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senior staff writer
Top-notch restaurants get four stars. Honor students get A's. Bang-up businesses get listed in the Fortune 500.
How do you think your county government would stack up against other counties?
Some day you may find out.
A public affairs school and two publications that report on government affairs have teamed up to do the grading.
Backed by a $2.5 million grant from the Pew Charitable Trusts, representatives from the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs of Syracuse University in Syracuse, N.Y. and Governing and Government Executive magazines of Washington, D.C. announced the launch of their undertaking at a press conference Feb. 12.
"It will give us the ability to understand what makes governments tick," said Patricia Wallace Ingraham, professor of public adminstration and political science at the school.
"These ratings will enable us to look more systematically at performance - to find out: what are the ingredients of good performance?" said Tim Clark, editor and publisher of Government Executive, a monthly magazine on management of the federal executive branch.
Peter Harkness, editor and publisher of Governing magazine, said evaluations of this type are sought after by private companies, which pay outsiders to let them know if they measure up.
"What we're trying to do is what corporations do all the time," he said. "They pay a lot of money to have it done."
When asked what would happen if a government resisted being graded, Philip Joyce, assistant professor of public administration at the school, said he hopes "they view it as an opportunity. This would be expensive for them if they brought in experts to help them."
Hennepin County, Minn., and Philadelphia, Pa., a consolidated city/county, along with two other cities and four states, will each serve as a sort of guinea pig in a pilot project currently underway to work out kinks in a survey to be used as part of the ratings mix.
"I think we're alleged to be reasonably well managed," said Jeff Spartz, Hennepin County administrator. "There's always an opportunity to learn."
The survey, produced by Ingraham and Joyce, will be filled out by counties as well as federal agencies and state and city governments that go under the microscope.
Ingraham and Joyce also received input from an advisory board that includes Doug Brown, Office of Management and Budget for Prince George's County, Md.
"I think there's a deep interest by everyone to know how well or how 'unwell' we're running our governments," Brown said.
Government will be rated in six performance areas:
The two publications will devote extensive coverage to the ratings, followed up by articles of their own on how the governments do their jobs so well, or so poorly.
As the effort gets underway this year, the group's big concern will be to get the survey "right," after the results of the pilot projects are studied. Then, in 1998, the group will be ready to rate all 50 states and 20 federal agencies. In 1999, 20 counties and 20 cities will be rated, along with 20 different federal agencies.
Ingraham said the largest counties and cities - those with the highest population - will be chosen to participate in the 1999 endeavor.
Based on 1992 census figures, the counties most likely to be the first rated by the survey are:
1. Los Angeles County, Calif.
2. New York City, N.Y. (consolidated city/county)
3. Cook County, Ill.
4. Harris County, Texas
5. San Diego County, Calif.
6. Orange County, Calif.
7. Maricopa County, Ariz.
8. Wayne County, Mich.
9. Dade County, Fla.
10. Dallas County, Texas
11. Philadelphia, Pa. (consolidated city/county) *
12. King County, Wash.
13. Santa Clara County, Calif.
14. San Bernardino County, Calif.
15. Cuyahoga County, Ohio
16. Middlesex County, Mass.
17. Allegheny County, Pa.
18. Suffolk County, N.Y.
19. Nassau County, N.Y.
20. Alameda County, Calif.
21. Broward County, Fla.
*Philadelphia, part of a pilot project, won't be surveyed as part of a 1999 study.