Archives of the Mayor's Press Office

Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani today unveiled the Citywide Accountability Program (CAPSTAT), a data-driven management system, in eighteen key City agencies. CAPSTAT was modeled after the inventive and highly successful Compstat program in the New York City Police Department. The Mayor also launched a new Internet Web site that provides timely updates and postings of statistical indicators for the public to review and to gauge the performance and effectiveness of each of the eighteen agencies. The Web site, www.nyc.gov/capstats, became operational immediately when the Mayor activated the program during today's announcement.

"The CAPSTAT program is the next generation of Compstat, which proved to be an enormously successful management tool in the Police Department," Mayor Giuliani said. "Compstat provided police executives and managers with the ability to accurately pinpoint key areas in a timely manner that either met or fell short of the agency's goals and objectives. The CAPSTAT program promises to do the same for all eighteen City agencies that are now also on-line. This program also furthers this Administration's goal of creating a more transparent form of government that is widely accessible to the general public. I would expect that this revolutionary new approach to management in the City's agencies will be continued by future administrations."

The Mayor also noted that "this system of strict accountability will help to ensure that each agency continues to provide the very best level of service to the public, and relegates the old adage of New York City being 'ungovernable' to the distant past."

The concept of CAPSTAT being installed as a management tool for many of the City's agencies was first introduced by the Mayor during his State of the City address in January. The Mayor then charged Geoffrey N. Hess, Senior Advisor to the Mayor, with ensuring that a CAPSTAT program be created for many agencies throughout City government, and to oversee its ultimate implementation.

"I am thrilled that so many agencies have adopted the Compstat model," said Hess. "It is an approach to evaluation that leads to greater accountability for all levels of management. By analyzing a set of statistics or performance indicators, City agencies are better able to achieve their goals and objectives. Our new CAPSTAT programs highlight the importance of 'knowing the numbers' and using them to measure success, identify new issues and form strategies for improvement."

Each of the eighteen participating agencies now gathers data on select productivity areas on a weekly, bi-weekly and monthly basis. Agency commissioners and their senior staff then analyze the information and assess whether their stated goals are being achieved. CAPSTAT provides these managers with an opportunity to receive timely and comprehensive status updates on a vast array of agency issues, which enables them to deploy or adjust their resources accordingly. Data from these same reports are then posted on the Internet (log onto www.nyc.gov/capstats to access all agencies) for the public to review.

The eighteen New York City agencies currently participating in the CAPSTAT initiative are the Police Department, the Department of Correction, the Human Resources Administration, the Department of Parks and Recreation, the Department of Juvenile Justice, the Mayor's Office of Health Insurance Access, the Department of Transportation, the Department of Citywide Administrative Services, the Taxi and Limousine Commission, the Off-Track Betting Corporation, the Fire Department, the Department of Probation, the Department of Buildings, the Department of Youth and Community Development, the Department of Consumer Affairs, the Department of Housing Preservation and Development, the Department of Health, and the Department of Environmental Protection. Over the next few months, other agencies will be added to this list.

The CAPSTAT program is specifically tailored to the needs and objectives of the eighteen agencies currently involved. For example, the Parks Department web page lists the percentage of parks with acceptable ratings for cleanliness and overall condition; the Department of Transportation offers statistics on percentage of On-Time Trips for the Staten Island Ferry as well as statistics for Roadway Resurfacing projects; the Human Resources Administration web page presents a dramatic historical overview of declining welfare rolls, in addition to various customer services; the Fire Department section illustrates EMS response times and civilian fire fatalities; and the Police Department provides crime statistics for each of the City's 76 police precincts. The CAPSTAT program capitalizes on the use of computer technology to create a transparent government for the public at-large to examine.

"In the coming months, nearly all City agencies will be included in the CAPSTAT program," the Mayor said. "This initiative will fundamentally change the way in which government operates and how the delivery of services is administered. This Compstat-style approach to management can lead to improved performance by the agencies and increased levels of accountability for all City employees."

www.nyc.gov