Modelling and information systems for senior management in local government: problems and prospects

The paper considers the role of modelling systems at senior levels in democratically accountable multi-service public sector organisations such as local government.The main basis for the arguments proposed is three years of project work terminating in mid-1977. During this period the writer acted as a consultant to the IBM (UK) Scientific Centre and was responsible for the day-to-day co-ordination of a major project undertaken in the first tier Welsh local authority, Clwyd County Council.The project, which involved substantial resource inputs from both IBM and the local authority, led to definitive conclusions as to the nature and potential value of the modelling system developed.The main purpose of this paper is to consider the extent to which multi-service modelling systems in general are of relevance to local government. The system developed in the Welsh local authority may be described as affording means oriented resource planning facilities. Further it was designed to generate short and medium term (up to five years) information.It is concluded that although at first sight the implementation of an extensive modelling system may seem to involve intervention on a narrow front the reality is that it impinges upon all the main organisational variables. Because of this the prospect for realising the potential of the system will vary considerably from organisation to organisation. It is important that this should be appreciated by senior management before they approve the commitment of resources to developments of this nature.     

Financial Models for Projecting National Educational Expenditure

In the process of planning education services it is essential to have a means of projecting the financial consequences of both current policy and potential new policies. This paper describes some of the financial models covering local authority recurrent and capital expenditure developed by the Department of Education and Science to assist in this planning process. It explains the underlying rationale behind the models, some of the equations used and the performance of the modelling systems in practice.     

Planning Aids for London Borough Housing Committee

The process by which a London Borough makes decisions relating to its provision and management of council housing is described, and the problems of integrated policy planning in a system of decentralized control stated. Optimality of a housing strategy can only be related to the subjective and political aims of the housing committee, so optimization techniques are replaced by a decision evaluating model. This model has been used by the chairman of the committee and officers of the Borough to take decisions upon the Borough's medium range building plan with adequate recognition of effects upon the financial and social responsibilities of the committee. A critique points out the directions in which the model should be developed, and indications are given of the way in which these developments might be implemented.     

Intensive quantities in an economy and conjugate variables

In an economy, the flows of goods, resources, and money are extensive (additive) variables, while the prices, interest, and exchange rates serve as intensive variables. Using the simplest economic planning problem as an example, we show that these intensive variables arise naturally as conjugate variables to balance constraints under the decomposition of the planning problem into the problem of the dynamical (intertemporal) equilibrium of an economy. It is also shown that linear homogeneity symmetry, which is a natural feature of an economy, generates, by Noether’s theorem, an equity capital equation.     

具有增益的概率网络金融计划模型

本文绘出一类具有增益的概率网络金融计划模型．许多多阶段金融计划问题可纳入这类模型．在这类模型中,随机变量的分布函数与Alexander过滤交易规则密切联系在一起,金融市场交易信号由神经网络产生,目标函数的最优值按其期望值计算．文中提出临界流和临界路的概念,给出目标函数下界等于其期望值的充分必要条件和期望最优解的求解方法．     

Water resources planning based on complex system dynamics: A case study of Tianjin city

A complex system dynamic (SD) model focusing on water resources, termed as TianjinSD, is developed for the integrated and scientific management of the water resources of Tianjin, which contains information feedback that governs interactions in the system and is capable of synthesizing component-level knowledge into system behavior simulation at an integrated level, thus presenting reasonable predictive results for policy-making on water resources allocation and management. As for the Tianjin city, interactions among 96 components for 12 years are explored and four planning alternatives are chosen, one of which is based on the conventional mode assuming that the existing pattern of human activities will be prevailed, while the others are alternative planning designs based on the interaction of local authorities and planning researchers. Optimal mode is therefore obtained according to different scenarios when compared the simulation results for evaluation of different decisions and dynamic consequences.     

A PRAGMATIC MULTILEVEL APPROACH TO LARGE-SCALE RENEWABLE RESOURCE OPTIMIZATION: A TEST CASE

In recent years, public renewable resource management agencies have devoted substantial effort to local planning. This paper analyzes and evaluates a multilevel approach to utilizing these local planning analyses as an input in developing large–scale (national) resource management plans. This approach is evaluated in a test case with a two–level prototype model that is built from a global model that serves as a standard of comparison. The two–level prototype performs well at the highest level of analysis (involving aggregated variables) but is less reliable in terms of its implications for the lower level planning units.     

Adapting Multi-criteria Planning to the Nigerian Economy

Techniques of development planning involve physical and financial aspects. Financial planning refers to the allocation of monetary resources; in Nigeria the previous development plans and budgets, which had been based on the incremental approach, contained various shortcomings, resulting in the deliberate inflation of estimated expenditure, and consequently it has been associated with retarded growth and conflicts between ministries. In addition, the approach does not adequately relate national objectives to their priorities. Conventional mathematical programming models are unable to allocate resources effectively in a conflicting environment. This paper proposes a goal programming model for allocating a country's scarce resources among competing sectors during a planned period. The goal programming model is shown to be adequate for allocating resources under the conflicting conditions of national planning. The model can help to determine all the priorities for the goals.     

涟漪效应还是空间互动——基于空间面板联立方程模型的房价与地价关系研究

本文通过构建包含房价和地价在内的空间面板联立方程模型,利用2009~2016年中国286个地市的数据,构建空间面板联立方程模型,以研究房价和地价的空间自相关性和空间溢出效应。实证结果表明:房价与地价之间的空间互动作用明显,房价不但受到当地地价的影响还会受到周边城市房价的影响;而城市地价也会受到当地房价引起的引致需求影响,并且受到周边城市地价的影响。分区域来看,地价对房价的作用强度在东、中、西部地区依次下降,房价对地价作用强度呈现出相反的趋势。而从价格的溢出效应来看,无论是房价还是地价,西部地区的价格溢出效应都最为明显,表明相对于东、中部地区,西部地区城市在房价和地价上都更会受到周围城市的影响。     

Corporate Financial Planning in Insurance—A Case Study

ECGD's OR group has built a financial model to forecast accounts and performance indicators. This meets the need for soundly based financial planning, and its output is considered at the highest levels of the organization. The model enables senior management to evaluate the consequences of different courses of action against the background of varying world economic scenarios. Using a financial planning package has made for quick and efficient development of the model, which has been modified continually over the last 10 years. A flexible, adaptive approach has maintained the relevance of OR's contribution. The model forecasts the financial variables which underpin ECGD's quarterly financial review and annual business plan. The Department's Financial Policy and Planning Division uses the model extensively in its preparation of these documents and to explore feasible policies through ‘what-if’ analyses. Organizational changes, increasing delegation, and the introduction of strategic planning will require further adaptation of the model allowing access to a wider range of end-users.     

Operations risk management by optimally planning the qualified workforce capacity

Operational risks are defined as risks of human origin. Unlike financial risks that can be handled in a financial manner (e.g. insurances, savings, derivatives), the treatment of operational risks calls for a “managerial approach”. Consequently, we propose a new way of dealing with operational risk, which relies on the well known aggregate planning model. To illustrate this idea, we have adapted this model to the case of a back office of a bank specializing in the trading of derivative products. Our contribution corresponds to several improvements applied to stochastic programming techniques. First, the model is transformed into a multistage stochastic program in order to take into account the randomness associated with the volume of transaction demand and with the capacity of work provided by qualified and non-qualified employees over the planning horizon. Second, as advocated by Basel II, we calculate the probability distribution based on a Bayesian Network to circumvent the difficulty of obtaining data which characterizes uncertainty in operations. Third, we go a step further by relaxing the traditional assumption in stochastic programming that imposes a strict independence between the decision variables and the random elements. Comparative results show that in general these improved stochastic programming models tend to allocate more human expertise in order to hedge operational risks. Finally, we employ the dual solutions of the stochastic programs to detect periods and nodes that are at risk in terms of the expertise availability.     

An integrated FDM–ANP evaluation model for sustainable development of housing community

When sustainable development becomes the global trend on residential environment, the transformation of abstract concepts into practicable implementations is necessary. In consequence, an objective evaluation model on regional property needs to established and carried out to examine the effectiveness and performance of local action. Because of the limitations of the small area and dense population in Taiwan, the development trend of the residential environment is toward multistory and high-density housing communities. This paper discusses the development characteristics and demands of a regional sector, and the fuzzy Delphi method (FDM) is used to extract the factors. To consider possible interdependencies among dimensions and among selected factors, the analytic network process (ANP) is used to create a quantitative evaluation model to convert the abstract concept of sustainability into an understandable network model for evaluating different development projects. Our objective and practical evaluation model can be used in related living environment planning fields, and it can be tailored and applied in other management studies.     

Assessing financial distress where bankruptcy is not an option: An alternative approach for local municipalities

The goal of this paper is to build an operational model for evaluating the financial viability of local municipalities in Greece. For this purpose, a multicriteria methodology is implemented combining a simulation analysis approach (stochastic multicriteria acceptability analysis) with a disaggregation technique. In particular, an evaluation model is developed on the basis of accrual financial data from 360 Greek municipalities for 2007. A set of customized to the local government context financial ratios is defined that rate municipalities and distinguish those with good financial condition from those experiencing financial problems. The model’s results are analyzed on the 2007 data as well as on a subsample of 100 local governments in 2009. The model succeeded in correctly classifying distressed municipalities according to a benchmark set by the central government in 2010. Such a model and methodology could be particularly useful for performance assessment in the context of several European Union countries that have a similar local government framework to the Greek one and apply accrual accounting techniques.     

A planning model for urban housing developments

Summary A planning model for urban housing projects is developed within the framework of systems analysis. The first part gives a cost model of housing projects. Costs are shown to depend on the costs of building sites, construction costs, costs for streets and for parking facilities. The planning model takes factual and legal constraints into consideration. A housing benefit function for the evaluation of urban housing projects is developed by making use of factor analysis. Cost model and benefit model of housing projects are combined in a cost-benefit-analysis for urban planning. The model is shown to be operational by pointing out results derived in an empirical study of a large housing project in Berlin.

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Zusammenfassung Ein Modell für die Planung öffentlicher Investitionen im Wohnungsbau wird entwickelt. Ausgangspunkt ist eine Systemanalyse der Kosten städtischer Wohngebiete. Die Kosten hängen von den Gebäudekosten, den Grundstückskosten, den Straßenkosten und den Kosten für das gewählte Parksystem ab. Das Planungsmodell berücksichtigt faktische und rechtliche Nebenbedingungen, die der Städteplaner bei seinen Entwürfen zu beachten hat. Ein methodischer Ansatz für die Bewertung städtischer Wohngebiete wird aufgezeigt. Wohnwerte und Kosten werden abschließend in einer Kosten-Nutzen-Analyse städtischer Wohngebiete zusammengefaßt. Die Operationalität des Modells wird an einem praktischen Beispiel nachgewiesen.

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This paper is based on research carried out withO. M. Ungers, A. Tönjes, K. Viebering, M. Wegener, andK. P. Kistner. See for detailsH. Albach andO. M. Ungers:Optimale Wohngebietsplanung, Band I, Wiesbaden 1969.     

单指标众数模型的统计诊断及在波士顿房价分析中的应用

在金融、经济、社会科学、气候科学、环境科学、工程技术和生物医学等领域,数据分布常常呈现出尖峰厚尾的特征,且密度分布是不对称的有偏分布。此时,单指标众数模型是刻画这些特征的一个重要方法。为此,非常有必要研究该模型下的统计诊断。本文将考虑单指标众数模型基于数据删除模型和众数漂移模型的统计诊断与局部影响分析。模拟研究和波士顿房价数据的结果表明所提出的方法是有效和可行的。     

Assessing the impact of derived behavior information on customer attrition in the financial service industry

The value of the customer has been widely recognized in terms of financial planning and efficient resource allocation including the financial service industry. Previous studies have shown that directly observable information can be used in order to make reasonable predictions of customer attrition probabilities. However, these studies do not take full account of customer behavior information. In this paper, we demonstrate that efficient use of information can add value to financial services industry and improve the prediction of customer attrition. To achieve this, we apply an orthogonal polynomial approximation analysis to derive unobservable information, which is then used as explanatory variables in a probit–hazard rate model. Our results show that derived information can help our understanding of customer attrition behavior and give better predictions. We conclude that both researchers and the financial service industry should gather and use derived financial information in addition to directly observable information.     

Connecting a population dynamic model with a multi-period location-allocation problem for post-disaster relief operations

In this study, we propose a mathematical model and heuristics for solving a multi-period location-allocation problem in post-disaster operations, which takes into account the impact of distribution over the population. Logistics restrictions such as human and financial resources are considered. In addition, a brief review on resilience system models is provided, as well as their connection with quantitative models for post-disaster relief operations. In particular, we highlight how one can improve resilience by means of OR/MS strategies. Then, a simpler resilience schema is proposed, which better reflects an active system for providing humanitarian aid in post-disaster operations, similar to the model focused in this work. The proposed model is non-linear and solved by a decomposition approach: the master level problem is addressed by a non-linear solver, while the slave subproblem is treated as a black-box coupling heuristics and a Variable Neighborhood Descent local search. Computational experiments have been done using several scenarios, and real data from Belo Horizonte city in Brazil.     

A framework for predicting gross institutional long-term care cost arising from known commitments at local authority level

As the UK population ages, it is forecasted that there will be an unsustainable increase in the need for, and therefore in the costs of long-term care. Although several studies have been performed to estimate these costs, they do not take into account the impact of survival patterns on costs. Focussing only on residents already in care (known commitments), we have developed, in association with an English local authority, a framework for estimating the future gross cost incurred by this group, built around a survival model. We apply this framework to forecast the cost over a given period of time, of maintaining a group of individuals in residential and nursing care, funded by the local authority. One of the novelties in the model is that it translates survival inputs and unit fees for care into cost in a manner, which was useful and meaningful to decision makers.     

A decentralized two-level transportation problem in a housing material manufacturer: Interactive fuzzy programming approach

In this paper, we deal with a transportation problem in a housing material manufacturer and derive a satisfactory solution to the problem by taking into account not only the degree of satisfaction with respect to objectives of the housing material manufacturer but also those of two forwarding agents to which the housing material manufacturer entrusts transportation of products. The two forwarding agents handle the regular transportation and the small lot transportation, and each of them assigns work force, the transformation tasks properly. There are two objectives in the housing material manufacturer: one is to minimize the transportation cost and the other is to minimize the opportunity loss with respect to transportation time. The objectives of the two forwarding agents are to maximize their profits. We formulate the transportation planning and work force assignment problem as a decentralized two-level integer programming problem, and derive a satisfactory solution by applying an interactive fuzzy programming method.