PERRY COUNTY — Commissioners invited Joan Hess of the Convention and Visitors Bureau to speak before them at the regular May 16 meeting to address a letter the CVB had sent.

FERDINAND — Indiana 15 Regional Planning Commission has many active grants in process for the counties in its region. At its regular executive session Tuesday, May 23, Director Nathan Held highlighted the COPS Hiring Program grant, which has recently become of interest to some law enforcemen…

INDIANAPOLIS — The United States has one of the biggest incarcerated populations in the world — roughly 1.9 million — but the number of Americans on probation or parole is nearly twice that at 3.7 million.

INDIANAPOLIS — Spending on specific local projects climbed to $536 million in Indiana’s newest two-year budget, which Gov. Eric Holcomb signed into law Thursday. Such earmarks, routed through the State Budget Agency, have risen steeply in recent budget cycles — up from just $18 million in 2015.

INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana’s gas tax will continue to rise with inflation — up to one penny a year — while key figures gather for a long-term look at how the state funds its roads: inflation, electric vehicles, local road woes and all.

INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana’s gas tax will continue to rise with inflation — up to one penny a year — while key figures gather for a long-term look at how the state funds its roads: inflation, electric vehicles, local road woes and all.

INDIANAPOLIS — Lawmakers in more than a dozen states have filed legislation this year to outlaw the declawing of cats, which many animal advocates and some veterinarians say is a cruel deforming of felines’ bodies and impedes their natural instincts to climb and scratch.

INDIANAPOLIS — Dozens of new bills were signed into law Monday by Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb, including those that will allow pharmacists to prescribe birth control, establish a pilot program for speed cameras in road work zones and exempt military members from paying state income taxes.

INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana lawmakers gave charter schools major funding boosts in the next state budget after advocates ramped up lobbying efforts in the 2023 legislative session to extend more benefits to the traditional public counterparts.

INDIANAPOLIS — Lawmakers quietly included $1 million each year to address veteran suicide prevention efforts in the new state budget — a tiny portion of state spending that could provide much-needed help as thousands of veterans die across the country each year at higher rates than their civ…

INDIANAPOLIS — A school funding provision in the Senate-drafted state budget has drawn apprehension from some Hoosier education officials who say the change threatens students’ access to “essential” training programs.

INDIANAPOLIS — A controversial bill mandating that Indiana schools notify parents when a student asks for name or pronoun changes is headed to the governor’s desk.

INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana’s House on Monday signed off on the final version of a controversial proposal cracking down on the state’s pension investment managers — which its author said would “preserve” a free market while Democrats called it the “opposite of capitalism.”

INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana lawmakers are largely mum about the revival of a much-debated ban on materials deemed “harmful to minors” in school and public libraries.

INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana’s lawmakers are nearing the end of a grueling nearly four-month legislative session, but three of their biggest priorities — aside from the budget — remain unresolved.

INDIANAPOLIS — With the month of April coming to an end, so is the 2023 session.

PERRY COUNTY — Commissioners reviewed several items of business at their regular meeting, April 18.

INDIANAPOLIS — The Prison Policy Initiative has released “Mass Incarceration: The Whole Pie 2023,” described as a “comprehensive view” of how many people are incarcerated in the U.S., why they are incarcerated, and the kinds of facilities in which they’re housed.

INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana’s lawmakers on Monday stayed well into the evening to approve multiple priority health bills as they sought to meet critical deadlines: in the House, a deadline for final passage, and in the Senate, for chamber-wide amendments.

INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana lawmakers are one step closer to advancing a contentious bill to the governor’s desk that has been decried by the state’s teachers unions as “unnecessary” and “union-busting.”

INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana’s Senate on Tuesday — after vivid and emotional arguments — approved legislation creating a state-funded gun training program for school staff. Lawmakers gave school districts the authority to let their employees carry firearms at school a decade ago, but offered no tr…

INDIANAPOLIS — An amendment added to Senate Bill 419 will make breastfeeding supplies—including breast pumps, collection and storage supplies, and repair and replacement parts for breast pump kits—tax-exempt. The legislation passed out of the House of Representatives Monday and now heads bac…

PERRY COUNTY

Twenty-four years ago last week, Lawrence North basketball standout John Stewart collapsed and died during a regional basketball game against Bloomington South at Columbus North.

INDIANAPOLIS — Lawmakers tackled numerous topics [Monday, March 20], highlighted by key election bills and a measure that could slow the retirement of coal-fired power plants.

INDIANAPOLIS — A bill that seeks to propel Indiana’s ongoing carbon sequestration pilot project was approved Tuesday by lawmakers in the House, signaling momentum for what has so far been a divisive measure.

BLOOMINGTON — Global warming was a hot topic at the conference “America’s Role in the World,” last week at the Hamilton-Lugar School of Global and International Studies at Indiana University.

INDIANAPOLIS — A little more than a month after Indiana House Speaker Todd Huston’s high-profile departure last year from a six-figure role at the College Board, the Republican leader quietly started his own private consulting firm, according to new financial disclosure records.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — U.S. Senators Todd Young (R-Ind.) and Tim Kaine (D-Va.), members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, applauded committee passage of their bipartisan legislation to repeal the 1991 and 2002 Authorizations for Use of Military Force (AUMFs), formally ending the Gulf an…

INDIANAPOLIS — The U.S. Census Bureau recently released statewide totals for building permits issued in January and shows 783 single-family permits were pulled. The 783 permits pulled in January of 2023 are down 49% from the 1,539 permits pulled in January of 2022. This number is down 3% fro…

INDIANAPOLIS — Hoosiers undergoing a financial hardship may qualify for a state program that offers property tax relief.

INDIANAPOLIS — Author Sen. Ed Charbonneau, R-Valparaiso, spoke before the Senate Chamber to testify on his Senate Bill 4. Charbonneau said the bill seeks to bring more state funding and assistance to local health departments.

INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana lawmakers are taking a stand for the future of handwriting.

Provided by the UniteD States Department of Agriculture

INDIANAPOLIS — A new report finds that poverty, or inadequate income to meet a household’s basic needs, is much higher and more extensive in Indiana than official counts would suggest — particularly among working, single mothers of color.

INDIANAPOLIS — Hundreds of Hoosiers rallied at the New Direction Church in Indianapolis Saturday to urge lawmakers to fully fund Senate Bill 1, which would bolster mental health care access and services across the state.

INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana lawmakers have seized on high health care costs as a priority problem to tackle this legislative session, but rural hospitals with thin profit margins are worried — and want more help from the state.

INDIANAPOLIS — A collaboration between a Fishers Girl Scout troop, a local nonprofit and State Sen. Kyle Walker (R-Lawrence) created legislation to help foster care children work through trauma.