B. The Governor's Policy Management Tools
III. ADMINISTRATORS' REACTIONS TO THE GOVERNOR'S INFLUENCE
To what extent do governors influence administrative agencies9 Clearly, the pub lie expects that in their positions as chief executives they will exercise influence Some tools of the office are designed to give them influence However, in the context of separation of powers, they compete with legislatures to control admin- istration Both governors and legislatures attempt to provide close administrative oversight, sometimes even to provide detailed instructions or guidance that thwarts the desires of the other Rosenthal (1990 173-174) descnbes this compe tition as follows
Although the governor is chiet administrator, it is not unusual tor the head of a department to spend as much time relating to the legislature as to the governor and the governor's staft Nor is it unusual for those at the top ot the ladder in the career service to spend more time trying to pacify the legisla ture than trying to figure out what the governor might want to do The gover nor's concern is episodic, the legislature's is continuous
Several investigations of the governor's influence over administrative agen cies have been explicitly comparative, examining the influence of both the gover-
118 Hebert nor and the legislature (Abney and Lauth, 1986, Brudney and Hebert, 1987, El- ling, 1992) From the perspective of agency directors, these two major formal institutions, or "external actors," are especially salient features of their environ ments Public agencies, however, are relatively open to external influences, and consequently are affected by other important external actors as well Among the more prominent ones that compete with the governor and legislature are interest groups, federal agencies, Congress and the President, local officials, and profes sional associations (Abney and Lauth, 1986, Brudney and Hebert, 1987)
Abney and Lauth (1986) asked department heads in all 50 states to rank the impact of various external political actors on agency programs and objectives The governor and legislature dominated the first place rankings, with 43% of respondents placing the legislature first and 38% placing the governor first While this difference is not great, it indicates both the slight advantage the legislature might have in total "impact" on agencies and the degree to which these two actors contend with each other for influence over state administration
Elling (1992) reported findings from a study of 10 states and similarly found that the legislature has somewhat greater influence over administrative agencies than does the governor, especially in matters concerning agency budget levels
The 1994 ASAP survey, as well as similar surveys dating back to 1964, asked state agency heads to compare the amount of control and oversight that the governor and legislature exercise over their agencies Administrators' re sponses to this question are displayed in Table 1 Throughout this 30 year penod, somewhat over one-fifth of respondents have indicated that the two actors are roughly equal in influence Notably, though, in three of the four survey years, more than two fifths of the administrators indicate that the governor has the most control and oversight—and this figure approaches 50% in 1994
It appears, then, that in terms of broadly described "control and oversight,"
the governor has the upper hand relative to the legislature, and this may have grown in recent decades Perhaps, however, more is concealed than revealed by this general comparative question Table 2 reports administrators' responses to two questions concerning the legislature's and the governor's influence over Table 1 Agency Heads Assessments of Governor s and Legislature s Control and Oversight
1964 1974 1984 1994 Exercises more control & oversight
Governor Each the same Legislature
Total
332 226 4 4 2 1000
474 263 263 1000
421 233 346 1000
483 214 303 1000 Source American State Administrators Project surveys years indicated
Governors as Chief Administrators 119 Table 2 Agency Heads Assessments of Governor s and
Control
Exercises more detailed review Governor
Each the same Legislature
Total
Greater tendency to reduce requests Governor
Each the same Legislature
Total
1974
355 324 321 1000 319 243 438 1000
Legislature s Budget
1984
304 353 343 1000 362 200 438 1000
1994
326 370 304 1000 392 242 367 1001 Souice American State Administrators Project surveys years indicated
agency budgets Specifically, agency heads were asked whether the governor or the legislature exercises the more detailed review of the agency's budget, and whether it is the governor or the legislature that has the greater tendency to reduce the agency's budget request
Comparing the governor's and the legislature's influence over budget mat ters, and examining changes in responses since 1974 (the first year these questions were asked), we see that the two institutions exhibit more nearly equal influence Regarding who exercised more detailed review ol agency budget requests, 32 6%
of respondents in 1994 indicated the governor did, compared to 30 4% who said the legislature did A plurality of 37 0% indicated the two had equivalent influ ence
Clearly, in the 1994 survey as well as in the surveys from the two earlier decades, the governor and the legislature are shown to be closely competitive in their abilities to review agency budgets—but did this similarity extend to action they took on those budgets9 Agency heads were also asked whether the governor or legislature had the greater tendency to reduce budget requests Since adminis- trators often support the programs their agencies provide, and this requires seek- ing increases in annual appropriations, it is interesting to inquire about the reac tions to their requests These requests afford the governor (and the legislature) a unique opportunity to review an agency's activities and to either reward it or, potentially, impose sanctions A clear tendency to reduce requests may indicate that the governor is using the budget as a tool of influence
The lower section of Table 2 shows that in 1994, administrators were di vided on who was more likely to impose reductions The governor held a slight edge Across the 20-year span a trend seems to emerge, with governors becoming more likely to reduce budget requests
120 Hebert
A. A Complex Environment: The Governor Is Only One