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Springfield CitiStat Reports

by Bill Dusty

This July, the Springfield CitiStat program issued its first progress report of the year. In a brief overview, the report reviewed its own development thus far, while also providing readers with analyses and reviews of various city departments, programs and policies.

As explained in the report, CitiStat is a “management process” that was created to help review and evaluate any number of services and procedures within city government in order to assist in finding more efficient ways of doing business. The program was initially funded under the City’s Fiscal Year 2008 budget, and in the waning months of 2007 a Director and staff of analysts were hired on to start getting things organized. From September through December of 2007, the team conducted one-on-one meetings with department heads, crafted plans to access and evaluate existing city data, and visited with CitiStat programs already in place in other cities. In January, 2008, the CitiStat team began a schedule of regular meetings (3 to 4 per week) and also launched a neighborhood program called “NeighborhoodStat” to help evaluate issues in the South End section of the city.

Since CitiStat began meetings this past January, the program has held 58 meetings covering 20 different departments and reportedly issued over 350 “action items” and a further 400 follow-up reports. [Read more here.]

The progress report also discussed the implementation of the 3-1-1 Citizen Service Center, currently slated to begin operating later this year. The report said CitiStat assisted in finding a location for the Center as well as selecting a Director.

On managing personnel, the report delved into affirmative action policy when it brought up efforts to develop and implement an online job application system in order to help ensure workforce diversity. It said an online application form would be helpful in tracking the City’s success in both recruiting and hiring “a diverse workforce.” (It was actually somewhat surprising to find there was nothing in the report covering “green” policy reviews, as well.)

Other issues reviewed by CitiStat included worker injuries and safety, payroll tracking, teacher attendance and turnover, and inter-departmental communication.

The report also said that as a result of discussions with CitiStat, the Police Department had identified thirteen headquarters positions that could be “civilianized,” thus putting thirteen more patrol officers on the streets.

On trash collection, the Public Works Department will be considering re-routing pickup routes in order to make more efficient use of worker hours. Currently, waste collectors are able to leave as early as two hours before the end of their shifts due to having finished their work.

On the matter of collecting overdue fines, payments and fees, CitiStat found that different city departments were using different collection agencies. The report said research is currently ongoing into whether a single collection agency could be used to serve all city departments.

And finally, a city-wide ID card was brought up as a possible solution to the current situation where residents need several different ID cards to access various city services.

For more on CitiStat, check out their City website here.

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Posted by Bill Dusty on Jul 30th, 2008 and filed under Cities & Towns, City Hall. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.