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Tripepi Smith firmly believes in making investments in the local government world. It is why we support nearly every major local government association (Cal Cities, MMASC, MMANC, CCCA, WCMA), frequently organize panels to share wisdom at conferences and financially support the Institute for Local Government. These investments are intended to help local government learn and improve and adapt to the changing economic and policy environment.
Beyond these investments, sometimes you need to “dive deep” and get directly involved in tackling an area. That is why Tripepi Smith has made two critical investments in the last six months.
First, the Tripepi Smith recruiting and talent division - TS Talent Solutions - has helped underwrite a critical study developed by the California City Management Foundation and being conducted by the Rose Institute of State and Local Government. The study will research key demographics and traits of the California city management profession. Full disclosure, I have the honor of serving as Chair of the Rose Institute. The study will focus on answering basic questions about the profession in California like: What is the average tenure of a city manager? What is the distribution of educational attainment of city managers? What is the current gender breakdown of city managers? City managers in every city in California have a survey in their inbox awaiting a response, and failure to respond will likely result in a Claremont McKenna College undergraduate student calling. The study needs responses in order to be successful, and I urge the city manager community to support this research by swiftly responding. I am proud that TS Talent Solutions and CCMF are working together to help our city manager community learn more about itself.
Second, Tripepi Smith joined with National Demographics Corporation (NDC) to launch our own research on city government redistricting processes spawned by the 2020 Census. CVRA has now motivated over 175 cities to shift to district elections. NDC has been the key demographic partner to cities for over 85% of those district formation efforts. Tripepi Smith has built websites, project managed and/or executed the outreach for nearly 100 redistricting or district forming processes. To be clear, neither of our firms are responsible for cities getting “the letter” threatening a CVRA lawsuit, but when the letter arrives, we are the firms that cities call for help.
Our joint study, Redistricting Retrospective, has focused on 142 cities that had by-district elections prior to the 2020 Census who then had to re-draw their lines to ensure population balance among their districts. The study seeks to understand the types of cities that have by-district elections, whether a commission of some form was used for redistricting and other common practices associated with the redistricting process. Eventually, we will publish the results for all to review and learn from. The work, once complete, will likely represent 200 hours of staff time that Tripepi Smith and NDC will have invested to understand this important area of policy execution.
We have a credo at Tripepi Smith: Always Be Learning (#ABL). That includes always learning about local government and supporting primary research to break new ground. It is all part of our broader effort to support our local government community throughout California and beyond.
Study Hard,
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