Governor Rick Snyder and "Dashboard" (July 1) self-reporting not as promised/fully implemented

Snyder moving quickly, but his 'dashboard' lags behind

Paul Egan/ Detroit News Lansing Bureau

Lansing — Gov. Rick Snyder says he's proud of a list of accomplishments in his first six months in office, but almost nothing has changed on the state government "dashboard" Snyder touted during his State of the State speech in January.
Snyder hasn't moved the needle on his dashboard, which mostly features data that's a year or more out of date. For several topics, the most recent data on Snyder's dashboard is from 2009 and even 2008, when former Gov. Jennifer Granholm was only midway through her second term.
"One of the challenges of having the dashboard is … timely updates," Snyder said in an interview Thursday with The Detroit News. "That's one of the things we need to work on."
The governor said he is pleased with what he and the Legislature accomplished in his first 182 days, including early approval of a state budget he says sets the foundation for economic stability. He led a revamp of the state's tax system and has streamlined business regulations, including repeal of the item-pricing law retailers saw as a job killer.
Two goals Snyder didn't accomplish by his self-imposed July 1 deadline were legislative approval of a public authority to take bids on a new bridge across the Detroit River and passage of a series of school reforms he called for in a special message in April. But Snyder said he didn't look upon those items — which remain live issues — as failures.
"It's just the magnitude and volume of all the reforms we asked for were probably beyond what was possible," Snyder said. "We're pushing the envelope pretty hard in terms of reinventing Michigan."
Mark Brewer, chairman of the Michigan Democratic Party, said Snyder's first six months have been a disappointment and he hasn't seen that his policies have created jobs.
"Whether it's the repeal of item pricing, the cuts to film incentives, or his budget, which is causing the layoffs of thousands of teachers, police, firefighters and other public employees — Snyder has proven that all he knows how to do in office is kill jobs," Brewer said in a statement.
Snyder has made performance measurement a central theme of his administration, several times saying he wants to make "dashboard" the most overused word in Michigan.
Of the 20 items measured on Snyder's dashboard, only two include 2011 data. Ten items feature data from 2010; six from 2009; and two from 2008.
In some cases, the dashboard features the most recent data available, but in other areas it does not.
For example, under public safety, the dashboard uses crime data from 2009, despite the fact the FBI released 2010 data in May.
Under "value for money government," the state hasn't updated the 2010 data on the number of online state government services, despite the fact it comes from his own Department of Technology, Management and Budget.
Snyder acknowledged the dashboard needs to be improved. He said it needs to be updated more frequently so residents will want to look at it often.
But he said the timeliness of certain data is constrained by the need to have matching data from other states for comparison purposes. He said additional dashboards he told each state department to set up will often feature more current information than the overall state dashboard.
The Michigan Dashboard got mixed reviews Thursday from two national experts on performance management.
Dean Spitzer, author of "Transforming Performance Management" and an adviser to public and private organizations, said the dashboard scores poorly for "relevance and actionability."
"How is this dashboard helping the state of Michigan drive more effectively?" Spitzer asked. "My concern is that it's measuring too much, and it may be measuring the wrong things."
Harry Hatry, director of the public management program at the Urban Institute in Washington, D.C., and a recognized expert on measuring performance in government, said many of the items measured in the dashboard, such as child poverty, are "social indicators" influenced by a wide range of factors and are not directly or fully under the control of state government.

Posted at NEWSPAPER website (July 1, 2011)
From The Detroit News: http://detnews.com/article/20110701/POLITICS02/107010382/Snyder-moving-quickly--but-his-‘dashboard’-lags-behind#ixzz1Qrsv3G1S