The Thicket at State Legislatures

Thanksgiving Trivia

We are talking turkey on this Thanksgiving holiday. Before you sit down at the dinner table, stuff yourself full of some useful trivia to share with family and friends. Here are a few questions to whet your appetite.

Which state produces the most turkeys?

Which state has a town named after the turkey?

Approximately what percentage of homes eat turkey on Thanksgiving?

And in what state is the Wild Turkey Center located?

For the answers to these questions and even more trivia, head to NCSL's website. You can gobble up all of our facts and impress your guests with your extended knowledge of the holiday!  

There is a List for That Tweet

by Meagan Dorsch

This month, Twitter unveiled a new feature called Lists. It's a way for you to organize your followers or the people you are following on Twitter. 

The National Conference of State Legislatures tweets daily under NCSLCOMM (this site is operated out of our communications division, hence the COMM) and we have decided to put this new list feature to good use.

On our Twitter page, we have made our "lists" available to our followers. You can now find state legislators, legislative staff, caucuses and NCSL staff on Twitter. We would be remiss if we did not thank NCSL policy staff and the Legislative Information and Communications Staff Section (LINCS) at NCSL for helping us compile these Twitter addresses.

We know that we were not able to capture every state legislator or caucus that is active on Twitter, so this is where your help comes in. Please send us a direct message on Twitter (or reply to this blog) and let us know where to find your lawmaker or staffer.

We hope you enjoy and use our "lists" and we look forward to adding more names in the coming weeks.

Follow NCSL on Twitter and Facebook and Ning!

Legislators Serve Military and State

by NCSL Staff

As the United States fights wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, a handful of state legislators are serving in their state's National Guard or Reserve units while holding elected office, according to a new survey from the National Network of Legislators in the Military and the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Currently, 65 state legislators serve in the U.S. military in reserve units or National Guard units. Of those 65 state legislators in the military, 31 have been deployed to another country while also serving in their respective statehouse.

Although there are no federal laws that prohibit state lawmakers from serving on active duty with the military, there are specific requirements for lawmakers who are activated and/or deployed. A Department of Defense directive, revised on Feb. 19, 2008, generally prohibits a full-time military service member on active duty from holding civil office in state government. For reserve members on active duty service for 270 days or less, this directive allows members to hold an elected office "provided there is no interference with the performance of military duties." Since September 11, 2001, increasing numbers of National Guard and Reserve members have been called up for longer and more frequent tours of duty.

Recognizing the difficulties elected officials who are called to active duty may face, state legislators have introduced legislation that addresses maintaining the elected position of the public official.

Enacted this year, Arkansas specified that an elected official retains the public office upon returning from active military duty. In 2008, Louisiana allowed for temporary successors to be appointed if a legislator is called to active duty for more than 180 days and Maine exempted National Guard members from the law prohibiting an unclassified employee of the executive branch from being a candidate for elective office in a partisan public election.

In 2004, Indiana established a procedure for an elected office to take a leave of absence when called to active duty and for the appointment of a person to temporarily perform the officeholder’s duties during the leave. Click here to review the 2003-2009 state legislation.

For more information on state legislators serving in the military, read NCSL press release.

Bipartisan Beltway Committee Seeks to “Modernize” U.S. Election System

by Tom Intorcio

Voter registration can sometimes be a highly charged and partisan issue, so it is worth noting that advisers from recent Democratic and Republican presidential campaigns have recently aligned themselves to propose a new system. Trevor Potter, former general counsel to Republican John McCain’s 2008 campaign and Mark Elias, general counsel to Democrat John Kerry’s 2004 campaign are co-chairs of the Committee to Modernize Voter Registration.

The group is “dedicated to bringing the voter registration system into the 21st century by automating the outmoded system that relies on paper forms being filled out by voters and manually processed by local election officials,” according to its inaugural press release. Specifically, the Committee proposes: automated (universal) registration, within a “portable” system to obviate the need to re-register after a voter moves, and a “fail-safe mechanism” for any Election Day problems. Ostensibly, the fail-safe component would be same-day registration, currently used in nine states. A recent story by Pam Fessler of NPR’s All Things Considered gives more background on the 13-member Committee.

The Fiscal Outlook for Higher Education

by Brenda Bautsch

2009 was a tough year for states in terms of funding higher education, and 2010 does not look any better.

The recession has made fiscal conditions worse in the states, and while the federal stimulus funds have helped, states know that those funds will end soon. According to Joni Finney, Vice President on the National Center of Public Policy on Higher Education and a professor at practice at the University of Pennsylvania, most states do not have a plan for funding higher education in the long term.

In this edition of the Buzz, we sit down with Professor Finney to talk about hope for the future. Finney says it is going to take leadership to make sure that states have a plan to fund higher education in the long term. She also says thinking outside of the box might help states find a solution in these unprecedented times.

Listen to this podcast and our other podcasts on college completion rates with David Longanecker and federal policies and programs with the Deputy Under Secretary of Education.

Vermont Garden

by Meagan Dorsch

My colleague, Bert Waisanen, an avid home gardener, recently discovered what we believe to be the first, and perhaps only, state capitol food garden in Montpelier, Vermont.

Bert discovered the Vermont State House Food Garden as he waited to testify on state taxes at the capitol. It appears the garden was the project for a local advocacy group, with a goal of making Montpelier a more sustainable place to live. The group also hopes to inspire residents to create their own vegetable gardens. You can read more about the project and how it got off the ground in this blog. While he was on-site, Bert's thumb turned green with envy as workers harvested dozens of pounds of fresh greens and vegetables.  

The Vermont program is volunteer based and about a half dozen workers are dedicated to the harvest. All of the food is immediately given to local food banks. The fourth harvest of the year (which Bert was on-site for) produced over 8 lbs of cabbage, 27 lbs of beets and over 3 lbs of beans. All of the food was given to the Bethany Soup Kitchen. It looks like workers planted more kale, collards, broccoli, lettuce, beets and spinach.

The volunteers told Bert their program is the first state capitol food growing program in the US, which began this year. It appears they are correct. I attempted to Google and find other statehouse gardens, but didn't come up with any. We do know the White House has a community garden and a blog to keep track of each harvest.

Each month, Bert turns our NCSL break room into a mini farmer's market to sell fresh jalapenos, peppers, lettuce and tomatoes (I loved the peppers). Harvest time is right around the corner, so let us know if there is another state capitol that is helping to feed the community, or if you are planting the idea for this spring.

How are Students and Teachers Doing in the Classroom?

by Yilan Shen

The National Conference of State Legislatures recently held a half-day meeting where legislators and legislative staff heard from several experts in the field of teacher and student assessments. Assessing how students are progressing in their studies and how teachers are performing are essential in meeting and refining goals of public education.

Gene Wilhoit, executive director of the Council of Chief State School Officers, kicked off the meeting. Wilhoit described the shift to standard-based assessments away from normative and comparative. Wilhoit(1:51) spoke about the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) and the need for common standards amongst states.

Given the change in needs and shift in recent times, Wilhoit thinks states will have several issues to address in the next few years in terms of assessments (6:08). Wilhoit began the conversation around common standards by talking about the process and nature of standards that have made assessing student achievement difficult without having a common measure (1:20), a conversation that continued with the other speakers.

Experiments in Social Media

by Gene Rose

Last week, three of NCSL's staff sections met in Austin, Texas, for their annual professional development seminars. State legislative staff representing public information, leadership and information technology sectors met to discuss key issues and trends in their chosen fields.

For the public information officers, much of the conference--including a one-day boot camp--focused on social media outreach. While recognizing there is significant resistance to 140-character conversations in the state legislative realm, there was even a greater sense that this new method of communication is being embraced by a significant number of legislators, staff and constituents. And, most agreed, those that don't recognize it as a critical communications tool are choosing to ignore an important audience.

NCSL staff decided to experiment on site to see what kind of response we would get by using social media to communicate with attendees and those who could not be in Austin to join us.

First, using a $100 video camera, we conducted more than 20 video interviews with faculty and attendees on site and posted them on our NCSL Facebook page. We heard  from some legislative staff who could not attend the meeting, wishing they could be there to share in the learning opportunities that the attendees highlighted. And the speakers really appreciated being interviewed, with many of them choosing to take the videos and post them on their own websites or Facebook pages.

Second, we announced that attendees and faculty use Twitter during the meeting. We set up a special hashtag (a set of characters that allows anyone online to follow what is being written about during the meeting) and encouraged its use. The #ncsl20 hashtag generated dozens of comments, including from people that could not attend the meeting.

All of this was done with minimal investment and a relatively low amount of staff time. The payoff--increased interest in the meeting and creating greater interaction between attendees, faculty and non-attendees--seems to have been well worth the effort.

We believe our experiments were successful and welcome suggestions to engage NCSL audiences--both on and off site--at future meetings. Share your thoughts in the comments link below.

Jerry Sohns, Long-Time Valued Colleague

by Karl Kurtz

I am sad that Jerome Sohns, one of NCSL's original staff members when the organization was formed in 1975, died last week after a long battle with Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases.

Jerry became director of our Washington office when then-Executive Director Earl Mackey moved from Washington to the new NCSL headquarters in Denver in 1975.  Jerry had held numerous government relations positions in Washington, including a stint as director of the Washington office for Mayor John Lindsay of New York.  In 1978 Jerry followed a long-time "get out of Washington" urge and moved to NCSL's Denver office, where he served as director of administration.

In 1979 he obtained his real estate license and became a realtor in Boulder, Colorado, a practice that he continued for 10 years.  He returned to NCSL in 1989 as director of development for the NCSL Foundation for State Legislatures.  He retired in 2001.

Jerry was a wonderful guy.  He was a consummate gentleman.  He had a marvelous way of taking care of anyone he knew--and he seemed to know almost everyone.  Our former colleague, Dick Merritt, captured him in an obituary in the Longmont (CO) Times-Call: 

Jerry had one of the most compelling and magnetic personalities of anyone I ever met. You were simply drawn to him by that wonderful smile and sweet disposition. He was kind, compassionate, considerate, thoughtful, and just plain nice. There are people who are kind and there are far fewer who are magnanimous. Jerry was magnanimous.

Not only did I have the pleasure of working with Jerry closely for his 15 years at NCSL, but he spent countless hours squiring my wife and me around Boulder in an effort to find us a new home. He took care of us both in the office and in our personal lives.

My thoughts and prayers, as well as those of the many NCSL staff who worked with Jerry, are with his wife, Sharon, and daughter Stephanie.  We miss him.

Baby Boomers Dominate in State Legislatures

by Morgan Cullen

Our analysis of state legislator ages in 2008 shows that 47.9% of legislators presently serve between the ages of 50-64 years of age. This age range accounts for nearly half of all legislators presently serving and is almost two times larger than any other age group.

There are many contributing factors to why a majority of legislators decide to run for elected office during this period of their lives. Candidates running for office from this age group have a broad range of professional experience making them more electable. Family responsibilities have often been significantly reduced since children are often fully grown. And the 50-64 age group is also the most financially stable, a benefit of many productive years in the workforce. According to US Census data, this age group only makes up 17.5% of the total US population which is significantly less than their representation in state legislatures.

Conversely, only 3.8% of legislators nationwide fall into the 20-34 year old category (and less than 1% are under 30 years of age). This is by far the lowest percentage of any other age group. There are several factors contributing to the low number of legislators serving in their 20s and early 30s but the most obvious is their lack of professional experience. Candidates seeking elected office during this period of their lives are at a competitive disadvantage to their older and more experienced opponents.