The Repair, Replacement, Renovation and Maintenance (R3M) Program concept is a strategy for managing Hillsborough County’s physical assets. The purpose of the R3M Program is to protect investment in infrastructure, reduce the maintenance backlog, control and reduce costs, minimize waste, and to maintain public buildings and facilities in a safe and efficient condition.
The Foundation for Education Reform & Accountability (FERA), based in Albany, New York, has been implementing a school-choice initiative — the Albany Project — that has created high-quality charter schools to serve more than half of the local public school student population in the state’s capital city. FERA believes that a district composed of choice schools can better serve students, parents, and the community than the traditional urban school district system. The Albany Project is demonstrating that the charter school model — freedom from state regulations and education bureaucracy, freedom to innovate, and increased accountability—can better serve all students, not just the small segment of the population fortunate enough to win an enrollment lottery or afford a private school.
Iowa’s Charter Agencies Initiative, originally developed by the Public Strategies Group, a Minnesota-based government-consulting firm, is one in a series of programs implemented by Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack to ad-dress the ballooning state budget. The program stresses increased efficiency, reduced costs, and greater freedom for state agencies (and the Governor’s office) to offer better value to Iowa’s citizens.
Through its pay-for-performance program, the Dallas County (Texas) Motor Vehicle Division (MVD) has set an example for how similar agencies across the country could be reformed. MVD registers 1.9 million vehicles per year and has 140 employees at 10 sites. In March 1998, the Vehicle Registration and Title Department launched its performance pay program. The program utilizes performance measures to identify and reward quality work.
Buildings in Florida’s Miami-Dade County typically fill up as quickly as they can be built. Between glimmering high-rise towers for vacationers or retirees, banks and offices that serve as the nerve centers of Miami’s south-ward-looking economy, or schools and public buildings to support a growing population, South Florida has the look of a perpetual hard-hat zone. This steady pace of needed construction is maintained by an innovative building department and its Building Permitting Automation Efficiency Program.
Bid-to-Goal is a program originally developed by the City of San Diego’s Metropolitan Wastewater Department (MWWD), in conjunction with consulting firm Henningson, Durham and Richardson (HDR), in 1997 as an “optimization strategy” to more cost-effectively implement large public works initiatives. By means of a binding pact between the city and public sector employees, the MWWD had hoped to create a hybrid dynamic that incorporates the most desirable features of both public and private sector contracting.
We propose to close all five Registration and Titling Bureau offices and al-low the RMV to register all motor vehicles—boats, ATVs and snowmobiles included. This consolidation would bring significant savings while actually improving service for off-road vehicle owners.
The Massachusetts Estuaries Project, through the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth School of Marine Science and Technology (SMAST), supports the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) in the development and implementation of policies to protect nitrogen-sensitive coastal embayments. The Project collects data and develops models to manage and restore the 89 embayment systems that comprise the coastline of southeastern Massachusetts. The Project encompasses new technologies, regulatory approaches and funding mechanisms to reduce the costs of conducting estuarine restoration.
The Massachusetts Department of Industrial Accidents has implemented numerous reforms that have improved the safety of workplaces throughout the state since Governor Mitt Romney’s election in 2002. In the process, the DIA has reduced the number companies that do not adhere to the state’s worker compensation laws.
The cost of housing in Massachusetts absorbs too much of the average resident’s income and drives people and businesses out of the state. According to recent research studies, the problem is not a lack of land but an excess of regulation. I propose a concrete and politically palatable policy reform to ensure that septic and wetland regulations are used to protect the environment and public health. This reform would remove the temptation for towns to misuse these rules to discourage development.
The EZ-ID License Plate Program offers a unique reform to the Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles (RMV) license plate system. The program is designed to make motor vehicle license plates more easily recognizable for law enforcement purposes. It incorporates an easily recognizable symbol such as a circle, square, triangle, heart, diamond or star into the registration number itself.
While organized, searchable Internet listings have become an integral part of the market-rate home buying process, such tools are typically not used to help homeless or low-income families find suitable housing in Massachusetts. HousingWorks, a Massachusetts corporation, uses these technologies to match those in need with affordable housing units. It provides a central database for those who provide affordable housing, and for those who need it.
The Massachusetts Highway Department, or MassHighway, solved a longstanding management problem by using technology in an innovative way. Contractors who work for MassHighway, such as snowplow operators, are now assigned GPS-enabled cell phones so that managers can track where and when work is being done. This capability ensures that workers, equipment and budget dollars are used efficiently.
The Michigan Electronic Grants System (MEGS) is an initiative that permits online education grant applications to feed directly into the Michigan Department of Education (MDE) system. By removing a time-consuming step from the application process, MEGS has improved performance and slashed administrative costs without any additional state funds. A similar program could benefit both the Massachusetts Department of Education (DOE) and the grant applicants who hope to put state funds to work.
2007 Better Government Competition Compendium of Winning Entries – Municipal Management
Ladies and gentlemen, good evening. I’m Diane Schmalensee, Chairperson of the Pioneer Institute, and I’m delighted to welcome you to the 8th Annual Lovett C. Peters Gala and Public Policy Lecture.
To Pioneer Institute, let me say thanks for hosting what really is a very timely event. Let’s cut right to the chase. The bloom is off the rose of education reform. If by hosting events such as this, you can re-invigorate and re-inject the enthusiasm that heretofore had characterized our efforts to improve our public schools, you will be performing a great public service. So, Pioneer Institute, thank you very much for getting us to focus on this issue.
The conventional wisdom among most regional economists, business leaders, and even policy experts is that Massachusetts is a high cost state for businesses. The purpose of this paper is to take a granular look at the issue by considering the specific components of business costs and how they vary across nine key industries in Massachusetts and six neighboring and competitor states.
Massachusetts is the first state to require that individuals purchase health insurance, and the first to propose a “Connector,” or state-mandated health insurance market for consumers and small businesses. As part of the well-regarded Colby Hewitt Health Care Series, Pioneer held “A Blueprint for the Future” featuring an in-depth presentation by Health and Human Services Secretary Tim Murphy, as well as presentations by two nationally recognized health policy leaders: Professor Regina Herzlinger of Harvard Business School and John Goodman, President of the National Center for Policy Analysis. Biographies of the presenters and the moderator, Susan Connelly of Mercer Consulting, can be found on the last page of this transcript.
Despite three federal laws that prohibit the federal government from directing, supervising or controlling elementary and secondary school curricula, programs of instruction and instructional materials, the U.S. Department of Education (USDOE) has placed the nation on the road to a national curriculum, according to a new Pioneer report written by Robert S. Eitel and Kent D. Talbert, two former counsels general to the USDOE.
This event featured a keynote address by Joseph Giglio, entitled “Rethinking Mobility for the New Century.” Professor Giglio is Executive Professor for General Management at Northeastern University, author of a new book entitled Mobility, a Board Member for Pioneer Institute’s Shamie Center for Better Government, and Vice Chairman of the Hudson Institute.
On Friday, April 28, 2006 Pioneer Institute and the Clean Water Council held a forum on the issue of MWRA’s potential expansion as a water supplier for more communities. The issue is significant because of its what it means to the environment, development and the cost of water for millions of residents in Massachusetts. The forum featured a panel including: Mary Griffin, General Counsel, Executive Office of Environmental Affairs; Peter Hechenbleikner, Town Manager, Town of Reading; Fred Laskey, Executive Director, Massachusetts Water Resources Authority; and Mark P. Smith, Director, Eastern U.S. Freshwater Program, The Nature Conservancy and former Water Policy Director, EOEA.
On Tuesday, January 31, 2006, Pioneer Institute held an event entitled “School Choice and Education Reform in Massachusetts: Competing in the 21st Century,” featuring a presentation by Chris Whittle, CEO/President of Edison Schools. “School Choice and Education Reform” is part of Pioneer Institute’s ongoing mission to present ideas, lectures, and experts on topics of significance to the Commonwealth, and to the country.
2006 Better Government Competition Compendium of Winning Entries – State Government
Angus McBeath was Superintendent of Schools in Edmonton, Alberta, until October 2005. He is currently a Visiting Scholar at the Atlantic Institute of Market Studies in Halifax. We are indebted to AIMS for making Mr. McBeath available to us.
Frederick (Rick) Hess, an education scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, led a team of experts in evaluating a seven-year comprehensive reform of the San Diego school system. He presented the team’s findings at Pioneer Forum June 9, 2005. The Forum also included remarks by Nonie Lesaux, an assistant professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and one of the San Diego review team members, and Thomas Payzant, Boston schools superintendent, who once served in the same capacity in San Diego. Excerpts of all three participants’ remarks follow.
As a follow-on to Peters Paper #2 titled “Rescuing 16,101 Drowning Students,” Pioneer Institute brought Harvard education scholar Paul E. Peterson to a standing-room-only Pioneer Forum on March 30, 2005, to outline his ideas of what might be done to rescue the 16,101 students in 25 Massachusetts schools that have failed to make “adequate yearly progress” in any of the last six years.
The 2004 Lovett C. Peters Lecture in Public Policy focused on the disturbing gap in the number of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics graduates that the United States turns out compared to other nations. Robert J. (Bob) Herbold, (pictured at right), a retired Microsoft official and chair of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology’s Workforce/Education Subcommittee, argued the situation threatens our nation’s position as the world’s industrial leader and requires immediate action to strengthen science and math education in our schools— including instituting merit and differential pay for teachers in such subjects. An edited transcript of his remarks follows.
Lowell Municipal City Guide
2005 Better Government Competition Compendium of Winning Entries – Streamline Government