Whether we are born here or moved here, we all value that Virginia is a great place to raise a family. Immigrants move to Virginia for many of the same reasons as people born in other areas of the United States — job opportunities, good schools, and thriving communities. And Virginia’s immigrants are critical contributors to the state’s economy and communities, adding new energy and ideas everywhere from struggling mill towns seeking a second wind to the worker-hungry tech corridors. Immigrants in Virginia today are typically well educated, long-time residents of the United States, with many becoming U.S. citizens and raising children of their own.
Publication
Since 2009, there has been a growing problem in Colorado with increasing employee turnover, programs operating with short staffing forcing employees to work extensive overtime, and low morale that jeopardizes vital public services. The growing turnover is complicated by the difficulty filling authorized positions. Research shows that collective bargaining for public sector employees, coupled with labor management partnerships, has been effective at improving agency performance and reducing employee turnover.
High turnover makes it hard to provide quality service to residents, reduces the efficiency and effectiveness of state agencies, puts a strain on state workers, and burdens taxpayers. Based on a careful review of research on turnover costs, replacing the 4,268 workers who left state government in FY 2017-18 conservatively cost taxpayers $48 million. Research shows that allowing state employees to negotiate with their employer through a collective bargaining process for better pay, benefits, and working conditions will help lower turnover rates, save taxpayers millions, and improve services.
THE VACATION RENTAL INDUSTRY has exponentially expanded with the growth of online home-sharing platforms such as Airbnb, Flipkey, and Homeaway. The state of Hawai‘i alone hosted approximately 23,000 vacation rental units (VRUs) in 2017, meaning one out of every 24 of our housing units is a VRU.
While not every city has adopted such a comprehensive strategy, Hawai‘i’s counties have the opportunity to model their ordinances off successful VRU regulations from around the world. Appleseed finds that the most effective VRU ordinance:
- Holds platforms liable for illegal transactions on their websites;
- Requires platforms to provide data on VRUs to cities;
- Imposes meaningful fines;
- Focuses on bringing major offenders and commercial hosts into compliance;
- Empowers neighbors;
- Limits the number of units a host may rent and nights a unit may be rented;
- Bans VRUs from operating in inappropriate types of housing; and
- Provides clear restrictions on Non-Conforming Units (NCUs).
Commercial operators already dominate our VRU industry: as of November of 2018, 73.5 percent of Hawai‘i hosts operate multiple listings, and 84.8 percent of Hawai‘i listings are entire homes or apartments. VRU conversion will not go away on its own; the financial incentive to operate VRUs is so great that only powerful enforcement tools can save our valuable housing stock. It is imperative that our counties employ enforcement strategies that will help, not hurt, our residents.
Poverty rates in Ohio remain high despite improvements in the job market. There were still 115,000 more Ohioans living in poverty in 2017 than in the year prior to the last recession.Child poverty is exceedingly high. Cleveland has the highest child poverty in the nation — nearly half of all kids. Cincinnati had the third highest child poverty rate in the nation. More than 513,000 Ohio kids lived below the poverty line last year. This has long term consequences for our children and our state. Policy makers have failed to address this crisis. The Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is a tax policy designed to help. Yet, Ohio’s EITC remains one of the weakest in the nation.