WASHINGTON – Alabama’s two Republican state senators showed a united front last week while siding with a move to challenge the constitutionality of a Trump impeachment trial and voting against President Biden’s nominees to key positions. Here are votes on major issues in the Senate during the week ending Jan. 29. The House was in recess. Read more.
Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin urges Birmingham residents to continue taking the new coronavirus seriously, and he speaks from firsthand experience. Woodfin told BirminghamWatch on Saturday that he is mostly recovered after being hospitalized briefly with COVID-related pneumonia, but it’s an uphill battle, including neurological effects that left him barely able to walk for several days. Read more.
MONTGOMERY — Alabama lawmakers on Tuesday kickoff a legislative session like none they’ve seen before. COVID-19 protocols are limiting public access to the State House, the number of committees that can meet at a given time and, some say, the amount of bills lawmakers will be able to consider. This year's schedule is largely tentative, as leaders acknowledge a virus outbreak could disrupt the session at any time. For now, leaders are planning to meet the first two weeks of February to pass essential bills, then take a week-long break to reassess their COVID-19 protocols and priorities. Lawmakers are expected to focus on bills to: clarify that federal COVID relief funds received by Alabamians and their businesses aren’t subject to state taxes; provide entities with liability protection from COVID-related lawsuits; and revise, revamp and expand economic incentives offered to businesses. Read more. Read the pre-session interview with Gov. Kay Ivey, Ivey Wants 2% Pay Raise for Teachers and State Employees, and more on the upcoming legislative session.
Mayor Randall Woodfin officially kicked off his campaign for reelection at a drive-in rally at George Ward Park on Saturday, offering a slightly updated slate of second-term goals but maintaining his first campaign’s focus on neighborhood revitalization. He repeatedly invoked his new campaign slogan, “progress together,” and promised to “finish the job” he started in 2017 over the next five years. “We’re ramping up everything we’ve already put in place, making it tighter, putting more resources to it,” he said. Read more.
Legislation filed to renew and revamp state tax incentives for Alabama businesses includes new credits for women- and minority-owned enterprises, increasing the cap on one of the state’s “backbone” incentives and giving a break to automakers who will ship vehicles out of the Port of Mobile. House Bill 192, expected to be a high priority for passage when the 2021 legislative session begins next week, was pre-filed Thursday. Commerce Secretary Greg Canfield this week discussed some of the details with Alabama Daily News. “The bill reestablishes and builds on the success of Alabama’s performance-driven incentive tools,” Canfield said. “And those are specifically being addressed in the Alabama Jobs Act, the Growing Alabama Credit and the Alabama Port Credit.” Read more. More stories on legislative budget hearings held before the session starts Tuesday. Ivey Wants 2% Pay Raise for Teachers and State Employees Law Enforcement Agencies Ask for Increased State Funding; General Fund Budget Looks OK Mental Health Services in Schools Improving, More Help Needed Lawmakers Discuss Education Pay Raises, a Focus on Literacy and Learning Loss
Former U.S. Sen. Doug Jones made his debut Friday afternoon as a political commentator on CNN's The Lead with Jake Tapper broadcast. Read more.
MONTGOMERY — Gov. Kay Ivey said she wants to give pay raises to state employees and teachers in the next budget year. In an interview Thursday with Alabama Daily News, Ivey said her state budget proposals, which are set to be presented to lawmakers next week, will include the pay raises in both the General Fund and Education Trust Fund budgets. Read more.
WBHM Women who are pregnant, breastfeeding and planning to get pregnant should get the COVID-19 vaccine, according to the chair of UAB's Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology. Read more.
The novel coronavirus that has pushed the world into a pandemic has mutated into additional strains, and one of those strains that is more contagious has now reached Alabama. The Alabama Department of Public Health announced Wednesday that a strain called B.1.1.7, which originated in the United Kingdom and is described as “new and more highly transmissible,” has infected a resident of Jefferson County plus two in Montgomery County. One patient is an adult and the other two are under age 19. Read more.
MONTGOMERY — The outlook for the state's current General Fund budget is good, according to state lawmakers meeting this week for budget hearings. Rep. Steve Clouse, R-Ozark, who chairs the General Fund budget committee in the House of Representatives, said he did not expect any large COVID-19-caused cuts in the current budget as lawmakers begin to craft next year's budget in the upcoming legislative session. Lawmakers on Wednesday heard from law enforcement agency heads who were asking for budget increases to pay for more personnel and mitigating issues brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. Read more.
