This dissertation explores the impact of the state public sector legal environment as a determinant of the governance content of faculty collective bargaining agreements. Using content analysis, the legal environment and contractual content are reduced to quantities that may be explored through the lens of population ecology. Legal environment is determined to have a significant impact on the development of contractual content and individual factors of governance and statutory form are identified. Specifically, the statutory scope language and reservation of management rights are seen as the primary environmental forces determining policy and rule issues in contractual content. Further, the relevant temporal element for an ecological model appears to be the tenure of public sector bargaining in each state. National affiliation, institutional type and other temporal variables do not have a significant impact on governance language. Implications and directions for further research are discussed.

This dissertation examines the factors influencing a state’s decision to adopt a local government investment pool (LGIP), the institutional arrangements used in managing them, and the effect of the institutional types on LGIP performance. The dissertation extends the policy adoption theory with insights from investment theory to demonstrate that management credibility influences the likelihood of a state’s LGIP adoption. The study finds that the quality of financial management, the quality of professional leadership, proximate state neighbors who have previously adopted an LGIP, and economic factors determine a state’s proclivity to policy adoption. The dissertation also describes the institutional arrangements used in managing LGIPs and develops typologies based on their institutional arrangements. The dissertation compares LGIPs depending on the risk aversion of their institutional arrangements. The research extends the risk-return tradeoff in investment theory to LGIP institutional arrangements. The empirical findings show that LGIP institutional arrangement that has greater risk report higher performance. The dissertation also finds that competition in the LGIP market due to multiple vendors, and periods of economic recession account for higher performance because of higher risk-taking behaviors associated with them. This dissertation promotes public funds investment laws that emphasize prudent management of government finances and guides managers of the public purse on the types of institutional choices that optimize returns with minimal risk.

The question of policy origination is the very essence of state public policy analysis. This study provides an overview of the previous research on innovation, as defined by Rogers (1962, 2003) and Walker (1969), and determinants models of state policy formulation, as they relate to innovation and policy adoption on the state level. The literature review indicates that previous research mostly focused on the internal state characteristics such as political and socioeconomic variables to explain state differences in policy adoption. The literature also indicates a general lack of empirical research relating diversity to innovation and policy adoption. State governments have to deal with diversified populations and workforces whether they want to or not. The number of immigrants from other countries as well as migrants from other states is constantly growing. For instance, in just the five years from 2000 to 2005, we added almost 5.5 million immigrants, and that figure represents only those who are documented. These people are coming from all over the world. They speak different languages, are accustomed to different foods, and have different religious affiliations. It would be unrealistic to expect them to have social and political values similar to those of people born and raised in the United States. The impact and the overall influence of such diversity on state policy formulation have not yet been fully explained. The growing importance of diversity in the United States calls for its inclusion into state policy adoption models. This study proposes a new model including a construct of diversity as one of the determinants of state policy adoption. The reasoning for the new model is twofold: first, to determine the potential influence of diversity on innovation, and second, to determine whether iv diversity also influences state policy adoption. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) is used to test the proposed model in five different policy areas: education, health care, criminal justice, economic development, and environmental policies. Results of the analysis indicate that, while state diversity is positively associated with state innovation and state policy adoption, inclusion of state socioeconomic and political variables in the analysis decreases the relative influence of state diversity on innovation and policy outcomes. Furthermore, the relative influence of diversity, socioeconomic, and political variables differs among the policy areas used in this study. Three major themes are noticed here: the overwhelming significance of state political characteristics to state innovation, the relatively moderate significance of state socioeconomic characteristics to state policy outcomes and state innovation, and the low significance of state diversity variables to state policy outcomes.

Agency directors, program administrators and planners as well as U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service regional federal aid supervisors provided input that defined 22 factors considered most important in determining management effectiveness of state fish and wildlife agencies. I grouped the factors into the following six categories: public support and awareness, conflict resolution, politics, planning and funding, agency management and personnel. State agency directors, commissioners and legislators ranked the factors. In cooperation with the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Organization of Wildlife Planners, I conducted case studies of nine state fish and wildlife agencies widely recognized by their peers as being particularly effective relative to the identified factors. Questionnaires and interviews with 845 agency members and constituents revealed effective fish and wildlife agencies had much in common with the excellent companies described by Peters and Waterman (1982) in In Search of Excellence. Effective agencies were proactive in dealing with issues and frequently among the nation's leading agencies in dealing with issues of national scope. Effective agencies used a variety of techniques to understand public desires and involve the public in making important decisions. Effective agencies grant their employees much freedom to make decisions and try new ideas without fear of punishment for making mistakes. They are committed to the personal development of employees. Effective agencies are good planners, with well defined missions and goals. Personal missions of employees are highly congruent with agency missions, resulting ina missionary-like zeal for their work. Effective agencies have a strong biological basis for their decisions and maintain credibility by balancing biological factors with public opinion. Effective agencies have stable political environments and experienced, enlightened resource management professionals as their leaders. Leaders emphasize participative decision making and teamwork. Finally, effective agencies have strong public support and are effective in mobilizing that support when important policy decisions are made. Many specific examples that illustrate the characteristics of effective agencies are discussed. / Ph. D.

According to Part H (Public Law 101-476), governors of each state have the authority to designate a lead agency within the state to carry out this legislation. Some lead agencies may include the Department of Education, Department of Health, or Department of Economic Security. Each lead agency has the power, within Part H, to decide whether infants and toddlers who are at risk will be served under the provisions of special education to infants and toddlers. According to The National Early childhood Technical Assistance System (NEC*TAS) (1992), 22% of states include at risk in their definitions for Part H. Of those 11 states, only 6 include services for perinatally exposed infants and toddlers in their at risk definition. The National Association for Perinatal Addiction Research and Education (NAPARE), (1993) defines perinatally exposed as, "fetal exposure to inappropriate use of licit or illicit drugs." Delivery of care is not systematic between these state agencies. There is a lack of knowledge of which services, if any, each delivery system offers to perinatally exposed infants/toddlers and their families. Therefore the purpose of this study was to examine the delivery of services in the six states that serve this population under the at risk definition of Part H and compare those results to three states that do not serve perinatally exposed infants and toddlers under this legislation. Telephone interviews of 9 state Part H Coordinators were conducted to obtain information concerning various services provided to substance exposed infants/toddlers and their families. Six of those states claimed to provide services to perinatally exposed infants and toddlers under the at risk definition of Part H and three made no such claims. Data from the survey instrument were analyzed using qualitative analysis. Findings of the study revealed that only health department lead agencies provide services to perinatally exposed infants/toddlers and their families under the at risk definition of Part H of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. Data analysis provided information for making recommendations to governors and lobbying organizations who are concerned about providing services to perinatally exposed infants and toddlers. / Ed. D.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Urban Studies and Planning, 1981. / MICROFICHE COPY AVAILABLE IN ARCHIVES AND ROTCH. / Bibliography: leaves BIB 1-BIB 6. / by F. Ron Jones. / Ph.D.

This diploma thesis deals with the North American Free Trade Agreement. The aim of this work is to describe and evaluate the importance and impact of developing country and two developed economies of Canada and the United States on the Mexican economy. I deal with trade relations within NAFTA (Mexico - U.S. and Mexico - Canada). I analyze international trade of Mexico. The result of the thesis is to evaluate the impact of NAFTA to the Mexican economy with an emphasis on economic relations with other member states.

The purpose of this study was to ascertain the components necessary to develop a State Level Management Plan for Vocational Education. As background for developing the plan, research was done to identify what State Directors of Vocational Education perceive to be the best composition of a Management Plan for Vocational Education. Information was obtained concerning which components of the Management Plan were made operational by the state directors. Also, this study determined the relationship between the components which are made operational and the perceived importance of each component. The two specific conclusions resulting from this study are as follows. 1. The perceived importance of the components identified by state directors that should be in a Management Plan is indicative of the components that are functional in the planning process. 2. Related literature and findings indicate that an effective Model State-Level Management Plan for Vocational Education can be developed based on the components perceived by the state directors. Based on the identified perceptions, a Model for a State-Level Management Plan for Vocational Education has been developed. Included in the appendix is an example of the model adapted for implementation in the Department of Occupational Education and Technology in the Texas Education Agency.

This thesis is the result of analysis conducted on the income tax systems of thirty-one states and supported a recommendation for a Texas income tax act.

Collectively, US public transportation systems operated 137,047 vehicles per peak period in 2008 (American Public Transportation Association 2010). Buses accounted for the largest segment among these vehicles, and the passenger van segment was second. Together, they accounted for 78% of the vehicles operated per peak period (American Public Transportation Association 2010). Due to their pervasive use in the public transportation industry, buses and vans have been the focus in various academic research studies. However, very few studies have focused on vehicle procurement. Further, none have focused on the specific vehicle procurement function of supplier evaluation and selection. The over-arching objective of this research is to gain a deeper understanding of the relative importance of vehicle supplier attributes in reference to the Federal Transit Administration's (FTA) “best-value” procurement initiative and the influence of these attributes on the evaluation and selction of bus and van suppliers. This research studies vehicle procurement decision-makers at public transportation agencies to determine which supplier attributes they perceive to be the most important when evaluating vehicle suppliers. Results indicate that the top five supplier attributes were quality, reliability, after-sales support, warranties and claims, and integrity. The order of these top five attributes changed according to the type of supplier being evaluated, i.e., conventional fuel vehicle supplier versus alternative fuel vehicle supplier. The reason for this change was explained as being due to the increased engineering and technological expertise required of alternative fuel vehicle suppliers. Utilizing Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA), the research showed that the variation in the perception of the importance of particular supplier attributes was not generally influenced by an agency's urban classification, its vehicle fleet size, its capital expenditure level, its decision-makers' education level, or their years of experience. However, FTA region was determined to have an influence on two attributes. Utilizing a conditional logit discrete choice model, the research also found that in practice price and not quality had the highest parameter estimate and was therefore deemed most important. It was followed by quality, after-sales support, technical capability, and delivery. Further, to garner a deeper understanding of attributes' relative importance, participants in the research identified 41 attribute components and provided metrics by which to measure these components and, by extension, the attributes. This research contributes in four areas. These are government procurement initiatives, agency “best-value” procurement practice, vehicle supplier marketing, and academic research in supplier evaluation and selection in the public transportation industry.