State Agencies Must Imporve Efficiency

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Kotowski: State Agencies Must Improve Efficiency

Springfield IL—In an effort to cut costs and re-establish the people’s faith in Illinois government, State Sen. Dan Kotowski (D-Park Ridge) is holding state agencies to the same standard of efficiency as private companies.

“Illinois government is drowning in debt and deficits,” said Kotowski, Chair of the Senate Commerce Committee. “We can no longer tolerate state agencies that waste valuable time and resources. The state must run itself as much like a business as possible—producing the best possible outcomes at the lowest possible cost.”

Last year, Kotowski insisted that the State Budget Implementation Act include a provision requiring state agencies to formulate plans to improve their quality, accountability and performance. He is now using his position as Chair of the Commerce Committee to monitor agencies’ progress and to help them formulate plans for the future. He held the first of a series of hearings on state agency efficiency on Thursday, February 5th.

“I believe Illinois taxpayers expect their government to provide high-quality services at a reasonable cost,” Kotowski said. “They will no longer tolerate excessive bureaucracy and squandered resources.”

At the preliminary hearing on Thursday, Kotowski and the other members of the Commerce Committee heard testimony from a state agency that has successfully reformed its corporate culture to improve its efficiency—the Department of Healthcare and Family Services (DHFS) Division of Child Support Enforcement. Pam Lowry of DHFS explained how her division employed the Malcolm Baldrige Quality Model to drastically improve its effectiveness with no additional funding from the state or federal government and staffing cutbacks.

According to Ms. Lowry, her agency was able to effect this impressive change by taking an honest assessment of their performance, developing concrete performance measurements, and changing their corporate culture to improve efficiency. In addition to much better performance and cost-effectiveness, the division has improved the public perception of its credibility and managed to secure more federal incentive dollars.

“Every state agency should honestly assess its performance and do what it can to improve,” Kotowski said. “This kind of initiative is what Illinois taxpayers expect and deserve.”

The next hearing will most likely take place during the week of March 8th.

For more information, contact Ian Watts at 217.782.0591.

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