Intergovernmental Cooperation:
Partnering with other municipalities can stretch your infrastructure budget dollars further
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As federal tax dollars for local governments continue to decline, municipal officials face tough questions regarding their ability to budget for badly needed infrastructure improvements. The answer to these questions, however, may be right next door – in the neighboring municipalities.
By partnering with other municipalities for planning initiatives, roadway improvements, stormwater management, and water and wastewater treatment, municipal officials can vastly improve the quality of service they provide to their residents while reducing the costs associated with these efforts. Moreover, they may increase their likelihood of receiving state grant money, which often gives higher priority to regional projects over those requested by individual boroughs and townships.
A 1994 study by the Penn State Cooperative Extension (in conjunction with the Pennsylvania State Associations of Boroughs, Township Supervisors, and Township Commissioners) found that four out of five of the municipalities that responded already cooperated on fire protection and 49 percent cooperated on wastewater treatment. Today those numbers continue to grow, and the applications for which cooperative efforts are used continue to expand.
What are the benefits of partnering with other municipalities for infrastructure improvements such as roads, parks, and sewer systems?
The economies of scale achieved through partnerships allow municipalities to provide greater service to their residents for less money.
Many of the costs associated with an infrastructure improvement project are fixed costs that will not change dramatically by expanding the project over several municipalities. Thus, each participating municipality will pay a smaller share of those fixed costs than they would have if they had initiated the project on their own. Water and wastewater engineering is a perfect example. Certain costs like electricity, the number of personnel, and the number of chemicals required for water and wastewater treatment facilities will have a negligible change with the addition of another 200 users from a neighboring municipality. Therefore, it makes sense for municipalities to form a partnership and share these fixed costs when improvements or new facilities are needed. By doing so, they are able to reduce the financial burden of the treatment facilities on their residents while providing greater service than they were able to do before.
State and federal grant money often gives higher priority to regional projects over those initiated by a single municipality.
Transportation engineer Brian Emberg, P.E., says, “Competition for federal and state funding is extremely competitive … There is a very high demand for a limited amount of dollars, and proper coordination to document the need for a project is absolutely essential.” In the area of roadways and bridges, this is particularly true because the metropolitan planning organizations that recommend projects for the state's Transportation Improvement Program often give extra weight to projects that involve intermunicipal cooperation. The Department of Conservation and Natural Resources also gives preference to recreational facilities that will service multiple municipalities over those for a single borough or township when doling out grant money.
Municipal boundaries are arbitrary.
As civil engineer Albert Brulo, P.E., puts it, “Everybody is downstream of somebody.” Rivers are not confined within the borders of a municipality, and neither are roadways or air current. Poor (or non-existent) stormwater management efforts in one municipality will impact all of the other municipalities that share its watershed when that watershed becomes polluted. In much the same way, congestion issues on a heavily traveled roadway will quickly spread from one municipality to another as that roadway winds its way past municipal boundary lines.
What types of infrastructure improvement projects are best suited for cooperative efforts between municipalities?
Water and Wastewater Treatment
The cost of upgrading water and wastewater treatment facilities (or building new facilities) is great, but much of it comes from fixed costs that do not change much with the addition of more users into the system. By sharing these fixed costs with neighboring municipalities, borough officials can greatly reduce the cost per user to their own municipality. In some cases, a borough might not have been able to afford to improve its water and wastewater infrastructure without a cooperative agreement; thus the arrangement actually allows them to offer services it couldn't have offered otherwise (like bringing public water and sewer to new areas in which it didn't exist before). This, in turn, provides other benefits. By bringing public water and sewer to new areas, for example, they encourage development, which can be a boon to their local economy.
Another reason intermunicipal cooperation on water and wastewater infrastructure projects is so popular is because of the increasing sophistication required to operate water and wastewater systems in Pennsylvania . Regardless of a treatment plant's size or the amount of water it processes daily, the law requires the plant to have at least two licensed operators on staff. Yet small plants that treat only 100,000 gallons of water per day may not need to have two operators work full-time. As licensing requirements become more stringent by the year (requiring greater expertise and continuing education), it becomes increasingly difficult to find people to fill these positions when a municipality cannot offer them full time hours. Regulations also include certain testing requirements that mandate the use of accredited laboratory facilities, but the cost of maintaining these facilities is high. Therefore, it is often more practical to regionalize water and wastewater treatment and use one lab instead of several in a particular area.
Surveying and Geographic Information Systems Development
Like water and wastewater infrastructure, Geographic Information Systems (GIS) can be very expensive, but they can also save municipalities a great deal of money through greater efficiency. One way to reduce the cost of developing these systems is to cooperate with neighboring municipalities in the base mapping phase. When developing a GIS, aerial photography should be taken of the area, which is then used to produce an accurate base map of the municipality. To reference these aerial photos to actual locations on the ground, surveyors must locate a certain number of “control points” that can easily be identified in the photos. Because the number of control points needed to cover two municipalities is not significantly different from that required to cover one and most of the cost associated with obtaining aerial photos is related to the cost of getting the plane in the air, the price of procuring these services can be greatly reduced by including other municipalities in the project. Herbert, Rowland & Grubic, Inc. is currently working with two municipalities in Dauphin County to create aerial mapping in this way. Had they contracted the work independently, it would have cost them approximately $5,000 per mile. By contracting the work simultaneously, however, their cost is reduced to just $4,000 per mile!
Transportation Planning and Roadway Design
Most roadways (and the traffic they bring) routinely cross municipal boundaries; thus, transportation planning efforts require a regional perspective, as well. Current efforts to improve the intersection of Walnut Street and Progress Avenue in Susquehanna Township , Dauphin County , illustrate this fact clearly. This intersection is a common route of access for suburbanites to downtown Harrisburg , but drivers must cross through Penbrook Borough before reaching the city via this route. Thus, any improvements to the intersection that cause more people to use this route for access to the city will increase traffic in Penbrook, as well. Consequently, the borough has asked Susquehanna Township for input into the intersection improvement alternatives that are considered, and the township has agreed. Such foresight will be greatly beneficial to all parties involved.
Watershed Planning/Stormwater Management
As stated previously, watersheds cross many municipal boundaries; thus, the efforts to prevent pollution or flooding associated with these watersheds must cross municipal boundaries, as well. This very principle is the reason behind Pennsylvania 's Act 167 law, which requires stormwater management initiatives to be performed on a watershed-wide basis, not a municipal one. Because the state recognizes the importance of intermunicipal cooperation in these efforts, it reimburses municipalities for 75 percent of the cost of implementing stormwater ordinances in accordance with the Act 167 plan for their region. Though such plans are to be created by counties (not municipalities), they can be initiated by a municipality if it thinks there is a need for one. If a borough has issues with stormwater management and no Act 167 plan exists within the county, borough officials can suggest that the county create one. This will save the borough money it would have spent correcting the problem itself and create a more effective solution because similar stormwater management initiatives will be established in neighboring municipalities that impact stormwater in its area, as well.
Recreational Facilities Design
Recreational facilities such as ball parks, playgrounds, swimming pools, and trails improve the quality of life for local residents, but their cost can be more than one municipality can bear. By spreading the cost of developing and maintaining such facilities over several municipalities, boroughs may be able to provide recreational opportunities for their residents that would otherwise be impossible. Many municipalities throughout the state are creating regional recreation commissions, for this reason.
Planning & Zoning
Recent changes in the Municipalities Planning Code allow intermunicipal cooperation on planning and zoning to occur, which is a great benefit to borough and township officials. When neighboring municipalities create zoning ordinances independently, they may unintentionally create conflicting plans that prevent the proper extension of water lines, sewer lines, and roadways at their borders. They may also create situations in which incompatible land uses are zoned at their borders. (For example, one municipality may zone the land at its eastern border for industrial use, while the neighboring municipality zones land on the other side of that border as residential.) Joint planning and zoning efforts eliminate such conflicts, and they are also beneficial to smaller municipalities, struggling to meet state requirements to zone for every type of land use within their borders. By working with another municipality (or several), they can zone for all of those uses over a much larger area. Adams County Commissioners are currently encouraging municipal officials in their jurisdiction to pursue a joint comprehensive plan project, which was recently approved by council members in Bendersville Borough. Such efforts are occurring around the state.
How do I form a cooperative arrangement with other municipalities?
Act 177 (also known as the Intergovernmental Cooperation Law) establishes certain standards and ground rules for formal partnership agreements between municipalities. Under this law, the partnerships must be enacted by an ordinance that specifies the agreement's objectives, duration, methods of financing, and the manner in which property will be acquired, leased or sold. Councils of Government (such as SEDA-COG) and municipal authorities are specific examples of Act 177 agreements, but partnerships between municipalities need not be so formal. In instances that do not involve joint ownership of property, loans, or other legal responsibilities, many municipalities find it preferable to rely on an informal “handshake agreement.” Such agreements can be arranged much more quickly, but they often don't address long-term liability issues and can be misunderstood by one side or the other. Then again, in some cases, an agreement between municipalities is not necessary at all. Some engineering firms will coordinate with multiple municipalities on a project in order to achieve the cost savings such an arrangement will bring, but they contract with each municipality separately. In this way, each municipality has individual control over its area, which is often a preferable arrangement for municipal officials anyway. In cases where separate contracts are not possible and the municipalities must contract with an engineer as a single unit, special consideration must be given to the manner in which each municipality's share of the costs is calculated. The following are just a few of the ways in which this can be done fairly:
Equal Contribution
If all participating municipalities are approximately the same size and will receive equal benefit from the program, the total cost of the effort can be divided equally among them.
Population
If a particular program benefits the general population equally, each municipality's share can be determined by the number of residents it has.
Assessed valuation
In other cases, each municipality may pay a share of the total program cost that is based on the relative size of its tax base in comparison to other participating municipalities. (In other words, if the total value of the tax base of all participating municipalities is equal to X and Municipality #1's individual tax base makes up 35% of that value X, Municipality #1 pays 35% of the total program cost.)
Use
Some programs like libraries or recreational facilities require residents to register in order to use them. In these cases, a municipality's share of the cost can be determined by calculating what percentage of the total program users reside in its municipality. (For example, if the public library has 100 members and 45 of them reside in Municipality #1, Municipality #1 pays 45% of the total library cost.)
For more information on forming intermunicipal agreements for infrastructure improvement projects, please contact us.
Robert Grubic, P.E., is president of HRG and the retained engineer for Susquehanna Township in Dauphin County. He has extensive experience providing engineering services to a wide variety of public and private sector clients and is an active member of the business community in Central Pennsylvania. He has been providing retainer engineering services to local governments for more than 30 years.
This article was first published by the Borough News Magazine in November 2004 and is reproduced with the publisher's permission. Borough News is published by the Pennsylvania State Association of Boroughs (PSAB) - 2941 N. Front Street, Harrisburg, PA 17110. PSAB has represented the interests of boroughs and has helped to shape the laws that have laid the foundation for boroughs and other municipal governments. For more information, visit www.boroughs.org. |
