Arkansas State Senate - District 1

05/11/2012

The state revenue report for April provided signals of an improving economy in Arkansas, specifically in the number of people working.

State government collected $718.2 million in general revenue in April. That is generated almost entirely by state sales taxes and state income taxes. The amount is the most ever collected in one month by Arkansas state government, and it is 5 percent more than was collected in April of last year.

State tax rates have not changed, therefore the increase is not due to any tax increase. The good news is that the 5 percent increase in revenue represents growth in economic activity.

The state's top budget official presented the revenue report to the legislature's Joint Committee on Economic and Tax Policy. The governor noted the growth in individual income tax revenue and called it "good news" because it means that people are working more.

On the same day the state Finance and Administration Department presented the revenue report, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released an unemployment report for April that indicates the jobless rate had improved in all seven of the metropolitan areas in Arkansas.

There are two months remaining in the state's fiscal year. Budget officials said that in spite of the improvement in revenue, they would not change their official forecast. That means no changes are in store, at this time, in the amount of state aid budgeted for state agencies, school districts and institutions of higher education.

By nature, Arkansas budget officials are cautious. A specific reason for their caution after reviewing the April revenue report is that sales tax figures are not up to the levels that had been expected. That is an indicator that though people are working more, they are not spending on retail items as much as forecast.

The state's budget director said that paying more for gasoline has had a negative effect on retail sales. Motor fuels taxes are not part of general revenue - they are dedicated to maintaining and building highways and bridges.

Although the April revenue report was favorable, administration budget officials tempered their remarks by saying that the Arkansas economy was not completely recovered.

Also, the threat of a looming financial crisis in the state Medicaid program put a damper on the favorable revenue report.

The state Human Services Department, which administers Medicaid, has warned legislators that the program faces a possible budget shortfall ranging from an estimated $250 million to $400 million next year.

Medicaid is a government-subsidized program that pays for medical care for low-income families, care and treatment of people with disabilities and nursing home care for the elderly. Addressing the financial problems of Medicaid is shaping up to be the dominant issue of the 2013 regular session.

05/11/2012

State Capitol Week in Review
May 4, 2012
LITTLE ROCK – The state revenue report for April provided signals of an improving economy in Arkansas, specifically in the number of people working.
State government collected $718.2 million in general revenue in April. That is generated almost entirely by state sales taxes and state income taxes. The amount is the most ever collected in one month by Arkansas state government, and it is 5 percent more than was collected in April of last year.
State tax rates have not changed, therefore the increase is not due to any tax increase. The good news is that the 5 percent increase in revenue represents growth in economic activity.
The state's top budget official presented the revenue report to the legislature's Joint Committee on Economic and Tax Policy. The governor noted the growth in individual income tax revenue and called it "good news" because it means that people are working more.
On the same day the state Finance and Administration Department presented the revenue report, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released an unemployment report for April that indicates the jobless rate had improved in all seven of the metropolitan areas in Arkansas.
There are two months remaining in the state's fiscal year. Budget officials said that in spite of the improvement in revenue, they would not change their official forecast. That means no changes are in store, at this time, in the amount of state aid budgeted for state agencies, school districts and institutions of higher education.
By nature, Arkansas budget officials are cautious. A specific reason for their caution after reviewing the April revenue report is that sales tax figures are not up to the levels that had been expected. That is an indicator that though people are working more, they are not spending on retail items as much as forecast.
The state's budget director said that paying more for gasoline has had a negative effect on retail sales. Motor fuels taxes are not part of general revenue - they are dedicated to maintaining and building highways and bridges.
Although the April revenue report was favorable, administration budget officials tempered their remarks by saying that the Arkansas economy was not completely recovered.
Also, the threat of a looming financial crisis in the state Medicaid program put a damper on the favorable revenue report.
The state Human Services Department, which administers Medicaid, has warned legislators that the program faces a possible budget shortfall ranging from an estimated $250 million to $400 million next year.
Medicaid is a government-subsidized program that pays for medical care for low-income families, care and treatment of people with disabilities and nursing home care for the elderly. Addressing the financial problems of Medicaid is shaping up to be the dominant issue of the 2013 regular session.
UALR Nanotechnology
The University of Arkansas dedicated its new $15 million Center for Integrative Nanotechnology Sciences, which will house almost 50,000 square feet of laboratory space. Partners in the venture include 12 other universities, private businesses, federal agencies and national research facilities.
The UALR nanotechnology research staff had been using a 7,200 square foot lab in which they were cramped, a university spokesman said.

04/30/2012

State Capitol Week in Review
April 27, 2012
LITTLE ROCK – The number of state prison inmates who are released on parole is steadily going up while the number who are discharged after serving out their entire sentence is going down, according to a report compiled by prison officials for the state Board of Correction.
In the decade from 1999 to 2008, the number of Arkansas inmates released on parole went up from 4,677 to 6,160. Over the same ten-year period the number of inmates discharged after serving their maximum sentence went down from 643 in 1999 to 145 in 2008.
The report is a recidivism study, which means it is an analysis of the percentage of inmates who are released and then break the law and return to prison.
Correction officials reported that from 1999 to 2008, the three-year recidivism rate went down from 54.6 percent to 45.6 percent. In 1999 the Correction Department released 4,677 inmates on parole and within three years 54.6 percent of them were back in prison. In 2008 the department released 6,160 inmates on parole and within three years 45.6 percent of them were back in prison.
The recidivism rate is quite a bit lower for prisoners who are discharged after serving out their full sentences. The three-year rate for those discharged in 1999 was 28.6 percent. The rate for those discharged in 2008 was 15.9 percent. One factor may be age. The survey found that middle-aged and older offenders, after being released, are less likely to end up back in prison.
Correction officials are implementing Act 570 of 2011 and paying close attention to its effect on the inmate population. The 167-page act changes sentencing laws and puts more emphasis on parole, in part because inmates released on parole are under supervision when they return to the free world and inmates discharged after serving out a complete sentence are not supervised.
Although the overall trends over a ten-year period have been fairly consistent, there have been a few fluctuations in the percentages from year to year that don't seem to follow the pattern. Prison officials attribute those aberrations to differences in the kinds of inmates released within a certain period.
During one year many inmates who become eligible for parole may change their behavior because they are determined to stay out of trouble, but in another year there may be fewer who are willing to make those changes.
Correction officials are keenly aware of how policy changes affect recidivism rates. For instance, they attribute a jump in the rate from 2007 to 2008 in large part to a policy change -- a new limit on the number of times a parole violator could be housed in the Omega Technical Violator Center near Malvern.
They are housed in the Omega center for 60 days if they violate the terms of their parole, such as failing to report to a parole officer or failing a drug test. After three violations in one year, a hearing officer can place them back in prison and they are counted in recidivism surveys.
Also in 2011 the legislature added 49 additional parole officers to the Department of Community Correction, which has a staff of 1,182 who supervised an active caseload of 36,705 offenders last year. Those offenders were on probation or parole, or going through drug courts or boot camp.
The department housed 1,230 offenders in residential facilities last year. They had been sentenced mostly for drug crimes, theft of property or burglary.

04/20/2012

State Capitol Week in Review
April 20, 2012
LITTLE ROCK – About 8,000 graduating high school seniors will be eligible for the Academic Challenge Scholarship when they attend an Arkansas college or university next fall.
The Department of Higher Education has notified the seniors and several thousand have officially accepted the awards. The deadline for all financial aid packages is June 1 for students who plan to attend an Arkansas college or university in the fall semester of 2012 and the spring semester of 2013.
Last year about 31,100 students received Academic Challenge scholarships, which are funded from the state lottery. Students enrolled at a four-year university receive $4,500 a year if they maintain their eligibility and students at two-year colleges receive $2,250 a year. Those amounts have been lowered since the 2010 school year, when they were $5,000 and $2,500. A decline in lottery sales is responsible for the drop off in scholarship amounts.
Students who got $5,000 and $2,500 in 2010 will continue to receive those amounts as long as they maintain their eligibility. Similarly, students who get $4,500 and $2,250 this year will continue to receive those amounts throughout their college career, as long as they keep up their grades.
According to a study presented to legislators, 41.6 percent of the students who got a lottery scholarship in 2010 failed to get them renewed in 2011. Among the requirements for maintaining eligibility are to earn 15 hours in the fall and 15 hours in the spring, to successfully complete 30 hours during the year, with a cumulative grade point average of at least 2.5.
The renewal requirements are slightly lower for first-time recipients. They have to enroll in 12 hours in their first fall semester and complete 27 hours in their first year.
In following years they must complete 30 hours. Whether or not they are first-time recipients, they must all maintain a 2.5 cumulative grade point average.
If students have fallen behind in the current school year, they can take summer courses to complete their requirements. A transcript of their summer courses must be turned in to the Higher Education Department by October 1, 2012.
Legislators voiced concerns that there are still high school students who are unaware of the availability of lottery scholarships. The Lottery Commission and the Department of Higher Education are fine tuning their marketing to better reach young people. The director of the Higher Education Department said that marketing emphasizes to young people the importance of knowing what grades they must maintain to keep the scholarships.
High school counselors are an important source of information about all types of financial aid.
In related news, the University of Arkansas will increase tuition at its four-year universities next year. The increases range from 3.21 percent to 5.28 percent at campuses in Fayetteville, Little Rock, Fort Smith, Pine Bluff and Monticello. Five two-year community colleges in the system will increase tuition by 1.94 percent to 3.67 percent.
In all, Arkansas has 22 two-year colleges and 11 four-year universities that are supported by tax dollars, as well as by tuition, fees, donations and licensing arrangements. The Higher Education Department distributes about $170 million a year in financial aid programs to help students afford the cost of higher education. Last year about $94 million of that came from lottery ticket sales.

04/18/2012

State Capitol Week in Review
April 13, 2012
LITTLE ROCK – The state of Arkansas has won a judgment at the trial court level against a major pharmaceutical manufacturer and its subsidiary, winning a judgment of $1.2 billion for the state's Medicaid fund.
The drug manufacturer is Johnson and Johnson and its subsidiary is Janssen Pharmaceutica. They are expected to appeal the fine, which was ordered by a Pulaski County circuit judge.
The attorney general, representing the state of Arkansas, filed the suit in 2007. The trial lasted two weeks. A jury of six men and six women deliberated for about three hours before issuing a verdict saying the pharmaceutical companies committed Medicaid fraud and used deceptive trade practices by hiding the negative side effects of a drug commonly prescribed for people with mental disorders.
The potential side effects of the drug are diabetes, hormonal changes that affect the sexual development of children, increased likelihood of strokes in elderly people and excessive weight gain in users of all ages. Jurors were asked to determine whether the company's labeling accurately disclosed its possible side effects. The jurors were also asked to determine if a letter to Arkansas physicians about the drug was deceptive.
The drug manufacturer has a mixed record in defending itself in similar lawsuits in other states. According to news reports it has won on appeal in West Virginia and at the trial court level in Pennsylvania. It lost in South Carolina and Louisiana and is appealing those verdicts, which impose fines totaling more than $327 million. Earlier this year the drug company settled a case brought by Texas officials and agreed to pay that state $158 million.
Also, the federal government is seeking to impose a fine of $1.8 billion against the company and is in negotiations on a settlement.
The judgment in Pulaski County raised comparisons with the 1998 legal settlement with major to***co companies, under which Arkansas is supposed to get an estimated $1.6 billion over 25 years.
The fine of $1.2 billion against the pharmaceutical manufacturer is based on the number of prescriptions that the state Medicaid program paid for over a three-and-a-half year period. During the trial the state claimed that Arkansas Medicaid paid for 238,874 prescriptions and each one was a violation of laws against Medicaid fraud.
The company's attorneys disputed the number of violations, arguing the number of claims by the state should be 1,319 and that it was excessive to base financial penalties on more than 238,000 separate violations.
Also, the drug company claimed that no financial fraud occurred because each prescription was medically necessary, adding that no evidence was presented during trial that proved any patient suffered harm from taking the drug and arguing that no physician had complained about its side effects.
The attorney general said he was grateful to the jury for holding the drug manufacturers accountable, and that the jury confirmed that the two drug companies had lied to physicians and patients in their marketing campaign.
Last fiscal year the state Medicaid program processed more than 39 million claims from 12,300 providers, such as physicians, clinics and hospitals. Those claims sought reimbursement for medical treatment of 770,000 Arkansans.

04/06/2012

State Capitol Week in Review
April 6, 2012
LITTLE ROCK – The state's medical school is taking steps to establish a dental school at its Little Rock campus.
Foundations have donated large sums to the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences for its long-range plans to expand teaching at its school of dental hygiene and oral health clinics. It will take several years but eventually the goal is for Arkansas to have its own school of dentistry, which should go a long way toward alleviating the shortage of dental services in many parts of the state.
The director of the UAMS Center for Dental Education said it would take at least five years of preparation to establish a dentistry program.
Arkansas is one of 14 states without its own dental program. Arkansas college students who wish to study dentistry must attend programs in other states. The majority go to Tennessee.
The availability of dental services is best in suburban areas and worst in areas of poverty. The director of the Center for Dental Education said that there is a demand within the state for a dental program. An Arkansas school of dentistry likely will spread out the distribution of dentists throughout the state. Now, most dentists are clustered in the state's eight most populous counties and five rural counties in Arkansas have no dentist at all, he said.
UAMS plans to open a dental clinic at its Little Rock campus later this year, where patients can get dental services and faculty can teach students about dentistry and oral health.
There is a dental hygiene program at the UAMS College of Health Related Professions in Little Rock, and since 2009 the Department of Dental Hygiene also has offered classes at the campus of Arkansas State University at Mountain Home.
Students at Mountain Home learn from faculty in Little Rock using interactive video. They get clinical instruction and lab classes from faculty in Mountain Home.
On average, the Little Rock campus enrolls 34 students a year and the Mountain Home campus five students a year.
Arkansas has about 1,300 dentists and about 32 newly licensed dentists start practicing in the state each year. Many are in the Baby Boom generation and are expected to retire in the next few years, so a school of dentistry at UAMS would help alleviate an expected shortage of dentists.
UAMS has a College of Pharmacy, a College of Nursing, a College of Public Health and a Graduate School. In addition to dental hygiene, its College of Health Related Professions has numerous programs in fields such as cytotechnology, radiation therapy, nuclear medicine imaging, surgical technology and respiratory care. Five years ago UAMS opened a regional campus in Fayetteville called UAMS Northwest.
Century Farm Program
The Arkansas Agriculture Department wants to recognize families who have farmed the same land for 100 years or more, as of December 31, 2012. Their property may have passed down in the family through children, grandchildren, nephews or nieces, marriage or adoption. The farming operation must be at least 10 acres of the original land acquisition.
There is no cost to apply. Qualified applicants will receive a metal sign and a certificate. You may call 501-225-1598 for information or get on the department's web site at www.aad.arkansas.gov and click on Century Farm Program on the left side of the front page.

The Alternative Fuels Development Program is designed to increase the availability of fuels produced from Arkansas feedstock.

04/03/2012

State Capitol Week in Review
March 30, 2012
LITTLE ROCK – The state attorney general has officially asked in federal court for an end to state payments to the three school districts in Pulaski County in a long-running desegregation case.
The state has paid more than $1 billion to the three districts since 1989, when the federal court accepted a settlement among the Pulaski County districts and state government.
The amounts paid every year by the state to the three districts mean that every other school district in Arkansas has a financial stake in the outcome of the lawsuit. So do institutions of higher education and state government agencies that are funded with general revenue, such as the Medicaid program and prisons.
That is because payments in the desegregation settlement are made "off the top" of the state budget, in the same way that income tax refunds are taken from state revenue and sent to taxpayers. Desegregation payments, like income tax refunds, are not counted as part of the state's net revenue available for distribution to pay for state services.
The attorney general's office, which represents the state in lawsuits, argued before the federal court that the state should be allowed to end payments because the Little Rock and North Little Rock districts have officially been declared desegregated.
The third school district that receives state payments under the settlement, the Pulaski County Special School District, has been ruled partially desegregated by a federal court. The attorney general says that all the districts in Pulaski County have been released from their obligations to racially balance their schools, and therefore the state should be released from its obligation to pay for efforts to racially balance the three school districts.
A major issue before the federal judge is whether the state should continue to help pay for magnet schools in Pulaski County and for "majority to minority" transfers, known in shorthand as "M to M" transfers. The transfers allow a black student to attend school in a district that is majority white, or a white student to attend in a district that is majority black.
Magnet schools in Little Rock are 50 to 55 percent black and are an important component in the efforts of Pulaski County schools to desegregate.
Another looming issue is the number of charter schools in Pulaski County that have been approved by the state Board of Education. The Little Rock School District argues that the state has violated the desegregation settlement because the state Board of Education has approved so many open enrollment charters.
The Little Rock district contends that charter schools attract students who otherwise might attend magnet schools or who might participate in majority to minority transfers.
There are 11 open enrollment charters in Pulaski County with more than 4,500 students. Charters are publicly-funded schools that are allowed flexibility in their curriculum and other education standards. The goal is to encourage innovative teaching strategies and to enable charters to better teach gifted students as well as disadvantaged students.
Little Rock's attorneys claim that the charters in Pulaski County hamper the efforts of magnet schools, which have 3,500 students, and the "M to M" transfer program, in which 1,800 students participate. Little Rock's attorneys have asked the federal courts to put a stop to any new charters in Pulaski County.