Wantage Township overwhelmingly defeated the consolidation referendum question in November 2009 to merge with Sussex Borough, the first consolidation effort to fail since New Jersey passed the Local Option Municipal Consolidation Act (N.J.S.A. 40A:65-25 et seq) in 2007.

Even though the final report of the Sussex/Wantage Joint Consolidation Study Commission identified $585,000 of savings annually following the recommended merger, this equated to a meager $57 annual reduction in the tax bill for the average home in Wantage after the tax rate was combined and equalized with that of Sussex Borough.

These projected savings did not include any savings from the consolidation of police departments, almost always the largest cost item for a New Jersey municipality, because both Sussex and Wantage receive full police coverage from the New Jersey State Police. If the towns had been providing their own police, the savings from consolidation should have been larger. Consolidation of police services has produced cost savings in many other states. One of five studies - Literature Review and Analysis Related to Costs and Benefits of Service Delivery Consolidation among Municipalities (pdf) - completed by Rutgers SPAA for the New Jersey Local Unit Alignment, Reorganization, and Consolidation Commission (LUARCC) lists examples of savings throughout the United States from shared services, including police services (see pages 15–16).

Other states have led the way on most of the police consolidations. Many elected officials in New Jersey, a state with a strong labor tradition, binding arbitration, and the highest population density in the country, feel that police consolidation is not achievable, even if they think it would reduce taxes for their residents. Two things that will change that belief are starting to emerge.

First, law enforcement experts are beginning to see benefits in consolidation and regionalization of police services. The FBI’s National Executive Institutes Associates details the concerns with regionalization and then presents seven cogent reasons local governments should evaluate regionalization and consolidation in Regionalization or Consolidation of Law Enforcement Services in the United States.

The New Jersey State Association of Chiefs of Police has written a white paper on the important considerations in Police Department Regionalization, Consolidation, Merger & Shared Services (pdf). It covers basic issues and raises questions that should be addressed in an evaluation of collaboration.

The second thing to emerge is the fact that there is a growing number of police collaborations and studies to achieve police collaborations. Even we were surprised, when we followed our nose after conducting some initial telephone interviews in September with towns in New Jersey, which we knew had studied or implemented police department consolidation. We talked to anyone (consultants, municipalities, trade associations, DLGS – NJ Division of Local Government Services), who our initial interviews disclosed might be active in police consolidation. This “snowball sample” showed a lot more activity than the reservations about police consolidation in New Jersey would suggest.

These collaborations are more comprehensive than what some consider the “no-brainers” of centralized or regional dispatch, lab analysis, or investigative services. Some of these department consolidations have worked, some have had problems, and some have been stopped by residents willing to pay higher local taxes to assure coverage with which they are familiar. 

Facebook offers advantages in helping local governments do a better job of listening to their bosses, from features like status updates, postings, applications for polling, longer discussions, videos and photos, and much else.

Cities are under greater pressure than ever, struggling with budget cuts and outdated technology. What if, instead of cutting services or raising taxes, cities could leverage the power of the web to become more efficient and effective?

ISPs may not act for years on local complaints about slow Internet – but when a town rolls out its own solution, it's amazing how fast the incumbents can deploy fiber and cut prices.

North Texas may be in the early stages of a green awakening. The city of Dallas is setting an example with its shift to hybrids and other low-emission vehicles and its purchases of renewable energy. Dallas' new green building code has been called the nation's toughest.

Many of the thousands of local and state law-enforcement agencies have been scrambling to gear up for 21st century crime fighting.

While this report goes back to September, it is as relevant today as then. Cities need broadband to help in the economic recovery – more so than many realize.

For the latest in technology developments, including special web-briefings please visit www.pti.org

In times of financial difficulty performance measurement tools can provide valuable information that can be used to head off a complete crisis. One such example exists in the state of Washington. The Transportation Improvement Board (TIB) implemented a dashboard system and Stevan Gorcester, Director of the TIB, credits that system with providing him with data that has allowed him to make adjustments and resource decisions ahead of time and avoid a larger crisis than they could have been facing.

Performance measurement is a systematic management tool rapidly increasing in its use and sophistication. It is a dynamic tool that can be utilized by local, state, and federal government across a diverse range of service areas. Performance measurement addresses indicators of productivity, effectiveness, service quality, and timeliness. Overall, the aim of performance measurement is to provide data that can be utilized to inform management decision-making from allocation of scarce resources to program delivery design.

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