Thread by @shayshinecastle

Here's the staff presentation. I might not tweet much bc I haven't had a chance to look at the budget yet. I need to pay attention. www-static.bouldercolorado.gov/docs/Item_5-20…

Brautigam singing the praises of this year's budget.

This budget anticipates slowing economy, Kady Doelling says. Budget "continue(s) to be conservative" with respect to sales tax revenue, given the challenges of low unemployment, wage pressures, aging population, slow national GDP growth.

Boulder has 1,475 FTE (e = equivalent) workers. With non-standard employees (seasonal, etc.), ~ 1,650.

Budget based on revenues (flat over 2019) of $360,262,688.

General Fund budget for 2020: $157.4M up ~3% mostly bc of property tax, Doelling says.

For every retail tax $1 in Boulder, the city gets 43c of that. 21c of *that* goes to general fund.

For every property tax $1 in Boulder, city gets 14c. 9c of *that* goes to general fund.

Citywide property tax increasing slower than the county as a whole, Doelling says.

We're talking buying power. It's stayed pretty flat over time, even as sales and use tax revenue has increased.

Avg. annual SF water bill has increase only 3% annually, though rates are going up 5%, bc use is decreasing.

total budget: $369M; 4% increase mostly due to $15M extra in capital spending in 2019. Op budget of $288M is a "modest" 1.8% increase compared to 2018.

Honestly, most of this is in Sam's story on the budget: dailycamera.com/2019/08/29/bou…

I'm not sure you even need me.

In 2020, the city will draw a little bit from reserves to pay for homeless services.

2020 general fund budget: $160.8M

I'm sorry; I have to stop tweeting. I'm trying to pay attention and keep my dog from licking her bleeding tumor. It's too much.

I will be back with council qs/discussion.

We're talking a bit about council priorities and how they figure into the 2020 budget.

Online petitioning: $400K is cost to build the system. Not sure if that's budgeted or not...?

Muni doors project: $700K will not include interior sister city work; that was paid for in 2019.
Jones: What was process to decide to change it?
Jane: Council directed us to do this at the retreat.

Library: $9M now (actually I think $9.7M)
Weaver: New normal will be $11M in 2020?
Doelling: Prob $10.5M, but we’ll get that number.

OK Doelling clarifying on some of these priorities. NOT included in 2020 budget, but will be incorporated in 2021, pending feedback.

I think.

I haven't read this packet yet; I will update this thread when I do.

NoBo library will have more staff higher than other branches, bc of full-time security (like at main library)
Carlisle: Does it have to do with location?
David Farnan: It was heavily requested by community. It has reduced incidents at the main library quite a lot.

Transportation essential services: Stepping that up will increase budget by $600K.

Brockett: Can we get metrics of how this will improve things?
Doelling: I'll talk to transportation.

Jones asking about Vision Zero. “We’re going to want to have a fuller discussion when we look at Transportation Master Plan.”
Doelling: Would you like to see $$ broken out by operating or capital?
Jones: I think more how we’re investing in Vision Zero and what that looks like.

Weaver: It's hard looking at a slide that says $600K. What is that relative to what we're already paying?

Yates: Currently our funding for neighborhood speed mgt is $250K. Is that going up at all or is it part of $600K?
Doelling: We can include a breakout

Young: $600K is capital and operating.
Doelling: That's my understanding. Ppl from transportation can correct me.

Bill Cowern stepping up to do that.

That $600K does not represent any Vision Zero safety actions; it's for potholes, median maintenance, snow/ice removal.

"This is essential services, not Vision Zero. These are operating increases, not capital."

$350K for median maintenance
$150K for snow and ice to expand to residential streets and multi-modal facilities
$150K for particularly proactive potholing

Crap that was $100K for that last one, not $150K.

Cowern: Last year we did 1,700 potholes. This would bring it up to over 2,000 per year. Just as an example.

Young: Isn't pothole repair necessary when pavement has deteriorated badly?
Garrett Slater (I don't think I spelled that right): True. We don't want to be doing more potholes; we want to be able to do less, which means we're maintaining our roads.

"The potholes do not typically appear on streets that are in good condition." Potholes will start appearing after 8-10 years and treatment of a new overlay or chip seal.

$75K request for tribal consultation will be half general fund, half open space $$. Carlisle asks why.
Brautigam: Most of the cultural lands are open space.
Morzel: We're on cultural lands right here. There's a graveyard.... (kinda trailed off; I didn't hear the rest)

$769,875 request for housing vouchers to provide housing for formerly unhoused. Oct. 1 will have a more in-depth discussion on the homeless strategy.

$200,000 request for increased prairie dog working group recommendation. 3 staffers added to help with that. This amount will stay consistent(ish) over the next three years.

$142,200 for "language access specialist" to create a position for inclusive city communication (Spanish translation of documents, meetings, etc. vetting of translators and back-translating of existing documents)

"Let me just say yay," Young says.

I second that. Frustrating to not have city docs available in Spanish.

Young asking about increased compensation for bilingual employees who get asked to translate.
There's a process for that underway, Doelling says.

HR director Abbie Poniatowski: That's what we're planning to do to recognize language or alternative skills. It will come with different pay.

$825,000 increase for living wage, which will go to $17.42/hr for city employees and contractors.

$107,200 extra for cybersecurity.

Brockett asks about the recently released financial audit and the deficiencies called out there (I tweeted about it and put it in my newsletter.) Will this $$ address those?
Julia Richman, CTO: Yes(ish). This is a new, general role. "It's an ongoing effort."

Brockett asks if we are Y2K compliant. Much laughter.

Weaver: This is a really big deal to be paying attention to. Other cities have been held ransom recently. This is a good one to be on top of.

Last priority: $250,000 for arts/cultural grants. That was added as one-time last year. It will become ongoing.

Now Brautigam's "secret" addition.

It's about police oversight / racial equity. "It became clear to staff we needed a person focused on data related to the police dept." Stop data, trend data, etc. We didn't have person in the police dept. or IT to take that on. We've added that position.

Jones: Way to be anticipatory.
Brockett: Thank you very much for putting that forward.

Next budget stuff: First reading, Oct. 1, with public hearing.
Second reading, with public hearing, Oct. 15

Young asks about what ISN'T getting funded in this budget.
Doelling: There are several key priorities that have been achieved in 2019-2020. A lot of unfunded is large capital projects, for a lot of $$

Brockett asking about an unfunded priority of inclusive purchasing (from more women and minority-owned businesses).
Doelling: We've met with our purchasing manager. We're doing a lot of work with recent RFPs.

It's a Julia answering, but I didn't catch her last name.

General findings: We're not getting good data on vendors we interact with, so we don't have a good measure on biz we have been buying from.

Efforts to get better data being piloted now through broadband. "We're changing the way we do capital procurement... to expand no. of participants in the process, providing longer runways."

City did a pre-RFP (request for proposal, city's competitive bidding process) webinar for vendors to learn more about how to do the city's process.

Brockett: Let's highlight this moving forward. Thank you.
Jones: Do we have a stated goal around this or are we just heading this direction?

Long answer, but I think it's no.

It is.

Jones: A new council might want to look at that.
Brautigam: The work is underway with GARE and our procurement process.

Yates: One of the projects on the not-funded list is senior auditor. What is that? Why are we comfortable without it?
Doelling: The unfunded list right now, it's heavy on staff. A lot of the unfunded is staff bc we're trying to be cautious with resources.

Cheryl Patelli, CFO: Finance dept. saw this as a pretty high priority for us. Bc of our recent accounts payable scam we had.... Internal auditor was something city had but eliminated in recession. It didn't make the cut this year.

Brautigam: I was hoping council would ask if there was one thing you could take off the unfunded need list, this was it. Plus the adding of more trees to the city. Those were the ones that were "on the bubble and did not make it."

Yates: "I understand this is a tight budget. Are there things within the incremental budget that we could dial back a little bit and pick up" this?

Brautigam: I don't believe there's flexibility in things we added.

what about $700K to add doors to the municipal building? Literally Morzel is the only one I've ever heard talk about that.

But, to be fair, that's a one-time expense, not an ongoing one. Different buckets.

Weaver: This is the cleanest audit we've ever had. Maybe we don't need an internal auditor.
Yates: I'd put this on the list for our running adjustment to base if we have a little extra $$.

Weaver: How many auditors do we have working for us now?
Patelli: We don't have any. Some accounting folks do minor audits. But it's not good practice to have ppl running the books do the audits.

Correx to spelling of Pattelli's name. I was using one T, not two. Pattelli, Pattelli, Pattelli.

Weaver: Can we do a PT auditor?
Pattelli: Anything would be better than nothing, but we'd prefer full-time.

Brautigam: It would be "super awesome" to get your questions and requests two weeks from tonight to get it in the packet for the Oct. 1 public hearing.
Jones: You're going to give us two weeks and you two days to get it in the packet?
Brautigam: It's not fair.

Jones gives council one week to get its feedback in: Sept. 20

Yates: Ppl in the community read this budget. Do we send those qs to you?
Doelling: Yes.

OK, that's it for tonight. I promise to be better prepared next week, hopefully with a non-injured dog and more than two hours to prepare.

Last unroll of the night, @threadreaderapp. Please and thank you.