Urban Studies and Planning Commons^™

Explaining Horizontal And Vertical Cooperation On Public Services In Michigan: The Role Of Local Fiscal Capacity, Jered B. Carr, Elisabeth R. Gerber, Eric W. Lupher

Working Group on Interlocal Services Cooperation

Michigan local governments engage in a wide range of cooperative activities. Little is known, however, about what factors motivate local governments to engage in intergovernmental cooperation and how local government officials choose among various forms of collaboration. We develop and test a theory of intergovernmental cooperation that explains differences in the factors that lead local governments to engage in horizontal cooperation with other local units versus vertical cooperation with county or state governments. Our primary focus is on fiscal capacity: we hypothesize that limited fiscal capacity leads many local governments, especially townships, to work collaboratively with state or county actors …