CSG Regions

WASHINGTON, D.C.--U.S. companies looking for employees often must take that search elsewhere. But, said Kelli Wells, executive director for education for the GE Foundation, those companies would rather find a prepared workforce on U.S. soil. The Council of State Governments' State Pathways to Prosperity Initiative has a similar goal.

fter the Environmental Protection Agency finalizes rules on reducing carbon emissions in mid-2015, states will have a year to develop a plan for reduction.

The goal is to reduce the “pollution to power ratio of covered fossil fuel-fired power plants in a given state,” Janet McCabe, assistant administrator for the EPA’s Office of Air and Radiation, said in a blog post explaining the rules.

Catherine Bray believes it's important for states to become globally fluent. "The more people that think international the better," said Bray, who recently returned to lead The Council of State Governments' international program.

When CSG’s leaders established the office in Washington, D.C., in 1966, they understood the importance of the state’s role in federal decision-making. They knew the federal-state struggles of the previous decades would likely expand into new areas of public policymaking as both sides attempted to master the cyclical nature of federalism. Today, CSG’s presence in our nation’s capital has never been more important. Medicaid expansion, air quality regulations, net neutrality, cybersecurity, transportation funding and public lands—to name just a few—are all critical issues to the states. That is why CSG has made the conscious decision to align its Washington, D.C., activities more closely with the national policy and research team.