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Building A More Effective Government

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 28, 2007

Lately, The Tampa Tribune, St. Petersburg Times and other state newspapers have been full of articles about government agencies bemoaning the economic downturn and the impact it has had on their budgets.

At the time when our economy and real estate markets were booming, I asked myself: Will the expansion of our economy last forever? I spent many years in private business before serving as Hillsborough County tax collector. I learned that the ability to navigate through downturns is a more important business skill than being able to ride atop periods of economic expansion.

As such, I want to issue a challenge to all state and local agencies to incorporate the best of business strategies into their budget planning and organizational systems. My challenge is threefold:

• Modernize and clean all public office spaces: Smart capital purchases and utilization of modern and cost-effective technologies are the best ways to cut operational costs and keep them low. For example, the tax collector's office purchased and implemented the Q-matic line-queuing system that reduced client wait times so dramatically that we can promise customers they will not have to wait longer than 15 minutes (on average) for service.

Punctuality, modernization and cleanliness are qualities we should all expect when dealing with any state or local agency.

• Be fiscally conservative: It is critically important that public agencies utilize tight budgetary controls. At the Hillsborough County Tax Collector's office, we give initial budget priority to costs that are essential for operations, with an emphasis on our most valuable asset, our people.

Eighty percent of our budget is allocated for FTEs, and we have only added five new positions in the past five years despite an increase of over 200,000 transactions annually.

You can only accomplish this by hiring the best people, compensating them fairly, and creating a focus on learning.

Our second budget priority is to implement systems that improve our processes and save money.

• Put your primary focus on service that exceeds customer expectations: It is government's job to serve the public. There is no reason why government cannot incorporate friendly customer service models into the way it conducts business.

In fiscal year 2007, the Tax Collector's office collected approximately 50,000 comment cards which indicated 99 percent of our customers were satisfied with the service provided by our office.

We have a management philosophy at the tax collector's office: If it ain't broke, improve it! There is not a single process that cannot be tweaked to make it work better.

There is such a thing as effective and responsible government, and it is high time that we demand it as citizens of this great state.

Doug Belden is Hillsborough County's tax collector.

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