Programme Management effects – Kansas City CIMO example:

Extract from: http://www.pwmag.com/industry-news.asp?sectionID=768&articleID=362838

See more on CIMO at: : http://www.kcmo.org/cimo.nsf/web/home]

Fast-tracking the future

By 2004, Kansas City faced a backlog of projects worth more than $240
million. Teaming with private consultants, the city created a separate agency
to be its “economic engine for redevelopment.”

Source: PUBLIC WORKS MAGAZINE

Publication date: 09/01/2006

By Michael Musgrave

Kansas City, Mo.'s deteriorating urban core needed a jump start. City leaders needed
to upgrade its crumbling infrastructure to draw people and businesses and revitalize
blighted areas into commercial, cultural, entertainment, residential, and retail hubs.

Such initiatives stagnated, however, when inefficient, outdated, scattered municipal

processes could not deliver projects quickly enough. Compartmentalized within
various city departments, those processes lacked a common systematic approach,
defined schedules, and accountability to resolve issues and push projects forward.

With the public works department able to deliver an average of only $40 million in
projects annually, already funded projects were stalled from three to 10 years.
Backlogged project budgets swelled with rising inflation costs. Contractors hesitated
to bid on city projects or give the city “preferred client” status because of lengthy
timeframes for bid-to-notice-to-proceed and contractor payment.

By 2004, the city faced a backlog valued at more than $240 million.

MEETING THE NEEDS

To fast-track its future, Kansas City needed to streamline project delivery and relieve
its capital projects backlog.

In early 2004, mayor Kay Barnes, the city council, and city manager Wayne Cauthen
addressed that need by launching the Capital Improvements Management Office
(CIMO). CIMO is an innovative, integrated public-private project management team
comprising city staff, consultants from MWH Global Inc., a Colorado-based
engineering consulting firm, and locally based consulting firm Burns & McDonnell.
The city took the unprecedented step of placing these consultants in key CIMO
leadership roles, including the director spot, giving them authority and responsibility
to make decisions on the city's behalf.

“We recognized that developing a centralized capital improvements office required

private-consultant support, and that placing consultants in key leadership positions
was crucial to CIMO's rapid development and success,” says Cauthen. “Those steps
allowed us to be more accountable to Kansas City's people and to be better stewards
for the city's public infrastructure resources.”
CIMO's mission was to create a better-built community through lasting improvements
to Kansas City's project-delivery system. Specific objectives were to:

• Fast-track project delivery by applying industry best practices.

• Reduce capital improvement project backlogs.
• Spur area economic development.
• Prepare city staff to assume CIMO leadership positions within three years,
while providing for ongoing project delivery improvements.

A NEW CULTURE
CIMO transformed the city's old, siloed capital project delivery processes into a
project-delivery-focused culture using a centralized approach. Apivotal first step was
initiating project-centric teams such as those used in private industry.

Under the project-centric team model, a single project manager is accountable

throughout all project delivery processes, with the support of a knowledgeable, cross-
functional team to help make decisions and resolve issues. Teams specializing in
public infrastructure projects such as streets, streetlights, bridges, and parks work
together from funding through completion.

To complete the transformation, CIMO introduced powerful tools based on industry

best practices. These included project delivery controls using key performance
indicators to track progress of delivery processes toward stated goals, and systems
to provide project managers, teams and city staff with up-to-date project information
and standardized project delivery tools. CIMO also launched an external Web site to
give the public transparent access to project scope, schedule, and status, and to
allow contractors to look ahead on future bids.

In addition, CIMO implemented education and training methods such as “KCMO

University,” a series of structured professional training courses, to transfer
professional project delivery knowledge and skills to city staff and embed private-
industry best practices within city government.

• Reduce capital improvement project backlogs.

• Spur area economic development.
• Prepare city staff to assume CIMO leadership positions within three years,
while providing for ongoing project delivery improvements.

The projects steered by the

Capital Improvement
Management Office include
the $835 million
entertainment district,
which stretches across
seven square blocks and
features movie theaters, live
entertainment venues,
corporate offices, and
residential spaces.
 When Kansas City's Capital
Improvement Management
Office launched, the
partnership between city
officials—such as city
manager Wayne Cauthen,
left, and private consultants
including MWH Global
project executive Mike
Musgrave—openly shared
with the public its plans to
streamline capital project
delivery. Photos: MWH

The $135 million expansion of Kansas City's

Bartle Hall Convention Center is one of the
many projects administered by the city's public-
private management team.

“Their program to train city staff ensured that the proper professional skill sets are in
place for CIMO's long-term success,” says Cauthen.

Now a formal department of city government, CIMO directs $1.2 billion in

redevelopment efforts, including downtown's $835 million entertainment district, the
$135 million Bartle Hall Convention Center expansion, and the $276 million Sprint
Center Arena—plus $190 million in neighborhood and public service projects. These
efforts are generating as many as 5000 jobs, $170 million in annual state sales
benefits, convention business averaging $7 million annually, and $15 million in net
convention-expansion-related annual direct spending.

Cauthen calls CIMO the city's “economic engine for redevelopment” because every
dollar of public funds invested in the community results in $3 to $4 of private funds
brought to Kansas City. “New venues, facilities, and services being developed under
CIMO's direction will enhance opportunities and quality of life for everyone in Kansas
City and its surrounding communities,” he says. “They're also attracting visitors and
new businesses, thus increasing the city's tax revenue.”

WATCHING A CITY'S REBIRTH

CIMO installed Webcams to allow Kansas City's people to watch the progress of
downtown redevelopment on their computers via the CIMO Web site at
www.kcmo.org/cimo. CIMO also supports the Kansas City Area Development
Council's efforts to produce a documentary television film, “Mending the Heart of an
American City,” which will chronicle for a nationwide audience the story of greater
downtown Kansas City's dramatic rebirth.

The world already is watching—and approves. Kansas City and MWH, along with
Burns & McDonnell, earned the 2006 U.S. Conference of Mayors (USCM) Public-
Private Partnership Award of Excellence. “This prestigious award acknowledges the
collaborative efforts of USCM member cities such as Kansas City and private firms
such as MWH, working together to enhance the quality of life in communities we
serve,” says MWH's Mike McClure, CIMO director.
CIMO's success underscores the importance of public investment in a city's
prosperity and shows how a streamlined delivery approach can ensure consistent
growth.

“This approach avoids the ‘boom and bust' economy that has plagued municipalities
such as Kansas City in the past,” Cauthen says. “The CIMO public-private
partnership has transferred professional project delivery knowledge and skills to city
staff and brought a new working attitude to city government.”

— Musgrave is MWH's project executive for the Kansas City CIMO.