The National Conference of State Legislatures annually examines the issues likely to dominate legislative discussions in the 50 states. This year, Julie Lays, editor of NCSL’s magazine, State Legislatures, produced her top 10 list.
The items on the list are not particularly surprising:
- Health care reform
- Immigration migration?
- Regulations on review
- Transportation infrastructure
- Children of the opioid epidemic
- Police community relations
- Planning for the federal Every Student Succeeds Act
- The affordability of higher education
- Fending off cyberattacks
- Marijuana, phase 2
Earlier we posted on an Elway Poll of top issues for the Washington legislature and how Opportunity Washington survey respondents viewed the session. Both surveys put K-12 funding at the top of the list; school finance didn’t make the NCSL list, although the ESSA puts the public schools in play. That funding topped the Washington survey may demonstrate anew the wisdom in Dr. Johnson’s observation about the effect of knowledge about an impending hanging or, in this case, a coming court accounting.
