MINUTES OF THE INFORMAL MEETING OF THE JOHNSON COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS:
NOVEMBER 17, 1997
STRATEGIC PLANNING WORK SESSION
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Issues for the Next Couple Years
Preparation for Budget Process
Chairperson Stutsman called the Johnson County Board of Supervisors to order in the Iowa National Guard Armory at 8:35 a.m. Members present were: Joseph Bolkcom, Charles Duffy, Stephen Lacina, and Sally Stutsman; Jonathan Jordahl arrived at 8:45 a.m.
University of Iowa Institute of Public Affairs Planning Facilitator Tim Shields asked what kind of feedback the Board got from department heads after the last strategic planning session. Bolkcom felt it was real productive. Stutsman said she heard positive feedback from department heads and felt they were more free to talk without an audience.
Shields said at the last meeting they started with a discussion on accomplishments. He asked what are some problems coming up, forces and trends that were affecting the County. He stated that no one had really thought about the effect of Coral Ridge Mall. He said that the County and Iowa City were not yet dealing with all of the realities the mall is going to bring. Lacina cited the need for off-site storage. Shields said the mall would impact labor and housing.
Shields said one of the long-term issues was the land use plan, and asked how close it was to being done. Board members said there is much work remaining. Shields asked in reference to regional planning if JCCOG worked. Bolkcom said yes for things like transportation, human services, and solid waste, but not for land use planning because there were no real mechanisms to talk about regional issues. Duffy felt that JCCOG is over-represented by Iowa City and that ECICOG should do more regional planning. Bolkcom said they don't even talk to entities in their own county.
ISSUES FOR THE NEXT COUPLE YEARS
Shields asked the Board what they wanted to work on in the next couple of years. Lacina felt they should work on disaster planning. Duffy noted how the nature of disaster planning has expanded beyond weather-related disasters to include terrorism. Lacina said they should break down department head needs by category. Shields said a lot of the department head responses were consistent with the goals of the Board. He said they need to talk about ideas for organizational communication improvement. Shields said they also need to discuss space needs. Duffy asked if they had anything about funding. Shields said that the Auditor had stated that he was opposed to regressive measures such as local option sales tax. Jordahl said that fiscal planning was not just looking for alternative sources, but also setting limits. Duffy said it means priorities. One issue that Shields said came up was role clarity. Shields mentioned strategic planning follow-up and said department heads felt good about being asked to participate. Bolkcom said that one department head showed interest in being involved in follow-up to strategic planning sessions. Jordahl said he would like to see this go on. Jordahl said he would like to see a mission statement.
Shields said the issue of organizational capacity seemed to run through a lot of comments- revenues, staffing, space. He said the last item they left off with was technology. Shields said they also needed to talk about role clarity, as in the role of elected officials versus the role of department heads. Jordahl said budgeting brings this issue to the front burner. Shields asked if strategic planning was helping. Lacina said that prioritizing was very important.
1. Technology improvement plan. Stutsman said she wanted to keep it moving ahead. Bolkcom said a long-term implementation strategy requires attention. Jordahl said in the short-term they need to resolve budget issues such as autonomy. Lacina said they need to be able to maintain adaptability. Bolkcom said that the What-When committee was a good model. Duffy felt they needed to eliminate some meetings and Jordahl said they needed to prioritize more.
2. Economic Development. Shields asked how economic development was going. Lacina said they hadn't gotten to it yet. Duffy said it was one of his top priorities; he is serving on a state economic development board. Bolkcom asked if it really was a priority because there had been little movement and a lack of time. Lacina said the goal was stated in a 5-year time frame. Duffy said other committees are taking more time, but economic development is very important. Shields said previous discussion had related this to the Comp Plan which they are still working on and Duffy agreed. Shields said this is one area the Board had indicated they felt pretty good about where they are at and their lack of attention in the past 6 months probably confirms that feeling. Lacina said there aren't pressing things right now, but it needs to be a component. Shields said they need to bring key players together and bring everyone up to speed as to what are the options for economic development. Lacina added it's a moving target because impacts such as the new mall are not yet known. Duffy said economic development is more than just building. Jordahl added that this relates to welfare issues in the county.
3. Fiscal Planning. Shields said the Board should examine staffing needs. Lacina said they don't want to reinvent the wheel and they may need to hire a consultant. Jordahl said he and Stutsman talked to a consultant who was willing to come talk to the Board at no cost to discuss what the costs for a site assessment would be. Stutsman said they had introduced performance-based budgeting to the department heads. There was a lot of reaction, so the Board is stepping back and reassessing it and looking at it as a long-term goal for the next year to implement with or without a consultant. Bolkcom said they revisit the timing of this. Shields said an assessment was made and it was really big. Stutsman said the department heads saw it as the Board telling them how to run their departments. Bolkcom said they need to recognize the impact and the costs to the departments for performance-based budgeting. He said the Board needs to sell the elected officials and department heads on this. Bolkcom said they are making a lot of changes and in meetings the department heads are expressing the sentiment that the Board may be moving too fast. Duffy said it was a mistake not involving the elected officials and department heads in the strategic planning process from the beginning. He said they also didn't involve them with the plans to hire a budget director and human resources director. Jordahl agreed that they needed a broader process. Bolkcom said it took a lot of effort to just get the 5 Supervisors together to begin strategic planning and adding something like 15 more people would have made starting the process more difficult.
Bolkcom left at 9:25 a.m.
4. Space needs. Shields asked what had been done in relation to space needs. Stutsman said not much. Lacina said they started a committee to deal with the issue. Stutsman said she and Duffy had met with a group of department heads and elected officials. The feedback received indicated this was one more committee which people didn't have a lot of time for. There was no clear direction where to go with this issue and Stutsman thought this is something the entire Board should deal with.
Bolkcom returned at 9:27 a.m.
Bolkcom added on fiscal planning that a lot of work had been done by the committee on that issue laying the groundwork.
5. Comprehensive Plan. Bolkcom said they were at the same place with the comp plan as they had been the last time they met with Shields. Lacina said he is ready to vote on it now and flesh it out. Duffy said the old plan was a lengthy process and he sees the County doing a good job of preserving prime farm land. Bolkcom said the process for the proposed plan had been messed up by the different interpretations of the process by staff, the Planning and Zoning Commission, and the Board of Supervisors. Lacina said County Attorney Pat White had told them the process of dealing with the comp plan, that the Board can vote to approve, deny or negotiate the plan with the Planning and Zoning Commission. Jordahl said White had indicated a 4th and 5th option: the Board could do what they wanted with the plan or send it back to the Planning and Zoning Commission. Lacina said rewriting the plan is not a viable option. Bolkcom said they need to put it on the agenda and figure out a strategy. Lacina agreed that they need to put it on the agenda. Bolkcom said the Board's written comments to the Planning and Zoning Commission were pending.
6. Citizen/County Relations. Bolkcom said he and Jordahl had a committee that was working on Citizen/County Relations. He said they are working on a handout with a map of County department locations. Jordahl said they are looking into using older computer equipment to provide a place to look up County information by the public using a touch-screen interface. Jordahl said that the department heads were invited to their meetings.
7. Board Effectiveness/ Capacity. Shields said they need to discuss Board capacity. Jordahl said they need to look at when to form a committee, when do they hire a consultant, when do they need a new staff person, where does the money come from, and how do they adjust priorities for the County as a whole. Bolkcom said the Board effectiveness comes down in part to whether being a Supervisor is a full-time or part-time job. There are 5 of them and they can only do so much.
Shields reviewed the status of each of the preceding goals. Indicating and that they all were on-going goals.
Shield took input and listed things which need to be discussed further.
1. Fiscal Goal Implementation.
2. Space Needs Process
3. Comprehensive Plan
4. Board Capacity and Methods; including Space Needs and Staffing
Needs.
5. Organizational Communication.
6. Role Clarity.
7. Strategic Planning Follow Through.
8. Hiring a Human Resource Function
Shields said that 4, 5, 6, and 7 were team issues or relationship issues within the organization. Much of what they are doing entails change, which is good, but is difficult. He said they have bump into the "how do we do it" issues, as opposed to "what are we going to do".
Recessed at 10:10 a.m.; reconvened at 10:15 a.m.
Shields said fiscal goal implementation is fairly complex. Bolkcom said they would need to figure out a way to integrate the human resource person. Jordahl said that under fiscal goal implementation they needed to start the implementation of performance-based budgeting, which would help them better understand revenues and expenditures. He said the consultant who he and Stutsman had talked to from McGladrey and Pullen from Indiana had indicated it would be useful to have a consultant in during the current budget process, even if implementation of performance-based budgeting would occur in one more year.
Jordahl said that department heads may see it as moving too fast. Bolkcom agreed they would be viewed as moving too quickly. He said they should wait to start the process of implementing performance-based budgeting and take a more low-key approach. Stutsman said department heads seem to be threatened by performance-based budgeting and a consultant may be able to educate the department heads on the benefits of performance-based budgeting. Lacina said that consultants could present it in a way that stated performance-based budgeting gives the tools to department heads to measure the effectiveness of their own departments. He said the department heads are more likely to buy into performance-based budgeting if they don't let it die down. Jordahl said it could be framed as an educational process or a support process. Bolkcom said while supporting moving ahead in the next year the Board should ask department heads how they want to be involved and what do they need. Lacina said bringing in a professional may eliminate some of the pitfalls that may occur. Duffy asked what was wrong with the budgeting system now. Lacina said it can be better and Jordahl said there could be more clarity, particularly for reporting to the public. Duffy said the budget notebook provided by the Auditor should be reviewed more thoroughly, because it has information he finds usable. Shields asked whether the Supervisors other than Duffy believed the budget needed improving and they indicated it did. Jordahl said performance-based budgeting would give information to share with the public, such as cost per meal for Senior Dining.
Shields stated, with the Board wishing to proceed on performance-based budgeting, the question is timing and how to implement it. Jordahl felt that buy-in was central to this. Lacina asked what was the next step in the implementation process of performance-based budgeting. Is it to bring in the consultant? Jordahl felt they should. Lacina agreed because the cost is zero and additional information can't hurt. Bolkcom said bringing in a consultant flew in the face of what was said to the department heads. He said this step would risk the buy-in from them. He asked if there was anything more pressing besides performance-based budgeting, because they have a large workload to manage. Shields said the only change he hears from Bolkcom is that prior to a consultant coming in the County should do some internal work around collecting issues, questions, and concerns. Bolkcom said they have done some of that, citing Jordahl's presentation in a department head meeting. Shields said by having work sessions with the department heads they can create an agenda for the consultant. There was continued discussion whether to have the consultant come.
Shields said they need to stop talking about positions taken and start talking about plans that need to be made. He said in a work session with department heads they can: get questions and concerns; restate the Board's commitment; and can offer ideas about how to move ahead. At this meeting they can tell the department heads about the person who could serve as a resource and ask what they think. Shields said they then can have a consultant come at the no fee level for an information meeting and an assessment. Duffy said that 2 or 3 consultants might not agree. Bolkcom said there may be the interest and energy to move it along and he wants to get there as cheaply as possible. Jordahl said County Auditor Tom Slockett was interested in working with the Board to do this. Jordahl felt Slockett doesn't think we need a consultant and Auditor's Office staff could do it in-house. Lacina said no one has indicated they are committed to spending money for a consultant. Shields said that going this far does not commit the Board to hiring a consultant for the implementation phase. Bolkcom said he was agreeable to the steps outlined with no commitment to spend money on a consultant.
Jordahl said the consultant could come on December 9th, one week after the department head meeting. Carol Peters said that the Human Resource interviews were on the 9th and so was the legislative meeting. Stutsman said she and Jordahl could discuss this and bring it back to the Board members to work out the details. Shields said there apparently is enough support for an objective under their overall fiscal planning goal for a budget improvement plan and action plan, which includes: a work session continuing the dialogue with department heads and elected officials, raising their questions and concerns, and gaining their ideas and input; and then possibly bringing in a consultant on the basis they've agreed to. Peters said they could have a work session during the department head meeting. Shields said they should state up front that there is no intent under this process to change any statutory relationships; there are statutory limits on how far the Board can go into the budgets of the elected officials.
Jordahl said the issue of space needs was on the front burner and now it's on the back. He related the change in plans from using space from the Recorder's Office to instead placing the Human Resource person in a small office on the first floor. Lacina said space needs is a big project with many needs. Jordahl said they need a process, whether it's a citizen's committee, County staff or using a consultant, which they don't have. Lacina said they don't want to do it piecemeal. Peters said a citizen's advisory committee was utilized prior to building the jail. Shields said one thing that came out of the department head meeting was to talk about a citizen's task force; and another idea talked about was there are short-term and long-term needs. He said accumulating funds for construction of a building was a long-term process but with short-term needs. Duffy said, in terms of owning versus renting, the County gets a good deal renting the Human Service building and there was a high cost on buildings that were owned. There was discussion of forming a committee, and Bolkcom recommended the department heads be involved. Shields asked if it is important enough engage a citizens' task force. Jordahl said that the result of the task force could be recommendations that the Board wouldn't have the money to implement. Bolkcom said they needed a long-term and a short-term implementation program. Lacina said they should discuss with departments what space they have that can be better utilized as a short-term solution. Jordahl said they need a long-range plan in order to determine the needed amounts to accumulate each year for capital projects and asked why they should delay the citizens' committee.
Stutsman left at 11:05 a.m.
Duffy said they should involve the department heads and the elected officials right from the start. Jordahl said there wouldn't be a conflict between a citizens' committee and department head input. Lacina agreed, because if the department heads are all players they can plan for future needs which wouldn't have been identified without them. Shields asked if the process would be for short-term needs Board-driven with input from department heads and elected officials and the long-term would be driven by a citizens' task force. Jordahl said the task force would prevent a piecemeal approach. Shields said it sounded like there might be some needs they will have to address now. Duffy said if they have a task force they should ask the elected officials to make appointments to it. Shields asked if they could initiate this process in the next year and the Board members agreed that they should.
Shields said the Board had laid some groundwork for the comp plan and what should they do now. Lacina said the Board should list options and vote on a process to take. Jordahl said they should wait for Stutsman to talk about the comp plan and there were a lot of options to take. Lacina said it looks like a decision tree with a number of options to follow.
Preparation for Budget Process
Shields asked if there was anything they would feel comfortable talking about without Stutsman. Lacina asked if there were any measurements they could use for the coming budget cycle. Lacina said they need a continuation of what Deputy Administrative Assistant Kim Benge did, such as the graphs she produced showing a 5 year trend. Bolkcom suggested they talk to County Auditor Tom Slockett about that. Jordahl hoped to see any performance measures that are in place reported to the Board in some manner. Peters asked about the graphs, wanting to know if that is something which they don't want the Deputy Administrative Assistant to do. Jordahl said there is more the Auditor's Office could do and the Board should discuss it with him. Bolkcom said the new Deputy Administrative Assistant could not be ready quickly enough to provide this information immediately after starting at the beginning of the year. Lacina pointed out that Deputy County Auditor Lynnette Hultman has the information in Excel and could provide the information in the needed format. Bolkcom felt they should have a meeting with Slockett to discuss their ideas for the budget and ask for more time and a physical presence from the Auditor or Deputy Auditor during discussions. Shields reviewed 3 things mentioned about the current budget process: the 5-year trend sheets to be continued, to put out the question of whether existing performance measures could be seen, and to early on meet with the Auditor to talk about the process. Jordahl expressed an interest in asking Hultman to highlight trends that deserve their attention; he would like to see some analysis from the Auditor's Office.
Shields said he would have talked about the comp plan first if he knew that Stutsman was going to have to leave early. He suggested they have another 3 hour session.
Recessed 11:10 a.m.; reconvened 11:15 a.m.
They decided to have another strategic planning session at the Armory from 9 a.m. to 12:00 noon on December 5th.
Adjourned at 11:20 a.m.
Attest: Tom Slockett, Auditor
By Mark Kistler, Deputy Auditor