The unfortunately popular view of voters — and of some candidates running for office from outside of government — observing government action/inaction is that government is inherently inefficient. This popular view of government can only be changed significantly in the long run with a combination of an education effort and a government that meets the needs of its citizens while improving their quality of life. NOTE: A prime example of this working is the October 2001 Governing cover story about Christchurch, New Zealand, “The Best-Run City in the World.” Has Christchurch eliminated all of its inefficiencies? Both the city officials and the voters likely would answer “No.” But the story there is not on inefficiencies.

Notwithstanding the above assertions, the immediate approach for the administrator and the aayor of Zenith City should be a combination of identifying some “quick hits” of inefficiencies and the diversion of attention. The quick hits announced in the first week in office allow the mayor to demonstrate leadership and keeping a promise of eliminating inefficiencies, which was a central campaign issue in getting him elected. This also buys time for both the mayor and the administrator (1) to review the current allocation of city resources — both staff and dollars — in the various city departments; (2) to evaluate any performance/outcome measures that may exist; (3) to compare the current array of city programs and services with other items/issues/initiatives raised in the campaign; (4) to develop a strategic plan for the city which reflects the mayor’s priorities; and (5) to use the budget process and ongoing management decision-making (which may include reorganization of parts of city government) to allocate resources to support the mayor’s priorities in the plan.

I also agree with Bob Behn’s comment that focusing on savings is a trap. In practice, eliminating inefficiencies in government results in shifting resources from a real/perceived inefficient use to a higher priority. Savings occur in those less-common situations where elected officials exercise both the political will to eliminate programs and services and the courage to not immediately reallocate the resources from those programs to another purpose. This is the macro view of resource allocation in government, in which the predominant tendency is for savings in one area to be immediately reallocated to another, presumably higher and better purpose. Nothing wrong with that — simply, elected officials tout the savings from eliminating inefficient use of resources or ineffective programs, but their initiatives have to be paid for in some fashion. This is the resource allocation portion of public-sector decision-making.

Jim Kasprzak
Director
Bureau of Administrative Services
Michigan Family Independence Agency

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

Bob Badger
Customer Service Supervisor
Division of Florida Land Sales, Condominiums and Mobile Homes
Tallahassee

A BENEFICIAL PROCESS

At first, there was a fair amount of resentment about the report. Residents were upset that “outsiders” were making these recommendations about their city. Employees were upset that the businesspeople took credit for ideas the employees made. City executives were concerned that some of the recommendations were hastily prepared and not well conceived.

The city’s approach was to “assume positive intent,” meaning that we assumed everyone involved in the process wanted to make the city more efficient and that, if erroneous assumptions were made, it was because of a lack of information, not a desire to hurt the city.

We created a broad-based team of city executives, city employees and city residents to look at every one of the recommendations. This review team considered positive and negative aspects of each proposal, considered ways to modify the proposal, and made a recommendation on how to proceed. Some of the proposals were easy to review; for example, several proposals had already been implemented by the time the report was released, and we reported that. Some of the recommendations were against state law or the city charter; we reported that and also explained, to the extent we could, why rules for business and government differed.

Other recommendations were more complex and required hours and hours of research and debate within the review team. Complex operational recommendations were studied carefully so that the team could consider intricacies that the businesspeople did not have time to understand.

Many of the policy related recommendations were directed to the elected officials, who needed to determine if they wanted the change in policy that was recommended. With the divergent philosophies of the elected officials, it became clear that they did not agree,

We spent a little more than a year plowing through every recommendation, accepting the good ones, modifying the ones that were useful in revised form, and explaining why unworkable recommendations were rejected. By sharing our progress with the elected officials and community on a regular basis, everyone knew that the report was being taken seriously.

In the end, I think it was a very positive experience. The business executives got an up-close look at the city and discovered we were not as inefficient as they originally thought we were. The businesspeople also saw specific examples of how governments are forbidden from doing things that they considered “good business practices.” The report provided some safe cover for city executives and employees to push issues that were good ideas, but unpopular among employees or another constituency group. The city was forced to make a frank and honest self-evaluation and make changes that made us more efficient.

Was the process beneficial? Absolutely. The benefits were not only financial, but the city also developed several new advocates in the business community. Did it save as much as the report said it would? Of course not. We have all had to rush through research on a subject we don’t know enough about and have made mistakes in initial recommendations. Could the process have been better? Sure. Working together, the businesspeople, employees and residents would have had more complete information and would have made better recommendations the first time. But we did what we do every day — take an imperfect situation, make the best of it, and try to balance the interest of all the constituencies.

The process is like playing poker — you have to play the cards that are dealt you and make the best hand you can. These outside reviews can be a good opportunity for a city to take a fresh look at itself, discuss the “undiscussible,” and create new partnerships that will pay off in the future.

Kery T. Gray
Legislative Liaison
City of Dayton, Ohio