Doug Chapin at Electionline:

Ed Koch, former New York City mayor (1978-1989), was famous for greeting his constituents, on street corners or in the subway, with a simple phrase: “how’m I doin’?” It was his way of reconnecting with them and asking them to give him honest appraisals of his performance.

For the election field, that simple question must feel dangerous given how loudly (and sometimes violently) critics have been offering their own “feedback” since 2020. And yet, with federal grants for election cybersecurity and COVID-19 assistance in the field – and a growing push for regular funding for election administration – there will be a time very soon where state and local election officials and anyone else doing work in this space will have to become familiar with program evaluation: the formal process by which funding recipients tell Congress or other funding sources how I’m doin’.

To date, program evaluation has not been used in the election funding space, but it is already a well-recognized concept; indeed, many federal grants – including, for example, DHS’ State and Local Cybersecurity Grant Program – include language like this:

Recipients … are encouraged to incorporate program evaluation activities from the outset of their program design and implementation to meaningfully document and measure their progress towards the outcomes proposed.

These activities are in addition to financial or progress reports, and they are designed to go beyond what a grantee did with the funds to a demonstration of what the funding did. Many agencies already do this as a matter of course, as demonstrated by Fors Marsh’s existing work with the Federal Voting Assistance Program, Internal Revenue Service and Small Business Administration, just to name a few.