Governments at all levels and locations within the United States, as well as many worldwide, have been going through tremendous changes over the past two decades, which include improved customer service initiatives, citizen satisfaction efforts, streamlining agencies, flattening hierarchies, and continuous economic, redevelopment and growth management issues. State governments, especially larger ones, are becoming more centralized in order to deal with financial, legal, political and administrative relationships. In the State of Florida, as the never-ending quest for best government measures and practices are constantly being sought, it is important to examine the opposing viewpoints regarding the decentralization of government for local decision-making.

Yes there are pros and cons to the centralization of government in Florida and size often dictates the need for centrality. Florida is not only growing faster than any other part of the country, it has very large areas of separation between its urban centers. Voters in South Florida may differ vastly in opinions than the voters in the Keys or the Panhandle areas. It has been said that no one metropolitan area can dominate Tallahassee politics. With such a vast difference in geography and diversity in politically strong areas, it is difficult to manage government in Florida from one point of view or one part of the state. The members of the Florida Legislature, who are representatives of the different localities, can cause an effect on one area that they do not represent. Since this state also varies greatly in its location of resources, economic markets and products, to name a few, decentralization would appear to me to be a better fit, however, as my findings will suggest, there is always a benefit for either centralization or decentralization in certain areas depending on needs, past performance, intended outcomes and political climate.

Administrative Relationships

With the signing of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, the federal government passed to the states the responsibility for public assistance to families with children. This allowed the states flexibility in managing their own programs and through time has caused states to look at increasing the responsibilities of localities according to the New Federalism National Survey of America’s Families by The Urban Institute. The State of Florida embraced this reform and created the Work and Gain Economic Self-Sufficiency Program or WAGES. Due to this and other changes taken in Florida, dramatic changes have occurred in the administration and delivery of social services. The responsibility for running programs, and through the use of contracts, the management and administering of services has shifted from the state to the local level. Local governments will often support programs that they are more involved with administratively than ones in which they have very little control and less autonomy. In order to provide better services to constituents in all of the localities, it is necessary to shift responsibility and authority to employees nearer to these areas.

Financial Realm

Due to the recent population explosion and growing needs, Florida expended an unusual effort at predicting its financial future. Managing for results, performance based budgeting, tracking state expenditures and other efforts to increase accountability have been a constant focus of Florida state government. The process of decentralization and the effect on local government may include any combination of block grants from state to county or municipal governments reduced aid from the federal government that get addressed at the state level and then trickle down to local levels, or decentralization of state agencies to provide closer and more cost-effective services to local areas. A review of the decentralization of the teacher certification renewal process, as reported by the State of Florida’s Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability, showed that the early effects of decentralization were the elimination of duplication of work by state and district offices, increased service efficiency and increased district funding flexibility. The report also demonstrates that decentralization reduces the Department’s Bureau of Teacher Certification workforce and costs at the state level by approximately $1 million annually. The only drawbacks to this is that the workload for remaining staff is increased, but as demonstrated by the OPPAGA’s report, decentralization results in big gains for the financial realm for the entire state.

Decentralization is designed to enhance the efficiency and responsiveness of lower levels of government by allowing the localities more control over spending. Typically, counties will only contribute to program funding if they are involved administratively. A negative situation occurs when decentralization results in increased costs for services provided to constituents of local governments in the way of higher taxes. A politically hot issue these days are the increasing costs of providing police, fire and emergency medical services to local governments. These costs seem to increase significantly every year in municipalities and in county governments. Cooperation among police and fire departments has emerged as an effective way to deal with an environment of increasing needs, rising costs and decentralized service delivery. Successful mergers of departments, inter-local agreements and use of volunteers can improve service delivery and reduced taxpayer costs. Centralizing fire departments with a County would result in better response times and coordination, as well as, decreased costs to citizens. The decentralization of fire departments from a county to each municipality within a county is an option that appears to have local value in the beginning, but often in order to keep up with increasing demands, population and customer satisfaction, centralization seems often provides the solution.

Legal Arena

In Florida, law enforcement and regulatory agencies may take a case to either to local state attorney or to the Office of Prosecution at the state level. Although this choice enhances Florida law enforcement’s ability to aggressively fight crime, the debate as to whether this system is effective is continuous. Reports have shown that the state office not only collects more money for victims and government agencies, but that it has a very high prosecutorial record. There are certain cases that are better suited for statewide prosecution and those that are better handled locally. If the office of statewide prosecution were to be eliminated, there would be consequences that state and local law enforcement would not want to face. It is evident that the legal needs of Florida are vast and that a balance between centralization and decentralization is needed.

Conclusion

It is important for localities to continue to be growing providers of services and employment for the benefit of all citizens. We are in an environment in South Florida where there are a great number of municipalities within county borders and intergovernmental administration at the local level is very complex and politically cumbersome. Decentralization is a government reform that is at the forefront of the changes which are occurring in Florida now, especially given the current economic climate. When faced with increased financial burdens placed upon localities due to the decentralization of services such as health and education sometimes run counter to worldwide trends towards decentralization and actually results in government setbacks. It is obvious that decentralization is the answer for many deficiencies found in government and that this is a current trend. However, local governments can be financially hurt by unfunded mandates and growing needs. Results based management and reporting are new concepts that takes some getting used to and unfortunately many good programs suffer or do not get adequate funding because of the ineffective reporting that is occurring by state and local governments. This is highly prevalent when the improper or ineffective application of performance measurement to agencies’ activities occurs. Additionally, the transitioning of services and programs to lower levels of government is still an unsettling and uncertain one at times, but with good working relationships, proper management, and strong alliances between local governments with each other and the state, the benefits will outweigh any setbacks.

The author of this article is Gerald Henry, a Senior Code Enforcement Officer in Broward County Florida who holds a Bachelors Degree and Graduate Certificate in Public Administration from Florida Atlantic University and maintains the Certified Code Enforcement Professional designation.

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