All Resources — Local Solutions Support Center

Can Local Emergency Authority Provide a Basis for Local COVID-19 Policy When State Law Otherwise Preempts?

This memo aims to engage in a preliminary way with the question of what a state’s grant of emergency authority to local governments means for localities facing the COVID-19 crisis.

LegalAdam PolaskiApril 1, 2020COVID-19, Public Health, Memo

How Do You Know if Your Local Government Has the Legal Authority to Adopt a Policy in Response to the Coronavirus Pandemic?

As the coronavirus pandemic spreads, local elected officials and advocates are asking what they can do for their communities. This brief guide can help you determine whether your community has the authority it needs to adopt a particular policy.

LegalAdam PolaskiMarch 18, 2020COVID-19, COVID Decision Tree

The Essential Role of Fiscal Authority in Local Democracy

This White Paper considers the consequences of decreasing state aid to cities and offers some suggestions for policies that would allow municipalities to better carry out their important responsibilities as engines of local democracy.

Legal, White PapersAdam PolaskiMarch 1, 2020White Paper, General

Home Rule: Principles to Action Webinar

On February 27, 2020, staff from the Local Solution Support Center and Fordham Law hosted a webinar focused on home rule and discussed findings from the new report, Principles of Home Rule for the 21st Century.

LegalAdam PolaskiFebruary 27, 2020Virtual Trainings, Home Rule

Principles of Home Rule for the 21st Century

This groundbreaking new framework lays out a vision for rebalancing state and local relations, and provides model constitutional language to encourage legal reform.

LegalAdam PolaskiFebruary 13, 2020Home Rule, Report, General, Home Rule Reform

Moving the Principles of Home Rule for the 21st Century into Action

This action guide will inform the process of building demand for a new, timely, and modern version of home rule that defines what powers local governments need now to protect and promote the health, safety, economic well-being and democratic voice of their residents.

Adam PolaskiFebruary 11, 2020

Messaging Guide: Home Rule for the 21st Century

This guide provides topline messages, best examples, and language do’s and don’ts to keep in mind when talking about HR21, or Principles for Home Rule in the 21st Century. The Principles call for a presumption of local authority and lay out a roadmap for strengthening local self-governance, local competence, and local fiscal stability.

LegalAdam PolaskiFebruary 10, 2020

Florida Gun Preemption Amicus Brief – First District Court of Appeal of FL

This December 2019 amicus brief in the case ‘State of Florida v. City of Weston, FL” deals with Florida and gun safety preemption.

Amicus Brief, LegalAdam PolaskiDecember 27, 2019Florida, Gun Safety

Repealing Preemption: Defending Local Democracy Now Includes A Growing Focus on Recovering Lost Local Authority

This white paper captures how defending local democracy now includes a growing focus on recovering lost local authority and summarizes key lessons learned so far in the fight to repeal existing preemption.

Legal, White PapersAdam PolaskiDecember 1, 2019General, White Paper

Webinar: Preemption & Home Rule Polling

This webinar features the results of research about preemption and home rule, published in November 2019.

Webinar, Polling, CommunicationsAdam PolaskiNovember 1, 2019General, National Polling

Exposing Juul: New Vaping Titan is Deploying Big Tobacco’s Old Playbook

In this white paper, we document how Juul has flooded statehouses with lobbyists to advance T-21 legislation – bills to raise the purchase age of tobacco to 21, but that include poison pill measures preempting local governments from further regulating tobacco products.

White Papers, ResearchAdam PolaskiOctober 1, 2019Report, Public Health

State Interference: The Push to Erode Local Democracy

LSSC helps to coordinate and create opportunities to counter the increasing state abuse of preemption and working to strengthen local democracies so they have they have the authority they need to protect and promote the health and safety of their residents.

State CampaignsAdam PolaskiSeptember 1, 2019General, Public Education

Maryland Resolution Calling for Stronger Local Democracy

This model ordinance from Local Maryland encourages local governments to pass laws that support healthy families, a clean environment and good jobs.

Legal, Model ResolutionsAdam PolaskiSeptember 1, 2019Maryland, General

The Growing Shadow of State Interference: Preemption in the 2019 State Legislative Sessions

Between January and June 2019, state legislatures across the nation continued a troubling trend of passing more laws forbidding or “preempting” local control over a large and growing set of public health, economic, environmental, and social justice policy solutions.

ResearchAdam PolaskiJuly 29, 2019End of Session Report

Austin Paid Sick Leave Amicus Brief – Texas Supreme Court

This July 2019 amicus brief in the case ‘City of Austin v. Texas Association of Business’ deals with preemption of Austin’s paid sick leave policy.

Legal, Amicus BriefAdam PolaskiJuly 15, 2019Texas, Labor, Paid Sick Leave

Confederate Monuments and Punitive Preemption: The Latest Assault on Local Democracy

The unfortunate result of this burgeoning legislative movement to adopt statue statutes and other punitive preemption measures has been the erosion of local democracy, the stifling of local political innovation, and the undermining of local faith in the democratic process.

White PapersAdam PolaskiJune 1, 2019White Paper, Racial Justice, Protesting

New Orleans City Council Resolution Promoting Local Control Over Minimum Wages.

Localities can look at this New Orleans City Council resolution as a model for empowering local governments to set their own minimum wages and worker protection policies.

Model Resolutions, LegalAdam PolaskiApril 11, 2019Louisiana, Minimum Wage, Labor