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A study of the decision-making related to provision and pricing of services by local governments in a decentralized environment is presented. The local governments decide on provision of service, its user fees, and taxes, and also impose discriminatory fees on users from other regions. The competition among governments can lead to either over provision or under provision of the services and consequently affect the user fees.

A mathematical model analyzing the conditions under which there is a symmetric equilibrium in inter-jurisdictional tax competition is presented.

We who are members of the International City/County Management Association take the "I" in ICMA seriously. ICMA is involved in programs in more than 40 countries around the world. In […]

The defeat of devolution referendum in the assembly is a setback to the labor party's regional projects. The party is now considering a new localist initiative with appointment of mayors and community leaders. The uncertain fate of non-elected regional assemblies is discussed.

The devolution of powers in Wales is discussed. The policies of the assembly are in sharp contrast to that of the center driving them further apart.

Urban centers can fix the market-clearing price for curb parking to remove cruising. Henry George's proposal is examined in this context. Revenue potential of curb parking is evaluated. Suggestions are offered on the ways to tackle curb parking.

Weatherization Assistance Program (WAP) funding is biased in favor of cold-climate states. Department of Energy (DOE) tries to resolve this issue by developing a new funding formula but ambiguity regarding weatherization assistance restricts the implementation of a new funding policy.

The efforts of government to make local governments move closer to the communities, area committees and forums so as to have allocative efficiency and productive efficiency are discussed. The pressure exerted by the government on local officials to do contradicting things at a time is analyzed.

Few words relevant to intergovernmental relations were featured more recently and frequently than devolution or devolution revolution. In the 1990s a series of congressional, presidential, and judicial actions was taken [...]

Many questions remain about the causes and implications of state government reorganization. Using an original data set on agency consolidation in the states between 1950 and 1992, we show that executive branch restructuring occurs incrementally as well as through better recognized comprehensive reorganization. With continuous state-space modeling we show that these different reform paths are related and driven by distinct political and economic conditions. We also show that, contrary to previous findings, state attempts to alter their administrative organizations do impact long-term employment growth rates. Although smaller in magnitude, incremental as well as comprehensive reforms can enhance administrative efficiency. Further, unlike the Baumgartner and Jones (1993, 2002) punctuated-equilibrium model we do not find evidence that incrementalism gives way to bursts of nonincremental change. Rather, incremental adjustments to the status quo may be sufficient to reduce the possibility the possibility of comprehensive reorganization at any point in the future.

At this pre-election time the government feels that offering people more shops to shop from is public service. What they should be focusing on is better schools/education and better medical & emergency care. Offering more choice and paying extra taxes for them is not logical.

An investigation about the income distribution in the Catalan economy is presented with a linear model of social accounting Matrices (SAM) multipliers. The various components of income distribution, shown in studies of the additive decomposition of the distributional incidence measurement provided by Roland-Holest and Sancho (1992) and the role of government in income distribution are also discussed.

The issues concerned with the local government's balance of funding and the impact of council's tax system on the provisions of funding are discussed.

When two regions offer same kind of public welfare and other facilities to encourage migration of workers to their region either of the regions may attract more workers. The agglomeration of workers in the region may reach the maximum levels and over provision of public welfare.

The empirical study concludes that between governments strategic interaction in policy matters exist. These interactions are in multi dimensional frameworks and not only in any specific framework, along with the degree of strategic strategic alliances the interaction expands to multiple fields.

The influence of the governance and investment decisions on the performance of state and local government pension funds are analyzed.

The accuracy of the revenue forecasts of the federal government, where more consensuses is required, is compared with the state revenue forecasts that are solely decided by the legislators or executives.

The local government performance is compared with benchmark performance levels of some other local government and measured for its service quality and reliability. The study concludes that reliability and relevance of performance and cost data is key in achieving data use in a comparative performance measurement. The North Carolina Government Performance Measurement Project is taken for the study.

The local governments of Ohio are studied for their financial management. The causes of financial emergencies that occur in Ohio local governments and how the governments cope up with them are analyzed.

The study is to assess the revenue forecasting techniques of the local governments. The focus of the assessment is the usage of casual techniques of deterministic and econometric forecasting.

The consequences that result in changes from adopted budgets while implementing which derive from institutional structure and structural influences are studied in the symposium on local government financial administration.

The flypaper effect of the local government grants is analyzed. Political dynamics and its influence over the public expenditure by the local government is also analyzed.

While implementing the budget some adjustments are made without undermining the integrity of the budget that offer flexibility of operation. The turnover of leadership, transfers of professionals are tending to affect the budget execution process in local government bodies.

In NOVEMBER 2000, PREMIER LUCIEN BOUCHARD'S PARTI QUEBECOIS government introduced Bill 170 to merge a number of Quebec municipalities. The PQ forced the bill through the National Assembly over angry [...]

The failure of the governments to implement the reforms suggested by economists is discussed. The reason for the failure is identified as inability to identify individual specific uncertainty.

An examination is conducted into the possibility of holding legal gambling companies responsible for the social costs involved. Taxation is suggested as a possible solution and that more research is to be done on the impact of gambling on states' economy.

How did state governments respond to constraints imposed by tax and expenditure limitations? We argue that the states' experiences with TELs help us understand an evolutionary dimension to political institutions and institutional change. We test if TEL states Created new local governments in response to constraints TELs placed on state budgeting. Other studies show that states shifted their revenue and expenditure mixes in response to TELs. We demonstrate that they also shifted their jurisdictional mix of governance. We find that TEL states were more likely to create new local governments after the 'tax revolt' of the 1980s. However, this effect depends on where TEES were introduced. They had greater effects on generating new governments in states where ballot initiatives were easier to use.

Improved New York City services and management are part of a long-term trend of incremental, almost self-perpetuating innovation within local American governments over tire decades, rather than stemming from new developments attributable to the national and eventually global Reinventing Government movement of the 1990s. Management reform and service expansion have been a constant in New York City government over the past half century, first through additional spending, then through management innovation on a stable budget. Reinvention and traditional public administration both contributed to a sustained effort at improving service delivery, which New York reflects in its budget allocations. Decades before the first United Nations Global Forum on Reinventing Government (1999), New York City, like most American local governments, began expanding and improving the delivery of services. Today, considered from a public administration viewpoint, the programs that New York City spends money on and the outputs of those programs have not changed dramatically in the last quarter-century. The principles of government efficiency and effectiveness that are at the center of reinvention discussions are simply the traditional key elements of the field of public administration that are already integral to American local government as demonstrated by New York City. For decades, New York City's mayors and their administrations have fought poverty and crime; increased access to health care and services; and improved sanitation, education, information and communications technologies, and other services by adhering to well-developed strategies of management reform continually improved within the dynamic field of public administration. KEYWORDS: local government reform, management innovation

An expert on Russian politics examines the development of regional political institutions in St. Petersburg, comparing them with those of other regions of Russia. Asking whether St. Petersburg is a 'delegative democracy,' and whether democratic institutions have taken root in the city, the author examines five areas: the way chief executives have been chosen; the nature of the legislature and its relations with the executive branch; the effectiveness of political parties; the degree of independence of the media; and the relationship of local politics and the federal government.

The school transport is now a prime candidate for co-payment with parents and the government likely to share the extra cost of an expansion, despite the close parliamentary vote on tuition fees. The new legislative freedoms will help children and their parents be at the traffic and improve the health and fitness of children.

Self-managed work teams (SMWT) are promoted as a means for improving worker participation, decreasing hierarchy, and increasing productivity. This paper discusses SMWT in terms of concept, theory, and benefits. We then report a survey of city managers conducted to learn how extensively and how satisfactorily they have been adopted in American cities. Findings reveal that they are more likely to be adopted under council-manager forms of governance, larger cities are more likely to adopt than smaller cities, and cities in the South and West are more likely to adopt than are cities in the Northeast and Midwest. When adopted, managers report satisfaction. Finally, we offer implications for practice and suggestions for further research. KEYWORDS: city management, organization theory, participative management, self-managed work teams

Measuring citizens' overall satisfaction with urban services is important both for administrators involved in local citizen surveys and for scholars interested in understanding how citizens respond to municipal government. However, little empirical research has been devoted to developing and testing measures of overall citizen satisfaction. Using data from an online panel survey, this paper describes and compares several single- and multi-item scales of overall citizen satisfaction with urban services, including a newly developed Likert-type scale. Results suggest that multi-item scales generally perform better than single-item scales. A concise three-item scale similar to that used in the American. Customer Satisfaction Index, along with another scale based on Hirschman's exit-voice-loyalty model, appears to offer the best combination of reliability, validity, and practical utility, although future methodological research is needed. KEYWORDS: citizen surveys; local government services; methodology; service quality

Many municipal governments adopted performance measurement decades ago. However, the role of elected officials and citizens in the development and usage of performance measures remains limited. We propose a model of 'citizen-initiated performance assessment' in which citizens, elected officials, and city staff collaborate to develop performance measures. We also examine how nine Iowa cities implement the system, and how city officials perceive its impact on departmental procedures, managerial practices, and organizational culture. In addition, we discuss the major challenges in the implementation process, so that future reformers of performance measurement may draw lessons from the Iowa experience. KEYWORDS: citizen participation; performance measurement

Local government training programs likely face increased scrutiny in the future. Despite well-documented need for training and its resultant benefits, budgetary constraints may see trimming of training dollars, especially if programs cannot demonstrate that employees can perform better after training than before (effectiveness). This study, by analyzing a survey of municipal clerks, examines the extent to which perceived effectiveness of training is associated with organizational, trainer, and trainee factors. Regression analysis demonstrates an effectiveness model that includes predictors from the dimensions of the organization, trainer, and trainee: ability to incorporate new learning into the workplace, relatedness of curriculum to the job, and trainee commitment to apply learning to the job. Support of this training-effectiveness model demonstrates the need for greater involvement of municipal administrators in fostering a positive organizational environment and greater collaboration among municipal administrators, municipal clerks, and clerks' training directors in developing programs. Although limited in scope, this study gives some credence to the need to enhance planning and rational decision-making for public-sector training. KEYWORDS: municipal administrators, municipal clerks, public-sector training, training effectiveness, training factors

Under nested governance, local governments voluntarily assign public services traditionally performed by them to larger or higher levels of government in the metropolis whose boundaries overlap those of the local units. Yet, an attachment to governing autonomy by politically resilient township governments may serve as a barrier to using nested governance for the regional delivery of urban services. This article examines the orientations of township officials in two Midwest metropolitan counties toward nested service delivery, explores some theoretical implications for township officials' roles as rational political and economic actors, and suggests likely patterns of township participation in implementing nested delivery. KEYWORDS: Local government; local service delivery; nested government; regionalism; townships

This article suggests that efforts to study decentralization outcomes would benefit from widening the unit of analysis from the local government administration to the local governance system. Many individual local governments, especially in developing countries, lack the human and physical resources to be effective governors by themselves. It is, thus, useful to recognize the linkages between different governance actors. The empirical analysis, based on observations in Bolivia's forestry sector, finds that the degree of connectivity between the actors in a municipal governance system helps explain why some systems are more effective than others. Key words--Latin America, Bolivia, decentralization, forestry, municipal government, collective action

A good poker player will tell you that luck at the card table comes to those who are prepared. The better prepared, the more luck you'll have. As state leaders […]