A National Presence

This last week I spent five days at the National Association of Counties national conference in New Orleans, LA. I have never been to New Orleans, but I can definitely understand why people fall in love with it. The music, the food, and most of all the incredibly friendly people, which reminded me of home.

And this year's conference was chock full of sessions on data centers, affordable housing, mental health supports for youth, and immigration services. I cannot stress enough how important it is that Johnson County have a presence at these national conferences. There are two reasons for this:

1. At this conference we discuss and vote on platform issues by committee that we will send to Congress. For instance, The Justice and Public Safety Committee approved:

   • Proposed Resolution on Transparency and Respect for County Values Regarding Federal Immigration Detention Facilities

     Issue: As federal immigration detention capacity expands, meaningful local government involvement is essential to determine whether such facilities are appropriate for their area and to ensure transparency regarding costs, impacts, and other factors affecting public welfare and local planning goals.

     Proposed Policy: The National Association of Counties (NACo) supports meaningful local government involvement in decisions regarding federal immigration detention facilities to ensure communities have a voice in whether such facilities are appropriate for their area. NACo supports full transparency regarding costs, impacts, and other factors affecting public trust, health, welfare and local planning goals.

     • This will then get sent to our affiliates in Washington DC and staff will work with their associates to make progress on this. In some cases, NACo will fly in a group of county engineers or other county staff/elected officials to DC to speak to legislators on their expertise to influence upcoming or pending bills.

2. Networking and deepening relationships with other local electeds around the country

   1. I was able to connect with another county official in Douglas County, KS that is also home to the University of Kansas and is around 120,000 in population. They just recently defeated a jail bond and instead invested in adding an additional facility to their current jail to treat inmates with acute psychiatric crises and addiction issues to the tune of $34M. I am meeting with Shannon Reid, one of their commissioners later next week to discuss the ins and outs of their jail bond.

And to round it all out, I was elected to an at-large Board member position with NACO's National Association of Queer Officials (NAQuO)! I am very excited to serve on a national board to support our LGBTQ+ elected officials and their staff across the country.

Three with V:

1. Our Resistance Lab Training series is kicking off tonight at the Iowa City Public Library in Meeting Room A from 6-8pm (Please Register Here. We will have food and childcare provided! Please join us as we learn some community organizing skills and meet like-minded neighbors.

2. We will be joining the Planning and Zoning Commission this Wednesday night at 5:30pm to hear a draft ordinance from our Planning, Development and Sustainability department. This is a first draft and then I have requested that we have robust community input from around the county. My ask is that we have joint meetings with each of the municipalities and/or separate public meetings. This will be at the Health and Human Services Building at 855 S. Dubuque St. on the third floor.

3. I will be back at Deluxe Bakery this Friday from 8-9am for Cafe con V! I hope to see you all there, we have been having lots of conversations about the jail and I am more than happy to keep listening and answering questions.

Maraming Salamat!

-V