#28 - Public Works Operational Assessment

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We will review and analyze these materials to provide context for the work to come. Task 1 will also include standard, ongoing communications and quality assurance activities to ensure the project achieves the City’s stated objectives on schedule and within budget. This includes monthly progress reports with a narrative discussion of all activities in progress and services anticipated to be performed during the next month. TASK 1 DELIVERABLES • Agenda and materials for project kick-off meeting • Detailed data request and shared drive Task 2: Organizational Assessment The first phase of the work will focus on the organizational assessment to ensure Public Works operations have the appropriate staffing and structure to achieve its goals now and for the next several years. In order to prepare such a plan, it is critical to fully understand operations and initiatives so that current and future workload, and staffing, can be determined. Our project team is comprised of experts in operations and management with the knowledge of human resources to prepare an accurate and comprehensive understanding. After the kick-off meeting, Raftelis will spend up to two days performing onsite and virtual data gathering, as appropriate, including interviews with key staff, site tours, and data discussions to understand department practices. Using the kick-off meeting and data gathered in Task 1 as a foundation, Raftelis will interview all managers, supervisors, and key staff in Public Works to gain a thorough understanding of activities. In addition, we will hold small group interviews with designees at all levels of the Department to ensure a more detailed understanding of daily operations and staff perceptions of staffing levels, workload and workload drivers, inter- relationships between workgroups, and potential ways to increase efficiency and effectiveness. We will conduct remote interviews as needed with staff who are unavailable while we are onsite. This helps manage the project schedule and allows us to meet with staff when it aligns with their schedules. Our team will identify themes from these interviews for follow-up research and analysis. Based on data review and interview themes, we will compare current structure and staffing to industry best practices and recommend options to capitalize on potential efficiencies to meet current and future regulatory and strategic goals. Raftelis will likely request additional follow-up data as we delve into the organization and structure. Raftelis will evaluate and compare desired level of service with staffing levels and identify areas in which the City can streamline resources to maximize efficiency as well as identify areas where it may consider additional resources to achieve stated levels of service and address workloads. Raftelis will benchmark Lake Elmo’s utility organizational and staffing elements with both peer and EUM’s Ten Attributes of Effectively Managed Water Sector Utilities