In 2006, Alaska voters approved a ballot initiative that imposed tough environmental rules on the water discharges of cruise ships. Now that state's lawmakers, claiming that enforcement of the rules threatens to hurt tourism in the Last Frontier, are pushing legislation to relax those standards.

Check out the end of this story in the Great Falls Tribune about an attempt to regulate the pay day loan business in Montana. After the bill failed to get out of a legislative committee, one backer pledged to take the regulatory proposal to the people in the form of a ballot initiative.

The legislature is battling it out over the budget deal tonight. (The Senate is in caucus, and the Assembly floor session is in recess). Yep, Valentine's Day. One bit of news, pointed out first by KQED's John Myers. The legislature seems to be anticipating a special election on May 19. And yes, that is too early for ballot initiatives to be qualified. None of the measures currently approved for circulation seem to be circulating actively. Several initiative coordinators I know are on the way to other states where there are petitions circulating.

President Clinton is scheduled to give a speech Sunday in San Diego to something called the International Franchise Association. Bad move. The location of the speech is a Hyatt hotel that has been the subject of a boycott by the No on 8 folks (that is, supporters of same-sex marriage) since the hotel's owner gave to the Yes on 8 campaign during last year's initiative campaign. The Courage Campaign, a progressive group with an an active Internet organizing operation here in California, is sending out emails and petitions urging Clinton to cancel the speech. Labor unions, which have been battling the hotel, also are boycotting.

In the Sacramento Bee, New America's Steven Hill examines claims being made in California about the value of a "top two"-style open primary, which appears to be the new favorite idea of the state's community of goo goo reformers. Hill is skeptical of claims that such a primary would produce more moderate office holders or provide voter choice -- particularly in light of Washington state's experience with such a primary.

The Webster-Kirkwood Times offers a very detailed rundown of the initiative petitions now circulating on the streets of Missouri.

That's not a record. The number topped $300 million during 2005, the year of Gov. Schwarzenegger's ill-fated special election, and in the 2006 cycle. But it's not chump change--more than the payroll of the New York Yankees, and a little less than the budget at smaller University of California campuses.

Not the 21st century, mind you. But South Dakota, where American direct democracy began in 1898, is considering whether to change its woefully outdated laws that permit initiative sponsors to write their own descriptions of what their measure would do. In the world outside South Dakota, titles and summaries have been written by public officials who are supposed to be neutral. (In California, it's the attorney general). More details of the proposal from this story in the Mitchell Republic.

Paul Jacob, the term limits advocate, emails and says that Citizens In Charge, his organization to advocate for the initiative process and the rights of people to petition their government, is growing. A year in, the group -- which is really two groups (one a 501 c 3, the other a different kind of non-profit, a c4) -- has six employees and is working on several fronts, including making it easier to qualify measures for the ballot in Oklahoma. If he's successful in opening up the process in Oklahoma (where the attorney general unsuccessfully attempted to prosecute Jacob for ballot initiative work), it would be especially sweet. The state is probably the hardest place in America to qualify an initiative, because of government hostility and a tight, 90-day time limit on signature gathering.

A federal judge has ruled that the names of Prop 8 donors have to be disclosed, turning aside a legal challenge that argued that disclosing the donors would subject them to harassment.