July 16 Message
Good Afternoon: I hope all of you have had a good week. I know all of you are busy preparing for county fair along with all of the other summer programming. The County Fair schedule in our region is as follows:
Yellow Medicine: July 23-26
Redwood: July 30-August 2
Lincoln: July 30-August 2
Kandiyohi: August 5-8
Lyon: August 5-8
Chippewa: August 12-14
Renville: August 18-21
Lac qui Parle September 9-13
NEP Database: Many of you were part of the July 8 UM Connect session on the new NEP Data base. The new database will be more efficient and effective in documenting the Nutrition Education Program for continued program accountability and funding. The role of the County Support Staff will continue to enter the participant and course data into the database. The new data base will be web based rather than the current spread sheet. Training for County support staff is planned for October.
Extension County Budgets. In the last week, seven of the eight counties in our region have held County Extension Committee meetings. An important part of the agenda for these meetings was the development of the 2010 budget proposal. As we all know, this is a difficult budget year for counties. Yet, I have been very impressed with the level of support that the Extension Committees have shown for the programming that the budgets support as well as the accountability that we have shown for the public dollars that support our County offices and local programs. Counties continue to make a significant investment of local tax dollars in Extension. The 2010 budgets for Counties in our eight counties total 925,247 dollars.
Have a great weekend.
Bob