National Association of Counties * Washington, D.C.            Vol. 31, No. 5 * March 15, 1999

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Policy takes center stage at conference

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At its Legislative Conference meeting this year, NACo’s Board of Directors adopted 44 interim policy resolutions. They come to the Board as recommendations from NACo’s steering committees. As presently structured, the steering committees address 12 issue areas.
The interim policy resolutions determine NACo’s stand on a number of federal initiatives and guide lobbying efforts until NACo’s full membership adopts or rejects the proposals at its annual meeting in July.

The following information summarizes the policy positions adopted by the Board in each steering committee issue area.

Agriculture and Rural Affairs

• Support legislation that would establish a permanent position of Chief Agriculture Negotiator in the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative. The resolution addresses the first monthly trade deficit for American farm and food products since the United States began tracking the data in 1941.
• Support legislation that would give Congress the opportunity to approve or disapprove any presidential embargo that singles out agriculture. The Senate is currently considering a bill (S. 315) that amends the Agricultural Trade Act of 1978 to give Congress 100 days to approve or disapprove an embargo. The resolution states this would encourage the president to consult with Congress before an embargo and signal to foreign countries that the United States is a reliable producer of exports.
• Strongly urge Congress to investigate the relationship between commodity prices and retail prices for agriculture products. Historically low commodity prices are blamed for serious financial problems in the agriculture sector, while retail prices have remained steady. L. Harold Blattie, who sponsored the resolution, said that since a $2 loaf of bread includes a nickel of wheat, "this issue can’t wait."

Community and Economic Development

• Urge Congress to fund Community Development Block Grants at $5 billion in FY00 and limit CDBG set-asides to those that are authorized by statute and traditionally have been funded out of CDBG. The resolution is designed to address the fact that although CDBG funding remained constant from 1994 to 1997, formula grants to counties, states and cities have dropped 3 percent a year thanks to an increase in set-asides.
• Support the president’s request for more money to assess, clean up and redevelop brownfields. NACo urges the EPA to setup a revolving loan fund for cleanup as well as site assessments. HUD and EDA money should be used for planning. Local governments should have the flexibility to determine appropriate uses for sites.

• Support FY2000 funding for the Welfare-to-Work Program, and amend the program to eliminate or modify restrictive eligibility requirements and the matching fund provision. In addition, allow workforce investment areas in states that do not participate in the program to directly apply for Welfare-to-Work funds.
  
  Many counties have reported that the restrictions imposed by the Welfare-to-Work Program, which just began rolling in FY99, are hampering, instead of helping, efforts to move people off assistance.

Environment, Energy and Land Use

• Seek federal legislation to maintain local control over solid waste disposal. This resolution arises from the fact that some states are considering legislation to limit the control of local governments over landfill-related decisions in their communities.
• Encourage review of EPA’s method of determining non-attainment for carbon monoxide levels in urban areas. Nine urban areas are consistently cited by EPA as being out of compliance with the Clean Air Act, even though these areas meet standards for carbon monoxide levels 98.8 percent of the year. These areas say that atmospheric conditions prevent 100 percent compliance.

Health

• Urge counties to pursue tobacco settlement funds in amounts that compensate counties for tobacco-related disease and disability.
• Endorse S. 346 and H.R. 351, legislation that will prevent the federal government from recapturing states’ tobacco settlement funds. NACo also urges the Administration to abandon its claims on these funds.
• Support legislation to improve quality and access to health care in rural and urban counties and continue to work to ensure that both the Medicare and Medicaid systems remain responsive and sensitive to providing fair, adequate benefits and reimbursements to both providers and beneficiaries.
• Expand Medicaid and Medicare to allow disabled workers to retain their health benefits when they return to work.
• Support an increase to the mental health services block grant, and a policy to require states to confer with counties, in states where counties have significant responsibility for the care and treatment of persons with mental illness.
• Support a proposed White House Conference on Mental Health.
• Support the formulation of a congressional mental health advisory committee; seek to expand the focus of the committee to examine gaps in services and appropriate prevention and treatment strategies.
• Back a policy that allows state flexibility in deciding whether to utilize funds from the Community Mental Health Block Grant and from the Substance Abuse Treatment and Prevention Block Grant for people with co-occurring disorders.
• Endorse a policy that the Federal Health Care Financing Administration shouldn’t require the application of "consumer choice" of behavioral health carve-outs at the plan level.
• Support expansion of Medicaid and Medicare to allow disabled workers to retain their health benefits when they return to work.
• Urge Congress to amend the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act to make it easier for those exposed to radiation and who are experiencing medical conditions associated with uranium mining and their families to qualify for compensation.
• Support a FY2000 appropriation of $40 million for CDC to continue implementation of the Health Alert Network program, under which at least 75 percent of appropriated funds will be granted to local public health departments.

Human Services and Education

• Support legislation that would expand and improve services to the nation’s elderly, including support for a national prescription drug program.
• Expand or create programs to provide early childhood development, such as a flexible federal program that allows counties and states to develop home visitation programs for children and their families, including prenatal care visits.
• Support legislation that would provide support and help ease the transition for youth moving out of foster care. Each year more than 25,000 young people are "aged-out" of foster care, usually at 18. Although they are expected to live independently, they receive little in the way of assistance. As a result, studies have shown that they are at higher risk for homelessness, unemployment and criminal activity. This policy addresses the need to help.

Intergovernmental Affairs

• Strongly urge NACo to oppose any efforts to preempt local authority. These efforts have increased over the past several years, with such notable examples as removing local control over siting wireless communications towers and preemption of local land use authority.
• Urge the Census Bureau to work closely with counties in making the agency’s demographic information conform to accurate longitude and latitude coordinates, so that counties can make better use of census data.
  In another census-related policy, NACo supports a review of Census 2000 data by local governments similar to the one mounted after the 1990 Census. Currently, there are no plans to have local officials review the accuracy of Census 2000 data.
• Support strong ties and coordination between counties and the Federal Geographic Data Committee.

Justice and Public Safety

• Support a formula change in the Juvenile Accountability Block Grant that would utilize juvenile justice expenditure data instead of criminal justice expenditure data to determine local block grant allocations.
• Support appropriating the full authorized level of $650 million for the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program. NACo strongly believes that securing the nation’s borders from illegal immigration is clearly the responsibility of the federal government, and that Congress should reimburse states and counties for the costs of incarcerating undocumented aliens who have committed serious crimes in the United States.
  States and local governments have incurred more than $1.7 billion in eligible costs in FY98, yet Congress has only appropriated $585 million.
• Support a new Criminal Justice Block grant to replace the existing Local Law Enforcement Block Grant. The new grant would be designed to distribute funds by formula to all components of the local criminal justice system. NACo favors changing the formula so that criminal justice expenditure is clearly the major element.
• NACo also supports retaining the allocation provision for all counties that are potentially eligible to apply (about 600 counties) and providing incentive funding to cities and counties that file joint applications. Finally, NACo would create a new category in the program to cover corrections, including correctional programming and management.

Labor and Employee Benefits

• Support local elected officials being granted leave without pay for the time needed to perform their duties as elected officials, and that this leave without pay include a right to restoration to employment and have no deductions to existing annual leave, efficiency ratings or other accrued benefits.
• Amend the Labor and Employee Benefits Platform to support efforts to adjust the minimum wage so that "county and non-county employees are able to obtain a livable wage."

Public Lands

• Strongly support the principles of proposed legislation called the Conservation and Reinvestment Act of 1999. The act would reallocate Outer Continental Shelf oil and gas revenues to the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF), add funding to the Urban Park and Recreation Recovery Program and add an innovative funding procedure for the Payments in Lieu of Taxes Program (PILT).
  The LWCF fund is a revenue sharing program for coastal states. NACo will advocate a change in the bill that would allow counties to directly apply for LWCF grants.
• Support federal legislation to authorize the Cooperative Agreement to implement the Recovery Implementation Program for Endangered Fishes in the Upper Colorado River dated Sept. 29, 1987 and the Cooperative Agreement to implement the San Juan Recovery Implementation Program dated Oct. 21, 1992.
• Petition Congress to amend the Endangered Species Act through its reauthorization process. Amendments include:
  • greater involvement of local governments in planning and management decisions
  • improved scientific review
  • more study on the effects on economic, social and cultural aspects of human activity; and
  • protection of private and public property rights.

• Encourage the U.S. Department of the Interior to fully consult and confer with affected local governments as soon as possible when considering the designation of national parks, national monuments or other designations that affect the use and status of lands in the United States. The resolution also supports efforts of Mohave County, Ariz. to ensure local government participation in the decision-making process of the proposed Shivwits National Monument.
• Support creation of a "safety net" schedule of payments to forest counties to offset loss of revenues from national forest timber sales. Recommended elements of the safety net include:
  • it should cover all national forest counties
  • require payments be guaranteed based on 100 percent of the highest three-year period during 1986–1995
  • require "either/or" language that provides for the above payment, or the actual 25 percent fund receipts, whichever is greater
  • provide for indexing of the payments to the CPI
  • make no changes to existing laws; specifically no "decoupling" of payments from actual timber receipts; and
  • provide for a process to develop a long-term solution to ensure long-term forest management and a return to actual timber receipts.

• Support the continued, multiple uses of all of America’s rivers, including the Columbia and Snake rivers, for fish and wildlife habitat, hydropower generation, flood control, transportation, irrigation and recreation. The resolution is in response to a plan to breach four dams on the Snake River to save salmon. The impacts and alternatives haven’t been fully studied.

Taxation and Finance

• Urge Congress to reconsider its appointments to the Advisory Committee on Internet Taxation, which do not reflect the balance in membership set out in the Internet Tax Freedom Act of 1998. If the commission membership is not changed to comply with the law, the adopted resolution authorizes NACo to join with the U.S. Conference of Mayors in filing suit to prevent the commission from meeting.
• Support bankruptcy reform legislation, passed by both houses last year that includes the recommendations of the National Association of County Treasurers and Finance Officers regarding state local government taxes and how they are treated.

Transportation and Telecommunications

• Urge Congress to reauthorize the Airport Improvement Program (AIP) at a level of at least $2.4 billion and take the Airport Trust Fund off-budget; increase the Passenger Facilities Charge by $2; and provide assistance to smaller communities to assist them in both attracting and expanding air passenger service. If a final bill is not enacted by March 31, when the AIP program expires, support a six-month extension.
• Oppose the reopening of TEA-21 to redistribute excess federal fuel tax collections. If reopened, Congress should distribute the extra $1.5 billion directly to local governments for local projects on or off the federal designated system.

(County News editor Beverly Schlotterbeck and senior writers, Mary Ann Barton and Kevin Wilcox, contributed to this report.)