Grading the States introduction THE GOVERNMENT PERFORMANCE PROJECT Report Card: Montana GOVERNORS Judy Martz (Republican, elected 2000) Marc Racicot (Republican, 1993-2001) LEGISLATURE House — 57 Republicans, 43 Democrats Senate — 31 Republicans, 19 Democrats FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT: B Montana is one of a handful of states in which the legislature and executive branch each arrive at an estimate of revenue and then duke it out. In the past, legislators have been a bit secretive about how they derive their version, but as the state approaches a new biennium, it is moving toward a more cooperative approach. “There’s a push from the legislature to the staff for more of a consensus process,” says a gubernatorial adviser. Whichever side turns out to be the better prognosticator, state revenues have been coming in solidly above expenditures in recent years. The end-fund balance has been rising since 1995, and was about 11 percent of general fund revenues at the end of the last biennium. Montana has a well-respected Board of Investments, which recently got the go-ahead from voters to do limited equity investment for a small portion of the state portfolio. Generally, however, the board’s hands are tied to a limited range of allowable investments. In an effort to speed up procurement, Montana has increasingly been delegating purchasing authority. Wisely, it requires agencies to demonstrate sufficient expertise in this area before it gives them much freedom. As in many other areas of Montana government, challenges in both procurement and contracting include limited staff, as well as time and resources for training. CAPITAL MANAGEMENT: C+ The Department of Transportation recently took over thousands of miles of secondary highways and other roads that had been under county and city management. The addition of these roads — most in poor condition — created an instant maintenance backlog, the size of which the department hasn’t yet fully calculated. Building maintenance, on the other hand, has been getting better. The Racicot administration’s emphasis on this area was a welcome relief to agencies with repair problems. And with capital budgets now exceeding $100 million, increased building construction has alleviated some space concerns. The real disappointment here is a technological one. In some ways, the state appears to have taken a step backwards. The Department of Administration uses a statewide accounting system, implemented two years ago, to track the financial progress of active projects, but this system tracks only the current year’s spending. More information was actually available the old way. HUMAN RESOURCES: C+ Action on work-force planning has been rather limited here. “The only thing I’ve been able to do so far,” says John McEwen, administrator of the State Personnel Division, “is that I bring it to everyone’s attention that this is something we have to work on.” It definitely is. High turnover and heavy retirement are both serious problems in Montana’s work force. Agencies have been poaching one another’s workers, and good projects have been delayed because there simply isn’t the staff to complete them. “Just in one year, I’ve lost three out of a staff of 12 professionals,” says McEwen. It’s not that the state doesn’t have good ideas. Pilot projects have been in the works for years that seek to offer agencies greater flexibility in terms of pay, but currently these affect only about 10 percent of the work force. The rest are locked into old pay plans that don’t recognize superior performance. The state does have a rapid and flexible hiring system, which provides considerable authority to agencies. Montana has also been one of the most active states in developing a “competency-based” system of hiring. MANAGING FOR RESULTS: C Montana’s effort at long-term planning — more of a vision statement than a strategic plan — was launched by former Governor Racicot, with a great deal of input from citizen advisory groups, after his election in 1992. In a sparsely populated state, with a very powerful governor’s office, there may not be a crying need for a more rigorous effort. But the quality of MFR in Montana is essentially hostage to the desires of whoever happens to hold the top office at a given moment. Agency performance measurements are published in the state budget and are available on the Internet. But many are just at early stages of development. Even the Department of Revenue, which has moved more quickly than most, concedes that “for years, we have utilized quantitative measures to measure progress and performance, but the aspects of measures relating to quality, efficiency and effectiveness are all new to our organization.” The state’s Legislative Audit Division continues to be a potent force here; its evaluations are taken extremely seriously. INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY: C The state recently made dramatic progress in bringing on line an integrated financial and human resources information system. But its other IT systems, notably in capital management, aren’t nearly where the state had hoped they would be a couple of years ago. Most IT processes are well standardized. And the state’s single data network is a tremendous asset in sharing information among agencies. SummitNet, as the network is called, links Montana’s libraries, tribal colleges, universities, qualifying non-profit agencies, state government departments and some K-12 schools. That’s impressive, and the state intends to use it still more. Montana has developed a mission statement for e-government, gotten the governor to endorse it and just signed a contract for an e-government portal. Efforts to get legislation that would allow for innovative procurement methods, helpful for adequate speed in IT purchases, failed in the last legislative session. “A control type of philosophy has put a stranglehold on procurement here for years and years,” says one official. AVERAGE GRADE: C+ Copyright © 2001, 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.