The AAC Legislative Package Association offers overview of the issues it plans to present to state legislature.
O
ur member associations and your liaisons at the Association of Arkansas Counties (AAC) have been hard at work crafting proposed legislation for the 91st General Assembly. As you are aware, the session begins in January 2017, and bills are already being prefiled. Our legislative package of bills has proceeded through two committees of your peers — both the AAC legislative committee and the AAC board of directors under the skilled hand and experienced leadership of AAC Legislative Chair Debbie Wise. Both committees have approved the following bills for inclusion in our legislative package, and we are ready to transition from the work of assimilating bills to the efforts of pursuing passage by the legislature and ultimately signature from the governor. The county legislative package has historically been approved almost in full without many questions. This is because all of you have had a voice in what issues concern your respective offices and because counties generally look for pragmatic solutions that make sense. Countless hours and days have gone into turning conceptual ideas into actual legislative drafts, and this past year has been an incredible exercise for your respected association leadership. I want to thank you for all the hard work you’ve put into improving county government. We encourage you to be a part of the process as we work with the 91st General Assembly to educate the legislature on our ideas to make our level of government even more effective. Our legislative bills are summarized as follows::
General
Continuing education boards (Amendments of ACA § 14-15-811 and § 14-15-1001) The treasurers and county collectors will pursue a change to their respective continuing education board membership as they propose going from the current six members to a board of 10 members. Record retention (Amendments to various code sections proposed by multiple member associations) Several member associations submitted drafts concerning record-retention modernization and clarifications and these legislative changes have been included in one record-retention bill. This cumulative proposal further defines electronic and/or photographic versions of records and established in code the custodian’s ability to reproduce a durable medium for the original. It also describes a retention conversion-and-review schedule to be performed at least one time every four years to prevent the physical loss of data. The record retention bill also addresses juvenile records, dispatch reports and unused ballots. This piece of legislation also sets a default record retention schedule of three years after an audit by the Arkansas Legislative Audit or a private auditor for documents not explicitly stated in the statute.
bly, governor and citizens on the dire need in Arkansas for four major complex and challenging areas of emphasis: behavioral health and crisis intervention diversion; prison and jail overcrowding; road and bridge funding; and 911 funding and efficiencies. Not all of the actual legislative drafting efforts in these areas are yet defined. • • • • • • •
The Arkansas Sheriffs’ Association, CJAA and the Arkansas Association of Quorum Courts all have adopted resolutions supporting funding for crisis intervention training and regional crisis stabilization units. Prison/jail overcrowding The CJAA voted to engage and partner with state leadership and the governor to address a growing prison population that generally overflows into county jails hindering local law enforcement’s ability to utilize the jail as it was intended. The CJAA will further detail its recommendations and garner support for measures where deemed appropriate and warranted. Road and bridge funding The CJAA general membership also identified the following points concerning road and bridge funding that may warrant legislation: • • •
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County Judges
The County Judges Association of Arkansas (CJAA) voted to continue to pursue, support and educate the general assemCOUNTY LINES, FALL 2016
Behavioral health and crisis intervention diversion Crisis Intervention Training (CIT) in Arkansas; Crisis Services in Arkansas; Diversion of the mentally ill to treatment and away from being warehoused in county jails as default mental health facilities; Appropriate level of in-jail services and telemedicine for behavioral health treatment of detainees in our jails in Arkansas; The state and DHS to make necessary policy and budgetary changes to assure these vital services; Local communities, local governments and stakeholders to combine resources and investments to support these vital resources; and State and local funding, revenues and court costs or fees to support diversion of the mentally ill.
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The need for new/additional revenues for state and local bridges (new revenue, taxes or user fees; motor fuels taxes; or responsible general revenue transfers, etc.); The annual county bridge and maintenance needs statewide in excess of $750 million; The need to maintain the traditional revenue sharing under the 70-15-15 split (which has been supported by law since 1965 and recently in 2012 by the people under Amendment 91 of the Arkansas Constitution); The need to maintain local control (which has been supported by the people under the Arkansas Constitution since 1874, Article 7, § 28; Amendment 55-County Government; Amendment 61-County Road Tax); and The CJAA voted to reiterate their support for the interim 37
