Headlines
Romney to propose voucher-like education overhaul
States looking to new tolls to pay for highways
WI: County officials: State push for W-2 privatization threatens Job Center efforts
VA: Virginia State Fair sold for $5.7M
FL: Judge to weigh Florida prison health privatization
TX: Armed with new data from toll road critics, Mayor wants answers
NC: NC House wants to go slow on prisoner health care
CA: Oceanside City Council rejects outsourcing public works services
Romney to propose voucher-like education overhaul
Shifting from the economy to education, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney was proposing a voucher-style system that could significantly alter the public school system and revive the debate over school choice…The plan is line with GOP reforms aimed at giving students more educational choices. But it’s unclear how schools in areas that depend on the federal funding would fare. The proposal was not expected to include any new federal money for education. AP
States looking to new tolls to pay for highways
Driving onto an Interstate highway? Crossing a bridge on the way into work? Taking a tunnel under a river or bay? Get ready to pay. With Congress unwilling to contemplate an increase in the federal gas tax, motorists are likely to be paying ever more tolls as the government searches for ways to repair and expand the nation’s congested highways. Tolling is less efficient and sometimes can seem less fair than the main alternative, gasoline taxes. It can increase traffic on side roads as motorists seek to evade paying. Some tolling authorities — often quasi-governmental agencies operating outside the public eye — have been plagued by mismanagement. And some public-private partnerships to build toll roads have drowned in debt because of too-rosy revenue predictions. Boston.com
WI: County officials: State push for W-2 privatization threatens Job Center efforts
Dane County officials say the state has quietly put in motion a plan to privatize its W-2 program that will cut assistance to the jobless and destabilize coordinated services such as those at the county’s Job Center. “With the economy the way it is, we need these services more than ever, and we can’t afford to take apart a system that works,” County Executive Joe Parisi said Wednesday. “The speed at which they are doing this and the fact that it is flying under the radar causes me concern.” The Wisconsin Department of Children and Families has set a June 11 deadline for proposals from counties and private businesses that want to administer the W-2 “welfare to work” program. Wisconsin State Journal
VA: Virginia State Fair sold for $5.7M
The owner of a Tennessee-based amusement company placed the winning bid for the State Fair of Virginia, buying both the 150-year-old fair and the event site, which includes where Triple Crown winner Secretariat was born. Washington Post
FL: Judge to weigh Florida prison health privatization
Eight months after a judge tossed out a controversial prison-privatization plan, attorneys will argue next week about the constitutionality of a state decision to contract with companies to provide inmate health care. Leon County Circuit Judge Kevin Carroll will hold a hearing Tuesday focusing on budget fine print that lawmakers approved last year directing the Florida Department of Corrections to privatize prison health services. Opponents, including the Florida Nurses Association and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, filed lawsuits early this year challenging the move. Like in the prison-privatization case, they argue that lawmakers improperly used the budget fine print — known as proviso language — to require the health care changes. The News-Press
TX: Armed with new data from toll road critics, Mayor wants answers
Council members Angela Hunt, Sandy Greyson and Scott Griggs have shown him data and other information from state officials they believe prove that the toll road is both more expensive and less effective than improving Interstates 30 and 35, Rawlings said. The new information contrasts with the answers he got when he was forming his opinion of the Trinity toll road, Rawlings said. As a result he has given TxDOT 30 days to present a simple matrix with the two approaches’ costs and benefits side-by-side. Dallas Morning News
NC: NC House wants to go slow on prisoner health care
Legislators are trying to prevent North Carolina prison officials from privatizing inmate medical care for all of the state’s adult prisoners unless they get the express approval of the General Assembly. House leaders, some of whom have heard state workers’ objections to privatization, amended the measure earlier in the day in their budget-writing committee to include a provision that would restrict what actions the Department of Public Safety could take on the issue of prisoner health services through June 2013. Daily Reflector
CA: Oceanside City Council rejects outsourcing public works services
City Council voted against outsourcing city trash removal, weed abatement and landfill maintenance services on May 16. Outsourcing city street sweeping services and recreational custodial services also failed in a split vote…“We’re talking 18 cents per month per household by eliminating four positions that will have a catastrophic effect on the rest of the department,” Chip Brust, president of Oceanside Employees Association, said. “We’re just nickel and diming what’s really the problem, furlough pay reductions across the board,” Councilman Jack Feller said. “I want to go in that direction, not in this direction.” Over 30 public works division employees came to the council meeting and half a dozen employees addressed city council. They said they wanted to keep their jobs and spoke in support of fellow workers…Loss of city control if work was outsourced was also discussed. The Coast News