Mid-size city to increase performance of its public utility through business process review

Client need

A mid-size city needed to evaluate the performance of its public utility’s departments, programs, activities, and functions to ensure appropriate decision-making authority, effectiveness in achieving desired results, efficiency and economy in the use of resources, conformity with standard practices for peer utilities, and compliance with relevant city and utility policies.

Baker Tilly solution

Baker Tilly executed a business process review of the utility focusing on financial areas, such as management of receivables, fiscal policies, contract management, and utility rates, as well as operational areas, such as the oversight and processes around installing services to customers. This included conducting more than eighty interviews with management, line workers, board members, city council members, and the chamber of commerce.

Results

Baker Tilly made forty-three business process improvement recommendations categorizing high, medium, and low priorities. Of the eleven high priorities, seven could be implemented with the city and utility’s existing resources. For the remainder, cost estimates for individual recommendations ranged from $50,000 to $5 million. The utility anticipates implementing changes with existing resources first to gain some quick wins in efficiencies and evaluating others that will require longer term dollar investments.

For more information on this topic, or to learn how Baker Tilly state and local government specialists can help, contact our team.