The cost of Portland City government

Several bloggers have provided insightful analysis of the Hackett Report this week. Mayor Potter and proponents of Charter change are touting this consultant’s study as giving evidence of $10-15m in savings to be gained by switching to the super-strong Mayor form of government. Neither PortlandOnLine nor the first few pages of a Google search provide a link to the actual report, so citizens must rely on the opinions and reports of those who have access to it. Anna Griffin, b!X, and Scott Moore each offer intriguing comments.

Anna notes, “The study had nothing to do with the commission form of government, or whether a different form of government might lead to better, cheaper results. The changes recommended by the Hackett Group could, theoretically, be completed under the commission form of government, in which city commissioners and the mayor share power over the bureaus. The city is in the process of building and installing a new financial management system.”

Scott ends, “Another interesting tidbit—the last line of the last page of the report: “The City of Portland has different business requirements, as all organizations in the [Hackett] database do, however, in Hackett experience, the City of Portland is actually less complex than many other organizations in the database.