Does Local Government Coproduction Lead to Budget Adjustments? An Investigation of Boston, MA and San Francisco, CA

Abstract

Coproduction provides a broad range of benefits to governments and citizens. However, we currently lack an understanding of how coproduction influences resource allocations. This article focuses on one application of coproduction, 311 systems, and how citizen requests might influence departmental budget allocations. We track budget allocation in the cities of Boston and San Francisco for 106 departments or sub-units from FY2005-FY2013.

The findings indicate that there is no significant resource benefit for departments using 311 versus those that do not. While departments using 311 do have larger budget allocations than those that do not, those departments had larger budget allocations prior to the implementation of 311. It also provides evidence that data generated through the process of coproduction, similar to data generated for the measurement of performance, has little to no effect on the budget allocation process.

Keywords: coproduction, 311 systems, Boston, San Francisco, performance measurement, citizen particiaption