Travis County Commssioners Court
December 30, 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 3
Number 3 is to consider and take appropriate action on health and human services department's recommendations regarding five (5) social services agencies with outstanding contract issues. Before you get started, on the dare item if the -- anybody here from the sheriff's office?
>> [indiscernible] was wanting to come over.
>> let's just announce for the sheriff's office then that we can call up the dare item as soon as somebody gets here from the sheriff's office. Hopefully within the next 15 to 207 minutes. Now back to item 3, stephen.
>> okay.
>> mr. Williams.
>> that's what I like. [laughter]
>> oh, stephen.
>> yes, ma'am.
>> on October the 28th, you authorized us to negotiate with the majority of our social service agencies our contracts that would begin January 1, 2004. There were 8 agencies that you did not authorize to negotiate with. Since then you have authorized to negotiate with three of those 8 remaining agencies. Currently, all of the agencies with the exception of one have actually turned in audits. We are recommending that we -- we are requesting that you extend those contracts for five agencies, five of the 8 agencies for two months. And --
>> how long, stephen?
>> for just two months. During that two-month time frame what wewould like to do is to work with the agencies to develop a corrective action plan that would actually enable them to strengthen their weaknesses and it would enable us to continue to have the community capacity to continue services provided by those agencies. We believe that -- we are asking for two months because it will take us that long to actually come up with individual plans that would be embedded within the contracts of those agencies if they are in agreement with that in order to continue those services.
>> once they get the training opportunities, they will make -- we will work with them to make the necessary changes and have those in pce so that they can be successful?
>> yes, we will. But it doesn't -- it doesn't automatically mean that if we enter into a contract with them say after two months with special conditions within the contracts. It doesn't mean we would probably have some milestones that each of the contractors would have to meet in order to continue to do business with them.
>> okay.
>> I didn't really want to get into the specifics of the individual contracts because it's different for each agency. In some cases we might require some additional analysis and work within the agencies in order to get a fuller picture of what's going on within those agencies.
>> why -- [multiple voices]
>> sorry.
>> will they be separate and distinct or would they still follow some of the format of our boilerplate --
>> they will follow the -- they will follow the boilerplate, but they would have special conditions on them. If there were certain financial weaknesses or administrative or programmatic weaknesses that we discovered during this process that a corrective action plan would have to be developed and fold in order to do business with them.
>> then again I guess in all of this, even within the directive action plan -- corrective action plan and all of the other things that the programmatic problems that lieud at before, my concern is that -- that you looked at before, my concern is will they be able to comply with what the auditor was suggesting as far as payment is concerned and also if they are not able to comply, my whole interest, not whole interest, but a lot of my concern has been that if you didn't get compliance, then I would not like to see the persons out there that are receiving this servic be held hostage because of the fact that they wouldn't have the service.
>> that won't happen.
>> who do you have in a position to make sure that the services are continually provided if there is a shortfall that may occur if the service is not rendered.
>> if within the two months we believe that the agency is either unwilling to develop the capacity or we discover other issues that we believe would cause us to conclude that they are unlikely to do it, then we would just have to find someone else to do it. In some cases it wouldn't be an easy job.
>> because [indiscernible] significant [indiscernible] receiving services, elderly, and others, youth, teenagers and --
>> that's one of the reasons why we are suggesting that they -- that we go into a two-month time frame where we work more closely with the agencies to develop a corrective action plan. In essence we are putting the agencies on probation.
>> probation.
>> pending a corrective action plan and our continued willingness to do business with them would be predicated upon their actually following the corrective action plan and meeting certain milestones.
>> I guess stephen I guess my question, if you could -- maybe it went right by me, maybe you did answer it. But in the procedural way of going through this, a, b, c, whatever step we are in now, my preference is to hear you say somewhere along the line, if you do not get that cooperation of what we are looking for in this 60-daytime frame, do we have somebody in line, in place to continue to provide services to the community that need the services.
>> in some cases we do, yes.
>> in some cases?
>> yes. I can't guarantee that for every situation, but in some cases. I would say in most cases we do.
>> I just didn't want to see the person that's depending on Travis County, depending on what we are doing up here come out on the short end of the stick because of the fact that we have not been able to satisfy correction actions and things like that in the 60 daytime frame.
>> we will try very diligently to avoid that consequence.
>> we will just have to wait and see, but I'm concerned about that.
>> what you would see in 60 days or less is really a contract where it's -- where specific conditions within that contract. If we believe that they are likely to succeed. If not, after 60 days the contracts would just expire.
>> so you are saying that you will make the call in 60 days as to whether the agency is aggressive and satisfactorily -- is progressing satisfactorily or not.
>> or whether they have even negotiated with us on those special conditions. We might put forward special conditions that they wouldn't agree with.
>> if you chatted with the agencies about this recommendation.
>> not specifically.
>> do you have reason to believe that the agencies will go along with it or do you want the court to bless it and --
>> this is --
>> -- for a later status report of the ones that go along with it and the one that's don't.
>> I'm only -- well, my recommendation would be if the specific agencies do not go along with it, then we just let the contracts expire and we try to purchase those services from another agency.
>> what's the expiration date?
>> December 31st.
>> tomorrow.
>> tomorrow.
>> so we need this item posted next week for the agencies that say no way stephen.
>> no. If they expire, the contract expires. And what we will do is to try to negotiate with another agency to pick up those services.
>> but you are asking us for a 60 day hold on the contract.
>> yes.
>> that even if legal could prepare by tomorrow, we would not be able to act on until next Tuesday.
>> I think that the holdover as we discussed last week, the holdover can kick in and we are sending a notice out based on last week's notice to the agency that's we held over for one month, we can send a similar notice letter to these agencies that will be -- they will be under the holdover clause held up for 60 days. We would have to give them notice 30 days ahead of time if we were going to terminate. That gives us 60 days to work on it to bring them back a contract or notice that they are going to terminate at the end of those 60 days. We would do the same type of notice letter to them which is not required under the contract for the holdover, but because this group of contracts is being handled a little differently, we are sending out written notices to be sure everybody knows exactly what their status is.
>> okay.
>> are these five agencies, four of them are pretty small, one is pretty large. On the small ones what we hope is that we can provide technical assistance that would bring their performance up to Travis County standards.
>> yes.
>> but your commitment to the court is that once you communicate with the agencies, if the special terms and conditions that you have in mind cannot be agreed upon by the agencies and then we would expect you to be reasonable.
>> of course, judge.
>> now, if these five agencies attended the meeting down at palm school my guess is that they would have questions about that. But you would come back to the court as soon as possible and give us an update.
>> yes.
>> stephen what's the dollar amounts for community advocates for teens and parents.
>> I don't know. Marlene can you help us? The question is the same for all five agencies, what's the dollar amount that we are talking about.
>> whoever gets it first. This is -- this is '04 for next year? Okay. It's 13 -- it's 39 -- well, rounded about $40,000. For out youth Austin, it's $11,000. For pushup, it's $53,000. For services for the elderly it's $21,000. And for vaughan house it's $43,000.
>> here's where I'm going. Why are we not going to column number 5 on this, that is to transition -- I mean, other than out youth which is more of a technical assistance, every single one of the others is a probationary status. This is not the first time these agencies have had issues with us. It's been a continuing story. Why are you not just saying, you know what, we love ya, but we are moving on with other agencies that have their act together and can provide the services and provide the accountability that taking public dollars demands.
>> in my opinion, we haven't done our part. I would feel more comfortable if we went that additional step and for me that additional step is a probationary status where we will advise and provide some more specific technical assistance. That's why I'm asking for the 60 days and the special conditions within the contract. I look at this as I would a personnel issue. I think that, you know, we -- there is some responsibility on our part to provide some guidance and technical assistance. I also believe that it is in the community's interest to develop a certain capacity within community based organizations, especially organizations that have niches such as these. I don't believe that -- a lot of the agencies, other agencies that provide the same services, I think there's some uniqueness about some of the agencies that you see here.
>> at what point do we stop the hand holding? And here's where I'm headed with this.
>> in this case it's 60 days. I think that we are on a very -- to me this is our plan to stop the hand holding and it's letting everybody know publicly exactly where we are heading. So there won't be any surprises on the agency's part, on our staff's part.
>> so if this is a 60 day period where it's like we all noticed to get our act together, is there simultaneously going to be a transition plan being worked on for one, two, three, four of them, five of them, that can't get it together during that time period, so when the 60 days is up, that we will all be red and not feel guilty and ring our hands that we haven't properly made -- made accommodations for the transition.
>> we have pretty much started tolan for that already.
>> because what I am picking up from Gerald hop in wherever you want to, but what I am picking up from some of the agency that's we have hit so far --
>> or any other court member, absolutely. But I know that Gerald has hit quite a few of these with me. Is that the problem agencies are causing problems for all of the agencies. And quite frankly I'm picking up from them that they would rather that we deal with the problem agencies and not try to make our rules deal with --
>> I totally support that.
>> thank you.
>> because they are also wanting us to deal with the agencies because they are all being blackened in this situation by problems with one, two, three, four, five, out of 54, whatever our new number is, we all need to get to a place where we feel comfortable. If people can't get with the program in terms of the responsibilities, what comes with taking public dollars, we are not the only one that's they are taking dollars from. There are city dollars involved, many of them are taking state dollars, federal dollars. There are requirements that come with public dollars. They either can handle it or they can't. And there are? Terrific agencies out there that it may not be part of their niche now and r it could be part of their niche and they have the capacity and they have the staff and they have the infrastructure to deal with the accountability that comes with publi dollars. So -- so I will vote for this 06 days, but that's it. That's it related to these five agencies, they need to get it together or we are going to have to move on and there are agencies that can handle the clients that we are talking about here. They can. My concerns -- my concerns are multi- again, I would like to emphasize very strongly if things don't work out, during this interim 60 daytime frame, someone has to be lined up to take on the services that these persons are rendering to the clients of Travis County. As I stated earlier, I don't want to see anyone left witht service. And I know that's your concern, also. So again I would like to make sure that happens. When you do bring up this backup before us, it would be good if we did have a monitored amount associated with them. With the agency that we are dealing with. So -- so is that possible to make sure that -- you know, so that so many days somebody won't do what they are supposed to do. I think Commissioner Sonleitner brought up the point as far as services are concerned. In concert with these services that need to be rendered to these people to the residents of Travis County. So in the 60 daytime frame, is that going to be part of this strategy is that going to be person who's receive these services regardless of what happens here.
>> I'm willing to bring back alternatives if this situation doesn't work out.
>> all right.
>> thank you.
>> anybody else?
>> well, I think everybody has been said. So I would move that we extend the contracts for two months through 2-29-04 and that a corrective action plan be in place and that a transition plan also might be brought back to us at that time and then we will -- we will go with the recommendation.
>> I will second that, Commissioner.
>> any more discussion?
>> Commissioner Daugherty? Of these five agencies, stephen, which ones have had more than this year's non-compliance with the audit? I think there was some indication that was -- I think there were continuous problems --
>> they weren't necessarily related to the not having the audit. So I think some of them were -- they had other issues. Or other challenges.
>> but the audit was the thing that kind of got all of our attention was -- to begin with, right?
>> yes.
>> so of these five, which ones have had audit issues in the past.
>> I -- I can't answer that.
>> that would be --
>> I mean, I guess that I can get comfortable with 60 days, I wouldn't be very comfortable if -- if all of these, if this was an issue that we dealt with every year and they knew what being in compliance meant. An audit is pretty straightforward. We have to have this in order to continue --
>> yeah.
>> if you can't give me that, that's fine. But I would like for you to give me a letter.
>> I will.
>> any more discussion?
>> would we find out sooner than the two months if there are agency that's basically say we are not going there so that we can work on a true transition plan.
>> yes.
>> actually. I could meet with every one of them and tell them because they are going to be -- there are going to be some real specific actions. Not related just to services, but related to things like governance. Fiscal accounting, whole nine yards. Any more discussion? All in favor? Show Commissioners Gomez, Davis, Sonleitner voting in favor. Voting against Commissioner Daugherty.
Last Modified: Tuesday, December 31, 2003 6:52 AM