A decision model for municipal resources management

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present a model to support governmental local managers in public budget optimization, based on an integration of methods. It was constructed to fill the gap related to weights definition in problematic, commonly performed subjective assessments. This model supports the decision making in budget distribution identifying the importance of sectors in local governments, captured by historical data. Design/methodology/approach The model was developed following three steps: the first step included the exploitation of the characteristics of local sectors represented by city departments and the data collection procedure using time series (TS). In the second one, the weights regarding the importance of each city department were calculated by the UTASTAR method and based on historical data from the first step. Finally, an objective function was formulated using linear programming and constraints based on law specifications, and as a result, an optimized projection for public budget distribution was performed. Findings The results demonstrated that the model can be more efficient to weights definition, considering the behavior of preferences by historical data and supporting local public resources optimization, also to comply with the legislation, being able to predict or project future values available on the budget. Research limitations/implications The theoretical and practical implications are related with a novelty in recognizing the weights for criteria by a historical behavior of preferences. It can be bringing important directions for budget distribution. The main limitation detected in this study was the difficulty to formulate an assessment involving an integrated opinion from local managers and the population. Practical implications First of all, with the correct allocation of resources, the government has a greater advantage to capture investments from the negotiation with development entities and banks. Second, an efficient local government management can promote compliance with legislation and more transparent public policies. Social implications The correct distribution of resources affects the life quality for citizens, since the government acts as a provider of essential services for the population like education, safety, health, particularly for citizens who depend exclusively on the services offered by the local government. Moreover, it can also affect the environment as resources for garbage collection, disposal services and sanitation and, finally, affect the city development such as infrastructure, taxes, etc. Originality/value It might be considered an original contribution mainly by the development of a procedure to capture values for weights by TS and meeting the manager’s requirements, based on analytical, statistical and mathematical tools integrated.

Analytics in developing countries: methods, applications, and the impact on the UN Sustainable Development Goals

“…Examples are given in Thesari et al. (2019) who formulate an LP model to support governmental decisions on budget allocation for different local sectors in Brazil, and in Nguyen et al. (2018) who formulate an LP model to evaluate the maximum reduction in greenhouse gas emission in Vietnam.…”

“…Thesari et al. (2019) support governmental local managers in their budget allocation decisions for different sectors in Brazil. Abolghasem et al.…”

Comparative study of forecasting approaches in monthly streamflow series from Brazilian hydroelectric plants using Extreme Learning Machines and Box & Jenkins models

“…Artificial neural networks are structures of distributed processing of information, consisting of simple processing units, called artificial neurons, with a high degree of interconnectivity (Haykin, 2008;Lizot et al, 2020;Siqueira et al, 2012a;Tang et al, 1991;Thesari et al, 2019;Wang, 2011). One striking feature of this methodology is the ability of learning (Kachba et al, 2020;Zhang et al, 2018).…”

Combining Total Cost of Ownership and Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis to Improve Cost Management in Family Farming

“…There is needed a very particular expertise, knowledge and practice for a good management of agribusinesses [11], nevertheless, these competencies are more developed in larger firms. In small agribusinesses, the analysis of performance and profitability is often based on empirical perceptions, without using management tools, software or any technology for data collection and/or to perform specialized analysis [12].…”