Local public health law in the United States: Scope and orgin

While federal and state public health laws have been studied and reformed significantly over the past 20 years, considerably less focus has been directed to local public health laws in the United States. Like their federal and state counterparts, local public health laws can serve a critical role in protecting population health. Through our ongoing study, Building the Base for a Research Agenda on Local Public Health Legal Authority, we have reviewed public health components and themes within local ordinances in 37 selected municipalities of varying size and location. Diverse public health areas are addressed at the local level, partly dependent on the relationship between the state and local governance. This presentation will examine the breadth of local public health decisions making authority and describe how local public health ordinances fill gaps in or supplement existing state and federal public health laws. The goals of the study are to (1) provide an initial database of knowledge and local ordinances for existing and future research on local public health law, and (2) facilitate information sharing among those working at the local level to modernize and improve local public health law.