Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Engaging Citizens in Government
Good morning, and greetings from the fourth floor of the Landmark Convention Center. I'm at a workshop hosted by the Association of Washington Cities. The workshop is about engaging citizens in government, and about particular tool, the performance audit.
Lakewood sent quite a delegation here: we also have council members Pad Finnigan and Claudia Thomas, and assistant city managers Jeff Brewster and Dave Bugher.
Several folks advocate for creating a performance audit system within Lakewood. Performance audits are supposed to measure, as scientifically as possible, whether a government activity is being done at the most reasonable balance of cost and service. Performance audits are an outside opinion by experts about whether government is working at its best, or what other options are possible.
One of my frustrations with public policy in Lakewood is that because we are a relatively new city, we do not have a lot of role models for how to do things. People, including me, often pontificate about how the city should do this or that, without having the personal expertise to evaluate whether something is effective or not.
This morning, we heard in a key not speech about how polls show something we already know: Americans are extremly interested in accountability. Accountability is the most popular word people want to apply to their government. So hopefully today those of us from Lakewood will get some good ideas about how to get citizens involved in the pursuit of better government and specifically accountability. I will keep you posted.
Right now, a bunch of loudmouths at the front table have diverted the presenter with a bunch of questions related to their own personal opinions about performance audits. I hate that; I always think you should let a speaker finish their presentation before diving into questions. So I will have my fingers crossed that she can do so. I want to hear how perfermance audits can not only improve government, but also get citizens engaged.
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Lakewood sent quite a delegation here: we also have council members Pad Finnigan and Claudia Thomas, and assistant city managers Jeff Brewster and Dave Bugher.
Several folks advocate for creating a performance audit system within Lakewood. Performance audits are supposed to measure, as scientifically as possible, whether a government activity is being done at the most reasonable balance of cost and service. Performance audits are an outside opinion by experts about whether government is working at its best, or what other options are possible.
One of my frustrations with public policy in Lakewood is that because we are a relatively new city, we do not have a lot of role models for how to do things. People, including me, often pontificate about how the city should do this or that, without having the personal expertise to evaluate whether something is effective or not.
This morning, we heard in a key not speech about how polls show something we already know: Americans are extremly interested in accountability. Accountability is the most popular word people want to apply to their government. So hopefully today those of us from Lakewood will get some good ideas about how to get citizens involved in the pursuit of better government and specifically accountability. I will keep you posted.
Right now, a bunch of loudmouths at the front table have diverted the presenter with a bunch of questions related to their own personal opinions about performance audits. I hate that; I always think you should let a speaker finish their presentation before diving into questions. So I will have my fingers crossed that she can do so. I want to hear how perfermance audits can not only improve government, but also get citizens engaged.
