News from Across the Nation - Feb. 20, 2017

ARIZONA

By a 3–2 vote, the PIMA COUNTY Board of Supervisors decided to appeal a Superior Court judge’s ruling invalidating a lease between the county and space technology firm, World View. 

The Phoenix-based Goldwater Institute sued the county last year, claiming the deal violated state law.

Goldwater contends the county violated the state’s gift clause, failed to follow state procurement rules and failed to follow state law on leasing public property. The county denies these claims. Next stop for the case: the Arizona Court of Appeals. 

 

CALIFORNIA

• A Superior Court judge put the kibosh on the state’s plan to place a violent sexual predator in PLACER COUNTY after officials and residents argued that doing so would endanger children in the area. 

The offender, Dariel Shazier, has two prior convictions of molesting teenage boys, in which he used alcohol and then forcibly assaulted them, The Sacramento Bee reported.

Placer County Detective Scott Alford told the court that children live throughout the area where Shazier was to have been housed, and that many others visit the area because of youth activities.

“Mr. Shazier will hear the boys play when he’s sitting in the room,” Alford said. “It will be too much temptation for him.”

• A SANTA CLARA COUNTY ordinance aims to enable broader access to affordable housing. It bars landlords from rejecting prospective tenants solely because they receive a housing subsidy.

The new ordinance also prohibits landlords from including statements such as “No Section 8 Accepted” in ads for rental housing.  The ordinance will take effect in January 2018.

Thirteen states and dozens of local jurisdictions nationwide have already passed similar ordinances, county officials said. Such ordinances have been shown by the Department of Housing and Urban Development to increase the use of housing assistance funds by up to 11 percent.

DELAWARE

NEW CASTLE COUNTY’s new executive, Matthew Meyer, has signed three ordinances designed to boost economic growth and strengthen neighborhoods.

The first measure provides principles for site design and project amenities during the review of new land development plans.

Another ordinance empowers neighborhoods to establish Neighborhood Preservation Overlay Districts. This will allow communities, by a two-thirds vote, to set standards including building height restrictions, setbacks, open space and streetscape elements.

Under the third measure, the county may designate Economic Empowerment Districts to encourage business development.

MARYLAND

• FREDERICK COUNTY would set aside more money from its recordation tax to preserve agricultural land and acquire parks, under legislation requested by the county executive. It would not increase or impose new taxes.

The bill would reduce to 58 percent the amount of money from the county’s recordation tax that goes into the general fund. Currently, the figure is about 68 percent, The Frederick News-Post reported.

A public hearing on the issue is scheduled for later this month.

• Despite sponsors’ removing the words “sanctuary county” from a bill, HOWARD COUNTY Executive Allan Kittleman says he’ll veto the measure designed to protect immigrants. It passed the County Council three votes to two.

“If the sponsors had reached out to key stakeholders prior to filing the legislation,” said Kittleman, “they would have learned that it was unnecessary,” The Baltimore Sun reported.

The bill would have prohibited police officers and most government employees from asking residents about their immigration status.

MINNESOTA

The ST. LOUIS COUNTY Board is considering a resolution calling on the Trump administration to overturn a ban on copper mining near a federal wilderness area in the county.

The resolution is part of a regional effort to support copper mining in the Superior National Forest after the Obama administration temporarily banned mining on 235,000 acres near the wilderness area, according to The Duluth News Tribune.

County Board Chairman Frank Jewell sees the resolution as something of a toothless tiger that will “have no impact” at the federal level. “We just should be voting on things that the county has responsibility for, and this clearly isn’t one of them,” he said.

NEW YORK

• Tobacco and pharmacies seem diametrically opposed, and now ROCKLAND COUNTY’s Legislature has codified it, banning tobacco sales there. 

The CVS chain, which has pharmacies in the county, stopped selling tobacco in 2014. The New York State Department of Health will be responsible for enforcing the law.

PIX News reported that Rockland County is the first county in New York to ban tobacco sales in pharmacies; municipalities in Massachusetts, California and Minnesota already bans in place. 

• A state appeals court sided with WYOMING COUNTY and dismissed a lawsuit by a woman who was bitten by a dog while working at its animal shelter. 

The woman was working at the shelter as a dog walker about five years ago when she was bitten. She later filed a personal injury lawsuit claiming the county “may have been informed” that the dog had previously knocked over a child. The court ruled that wasn’t enough to consider the dog vicious. The suit also claimed the dog may have bitten a child four months before biting the employee. The court ruled that Wyoming couldn’t have known about the incident, The Daily News reported.

OKLAHOMA

• ROGERS COUNTY has been chosen to be the first recipient of a new long-range transportation plan. The Grand Gateway Regional Transportation Planning Organization is a state Department of Transportation program with the Oklahoma Association of Regional Councils to develop regional transportation planning process and regional public participation process in the non-metropolitan areas of the state. All of the information gathered during the planning process allows entities to correlate projects such as project progression, economic development, wear and tear on roads and more.

That will include freight routes on air, ground, waterways and rail system, the Claremore Progress reported.

• A consolidation study to look into merging TULSA COUNTY and city parks got off the ground with the allocation of $18,000 from the County Commission. Private sources will provide much of the rest of the $190,000 price tag for the study, the Tulsa World reported.

Sales tax revenue pays for most of the city’s 143-park system. The county’s parks are mostly financed through user fees and the county’s general fund.

Tulsa County is the only county in the state with its own parks department.

PENNSYLVANIA

The $2.2 million worth of improvements to ALLEGHENY COUNTY’s Deer Lakes Park were all paid for by a fracking deal for the gas and oil under the park’s 1,180 acres. Texas-based Range Resources paid the county $4.7 million when the deal was signed and agreed to donate $3 million to a Parks Improvement Fund in installments, plus 18 percent in royalties once natural gas production started, according to The Valley News Dispatch. The lease will last as long as the well produces.

The improvements to Deer Lakes Park have included adding 24 benches around two of its three lakes, cleaning up the lake waters to make them more fishable, adding bathrooms, upgrading pavilions and making trail improvements.

UTAH

The Lead Safe Homes program, funded by a federal grant, will remediate lead hazards in homes built before 1978 in which children under six years old live or visit frequently.  

The program will fund blood testing for children, visual inspection and dust analysis, temporary relocation and paint removal and specialized cleaning. 

News From Across the Nation is compiled by Charles Taylor and Charlie Ban, senior staff writers. If you have an item for News From, please email cban@naco.org.