The Patriot Ledger today has a story about Plymouth County Commissioner John Riordan saying that county government may no longer be needed — essentially suggesting that his fellow commissioners fire themselves.
(http://www.patriotledger.com/news/state_news/x699612322/County-government-may-face-the-ax)
For many of you BMGers who live within the 128 belt, this story may raise a few eyebrows. “County commissioners?” you may say. “Didn’t we get rid of county government 20 years ago?”
In part, yes. Under Weld, the old executive branches of county government in Middlesex, Essex, and Worcester counties (among a couple others) were abolished, and control of all county functions (jails, courts, registry of deeds, etc) were turned over to the state.
However, for us out here in God’s Country (Plymouth, Norfolk and Barnstable Counties) county government remains alive and well today.
Which brings us back to Plymouth County Commissioner Riordan’s question: is county government in Massachusetts really needed any more? Should all county functions be turned over to the state?
Or should we move to a system where county governments absorb more regional responsibilities from the local communities, such as DPW functions, Human Resources, and, dare I say even, police and fire?
My opinion is that county government can’t continue in its current form. It has too few powers to justify its sizeable expense.
Remember, county government budgets are paid for by local property taxes. Every municipality within Norfolk and Plymouth County gets an annual assessment ranging from tens of thousands of dollars to several hundreds of thousands of dollars.
It costs several hundreds of thousands of dollars alone just to “manage” county government, between the salaries and benefits for the county commissioners, county administrator, county treasurer and various support staff.
And what, exactly, are the services they provide? They don’t manage the Registry of Deeds, or the courts, or the jails. In Norfolk County, the towns get some free surveying services, and a bulk purchasing program. In Plymouth County, there is actually a pretty successful county health insurance plan.
But do we really need a county government system to manage these functions? Can’t a bulk purchasing program be managed by an administrator and an advisory board? Same for the health insurance cooperative?
What do the BMGers think?
(And, yes, Ive deliberately avoided any mention of the hack-filled paradises county government tends to be. Shouldn’t be relevant to the bigger policy discussion.)
Actually, the unabolished counties still run their own registries of deeds. That’s where the bulk of their revenue comes from- deeds excise and recording fees.
There’s a lot done by city/town governments that could be done more efficiently on a regional basis. But a lot of times the town government refuses to give up power even if it makes the citizens better off. That’s why voluntary regionalization doesn’t work. County government with the power to force regionalization where appropriate would save a lot of money. You could limit the county government’s funding to an amount equal to whatever it managed to shave off of city/town budgets to keep it from turning into a hack paradise.
In Barnstable County, for example, the county now runs a single enhanced 911 program for virtually all towns – a big help for tourists who don’t know WHERE they are when they call in, as the county can alert the nearest PD/FD (many Brewster calls are answered by Harwich under mutual aid due to the geography of the stations, for example). We also have a representative Assembly of Delegates in additon to the Commissioners for legislating county wide services (and no, this isn’t a patronage haven – it’s elective and has only selectman-like stipends, but assures tiny towns a seat at the table). There’s also a county-wide purchasing co-op to create a single pool for municipal health insurance that’s cheaper than GIC. The Cape Light Compact creates a similar pool for residential electrcity rates, making the Cape the only multi-town bargaining group in the state for residential rates under electric deregulation.
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p>And so on.
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p>It strikes me that many counties don’t use the resources they have and operate like Louisana parishes, dipped in the amber of time, instead of trying to reinvent themselves and create new and necessary regionalization services for the mainly rural towns they are comprised of.
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p>Oh, and Dukes and Nantucket have counties as well.
Peter, can you delinetae the difference in responsibility between Barnstable commissioners and delegates? This is something I’ve wondered about for a while.
Delegates are legislative. Sort of like the relationship between a board of selectmen and Town Meeting.