Alabama Politics in
Doc’s Political Parlor
& Home of Lawn Mower Repair

Today’s Birmingham News reports a poll that shows candidates Larry Langford and Patrick Cooper easily ahead of the rest of the field in the Birmingham mayor’s race. Langford polls at 33%, Cooper at 25%, and the rest of the crowded field polls at a combined 25%. (Incumbent Bernard Kincaid leads that group at 9%.) The margin of error is +/- 4.9 percentage points.

Which is not so different from what you could read between the lines (and we did) in an unusual Birmingham Times poll mentioned here last week.

Eighteen percent of the voters are undecided. (The graphic shows “Undecided/other” at 18%, but the text of the article says that 18% are undecided and “other” accounts for less than 1%.)

What would it take to shake up the field significantly between now and the October 9 election?

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• Considering the Birmingham Mayor's Race
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Birmingham News - Report says that Trenholm Community College program supervised by Sen. Quinton Ross (D-Montgomery) suffered due to senator’s absence to attend to legislative duties.

Birmingham News - Presidential hopeful John Edwards returns to Alabama today in campaign fund-raising stop.

Birmingham News - Commentary by Thomas Wells of Birmingham,  president -elect of the American Bar Association, calls for Alabama to adopt a system of merit selection for appellate judges.

Birmingham News - Commentary by Susan Pace Hamill uses controversy over new school zoning structure in Tuscaloosa as evidence that the underlying issue is an inadequate and unfair tax structure.

Birmingham News - Commentary by the director of the Alabama Women’s Resource Network argues that state should replace aging Tutwiler Prison with a smaller facility in and increase investments in community based corrections programs.

Mobile Press-Register - Press-Register praises the efforts of Chancellor Bradley Byrne, finding that his efforts are “restoring the [postsecondary] system’s credibility.”

Montgomery Advertiser - Alabama likely faces legal battles over executions.

Tuscaloosa News - The Tuscaloosa News views  Governor’s decision not to call a special session this fall as wise.

Tuscaloosa News - The Tuscaloosa News contends that controversy over state’s lethal injection processes indicates need for moratorium on death penalty.

Tuscaloosa News - U.S. Rep. Artur Davis (D) defends the role of postsecondary employee assigned to his office.

Gadsden Times - The Gadsden Times calls for Governor to order DNA testing of evidence in Tommy Arthur case while execution is delayed.

Tuscaloosa News - “Alabama Exposure,” Dana Beyerle’s weekly political roundup for readers of the NYTimes regional papers.

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The word in the Parlor is that Rep. Terry Spicer (D - Elba) has formed an exploratory committee to look at running for the Congressional seat (AL-02) being vacated by Republican Rep. Terry Everett.

Ever have college friends that weren’t quite engaged to be married, but were “engaged to be engaged?” I’d venture to say that forming “an exploratory committee” is to running for an office as being “engaged to be engaged” is to being engaged.

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• Bobby Bright, Terry Spicer, and AL-02
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Birmingham News - ADEM facing $3 million budget shortfall.

Birmingham News - 11th Circuit Court orders Federal District Judge to rule on Siegelman’s request to be released from prison pending his appeal.

Birmingham News - The Birmingham News calls the firing of postsecondary’s chief financial officer a “necessary step.”

Mobile Press-Register - Shelby opposes measure that would add wind damage to coverage of federal flood insurance program; budget committee chair won’t commit to support expansion of coverage.

Montgomery Advertiser - AG asks Supreme Court to set new execution date for Tommy Arthur one day after Governor orders 45 day stay.

Associated Press - All of state’s GOP congressman vote against reauthorization and expansion of SCHIP.

Tuscaloosa News - Shelton State Community College foundation to sell president’s home after audit citing.

Tuscaloosa News - The Tuscaloosa News expresses disappointment that Alabama’s GOP congressmen voted against SCHIP reauthorization and expansion.

New York Times - Congressional Democrats working to gain support to override expected veto of SCHIP.

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Early indications are that national Democratic leaders are excited about the idea that Montgomery Mayor Bobby Bright may be their candidate for the AL-02 vacancy next year. That is according to an article from Roll Call (behind a subscription wall) and, to a lesser degree, this one from Politico.

The word we hear is that state Rep. Terry Spicer of Elba is working aggressively behind the scenes to make sure that his interest in the seat is known when national Democrats plot their course of action.

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Attorney General Troy King demonstrates that politics can be personal with him (e.g. with Tony Castaldo and Robby Owens), but that doesn’t mean its smart. Continuing to goad district attorneys around the state by sending critical news releases naming individual DA’s who took a public stance opposing King on the Robby Owens issue, well, it simply does not feel politically astute.

Mobile’s Press-Register yesterday:

Fifteen district attorneys were targeted with the customized statements. Their names were inserted into the releases that went to media in their jurisdictions.

A King spokesman said the releases were simply designed to get across his side and to alert local news outlets that their local district attorney was involved. An official with the Alabama District Attorney’s Association said the releases were out of line.

These DA’s are local folks closer to their constituencies than King is, and I don’t see how this plays out well for King. I see King building walls where he should be building bridges.

The Ft. Payne Times-Journal last weekend with Dekalb County District Attorney Mike O’Dell after “King continued to attack O’Dell:”

O’Dell says local district attorneys did not object to King taking over the Shelby County case. They object to what they say is King using it for political gain.

“What we resented is he used that tragic, tragic situation – which has got to be painful for the victims’ families – to politicize and to attack and punish a fellow prosecutor. That’s what we couldn’t take. It’s the fact that he took such cheap shots as another prosecutor when it was unnecessary,” O’Dell said.

“The Troy King I thought I knew for the first few years he was in office, I would have not thought he was capable of doing this. I am ashamed of him. My position is that this is not about Troy King anymore, and it’s not about Robby Owens and it’s not about the personal attacks that he is putting on us. It’s about the people we serve and the people have a right to expect more from its prosecutorial leadership than this.”

Editorials are biting King pretty hard: Montgomery Advertiser, Press-Register, Birmingham News, Huntsville Times, Tuscaloosa News, TimesDaily.

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The Press-Register had a piece yesterday saying that even though many people (and consequently most politicians) say they are in favor of going back to property appraisals every four years instead of annually, it’s not that easy.

First, if legislators and Gov. Bob Riley, who also prefers four-year intervals, change the law, it must be able to pass legal muster. The federal court case that led to the annual appraisals — contrary to the popular and incorrect belief that it was all the governor’s fault — made it clear that the law requires that all counties and properties be treated equally and assessed according to fair market value.

Worth a read if this is a topic of interest to you.

Also, fyi, several a months ago a county tax official outlined the pros and cons of annual property tax revaluations for the Political Parlor.

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• Pros & Cons of Annual Property Tax Reappraisals

Kyle Whitmire’s War on Dumb in the Birmingham Weekly take a fun, decidedly non-scientific, and interesting look at the Birmingham mayor’s race by counting yard signs in all nine council districts.

Over breakfast, we came up with the rules. Only signs in yards counted. Placards on telephone poles and in the rights-of-way were disqualified. Only one sign per yard per candidate counted. However, if a yard had signs from more than one campaign, each candidate got a point.

The whole article is here.

Also, you may appreciate the Birmingham Weekly’s recent cover story in which five front-runners in the race were interviewed: Valerie Abbott, William Bell, Patrick Cooper, Bernard Kincaid and Carole Smitherman. Larry Langford’s campaign did not participate.

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If you are interested in the potential candidates for the Congressional seat being vacated by Terry Everett next year, note that we have updated the AL-02 Big List with several names in the last 24 hours.

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Birmingham News - Riley delays scheduled execution to allow state to modify lethal injection procedures.

Birmingham News - Chancellor says that private foundation contains millions of dollars.

Birmingham News - The Birmingham News calls for Governor to order DNA testing in Thomas Arthur’s case while stay is in effect.

Mobile Press-Register - Bush threatens veto of House-passed measure that would allow adding coverage for wind damage to federal flood insurance policies.

Mobile Press-Register - Bishop State Community College foundation to be dissolved.

Mobile Press-Register - Press-Register sees improvement in reading scores among state’s fourth graders as a “cause for celebration.”

Mobile Press-Register - Press-Register contends that development of toll roads is “a reasonable answer” to state’s infrastructure needs.

Associated Press - Many expressing interest in U.S. House opening.

Montgomery Advertiser - National GOP chair visits Alabama faithful.

Montgomery Advertiser - Huntsville creating nation’s most ambitious fallout shelter plan.

Decatur Daily - Education Trust Fund revenues growth slows, budget official warns State Board members that “real priorities” must be determined for the 2009 budget.

Decatur Daily - State Board of Education gives chancellor the authority to reject any two-year college appointment or promotion “that violates state law.”
(more…)

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What would have to happen for a Democrat to win the seat being vacated by retiring Republican U.S. Rep. Terry Everett? The Cook Partisan Voting Index for the district is R +13, meaning that in the last two presidential elections the district voted Republican 13 percentage points higher than the nation as a whole did.

Alabama is an odd mix. A red state with two Democratic houses in the legislature. A Republican Governor and Democratic Lt. Governor. A Republican Supreme Court with a newly elected Democratic Chief Justice. I don’t hear that Democrats are ready to pack it up and go home on this race.

So I asked someone who gets paid to think about politics, “Can a Democrat win AL-02?”

A Democrat has to lock down the black vote (30%) and hope for a good turnout, hold the white Democrats that still exist in the Wiregrass (10-12%) and then steal some white Republicans. There are plenty of Democrats in this district who have experience winning with white Republican votes — Ron Sparks, Wendell Mitchell, Jim Byard, Jimmy Holley, Terry Spicer, and others. This type of Democrat could conceivably lock down the Dem base and have enough local appeal in a key area like suburban Montgomery or the Wiregrass to hold GOP margins down. In such a situation a Democrat could be very competitive and if able to raise money well, catch a few breaks, then it’s potentially doable. Also the GOP nominee will probably emerge broke after a competitive primary and probably runoff. Geography could certainly play large role in the race as well. A Wiregrass Democrat vs a Montgomery Republican might be the kind of matchup where a Democrat can eat into normally GOP turf with the hope that geography can trump party.

Certainly the smart money is on the GOP to hold it, and perhaps not break much of a sweat doing so. But if Democrats can recruit a good candidate (and there are a few out there) then things could stay interesting through November 2008.

A GOP elected official in the district echoed that in telling the Parlor that the GOP would be making a big mistake to take the general election for granted. The official believed that Republicans should hold the seat but quickly acknowledged that a Democrat could possibly slip in.

Likely? Certainly not. Possible? I believe we have seen more unlikely political outcomes.

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The Birmingham Times today has a poll on the Birmingham mayor’s race. However, I confess that, to my way of thinking, it is oddly reported.

The poll does not ask for whom respondents will vote. It asks respondents what their top four concerns are, and then it asks, “What mayoral candidate do you believe would be the more responsive to meeting your goals and expectations as it relates to your concerns?” They then report those numbers not including the undecided voters. Granted, the person they believe is “more responsive to meeting your goals and expectations as it relates to your concerns” is probably the person who will receive the vote, but why not just ask?

The results:

 2 % Valerie Abbott
 6 % William Bell
13 % Patrick Cooper
16 % Bernard Kincaid
 8 % Carole Smitherman
55 % Larry Langford

Except that “Half of the voters polled on these dates stated they were undecided.” So actually, of the people polled, only 27.5% or so support Langford. Kincaid is at 8%, Cooper at 6.5%, and so on.

And a whopping 50% are undecided.

Incidentally, I have been conducting polls going back to the days when George Wallace was running for Governor and when he ran for President of the United States. I have never seen this many undecided voters so close to election day.

Conventional wisdom is that undecided voters will not break late for the incumbent so Kincaid looks in trouble. Larry Langford is so well known from his various roles that I have a hard time imagining that many of the undecideds will break for him. (He may be as well known as the incumbent.) Many of the undecideds will not vote.

Another interesting thing about the poll. “The polling was done in the larger predominately Black boxes.”

The question on some people’s mind is why these three or four boxes in the white community were not included in the polling. We have done four polls concerning the Mayoral election. The boxes in question in the white community have remained constant. Valerie Abbott will receive 48 percent of the vote, Patrick Cooper 28 percent, Larry Langford 14 percent and the remaining 10 percent is divided between William Bell, Bernard Kincaid, and Carole Smitherman.

What are the undecideds? We don’t know. (The %’s add up to 100 with no undecided voters, so we can assume that they left them out again.) Since the article doesn’t tell us, we can only guess, and my guess is that it’s lower than 50% reported in the other poll.

If Langford is at 27.5% in the majority black boxes, I don’t see him getting enough votes from the undecideds and the separately reported white boxes to get a majority. Unless all the undecided stay home.

If the incumbent Kincaid is second at 16% in the majority black boxes, I don’t see him staving off Cooper who is third in those boxes at 13%. Cooper is likely to get easily more of the undecideds, and shows much more support in the separately polled majority white boxes.

I read this article and, taking it at face value, it looks like a run-off between Langford and Cooper. The article correctly notes, “We must remember, it’s not over until it’s over and the only poll that counts is the one on October 9th.”

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As you peruse the AL-02 Big List, where the Political Parlor keeps up with who is, who isn’t, and who may be running for the seat being made open by Terry Everett’s retirement, keep in mind that you do not actually have to be a resident of the district to run for the seat. I have seen statements around the net saying or implying that one person or another lives outside the district and so would not run.

Granted, residency outside the district may make a candidate less attractive, but it does not prohibit someone from running for the seat.

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CQPolitics has an interesting piece on Rep. Terry Everett, saying that in Congress he paid a price for not playing nice.

Everett was 55 and a self-made millionaire when he won his first election to the House as a conservative from a district whose economy is reliant on agriculture and its military bases. But his attempts to move up in Congress were thwarted for years by his refusal to raise large amounts of cash for the Republican Party at election time.

GOP leaders passed him over for chairman of the Veterans’ Affairs Committee in 2005, in favor of a more junior lawmaker, Steve Buyer of Indiana. Two years earlier, Everett lost a bid for Agriculture Committee chairman to Robert W. Goodlatte of Virginia.

Everett remained peeved that the National Republican Congressional Committee, the House GOP’s political arm, had backed another candidate in his first run for Congress in 1992. But in the run-up to the 2006 elections, Everett reconciled with the NRCC and contributed $71,000 to its coffers.

The Dothan Eagle has a nice article on him and his decision to retire.

“It’s been a great ride,” Everett said Wednesday during a phone interview with the Dothan Eagle. “But there comes a time, especially when you get older, you need to lean back and smell the roses.”

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Who’s definitely in the race for AL-02 now that Terry Everett has retired? Who’s already out? What is the latest?

You can find it in the AL-02 Big List.

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Birmingham News - Jefferson County commissioners tout regional transit plan, will ask voters to approve tax to fund transit programs.

Birmingham News - U.S. Terry Everett (R) says he will retire at end of current term.

Birmingham News - Attorneys for death row inmate seek stay from U.S. Supreme Court, says that state’s plan to alter lethal injection procedures “is an implicit concession that such protocol violates the United States Constitution.”

Birmingham News - The Birmingham News contends that Attorney General King places convictions or death sentences as a higher priority than justice..

Birmingham News - The Birmingham News praises Environmental Management Commission for pursuing policies requiring mandatory ethics training for ADEM staff, but insists that a strong ethics policy is also required.

Mobile Press-Register - Rep. Ben Brooks (R-Mobile) unveils proposed legislation to address insurance concerns along Gulf Coast.

Mobile Press-Register - AG King targets specific DAs in latest round of press releases.

Mobile Press-Register - Press-Register argues that although majority may support the return to four-year cycle for property evaluations, such action is not “that simple.”

Tuscaloosa News - Riley sees no consensus on measures to address insurance crisis on the Gulf, chances of special legislative session dim.

Tuscaloosa News - The Tuscaloosa News argues that improvements in test scores should not overshadow the need for schools to improve student performance.

Anniston Star - The Anniston Star agrees with congressman who defined battle over S-CHIPboils down to “were you with the kids or were you not?”

Anniston Star - The Anniston Star calls for the state to halt planned execution until U. S. Supreme Court rules on use of lethal injection.

Decatur Daily - Efforts to secure documents related to postsecondary foundation have limited result, no minutes or bylaws found thus far.

Montgomery Advertiser - Several potential candidates considering run for congressional seat being vacated by Rep. Everett.

Montgomery Advertiser - Alabama’s GOP members vote against S-CHIP reauthorization, state says program will reduce service unless expansion is approved.

Opelika-Auburn News - With education revenues facing a shortfall of $100 milllion, The Opelika-Auburn News calls for legislators to “cut waste.”

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State Rep. Jay Love (R - Montgomery) has confirmed to the Political Parlor that he is “definitely running” for the AL-2 Congressional seat and “has been on the phone all day with supporters.”

Would the Republican nomination come down to a Montgomery candidate vs. a Wiregrass candidate? I asked him. He could “very much envision a scenario” that involved a run-off between a Montgomery candidate and a Wiregrass candidate.

He said that Elmore, Autauga and Montgomery counties (near Montgomery) make up about 42% of the vote, Houston County (Dothan) makes up about 20 percent of the vote, and the Wiregrass makes up the rest, so “it’s about a 40-40-20 split.”

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There is a rumor circulating that Montgomery Mayor Bobby Bright has been quietly “shopping the idea” of running as a Republican for the AL-2 seat. Bright has been long identified as a Democrat though Montgomery mayoral elections are non-partisan. (The district unquestionably trends Republican.)

If state Sen. Jimmy Holley (D - Elba) runs for the seat, he may run as a Republican. He has been one of a handful of Democrats to caucus with the Republicans in the state Senate.

In addition to the potential candidates mentioned before, another name floated as a possiblity on the Republican side is former Alabama Supreme Court Justice Terry Butts.

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• U.S. Rep. Terry Everett to Retire

Post has been updated. And again.

U.S. Rep. Terry Everett (R - Rehobeth) has announced that he will not seek a ninth term to represent Alabama’s 2nd Congressional District.

Because there has been much speculation that he might retire, there has also been much speculation about who would run if he did. Names on the Republican side have included state Representatives Steve Clouse, David Grimes, Jay Love, and Greg Wren, state Sen. Harri Anne Smith, Attorney General Troy King, and possibly even PSC President Jim Sullivan. Add former PSC Commissioner George Wallace, Jr., state Representatives Benjamin Lewis and Barry Mask, and state Sen. Larry Dixon as possibilities. Larry Dixon ran for the seat in 1992, losing in the GOP Primary to Everett.

Names mentioned on the Democratic side have included Montgomery Mayor Bobby Bright, state Sen. Wendell Mitchell, state Rep. Terry Spicer, state Senator Jimmy Holley, Speaker of the House Seth Hammett, and Agricultural Commissioner Ron Sparks.

We will sort it all out and update the Alabama Line accordingly.

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Last year’s Democratic gubernatorial nominee Lucy Baxley is telling people (including our source) that she is strongly considering a run for president of the Public Service Commission in 2008.

She has over $100,000 in her campaign account according to the Secretary of State website, and that would nicely seed a campaign.

I imagine the former Lt. Governor could be a formidable candidate if she demonstrates that she has recovered from last year’s stroke to the point that she can hold up on the campaign trail.

Ed Gentle, Democratic Party county chair in St. Clair County, has also been mentioned as a potential candidate.

Republican incumbent Jim Sullivan has been president of the Public Service Commission since 1983.

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Birmingham News - Alabama’s fourth-graders lead nation in improvement of reading scores, but still lag behind nation.

Birmingham News - South Mobile county residents meet with Sen. Richard Shelby to discuss Katrina housing needs.

Birmingham News - The Birmingham News sees increase in state’s teen pregnancy rate as cause for concern.

Mobile Press-Register - Lawsuit seeks information on Indian gaming interests campaign contributions to Riley.

Mobile Press-Register - Alabama’s congressional delegation follow party lines in vote on reauthorization and expansion of SCHIP; measure passes House but without a veto-proof majority.

Senate Sketches - “Senate Sketches,” Sen. Hank Sanders’ (D-Selma) weekly column for his constituents.

Tuscaloosa News - Riley says state will build new nursing home for veterans.

Anniston Star - The Anniston Star calls for congressional delegation to attempt to change proposal that will remove Medicaid funding for transportation and administrative costs associated with providing educational services to children with disabilities.

Decatur Daily - Other purported board members of postsecondary foundation express surprise at their role.

Times Daily - Execution scheduled for Thursday.

Times Daily - Alabama-based Movie Gallery closing 520 stores nationwide.

Times Daily - The Times Daily cautions that reliance on toll roads may shortchange infrastructure needs of rural Alabama.
(more…)

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Just a quick note saying that I believe there are some interesting posts in the pipeline coming down to the Parlor tomorrow.

Today has been a busy day…

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Birmingham News - Former interim chancellor named to head Bush’s International Education Initiative.

Birmingham News - New poll shows Clinton widening her lead in state for Democratic presidential nomination; GOP voters still without clear favorite.

Birmingham News - The Birmingham News sees Riley’s refusal to delay planned execution to allow DNA testing as “beyond disappointing, and it’s beyond logic.”

Mobile Press-Register - Insurance industry representatives and regulators meet to discuss role of federal government in making insurance available and affordable in disaster-prone areas.

Mobile Press-Register - Press-Register contends that Attorney General King “behaved foolishly and vindictively in a capital murder case, and has damaged his reputation in the process.”

Tuscaloosa News - Chancellor fires postsecondary system’s chief fiscal officer.

Tuscaloosa News - The Tuscaloosa News views proposal to use toll roads for future highway development “the most feasible for Alabama at this time.”

Anniston Star - The Anniston Star argues that campaign ethics reform should be only issue if Governor calls special legislative session.

Decatur Daily - Health officials ponder state’s increasing births to teen mothers.

Times Daily - TimesDaily finds that mandatory ethics training for ADEM staff is “overdue.”

Montgomery Advertiser - Legislators are no-shows at meeting of Veterans and Military Affairs Committee.

Montgomery Advertiser - Attorney General Troy King responds to District Attorneys in continuing flap over death penalty case.

New York Times - President and Congress appear headed for showdown over health insurance program for children.

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The latest update for the Political Parlor’s Alabama Line is below. Many thanks to the elected officials, consultants, and other insiders who were willing to consider the likelihood of various public figures actually being elected to the offices listed.

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Recently, we had a very interesting and wide-ranging conversation in the Political Parlor with Dr. Susan Parker, elected last year as a Democrat to serve on the Public Service Commission. She served as State Auditor from 1999 to 2003, and she was the first woman in Alabama to be nominated for the U.S. Senate. She is rumored to be considering a run for Lt. Governor in 2010.

While she did not offer many hints about her political future, she did speak with enthusiasm about the issues that she and the Public Service Commission are facing. (She also addressed some of the energy issues facing Alabama in a recent Op-Ed piece that ran in several Alabama newspapers.)

Read on and see what Susan Parker shared with us about pressing issues facing the state. (And who knew that the Public Service Commission dealt with railroad track safety or performed natural gas pipeline inspections?)

(more…)

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FYI, look for the Alabama Line to be updated today.

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Updated: SD 32 general election date corrected.

I heard people questioning (and wondered myself) why the timetable for filling the vacant House District 12 was slow to be announced after Rep. Neal Morrison resigned.

For purposes of comparison I decided to look back at how the timetable has unfolded for filling the Senate District 12 seat after Sen. Bradley Byrne resigned earlier this year. (The numbers in parentheses are the number of days that pass after the previous date.)

Compare that to the timetable for filling Rep. Morrison’s seat, and you see there is no real difference.

The latter schedule has an extra week between a primary run-off and the general election, but that span includes the Christmas and New Year holidays.

The best guess I have about what created the perception that this latter timetable was moving slower compared to the earlier one is that when Byrne’s resignation was announced, there were plenty of other political stories to keep us interested and distracted. The legislative session had a couple of weeks left in it with enough drama and tension there to keep our attention (capped by Charles Bishop hitting Lowell Barron on the Senate floor). A week after the session ended, the timetable for filling Byrne’s seat was announced.

When Morrison resigned there simply were not a lot of other political stories competing for our attention, so many of us were waiting with little distraction to hear the announcement regarding the timetable for filling the seat. But to be fair, there really has been no delay in announcing the dates to fill Morrison’s seat compared to the timetable used in filling Byrne’s seat.

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Birmingham News - The Birmingham News calls for the Department of Corrections to offer explanations and records in response to inmate deaths and allegations of rampant violence in state’s prisons.

Mobile Press-Register - “The Political Skinny,” the Press-Register’s weekly political roundup from Mobile, Montgomery and Washington.

Mobile Press-Register - Press-Register says there should be no “lending” of postsecondary employees to outside entities.

Huntsville Times - After only two meetings, the Joint Interim Patriotic Immigration Commission is off to a rough start.

Montgomery Advertiser - Legal experts see battle between District Attorneys and Attorney General as “more political than legal.”

Montgomery Advertiser - Profile of Larry Lee, recently appointed to head the Center for Rural Alabama.

Tuscaloosa News - Governor, DOT continuing to explore option of toll roads.

Montgomery Advertiser - The Montgomery Advertiser views District Attorneys’ response to Attorney General’s attack on Shelby County prosecutor as a “justified reaction.”

Montgomery Advertiser - This is the text of the public release of the Alabama Association of District Attorneys regarding Attorney General Troy King.

Tuscaloosa News - The Tuscaloosa News contends that reworking the state’s tax code to provide adequate funding for education and government is a better alternative than capping annual increases in property evaluation.

Tuscaloosa News - The Tuscaloosa News views actions of Attorney General make him appear “more interested in political grandstanding than in the fair administration of justice. ”

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Birmingham News - Retiring energy executive seen as “right person” to lead Children’s Hospital.

Mobile Press-Register - New poll show residents 75% of Mobile and Baldwin county favor return to property tax reappraisals on four year cycle.

Mobile Press-Register - Restrictions on where sex offenders may live result in certain areas have high  concentration of registered sex offenders.

Mobile Press-Register - Commentary by Gary Palmer of the Alabama Policy Institute reviews the issues of rising costs for health insurance and retirement benefits for public employees, and contends that “it will most likely be Alabama taxpayers that the Legislature” will turn to resolve the issue.

Montgomery Advertiser - The Montgomery Advertiser calls for policy to require State Board of Education to approve any situation where a postsecondary employee is “loaned” to another elected official’s office.

Tuscaloosa News - The Tuscaloosa News contends that Siegelman’s contention that politics, not his actions, led to his prosecution are bolstered by the Justice Department’s refusal to release records.

Tuscaloosa News - “Alabama Exposure,” Dana Beyerle’s weekly political roundup for readers of the NYTimes regional papers.

Gadsden Times - Former interim chancellor of postsecondary system predicts recovery.

Decatur Daily - Commission delays adopting new child support standards pending federal court hearing.

Times Daily - North Alabama counties fare relatively well in new Kids County report.

Times Daily - The Times Daily says Attorney General’s actions in death penalty case controversy reflect his “ethical and judgment lapses as well as a continual disinterest in taking the high road.”

Daily Home - The Daily Home views actions by Environmental Management Commission committee to require ethics training for staffer as “laughable if it weren’t so sad.”
(more…)

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Birmingham News - Environmental Management Commission recommends mandatory ethics training for ADEM staff.

Birmingham News - Community college presidents testify before federal grand jury in continuing investigation.

Birmingham News - Energen chairman to become CEO of Children’s Hospital.

Birmingham News - The Birmingham News takes a simple approach to reports that community college employee worked as a political aide for governors and congressman while:  it’s wrong.

Mobile Press-Register - Impact of potential CHIP expansion unclear in Alabama.

Montgomery Advertiser - Federal appeals court refuses to delay execution to allow DNA testing.

Montgomery Advertiser - Siegelman attorney pushes for release of 514 pages of documents related to recusal of federal prosecutor.

Montgomery Advertiser - Commentary by Stephen Black discusses the planned conference of representatives of state’s universities to address issues of poverty.

News link - Gulf Coast housing advocates gear up for Washington “Week of Action.”

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