NORTH CAROLINA

• As remnants of Hurricane Gordon blew through the county Sept. 18, CARTERET COUNTY officials learned that the county had been named StormReady by the National Weather Service (NWS), one of only 22 communities nationwide to be so designated.
  
  Even as thunder rumbled outside, NWS representatives presented county commissioners with a framed certificate and two StormReady signs to post along roadsides.
  
  StormReady certification is awarded to communities that have shown a strong desire in planning for the threat of severe weather. The designation shows the county has established methods and procedures to monitor and receive severe weather information and disseminate it to the public. StormReady communities must also promote the importance of public readiness by conducting public seminars, training weather spotters and conducting emergency exercises.
  
  To help alert the public about severe weather, Carteret County recently received funding from the state that allowed the purchase of 55 NOAA weather radios that were distributed to nursing homes, schools and day care centers, and police and fire departments.
  
  And the county has other links to weather information, including satellite, the Internet and a land line system. So if one system goes down, county officials have other ways to get weather information.
  
  The StormReady program originated in Oklahoma and the NWS began implementing it this year nationwide.
  
  

MARYLAND

• Residents of FREDERICK COUNTY will breathe easier with passage of the state’s first ordinance limiting locations of large-scale hog farms. The Frederick County Board of Commissioners passed the measure in September after residents of the rural northern part of the county had complained for two years about the stench coming from a hog farm. The farm had been converted from a dairy farm to a 4,000-hog “finishing operation” for Purina Corp. in 1998. The ordinance prohibits farms with more than 1,000 hogs from being built within a half-mile of residential areas or within one mile of designated scenic waterways.
  
  The two large-scale hog farms that have started operations in the last three years are a new phenomenon in a county whose $100 million in annual agriculture revenues comes mainly from dairy and other family farm operations.
  
  

HAWAII

• A thatched roof over your office? The MAUI COUNTY Council recently passed a bill to give indigenous architecture official recognition in the county building code.
  
  The bill amends the building code to include structures that are “comprised of either rock walls or wood frames for the bottom portion and thatch of different native grasses and leaves for the roof.”
  
  The bill’s sponsor Councilmember J. Kalani English said, “This bill will help to spur economic development because indigenous architecture holds great appeal for visitors and residents alike.”
  
  According to the bill, structures that incorporate indigenous architectural principles “are often sturdy enough to substantially survive tropical storms that destroy Western-style buildings.”
  
  

WASHINGTION

• The PIERCE COUNTY Detention and Corrections Facility expansion design was recently selected as one of North America’s exemplary justice facilities. A committee representing the American Institute of Architects, Committee of Architecture for Justice, and the American Correctional Association made the selection. The project was honored not just for design excellence, but also as a facility that is “highly functional, secure, efficient to build and operate, and represents advanced justice planning principles and practices,” according to the designer. The 1,000 bed facility is scheduled for completion in August 2002.
  
  
• Both national and state awards were recently given to a joint PIERCE-KING counties study aimed at preventing earthquake damage to the Tacoma-Seattle transportation corridor. The Pierce-King County Port to Port Transportation Corridor Seismic Vulnerability Project aims to determine economic consequences of transportation system failures between the ports of Tacoma and Seattle following a major earthquake.
  
  The two counties pooled the $300,000 each they received from the Federal Emergency Management Agency under its Project Impact disaster mitigation program to conduct the regional study. The transportation project was awarded the 2000 national Award in Excellence for Response Plans and Materials from the Western State Seismic Policy Council. It also received an Excellence in Innovation award from the Washington City Council Management Association.
  
  

NEVADA

• The City of Reno and WASHOE COUNTY are floating a bond issue this November to raise $86 million to construct a regional justice center. Recently the county commissioners and city council agreed to locate the District and Justice Courts with the Reno Municipal Courts in the same facility. This move would save a projected $9.8 million in taxpayer money over 10 years, which is $2.2 million more than if the courts were not collocated, and will be more convenient to the public.
  
  

FLORIDA

• In recognition of its efforts to cut the pollution that is causing global warming,MIAMI-DADE COUNTY was given a Local Climate Protection Award by the White House at a meeting of the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI). One of the first local jurisdictions to take a stand on climate protection, Miami-Dade’s most recent effort has been to make county transactions available via the Internet, helping the public avoid vehicle trips to do business at county offices.
  
  The award was made at ICLEI’s fifth annual Cities for Climate Protection Conference, an association of 78 cities and counties in the U.S. and other countries that are concerned that urban pollution is the main contributor to global warming. The meeting took place in below-sea-level New Orleans, one of the first places that will be under water if the oceans rise even a few inches.
  
  

MICHIGAN

• All seven communities that applied for downtown redevelopment assistance through the Main Street OAKLAND COUNTY program will receive support and mentoring through the downtown revitalization program. Three of those communities – Rochester, Roay Oak and Walled Lake – were selected as Main Street Communities and will receive assistance for the next three years. Four other communities – Birmingham, Ferndale, Holly and Pontiac – will be provided with individualized consulting to ready them for getting the Main Street Designation and participating in the program next year. These four communities will also be mentored by the initial three after the first year.
  
  Oakland County Planning and Economic Development Services instituted program in partnership with the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s Main Street Center to provide communities with assistance for downtown revitalization and preservation. Oakland County is the first county in the nation to use the Main Street principles and to provide downtown design and counseling services on a county-wide basis.
  
  
• Because surviving a heart attack depends largely on how quickly help is provided, the MACOMB COUNTY Sheriff Department is equipping marine patrol boats and squad cars with automatic defibrillators, devices designed to jolt the hear with an electrical shock if cardiac arrest occurs. Two of the devices were put into service last month in boats patrolling Lake St. Clair, the Clinton River and neighborhood canals.
  
  

VIRGINIA

• When the Washington-Baltimore Regional 2012 Coalition makes is pitch for the 2012 Olympic games, FAIRFAX COUNTY wants to make sure that the coalition has a new name – the Washington-Baltimore-Fairfax coalition. County board members, especially Supervisor Michael Frey, do not believe that the coalition’s name gives enough credit to the role the county would play if the games come to the area.
  
  Under current plans, facilities in Fairfax County would be serve as sites for several popular Olympic events such as swimming and wrestling. In a Washington Post report, Frey is quoted as saying, “A good number of the events will be in Fairfax. Most of the athletes will probably enter or exit the area through Dulles [airport]. It seemed to me we deserve some credit. It seemed to me it was not particularly inclusive with just Baltimore and Washington.”
  
  At least 13 regions are vying for the 2012 games.