Impact of budget cuts to environmental health services at local health departments: key findings.

The recent economic recession and its aftermath negatively impacted many local health departments (LHDs) across the U.S. Seven surveys conducted by the National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO) between August 2009 and February 2012 produced informa­ tive data (NACCHO, 2012). Each wave of the study showed that in comparing the current and prior fiscal years about 40% of LHDs na­ tionwide had lower budgets, about 50% cut at least one program, and about 45% experi­ enced staff reduction. Since 2008, LHDs lost almost 40,000 employees. To learn specifically about changes to envi­ ronmental health funding and the impacts of these changes on the environmental health workforce and services at LHDs, NACCHO surveyed a nationally representative sample of LHDs in March and April 2012. The study assessed changes between each respondent’s most recently completed fiscal year and prior fiscal year. The study data indicated that environmental health revenue decreased for a substantial percentage of LHDs and that significant cuts to the environmental health workforce and to valuable environmental health services were made for budgetary reaAccording to one respondent, personnel reductions due to budget cuts had “put an enormous strain on providing customary environmental health services.”