President Barack Obama announced a new government program Thursday to promote partnerships between local communities and the federal government. With the stroke of a pen the President signed an executive order establishing the White House Council on Strong Cities, Strong Communities to ensure economic strategies are implemented at the local community level.

“Strong Cities,  Strong Communities is a remarkable initiative, one that takes innovation, a determination to cut-through the red-tape and ensure taxpayer dollars are used wisely,” said Cecilia Munoz, Director of the Domestic Policy Council and Co-Chair of Strong Cities, Strong Communities.

“The Strong Cities Council will support bottom-up solutions that break down silos within federal and local governments, and will urge the private and nonprofit sectors to come up with innovate strategies to solve challenging issues.”

Six cities – Chester, Penn.; Cleveland/Youngstown, Ohio ; Detroit, Mich.; Fresno, Calif.; Memphis, Tenn.; and New Orleans, La. – were selected as the first participants in the pilot program which was launched in June 2011.

The Council will assure technical and planning resources are available to allow communities to develop their economic vision and strategies. The council will make recommendations to the President for changing federal policies and programs to support local governments and their economic growth.

The Council will also reach out to non-profit organizations, businesses, labor organizations, school districts, and faith and community-based groups in addition to working with local and state governments.

Members of 25 different federal agencies will work together to fully establish the program’s foundation before expanding it across the country. Strong Cities, Strong Communities Council is headquartered at the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The Secretary of Housing and Urban Development and the Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy are co-chairing the council. Attorney General Eric Holder and Secretary of Defense Leon E. Panetta will join other members of the President’s cabinet, including the cabinet secretaries of Treasury, Interior, Agriculture, Commerce, Labor, Health and Human Services, Transportation, Energy, Education, Veterans Affairs and Homeland Security.

Other members of the council will include the Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator, Office of Management and Budget Director, General Services Administrator, Small Business Administration Administrator, National Endowment for the Arts Chairperson, Chief Executive Officer of the Corporation for National and Community Service, Senior Advisor and Assistant to President for Intergovernmental Affairs, Assistant to the President and Cabinet Secretary, President’s Assistant on Economic Policy, the Chair on the Council on Environmental Quality and the Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy.

An executive director for Strong Cities, Strong Communities will be appointed by the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. The executive director will coordinate the Council’s activities and, with instructions from the board, will support coordination and implementation efforts.

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Rick Perry’s decision to mandate HPV vaccines for sixth-grade girls back in 2007 has become a bone of contention on the campaign trail. Under the terms of Perry’s executive order, 12 year old girls in Texas were supposed to receive the Gardasil vaccine, which inoculates them against the human papillomavirus (HPV).

HPV is quite widespread, with approximately 50% of sexually-active adults acquiring it during their lifetime. However, according to the Center for Disease Control, in 90% of cases, the body’s immune system eliminates the virus without any adverse effects. But in the remaining 10% of cases, the virus can have serious side effects, including genital warts or cervical cancer.

It is because of the risk of sexually-transmitted diseases that many medical authorities recommend administering the HPV vaccine to all girls before they become sexually active. Even though the executive order was ultimately overturned by the Texas legislature, Perry’s attempt to impose the HPV vaccine by executive fiat is hard to reconcile with his promise to reduce the government’s role in people’s lives.

Fellow GOP presidential hopeful Michele Bachmann criticized Perry’s decision, saying that “to have innocent little 12-year-old girls be forced to have a government injection through an executive order is just flat out wrong.” Even Democrats have joined in the criticism. During the 2010 election, they ran attack ads featuring menacing images of a needle poised to strike a young girl’s arm.

Perry’s decision also vexes social conservatives because inoculating girls against sexually-transmitted disease flies in the face of their support for abstinence-only sex education. Conservative Christian leaders were vocal in their opposition to the executive order, and their opposition was instrumental in convincing the legislature to overturn it.

Another issue with Perry’s support for the HPV vaccine is that Merck, the company that makes Gardasil, donated $30,000 to Perry’s campaign. The company also employs Perry’s former chief-of-staff as a lobbyist. Naturally, these close connections have given rise to claims that the Texas governor was acting more for the benefit of a major donor than the general public.

Although Michele Bachmann accused Perry of “crony capitalism,” he claimed that there was nothing untoward about the situation. “”If you’re saying that I can be bought for $5,000, I’m offended,” he replied. However, as noted above, Merck’s contribution was actually much greater than the $5,000 quoted by Perry.

Furthermore, Merck and its subsidiaries also contributed $380,000 to the Republican Governors Association once Perry took the helm of that organization in 2006. Now that Perry is coming under fire for his decision, he seems intent on distancing himself from it. During a recent debate, he admitted that, if he had to do it all over again, he would have approached the matter differently.

Meanwhile, his spokesman Mark Milner, accused Bachmann and others of staging histrionics in order to draw attention to themselves. “You have candidates out there that are trying to get attention and will throw outlandish accusations out there just to get their name in the paper,” Milner said. “What drove the governor on this issue was protecting life.”

Despite the Sturm und Drang that this has generated, Perry is still the candidate most likely to appeal to the right wing of the GOP. His social conservative credentials are still stronger than those of Mitt Romney, who is still struggling to overcome grassroots Republican opposition to Massachusetts’ healthcare law.

Image Courtesy of  http://www.flickr.com/photos/gageskidmore/

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