Every two years at the CSAC Annual Meeting, we conduct a workshop that provides county officials with an opportunity to satisfy their state law (AB 1234) ethics training requirements.  At our upcoming Annual Meeting in Riverside County, this workshop will be held on Tuesday afternoon, Nov. 16. 

The course is being conducted by the Executive Director/Ethics Program Director of the Institute for Local Government, JoAnne Speers.

Each year, when CSAC staff and leadership begin planning our Annual Meeting, we examine timely topics and issues that will be of particular importance to California counties at the end of the year. Among the topics we will be covering at our upcoming Annual Meeting, set for Nov. 16-19 in Riverside County, is one that all counties must face in the near future: redistricting. 

It’s hard to believe it’s been a decade since this issue was last addressed, but it is time again for counties to prepare for local redistricting.  On Tuesday afternoon (Nov.

Six weeks from today, CSAC will kick off its 116th Annual Meeting. 116 years…think about it. Since 1895, county supervisors have been coming together to discuss common concerns and potential solutions. Back then, California was home to less than 2 million people.

Six months ago we started this new venture called “The County Voice.”  It’s grown significantly in terms of content and readership during that time span.  Our blog is now a vital and timely communications tool for CSAC. 

The content has been as varied as the 58 counties we represent.

One part of CSAC’s mission is to provide our membership with as much information and knowledge as possible surrounding county government. While we have traditionally done so through our major meeting workshops, policy committee meetings and the New Supervisors Institute, CSAC launched a new endeavor just 16 months ago: The CSAC Institute for Excellence in County Government. 

Last November, the Institute reached its first milestone: our first five individuals were honored with Institute credentials.

If our counties have been wondering what their portion of the Williamson Act subvention allocation is going to be for 2009-10, their wait is over.  Sent yesterday by the State Controller’s Office, the checks are in the mail.  But don’t hold your breath; 22 counties and three cities are receiving checks for under $10.00, six of these are actually getting a check for under $1.00. And shockingly, four are receiving checks for under 10 cents!  Orange County and the City of Camarillo are both getting checks for one penny.

More than 300 county officials gathered in Sacramento this week for the 2010 CSAC Legislative Conference. In light of the dire status of the state budget, the timing couldn’t have been better. Conference attendees listened to State Treasurer Bill Lockyer and State Senator Denise Ducheny provide candid insights on California’s fiscal challenges. They heard grim reality peppered with much-needed humor from journalist Greg Lucas. 

Our members attended workshops focusing on labor relations, federal funding and local initiatives.

Take note: if you are one of a growing number of Californians to vote by mail, you can expect to receive your ballots this week.  County elections officials across California are mailing out ballots to officially get the June primary under way.

They used to be call “absentee ballots,” and there was a time when Californians could only vote by mail if they were traveling on Election Day or had a medical reason for not being able to go to the polls.  Now we refer to them as “mail-in ballots” since so many voters take advantage of this option.

Although I still vote the old-fashioned way,

The Associated Press released its nationwide “Economic Stress Index” for March today and the numbers aren’t pretty – at least for California. While economic stress declined in the vast majority of the country’s 3,100-plus counties, you can’t say the same for California. In fact, counties from the “Golden State” dominated the Top 20 list of most economically distressed counties. Twelve California counties are in the Top 20, and seven are in the Top 10.

We’ve been reading daily about counties having to deal with fiscal crises, but Sunday posed a new challenge for Imperial County: dealing with the aftermath of the 7.2 quake that struck near Mexicali.  Centered just 40 miles from the Imperial C

“California Counties: 38 Million Served” – that’s been a message that CSAC has been spreading for the past year. Every California resident lives in a county. Our 58 counties are California. The role that counties play in our every day lives is immeasurable and complex; and it’s a role that few Californians truly understand.

When President Obama signed the landmark health bill in Washington, D.C. this morning, Santa Clara County Supervisor Liz Kniss was present at the invitation of the White House.  Supervisor Kniss has been a strong advocate of health-care reform at both the national and state level.

As CSAC continues to strengthen and broaden its communications tools, we have begun to branch out into audio.  On our Web site, we are now providing audio-casts by CSAC legislative staff describing the impact of state budget cuts on California counties. If you don’t have time to read one of our detailed Budget Action Bulletins, you can now spend just a few minutes hearing about these impacts.