© Phoenix Business Journal 2010 Business lobbyists are among the main advocates of a ballot measure asking voters to ditch Arizona’s public financing of election campaigns. The Arizona Senate is considering Senate Concurrent Resolution 1009, which would ask voters in November to rescind the state’s Clean Elections Law. Voters approved the law in 1998, allowing candidates for state office to finance their campaigns with public funds. It is facing court challenges. Some business interests worry that public campaign financing has allowed more ideological and less pro-business candidates on both sides of the political spectrum to win legislative races. More >>

®CNN.com 2010 With the health care summit showing no sign of getting either side to budge, lawmakers are staking out positions in the battle many believe is imminent: a presidential effort to push legislation through without Republican support.  On the political talk shows Sunday, Democratic and GOP leaders fought over budget reconciliation, the parliamentary procedure that could allow a vote in the Senate and circumvent a GOP filibuster. Read more.  ...
More >>

®A/P 2010 If you're at the Arizona Legislature trying to fend off a budget cut or promote a tax cut, create a new program or kill one, talk jobs - saving them, creating them, embracing them. With the state's unemployment rate at 9 percent after losing nearly 124,000 jobs in the past year, the word "jobs" is on the tip of many tongues at the Capitol this year.Read more. ...
More >>

If you purchased a home in 2009 or early 2010, you may be eligible to claim the First-Time Homebuyer Credit, whether you are a first-time homebuyer or a long-time resident purchasing a new home.    Here are seven things the IRS wants you to know about claiming the credit:  1.     You must buy – or enter into a binding contract to buy – a principal residence located in the United States on or before April 30, 2010. If you enter into a binding contract by April 30, 2010, you must close on the home on or before June 30, 2010.  2.     To be considered a first-time homebuyer, you and your spouse – if you are marrie ...
More >>

A California judge has overturned a 2003 ruling governing the state's use of its share of Colorado River water. The pact came about to help California wean itself from Colorado River water deliveries by creating a multibillion-dollar transfer of Imperial Valley irrigation water to San Diego and the Coachella Valley.  The judge found that the state's funding commitment in the agreement was so vague that it amounted to a blank check and therefore violated California's constitutional limits on state debt. The ruling could skew how Southern California's farms and cities share this scarce resource.  ...
More >>

For the first time, voting districts for California's Legislature will not be drawn behind closed doors in the backrooms of the state Capitol. Instead, a first-in-the-nation citizen commission will do the job, and thousands of everyday Californians are jostling to serve on the panel.But hopes of taking politics out of the process are fading.Ethnic groups charge that the pool of applicants is too white and too male to reflect the state's diversity. Others are raising questions about $1.3 million in taxpayer money being spent on a public relations contract to woo minority applicants. And an effort is afoot to repeal the commission, which ...
More >>

Missourians could be faced with an extra housing tax unless action is taken.Currently, the Missouri Constitution allows real estate transfer taxes on homes and property. This means that when homeowners transfer ownership on their home, a tax is imposed, ultimately costing the homeowner extra taxes. This tax rate can be increased without a vote from the people.Elizabeth Mendenhall, president of the Missouri Association of Realtors, is currently heading up a campaign to adjust the Missouri Constitution to prevent this tax from being collected.“The one place that we have, the one place we call home, that place that’s so sacred to us, they’re trying to tap into it,” Mende ...
More >>

The election of Republican Massachusetts state senator Scott Brown to the U.S. Senate seat long held by health-reform champion Ted Kennedy (D-MA) has changed the political dynamic of the ongoing health care debate. It remains unclear whether Congress will proceed with its efforts to merge recently passed House and Senate versions of reform legislation or take a new course, which could include pursuing a scaled-down version of legislation. In his State of the Union on January 27, 2010, President Obama urged Congressional leaders to continue to work on reform, citing the ongoing need to address rising costs and the growing numbers of uninsured Americans. While no single strategy has been ident ...
More >>

©WSJ 2009  For the first time, government programs next year will account for more than half of all U.S. health-care spending, federal actuaries predict, as the weak economy sends more people into Medicaid and slows growth of private insurance.   The figures show how federal and state spending is taking a bigger role while Congress hesitates over a health-care overhaul. Over the next ten years, health spending is expected to balloon to $4.5 trillion. Despite this, the government's health overhaul has stalled, Peter Landers reports. Government health programs are a growing burden on the federal budget, which is running annual deficits of more than $ ...
More >>

©CNNMoney.com 2009   Luckily for banks, the commercial real estate time bomb just keeps on ticking. Industry observers have issued dire warnings for more than a year, suggesting that lenders are on a collision course with potentially billions of dollars worth of commercial real estate losses.  But for all the gloomy talk, the fallout has remained relatively well contained. Banks have already recognized about $50 billion in losses, or about 60% of the estimated cumulative losses, according to real estate research firm Foresight Analytics. Read more. ...
More >>