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Few Election Surprises Expected In Western States
As in the United States as a whole, talk of improving public education, curbing the costs of prescription drugs and snuffing out urban sprawl are dominating races up and down the ballot in nearly every western state. In the 13 states from the Rockies to Hawaii, voters will select nine U.S. Senators, three governors and […]
States Hark Back In Choice of Designs For Quarters
For the first time since the Susan B. Anthony dollar wobbled into history two decades ago, Americans have a new reason to keep an eye on their money. The U.S. Mint, perhaps the most dust-covered of all the federal bureaucracies, is allowing each of the 50 states a chance to breathe new life into our […]
States To Lose Billions For Children’s Health
As many as 37 states are set to lose more than $1 billion meant for health care for low-income children because they will miss a September deadline to spend the money. The states had three years to use a grant appropriated by Congress in 1998, but the Health Care Financing Administration estimates 75 percent of […]
Minnesota Tops For Kids, Report Finds
Because of its low poverty rate and success in keeping teenagers in school, Minnesota is the best place to be a kid, a national report has found. In its annual survey of the well-being of children in the 50 states, the Annie E. Casey Foundation ranks Minnesota number one, displacing last year’s winner, New Hampshire. […]
Experts Encouraged By Decline in Child Abuse
The tidal wave of child abuse and neglect that has cascaded across the United States over the past 15 years is ebbing and because states are now taking a more aggressive approach to the problem, there is reason to hope the declines will continue, experts say. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reports […]
State Campaigns Against Identity Theft Enter New Phase
Imagine you return from a trip abroad. You are detained at the border, arrested and thrown in jail for a crime committed by someone else posing as you. It’s the worst-case scenario for a victim of identity theft, say experts, a crime that has hit more and more people in the United States in the […]
Births to Teenagers Drop in Every State
Teen birth rates continued to decline in 1998 and have hit their lowest level since 1986. Births to women age 15-19 fell significantly in every state and the District of Columbia, the Centers for Disease Control reported Tuesday. In 1998, the latest year for which data are available, births to teenagers dropped another two percent […]
Internet Raises Questions About States Rights
With the growth of the Internet, states face the most serious threat to their ability to enforce their laws since the rise of catalog sales and the repeal of Prohibition. The states have just begun to grapple with the loss of tax revenue to Internet transactions — an Advisory Commission on Electronic Commerce, chaired by […]
States Advance In Extending Health Insurance To Poor Kids
The Clinton administration announced Tuesday that 47 states have enrolled almost two million children in their Children’s Health Insurance Programs. Between December 1998 and October 1999, the states doubled enrollment in CHIP, according to the Health Care Financing Administration. Congress created CHIP in 1997. The program provides states with $24 billion over five years to […]
States Take The Lead On Minimum Wage
While Congress is unlikely to pass an increase in the federal minimum wage this year, four states – Delaware, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Vermont — seized the initiative in 1999 and voted to increase their wage rates. Massachusetts and Vermont already demanded employers pay their workers more than the current federal minimum of .15/hour. Rhode […]
Public Housing Agencies Experiment With Time Limits
KENT COUNTY, DE — When she went to renew her lease this summer, Dalphine Moore was surprised to learn that she was about to become one of the first participants in yet another federal experiment: a program designed to move families out of public housing. A 36 year-old single mother in the process of working […]
New Federal Rules Force Action In Alaska, Wisconsin
New federal regulations that arrive with the onset of the fiscal year, Friday, October 1, forced decisions by lawmakers in Wisconsin and Alaska this week. In Alaska, lawmakers let a deadline imposed by the U.S. Department of the Interior pass, letting the federal government assume control of fisheries. In Wisconsin, where the Assembly and Senate […]