Using RealTime Data for Municipal Management

1
Using Real-Time Data for Municipal Management
April 25, 2008
Mayor Joe Curtatone, City of Somerville SomerStat
Director Stephanie Hirsch 93 Highland Ave,
Second Floor [phone] ext. 2103
2
What are Stat Programs?
Slide 2
Bob Behns Definition All these programs are
characterized by a series of regular, periodic
meetings where the mayor and/or the mayors top
aides, agency heads, and their top staff use data
to discuss, examine and analyze past performance,
set future performance objectives, and develop
overall performance strategies. Mark A Abramson
Case Study Editor, Robert D Behn (2006) The
Varieties of CitiStat Public Administration
Review.

• SomerStat in Somerville
• 16 departments are tracked in weekly, bi-weekly,
  or monthly meetings
• Meetings are attended by SomerStat panel of key
  city decision makers
• Dept is staffed by four analysts and director who
  meet with Mayor each morning

Stat Dpts.
Traffic Parking 9/23/04 (monthly) Public Works
9/29/04 (bi-weekly) Police 10/21/04
(monthly) Fire 10/27/04 (monthly) IT 11/4/04
(monthly) Personnel 11/9/04 (monthly) Environmenta
l 3/31/05 (monthly) 311 4/28/05 (monthly) Youth
Rec 7/27/05 (monthly) Library 9/14/05 (monthly)
Health 9/27/05 (monthly) Inspectional Services
10/5/05 (monthly) Capital Projects 5/9/06
(monthly) Strategic Planning, Comm. Dev. 9/15/06
(weekly) LegiStat 1/17/08 (bi-weekly) Finance
1/22/08 (monthly)
Who Attends
3
How does a Stat meeting differ from a Staff
meeting?
Slide 3

• Very structured
• Meetings start and end on time and always follow
  the same format and protocol
• Detailed materials on agenda items are sent out
  in advance

• Facilitated by the central Stat team
• SomerStat prepares discussion topics with input
  from Mayor and department head
• Issues affecting more than one department are
  tracked across meetings
• SomerStat has access to all city data and
  identifies problems and opportunities

• Meetings result in task tracking
• SomerStat records all next steps in a central
  database
• Only SomerStat can update or close a task

Slides

• Meetings involve a panel of decision makers
• Other key department heads attend the meetings
• Involvement allows for quick problem solving

Task List
Briefing Notes
4
What did it cost to start?
Slide 4

• Each year, there have been added SomerStat
  responsibilities (and costs)
• SomerStat staff also assist with project
  management and analytical functions
• There have been no additional technology or
  facility costs
• Has paid for itself many times over in dollars
  and quality of City functioning.

5
What did it cost to start?
Slide 5
FY05 General Fund Expenditures Per Capita for
50,000 Population Cities Source Massachusetts
Department of Revenue Municipal Databank/Local
Aid Section http//www.dls.state.ma.us/Allfiles.ht
m
6
What are the keys to success?
Slide 6

• Commitment of Mayor SomerStat and 311 are part
  of Mayors Office, brief the Mayor each morning,
  and are recognized as acting with the Mayors
  authority
• Consistency of Message and Meetings SomerStat
  and the Mayors Office immediately established
  set of expectations about meetings (e.g.
  start/stop time, hand-outs, agenda, participants
  roles, and follow-up). We have been relentless
  about upholding those expectations.
• Incremental Progress and Use of Existing Data
  Rather than wait for information systems to
  improve, we immediately launched SomerStat
  meetings. SomerStat started with a staff of two,
  MS Office Suite products, and assistance from IT.
  We extract raw data from administrative systems
  and carry out analysis, rather than requiring
  departments to complete templates. Using existing
  data helps define how we can improve data
  management systems.
• Partnerships with Academia SomerStat can
  attribute many of its successes to academic
  partners, such as the Rappaport Institute and
  Professor Linda Bilmes.
• Dedicated SomerStat/311 Staff with Specific
  Expertise SomerStat staff includes people with
  significant data handling experience. Our 311
  director came from the private sector with
  extensive call center and operations experience.
• Leadership of Core Management Departments The
  SomerStat process works best with involvement of
  core management dpts (e.g. Personnel, Law,
  Finance).

7
Next Steps for Somerville
Slide 7

• Benchmarking with other municipalities
• Regional Problem-solving
• Lobbying
• Integration of new data sources
• Time and Attendance
• Preventive Maintenance
• Detailed cost accounting data
• Transaction completion
• In-person, on-line, by mail, by phone
• 24 hours a day (or as close as possible)
• In English, Spanish, Portuguese, and Haitian
  Creole

8
Next Steps What is the direction of innovation?
Slide 8

• Rapidly increasing availability of data
• Data generated by administrative systems
• Police calls for service, incidents, arrests
• Water meter reads
• Library circulation
• Purchase orders opened
• City employee phone calls by time, extension,
  duration, origination
• Recreation registrations
• Fire calls and incidents
• Oil, gas, electricity, and water usage by
  building
• GPS data on location of City vehicles
• Time and attendance tracking of employees
• Child visits to school nurses
• Work requests for each department

• Data collected for decision making
• 311 calls and website visits
• Air pollution by location, time, etc.
• Counts of people entering buildings
• Height and weight of school children
• Resident survey results
• Mystery shopper feedback

9
Next Steps What are the problems and
opportunities?
Slide 9
Too much data? For example

• Somervilles Traffic and Parking department
  issues about 220,000 tickets a year. Detailed
  information on tickets is captured in hand-held
  devices.
• The resulting database shows when a ticket was
  issued, to what car owner, of what kind of car,
  from which state, for what violation, where, by
  which parking control officer, etc. From this
  information, we can answer many questions, such
  as
• Which neighborhoods were ticketed the most
• Which parking control officers had the highest
  issuance
• What factors are correlated with a car owner
  receiving multiple tickets
• However, we might also want to link the data to
  other databases to answer many more questions. We
  could link to
• The 311 database of complaints about illegal
  parking to ensure enforcement matches complaints
• Resident survey data by neighborhood to determine
  how different ticketing activity affects resident
  satisfaction with parking policy
• Weather data and employee benefit use data to
  determine if weather affects sick days and
  issuance for those who do come to work.
• The Police Departments records of stolen
  vehicles, to alert police of vehicles

10
Next Steps What are the problems and
opportunities?
Slide 10
How much should we spend to learn how to use the
data?

• Baltimore spends .0162 percent of its budget on
  its Stat program
• Somerville spends .12 percent of its budget on
  its Stat program. (Baltimore has a budget 14
  times Somervilles and a Stat program twice the
  size.)

Somerville
Baltimore
Both cities attribute great savings to the Stat
program. Would even more investment yield more
savings?
11
Next Steps How will organizations use the
opportunity?
Slide 11
Are data warehouses the answer?

• ? But we still need human analysts to
• Think of the questions to ask
• Clean up data and make sure it makes sense
• Link data across departments, organizations,
  levels of government

12
OTHER PROGRAMS - 311
Slide 12

• Somerville runs a 24-7 311 phone line, available
  from any landline or cell phone, with English,
  Spanish, Portuguese, and Haitian/Creole languages
  available during business hours.
• 311 takes all DPW and TP calls, plus
  informational calls. Plan is to enable 311 to
  handle all City transactions eventually.

• 311 is staffed by non-union Customer Service
  Representatives and run by a private-sector call
  center expert.
• Director applies private sector principles to
  call center management.
• Generated data gets used in SomerStat meetings.

13
OTHER PROGRAMS PROGRAM BUDGET
Slide 13

• Budget provides activity- and program-level goals
  and data and links these to Mayors strategic
  goals.

14
OTHER PROGRAMS ACE
Slide 14

• The mission of the ACE project is to ensure that
  each encounter with the City is Accurate,
  Courteous, and Easy.
• To learn how to improve, the City is
• Recruiting resident mystery shoppers who are
  evaluating City service delivery
• Sharing results of mystery shopping and surveys
  with front-line staff to get their ideas on
  problem-solving and
• Gradually implementing improvements based on
  feedback, wherever possible making it possible to
  complete City transactions in different
  locations, during more times, and in more
  languages.

15
OTHER PROGRAMS RESISTAT
Slide 15
16
Stat Resources
Slide 16

• Come Visit SomerStat!
• Arrange to visit a SomerStat meeting and tour
  311.
• Wed be happy to send any of our databases or
  templates.
• Contact Stephanie Hirsch, SomerStat Director,
  617-625-6600 (ext. 2103), shirsch_at_ci.somerville.ma
  .us.
• Other Resources
• Baltimores CitiStat (http//www.ci.baltimore.md.u
  s/news/citistat/) hosts many visitors from
  municipalities who are interested in CitiStat and
  311.
• The Rappaport Institute (http//www.ksg.harvard.ed
  u/rappaport/) has published articles and runs
  workshops relating to Stat programs.
• National Center for Civic Innovation
  (http//www.civicinnovation.org/main.html) has
  carried out extensive work on civic engagement,
  as has Worcester Regional Research Bureau
  (http//www.wrrb.org/).
• GASB has a site with extensive information on
  performance reporting (http//www.seagov.org/)