Currently, Nebraska has fairly strict regulations on midwife-assisted birth. There are a few bills this session that would change that…
LB406 would prevent hospitals from denying privileges to a CNM (certified nurse midwife) simply because they are a CNM.
LB457 would change the requirement that prevents a CNM from practicing without working under a doctor. Currently, CNMs [...]
Entries from January 2009
January 28, 2009
More Options in Childbirth
January 27, 2009
Watching Education
I am a member of my local school board, so attended a “legislative conference” with school board members and administrators of public schools from around the state yesterday. During this conference, Governor Heineman spoke to us, and pointed to the fact that while Nebraska is one of only 9 (or 7 depending on the measure [...]
January 22, 2009
Making Contact
Joe’s Crabby Shack is a Nebraska based blog that specializes in following Nebraska legislation dealing with gun rights. They’ve got a great post up today that gives really good advice for making contact with your state senator (the advice is universal and endorsed by Unicam Watch for all issues).
January 21, 2009
Last Day of Bill Introductions
For all intents and purposes, all of the bills for this session of the legislature have been introduced. I’m told that for a “long session”, the 679 bills introduced is on the low side–that it’s typical to see 900 or so introduced in a 90 day session. From that standpoint, maybe term limits have been [...]
January 19, 2009
Hearing Schedule Posted
The hearing schedule for the next week or so has been posted. There are a few bills on there that we’ve touched on (such as LB229 and LB261 about real ID and machine-encoded info on driver’s licenses), so you might consider showing up for some of these hearings.
January 17, 2009
Life and Death
Nebraska legislators will be looking at two options for the future of the death penalty: LB36 seeks to change the method of death penalty to lethal injection; LB306 would replace the death penalty with life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.
The death penalty is a tough issue. I think we can all agree that taxpayers [...]
January 17, 2009
The Insidious Reach
Just a quick comment as I leaf throught he 416 bills that have been introduced in the legislature thus far (there should only be 2 or 3 more days of significant introduction of legislation–most is introduced in the first 10 days of the legislative session so that they can be assigned to committees and placed [...]
January 16, 2009
Driver’s licenses and privacy
It seems that more and more, the government is looking to use a driver’s license for more than just driving. If LB261 is passed, you may be sharing the information on that license whenever you buy alcohol, tobacco, or lottery tickets. This bill allows businesses to use machine readers to swipe the license and verify [...]
January 15, 2009
Hip Techie Legislators?
About 70 new Macbook Air computers were purchased for state legislators and other staff, according to an Omaha World-Herald article.
Props to Senator Tony Fulton for thinking that legislators don’t need the sexiest laptop on the block. He is right in thinking that cheaper, regular Macbooks would have served the legislators just as well. (The OWH [...]
January 14, 2009
Kids, Love, and Money
LB91 seeks to make subsidies for foster children continue once they are adopted. Adoption is a great thing…when the parents are being motivated by love for the child.
I can understand that there are situations where the subsidies would be a good thing, especially for children with high-cost special needs that would present a great financial [...]
