Here’s a link to the ninth week of Idaho’s legislative session in pictures, as a slide show. Let your cursor hover over the bottom part of the picture frame, and the captions will appear as the slide show plays. Tonight, on Idaho Public Television’s “Idaho…
Here's a link to my full story on today's approval of a plan to hire more tax auditors to go after a chunk of Idaho's "tax gap" next year - and help balance the budget - and here's a link to my story on the…
District 1 lawmakers won $5,000 for their local schools today, as part of Regence BlueShield of Idaho's fifth annual "Move It" competition, which pits lawmakers against each other by district to see who can take the most steps in a four-week walking challenge, as measured…
He's still made no official announcement, but Gov. Butch Otter today put the speculation to rest over whether he'll seek a second term: He will. Otter filed his candidacy papers with the Secretary of State's office today. Also filing today were Republican Vaughn Ward, who's…
Final passage in the House came unanimously today for SB 1329, legislation from the Idaho Sheriff's Association regarding when two boats bump. The bill raises the trigger for mandatory investigations of boat accidents from $500 in damages, to $1,500 in damages - matching state law…
The Senate State Affairs Committee has voted 6-1 to send SB 1271, the last remaining immigration bill this session, to the Senate's 14th Order for amendment, after a two-hour hearing that drew extensive testimony overwhelmingly opposed to the bill. Among its provisions: Anyone falsifying documents…
Idaho's Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) has run out of money three weeks earlier than usual, due to increased demand, and is shutting down today; it usually operates through April 1. “This year was an incredibly difficult year for tens of thousands of Idaho…
Now that most state agency budgets have been set by the Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee, the committee has gone through a series of unanimous votes on transfers from various funds necessary to balance the state's budget, both this year and next year. "We have to have…
JFAC has voted unanimously, 18-0, in favor of the proposed budget for the state Tax Commission from Reps. Wendy Jaquet and Darrell Bolz, which includes a boost in both permanent and temporary staffers in the audits and collections division, both to make up cuts from…
Rep. Darrell Bolz, R-Caldwell, said Gov. Butch Otter has a compliance initiative aimed at closing what the state Tax Commission estimates as a $67 million annual "tax gap" in taxes due, but not collected. "What we're trying to do in this tight economic time is…
The plan developed by Reps. Darrell Bolz and Wendy Jaquet to phase in an increase in tax auditors next year calls for first restoring cuts already made in the audit and collections to 2009 levels. Without that restoration, the Tax Commission estimated it'd lose another…
Two JFAC members have come up with a plan to add tax auditors at the state Tax Commission in a carefully phased plan designed to collect $16.4 million more in already-owed taxes next year, and when they presented it at an early-morning workshop meeting of…
News, happenings and more from the Idaho Legislature and the state capital.
