FEATURES

• Are the Unions Winning the Fight?
• By: Alan Greenblatt
• Governors and mayors say their workers are demanding unsustainable benefits. Union rebuttals are not turning the tide.

• Rewriting State Retirement Plans
• By: Jonathan Walters
• States are putting limits on their pension plans and retiree benefits, usually calling for employees to pay more toward their future.

• Medical Residencies Serve as a New Model for Police Training
• By: John Buntin
• One officer’s battle with cancer inspired him to take a new approach to policing.

• Cloud Computing Is No Easy Fix
• By: Russell Nichols
• Companies have been pitching the cloud as a virtual field of dreams that can help make storage issues and server problems disappear. But is that true?

• America’s One and Only Personal Rapid Transit System
• By: Tod Newcombe
• Morgantown, W.Va., is the only place in the world where riders can hop into cars and travel from point to point without stopping at other stations along the way.

• Is It Time to Retire Jane Jacobs' Vision of the City?
• By: John Buntin
• Triumph of the City author Edward Glaeser challenges long-accepted views on urban planning, promoting a more market-friendly set of policies.

DEPARTMENTS

• A Fundamentally Different-Looking Government
• By: Paul W. Taylor
• In Oregon, hard legislative choices reflect national structural changes under way.

POLITICS + POLICY

• The Many Benefits of Roundabouts
• By: Ryan Holeywell
• Due to the lower construction costs and higher safety rates of roundabouts compared to traffic lights, they're more popular than ever.

• States Crack Down on Cigarette Tax Evaders
• By: Ryan Holeywell
• More than half the price of a pack of cigarettes is taxes and other fees, which states don't get when smugglers and bootleggers find a way around them.

• Profiting from Radioactive Waste
• By: Ryan Holeywell
• One Texas county saw a chance to cash in on radioactive waste by hosting a national dump site for it and collecting money from each state that participates.

• Do Superintendents Need Classroom Experience?
• By: Caroline Cournoyer
• In recent years, state legislators and school boards nationwide have been paving the way for people with little or no education experience to lead districts.

• Cities Must Find the Economy's Fix
• By: Peter Harkness
• With Washington paralyzed by its debt and states facing deficits, the pressure is on local governments to raise more revenue or make significant structural changes to reduce costs.

• Cutting Washington's Red Tape
• By: Ryan Holeywell
• A new initiative in Washington aims to cut red tape and offer greater flexibility to state and local governments administering federal programs.

• A National Model for Curbing Childhood Obesity
• By: Jessica Mulholland
• A Massachusetts town's award-winning program that puts healthy choices at the heart of its planning efforts has been mirrored by others around the country.

• Saying Goodbye to the Yellow Pages
• By: Elizabeth Daigneau
• San Francisco became the first city in the country to ban phone books that many say are wasteful and outdated.

• Tax Credit or Tax Cut?
• By: William Fulton
• Political rhetoric comes down to being for or against taxes with little discussion about their effect on economic development.

• Manufacturing Returns to Cities
• By: Tod Newcombe
• Small urban manufacturers offer economic benefits to cities and could flourish with federal policy support.

PROBLEM SOLVER

• Changing the Way Citizens View Their City
• By: Heather Kerrigan
• Before Baltimore could help its most at-risk populations, it first had to make them see public services in a positive light.

• Across-The-Board Budget Cuts May Not Bring Real Savings
• By: Katherine Barrett & Richard Greene
• When states determine to make some kind of cut with regard to agencies, it's important to differentiate between them.

• Why Does Open Government Matter?
• By: Steve Towns
• A new tool helps agencies measure the value of transparency, trust and accountability.

• Who's the First to Go?
• By: John E. Petersen
• Public employees are at the front of the firing line, paying the price for widespread voter angst.

• Ohio Lt. Governor's Job Is a Balancing Act
• By: Tina Trenkner
• Mary Taylor is the only deputy to also serve as the state insurance commissioner, a position she balances along with heading up a regulatory reform commission.

Training Opportunities

• Outsmarting the Social Services Fraudster
• Learn how IBM InfoSphere Identity Insight helps social services organizations reduce time and labor for caseload management, comply with new regulations fast and cost-efficiently and identify fraudulent behavior rapidly to stop it before it occurs.
• A Safer Public Through Advanced Analytics
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• Accelerating Economic Growth and Vitality