Gov. Butch Otter is planning to be back in the saddle - literally - by this spring, and riding on the rodeo circuit again by summer, reports Dan Popkey of the Idaho Statesman. Otter, 66, just returned to work last week from major shoulder surgery…
The room was as packed as it could be at the Senate Health & Welfare Committee today, where there were a whopping 12 bills on the agenda for introduction. It's the final day for introducing bills in non-privileged committees; the Senate plans to go back…
Senate Finance Chairman Dean Cameron, R-Rupert, says the first effect of the new federal economic stimulus legislation's passage could be that Idaho doesn't have to make two big transfers from its public education stabilization fund - one that's in HB 61 and already passed the…
HB 61, the legislation that makes Gov. Butch Otter's 4 percent holdbacks, or mid-year budget cuts, permanent, passed the House 68-1 a week ago, but when it came up for a vote today in the full Senate, Senate Finance Chairman Dean Cameron, R-Rupert, asked to…
It was a close 10-8 vote, but the House Revenue & Taxation Committee has agreed to introduce legislation that would hike Idaho's beer and wine taxes - which haven't been increased in more than 40 years - more than threefold to provide a stable funding…
Each year, three North Idaho state representatives - Reps. Bob Nonini, R-Coeur d'Alene, Frank Henderson, R-Post Falls, and Eric Anderson, R-Priest Lake - take the lobbyists out to dinner on the reps' own personal dime. Last week, the annual dinner drew about 35 lobbyists, Nonini…