THE GOVERNMENT PERFORMANCE PROJECT

Grading the States 1999
A Management Report Card

By Katherine Barrett and Richard Greene

The task of fairly evaluating all 50 states in five areas of management more or less defines the word “daunting.” More than once the team assigned to this project—reporters, researchers and writers at Governing and at Syracuse University’s Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs—wished the nation had simply stopped growing at 13 colonies. But we kept on measuring, and the report you see before you is the result.

This effort, funded by a grant from the Pew Charitable Trusts, began in 1997, when groups of experts were convened to help develop reasonable criteria for assessing the way each state handles its financial management, capital management, human resources, managing-for-results efforts and information technology. The evaluation process, which started with the construction of a detailed survey instrument, was given a trial run in four states: Ohio, Kansas, Oregon and Florida. One lesson was learned very quickly: Even states that agree to be pilots get testy when confronted with a survey the size of a phone book.

The final survey—streamlined considerably—was sent to all the states in early 1998. Forty-nine of the 50 ultimately completed it. California’s executive branch was the only holdout, forcing researchers to gather the relevant information about that state through a variety of alternative sources.

Governing and the Maxwell School conducted nearly a thousand interviews with sources inside and outside state governments, including budget officers, managers in personnel, information technology and public works agencies, auditors in both the legislative and executive branches, academics, legislative aides, and representatives of government research groups. Survey responses were clarified and updated; reams of new information were added; and the special circumstances that make each state unique were taken into account. Only then did the process of grading begin.

To be sure, state officials were eager to explain why their particular governments shouldn’t be held accountable to the same standards as others. Sometimes it was because their population was too small. Or because it was too large. Or the area was too large. Or, in one case, because they were an island.

But for all the predictability of the protests, the vast majority of sources seemed happy to engage in these conversations. Many were proud of their work, and they wanted attention paid to it. A few even seemed pleased that we would be publicizing their shortcomings—so that their own citizens, budget writers or legislators might take note and try to do something about them. Still others were glad merely to have a conversation with someone genuinely interested in rainy day fund policies, personnel reforms, capital budgeting techniques or the details of standardized information technology.

The people we talked to were hungry for news of innovation in other states. They wanted to hear about Utah’s travel office, which saves the state bundles of cash, and Tennessee’s innovative means of financing information technology, and Kentucky’s aggressive recruitment policies, which include sending scouts to Louisiana and Alabama to pick up potential new state employees. Despite the curiosity, many of our sources were laboring under misconceptions when it came to other states. For example, many were startled to discover that—contrary to the news reported a couple of years ago in the Wall Street Journal—performance measurement efforts in Oregon are alive and well.

The greatest surprise to us was the fact that many states didn’t fit the common wisdom about them. Kentucky may not strike most Americans as a cutting-edge innovator, but its managerial reforms in a variety of areas earned it good grades. Wealthy Connecticut, identified by many as a leader in technology, lags in its own use of computers (and is planning to outsource the whole problem). Louisiana’s government, butt of countless jokes, is a pioneer in its use of performance measurements. Wisconsin, widely considered a laboratory of administrative technique, is a state that seems less prepared than others for unforeseen economic downturns. And West Virginia, long considered a financial backwater, just earned its third Government Finance Officers Association certificate of achievement for financial reporting.

Despite our best efforts and intentions, there’s little doubt that some states haven’t gotten the grades they deserve—in one direction or the other. The academic and journalistic resources devoted to this project were enormous, but they were not infinite, and we would never claim that the judgments are perfect. The whole process is a mixture of science and art, and the best one can genuinely claim for the result is cautious optimism. That’s the bad news. The good news is that this same exercise will be repeated for the states in two years (and for local governments next year). Improvements will be made. Lessons will be learned.

And all of us on both sides will be held accountable.

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