The wildfire season has barely begun, and already hundreds of homes have burned in Colorado and 66 homes in southern Idaho were destroyed over the weekend. The U.S. secretaries of homeland security and agriculture came to Boise on Tuesday to check in with national fire…
Idaho Rep. Raul Labrador has joined Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., Rep. Michele Bachman, R-Minn., and a group of other national lawmakers in signing a letter urging all 50 states' governors not to implement health care exchanges as required under the national health care reform law…
Rep. Max Black, R-Boise, moved to approve the budget for the state's official governor's residence - the former Simplot mansion - for next year of $177,400 as proposed. "I don't think there's any question in anybody's mind that this isn't something we can just let…
Gov. Butch Otter today appointed Chief Deputy State Controller Brandon Woolf to temporarily serve as state controller while Controller Donna Jones continues to recuperate from a May 25 car accident. Otter said the move came at Jones' request. “Donna takes her oath of office to…
The Governor's Housing Committee meeting today has drawn a number of members of the public who are objecting to Idaho continuing to maintain the former Simplot home as a governor's residence and state event facility, though no Idaho governor has lived there. One even suggested…
The Governor's Housing Committee has set a public meeting for this afternoon, after a senator on the panel objected that an earlier vote by email on the committee's budget for the upcoming year for upkeep of the hilltop former Simplot mansion violated the Idaho Open…
The Idaho Lottery has announced it's going to bid on its contract for marketing services, a $600,000 a year contract that since 2009 has been held by the Boise firm DaviesMoore. "Our prudent examination of how we operate the Lottery, and taking our advertising and…
Dick Eardley, Boise's longest-serving mayor, died over the weekend at a local hospital at the age of 83. His son, Randy Eardley, told KIVI-TV, “He had undergone minor knee surgery, and was feeling great Friday.” He then suffered a heart attack on Saturday and died…
A labor dispute between longshoremen and electrical workers at the Port of Portland has backed up all the way to Lewiston, the AP reports, where some shippers are opting for more expensive truck shipments rather than risk delays in loading their products and sending them…
A national legal settlement with drug maker GlaxoSmithKline will bring Idaho more than $1.6 million, Idaho Attorney General Lawrence Wasden announced today, including $732,750 to reimburse Idaho's Medicaid program, and $877,679 to go into Idaho's general fund. The firm will pay another $3.7 million to…
Outgoing Idaho state Rep. Phil Hart has filed a Chapter 13 bankruptcy plan in federal court that proposes that he pay $200 a month for five years - a total of $12,000 - to get his entire debt of more than $600,000 discharged. The vast…
The Idaho Division of Public Health has issued a fish advisory, warning that catfish caught in the lower Boise River have been found to have high levels of mercury, and pregnant women or children age 15 and younger should limit their consumption. Catfish often absorb…
Here's a news item from the Associated Press: NAMPA, Idaho (AP) ― A petition supported by Idaho grocers seeks to stagger the distribution of food stamp benefits. Grocers have complained to state lawmakers that they've been swamped by food-stamp recipients on the first day of…
Idaho Democratic lawmakers have issued a call for the governor and Republican legislators to return to planning for a state-run health insurance exchange, now that the U.S. Supreme Court has upheld the national health care reform law. "That will mean either an Executive Order or…
Idaho Congressman Raul Labrador reacted to Thursday's U.S. Supreme Court decision on health care reform by saying the nation's founding fathers would be "appalled." He wasn't the only one invoking the founding fathers in the wake of the controversial decision. But David Adler, constitutional scholar…