5.5. SR 05-13-1996 - Laserfiche WebLink

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be annually inflated by the price of government inflation index that is currently used for the local government aid distribution. Local performance aid is funded by reducing each city and county's HACA by $1 per capita and adding an additiona' $1 million of state resources to the overall pool. Combined, these two performance aid revenue sources will generate approximately $4.1 million to fund the program for cities. Each qualifying city will receive a per capita LPA distribution based on the total available city LPA resources divided by the total population of all qualifying cities. The future of LPA Representative Dawkins hopes to expand the local performance aid program next legislative session. In discussions with the League of Minne- sota Cities, he indicated that he would like to increase the funding for the program by $200 million which reflects the current of excess of property tax collections over income taxes. Accord- ing to Representative Dawkins, adding new resources to the performance aid program will be tied to more stringent eligibility criteria for local units of government. Rather than simply gathering workload measures, local units may be required to begin examin- ing efficiency and effectiveness of the services provided to their local resi- dents. Of course, details of these future requirements have yet to be fully developed. If you have any questions about local performance aid, please contact Gary Carlson at the League of Minne- sota Cities or the property tax division of the Minnesota Department of Revenue. ~- April 15, 1996 Mr. Gar), Carlson League of Minnesota Cities 14.5 University Avenue West St. Paul, MN 55103 Dear Mr. Carlson: ...As the chief author of the "Local Performance Aid" provisions of this year's omnibus tax bill (H.F. 2102, Article 3, Sees, 48 and 49), I want to be clear that my intent is that every city and every county qualify for performance aid for calendar year 1997. The threshold to qualify is very low: "affirm that it is in the process of develop. lng and implementing a system of performance measures." So long as a city council or a county board has this as an item on the agenda prior to June 30.1 996, that city or county will qualify for perforrnance aid. In fact, any city or county that presently tracks "workload input ... has already begun the process of developing and implementing performance measures, in others word~, ifa city or county tracks the number of employee hours worked, number of appllcationr pro- cessed, ton~ of garbage collected, number of police arrests, etc., that city or county qualifies... However. I also want to be clear that my intent is that cities and counties will make a good faith effort over the course of the next year to move beyond simple work. load measurement and get to the next levels of performance measurement in due course_. As you kno~; the final report of the Local Government Aid Distribution and Govern.' ment Service Delivery Subcommittee included an Appendix C which had examples from Minnesota cities and counties that already have performance measurement in have your jurisdictions refer to that appendix for examples of what the legislature is expecting. Finally. as i also explained at our meeting, it is my intent w reconvene the Local Government Aid Subcommittee ... prior to the start of the next legislative session to determine what will be in the 1997 tax bill regarding standards for local performance aid and that it is my hope that the 1997 legislature will appropriate $200 million for the next round of performance aid, but this **'ill only happen if cities and counties make a good faith effort to meet the legislative intent contained in the 1996 tax bill and this letter. Please call me with any questions you might have, and I thank you for your coopera- tion in disseminating this letter. ~incerely. Andy Dawkins State Representative Page 6 LMC Cities Bulletin