Session Adjourns - Legislative Conference Concludes

The lack of posts here are more a reflection on too much activity rather than too little over the last month. As the legislative session wound to a close, meetings often extended late into the day. Hopefully I can resume providing new information here now that my schedule is more normal.

The General Assembly adjourned for the year on Thursday, June 10th in the wee hours of the morning. Earlier that week, the TCSA Legislative Conference wrapped up in Gatlinburg on Wednesday morning. The conference was a success even though some legislators scheduled to speak were unable to attend due to the continuation of the legislative session. Thanks to all of you who attended and participated in the conference.

Over the coming weeks I hope to make more information about the outcome of the legislative session available to you here. As for association functions for the upcoming summer, I have already begun planning and development on our 8 TCCA regional meetings for this upcoming September and hope to have all dates and locations finalized soon. I will also be working with the UT County Technical Assistance Service on training sessions for newly elected county commissioners for the County Officials Orientation Program offered this upcoming August after the county election.

Thanks for your continued support of the association and its activities.

County Commission Survey Going Out Today

The Tennessee County Commissioners Association periodically surveys all 95 counties to determine who currently chairs the commission, how often it meets and on which days it meets, the compensation paid to county commissioners and whether or not commissioners are eligible for county health insurance and retirement benefits. These surveys are being sent out today to chairs of county commissions and to county mayors. Please help to ensure these are filled out and returned promptly. County commissions across the state frequently ask the association for this information, so we try to keep it as accurate as possible to help you, our members. We hope to collect the data and make it available to you before the end of the year, but that is dependent upon how quickly we receive responses back.

Thanks for your assistance with this project.

New Officers Selected by the Membership

Much of the Board of Directors remained intact this year. While there has been some change in recent years, the board is relatively stable this year headed into the 2010 elections. New members include Thomas "Tank" Strickland as Knox County representative and Troy Beets of Roane County as President-Elect. Jim Westbrook of Weakley County assumed the Presidency at the meeting last week in Hamilton County. Treasurer Houston Naron of Williamson County and Secretary Marlene Steinbuck of Benton County round out the list of officers.

Regional Meeting Dates and Locations Set

As happens every year, the TCCA will be conducting a series of regional dinner meetings across the state. These meetings usually run a couple of hours and provide an opportunity to discuss what happened this year, look forward to the issues of the next legislative session and focus on emerging issues impacting county governments. I hope you can attend one of these meetings in your area. Dinner is provided by the association at each meeting. All meetings begin at 6:30 p.m. local time. Folks usually begin arriving a little earlier to meet, network and socialize. More information will be forthcoming about our meeting agenda, but for now, here are the dates and locations:

August 25 Volunteer State Community College (Rochelle Conference Center), Sumner County
August 27 Paris Landing State Park, Henry County
September 1 Jonesborough Visitors Center, Washington County
September 2 City County Building, Knox County
September 3 Leslie Towne Center, Putnam County
September 8 UT Ag Extension Building, Madison County
September 10 Holiday Inn Mountain View, Bradley County
September 17 Henry Horton State Park, Marshall County

TCSA Post Legislative Conference

As happens on rare occasions, it looks like this year the TCSA "Post" Legislative Conference will not be "post." Although it is likely the General Assembly will still be meeting in June, we will be meeting as well. There is registration information on our main association website including this form and an agenda available here. If you have not already registered, I encourage you to do so. To the extent possible, we will update you on the latest developments with the state legislature and there will also be updates and information about the federal Recovery Act.

I hope to see you there.

County Government Day Conference

It was a busy week last week as we had around 450 county officials in town for the annual county government day event in addition to the usual legislative hearings and committees. Included among the conference attendees were approximately 150 county commissioners from across the state. They took part in our TCCA board meeting and membership meeting and had opportunities to meet and greet with state legislators. At our Wednesday morning breakfast we were honored to have Governor Phil Bredesen, Lieutenant Governor Ron Ramsey and Speaker of the House Kent Williams there to address county officials. We were also joined by many other legislators at our breakfast.

More than 100 of the county officials in town also took advantage of a special session we organized on Wednesday to hear an update from state and federal departments and agencies on the Economic Recovery Act. Officials from the Governor’s Office, the State Departments of Transportation, Education, Economic and Community Development and Environment and Conservation and the United States Department of Agriculture Rural Development office presented an update on the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (often referred to as the federal economic stimulus legislation). The speakers outlined in general terms the funds that would be available to Tennessee and how such funds are planned to be distributed. A recurring message from the speakers was that the details of this legislation are still being sorted out as various federal departments and agencies continue to develop rules and regulations for the administration of the funds. If you would like more information about the Recovery and Reinvestment Act, contact our office via e-mail at tcca.connor@tncounties.org or by phone at (615) 532-3767 to request copies of a handout we distributed.

TCCA Board Meetings for 2009

The dates for TCCA Board Meetings have been set for 2009. Our first meeting will be Tuesday, February 3rd in Nashville in the ground floor conference room of our office building located at 226 Capitol Boulevard, Nashville, TN. The meeting will start at 11:00 AM with lunch provided for board members.

Our other meetings will occur in conjunction with the 3 TCSA annual conferences and meetings. These will be as follows:

March 3 at 1:00 p.m. in conjunction with the County Government Day event at the Nashville Downtown Sheraton.

Tuesday June 2 at 1:00 p.m. in conjunction with the Post Legislative Conference in Gatlinburg, TN.

Thursday, October 8 in conjunction with the TCSA Fall Conference and Trade Show, Chattanooga, TN.

If additional meetings are necessary to conduct the business of the TCCA, these will be called by the president and proper notice will be provided.

TCSA Annual Conference a Success

It was good to see many of you in Memphis last week for the TCSA annual fall conference. We had a number of good meetings and informative workshops. During the conference, our association selected its new slate of officers for next year. We recognized out-going president Phil King of Greene County for his service this past year as our president and welcomed in Wallace Austin, White County commissioner as our new president for 2008-2009. Jim Westbrook of Weakley County who had been serving as association treasurer was selelcted as president-elect. Houston Naron of Williamson County was named to replace him as treasurer. Most of the board members are continuing to serve, but we have two new members: Scott Gillenwaters of Anderson County and Robert Barnwell of Williamson County. I look forward to working with all these good folks during the upcoming year.

Introductions

Greetings and welcome to this site. This page is part of an on-going initiative to improve and expand membership communications for the Tennessee County Commissioners Association (TCCA) and to provide information and resources about county government in Tennessee. Most likely, you arrived at this site through a link on the association's primary website: http://www.tncountycommissioners.org/. If not, I encourage you to visit that site to learn more about the Tennessee County Commissioners Association and its activities. The TCCA is a membership association representing the interests of the elected members of county legislative bodies across the state. It is an affiliate organization of the Tennessee County Services Association (TCSA) which is also comprised of the Association of County Mayors (ACM) and the Tennessee County Highway Officials Association (TCHOA). Last week, the TCSA held its 54th annual conference and trade show in Nashville. That event was attended by several hundred county officials and employees who had the opportunity to hear from a variety of speakers on numerous topics related to county government. The conference included workshops on open government, dealing with the media, education funding, jail cost management, highway and infrastructure maintenance and more.

In August and September, the TCCA held a series of grass roots membership meetings at seven locations across the state to hear about the issues and concerns affecting individual counties and commissioners. These meetings were well attended and are always an important part of developing the legislative platform and agenda for the association's activities for the next year. Whether it's through an old-fashioned bar-be-que dinner and a face-to-face meeting at a local community center or communicating and staying informed through a website like this one, I encourage all county commissioners in Tennessee to get involved and benefit from the services, information and networking possibilities available through the Tennessee County Commissioners Association. The association is here to serve you, so let us know of anything we can do to help you do your job better. Together we can work to make all our communities in Tennessee better and stronger places to live.