Richard C. Elling

Pathways to Family Empowerment: Effects of Family-Centered Delivery of Early Intervention Services

This study explores how the method of delivery for early intervention services impacts perceptions of empowerment among families. Analysis of data collected from 270 randomly sampled families participating in the State of Michigans Early On (Part H of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act) program suggests two paths by which empowerment is effected. Along one path, implementation of program components via a family-centered framework appears to help increase empowerment. An alternative path models how family-centered delivery may help to build a familys support network. This is related to reduced stress and increased empowerment. Findings support programs emphasizing family-centered methods of service delivery.

Democracy among Strangers: Term Limits' Effects on Relationships between State Legislators in Michigan

By truncating service, term limits create massive turnover in some state legislatures where they exist, bringing flocks of newcomers into office. With less time to get to know each other and to develop expertise and influence, how do legislators know who to consult and whose advice to rely on? We explore this and other questions about three relationships (influence, friendship, and policy consultation) with a longitudinal study of the Michigan House of Representatives, a highly professionalized body with stringent limits on legislative terms. We found that term limits lead to a more pronounced regional component of friendship, greater concentration of influence among caucus leaders, consulting networks with more prominent hubs that could control the flow of information, and a decline in relationships across party lines. We argue that these effects of term limits bode poorly for bipartisan negotiation and consensus-building among legislators representing diverse constituencies.

Human Resource Problems and State Management Performance Across Two Decades The Implications for Civil Service Reform

Based on the views of hundreds of managers in 10 states surveyed in 1982 and 2000, this article explores the severity of a range of human resource-related barriers to effective state management. Adequately rewarding outstanding employees, difficulty filling key staff vacancies, retaining experienced staff, disciplining low-performing employees, and—in 2000—uncompetitive pay were among the most serious impediments. Little change in the severity of various human resource-related problems occurred between 1982 and 2000, however. Despite the criticism often leveled at them, variation in civil service coverage and variation in public sector collective bargaining were typically only weakly related to the severity of particular personnel-related problems. In fact, certain problems were less serious in those states with more extensive civil service coverage or more widespread collective bargaining. There was little evidence that deregulating aspects of state human resource systems reduced the severity of personnel-related impediments.

What Should We Do? Public Attitudes about How Local Government Officials Should Confront Fiscal Stress

Abstract Despite strong scholarly interest in the topic of fiscal stress, little attention has been paid to understanding how the general public thinks local governments should respond to situations where declining revenues endanger service levels. This study reports findings from a survey of 660 residents undertaken between November 2006 and January 2007 in the US state of Michigan to examine their support for eight potential strategies to cope with fiscal stress in five different local government services. We find that the public has a surprisingly nuanced perspective about these strategies and on their use for different services. Our findings may provide local policymakers with some insights about how to respond to fiscal stress.

Dissin' the Deadwood or Coddling the Incompetents? Patterns and Issues in Employee Discipline and Dismissal in the States

Abstract Relying on several extensive databases, this study finds state employee dismissal rates to be low with many managers also complaining about discipline and dismissal processes as a management impediment. Although interstate variation was evident, extent of civil service coverage, the presence of collective bargaining, or past efforts to simplify dismissal processes had limited explanatory power, however. The implications of the findings for civil service reform and the adoption of at-will employment arrangements are discussed.

A Naturally Occurring Quasi-Experiment in the States: Research on Term Limits in Michigan

Term limits provide a rare opportunity to employ pre- and post-intervention research designs to investigate the effects of turnover in legislatures. This article describes a study of term limits in Michigan that takes advantage of this opportunity. With eight states implementing term limits in 2002 or soon thereafter, there are opportunities for other scholars to replicate all or parts of the study described here. The payoffs for such projects in terms of generating systematic answers to the impacts of legislative turnover and term limits are considerable.

Checks and Balances: Intragovernmental Relationships and Outside Influences

The notion of “checks and balance” is a fundamental tenet of American democracy that assumes that each branch of our government has powers that allow it to limit—check—the power of the other two branches. This system is based on the assumption that power is balanced between the three branches of government, and this balance prevents one branch from dominating policymaking. In part because of its highly professionalized legislature, Michigan’s government closely resembles the national system based on three co-equal branches of government. But under term limits, its highly professionalized legislature could be overshadowed by its professional bureaucracy headed by a strong governor.

Conclusions: Term Limits’ Report Card

Term limits illustrate the potential for seemingly simple changes in a political system to have far-reaching, unintended, and unanticipated impacts. Hence our discussion of their impacts has ranged over many facets of state politics. Before we begin to synthesize and integrate these findings, we summarize them briefly.

Career Paths of Term-Limited State Legislators

Term limits advocates envisioned a legislature populated by elected officials who would look like “mom and pop from the corner grocery store,” and would want to “put in a couple of years of public service and then return to the private sector” (California Journal, 1991, p. 490). These citizen legislators they reasoned would neither be driven by reelection concerns nor beholden to special interests. They would be a more representative cross-section of people (Detroit Free Press, October 12, 1992). Term limits opponents feared that instead of rectifying the ills of special interest influence and creating greater representation, high turnover and lack of experience would rob the legislature of expertise needed to counteract the power of the executive branch, lobbyists, and others in the political system (Detroit Free Press, April 2, 1992 and Milliken, 1992). So while both sides anticipated that term limits would attract amateur legislators, some saw this as an asset and others as a liability.

The New Breed of Term-Limited State Legislators

Many people, both those supportive of and opposed to term limits, assumed that once entrenched white, male incumbents— the good ol’ boys—were termed out of office, women and ethnic minority group members would win more elections (Bell, 1992). Additionally, some scholars (Petracca, 1996) believed that reducing the length of service would discourage middle-aged males from abandoning established careers to run for the state legislature. Thus, some opponents of term limits consoled themselves that at least term-limited state legislatures would become more diverse.