The AGA Weblog

City of Saco, Maine’s Experience with Citizen Centric Reporting

By: Lisa Parker, CPA

Lisa Parker, CPA, a member of AGA’s Maine Chapter, is a project manager with the Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB). Until recently she was the finance director for the City of Saco, Maine.

The City of Saco, Maine issued its first performance report, Delivery of City Services—Fiscal Year 2004, in January of 2005. This 94-page report measured the performance of all 11 city departments and omitted only the performance of the school department, which is governed by a separately elected Board of Education. Due to the size of the report, the performance information provided was not being fully utilized by a wide range of citizens in Saco to assess governmental accountability and to enhance their ability to make economic, social and political decisions. The performance information was, however, being used by department heads in the management of their departments in order to improve internal performance, and during budget deliberations with the city council to justify their requests for additional funding to enhance existing service levels. As a result, the city recognized that an additional communication mechanism would be needed to more effectively communicate performance information to its citizens and other potential users.

To accompany the city’s second annual performance report, Delivery of City Services—Fiscal Year 2005, the city also prepared a shorter handout version of the report that included the executive summary, one measure from each of the 11 departments, and the website address where the entire report could be reviewed. These handouts were distributed locally at city hall, the public library and major grocery stores. The city simultaneously began issuing a digital monthly newsletter, which highlighted the performance measurement information of one city department each month. However, the citizen satisfaction survey results were still not reflecting higher levels of satisfaction for the effective communication of governmental accountability.

In December of 2006, with the release of the city’s third annual performance report, Delivery of City Services—Fiscal Year 2006, the City of Saco, Maine, supplemented that report by becoming the first in the country to issue a Citizen-Centric Report following AGA’s recommended model. The four-page report was published in the local newspaper and a press conference was held to alert all media sources of this important release. Mayor Mark Johnston so eloquently stated, “We know that governments have a reputation for being good at collecting taxes but not necessarily as good at being accountable for how those tax dollars are spent. Saco wants to change that. This report has both the good and the bad. And while I’m glad to say there’s more ‘good’ to report in Saco these days, this report is chock full of challenges coming down the pike. We’re hoping to inform a thoughtful debate on these issues.”

The concise, four-page document is intended to engage citizens and spark their interest to learn more about city services delivered, policies established and how well the organization is achieving its goals and objectives. Charts and graphs aid in making the information visually aesthetic and easier to understand for those who do not care for the monotony of pages filled with text. Each page of Saco’s report covers specific information and has a reference to the city’s website where the entire volume of the comprehensive annual financial report, the distinguished budget document and the annual performance report can be reviewed for more detailed information. The Citizen-Centric Report will provide for comparability from one year to the next or with similar organizations if prepared consistently with the same type of information on each page. The contents of each page within the City of Saco report are as follows:
➢ Page 1: Strategic objectives and demographics
➢ Page 2: Notable accomplishments
➢ Page 3: Revenues and expenses for city operations
➢ Page 4: Challenges moving forward/future issues

This same format was used again with the dissemination of the city’s second Citizen-Centric Report in 2007. For complete copies of the city’s four AGA award-winning performance reports (Certificates of Excellence in Service Efforts and Accomplishments Reporting) and the two released Citizen-Centric Reports, please visit the city’s website at www.sacomaine.org. The three completed citizen satisfaction surveys can also be reviewed at this website, displaying an increase in citizen satisfaction with the city’s communication efforts between the second and the third surveys. Due to the fact that the second survey was conducted prior to the release of the 2006 Citizen Centric Report and the third survey was conducted after its release, the city has concluded that the increase in satisfaction can be attributable to this effort.

What types of citizen centric communication documents do your governments currently use to disseminate financial, budget and performance information? Do they engage citizens in assessing government accountability and in making economic, social and political decisions?

TOMORROW: Mike Kristek, CGFM, recently retired from the U.S. Department of Energy, on "Are the IGs and Other Federal Auditors Doing Enough to Improve Government Accountability?"

Questions on posting comments or wish to subscribe to the feed that sends blogs right to your e-mail? Find instructions here. Want to be our guest on the Blog? Contact Marie Force, AGA communications director, at mforce@cox.net.

What About Small Governments?

By: Penelope S. Wardlow, Ph.D., CGFM

Penelope S. Wardlow, Ph.D., CGFM, is an at-large member of AGA. She is currently a consultant with FASAB and SEC. Previously she was the senior research manager for GASB following service on the faculties of the University of Maryland and George Mason University. Opinions expressed here are her own.

“Governments exist to serve their citizens. Citizens have the right to an understanding of how their government operates and if their tax dollars are being spent efficiently and effectively. And governments have a responsibility to provide that information in an easily understandable way.” (Introduction to AGA’s Citizen-Centric Reporting Program)

This excellent statement reminds us of the functions and obligations of governments and encourages all governments to do a better job of communicating with the citizens. I’d like to see it prominently posted at meetings of government officials, especially those open to the public.

The idea of providing user-friendly reports to citizens—sometimes called “popular reporting” —is not, of course, new. I recall that in 1992 GASB published a research report by Frances Carpenter and Florence Sharp about local government “reports to the citizenry.” The report contained illustrations and do’s and don’ts for governments interested in popular reporting. Some of the ideas resulted from the Government Finance Officers Association’s efforts to promote popular reports through its Popular Annual Financial Reporting Program. AGA’s initiative is a welcome addition not only because it provides useful report content and design guidelines, but because it encourages Citizen-Centric Reporting by federal agencies, as well as state and local governments. I look forward to a time when most governments at all levels will provide reports that are truly useful—and used—by the citizenry.

However, I have two concerns that I have not seen addressed either in Association publications or in articles by those encouraging Citizen-Centric Reports. Both concerns involve small governments, especially counties, cities, towns and other forms of municipalities with fewer than 30,000 citizens, and even more so those with 10,000–15,000 population or less. There must be thousands of these governments spread across the 50 states, especially in rural areas, and their populations add up to a large number.

First, how can small governments prepare Citizen-Centric Reports that will be useful and informative to their citizens? Many small governments have very few employees. Most (sometimes all) of them have little or no knowledge or experience in accounting, finance or financial management and many are part-time employees. Frequently these governments can barely function without continual advice and assistance from agencies of their state government, and from CPAs and others in the community who volunteer their time. These governments do not have the time, resources or ability to summarize financial data, collect statistics about their communities and about the inputs, outputs and outcomes of their services, and present it all in a user-friendly form to the citizens. Yet their citizens’ information needs are just as great as those of citizens of larger governments.

Secondly, what can be done to change the attitude of managers of small governments who do not wish to communicate with the citizens, much less prepare Citizen-Centric Reports? From survey results (including AGA’s) and my personal experience living in a rural county (population 13,000), managers and councilors or commissioners do not want to provide information to the citizens and they do not like questions or input from them. They have little sense of accountability to the public. They tend to hold their positions for many years and they resist change. They view questions from citizens as an intrusion. AGA’s survey respondents must have been referring to my county among other governments when they described an “expectations gap” and “a problem of trust between citizens and their governments” and when they said that ways to improve accountability include “better reporting (open disclosure, easy-to-read reports)” and “a change in attitude in communications (honesty and transparency).”

How can we encourage and help small governments to be more transparent about their activities and to provide Citizen-Centric Reports to the public?

MONDAY: Sheila A. Weinberg, CEO and Founder, Institute for Truth in Accounting

Questions on posting comments or wish to subscribe to the feed that sends blogs right to your e-mail? Find instructions here. Want to be our guest on the Blog? Contact Marie Force, AGA communications director, at mforce@cox.net.

Can Government Just Give Us the Facts?

By: Craig C. Hall, MPA

Craig C. Hall, MPA, is a member AGA’s Greater Boston Chapter, and associate faculty for the College of Business and Management for the University of Phoenix. He’s the chief financial officer for the Massachusetts Developmental Disabilities Council, the first state agency and first governmental entity in Massachusetts to complete a Citizen-Centric Report, as well as first Developmental Disabilities Council in the nation to complete the report.

Can government just give people the facts about how good a job they are doing with your tax dollars? A few governments have the magic formula—using a Citizen-Centric Reporting model.

A January 2008 Harris Interactive poll confirms, “deep dissatisfaction among the American public with both the availability of government financial information and the way it is delivered to the people.” Relmond P. Van Daniker, AGA executive director, in commissioning the poll, said the dissatisfaction with government is “at all levels” and is “failing to meet the needs of its citizens with regard to financial management reporting.” Van Danker added that, “There is a large `expectations gap,’ with the public overwhelmingly believing that government has the obligation to report and explain how it generates and spends its money, and government’s perceived failure to meet reporting expectations.”

Has anyone not been frustrated or confused with information they have received about how well their government is working and spending their tax dollars? I have, and I’m in the business of public finance. My government agency tried out the Citizen-Centric Report model and is happy with the recognition the report has received because we were the first governmental entity in Massachusetts to complete the report, and also because the initiative coincides with Governor Patrick’s key priority around civic engagement.

The Citizen-Centric Report model is now being used by government leaders across the country to communicate the facts about how government is operating in a clear, concise and complete manner using a simple four page summary, not the typical government document full of bureaucratic jargon incomprehensible to the citizen on the street.

The Citizen-Centric Report came about through a grant from the Sloan Foundation “to provide understandable information to citizens.” AGA is leading the initiative as part of its campaign to advance government accountability. The idea is that governments can use this model to “publish ‘state of the government’ reports.” What is refreshing about the Citizen-Centric Report is that it’s designed to be visually appealing, providing understandable information about the financial condition and performance of their government.

The public fumes when hearing about government spending on frivolous pork-barrel projects. At the same time taxpayers hear local and state officials lament over budget concerns and the need to cut back on programs and services. What are taxpayers to believe? The obstacles and barriers to meeting citizen needs can be surmounted by modeling a report that includes the mission of the government, performance goals, where the money comes from and how it is spent. The information should be illustrated to include trends and talk about unforeseeable events that the government may have to deal with, affecting budgets and operations.

The timing of the implementation of the Citizen-Centric Report is good, too. A report by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press in March 2007 investigating trends and core attitudes of voters found that barely a third of Americans believed that elected officials cared about what they thought. As governments at all levels begin using the Citizen-Centric Report, citizens and government officials can begin to discuss and understand one another’s priorities and find common ground.

The League of Women Voters, a public interest group interested in civic engagement, good government, transparency and accountability is supportive of the initiative and believes the Citizen-Centric Report can connect citizens and government. Citizens and taxpayers, once their government adopts the Citizen-Centric Report, can finally have easy to understand information on how their government is performing and make informed judgments on the use of their tax dollars.

Governments today are simply not communicating and engaging citizens in the operation of government. Government leaders should investigate the Citizen-Centric Report and resources offered by AGA at www.agacgfm.org. Citizens should expect more from their governments and demand accountability and transparency of government performance and spending of tax dollars. “We believe that accountability and transparency are essential to a healthy democracy and should be priorities for every elected official,” said Van Daniker.

The Citizen-Centric Report is a step in the right direction. Is your government considering a Citizen-Centric Report? If you’ve already done one, how was it received? Will you do it again next year?

Editor’s Note: This article first appeared in the Weymouth News as an op-ed piece.

TOMORROW: Joe Kull, CGFM, director, PricewaterhouseCoopers LLC on transparency in government.

Questions on posting comments or wish to subscribe to the feed that sends blogs right to your e-mail? Find instructions here. Want to be our guest on the Blog? Contact Marie Force, AGA communications director, at mforce@cox.net.