State Highlights: Alabama’s Escalating, Deadly Prison Crisis Tests State Lawmakers; Volunteers In States Across U.S. Try To Count Number Of Homeless People

The Wall Street Journal: Alabama Has The Deadliest Prisons In The Country. It Says It’s Looking For Reforms.
One afternoon in October, the warden at the prison where Sandy Ray’s son was serving time called to say he was hospitalized in critical condition, she recalled. He had fought with correctional officers who accused him of rushing at them with handmade weapons, according to the Alabama Department of Corrections. When Ms. Ray arrived, her 35-year-old son, Steven Davis, lay in bed unconscious, his face swollen and disfigured, photos she took show. “He was unrecognizable,” Ms. Ray said in an interview after a demonstration for prison reform where she spoke publicly. “He looked like a monster.” (Campo-Flores, 1/26)

Seattle Times: Across Washington, Volunteers Fan Out To Count Homeless People – But In Very Different Ways
In all, though Shelton encountered seven people who identified as homeless that day, she only counted three – a reflection of the varied ways local governments conduct counts they rely on to show funders how many people are experiencing homelessness on any given night. Homeless point-in-time counts like these were conducted across the United States this week, because they are the main way cities and counties are able to solicit federal dollars to address homelessness. As rough as these counts can be, they are required for federal investment. But across the state, methods for counting people vary widely. Snohomish County uses an in-person and service-based count in which only people surveyed contribute to the overall total. (Brownstone and Greenstone, 1/24)

Texas Tribune: How Many Homeless Texans Are There In 2020? Volunteers Are Counting.
The Point In Time Count, as it is called, is mandated by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and is conducted across the country each January. Volunteers in Fort Worth and San Antonio also fanned out across those regions to conduct similar counts Thursday. Austin volunteers will do the same Saturday. The Houston area’s count will be next week. (Garnham, 1/24)

ProPublica/Anchorage Daily News: Alaska’s Public Safety Officer Program Is Failing. Can It Be Saved?
A task force of Alaska legislators is proposing an overhaul of key elements of the state’s failing Village Public Safety Officer Program. The group of legislators spent five months looking for ways to fix the 40-year-old program, which uses state money to train and pay officers working in remote villages. In 2019, the number of VPSOs fell to an all-time low of 38 — compared with more than 100 in 2012. (Hopkins, 1/24)

Boston Globe: One Year After Merger, Beth Israel Lahey Gets Good Marks From Monitor
Nearly 11 months after their historic merger, the hospitals that make up Beth Israel Lahey Health have started collaborating on a number of programs, and so far they’re meeting all the conditions that Attorney General Maura Healey imposed on them, according to a new report. Healey’s office allowed the merger of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Lahey Health system — despite concerns that the deal could raise costs and reduce competition. (McCluskey, 1/24)

Chicago Tribune: In A Race Against Terminal Illness, Former Obama Staffer With ALS And His Wife Find New Hope A Year Later
In response to Wallach’s diagnosis, the couple, both 39, launched I AM ALS in 2019. Former staffers in the Obama White House, they marshaled lessons learned while campaigning — gathering information, forming consensus, considering the impossible possible — to build a force to mobilize hope and change for those facing a disease they say can and should be cured. Rays of hope are beginning to emerge through an innovative trial that received FDA approval this week to test several drugs at the same time, a bipartisan congressional caucus, doubled federal funding, and support from groups like the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, which gave the couple’s organization a $453,000 grant in September. (Bowen, 1/24)

The Associated Press: Abortion Among Key Issues In Missouri 2020 Governor's Race
Abortion is expected to play a key role in Missouri's 2020 governor’s race, when voters will decide whether to stick with a Republican who signed one of the most restrictive abortion laws in the U.S. or go with the only Democrat who holds statewide office. Republican Gov. Mike Parson, who served as lieutenant governor and assumed leadership after Gov. Eric Greitens resigned amid scandal in 2018, is heading into the race with good odds over state Auditor Nicole Galloway in the GOP-dominated state. (1/26)

St. Louis Post Dispatch: Vape Shops Battle Perceptions, Policies In Effort To Stay Viable
Independent vape shops, feeling the squeeze of tighter government regulations and renewed scrutiny from health advocates, have found themselves weathering a market that had been, for nearly a decade, in constant growth. Store owners here and across the country have responded by trimming their stock, adding unrelated merchandise to their shops and cutting workers' hours. Some stores have closed. “It’s very hard to run a business when you’re constantly under the threat of being put out of business,” said Gregory Conley, president of the American Vaping Association. (Schrappen, 1/24)

San Francisco Chronicle: SF Vape Shops Scramble With Ban Taking Effect: ‘I Don’t Know What The Hell I’m Going To Do’
San Francisco’s first-in-the-nation ban on e-cigarette sales, scheduled to take effect this week, is weighing heavily on Asad Sharifi, who owns Cheaper Cigarettes in the city’s Sunset District. Sharifi worries he may have to close his business, which sells cigarettes, cigars, pipes and vapes, because it’s poised to lose 40% of its profits. (Ho, 1/26)

St. Louis Post Dispatch: Paralyzed Inmate Accused Of Murder Says He Developed Large Bedsores In The Cole County Jail
Clark McVey, his public defender, hasn’t gotten to all of that yet. He said he’s been too busy addressing the bedsores that Estes may have developed in the Cole County Jail. “I have heard people flat-out say that he is just getting what he deserves,” said McVey. “We should all be given humane treatment. Furthermore, with Mr. Estes, these cases are pending. There has been no finding of guilt.” His client’s condition illustrates the costly challenge that many jails face since increasingly becoming repositories for the infirm. In Missouri, one of about 20 states that doesn’t have statewide jail standards, his situation is poised to go unnoticed beyond local authorities. (Bogan, 1/27)

Reveal: Miami Police Reform U Visa Policies For Immigrant Crime Victims
The Miami Police Department has enacted changes to how it treats immigrant victims of crime in response to an investigation by Reveal from The Center for Investigative Reporting. The story found that dozens of law enforcement agencies across the country routinely undermine visa protections for immigrants. (Morel, 1/24)

Nashville Tennessean: Tennessee House Adopts Drug-Free Workplace Policy Under
For the first time, staff members employed by the Tennessee House of Representatives could be subject to drug testing. The change comes less than a year after a former employee admitted to using cocaine in a legislative office and as House Speaker Cameron Sexton, R-Crossville, looks to modernize the chamber's policies to align with the best practices of private companies. (Ebert, 1/25)

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Parental Paid Leave Spreads In Georgia After Years Of Resistance
Three months of paid leave, maid service and a year of free diapers. Those are among the parental perks the Midtown software firm SalesLoft is using to lure top talent through its doors — and keep them there. SalesLoft is an outlier among companies in Georgia, which has long ranked among the bottom of states requiring paid leave benefits. But that’s beginning to change amid record-low unemployment as businesses court workers, particularly in highly paid, white-collar fields such as tech and consulting. (Hallerman, 1/24)

The Philadelphia Inquirer: Children’s Hospital Of Philadelphia Finds Benefits Of Fetal Surgery For Spina Bifida Continue Years Later
Eventually, a doctor referred the young couple to Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, where doctors were performing prenatal spina bifida surgery with promising results. “Hope is the word that always comes to mind," Oberio recalled. "It was a time we really felt hopeless, the way the previous doctors had described what was going on. CHOP didn’t make it seem like it was going to be easy, but they made it sound like things could be OK and that she could be happy.” (Gantz, 1/24)

Cleveland Plain Dealer: Cuyahoga County Jail Guard Pleads Guilty To Felony Charges In Pepper-Foam Attack Of Restrained Inmate, Extortion Of Fellow Guard
A Cuyahoga County jail supervisor admitted Friday that he doused the face of a restrained woman with pepper foam and used bootlegged copies of jailhouse video to threaten a fellow guard to testify on his behalf. Idris-Farid Clark, 32, pleaded guilty to extortion and attempted felonious assault, both third-degree felony charges, and a misdemeanor charge of unlawful restraint of inmate Chantelle Glass. (Shaffer, 1/24)

The Philadelphia Inquirer: St. Christopher’s Hospital Real Estate To Be Bought By Philadelphia Developer Iron Stone
Iron Stone Real Estate Partners, a Philadelphia developer known for acquiring financially distressed health-care properties, has agreed to pay $65 million for the buildings and other property occupied by St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children, according to people with direct knowledge of the pending deal. The sale of St. Christopher’s real estate, expected to close next month, will remove the North Philadelphia safety-net hospital from the legal chaos surrounding the bankruptcies last summer of St. Christopher’s and the now-closed Hahnemann University Hospital in Center City. (Brubaker, 1/27)

The Oregonian: Will Catlin Gabel School Survive Its Massive Sexual Abuse Scandal?
Catlin has admitted as much in the stunning internal report that found four decades of sexual abuse and misconduct at the school. The report, released five weeks ago, named some of the best-known and most-liked instructors to ever work at Catlin as alleged serial sexual predators.With dozens, perhaps hundreds, of potential lawsuits in the works, the question becomes: Does Catlin have the resources to survive a flood of complaints?The school’s admission that its administrators repeatedly failed to heed warnings that students were being abused could prove especially expensive. (Manning, 1/26)

North Carolina Health News: Former Dorothea Dix Chapel Reopens
The chapel that patients and staff at Raleigh’s Dorothea Dix Hospital attended for almost 60 years is getting a $2 million facelift and will greet visitors to Dix Park as well as offer concerts, community meetings, educational programs, spiritual events and more. The All Faiths Chapel opened in 1955 as a brand new resource for people at Dorothea Dix, a state-run hospital for people with mental illness, substance abuse problems, and intellectual disabilities that housed people from all over North Carolina. It closed along with the hospital in the 2010s, but the imposing red-brick building with a soaring sanctuary appears much as it did during its life as a church, when patients such as Lori Brinson, of Asheville, found it a refuge on the campus. (Goldsmith, 1/27)

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Prescription Drug Deaths Down In Much Of Georgia, GBI Finds
The number of overdose deaths caused by prescription drugs decreased in much of Georgia in 2018, according to a GBI analysis released Friday. Autopsies performed by the GBI Medical Examiner’s Office in 152 counties determined the rate of prescription and opioid-related deaths was lower in 2018 than the previous three years, the agency said. (Abusaid, 1/24)

The Baltimore Sun: Maryland Plans A Coed Training Center For Inmates Heading Home, But Women’s Advocates Say It’s Not Enough
Maryland corrections officials plan to convert a Jessup facility into a center dedicated to preparing inmates to return home, but advocates say incarcerated women still won’t have the same access to services as men. The state wants to turn the Brockbridge Correctional Facility into a “comprehensive pre-release, re-entry, and workforce development facility” for both men and women. Corrections leaders say it will offer programs to get people on the right track as they leave prison, with a focus on job training, education and family mediation. “It represents the next step of going home,” said Secretary Robert Green of the state’s Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services. But the plan doesn’t satisfy those who have been lobbying for several years for the state to open a prerelease center solely for female inmates. They say women haven’t had opportunities equal to those for men in terms of job training, housing referrals and other services to help them be successful once released. (Knezevich, 1/27)

Texas Tribune: Austin, Texas, Police Chief On Marijuana: Arrests Will Continue
The day after the Austin City Council approved a resolution to stop arresting or ticketing people for most low-level marijuana possession offenses, the police chief made clear he had no plans to do so. “[Marijuana] is still illegal, and we will still enforce marijuana law if we come across people smoking in the community,” Chief Brian Manley said during a news conference Friday afternoon. Although cracking down on those in possession of small amounts of marijuana has never been a priority for the department, he said, police will continue to either issue tickets under the city’s “cite-and-release” policy or arrest people if officers “come across it.” (McCullought, 1/24)

Boston Globe: State-Run Marijuana Stores? Proponents — Including Rhode Island’s Governor — Say It’s An Idea Worth Exploring
Plenty of New Englanders have made a pit stop at one of New Hampshire’s state-run liquor stores. Now, another state in the region is wondering: Why not state-run marijuana stores? Rhode Island Governor Gina Raimondo last week proposed creating a network of recreational pot shops owned by the government, a plan that would make the state the first in the country to hold a monopoly on selling cannabis to consumers 21 and older. (Adams and Gans, 1/24)

Kansas City Star: Missouri Approved 40 Medical Marijuana Dispensaries In Kansas City
Forty medical marijuana dispensary facilities received licenses to operate in the Kansas City area, according to a list issued by the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services (DHSS) Friday.Missouri is required to license at least 192 facilities -- 24 per Congressional district -- where qualifying patients can purchase marijuana. As of Jan. 21, DHSS has issued medical marijuana ID cards to 29,457 Missourians and 820 to caregivers. (Gutierrez, Thomas and Hardy, 1/24)

Kansas City Star: Missouri Medical Marijuana Approvals ‘Kind Of A Mystery’
Stevens, a paralegal of 30 years, filed a formal appeal of the state’s decision last week. But her complaints are hardly unique as would-be marijuana business owners have raised questions across Missouri about how the state selected winners and losers.Numerous attorneys, lobbyists and applicants spoke with The Star about inconsistencies and irregularities they saw in the scoring process. State officials maintain that their blind scoring process was secure and legitimate. Yet administrative appeals and lawsuits have started to pile up — so much so that the Department of Health and Senior Services solicited bids on Tuesday from attorneys who could help defend the state in legal action. (Hardy, Hancock and Vockrodt, 1/25)