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elections, his government was accused of blatantly rigging the vote.
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Unions showed political muscle and spent millions in state elections, ballot measure fights
• WASHINGTON (AP) -- From California to Maine, unions used their political muscle in the recent elections to help install Democratic governors, build labor-friendly majorities in state legislatures and defeat ballot initiatives against them.
• The combination of union money and member mobilization helped Democrats take control of state legislatures in Maine and Minnesota.
• In Michigan, voters repealed a law that allowed cities in financial distress to suspend collective bargaining contracts. But unions lost there on an effort to make collective bargaining rights a part of the state constitution.
• In New Hampshire, unions helped Maggie Hassan win the governor's race. Unions spent millions backing Hassan with television ads and an extensive get-out-the-vote operation because she opposes a right-to-work bill to ban labor-management contracts that require affected workers to be union members or pay union fees.
• In perhaps their most important victory, unions defeated a California ballot measure that would have prohibited them from collecting money for political purposes through payroll deductions.
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Superstorm puts federal beach program in spotlight after stripping sand from NJ coast
• SPRING LAKE, N.J. (AP) -- The average New Jersey beach is 30 to 40 feet narrower after Superstorm Sandy, according to a survey that is sure to intensify a long-running debate on whether federal dollars should be used to replenish stretches of sand that only a fraction of U.S. taxpayers use.
• Some of New Jersey's famous beaches lost half their sand when Sandy slammed ashore in late October.
• The shore town of Mantoloking, one of the hardest-hit communities, lost 150 feet of beach, said Stewart Farrell, director of Stockton College's Coastal Research Center and a leading expert on beach erosion.
• Routine storms tear up beaches in any season, and one prescription for protecting communities from storm surge has been to replenish beaches with sand pumped from offshore. Places with recently beefed-up beaches saw comparatively (Continued on page 32)
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