Related Experiment Videos
The Challenges of Conducting Intrastate Policy Surveillance: A Methods Note on County and City Laws in Indiana
Lindsey Sanner1, Sean Grant1, Heather Walter-McCabe1
1Lindsey Sanner is with the Center for Health Policy, Richard M. Fairbanks School of Public Health, Indiana University, Indianapolis. Sean Grant is with the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Richard M. Fairbanks School of Public Health, Indiana University, Indianapolis. Heather Walter-McCabe is with the Department of Social Work and Law and the Robert H. McKinney School of Law, Indiana University, Indianapolis. Ross D. Silverman is with the Department of Health Policy and Management, Richard M. Fairbanks School of Public Health, and the Robert H. McKinney School of Law, Indiana University, Indianapolis.
Abstract:
Policy surveillance is critical in examining the ways law functions as a structural and social determinant of health. To date, little policy surveillance research has focused on examining intrastate variations in the structure and health impact of laws. Intrastate policy surveillance poses unique methodological challenges because of the complex legal architecture within states and inefficient curation of local laws.We discuss our experience with these intrastate policy surveillance challenges in Indiana, a state with 92 counties and several populous cities, a complicated history of home rule, systemically underfunded local governments, and variations in demography, geography, and technology adoption. In our case study, we expended significant time and resources to obtain county and city ordinances through online code libraries, jurisdiction Web sites, and (most notably) visits to offices to scan documents ourselves.A concerted effort is needed to ensure that local laws of all kinds are stored online in organized, searchable, and open access systems. Such an effort is vital to achieve the aspirational goals of policy surveillance at the intrastate level.