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LFC and DFA present PIVOT inventories showing most program dollars in evidence-based work; dashboard to launch in December
Summary
LFC and the Department of Finance told the Legislative Health & Human Services committee that inventories of six agencies show 72% of reviewed programmatic spending is evidence- or research-based, and that a public PIVOT dashboard will be available by December to let legislators and the public inspect program-level data.
Simon Miller, an analyst with the Department of Finance, told the Legislative Health & Human Services committee that the state—s PIVOT process catalogs agency program inventories to pin evidence to spending. "The pivot process was added to the Accountability in Government Act through Senate Bill 58 of 2019," Miller said, explaining the law—s intent to pair executive flexibility with regular performance reporting.
Sarah of the Legislative Finance Committee, who led the inventory presentation, said the team reviewed program-level spending for six agencies across seven divisions and focused on programmatic—not total—agency budgets. LFC reported that roughly 72% of the $260,000,000 in programmatic spending reviewed this year fell into evidence- or research-based categories, up from 67% in the prior exercise.
LFC summarized results by agency: Corrections— reentry and inmate-management divisions concentrated nearly all programmatic requests in evidence- or research-based programming and have used the inventory to shift contracting and improve internal data tracking. Early Childhood Education and Care (ECECD) home visiting programs accounted for $28.1 million in FY25 spending and more than 7,600 participating families; Parents as Teachers served nearly 5,000 families at about $13.6 million, and First Born and More served roughly 1,400 families at about $7.4 million. The Behavioral Health Services Division spent about $46 million on therapeutic and rehabilitative programming; LFC said billing practices made disaggregating service-level evidence difficult and therefore labeled 61% of some BHSD spending as "mixed/varied," while noting large programs such as Housing First (about $6.7 million for 700+ participants) and the 988 crisis hotline (nearly 40,000 connections at roughly $5.1 million).
LFC stressed limits to the inventory: an evidence-based program can fail if implemented at low fidelity, and many agencies currently report outputs rather than long-term outcomes. To address that, LFC urged better contract language requiring service-level reporting and increased provider capacity for outcome tracking.
The committee pressed LFC on details. Representative Chavis asked whether agencies have the capacity to run rigorous outcome evaluations; LFC and DFA said capacity varies and pointed to recent appropriations that included evaluation funds. Sarah told members the PIVOT public dashboard will catalog collected inventories and should be up by the December LFC hearing so legislators can access program-level spending, cost-per-participant and whether outcomes are tracked.
The report aims to help lawmakers factor program evidence into FY27 budget decisions; LFC asked members to use the inventories when weighing budget requests rather than treating the update as a formal legislative proposal. The committee requested the underlying inventories and spreadsheets for deeper review.
