The special election to fill the House District 18 seat has been set for September 12, 2015.

Rep. Mike Barbieri vacated the seat to take a job leading the state’s Division of Substance Abuse and Mental Health.

In a written statement, House Speaker Pete Schwartzkopf said the date was chosen to give candidates time to reach out to voters in the district and, by scheduling the election on a Saturday, to make voting “as convenient as possible.”

The Utah Legislature adjourned its one-day special session on August 19, 2015. A resolution to build a state prison in Salt Lake City was approved, as expected. Gov. Gary Herbert, who called the special session, will address whether he will sign or reject the resolution at his regularly scheduled news conference today.

Today at 3 p.m. the first special session of the Utah 61st Legislature will be held. The session, expected to last one day, was called by Gov. Gary Herbert on August 14 to vote on a resolution concerning the building of a new state prison in Salt Lake City. While the resolution is expected to pass, the new prison still faces opposition from city leaders, who may file “an environmental lawsuit to slow or block the project,” according to the Salt Lake Tribune.

Photo of the Utah State Capitol by Robert Cutts on Wikimedia Commons.

Elizabeth Brown, daughter of Sen. Sherrod Brown, will replace Michelle Mills on the November ballot in the race for Columbus City Council. Mills recently announced her resignation from council effective September 4, 2015.

Though no reason was given for her resignation, Mills was one of four members of council who attended the Big Ten Championship football game with lobbyist John Raphael. Raphael is part of a federal bribery investigation involving the city’s former red light camera vendor.

In a surprise move, Senate Democrats voted yesterday to adjourn the special session of the General Assembly. Lawmakers had reconvened just hours earlier to redraw congressional district lines.

The maneuver is an attempt to allow Gov. Terry McAuliffe to extend a temporary appointment of a state supreme court justice.

Though many senators have left the capitol, House Republican leaders insist the session has not ended and are contemplating their next move.

Following a lawsuit by the Oklahoma Democratic Party, the Oklahoma Ethics Commission has voted to suspend its rules prohibiting fundraising and distribution of election materials on state-owned property. The Commission will suspend enforcement of Rules 2.6 and 2.7 until they are amended to ensure their constitutionality.

The Oklahoma Democratic Party’s lawsuit argued the new rules improperly infringed on free speech.

Ethics Commission Executive Director Lee Slater hopes the move will render the lawsuit moot.

The number of municipalities and regional governments our research associates track continues to grow. We now cover almost 300 municipalities and local governments. This is part of a continuous effort to better serve the needs of our clients.

In that effort, we have recently added another abridged jurisdiction to our website. These entries, condensed due to the limited number of relevant local laws, provide the core information our clients need for their government relations work.

The new jurisdiction is: Peoria, Illinois

The state Democratic Party has filed suit in federal court against the state Ethics Commission over rules the agency adopted last year.

The Democratic Party argues the new rules, which prohibit fundraising and election material distribution on state-owned property, improperly restrain free speech and, therefore, violate the Constitution.

The party is asking the court to invalidate the rules.

The South Carolina Department of Transportation is instituting a new rule regarding employees who leave state employment to work for state contractors.

The new policy will prohibit former employees from working on new road construction projects for 365 days after leaving the department.

The department’s acting secretary says the new policy will help clarify state ethics law and ensure there is no perception of impropriety.

Ohio state Rep. Ron Gerberry is resigning from his House seat effective August 21.

His resignation comes after reports he was facing charges of campaign finance law violations. Gerberry allegedly had false information on his campaign finance filings. According to The Vindicator, he will plead guilty to the charge of “unlawful compensation.”

Gerberry has served in the Ohio Legislature for 27 years.

With still no budget agreement for the state, the Alabama Legislature adjourned its special session sine die on Tuesday, August 11, 2015. The special session had been called because there was no state budget in place at the end of the regular legislative session for the fiscal year beginning October 1, 2015. Gov. Robert Bentley is likely to call another special session to resolve the state budget issue.

Gov. Mary Fallin has called a special election to fill the seat of state Sen. Rick Brinkley.

A primary election for the District 34 seat will be held on November 10, 2015 and a general election on January 12, 2016.

Sen. Brinkley announced his resignation, effective at the end of the year, amid allegations of embezzling more than $1 million.

Gov. Mike Pence has cancelled a contract between the state Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV) and Express MVA and requested an investigation due to possible ethics violations.

Shawn Walters, formerly the BMV chief of staff, had approved Express MVA’s opening of a private license branch in 2010. However, when Walters moved from state employment to become the chief operating officer of Express MVA in 2014, he did not ask the state Ethics Commission if such a move would violate the state’s law requiring a one-year cooling-off period.

In addition to ending the contract, Pence has asked the inspector general to determine if Walters violated any ethics law by accepting a job with Express MVA.

A runoff election for mayor will be held next month due to such close voting results in the August 6 Nashville municipal election.

Megan Barry and David Fox came in first and second, respectively, in a field of seven candidates. Barry, an at-large member of Metro Council, earned about 1,500 more votes than Fox, former chair of the Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools Board.

The runoff election will be held on September 10.