State Legislatures articles from March 2003

State Legislatures archives from March 2003

America's Legislators Back to School Week. (Statestats).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... The official 2002 numbers are in for America's Legislators Back to School Week, the time when lawmakers marched off to schools in their districts to meet personally with young constituents. At least some legislators in every state supported...

Swimming upstream: regulating genetically engineered fish. (On First Reading).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Protesting human manipulation of living food items, chefs, restaurateurs, grocers and seafood distributors across the nation have decided to pull salmon off their menus and out of their seafood counters because most are raised on fish farms and...

Biotechnology--a new tool for economic development. (On First Reading).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... You've heard of the Rust Belt and the Bible Belt, but do you know about the "Biotechnology Belt?" States are forming clusters of biotechnology research laboratories and companies to meet potential demands for products and as a unique means...

Poor families need to know about federal tax credit. (On First Reading).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... April 15. That date, dreaded by so many American taxpayers, represents an opportunity for low income working families. The long-standing federal Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) puts cash into the hands of working poor families, who normally...

Seeking balance between public records and the need for secrecy. (On First Reading).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Since the 2001 terrorist attacks, at least 40 states have proposed changes to their open records laws, ranging from closing some documents to deny information to potential saboteurs to creating commissions to oversee the records. Many of...

The arts are aching. (Stateline).(arts education)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... With budgets hurting as much as they are around the country, almost everyone feels the pain. And the arts, representing only 0.063 percent of state general fund budgets, are very susceptible. Massachusetts' funding dropped the most (excluding...

Speaking of sex slander. (Stateline).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Watch what you say about women in Washington--at least for now. A 1909 state law makes it a misdemeanor to injure a woman's reputation by slandering her virtue or chastity. It's OK, however, to slander her if she is a "common prostitute" or if...

The power of incumbency. (Stateline).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Ed Case, a former state legislator, beat 43 other candidates with 43 percent of the ballots, to win a special election in Hawaii and become the final member selected to the 108th Congress. His advantage? Maybe it's the fact that he had been an...

That meandering river. (Stateline).(Red River)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... In the 1820s, when officials of the then-Arkansas Territory chose the Red River as a boundary for its southwest counties, they probably had no idea what confusion that would cause in the following years. You see, a river floods, erodes and gets...

Going electronic. (Stateline).(elections in Georgia)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Georgia is the only state so far to have totally electronic elections with touch screen machines, according to Electionline.org, an election reform clearinghouse. More than 510 counties in states including Florida, Maryland, Texas, Louisiana...

Schools reborn. (Stateline).(using older schools for community purposes)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... When the Kentucky Education Reform Act of 1990 provided school districts with more money, many opted to abandon their old schools in favor of new, bigger facilities on larger pieces of land. In fact, it sometimes costs more to renovate than to...

The problem of pregnant pigs. (Stateline).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Voters in Florida recently decided to give pigs some space to stretch out in. They passed a constitutional amendment supported by national animal rights groups that bans pregnant pigs from being housed in stalls so narrow the sows can't turn....

Smugglers beware. (Stateline).(cigarette marketing)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Cigarettes cost at least $1 a pack less in Delaware than in neighboring states because of its lower excise tax. That is causing the state to become an attractive spot for traffickers. They buy the cheaper cigarettes there and profit by...

Goodbye paper trail. (Stateline).(compterized system for tracking legislation)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Rhode Island has taken a big step into cyberland as both legislative chambers switched to a paperless computerized system for writing and tracking bills. Each desk in the House and Senate has a flat screen computer monitor, a keyboard and an...

Computer crime lab. (Stateline).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Cybercriminals may have found their match in a state-of-the-art statewide computer lab recently opened in Columbia, S.C., to handle the forensic examination of all evidence collected during investigations of computer crime. A cooperative...

Insurance regulation: a time for change; can the states fix the age-old system of insurance regulation to meet the needs of the modern economy, or will a federal takeover leave consumers to fend for themselves?
March 1, 2003... A bride and groom stand before a majestic view as the Beatles song plays, "When I get old and losing my hair, many years from now..." The commercial moves through images of the couple's life together: having children, paying for college and...

What is Altria?(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Altria Group, Inc. is a parent company whose roots are firmly planted in success, through years of strong financial performance and global reach. A parent company whose branches are blue clip operating companies: Kraft Foods, Philip Morris...

States will miss TEA-21: the federal transportation act has poured billions of dollars into highway, transit and alternative modes of travel projects. What should its reauthorization look like?
March 1, 2003... In booming Montgomery County, Md., where the population--a white-collar spillover from Washington, D.C., and environs--has jumped by nearly 30 percent in the past two decades, Carol Petzold admits she is grateful for the Transportation Equity...

What's up with e-government? Digital government isn't a silver bullet, but as part of a long-term plan, it may provide a means to reduce state spending.
March 1, 2003... An estimated 143 million Americans-more than half the nation-- are now online, and 2 million new users are logging on every month. Many of them use government Web sites, according to a recent Pew Internet and America Life study. In fact, 68...

Insuring kids in hard times: since it began, SCHIP has been taking care of children's medical needs. The question now, however, is how will it be funded.
March 1, 2003... Devastated by losing both his job and family health insurance, Collin Andersen and his wife, Marie, found themselves desperately searching for options for medical care for their children. When they discovered Vermont's Dr. Dynasaur program--the...

Moving ahead with Olmstead: to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act, states are working hard to find community placements for people with disabilities.
March 1, 2003... Elaine Wilson and Lois Curtis wanted their freedom. After living in a state psychiatric hospital for several years, they wanted Georgia to provide their long-term care in the community. They felt isolated and knew they were physically and...