Archive
The typical tools of urban America don’t always work in the rapidly growing region.
Increasingly, people are selling everything from everywhere. It’s given hope to communities once shut out of the global economy.
The conflicts playing out in one North Carolina county could be plaguing other places.
“The Trump dystopia is clearly motivating people to do something, and at the local level that means running for office, even against your own party.”
A 75-year-old highway project offers clues to solving a critical present-day problem.
A group of 10 governors, including Republicans, is urging the Senate to reject a proposal for a so-called "skinny repeal" of Obamacare.
There are no crystal balls, yet some judges expect planners and policymakers to predict the future anyway.
The Ohio State Fair ride that ejected passengers, killing one and injuring seven, had been cleared by state inspectors to operate, officials said Wednesday night.
When Taylor Merendo moved to Bloomington, Ind., nearly two years ago, fleeing an abusive marriage, she needed help.
Gov. Rick Snyder vetoed on Tuesday a tax cut recently approved by the Michigan Legislature, saying the measure would put too much strain on the state's budget.
As more TV and film productions make their home in Georgia, California and elsewhere outside the Sunshine State, another local government is hoping to make up a part of the nearly $300 million in incentives that Florida once offered to the industry.
President Donald Trump has appointed Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback to an ambassadorship, a little more than a month after the Kansas governor saw his signature tax policy dismantled by the state's Legislature.
In lawsuits involving high-profile partisan issues, some state AGs choose to sit out.
Critics say laws that treat attacks against police officers as a hate crime are unnecessary and hard to enforce.
It's now common, even for lower-paying jobs, to make employees pledge their loyalty to companies. Some states are stepping in to stop the corporate abuse.
Some negotiations have become so heated that legislatures have taken their fight to the courts.
Minneapolis police officers must turn on their body cameras when responding to any call, traffic stop or self-initiated activity, Acting Police Chief Medaria Arradondo announced Wednesday, in a key change to city policy in the wake of Justine Damond's shooting death.
Akron child killer Ronald Phillips was put to death Wednesday, the first execution carried out in Ohio in more than three years.
The technology could signal the beginning of the end of parking tickets and other revenue sources. Some cities' budgets could take a big hit.
The Texas Supreme Court justice is witty and approachable, and he's huge on Twitter. He's also one of the most influential conservative jurists in the country right now.
Health policy experts say the move could further destabilize the market.
Congress jeopardized the future of state plans to help private employees save for retirement. States don't seem to care.
After leading the creation of the nation's first legal marijuana market in Colorado, Andrew Freedman took the lessons he learned and made a business out of helping states regulate the drug.
The radical idea of a universal basic income is far from new, but it's finally being tested around the world -- even in America.
An appeals court on Tuesday upheld a federal judge here who refused to dismiss a lawsuit against the city of Ferguson and police related to the 2014 fatal shooting of Michael Brown.
Two California governors -- one a Republican, the other a Democrat -- joined together Tuesday to celebrate the extension of one of the state's key global warming programs and slam the federal government for abandoning the climate fight.
After revenues came in $75 million lower than projected, the state Tuesday announced severe cuts that will deeply affect the way government serves Montanans, including lost jobs and reduced or terminated programs.
Mayor Toni Harp said they came mostly from immigrant residents. It wasn't hard to pinpoint their worries: Trump had vowed to deport undocumented immigrants and build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. Months later, Trump has mostly kept his word on enforcing immigration law, shedding Obama-era deferment policies that once focused on undocumented immigrants with criminal records. Now, undocumented immigrants who have no criminal history are being monitored and deported by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
The Trump administration strengthened its crackdown on so-called sanctuary cities Tuesday, announcing a new policy that says local governments will lose some federal grants if they do not give advance notice when illegal immigrants are about to be released from custody and give immigration agents access to local jails.
A Texas version of a North Carolina-style "bathroom bill" targeting transgender people has again passed the state Senate, on Tuesday, July 25.
A federal appeals court on Tuesday blocked a District of Columbia law that makes it difficult for gun owners to get concealed carry permits by requiring them to show that they have a good reason to carry a weapon.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo has ordered state agencies to make voter registration forms available to the public and offer assistance in filling them out in an effort to boost participation in elections.
The reasons spotlight cities' funding and workforce struggles that cybersecurity experts have warned about for years.
In this year's class, even the weakest-performing governors are surviving.
A federal judge ruled Monday against a privacy organization's effort to halt the nationwide request for voter information made by Kris Kobach.
Several cities have intensified their efforts to combat rat infestations. It’s no simple task.
JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. — Looking out a fourth-floor window of his hospital system’s headquarters, Alan Levine can see the Appalachian Mountains that have defined this hardscrabble region for generations.
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio on Sunday called on Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and MTA officials to "step up" and solve the city's subway woes.
One of the four Republican candidates running for governor of Ohio said she intends to be the Buckeye State's first elected woman governor.
It is illegal for offices to hold people based solely on their immigration status, the highest court in Massachusetts said in a ruling released Monday.
Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner has summoned lawmakers back to Springfield for a special session Wednesday after Democrats who control the General Assembly did not meet his noon Monday deadline to send him an education funding formula bill crucial to getting state money distributed for the upcoming school year.
Gov. Christie on Friday signed into law legislation that raises the minimum age for purchasing tobacco products and electronic cigarettes in New Jersey from 19 to 21.
Becoming a law enforcement officer in South Carolina will require psychological testing under a new requirement aimed at weeding out people not suitable for the job.
Starting in November, Hawaii residents statewide will hear an air raid warning siren test that's not been heard since the Cold War: a wailing alert that potentially would be used to warn of a North Korean missile attack.
Are body cameras working? How well-trained are patrol officers? What can be done to improve public trust in the force and to better combat the city's rising crime?
Local and state government agencies from Oregon to Connecticut say they are using a Russian brand of security software despite the federal government’s instructions to its own agencies not to buy the software over concerns about cyberespionage, records and interviews show.
Frances Russo-Avena won't ever forget her son screaming for help.
Gov. Asa Hutchinson announced Thursday the completion of the Arkansas Public School Computer Network, a high-speed broadband upgrade for every public school in the state.
The Trump administration's attack on legal marijuana, already stymied by large states determined not to roll back the clock, is increasingly confronting an even more politically potent adversary: military veterans.
A Supreme Court ruling about regulating church signs is spurring cities to repeal their anti-begging laws.
Dangerous heat isn't new to Phoenix, but its efforts to keep people safe in triple-digit temperatures are.
Gov. Bill Haslam and other state officials exulted Thursday as Tennessee's unemployment rate sank to its lowest point in recorded state history last month.
State Superintendent Tony Evers has filed paperwork to challenge Gov. Scott Walker in a 2018 race, according to state campaign records.
Attorneys general from 20 states invoked the memory of a conservative icon, the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, to make a case that President Donald Trump should defend nearly a million young immigrants who could soon be back in line for deportation.
A Tennessee judge is offering to cut 30 days off inmate sentences if they agree to undergo an elective birth control procedure.
Jennifer Lawless is optimistic about the wave of women thinking about running for office -- but only tepidly.
Maine Gov. Paul LePage says he might change his mind and run for Senate after all.
Two months after demonstrators demanding greater accountability from state legislators were arrested at the Pennsylvania Capitol, a bill to ban gifts from lobbyists to officials remains stuck in committee without a hearing.
The boundaries of election districts in a southeastern Utah county are unconstitutional and violate the rights of American Indians who make up roughly half the county's population, a federal judge has ruled for the second time.
North Carolina's Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper said Thursday that his administration will oppose the Trump administration's efforts to open Atlantic Ocean waters to offshore oil and gas drilling. Cooper's decision reverses the state's policy under former Republican Gov. Pat McCrory, who urged federal officials to promote energy exploration in ocean waters to help the nation achieve energy independence.
Elon Musk said Thursday that he has received "verbal government approval" -- but not a formal go-ahead -- for his newest, tunnel-digging venture to build an underground, high-speed transportation system connecting New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington, D.C.
It's a fancy legal term for a law that seeks to punish someone after the fact. It is a big no-no, banned by the U.S. and Pennsylvania constitutions.
Minneapolis Police Chief Janeé Harteau on Thursday called the shooting death of Justine Damond "unnecessary" and bluntly said it contradicted the mission and training given to her officers.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions' claim that President Trump won't strip federal funding from San Francisco, Santa Clara County and other sanctuary locales for refusing to cooperate with immigration officers was an "illusory promise," a federal judge ruled Thursday.
Jurisdictions are tapping the latest in behavioral science to steer people toward better choices. Emerging technologies can increase its impact.
A roundup of money (and other) news governments can use.
Just 30 miles south of the urban epicenter of Houston, the scene around one of Texas’ oldest maximum-security prisons has a much more rustic quality.
Former Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray is going to run for governor of Ohio, Ohio Supreme Court Justice Bill O'Neill said he was told last week by a mutual friend.
Senate Republicans' proposal to repeal much of the Affordable Care Act without a replacement would leave 32 million more Americans without health insurance over the next decade, according to an updated analysis by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
California’s Obamacare exchange scrubbed its annual rate announcement this week, the latest sign of how the ongoing political drama over the Affordable Care Act is roiling insurance markets nationwide.
Police and prosecutors in Baltimore have launched investigations after being alerted to body camera footage that the public defender's office says shows an officer planting drugs.
After an embarrassing jail escape that was blamed in part on inadequate facilities, Walker County in 2012 issued $20 million in bonds to build a new jail. It was a hefty price tag for the county of fewer than 70,000 people north of Houston, and officials pledged to search for new revenue streams to help pay for the jail.
The Idaho Supreme Court, in a 4-1 ruling Tuesday afternoon, upheld Gov. Butch Otter's veto of legislation removing the state's 6 percent sales tax on groceries.
The Oakland Police Department can no longer designate its investigators as U.S. customs enforcement officers -- a classification that allows local police agencies to work with federal immigration officials on cases of human trafficking, narcotics smuggling and other cross-border crimes.
The Trump administration's travel ban suffered another legal setback Wednesday when the U.S. Supreme Court sided with a federal judge in Hawaii, temporarily exempting grandparents and other extended family members from the directive.
The president's victory has been extensively explored. But a state- and county-level look at the data offers stunning evidence of just how large the shifts were in certain places.
The latest plans in California and New Jersey have observers asking: creative solution or accounting gimmick?
State politicians on both sides of the aisle have increasingly worked to curb the practice. Now, the attorney general may have made their efforts pointless.
Seven years of Republican vows to “repeal and replace” the Affordable Care Act came to a crashing halt Tuesday.
Montana Gov. Steve Bullock said Tuesday he is forming a federal political action committee to allow him to travel and be a larger part of the national political conversation.
The officer who shot and killed 40-year-old Justine Damond late Saturday apparently violated his department's rules on the use of body cameras when he failed to activate the device.
Ride-hailing companies such as Uber and Lyft already have struck a financial blow to their competitors in the taxi industry. Now many officials fear they may take a big bite out of airport parking revenue.
Gov. Chris Sununu has signed into law a bill eliminating criminal penalties for possession of three-quarters of an ounce or less of marijuana.
MARIPOSA -- Evacuations here were underway Tuesday and Highways 140 and 49 were closed to traffic because of the growing Detwiler Fire.
Gov. Scott Walker signed 11 bills Monday to combat the state's opiate epidemic, including one that would establish a charter school for recovering addicts.
Credit rating agency Standard & Poor's lowered Alaska's credit rating on Tuesday and said the state's reliance on financial reserves to fund its budget cannot continue.
Ohio Gov. John Kasich joined 10 other governors from both parties Tuesday afternoon in urging Congress to not repeal Obamacare without a replacement.
“As far as I know, we’re the only state doing this,” says Gov. Terry McAuliffe's chief of staff.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's latest bid to salvage the GOP campaign to roll back the Affordable Care Act collapsed Tuesday as centrist Republicans balked at legislation to repeal the health care law now and develop an alternative later.
Gov. Greg Abbott said that he would publicly call out lawmakers who didn’t support his 20-item legislative agenda while Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick came out swinging against House leadership during Monday appearances on the eve of Texas' special legislative session.
Almost as soon as an ethics commissioner was nominated to the Wilmington Ethics Commission, the city removed him.
Officials at the Sacramento City Unified School District took an international field trip to the Philippines this year -- to hire teachers.
Salt Lake County Councilwoman Jenny Wilson on Monday officially launched her bid for the U.S. Senate seat up next year, saying she wants to bring actual change to Washington.
Reacting to new information about sexual-abuse allegations against Seattle Mayor Ed Murray, City Councilmember M. Lorena Gonzalez said Monday that she's asked Murray to consider resigning before his term expires at year-end.
Calling painkiller abuse a "modern plague," Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens sidestepped the Legislature Monday to create a prescription drug monitoring program on his own.
California lawmakers voted Monday evening to extend the state's premiere program on climate change, a victory for Gov. Jerry Brown that included unprecedented Republican support for fighting global warming.
Republican efforts to replace the Affordable Care Act collapsed in the Senate on Monday evening as two more GOP senators announced they would oppose the latest plan backed by their party's leadership.
Some cities post letter grades on restaurants. King County opted for something more visual. The person who pushed for public ratings in the first place, though, isn't satisfied.
Warning that “liberals are trying to mess with Texas,” a confident Gov. Greg Abbott promised Friday he’ll fight to keep Texas in conservative hands if voters give him another four years in office.
A driver mows down six mailboxes, slurs her words and tells police she has a lizard in her bra. Throw in a wisecracking police officer, and what do you get? A flippant post on Facebook, along with photos of the woman, and of course, her lizard.
Touting nearly three decades' worth of legislative experience, including six years in leadership, House Speaker and Nashville Republican Beth Harwell is officially launching a campaign to become Tennessee’s next governor.
Much has been written lately about how individuals’ health could suffer if they lose insurance under the health proposals circulating in the U.S. House and Senate
Gov. Kay Ivey today banned officials in the executive branch from appointing registered lobbyists to serve on state boards and commissions.
They are the nation’s invisible homeless population, undercounted for years, hiding out in cars and abandoned buildings, in motels and on couches, often trading sex for a place to sleep.
The national opioid commission chaired by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is pushing back the release of an interim report for a second time.
Top officials in the Democratic National Committee are worried about a sudden drop in voter registrations in Colorado, concerned that President Donald Trump's new election commission is encouraging Democrats across the country to remove themselves from the electoral grid for fear of revealing personal information to the GOP leadership.
As the first leader of a national government to ever address the National Governors Association, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called for fewer trade barriers and promised to work directly with state leaders.
Environmental advocacy is difficult in the Trump era. In rural areas, it's even harder. “To be personally attacked for speaking up, to be silenced, it was devastating to me," says one resident who tried to fight fracking in her rural Pennsylvania county.
The programs we have are pretty good, but they need to keep graduates engaged and deepen their learning.
A federal appeals court in Manhattan on Thursday overturned the 2015 corruption conviction of former Assembly speaker Sheldon Silver, but prosecutors quickly signalled that they would seek to re-try the case against the once powerful Albany powerbroker.
A federal judge in Hawaii ordered the Trump administration on Thursday to allow grandparents, grandchildren, aunts, uncles and other relatives of people in the U.S. to circumvent the travel ban policy.
Distributors previously operating in Nevada's medical marijuana program may soon enter the recreational marijuana market after the Nevada Tax Commission today approved emergency regulations to reopen distribution licensing.
A top-down view of transportation is important, but it's crucial to focus on the needs of individuals and underserved communities.
In this community center turned polling place, Juan Sanchis stands near an electronic ballot reader with a smile on his face, waiting.
Beginning in January, Michigan will have rules in place for the disclosure and retention of audio or video recordings from body cameras worn by police officers.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) threw his weight behind former NAACP President Ben Jealous' bid for Maryland governor on Thursday morning during an endorsement rally.
The Trump administration's attempt this weekend to win their support didn't go as planned.
Hoping to secure the 50 votes needed for passage, Senate Republicans unveiled their revised draft health care legislation on Thursday that includes some meaningful changes but retains many of the same elements that kept the original version from winning the support of GOP moderates.
Standard & Poor's downgraded Hartford debt to junk bond status late Tuesday, less than a week after the financially troubled capital city hired a New York law firm with expertise in restructuring municipal finances.
Alaska will receive more than $300 million in new federal funding over the next five years to shore up the state's individual health insurance market, federal officials announced Tuesday.
A roundup of money (and other) news governments can use.
A federal appeals court on Wednesday upheld Wisconsin's law that bars collective bargaining agreements requiring workers to pay union fees.
While Republicans in Washington keep promising rollbacks of gun control laws — though so far haven’t taken action on any on it — Mike Bloomberg’s Everytown for Gun Safety group is claiming another round of success in new restrictions passed on the state level.
Cops Pulled Over a Black Driver for Having 'Really Dark' Windows. It Was the Florida State Attorney.
Florida’s first African-American state attorney, Aramis Ayala, was leaving Florida A&M University College of Law in Orlando, Florida on June 19, when police officers stopped her.
The state's transportation chief calls a new $54 billion transportation package monumental. But the projects it funds will be more mundane than monumental.
The industry has been a key driver of the sector's job gains. See which metro areas could suffer most from expected job losses.
Wisconsin's state budget impasse just got $51 million harder to solve thanks to the tax increases that neighboring Illinois enacted to finally pass its spending plan, state lawmakers learned Tuesday.
Nevada officials have declared a state of emergency over marijuana: There's not enough of it.
On Jan. 14, 2014, David Wildstein walked into the United States Attorney's Office here and started talking.
The federal government is giving the Oregon DMV another temporary reprieve after state lawmakers approved a plan to offer TSA-compliant driver's licenses.
Dashboard-camera videos of incidents in which police officers use fatal force must be made available to the public in most circumstances, the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled Tuesday in a unanimous decision that advocates for open government and transparency are calling a historic victory.
Dr. David Fowler’s staff is scrambling to keep up with the surging stream of corpses flowing through the doors.
For many consumers, an unexpected health care calamity can quickly burgeon into a financial calamity. Just over half of all the debt that appears on credit reports is related to medical expenses, and consumers may find that their credit score gets as banged up as their body.
The Seattle City Council unanimously approved an income tax on wealthy residents Monday, a move widely expected to draw a quick legal challenge.
Democrats flipped two GOP-controlled districts on Tuesday, giving Oklahoma's minority party a morale boost heading into a long season of special elections as they prepare for 2018.
Businesses and governments are going cashless. Anti-poverty advocates say the change is problematic for low-income people, but they disagree on how to solve it.
For the second year in a row, Gov. Tom Wolf will allow the state's budget to become law -- with no way to pay for it yet.
Aidan Long is a 13-year-old from Montana who has suffered multiple daily seizures since he was 4. The seizures defy medical cure, and some of them continue for weeks, requiring Aidan to be airlifted to children’s hospitals in Denver or Seattle, said his father, Ben Long. The medical bills to Medicaid and his private insurance have been enormous.
The Republican gubernatorial primary was just weeks away, and then-Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell had his sights set on securing the nomination.
President Donald Trump and Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach still want troves of information about voters. Just not yet.
Gov. Christie on Monday lashed out at a constituent as a communist and called Hillary Clinton a "criminal" during his audition to replace a New York sports radio host, hours after a new poll affirmed his standing as the least popular governor in New Jersey history.
The federal judge overseeing reforms in the Oakland Police Department criticized city officials Monday for a "severely mishandled" investigation into officers who allegedly had sex with an underage girl, saying City Hall and police commanders appeared to be treating him as an "inconvenient bump" on the way to regaining full control of the force.
Maine Attorney General Janet Mills announced Monday that she would seek the Democratic Party's nomination for governor in 2018.
After three defendants fatally overdosed in a single week last year, it became clear that Buffalo's ordinary drug treatment court was no match for the heroin and painkiller crisis.
Secretaries of state are concerned about not just the federal government's request for voter information but also the information they're not getting about election security breaches.
State election officials voiced doubt Saturday that adequate security measures can be adopted before 2018 elections to safeguard against the possibility of a foreign government interfering in U.S. elections.
A little-discussed provision in the Senate health care bill is designed to boost the number of hospital beds for psychiatric care, providing a long-sought victory for mental health advocates.
Drug companies asked a federal judge on Thursday to throw out Maryland's new prescription drug price gouging law, saying the state's first-in-the-nation measure is both unconstitutional and vague.
