Interlocal Agreements Research Articles

Interlocal collaborative processes and network position: the combined effects on environmental performance

ABSTRACT This study investigates how network actors’ participation in collaborative processes improves environmental outcomes and how their closeness centrality moderates these relationships. Relying on a city-level panel dataset for 76 cities from six urban regions that participate in China’s joint atmospheric pollution mitigation programs, we found that participation in joint meetings, interlocal agreements, and joint implementations positively influences a city’s air quality. These effects differ for cities in dominant and peripheral positions with unbalanced power and resources within the network. Our findings deepen our understanding of intergovernmental networks and provide practical insights for equitable and effective collaboration implementation.

Measuring accountability in interlocal agreements between Indigenous and local governments

AbstractInterlocal agreements are becoming a popular policy tool for facilitating intergovernmental coordination and cooperation in Canada and the United States. Indigenous and local governments are also turning to these agreements despite long histories of colonialism, exploitation and dispossession by the settler State toward Indigenous communities. To what extent do interlocal agreements between Indigenous and municipal governments require stringent accountability measures to facilitate intergovernmental coordination? Using a hierarchical Bayesian item response theory model, we explore this question by analyzing 317 interlocal agreements between Indigenous and municipal communities in Canada. We find that accountability strength varies significantly across agreements, contrary to our expectation that accountability requirements would be strong across agreements due to the long history of colonialism. We also find that some of the variation may be a function of the policy area addressed by each agreement, although this finding is likely the result of measurement uncertainty in our estimates.

The salience of megaregional geographies for inter-metropolitan transportation planning and policy making

Researchers have argued that megaregions are a crucial spatial scale to address infrastructure modernization, growth management, economic development and environmental impacts because processes affecting these domains are highly concentrated within megaregional spaces. This paper evaluates the conceptual issues and policy salience of megaregional planning in the U.S. by analyzing the results of a 2018 survey of 382 designated MPOs. Drawing upon the survey results, we find support for the notion that MPO partnerships operating at the megaregional scale are somewhat widespread and involve MPOs along with other partners, like state DOTs and councils of governments. A subset of common concerns—especially multi-modal freight, major transportation corridors, economic development, intercity rail service, and air quality—appear to motivate megaregional partnerships. MPOs were most likely to engage in megaregion-scale collaborations requiring relatively low levels organizational time and resources versus more substantive collaborative efforts to develop joint plans or coordinated project investments. At the same time, few MPO respondents viewed megaregional scale planning collaborations as a high priority or as highly effective. For the majority of MPOs, it appears likely that the costs of such collaborations currently outweigh prospective benefits. Survey respondents identified increasing staff funding, requiring state DOTs’ statewide plans to address megaregional issues, and facilitating and enabling inter-local agreements for megaregional planning as actions that would enhance the salience and effectiveness of megaregional planning. These actions will likely occur only if planning at this scale is embraced as an important priority by federal and state policy makers.

Interlocal Agreements and Multilateral Institutions: Mitigating Coordination Problems of Self-Organized Collective Action

ABSTRACTIn the United States, competition among cities for economic development tends to be the norm. Cities are also collaborating more to improve their economic advantage. However, transaction costs inhibit various of interlocal agreements from being formed. This study examines the role of multilateral institutions in facilitating interlocal agreements for economic development. An analysis of survey data collected from city governments in eleven US metropolitan areas highlights the importance of regional institutions in moderating the effect of coordination problems on the formation of developmental joint venture agreements. The findings complement extant research on the governance mechanisms that mitigate transaction costs of collective action.

Public Service-Function Types and Interlocal Agreement Network Structure: A Longitudinal Study of Iowa

Interlocal service delivery networks have become a prominent subject within the urban governance literature, with significant scholarly attention being focused on the political, legal, and demographic characteristics that influence an organization’s decision to join a collaboration network. However, despite being a theoretically significant factor, few analyses have examined the role that service-function type plays in shaping these networks. This research note replicates and extends previous tests of the hypothesized relationship between service-function type and network structure by relying on a comprehensive 25-year data set of interlocal agreements from the state of Iowa. Using hierarchical linear modeling, the positive relationship between networks of system maintenance service-functions and network centralization is confirmed after controlling for the significant moderating effect of time. This more-generalized finding enhances our understanding of when local governments use service networks to solve public problems and potentially carries important implications for the relationship between network governance and policy performance.

What Propels Municipal Governments to Collaborate? The Case of Thematic Environmental Association in Chile

Although it is widely accepted that inter-local agreements can enhance municipal governments’ capacity to provide complex services, there is little evidence in the Latin American case to explain why municipalities decide to collaborate with each other. What propels municipal governments to collaborate? Using data from Chilean government this paper identifies and analyzes the determinants of inter-local collaboration to address environmental issues. Five logit models are used for the empirical analysis. The results show that this form of cooperation is determined by poverty, population size, municipal fiscal capacity, and the degree of urbanization of local communities.

Regional Governance and Institutional Collective Action for Environmental Sustainability

Abstract This research investigates why various mechanisms of cooperation among local authorities are chosen using the theoretical lens of institutional collective action (ICA). The article analyzes 564 local collaboration agreements drawn from four urban regions of China to explain the choices of environmental collaboration agreements among cities. Examples of three forms of interlocal agreements—informal, formal, and imposed agreements—are analyzed. Ordinal logistic regressions are estimated to test which factors predicted by the ICA framework influence the form of collaboration selected. The results indicate that the involvement of national or provincial government, the number of policy actors involved, heterogeneity of economic conditions, and differences in administrative level among the actors involved influence how collaboration agreements are structured. Examining the choice of agreement type contributes to the understanding of interlocal collaboration and provides practical insights for public managers to structure interlocal collaboration.

Comparative Overview of Local Government Legislation in Albanian-speaking Republics

The Consttution of Albania defines in its Article 108, three units of local power, communes, municipalities and districts. Upon teh amendaments deriving from the new territorial reform, Albania has only 61 municipalities and 12 districts and no commune at all. In the article 5 of the law no. 139/2015 of the Local Self- Governance of the Republic of Albania, it is defined that municipalities and districts are the units of local governance. We have to do with a difference between the definition of the Constitution of Albania and the Law on Local Self- Governance. Therefore a constitutional amendment is needed in order to reflect the legal amendments on the local self-governance. The Republic of Albania approved the law no. 8548 on 11th November 1999 “ On the ratification of the European Card of Local Autonomy”. Upon this approval, the Card is an internal resource of the law and its implementation from the institutions and individuals is obligatory. Point 4 of the Article 14 of the Law on Local Self- Governance in the Republic of Albania defines that the Units of local self- governance may enter into inter-local collaboration agreements with units of foreign local self-governance units. Before entering in such agreements, these units obtain the opinion of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “Law on Local Self- Governance” of the Republic of Kosovo, approved in 2008. The reform on local governance started in 1999/2000, upon the end of the War in Kosovo and settlement of UNMIK Administration. Initially, the organization and functioning of local power was regulated by UNMIK Rule, which had the legal power, and then by the constitution in 2008. The Republic of Kosovo lies in an area of 10908 km/2 which is divided in 38 administrative units or in 38 communes which extends and act under specific territorial conditions. “Law on Local Self- Governance” of the Republic of Macedonia defines the communes as units of local self-governance. Another particularity of the Law on Local Self- Governance of the Local Republic of Macedonia is the status given to the city of Skopje as a special unit of local governance, as it is the Capital of the Republic. There are to be done the right legal amendments, in accordance to the legislation of EU and the interstate coordination in order to improve the collaboration in local governance level among the Albanian- speaking states, especially in the economic point of view, but as well as in the cultural and environmental one. DOI: 10.5901/ajis.2016.v5n3s1p86

Response to Lidstrom, Lewis, and Barnes on Fragmented Regionalism

Critics often take their subjects on worthy journeys. Lidstrom has done this through a comparative approach. He draws parallels between American public authorities and European “inter-municipal cooperation”. While comparisons can be useful the parallels have limitations, and we point out that public authorities, “transcend local interests” whereas “inter-local agreements” reflect local interests. Lewis opens a new vista on the American landscape by demonstrating how numerous institutions work across jurisdictions. He shows there are functional equivalents to public authorites that work as “kludges” to patch together fragmented metropolises. Barnes takes us down a rockier road. He attributes much to our article that was neither written nor intended. Barnes’ critique is lodged in an assertion that we envisioned regionalism as an “ideal” of “one big metro government”. We take issue with this premise and its conclusions.

An Illustrated Conceptual Model of Key Factors Impacting Perceived Interlocal Agreement Outcomes

ABSTRACTThe increasing use of interlocal agreements (ILAs) to provide government services makes it important to understand the development of the ILA process and its potential effects on outcomes. This article develops a conceptual model that identifies and organizes factors that may contribute to perceptions of ILA effectiveness and service outcomes. The model is illustrated using examples from two ILAs in Pulaski County, Arkansas, that have the same players within the same political landscape. This allows examination of how the characteristics of the agreements may result in very different service outcomes and perceptions of effectiveness. The study’s focus on key factors contributes to the understanding of ILA development and its connection to service outcomes.

Assessing local elected officials’ concerns about interlocal agreements

At times, local politicians are described as barriers to interlocal cooperation; however, recent studies show elected officials are active in interlocal networks and harbour diverse motivations for their involvement in interlocal politics. This research introduces institutional role theory to the study of interlocal politics. Using a survey of elected officials in the San Francisco Bay Area, support for various roles in interlocal politics are assessed in relation to the scope of elected officials’ concerns about the use of interlocal agreements, as well as variables related to institutional context. Exploring elected officials’ concerns about interlocal agreements and the roles they undertake in interlocal politics sheds light on the democratic underpinning of metropolitan civil society and highlights new research opportunities at the intersection of public administration, political science and urban studies.

Regionalism, Municipal Organization, and Interlocal Cooperation in Canada

The challenge of governing multi-municipal areas is a long-standing policy problem for those who study local government. While changes to government structures are often suggested as a solution to the coordination and servicing dilemmas inherent within metropolitan areas, more recent research has demonstrated that decentralized, voluntary means of interlocal cooperation show promise in providing for service and policy continuity within these regions. Very little research has been conducted on the state of voluntary cooperation in Canadian metropolitan areas. This article seeks to correct this by studying interlocal agreements within six Canadian metropolitan areas, while introducing new measures for examining the intensity of these relationships. Overall, this article finds that municipalities within these areas are using interlocal agreements sparingly, and those with arrangements are mostly signing low-value, low-risk agreements that do not integrate governance mechanisms or service responsibility.

Bridging Academic and Practitioner Interests on Interlocal Collaboration

Academic interest in local government collaboration is well documented. This article bridges that interest with practitioner preferences in a survey to a dozen experienced city and county managers in Florida on their experience in forging local government collaboration. The results showed that most formal collaboration agreements involved sharing facilities and most informal collaboration agreements involved sharing equipment. Moreover, none of these local managers felt that federal or state mandates had any impact on their agencies decision to enter into collaborative agreements and the managers did not evince a general agreement on either the process to follow to initiate or to evaluate interlocal agreements.

Intergovernmental Cooperation in the Provision of Public Safety: Monitoring Mechanisms Embedded in Interlocal Agreements

AbstractThis article examines how monitoring mechanisms embedded in interlocal agreements (ILAs) are associated with vertical and horizontal intergovernmental relations. The authors hypothesize that ILAs established by local governments with higher‐level governments are likely to rely on a clearly specified set of rules to establish an administrative structure, whereas ILAs established by local governments with other local governments rely on associational benefits to ensure that policy preferences are aligned across multiple political boundaries. The article examines ILAs established by small town, county, and municipal governments in Denton County, Texas, for the provision of emergency medical, police, and fire services. Findings show that more than half of the ILAs specified a financial reporting system, but an almost equal percentage did not contain features requiring financial records to be available for audit by a third party. Quadratic assignment procedure correlation analysis confirmed the presence of cross‐monitoring mechanisms and showed that the patterns of ILAs tend to cluster around a geographic space.Practitioner Points Monitoring mechanisms embedded in interlocal agreements (ILAs) matter, highlighting the important managerial functions played by frontline officers drafting ILAs. The rules embedded in ILAs are important not only for encouraging intergovernmental cooperation but also for reducing the risks associated with contract failures. With the increasing number of ILAs, local government officials need to consider various types of ILAs that are suitable to meet jurisdictional interests and policy preferences.

Public Entrepreneurship and Interlocal Cooperation in County Government

The use of interlocal agreements for the delivery of public services has expanded in recent years. Prior studies show that county governments are well positioned to exercise leadership in the development of interlocal cooperation. Theories of public entrepreneurship and institutional collective action can help us better understand when county government leaders pursue new interlocal agreements or shared service delivery projects. Using a survey of county leaders in five states, this research outlines several hypotheses linking institutional context to county leaders’ roles in the expansion of interlocal cooperation. The survey identifies distinct patterns of support for preparing for interlocal cooperation inside the county and reaching out to other local governments. The findings highlight the need for new research about counties’ internal preparation for interlocal cooperation as well as managers’ tolerance for entrepreneurship and risk.

Regional Cooperation and Multilateral Agreements in the Provision of Public Safety

Although much has been written about interlocal agreements for the delivery of services, few studies have examined the factors that influence the establishment of different types of multilateral agreements (MLAs). To address this lacuna, the authors draw a distinction between an adaptive and restrictive MLA and seek to understand why local governments enter into one type of arrangement over the other. The authors build our theoretical argument on the basis of previous research that suggests agreements are designed to minimize the uncertainties associated with transaction risk. On the basis of this premise, the author’s general proposition is that the decision to establish an adaptive MLA is shaped by the asset specificity and measurability of the goods and services of the transaction. The authors utilize data on public safety agreements among municipal and county governments in the state of Florida. Findings suggest that local governments are more likely to form an adaptive MLA when goods and services are relatively high in service measurability difficulty and when both high and low asset specificity exit.

The Problem of Democratic Anchorage for Interlocal Agreements

More attention must be given to the performance of interlocal agreements (ILAs) as they continue to grow in popularity as a mode of service provision in U.S. cities. This study scrutinizes the democratic performance of ILAs, drawing theoretical insights from the literature on network governance. Because ILAs shift service responsibility from individual cities to multijurisdictional arrangements, these tools may lead to complaints about the responsiveness of the service to the public in the individual units served by the multijurisdictional arrangement. Thus, democratic anchorage is central to assessments of ILA performance. This study evaluates democratic anchorage by identifying concerns with ILAs in interviews with a sample of local elected officials in Michigan. The concerns then are discussed in the context of the institutional collective action framework, a theoretical foundation that has become popular for explaining the emergence of ILAs and regional cooperation.

Overcoming the Barriers to Cooperation: Intergovernmental Service Agreements

Interlocal cooperation through service-sharing agreements has a long history, but its use has increased in popularity during the last 20 years. The decisions of local government units to collaborate through intergovernmental service agreements are best understood as a two-stage process. The first stage, in which communities decide whether to consider interlocal cooperation, involves the nature of the immediate problem faced plus specific demands for performance and efficiency gains that can result from service cooperation. In the second stage, communities confront a question of institutional supply, and hence must overcome inherent bargaining and collective action issues in order to forge interlocal agreements. Heckman probit estimates of such complex relationships using data drawn from a 2003 ICMA survey suggest strong support for this model. The authors conclude by discussing the role of network relationships among local actors for reducing transaction costs and facilitating intergovernmental collaboration.

Prospects for Centralizing Services in an Urban County: Evidence from Eight Self-Organized Networks of Local Public Services

ABSTRACT:Networks of interlocal agreements (ILAs) provide a way for municipal governments in a fragmented region to cooperate on services, and these networks may be especially likely to form when local government officials are linked through interpersonal networks. Drawing on insights from Williams’ Lifestyle Model of Metropolitan Politics and Frederickson’s theory of administrative conjunctions, this paper uses network analytic methods to examine the structure of ILA networks, and to assess the impact of governing officials’ interpersonal networks on the probability of ILAs forming between cities. Forty-four local governments in the Detroit metropolitan area provide the context for this study. Our findings show that these municipalities cooperate more extensively for system maintenance functions, such as transportation infrastructure and public works. More importantly, we find that any given cluster of municipalities has an increased probability of cooperating through ILAs when their senior administrators participate in the same local professional associations. The same effects hold true for elected executives’ networking with counterparts, and for some functions, these electoral conjunctions serve as even stronger predictors of ILA usage than administrator’s networks.

California County Administrators as Sellers and Brokers of Interlocal Cooperation

County administrators occupy a unique position from which to practice concept of admin istrative conjunction. This article reports data on interlocal service agreements by cit ies and counties in California and evaluates extent to which county administrators support two conjunctive roles: selling ser vices to local governments through interlo cal agreements and brokering agreements among other local governments. County administrators' support for administrative conjunction may be limited by their atti tudes toward intergovernmental relations, tenure in office, existing contracting pat terns, and other features of local mar ket for public goods. This study finds that levels of support for broker and seller roles are distinct, highlighting need for more detailed measures of administrative support for interlocal cooperation. The intergovernmental activities of local government administrators have gained new attention in discussions about local govern ment service organization. Local governments in U.S. metropolitan areas are often depicted as competitors for economic development, tax base expansion, and mobile citizen consumers (Schneider 1989; Sokolow 1993; Park 1997; Lewis and Barbour 1999). They are also partners who are tied together in cooperative arrangements to share or jointly produce local government services (Oakerson 1999; Feiock 2004). Prompted by desire to improve efficiency or effectiveness, local officials forge interlocal agreements in order to provide services ranging from policing to parks (Thurmaier and Wood 2004; Chen and Thurmaier 2009). City managers have been identified as key actors in negotiating these agreements. Frederickson (1999) has advanced a theory of administrative conjunction to explain importance of local administrator in met ropolitan cooperation. He defines administra tive conjunction as the array and character of horizontal formal and informal association