- To empower local governments to structure services and their payment as they think best, and
- To enhance public accountability for results.
The context for this proposal is interesting. The idea originated out of parallel - but separate - conversations. Local governments wanted more flexibility and local authority, particularly on the revenue side. State government wanted less duplication of government, particularly at the local level. Inside the umbrella of our transformation work with the state of Iowa, we brought these two conversations together to the same table to design a way to meet both sets of desires.
Under the legislation that is pending, in exchange for freedom from state mandates, cities and counties would need to achieve significant spending efficiencies by merging, consolidating and sharing at least 50 percent of services delivered. If they did so, they would be designated a Freedom Community - and given significant revenue flexibilities and tools (e.g. removal of levy limits). Further, a Freedom Community would be expected to report on progress made every six months. Here's another cool thing from my perspective. This report is not for state level eyes and ears, but is to be in a format designed to reach the vast majority of households in the area, building in clear accountability to local citizens.
PSG partners on the lead of this initiative are Bob Rafferty and Beverly Stein. I asked Bob what he has learned from this work to date.
"I've learned to appreciate just how big the hurdles are for local governments who want to change," he answered. "There are provisions in state law now that allow locals to change - but they are cumbersome and not often used. If locals want to change governance structures today, they must first get the signatures of 25% of the people who voted in the last general election in order to start the discussion. These petitions establish a commission to study the issue. Membership on the commission is strictly defined. After the commission's review, the people must vote in order to proceed." Bob went on to say, "This set-up makes it extremely hard to change the status quo. It has never been successfully used."
What Bob finds most exciting is that the concept of Freedom Communities has helped sprout side discussions on other ways to make it easier for local governments to transform services.
"We may not end up with the exact 50% figure or all the revenue tools," he said, "but we will end up with some flexibilities to help local governments change the way they do business. Solutions that seemed unreasonable to suggest a few months ago are becoming more acceptable because they're bubbling up as a result of this initiative."
One such idea is voluntary clustering. Jerry Kelley, Mayor of Indianola, IA, explains:
"We shy away from words such as regionalism or consolidation or mergers because people fear a loss of local identity." Clustering would allow local jurisdictions to voluntarily do three things:
- Choose a service with potential for service improvement or cost efficiency
- Determine the effective geographic service area that makes most sense, and
- Bring existing funding streams together to maximize results.
Mayor Kelley envisions that the flexibility would be used primarily for effecting efficiencies in administrative, infrastructure, and equipment costs. One example might be coordinating snowplow equipment across city streets departments and county public works. Another example:
"In most counties in Iowa, there are multiple school districts. Voluntary clustering would allow schools to leave neighborhood school attendance areas intact, but still consider efficiencies in who sends the buses, who buys the books, who makes the school lunch, and who develops the curriculum. Voluntary clustering can range from something small like sharing library card catalogues to something big like sharing public safety services. It allows local leaders to be as creative as they want to be."
Voluntary clustering also offers a twist on when the public "gives permission". Under current law the public must vote before the governance structure is changed. Under proposed language, local communities would be able to voluntarily cluster for three years. At the end of the three years the public would vote whether or not to keep it. Mayor Kelley likes that the public would be able to judge the effectiveness of an idea in practice, not just the idea itself. "Did the service levels improve or stay the same while costs went down? After three years, we'd all know."
I asked Mayor Kelley if he would use the new flexibilities if passed.
"I'd try it immediately," he answered. "The reason you run for election is that you want to make effective change. Then you're elected and you're stymied. Either of these proposals allows us to step up and do something significant. And we must. If you think about the state of Iowa, we have 1% of the population and 6% of the government. Seventy two out of 99 of our counties are either stable or declining in population. We see nothing ahead but flat or diminishing revenues. It's a real simple math problem. We must do something like this."
"Making it voluntary is key," he added. "I believe we'll have 3-5 successes right out the door. That's what we need to make it catch fire."
To learn more about Freedom Communities, you can read an AP article entitled "Freedom communities could reduce city, county costs" (Minneapolis Tribune, Saturday, December 6, 2003). It includes this quote from our partner, Bob Rafferty:
"What's important ... is to really empower local officials to solve problems and improve that local quality of life."
Our hope at PSG is that the end result of Freedom Communities, or its offspring, will be a groundswell of local governments in Iowa creatively tackling the delivery of better results to citizens. Now that's freedom beyond "nothing left to lose." This kind of freedom can result in a win-win for all.
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