County officials say nation on the ‘wrong track’
The Iraq war, immigration, health care, the economy and energy prices were the top concerns of respondents to the Washington-based National Association of Counties’ (NACo) National County Elected Officials Poll. A record-setting 55 percent of the county officials who took the poll said they think the country is on the “wrong track.”
However, county officials were more optimistic about the state of the nation than the general public, 72 percent of which said the country was on the wrong track in a CBS/New York Times survey quoted by NACo. National security and the Iraq War and immigration were the top concerns for county officials. Sixty-five percent said the call up of county service providers for military duty had at least a small effect on county services, and 10 percent said the war has had a serious effect on county services. Sixty-seven percent of the respondents said illegal immigration is a very serious problem.
Data for the poll were collected from 501 county officials. More information on the survey is available at http://www.naco.org/CountyNewsTemplate.cfm?template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=24667.