Grading the Cities introduction THE GOVERNMENT PERFORMANCE PROJECT Report Card: San Diego Revenue Rank: 15 Form of Government: Council-Manager Mayor: Susan Golding (took office 1993) City Manager: Michael T. Uberuaga (appointed 1997) City Council: 8 members, elected by district FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT: B+ Like other large California cities, San Diego has very comprehensive investment policies, including monthly tracking reports and thorough oversight. “Most public managers don’t have an appreciation of the risks they’re incurring,” says City Treasurer Conny Jamison, “Even with fixed-income investments, you can still make a lot of mistakes.” The strict approach is designed to minimize those risks. Moody’s Investors Service cites concern about the city’s reliance on one-time revenues to balance its budget, although it notes that this practice has been decreasing somewhat. Another concern to the rating agencies is San Diego’s plan to take on additional debt with capital projects that include an expansion of its convention center, a new ballpark for the baseball Padres and a new main library. The city’s budget document is very readable, and clearly identifies issues and goals, as well as relevant economic conditions. There is also a CD-ROM version of the document, which is much cheaper to manufacture and saves the lives of countless trees. In addition, San Diego deserves special recognition for going beyond most other cities in cost accounting. It can tell you the cost per residential ton of refuse recycled or the average cost per foot of sewer mains cleaned. The utility of such data is enormous. HUMAN RESOURCES: C San Diego’s bureaucracy is split between haves and have-nots. The agencies with borrowing power or independent funding sources, such as those that operate the new convention center and other high-profile facilities, generally are well staffed. The ones dependent on the general fund — on general tax money — are the have-nots. They are short on resources for training and recruitment. Budget constraints also limit the city “employment counter” — where candidates hand in applications — to a three-day-a-week schedule. San Diego is short on data about its personnel and, as a result, has done little centralized work force planning. The hiring process is slow, a real disadvantage in this high-employment area where good candidates have plenty of options. The city can sometimes do provisional hiring if it really needs to fill a position quickly. Fortunately, managers are given a reasonable amount of flexibility in deciding whom they hire. Even though San Diego still has a traditional civil service system, managers can choose from ample lists of names; in some cases, they can look at every candidate they deem qualified. One particular strong point: Superior performance is rewarded with cash. Managers can get bonuses of up to $3,000; non-managerial positions can be rewarded with up to $1,000. INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY: C San Diego’s managers are still short of the technology they need. Information for personnel management is very weak. There is a sparkling new budget system, but the city’s accounting technology is “an old mainframe legacy system that doesn’t give a lot of the useful tools that newer systems have,” says Richard Wilken, the information technology director. One plus: the budgeting system does provides cost data by activity, a real rarity in the cities. Departmental IT systems developed here in an inefficient, stovepiped manner. In some areas, such as permitting and engineering, information is not easily accessible across agency boundaries. This will change, however, as San Diego takes likely steps toward an overall IT plan and new IT governance, utilizing a CIO and a steering committee to ensure buy-in from departments. Twenty years ago, San Diego recognized its problems in attracting and retaining good technical people. So it created the San Diego Data Processing Corp., a city-owned, independent non-profit corporation that sells IT services, including procurement and maintenance, to the city via an operating agreement. By and large, this experiment has been a success. CAPITAL MANAGEMENT: B+ The city’s capital planning process serves its needs well, relying on a good deal of community input. The capital plan is closely followed and respectfully treated by the council. There’s a heavy emphasis on the design phase of projects, in order to come up with more cost-effective, energy-efficient plans. The city generally has good information on the condition of its streets, and comprehensive site inspections are under way for facilities. Still, it has been funding only about half of its facility-maintenance needs. Sewer problems led to a settlement with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for necessary repairs that will cost about $2 billion by the time they’re finished in 2004. Delays have occurred in some highly visible projects, such as the expanded convention center and the new baseball stadium. This has stemmed largely from vigorous opposition to the spending by a group of citizen activists. MANAGING FOR RESULTS: A- After five years of managing for results, San Diego is now near the head of the class. Performance measures and goals can be found for every program and within each department, with citizen feedback included. The budget makes outstanding efforts to tie its spending figures to performance measures. Performance targets are also developed by each department. “In most cases they’re realistic, but challenging,” says Lisa Irvine, manager of competition and organization effectiveness. “We want them to drive performance. We don’t want to be mediocre.” Another safeguard against mediocrity: San Diego publishes comparative data from other cities to identify best practices and opportunities for improvement. One quibble: The city could do considerably more to educate lower-level workers on the way their jobs tie into the measurements. AVERAGE GRADE: B Copyright © 2000, Congressional Quarterly, Inc. Reproduction in any form without the written permission of the publisher is prohibited. Governing, City & State and Governing.com are trademarks of Congressional Quarterly, Inc.