Managerial perceptions and the production of fire protection

Despite compelling impetus to carefully specify the influences on public performance levels, the role of public managers in public production has not been fully characterized or measured. This article argues that an issue central to the study of local government performance is how public managers perceive their decision-making environments. It examines a key aspect of the relationship between public management and government performance by explicitly incorporating public managers in an economic production framework for public services. A portion of the model developed in the article is applied to the case of fire chiefs as the primary managers of the production of fire protection by local fire departments. The Q factor analysis technique is used to typologize fire chiefs' perceptions of their managerial environments.