Merger answers difficult to find
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Two centuries after the first of 33 city-county mergers in the United States, researchers still can't answer one key question: Do they work?
That question can't help but bedevil an effort to chart a path for the city of Pittsburgh and Allegheny County.
"A year from now, when you ask the question, 'Should the city merge with the county?' we'll have the answer," Mayor Luke Ravenstahl said when the advisory committee was formed in October 2006.
Yet, more than a year later, University of Pittsburgh Chancellor Mark Nordenberg, who heads the committee, said it had done exhaustive research but was still "in the consensus-building phase."
If nationally published research is any guide, consensus may be hard to reach.
The most recent consolidation, Louisville in 2000, was driven by the loss of one-third of the city's population and the growth of surrounding Jefferson County.
Did the merger help? Not according to Hank Savitch, the Brown and Williamson professor of urban and public affairs at the University of Louisville, who is writing a book on the subject to be called "Transformation Without Change."
His 2004 paper on the merger, and subsequent research, found neither savings nor the economic boon promised by consolidation's business backers in a high-dollar ad blitz. "Really, to be blunt about it, it was a pack of lies," he said.
Government costs continued to grow at the same pace, defying predictions that economies of scale would save money. "You need more layers of supervision, and it becomes much more cumbersome to run public works, to run the police department, to run emergency services and the like," Mr. Savitch said.
Bigger not always better
Several consolidation experts said government gets more efficient as it gets bigger -- until it hits a point at which that trend reverses. The trick is identifying that tipping point.
Pat Hardy, a municipal consultant at the University of Tennessee who has managed cities and advised governments on consolidations, said the "scale for most municipal services tips at about 15,000 customers," after which getting bigger means getting less efficient.
Athens and Clarke County, Ga., merged in 1991, and a study found that government initially cost more, before levelling off.
"You may have some savings if you had two managers, or two directors of different departments," said Betty Hudson at the University of Georgia's Carl Vinson Institute of Government, who co-authored the Athens study. "But generally, you're not going to be cutting the amount of staff you have." In fact, the merger of two workforces can force government to raise the pay and benefits of one to match those of the other.
Several studies have found that borrowing costs drop when cities and counties merge. Former Albuquerque Mayor David Rusk, a prominent speaker and consultant on consolidation, found that seven merged city-counties had credit ratings that were, on average, in the high-grade category, while 15 cities that stayed separate averaged one credit level lower. The effect: Consolidated cities could borrow at lower interest.
It's impossible to calculate whether consolidation has an effect on economic growth, Mr. Savitch said. In the case of Louisville, promises of a turnaround "simply weren't borne out," he said. "All we can say is that after consolidation, Louisville has done worse."
One theory holds that in the global economy, a region has to have a focused message and plan, and consolidation can help.
"Getting toward regional governance is just critical, as the economy is globalizing," said Mark Muro, policy director at the Brookings Institution's Metropolitan Policy Program, who has studied Pennsylvania's local governments.
Regions like southwestern Pennsylvania need "a much more cohesive, nimble, decisive regional governance, so you can do your transportation investments wisely, so you can have a coherent economic development network," he said.
Success stories
For a glowing review of consolidation's development benefits, go west. "In Wyandotte County and Kansas City, Kan., it was a very important turning point," said Suzanne M. Leland, a professor of political science at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte and co-author of the coming book "City-County Consolidation: Promises Made, Promises Kept."
Merged in 1997, that city-county saw a big jump in development in its western end, anchored by a speedway that became a major tourist attraction. Total real estate values rose 76 percent in a decade, allowing tax rates to drop 25 percent, according to information provided by Wyandotte County. Permits for new single-family homes are triple what they were before consolidation -- though population declines haven't stopped, and have only slowed slightly.
The 1969 merger of Indianapolis, Ind., and Marion County has been held up as a development success. Professor William Blomquist, of Indiana University, found in a 1995 study that centralizing development power "contributed strongly" to the city's reinvention as an amateur-sports paradise. Employment grew faster than in most comparable -- but unconsolidated -- cities and counties. Manufacturing job losses, though, were similar to other cities.
Though it's called Unigov, the Indianapolis solution falls far short of complete unification. Four cities within Marion County remain independent, and a number of towns have limited autonomy. Public safety services remain fragmented even within the Unigov boundaries. The center city still pays higher taxes than outer neighborhoods.
"What may be Unigov's clearest and longest lasting impact on central-city residents is that the consolidation has solidified Republican Party control of city government," Mr. Blomquist wrote. It transformed a Democratic-leaning city government and a Republican-dominated county structure into a single GOP bastion, he wrote.
In 1999, a Democrat won the Unigov mayor's race for the first time, but he lost it to a Republican last year.
Minority representation has been a lightning-rod issue. In Louisville, the pre-consolidation city's Board of Aldermen was one-third African American. Though consolidated district lines were drawn to favor black candidates, the new 26-member metro council has six African-American members -- less than one-quarter of its number -- reducing minority clout, in Mr. Savitch's view.
Political calculus is one reason some Pittsburgh officials -- all of whom are Democrats -- cringe at the idea of full consolidation. The fact that Republican Jim Roddey won the 1999 race for county chief executive proves that the GOP could win in a merged entity -- giving that party control of the city's 3,300-person workforce and $424 million budget, plus related authorities.
Political costs
In talking about city-county consolidation, Mr. Ravenstahl has focused on sharing services, like the city's year-old arrangement to collect trash for neighboring Wilkinsburg, which he's in the process of extending for three years.
"I see someday the city taking over the county, not the county taking over the city," City Councilman Jim Motznik said at Wednesday's council meeting, during a discussion of the Wilkinsburg pact extension.
Some experts argue that it's just as effective, and less politically painful, to combine certain departments without erasing whole governments. Mr. Rusk said that's likely the only way to go for Pittsburgh.
"There's just no prospect that the other 129 municipalities within Allegheny County are going to join" a merged government, Mr. Rusk said. Nor is there any unclaimed county territory that could be given as a "dowry," in his words, to entice the city to wed. "So what's the benefit?"
Where backers can't show benefits for both the city and county, consolidation almost always flops at the ballot box. By Mrs. Leland's count, 80 percent of consolidation referenda fail.
Pennsylvania law requires that for governments to merge, there must be a voter referendum and majorities of residents of each entity have to vote yes. If it fails on one side or the other, it can't be tried again for five years.
That law, though, excludes both Pittsburgh and Allegheny County. Any wedding of the two would occur under as-yet-unwritten rules.
With plenty of questions about consolidation unanswered, many of the nation's theorists and practitioners have their eyes on Pittsburgh.
"Pittsburgh is really ground zero in terms of governance questions in the country," said Mr. Muro. "You have some of the most urgent challenges, and it's one of the largest places that faces these issues."
First Published January 20, 2008 12:00 am
