POLICY ROUNDUP

It’s not possible to set a blood-test threshold for THC, the chemical in marijuana that makes people high, according to a study commissioned by AAA, the nation’s largest automobile club.

Six states that allow marijuana use currently employ legal tests to determine whether someone is driving while impaired on the drug, but they have no scientific basis to do so.

AAA’s safety foundation is recommending that the laws in Colorado, Montana, Nevada, Ohio and Pennsylvania be scrapped and replaced with ones that rely on specially trained police officers to determine if the driver is impaired.

There is no science that shows drivers become impaired at a specific level of THC in the blood. A lot depends upon the individual and how regularly he or she uses the drug.

Driving with “a noisy child in the back of the car” is about as dangerous as using marijuana and driving, Mark A.R. Kleiman, a New York University professor specializing in issues involving drug and criminal policy, told the Associated Press.

The exception is when a driver has both been using marijuana and drinking alcohol, because the two substances together greatly heighten impairment, he said.

As many as 11 states could vote this fall on ballot measures to legalize marijuana for recreational and medicinal use. — Joana Suleiman

EDUCATION

Teachers’ unions invest millions in anti-hedge fund group

According to the education news website The 74, teachers’ unions are spending millions against an unlikely opponent: hedge funds.

Three of America’s largest teachers’ unions (National Education Association, American Federation of Teachers and New York City United Federation of Teachers) have spent at least $5.5 million funding and directing Hedge Clippers, a group protesting hedge fund investors and their influence in politics.

Public education seemingly has little to do with hedge funds. But Michael Kink, the executive director of Strong Economy for All, which launched Hedge Clippers, claims otherwise. “We’re talking about a larger fight for a more fair society,” he told The 74. “It’s much broader than education, although it includes education.”

Despite the questionable connection between the two, Kink is a UFT employee according to federal tax records.

Andrew Rotherham, a partner at Bellwether Education Advisors, says teachers’ union members might be upset their dues are being spent on non-education issues. “Some fund managers are reformers and charter supporters, but … most aren’t involved at all. If I were a teacher, I’d ask myself, ‘Is this really something I want my [dues] spent on?'”

Hedge funds are made up of investors who pool funds to create large financial gains. — Jason Russell

EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT

First responders’ network not coming fast enough

When a crisis strikes, there currently isn’t a broadband network or app that seamlessly transmits information from 911 centers to police, fire departments or emergency medical services, said Jay English, a director at APCO International, a nonprofit dedicated to public safety communication, during a panel in Washington last week.

“There is a real need today. Officers are responding — firefighters and medics responding — without information,” English told attendees at the AFCEA Bethesda’s Law Enforcement IT Day.

First responders can’t wait for FirstNet (or Next Generation 911), a public-private partnership and IP-based emergency reporting system that could take years to develop.

They also need a system that helps them aggregate information on specific cases from other jurisdictions, levels of government and the public, said Mike Boxer, a special agent at the Washington Division of Bureau, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

“It’s the person that hears about the incident, and they know something. How do they upload that [so it’s] accessible to the command staff of the investigation, so you can get a broader picture?” asked Boxer.

First responders are also under constant pressure, so the app needs to account for that. “To get access to a secure system, I need two-factor login. That kind of stuff works well for the guy writing at the desk. Doesn’t really work well for me in the field,” said Don McGarry, who is part of the Loudoun County Virginia Volunteeer Rescue Squad. — Joana Suleiman

ENVIRONMENT

Is it time to enlist the gopher tortoise?

In the future, the U.S. military can conduct simulated drone strikes and run tank treads over as much gopher tortoise habitat as it wants, just as long as it has enough credits.

At least that’s the plan the Fish and Wildlife Service is proposing.

The idea is that a voluntary conservation-credit system would be created as a way to ensure that the gopher tortoise, which the wildlife service could list as threatened, is protected in areas where the military conducts its maneuvers.

The military could train and conduct operations within gopher tortoise territory as long as it has enough credits to account for the damage done to the tortoise habitat. The credits would be generated by the military services undertaking voluntary conservation activities to protect the habitat.

The credit system the wildlife service envisions implies the bases would be able to sell the credits to other bases looking to comply with the endangered species law, but it is not clear how that would work.

The gopher tortoise is indigenous to much of the Southeastern and Gulf of Mexico states, but it is only protected as a “threatened species” west of Florida and the eastern Gulf of Mexico.

But that might change, making the tortoise an endangered species across much of the South where the military has bases and isn’t necessarily used to managing protected habitat. — John Siciliano

REGULATION

SEC goes after delinquent energy firms

The Securities and Exchange Commission is going after two energy companies that are delinquent in their financial filings, ordering that all trades on exchanges carrying the companies be suspended immediately.

The first is a clean energy company in Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid’s home state of Nevada. The SEC says it has tried to contact the company, Li-ion Motors, aka Terra Inventions, for months with no answer. The company hasn’t made a securities filing for three years.

“On Aug. 19, 2015, a delinquency letter was sent by the Division of Corporation Finance to Li-ion Motors Corp. requesting compliance with its periodic filing obligations, but Li-ion Motors Corp. did not receive the delinquency letter due to its failure to maintain a valid address on file with the commission as required by commission rules,” a notice in the Federal Register says.

The agency also is going after a Maryland company that appears to be vested in the oil business, but the agency doesn’t identify the company.

PetroHunter Energy Corp., a Maryland corporation with its principal place of business listed as Denver, hasn’t filed any reports since the period that ended June 30, 2013. A delinquency letter was sent three years ago requesting compliance with its periodic filing obligations, but PetroHunter didn’t comply.

The SEC notice says the company received the letter, “but failed to cure its delinquencies.” — John Siciliano

LABOR

Rising minimum wage prompts Wendy’s to turn to kiosks

Wendy’s said last week that the fast-food chain would use self-service kiosks at 6,000 of its restaurants in response to the nationwide movement to raise the minimum wage.

Company President Todd Penegor warned a year ago, when he was chief financial officer, that the company would explore using the kiosks and other automation if the minimum wage were raised, as well as raising its food prices.

McDonald’s also is testing self-service kiosks, and other fast-food restaurants are warning of doing the same as cities and states raise the minimum wage to as much as $15 an hour. The federal minimum is $7.25.

In a guest article written for Forbes last month, former McDonald’s USA CEO Ed Rensi wrote that instituting a $15 minimum wage would mean “wiping out thousands of entry-level opportunities for people without many other options.”

Arguing that McDonald’s franchisees would not be able to absorb the additional labor costs that would come with a minimum wage of $15, Rensi suggested that the restaurant instead would turn to self-service kiosks to replace some employees. Customers don’t mind the kiosks, and they have been successfully implemented in Europe, he said. — Cathy Gainor