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Achieving universal access to basic services and safe and affordable water and sanitation to all by 2030, as targeted in Sustainable Development Goals 1 and 6, is of utmost importance in improving people's well-being. In Kenya, this means fulfilling a significant water services gap. This study analyzed the viability of user-owned urban water utilities there from managers' perspectives. It found that the high performance of the few licensed private utilities, high ownership and control, small size, robust public participation, and regulatory policies favor their performance. Yet, the costliness of water services production limits their viability in the most sidelined low-income areas. The article recommends (i) diversifying service production models, (ii) establishing a revolving fund to finance major capital investments, (iii) making full cost recovery a key policy objective, (iv) mobilizing financing from local users, including low-income earners, and (v) setting pricing structures that imply cross-subsidizing between the rich and poor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The cyclicality of economic recessions worsens fiscal stability and increases vulnerability to future shocks. This article argues that the concept of resilience provides an important frame for understanding the dynamic character of public financial management. The study introduces a theoretical framework that decomposes fiscal resilience into precrisis fiscal resistance, postcrisis fiscal recovery, and long-term fiscal renewal. It empirically tests the model employing a Cox proportional hazard model and over three decades of data (1991–2018) covering two previous recessions—the dotcom recession and the Great Recession. The findings indicate that although strategic decisions associated with revenue diversification and countercyclical capacity facilitate fiscal resilience, specific features of local government finances such as the revenue structure and service structure are critical to fiscal recovery and renewal. In addition, the underlying characteristics of each recession affect whether institutional and economic conditions facilitate fiscal resilience. The article discusses implications for financial management and emphasizes embedding resiliency-based frameworks in local government strategic planning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article studies the party alignment bias in Poland. Relying on quasi-experimental regression discontinuity design and 2006–2019 data for over 2,400 municipalities, we aim to establish whether the impact of political alignment on the distribution of grants from the central to the local governments has increased under the rules of populist, authoritarian government. We report robust evidence that provides an affirmative answer to this question. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

State Infrastructure Banks (SIBs) are established to provide low-interest loans and credit enhancements to assist local governments in financing transportation projects. SIB loans, one of their core products, are low-cost and low-risk when compared to traditional capital finance tools. However, SIB loans are still rarely used by local communities. This study investigates the determinants of local government adoption of SIB loans among Pennsylvania municipalities from 2008 to 2015. Using limited dependent variable models, we discover that infrastructure demands, prior experiences, and neighboring adoptions are all positively associated with municipalities' likelihood of applying for SIB loans as well as the intensity of loan usage, whereas fund balance reduces the probability of applying for SIB loans. We also find that as fund balance increases, the positive impact of infrastructure demands diminishes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Municipal annexation has been one of the most widely adopted instruments for urban growth in the United States. Scholars of public choice and regional studies have long debated the fiscal effect of local government annexation. Few studies, however, examine the fiscal effect of municipal administrative annexations in China, where prefectural cities have extensively annexed county-level governments through forcefully converting rural counties into urban districts in a top-down manner. Employing a difference-in-differences (DID) method coupled with an event study approach, we analyzed a panel data set of 282 prefectural cities from 2007 to 2015 to examine the fiscal impact of annexation in China. The findings show that prefectural cities have significantly increased their land conveyance fees through administrative annexation. Given that land conveyance fees serve as one of the most important own-source revenues at the local level, our findings shed light on the crucial link among the urbanization process, government reorganization, and local land finance in China and, potentially, in other transition countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Not only the Central Government, local governments also have a role to shape, adapt and provide a holistic response to the COVID-19 pandemic. One of the most important actions taken by local governments during the COVID-19 pandemic is to make immediate, timely, and targeted decisions for the right institutions in order to give an effective response. Regarding financing, the main point is to focus on increasing support and accelerating fiscal transfer funds to local governments in an effort handle COVID-19. This paper wants to observe the empirical practice of local governments in various countries in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic, especially in terms of financing various programs and activities related to the COVID-19 response. Literature was obtained from several databases, namely PubMed, ScienceDirect, Cochrane Library and Google Scholar. Of the 783 articles obtained at the start of the search, in the end only 11 articles met the inclusion and exclusion criteria of this study. The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is aparrent in all parts of the world, including in countries' local governments, that forced them to carry out various efforts of mitigating the severity of the pandemic. Although the detailes of local governments budgeting were not found in most of the articles studied in this literature review, it is sufficient to provide a fairly significant picture of the function of local government in tackling the spread of COVID-19. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Feler and Senses assess the impact of trade shocks on local government finances in the United States. They find that increased import competition from China reduces housing prices and business activity in affected regions, which subsequently diminishes property and sales tax collections and the provision of local public goods. We replicate the authors' published results and find that they are generally robust to alternative sample construction procedures and the removal of analytical weights. We also extend the authors' methodology to evaluate the impact of trade shocks on local capital outlays, borrowing, and cash reserves. We find that the reduction in local expenditures resulting from Chinese trade exposure is driven in large part by decreased spending on fixed assets and that local governments facing greater import competition experience larger declines in cash and financial investments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the financial crisis facing local government in England, using examples such as Warrington Borough Council and Birmingham City Council. It highlights that many councils are facing shortfalls or even bankruptcy, and that solutions to the crisis would require a level of political commitment to local government that has been lacking. The article also explores the historical obstacles to reforming local government finance, including the power of vested interests, the attraction of measures like council tax capping, the reluctance of governments to devote time and political capital to the issue, and innate caution. The author questions whether a future Labour government would be able to address the crisis effectively. [Extracted from the article]

Once again, LGC staff often works with DWI staff as financially distressed water and sewer systems are one of the primary factors in the LGC stepping in. Local governments in North Carolina must have most of their debt approved by the LGC and must submit annual audits to the LGC staff for review each year. To accomplish its goals in partnership with local government, the LGC has come to rely more than ever on other institutional partners in the state, and they on the LGC, as they work together to keep the state's local governments on the right track financially. [Extracted from the article]

Budgets and financial statements convey essential information about revenues, expenditures, assets, and liabilities. But perhaps more important, they also convey positivity, negativity, fairness, uncertainty, and other social sentiments. This essay examines what we know, and what we need to know, about how state and local governments communicate financial sentiment. The main conclusion is that they do convey clear financial sentiments through traditional financial reporting methods and through new channels like social media. Moreover, those sentiments shift predictably in response to broader economic trends and policy priorities, and can shape how investors and other stakeholders view a government's finances. This raises several practical questions about how states and localities can measure financial sentiment, and many normative questions about whether and how they ought to attempt to manage it. The discussion also includes a brief demonstration of how to extract financial sentiment from state and local Twitter activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the distribution of selected place-based urban assistance grants provided by the Obama administration to the 50 largest U.S. cities. Our analysis contributes to understanding Obama's urban legacy by separating planning from implementation grants, distinguishing between policy domains, and acknowledging the limitations of local policy coordination. Facing staunch Congressional opposition to its urban agenda, administration officials encouraged local participants to finance their revitalization projects by braiding (seeking resources from many sources and coordinating and integrating existing federal funding streams locally to create comprehensive, synergistic initiatives). However, braiding was not always successful. Cities struggled to win federal grants in multiple policy domains and to coordinate the use of grants they did win, as braiding made an already difficult process even more demanding and complex. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a strand of the economics literature that considers the regionalized economic effects of natural resource endowments. The so-called Natural Resource Curse suggests that natural resource endowments are associated with lower longterm growth rates in the areas in which the resources are located. Lower growth arises because these areas tend to specialize in the development and exploitation of the natural resources at the expense of other dynamic economic activities that offer higher long-term growth potential. Empirical evidence has, however, not reached consistent conclusions. In this paper, we take advantage of the rapid growth in oil and gas development and production in Texas over the course of a decade to consider the localized effects on inter-industry county-level employment at the NAICS-2, county-level mean and median income, and key public finance measures at both the county and school district levels. Considering the effects within a single, large and economically diverse state enables us to control for important state-level variables that influence local public finances. We find little evidence of short term effects necessary to generate the circumstance of a resource curse over the longer term. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay offers a perspective on a new and reinvigorated research agenda for the study of U.S. local governments. It reports on the ideas and reflections of a set of local government scholars with different vantage points and varied substantive interests. Seven paramount themes or directions for a research agenda were identified, all of which contain numerous threads and thrusts: local government finance and economic development, local government management, intergovernmental relations, collaboration, public engagement, social equity, and institutional design. The essay offers some reasons for optimism about the future of U.S. local governments while also identifying cause for concern. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using a panel of Russian regions, we estimate the link between intraregional fiscal decentralization and regional budget deficits. Although Russia's regions are not as autonomous (either politically or fiscally) as regions in some other federal states, we obtain robust and statistically and economically significant results. Specifically, expenditure decentralization has a positive effect on consolidated regional budget balances, while transfer dependence of municipalities is associated with higher deficits. The impact of revenue decentralization depends on whether a regional government can use its tax revenue assignments with the same high degree of discretion that generally characterizes explicit fiscal transfers. We show that a 2009 local finance reform that limited the discretion of regional governments to assign regional tax revenue to municipalities has changed the effect of tax decentralization on budget discipline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholars and practitioners in the United States have paid significant attention to the need for consistency in urban planning documents. However, consistency between general plans (GPs) and capital improvement plans (CIPs) has received little attention. Aiming to fill this research gap, this article first reviews the academic and professional literature to identify the strategies that local governments use to ensure strong consistency between GPs and CIPs. Then, it reviews the GPs and CIPs of four cities and presents a framework for evaluating whether, how, and how well local governments are implementing strategies that enhance GP–CIP consistency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The shape of local government finance in the United Kingdom is changing. The UK Government has been promoting fiscal devolution in the context of austerity following the 2007 global economic crisis. Consequently, local government finance is becoming an increasingly important issue. According to the current regulation, the revenues from business rates, a local tax on non-domestic properties, are pooled to the Welsh Government and then redistributed to the councils, based on their adult population. In the context of fiscal devolution, and following England and Scotland, which adopted retention of business rates income, the discussion for the local retention of business rates revenues in Wales is topical. This paper looks at the organisation of the current business rates system in Wales and the impacts of a potential local retention. It provides a rigorous review of the current state of business rates scheme and the features of the councils according to the net difference between business rates, settlements and contributions. The findings suggest that the current system financially backs the economically disadvantaged Welsh councils, whereas a local retention of business rates income would possibly polarise the uneven allocation of local funding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In India, a new approach to finance has been transforming shelter options for low-income households and supporting community-led development over recent decades. This paper examines the financial architecture developed to support hundreds of community-driven efforts by grassroots groups working in alliance with the Mumbai-based NGO SPARC. Much has been written about this Alliance’s work, but its financial architecture has had little attention. This paper seeks to explain how grants given for grassroots community development in urban areas can produce new forms of entrepreneurial behaviour among the urban poor, showing how they can design and execute large projects with the expertise gained from more modest efforts. It also shows how this Alliance has managed, invested and revolved these grants and other sources of funding, including its own savings, to leverage resources and opportunities for inclusive city development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Large, urban governments often provide a tremendous variety of public goods, while the expenditures of small communities usually address basic needs such as fire protection and road maintenance. However, certain small local governments dedicate significant public resources to recreation, culture, and public health services, among others. This research examines the variation in services provided by these smaller, often overlooked governments. Differences are explained, at least partially, by various community characteristics, location, and capacity. For the millions of people who reside in these communities, the findings illustrate why variations exist and what, potentially, can be done to alter expenditure levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Financial support for affordable housing competes with many other municipal priorities. This work seeks to explain the variation in support for affordable housing among U.S. cities with populations of 100,000 or more. Using multivariate statistical analysis, this research investigates political explanations for the level of city expenditures on housing and community with a particular interest in the influence of housing advocacy organizations (AOs). Data for the model were gathered from secondary sources, including the U.S. Census and the National Center for Charitable Statistics. Among other results, the analysis indicates that, on average, the political maturity of AOs has a statistically significant, positive effect on local housing and community development expenditures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the article "Strategic Alignment for the New Normal: Collaboration, Sustainability, and Deliberation in Local Government Across Boundaries" by Michael Abels which appears within the issue and how a panel of local government managers tested out his proposal. Topics include political reconfiguration, how administrators' experiences differed in cities and counties, and Abels' idea that the Great Recession in the U.S. led to a New Normal of fewer government resources.

There is increasing pressure on state and local governments to be transparent. The ultimate goal of increased transparency is to improve the accountability and the efficiency of government through greater citizen awareness. However, despite the abundance of data now available at the click of a button, citizens are still distrustful and dissatisfied with government policies. Fiscal illusion may be at the root of the disconnect. Fiscal illusion suggests that the citizens systematically misperceive their tax burdens and subsequently the cost of government. These issues are discussed with an emphasis on the relationship between fiscal illusion and transparency in this essay. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Some local governments solicit voluntary Payments in Lieu of Taxes (PILOTs) from nonprofit organizations. PILOTs are intended to substitute for property and other taxes nonprofit entities do not pay even though they consume local government services. The diffusion of PILOTs to other jurisdictions depends in part on local government financial managers’ knowledge and perceptions. Using a mail survey of local government financial managers, this study explores factors that explain the use and solicitation of PILOTs. Jurisdictions where local government financial managers do not view administrative and political costs as greater than benefits of revenue are more likely to have and solicit PILOTs. Proximity to other jurisdictions that have a PILOT make it more likely a jurisdiction will consider soliciting a PILOT. However, perceived stakeholder support for the tax exempt status of the nonprofit sector makes a jurisdiction less likely to consider soliciting PILOTs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article surveys a number of key elements of the government's localism agenda, particularly as it relates to local government finance. It concludes that this is a genuine attempt to free up local authorities to innovate and control their own resources, but that the toxic climate and emphasis on central guidance may undermine it. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Economic development agencies worldwide have eagerly embraced clusters as a strategy to boost local economic development. When implementing cluster-based interventions, one of the main issues encountered by many public sector bodies is that the majority of cluster analysis and measurement techniques only give a partial overview of how they actually operate. Often it is the dynamics of collaboration within a cluster that has the biggest influence on overall success. This paper adopts a system thinking approach to help us understand cluster development and inter-firm collaboration. The outcome of this work was the development of a basic five stage conceptual model that helps explain how a cluster develops, together with the changes in company behaviour and company interaction that might be seen at different stages of this developmental trajectory. Using Scotland as an empirical test case, this article highlights the model and examines the problems associated with the adoption of this approach. This methodological approach was shared with other regions working to support clusters to ascertain the relevance of this approach elsewhere. Overall this paper concludes that the model proves to be a useful tool in assessing the varying stages of a cluster's development both within and outside Scotland. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the potential role of time banks in re-building and sustaining local economies based on two key issues: that time credits need to show that they can help people dependent on limited financial resources; and that they can interact with local businesses. The potential of time credits to interact with local economies has been questioned as alternative community currencies show greater compatibility with business. However, this paper argues that the potential of time credits is substantial. Drawing on recent research with a time bank in the Welsh valleys, this paper explores these two issues, to consider the potential of time banks for local economies, beyond their social intervention status. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article considers the relationship between ethnicity within the elderly population and education spending. Extensive literature analyzes the relationship between demographics and education spending. This article contributes to this literature by examining the dynamics between the elderly population and ethnicity and its impact on education finance. Using a national panel public school district data set, it is found that increased ethnic fragmentation within the elderly population is negatively related to perpupil spending and to per-pupil local revenues, but this effect depends on whether the state has a court-ordered reform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Local areas, consisting of governments, special districts, and nonprofits, benefit from the receipt and use of federal funds in support of local programs and projects. This study examines the combined effects of political and administrative capacity factors that influence flows of federal grant funds into local areas. The effects of these capacity dimensions are measured and tested using pooled cross-sectional time-series analysis. The results indicate clearly that institutional measures of capacity must take into account not only political dimensions but also administrative and need/demand dimensions. These results help to explain the disparity observed between high- and low-capacity areas and provide some general lessons for enhancing local grant-getting capacity under differing conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyzes the fiscal crisis at the township level and the related worsening of the peasant burden that was predominantly caused by the 1994 tax reform. This reform changed the tax-sharing rules in favor of the central government. The pressure for performance under tighter fiscal constraints drove local officials to replicate the central government's "self-serving" policy and to desperately attempt to balance their budgets at the cost of their sub-ordinate jurisdictions. Located at the bottom of the administrative hierarchy, the township had no subordinate governments to absorb its fiscal losses or contribute to its coffers. Diminished sources of revenue compelled township officials to squeeze the peasants even harder, particularly in the agricultural provinces. While the tax-for-fee reform and the repeal of the agricultural tax eliminated most of the burden on the peasants, the fundamental structural problem with rural finance not only still exists but also is getting worse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How DOES THE MUNICIPAL use of tax increment financing (TIF) influence the revenues of the overlapping jurisdictions, and how contingent are the effects of TIF on geography? Using regression analyses, this study estimates the extent to which TIF affected the property tax revenues of school districts in Illinois between 1990 and 2000 and tax rates in 2001. Although, in the aggregate, TIF tends to raise tax rates, the local economic development tool slowed property tax revenue growth in downstate urban areas but increased growth in rural districts. TIF had little effect in the Chicago metropolitan region, possibly due to development in non-TIF portions of the school districts, intergovernmental agreements for sharing TIF revenues, and the compensatory effects of the state school equalization formula. In addition to suggesting that distinct systems of fiscal governance in different regions of a state influence the revenue effects of TIF, the findings point to the need to analyze inter-jurisdictional relations in different geographic contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Similar to many property tax relief programs, New York State's School Tax Relief (STAR) program has been shown to exacerbate school resource inequities across urban, suburban, and rural schools. STAR's inherent conflict with the wealth equalization policies of New York State's school finance system are highlighted in a manner that effectively penalizes large, urban school districts by not adjusting for factors likely to contribute to high property taxation. As a policy solution, this article presents results of a simulation that distributes property tax relief using an econometrically based cost index. The results substantially favor high-need urban and rural school districts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A comparison of planning law in Malaysia and England reveals that despite some similarities in principle, there remain a number of serious difficulties with Malaysian law. These include a lack of universal application, a lack of policy guidance, and a lack of public participation in both the formulation of development plans and in development control. There are also weaknesses in the application of environmental impact assessment in the planning process. This article examines the two systems from a comparative standpoint. It is concluded that Malaysian law has not developed sufficiently in this field, a problem which is linked to deficiencies in the rule of law, lack of adequate local finance, and a narrow view of the role of lawyers in the planning process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Part III. Develops an algorithm for an equitable distribution of substance abuse prevention funds based on social indicators, using a case study on the state of Florida. Social indicators at the county level; Schedules of county-based prevention funding levels.

Urban political economy scholarship demonstrates the economic dependence of cities. Cities have responded by pursuing urban economic development strategies. Such strategies often do not successfully address this dependency problem, however. In contrast, an alternative strategy for decreasing a city's economic dependence by increasing its economic self-reliance is offered. A model of this alternative approach — a self-reliance strategy for urban economic development — is first sketched. Then its feasibility is assessed through a case study. A discussion of the empirical analysis and the future prospects of this alternative strategy is presented in the final section. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the congressional allocation of federal grant funds. Reflecting the decision processes and norms of Congress, federal grant funds are allocated almost completely on the basis of population (or equal share). None of the other factors used to allocate specific federal funds (e.g., income, poverty, unemployment) have a great deal of impact. As a result, most congressional battles are at the margin with only marginal impact on the overall distribution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article proposes methods by which local governments in the United States can evaluate expenditures which are mandated by state governments. State governments, from time to time, directs local governments within the state to spend for particular services which the state will not reimburse. In 1978, the US Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations held a study on state-mandated local government expenditures. Mandates were for state personnel, public safety, environmental protection, social services and education. Included in the discussion are reasons for the mandates and alternatives to state mandating. The four criteria for evaluating the mandates are effectiveness, efficiency, equity and accountability.

Examines the budgetary problems of local governments experiencing rapid population growth in the U.S. Relationship between rapid population growth and public budgeting; Occurrence of crises; Impact on decision-makers; Problems faced by local governments; Conflicts between social and environmental needs; Capital budget process; Optimum Population and Urban Growth program developed by Manatee County, Florida.

During the 1980s, school finance research in general, and research on fund distribution and equity issues in particular, has been in a depressed state, with little progress being made on either the substantive or the methodological fronts. There is a backlog of old issues requiring attention, and certain new finance issues are emerging, mainly in connection with current education reform efforts. The priority tasks to be undertaken in the next round of research would seem to include (a) upgrading the methods used to address the traditional core topic in school finance research, equity in the distribution of funds among school districts; (b) extending the research on fund distribution issues to deal with hitherto-neglected dimensions of finance, inducing allocations of funds by type of resource, by level of education and type of pupil, and by curricular area or program; and (c) initiating new research into the relationships between education finance and efforts to improve the schools. The research on the finance-reform relationship should deal not only with the financial implications of particular reforms but also with the broader question of how school finance systems can be used to facilitate reforms and stimulate better performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to provide the most recent national information available on the relationship between school district poverty, local fiscal needs and capacities, and Chapter 1 allocation levels. Two central questions will be addressed. First, what is the relationship between a school district's poverty rate (the primary basis for Chapter 1 allocations) and its local revenue raising capability? Second, how are Chapter 1 funds allocated among districts with different poverty rates, fiscal capacities, and local revenue bases? Following a presentation of findings related to these questions will be a discussion of some of their implications with regard to targeting federal compensatory aid to the "right" school districts, schools and students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the implications of the background attributes of local decision makers to the explanation of local public expenditures in the U.S. According to the author, the contextual variables act as the major constraints on local budgets but has failed to predict the variance in public spending. However, it has been emphasized that having knowledge on the background attributes of the city manager could explain one-fifth of the unexplained variance and knowing the attributes of the councilmembers explains five percent of the residual. In addition, it has been suggested that the condition of the local budgeting need revising in order to fully understand the process of the local budget.

This article focuses on various literature on the subject of fiscal pressures and the actual budgetary responses of local governments in the U.S. The reasons attributed to local government revenue troubles have been many and diverse: declining role of federal aid, recessions, outmigration of middle-income taxpayers and socioeconomic decline eroding the tax base in the inner cities, state imposed tax and expenditure limitations and citizen initiated tax limitation movements. The broadest categorizations of revenue loss behavior exhibited by organizations can be found in theories posited by Levine. Levine's strategic choices of an organization in a period of revenue shortfall are best summarized in an article in a 1978 Public Administration Review entitled Organizational Decline and Cutback Management. In this article, Levine proposes theories about how organizations decline, how they might behave in decline and some possible solutions with respect to how organizations might better behave when not growing. Another research example lending insight into what behavior one might expect following revenue loss was summarized by Holley, and developed by Wolman. Holley identified four major coping strategies which followed those previously enumerated by Wolman: buying time; reliance on intergovernmental revenues; own source revenue increases; and expenditure reductions. Marando studied city need and fiscal condition variables and found General Revenue Sharing as a percentage of operating budget to be positively correlated with cuts in government services. Additionally, Marando found that cities at the property tax rate maximum were more likely to levy new fees, increase existing fees, and reduce capital expenditures.