The Week That Was

Jittery in an election year, state lawmakers returned for their annual regular session with no solution in sight to taxing and spending woes. Also on the agenda: juvenile justice reforms, charter schools, urban growth policy, reform of mental health laws, and a state lottery. Sen. Ward Crutchfield said he wants to push for a Senate floor vote on the lottery issue early this year, likely during January.

Tax foes denounced lawmakers for requiring candidates for the 2000 elections to file their qualifying petitions six weeks earlier. Calling it ”a sneaky incumbent protection act,“ Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Brentwood said Democrats ”slipped through“ the bill and she admitted making a mistake when she voted for the change last year. She said that after the April 6 deadline passes, legislators without an opponent may be more likely to vote for a state income tax. One of the bill’s sponsors, House Democratic Leader Jere Hargrove, said he just wanted to give the public more time to get to know the candidates.

New figures showed country music sold only 69 million albums in 1999, a nearly 5-percent drop from the previous year. It was such a bad year that the top country album was one that came out in ’98—Shania Twain’s Come On Over. The record industry as a whole grew by 6 percent.