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From Governing’s
Grading the Counties introductionFebruary 2002 issue
THE GOVERNMENT PERFORMANCE PROJECT
Report Card:
The fragmented structure has been a particular problem in human resources and information technology, where it has led to duplication and inefficient use of resources, bidding wars for staff and major challenges in sharing data due to incompatible systems. In January 2000, a county-sponsored report severely criticized Franklin’s technology management, citing extremely poor communications among the agencies and an ill-advised and antiquated organizational structure. (Of course, although the news was bad, the county deserves credit for paying for this kind of risky study.)
Given these problems, the county should be commended for the efforts it has made in recent years to improve its management practices, especially since many of the structural difficulties stem from state law and can’t be eliminated through local action. The board has taken on the challenge, says County Administrator Guy Worley, of convincing as many players as possible that “they’re all part of county government and still represent Franklin County, even though they’re independently elected.”
The key is persuading managers to look toward countywide results, not narrowly prescribed goals for their agencies alone. Toward that end, the commissioners hired a consulting firm in early 2000 to provide instruction in business planning and performance measurement to any official who wanted it. Staff have been added to support the fast-growing measurement and planning process.
The county finally has begun providing resources to standardize its disparate and inadequate information systems and purchased new budgeting software that will integrate financial and performance information. One of the key recommendations in the January 2000 technology report was that a chief information officer be hired. After an eight-month search yielding hundreds of resumes, the county decided on George Marentic, a retired Navy supply corps commander. Marentic says the Franklin County leadership structure reminds him of the Navy. “Each ship is an independent business unit,” he says, “with a profit and loss center and a captain on board. You learn very quickly how to work with very independent people.”
Positives: Strong structural balance; good reserves; AAA bond rating, solid investment-management practices; good training for procurement officials; good use of master contracts; financial report popular with citizens; budget document being redesigned for better communication.
Negatives: Revenue estimates have been extremely conservative, although county trying to push for greater accuracy; debt management lacks formal policy and oversight body; e-government and purchasing innovations stalled by Ohio Revised Code.
Positives: Good long-term planning; stable and professional staff for both facilities and roads; good attention to condition assessments; aggressive program of preventive maintenance; good maintenance funding stream; careful project tracking and management, with record of keeping projects on or under budget; facility inventories have improved greatly.
Negatives: Project schedules sometimes slip; capital improvement plan not yet coordinated with more general strategic plans, although improvement under way.
Positives: Dramatic recent reductions in turnover; good outreach for recruiting; county is longtime leader in using performance pay; emphasis on training; good labor-management relations; strategic and business planning for HR in place; central HR office increasingly “consulting” with independent agencies; speed of hiring has improved.
Negatives: Diffuse organizational structure; outdated and unwieldy classification system; cumbersome disciplinary processes; more formal and long-term workforce planning needed.
Positives: Major strategic and business planning effort for all agencies; good training; performance measures used for contracting by some agencies; many budget and policy decisions based on results information, particularly in Jobs and Family Services and Children’s Services departments; good attention to management analysis; strong links between individual performance and organizational goals; new budgeting system will integrate financial and performance information; first performance-based budget planned for 2003.
Negatives: Data collection at very early stage for many agencies; business plans not finished for many independent agencies; no overall county strategic plan or cross-agency planning.
Positives: New CIO position filled in May 2001; useful new financial management information system; very good GIS; all individual departments have three-year strategic IT plans; informative Web site with multiple searchable databases; efforts under way to encourage technology sharing among independently elected leaders; procurement process being freed up to reduce data scrutiny by board for smaller purchases; new effort to set IT training standards based on job descriptions.
Negatives: Obsolete organizational structure dictated by Ohio Revised Code; no overall strategic plan but one due next year; fragmented IT structure makes data sharing among agencies difficult and creates barriers to standardization; county telecommunication and data systems not integrated; Web transactions currently minimal.
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ranklin County’s three-member commission is a small tail doing the best it can to wag a very large dog. Not only is the county government a mega-bureaucracy, with 7,000 employees and 33 separate agencies, it is a bureaucracy that has had a habit of venturing off on its own. Only 1,300 employees and 13 of the agencies actually fall directly under the control of that board.