ARIZONA
MARICOPA COUNTY began work earlier this month on a seven-year, $67 million flood-control project designed to protect several thousand homes and businesses. The final project will stretch five miles and will feature pedestrian, bicycle and equestrian paths.
Maricopa is already in the process of buying out 76 endangered homes. The Arizona Republic reports that most residents have been receptive and cooperative in the buyout.
CALIFORNIA
In more big-money news, a $207-million deal was finalized to make ORANGE COUNTY the owner of the first fully automated toll road in the world. The Highway 91 Express Lanes, previously a privately owned, for-profit tollway, will now be operated by the county’s transportation agency.
Orange County expects to increase capacity by reducing toll prices. Tolls have been as much as $4.75 in the past. The tolls, which have supported highway improvements without expenses to taxpayers, will finance the cost of the acquisition for the county.
“We will be maximizing the number of cars going through the corridor, not maximizing profits,” Todd Spitzer, former Orange County supervisor and former chair of the county’s Transportation Board, told The Business Press.
KENTUCKY
JEFFERSON COUNTY has seen a lot of changes in its long history. Established in 1780 as a county in Virginia named after the second president, the area’s latest historical marker came this month with the merger of Louisville and Jefferson County’s governments.
The merged Metro Council, with 15 Democrats and 11 Republicans, now must revisit and repeal several city and county laws. Among the top concerns are the ordinances that tax telecommunications companies, the raising of some minimum wages and requiring public employees to be county residents.
This was the third time the merger issue had come before the electorate. The idea finally received the backing of both parties as well as the county judge and city mayor, mainly because business is expected to blossom in the area without the requirement of receiving permits from both the county and the city.
Of the 26 Council members, seven came from the old Louisville government, none are from the old Jefferson County Commission, and the rest are from newly created districts. The merger, incidentally, makes Louisville the 16th largest city in the nation. For more information on the lengthy march toward the merge, go to www.co.jefferson.ky.us/Reorganization/Timeline.pdf.
MICHIGAN
The Michigan Sheriffs’ Association realizes it has an emergency on its hands, and with the state budget crunch, there may be little immediate hope for monetary relief from the increase in the risks of suicide by mentally ill inmates in the state’s county jails.
The Detroit News recently reported that 23 percent, or 11,598, of new state prison inmates in 2002 reported past mental health problems. That’s an increase from 19 percent, or 6,169, in 1990. Michigan has closed 10 state mental hospitals in the past decade.
“We’re looking for better ways of diverting the mentally ill from county jails to treatment programs,” Terrence Jungel, executive director of the Michigan Sheriffs’ Association, told Michigan Daily Online. “One of the problems is that there is really limited availability of regional treatment programs. It’s a community problem that needs to be dealt with on a community-wide basis.”
MINNESOTA
MOWER COUNTY is home to the first woman elected sheriff in Minnesota history. Terese Amazi was sworn in Dec. 13.
“As a little girl, growing up, I was more interested in fishing than TV or anything else,” she told the Austin Herald. “I didn’t really watch any of the cop shows. I just knew I wanted to be in law enforcement. I thought if I would work hard and always put forth a good effort, the job would take care of you and it did.”
Winning the election by a comfortable margin, Amazi has become a bit of a local celebrity. She has also received congratulatory calls, cards and letters from throughout the Midwest.
Some of her priorities include installation of a new communication system, new resources and equipment for her deputies, controlling the area’s prevalent methamphetamine drug trafficking and focusing on homeland security as the Mower County emergency management director. “I enjoy a good working relationship with the county commissioners and I plan to continue it,” Amazi said.
NEVADA
NYE COUNTY Commissioner Dick Carver, made famous when he appeared on the cover of Time Magazine for using a county bulldozer to open a U.S. Forest Service road, has died at the age of 58.
In addition to devoting large amounts of time to the county, Carver was also passionately involved in the fight to get public lands in Nevada turned over to the state from federal agencies.
NORTH CAROLINA
In more merger news, the NEW HANOVER COUNTY Commissioners have agreed with the Wilmington City Council to let the public vote on consolidation of the two governing bodies.
A citizen’s committee will help prepare a plan for combining the city and county governments, and in November 2004, residents will vote for or against full consolidation.
In the meantime, according to a local television station, the county and city will study functional consolidation to consider if the vote doesn’t pass. A committee will look at merging the sewer and water departments.
SOUTH CAROLINA
In these tight financial times, counties are looking for every way possible to bring in additional income. In BEAUFORT COUNTY, officials are waiting for a South Carolina Supreme Court decision on the county’s lawsuit against the state over the way property taxes are collected on time-share housing.
The county filed suit in February 2001 alleging that the way the state calculates property taxes on time-shares is unconstitutional. While the state says time-shares must be valued like any other residence, county officials contend the resort properties should be assessed based on their cumulative sale value.
County officials claim they would be able to collect between $1.8 million and $3.8 million in additional property taxes on time-shares if the suit is successful.
TENNESSEE
And in even more merger news, faced with a mounting fiscal crisis, the DYER COUNTY Commissioner recently decided to once again seek consolidation of city and county governments.
The talk about consolidation came after county Trustee Judy Patton presented budgetary facts to the commissioners. Patton pointed out that the county school budget is $1.5 million in deficit and making up that deficit alone will cause a 34-cent increase in county property taxes.
“People are telling me they can’t stand any more in taxes,” Patton said at the meeting. “You’re going to have to make some really tough decisions.”
Though no vote was taken, county officials plan to meet with officials from the three cities in the county about appointing a neutral committee of citizens to consider consolidation and make a recommendation.
According to the Tennessee State Gazette, consolidation has been considered three times prior for the county, but each time concerns about turf protection caused the proposals to flounder.
VIRGINIA
• On Saturday, Jan. 11, during his first full, regular meeting as chairman, ARLINGTON COUNTY Board member Charles P. Monroe suffered a ruptured brain aneurysm and died a short time later. Monroe was 46.
Monroe was a lifelong resident of Arlington County and was the son of the county’s first African American member of the school board and the county’s first African American judge.
“He was one of the kindest, fairest people I think any of us ever met,” County Board Vice Chairman Paul Ferguson told The Washington Post. “He loved Arlington County, his job and his family … He approached every issue with an open mind.”
Monroe was an advocate for the poor and was especially active in housing issues. At the New Year’s Day organizational meeting (see County News, 1/13/03), Monroe outlined his plans to push for changes to give the county broader powers to enforce local ordinances and fire codes to remove the blight of dilapidated properties in the county.
• In a move that has sparked heated debate and lit up Internet discussion boards, the FAIRFAX COUNTY police and Virginia Department of Alcohol Beverage Control joined forces during the holidays in what they say was an effort to prevent crime before it happens.
Undercover agents went into 20 bars in the county looking for examples of bartenders overserving customers. The police ultimately raided three bars and arrested nine patrons who failed sobriety tests. They were charged with public drunkenness and spent the night in jail.
Under Virginia law, a restaurant or bar is a public place and public intoxication is a low-level misdemeanor punishable by a night in jail and up to a $250 fine.
Police said the holiday raids, first reported in the Reston Times, were born of a community-policing goal of discouraging crime before it occurs. Lt. Tor Bennett told The Washington Post that police had been called repeatedly to the three bars in response to fights and disorderly conduct.
“We’re not talking about over-zealousness here,” Bennett told The Post. “We’re not talking about someone who was enjoying a cocktail or two and enjoying a nice evening out. They drew attention to themselves by their actions.”
Katherine Hanley, chairman of the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors said the operation was a tool to reduce drunken driving and would be evaluated before it is repeated.
WASHINGTON
• While there are no pistols at high noon and you don’t get hanged for rustling cattle, CHELAN COUNTY’s Code of the West does lay it on the line for city folks preparing to move to life in the sticks.
The Code, which got its start in Larimer County, Colo. in 1996, is an informal set of country-living truisms. Both counties credit Western writer Zane Grey’s accounts of the men and women who valued integrity and self-reliance in their daily lives. Chelan localized and amended the code, and it’s available through the Public Works and Planning departments, as well as on the county’s Web site (www.co.chelan.wa.us/).
“It’s really just a reality check for people who live in an urbanized environment and aspire to live in a remote environment,” Commissioner Buell Hawkins told CNN. “It lets them know what they should expect and, more importantly, what they should not expect.”
Chelan County is one of the fastest growing counties in the state, attracting urban expatriates, retirees and migrant farm workers looking to settle down. One of the most common complaints the county receives from its new residents is about roads.
“People come into the area, build a beautiful home, perhaps up a rural, primitive road,” Hawkins said. “After they’ve traveled that road for some period of time, they believe that road ought to be just like a road they used to travel in an urbanized area.”
The county is already responsible for 663 miles of road and, according to commissioners, it cannot afford to take on many new ones, nor do they believe it’s the county’s collective responsibility to improve roads just because someone’s built a dream home at the end of a dirt lane.
“Many times people will build in a remote area and would like the county to make those improvements and have the cost borne by the people of the county as a whole,” Hawkins said. “I don’t believe that’s fair or equitable.”
• The spirit of cooperation that sprang up in the post-September 11th world continues in PIERCE COUNTY. The county recently signed an agreement with several military bases in the area that provides for fast responses to requests for medical assistance in the event of a terrorist attack.
The Memorandum of Understanding, motivated by potential terrorism, is also applicable in responding to natural disasters. Pierce County Emergency Management Director Steve Bailey said that while the military has always had the ability to provide assistance to local jurisdictions during an emergency or disaster, the process was burdensome and could result in delays in providing the needed help.
The MOU streamlines the process with the goal of having a decision and requested assistance moving within two hours. In the event of a large emergency or disaster, with many injuries or casualties, the county can request doctors, nurses, medical technicians, field hospitals, ambulances and hospital space. The same process works in reverse if an emergency or disaster occurs at a military facility.
WISCONSIN
If BROWN COUNTY Supervisor Jane Hansen has her say, everyone is going to have to start being a lot nicer to each other at board meetings.
Hansen recently proposed the “Patriotism Idea.” The proposal calls for county supervisors to give each other respect at board meetings. Hansen said she put forth the idea because she is tired of the bad attitude at meetings.
“People are calling each other names, they’re standing and pointing fingers at each other,” Hansen told a local Green Bay television station.
The proposal passed the executive committee and next Hansen hopes to meet with members of the media and community to get input on how to push the issue forward.
