Chapter 2
Local Governments are Key to Building Trust and Improving Performance
Chapter 2 covers the growth of local governments in the United States, the importance of local governments, and who does the work of local government.
Local governments are the lifeblood of American democracy. They play a role that is unequaled in the world. They enjoy extraordinary police powers that provide local communities with the ability to control the amounts, kinds and costs of services they care most about. Local governments contribute to the GDP an amount that is equal to the national and state levels of government. They employ more public servants than their national and state counterparts and they enjoy higher levels of citizen trust. They rely on a governance model that entails much more cooperation between elected officials, administrators and citizens than is the case at our state and federal levels of government. Looking into the future, we anticipate that local governments will continue to grow in importance as fundamental differences in what democracy means gets joined and decided locally. We see this playing out daily in debates over the role of policing, the treatment of immigrants, the content of school curriculum, addressing the homeless crisis, gun violence and numerous other equally weighty issues.