A fresh look at the county's Fiscal Crisis.

Byline: Kate Davidson For The Register-Guard

Are Lane County's public safety programs underfunded? The story, as it has been represented by county officials and reported unquestioningly by the media, is startlingly incomplete.

In reality, the county's public safety funding can be seen as an issue of overall general fund budgeting, priority setting and credibility - not simply an issue about the need for taxpayers to pony up more money.

We all want the benefits that a system of shared resources, in the form of taxation, can confer. Public safety, health and human services, public works and land management are a few of the services that citizens value and that Lane County provides.

But the truth is that the county's fiscal crisis has become permanent. Given this fact, do we want our county government to go about business as usual, forwarding revenue proposals to voters with little or no real citizen input?

Or do we use the opportunity that a fiscal crisis offers to turn the budget process on its head so that it starts with the results we demand and the price we are willing to pay, rather than the programs we have and the costs they incur?

A year ago, the Lane County Board of Commissioners appointed a Service Stabilization Task Force and charged its nine members with recommending whether and how to pursue certain strategies to address the county's general fund deficit. The structural deficit picture looks like this:

The county spends about 3 percent more per year than it receives in revenue. Public safety services (the sheriff, the district attorney, juvenile justice center bonds, justice courts) consume 70 percent of the property tax dollar. Services categorized as health and human services (health, prevention, intervention, children and families) consume just in excess of 7 percent of the discretionary general fund.

The task force, a diverse group of ordinary citizens, was asked to evaluate the wisdom of advancing a law enforcement district proposal to the citizens in November 2006, as well as other possible recommendations. The panel listened to testimony from county staff and department heads concerning the budget deficit, and it reviewed the county's entire budget, its strategic plan and a multitude of other documents.

After considerable discussion, debate and research, the task force presented a results-based approach to the county's budget problem:

Prioritize county services using an outcome-based approach, with prioritization being driven by county residents. Prioritization should result in targeted, as opposed to across-the-board, reductions.

Reduce the cost factors that drive the deficit. Engage in departmental and cross-jurisdictional cooperation and efficiencies.

Appoint a revenue task force of ordinary citizens to select reasonable and achievable options for garnering revenue other than the proposed public safety taxing district.

The Stabilization Task Force did not garner much media attention, perhaps because the recommendations were not what the county seemed to be looking for: citizen cover to pursue a public safety taxing district.

What we did provide, however, was a cogent game plan for the county to prioritize its services and programs, gain efficiencies and increase revenue without taxation. Once these had been achieved, the Stabilization Task Force perceived that the county could reasonably and in good conscience ask the taxpayers to fill in any gaps that remained.

The task force report can be found at www.co.lane.or.us/CAO_Budget

/documents/ServiceStabTF.pdf. Here are the key points:

The county needs to live within its means annually. We recommended that the commissioners immediately determine the priorities of government in the form of outcome goals measured by achievable and tangible results that matter most to citizens.

Rather than making across-the-board reductions, the commissioners should fund the highest priorities. The county's strategic plan lists those services the county would like to provide as a general purpose government, yet those services are listed in no particular order of priority and are not described in a results-oriented method.

The task force spent time engaging in a prioritization exercise. The fruit of our effort can be seen in the form of a chart in the service stabilization report on the county's Web site, but the gist of the message is this: A widely diverse group of county residents can accurately describe and prioritize the results we want from local government.

We recommended the following strategies to reduce the cost factors that drive the county's deficit:

Propose to the governing bodies of all public agencies in the county, except school districts, that employee health care benefits be pooled. By pooling employees and gaining greater control over the benefit package, the agencies could reasonably set a goal of reducing the annual increase in insurance costs to less than 10 percent (from the current figure of 25 percent and rising), while still maintaining a comprehensive benefit package for staff.

Audit departments to evaluate what department services are necessary to meet the prioritized outcomes.

Explore the potential for making more county programs self-supporting, as the board currently does with planning and building permits and waste management. By charging users more of the cost of some programs, the general fund would increase the resources available to fund high-priority services such as public safety and health and human services. Fee structures should be transparent, understandable and allow for enforcement.

Budget for outcomes, not departments, to ensure that all departments' efforts are directly related to the priorities that have been established. The county needs to start by determining the results that are most important to citizens, setting the price for those results, and then purchasing programs and activities from all corners to achieve these results.

Manage competition by having internal departments compete with private businesses and nonprofit organizations for the provision of services. When they are more efficient than private businesses or nonprofits, the departments should continue to provide services. When they are found to provide unique services, they might be encouraged to market and sell those services to the public and other governmental jurisdictions. On the other hand, when internal departments cannot provide a service as efficiently as external groups, the board should consider contracting out for that service.

Meet with other agencies to discuss ways to consolidate services.

Work with the Association of Oregon Counties and other groups to lobby the Oregon Legislature to adequately fund state mandates that deal directly with the operation of government, such as jails, courts and elections.

The task force proposed a bold but reasonable citizen-motivated strategy to tackle the county's ongoing budget crisis. The strategy largely has been ignored. In fact, the county has gone on to do essentially the opposite - expending supposedly scarce resources to move ahead with what is bound to be a losing ballot proposal.

As The Register-Guard asserted in its Aug. 27 editorial, the public is hungry for bold, visionary leadership - the kind of leadership willing to take major risks because it recognizes the need is great. While it is not the easy way out, the stabilization task force's recommendations reflect the 21st century taxpayer's need for value, intergovernmental cooperation and efficiency. To satisfy this need, governments must radically transform the way they do business.

In government, as in most realms of life, it is easier and safer to do what we've always done. Only on rare occasions - usually in a time of crisis - do we step back to gain a broader perspective, erase all our preconceived ideas and routine behaviors, and take a fresh look at how to make the most of our limited time and resources.

Kate Davidson was chairwoman of the Lane County Stabilization Task Force and for six years headed the Lane County Human Services Budget and Planning Committee.