Some have declared the outcome of the state superintendent’s race to be a wholesale rejection of recent changes to public education in our state. Such a pronouncement is an oversimplification at best.
The last few weeks have been interesting; for all the hyperbole surrounding the presidential election, some 3 million fewer votes were cast for the president than in 2008. Go figure. As a snapshot of what that means, John McCain got 2 million more votes than Mitt Romney this year, while the president garnered 3 million fewer. In the end, the margin was about 2.5 million votes.
Indiana lawmakers reviewing the embattled Department of Child Services voted Tuesday to localize more decisions on when to investigate cases of child abuse and neglect and set up a permanent oversight committee at the Statehouse.
Marion County’s trial judges are selected by a process used nowhere else in the state, and, as far as I know, nowhere on this planet. In the May primary elections, the two major parties each nominate only half the number of judges that will be elected in the general election.
Supporters and opponents of gay marriage are already squaring off in a battle over whether to amend Indiana's constitution that could stretch until voters decide the issue in November 2014.
A new set of projections released Monday estimates that expanding Medicaid coverage as called for in President Obama’s 2010 health reform law would cost the state government less than $54 million per year on average over the next decade—far lower than projections issued by the actuarial firm hired by Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels’ administration.
Indiana's new superintendent of public instruction, Democrat Glenda Ritz, said she can make some policy changes for the state's schools without needing the approval of the Republican-controlled General Assembly and governor's office.
State tax collections—the lifeblood of the budget and everything from road-paving to classroom sizes—could remain stagnant as the state continues to crawl out of the recession.
During Republican Tony Bennett’s tenure as superintendent of public instruction, Indiana became the poster child for school choice. But with Bennett’s surprising election loss to Democrat Glenda Ritz this month, the future of charter schools and private-school vouchers is murkier.
State Rep. Ed Clere plans to introduce a bill that would give municipalities explicit powers to create land banks, which can sell surplus property for redevelopment. He also wants to include a revenue source to support land-bank operations and eliminate tax-foreclosure sales as a form of investor speculation.
As I’ve traveled across Indiana and met with Hoosier employees, business executives and civic groups over the past two years, I’ve heard many stories about the complex, unfair nature of our federal tax code.
The Court issued no decision on Wednesday about the program, which is currently giving scholarships of roughly $4,000 to 9,324 students around Indiana to attend 289 private schools, nearly all of which are religious.
Attorneys responded to pointed questions and knotty hypothetical scenarios thrown at them by the five justices on the Indiana Supreme Court during a legal battle Wednesday morning over Indiana’s school-voucher program.
House Speaker Brian Bosma used the ceremonial opening of Indiana's legislative session Tuesday to call for bipartisanship, even though Republicans now enjoy a supermajority that largely allows them to circumvent Democrats to push through their plans.
Incoming state school Superintendent Glenda Ritz says she intends to remove herself as a plaintiff in a lawsuit that seeks to overturn the state's popular school voucher program.
