Mr. Regionalism - Polk County’s Judge Thompson reflects on his term as president of the National Association of Regional Councils / By Maria Sprow

LONG TIME Polk County Judge John Thomp - son will probably never forget when Hurricane Rita wrecked havoc on the Gulf Coast in 2005, immediately following Hurricane Katrina. The property and financial loss around the coast was enormous, but Thompson also remembers noticing a silver lining among the aftermath’s devastation – it was in the way local governments came together to pick up the pieces, to help themselves out while helping out each other.

“For us, without a doubt, that regional effort helped,” Thompson said. “To the extent possible, resources were shared, and prior to that event, there had been equipment purchased and training performed on a regional basis, and all those things led us to be better prepared than we would have been without the regional programs.”

But it’s certainly not the only example Thompson has of how his county has benefited from regional cooperation, and in fact, Thompson is one of the most vocal proponents in the country of solving local issues – whether it’s building highways, developing the local economy and workforce, not having enough money to train sheriff’s deputies or preparing for a disaster – through joint efforts of counties, cities and other local governments. In fact, just this last year, he was out spreading his local collaboration message to members of the United States Congress and others, and people listened. His ability to get along with others and immediately develop symbiotic and mutually beneficial relationships with those whom others may consider adversaries helped him climb the regional cooperation ladder all the way to the top, and in June, he finished serving his term as the President of the National Association of Regional Councils, or NARC. The National Association of Regional Councils is an independent association that advocates regional approaches to problem-solving. Its membership includes councils of government, regional councils, regional planning and development agencies and metropolitan planning organizations. Its structure is similar to that of the National Association of Counties – it’s led by a Board of Directors comprised of elected officials, with an executive board comprised of a second vice president on up to president. Officials are elected into the second vice president position, then automatically move on up each year to first vice president, vice president and then president.

As NARC president, Judge Thompson spent part of this last year not only in Washington, D.C., speaking to Congress about the importance of governments working collaboratively, but also traveling across the country to promote regional homeland security, disaster preparedness and transportation efforts. The Judge also helped reform the association itself, aiding in the hire of a new executive director and helping the organization focus on issues most important to its members.

“Really, during that year, we were very busy charting a new course for NARC,” said Cameron Moore, the executive director who Thompson helped bring on board, adding that the organization had previously been “a mile wide and an inch deep” when it came to helping its members – trying to do too much in too many areas, and not achieving what it wanted to achieve. With Thompson’s help, the association surveyed its members and focused on the four issues most important to its membership: transportation, economic development, homeland security and the environment.

“He really helped drive the process. This was something we had started talking about when we began having conversations about his agenda for the year. The organization had to get more focused. That was really something he believed in, and he played a leadership role in making that happen. We were trying to do more things than we possibly could do well, and I think the judge recognized that. Having gone through that process will put us in a better position to serve our members,” Moore said.

Thompson’s experience in leading regionalism efforts and organizations didn’t start at NARC. Texas has 24 regional councils of government, which are non-taxing entities that serve mostly as a way to distribute federal funding down to local governments and as a neutral setting for collaboration among local leaders. Thompson has been active in his local council, the Deep East Texas Council of Government, for years, serving on its board and as its president. The 24 councils of government are members of the Texas Association of Regional Councils, which further enables different regions to collaborate and work together, and Thompson has served as president of that organization as well.

“He has played an important role in positioning his county as an important player within their region. He understands why a regional approach to emerging issues can yield great results,” said TARC Executive Director Penny Redington, who first met Thompson in the early 1990s, back when they were both fairly new county judges. “He definitely has a broader vision for his region that goes beyond his jurisdiction’s boundaries, and I think that has helped his county, it’s helped Texas, it has helped all of us.”

As NARC President, Thompson encouraged the organization to hold its 3rd annual Freight Summit in Corpus Christi in 2006. The Freight Summit itself, which sought to “engage freight stakeholders and spur discussions about the benefits of public investment in infrastructure,” was Thompson’s idea.

Transportation has been his principle issue since first becoming a county judge. He sees it as an issue that touches on all the other issues – economic development, emergency preparedness, workforce development, quality of life. He’s been a major proponent of state highway projects, including the Trans-Texas Corridor. The Judge is currently serving as president of the Alliance I-69 for Texas group. He’s on the Executive Board for the I-69 Mid Continent Highway Coalition. And he’s chair of the Gulf Coast Strategic Highway Coalition. In August, he moderated and participated in a transportation panel discussion at the Texas Association of Counties Annual Conference.

Transportation, Thompson believes, will be the cornerstone of the state’s economy, especially since the amount of freight coming into the country is expected to triple by the year 2025. In 2005, the freight system transported about $6 trillion in goods and employed about 13 million Americans.

“If you are a county commissioner, it’s hard to understand why you should be interested in or supportive of major corridors, because your responsibility, or what you are elected to do, is to maintain the county roads in your precinct,” Thompson said. “I look at it from a different perspective. My ability to help accomplish things in Polk County is based on our tax base and our local economy. A major corridor with two highways that would intersect in my area would help increase the tax base through economic development, and that would give me the money to do the things that the commissioners and I would like to do.

“If you are not served by major transportation facilities, it makes it very difficult to grow your economy,” he added. “If we don’t do something, we are going to drown in traffic and freight.”

Thompson’s interest in transportation stems from a short stint doing economic development work. He served as the Executive Director of the Polk County Chamber of Commerce in 1988˜– while also serving as mayor of Livingston – and learned that an area can’t have economic development without a well-planned infrastructure. Thompson, like so many of his Deep East Texas colleagues, is a product of the 1950s and 60s, when American activism was at its peek. It was an era of Civil Rights, the creation of the Peace Corps, opposition to the Vietnam War and the Space Race.

“A lot of us grew up in the 60s with the idea that we were supposed to leave things better than we found them,” Thompson said, sitting at his desk in the Polk County Courthouse in Livingston, a small town in the Piney Woods.

It was around that same time that the regional councils of government began forming, both in Texas and nationwide, the result of a drive by the federal government to push funding toward regions and not single entities. The National League of Cities and the National Association of Counties formed NARC in 1965 to help aid the newly formed regional councils in their mission. NARC became an independent association two years later.

“I think local governments were a little bit afraid at first to delegate some authority to a larger organization that was not a state or federal agency. A lot of that fear has been worn out now because they recognize that regionalism may be a way to keep taxes from rising, by doing things on a regional basis,” said Walter Diggles, the executive director of the Deep East Texas Council of Governments.

Thompson’s interest in public service goes back to those days in the 1960s – he’s been a politician ever since 1965, when he campaigned for and won the position of Student Body President at his “little-bitty” high school in north Louisiana.

“I liked the challenge of getting elected, the challenge of politics,” he said. “It followed me. … when I moved to Livingston, the first opportunity that presented itself, I ran for city council office.” That was in 1983 – he was a member of the Livingston City Council back then, and two years later became the city’s mayor, a role he filled until he became Polk County Judge in 1990.

Thompson’s been involved in regional cooperation efforts ever since those days on the city council, first with the Deep East Texas Council of Governments. Back in those early days, areas were struggling with rural health care, housing, law enforcement, workforce development and senior citizens issues.

“He’s always been a regional person,” Diggles said. “He understands that some issues are not just a concern for one jurisdiction, but they cross those boundaries, city and county lines. He’s probably leading the pack with his knowledge and exposure to those kinds of issues. not all elected offi cials in those positions always see the benefi t of working on a regional basis.

“I think it’s really important that government officials understand that in the past 10 or 15 years, you had a locally elected offi cial who brought a lot of experience and expertise to regionalism. He has had a tremendous impact on the regionalism concept, on how it can work, how it can be eff ective and how it can have benefits for cities and counties working together,” Diggles added.

Th ough regionalism was still a relatively new concept – most regional councils of governments in the state formed in the 1960s, and those 24 CoGs didn’t sign the interlocal agreement creating the state umbrella organization, the Texas Association of Regional Councils, until 1973 – federal funding for local projects and limited funding for others forced areas to work together.

“Th e issues weren’t too dissimilar from today,” Th ompson said. “Th e only diff erence today is that we have the issue of homeland security added to those other issues.”

Th ough the original push for regional councils of government was federal, the need for the CoGs was perhaps greater in Texas than in other states.

“To a certain extent, I think it was just the sheer size of the state of Texas that really contributed to need for the councils of government here. It’s diffi cult to communicate with 254 counties,” Redington said.

Even though communication has gotten easier over the last few decades with email and cell phones, the importance of regional collaboration has grown as distances between cities continue to decrease because of urban sprawl, air transportation, new highways and the Internet. Residents are more transient, living in one county and commuting to another for work.

“Th ere probably has never been a better time to be in the regionalism field,” Moore said, adding that regional councils have had time to distinguish themselves and focus on the unique needs of their regions. “It took awhile for these organizations to sort of take on a life of their own. They aren’t there anymore strictly or simply to take on a federal agenda, like they were in the 1970s or 1980s.”

Th ompson said he believes regionalism is still in its infancy, and that the role of the councils of governments will only increase in the future, mostly because local offi cials’ perception of regionalism, especially in rural areas, is changing due to the constant struggle of having limited resources.

“As the success stories continue to come out, and as people begin to be more educated about regionalism and begin to see the bigger picture, I think it’s obvious that you must think about a lot of the services that local governments are expected to provide, and how they must be looked at on much broader basis,” he said. “I think the role of regionalism has a huge future.”

Others agreed that the role of regionalism isn’t just evolving, but growing. For so many issues nowadays, solutions aren’t as successful if they are only implemented within city or county boundaries. The CoGs carry important roles in programs relating to economic development, water supply and water quality, air quality and transportation. “When I was fi rst elected, I didn’t know what regionalism was,” Redington said. “Th en I learned about the north Central Texas Council of Governments, and I began to understand a little bit more about the role that the CoG played in, fi rst of all, transportation planning, and then in the development of the 9-1-1 system, and then later in clean air planning, and in solid waste planning.” After the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in 2001, and especially after Hurricane Katrina and Rita in 2005, the CoGs also assumed important roles in disaster management and emergency preparedness.

After those hurricanes, Texas developed a model regional program to emergency preparedness, one that Th ompson promoted throughout the country and which he expects other states to soon follow.

“Emergencies aren’t just confi ned to one jurisdiction,” Redington said. “Flooding, tornadoes, hurricanes can aff ect more than one region, more than one state. So a county’s emergency planning must be done in coordination with their neighbors. And the way to do that, and the way the state has determined that it will be done, is that the state provides grant funding for an emergency planner in each region, who works with each jurisdiction on their emergency plans.”

Though his term as nARC president ended in June, Thompson will continue to have an impact on regional issues within his area and the state.

“I’m very fortunate to be in my 17th year as county judge and still enjoy getting up every morning and going to work. Every day is a different day and your only responsibility is to try to make things better,” he said. “What a great thing.”