Virginia and Maryland both ranked high in a report Monday evaluating how well states serve their citizens.
The Pew Center’s 2008 “Grading the States” report, which looks at how states manage money, use technology, recruit employees and maintain roads and buildings, gave Virginia an A- and Maryland a B.
Only 13 states surpassed the national average score of B-, and Virginia’s A- ranked it in the top three states, along with Washington and Utah. The District of Columbia was not evaluated.
The report credits Virginia Performs, a system that publicly tracks whether state agencies meet their performance benchmarks, as a key factor in Virginia’s high performance.
A similar benchmark system for Virginia’s Department of Transportation has brought the agency’s on-time project completion rate up from 27 percent to 87 percent over the past five years, the report said.
“Virginia proves that tracking data — and holding employees accountable for outcomes — can work wondrous efficiencies,” the report said.
Virginia received its lowest grade, a B+, for infrastructure, after the Pew Center noted that the state does not perform regular full assessments of all state buildings.
The report praised Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley for pushing through unpopular tax increases to fix a $1.7 budget shortfall, but said the state is still economically vulnerable.
Maryland’s economic outlook could hinge on whether voters approve the legalization of slot machines, which could net the state as much as $400 million a year, the center said.
Maryland also is implementing a system that publicly measures state employees’ performance, dubbed StateStat, which could improve the state’s overall score in future reports.
The Pew Center docked Maryland points for its employee training system, noting that the central government does not directly monitor whether agencies provide adequate training.
