Tennessee on Tuesday June 30, 2009

TN: Judicial selection proposal signed
By The Associated Press, The Tennessean (Nashville)
A proposal to change the way judicial vacancies are filled in Tennessee has been signed by the governor.
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TN: Tennessee cities rush to ban guns in local parks
By Chas Sisk, The Tennessean (Nashville)
The handgun battle is heading from Capitol Hill to City Hall. Local governments and advocates for firearms owners are gearing up for a summer face-off over how far to take a new state law that lets people with carry permits bring handguns into parks.
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Furloughs cut into state services
By Pauline Vu, Stateline.org Staff Writer
With states facing a $121 billion shortfall in the next fiscal year, a growing number of them have turned to squeezing their workforce for savings, and effects both great and small will be felt.
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TN: One for the books: Bredesen, Wharton celebrate reading grant
By Sara Patterson, The Commercial Appeal (Memphis)
"I think I can, I think I can," a group of 4- and 5-year-olds chanted as Gov. Phil Bredesen read his favorite childhood book in the Urban Child Institute Monday afternoon.
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US: EPA lists sites where coal ash may pose threat
By The Associated Press, The Wall Street Journal
WASHINGTON -- The Environmental Protection Agency on Monday made public a list of 26 communities in 10 states where residents are potentially threatened by coal ash storage ponds similar to one that flooded a neighborhood in Tennessee last year.
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US: Ruling adds teeth to state oversight of banks
By Neil Irwin, The Washington Post
For years, state governments have had little power to enforce consumer-protection and lending rules at the country's biggest banks. No more.
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US: Obama steers health debate out of capital
By Sheryl Gay Stolberg, The New York Times
WASHINGTON — With Democrats deeply divided over health legislation, President Obama is trying to enlist the nation's governors and his own army of grass-roots supporters in a bid to increase pressure on lawmakers without getting himself mired in the messy battle playing out on Capitol Hill.
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US: A green way to dump low-tech electronics
By Leslie Kaufman, The New York Times
Since 2004, 18 states and New York City have approved laws that make manufacturers responsible for recycling electronics, and similar statutes were introduced in 13 other states this year.
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