Archive
Ohio Gov. John Kasich is chiding fellow Republicans for their refusal even to meet with President Barack Obama's nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court.
In a decision that could spell the end for coal in the West, Oregon became the first state in the nation to pass legislation to completely do away with the dirty energy source.
As a political newcomer, Ron Hale struggled to stand out this year in a crowded race to join the Texas Railroad Commission, which regulates oil and gas.
Providers of mental health and adult disability services are scrambling to understand pending changes from the Department of Health and Human Services that could cut or interrupt services for thousands of consumers and change payments for service providers.
With no fanfare, Gov. Rick Scott late Thursday said he has signed a record $82 billion budget for the next fiscal year, keeping intact $256.1 million in line-item vetoes that he foreshadowed earlier this week.
With Democratic members of Congress calling for his resignation, Gov. Rick Snyder lashed out Thursday at federal regulators for their response to the Flint water crisis, saying that despite the Environmental Protection Agency's insistence that the agency bore no direct responsibility there was evidence it could have moved far more quickly to protect the public.
Judge Merrick Garland may well be the most moderate Supreme Court nominee anyone could expect from a Democratic president, but he's also a justice who could create the first liberal majority on the high court in more than 40 years.
Following an emotional debate, the Senate blocked a bill that would prevent states from requiring labeling of genetically modified food Wednesday.
Ride-sharing and car-sharing are complicating life for transportation planners, not to mention automakers.
A Democratic congressman from Virginia lashed out at Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder for the role of emergency managers in the Flint water crisis that has forced the city of nearly 100,000 into using bottle water for months under an ongoing state of emergency.
The most important election news and political dynamics at the state and local levels.
A roundup of money (and other) news governments can use.
It’s been about 40 years since the majority of moms stayed home, and married dads in the 21st century spend twice as much time caring for their children as they did back then.
Whenever Jamison Rich got thirsty after gym or recess, he took a drink from the nearest water fountain at his elementary school.
Ohio Gov. John Kasich is calling on North Korea to release a Cincinnati-area native who was sentenced to 15 years of hard labor on Wednesday.
After trying, and failing, to execute convicted killer Romell Broom six years ago, Ohio can try again, the Ohio Supreme Court ruled Wednesday.
Former Charlotte Mayor Patrick Cannon pleaded guilty Wednesday to a misdemeanor in connection with an illegal vote the convicted felon filed in the November 2014 election.
The day after Donald Trump cruised to an easy victory in Florida's presidential primary, Gov. Rick Scott endorsed him for president Wednesday.
There's a long-standing rivalry between the people who do performance measurement and the people who evaluate programs.
A public university president's parting payout of nearly $270,000 is raising a lot of questions in Massachusetts.
Voting rights advocates and the state of Nevada settled a lawsuit today over the state's implementation of a federal law aimed at registering low-income voters.
Washington, D.C.'s commuter rail will suspend service for more than a day for a systemwide safety inspection after a fire Monday in a train tunnel disrupted the morning commute.
Republican Gov. Pat McCrory and Democrat Roy Cooper turned back their primary opponents Tuesday, setting up what’s expected to be one of the closest and hardest fought gubernatorial races in the nation.
Chalk up a win for Democratic House Speaker Michael Madigan in his war with Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner.
The Ferguson City Council unanimously approved a proposal with the U.S. Department of Justice on Tuesday to overhaul the city's police department, an agreement the city effectively rejected six weeks ago, provoking a federal lawsuit.
The Obama administration said Tuesday it will not allow offshore drilling in the southeast Atlantic Ocean _ a significant reversal from its original plan and a major victory to coastal communities and environmental activists who fought the proposal.
Donald Trump romped to victory Tuesday in Florida, chasing Marco Rubio from the race, but Ohio Gov. John Kasich won his home state, raising hopes for those seeking to stop Trump and settle the presidential contest on the floor of the Republican convention.
Instead of divesting from oil companies, the nation's largest pension fund is trying to make all companies more environmentally friendly from within.
The governor of Texas thinks that fraud in the electoral system that put him and others in office is “rampant.”
In mid-October, as the massive scope of the Flint drinking water scandal and public health crisis was beginning to sink in, Michigan Department of Environmental Quality engineer Adam Rosenthal wrote an e mail to two of his then supervisors in the department's drinking water section.
In Kentucky, state lawmakers will consider in coming days whether to make tuition at community colleges free.
Beginning in July, Massachusetts hospitals will have to evaluate for substance abuse anyone who arrives at an emergency room suffering from an apparent opioid overdose.
One morning this month, Silvia Cota, a nurse supervisor in the emergency room at Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan, gathered her nurses together in a huddle to prepare them for the future.
As many as 13.1 million people living along U.S. coastlines could face flooding by the end of the century because of rising sea levels, according to a new study that warns that large numbers of Americans could be forced to relocate to higher ground.
DeRay Mckesson insists his campaign is about more than race.
Ohio must let 17-year-olds vote in the state's March 15 primary, if they turn 18 by Election Day, a judge ruled in a boost to Bernie Sanders.
The legislative session fraught with labor and social issues that raised the hackles of many a lawmaker ended Saturday night on a more peaceful note than many state government spectators would have thought possible after is rocky beginning.
Oregon's most consequential energy bill in decades -- a nationally ambitious plan to wean the state off coal and boost renewable sources -- has become law.
States are spending millions fighting the law that courts uphold almost every time.
Rail union leaders cheered. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie smiled. And hundreds of thousands of New Jerseyans were assured of a routine rail commute to work Monday without an immediate fare hike.
The national uproar over lead poisoning in Flint, Mich., has drawn renewed attention to a children's health crisis that has plagued Pennsylvania and Jersey for decades.
Over objections from doctors and medical groups, West Virginia legislators have put into law a ban on the most common abortion procedure for pregnancies in the second trimester.
Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders on Saturday repeatedly slammed Rahm Emanuel and called on front-runner Hillary Clinton to reject the embattled mayor's endorsement as the Vermont senator tries to boost his chances in Tuesday's Illinois primary.
Florida Sen. Marco Rubio took the unusual step of urging his supporters in Ohio to vote for Gov. John Kasich in Tuesday's Ohio Republican presidential primary in an effort to keep Donald Trump from winning the party's presidential nomination.
The Justice Department on Monday pledged $2.5 million to help state judges and court administrators ensure their systems for levying fines and fees do not violate the rights of poor defendants.
The city is at the forefront of the emerging concept of mobility management.
Gov. Terry McAuliffe vetoed legislation Thursday that would have stopped local governments from removing Confederate monuments.
Lawmakers this legislative session had two fundamental responsibilities: Come up with a full plan for K-12 education funding and pass a supplemental budget.
A sprawling Central Valley water district run by some of the state's wealthiest growers papered over its drought-related financial struggles and misled investors, federal regulators said Wednesday.
Nearly three years after Texas lawmakers passed a law requiring some applicants for unemployment benefits to pass a drug test, the state has yet to test a single applicant, and it remains unclear when the program will get going.
Rafael Rivera left Puerto Rico for Central Florida late last year, fed up with the island's escalating debt crisis and dwindling sales at his cellphone shop.
Moody's Corp. will pay $130 million to the California Public Employees' Retirement System to settle allegations that the ratings agency acted negligently by giving top scores to ultimately toxic investments that cost the pension fund hundreds of millions of dollars, CalPERS said Wednesday.
Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey signed a proposal Wednesday that makes it illegal in most cases to collect and drop off someone else's ballot.
A state House committee strongly rejected a bill Wednesday that would abolish the death penalty, saying the state needed to retain capital punishment as a sentencing option.
The former businessman talks about betting his political career on fixing the Last Frontier’s finances.
A roundup of money (and other) news governments can use.
A West Virginia lawmaker who passed out cups of raw milk to celebrate passage of a raw milk-related bill says the unpasteurized beverage had nothing to do with an intestinal virus that plagued a number of House of Delegates members and staffers last weekend.
The costs of the Flint drinking water crisis continued to climb Tuesday as Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder asked the State Administrative Board to approve contracts worth up to $1.2 million to cover his outside legal bills and Attorney General Bill Schuette asked for approval of a $1.5 million contract with attorney Todd Flood to cover the cost of his investigation into the public health disaster.
The full U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals agreed to take up the Texas voter ID case Wednesday, adding another chapter to the law’s convoluted journey through the federal court system.
The California bullet train has won a court victory in a key lawsuit that sought to stop the $64-billion project because it allegedly violated restrictions voters imposed in 2008.
Just after 5 a.m. Wednesday, sleep-deprived Republican senators were huddled behind closed doors.
Republicans play offense in three states, while Democrats have a shot at flipping one seat.
The most important election news and political dynamics at the state and local levels.
A first-of-its-kind bill to regulate both daily and seasonlong fantasy football, basketball and baseball contests, among others, has been signed into law in Virginia.
At a packed Travis County GOP executive committee meeting Tuesday night, it took less than a minute for someone to acknowledge the elephant not in the room.
In a legislative showdown between LGBT advocates and religious groups, Democrats in the Missouri state Senate staged a marathon filibuster Tuesday to stop a constitutional amendment that would allow businesses to refuse to provide services for same-sex marriage ceremonies.
A cross section of California leaders in business, education, law enforcement and religion joined Tuesday in urging the Supreme Court to uphold President Barack Obama's plan to offer temporary relief and work permits to as many as 5 million immigrants who have been living in the U.S. illegally.
Nine 17-year-olds, including one from Toledo, sued Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted Tuesday over his office's refusal to allow them to vote in the presidential race in next week's primary election.
John Kasich failed to achieve even his lowered goal of finishing second in Michigan, but his team was jazzed by a new national poll showing him ascending into the thick of the competition.
A federal appeals court on Monday partially granted a motion to stay an order of the Federal Communications Commission lowering a cap on the rates that can be charged for inmate phone calls by 65 percent.
A new report details revenue projections for each state, showing that many will have sizable budget shortfalls to close.
The Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act is just a Senate vote away from the president's desk.
His tenure was marked with disappointment, embarrassment and little to brag about. But his anti-tax stance helped him politically.
Modeled after a successful anti-recidivism program, Kansas has a new volunteer mentoring program to help people on welfare find work.
Weeks after the Texas attorney general declared that games offered by popular daily fantasy sports sites violate Texas laws against gambling, a major player in the business has agreed to stop taking paid contest entries -- and another has decided to press its case in the courts.
Bills to make overdose reversal drugs more widely available and to curb overprescription of opioid drugs were signed into law Friday by Gov. Susana Martinez.
A new class-action lawsuit filed Monday, March 7 over the city's water crisis is seeking damages for those injured from exposure to the introduction of lead and other substances.
Texas health officials have asked a prominent academic journal to take the state's name off a published finding that Texas women lost access to health care services after lawmakers kicked Planned Parenthood out of a family planning program.
The California Assembly swore in a new speaker Monday who pledged to make poverty reduction, increased government oversight and voter turnout his key priorities.
The U.S. Supreme Court in a victory for gay rights ruled Monday that states must honor adoptions by same-sex parents who move across state lines.
Billionaire Medford native and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg ruled out an independent run for president yesterday, voicing concerns his candidacy would hand the White House to either Donald Trump or Ted Cruz.
Many governors and mayors are struggling to raise the minimum wage for their jurisdictions. In the meantime, some are giving their own employees a raise.
The Oklahoma Office of Management and Enterprise Services told state agencies to prepare for an additional 4 percent cut of their annual state allocations.
As far as Sedgwick resident and locally sourced food advocate Deborah Evans is concerned, everyone should have the right to choose their own food, whether it’s from the farmer down the road or from the local supermarket.
The Alabama Supreme Court on Friday dismissed motions and petitions in a lawsuit seeking to ban same-sex marriage in Alabama.
Saying John Kasich was an "action hero" who "kicked some serious butt" in Washington before, former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger endorsed him Sunday for a return engagement.
Michigan issues such as the mass shooting in Kalamazoo dominated the Democratic debate in Flint on Sunday.
The Supreme Court handed abortion rights advocates a victory Friday by blocking a Louisiana law they said would leave the state with only one doctor licensed to perform the procedure.
It's not enough to come up with a good idea. You need figure out how to build an army of supporters.
Young people were twice as likely to be out of work last year, according to new data.
Thousand of children and pregnant women exposed to lead in the drinking water in Flint, Mich., will have access to health care, under an emergency Medicaid expansion announced Thursday.
A chief sponsor of legislation that would allow terminally ill Marylanders to end their lives has withdrawn the bill amid stiff opposition, signaling that the effort has again failed in the General Assembly.
In a ceremony featuring dozens of law enforcement officers from around the state, Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin vetoed the no-permit concealed-carry bill Thursday (HB 4145), an act he said was "for the safety of law enforcement officers and for all West Virginians."
A Boston nonprofit plans to soon test a new way of addressing the city’s heroin epidemic. The idea is simple: Starting in March, along a stretch of road that has come to be called Boston’s “Methadone Mile,” the program will open a room with a nurse, some soft chairs and basic life-saving equipment — a place where heroin users can ride out their high, under medical supervision.
Lawmakers have approved a crucial rewrite of Florida's death penalty sentencing law, hoping it passes muster after the current version was recently declared unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Gov. Kate Brown signed historic increases to the minimum wage into law Wednesday, claiming a major win for Democrats and promising to uplift the working poor.
New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez on Thursday ended her neutral stance on the contest for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination by endorsing Marco Rubio.
In a significant victory for the Obama administration, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. on Thursday refused to block an Environmental Protection Agency regulation limiting emissions of mercury and other toxic pollutants from coal-fired power plants.
Here’s what some places are already doing to accommodate self-driving and connected vehicles.
There's a growing movement -- even in some conservative states with strict abortion regulations -- to make birth control more accessible.
Attorney General Kathleen Kane's closest confidant and driver, Patrick Reese, was sentenced to 3 to 6 months of jail and fined $1,000 Thursday for violating a judge's order by snooping through coworkers' emails to keep tabs on a grand jury investigating his boss.
The growing threat of cybercrime has exposed just how vulnerable police departments are to it.
A roundup of money (and other) news governments can use.
Many cities are trying to use behavioral science to better communicate with citizens. New Orleans is testing the effectiveness of different text messages.
On his first full day leading Detroit Public Schools, retired U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Steven Rhodes laid out his vision for launching a financially sound school district that will be able to aggressively compete for students.
The LePage administration on Wednesday introduced a bill that would create new restrictions for prescribing opioids to control pain, as part of the state's effort to combat the heroin epidemic. If approved, Maine would have one of the strictest prescribing standards for opioids in the country, a national expert said.
The District, Maryland and Virginia have agreed on a plan to create an independent agency that will oversee safety at Metro, officials said Wednesday.
New Orleans police will no longer cooperate with federal immigration enforcement, a momentous change likely to elicit denunciations from opponents of such "sanctuary city" policies.
When Kansas Republicans decided to offer absentee voting for the first time in their presidential caucus, they expected to get maybe 300 applications.
The four liberal members of the U.S. Supreme Court took turns tearing into Texas' controversial anti-abortion law at a highly anticipated hearing Wednesday, raising the possibility of a landmark court ruling that could make the procedure easier to access nationwide for years to come.
The most important election news and political dynamics at the state and local levels.
Changes in numbers of foreign born residents for more than 300 cities.
The U.S. Supreme Court dealt a blow Tuesday to nascent efforts to track the quality and cost of health care, ruling that a 1974 law precludes states from requiring that every health care claim involving their residents be submitted to a massive database.
We have to have them, so we might as well make them as productive as possible.
The group's top priority will be preserving the tax-exempt status of municipal bonds, which President Obama wants to reduce for higher earners.
Gov. Susana Martinez on Monday signed into a law a $6.2 billion budget that cuts state government spending from current levels as New Mexico's sagging economy continues to take a hard hit from low oil prices.
Kansas tax receipts fell $53 million short of estimates in February, and Gov. Sam Brownback on Tuesday immediately announced a $17 million cut to the state's university system.
South Dakota Gov. Dennis Daugaard on Tuesday vetoed a proposed law that would have been the first in the country to require transgender students to use bathrooms and locker rooms that match the gender listed on their birth certificates.
Gov. Jerry Brown signed legislation Tuesday to expand a tax on the health insurance industry so that the state doesn't lose $1 billion in federal funding.
The U.S. Supreme Court has declined to rule on a legal dispute between Governor Christie and New Jersey public labor unions suing over billions of dollars in missed payments to the state pension system.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Monday sent letters to governors and water regulators across the U.S. promising greater enforcement of rules to protect citizens from lead in drinking water in the wake of the crisis in Flint and urging every state to locate lead water lines as required.
California's system of seizing and spending "unclaimed" cash from banks, mutual funds and defunct businesses has survived a Supreme Court challenge.
A federal judge overrode Gov. Mike Pence's attempt to stop Syrian refugee resettlement in Indiana, issuing a preliminary injunction Monday that the state immediately contested.
Advocates of low-cost housing scored a legal victory Monday when the U.S. Supreme Court left intact a ruling by California's highest court allowing cities and counties to require builders to include a percentage of affordable units in each new development.
Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach on Monday endorsed Donald Trump for president -- and he backed Trump's plan to force Mexico to pay for a border wall.
The Maine Department of Corrections on Monday issued its revised inmate discipline policy that reverses previous practices that prisoners, advocates and lawyers had said were unconstitutional, particularly restrictions on communicating with the outside world.
The layoffs announced Monday by Chicago Public Schools -- 62 workers, 17 of them teachers -- were far milder than feared earlier in the school year, but the district's plan to end its longstanding practice of picking up pension costs for teachers led to a fresh strike threat from the Chicago Teachers Union.
Gov. Scott Walker signed nearly four dozen bills on Monday, including a ban on county executives serving concurrently in the Legislature.
It shows how technology can come to people’s aid -- sometimes faster than government.
These are the top challenges governments will need to address in 2016.
Is anyone trying to balance the fiscal inequities states impose on their localities?
Some of the skeptics are also the people with the most power to make a difference. Ignoring or denying the issue isn’t an option.
New Orleans has been battling an increase in noise complaints ever since outsiders moved there after Hurricane Katrina. Its found a way, though, to keep residents happier and music going.
Cities tend to favor building stadiums and convention centers over investing in education or human services. It's an understandable but troublesome trend.
A gritty blue-collar town in Minnesota reflects the tensions in many places located between cities and suburbs.
Unlike other oil-dependent states, Louisiana has deeper financial issues that began nearly a decade ago after Hurricane Katrina. The legislature is meeting in special session to deal with them.
More people face traffic tickets than criminal charges, but until now, only the latter could be looked up online here.
Poverty in Wisconsin hit its highest level in 30 years during the five-year period ending in 2014, even as the nation's economy was recovering from the Great Recession, according to a trend analysis of U.S. census data just released by University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers.
The Billings Chamber of Commerce announced Friday it's joining a group of trade associations opposed to the federal Clean Power Plan, which seeks to cut carbon emissions from energy producers.
The legislative battle over Birmingham's minimum wage ended Thursday.
A study published Thursday confirmed that the 100,000 tons of methane that flowed out of Aliso Canyon was the largest natural gas leak disaster to be recorded in the United States, and that it doubled the methane emission rate of the entire Los Angeles basin.
Gov. Paul LePage privately called on his fellow Republican governors to disavow Donald Trump less than a week before LePage publicly endorsed the Republican presidential front-runner, according a newspaper report published Saturday.
States are starting to consider the problems with Alzheimer's care more seriously. But they have a long way to go.
Gov. Mary Fallin signed an executive order Wednesday requiring state agencies to eliminate questions about felony convictions from employment applications.
Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder removed his communications director and press secretary Thursday amid the ongoing Flint drinking water crisis, after each had been in their posts only a few months.
Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval took himself out of consideration Thursday for a seat on the U.S. Supreme Court, a day after his name surfaced in speculation to fill the vacancy created by the death of Antonin Scalia.
A federal appellate court gave Louisiana the go-ahead Wednesday to enforce a 2014 state law requiring abortion doctors to have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of their clinics, a requirement clinic advocates say would force the closure of all but one of the state's facilities.
We learned from the failures that followed Hurricane Katrina. Will Flint's calamity teach us as well?
Two new initiatives show the increasing sophistication of an approach that pays social-services providers only for programs that work.
More than half a dozen governors are worth more than $100 million, worrying many about the influence of money on state politics.
