Uniform Environmental Covenants Act

Ohio was the first state to adopt the Uniform Environmental Covenants Act (UECA), done on Dec. 22, 2004 by HB 516. This law addresses the re-use of brownfields. The National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws has created a UECA web site devoted to further developments with the law. The site has a map showing the latest legislative activity among the fifty states regarding adoption of the uniform law. To track all pending and recently enacted uniform laws by state, search the Final Acts and Legislation database on the NCCUSL web site.

Ohio Channel

The Ohio Channel offers live streaming video of Ohio Senate and House of Representative legislative sessions. Archives can be searched by specific parameters, down to the level of document type, keyword, date, and General Assembly number. The video and audio quality is decent, with detailed identification of each speaker or action, bill numbers, and length of time for each activity. Archives go back to 1997 for both legislative house. Those intersted can purchase a DVD or a VHS of any session available on the Ohio Channel. These video sessions mirror the legislative proceedings recorded in the Journals of the House and Senate. The Ohio Channel videos offer the verbatim dicussion, while the journals do not.

Blog: 13th Floor

Governing magazine has a group blog authored by the magazine's writers and editors. It's called 13th Floor and it focuses on the topic of state and local government. It's been around since October 2005. 13th Floor has a substantial statehouse blogroll listing "the most interesting blogs covering state capitols ... !"

State legislative monitoring

Stateside Associates a state legislative monitoring service, offers a few free items on its web site. A web page called "About the fifty states" includes a state session calendar and a chart of bill introduction deadlines for each state. There are several state tracking publications that can be viewed regularly including, This Week in the States, State Environmental Highlights, and State Policy Check-up, a state health care legislative publication.

Ohio's pandemic web site

A group of Ohio agencies have joined forces to prepare for the potential worldwide flu pandemic. A web site, Ohio Pandemic Flu, (http://ohiopandemicflu.gov/) helps to disseminate information to the public. The site posts Ohio's preparation plans, details about vaccines and medicines, how the outbreak will monitored, and how to take precautions.

RSS feeds for the Ohio Supreme Court

The Supreme Court of Ohio began to offer court news and opinion summaries as RSS feeds starting on June 29, 2006 (press release). A nicely composed informational page about how to subscribe to the court's RSS feeds is here. There is a separate feed for news items and one for opinion summaries.