Tuesday, January 04, 2005
City Donation of Equipment--ICMA Broker
Note: This posting is way too long--keep scrolling--there is stuff below.
Opportunity: Cities have a lot of surplus equipment that could be conveyed to international communities.
We ought to consider our involvement in moving faciliating equipment donations from US to international cities. From time to time, ICMA is involved directly or indirectly with cities that wish to ship surplus material overseas. We have not become involved in most of these efforts, for they take an incredible amount of time and effort on our behalf. A couple of things have happened over the past few months to make me wonder whether we should re-visit our stance. Specifically:
*The City of West Bend, Wisconsin has sent 4 containers of computers and other equipment to Bulgaria over the last couple of years. This effort has been taken solely by the City (and a really dedicated city manager), without any significant help from ICMA. The effort has been warmly received by the Bulgarian recipient, and USAID has been very receptive as well.
*I was contacted by a city in North Carolina, which has sent fire trucks to Nicaragua. After receiving some publicity, they have been approached by a number of other cities interested in donating their surplus equipment, and the City Manager wants ICMA to help.
*The City of Great Falls wanted to send a trash truck to Kyrgyzstan, but found too many obstacles. They ended up selling the truck for $17,000, and buying a truck in Kyrgyzstan, which was a great solution.
*We worked with Athens, Georgia to donate 6 pickups and 5 dump trucks (all used) to Bamako, Mali. The cost of shipping was approximately $175,000. The estimated value of the trucks was a total of $75,000. USAID agreed to pick up the cost of the shipping, but the deal fell through when the Athens Law Director intervened. But the fact that USAID would pay so much for shipping got my attention.
Everyone likes these programs—the US city feels good when they give away equipment that is still useful, but no longer meets their needs. The international city likes it, because they get equipment that they need desperately, and would never have the chance to acquire otherwise. And USAID likes it, because it connects US cities internationally, and there is a tremendous amount of good will created for the Mission and Embassy. So why aren’t we involved if everyone likes it so much?
In my experience, the effort can be very time-intensive and costly, and there can be some significant downside. For instance, the City of Kabul has received significant donations of trucks, but they are too large to use everyday, they are very expensive to fuel (the trucks are huge, and so is the quantity of fuel needed) money that the City doesn’t have. Also, Kabul doesn’t have a garage or even electricity—when a tire goes flat, they have to pump in up manually. Also there is no supply of parts readily available, from oil filters to engine belts. The trucks simply cannot be sustained. This is the most recent example I have seen, though cities internationally are littered with equipment that was given by a donor, with no real maintenance/upkeep planned, leading to a premature death/underuse. In Sofia I saw a $50,000 filter mechanism from Japan still in the crate (the city couldn’t afford the electric to run it); $100,000 GIS systems that were turn-key in the Philippines, but no one had time to maintain the data; a $150,000 ‘mulcher’ that broke after a year’s use and was never repaired; and multimillion dollar waste treatment systems in Thailand that had never been started because they weren’t connected into the sewage collection network, they were too expensive to operate, and no one knew how to maintain them.
Given the misguided but well-intentioned efforts of international donors (and US cities), I have always maintained that we should stay away from the effort. Seeing a system that is so broken, I thought this to be a rational stance. Is it time to re-think that stance, and helping to fix the situation? For instance, we could explore:
*Creating an effort that would allow US cities to donate their excess equipment to ICMA (much as non profits in the US encourage people to donate cars and boats) and then ICMA reselling the equipment. Before you think me nuts, it seems like we could list the stuff on E-Bay, and require the successful bidder to pickup the equipment from the donor city. Our only costs would be the administrative time it took to monitor the auction and process the payments. We could then take the money and buy equipment internationally to give to cities. This might have the further benefit of allowing us to purchase equipment internationally, avoiding “Made in America’ rules that make the most basic of equipment very expensive to buy/ship, and often times introduces equipment into a country for which there are few parts/supplies available. We have floated the idea of the Great Falls model—selling the equipment and donating the money—but most cities can’t do it because once they generate real dollars, they aren’t giving it away. This idea might give the cities another option that would work.
*Alternatively, should we get involved in the current ad hoc efforts, and lead the way in showing cities how to donate equipment? Should we create a model? With a bit of work, we could capture what has been done, the lessons learned, and provide the path for US cities to follow.
*Should we emphasize to USAID the need for supporting this equipment, either new or used? This could be as simple as a questionnaire for the international city to respond to, to determine whether they had a need for the equipment, and the capacity to maintain, before a donation could be made (Question: You wish to receive dump trucks: Do you have a garage? Do you know how to maintain hydraulics? Where will you get parts for this truck? Question: You wish to receive computers. What access to electricity do you have? Who will maintain the computers?
*We could also propose that USAID provide training support—through CityLinks the donating city could send a mechanic to train the recipient on maintenance of the equipment. It would greatly increase the likelihood of success. And it would cover a US city concern—they will donate the equipment, but they would rarely incur the cost of sending someone to train people in maintenance.
These are just some thoughts. I think there is a lot of equipment out there that US cities would donate—or money that could be generated from equipment donation. And we know USAID loves it. Yet it sometimes falls short of meeting the real needs of international cities. Do we want to continue to stay hands-off, or should we consider getting more involved and try to fix a system that appears to be broken?
If we are going to get engaged, the time is now. Kabul has a great need, we have staff here that can evaluate the need and know what would be useful, it will resonate with US cities, and I think there should be military flights that we can use to ship. Whether or not we should broker donated equipment on E-Bay is a separate question.
What do you think?
This worked well in the Peace Corps- we did the same thing. Often times the cities/schools/hospitals, etc. would ask the volunteers to ‘get them’ equipment without thinking about how they would use it or run it- often it was to show off. My school wanted a copier for instance, but there was no electricity, people would have to pay to use it, toner was really expensive, and the director wanted to keep it locked up so it wouldn’t be broken…in his office. The director wanted the copier so he could say that his school was the only one in the region with its own copier- it made him look great. We had to submit a type of mini grant proposal to Peace Corps because they had a stash of money for these types of things. However, we had to do the grant with the international partners receiving the equipment, and there had to be a certain percentage of in-kind given by them, be it labor, recurring costs later, or money up front. My friend had her school roof redone and the school parents agreed to do the bulk of the work if PC paid for the materials.
So, my thought is, the questionnaire is a must because we have to get people to think down the road to when stuff will break. There also has to be something in place to show that this stuff isn’t going to sit in the boss’ office or be used by an exclusive group.
We could set up a webpage that would allow US cities to post what they have to offer and international cities to ask for stuff, by way of questionnaire/application. We could then facilitate the exchange.
There are a lot of US orgs that already do this stuff, but probably not specifically for cities, rather entities within cities. We could tap into them to be the brokers.
At the very least we should get up to speed on the laws and regs for shipping, because when people ask we should be able to tell them. If they have to do a ton of research and figure it all out, it may not be worth it for them.
I think that’s it.
: 11:53 AM : 11:56 AMJon, I feel that ICMA should play an active role in soliciting and distributing equipment in coordination with USAID from our member Cities. I know this would be major undertaking but someone needs to evaluate the needs of the receiving Countries as well as the capabilities and capacity for operating and maintaining whatever equipment or vehicles are made available. On the flip side it needs to make economic sense to send certain types of vehicles and equipment. We should not spend a $ 100,000 to send a $ 20,000 vehicle. This is a very complex issue but I think it deserves to be thoroughly discussed and reviewed by ICMA. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to share my thoughts with you. If you get a group together I would like to be involved. Take Care!
: 11:57 AM : 12:15 PMI think that 1) selling used items on e-bay would become time consuming, as well as complicated, 2) I agree definitely with the development of a process, 3) training folks on maintenance is a necessity, because this underscores ICMA's image of following through and raising the standard of how we assist, and 4) we should go as far as talking to USAID about assistance.
I suggest that:
Step 1: We send out a note to USAID missions, asking if they are interested in receiving notification about goods/equipment to be donated internationally, if they would pay for training ($500 honorarium, $1500 flight, $1500 per diem), international tax (in some cases they don't pay import taxes) and shipping costs (we can get a quote from a US shipping company). A form should be developed to assess: a) what the mission is willing to do in the way of financial assistance for the donation process, b) what the mission thinks the community/country needs (trash trucks, computers, supplies), c) what the capacity of the local institutions to contribute to maintenance and part of the cost that we ask USAID to underwrite.
Step 2: Compile a list of USAID missions willing and interested in receiving and paying.
Step 3: Send out a brief guide to our members (perhaps in an article in PM) on what they need to do, who they can contact here at ICMA, and a form on the type of stuff they want to send. There is one caveat we can't overcome and that is unavailable parts to fix older pieces that are sent abroad, which is why we need to know the quality of the item and the life expectancy, which should be included in a form for interested US Cities to fill out.
Step 4: Match goods with USAID missions. Everyone wins. ICMA helps out our members and our client, USAID can give the gift of trash truck, uniform, etc. We underscore that we are the promoters/supporters of local governance strengthening (through goods or TA).
What do you think?
: 6:02 PM<< Home
