Bob McDonnell pledged during his gubernatorial campaign to a bring results-based budgeting system to Virginia.

His campaign said in a September 2009 news release that the state should establish goals for each agency at the start of every budget cycle and evaluate the results at the end before setting determining future appropriations.

"Bob McDonnell will improve the budget system by implementing a budget process that rewards effective programs and allocates future spending based upon that effectiveness," his campaign wrote.

When we asked for an update on this promise, the governor's office said it was fulfilled early in McDonnell's term through the startup of a computer program created for the Department of Planning and Budget. The tool provides a website where politicians, state employees and the public can scrutinize state agencies' performance measures and budget information.

For example, a goal of the Department of Motor Vehicles is to cut average waiting for motorists at its customer service centers to 20 minutes per visit by 2016. This year, the average wait is 21.5 minutes.

The state's Department of Taxation has a goal over the 2014, 2015 and 2016 fiscal years to answer at least 87 percent of customer service calls made to the department before the caller hangs up. In the 2013 fiscal year the department reported it answered 90.3 percent of calls before the customer disconnected. The department noted that although its regularly exceeded the 87 percent threshold, it's concerned about maintaining that level of service amid rising call volume and decreased staffing.

Each agency creates its own goals, said Dan Timberlake, the director of the Department of Planning and Budget. The benchmarks alone don't tell state officials how much money should be spent on a program, but they can flag issues that need to be addressed.

If an agency isn't meeting goals, Timberlake said the data can help budget writers determine whether the office is using funds effectively or should receive more or less money.

The online budget tool was built by a McLean-based Project Performance Company, and is projected to cost $15 million over the next decade, according to Timberlake. The system was launched under McDonnell and has been funded during the course of his administration, Timberlake said.

We should note, however, that the contract was awarded in early 2009 by then-Gov. Timothy M. Kaine and the system was in the process of being implemented before McDonnell was inaugurated in January 2010.

Even prior to Kaine's administration, Virginia had been recognized for its use of performance benchmarks in budgeting.

The Government Accountability Office -- the investigative arm of Congress -- said in a 2005 report that Virginia and several other states had "established histories of performance budgeting efforts." The GAO noted that a 2004 state law --- enacted under then Gov. Mark Warner -- required agencies to develop a series of performance measures for any new state programs or services as part of a budget request.

Timberlake said that although the state had been funding programs based on effectiveness prior to the new budget tool's implementation, "we didn't have all the connections and data that we have now that's available to us today."

Robert Vaughn, staff director of the House Appropriations Committee, described the computer program as helpful, but not revolutionary. He said it is one of many tools used by budget writers.  

So the McDonnell administration has followed through on plans put in place by previous administrations to create a program that can help budget writers fund programs based on effectiveness. But this tool has hardly led to a new budget process that, in McDonnell's words,  "rewards effective programs and allocates future spending based upon that effectiveness."

We rate his action on this pledge as a Compromise.