AAC
County Lines County Lines ([ISSN 2576-1137 (print) and ISSN 2576-1145 (online)] is the official publication of the Association of Arkansas Counties. It is published quarterly. For advertising inquiries, subscriptions or other information relating to the magazine, please contact Christy L. Smith at 501.372.7550. Executive Director / Publisher Chris Villines Communications Director/ Managing Editor Christy L. Smith Communications Coordinator/ Editor Holland Doran
AAC Executive Board: Debbie Wise – President Brandon Ellison – Vice President Rhonda Cole – Secretary-Treasurer Jeanne Andrews Terri Harrison Debra Buckner Sandra Cawyer Kevin Cleghorn Terry McNatt Debbie Cross Brenda DeShields Ellen Foote Jimmy Hart Gerone Hobbs Bill Hollenbeck John Montgomery Heather Stevens David Thompson National Association of Counties (NACo) Board Affiliations Debbie Wise: NACo board member and member of the NACo Credentials Committee. She is the Randolph County Circuit Clerk and president of the AAC Board of Directors. Ted Harden: Finance & Intergovernmental Affairs Steering Committee. He serves on the Jefferson County Quorum Court. David Hudson: Vice Chair of NACo’s Justice and Public Safety Steering Committee. He is the Sebastian County Judge and member of the Rural Action Caucus Steering Committee. Barry Hyde: Justice and Public Safety Steering Committee. He is the Pulaski County Judge. Gerone Hobbs: Membership Committee. He is the Pulaski County Coroner. Kade Holliday: Arts and Culture Committee and International Economic Development Task Force. He is the Craighead County Clerk.
DIRECTOR’S DESK
A time to celebrate a half-century of accomplishments
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n 1968, a small group of county and district elected officials gathered together in downtown Little Rock at the first of what would become annual conferences of the Association of Arkansas Counties (AAC). Chris Villines Dreaming big about this new and unique network across the AAC state was no doubt an exciting, yet daunting proposition. Executive Director Had they been able to look into the future, I have to think they would have been extremely satisfied with what this group has accomplished in the span of half a century. I have been told at one time the second largest political body in the world was the Pulaski County Quorum Court, with members numbering in the hundreds — second only to the Politburo in the U.S.S.R. To digress a bit, I remember always being chastised by elementary teachers for referring to it as Russia, as that was a state within the U.S.S.R., not the country. Ironic how things turn out sometimes. Whether we housed the second largest political gathering or not is unverified, but between insanely large legislative bodies that met only once a year and a fee system of county elected offices, county government in Arkansas was known for its inefficiencies and — because of a fee system — potential for abuse. The Association of Arkansas Counties was instrumental in the passage of Amendment 55 in 1974, which passed by a vote of 242,419 for and 230,014 against. This sweeping reform of county government created manageable sized quorum courts that met once a month instead of once per year to approve the annual budget prior to its passage. Amendment 55 eliminated much of the fee system, replacing it with salaried, non-commissioned elected positions in our counties. Amendment 55 could not have been passed without the AAC and the powerful networks that sprung from the organization and its annual meetings. Fast forwarding to recent years, Arkansas had the shortest terms in the United States for countywide offices at only two years. In the 2015 legislative session all of you worked hard alongside the AAC to send to the voters a constitutional amendment referral. Ultimately the voters approved that measure, and many of you are about to be elected to the first four-year terms for countywide office in our state’s history. As we move into the present and future, I believe the AAC is setting a gold standard across the country in how we are approaching the opioid epidemic. While the crux of this issue does not necessarily involve legislative pathways, we find ourselves with important partners in the Arkansas Municipal League (ARML) and the state of Arkansas. Many thanks to Mike Rainwater for pushing this issue to us in 2017. His vision and an extraordinary partnership with the Municipal League has positioned the counties of Arkansas well as we look to solve this scourge in our society. Under the city leadership from ARML Executive Director Don Zimmerman and Chief Coun>>>
COUNTY LINES, WINTER 2018
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