Blog

There’s a noticeable change in Sacramento when the Legislature is in recess. Traffic is lighter, parking is easier and lines at popular lunch spots are shorter. While it’s been more than a month since the end of session and two weeks since the Governor’s bill-signing deadline, CSAC remains hard at work advocating on its key priorities of homelessness, In- Home Supportive Services and wildfires.

Homelessness

Homelessness remains an ongoing advocacy priority, with registration ending today  for a day-long Homelessness Policy Workshop next Monday, November 4, at the Sheraton Grand Sacramento Hotel. The event, which runs from 10 am to 3 pm, is being hosted by the CSAC along with the League of California Cities. The event will showcase local partnerships and coordination between counties, cities, and non-profit organizations that are critical to addressing homelessness. The Homeless Coordinating and Financing Council will also provide information about application requirements for 2019-20 state homelessness funding—the Homeless Housing, Assistance, and Prevention Program. CSAC has also organized a Homelessness Action Team to provide key information and updates to counties, especially as it relates to the Governor’s Council of Regional Homeless Advisors.

California’s 58 counties provide nearly all state and many municipal services to help Californians improve their daily lives. From public health to homelessness supportive services; foster care, behavioral health and substance use disorder treatment to public safety; housing and land use to emergency services and more; California’s counties are driven to serve.

To showcase the vital work counties do each day, we’re launching “Driven to Serve,” an educational campaign to highlight the critical services counties provide to serve all Californians, but with an emphasis to the vulnerable and those most in need.  

Each month, we will feature some of the most innovative and proven solutions counties have developed to address societal challenges and the unique needs of their residents. Driven to Serve will focus on one of these inventive county programs and showcase efforts through short videos, information handouts, and newsletters.

Counties play an important role on the front lines of California’s criminal justice system. For the last five years, a handful of counties have accessed support for their criminal justice programs through participation in our Results First Initiative. This initiative has been critical in laying the foundation for the work of CSAC’s Support Hub for Criminal Justice Programming (The Hub) to empower counties to continue prioritizing data-driven and evidence-based policymaking.

Last week, 85 leaders from 20 counties across California gathered in Ventura County for a day and a half of learning and planning to build more champions for the evidence based movement in criminal justice. The CSAC Support Hub Summit included panels and workshops focus on providing counties with an overview of the building blocks for effective program design and implementation, as well as how to harness the power of data analysis to inform their practices. Panels and workshops featuring experts and county practitioners shared expertise in using logic models and process maps, enhancing contracting practices and utilizing data analysis to answer key criminal justice questions. 

One of CSAC’s core activities is giving California’s counties opportunities to talk with each other about the issues that matter most to them, but it can be easy for CSAC staff to forget that we can benefit from that same type of opportunity.

Genealogy is a pretty big deal in my family. My mother’s family arrived in this country before the American Revolution. Thanks to the very first census record in 1790 and other sources, we’ve traced our lineage to Martin Van Buren, the eighth U.S. President, and later records helped map our family connection to Norman Jay Coleman, the first U.S. Secretary of Agriculture.

Willie Nelson wrote a popular song titled “On the Road Again.” For me, being on the road again and seeing county programs in action is one of the most rewarding parts of working at CSAC. But it’s when we have an opportunity to meet the residents who are benefiting from county services that we receive true and personal insight into how vital these services are in the lives of so many vulnerable people.

Cyberattacks on local government agencies are occurring with alarming frequency, and counties need to have a communications strategy in place when the inevitable happens.

Local agencies are a popular target for cyberattacks, since many have not established rigorous safeguards. Imagine what could happen if a cyberattacker seizes control of your data and systems, whether it’s theft and public release of information or a ransomware hostage situation.