In April of 2007, the Florida City and County Management Association (FCCMA) entered into an agreement with the Reubin O’D. Askew School of Public Administration and Policy at Florida State University (FSU) and the John Scott Dailey Florida Institute of Government (IOG) to form the Center for Florida Local Government Excellence, hereafter referred to as CFLGE (pronounced sea flag).
Our mission is to build and maintain meaningful partnerships that will provide education, professional development and researched-based information to local government administrators through collaborative partnerships with other Florida Universities and agencies that support our initiative. With the vision of developing a premier model (recognized nationally and internationally) for educating and assisting current and future generations of local government administrators in Florida.
What specifically is the CFLGE doing?
A Two Year Program of Work (2008-2009) has been developed. Input was received from FCCMA's Board members, Past Presidents Council, District members, and the Emerging Professionals Council. Input was also obtained from the faculty at the Florida State University Askew School of Public Administration, representatives from the Florida League of Cities, the Florida Association of Counties, and the CFGLE Steering Committee. The CFLGE is everyone's local government resource center and input and participation is encouraged.
Among the more exciting aspects of the program is the “Certificate in Florida City and County Management”. This certificate program includes four courses that address “the real” day- to-day management of Florida local governments. The courses are taken on-line with two full-day meetings required for each course. At these day-long meetings, students will discuss their on-line materials and interact with experienced managers in a very interactive format. The courses will be located in FCCMA Districts throughout the state and be timed to correlate with other activities in their area.
In regards to the CFLGE Division of Research, Associate Director, Bob Lee, presented a "draft report" on Unfunded Mandates in Florida at the Florida ASPA conference that was held on May 2nd. Lee Feldman, City Manager in Palm Bay, Jim Ley, County Manager in Sarasota County, Jim Dineen, County Manager in Volusia, and Mark Abels, City Manager in Deland joined him on the CFLGE panel. The panel discussed the paper and the impact of unfunded mandates, along with solutions for meeting the challenges in Florida's current revenue reducing climate. The unfunded mandates report is a project that Dr. Lee, who is also a member of the faculty at the Askew School, is working on with Dr. Lance dehaven-Smith, Professor at the Askew School and Director of CFLGE. The report provides a historical overview of unfunded mandates in Florida and includes case studies involving 15 diverse cities and counties with a focus on the financial impacts of these mandates. A final copy of the report along with a summary of the ASPA panel discussion will be available on this website at the end of May.
