OFFICE OF THE CITY COUNCIL

 

117 WEST DUVAL STREET, SUITE 425

4TH FLOOR, CITY HALL

. JACKSONVILLE, FLORIDA  32202

 

 

 

Finance Committee Budget Hearing #2 Minutes - amended

August 14, 2015

9:00 a.m.

 

Location:  City Council Chamber, 1st floor, City Hall – St. James Building; 117 West Duval Street

 

In attendance:  Council Members Bill Gulliford (Chair), Anna Lopez-Brosche, Danny Becton, Aaron Bowman, Lori Boyer, John Crescimbeni, Reggie Gaffney

 

Also: Council Members Greg Anderson, Katrina Brown, Tommy Hazouri, Sam Newby, Jim Love, Joyce Morgan; Kirk Sherman, Kim Taylor, Philip Peterson – Council Auditor’s Office; Phillip Zamarron and Jessica Morales – Legislative Services Division; Peggy Sidman and Paige Johnston – Office of General Counsel; Jeff Clements – Council Research Division;  Sam Mousa – Ali Korman Shelton – Mayor’s Office; Mike Weinstein and Angela Moyer – Finance Department

 

Meeting Convened: 9:00 a.m.

 

Chairman Gulliford convened the meeting with a quorum present and the members announced themselves for the record.

 

CAO Sam Mousa responded to comments made at yesterday’s meeting regarding issues relating to the Fire and Rescue Department. First, when the IAFF union contract expires at the end of September, the terms of that contract will continue in effect until a new contract is agreed to. He believes that the current provision regarding a prohibition against layoffs and non-disciplinary demotions will remain in effect. Council Member Crescimbeni indicated that he had a legal opinion from Stephen Durden of the General Counsel’s Office stating otherwise, that the layoff and demotion provision expires when the contract expires. Mr. Mousa will confer with the Office of General Counsel on this issue.  With regard to the JFRD health and safety officers (captains and district chiefs) approved by Council in February of 2015, Mr. Mousa stated that there is no data on cost savings and performance measures for those officers. The entire management structure at the department has changed with the new administration and there appears to be no verifiable data collected on that subject. The Curry administration intends to charge the new management of the department with developing measures and metrics to evaluate those employees and to quantify whatever cost savings have or have not been achieved. Mr. Crescimbeni asked for a 5-year history of changes in the JFRD’s management structure and the number of chiefs and captains from year to year.

 

Property Appraiser’s budget

Council Member Crescimbeni lamented that the nature of the Property Appraiser’s budget approval process through the Florida Department of Revenue allows that officer to provide salary increases to the employees of that office that are not available to any other City employees. He believes those employees should be treated equivalently with the rest of the City’s employees and it appears that that can only be accomplished by appealing the Property Appraiser’s budget to the Governor and Cabinet. Council Member Boyer suggested that since the FDOR has agreed to a compromise amount providing for some raises but not the merit pay pool, the Council could approve funding at that level and release a portion of the $365,000 allocated to a designated special council reserve (excluding the market-based salary survey raise amount) for other uses. Committee members debated the potential cost of an appeal and the likelihood of success before the Governor and Cabinet. In response to a question from Council Member Bowman about a mechanism to deal with this issue in future years to avoid a repeat of this situation, Deputy General Counsel Peggy Sidman suggested that the Council could pass a resolution in May (prior to the Appraiser’s deadline to submit his budget to Tallahassee) instructing the Property Appraiser on the Council’s expectation for his budget.

 

Motion (Crescimbeni): authorize an appeal of the Property Appraiser’s budget to the Governor and Cabinet – approved unanimously.

 

Ms. Sidman will draft a resolution directing the appeal (Finance Committee sponsored) for introduction and passage as an emergency at the next Council meeting. CFO Mike Weinstein will contact the FDOR today to obtain the exact amount that FDOR is approving for the Property Appraiser’s budget that the City will be appealing.

 

Motion (Boyer): reduce the special council contingency fund designated for Property Appraiser salary increases to provide the FDOR-approved compromise budget amount and release the remainder of the $365,000 reserve for reallocation to other uses – approved unanimously.

 

Fire and Rescue Department

Acting Fire Chief Kurtis Wilson responded to several issues raised by the committee at yesterday’s meeting. With regard to the chaplaincy program Chief Wilson indicated his full support for the program and the current designated chaplain but said that he wants to expand the use of volunteers (both religious leaders and non-religious professional counselors) to provide greater coverage and service to the department’s personnel for more hours a day. He explained that the full-time chaplaincy director is an engineer assigned to a truck and that there are two chaplaincy instructors assigned to the Fire Academy.

 

Regarding the new safety officers, Chief Wilson recounted the history of those positions from the 1980s through the present and explained why a number of positions were reclassified earlier this year to chief positions. He noted that federal law requires that safety officers be authorized to take command of incident scenes to provide for the safety of firefighters. Practically speaking given the command structure of the department, that incident control must be wielded by chiefs. He noted the need to have an additional chief to be able to command four serious incidents occurring simultaneously in the City. Council Member Crescimbeni requested copies of the department’s documentation of the analysis of the conversion of the safety officer positions earlier in 2015 and the cost savings that were supposed to have been produced to offset the increased salary costs.

 

Page references from this point refer to Council Auditor’s Meeting #2 Handout – August 14, 2015

 

Jacksonville Public Library

Motion: on p. 3, approve Council Auditor’s recommendation #1 to create a new sub-object for Public Library Fines – Refunds to match refunds with associated revenue – approved unanimously.

 

In response to a question from Council Member Brosche about a reference in the Auditor’s report to “merit pay”, Library Director Barbara Gubbin stated that the library did not give merit pay raises but did make one adjustment for equity reasons. Ms. Gubbin explained an upcoming joint effort between the Library and the Duval County Schools to provide electronic library cards to 60,000 kindergarten through fifth graders and programs to encourage their greater use of libraries. Several council members expressed concern with the inability to restore longer library hours, particularly on Sundays and Mondays and in the evenings.

 

Ms. Gubbin reported that the Mayor’s budget includes design funds in the CIP for 4 library capital projects and they plan to utilize capital funding from the fine revenue account to pursue one or more of those four projects. Council Member Boyer suggested that the library be authorized to spend its capital funding on whichever of the four projects were ready for construction during the fiscal year without the need for further City Council approval.

 

Motion: on p. 7, approve Auditor’s recommendation #1 to reduce fine revenue by $100,000 and correspondingly reduce the capital outlay line item by the same amount – approved unanimously

 

Motion: on p. 8, approve Auditor’s recommendation #2 to remove library fine revenues and expenses from the Library Conference Facility Trust and create a new capital projects subfund - approved unanimously

 

Motion: on p. 8, approve Auditor’s recommendation #3 to shift the library’s $850,000 of fine revenues from a repairs and renovations account to a capital contingency capital account, net of $3200 in fee refunds –

Motion (Boyer): amend the Auditor’s recommendation to authorize spending the $850,000 (less $3200) on two library children’s room CIP renovation projects – approved unanimously.

 

Erin Skinner, Chair of the Library Board of Trustees, told the committee that this is the first budget in a number of years that has not seen library cuts and the board is appreciative of the Mayor’s and Council’s support. Many committee members expressed their support for the libraries and their interest in expanding hours to serve tremendous community needs. Council Member Crescimbeni expressed concern that Council Member Hazouri’s proposed restoration of library hours (distributed on a handout) is targeted exclusively at four regional libraries rather than to neighborhood libraries. Ms. Gubbin and Ms. Skinner said that the Library Board’s decision was to make the restorations at the largest and busiest libraries in order to serve the greatest number of people. The board feels that the greatest needs in the urban core communities would be better addressed through the addition of literacy coaches, early learning specialists and other staff who would work outside the libraries in day care centers, community centers, etc. to increase community outreach and expand understanding of what the library is and what it can do. Ms. Gubbin said that, while the library system is very interested in doing more for urban core neighborhoods, those neighborhood libraries are the oldest, smallest and least well equipped of all the libraries in they system, and can’t handle much more usage, particularly in the form of large groups. They simply can’t handle the volume of use, which is why the decision was made to devote available additional resources to regional libraries that can handle the greater usage.

 

Motion (Crescimbeni): budget for $90 million in state sales tax revenue and allocate the $1.6 $1 million above the proposed budget of additional revenue “below the line” in a contingency fund for restoration of library hours - approved unanimously

 

Council Member Dennis, Chair of the NICE (Neighborhood Improvement and Community Enhancement) Committee requested a Finance Committee member to propose an amendment to the budget to allocate $100,000 of funding from Special Council Contingency to the Intragovernmental Services Department for a Fight Blight publicity campaign. CAO Sam Mousa indicated that the administration is fully supportive of the appropriation and would have included it in the budget had it had time during the preparation process. Council Member Hazouri requested that this issue be referred to the NICE Committee for review and recommendation. Council Member Crescimbeni suggested that the increased vacant property registry fee revenue would be a good funding source for this initiative.

 

Motion (Boyer): approve an allocation of $100,000 from Special Council Contingency to the Intragovernmental Services Department to fund the Fight Blight publicity effort – approved unanimously.

 

Intragovernmental Services Department

In response to a question from Council Member Boyer, Chief of Procurement Greg Pease described the functions of the department’s grants office, clarifying that the office both oversees grants the City has made to outside agencies and also seeks grants for which the City may apply. Sam Mousa explained that grant writing is still taking place in individual departments and a new employee is being hired to coordinate grant writing efforts. Ms. Boyer feels that the City hurt its overall grant writing effort when some years ago it shifted grant writers from the departments to a centralized grant office. She feels that effort was unsuccessful. She requested a listing of all the employees in departments citywide who devote some or all of their time to grant writing. Mr. Mousa said that the administration is beginning to develop a program to train City employees on contract compliance and project management. Council Member Crescimbeni suggested exploring hiring outside grant writers on contract, which has worked very well for the St. Johns River Ferry Commission.

 

The committee was in recess from 12:00 to 12:50

 

Office of General Counsel

Council Member Boyer expressed the need for the OGC to implement a document management system that would enable the office to quickly and easily track, search and find legal opinions, letters and other documents from past years. Kirk Sherman stated that the City already has a document management system used by several departments, including the General Counsel’s office. Council Member Crescimbeni asked for information on what other City agencies are already using that existing system and suggested that OGC legal opinions could be posted online in the same manner as the Florida Attorney General’s office posts its opinions online. Mike Weinstein agreed that the OGC needs the document management functionality but cautioned the committee against authorizing many stand-alone IT systems for different departments that may or may not work together. The administration recognizes that IT is a very pressing issue and plans to take a comprehensive look at all IT functions and needs to produce a rational system going forward.

 

Motion (Boyer): increase “other operating expenses” by $100,000 and increase the charge for services revenue line by a like amount to fund a document management system for the OGC – approved unanimously.

 

Chairman Gulliford thanked General Counsel Jason Gabriel for the outstanding work done by Peggy Sidman, Paige Johnston and Susan Grandin in support of the work of the City Council. Ms. Boyer cautioned the committee that the OGC has developed a substantial fund balance because of a number of unfilled positions which indicates that the office is having difficulty hiring and then retaining good employees.

 

 

 

Information Technology Division

In response to a question from Council Member Boyer, Mr. Mousa said that the new administration is researching the issue of whether the City Council needs to approve large capital improvement projects as a unified whole at the start of the project or could approve the project in phases (design, engineering, construction) over time. He has received conflicting opinions from the General Counsel’s Office and further research is ongoing.

 

Motion: on p. 15, approve the Auditor’s recommendation to lower charges to customers by $172,637 to revise the interest rate calculation – approved unanimously.

 

Usha Mohan, Chief of the IT Division, explained the division’s 8-year plan to refresh hundreds of mobile radios.

 

Motion: on p. 17, approve the Auditor’s recommendation to direct IT to bill its customers on a two-year time frame for the radio refresh and correspondingly reduce the cash carryover by $596,085 – fails 3-4

 

In response to a question from Council Member Brosche, Ms. Mohan explained the rationale for changing many of the division’s job titles to more recognizable industry standards and for increasing some salaries to help with retaining qualified employees. Mr. Mousa stated that the administration recognizes this difficulty and is considering options for improving retention.

 

Motion (Boyer): on pp. 18-19, amend the 5-year ITEC program to include a notation that project amounts are being approved in the aggregate but budgets are not being established for each year - approved unanimously.

 

Council Members Gulliford and Crescimbeni thanked Ms. Mohan for the improvements in the professionalism of the City’s IT operations over the past several years.

 

Procurement Division – Copy Center

Chief of Procurement Greg Pease reported that the enterprise print solution contract is running out this month and will be on a month-to-month basis until a new contract is approved.

 

Fleet Management

In response to a question from Council Member Boyer, Mr. Sherman explained how fuel cost savings due to lower gas prices in the current fiscal year will be reflected in the current year’s budget in the form of an increased year-end fund balance carryover.

 

Motion: on p. 26, approve Auditor’s recommendation to reduce the fuel budget by $1 million due to reduced fuel consumption by a contract waste hauler due to conversion to CNG trucks, with a reduced contribution from Solid Waste through Fleet Management to the hauler – approved unanimously.

 

Mr. Sherman noted the continuing use of an Ordinance Code waiver to permit use of borrowed funds to purchase vehicles, but said the amount is decreasing over time. In response to a question, Karim Kurji, Chief of Fleet Management, explained the City’s fuel purchase system. Chairman Gulliford suggested that City Fleet Management should explore joint fuel purchases with the JTA and JPA for better efficiency and cost savings. Sam Mousa said that the administration plans on taking a hard look at how Fleet Management operates in the coming year.

 

Office of Ethics, Compliance and Oversight

Motion: on p. 35, approve Auditor’s recommendation to reduce the number of part-time hours by 880 - approved unanimously

 

Office of Inspector General

Motion: on p. 37, approve Auditor’s recommendation to reduce the hardware/software maintenance and licenses line item by $10,347 - approved unanimously.

 

The committee discussed an appropriate location for the Inspector General’s Office. Inspector General Tom Cline recommended that the IG office be moved from City Hall to the Yates Building for reasons of security (related to professional accreditation standards for the office), to provide a greater level of anonymity to employees wanting to visit the office to discuss a potential complaint without coming to City Hall, and to increase office efficiency by eliminating the need for staff to meet complainants in remote locations. There will be several costs involved in moving, including build-out of the new space and a changed public buildings internal service charge for the City Hall location versus the Yates Building. The Public Works Department is working up an estimate of the space build-out that hopefully will be completed in the next week.

 

The chair deferred final action on the Inspector General’s budget until the cost of relocating to the Yates Building can be determined and the budget adjusted accordingly.

 

Health Department

Sam Mousa explained that the department’s IT division had moved to the fourth floor of the Ed Ball Building and the department was promised additional space in that building on the seventh floor by the previous administration on a rent-free basis. The Health Department’s current lease in the 900 Building on University Boulevard expires at the end of 2016 and they anticipated moving the operation to the Ed Ball Building.

 

Health Department Director Dr. Kelli Wells discussed the department’s reaction to the state’s cut in Low Income Pool funding for public health programs. The department has prioritized 3 programs for most effective use of its reduced funding:  diversion of citizens from using hospital emergency rooms for primary health care, childhood immunizations, and sexually transmitted disease programs.

 

Jacksonville Housing Finance Authority

Laura Stagner explained that the City’s budget preparation software has difficulty accounting for portions of less than full-time employee hours, which accounts for the salary expenses being assigned to an “other operating expenses” account. She responded to questions about the authority’s professional service expenses and employee position complement. Council Member Crescimbeni will provide the JHFA board with information he’s received from a company that factory-builds modular housing units that are delivered by truck and assembled on-site at a lower cost than site-built structures.

 

Motion: on p. 41, approve Auditor’s recommendation #1 to amend the budget ordinance to insert the standard revenue, expenditure, transfer and employee information for the new independent agency – approved unanimously.

 

Motion: on p. 41, approve Auditor’s recommendation #2 to revise Schedule N to correct salaries and benefits – approved unanimously.

 

Emergency reserve contingency fund

Mr. Sherman reported that for FY14-15 the City’s non-emergency reserve fund stood at 7.5% of budget and the emergency reserve fund was nearly 5% of budget. In response to a question from Council Member Boyer, Mr. Sherman stated that an allocation of $1,712,868 would be needed to bring the emergency fund up to the 5% minimum threshold. Council Member Boyer argued against taking $3 million from General Fund balance and depositing it into an account where it cannot be accessed outside of a true emergency situation. She would prefer to use General Fund balance to purchase replacement vehicles with cash rather than via borrowing.

 

Motion: on p. 44, approve the Auditor’s recommendation to transfer $3 million from General Fund year-end fund balance to the Emergency Reserve fund -

Motion (Boyer): allocate $1,712,868 from year-end General Fund balance to a special council contingency fund for future allocation – approved unanimously.

 

Medical Examiner’s Office

Medical Examiner Dr. Valerie Rao answered questions about the costs and benefits of privatizing the toxicology lab functions, including the cost of hiring a PhD toxicologist as required by accreditation standards. Dr. Rao stated that her office has had considerable difficulty trying to hire qualified toxicologists at the salary the City can offer and believes that contractual service would be a more feasible option. Although the in-house option may be less expensive in the long run, the hiring of toxicologists and the purchase of equipment are more expensive in the short run and the difficulty of hiring the toxicologists makes success of the in-house route questionable.

 

Motion: on p. 48, approve Auditor’s recommendation #1 to increase service charge revenue to $730,000 and allocate $107,100 to Special Council Contingency – approved unanimously.

 

Motion: on p. 48, approve Auditor’s recommendation #2 to increase operating revenues by $28,575 to recognize increased fee rates - approved unanimously.

 

Motion: on p. 48, approve Auditor’s recommendation #3a, 3b and 3c to increase the professional services line via a $164,068 transfer from Special Council Contingency to pay for the full cost of privatizing the toxicology function and to include the toxicologist and chief toxicologist positions on the Position Redline schedule to eliminate those two positions when vacated – approved  6-1 (Crescimbeni opposed)

 

Motion: on p. 48, approve Auditor’s recommendation #4 to add 2,500 part-time hours to the Medical Examiner’s budget - approved unanimously.

 

In response to a comment from Council Member Boyer, Mr. Mousa indicated that the new administration has identified a number of instances in various departments where contracts are being entered into without prior legislative authority and he is taking steps to put a stop to that practice.

 

Other

Mr. Mousa reported that he has confirmed since this morning’s session that the “no layoff or demotion” clause in the firefighters’ collective bargaining agreement has a specific sunset date of September 30, 2015, so it will not apply once the contract expires on that date.

 

Council Member Crescimbeni requested that two items be addressed at the Finance Committee meeting on Monday: the Police and Fire Pension Fund forensic audit and the recently released Clerk of the Courts’ audit.

 

Special Council Contingency status: $997,540 to the positive.

 

Public comment

Joseph Strasser condemned the conversion of the Fire and Rescue Department positions to chief and captain positions in early 2015 and urged the Finance Committee to revert the positions to their former status.

 

Connie Benham urged the committee to increase the Emergency Reserve fund to a higher level to protect the City’s potential to recover from potential future disasters.

 

Pending action items

 

Meeting Adjourned: 3:40 p.m.

 

Minutes:  Jeff Clements, Council Research Division

               8.19.15   Posted 4:00 p.m.

Tapes:     Finance Committee Budget Hearing #2 – LSD

                8.14.15

Materials: Budget handouts

    8.14.15