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HomeMy WebLinkAbout01-28-2000 Meeting I ADMINISTRATOR'S EVALUATIONSUBCOMlliflTTEE COMMITTEE ROOM - January 28, 2000 4:00 P.M. PRESENT: B. Kuhlke, Chairman, W. Mays, Mayor Pro Tern, S. Shepard, U. Bridges, R. Oliver, Administrator, W. Hornsby, Deputy Administrator, N. Morawski, Deputy Clerk of Commission. ABSENT: H. Brigham, member. Mr. Kuhlke: Following our last meeting there was some discussion, there were some additions to the goals and objectives, Mr. Oliver made those corrections and mailed those out. For your information, this will be on the Commission agenda for Tuesday, Feb 1. What Randy has done is take the items that we had on the agenda, broke them down and put a dollar value by each and put basically what quarter he felt like he would have these completed or started. Is that completed or is that started? Mr. Oliver: It would be completed by then. Some of them maybe like to complete to start design on Augusta Commons. But most of them are to complete an activity. Mr. Shepard: The bars go to the quarter, is that the way it works? I Mr. Oliver: If the bar goes a quarter of the page, it's three months, if it goes half the page it's six months, if it goes three quarters of the page, its nine months, if it goes to the end its twelve months. There is a number that says completion, quarter three, ifI change the number there, that changes my bar line, that's the way I set it up. So I can change the numbers. Mr. Kuhlke: We have sent out three letters to the Commissioners to provide any input. At our last meeting we had about eight Commissioners present so we didn't get any written response from anybody? I think Steve has some things. Mr. Shepard: Randy, I didn't know exactly how you were handling the strategic planning session that we did last year. But I did find my goals that I then had. There was some overlap on some things. For example, I was in Greenville for the Phase IV SPLOST, and I had some specific projects. At the time we were talking about buying the property on 5th and 6th Streets owned by the Pension Fund. I think that's something we hit pretty hard on yesterday. But I think we've talked around here since before I was a Commissioner, Rob Zetterberg talked about a joint purchasing program with RCBOE if the economies of scale dictated. The one joint use facility that we've done is Garrett gym and we're not going to do one at Sue Reynolds. I've always worried about the Columbia County water treatment system. I have talked about it with Jack, the high mask lighting program for the Interstate. Eight is Jack Connell's idea about the track connector to change the 6th and 11 th Streets rail contiguration. The last three are rail issues, we look at rail as a negative here but the Georgia Rail Passenger Authority is planning a rather extensive network of rail which we saw at GMA last weekend and unfortunately, Augusta is dead last in the development. I think we need to try and move up on their priority list. Bob Young and a constituent suggested that if we ever bridged the Savannah that the NS come across the Savannah on the new 520 right-of-way. I Mr. Oliver: One of the things that we are working on at one of the Commissioner's suggestions, I don't know if it'll work out at this point or not, by Monday I should know. There was some discussion about for Augusta Day to see if we could get one or two train cars to take from here to Atlanta to emphasize the possibility, and maybe Mr. Mays through his connection with the Rail Passenger Authority can work that out for us. Mr. Shepard: I don't think you have enough time to do this for this session. You need probably about six months to a year to arrange that. I Mr. Kuhlke: Why don't you look at these, Randy, and see ifthere are any you feel like you might want to add to the list, that would be doable or can begin in 2000. If so, just add them to the list with no cost attached. If you'll quickly look through the handout that Randy gave to us and see if you have any questions. I don't know if anybody has come up with any other items that they would like to add to these goals and objectives. Randy, I assume that these dollar figures come directly out of the budget? Mr. Oliver: That's right. And the only times they don't is when it says to be determined, and there are some cases that I have non, minimal and budgeted because it was impossible to break out. Mr. Bridges: Under Information Technology, provide for electronic payment of utility bills, does that include draft from the bank account? Mr. Oliver: Yes. We're there. We can do it. That function became operational January. We're working on doing a bank RFP. To do that Georgia Bank and Trust wants us to increase our compensating balance. We're currently evaluating the merits of doing that. Mr. Bridges: Why would we have to increase our balance? I Mr. Oliver: Because they're saying that there's some cost to them and to avoid us paying those costs, they want to increase the compensating balance. If we put out a banking RFP it'll probably be July 1 before we do anything. The other one, we have had a meeting with but I'm not willing to commit to it yet. We've had a meeting with people regarding paying the bills over the internet with credit cards and that type of thing; our main concern at this point is the discount fee. We don't think the discount fee is an issue for most of the utility bills for the people that will pay it that way. This would send the bill electronically via E-mail and you could pay it with your credit card automatically coming back, so it wouldn't be bank draft or anything. Mr. Kuhlke: If we implement that, what benefit is it to us? Mr. Oliver: It's convenience more than anything, because we're still mailing the bill under the bank draft. Mr. Kuhlke: What cost benefit is it? What I'm getting at, is with all this electronic stuff going are we going to keep the same number of people? Mr. Oliver: On that one, the only thing in my opinion that you really save is the cost of an envelope because we're putting return envelopes in the bills which if you're doing bank drafts you would not, so there would be some minimal savings there. Other than that you aren't going to see any. On the credit card part if you we had a large number of people do that you could save some money. It costs us about a dollar to send out each statement every month by the time you consider postage, handling and printing. If you did it electronically, we believe we could I cut that cost down to about forty cents so there's the potential to save sixty cents. I Mr. Williams: As Bill said, if we're going to modern technology, if we're only saving in the cost of the envelope that we're sending, half the time I never find mine anyway. I think it's cheaper for someone to furnish an envelope. Mr. Oliver: I think ultimately, there is going to be, and I'm speaking four to five years out, and this is just my crystal ball, I think there is going to be, I would not have an aversion of doing this, some banks are offering electronic transfer now where you can go into a given bank and write a check and it comes right off of your balance. I think that technology will be there in the next five years and I think that's where the market is going, even though the banks have a lot to work out to get there. Mr. Williams: I had a dealing with the bank where I paid BellSouth by an electronic check, they couldn't find it I had to end up paying again in cash and they eventually found it after checking in the data. Even after the bank gave me a copy of the check, I had to wait before they would pay me even with proof from the bank of payment. Mr. Kuhlke: I think that this is a service that we offer to the customers. Mr. Williams: Will we continue to mail the envelopes out? I Mr. Oliver: We'll continue to mail the envelopes out to those who want to pay the old fashioned way. What's amazing to me is that about twenty to thirty percent of these customers come in and pay in person. I would love to get away from that because it's killing us personnel wise. That's why you get those lines on Peach Orchard Road. I've never seen the numbers so high from people coming in person to pay. What I would like to look at this year is to look at using, and there will be some discussion on this, is to look at what our cost is of servicing those people versus contracting with banks on how much they charge per transaction. Mr. Bridges: Or place collection points at different points. Mr. Oliver: But the problem with collection points, Ulmer, is personnel. because you have to have at least two people there at all times. She still does have a number of collection points at certain locations. We pay them about a quarter per transaction; the difficulty, however, is that it takes about two days to process them through the system. Mr. Bridges: I think we make mistakes when we think computers are going to save us as far as personnel is concerned. They actually add personnel because somebody has to repair the computer. I Mr. Mays: When the age of your population of customers eventually reaches a point I think then just as you have a younger age you'll have a different level of technology. But, I think the economy, even though it's been overall good, there are still a lot of folk out there making ends meet and I don't think those lines are going to get any shorter anywhere. And I think the bad experience that a lot of those people have had is when they've paid, not to the city, but to these other utility companies, at these third party payment places either where they have not done a good job of getting the money into those places and folks' utilities get turned ofT. So you have a fear factor in there as to why you have a lot of people not going anywhere. They're down to the last day ofa grace period and they're stretching that dollar down to the last day to get it in trying to make sure they pay their utility bill. Those people are not going anywhere. Mr. Kuhlke: I think we ought to leave it in there just as an option; we'll be looking at these things as we go along. Do you all see anything else in this list? Mr. Bridges: Randy, on the utilities, number one and number two at the back which is the water line at the back and the five million gallon well fill at Old Waynesboro, you have the third quarter. I Mr. Oliver: It's July, the first week or two in July is the reason it's the third quarter. Mr. Bridges: We've been saying May. Mr. Oliver: He won't make May. It will be June at the earliest. That contract is a hundred and whatever days. Max edited that this morning. We're trying to press the schedule to escalate it. Mr. Kuhlke: I hadn't heard that that had been moved back to July. Mr. Oliver: I'll get you the exact date; it's like June 20 or July 6. Mr. Kuhlke: That's another question. We have these goals and objectives and I'm assuming that every department head has signed off on what we're doing. Mr. Bridges: So move we approve. Mr. Shepard: Second. Motion carried unanimously. I Mr. Oliver: What I would think is that at periodical intervals, say six months, and then at the end of the year, we'll come back and go down this list and check what we have completed. Mr. Kuhlke: What Randy and I talked about and I think it makes sense, his contract calls for evaluating on a six month basis. What Randy and I talked about is that if this Committee would come back together in six months for an update, not an evaluation and then at the end of the year, we'll come back and go through an evaluation process. Now Randy let's talk a little bit about the evaluation process. When we get into that, obviously it could be a media event so I asked Randy to come up with a way we could take a look at this. During the evaluation part of it, will the evaluation be done by this Committee or will it be done by the Commission? Mr. Oliver: My suggestion is I think it has be done by the Commission as a whole. The dilemma, the difficulty that you get into on any kind of evaluation is with the Mayor's report card, if you will, a week or so ago, is you'll have people with differing opinions and they'll say why did Commissioner so and so rate this in this category and they'll be people comparing and con~asting and doing other things and that obviously creates a media frenzy. Mr. Kuhlke: Well it does, but I think with adopting this and this is what you're telling us that you're going to accomplish, this is what we'll evaluate. My question would be is that this particular scoring deal, should it be amended somewhat to coincide with the goals and objectives? Mr. Oliver: I think it should be but I also don't think and I'm comfortable with the goals and objectives, I'm not going to layout things that I'm not pretty comfortable with and you're I I going to notice on some of the dates I think we'll beat these dates. I think that there are other factors that go into the evaluation beyond just the straight goals and objectives. That's why my suggestion would be to do a hybrid of this form and then the goals and objectives. Mr. Kuhlke: Do you feel comfortable about having just an informational meeting in six months and doing the review at the end of the year? What I would like to suggest is that we through this same process during the budget process this year for next year, not come in behind adopting the budget to set goals and objectives but try to set some goals and objectives in conjunction with the budget. Mr. Williams: Until we adopt a budget how can we know what we're going to do? Mr. Kuhlke: Well, what we did, Marion, is that all of these items are in the budget. And what Randy has done is put a time frame on it and taken that budget number and put beside it. What I'm saying is that our budget ought to be driven goals. Mr. Oliver: There is another factor in this thing that's going to come out and here is going to be the factor. About eighty percent of your goals, candidly, or seventy percent of your goals will be driven by the sales tax approval list, which you all will consider in the next couple of months, sometime between June and September. So that event will set a large number of these goals, because that's where the money will come from. I think in concert with that sales tax approval this has to be somewhat of an ongoing process but it has to culminate into a document like this. I Mr. Kuhlke: It does and you have a couple of subcommittees sitting out there right now, the Indigent Care Subcommittee. Ulmer appointed me to look at subdivision regulations. If we come back with some ideas they will have to be handled by the Administrator and the Law Department. So from the sales tax and from some of the working subcommittees that you have out there will have some impact on what this looks like. Mr. Mays: I'll tell you one other thing and it won't upset what we have here. Another idea depending on what will be the final outcome on this Lock & Dam situation that's another area that we'll have to return to and we still have to deal with the lease. Mr. Oliver: The Corps says that this project is not for flood control, but if they have a lot of water coming they'll raise the gates to lower the water so that they can retain it upstream and minimize flooding down stream. Mr. Kuhlke: They made the comment at the meeting that if they can't control the gates downto\VTI would flood. For $6.5 million dollars they could probably stabilize it ok, close it down and I believe by doing that and keeping the pool up stream. I believe the $2.5 million that they want I think you could get the State of South Carolina, the State of Georgia, and we do a little something and North Augusta do a little something... I Mr. Oliver: This is just a strategy thing; we are in the process of getting four or five letters from some pretty heavy environmental folk. DNR is going to write a letter saying that they have reviewed it and that they have questions as it relates to the secondary ecology structure. Dr. Eidson is going to write a letter and Dr. Birdsong from the University of Georgia is going to write a letter. The Department of Agriculture is going to write requesting that the Corps do a complete environmental impact statement. A complete environmental impact statement will cost them about couple million dollars and take them about eighteen to twenty-four months. My goal is to use that as a bargaining chip and say that maybe its better for you all to go ahead and pay for the whole thing and fIx them instead of doing this study. That's just a strategy at this point. Mr. Kuhlke: I would like to have a motion that we approve the performance appraisal form that we put out. And include in that that we approve the update time in six months and the tinal evaluation in one year. Mr. Bridges: So move. Mr. Shepard: Second. Motion carried unanimously. Mr. Shepard: If the Corps won't perform an EIS, Randy, do we need to seek legal action? We would probably be the only party that could do it. Mr. Oliver: I agree with that. I think as the alternatives get rolled around that may be something we may want to consider. The other aspect of that that s floating around is that there has been some talk between the industries downstream that they may be willing to take over the maintenance if it's brought up to standard. Mr. Shepard: Why don't we go on record with the Doug Bernard position that the Corps' mission is narrowly defmed commercial navigation hauling a barge full of brick or oil or whatever. Commercial navigation now is more recreational in nature, boating, skiing, fishing and tourism related. I think a broader congressional mandated purpose would solve the Corps' problem. Mr. Oliver: What I see as a little bit of a logistic problem. I think that this Committee should meet in six months and again next January and use this form, evaluate against this. The way the current contract document works, though, it expires February 28, 2001. I would rather see the current contract expire June 30 or July 31. Mr. Kuhlke: I think the only other thing we can do is to amend his contract. I'll talk to the other Commissioners about this. Mr. Kuhlke: I'll entertain a motion that we adjourn. Mr. Bridges: So move to adjourn. Mr. Shepard: Second. Motion carried unanimously. With no further business to discuss, the meeting was adjourned. Nancy Morawski Deputy Clerk of Commission I I I