08-08-2016 Council Special Work session Minutes

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CITY COUNCIL SPECIAL WORK SESSION August 8, 2016 APPROVED 89 Mayor Reinert asked why the PERA budget (Page D38 noted), went up by $90,000? Ms. 90 Cotton remarked that the council recently heard about positions that were added to that 91 budget and that translates to an increase. 92 93 Mayor Reinert asked what is happening with health insurance in 2017 and Mr. Karlson 94 explained that the city hasn't yet received a report. Ms. Cotton noted that the budget 95 includes a seven percent increase as an estimate. 96 97 Mayor Reinert asked about the Forestry budget. Director Grochala explained that the 98 budget proposes an increase basically related to Emerald Ash Borer work — injections, 99 tree replacement, etc. Staff has been preparing over the past few years to address the 100 EAB situation and 2017 is the year that these efforts will begin in terms of funding. 101 102 Mayor Reinert noted the personnel levels in the Police Division. He sees an increase in 103 the salary budget coming forward and would like to understand more. Public Safety 104 Director Swenson reviewed the staff level moving forward to 2017; it was noted that 105 there are standard wage increases included. The staffing level for officers for 2017 is 27. 106 Director Swenson also reviewed increases on various miscellaneous line items in the 107 budget (i.e. software, joint law enforcement system, animal control contract). 108 109 Finance Director Cotton discussed her proposal to reinstate one-half of an Office Support 110 Specialist position to be funded from the water and sewer enterprise funds with no impact 111 on the general fund. The impact to those funds is just over $31,000. The goal is to 112 transfer all the daily receipting functions for utility billing and deposits and cross training 113 for utility billing backup, as well as providing front line response to basic utility billing 114 inquiries and working with plans to move to paperless finance records. The new position 115 will also provide relief on other general administrative tasks within the finance 116 department. 117 118 Council Member Rafferty identified that the position requested is actually already in 119 place temporarily with a person out on maternity leave. He also recalled that half of the 120 position was cut last year because it wasn't needed. Administrator Karlson recalled that 121 the position was four hours budgeted to the Public Services Department that was not 122 needed. The finance director, since then, has identified restructuring that can occur in her 123 department and a need for this half position within that realm. 124 125 The council discussed the duties involved in utility billing. The finance director 126 explained the stresses facing finance department employees with a high work load and the 127 lack of time in the schedule to work on new initiatives and the added work that comes 128 from new properties in the city. 129 130 Public Services Director DeGardner reviewed his request for a .5 FTE Office Specialist 131 position. He reviewed the history of support staff positions in his office and at the Public 132 Works facility. Currently additional support staff is required to serve those needs, 133 especially to free up the administrative assistant's time from front line duties for her core 3