Collaborative governance is richly debated in public administration, with some consensus on its parameters and frameworks available to explore defining features. This study examined a less-developed area of collaborative governance: innovation and its effects on performance. Although innovation is a defining element of most examples of collaborative governance, little connection has been made between collaboration, innovation, and performance levels. This study reported the findings of a mixed methods approach to develop measures of collaboration, innovation, and performance and evaluate their effects within a collaborative system. The qualitative analysis provided a framework for understanding the system's intrinsic features, including performance metrics and perceived drivers of collaboration. The research proposed to quantitatively evaluate these features to determine the effects of collaboration and innovation on performance, testing a theory of performance driven by collaboration and mediated by the level of innovation produced by collaborative governance. The findings offered a detailed case study of collaborative governance, governance platforms, and public innovation that is valuable to a more generalizable knowledge of these important aspects of public life. The quantitative results were severely limited by low response rates but represented sound methodology that will be replicable in other research. The research contributed to understanding the relationship between collaboration, innovation, and performance within a collaborative system.