this is what happens when government funds something

interesting thoughts

The dude still abidesWednesday, Mar 20, 2013

* If you want to see what a successful Illinois Republican is - not some ideologically embittered hyperpartisan - then you have to go no further than Big Jim Thompson.
Elected four times as governor, Thompson embodied Illinois Republicanism. Tough, accomplished, governing-focused and pro-business but with a decidedly humane and moderate face.
Thompson spoke this month to the World Presidents’ Organization/Young Presidents’ Organization Chicago Chapter forum and part of his speech has been transcribed. We ran some excerpts the other day, but I strongly urge you to read the whole thing now. This guy still has it…

We need to improve the business climate in the state of Illinois because we need to increase employment in the state of Illinois. There is no sounder reason to increase employment and to drive down the cost to the state of Illinois of pensions and pension reform than more jobs in this state. Two million people in a population of 12.8 million, 2 million people in the state of Illinois are on food stamps. Two million, Why? Because they don’t have jobs that can support themselves and their family. They don’t have enough money to buy food, so they’re on food stamps.

Now we’ve got a choice. We can continue all those people on food stamps and just push (them) away, put them behind the curtain, don’t think about them. Or we can work to increase the business climate in this state to provide the jobs that will start taking people off food stamps and off welfare and off government assistance.

Thompson, unlike so many modern “conservatives,” did not demonize the poor and heap condemnations upon them He fervently wants to help them with the only hand up that really matters: A decent job.
* But he’s no automatic mouthpiece for big business, either…

We’ve got to scour the tax code of this state, get rid of wasteful tax expenditures, or have a rational tax policy that encourages business and its growth in this state. And you can tell the difference. And yes, various businesses will come and say, “But keep mine.” OK. That happens all the time. But the governor and the legislature can decide who’s right in that one. Academics can help them decide who’s right in that one., Economists can help them decide who’s right in that one. You don’t have to listen to every special plea no matter where it’s from. But if we’re not constantly looking at our tax policy, looking at our unemployment compensation policy, looking at our workers’ compensation policy to make this state a haven for business and send those carpetbaggers from Wisconsin and Indiana and Iowa and Mississippi and Alabama and Texas back to their own states. Thank you very much, we’ve got just as good a business climate in Illinois as any that you can conjure up to make our people move. If we don’t put our efforts behind that, if we don’t link it to government expenditures beginning with pension reform, we are going to be in even bigger trouble.

* And he wants us to think big, like he did back in the day…

We need to substantially repair Illinois’ infrastructure. The governor is going to hope to sell $800 million in bonds shortly that would go for capital projects, infrastructure. It’s not enough. It’s not enough. […]

Look, I used to be proud to say that Illinois was the transportation center of the world. And it was literally true. What’s the largest economy in the world? The United States. What state has more components of a transportation system than any other? Illinois. Sitting in the heart of the nation. Criss-crossed by Interstate highways north, south, east, west. The Mississippi River flowing down, the Illinois River. Railroads running into the state and out of the state. Illinois in Lincoln’s time was the jumping-off place for the railroads to go west, To bring the finished goods from eastern and Midwestern factories out to the West and to bring the grain and the beef back. We still occupy that position even though the cargo that we carry may be different now.

O’Hare until just recently was the busiest airport in the world. Now, if the United States is the largest economy in the world and if Illinois has more transportation components than any other state, then Illinois is literally the transportation capital of the world and we ought to act like it and keep that system in repair. Because when you talk about the economy of this state you have to pay very close attention to what I call the economic backbone. Of the state. What do I mean by that?

The transportation system, obviously. The ability to get the employees to and from work. The ability to get goods out of your factory to where you’re sending them across the world. The ability to get raw materials in to aid in your process of manufacturing. If we don’t have a good, decent transportation system, we will never have a strong economy and won’t have the jobs we want.

* Thomspon also took a swipe at Attorney General Lisa Madigan and Gov. Pat Quinn when he made this point about utility infrastructure…

A lot of politicians like to pick on the utilities. Our electric utilities. Our telephone systems. Well that’s all well and good. An attorney general can be the people’s lawyer and bash the utilities and oppose rate hikes and try to hold down profit. I mean, the list is endless.

But governors, governors responsible for the economic climate of the state have to ensure that our utilities as well as our transportation system are doing their job. That our utilities are strong, technologically advanced and dependable. And you can’t have a utilitly system, whether it’s phones or electricity or gas, that’s strong, technologically advanced and dependable if you are consistently trying to starve it in the name of consumers or customers. That’s why the job of attorney general and governor are different. Very different.

* And he made an excellent point about cleaning up government…

And we have to scour the state budget to end the boondoggles. I know everybody decries the boondoggles. The press likes to expose them. Grants going to community organizations that turn out to be just for the private profit of those who are running them. Look, it’s not a lot of money. The state budget is $35 billion. Stuff like that is in the millions. Small potatoes. But what it is, it says something about the credibility of the state. It says something about the credibility of state government if you’re wasting money.

I know that candidates’ favorite refrain is “fraud, waste and abuse.” They’re going to end fraud, waste and abuse and then when they get elected it’s the last you ever hear about it, and they start participating in fraud, waste and abuse. And I’m not here to tell you, as some politicians have before me, that if we cut fraud, waste and abuse we can cut taxes and don’t have to spend as much. That’s all wrong. It’s wrong. That’s such a miniscule part of the state government that makes no difference except that it debases state government. And people feel less about their state government when they read something like that in a newspaper and there’s no reason why we shouldn’t get rid of it.

* Another invaluable insight…

The point is, people in Illinois — and in other states; we’re not the only ones – the point is that people in this state have allowed things to go so far that they think they can get away with anything. And they have. They have. And let’s stop pointing fingers about who’s responsible for this, the legislature, the governor, the public employees – it’s irrelevant. They’re all responsible. And we’re all responsible.

Right freaking on.
Yeah, he made his share of mistakes, kicked his share of cans down the road. I could give you a very long list of all of that. But, man, the dude was a giant, and he loved every square inch of this state and had the skills to make his visions a reality.
This used to be a great state. We still are in many respects, but we’ve slipped partly because we’ve completely lost our confidence - and for good reason. Too many clueless governors and voters. Too much inertia, partisan and otherwise. Not enough vision.
I don’t know about you, but, personally, I’d vote for Big Jim if he ran again. This is exactly the sort of leader we so desperately need in Illinois right now.

- Posted by Rich Miller

Paul Ryan’s Ax Isn’t Sharp Enough

By PAUL C. BROUN Jr.

Published: March 18, 2013

Washington

THE latest budget proposal by Representative Paul D. Ryan, called “The Path to Prosperity,” is anything but. It fails to seriously address runaway government spending, the most pressing problem facing our nation. I cannot vote for something that would trick the American people into thinking that Congress is fixing Washington’s spending problem, when in actuality we’d just be allowing it to continue without end.

Supporters of the “Path to Prosperity,” including many of my fellow Republicans, say that we have to stop spending money we don’t have, an idea I promote every chance I get. But under the proposal by Mr. Ryan of Wisconsin, the chairman of the House Budget Committee, the federal government would continue to spend more than it will this year.

Spending would grow by an average of 3.4 percent annually, only slightly less than the rate under President Obama’s plan, which is 5 percent a year. After 10 years — Mr. Ryan’s target for eliminating the deficit — the “Path to Prosperity” will have spent $41 trillion, when the president’s plan would allow spending of $46 trillion. My party’s de facto position has become “we’re increasing spending, but not as much as the other guy.” That’s not good enough.

Just reducing growth in spending does almost nothing. We have to dig deeper and make profound cuts now. We cannot continue to assume that future Congresses will do our dirty work for us.

We ought to get rid of certain federal departments and agencies, stopping only to shift the role of governing back to the states, where it belongs. The Departments of Education and Energy, for example, are two bloated bureaucracies that we don’t need; their core functions would be absorbed by the states through block grants, saving taxpayers at least $500 billion over the next decade.

Constitutionally speaking, the federal government should not have a role in K-12 public education anyway. Overpaid Washington bureaucrats shouldn’t be deciding how to provide for teachers and students, whose own state and local governments are better equipped to understand their needs. A Heritage Foundation study showed that in 2010, the average salary of an Education Department employee reached $103,000 — nearly double the average public-school teacher’s salary. Let’s phase out a large portion of the department’s roughly $70 billion budget. We can transfer the remaining dollars directly to the states, where they will be used more wisely.

Let’s also abolish the Energy Department, which is one of the biggest federal culprits responsible for the mismanagement of taxpayer dollars. Without unending government backing, the Energy Department would have ceased to exist long ago because of its ineffectiveness, corruption and poor investment strategy. Taxpayers are now on the hook for hundreds of millions of squandered dollars because of failed federal loans given to green companies like Solyndra and Fisker Automotive.

The only constitutionally necessary service provided by the Energy Department is regulation of the nation’s stockpile of atomic weapons, a function that can return to the Department of Defense. Eliminating this bureaucracy would be a large, permanent spending cut, and restore energy-related venture capitalism to its natural home, the private sector.

Our spending crisis is so severe that we can’t stop at these two departments — there are more areas to cut. For example, we should also phase out the federal highway financing system and allow states to keep their own gas tax receipts. States would then be free to determine their own transportation needs and explore creative funding for roads like public-private partnerships.

As a family doctor for more than 30 years, I understand that we must look for savings in our health care system too. I recently co-sponsored legislation that would convert Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program into state-managed programs through a single federal block grant. This would save approximately $2 trillion over 10 years by capping federal funding at 2012 levels for the next 10 years and giving states an incentive to seek out and eliminate waste, fraud and abuse. The government agency closest to the consumer can most efficiently manage taxpayer dollars.

We’re not done. We must repeal Obamacare — including the associated taxes, which the Ryan budget leaves intact by assuming the enactment of tax reform later on. We’ll replace it with a market-based health care system devoid of government involvement and managed by patients and their doctors, a plan I have described in my Patient Option Act.

If we get government out of the way and put Medicare in patients’ hands by increasing contribution limits to health savings accounts, it will transform Medicare into a more flexible premium assistance program.

To cap all this off — literally — I have proposed a balanced-budget amendment that would force Congress to stick to the principle of not spending more than we take in. Passing a constitutional amendment is no easy task. While it’s a large undertaking, I’ll continue to fight for its passage. Just a few weeks ago, the House put enough pressure on the Senate to force it to produce a budget — something Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic majority leader, hadn’t attempted in over four years. If we keep up the pressure, we’ll continue to see results.

Rather than nibbling around the edges as the Ryan proposal does, we must do all of this and much more now. There is a “Path to Prosperity,” but Mr. Ryan’s budget isn’t it. The only way to protect our nation’s financial future as well as our citizens’ liberty is to stop the outrageous spending in Washington and permanently reduce the size of our overreaching federal government.

Paul C. Broun Jr., a Georgia Republican, has been a United States representative since 2007 and is a member of the Tea Party caucus in Congress
.

A version of this op-ed appeared in print on March 19, 2013, on page A27 of the New York edition with the headline: Paul Ryan’s Ax Isn’t Sharp Enough.

The sad state of Illinois

Tapped out Illinois can’t even pay to bury its impoverished dead. The service was hollow.
The congregants sat before the cheap casket in worn, workingman clothes. The pastor
saying the last words kept forgetting the dead man’s name. I’m sad to say, more than 20 years later
even I, the reporter sitting in the back of the chapel, now struggle to remember the fellow’s name.
His life alternated between jail cells and street corners. And at the service he was receiving more respect in death than he had in life. He was buried by the state.
Funerals for the destitute are sad affairs. It’s usually a cheap casket, a rented pastor and burial in a potter’s field. Anyone who is a regular reader of this column knows that I believe government
should be limited in scope. But burying the penniless has been a governmental functional since Biblical times — long predating the modern welfare state. And even this basic government
function is failing in Illinois. The state’s funeral and burial program wasappropriated $9.58 million for the current fiscal year, and yet funeral homes directors complain of waiting as long as a year for the state to pay them for their services. Increasingly, funeral homes and cemeteries are just saying
no when asked to handle an indigent person’s funeral arrangements. They operate businesses, after all. Their employees won’t wait a year to get paid. Their suppliers won’t wait a year to receive a check. But somehow the state seems to think it is just fine to make businesses wait. Of course it’s not just funeral homes and cemeteries that are getting this sort of shabby
treatment from our government.It’s also doctors, dentistsand pharmacists. Thoseare just a few of the professions where you’ll find individuals choosing not to offer services to Medicaid patients
because the state pays them a fraction of their actual costsand reimburses them months late to boot.
Often those relegated to the Medicaid rolls are left searching for a provider — any provider — willing to offer their family care. More people may have Medicaid cards. But fewer people are choosing to treat those carrying them.
Please keep in mind this is happening at a time when state revenues are at their peak. Never before in the state’s 195-year history has it taken in more money. And yet the Land of Lincoln is spiraling toward insolvency.Why?
Our leaders have consistently made poor decisions. Problems with pensions have been kicked down the road for decades. When difficulties needed to be addressed, they were avoided. Politicians made vows, knowing full well they wouldn’t be in office when those promises came due. We needed leadership; instead we got the same old politics. Now, under new accounting
rules, state pensions are underfunded to the tune of more than $200 billion. When circumstances called for belt tightening, our lawmakers chose to expand government instead. The state now has $9 billion in unpaid bills. But earlier this month, the Illinois House voted to approve a host
of questionable appropriations. “They voted to spend $115,000 for an Illinois Basketball Hall of Fame in Danville and $30,000 or $40,000 for bicycle racks, and even more for a mining monument in southern Illinois — at a time when we can’t even pay our bills,” said state Rep. Tom Morrison,
R-Palatine. “People think that isn’t much money — but it all adds up. And we shouldn’t be spending money on new programs like this when we can’t even pay our bills.”
Core functions of government - incarcerating criminals, educating children,
maintaining roads — have suffered because of such political indecision. Government can’t be all
 things. “No” is a healthy word for lawmakers to learn because the more spending balloons in some areas, the less there is to spend in more important areas. After all, we live in a state that struggles just to bury its dead. Don’t we deserve better?
Scott Reeder is the journalist in residence at
the Illinois Policy Institute. He can be reached
at: sreeder@illinoispolicy.org.

Food Stamp Rolls in America Now Surpass the Population of Spain

February 11, 2013

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By Elizabeth Harrington

“Now is the time to act boldly and wisely – to not only revive this economy, but to build a new foundation for lasting prosperity,” said Obama during his first joint session address to Congress on Feb. 24, 2009.(CNSNews.com) – Since taking office in 2009, food stamp rolls under President Barack Obama have risen to more than 47 million people in America, exceeding the population of Spain.

Since then, the number of participants enrolled in food stamps, known as the Supplemental Assistance Nutrition Program (SNAP), has risen substantially.

When Obama entered office in January 2009 there were 31,939,110Americans receiving food stamps.  As of November 2012—the most recent data available—there were 47,692,896 Americans enrolled, an increase of 49.3 percent.

According to the 2011 census, Spain had a population of 46,815,916.

Furthermore, between January 2009 and November 2012 the food stamp program added approximately an average 11,269 recipients per day.

President Obama will deliver his fourth State of the Union address Tuesday evening.  Obama is expected to focus on jobs and the economy.

Millions Improperly Claimed 

U.S. Phone Subsidies

By SPENCER E. ANTE

The U.S. government spent about $2.2 billion last year to provide phones to low-income Americans, but a Wall Street Journal review of the program shows that a large number of those who received the phones haven't proved they are eligible to receive them.

The Lifeline program—begun in 1984 to ensure that poor people aren't cut off from jobs, families and emergency services—is funded by charges that appear on the monthly bills of every landline and wireless-phone customer. Payouts under the program have shot up from $819 million in 2008, as more wireless carriers have persuaded regulators to let them offer the service.

Suspecting that many of the new subscribers were ineligible, the Federal Communications Commission tightened the rules last year and required carriers to verify that existing subscribers were eligible. The agency estimated 15% of users would be weeded out, but far more were dropped.

A review of five top recipients of Lifeline support conducted by the FCC for the Journal showed that 41% of their more than six million subscribers either couldn't demonstrate their eligibility or didn't respond to requests for certification.

The carriers—AT&T T +0.48% Inc.; Telrite Corp.; Tag Mobile USA; Verizon Communications VZ -0.07% Inc.; and the Virgin Mobile USA unit of Sprint NextelCorp. S +0.69% —accounted for 34% of total Lifeline subscribers last May. Two of the other largest providers, TracFone Wireless Inc. and Nexus Communications Inc., asked the FCC to keep their counts confidential. Results for the full program weren't available.

The program is open to people who meet federal poverty guidelines or are on food stamps, Medicaid or other assistance programs, and only one Lifeline subscriber is allowed per household.

The program, which is administered by the nonprofit Universal Service Administrative Co., has grown rapidly as wireless carriers persuaded regulators to let people use the program for cellphone service. It pays carriers $9.25 a customer per month toward free or discounted wireless service.

Americans pay an average of $2.50 a month per household to fund a number of subsidized communications programs, including Lifeline.

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For the carriers, the program is a chance for them to sign up more subscribers and make a small profit, plus more money if customers go over their small initial allotment and need to buy more minutes or text messages. Carriers can set prices for their Lifeline subscribers as the companies wish.

Until last year, FCC rules didn't require carriers to certify to the FCC that subscribers were eligible. Consumers could self-certify, and in many states documentation wasn't required.

Carriers said many of the disqualified subscribers simply didn't reply when asked to prove their eligibility. They also said the FCC rules on self-certification, and the absence of a national database of participants, made it hard to keep ineligible people from signing up.

The FCC said it is investigating allegations that some Lifeline providers violated the rules, though it declined to comment on that probe. Carriers that don't properly confirm eligibility can be fined up to $150,000 for each violation for each day of a continuing violation, up to a maximum of $1.5 million. In egregious cases, a carrier could lose its ability to participate in the program.

Telrite said it confirms Lifeline eligibility but said it had been difficult to verify the one-phone-per-household rule.

A Verizon spokesman said the "vast majority" of the subscribers removed from its rolls didn't respond to eligibility checks. While Sprint found that some of its subscribers were no longer eligible, it, too, found that many others didn't respond, a person familiar with the carrier's operations said.

AT&T hadn't detected the ineligible subscribers because customers self-certified under old rules and because some states required the company to provide Lifeline service to people enrolled in certain state assistance programs, according to a person familiar with the company's thinking.

Tag Mobile didn't respond to requests for comment.

TracFone Chief Executive F.J. Pollak declined to say how many customers his company shed. Nexus Communications didn't respond to a request for comment.

Two years ago General Communication Inc. GNCMA +0.12% paid more than $1.5 million to settle allegations that Alaska DigiTel LLC, an Alaskan company it owns, submitted false claims to the FCC for more than four years. General Communication said the alleged misuse occurred before the company took day-to-day control of Alaska DigiTel.

Lifeline users have been a source of subscriber growth in the otherwise saturated U.S. market and helped fuel the expansion of companies like TracFone, now the fifth-largest U.S. wireless carrier.

The FCC until last year allowed consumers to self-certify, without requiring documentation, that they met federal poverty guidelines. Subscribers didn't have to recertify once they were enrolled in the program, and there were few checks on whether households signed up for more than one cellphone.

"The program rules we inherited were designed for the age of the rotary phone and failed to protect the program from abuse," FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said.

The agency pushed through new rules last year, requiring documentation when a Lifeline customer signs up. Consumers also must certify that no one else in their households is using the program. Carriers now have to check a state or federal social-service database to confirm eligibility and must reverify eligibility every year.

Carriers were required by Jan. 31 to report the number of subscribers they had removed from Lifeline as of the end of last year. The data reviewed by The Wall Street Journal came from those reports.

The FCC said new verification procedures saved nearly $214 million last year, and projected total savings over the next three years would reach $2 billion. Disbursements under the program began to drop in the third quarter after 12 consecutive quarters of increases.

Write to Spencer E. Ante at spencer.ante@wsj.com

A version of this article appeared February 12, 2013, on page A1 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: Millions Improperly Claimed U.S. Phone Subsidies.

Which States Have Most Fragmented Local Governments?

POSTED BY MIKE MACIAG | AUGUST 30, 2012

from:http://www.governing.com/blogs/by-the-numbers/local-government-consolidation-fragmentation.html#data

Government fragmentation has long been torn between two competing interests. On one hand, many officials argue consolidation boosts efficiency and makes coordination easier. Citizens, though, remain attached to their local governments and often resent representation by a perceived group of outsiders.

The first set of figures from the 2012 Census of Governments, published Thursday, signals no significant shift toward government consolidation taking place in recent years, at least not on a national level.

There were 89,004 local governments across the U.S. this year, according to the survey. That’s down from 2007 by only 472, a small fraction of the total. In terms of raw counts, Illinois (6,968), Pennsylvania (4,905) and Texas (4,856) have the most local governments of any state.

Robert O'Neill, the International City/County Management Association’s executive director, said ongoing fiscal pressures sparked interest in consolidation in some localities, particularly those already with numerous government entities. But this hasn’t resulted in a big wave of mergers.

“There’s a community and political identity, and often that gets juxtaposed with the efficiency at which you perform a service,” he said.

Instead, O'Neill said some localities are exploring shared services to save costs and avoid consolidation. This is a particularly attractive option for transportation projects, economic development, public safety and other large-scale services.

“You keep the political jurisdiction, but perhaps there’s a way of organizing the work across boundaries that makes sense,” O'Neill said.

Over the past five years, special districts accounted for most consolidation. Nationwide, the number of special districts declined by 345, compared to a reduction of 127 total counties, townships and other general-purpose governments.

The prevalence of governments varies widely throughout different regions of the country. Historic boundaries and agreements, along with population and geography, often explain much of the regional differences.

Rural areas tend to have the most governments on a per capita basis. A Governing analysis of the new data and 2011 population estimates showed North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Wyoming and Kansas recorded the highest number of governments per capita.

The table below lists 2012 Census of Governments data and figures for each state per 100,000 residents:

 

Select State:--Select All--AlabamaAlaskaArizonaArkansasCaliforniaColoradoConnecticutDelawareFloridaGeorgiaHawaiiIdahoIllinoisIndianaIowaKansasKentuckyLouisianaMaineMarylandMassachusettsMichiganMinnesotaMississippiMissouriMontanaNebraskaNevadaNew HampshireNew JerseyNew MexicoNew YorkNorth CarolinaNorth DakotaOhioOklahomaOregonPennsylvaniaRhode IslandSouth CarolinaSouth DakotaTennesseeTexasUnited StatesUtahVermontVirginiaWashingtonWest VirginiaWisconsinWyoming
State	Total Local Govs.	General Purpose	Special Purpose	Total Per 100K	General Per 100K	Special Per 100K

Alabama	1,208	528	680	25.2	11.0	14.2
Alaska	177	162	15	24.5	22.4	2.1
Arizona	659	106	553	10.2	1.6	8.5
Arkansas	1,543	577	966	52.5	19.6	32.9
California	4,350	539	3,811	11.5	1.4	10.1
Colorado	2,818	333	2,485	55.1	6.5	48.6
Connecticut	644	179	465	18.0	5.0	13.0
Delaware	338	60	278	37.3	6.6	30.6
Florida	1,554	476	1,078	8.2	2.5	5.7
Georgia	1,365	688	677	13.9	7.0	6.9
Hawaii	21	4	17	1.5	0.3	1.2
Idaho	1,161	244	917	73.2	15.4	57.9
Illinois	6,968	2,831	4,137	54.1	22.0	32.1
Indiana	2,694	1,666	1,028	41.3	25.6	15.8
Iowa	1,939	1,046	893	63.3	34.2	29.2
Kansas	3,806	1,997	1,809	132.6	69.6	63.0
Kentucky	1,314	536	778	30.1	12.3	17.8
Louisiana	530	364	166	11.6	8.0	3.6
Maine	841	504	337	63.3	37.9	25.4
Maryland	347	180	167	6.0	3.1	2.9
Massachusetts	852	356	496	12.9	5.4	7.5
Michigan	2,877	1,856	1,021	29.1	18.8	10.3
Minnesota	3,633	2,726	907	68.0	51.0	17.0
Mississippi	991	379	612	33.3	12.7	20.5
Missouri	3,752	1,381	2,371	62.4	23.0	39.4
Montana	1,240	183	1,057	124.2	18.3	105.9
Nebraska	2,581	1,042	1,539	140.1	56.5	83.5
Nevada	190	35	155	7.0	1.3	5.7
New Hampshire	542	244	298	41.1	18.5	22.6
New Jersey	1,344	587	757	15.2	6.7	8.6
New Mexico	854	136	718	41.0	6.5	34.5
New York	3,454	1,603	1,851	17.7	8.2	9.5
North Carolina	964	653	311	10.0	6.8	3.2
North Dakota	2,666	1,724	942	389.8	252.1	137.7
Ohio	3,702	2,334	1,368	32.1	20.2	11.8
Oklahoma	1,854	667	1,187	48.9	17.6	31.3
Oregon	1,509	277	1,232	39.0	7.2	31.8
Pennsylvania	4,905	2,627	2,278	38.5	20.6	17.9
Rhode Island	134	39	95	12.7	3.7	9.0
South Carolina	681	315	366	14.6	6.7	7.8
South Dakota	1,979	1,284	695	240.1	155.8	84.3
Tennessee	920	437	483	14.4	6.8	7.5
Texas	4,856	1,468	3,388	18.9	5.7	13.2
United States	89,004	38,917	50,087	28.6	12.5	16.1
Utah	613	274	339	21.8	9.7	12.0
Vermont	728	294	434	116.2	46.9	69.3
Virginia	497	324	173	6.1	4.0	2.1
Washington	1,831	320	1,511	26.8	4.7	22.1
West Virginia	658	287	371	35.5	15.5	20.0
Wisconsin	3,123	1,922	1,201	54.7	33.6	21.0
Wyoming	795	122	673	139.9	21.5	118.5

The Census Bureau conducts the Census of Governments every five years, assessing organizational types, employment and finances for all state and local governments. The agency plans to release additional data describing local governments next year.

Illinois stands out with 6,968 localities, about 2,000 more than Pennsylvania, with the next-most governments.

Kent Redfield, a professor of political science at the University of Illinois at Springfield, said the previous version of the state's constitution, last updated in 1970, had created an environment encouraging the proliferation of municipalities. Debt and taxing limits were tied to all governments, so many localities simply created additional public entities to thwart the requirements.

While Illinois added residents and has since changed some of its laws, often-antiquated governing structures largely remained.

The state’s libraries are typically divided into districts. One law requires coverage by a fire protection district for every property not served by a municipal fire department. In some suburbs, elementary schools feeding into a single high school are even divided into multiple districts.

“If you were starting from ground zero, you wouldn't design a system of local government like Illinois,” Redfield said.

What's more, political patronage plays a role in preserving many of the state's existing structures. "There's a relationship that develops between (politics) and all these boards," Redfield said.

That makes coordinating projects, especially regional planning, no easy task.

Citizens in some areas will likely continue to resist calls for consolidation in an effort to preserve their local representation. This could become more difficult, though, as localities face mounting fiscal pressures.