California
The Secretary of State Business intends to adopt proposed regulations concerning the availability of business entity names that will (1) provide guidelines in selecting a business entity name prior to reserving the name or filing documents; (2) provide more certainty that a proposed business entity name will meet statutory standards; and (3) assist Secretary of State staff in determining if a proposed business entity name is acceptable, ensuring more consistency in the application of the statutory standards.  The Secretary of State will consider written comments received at its office by December 15 at 5:00 pm.  More information and a link to the proposed regulations can be accessed at
http://www.sos.ca.gov/business/regs-business-entity-names.htm

Rhode Island
The Secretary of State announced a 30-day grace period for LLC annual reports which must be filed between September 1 and December 1 to avoid a late filing penalty of $25.00.  More information and link to online filing is available at
http://www.sec.state.ri.us/corps/newsitems/llcs-get-grace-period-to-file-annual-reports

Texas
The Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts is not meeting the current volume of same-day requests for combined reports due to an overwhelming demand for tax clearance requests.  A combined report contains information on multiple business entities.  The turnaround time for requests for tax clearance for combined returns is currently 2 to 8 weeks, which means a clearance may not be received by December 31.  The link below opens to the Comptroller’s website with information regarding Certificate of Account Status certifying that a taxable entity doing business in Texas is in good standing with its franchise tax reports and payments or that the entity is exempt from the state franchise tax. http://www.window.state.tx.us/taxinfo/coasintr.html

Washington  
The Washington Secretary of State has advised business entities that legislation passed during the 2007 session to help fund the Washington State Heritage Center will increase filing fees by $5.00 effective January 1, 2009 for all business entity formation and qualification filings (except non-profit entities) at the Office of the Secretary of State's Corporations Division.  The notice can be accessed at http://www.secstate.wa.gov/corps/NewFilingFeeGoesIntoEffect.aspx

Wyoming
Effective January 1, 2009, the Wyoming Registered Offices and Agents Act, W.S 17-28-101, et seq., 2008,  will require all business entities formed or qualified to do business in Wyoming to provide their registered agent or the Secretary of State with a current Communications Contact, including the name, business address and business telephone number of a natural person. The Communications Contact may be an officer, director, employee, or designated agent of the entity who is authorized to receive communications from the registered agent. The new law requires business entities to update this information with their registered agent or the Secretary of State within 60 days of any change. The Act also requires additional record keeping requirements for domestic business entities. The Wyoming Registered Offices and Agents Act can be viewed on the “Business” section of the Wyoming Secretary of State’s website at
http://soswy.state.wy.us/Business/Business.aspx