Aside from getting back to me on what that legal framework is in writing and sending it through the Chair, if you can send it directly to me as well, that would be great. 68 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc.
I guess the simple question is, is the Administration following the law in establishing participation goals?
We certainly are following the law. I mean, that is one of the reasons that -- not one of the reasons, but, I mean, that is one of the -- one of Michelle Flamer's specific responsibility is to make sure that the Office of Economic Opportunity is guided by the relevant legal provisions and is pursuing the Administration's commitment to increasing diversity in a manner that is consistent with the law, because we don't want the results of that effort to be undermined by a legal challenge. So, yes.
But you're referring to State and federal law. In other words --
-- it 69 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. actually can be challenged from both positions?
You can be challenged by contractors who believe that you cannot set goals --
-- in establishing those goals. You also can be challenged by disadvantaged businesses who, based upon a disparity study, know that the availability exists at a level that the City is not actually pursuing. Therefore, the City is not actually meeting its diversity goals.
Yes, and in theory, a challenge could be brought from both ends. I find it probably less likely that a disadvantaged business would challenge the City's commitment, because 70 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. the law as it has evolved over diversity business participation is such that it's fairly difficult to hold a municipality to a particular standard. So that's why I said that Michelle has been working with OEO extensively to make sure that what we're doing is consistent with the law and, yes, that access to opportunity is provided in a manner that's sort of as equal as possible. But, yes, theoretically, a challenge could be brought in either direction.
If the City consistently does not meet the goals that are established by a disparity study over several years, then it would not be that difficult.
But I think the challenge would not be about the failure to meet the goal. I think the challenge would be a straight-out discrimination or equal -- some sort of discrimination claim against the City. It wouldn't specifically be about the goals or the 71 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. failure to meet the goals or a disparity study specifically. It would be more likely a challenge under some federal law or the federal constitution that opportunity is being denied, particular opportunities are being denied, to a certain group of people in violation of the laws that require that opportunities be provided equally.
Okay. In Fiscal Year '07, your department achieved a 55 percent DBE participation rate. The goals for Fiscal Year '08 and Fiscal Year '09 were 45 percent in both years, lower than the 55 percent that was actually achieved in Fiscal Year '07, and in Fiscal Year '08, only 16 percent was achieved, which is a 39 point drop from Fiscal Year '07. So the question is, was the 45 percent goal wrong? 72 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc.
I wasn't here in Fiscal '07, so I can't speak to the goal. What I can tell you is that we in the last two years have increased our participation, and as I testified, our current participation is at percent in 8 Fiscal '09 and we project it to be at 28 9 percent by the end of this current fiscal 10 year, and we expect to continue to move 11 to maintain that level of participation. 12
The 13 discussion I've been having in part, in 14 large part, is not just about what goals 15 were achieved, even though I've 16 referenced that, but how goals are set 17 and if we're following the law in terms 18 of how goals are set. What was the goal 19 for Fiscal Year '10, the year we're in 20 now? 21
It was established based on obligations, I believe. Is that right? Originally it was based on obligations, and then we looked at our actual expenditures and worked with OEO and ultimately arrived at the goal of 28 percent.
So legally you're not prepared to state right now how those goals should be set. You said Ms. Flamer will get back to us on that. I guess the question is, within the Home Rule Charter --
No. I would prefer to go back to the materials that -- we have already been looking at this extensively, and I just don't have those materials here, but I am happy to get 74 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. back to you on that.
I guess at the end of the day what's in the Charter I'm concerned about whether the City is in compliance with, not just in general but specifically in terms of how it trickles down. What's in the Charter calls for, which I'm assuming is completely legally enforceable, what's in the Charter calls for an annual disparity analysis and participation goals based upon four things - the present availability of qualified DBEs, the participation of qualified DBEs on past contracts awarded by the City, a forecast of eligible contracts to be awarded within the fiscal year, and, four, the latest annual disparity study. That is actually the legal framework within the Charter for setting the goals for the entire City, and those goals are set by the executive branch that the Finance Director has identified within the Charter. That then is translated into 75 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. departmental goals, which is then translated into RFP goals. And so the question is, are we actually making sure that the legal framework from the Charter is being followed and is it trickling down so that opportunities are actually being offered in a way that is consistent with the availability? At the end of the day, is utilization actually matching availability? And we already know through the series of budget hearings that we've had with different departments that that is not the case, that there is arbitrary goal-setting being done at the departmental level and at the RFP level. And you've told me you've identified who is responsible for that, but I'm as concerned not just holding department heads responsible but whether the Law Department is actually also holding each department head responsible legally for following that framework. So I look forward to what you will send me in 76 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. writing in terms of what you believe that framework to be, and then I'm assuming that that is also an opinion that will be shared with OEO and with other department heads and that is the framework by which we should proceed.
Well, yeah. I just want to be clear about something. The Law Department isn't -- the Law Department itself is not holding each individual operating department to any goals. What we do is advise the Office of OEO, which is the office responsible for developing the goals with the departments, and what we do is advise that office -- and I'm concerned, because you said I've identified the person who is, quote, responsible.
I meant responsible within your office for knowing what the legal framework is.
For dealing with the legal framework, okay. I just wanted to make sure we're clear. 77 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc.
And for identifying for those departments what the legal framework is.
And for the operating departments. Just identifying what the legal framework is, what they should be held accountable for.
We identify -- we worked with OEO and defined the legal framework for OEO, whose responsibility it is for effectuating this objective, right, for achieving this objective or administering it citywide, and through that and through the Mayor's Economic Opportunity Cabinet, the general discussion of the legal framework and the basis for OEO's work with the departments to establish each individual department's goals is communicated, and there are -- the Deputy Mayors are on that Cabinet, so through that process, they are advised as well. 78 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. But we don't necessarily advise each individual department of the legal framework related to the OEO goals. That's just part of the process of our advising OEO and their administration of the process overall.
That's fine, as long as that legal opinion is available. Because if you have disparity studies that are required under the Home Rule Charter that are done on an annual basis and that's really the only legal support we have for any sort of anti-discriminatory policy, if you have that within the Charter and the participation goals are supposed to be set based upon the disparity study and the disparity study says you should be reaching a goal of to 28 percent and 21 you consistently only reach 18 percent, 22 it's very possible that the 23 Administration at some point, if it does 24 not change its operation, which I believe 25 it is doing through the OEO Strategic 79 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. Plan, it's out of compliance with the Charter, and that we should not just be concerned about getting sued by majority contractors or prime contractors, we should be concerned about being sued by people who are not being given the opportunity they should be given.
And having gone from the beginning of my tenure 97 percent of contract dollars going to businesses owned by white men, to at this point in my tenure 82 percent of contract dollars going to businesses owned by white men and looking at the Mayor's goal in reverse of 75 percent of contract dollars still going to businesses owned by white men, if a disparity study has been done and identified availability and it's not being matched by utilization, there should be concern legally there as well.
Thank you, 80 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. Madam Chair.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Good afternoon, Solicitor. How are you?
I'm great. So you probably, if you've been paying attention, I've been asking each department about new and unfilled positions scheduled to be filled in FY11. Specifically, I'm asking about job duties, how those duties are being handled currently, et cetera. I do note that you have a $248,000 vacancy allowance across the 81 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. department, which obviously would offset some of these questions, but there's an unfilled Administrative Services Specialist position as of November. Has that position been filled?
That person would provide assistance with personnel budget reporting and analysis, payroll and human resources functions.
We are just doubling up on the work that's being performed by the remaining people in the Administrative Services Unit.
So will the 82 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. sky fall if you don't fill that position?
Perhaps not in the short term, but eventually. We lost a payroll clerk and so the processing of the time sheets and payroll information has been, I think, slowed somewhat by that.
So this is a position of someone doing data entry for time sheets, in part?
No. It's not simply data entry. It's also the processing of information in preparation for people's retirements and -- it's a comprehensive payroll function, not simply data entry.
That's great. I mean, we are automating that in an ERP package in FY11 under the budget that will automatically calculate pension stuff, do time reporting, other stuff like that. So it may make some sense, at least in my view, to keep that position vacant to see if we can accomplish our 83 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. goals. In the Litigation Unit, there are four new Assistant City Solicitor positions.
The vacancy chart we received shows that two of those have been filled?
For the two new Assistant positions that have not been filled, what are the job duties that you're envisioning?
One of the positions is in the General Litigation Unit. The General Litigation Unit handles all litigation. It doesn't fall into any of the other named litigation units, so that which is not claimed Civil Rights, Labor and Employment or Code Enforcement. The attorney would be needed to assume a caseload of approximately 40 files so that that -- to assist the City in defense of -- in its 84 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. defense in litigation. In answer to the question I imagine you're going to ask, how are we doing it now, again, we double up. But particularly with attorney positions in litigation, it's risky even in the short term to allow that additional burden to fall on lawyers, because at some level they can't meet their professional obligations to defend the City appropriately if the caseloads are too high. And so we try to keep them at an even level. Additionally, that litigation handles affirmative litigation, and because it's been understaffed for some period of time, we haven't been as aggressive on affirmative litigation as we would like to be. We've been working with the Inspector General on some particular issues, and to the extent that we have the staffing to do so, we would like to be more aggressive in that area as well. So an additional attorney there 85 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. will help us to do that.
Well, when I say "affirmative litigation," we would be the plaintiff, yes, but we don't -- that unit doesn't only handle matters where the City is the plaintiff. We handle every other kind of litigation but what I've already named for the City in defense as well, but additionally this unit does also handle affirmative litigation.
So I assume you're not suggesting that the lawyers working for the Law Department are currently unable to fulfill their professional responsibility?
No, I'm not suggesting that. What I'm saying is that we try to maintain the caseloads -- over the long term, we try to maintain the caseloads at a certain reasonable level, because it happens frequently that when 86 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. people leave or whatever, staffing changes, we have to redistribute, and eventually the redistribution causes an undue burden on the attorneys, who have to pick up the extra work, and it also -- that also in the long term has kind of a negative effect on morale, because when people see that they are being excessively burdened and no help is forthcoming, they tend to get frustrated and leave, especially in an economy like this when they're not getting pay increases either. So it has a lot of impact.
So if we fill these two positions, would we expect to save money in outside counsel fees?
Both in -- the other position is in Civil Rights, and what we -- we would expect to continue to maintain our decline in outside counsel costs, because we would have the staffing internally necessary to maintain an appropriate defense of the City and 87 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. reasonable caseload so that we have the capacity to continue to handle the volume of work that's coming in.
But FY10 and FY11 have the same outside counsel. You're not lowering it.
No. I understand, but we're doing that today. So you're saying we're providing additional resources and getting no 14 offset in costs from outside counsel.
No. We're increasing costs by the two positions we're talking about.
But you're maintaining essentially the same offset in costs, because this incremental -- this annual cost of 99,000 -- let's call it 100 -- $100,000 is, as you are well aware from our Class 200 obligations last 88 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. year, a drop in the bucket in comparison to the extensive outside counsel costs. It's a four-to-one ratio. So keeping attorneys on staff helps us to maintain lower outside counsel costs.
I understand, and if we keep the current staffing position, which is up two from last year, for most of last year, you will be able to maintain your current outside counsel costs. You'll just be -- what I understand from your testimony is you'll just be creating stress or poor morale among your existing City Solicitors.
Okay. Legal Assistant positions, there were two as of November. Have they been filled?
Both of those 89 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. positions are in the General Litigation Unit, which I've already described to you, and Legal Assistants in our office, they're what we call -- they're our internal name for paralegals. So they provide litigation support in conducting case investigations and responding to drafting discovery requests and general litigation support. When those -- assist with internal case management responsibilities, entering information into -- substantive case-related information into our case management system and tracking that information and the progress of cases as it relates to the input of that information. To the extent that we do not have Legal Assistants to perform those responsibilities, lawyers have to do it or secretaries, who really don't necessarily have the substantive expertise or knowledge to do it in the same way that a Legal Assistant would.
So by 90 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. providing these resources, are you going to be able to lower outside counsel costs?
I would say in an attenuated way, yes, because it allows the attorneys to focus on the work of attorneys rather than the work of paralegals.
Okay. So how much can we lower outside attorney costs if we give you these two positions?
I'm not sure, again, that it's directly dollar-for-dollar quantifiable. I would say that as with the attorney positions, it allows us to continue to maintain the reduced level of outside counsel expenditures that we have achieved over the past year.
Okay. The Commercial Law and Regulatory Affairs Unit, there was an unfilled Assistant City Solicitor position. Has that been filled? This is the Corporate and Tax 91 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. Group subdivision.
That is a position in the Tax Unit, and the Tax Unit collects taxes, delinquent taxes.
That position -- excuse me one second. This is a replacement for the attorney who specifically focused on bankruptcy-related tax collection matters in our office. The attorney that used to handle that is severely ill and so a person that we hired to fill that position would resume -- would pick up that work. There isn't anybody in our office now at all who focuses on that. That person had a particular niche and he's not there any longer.
It looks 92 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. like there are three Assistant City Solicitor positions to be filled in the Tax Unit. Have those positions been filled?
Three? Well, I have -- I mean, I have two in addition to the one that you just identified, but in any event --
What we were talking about before was the Commercial Law and Regulatory Affairs Unit.
Okay. I think -- all right. I think I misspoke. I think I misunderstood you. The person -- so the Commercial Law position is a position for an attorney to handle telecommunications legal issues. The person who was in that position left. And, again, essentially what happens when someone leaves is that, particularly in the Finance and Contracts Unit, though, on the Commercial Law side, the number of contracts incoming is remarkable, thousands in a quarter or in half of the 93 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. fiscal year, and so what happens is, those contracts are redistributed, but that means that the contracts are slower being processed. And in answer to your question, we don't -- that typically does not create an increase in outside counsel, because we typically don't hire outside counsel to perform transactional work, but what happens as a result of the vacancies is that it slows down the transactional work, which slows down the business conducted by the department.
Okay. So moving on to the Tax Unit, you've described one of those positions related to bankruptcy.
Right. And the others would just focus on delinquent collections more generally.
From several weeks to several months. 94 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc.
So there's not really additional revenue we're going to pick up by filling these positions?
I mean, I think there's the possibility. It's hard to say how much additional revenue is generated by additional people. Certainly the more people we can put on the work, the more revenue we have the potential for collecting, but that's all --
Could you please provide the Chair with the per person City Solicitor cost of the Tax Unit and how much they are able to settle and bring in --
Thank you. I've been asking also departments about the budget reduction scenarios. The reduction scenarios we 95 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. received from the Law Department showed cuts in three areas - 1.2 million in staffing restrictions, 587,000 in outside legal services, and $70,000 in postal services. We've talked about staffing levels a bit, so I'd like to focus on the other two cuts. Starting with the postal services cut, the budget detail indicates the FY10 appropriation for postal services was 54,000, but the projected spend is 150. Why did postal service costs increase so much?
I believe that that number has to be corrected. I think internally our postal service costs -- another budget category was erroneously attributed to postal service costs, and so we have to adjust that. That number is incorrect.
Okay. 96 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. That's great. That's $96,000. So with respect to the proposed outside legal services cut, can you describe how the department was planning to achieve that?
Well, the fact of the matter is that we have taken substantial steps to reduce our outside counsel expenditures as it is. We have little room to propose reductions because, in essence, our costs are staffing, outside counsel, litigation support services and administrative costs, like postage. If we reduce our staffing internally, it costs us on outside counsel. We have -- so it's preferable to try to reduce expenditures in outside counsel, and so what we would do is try to figure out some other way of administering conflict cases or further reducing the number of cases that we send outside, but it is a significant challenge. It would be a significant 97 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. challenge for us to do it.
It was in your reduction scenario that you provided to the Administration.
And if you had to have achieved it, you could have achieved it?
Well, if we had to have -- if we had to manage to do that budget number, we would attempt to manage to that budget number, but it's probably a difficult challenge.
Well, you've seen our past outside counsel budget for the past two years and you've seen what the tensions are between the reductions in one category and one fund versus the 98 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. reductions in another.
Your testimony is if you were appropriated that much less Class 200, that you could achieve that or something close to that.
That's not my testimony. My testimony is if we had to manage to that budget number, we would attempt to do so, but I can tell you from past experience and past experience that you've seen yourself, it's virtually impossible to do it. We are like the prisons. We have to defend what we get, at whatever cost it requires.
Okay. In last year's budget hearing you testified about the new case management system being developed by the Law Department to streamline workflow and thereby improve 99 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. responsiveness to clients and also the efficiency in which you're able to deal with cases, moving them quicker, et cetera. Reducing paperwork by attorneys also presumably allows them to take more cases, because there's less paperwork. So what's the status of this initiative?
We're still working with DOT to implement it. We have worked with our consultant and we have surveyed a number of law firms to evaluate their case management systems to come up with a model that works for the Law Department, and our consultant and the Department of Technology is working to implement that system with the modifications that we've identified. And so it's in process.
So do you believe that it will generate efficiencies once it's implemented?
Yes. I think we've already seen some improvements in claims, in opening new cases. But, yes, we do 100 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. expect -- because what it will do, ideally what it will do, is enable lawyers -- well, staff generally to have greater access across the department to documents, which our system does not allow now, which will reduce the re-creation of documents from one department to the other and allow people to access, like in a law firm, allow you to sort of go into the system and pull up a case or a document number and have access wherever you are to the current version of that document. That's sort of the general idea, to try to go to the law firm document management model.
So what were those efficiencies you just talked about? You held up a card.
The improvements made in the Claims Division really allows 101 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. a case number to be assigned and the file 3 to be opened electronically, whereas previously without the enhancement, we were unable to do that.
We're going unit by unit and doing sort of the incremental changes that can be made immediately, and then once we have the technology in place to do the bigger things, like get the document management system going so that you can target anything that's in the Law Department by basically entering just a few entries, that will come later, because the technology is not there, but we didn't want to hold back small changes that we can make now. And so Claims was actually the first division that they started with, because that was a small change.
Thank you. When do you expect the implementation to occur of the document management system?
Certainly it's 102 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. going to take a full year, I think, for --
-- everything to happen. We do require some coordination at some level with the Department of Technology. There are certain aspects of the case system that we want to interact with other programs that are already existing in other departments and that's where like Law has to wait and be responsive to that linking happening.
And once it's implemented, you do expect there to be efficiencies within the Law Department --
Are there any other questions? 103 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. (No response.)
Mr. Gillison is here. We're going to move right on to you, Mr. Gillison, and we can kind of be finished with this today. Thank you. (Witness approached witness table.)
Thank you very much for being here. Would you like to identify yourself and proceed with your testimony. DEPUTY
I will. Good afternoon, Councilwoman Tasco and other members of Council. My name is Everett Gillison and I expect to be joined here by other members of the First Judicial District rather shortly. 104 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. They're just running a little bit late.
No, they're not late. We're early. Would you like to wait a few minutes? DEPUTY
If we could. I think -- he's on his way. Can we just wait five minutes?
We're early, so we appreciate you getting here. Would you please begin your testimony. DEPUTY
Thank you very much. Again, my name is Everett Gillison. I'm the Deputy Mayor for 105 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. Public Safety. I'm here with Joe Evers, Prothonotary, and also President Judge Pamela Dembe from the First Judicial District, and we're here to discuss the Fiscal Year '11 budget for the Clerk of Quarter Sessions. During the past year, the Clerk of Quarter Sessions has undergone significant structural changes. Taking the current structure and function to the office into consideration, we are seeking approval for the Fiscal 2011 budget in the amount of $4,915,313. The budgeted positions level is 115 employees. The current filled positions are distributed as follows: Courtroom support staff, 73; file room 19 support and record maintenance, 11; administrative and clerical, 6; financial and accounting, 16. The current employee complement, therefore, is 106. There are nine vacancies, although there are a couple that have been filled, I believe, but I will defer 106 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. that to Mr. Evers, but totaling approximately $460,000.
Would you speak into the mike and go a little slower, please. DEPUTY
There are currently nine vacancies, totalling approximately $460,000, of which six are court clerks. The Clerk of Quarter Sessions provides support to 73 courtrooms in the Criminal Justice Center, 1801 Vine Street and the Prison. The duties of the Office of the Clerk is to record and maintain courtroom adjudications in criminal and juvenile matters in the Court of Common Pleas and Municipal Court. The office also maintains bills of information, transcripts, issues bench warrants, collects fines and costs, and issues commitments and discharges of defendants. 107 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. As this City Council is aware, effective March 3rd, 2010, the FJD has been charged with the oversight and management of the day-to-day operations of the Office of the Clerk of Quarter Sessions. The assumption of this function was precipitated by an order of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, and in a subsequent order from the President Judge of the Court of Common Pleas, Pamela Dembe to my right, Joseph Evers to my left was appointed manager of all aspects of the Clerk's Office. Since that time, much discussion has ensued about three areas of the Clerk's function that we will attempt to address. These three areas are collection and disbursement of revenue, efficiencies that can be achieved, and the status of the current employees. Also our preliminary assessments indicate the extremely poor working conditions, particularly at 1801 108 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. Vine, that needs to be addressed - equipment that doesn't work or is incapable of processing today's software, significant training deficiencies and a workforce that needs additional direction. We need to address these issues as well as workflow processes improvements that need to occur, and Mr. Evers and his staff are still in their discovery stage and are identifying new challenges each day. The revenue aspect is as follows: As part of the FJD's assumption of the Clerk of the Quarter Sessions' duties, we have jointly hired an independent accounting firm to review the Clerk's finances and accounts. The District is seeking a thorough audit to determine what funds are on hand, what funds need to be disbursed and to whom they need to be disbursed. Additionally, the First Judicial District is looking at the various accounts to associate current balances with bail deposits, case 109 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. dispositions and forfeitures. Furthermore, the First Judicial District has engaged a consultant to do a professional audit to review the Clerk's operating procedures and to determine if adequate controls are in place and where policies and procedures need to be tightened. Efficiencies: Recent testimony by Supreme Court Justice Seamus McCaffery suggests there needs to be better information transfer and record-keeping between the Clerk of Quarter Sessions, Prisons, courts and other justice partners. Better management of the City's criminal record-keeping function can result in increased remittance of collections and reduced delays in releasing defendants. Incorporating the Clerk's function into the First Judicial District enables the FJD to utilize its resources to upgrade and properly align the Clerk's staff. An examination of the core 110 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. processes is needed to identify redundancies, eliminate duplication of efforts, and define staff roles and responsibilities and establish proper policies and procedures. With this, a framework can be put into place to achieve efficiencies which will be realized for all justice partners. To achieve efficiencies, workplace reengineering is needed, along with employee training of case processing updates in CPCMS, which is the Common Pleas Court Management System, and in the use of current office software and technology. Standards must be established and a quality control review is needed.
Defined duties and workflow processes must be established and additional training in CPCMS is necessary to establish best practices that must be shared. All of these employee training initiatives will be available to all current staff. A management team is being put 111 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. together, which includes the FJD and the Clerk. Staff and supervisor meetings are being held weekly to hear employee opinions and recommendations, and wholesale changes will not be immediate, but we plan to prioritize and implement recommendations from our own internal and external reviews. We are seeking your full support and approval of this budget request so that the Clerk of Quarter Sessions can properly sustain its operation as currently envisioned. My office will work in coordination with the First Judicial District to ensure that the recently defined goals and alignment of the office will effectively serve the needs of our City. I thank you for the opportunity to appear before Council today and present the Fiscal Year '11 budget request of $4,195,313 for the Clerk of Quarter Sessions. And I do want to emphasize that this has all been done in 112 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. a thorough and a coordinated and a collaborative way. I appreciate the time and effort Council has given us to discuss these matters and also with the partners that are sitting with me at the table, and we'll be glad to answer any questions.
Thank you. Madam President Judge, do you have any comments you'd like to make at all? I mean, you don't have to.
Really just to support what Mr. Gillison has said. We are actually finding it fairly exciting to get a chance to rework the Clerk operation and to do it in a way that protects the employees and gives them new opportunities in the future and that should, in the long run, generate revenues for all of us, City, State and the courts. We're looking into all kinds of ways that we can move forward and use the most modern and efficient ways to accomplish what needs to be done. 113 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc.
No. I think the Judge and Mr. Gillison have both repeated what my thoughts are. We're in the process of discovering all the things that we need to do, and we'll continue to do that and perhaps give a more detailed report in some time when our audits are in.
Mr. Gillison, for the record, would you please explain to us now what happens with the position of the Clerk of Quarter Session? DEPUTY
With the transition and a little more detail about that, please. DEPUTY
I will. You will receive -- we are still finding out the exact language that will have to 114 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. be suggested to Council, but it is the Administration's view that we will be putting together an ordinance which will eliminate the elected position of the Clerk of Quarter Sessions and that we will end up providing a means and a mechanism for the functions to formally be absorbed by the First Judicial District. That will necessitate another ordinance transferring this particular money under a transfer ordinance to them, and it would then, as of Fiscal Year '11, just be part of the allocation to the First Judicial District. We have not accomplished that yet. I'm sure Council knows that we have not yet transmitted the bill, but it is my every intention to have that bill 20 hopefully to this Council for its review within ten days.
What is the disposition of the employees who are in the Clerk of Quarter Session and who are currently under the Civil Service 115 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. regulations for the City and what will their future positions be? DEPUTY
We are examining and making sure that the Mayor's intention in this effort is actually carried out. The Mayor made a promise to each and every one of the employees that those that wanted to go over, recognizing that the First Judicial District does not have Civil Service, that we would end up protecting all of their rights through maintaining the same union status that they have and also that we would maintain all of their pension, vacation, sick time and everything else. We have that agreement already with the First Judicial District. What we are trying to do is maintain and find places so that if people did not want to go to the First Judicial District, that we find employment for them in other City agencies. The idea is is that we are making sure that the environment that they're going to is a supportive one, is 116 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. one that is available for additional training, and we are making sure that we are transferring people to an environment that allows them to grow and to be seen as a valued member of the matter. And I know that Mr. Evers and Judge Dembe share my enthusiasm for that particular promise that has been made by the Mayor to the individuals.
You have a current employee complement of 106, and in your comments just now, if there are employees who choose not to move to the Judicial department and have those skills that are needed to function -- carry those skills that they perform now in the Clerk of Quarter Session and those skills will be needed, what does that do to your complement of employees in the Judicial department? Do you fill those and still allow for the people to move to other places? DEPUTY
What will happen is that -- and I will defer 117 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. to the Judge and to Mr. Evers, but what will happen is, I will sure get a list of people who do not want to go, no matter what. I will get that list, and then I will end up taking those individuals and finding employment for them in other departments in the City, as we have maintained. We are going to maintain their job and we will maintain their status as clerks if those are the persons that don't want to go. That would mean that the First Judicial District would ultimately be the party that would end up hiring for persons that would want to perform those duties and would be responsible for training, and I would leave that to Mr. Evers' quite capable hands to do.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Good afternoon, everyone. DEPUTY
Just first following along the same lines as Councilwoman Tasco asked. Madam President Judge, I think when you were here for the First Judicial District, you stated something to the effect that you thought the employees over there, in a sense, were not the problem, that a lot of them were good workers and that maybe the technology and what they were working with was the problem. Is that a fair statement?
Now -- and maybe Mr. Evers is the best one to answer this. In the written testimony, it talks about the training initiatives. Is there any specifics you can give like right now what you're kind of thinking about and will some of that training be mandatory? 119 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc.
Yes, it will. What happens, in the statewide CPCMS system, there are regular updates. Much of those -- many of those updates were not passed down to the employees. So what they learned and what they found out were things that were just sort of grapevine updates. What we're going to do is, we're going to have regular training programs that are mandatory for all the employees on a regular basis. We're redesigning the conference room and the administrative office has a training unit for the Quarter Session staff. There doesn't seem to be a training room 18 designated for them, so we're just doing some reengineering right now to do that. And actually we're also asking for suggestions from the employees who actually do this work for their needs. They have not been included in any of these processes. So their needs and thoughts have been paramount for me right 120 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. now, and we've made a number of instant changes in the first two or three weeks in my time there.
We read a couple stories when you first went over there. How do you feel the cooperation is now?
It's completely different. I'm trying to build a consensus there that we're all working together, that this is sort of an operating room where we're all working together on a patient, and I'm teaching people new skills, skills that may have not been available to them in the past.
I appreciate that. Just one other thing. On the audit review that you mention, is there any kind of timeline on that?
With respect to Ernst & Young, who are auditing the various funds, we are hoping to have their report in about two weeks, 121 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. maybe a little more than that. They unfortunately got started a little late because the gentleman who was in charge of the audit came down with the flu and da, da, da, da, so we're a little behind, about a couple weeks, and we should be able to come back, and when we get that information, we do intend to send Council a report.
And along those same lines, as far as like the new structure as far as that came, is there again a timeline on that, if it was a perfect world, which I know it's not.
The previous management had had a performance audit done. It doesn't cover everything, but it was a good start. So that I think has made it a little easier for Econsult to get started, and we've been pushing them we're hoping within a few weeks to 122 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc. have their report. That one, I think, is less crucial from all of our perspectives than the financial audit.
Okay. Thank you. Good luck. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair.
A lot of the questions that I have were answered and are somewhat repetitive, but by way of this takeover, if I understand this correctly, although they were court administrative functions, it was a City independent office. What prevents you guys from doing that to the Register of Wills or one of the other independently elected bodies?
I mean, but let's say an administration comes along that does want them. What prevents that from happening? 123 4/27/10 - WHOLE - BILL 100115, etc.