Managing Local Government
Managing Local Government

Author: Kimberly L. Nelson

Publisher: CQ Press

Published: 2017-08-04

Total Pages: 266

ISBN-13: 1506323383

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Managing Local Government: An Essential Guide for Municipal and County Managers offers a practical introduction to the changing structure, forms, and functions of local governments. Taking a metropolitan management perspective, authors Kimberly Nelson and Carl W. Stenberg explain U.S. local government within historical context and provide strategies for effective local government management and problem solving. Real-life scenarios and contemporary issues illustrate the organization and networks of local governments; the roles, responsibilities, and relationships of city and county managers; and the dynamics of the intergovernmental system. Case studies and discussion questions in each chapter encourage critical analysis of the challenges of collaborative governance. Unlike other books on the market, this text’s combined approach of theory and practice encourages students to enter municipal and county management careers and equips them with tools to be successful from day one.

Local Politics: A Practical Guide to Governing at the Grassroots
Local Politics: A Practical Guide to Governing at the Grassroots

Author: Terry Christensen

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2014-12-18

Total Pages: 587

ISBN-13: 1317465822

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Unlike most competing texts that are densely written and heavily theoretical, with little flavor of political life, this book is a readable, jargon-free introduction to real-life local politics for today's students. While it encompasses local government and politics in cities and towns across America, "Local Politics: A Practical Guide to Governing at the Grassroots" gives special attention to the politics of suburbia, where many students live, and encourages them to become engaged in their own communities. The book is also distinguished by its strong emphasis on nuts-and-bolts practical politics. It provides focused discussion of institutions, roles, and personalities as well as the dynamic environment of local politics (demographics, immigration, globalization, etc.) and major policy issues (budgets, land use, transportation, education, etc.). Other texts treat communities as abstractions and readers as passive observers. "Local Politics: A Practical Guide to Governing at the Grassroots" is designed to inspire civic engagement as well as understanding. It features "In Your Community" research projects for students in every chapter along with informative tables, clear charts, essential terms, and guides to useful websites.

The Public Administrator's Companion
The Public Administrator's Companion

Author: Sandra Emerson

Publisher: Waveland Press

Published: 2022-12-05

Total Pages: 526

ISBN-13: 1478650613

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The second edition of The Public Administrator’s Companion: A Practical Guide examines the most important elements of public administration. The authors provide readers with a keen understanding of how government works, useful for both students and practitioners of public administration. The book discusses governmental structure, human resources, and public funding. It delineates administrators’ actions in strategic planning, consensus building, budget development, performance measurement, and public policy assessment and implementation. This edition includes new chapters on nonprofit organizations and leadership for administrators, as well as an appendix about preparing and making presentations. The previous edition’s appendix on getting a job in local government has been revised to include interviewing and hiring from the perspectives of both the agency and applicant. Real-world examples and cases from the local, state, and federal level reinforce key topics. Each chapter ends with a “Practicing Public Administration” section that provides helpful exercises for building the skills described in the chapter and a “Bibliography,” which provides useful source materials that can broaden the reader’s comprehension of the chapter.

Tools for Decision Making
Tools for Decision Making

Author: David N. Ammons

Publisher:

Published: 2021-09-09

Total Pages: 400

ISBN-13: 9780367654399

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This book guides readers to mastery of a wide array of practical analytic techniques useful to local governments. Written in an easy-to-read style with an emphasis on providing practical assistance to students, local government practitioners, and others interested in local government performance, this updated third edition features analytic methods selected for their relevance to everyday problems encountered in city and county governments. The authors outline a variety of practical techniques including the simplest that the fields of management, public administration, policy analysis, and industrial engineering have to offer. Each analytic technique is introduced in the context of a fictitious case presented over a few pages at the beginning of that technique's chapter. Contents include demand analysis, work distribution analysis, process flow-charting, inflation adjustments, annualizing capital costs, staffing analysis, identifying full costs of a program or service, present value analysis, life-cycle costing, lease/buy analysis, cost-effectiveness analysis, benchmarking analysis, and more. This updated third edition features a dramatic expansion of Excel-based applications, plus templates and exercises accompanying many of the chapters and available online. New chapters prepare readers to: - use statistical tests to identify significant differences in performance averages; - construct Pareto charts; - develop cause-and-effect diagrams; - prepare control charts; - detect possible discrimination in hiring and appointment practices; and - present analytic evidence more effectively. This book is an essential resource for students and instructors of public administration courses on analysis, methods, evaluation, productivity improvement, and service delivery. Online resources for this book, including Excel templates, are available at https: //toolsfordecisionmaking.sog.unc.edu

The Local Council Clerk's Guide
The Local Council Clerk's Guide

Author: Paul Clayden

Publisher: Shaw Books

Published: 2004

Total Pages: 168

ISBN-13:

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This book fills an important gap in the published advice available to the thousands of individuals who act as parish council clerks. It covers all aspects of a clerk's appointment and duties, from the constitutional role of local councils, through the terms of appointment of clerks to their day-to-day responsibilities. Practical advice and guidance is given on such matters as preparing for meetings, supervision of staff (if any ), finances and, most importantly, relationships with councillors. and there is a section on the legal status of local councils. This new edition takes account of the many changes in law and practice since the book was first published. The main change is the bringing into force of the new ethical framework for councillors enacted in the Local Government Act 2000 but unimplemented when the first edition went to press. Other important changes include new Accounts and Audit Regulations made in 2003 and, also in 2003, the promulgation of the Quality Parish Council Scheme in England.