Nevada’s bid to enact the second state-based public option health benefit plan in the nation passed the state Senate Monday on a 12-9 party line vote and moved to the Assembly with one week remaining in the session.
Bill Dentzer
State government and politics reporter
Email: bdentzer@reviewjournal.com
Phone: (775) 461-0661
X: @dentzernews
Based in Reno, Bill Dentzer covers government and politics and related state news out of the Review-Journal’s capital bureau in Carson City. He joined the RJ in October 2018 after similar assignments at the Salt Lake Tribune in Utah and the Idaho Statesman in Boise. He earlier covered state and local government in his home state of New York, where he graduated from Hamilton College.
State lawmakers on Friday approved a new framework for distributing billions of state education dollars and voted to ban the sale and possession of untraceable “ghost guns.”
Assemblywoman Annie Black, R-Mesquite, was stripped of her right to vote and speak on the floor after she refused to wear a mask as required by the rules of the chamber.
Lawmakers launched the final two weeks of the legislative session Monday with final chamber votes on scores of bills, including measures that raise the legal age for tobacco use, decriminalize jaywalking and garnish casino winnings from people who owe child support.
In fits and starts, lawmakers on Friday moved some 80 bills through committees ahead of an end-of-day deadline as the Legislature closed in on its final two weeks of session.
The Nevada Supreme Court ruled Thursday that the Legislature needed a two-thirds majority when it passed a bill that extended a pair of existing taxes because they generated revenue for the state.
With the state’s fiscal outlook dramatically improved, lawmakers on Wednesday restored more than $301 million in planned cuts to Medicaid enacted in a special session last summer.
The foundational bill for implementing the overhauled statewide school funding plan approved by lawmakers two years ago passed in Senate committee Tuesday.
Gov. Steve Sisolak appeared before a Senate committee Monday in support of a bill that would open up a state infrastructure fund to cover projects ranging from affordable housing to rural broadband access and renewable energy.
Gov. Steve Sisolak on Wednesday touted the efforts undertaken during to the COVID-19 crisis to mitigate its economic impacts on Nevada.
Physicians, hospitals, insurers and business groups opposed a bill to create a public health insurance option, even as proponents said it would extend health care to those currently without it.
Nevadans fully vaccinated against COVID-19 may now move about outdoors mask free following the state’s move to align local restrictions with the latest guidance from the CDC.
One signature bill died and the ghost of another sprung back to life this week as the state Legislature moves into its final month of session.
Democratic lawmakers on Wednesday introduced a revived effort to establish a public health insurance option in the state aimed at helping some of Nevada’s 350,000 uninsured residents get health coverage.
Legislative committees will start meeting again in earnest next week following a bill deadline that required bills to pass from Assembly to Senate and vice versa.