Senate

CARSON CITY – A new federal program is bringing $13.8 million to Nevada to lend to small businesses to spur job growth, Gov. Brian Sandoval announced earlier this week.
The funds provided to Nevada’s State Small Business Credit Initiative (SSBCI) by the Small Business Jobs Act are expected to help create private sector jobs and spur more than $138 million in additional lending to small businesses in Nevada, Sandoval said.

CARSON CITY – Gov. Brian Sandoval has appointed Steve Hill as interim executive director of the newly created Office of Economic Development, a cabinet level position in his administration.

CARSON CITY – Racial gerrymandering, fracturing, packing, nesting – a three-hour hearing today in Carson City District Court over how to draw Nevada’s new political boundaries was full of arcane concepts and obscure terminology.
The much anticipated ruling from Judge James Todd Russell on guidelines for drawing those new districts will have major ramifications, however, for the state’s voters and its two major political parties.

CARSON CITY – Gov. Brian Sandoval and legislative leaders today announced their appointments to the new Economic Development Board, which will focus on job creation and economic diversification.

CARSON CITY – Nevada’s newest representative to Washington, DC was in the air today on his way east to be sworn in as the fourth person to serve in the 2nd Congressional District.
In an interview today before departing for his new job, former state Sen. Mark Amodei said he expects to be sworn into office Thursday and be casting votes the same day.

CARSON CITY – The results of the vote in the special election in the 2nd Congressional District went the way that most pundits had predicted: Republican and former state Sen. Mark Amodei will assume the seat vacated with the appointment of Dean Heller to the U.S. Senate.

CARSON CITY – So how much are Nevada taxpayers shelling out to educate children attending the state’s 17 public school districts this year?
And if the answer is not easy to ascertain, is it time to consider revising the 44-year old Nevada Plan, the admittedly complex formula used by the Legislature every two years to fund public education?

In a long awaited ruling, the federal nuclear safety agency has said Nevada can close down Yucca Mountain once and for all.
The Obama administration had asked Congress to zero out the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s (NRC) work on Yucca as a follow up to the prior  termination of funding at the Department of Energy (DOE) project. The NRC has directed that all project casework be wrapped up by the end of the month.

CARSON CITY – Nevada legislative leaders have selected Sen. John Lee, D-North Las Vegas, and Assemblyman William Horne, D-Las Vegas, to serve as nonvoting members of the Nevada Commission on Homeland Security.
Senate Majority Leader Steven Horsford, D-Las Vegas, last week selected Lee to serve on the panel, which meets quarterly to hear updates on Nevada’s efforts to deal with homeland security issues.

Nevada lawmakers today approved money to cover the costs of the upcoming special election, received an update on the progress of the state’s health care insurance exchange and complained repeatedly that state agencies were thumbing their noses at the legislative process.

School just started and every Republican state lawmaker has already received a failing grade from Nevada’s teachers’ union.
The Nevada State Education Association (NSEA) has released its 2011 legislative session report card and the 16 Assembly and 11 Senate Republicans all earned an F, according to the statewide association.

I guess it comes down to ideology. This budget mess we are now in really started two years ago when House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and crews refused to presen...

I guess it comes down to ideology. This budget mess we are now in really started two years ago when House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and crews refused to presen...

Democratic Rep. Shelley Berkley ventured into Republican Dean Heller's backyard Tuesday to say the big issue for next year's U.S. Senate campaign is job creation."For me there isn't a bigger issue,...

Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nevada, says he wishes the judge who ruled in the second congressional special election case had disclosed business interests he shared with Republican candidate Mark Amodei.

CARSON CITY – The Nevada Legislature’s representatives at the state Homeland Security Commission meetings have been no shows this year, and the lack of participation is being cited as a concern by members of the panel, including Gov. Brian Sandoval.

RENO – The two major party candidates running in the 2nd Congressional District special election to replace Dean Heller stuck to their talking points in a tame hour-long debate here today.
But the verbal jousting in front of about 150 people at the California Building in Idlewild Park still managed to illustrate the contrasts between Republican Mark Amodei and Democrat Kate Marshall.

CARSON CITY – Assembly Speaker and announced candidate for Congress John Oceguera acknowledged today that a number of Democrats are seeking seats in the House of Representatives in the 2012 election, and that hopefully any costly primary battles can be avoided.

HOMEWOOD - No progress has been made regarding if California will consider stipulations set forth in a Nevada Senate bill that threatens the Silver State's withdrawal from the Tahoe Regional Pla...

CARSON CITY – The Board of Examiners today approved a request for more than half a million dollars from a legislative contingency fund to pay the counties for the cost of the Sept. 13 special election in the 2nd Congressional District.

CARSON CITY – Secretary of State Ross Miller is seeking more than half a million dollars from a legislative contingency fund to pay the counties for the cost of the Sept. 13 special election in the 2nd Congressional District.

CARSON CITY – Gov. Brian Sandoval has appointed Las Vegas financial adviser Ken Wiles to the Economic Forum, a panel of mostly private citizen fiscal experts charged with making tax revenue projections for the state.

CARSON CITY – Nevada Secretary of State Ross Miller today released statewide active voter registration numbers through the end of July.
Statewide, Republican active voters increased to 407,866, a gain of 557 over the previous month; Democrat active voters totaled 472,987, an increase of 698; and non-partisans grew by 922 voters to a total of 179,112.

CARSON CITY – Nevada Democrat U.S. Senate candidate Byron Georgiou said he is in the race to win it in 2012 despite facing opposition from U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.

CARSON CITY – Rep. Joe Heck, R-Nev., announced today he will back a spending reduction plan put forth by House Speaker John Boehner because it proposes a balanced budget amendment that will protect the United States’ AAA credit rating.
A vote on the plan scheduled for today was delayed, however.

CARSON CITY – State officials and lawmakers are rejecting the suggestion that they acted improperly last year when fees generated from several college savings programs were shifted to shore up the cash-strapped Gov. Guinn Millennium Scholarship for academically eligible Nevada high school graduates.
But one former lawmaker, who voted for the transfer, acknowledges he remains concerned about the decision.

CARSON CITY – Efforts to resolve Nevada’s redistricting impasse remain a work in progress after a proposal floated Tuesday by a Carson City judge to use county election officials to draw new legislative and congressional lines ran into some opposition.
The job of redrawing Nevada’s political lines has fallen to District Judge James Todd Russell after two Democrat-approved redistricting plans were vetoed by Gov. Brian Sandoval. Sandoval vetoed the measures after concluding the proposals did not follow the federal Voting Rights Act.

A southern Nevada supermarket will now offer customers the ability to renew or reinstate automobile registrations on the way to the produce aisle.
The newest self-service “DMV in a Box” kiosk opens today in an Albertson’s grocery store at 4850 W. Craig Road in Las Vegas. It is the first supermarket in southern Nevada to host such a kiosk.

It's been a couple of weeks since I wrote about our local GOP candidate for Congress Mark Amodei and his politically opportunistic attempt to shed his moderate past and prove he's just as crazy as the other Tea Party people by declaring he would vote against raising the debt ceiling.