The CALIFORNIA Senate gives final approval to SB 716, which would make the Golden State the first to ban elephant handlers from using a bullhook, a sharp-pointed tool animal activists say is inhumane. It moves to Gov. Jerry Brown (D) for consideration (LEXISNEXIS STATE NET). Also in CALIFORNIA, lawmakers approve SB 142, a bill that would make flying a drone less-than 350 feet above private property without consent a trespass violation. It is now in the Senate (LOS ANGELES TIMES). Staying in CALIFORNIA, lawmakers give final approval to AB 96, which would extend the Golden State’s ban on the sale of ivory products to include those imported before January 1, 1977. It moves now to Gov. Brown (LEXISNEXIS STATE NET).
Infant formula marketing—just writing those words triggers a mental picture of ads full of cheerful, chubby-cheeked babies. Unfortunately for Mead Johnson Nutrition Company, some third-party distributors promoting the formula took a different approach, landing the company in hot water with the SEC over FCPA compliance. At issue? Improper payments to foreign officials. Could enhanced due diligence have mitigated the risk?
The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act defines a foreign official as “any officer or employee of a foreign government or any department, agency, or instrumentality thereof, or of a public international organization, or any person acting in an official capacity for or on behalf of any such government or department, agency, or instrumentality, or for or on behalf of any such public international organization.” In China, where the alleged violations took place, the distributors offered cash and other incentives to physicians and other healthcare officials so they would recommend the company’s infant formal to patients who were new or expectant mothers. Because these physicians work at government-owned hospitals, they qualify as foreign officials under the FCPA’s broad definition.
In the SEC press release, Kara Brockmeyer, chief of the SEC Enforcement Division’s FCPA Unit, said that “Mead Johnson Nutrition’s lax internal control environment enabled its subsidiary to use off-the-books slush funds to pay doctors and other health care professionals in China to recommend its baby formula and give the company marketing access to mothers.” According to the SEC investigation, the improper payments funneled through the distributor allowance amounted to more than $2 million over five years. To bring an end to the investigation, Mead Johnson Nutrition agreed to pay $7.77 million in disgorgement, $1.26 million in prejudgment interest and a $3 million penalty without an admission or denial of the findings.
Risk analysis that only covers the surface offers little protection, especially for companies expanding into emerging markets. Access to broad content, such as country risk analysis reports, sanctions and watch lists, PEPs, trusted news and business information sources, plays an important role in supporting enhanced due diligence to mitigate risk in today’s global pharmaceutical and healthcare-related industries. Are you confident that your current due-diligence strategy brings potential risks into view?
3 Ways to Apply This Information Now
Are you confident that your current due-diligence process mitigates third-party compliance risk? These days, you can’t be too careful when it comes to vetting and monitoring the third parties that you rely on. Regulators around the world have indicated that many companies lack the necessary controls for identifying bribery and corruption risks related to suppliers, agents or other third parties acting on their behalf.
Catch up on best practices from a recent LexisNexis sponsored webinar with the Sourcing Industry Group (SIG). You will learn:
The pressure is on. Every day, you’re tasked with providing business intelligence to support decision making across your organization. It’s an intimidating assignment when you consider all of the information being generated. According to a post on IndustryTap.com, human knowledge doubled every century until 1900, accelerating to every 25 years by the mid-1940s—still turtle-like paces compared to the doubling of knowledge every 13 months we currently experience. And as the Internet of Things (IoT) expands, IBM predicts that human knowledge will double every 12 hours. How can you even begin to sort out what matters? Even with sophisticated research and intelligence tools to help, you need to have a clear understanding of critical information needs.
Without a needs assessment, the research and analysis that you conduct is directionless—and we all know that aimless wandering won’t get you where you need to be. You need to map out the best route to the right information—and it starts with identifying your destination. That’s where a needs assessment comes in. Too often, we take the expected path, conducting the same type of research and analysis we’ve always done. It’s the long way, a slow process that will only decrease in effectiveness as the volume of information rises. A business intelligence needs survey helps you plot a better approach because you have a more informed view of where your research needs to lead. Here are 3 factors to address in your survey:
Chances are, you’ll need to conduct the survey in parts. First, gather responses based on the topics noted above. Second, get clarification on those results based on whether they are “need to know” or “nice to know.” Third, prioritize the business intelligence needs that rise to the top. With a clear understanding of business intelligence needs, you can conduct more focused research, efficiently pinpoint critical information and support effective, research-backed decisions within your company—regardless of how quickly the volume of information increases.
After the Iranian Revolution of 1979, the U.S. began leveraging economic sanctions against Iran, expanding them to include companies dealing with the Iranian government in 1995. In 2006, the UN Security Council piled on in an attempt to influence the government’s uranium enrichment program. Decades of sanctions took their toll on Iran’s economy, but the oil-rich nation is still an attractive market—and the sudden rush of European companies to Tehran following the announcement that OFAC sanctions would be lifted certainly demonstrates that fact.
As the sanctions are lifted, Iran will regain access to 100 billion dollars in previously frozen assets overseas—and companies in Europe are racing to claim their pieces of the pie. According to a DPA release, the Iranian Deputy Petroleum Minister promoted “excellent opportunities for partnerships and joint ventures” at a recent investor forum in Vienna. For companies that have been suffering from a less-than-spectacular European economy in recent years, the prospect of an eager—and well-funded—new customer has company executives tripping over themselves to tap the Iranian market.
It’s not all sunshine and roses, however. First, it’s important to remember that the Iran deal is not universally loved. The Republican-led Congress would love to nix the deal and with the upcoming 2016 Presidential election, the merits of the deal are likely to be hotly contested. What happens if Congress acts or a Republican wins the White House? The U.S. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew told Congress that “… if a company acts to go in and do business with Iran while the sanctions are lifting, that would be permitted. If Iran violates the deal and if the sanctions snap back, they would not be able to continue doing things that are in violation of the sanctions.” In other words, companies could find themselves unable to realize a return on major investments should Iran fail to keep its end of the bargain.
What’s more, companies must overcome reputational hurdles that may come from conducting business within a country that is openly hostile to Israel and has a poor human rights record. Already, Germany’s economic minister and vice chancellor Sigmar Gabriel has been forced to defend a trip to Tehran with a delegation of business representatives. And it’s not just company’s reputations at home that could suffer. When Nokia-Siemens sold advanced surveillance technology to Iran in 2008, the government used it to disrupt internet service during pro-democracy protests. The company’s reputation suffered, and Iranians showed their outrage with a boycott. So while the OFAC sanctions may be easing, companies must maintain the on-going due diligence and risk monitoring needed for any emerging market. The potential rewards may be high—but the risks still are too.
Competitor analysis is imperative to any business looking to stay a step ahead in a competitive environment. By exploiting the right kinds of information, you can gain insight into rival activity and improve your products and services based on market needs. Monitoring the right information will ensure that your company has the right intelligence needed to support strategic decision making. With so much information available in the public domain how do you decide what to monitor? We've pulled together two simple approaches to keep you up to date and stay one step ahead of your competitors .
1. Monitor traditional and social media.
Media offer vast collections of information that you can track to obtain competitive intelligence. Chances are your competitors will have social media channels that you can use as timely resources. Twitter, LinkedIn, company pages and marketing blogs like HubSpot all offer data that enable you to follow along with major updates and product launches of your closest competitors. However, with the countless media channels available, there are some techniques you should be using to help you gather the right kind of competitive insight:
The right approach can give you an understanding of their current positioning and their marketing direction, which you can then turn into actionable insight for your marketing and sales teams. 2. Analyze for actionable insights.
Now that you've collected all that important information about your competitors from the news and their social media channels, you need to turn it into meaningful and actionable insights. Ask yourself:
By forecasting their strategies, you can keep up to date and react to any change in the markets.
For those people constantly threatening to move to Canada if [Fill in the blank] is elected, not so fast. Allow me to introduce Canadian Parliament candidate Wyatt Scott, who has made the goofball political commercial into an art form. As the curious can discover on YouTube, Scott’s ad features him riding a giant Canadian goose, slaying a dragon with a sword and taking out an evil robot with lasers that shoot out of his eyes. But that isn’t all – the ad features Scott fist-bumping with green-skinned aliens, catching a dress-wearing man who falls from the sky and grabbing something that looks for all the world like an Academy award. Which the student filmmakers who shot this for him appear to be in no danger of winning any time soon. See it at http://bit.ly/1gXVQW0 if you dare.
Alaska lawmakers voted last week to sue Gov. Bill Walker (I) over his plans to go around the Legislature to expand Medicaid eligibility in the Last Frontier. The joint House and Senate Legislative Council voted 10-1 last Tuesday to spend as much as $450,000 on legal fees to pursue the case.
Walker called the Council’s action “totally unacceptable,” saying the suit is political. All 10 of the votes in favor of the suit came from Republicans; the lone dissent was from Democratic Rep. Sam Kito III.
“I cannot fathom why suing to take away health care coverage of working Alaskans is a partisan issue,” Walker told reporters at a news conference after the suit was announced.
Republicans countered that the suit is about process, not politics. They contend that Walker doesn’t have the legal authority to expand the joint state-federal Medicaid program without their approval.
“This is not a policy issue -- we’re not discussing whether we should or shouldn’t expand Medicaid,” said Senate President Kevin Meyer,(R). “This is a question of authority and process and our constitution.”
Walker put Medicaid expansion at the top of his agenda this year. He submitted a plan to lawmakers earlier this year that would have offered coverage to about 40,000 residents currently deemed ineligible. But the Republican-controlled Legislature, citing a lack of faith in long-term federal financial support to pay for the expansion, balked, refusing to bring his proposal to a vote. With no chance that lawmakers would change their minds, Walker announced in July that he would use his executive authority to accept the federal funding needed to support the expansion. Under that process, lawmakers can make suggestions or requests but have no power to block the move.
Barring a court order to stop, Walker said he plans to move ahead with the expansion, which is set to begin on September 1. (GOVERNING, ALASKA DISPATCH NEWS [ANCHORAGE], BELLINGHAM HERALD)
In theory, inside a voting booth is one place where what you do is absolutely between you and your maker. But, as the Union Leader reports, that just ain’t so in New Hampshire. A federal judge recently struck down a Granite State law that barred folks from taking cell phone photos of themselves – aka “selfies” for those over the age of 30 – with their completed ballots. The ACLU sued to block the law and the court agreed. No word on whether the state will appeal, but we’re guessing the folks in Indiana, the only other state with such a law, are getting nervous.
NEW YORK Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) signs SB 1757, legislation that bans the sale of powdered or crystalline alcohol in the Empire State. New York becomes the 25th state to ban the product, which has yet to actually reach consumers in any state (HUDSON VALLEY NEWS NETWORK).
ILLINOIS Gov. Bruce Rauner (R) signs SB 1440, a bill that imposes several new rules on disclosure for reverse mortgage lenders and imposes a three-day “cooling off” period for prospective borrowers to ponder their agreement (REVERSEMORTGAGEDAILY.COM)
.CALIFORNIA Gov. Jerry Brown (D) signs AB 359, which requires large grocery store chains to keep their workers for at least 90 days after a change in store ownership (CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR’S OFFICE).
OREGON Gov. Kate Brown (D) signs SB 844, which allows someone convicted of a marijuana crime to seek expunction for an act that, if committed by an adult, would constitute criminal possession of marijuana (LEXISNEXIS STATE NET).
Virginia lawmakers’ plan to oust Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s (D) interim appointee to the state Supreme Court (see VA LAWMAKERS REJECT GOV’S JUDICIAL APPOINTMENT in Aug. 8 issue of SNCJ) hit a snag last week. The Republicans who control the General Assembly said McAuliffe hadn’t consulted with them when he appointed Fairfax Circuit Court judge Jane Marum Roush to fill the vacancy created by the retirement of Justice LeRoy F. Millette Jr. while they were in recess. And they are planning not to confirm Roush to a full 12-year term in a special session on redistricting this week.
The Republicans were also planning to appoint Virginia Court of Appeals Judge Rossie D. Alston Jr. to the Supreme Court in place of Roush. But they weren’t able to muster the 21 votes needed to confirm Alston, with Lieutenant Governor Ralph Northome, a Democrat, casting the deciding vote. (WUSA [WASHINGTON, D.C.])
Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson (R) said he is in favor of keeping his state’s “private option” Medicaid enrollment – which served as a model for similar expansions in Iowa and Indiana among other states – but only with some significant changes. In a speech to special advisory groups he created to consider whether to keep or discard the current enrollment system - which uses federal Medicaid expansion funds to pay for private insurance for approximately 200,000 Razorback State residents who do not qualify for traditional Medicaid - Hutchinson suggested requiring enrollees whose income is above the federal poverty level to pay premiums equaling 2 percent of their household income, with lower income enrollees shifted to traditional Medicaid rather than private insurance. He also wants low-income workers with access to insurance through their employer to use that coverage instead of Medicaid, with the state picking up the cost of their deductibles and premiums.
Lawmakers, who must reauthorize the program for it to continue, are expected to meet in a special session this year to determine its fate. Although the expansion has drawn stiff opposition from conservative quarters, the decision to end or retain it is not a simple one. As reported by the Arkansas News, “if the state continues it’s current program, its portion of the cost will go from zero to 5 percent in 2017, with its share gradually increasing to 10 percent by 2020.” But Hutchinson also noted that a private consulting firm the state hired has estimated the program will save the state’s budget $438 million between 2017 and 2021, while costing it between $50 million and $60 million per year between 2021 and 2023. (NEW YORK TIMES, ARKANSAS NEWS)
North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory (R) and legislative leaders have finally agreed to spend $21.74 billion this fiscal year. The state has been operating without a budget - running on continuing resolutions instead - since the new fiscal year began on July 1, and a difference of opinion on what size the overall budget should be has been holding up negotiations on that overdue spending plan.
The Senate had passed a $21.47 billion budget, maintaining that the state needs to restrict spending despite the fact that it’s running a surplus. And the House had passed a $22.15 budget, contending that the state must make up for cuts made during the recession. The newly approved budget amount falls roughly in the middle of those two figures and represents a 3.1 percent increase over the previous budget.
“This agreement is the result of ongoing dialog during the last several weeks,” Gov. McCrory said in a statement. “We remain committed to working with the House and Senate to find common sense solutions that create jobs, strengthen education and fund critical infrastructure in North Carolina.”
Budget writers from both chambers will now decide how to divvy up the money for each major budget area, including health, education and public safety. And then lawmakers will decide which programs are going to be funded and which will be cut. (WRAL TV [RALEIGH], LEXISNEXIS STATE NET)
At least 25 states have either passed or considered legislation aimed at bringing the efficiencies of public retirement systems to new pension plans for workers in the private sector, according to the Pension Rights Center. Illinois, Oregon and Washington have passed such plans, while California and several other states have approved measures providing for studies of the issue.
Source: Pension Rights Center
Legend:
Passed legislation creating new public-style plans for private-sector workers: Illinois, Oregon, Washington
Approved public-style private pension plan studies: California, Connecticut, Maryland, Minnesota, New York, Utah, Vermont, Virginia
Considered/considering legislation related to the issue: Arizona, Colorado, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts*, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Dakota, Ohio, West Virginia, Wisconsin
* Enacted pension plan for non-profits
As a young man, California resident Scott Kirchner was admittedly not concerned with saving money for retirement.
“Until I was probably 31, the idea of saving any money for anything was foreign to me,” he says.
Now, at age 56 and with the knowledge that he is far closer to the end of his working life than the beginning, he says thinking about retirement is a daily thing. But with barely two-thirds of one year’s salary currently in savings, he fears what that future may look like.
Kirchner is not alone. And while he understandably frets about his situation, he is actually better off than millions of Americans who have done far less to prepare for the eventual day when they can no longer work. According to a report from the National Institute on Retirement Security released in 2013, 45 percent of the current private sector workforce - some 38 million working age households - owns no retirement vehicle, such as a 401(k) or Individual Retirement Account (IRA), at all. Even those with retirement accounts are in a tentative position, with balances that average just a few thousand dollars. In all, American households with workers between the ages of 25 and 64 have a retirement savings gap of between $6.8 trillion and $14 trillion, depending on the financial measurement used.
That is almost sure to have grim consequences for future generations, according to research done by Notalys, a research company based in Provo, Utah. A study it released in January showed that 20 percent of all Beehive State workers will retire with more accumulated debt than savings, something that will ultimately cost taxpayers in that state $3.7 billion in additional public assistance. Conversely, even a 10 percent increase in retirement savings by those same workers would save the state and federal governments $194 million over a 15-year period.
There are many reasons why Americans don’t do a better job of stockpiling cash for retirement, but one of the primary roadblocks is not having access to a retirement vehicle through an employer. According to research done at Boston College, only about half of all households headed by a worker 55 or over in 2013 had access to a 401(k) plan. And while anyone whose employer doesn’t offer such a plan will find numerous IRA offerings for individuals on the open market, the reality is that relatively few make the effort to do so. According to the U.S. Department of Economic Analysis, Americans currently save on average less than 5 percent of their income, among the lowest in the industrialized world.
That can be dramatically improved via access to a work-sponsored retirement savings plan, says Sarah Mysiewicz Gill, senior legislative representative for AARP.
“The reality is that people are 15 times more likely to save for retirement if they have a retirement plan at work,” she said during a panel discussion on retirement security held at the National Conference of State Legislatures annual meeting in Seattle in August. “People want to save for retirement. They just don’t always know where to start.”
That situation is not lost on state lawmakers, who foresee a tsunami of retirees suddenly becoming dependent upon government programs to help them get by in what should be their golden years. As such, a growing number have in recent years taken action to implement some form of IRA- and 401(k)-like savings plans for workers without access to them through their employer. Under these “retirement security” proposals, workers would be able to have a certain percentage of their pay put into an investment pool created by the state but overseen by a professional private sector pension management company. In most – but not all – proposals, eligible workers would automatically be enrolled unless they choose to opt out. Employers would be able to match those deposits, though not be required to do so. Employers would, however, be required to use their payroll system to make the employees’ contribution but would bear no fiscal costs or any of the usual fiduciary responsibility that comes with offering a retirement plan.
Since 2012, lawmakers in at least 25 states have introduced measures to create such plans. California adopted the first that year (SB 1234), but it required that an extensive legal and market analysis take place before it could be implemented. That study – conducted and paid for by private sector companies - is ongoing, with a final report expected to be released to lawmakers before the end of the year. But, presuming the program is given the green light, lawmakers will still have to pass an actual implementation bill next year before the program can be put into effect.
That doesn’t concern SB 1234’s co-author, current Senate President pro Tem Kevin de Leon (D), who said last week he doubts the impending report will indicate a need for any significant changes to the proposal.
In the meantime, other states have since come on board. This year, governors in Oregon, Washington and Illinois have signed private sector pension bills into law, with all three set to take effect in 2017. Oregon’s and Illinois’ laws establish California-style plans that automatically enroll workers unless they opt out; Washington’s sets up a marketplace where eligible employers are connected with private sector pension plan operators, with participation strictly voluntary for both employers and their workers. The laws also vary on other key points, such as how many workers a company may employ to be eligible for the program: In Illinois and Oregon, the law applies to companies with at least 25 workers; in Washington companies with 100 or fewer workers are eligible. California’s plan would apply to companies with as few as five workers.
While momentum seems to be building for these programs, challenges remain. Private sector pension management companies, for instance, have resisted proposals in which the government maintained management of the new retirement accounts, insisting they do not want to compete with the state. But perhaps most significant is whether these measures would run afoul of the federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA), which governs the management of private retirement plans. But advocates received a major boost in July when President Barack Obama directed the U.S. Department of Labor to clarify the ERISA rules to ensure that states would be able to move forward with their offerings. The new rules are expected by the end of this calendar year.
Washington Sen. Larry Springer (D), who also addressed the NCSL retirement session, said he and his colleagues are under no illusion that any of these plans will by themselves solve what many observers see as an impending retirement crisis. But their value is more than just in the dollars and cents they help some workers accumulate.
“This is only a start. It will not mean a secure retirement for every Washington worker,” he said. “What we’re hoping for is that it creates a culture of saving and planning for the future, particularly among young people.”
Every sport has its own lingo, the tossing around of which identifies the user as that most treasured of things – the insider. Politics is no different, and in fact has a whole language unto itself spoken under every Capitol dome. The Sacramento Bee did a nice piece recently laying out many of the terms said insiders use, from “gut and amend” (substituting language in a successful bill with that from a failed one) to “poison pill,” i.e. an amendment inserted into a bill to make sure it gets voted down. My personal favorite is “I wasn’t going to speak today,” universal code for introducing a longwinded floor speech. Alternately known as “I’ll be brief.”
In a guest viewpoint appearing in The Register-Guard of Eugene, Oregon last week, retired teacher and counselor Gary Crum advocates for the adoption of a proper impeachment process in the state “to address serious transgressions by state officials.”
Crum says Oregon’s “lack of an impeachment process promotes the more frequent use of the recall, which is “available as a weapon to use against political opponents,” as demonstrated in the recall efforts directed at both Republican and Democratic senators in Wisconsin in 2011 for supporting efforts to curb the influence of public employee unions and fleeing the state to delay a vote on the union issue, respectively.
Crum’s comments came specifically in response to a recall campaign aimed at Oregon state Sen. Floyd Prozanski (D). And whether impeachment is substantially less political than the recall process is debatable. But Crum’s article raises the interesting point that although Oregon is one of just 19 states that allow the recall of state officials, it is the only state without an impeachment process. (REGISTER-GUARD [EUGENE])
Last September the Washington Supreme Court held the state’s Legislature in contempt for failing to obey the court’s order in 2012 (McCleary v. Washington) to adequately fund K-12 education. Last week the court handed down the punishment for that transgression: a fine of $100,000 for each day the state fails to comply with the McCleary ruling, to be deposited in a separate account for schools.
But it looks as though the state isn’t going to be able to comply with that order immediately either. Although a spokesman for Gov. Jay Inslee (D) said, “We take the court’s sanctions very seriously,” after conferring with the state’s AG, the governor had concluded that legislation was required before a separate account could be created. However, the spokesman also said the state would keep a tally of the fine. And Inslee said his office would “work vigorously” with lawmakers “to tee up a solution” to the school funding problem that could potentially be approved in a special session before the end of the year. (SEATTLE TIMES)
One of the many things that sound just riotously funny when you’re stoned is to have a sign or some other public marker that uses the numbers “420.” For the uninitiated, 420 is yet another slang term for marijuana, aka “weed,” “chronic” or, if you’re old like me, “boo” or “hippie lettuce.” In any case, as the Sacramento Bee reports, Idaho is the latest state to remove the mile marker 420 sign from roadways as a hedge against them being stolen by stoners who undoubtedly have just the perfect place scoped out on their wall to display their prize. The Gem State instead has a sign that reads 419.9. It was preceded in making the change by Washington and Colorado, where – unlike Idaho – recreational marijuana use is legal. No word if any special protections are now in place for those chocolate cookies with the icing center and large bags of salted peanuts in the shell.
OREGON Gov. Kate Brown (D) signs SB 932, a bill that allows qualifying unauthorized immigrants who were brought to the United States as minors to receive state financial aid for college (EASTERN OREGONIAN [PENDELTON]).
As part of his plan for fixing what he believes is ailing his state,” Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner (R) wants to allow municipalities to file for bankruptcy. And a state lawmaker has introduced legislation to do just that.
A dozen states already permit municipalities to file for Chapter 9 bankruptcy protection and a dozen more allow that action under certain circumstances. Over the last 60 years 63 municipalities have filed for bankruptcy, eight coming in the last five years, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
But critics say Rep. Ron Sandack’s (R) proposed measure, HB 298, would hurt municipal bondholders, including regular people who own such bonds indirectly through mutual funds. Bankruptcy lawyer Lee Bogdanoff said when Detroit filed for bankruptcy in 2013, “creditors really took it on the chin,” with the city initially proposing to pay 10 percent of what it owed. The city of San Bernadino, California only offered to pay a penny on the dollar.
Despite municipal bankruptcy being a part of Gov. Rauner’s “Turnaround Agenda,” however, HB 298 faces a battle.
“In Illinois, it’s unlikely that a bankruptcy law would be passed, and even more unlikely that what might be passed would protect bondholders over employees,” said Municipal Market Analytics partner Matt Fabian. “The cost of capital would very likely rise.”
And although Illinois’ cities might appreciate having the bankruptcy option -- the Illinois Municipal League has pushed the idea -- another proposed item on Rauner’s Turnaround Agenda may be a bigger concern for them: the cutting of their share of state revenue by half.
According to Carrie Sloan of the Roosevelt Institute’s ReFund America Project, severe funding cuts are what really hurt Detroit.
“At a time when other cities were starting to recover [from the 2008 financial crisis], Detroit’s revenue was cut sharply by the state,” she said. “That was what pushed the city over the edge.” (CANTON DAILY LEDGER, LEXISNEXIS STATE NET)
Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam (R) is exploring the possibility of outsourcing a wide breadth of facilities management jobs to a private sector company. If they come to fruition, those changes would impact workers at state-run prisons, universities, state parks and a variety of other buildings. The state Department of General Services posted a “request for information” last week that, as reported by the Nashville Tennessean, listed 19 types of positions that would be outsourced, “including everything from security and custodial work to financial accounting for business operations” with an additional 10 “future potential components” that might be involved in any outsourcing include food services, project management and “master planning.”
Haslam defended the request, saying the state is looking to save money that it can then use for other needs, such as education.
“What we’re trying to solve is, we spend a lot of money on our facilities, in rent and maintenance and other ways. Can we provide that same function at a lower cost?” he told reporters last Tuesday. (NASHVILLE TENNESSEAN)
Just six weeks into the new fiscal year, LOUISIANA lawmakers have already been forced to make $4.6 million in budget cuts. While that amount is only a fraction of the state’s $25 billion budget, the cuts are likely a sign of things to come, given dropping oil prices and concerns that new taxes and fees might not generate the revenues projected for them (TIMES-PICAYUNE [NEW ORLEANS])
- Compiled by KOREY CLARK
The U.S. Office of National Drug Control Policy announces it will hire public safety and public health coordinators for five areas in the northeast hit the hardest by a growing epidemic of heroin abuse. The areas include parts of NEW YORK, NEW JERSEY, PENNSYLVANIA, MARYLAND, DISCTRICT OF COLUMBIA, New England and Appalachia. Officials said the focus will be on treatment of drug users rather than punishment (NEW YORK TIMES).
NEW YORK Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) signs SB 993, which bars people from smoking within 100 feet of an entrance to a public or private school while after school programs are in session (LONGISLAND.COM).
OREGON Gov. Kate Brown (D) signs HB 2300, so-called “right-to-try” legislation that allows doctors to prescribe to terminally ill patients medications that have not yet been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The Beaver State becomes the 24th to adopt such a measure in the last two years (LEXISNEXIS STATE NET).
CALIFORNIA Gov. Jerry Brown (D) signs AB 637, which allows physician assistants and nurse practitioners to approve patient wishes regarding resuscitative measures (CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR’S OFFICE).