ALASKA

• Signatures are being collected in KETCHIKAN GATEWAY BOROUGH as supporters of a $5 passenger fee for visiting cruise ships got the go-ahead from the Borough clerk to start the petition drive. Proceeds from the proposed head tax would support vocational training associated with the tourism industry and visitor infrastructure. The Ketchikan City Council voted down a similar proposal twice this year.

ARIZONA

• MOHAVE COUNTY received $904,310 from the State Lake Improvement Fund for improvements to Davis Camp, a regional county park. The money will be used to construct a personal-watercraft-only launch ramp, more picnic ramadas and sea walls to help prevent erosion at Davis Camp.
• In the 1940s, Davis Camp housed workers constructing the Davis Dam, which re-regulates Hoover Dam releases to meet downstream needs, including the annual delivery of 1.5 million acre-feet of water to Mexico. The Davis Camp site was turned over to the county in the 1980s.

ARKANSAS

• Both outgoing and incoming BENTON COUNTY judges and some members of the county’s Quorum Court hope to hire a chief financial officer to oversee the county’s finances. If they are successful (some Quorum Court members are not happy with the proposal), Benton County would become the fifth county in the state with a chief financial officer or comptroller. There are 75 counties in Arkansas.

CALIFORNIA

• ORANGE COUNTY is turning fallow data processing capacity and technology resources into profit. The county hopes to offset a hefty $260 million price tag for its county information and telecommunications systems by entering into a deal with a private company to farm out the county’s unused or underutilized computer systems to clients. The company projects about $250 million in outsource money, a part of which, as a business partner, Orange County will receive. For more information e-mail the County of Orange at webmaster@o-cgovt.com
• They’re at it again with the “mayor” thing in LOS ANGELES COUNTY. Board of Supervisors Chairman Michael D. Antonovich has declared himself “Mayor of Los Angeles County,” assuming the title approved for the board chairman in 1996. Antonovich briefly served as mayor after the board of supervisors approved the title change in October 1996. Since then, most board chairmen have eschewed the designation.
  The Los Angeles Times reports that City of Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan says he will be happy to call Antonovich “mayor” if Antonovich will agree to calling Riordan “Your Worship, ” as is the custom when addressing the mayor of London, England.

GEORGIA

• GWINNETT COUNTY is in the midst of distributing 500 free NOAA all-hazard radios to improve tornado and other natural disaster preparedness. The National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration radios are being sent to county/municipal government buildings, day care centers, fire and police stations; schools, and libraries with current in-place or future disaster plans. “Over time, we hope to offer [NOAA] radios to other high-concentration facilities such as movie theaters, recreation facilities and shopping malls,” said Frank Daniell, emergency management coordinator.

IDAHO

• If Idaho’s economy is to survive, turn around, and prosper in 2001, it desperately needs to attract new business, especially in the rural sector. That’s the read made during the Associated Taxpayers of Idaho meeting Dec. 6. “We really need more vehicles at the local governmental level,” Canyon County Commissioner Todd Lakey remarked. He also said that his county has been economically successful by diversifying its traditionally agri-based economy and going high-tech.
• The ATI suggested Idaho could attract more business by: lowering corporate and personal income taxes; offering tax credits or grants for R&D; offering extensive worker training to plug workforce holes; and creating enterprise zones in economically depressed areas with incentives for businesses to open there.

ILLINOIS

• The LAKE COUNTY Division of Transportation is working in a joint effort with local villages, a railroad company and the state commerce and transportation departments to improve railroad crossing safety. Automated horn systems, costing $250,000 and paid for by the state, are scheduled to be installed at designated county railroad crossings shortly after the first of next year. A study will determine their effectiveness. “This project is a wonderful example of intergovernmental cooperation. It is a proactive approach to a federal government mandate to blow train horns 24 hours a day, which would make life miserable for our residents,” said Diana O’Kelly, county board member.

MARYLAND

• PRINCE GEORGE’S COUNTY has entered into a program with the Lazarus Foundation, a Columbia, Md. outfit that recycles used electronics for refurbishment and donation to non-profits. The county Department of Environmental Resources also contracts with Subtractions, an electronics recycling processing facility that dismantles the equipment. Residents can bring their old computer equipment, such as laptops, printers and mainframes to a landfill as the first step in reclamation.

MICHIGAN

• OAKLAND COUNTY seniors, 60 and older, will have a new program available to them that will provide up to a 30 percent savings on prescription drugs. County commissioners worked with the Oakland County Senior Citizens Advisory Council and the National Prescription Administrators, Inc. to make it happen.

MISSOURI

• It was “Sight Night Week” in ST. LOUIS COUNTY recently as the Department of Human Services teamed with Lions Club International and LensCrafters to collect used eyeglasses for distribution to individuals in developing countries. More than 200 pairs of glasses were donated during the week. County officials expect Sight Night Week to become an annual event.

OKLAHOMA

• County officials in all 77 Oklahoma counties anticipate being online with the first fully automated child care payment system by next spring. The Oklahoma Department of Human Services says that Access Oklahoma Day Care will cut administrative costs, speed payments, and improve accuracy of subsidies paid out to child care providers.
• Spokesman George Johnson said the old program, used for about 30 years, was imploding under the weight of paperwork resulting in sluggish record keeping and tardy child care provider paychecks. In some cases, checks weren’t received for six weeks. “Now, we’ll be paying on a weekly basis with a two-week lag,” Johnson said.

OREGON

• The only Oregon house designed by Frank Lloyd Wright has dodged the wrecker’s ball – for now. The CLACKAMAS COUNTY Board of Commissioners received about 100 e-mails backing preservation of the Gordon House, according to Kathleen Stewart, county administrative secretary. “I have never received as many e-mails and letters [local or nationwide] over an issue in 16 years of public life,” said Commissioner Mike Jordan.
• The commissioners announced the homeowners will donate the house, constructed in the early 1960s, to the Frank Lloyd Wright Conservancy. The house was threatened with demolition when the current owners petitioned to remove it from the county historic register in order to build a $1.5-million contemporary residence.

TEXAS

• HARRIS COUNTY Tax Assessor-Collector Paul Bettencourt felt the bite of inefficiency. Saddled with an obsolete mainframe computer and a check-or-cash tax payment method begun more than 100 years ago, the county stood to continue to loose out on uncollected taxes.
• In 1998, thousands of county residents didn’t receive their property tax bills. That all changed with new technology. This year, Bettencourt’s tax office mailed 800,000 tax bills on time. His computerized tax office can now accept payments online via credit card and county residents can see their tax real estate, mobile home and mineral account bills via computer.

VIRGINIA

• The FAIRFAX COUNTY Public Library Foundation is the recipient of a $40,000 National Leadership Grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services. The funds are slated for development of a virtual library at Goodwin House West, a senior residence in Fairfax County.
  The Fairfax County Public Library will be joined by the Fairfax Area Agency on Aging, the Columbia Lighthouse for the Blind, and Catholic University in a one-year research project aimed at assisting Goodwin House West residents in meeting their information needs through computers.
• The state’s highest court has blocked the first challenge to a “slow growth” policy in LOUDOUN COUNTY, Virginia’s fastest growing county. In a three-sentence decision, the Virginia State Supreme Court said the county could go ahead with a public hearing on its proposed Comprehensive Plan and need not conduct a slew of studies on the plan’s economic and environmental impact that plaintiffs in the case had sought.
  Over the past year, county officials have come under attack by developers hoping to head off new restrictions proposed by the board of supervisors to moderate the pace of residential development in this Washington, D.C. outer suburb. The current nine-member board was swept into office last year on promises to moderate growth in the county.

WASHINGTON

• KING COUNTY and the city of Seattle offer real health news to the public. The Department of Public Health’s Web site, www.metrokc. gov/health/foodsfty, which is updated daily, features information on restaurants cited for health code violations, tips on safe food practices, clean water issues; news on communicable diseases, immunizations, HIV, sexually transmitted diseases and even birth/death records.
• A THURSTON COUNTY superior court judge granted an injunction Nov. 30 temporarily barring implementation of a tax ballot initiative scheduled to take effect Dec. 7. Initiative 722 could cost Washington state counties an estimated $66 million in lost tax revenues if it stands.
  PIERCE, KING, KITSAP, and WHITMAN counties as well as nine cities, special districts, nonprofits, and a few private taxpayers were successful in their plea to temporarily block implementation of the tax measure which Evergreen State voters okayed by 56 percent this last election.
  Opening briefs are scheduled for Jan. 22, 2001. I-722 was called by its opponents “Son of I-695,” a measure similar to I-722 and passed by voters in the previous election, but was then struck down by the courts on constitutional grounds.
  The measure seeks to void certain tax increases enacted between July 2 and Dec. 31, 1999 and also calls for limits to proposed property tax increases to 2 percent or the rate of inflation, whichever is less.
  “There are a whole lot more questions than there are answers,” Bill Vogler, executive director, Washington State Association of Counties commented.

(News from the Nation’s Counties was compiled by Terry King, senior staff writer and Bev Schlotterbeck, County News editor. If you have news from your county, please e-mail to: cnews@naco.org.)