10-23-17 Personnel and Finance - Laserfiche WebLink

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Committee Chair White opened the floor to questions and comments from Committee and Councilmembers. Committeemember Regina Williams-Preston stated, I want to thank the Administration for the increased consideration for the Public Safety Director issue. Councilmember Broden stated, Thank you to the Administration and Finance Department for handling all the questions from the Council and the public. The level of detail has improved over the last budget cycle I was involved with. I still believe there are some opportunities to implement some Standard Operating Procedures such as organizational charts and job descriptions. I think that would help tremendously. That will inform the public as well as the Council. The new position of the Public Information Officer,what do you hope to accomplish with that position?Also could someone explain the Director of Assets and Information System? Committeemember Ferlic left the Committee meeting at 5:22 p.m. Mr. Horvath replied, The idea behind the position is a result of there being a constant need for education of the programs we offer. A lot of the times people don't understand what Public Works is, how to access the programs or even what programs are available. The primary focus of this position would be outreach, education and marketing to give a better understanding to our citizens of what all is available. The Director of Assets and Information System is Jeff Weaver. He builds the platform to help manage assets. Councilmember Dr. Varner stated, Thank you to the whole Admin.and Finance staff. It occurred to me as we were talking about maximum salary ordinances that I didn't know if we budget for the maximum or the actual salary. Do we budget for the actual salary? Ms. Hockenhull replied, We budget close to the actual. Councilmember Dr. Varner followed up, I just noticed the State of Indiana is going to offer monetary aid to addressing the Lead Crisis. We should take advantage of that in the future. Councilmember Tim Scott stated, Thank you Councilmember White for running all of the public hearings for this year's budget. Thank you to Admin and Finance,the Administration and Finance Department and all the Department Heads. I know it seems that this process is quick but there have been a lot of meetings leading up to this vote. Councilmember Davis stated, I still don't know why we put in the budget those large salary increases if we are not going to utilize the maximums. It creates a lot of conflict and issues. I have never seen budgets like that for the City. It makes me uncomfortable. Why do we lock it at two percent (2%) for some and then for the nineteen(19) other positions have these high increases? What is your rationale for that? Ms. Hockenhull replied, Every year we take a look at positions and what folks are to doing to make sure everyone is in line with what they should be getting paid. We fixed a lot of positions last year and that was to really normalize those positions. This year we are coming back and 8