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Social issues crowd state ballots
By Pamela M. Prah, Stateline.org Staff Writer
Besides electing a president on Nov. 4, voters in some key battleground states also will face divisive social policy choices, including whether to ban gay marriage in Florida and restrict affirmative action and abortion in Colorado.
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A done deal
By David Montgomery, Capital Journal (Pierre)
South Dakota currently manages its 102,000 Medicaid recipients with a state-of-the-art computer system.
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State to celebrate 100 years of pheasants
By Peter Harriman, Argus Leader (Sioux Falls)
History does not record what happened when the crates were opened in Hagmann's Grove near Redfield. What is known is that when the party of H.P. Packard, J. Schalkle, L.J. Howard and H.A. Hagmann set free those first six pheasants in 1908, they made history almost as significant to the state as Lewis and Clark's Corps of Discovery.
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Huge housing bill set to become law
By Lori Montgomery, The Washington Post (registration)
The House yesterday easily approved legislation that seeks to slow the steepest slide in house prices in a generation, rescue hundreds of thousands of homeowners at risk of foreclosure and reassure global markets that mortgage-finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will not be allowed to fail.
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Prisoners' time spent on death row doubles
By Kevin Johnson, USA Today
The time prisoners spend on death row has nearly doubled during the past two decades. Legal experts predict it will rise further as states review execution procedures and prisoners pursue lengthy appeals.
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Minimum-wage hike a lift for seniors, too
By Cheryl Corley, National Public Radio (Audio)
The federal minimum wage increases by 70 cents on Thursday to $6.55 an hour. About one quarter of the people who work for a minimum wage are teenagers, but most are adults like 63-year-old Shirley Golliday.
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Gas conservation threatens road funding
By Christopher Conkey, The Wall Street Journal (subscription)
WASHINGTON -- The House passed legislation that would steer $8 billion to highway projects next year, in a prelude to a broader debate over how much to invest in roads, bridges and other transportation infrastructure.
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States slammed by tax shortfalls
By Conor Dougherty, Amy Merrick and Anton Troianovski, The Wall Street Journal (subscription)
The stumbling U.S. economy is forcing states to slash spending and cut jobs in order to close a projected $40 billion shortfall in the current fiscal year.
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A state that never was in Wyoming
By Kirk Johnson, The New York Times
SHERIDAN, Wyo. -- In early 1939, as talk of war in Europe clouded the horizon and hard economic times gripped the nation, a group of business and political leaders in this northern Wyoming city hatched an audacious, if not quite ridiculous, plan to break off huge chunks of Wyoming, South Dakota and Montana and form a new state.
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Housing bill will extend federal role in markets
By Damian Paletta and James R. Hagerty, The Wall Street Journal (subscription)
WASHINGTON -- A sprawling bill that reaches deep into the U.S. housing industry is close to becoming law, in what will likely stand as the federal government's most expansive effort to stabilize the mortgage and financial markets.
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AMBER Alerts continue decline
By Wendy Koch, USA Today
The number of AMBER Alerts, public announcements of a child's abduction, is falling as police use them only for kids in the most danger.
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Budget gaps triple for '09
By Pamela M. Prah, Stateline.org Staff Writer
The drumbeat of bad fiscal news from statehouses is intensifying. States collectively faced deficits of $40.3 billion in writing their current budgets — triple the $13 billion shortfall states weathered the previous year, a new report released July 23 shows.
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States worry about dwindling road funds
By Stephen C. Fehr, Stateline.org Staff Writer
(Updated 12:30 p.m. EDT, July 24, 2008)
Drivers are buying less gasoline, draining the federal Highway Trust Fund and jeopardizing thousands of major road and transit projects around the country.
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NCSL Conference focuses on floods, energy
By Daniel C. Vock, Stateline.org Staff Writer
As state lawmakers gather in New Orleans this week for a policy conference, they’ll be reminded often of what can happen if public works are allowed to deteriorate.
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States' hottest laws take on new threats
By Daniel C. Vock, Stateline.org Staff Writer
The mosaic of laws passed by state legislatures this year reveals a country grappling with threats, from a faltering economy and record-high gasoline prices to global warming and lead-tainted toys from China.
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2008 state-by-state summary
By The Stateline.org Staff
(Updated 2:26 p.m. EDT, July 18, 2008)
Here’s Stateline.org's state-by-state rundown of significant legislative action in 2008.
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States avoid slashing higher ed money
By Pauline Vu, Stateline.org Staff Writer
Despite a tough economic year, several states are attempting to hold the line on college tuition — or at least not let increases get out of control — by avoiding deep cuts to higher education, an area that states have been quick to slash in past years when funds were low.
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States move to regulate senior guardians
By Christine Vestal, Stateline.org Staff Writer
As the U.S. population ages and families scatter across the country, the frail elderly increasingly end up relying on court-appointed guardians when they can no longer take care of their personal affairs. California just joined six other states in watching over these professionals charged with protecting society’s most vulnerable adults.
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Govs turn to fixing infrastructure
By Pamela M. Prah, Stateline.org Staff Writer
PHILADELPHIA — Improving the nation’s crumbling bridges, roads and sewage systems is a $1.6 trillion problem that governors intend to explore in the next year.
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Govs celebrate past, look to '09
By Pamela M. Prah, Stateline.org Staff Writer
While 70 current and former governors hobnob and reminisce in Philadelphia July 11-14 during the National Governors Association's 100th anniversary celebration, the sitting governors also plan to strategize on how to influence the next president on policies ranging from energy to health care.
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Govs find their popularity might not transfer
By Louis Jacobson, Stateline.org Columnist
At a time when the presidential candidates are feverishly trying to flip red and blue states, a group of governors is finding that switching a state’s partisan leaning is no easy matter.
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Sour economy limits states' options in '08
By Daniel C. Vock, Stateline.org Staff Writer
(Updated 5:38 p.m. EDT, July 17, 2008) For many states, 2008 will be remembered for record numbers of home foreclosures, $4-a-gallon gasoline and the beginning of a slide into new fiscal woes after two years of overflowing coffers. Stateline.org’s annual state-by-state look at legislative accomplishments, covering 39 states so far, discerns the trends and precedents emerging from state capitals this year.
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State by state, it's still a tight race
By Louis Jacobson, Stateline.org Columnist
Finally, the last primary votes have been cast, and Barack Obama and John McCain are jousting with each other. But even as Obama opens up double-digit leads in two national polls, the election is still poised to be decided in a half-dozen toss-up states.
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Jobs are at risk if Congress doesn't fix the Highway Fund
By John Horsley, AASHTO Executive Director
State budgets and nearly 400,000 jobs are at risk if Congress fails to replenish the Highway Trust Fund, John Horsley, executive director of the American Association of State Highway & Transportation Officials, writes in a commentary for Stateline.org.
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Will Obama have coattails in the South?
By Louis Jacobson, Stateline.org Columnist
High turnout among African-Americans and younger voters could reshape the Southern political landscape this fall. But Democrats may find gains in statewide contests thwarted by bad timing and a potential conservative backlash.
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