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<br />" <br /> <br />International <br />IA\ City/County <br />\CY!~!A <br /> <br />Association <br /> <br />International City/County Management Association <br /> <br />Comparative Performance Measurement Consortium <br /> <br />ICrvIA has been involved with performance measurement for a long time. ICMA's first <br />book in the field, Measuring Municipal Activities, was published in 1943. Its authors, <br />Clarence Ridley (former Executive Director ofICMA) and Herbert Simon (a Nobel Prize <br />winner), were great visionaries. <br /> <br />Over time, measuring effectiveness became generally accepted as a good management <br />practice, but local government managers needed practical techniques for collecting and <br />analyzing data on performance. In a collaborative effort in the early 1970s, ICMAjoined <br />the Urban Institute and the governments of St. Petersburg, Florida, and Nashville/Davidson <br />County, Tennessee, to develop and apply effectiveness measures. Two important reports. <br />came from that work. The first was entitled: Measuring the Effectiveness of Basic <br />Municipal Services: Initial Report. The second report, revised and reprinted in 1992, is <br />How Effective Are Your Community Services? Procedures for Measuring Their Quality. <br />This later work provides specifics on measures, tools, and techniques. Harry Hatry of the <br />Urban Institute and one of the nation's foremost experts on performance measurement <br />provided the research that went into these and other publications. ICMA also worked with <br />the National Science Foundation and several other organizations, including the National <br />Fire Protection Associatiqn (NFPA), in the late 1970's in developing national comparative <br />performance measurement for a variety of local government service delivery areas. <br /> <br />In addition to ICMA's Performance Measurement Consortium, there are several other <br />national efforts. The Governmental Accounting Standards Board, GASB, has spent a <br />great deal of time studying performance measurement and has issued a series of reports <br />entitled Service Efforts and Accomplishments Reporting: Its Time Has Come. The <br />National Academy of Public Administration (NAP A) has passed a resolution expressing <br />their interest in performance measures, as has the American Society for Public <br />Administration (ASP A). In 1993, the federal Government Performance and Results Act <br />made performance measurement a requirement of federal agencies. There are also several <br />international government performance measurement projects going on, such as in New <br />Zealand and Great Britain. <br /> <br />The impetus for ICMA's Comparative Performance Measurement Consortium came in <br />large part from the Large Cities Forum and in response to the large number of members <br />