Kimberly L. Nelson

Form of Government Still Matters Fostering Innovation in U.S. Municipal Governments

Using data on the adoption of e-government, reinventing government, and strategic practices, and the Nelson and Svara (2010) typology of municipal government form, the authors investigate the characteristics of municipal governments that are related to the implementation of innovative practices. The authors find that higher innovation rates are associated with council-manager governments—both with and without an elected mayor, higher population, greater growth, lower unemployment, sunbelt location, and higher population density. Controlling for all other variables, form of government (and variations within form) account for the greatest explanation of the adoption of innovative practices in municipalities. The authors conclude that form of government remains an important variable to consider when investigating local government management and performance.

Adaptation of Models versus Variations in Form: Classifying Structures of City Government

A great deal of variability exists in American local government structures. It would be useful to analyze the differences in outcomes associated with different structures, but two factors stand in the way. First, there is no agreement about how to classify city governments. Second, many of the components used in existing classifications are inaccurately reported or missing in survey data. In this research note, a new classification system based on three easily determined components is developed and used to measure the current distribution of forms and variations in an expanded data set that includes almost all cities over 10,000 in population.

Municipal Choices during a Recession Bounded Rationality and Innovation

This study reports the findings of a comparative case study analysis of sixteen U.S. municipalities to provide an in-depth examination of the choices municipal leaders are making to address revenue shortfalls. The findings suggest that municipal fiscal choices during a recession fit the bounded rationality model. While local government leaders will attempt to follow a rational sequence of fiscal management decisions, as the economic situation worsens, the external pressures from electoral considerations, state government restrictions, and interest group involvement increase, leading a divergence in strategies. The greater the pressures (the bounds), the more unpredictable the choices among municipalities become.

Conflict and Cooperation in Municipalities Do Variations in Form of Government Have an Effect

One measure of governance quality is the level of reported conflict and cooperation that is present between and among elected officials and administrators. High levels of conflict or low levels of cooperation can hinder the decision-making process. However, there are few attempts to assess the causes of conflict and cooperation in the existing literature. This study uses an expanded typology of local government form and additional independent variables to determine what factors are likely to lead to conditions conducive to cooperation and lower perceived conflict in the local governance process. Data on government performance and indicators of perceived conflict and cooperation were collected from a national survey of municipal mayors, council members, and chief administrators in cities with populations of 50,000 to 250,000. Our results suggest that form of government and proportion of council members elected by district are two factors that significantly influence governance at the local level.

What Makes Municipal Councils Effective? An Empirical Analysis of How Council Members Perceive Their Group Interactions and Processes

Although local government scholars acknowledge the centrality of the municipal council to overall government performance, the literature provides limited guidance regarding how those councils can improve their effectiveness. Councils that display recurrent patterns of dysfunctional behavior are more likely to be ineffective in their core functions. Although there is research that identifies dysfunctional council behavior and its potential consequences for government performance, there is limited investigation into what aspects of member behavior are related to the functionality of the council itself. This study uses surveys of council members to identify which aspects of council behavior (interpersonal relations, leadership, staff competence, and conflict) have the greatest effect on perceptions of council effectiveness. The findings indicate that both interpersonal relationships between members of council and the mayor’s leadership ability are significantly related to perceptions of council effectiveness.

Transforming Municipal Boards into Accountable, High-Performing Teams: Toward a Diagnostic Model of Governing Board Effectiveness: Organizational Learning Mechanisms: A Structural-Cultural Approach to Organizational Learning

This article addresses the question of how municipal governing boards can make themselves accountable to higher standards of performance. There are many mechanisms that ensure accountability of administrators to governing bodies, but other than elections, how are members of governing bodies held accountable for their performance? Using an organization development (OD) perspective, the authors report the results of an empirical study of 32 northern Illinois municipal governing boards, based on a sample of 150 board members. An index of governing board effectiveness (GBE) is constructed and then tested against characteristics of small group behavior that should promote small group performance. Evidence is found to support the hypotheses that effective work group design, regenerative interpersonal relations, board-staff relations, and specific work group processes all significantly associate with GBE. These findings lend empirical support to the use of the GBE measures as tools for diagnosing and targeting specific areas for governing board improvement through customized OD intervention.

State-Level Autonomy and Municipal Government Structure: Influence on Form of Government Outcomes

A number of recent studies have argued that municipal governments have so significantly modified elements of their form of government that it is now difficult to distinguish form. However, none of these studies considers the influence of state government on these choices. This study uses a comprehensive data set of U.S. municipal governments with populations of at least 10,000 and a data set of state legislative provisions related to form of government to investigate the influence of state law on municipal form of government choices. The findings demonstrate that state law is associated with some choices of government form and that structures that hybridize the council-manager and mayor-council forms of government are still relatively uncommon.

Demand versus Supply: Can MPA Programs Satisfy the Need for Professional Management in Local Government?

This article addresses concerns expressed by members of the International City/County Management Association (ICMA) regarding whether the supply of qualified local government managers will keep pace with the future demand for this occupation. The authors developed several important observations, which are based on decades of experience with a Master of Public Administration (MPA) program focused on local government management, plus strategic planning experience in over 100 local governments. First, it is likely that the impending retirement of the Baby Boom generation of city managers will cause some supply shortages of professional managers in specific geographical regions of the country. Second, increases in the number of professionally managed cities creates the probability that some municipalities, due to their lack of associational attractiveness, may experience difficulty in generating sufficient pools of quality applicants. We suggest that MPA programs continue to nurture communication and relationships with local governments that will lead to specific mutual benefits. For instance, MPA programs benefit from the availability of practitioner speakers and student internships and, in turn, local governments benefit from the creation of a pipeline that provides a continual stream of quality applications.

INNOVATION MANAGEMENT IN LOCAL GOVERNMENT: AN EMPIRICAL ANALYSIS OF SUBURBAN MUNICIPALITIES

The authors surveyed city administrators in the six-county Chicago region to test an innovation management capacity process model. Innovation management capacity is conceptualized as the function of council-staff functionality, managerial leadership capacity, and staff team management. The empirical results from 220 city administrators in 53 cities support the hypothesis that the number of municipal innovations is positively correlated with innovation management capacity, controlling for structural, socioeconomic, and demographic variables. However, this study does not find a statistical relationship between innovation effectiveness and innovation management capacity. The authors posit two possible explanations for these results and propose an alternative innovation management capacity process model for testing in future research.

Book Review: Governing under stress: The implementation of Obama’s economic stimulus program, by Conlan, T. J., Posner, P. L., & Regan, P. M. (Eds.).ConlanT. J.PosnerP. L.ReganP. M. (Eds.). (2016). Governing under stress: The implementation of Obama’s economic stimulus program. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press. 256 pp.

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