The Greater North Dakota Chamber held their annual Congressional Policy Summit Monday in Fargo taking on four topics:  the U.S. economy, healthcare, energy and immigrant workers.

A panel at the GNDC Congressional Policy Summit addresses energy issues.

Martin Regalia, Senior Vice-president and Chief Economist U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said that the United States economy is worse than it looks and it's "not getting better fast enough to catch us up to where we used to be."The most disengaged working group are recent college graduates 19-25 years of age with college debt and no job prospects, likely living at home with their parents. "We are letting our seed go to rot," Regalia commented on not getting business up on its feet so that this age group can get the jobs they need to succeed. Ben Bernanke's expected retirement also causes some uncertainty.

In healthcare topics, Ruth Krystopolski from Sanford Healthwarned the group that the federal system to advance the new Affordable Care Act (ACA) health care system is not ready for the looming October 1 deadline. She said expect some "bumps" or pushback on deadlines. In her estimation, it will take five to ten years to fully implement because the system for all the stakeholders to exchange information is not ready. The number of part-time jobs has also risen, and it's unknown if that's directly linked to the Affordable Care Act provisions.

2. Temporary Work Visa programs - H1B Visas for highly skilled workers, the cap could be 165,000 workers

3.  E-verify so employers know that the employee is legal 

4.  Legalization through earned lawful status so that illegal immigrants begin paying taxes and earning their status

5. Border control to stop additional illegal immigrants from crossing into the U.S.

Bill Blazer, Senior Vice President for the Minnesota Chamber, said that immigrants have a high percentage of entrepreneurship. They might have a short cost to a community, but the long run outweighs the short cost in terms of their output over time.

• The feasibility and desirability of making political subdivision budget information accessible on the state budget database website as well as finding better ways to inform taxpayers regarding political subdivision budget or levy deliberations and legislative property tax relief.
• Whether political subdivisions can become more efficient and effective to reduce costs to taxpayers.

Representatives of the ND League of Cities, the ND Association of Counties, the ND School Boards Association, the ND Township Officers Association, and the ND Recreation and Park Association were each given the opportunity to address the commission and answer questions pertaining to the commission's study objectives.

In addressing political subdivision efficiency, the question of K-8 school districts (especially those in smaller towns) was brought forward. Several citizen members of the commission including Slope County Commissioner Scott Ouradnik and ND School Boards Association Executive Director Dr. Jon Martinson commented that smaller schools play a vital role in rural North Dakota. The point was made that if and when patrons of a particular school district determine that their district is no longer operating efficiently, it has the potential to opt for consolidation with another school district.

Comments were also heard regarding the usefulness of political subdivision budget information and the inclusion of that information on the state budget database website. Enabling legislation was passed during the 2013 legislative session to allow political subdivisions to include their budget data on the state budget database website. To date, no political subdivisions have utilized that website in sharing its budgetary data, though many of them publish their budget information on their own websites. According to Pam Sharp, Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), the task of gathering budget information from each of the more than 3,000 political subdivisions within the state would be less than easy. It was due to this fact that a similar piece of legislation mandating that all political subdivisions submit their budget information to the state budget database failed during the 2013 session. Commission Chair, Representative Brenda Heller, made note of the fact that most citizens who are inquisitive as to where their local tax dollars are being spent will more often than not contact their local taxing authorities directly instead of searching within a state database.

Testimony as provided by Assistant Director of the ND Association of Counties, Terry Traynor, on the two study areas is accessible in the link below. Also included is Traynor's testimony regarding additional areas of study counties would like to see the ACIR address during the interim.

WTI Crude: $109.25

Brent Crude: $115.71

Natural Gas: $3.58

ND Rig Count: 182