Archive for the ‘Lieutenant Governor News’ Category

From Courant.com:

Connecticut Lt. Gov. Michael Fedele (feh-DELL’-ee) says he’ll be the Republican candidate for governor in 2010 if fellow GOP member M. Jodi Rell doesn’t seek re-election.

Fedele said Wednesday that he expects Rell to seek another term, but the Stamford resident is ready to step in if she doesn’t.

Rell has declined to say whether she’ll seek re-election.

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From the Salt Lake Tribune:

Gary Herbert announced Wednesday that he has selected Sen. Greg Bell to serve as his lieutenant governor.

Bell emerged as the clear front-runner in recent weeks as Herbert narrowed his list, and several top candidates removed themselves from consideration. Some insiders, including Senate President Michael Waddoups, said an opposition campaign from the Utah Eagle Forum that tried to cast Bell as too liberal helped cement the deal.

Bell — an attorney, real estate developer and former Farmington mayor who now lives in Fruit Heights — has been a strong supporter of strengthening the rules on the gifts legislators may accept from lobbyists and had advocated for a complete gift ban. Last session he sponsored the bill requiring more disclosure of meals and gifts. Lobbyist oversight and elections management are among the chief responsibilities for the lieutenant governor.

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From SFGate:

Some Dem insiders suggest Alioto-Pier might have been convinced by party higher ups to leave the Lite Gov seat open — just in case a certain San Francisco mayor might eventually want to retreat from seeking the top spot.

Brown supporters have been promoting the line that Newsom may have set his ambitions too high in taking on Brown, who has logged four decades in state politics. Newsom insiders, though, counter that this all started when Brown himself showed up to a 75th birthday party for the Mayor’s dad — and reportedly told the elder Newsom that Gavin should be running for Lite Gov instead.

So could party leaders urge Newsom to make peace with Brown and settle for next-best-thing if it looks like he can’t get the brass ring?

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From the Baltimore Sun:

The nation’s lieutenant governors, more in the limelight in recent months than their second-in-command status usually affords them, are gathering in Maryland this week for a conference to brush up on policy skills.

The National Lieutenant Governors Association is holding its annual meeting through Friday at Baltimore’s InterContinental Hotel. About 120 attendees, including two dozen lieutenant governors and others who may not hold that title but are first in the line of succession to governors in states and U.S. territories.

While lieutenant governors are often overshadowed by and traditionally far less powerful than their gubernatorial counterparts, they have been making a splash in the news in past months as several have assumed power in their states.

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From NEMS360.com:

Lt. Gov. Phil Bryant told a Neshoba County Fair audience Wednesday that writing a state budget this year required tough decisions.

Bryant said he and Gov. Haley Barbour, a fellow Republican, made sure the state was frugal during the recession.

“In looking at the state’s budget, the easy road is spending money we don’t have just so you don’t have to make any cuts or to blame someone else for making cuts later,” Bryant said, according to a prepared text. “The hard road is being honest and not going into debt and making sure we live within our means.”

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From Lieutenant Governor Casey Cagle:

We are all blessed to live in such an extraordinary state, but it is impossible to miss the frequent reports of worsening economic conditions exacerbating’s budget challenges. The latest announcement of an additional $900 million budget shortfall puts us in the unfortunate company of 47 other states that have addressed or face 2010 budget shortfalls totaling a combined $166 billion. Clearly, the same budget challenges that dominated the 2009 agenda will be the focal point for legislators and leaders in 2010.

I’m proud of the work the state Senate has done to anticipate these challenges. My office worked with senators as early as summer 2008 to assess the role of each state agency and work in partnership with agencies to make significant spending cuts. Our goal was to maximize the efficiency of government with the firm expectation that the state’s budget situation would not improve in the short term. Thanks to their cooperation, this comprehensive review of state spending allowed us to enter the 2009 session with the necessary facts and information to make many carefully targeted cuts that totaled over $2.5 billion.

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From the Salt Lake Tribune:

As Lt. Jon Huntsman Jr., a handful of top-tier candidates for the state’s No. 2 job have declined the job or asked Herbert to cross their names off his list.

“It’s pretty widely known in political circles that Gary has made repeated overtures and it’s getting to the point where all eyes are watching to see who is ready to be the also-ran,” said one Republican legislator, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic.

But Herbert says that, while some of asked to have to be taken out of consideration for the job, it’s not a case of being jilted.

“If the thought is in anybody’s mind that I’ve offered this job to a number of people — three, four or five people — and they’ve turned it down, that’s factually incorrect,” Herbert said. He would not, however, say if the job had been offered to anyone.

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