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Merritt and Maggie Carlton

Freshman Orientation: Erica Mosca is Nevada’s first Filipina legislator

Assemblywoman Erica Mosca is the first in her family to graduate from college and the first Filipina to serve in the Legislature.

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Why Nevada is spending $8 million to refund millions of $1 DMV fees

Refunds of the technology fee — which has been in place since 2015 and was designed to fund a long-awaited but scandal-stricken DMV system modernization upgrade — didn’t exactly come as a surprise. The fee and an extension of the state payroll tax were challenged by state Senate Republicans in a 2019 lawsuit, and the state Supreme Court ruled in their favor in May 2021, requiring that the state pay back the unconstitutionally extended taxes collected over the past year.

College athlete compensation, cannabis investigations and ‘pot for pets’ among latest bills signed by Sisolak

Some of the higher-profile measures signed by Sisolak over the past two days include bills aimed at allowing collegiate athletes to receive compensation, lowering the penalties for minors caught in possession of alcohol or small amounts of marijuana, requiring teaching about minorities and historically underrepresented groups and raising the legal and age prerequisites for a person to become state attorney general.

Sisolak signs more than 70 bills, including sealing eviction records during COVID, Patient Protection Commission reorganization and curbside cannabis pickup

Sisolak’s office announced late Thursday that the governor had signed a total of 70 bills in a press release, bringing the governor’s total of signed bills from the 2021 session up to 107 as of Friday. Once bills are approved by both houses of the Legislature and sent to the governor’s office, the state’s chief executive has five days during sessions and 10 days after they adjourn to either sign the bill, veto the measure or allow the clock to expire, which causes a law to automatically take effect.

unlv campus

Lawmakers clarify price tag for expanding undocumented student access to Silver State Opportunity Grant

While AB213 does not include a fiscal note, bill sponsor Assemblyman Edgar Flores (D-Las Vegas) and Andrew Clinger, chief financial officer for the Nevada System of Higher Education, clarified that in order to create an alternative form and process for undocumented students to apply for the grant, the Nevada System of Higher Education will draw up to 5 percent of the Silver State Opportunity Grant program funds, which total $5 million a year allocated from the state general fund.

Lawmakers consider proposal to suspend business licenses over unpaid debt

The bill to do that, AB482, was heard in the Assembly Ways and Means Committee on Tuesday and would require the secretary of state’s office to not renew a business licenses if they are informed by the state controller’s office that the business in question has an outstanding debt owed to a state agency that is currently in collections with the controller’s office.

Budget committee passes surprise ‘premium holiday’ for public employee health plans

Assemblywoman Maggie Carlton (D-Las Vegas), chair of the Ways and Means Committee, announced a plan during a Friday joint budget meeting to give participants in the Public Employees Benefits’ Program (PEBP) a one-month “premium holiday” during which enrollees don’t have to pay their share of their health insurance costs. That would apply to about 44,000 active and retired public employees, according to legislative staff.

Lawmakers approve doubling size of state pension plan’s investment team to two

Members of a joint budget committee on Monday approved closing the state employee pension system’s budget with the addition of a new investment officer alongside Edmundson to help manage PERS’s $54 billion in assets. The new position comes with a base annual salary of $189,222 along with benefits, paid for by PERS administration fees.

Lawmakers plan for enhanced federal Medicaid dollars to last through 2021

Assemblywoman Maggie Carlton, during a budget subcommittee meeting on Thursday, suggested that lawmakers plan for the extra federal health care funding to exist for an additional six months beyond the current date it is set to expire, June 30. Her recommendation comes as the federal government has indicated that the current public health emergency will “likely” extend through the end of the calendar year, which would, in turn, mean that the enhanced federal matching dollars would be available through March 2022.

The exterior of a MoneyTree branch

Lawmakers grant final approval to payday lending database plans, over industry concerns

Members of the Legislative Commission — composed of state lawmakers who give final approval to state agency regulations — met Monday to approve the regulations submitted by the state’s Financial Institutions Division (FID), which will oversee and manage operations of the database. The majority-Democratic committee voted along party lines, 7-5, to approve the regulations.

Assembly Majority Floor Leader Teresa Benitez-Thompson, right, speaks with Deputy Minority Whip Robin Titus, on Friday, July 31, 2020 during the first day of the 32nd Special Session of the Legislature in Carson City.

Nevada grows majority-female Legislature after 2020 election, with more than 60 percent of seats to be filled by women

In total, the 42-seat state Assembly will have 27 female lawmakers and 14 male lawmakers, including 19 female Democrats and eight female Republicans. In the 21-member state Senate, men will hold 10 seats and females will hold 11 (two Republicans and nine Democrats). Women held 33 of the 63 seats in the 2019 Legislature, hitting the majority mark after two female Assembly members (Rochelle Nguyen and Bea Duran) were appointed to vacant positions by the Clark County Commission in December 2019.

A hallway at Sunrise Hospital

Audit: Group health plan for state workers ignored bidding rules, engaged in ‘wasteful spending’

An audit report released last week by the Legislative Counsel Bureau’s Audit Division into the contract management practices of the Public Employees Benefits Program, or PEBP, found that leadership of the health insurance program consistently failed to follow state laws and policies requiring contracts be put out to bid every four years, choosing instead to extend contracts in violation of normal practices for state agencies.

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