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HomeMy WebLinkAbout12-05-2013 regular meeting City Council of Peachtree City Meeting Minutes December 5,2013 7:00 p.m. The Mayor and Council of Peachtree City met on Thursday, December 5, 2013, at City Hall. Mayor Don Haddix called the meeting to order at 7:00 p.m. Other Council Members attending: Vanessa Fleisch, Mike King, and Kim Learnard. Eric Imker was out of town. Announcements. Awards. Special Recoanition Presentation of Saved by the Belt Award - Police Department Police Sergeant Brad Williams presented the "Saved by the Belt" award to Thana Mahmud Alusi. who collided head on with a tree on April 3 after suffering a medical episode that caused him to lose consciousness. Because he was wearing his seatbelt, Alusi escaped with very minor injuries. 10-Minute Talk Trey Ragsdale and Randy Weaver, Fayette Visioning Process Ragsdale noted it had been 20 years since Fayette County had gone through the visioning process to see what the citizens wanted the County to look like in 20 years. Ragsdale and Bob Ross served as co-chairs for the process. Market Street Services, Inc., had been selected as the consultant, and work was scheduled to begin on Monday, December 9. Phase 1 of the six- month process was the competitive assessment, which would include benchmarking and trend analysis. Phase 2 was the Vision Plan, which included developing short-term and long-term goals based on feedback and findings. Implementation Guidelines were Phase 3, and included milestones, funding information, and identification of leads/supporting implementation partners. Weaver said the process would cost approximately $150,000, and $60,000 had been raised to this point. He continued that the process was about preserving, rather than changing, the character of the areas of the County. All the local governments and businesses needed to be involved. Weaver added the City could help by contributing financially and an adopting resolution of support. The website for those interested in finding out more was fayettevision.org. Minutes November 21, 2013, Regular Meeting Minutes Learnard moved to approve the November 21 , 2013, regular meeting minutes as written. Fleisch seconded. Motion carried 4-0. Consent Aaenda 1. Consider Elimination/Replacement of One Position in Community Services Department 2. Consider Elimination/Replacemel'1t of One Position in Public Services Division - Stormwater 3. Consider Elimination/Replacement of One Position in Public Services Division - Building & Grounds 4. Consider Elimination/Replacement of One Position in Police Department 5. Consider Authorizing Fire Departl11ent to Return to Full Staff 6. Consider Vehicles for Surplus & Bid for Police Vehicles - Brannen Motor Co. 7. Update - Old Agenda Item 09-12-06 Facilities Bond Projects Status Report Haddix noted that were four additional documents on the dais - the staff memos for items, 3, 4, 5, and 6. Learnard moved to approve the Consent Agenda. Fleisch seconded. Motion carried 4-0. City Council Meeting Minutes December 5, 2013 Page 2 Old Aaenda Items There were no Old Agenda items. New Aaenda Items 12- 13-01 Consider Approval of The Show Business as Brand Name Production Provider for The Fred City Manger Jim Pennington said the contract with The Show Business would be up at the end of the year and needed to be renewed. The company's proposal for 2014 was $68,400. Pennington asked Council to consider The Show Business as the brand name production provider for The Fred for FY 2014 - 2016. He continued that, when dealing with a venue such as The Fred, no one ever knew what would go wrong. Whenever The Show Business staff was needed, they had been there. It was a very competent firm. Learnard moved to approve The Show Business as the brand name production provider for the amphitheater for $68,400. Fleisch seconded. Motion carried 4-0. 12-13-02 Consider Authorizing Resolution for Condemnation Proceedings for Stormwater Easements at 108 & 115 Wynnmeade City Attorney Ted Meeker said there were two resolutions - one for 108 Wynnmeade and one for 115 Wynnmeade. The condemnation was the last resort in trying to acquire the needed easements for the stormwater project. Staff had tried to contact the property owners several times over the last several months. ~, King asked if they were rental properties with out-of-town owners. Meeker said the City's consulting engineers, ISE, had tried to contact all the homeowners, and the City had heard from other owners. Pennington added that staff simply could not contact these owners, and this was the last resort. Stormwater Manager Mike Madison confirmed these were not rental properties. Staff had even knocked on the doors, and the drapes had been pulled aside, but no one answered. Learnard said the City had tried to contact the owners for 12 months. Meeker noted he had been involved for the last eight months. Madison said the project had been approved in 2009. Learnard moved to adopt two resolutions for 108 and 115 Wynnmeade. Fleisch seconded. Motion carried 4-0. 12-13-03 Consider Bid - Stormwater Collection System Cleaning and CCTV Inspection Services - All Pipeline T.V. Inc. (APT) Pennington said the Stormwater crew needed to be able to inspect the system, video it, and use a jet vacuum to clean in certain places. The City had contracted the service over the years, and the contract was for up to $60,000. The City had over 6,000 stormwater structures and 69 miles of stormwater pipe. The recommended bidder. All Pipeline T.V. Inc., had the capability of doing all the work for under $60,000,which was the cap on the bid. Pennington continued that the City would have to spend over $300,000 for the equipment, plus another $100,000 in training and manpower, to perform the functions in-house. It was less expensive in the long run to contract with APT, which the City had worked with for years. Contracting the service out was one of the most efficient ways to do it. City Council Meeting Minutes December 5,2013 Page 3 ~ King clarified that the City's stormwater crew was cleaning the system. Pennington said they were cleaning the system, but contracting with APT allowed the City to be in compliance with the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit. He added that there were only three people on the stormwater crew, and additional people were borrowed from Public Works when needed. Pennington said APT would also be on call for back-up with big things. King moved to approve the stormwater collection system Cleaning and CCTV inspection services contract with All Pipeline T.V. Inc. Learnard seconded. Motion carried 4-0. 12-13-04 Presentation of Public Safety Assessment by Matrix Pennington recalled that the assessment of both the Fire and Police Departments had been recommended in the spring given the circumstances at the time, which had been the appropriate thing to do. Matrix Consulting Group had completed the assessment, and Byron Pipkin of Matrix would report on theresults. Pipkin addressed the Fire Department first. He explained the scope of the project included providing the City with a complete and comprehensive review of the current organizational structure and service delivery of the Fire Department, identifying current staffing needs and schedules based on appropriate service levels and workloads, reviewing personnel management systems, analyzing station locations and their ability to meet response time standards, evaluating apparatus deployment, and making recommendations for improvements where necessary. ~ The methodology used included interviewing personnel in the City and at all levels of the Fire Department to gain an understanding of the agency; supplementing interviews with an anonymous employee survey; collecting comprehensive data for each Fire Department function; comparing the Fire Department to national standards and peer cities; and evaluating staffing, deployment, management, organization, and station locations. Pipkin continued that the overall service levels provide by the Fire Department were high. The use of volunteer and part-time personnel aided in cost efficiency. The department provided excellent initial and ongoing training to line personnel. Firefighter down-time was effectively utilized to increase efficiency and save the City money and included the hydrant maintenance, company inspection, and public education programs. The key themes Matrix found included the current station network provided for rapid response times to most of the City, the spans of control were appropriate for most supervisory positions, employees were positive about the recent management changes in the department, and information technology (IT) needs were not being effectively supported with the current approach to IT in the City. The organizational structure findings and recommendations included the current rank structure for volunteer firefighters no longer being needed since volunteer personnel had no supervisory authority or responsibility. The recommendation was to eliminate the rank structure for volunteer personnel and use the president of the Volunteer Board as a liaison with the Fire Chief. Pipkin continued that the City was currently compensating Fire personnel below other area 1"""""'. agencies and should consider establishing a compensation policy and conduct a formal salary survey of comparable communities to ensure salaries remained competitive. The rank of captain could be assigned to all staff positions. City Council Meeting Minutes December 5, 2013 Page 4 Under Emergency Operations, Matrix found the City had not adopted formal service level objectives for the Fire Department. All calls should have a priority designation at time of dispatch. The department should adopt the Commission on Fire Accreditation International (CFAI) Suburban baseline performance levels at a minimum, which included call processing (dispatch) calls within 90 seconds 90% of the time, turnout time of 90 seconds 90% of the time, and travel time of six minutes 30 seconds 90% of the time. The department's performance levels were: Current Times Call Processing 90% Turnout Time 90% Travel Time 90% Fire 1 :17 1 :31 4:54 EMS 1:35 1 :54 5:45 In Fire Prevention and Training, the department was effectively utilizing firefighter downtime for fire prevention and public education activities. The City should adopt the 2012 National Fire and Life Safety Codes upon adoption by the state in January. The department provided excellent initial and ongoing training opportunities for personnel and should continually monitor training hours for all personnel to ensure minimum training requirements were met. Pipkin continued that the City was slow to implement new technology and should consider hiring a shared IT professional to service the needs of the Police and Fire Departments. The Fire Department had completed a considerable amount of work in the self-assessment process for CFAI and should continue the self-assessment process and consider seeking accredited status through CFAI. King asked if the IT degradation was due to support or because the Department did not have the technology. Pennington said staff had discussed the issue, pointing out the entjre City had gone through a long process with IT, and staff was feeling very comfortable with where the City was at this time. The contract was signed that day for the virtual private network (VPN) that would make the connections the Fire Department needed. King said it had been mentioned there had been an 83% response rate to the survey, asking how many had been interviewed and how they had been selected. Pipkin said over 50 people were interviewed, some were key staff people who were chosen based on their position, and the others were selected by Matrix. Fleisch asked if the CFAI standards were different from other accrediting organizations. Pipkin said the CFAI and the National Fire Protection Association (NFP A) addressed similar issues and functions, and they were competitors in some areas. Both provided guidelines and standards to make fire organizations better. Pipkin then addressed the Police Department assessment. The scope of work included evaluation of the current delivery of police services to the community for effectiveness and efficiency, the current demand for law enforcement services, response times and various workloads; the organizational structure, staffing levels, capital assets, organizational mission/values, communication, and overall management of the department; personnel management and utilization of personnel for service delivery and performance; and the Identification of opportunities to increase operational efficiency at the lowest possible cost. City Council Meeting Minutes December 5, 2013 Page 5 The methodology included Interviewing personnel in the City and 37 staff at all levels in the Police Department to obtain an understanding of job functions, management, operations, service levels, workload, training, and working relationships; supplementing interviews with an anonymous employee survey; collecting data for each department function; comparing the department to national standards and peer cities; evaluating staffing, deployment, management and the organization of the Department; and providing interim reports to the City to ensure accuracy of data collected and other descriptive information. Pipkin went over the performance and positive attributes of the Police Department, which included a very good response time of 6.8 minutes average travel time to all community- generated calls for service (emergency, urgent, and routine calls). The department had low administrative/office based staff; 52 of 64 sworn employees (81 %) were assigned to field services [Patrol and the Community Response Team (CRT)]. Officers were "pro-active" during their shifts, initiating over 28,000 security checks and over 12,000 traffic stops. The department provided a very high level of follow-up investigative services. Police personnel expressed a high level of commitment to the organization and serving the public. The assessment included the deployment of officers, staffing, and workload levels. Pipkin said backfill overtime (OT) was very rare, reducing costs - managers closely watched the schedule to ensure minimum staffing levels were maintained. Line employee leave usage (322 hours for 2012) was slightly above the average range seen in other police department studies. Officers handled 16,628 community-generated calls for service in 2012 / 2013. Officers initiated 42,339 incidents (e.g. security check, traffic stops). Officers provided 1.065 hours of cart path patrol during the year. Due to low administrative overhead, managers had a significant workload. Pipkin continued that staffing required in Patrol was based on community-generated workload demands rather than the ratio of officers per 1,000 population. An average of all Patrol sergeants, corporals/officers' actual work hours was used in the workload calculations. The average time required to handle the community-generated calls and related work comprised 45% of the total staff work hours (an estimated 15% of work is not captured by CAD), including travel and on-scene time and report writing and prisoner processing time. The remaining 55% (or 40%, including the un-captured work) was "proactive" time. Pipkin said proactive time was the time remaining after handling community-generated calls and the related workload, including administrative time and on-duty court appearances, as well as directed patrol efforts. Uses for proactive time included traffic safety enforcement, foot patrol, problem-oriented tasks to address crime and identified quality of life community issues, community meetings, and special events. The desirable range of overall proactive time was 40% - 50%. Below 40%, officers would not have time in time blocks large enough to address traffic enforcement, crime problems, or other issues. Levels above 50% required supervisors to develop projects to keep officers busy/challenged or could result in poor utilization of staff. The department's level of proactive time varied throughout the day. Higher proactive time during night hours was due to the low number of calls versus the minimum staff needed for officer safety. The proactive time from midnight to 4:00 a.m. was 72% compared to 38% from noon to 4:00 p.m. The findings and recommendations included maintaining separate police and fire departments in Peachtree City as it was the most cost efficient and effective system of providing these services to the community. In the next one to two years the Police Department should review and revise the current vision and values statement, obtaining input from employees at all levels of the organization. Changes were needed to the complaint investigation process, including City Council Meeting Minutes December 5, 2013 Page 6 "- several administrative improvements and the creation of a discipline decision guideline for imposing discipline. The City should regularly survey other regional law enforcement agencies to compare salary/benefits and maintain a salary/benefits level at the average regional salary/benefits level or higher. In the Operations Division, the assessment found a proactive time level of 40% was exceeded for all but four hours of the day (noon - 4:00 p.m.). The current proactive time levels in Patrol provided sufficient time for officers to handle calls for service, generate self-initiated activity, and community policing efforts. Pipkin said using this methodology for an average 55% proactive time level resulted in a projected staffing level of 35 officers on Patrol; it was recommended the department maintain the current staffing level of 33 Patrol officers. To ensure adequate supervision levels, backfill overtime hours should be provided for the Patrol sergeant position and/or pay for corporals when they were functioning os sergeants. In addition, the number of calls for service from the computer-assisted dispatch (CAD) data should be reviewed annually to determine the trend in Patrol workload (increasing or decreasing). The "call priority" level should be integrated with the CAD system to provide separate response times for emergency and urgent calls. If significant additional hours of cart path patrol were desired, the Patrol staffing level should be increased by one officer. The feasibility of using Code Enforcement officers, with appropriate training, to handle additional low risk, low priority calls for service and tasks should be evaluated. In the Investigations Division, detectives were assigned to handle all follow-up investigations and a variety of other related tasks (e.g. obtaining warrants and liaising with the prosecutor and the court). Peachtree City had a total of 478 Part 1 Crimes in 2010, 465 in 2011, and 474 in 2012. The City's clearance rates for both violent crimes and property crimes were higher than the national average. For violent crimes, Peachtree City's rate was 67%, vs. the national average of 50%. Peachtree City rate for property crimes was 37%, vs. the national average of 23%. A performance measure should be established to "clear" cases investigated at a higher percentage than the national average for violent crimes and for property crimes (e.g. the department would maintain a clearance rate 10% above the national average). The current staffing level should be maintained in the Criminal Investigation Division - four detectives assigned primarily to case investigations and one detective assigned to the regional drug task force. Pipkin recommended one sergeant's position be added to the Professional Standards Division - primarily to manage the Department's in-service and special skills training program. Recommendations for the Support Services Division included evaluating the possibility of the Quartermaster assisting in the front lobby when the services of a sworn officer were needed, reviewing and revising the job description for Evidence Custodian to accurately reflect the job tasks, providing additional resources to review and purge evidence no longer needed, and providing funding for one shared full-time position to provide IT services to the Police and Fire Departments. Pipkin said 53% - 54% of the department responded to the survey. He pointed out that the use of backfill overtime was fairly unique and was non-existent in most of the departments Matrix had surveyed. City Council Meeting Minutes December 5, 2013 Page 7 ~~ Haddix asked how the cart paths were dealt with in the assessment and trying to figure out a balance with patrol times. Pipkin said they only identified that the paths were an issue. The department tracked the number of hours the paths were patrolled, but the incidents on the cart paths needed to be identified. Haddix said cart path patrols were an issue, and residents wanted to see more officers on the paths, adding he did not know if there was an answer. King noted there were approximately 1,000 hours spent on the paths, according to the study, which was 43 days or 1 /9 of a year. The hours patrolled in automobiles would be much higher. He said that was an internal problem the City could deal with. Pipkin agreed, saying the City should stay ahead of any problems on the cart paths. It was a unique situation that needed a unique solution. Haddix agreed with King, saying minimal hours were spent on the paths. Increasing patrols on the paths meant decreasing patrol time on the road. Pipkin said they recommended additional resources to increase the hours on the paths. King said the City could make the decision on whether to reduce road patrols in order to increase path patrols. Pipkin said the normal service level that was provided was good. If the level of service were reduced, then the City would be taking a risk. Pipkin said the study recommended against a Public Safety Director. King asked if one person could run both departments. Pipkin said if they were combined they would be less effective. ~ Learnard asked staff to make the PowerPoint available to the public. She continued that the report had been glowing and was a positive reflection on the Chiefs and the City Manager. There were some things Council needed to look at, such as adding personnel or increasing pay, and Council needed to take own~rship those things. Haddix noted the presentation was based on a 200-page report, which had a lot of detail that had to be sorted out, and that Council would have to deal with at some point. It was an extensive study, and there was a lot of work to do. The citizens needed to be aware that the study was not a trivial thing, but added up to a big picture. Pipkin said the City had good organizations, but had been the focus of some public controversy when the assessments were initidted. There had been individual isolated incidents, but the overall tone was progressive. The personnel in both departments were moving forward and wanted to serve the community. Haddix agreed, saying overall the people in the departments were superb, and it was sad when one or two people caused negative headlines. Fleisch said the recommendations also put the issue of a public safety director to rest. She did not see the pursuit of that position as being productive. King said the main thing was the quality of the individual men and women in both departments that were out there on a daily basis. Haddix asked Pennington if he had any comments. Pennington said the report was eye- opening. He continued that the biggest asset in any of the City's departments were the people doing the work. He was more concerned with the issues that would make the departments __ more effective and efficient, adding Fire Chief Joe O'Conor was making changes recommended by the report. The Police Chief seemed to be thinking in the same vein. The City had gotten its money's worth with this study. The departments were made up of people, so City Council Meeting Minutes December 5,2013 Page 8 ~. there would always be problems. There would be some changes that would be brought to Council. No action was required. 12-13-05 Consider Cancellation of December 19 and January 2 Meetings Pennington said Council Member Imker had asked for this item to be added to the agenda. There were a number of items on the December 19 agenda, including the certification of the run-off election for mayor, some items from the Fire Department, and some budget items. Pennington said he did not know of any items for the January 2 meeting, and it might be possible to skip that meeting. The oaths of office could be done at another time and did not have to be done at a Council meeting. Council consensus was to move forward with the December 19 meeting and consider cancellation of the January 2 meeting on December 19. Council/Staff Topics Hot Topics Update Pennington reminded everyone of the Hometown Holiday celebration scheduled December 7 at City Hall Plaza. ~ There being no further business, Learnard moved to adjourn the meeting. King seconded. Motion carried unanimously. The meeting adiourne(zr~o/ Don Haddix, Mayor .~