Unlocking Success: Key Lessons from Academia-Government Collaborations in Advancing Public Policy
Collaboration between academics and government agencies – in the form of faculty research projects, class projects, student research projects, and coalitions – is pivotal for advancing our understanding of public policy issues. However, numerous barriers can hinder these efforts and limit their effectiveness. Drawing from our experience spanning over twenty years – as an environmental economist and city planner – we have encountered and overcome many of these challenges. In this article, we present a structured approach to navigating collaborations, and we share some of the insights we've gained through our journey.
Establish Mutual Interest
It goes without saying that collaborators must have a shared interest in a subject. Fundamental to our partnership is a mutual interest in environmental policy and how it relates to the lives of people in flood prone areas. Specifically, we are committed to ensuring affordable access to flood insurance for vulnerable populations, identifying effective ways to reduce stormwater runoff and understanding the effects of urban stream restoration projects on nearby residents. Through these efforts, we have collaborated on peer-reviewed published papers that analyze public policy issues related to these topics. For example, a paper exploring the effect of urban stream restoration projects on the sale price of nearby properties was strengthened by our conversations about local land acquisitions and the expected impact of stream restoration projects. Thanks to this process, we recognized the need to investigate the effect of floodplain location on the sale prices of residential property. This laid the foundation for future research projects and an analysis of the City of Portland’s land acquisition practices.
Define Clear Expectations
Successful collaboration requires a common understanding about timelines, goals and deliverables. What are the academic project’s objectives? Do they align with the government agency’s needs? For example, will it be a theoretical exploration of a policy issue? How can emerging practice be applied to a local issue? Or will it provide a more detailed analysis of the agency’s work or the community context within which policy decisions are being considered? How much time do agency staff members have to participate? How will data be stored, shared, and with whom? What format will the deliverables take – a presentation, a report, or both? Recognizing the importance of independent research, will agency staff have an opportunity to provide feedback on the factual information, the policy implications of the research, or other elements of the deliverables?
Navigate the Rigors of the Research Process
In the social sciences, a typical research process starts by identifying the motivating question, reviewing relevant literature, proposing a modeling approach, collecting data, estimating results, and then discussing policy recommendations. If the research involves surveys, the process of developing the survey instrument can be time consuming, typically engaging multiple focus groups of representatives from the relevant populations to help inform and refine the survey instrument. Institutional review boards – which are responsible for protecting the rights of human subjects – play an important part in this process.
Before the research is finalized, authors often present an initial working paper at conferences, seminars, colloquia, or workshops. They use feedback gathered in these venues to update their paper and may potentially change the initial results and policy recommendations. This iterative process and the potential for results and conclusions to change means that researchers may be reluctant to allow their collaborator to share initial results with others. A long timeline can impact the utility of the research to agency staff when they need quick results. However, timelines – and occasions when a study’s findings are not urgently needed – can align well for longer-term and complex public planning and programmatic efforts. As an example, for decades the City of Portland has acquired property from willing sellers in the 100-year floodplain, typically purchasing a few properties each year. Research examining the impacts of the floodplain on residential home sale prices provided valuable insights for the program.
Bridge the Gap Between Peer-Reviewed Research and Public Policy
Peer-reviewed articles are considered by most as the “gold standard” for academic research. The process typically involves submitting an article to a journal’s editor, who evaluates whether, based on its quality and its contribution to the literature, an article fits the journal’s aims and scope. If acceptable, the editor then seeks input from peer reviewers – an independent assessment about the paper’s contributions to the literature, data, methodology, and the soundness of the paper’s policy implications and conclusions. The editor evaluates these comments and shares them with the authors along with the decision to accept or reject the submission or seek revisions before publication.
This process can be slow; it can take months to (more likely) years. It can be a frustratingly long time if political priorities change, and elected officials move on to other issues before they have considered insights gained from the research. In addition, the style, language, and ways of communicating results of academic research differ from what public agencies use. This can make it difficult for policymakers to understand and incorporate relevant findings. By working together with academics, agency staff can translate academic findings into policy briefs, presentation slides, or an executive summary written with practitioners and policymakers in mind.
To illustrate with an example: In the early 2000s, Oregon’s property rights movement was in full swing with voters passing a ballot measure that required state and local governments to either compensate landowners when land-use regulations reduced their property’s fair-market value or waive the regulations. This closely followed the listing of local salmon species as threatened under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). As the City of Portland sought to improve protections for natural resources, including streams and riparian areas, these countervailing pressures raised questions about whether local land use regulations decreased property values and if so, what that could mean for the City’s natural resource protection efforts.
Environmental overlay zones (e-zones), which restrict or limit building in environmentally sensitive areas, are a key tool the City of Portland uses to comply with Oregon’s statewide land-use planning requirements to protect natural resources. The city was updating its e-zones, in part to respond to the ESA listings. Determining if they had an effect on a property’s sale price was an important consideration in the process. Professor Noelwah Netusil wrote a paper estimating the effect of e-zones on property sale prices, but with an academic audience and specific journal in mind. Using the study’s findings, city staff created briefing points for agency managers explaining that impacts on property sale prices were both positive and negative, with minimal net impacts. Professor Netusil fact-checked these points, and agency staff focused on the relevance to policy makers – that e-zone expansions were not expected to trigger requirements to compensate property owners.
Influence Future Research and Legislative Action
A significant benefit of academic research is the power to influence future research. Citations matter. The number of times other sources cite a paper can signal a paper’s influence on a field. For example, the environmental zoning paper published in 2005 has been cited over 150 times (Google Scholar) and was referenced in an Amicus Brief submitted to the U.S. Supreme Court in the regulatory takings case Murr v. Wisconsin, 137 S. Ct. 1933, 1943 (2017).
Peer-reviewed research can also help inform legislation. A survey conducted about flood insurance knowledge and flood risk determined that homebuyers didn’t learn until very late in the home-buying process (often when signing closing documents) that their home was at risk of flooding and that they might need to purchase flood insurance, potentially increasing their housing costs by a significant amount. These findings were provided in testimony to support legislation to change Oregon’s seller disclosure form and ultimately were published in a peer-reviewed paper. Oregon now requires home sellers to disclose that buyers may be required to purchase flood insurance when a home is located in a FEMA-designated floodplain.
Here's a second example: A review of flood insurance policies conducted for the Lents Stabilization and Job Creation Collaborative identified many inaccuracies that often led to higher premiums. These findings informed legislation that requires insurance agents writing flood insurance policies in Oregon to receive flood-specific continuing education. This made Oregon, at the time the law was passed, the fifth state to enact a requirement. Key findings from the review of flood insurance policies appear in a policy brief, which was written with a general audience in mind.
Access Resources
Academic and policy sectors often connect through student internships and other “real world” student learning experiences. These opportunities are valuable to students. Agency staff can find it satisfying to mentor future practitioners, and students’ efforts can augment an organization’s capacity to gather and analyze information. For example, students provided useful information to city staff working on the Lents Collaborative by conducting over 100 door-to-door surveys about residents’ experiences with flooding and flood insurance. This information would have been difficult to gather in any other way.
Another benefit of working with academic researchers is that they can access literature that may not be accessible to agency staff, providing insights about recent findings and best practices for designing and implementing policies. Many academic journals require a subscription to view an article or require a one-time fee to download it. Some journals provide entirely open access. Others make authors pay a fee to publish their papers as open access, which allows for use based on that article’s creative commons license. There is an upward trend in the percentage of articles published as open access, but the fees can be steep. For example, the fee to publish the flood risk literacy and flood insurance knowledge paper was over $3,000.
Acknowledge Asymmetric Benefits
It is important for agency staff to have realistic expectations. For example, this may be a student’s first experience conducting research at this level, so the outcomes may reflect the level of their learning process and the constraints of the academic calendar. While some class and student research projects can yield helpful information for agency staff, the time agency staff members devote to these efforts may be best viewed as an investment in expanding the knowledge and experiences of future practitioners; they are bridging classroom learning with real-world opportunities and the challenges of public service.
Leverage Academic Expertise for Local Agency Advancement
Academic researchers often support local agencies by serving on review panels for consultant proposals and on agency advisory committees for policy development and implementation. Their participation can support agencies by providing needed expertise and fresh perspectives on critical issues. At the same time, an academic partner can benefit by making valuable connections with practitioners, generating ideas for future research and contributing to the community. A faculty member’s efforts may also be considered as part of the criteria for their promotion and tenure evaluation.
Final Thoughts
Like any successful relationship, collaboration between academic and government agencies is grounded in common interests and an appreciation for differing skills and knowledge. We have been committed to working together over the long term, focused in neighborhoods along Portland’s flood-prone Johnson Creek. We aren’t alone. Our collaboration exists within a broader community of people from nonprofits, academic institutions, community groups, and a local government dedicated to working in service to a special place. The cumulative impacts of these efforts are amplified by a shared dedication to community and environmental well-being. We hope others find a way to forge partnerships across sectors and disciplines and that they experience the satisfaction of seeing the impact of their work magnified through their shared efforts.
About the Authors:
Noelwah R. Netusil is the Stanley H. Cohn Professor of Economics at Reed College. She is an environmental economist with expertise in land economics, flooding, sustainable stormwater solutions, and non-market valuation techniques. She has served on several journal editorial boards, professional association committees, government agency advisory boards, and nonprofit boards. She received her BS in Chemistry and Economics from Allegheny College and her PhD in Economics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Marie Walkiewicz is a Senior Planner at Portland's Bureau of Environmental Services, with 25 years of experience integrating planning for land use, stormwater infrastructure, and natural resources. Ms. Walkiewicz brings a community-centered approach to her work, much of which has been in the Johnson Creek watershed and Portland's central city. Ms. Walkiewicz holds a Masters of Urban and Regional Planning from Portland State University and an undergraduate degree in communications from Marylhurst College.