Travis County Commssioners Court
September 16, 2003
The Closed Caption log for this Commissioners Court agenda item is provided by Travis County Internet Services. Since this file is derived from the Closed Captions created during live cablecasts, there are occasional spelling and grammatical errors. This Closed Caption log is not an official record the Commissioners Court Meeting and cannot be relied on for official purposes. For official records please contact the County Clerk at (512) 854-4722.
Item 37
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>> ... Other than simply just phoning you. And if we can do it legally, then I'm willing to come back after awhile with a recommendation to the court to say, wow all be accepting of these sorts of things, but I find that just about the time I think I can get my hands on something, find out that I really can't do what I would like to do with that, so I -- I mean, judge, I'm pleased with where we've gotten so far, at least the departments have sent me something and I have somewhat of a handle on, oh, I can see what these people are owed and see how far they go back, but I think that we've got some more work to do, but I do think that the departments are getting the message. I mean we want to find a way that it's not just a simple, okay, owe us this money, if we collect it, that's great. If we don't, we're not going to get pretty exercised about that. The precinct 3 is going to be pretty exercised about not collecting the money that is due to us.
>> you're right there in terms of what is going to get somebody's attention, if you don't pay the property tax, you're not going to be able to do business with Travis County in terms of getting a contract with us if you owe us money. If you try and renew your license, that is something that gets somebody's attention. It's like we need the equivalent over at the university of Texas for all of us that blew off our parking fee, we paid them in full when we got the letter from the university who said, hello, you're not graduating until you pay that parking fee and they clear a lot of things that way, we need something the equivalent of you're not graduating until you pay this, and then it means something to somebody and pay attention. I think you guys have done a lot of really good base work here for us to proceed on, and that is that we've got to get serious about this stuff. Visa and mastercard are seer you, the minute you don't send something in, they're relentless, they're adding on late fee, they're sending you letters. The letters almost seem to come out before you even have a chance to respond and we've got to have that same kind of attitude that these are just as important as an electric bill, a gas bill, a visa bill, these are fees that are owed and it's meaningful when you don't pay them.
>> I don't really -- the back up and stuff like that, I really was impressed with the response that we got from the department, and I think there's a couple of things in here that the auditor kimberly walton did suggest and I thought were pretty appropriate and step one and step two of that memo, and if kimberly is down there, I would like for her to come and say a couple of things on it, because I think -- I think it's something we can do internally also while we are going through this process and if we can even arrange records -- but I'm not going to -- go ahead, kimberly, if you don't mind and go through this memo the best you can and especially the recommendations and steps to let folks know where we're coming from and how serious we are about collecting fines and fees owed to Travis County.
>> after being part of the task force meet, we heard several people tell about their efforts to collect some fees internally. I believe the district clerk had some discuss as well as cscd in putting a little extra internal effort and they both collected some fees. 80,000 for district clerk. So in thinking about that, we wanted to suggest that we look internally first. We have some sort of standardized procedures, first would be documenting and flow charting the current collection procedures which may have already been accomplish bid the submissions that the departments made to you all, and it would be good to get copies of those, then to evaluate those current procedures and see how effective they are and see if there are opportunities to set it up and look at the different departments to see if there are some best practices in those departments that can be adopted by others, and then we suggested -- we thought that perhaps you could do a test similar to what tscd where you go in in the next 90 days and put one person on it, maybe internal resources, and collect a test sample of your receivables to see if they put some extra effort in, butter some phone call, somebody that can sit down and locate these people if they can collect funds and evaluate this test to see if it's worth our effort, maybe we should put another internal resource to and go out and first try to collect these funds ourselves, and if that is the case, then plem some additional in-house procedures to take it to the point where you think, okay, i've gotten pretty much everything I can get and now it's time to turn it over to an e. Eternal agency. If through these tests they're really not successful, then they need to go through the process by identifying what can be done outside. And put some rules around that. Make sure that we give them -- this would be in step 2, if we decide go to an agency that we have good files that are complete, preferably in electronic format and then implement some sort of procedure to monitor the collection agencies, to make sure they're doing their job, to make sure finding out how many people that they contact and what their success ratio is, and perhaps go to more than one collection agency which is something that the e.m.s. System did so they're competing against. So I believe that if we look internally first and make sure that our procedures are sound internally, that we will have a better overall success.
>> okay. Did anyone have anything they wanted to say in this particular regard? Okay. So what are we expected to do today? Just receive input?
>> that's all we can do today, judge. You know, we are -- this is a process that is going to take longer than 30, 45 -- 30 or 45 day, but it's on our screen, and that is the thing that I think that we were trying to do with this. And I don't disagree at all with what kimberly is saying in that we need to do everything we can within our power to do our own collections, because that does a lot more than sending it out. But, you know, when you have some pretty simple recommendations like additional billing of staff, additional data entry of staff, now, even though somebody is going to have to come to us and justify why you need ftes, I think it's a real simple equation to say what do you yield out of a person? I mean obviously some people can yield more than others. You know, I don't -- these are -- these kind of people -- I mean, that are making phone call, I don't see them -- I'm not looking for stand-up comics, I'm looking for somebody when you get a phone call from this person, you go, wow, this person is serious about wanting their money, and not to pick on the star plight, but this is how serious, you know, this -- this thing can be. As of April 30th, 2003, there is $600,000 in receivables that we have. Now, you know, I know that, you know, star plight is immensely popular in this community. Our Austin Travis County e.m.s. System, everyone wants to be like us. Now, that is one side of it. The other side of it is are we collecting everything that we should be collecting? And i'll use, you know, the e.m.s. System as a good example. I mean the fact that I can identify, you know,, what we are owed, is a good step in the right direction for me, because there are some areas, some departments that if I ask them that, you can see the eyes in the head light look, like I don't know, really, and I don't know whether that person really owes what we say that they owe us. That is the reason I say we're going to have to, you know, do some more work on this, but I think that what has happened is we have never really had any great attention to, hey, we are really going after our collectibles, and I for one -- I mean if you can sit down and justify to me why there perhaps are some ftes that are needed in some of these areas and I know we can get collections in, that is money well spent, but we need to go, we need to staff for areas where we have receivables, that we need to find a way to justify why we're going to bring people on, so I'm -- judge, I think we've done what we needed today, is apprised the court of where we are with this thing, but I would say we're 90 days away from really being able to come along and give some sort of opinion as to what we need to do, so I will continue to work on this. Commissioner Davis?
>> let me ask this, kimberly, has this particular information, the memo from you to the courts, has that been shared with all the departments?
>> no, it's just been sent to the members of the task force and we copied the rest of the report.
>> okay. Well, it would be good I guess for those that are a part of this to have this information because in 90 days, if there is something that we can do and continue to bring filing fees to Travis County to put on our cable, of course that is all well and good, so I want to make sure that this is shared with them, and I think we also need to look and I think there are some couple of points brought in from Commissioner Sonleitner for example, and also Commissioner Daugherty, about teeth, you know, if there need to be policy and procedures that we need to implement that have teeth to some of this. I think we need to also investigate that. So I feel comfortable if we can continue to do in house as much as possible, but still looking toward an end of how we can collect these fines and fees, and ensure that those persons that participated in this do look at these particular recommendations and a suggestion that we have here and see if we can do something about curbing some of these outstanding fees because it is the fees that are significant. It's a lot of money. So I would light to maybe, judge, maybe a point of direction, have them -- come back and report in 90 days, but in the meantime continue to work toward coming to a procedurally and also policy initiative whereby we can proceed in the effort of collecting fines and fees outstanding for Travis County, and we report back I guess in the 90-day time frame and I hope that will be sufficient enough time for the departments out there that are under this type of umbrella approach, as far as fines and fees are concerned, to get the message, that we are really serious about fines and fees owed to Travis County, so if that has to be a follow-up motion, I would like to make that motion, if not, it's a direction.
>> any objection? Any comments.
>> quick question, susan. You've got, for lack of a better word the s.w.a.t. Team in your office. Is there any possibility that there is a little bit of time that one person or something from the s.w.a.t. Team efforts can be part of this, or do you already internally have assistants that can lend weigh to this? I'm wondering outloud.
>> [inaudible - no mic]... Just because that s.w.a.t. Team is really going to be integrally involved in -- their main focus and trying not to get them off that, because going forward...
>> okay. Well kimberly being a big part of this is a big deal. Thank you.
>> exactly. Anything on item 37.
>> no, judge, except this information shared with all of the persons that have a role in the fines and fees or Travis County.
>> okay. Let's see if this next one is faster.
>> I didn't mean to cut off whether casey wanted to say anything or no. I apologize.
>> I asked and they did say no.
Last Modified: Wednesday, September 16, 2003 7:52 AM