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Alameda County is one of 58 counties in California. Its County seat is in Oakland.
County website
- Main article: Evaluation of California county websites
The good
- The names and contact information for all board of supervisor members is published.[1]
- Board of supervisors meeting agendas and minutes are published.
- Audit reports are published.[2]
- Information on contracts is published.[3]
- The current budget is published.[4]
- Tax information is available.[6]
The bad
- No information is provided on administrative officials, building permits and zoning, and lobbying.
Public Pensions
To meet new public pension financing rules, Alameda County would have to dedicate all of their existing property taxes to pay for pensions or pursue municipal bankruptcy through the courts, according to a report by Moody’s municipal credit rating agency. Moody’s proposed changes in evaluating pension funds are: [7]
- The assumed rate of return on pension fund investments will be lowered from 7.75 percent to 5.5 percent. The lower the interest rate on pension fund investments, the larger the cash contribution required by employees or counties. Public pension funds have assumed unrealistically high investment return rates based on inflation during the Mortgage Bubble.
- Municipalities will be required to catch up on its unfunded pension liabilities in 17-years, not the 20 to 30 year period now used.
- Full payment of borrowed principal and interest – called full amortization — will be required in making pension payments. This means that level payments will be required, not graduated payments that start low and rise over time.
Lobbying
- Main article: California government sector lobbying
In 2008, Alameda County reported $160,000 spent on federal lobbying. [8]
For state lobbying in 2007 and 2008, the county spent a total of $2,671,683 on lobbying. [9]
| Subsidiary
|
Amount spent lobbying
|
| Alameda County |
$2,271,273.00
|
| Alameda County Transportation Improvement Authority |
$93,282
|
| Alameda County Congestion Management Agency |
$92,400
|
| Alameda County Office of Education |
$144,402
|
| Alameda County Waste Management Authority |
$70,326
|
| TOTAL |
$2,671,683
|
External links
References
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