{"id":3709,"date":"2012-01-13T15:20:26","date_gmt":"2012-01-13T22:20:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/?p=3709"},"modified":"2012-01-13T15:22:09","modified_gmt":"2012-01-13T22:22:09","slug":"essential-stateimpact-top-five-stories-of-the-week-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/01\/13\/essential-stateimpact-top-five-stories-of-the-week-5\/","title":{"rendered":"Essential StateImpact: Top Five Stories of the Week"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A lot of news came out of the Idaho Capitol this week.\u00a0 In case you missed anything, we bundled our five most viewed stories in one nifty package.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<div id=\"attachment_3782\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 224px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"Inside the Idaho Capitol rotunda, which is where we'll be a lot over the next four months.\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2012\/01\/Rotunda_Albedo20_Flickr.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-3782\" title=\"Rotunda_Albedo20_Flickr\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2012\/01\/Rotunda_Albedo20_Flickr-300x401.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"224\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2012\/01\/Rotunda_Albedo20_Flickr-300x401.jpg 300w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2012\/01\/Rotunda_Albedo20_Flickr-620x829.jpg 620w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2012\/01\/Rotunda_Albedo20_Flickr-220x294.jpg 220w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2012\/01\/Rotunda_Albedo20_Flickr.jpg 765w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 224px) 100vw, 224px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Albedo20 \/ Flickr<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Inside the Idaho Capitol rotunda, which is where we&#39;ll be a lot over the next four months.<\/p><\/div>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/01\/10\/idahos-former-chief-economist-critical-of-govs-budget-proposal\/\" target=\"_blank\">Idaho&#8217;s Former Chief Economist Critical of Gov&#8217;s Budget Proposal<\/a>: For 26 years Mike Ferguson was Idaho\u2019s chief economist.\u00a0 He helped craft a lot of state budgets before leaving the job in 2010.\u00a0 He says everyone is in agreement Idaho is in need of economic development, &#8220;the problem with using the tax structure to try to promote economic development is it\u2019s a very scattershot kind of approach.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/01\/11\/gov-otters-salary-increased-4-percent-from-last-year\/\" target=\"_blank\">Gov. Otter&#8217;s Salary Increased 4 Percent from Last Year<\/a>: The governor&#8217;s salary is up 4 percent, but he&#8217;s still earning less than 261 state employee.\u00a0 We have the salary data you can scan through.\u00a0 Any guesses on the highest paid state employee?\u00a0 Here&#8217;s a hint, he&#8217;s earning $1.17 million.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/01\/09\/governor-otters-speech-focuses-on-jobs-education-and-a-leaner-future\/\" target=\"_blank\">Governor Otter&#8217;s Speech Focuses on Jobs, Education and a Leaner Future<\/a>: Gov. Butch Otter opened the legislative session with his annual State of the State Address this week.\u00a0 We have a copy of the speech with highlighted passages and additional information. <!--more--><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/01\/12\/nearly-1000-idaho-state-workers-laid-off-since-2007\/\" target=\"_blank\">Nearly 1,000 Idaho State Employees Laid-Off Since 2007<\/a>: Governor C.L. \u201cButch\u201d Otter said Idaho will not and has not faced \u201cstaggering\u201d state employee layoffs like many other states have during his annual State of the State address delivered Monday.\u00a0 But what does \u201cstaggering\u201d mean?\u00a0 Idaho has laid-off 928 people over the last five years.\u00a0 The state\u2019s total workforce has averaged about 24,700 employees during that same\u00a0time.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/01\/13\/state-health-exchange-advocates-say-jobs-hang-in-the-balance\/\" target=\"_blank\">State Health Exchange Advocates Say Jobs Hang in the Balance<\/a>: It\u2019s a worry that isn\u2019t hard to find, among those who want the state to create its own exchange.\u00a0 Department of Insurance Director Bill Deal has expressed it.\u00a0 And Regence BlueShield\u2019s Shad Priest also doesn\u2019t think Idaho\u2019s insurers can expect to compete in a national exchange.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A lot of news came out of the Idaho Capitol this week.\u00a0 In case you missed anything, we bundled our five most viewed stories in one nifty package. Idaho&#8217;s Former Chief Economist Critical of Gov&#8217;s Budget Proposal: For 26 years Mike Ferguson was Idaho\u2019s chief economist.\u00a0 He helped craft a lot of state budgets before [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40,"featured_media":3782,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[12],"tags":[111],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3709"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/40"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3709"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3709\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3802,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3709\/revisions\/3802"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3782"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3709"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3709"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3709"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}