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Fulton commissioners use on-duty police for rides to meetings, appearances
On-duty police officers routinely chauffeur Fulton County commissioners around town in apparent violation of the board’s own policy prohibiting the practice. Commissioners have asked officers to drive them to the airport, to concerts and to scores of other public events in recent years, even though county rules forbid using police officers to transport elected officials,…
Read MoreObamacare work in progress for Appalachian residents in Floyd County, KY
Four months after the Affordable Care Act took effect, a team of journalists from USA Today and The Courier-Journal has found that in Floyd County, Obamacare is a neither a train wreck nor a cure-all. It’s a work in progress; widely misrepresented and misunderstood, it’s helped some people and hurt others, while a handful seem…
Read MoreIllinois Department of Transportation increased the number of patronage positions
The Illinois Department of Transportation increased the number of patronage positions — jobs that can be filled based on politics or loyalty — by 57 percent in the last decade, documents released Friday show.
Read MorePhysical therapy has become Medicare gold mine
A few miles from the Coney Island boardwalk in Brooklyn stands an outpost of what, on paper, is a giant of American medicine. Nothing about the place hints at the money that is said to flow there. But in 2012, according to federal data, $4.1 million from Medicare coursed through the office in a modest…
Read MoreMilwaukee County Board pays labor law firm for secretive counsel
Supervisor Marina Dimitrijevic gets a number of perks as the chairwoman of the Milwaukee County Board, ranging from better pay than her colleagues to the power to appoint committee leaders. And, it now appears, the Bay View Democrat also gets her own private law firm.
Read MoreFBI examines lobbying by Brownback loyalists
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is exploring whether confidantes of Gov. Sam Brownback operated influence-peddling operations in Kansas pivoting on personal access to the Republican governor and top administration officials. The Topeka Capital-Journal learned the months-long inquiry involves Parallel Strategies, a rapidly expanding Topeka consulting and lobbying firm created in 2013 by a trio of…
Read MoreSavannah companies owned by women, minorities not contacted for school construction despite contractor’s pledge
When the Savannah-Chatham School Board agreed to pay JE Dunn/Rives E. Worrell construction company $21 million to build a new Hesse Elementary campus, they believed the 50 percent JE Dunn/Rives E. Worrell promised to women- and minority-owned subcontractors would make a huge impact on the local economy. Now, that’s open to question.
Read MoreFederal judges admit conflicts of interest
When Linda Wolicki-Gables and her husband appealed a lawsuit all the way to the second-highest court in the nation against Johnson & Johnson over a malfunctioning medication pump that had been implanted in her body, the couple had no idea that one of the judges who decided their case had a financial stake in the…
Read MoreWashington state loses waiver for No Child Left Behind
Washington has become the first state in the country to lose its waiver for No Child Left Behind. This after the state voted down the use of student test scores as part of teacher evaluations. Schools will lose control of about $40 million. However, private tutoring companies could be positioned to reap the benefits. With…
Read MoreIncrease in heroin use brings longer waiting lists for addiction treatment centers in New York region
Today, the recovering addict climbs into a taxi cab at 5 a.m. every weekday for a 60-mile drive to Crouse Hospital in Syracuse, where he receives methadone treatment. And that came only after a two-month delay on the program’s waiting list, which is now often nine months or longer. Across the Southern Tier, getting hooked…
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