Budgeting for Outcomes

One of Illinois' best new state Senators has begun the effort to put into place in Springfield an approach to budget reform that models exactly what I have been calling for since the start of my campaign. I have long felt that we should implement this general kind of approach in Cook County.

During my teaching career, we used the word "outcomes" all the time -- as our very methodological foundation. OBE (outcomes-based education) is a student-centered approach that revolutionized teaching some years ago. OBE is dedicated to measuring performance empirically. Rather than the traditional teacher-centered approach, OBE would help us get at exactly what we want to see students DO. (Traditional education always focused on resources being given to students that we called "inputs.") OBE is very open to lots of new ideas and can be flexibly applied. But it takes education one important step away from the past rote-learning, teacher-centered models. It requires instead that students demonstrate that they have learned the required skills and content.

I have long understood that these same principles, if applied to Cook County government, would go a long way to implementing desperately needed reform. The focus should not be on the Todd Strogers of the world putting in place the spending that they want -- based on their agenda and which friends they want to help.

Budgeting decisions should be made on the basis of OUTCOMES.

I said when I first announced my run for this office that I would call for a new process in which we first asked the fundamental questions of outcomes, as any sound business would do.

What should Cook County government be DOING?

State Senator Dan Kotowski, an old friend of mine and one of my earliest and most enthusiastic supporters, is working feverishly up until the Memorial Day weekend legislative holiday to get this new approach to budget reform put in place for state government in Springfield. I wish him every success. If anyone can get this done, he can; he is one of the most talented young legislators Illinois has ever seen. Given the climate in Springfield, however, I am not holding my breath.

His newsletter recently told us about his efforts to reform the disastrous Illinois financial situation: "These reforms focus on a wide-range of cuts and innovative, cost-saving measures, as well as an initiative called Budgeting for Outcomes (BFO). BFO will fundamantally transform how we spend taxpayer dollars in Illinois. Budgeting for Outcomes (BFO) will fundamentally reform the way the State prioritizes and spends taxpayer dollars. A dramatic departure from cost-based budgeting, BFO (also known as 'Results Budgeting') focuses on better results for taxpayers' dollars spent on government. The first step of BFO is defining spending priorities (such as job creation, education, health care, transportation, and public safety) and identifying how much revenue is actually available. The next step is to create measurable outcomes for these priorities. The process encourages legislators and state agencies to then find creative ways to achieve these goals using the limited resources available . . . Budgeting for Outcomes will fix our broken and ineffective budgeting process by placing clearly defined checks on spending and creating performance-based accountability.”

Senator Kotowkski goes on: "BFO also requires annual reports on how well programs and agencies achieved their outcomes. This information will allow legislators and agencies to have data-driven reasons (as opposed to personal, political ones) for cutting, eliminating, reforming and funding programs and agencies. BFO has already been adopted by several state and local governments, including Washington state and Iowa. In Washington, BFO took a $2.5 billion budget deficit and turned this crisis into an opportunity to improve the effectiveness of state programs while at the same time reducing costs."

Read my previous blog posts on Zero-based budgeting. This BFO will complement and enhance this approach to fixing what is wrong in Cook County. Implementing an outcomes-based budget in the Cook County will be among my top priorities once elected.