County leaders from throughout Pennsylvania this week unveiled their list of 2008 key legislative priorities while calling upon state leaders to strengthen their commitment to improving equity in county taxation, and to provide sufficient and fair levels of funding for mandated human services.

Among the priorities were strengthening the integrity of farmland preservation programs and legislation authorizing counties to adopt a recycling fee.

Dave Coder, Greene County Commissioner and president of the County Commissioners Association of Pennsylvania, said, “These 2008 priorities call attention to the wide variety of issues with which counties must deal every day. Often, our citizens and state lawmakers are not aware of the scope of services counties provide, frequently with great budgetary struggle. Counties are in the forefront every day meeting the wide array of citizens’ needs.”

Environmental priorities include—

Integrity of Farmland Preservation: Counties have a role in land use planning, farmland and open space preservation. In response to rapid development and increasing land values in many parts of the state, counties support legislation that would authorize an optional county realty transfer tax of up to one percent, with revenue dedicated to preservation of farmland and open space.

Counties also seek changes to statutes governing other programs initiated by the state to protect farmland by authorizing property tax breaks, including the optional millage freeze and Clean and Green. Clean and Green must be amended to provide county assessment offices with clear guidelines on how to administer preferential assessment for Clean and Green-eligible properties where tracts of land are leased to an alternative energy developer for projects such as wind towers.

Counties remain concerned about eligibility standards in the existing law, which allow non-farmer-owned mini-estates to receive preferential assessment at the expense of other local taxpayers.

County Recycling Fee Authorization: Due to a recent court decision, counties can no longer levy a local administrative fee to fund supplemental county recycling programs such as household hazardous waste collection; electronics recycling, recycling drop-off centers, illegal dump enforcement and cleanup, and tire recycling.

This ruling has left counties without a source of revenue to fund these programs and many supplemental local recycling programs will be cut or eliminated. A decrease in the availability of recycling programs will result in more recyclable goods filling up space in landfills, and a proliferation of illegal dumping on public and private lands.

This will have an adverse impact on the Commonwealth’s environment and the quality of life of many Pennsylvania residents, and will undermine the public’s investment in the Growing Greener bond initiative.

Counties are seeking express statutory authorization to re-instate administrative fees for recycling. CCAP urges the General Assembly to authorize a county administrative fee that would be dedicated to recycling programs, administration of those programs, and public education, such as is proposed in House Bill 934 (Scavello-R-Monroe).

For more information about these county issues, visit the CCAP website, or call 717-232-7554.

2/1/2008