posted online.

Once bills are in committee and get a hearing, Senate and House committee members will vote only on bills filed in their respective branch. That has been the practice so far this session, and the change has given senators (who are outnumbered on joint committees) a greater ability to advance legislation without necessarily getting buy-in from representatives.

Mariano told reporters that the new rules would help “everyone get to identify their priority and move their priority.”

“Now, with that comes an opportunity for debate and discussion, and we’re hoping that things get resolved a lot faster and easier than they have in the past,” he said. “We’re looking forward to implementing these, we think it’s going to make a big difference.”

Bills filed by someone other than a member of the Legislature (the governor, for example), so-called money bills that get filed in the Senate, and amendments to the state Constitution filed in the House will continue to be voted on by both House and Senate committee members.

Joint committees will be required under the proposed rules to act on legislation no later than the first Wednesday of December of the first year of the two-year session, moving the bill-reporting deadline about two months earlier than its current place on the calendar, the first Wednesday in February of the second year of the session.

Under House rules, committees must act on bills filed in the House no later than 60 days after the bill’s hearing, with an additional 30-day extension available at the discretion of the chair.

Spilka said earlier reporting deadlines will “move things faster, more efficiently, more transparently, and increase access for the public tremendously.”

Joint committees will also be required to post a summary of every bill that gets a hearing before their panel on the Legislature’s website prior to the hearing. Some committees currently post summaries for House bills, as do senators for many of the bills they file, though not all are posted before the bill’s hearing.

The rules also set out to regulate committee participation — the subject of a recent spat between the branches.

House rules require in-person attendance for representatives at hearings of committees they serve on. Senate rules do not require the same, however, and it is a common occurrence for the only senator at a hearing to be the chairperson. The Senate argues that there are far fewer senators than representatives, which means they serve on more committees, which frequently have overlapping hearings.

The compromise package released Monday allows lawmakers to participate in hearings remotely “unless prohibited by the rules of their respective branch,” according to the fact sheet provided by Creem’s office. Attendance will be taken and posted on the Legislature’s website.

The conference report effectively allows senators to continue their remote participation, and authorizes House leadership to require its members to attend.

A reporter asked Mariano on Monday why it was important to the House that attendance be taken at committee hearings.

“It was one of the priorities,” he said.

When pushed on why it was a priority, Mariano just responded, “A lot of different reasons.”