Overhaul Plans Unlikely to Result in Sweeping Reform
By HOWARD FINE
Staff Reporter
The California Performance Review report handed to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger calls for the most sweeping overhaul of state government ever proposed. Yet if past attempts at reform in California and other states are any guide, the odds do not favor turning those proposals into adoption.
Alabama, Minnesota, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina and Texas have all come out with similar plans in recent years, as has the federal government. There also have been at least two attempts at reform of California government over the last 40 years.
Each case ran into political opposition; as a result, only parts of the proposals have ever been implemented.
“The history of these overhaul reports is the same in state after state,” said Jonathan Walters, senior correspondent for Governing Magazine. “They hit the capital doorstep with a million ideas on how to fix things, then they run into political reality and only a few of the ideas get adopted. Few, if any, of the reports have actually resulted in a top-to-bottom overhaul of state government.”
Already, intense opposition has sprung up to the 1,200-plus recommendations in the California report. Among the key proposals: consolidating 11 agencies and 79 departments into 11 cabinet-style ‘super agencies,’ including a new Infrastructure Department; eliminating 118 of state’s 300-plus boards and commissions, including the state Air Resources Board; and cutting more than 12,000 state positions, mostly through attrition.
State Senate President-pro-tempore John Burton, D-San Francisco, has said that if the report is submitted to the Legislature for an up-or-down vote, it will be dead on arrival. Environmental groups have blasted proposals to consolidate environmental boards and agencies, while consumer groups strongly oppose the consolidation of various regulatory agencies.
And that’s just in the opening days. As the report goes through a series of hearings, opposition is expected to build from state employees fearful that their positions would be cut.
Governor’s star power
Still, Schwarzenegger, who has yet to comment directly, could make a difference if he gets behind a revised package of recommendations. “You can’t underestimate the governor. When he wants something, he usually gets it,” said Bob Stern, president of the Center for Governmental Studies in Los Angeles.
Over the years, there have been a few successes at government reform.
One was the push by progressive Gov. Hiram Johnson in 1911-1913 that resulted in the state initiative and recall processes and the establishment of a workers’ compensation system. The other came in the mid-1960s, as exiting Gov. Pat Brown and incoming Gov. Ronald Reagan endorsed a plan for a full-time Legislature and several other changes.
A more recent effort did not fare as well. The Constitutional Revision Commission came out in 1996 with a report recommending everything from making the budget process a two-year cycle, with only a majority vote needed to pass a budget, to eliminating some boards and commissions. Because of partisan squabbling and the departure of termed-out legislators, only a handful of recommendations ever got implemented.
Outside California, the most successful overhaul has been in Texas, when over the last 12 years two-thirds of the 975 recommendations in the Texas Performance Review have been implemented, including a consolidation of workforce development programs, contracting out-of-state services and achieving more than $40 million in savings from streamlining government procurement practices. A plan to consolidate the state’s community college campuses ran into opposition and was dropped.
Minnesota had a “performance review commission” 10 years ago, where “nothing happened,” according to Peter Hutchinson, president of Public Strategies Group Inc. of St. Paul, Minn. At that point, public disaffection with state government only grew, allowing former professional wrestler Jesse Ventura to win an upset victory in 1998.
At the federal level, the Grace Commission during the Reagan administration produced a report on how to cut waste, fraud and inefficiency in the federal government. But that report met opposition in a Democrat-controlled Congress and largely stayed on the shelf.
In response to the 2001 terrorist attacks, dozens of agencies have been consolidated under the newly created Department of Homeland Security and a new Transportation Security Agency has been set up. Now, after the release of the 9/11 Commission report, efforts are under way to restructure the nation’s intelligence services.
Some of that has carried through at the state level, where agencies have been restructured to deal with terrorist threats.
But for broader overhauls of state government, Walters said most successful reform efforts have been narrowly focused.
Hutchinson said the odds of implementing the sweeping reforms proposed in the California Performance Review report are daunting.
“You have one of the most entrenched partisan legislatures in the country. They are incredibly possessive of programs,” Hutchinson said. “The natural response is going to be opposition.”
Ambitious Blueprint – Highlights of the California Performance Review report.
Length: 2,500 pages, including 1,200 recommendations
Potential Savings: $32.2 billion over five years
Major Recommendations:
– Consolidate 11 agencies and 79 departments into 11 cabinet-style departments, including a new Infrastructure Department
– Eliminate 118 of state’s 300-plus boards and commissions.
– Eliminate more than 12,000 state positions, mostly through attrition
– Establish competitive
bidding for delivery of state
services
– Move many state services online, including renewal of
drivers’ licenses and bill
payment.
– Set up two-year budget cycle
– Sell surplus state property on eBay
