Your Services from Your Association
More than 40 years ago, the Texas Association of Counties was formed to represent county interests in the legislative process and inform counties of issues that affected them. Since, TAC services have expanded to meet the growing needs of counties.

Governmental Relations
TAC Governmental Relations serves as the main link between county officials and elected officials in Austin. Legislators will turn to TAC to find out how county officials feel about particular issues, while county officials use TAC legislative liaisons to voice their concerns to state officials.

During the session and beyond, TAC actively gathers, analyzes and distributes vital information on legislative issues affecting county government. Governmental relations staff keeps county officials abreast of current developments through a monthly publication called County Issues (bi-monthly during legislative sessions), and on the TAC Web site.

TAC Governmental Relations staff also serves on state and federal advisory committees and workgroups and conducts legislative training throughout the state.

Legal Research and Information
One of county officials’ greatest challenges is ensuring that operations are within the many state and federal guidelines. By offering a toll-free legal hotline (888-ASK-TAC4), TAC legal specialists can assist county officials in researching issues to find statutes, opinions and court cases relevant to a particular county situation. In addition, we provide many legal resources on-line, including upcoming legal deadlines, a wide variety of legal publications, law links, a search mechanism for laws and codes and other resources.

TAC also distributes upon request a number of helpful legal guides on topics that include: election laws, oath and bond requirements; open meetings, public information, financial disclosure for county officers, county subdivision regulations, county economic development, animal control and others.

Self-Insurance Coverages
Since 1974, counties have been banding together through the Texas Association of Counties to self-insure against a broad range of liabilities. Owned and managed by counties, these programs through the years have saved Texas taxpayers millions of dollars and grown into a stable, sustainable resource of protection. In addition to rates below the commercial market, TAC’s loss control programs work for our counties to help curb rising insurance costs. TAC’s Self-Insurance Pools include liability, property and workers’ compensation coverages through the Risk Management Pool, Health and Employee Benefits and Unemployment Compensation.

Our self-insurance pools offer its members:

• Sound county leadership. Each self-insurance fund is governed by a separate board of directors made up of county officials. Our county leaders conservatively navigate policy development, program enhancements and negotiations with vendors.
  
  
• Many program options. Pools work to provide all counties with a variety of viable options for coverages to fit their needs and budgets.
  
  
• Long-term stability of rates. Having your own insurance company to see you through the good times and bad is an advantage that few employers can realize. One of the clear benefits to pooling is the ability to stabilize rates from year to year due to volume purchasing.
  
  
• Proven track record of financial stability. The Texas Association of Counties has a 30-year proven track record of effectively administering self-insurance pools on behalf of counties. Every year, all self-insurance pools undergo outside audits to ensure financial accountability.

Risk Management Services
The Texas Association of Counties has representatives for every county to act as an important resource that county officials can rely upon for day-to-day questions and to help identify needs. TAC’s field representatives provide risk management consultation and technical assistance on coverages and pooling.

Our staff possesses expertise in risk management, safety, human resources and law enforcement to work with counties to minimize their losses. Assisting members in controlling losses is the primary reason TAC’s Self-Insurance Funds have been able to provide coverage at prices that have consistently been lower than coverage provided by the commercial market. Services regularly offered free of charge to members include on-site training, policy reviews, technical assistance when issues arise, safety inspections, video-training programs and much more.

County Information
In 1998, the TAC Board formed the County Information Project (CIP) to serve as a central source for county data, which before was scattered and often difficult to locate from among the various state and federal agencies.

County officials now have easy access to a wealth of county data that includes tax information, county profiles, census and financial data. TAC also offers useful comparative county data such as specific property tax and demographic information. All this information is available on the TAC Web site or upon request.

TAC also offers services utilizing GIS (Geographic Information Systems) technology. These services include mapping and data analysis. The way maps and other data have been stored or filed as layers of information in a GIS would enable counties to see the big picture.

Education
Providing a wide variety of training opportunities relevant to the daily challenges in public office is another important service that the Texas Association of Counties provides its members. Our training events—designed and guided by county officials—target the needs of the county audience and provide a unique opportunity for everyone to participate in coordinated, professionally planned educational activities that offer great networking opportunities. TAC training programs meet the mandatory education requirements of most county offices and many are co-sponsored by state institutions of higher learning including the University of Texas LBJ School of Public Affairs and Texas Tech University.

To inform officials of upcoming training opportunities, literature regarding education events are regularly sent to officials and are also featured in County magazine. On the TAC Web site, our education section offers a comprehensive summary of TAC-sponsored education events offering easy, on-line registration. The section also provides continuing education information and an extensive calendar of events for our county audience.

Communications
The Association delivers a variety of award-winning publications, both online and in print to keep county officials apprised of issues affecting local governments. For more than 15 years, TAC has published County, a bi-monthly magazine offering expanded and timely information. Other publications provide regular information and assistance on a wide variety of current topics or address specific needs such as a final analysis report following each legislative session and reports on county officials' salaries.

In addition to our publications, the Association offers a variety of ways for county officials to effectively communicate with each other, get their questions answered and keep abreast of issues on a day-to-day basis.

A communication tool that has proven to be very popular with members are listserves. A listserve is an email group whose members can seek information from the others by sending a single email to the entire group. The Association currently administers 11 listserves for officials and along areas of common interest. All listserves are free to officials and employees from TAC member counties. Membership in some listserves is limited to particular officials or organizations.

TAC now offers the majority of our services in addition to many other resources on-line. In 2009, the Association developed an additional Web site, TexasCounties4U, focused on educating the public about county government services, with brief how-to videos, links to local county Internet pages and a variety of other information useful for the general public.

Technology
Supported by the Texas Association of Counties, the County Information Resources Agency (CIRA) was created to ensure that all counties have the means and resources to implement technology that citizens now expect from their government. A main priority for CIRA is to provide opportunities for counties to efficiently communicate with one another so that solutions can be shared.

CIRA also provides a wide variety of technology services for all counties that include: Web hosting and e-mail services, electronic payments, high speed internet access, information sharing, regional technical support services, technology planning assistance and more.

Other Services

Purchasing Cooperatives.
In every county, budgets are tight and with every purchase, county officials look for opportunities to make a dollar go farther. Recognizing this, TAC leadership has explored ways to assist counties in strengthening and stretching resources through cooperative purchasing. Purchasing cooperatives can offer steep discounts due to volume purchasing and can take some of the hassle of purchasing while yet counties need to ensure that the cooperatives they utilize operate under legal requirements in Texas. TAC endorses several purchasing cooperatives that offer such advantages that include BuyBoard and U.S. Communities.

Retiree Benefits
Although most county officials and employees have an excellent retirement program with the Texas District and Retirement System, it is important to supplement this with a deferred compensation program. Nationwide Retirement Solutions, co-sponsored by the National Association of Counties and TAC, is the largest deferred compensation program in the country for county employees and provides an array of tax-deferred investments. For county retirees, TAC also offers a supplemental Medicare program called CountyChoice Silver that gives added protection at affordable rates.

Leadership Foundation
Created by the Association Board of Directors in 2000, the Texas Association of Counties Leadership Foundation focuses on developing leadership skills and disseminating best practices of innovation and achievement. Currently the Foundation features an intensive leadership class designed for county officials and an annual county best practices awards program.