ASPA Center for Accountability & Performance

Colorado’s “Evidence Continuum” Promotes Efficient, Effective Programs

Pew Charitable Trust, Results First

Colorado is a leader among states using data and research to strengthen their budget investment choices. Since 2014, it has applied research evidence to fund programs that work. For example, the state’s Office of State Planning and Budgeting requires evidence in an agency’s budget requests for changes to program funds, including expansions, reductions, and new projects.

“Significant Progress” Can Mean Allowing More Road Deaths

Washington Post

Half of states set goals for more people to die in crashes. Twenty-one planned for more pedestrians and cyclists to be hurt or killed. . . . The goals are part of a target-setting system that federal transportation officials devised in 2016 to measure what the public is getting for tens of billions of dollars from Washington that states spend each year. But by permitting targets that involve lower levels of performance, it has allowed states to do worse while still being labeled as making “significant progress” — a designation thatavoids consequences such as limits on how money can be spent.

Federal Billions and a Lost World of Accountability

Governing (Donald Kettl)

The stimulus program that followed the Great Recession was a model for tracking projects and spending down to the ZIP code level. We don’t have that with the American Rescue Plan, dooming us to fight about what matters most.

Portland’s New Review of Its Audit Recommendations

Barrett & Greene

Many audit offices do reviews of recommendations and the city of Portland, Oregon has just done a notable job by creating a visual dashboard comparing how agencies responded to recommendations made by City Auditor Mary Hull Caballero through 2021.

The Promise of Program Budgeting (Webinar, April 7)

ResourceX

There are many reasons to consider adopting program budgeting, but perhaps the most important is its ability to create a more transparent budget and budget development process. A program budget shows precisely what the government does and how much it costs.

Resource of the Week:  Centers for Civic Impact

The Centers for Civic Impact at Johns Hopkins University hosts three performance-related initiatives.  (1) The Center for Government Excellence, which provides coaching and technical assistance to city governments and nonprofits; (2) the GovEx Academy, which provides training and education; and (3) the Center for Applied Public Research, which supports evidence-based research and its application.

Problems with Performance Reporting: A Vermont Critique

Barrett & Greene

Here’s an investigative report by Douglas Hoffer, the Vermont State Auditor, about Vermont’s Annual Outcome Report. At the bottom of this blog post, you’ll see a short video in which Hoffer addresses his complaints with his state’s outcomes report. . . There are quite a few of them.

Atlanta Officers Scored on Level of Arrests

CBS News Channel 46

Channel 46 Investigates takes a look inside what some are calling an incentive system that encourages Atlanta police officers to arrest more people.

Announcing a New Initiative: The City Data Alliance

Bloomberg Cities Network

The Bloomberg Philanthropies City Data Alliance will identify 100 cities that are the most sophisticated, ambitious, and advanced at harnessing data and help them set a new standard for local governments committed to using data to power better results for residents.

China’s Disciplinary Enforcers Shift Focus from Corruption to Poor Performance

South China Morning Post

ChinChina’s President Xi Jinping is increasingly using the Communist Party’s disciplinary mechanisms, best known for tackling corruption, to punish poor performance, a study has found.

Resource of the Week:  Pew-MacArthur Results First Initiative

The Results First initiative works with states to implement an innovative evidence-based policymaking approach that helps them invest in policies and programs that are proved to work. This project is co-sponsored by the Pew Charitable Trusts and the MacArthur Foundation.

Meet the “Nudgers” – Pushing Behavioral Science to New Levels

Bloomberg Cities Network

Many city leaders took what they learned [about the uses of behavioral insights] and are now seeding it more deeply into their organizations. . . . Bloomberg Cities caught up with four people leading these efforts in U.S. city halls to learn more about how they’re using nudges in local government and what they’ve learned along the way. 

Four Ways to Make Data Work Better for Residents

Results for America

“Rather than try to overhaul their entire data infrastructure in a single pass, local governments can look to their peers for smaller, more attainable ways to improve their data practices. ”

Auditor’s 2021Annual Accountability Report

City of Portland (OR)

The year 2021 may best be described as one of endurance and reflection. . . . Community groups and leaders embraced our recommendations and joined our call for better, more equitable government.  

Tennessee Creates New System to Track Procurement Diversity

GovTech

Tennessee’s Governor’s Office of Diversity Business Enterprise (Go-DBE) launched dashboards last week to report contracting diversity spend and increase transparency around this data. . . . There is a public-facing dashboard that will be updated weekly as well as internal, agency-specific dashboards to track metrics related to increasing minority group participation in the government contracting process.

Shared Measures: Collective Performance Data Use in Collaborations

Alexander Kroll, Cambridge University Press (book)

Traditionally, performance metrics and data have been used to hold organizations accountable. This case study of collaboratives in North Carolina that were established to develop community responses to the opioid epidemic. It explains the use of shared performance measures in collaborative settings.

Resource of the Week:  Leap of Reason Initiative

The Leap of Reason Initiative is aimed at inspiring and supporting great leaders and funders in the nonprofit and foundation communities to build great organizations for greater societal impact by creating meaningful, measurable, and sustainable improvements in the lives of individuals, families, and communities. Its website contains numerous resources and a framework in which implementation can take place.

The Persistent Problem of Poor Data Quality

Barrett & Greene

Unquestionably the problem of poor data quality needs continued – and more aggressive – attention. We know there have been improvements in many places since we wrote our 2015 feature, but though people who are dedicated to state and local government are taking steps in the right direction, in the words of Robert Frost they have “miles to go before they sleep.”

The Performance Practice

Leap Ambassadors Community

The Performance Practice is a structured approach to help organizations delve deeper into the Performance Imperative and apply it for ongoing reflection, learning, and continuous improvement. . . . Each module of the Performance Practice is based on one of the seven pillars of the Performance Imperative.

The Role of Evidence in How Local Governments Spend Federal Pandemic Relief Funds

Mathematica (Podcast – 1 hour)

Guests Zachary Markovits of Results for America, Christy McFarland of the National League of Cities, and Candace Miller of Mathematica discuss local spending of federal aid from the American Rescue Plan Act, including the role that data, evidence, and evaluation play in the use of those funds.

Using Behavioural Insights in the Public Service (free online workshop – March 2^nd)

Apolitical.co

Join this free online workshop to gain an understanding of behavioural insights and learn how they can be employed in the public service to help government tackle a wide range of issues, from public engagement to pandemic management.

The Road to Rigorous Evaluation

CalData

As part of our statewide data strategy, CalData is working to increase the capacity of the State workforce and leadership to appropriately use data and evidence to support their work. We want to improve the capacity to ask key questions, use data tools effectively, and approach evaluation across our workforce.

Resource of the Week:  MITRE Center for Data Driven Policy

The Center for Data-Driven Policy is a resource for government, universities, think tanks, and other organizations to draw on for evidence- and experiential-based insights on policy priorities.

Rooting out Fraud in Government Programs

Government Executive

Machine-learning helps spot fraud, waste and abuse because it can not only automatically check massive amounts of data for signs of sketchy activity but also improve over time.

Transparency Websites: Interview with West Virginia State Auditor

Barrett & Greene

West Virginia state auditor JB McCuskey uses a state-level transparency website to allow citizens to see how American Rescue Plan monies are being spent. He’s also offered free accounting software to cities and town who want help recording the kinds of information the US Treasury is requiring as a condition of receiving these funds. Here’s a 20-minute web interview with McCuskey on West Virginia’s approach, which is a leading national best practice.

Guidelines for Building a Potent Performance Management System: CAP Webinar on March 1, 1:00 p.m. Eastern

Barrett & Greene

A recent Urban Institute paper by Harry Hatry and a number of co-authors, propose a series of “dos and don’ts” tips to strengthen performance management systems. Hatry will engage in a discussion of this paper along with co-authors Katherine Barrett, Richard Greene, and Maria Aristigueta. 

Immense Fraud Creates Immense Task

Washington Post

Roughly two years after lawmakers approved their first tranche of rescue funds, the U.S. government is grappling with an unprecedented challenge: how to oversee its own historic stimulus effort. Totaling nearly $6 trillion. . .  creating a unique and long-term strain on the nation’s policymakers to ensure the funds have been put to good use.

Kansas Performance Budgeting: Keeping Expectations in Check

Barrett & Greene

Kansas state auditors noted in a new report that the state’s executive budget division met most of the basic requirements of the Kansas 2016 performance-based budgeting law, it didn’t mince words on the actual impact of all the law: “This doesn’t seem to have meaningfully changed how the state budgets,” auditors wrote in big bold letters on page 2 of the audit.

Shared Measures: Collective Performance Data Used in Collaborations

Cambridge University Press (Alexander Kroll)

Increasingly, we see partnerships among government agencies, private or nonprofit organizations, and civil society groups. Such collaborations may also use goals, measures, and data to manage group efforts, however, the application of performance practices here will likely follow a different logic. This book draws on a case study of collaboratives in North Carolina that were established to develop community responses to the opioid epidemic. 

Resource of the Week: Charting the Next Decade of Evidence Generation in State and Local Governments: A Virtual Webinar Series

J-PAL North America (Poverty Action Lab)

 Speakers in the series will discuss how state and local governments and researchers can develop and implement evaluations related to the COVID-19 pandemic, racial equity, and climate change and environmental justice.