GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTING STANDARDS BOARD (GASB)

State of OREGON

Oregon appears to have set the standard for benchmarking practices in state government.  “Oregon Shines” was adopted in 1989 and was an effort to get citizens involved in benchmark selection.  Community Solutions Teams are workgroups of state agencies that plan according to needs identified by citizens. Benchmarks are developed using extensive citizen input and continuous involvement on the Oregon Progress Board.  And while medium and large cities generally have strong citizen involvement programs, small cities do not.

The first statewide planning goal for the Oregon Citizen Involvement Advisory Committee is citizen involvement.  It is purely advisory and encourages involvement by preparing material for dissemination—relating to opportunities for involvement, methods to increase involvement, and providing advice to policymakers.  Public officials let localities determine their own methods of involvement.  Some are experiencing problems relating to the increased cost of administrative procedures associated with citizen involvement. 

The state is in a good position to develop a comprehensive managing-for-results system complete with citizen involvement, but they are greatly lacking an agency-planning process to guide system development. For the state of Oregon, performance measurement is first a tool for communicating internally and then it serves external functions.

Items of note include:

• The Department of Land Conservation and Development has citizen involvement as its first goal but many feel that citizens think that “citizen involvement” means doing whatever citizens say to do.  The DLCD is one of several Oregon agencies that have unpaid-citizen-volunteer governing boards.

• There is a good deal of involvement in the K-12 education area but the nature of that involvement is not specified.

• They sought stakeholder approval before executing Department of Transportation plans. 

• There is general apathy towards performance measurement and the press doesn’t seem to care unless there is a problem. 

• The Audits Division hopes to make government “transparent” via the use of “risk assessment.”

• For motor vehicle services, there is no regular report to the public; the department believes that the public does not care.  They think that performance information may be perceived as self-aggrandizement, or would not be believed.    

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 Local Governments:

Austin, TX; Multnomah County, OR; Portland, OR; Prince William County, VA; Tucson, AZ; Phoenix, AZ; Winston-Salem, NC; Catawba County, NC; Dayton, OH; Coral Springs, FL; Long Beach, CA; Ramsey County, MN 

 State Governments:  

Arizona, Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, Oregon, Texas

 Background Information:

• GASB Performance Measurement Home
• Background on GASB and Performance Measurement
• Service Efforts and Accomplishments Reports