Travis County Commssioners Court
August 7, 2003
FY ‘04 Budget Hearings
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Judge Biscoe’s Comments
It's my belief -- it was my belief that we ought to give ourselves an opportunity to look at the preliminary budget and throw out some things that ought to be further considered. I thought those recommendations may include other departments, and those deptment heads should be given an opportunity to respond to the recommendations. And I think that's why we have today's discussion and the next discussion is Wednesday of next week. That will give us an opportunity to not only listen to impacted department heads, but also to mull over their different positions and that's when we'll consider the recommendation or not. What I did at the 11th hour and really completed just before noon today was a list of big things that I believe ought to be considered, and I don't have any problem with going through those if somebody he else wants to do it, then that's fine with me too. I think what we ought to do today, since this is posted as a work session, is that if something is reasonable, maybe we can give directions not to waste time on it if it's unreasonable. And if we want to pursue it, then I think we ought to. On a whole lot of these there are pros and cons that I may not have thought about initially or rest of us may not think about when we think on the spot. But if we get with other people put together and basically put toying a little statement and then have a discussion of that next week, I think the time would be a lot more productive. So go through my list and i'll go through ours and I can be last.
>> whatever is comfortable.
>> I知 comfortable going first.
>> I知 happy to go second.
>> first thing I believe is that we ought to cut the emergency reserve by one million dollars. Thierks the emergency.
>> , that is already smaller than it was this year. I think how we used that th year is important. The only time we did it was for health & human services, but we did it in a big way. A month or so ago it was my position that we ought to take a good realistic look at health & human services and budget the amount next year that we think will get us through the fiscal year, and if we ought to make policy determinations, then we ought to do those at the time that we adopt the budget. So even if we have a health & human services need next year, I知 thinking that it won't be nearly as large as this year. If we reduce that by a million dollars, then obviously we will have much less to spend, so we will have to be a lot more cautious. I am mindful that there is now two million in the allocated reserve and in my view it doesn't matter where you take the million dollars from. The allocated reserve would simply be a backup to the emergency reserve. If we wanted to leave the emergency reserve untouched, then I would recommend taking a million dollars from the allocated reserve. Neither way I知 suggesting taking the million from it. The one in the fluor daniel reserve, my recommendation is to take a million half from that. Leave the rest of it in the risk fund for covering risk matters. I understand that is about three and a half million dollars. That would leave two million dollars. That's a million and a half.
>> judge? There is no fluor daniel reserve right now. There will need to be discussions about the ability and appropriateness about releasing the whoalz holes that exist --
>> I find myself putting the most controversial once -- issues first. I just wanted to correct the use of the word reserve.
>> well, there are three million dollars somewhere.
>> there is three million dollars somewhere.
>> probably better to call it an encum chance. Sitting in a fund is encumbered.
>> my qualifier here is fluor daniels. [ laughter ] third, the road and bridge fund is healthy. I would take a half million dollars of that and unallocated reserve and reduce the unallocated reserve by that much money from the general fund contribution. I understand that that is doable. There are two or three other options that involve the same half million dollars of road and bridge money, so I don't know if there's anything that special about doing it this way. If we end up with a half million dollars of happy. There may be two or three other ways to do this and get the same effect, and I知 willing to discuss those. I thought of two or three over lunch. I don't know if it's essential to go through them right now. The other thing is what I think we ought to do is if we have an idea, either the person with the idea and another member of the urt, if the county attorney sanctions this, to try to meet with the appropriate budget analyst and other respective department heads and try to bring it to a head between now and next week. And come back and basically report pros and cons so we'd have a better feel fR impact of these recommendations. And what I try to do was conclude personally that we coul do these without a real harmful impact. That may be accurate, it may not. I知 hoping as to all of them. If it turns out these are much riskier than I thought, then I have no problem with backing off of them. These are where the big numbers are, and it seems to me if we are to get close to nine million dollars, then we have to do something like this. Speedily, I will try to cover these other a little bit faster. Number one is my belief is that we ought to try to increase the park fees in order to cover what's needed. A million dollars on the face seems to be a lot in operating expenses to me. It may be that we ought to reduce those some and increase the fees some, get it covered. I知 just -- leave operating expenses at a million bucks, then I think we ought to get additional fees of a million dollars. And another criteria there would be certifiable fees because it doesn't help us much if we don't get the revenue certified. Two there, notice I didn't put an amount out there because I don't know, but I just think that we should have done this a few years ago. We talked about doing it often. And maybe we'll take one or two steps in the right direction. I think we ought to do it in full. And that is to, one, identify the general fund contribution to the various records related services, record keeping, records management, records preservation, records this, records that. See what the general fund contribution is, see what the fees are. And to the extent that we can reduce the general fund subsidy of these programs. Somewhere on here I indicate that we need to chat with the attorney county attorney's office before moving on that because there are laws that guide us, so we need to make sure that we're acting legally. [ laughter ]
>> do you want a specific budget hearing on that discussion? Am I interpreting this properly, with all the players?
>> what I have in mind is to put in here some kind of report that indicates the different fees, the general fund contribution today, but legally what the restrictions are and whether we can do some shifting to reduce the general fund subsidy, so in a court and report back to the court we would get the facts at the same time steve roberg, dana, amelia, whoever else needs to be present would be there.
>> we're going to -- the legal side of that is -- might be tricky.
>> [inaudible - no mic].
>> next one is analysis of alfee increases with reduction of general fund contribution in mind. We are putting together a list. Virtually all of those that we have not acted on ought to be part of that public hearing on the 27th of this month. And part of that ought to be basically our estimate of the certifiable revenue. Then trying to figure out how we could help the general fund that way.
>> we have three so far on two, parks, constables, fire marshal.
>> okay.
>> if you have a fourth or a fifth or a sixth, we should get it on the table. We have scratched our heads.
>> we will have at least one today because that's number 8.
>> right.
>> sheriff's budget reduced by another one million dollars. I haven't chatted with the sheriff about that yet, but the way she looks at me, we're in agreement on it. [ laughter ] she's worked with us on $2.4 million, so looking at that and basically trying to figure out soft spots. Review litigation reserve and take appropriate action. That's a big question mark there. We do this annually. It's just time for us to do it again. Last time we committed to do it quarterly. And either I saw my -- I received my quarterly report, but it didn't have a heading and I overlooked it or I didn't get it, but we need to do that. Review vehicle maintenance fund. Appropriation may be better.
>> right.
>> my thing there is i've been reducing the number of vehicles in there and I don't know if it's been real substantial. If there have been savings, we need to look at that. Are we spending all the money budgeted for maintenance of vehicles?
>> I will have to look at that. Thierks a good question. Do we annually end up with some sort of surplus? And what has been the impact of those automobile reductions? My thinking was even when we reduced the number of underutilized vehicles we saw some savings, but christian believes if you had four cars and now you have three, you drive that three as much as you drove the fourth, so your maintenance expenses may be the same. That may be true. If so, this won't make a whole lot of sense. Collections pilot program. This recommendatn is to implement 50% of it, so back away from the eight and do the four. Hopefully that will reduce the capital by $40,000. And I have said basically take 200,000 of that $411,000. Let's keep working out the specifics. Really we need to bring the cscd issue to a head as well as the automation issues. I really see us needing another 12 months to really land on that. And I知 also mindful that we have 68 employees in cs -- six to aemployees in cscd doing collection there. It may be that we need 16, but I don't know that we need 16 without a whole lot of additional certifiable revenue. And that's why I say at the bottom there, 50 personnel specifics have been worked out or new revenue can be certified. I don't know that our intention was to spend $400,000 and collect the same amount of money. Right? There wasn't a whole lot of additional revenue, but I知 not opposed to spending a couple hundred thousand dollars to give ourselves an opportunity to see the pilot program produce results. Tnr, we have an state mandated responsibility in implementing changes to -- brought about by hb 1445. I would adopt the necessary fee increases to cover that cost. The next one is -- now, when we did the salary saving field, which I supported enthusiastically, I don't know that I thought the hit would be in this range. And if I understand the amount in the preliminary budget, if we leave that policy in place, this would be the hit next year.
>> right. That's incorporated into the preliminary budget. As you recall, the total to internally fund green circled employees, those employees from the reclassifications, was over $700,000. And the departments that have those additional fund internally are implementing those as directed by the court. By definition, that reduces it. The other thing is that we basically are -- our turnover rate has declined substantially. And during fy '02 was the first year that we did not get our budgeted salary savings in the last nine years. So there could be some refineme to it.
>> this really is for us to take a good look at and figure out the specifics.
>> right.
>> I knew there would be some budget impact. This is much greater than I thought it. I'll say it could be that we look at it and conclude that although there is substantial budgetary implication, it's the right thing on do and we ought to stick to it. I can live with that, but we ought to look at it more closely. Number 10 there, that's the good news that I got from danny hobby this morning. I don't know that he authorized me to put it down today, but he told me, so if it's good news, i'll share it with y'all. If it was bad news, maybe I would let danny tell you about it. [ laughter ] but he has talked to capco into funding 911 rural addressing 100% and that will saves $91,000. He said all we have to do is give capco a couple of letters. We think this ought to be a done deal before we start budget markup. So we get a final word on that.
>> 91,000. Judge?
>> 91,000. We have been getting 60 or 70,000 from capco, right, and our general fund contribution has been 91,000. They pick up the whole deal, then I知 told we can take our 91,000 out. My 11 is just a kind of general. I recommend a further discussion with the largest county departments and departments significant additions as set forth in the preliminary budget to identify additional reductions in savings that are possible. These discussions should take place before the budget work session and should be most productive. We give ourselves basically about four or five work days to get that done. The budget analys are conversant with the specifics of the different departments. I hate to pick on the big ones, but obviously that's where the money is. And the one i've added to deals with the car reserve of 10%. I think we need to look at that and figure out if we need 10%. In my mind there are two or three questions now that drive the answer. If we need 10%, so be it. If we believe we can save half that amount, I think we ought to do that. Since roger had been working for most of these projects, it seems to me e have been covering ourselves from a contingency point of view and from the bids that have been coming in under budget. So there have been savings there. At the same time, I don't want to significantly increase the risk. It's just that based on recent history, you would think that this would be an area where we can take part of this money and use it.
>> on number 11, do you have any more teeth to suggest to that other than the generality that exists under 11.
>> well, christian, a long time ago when we talked about chatting with the departments about where they would take a five percent reduction, if there's diamond in the rough, it's got to be right here. That's where I would start. So if there are not any additions, then I would like at that five percent.
>> well, you're going to have a lot of departments come do you for additional resources during the budget hearings. They're not going to come to you with requestso remove money from their budget. And you're going to hear that. And some of those are compelling arguments. Including some of the departments that you've already mentioned. Like health & human services and the sheriff's department and others. So what I知 trying to do is manage the process. I知 not saying that this is -- what I知 trying to do is see if I can get any more information from you.
>> I知 glad you asked that. You just reminded me of my third page, which says after school programs. Now, --
>> did I just set you up?
>> since I became part of county government in 1989, friend, colleagues, educators and juvenile justice experts have told me that the most vulnerable time of day for teens is that window between when school let's out and working parents get home. They have all said we really ought to do more to help out there. And for the last two years Travis County staff and others have been working to try to put together some sort of proposal. My first thing was you really ought to get out and map the area, try to figure out what's provided out there now. Make sure they keep that there. And then if there are gaps to be covered, then we ought to try to do that. I have asked steven to try to get a report to the court next week. What I would do is redirect the funds -- I知 going to some of the teen programs of whose effectiveness has been questionable at best. And I would redirect those fund. And so what I would do basically is that after the report from steven, if the court is as inclined to move in that direction as I am, there are three or four programs that I have identified, and I would take their fund and move it to this. If the court wants to do that, we can stied to do it now or next year. I just think after talking about this for 14 years that we ought to move on it or ought to say we're not doing it. Now, back to your question. Our department heads are creative enough to identify certain services and programs in their budgets that -- whose effectiveness is questionable. Some of them have much better ideas about things to do than we do. I知 agreeable to looking at programs that we now fund that we ought to reduce or put all together, take that revenue and shift it to the pilot programs that they want to try. We ought to be more flexible in that direction. We always said -- and maybe a few take us up on it. But maybe this is the year when we push it. Now, if we are to reduce the budget, the preliminary budget by nine to $18 million,, there's not a lot of new money to grant new requests. So maybe we ought to just indicate our intention to double the flexibility, work with them to get some of the things done. I don't know that I have a better answer to that question at this time. Maybe other members of the court do.
>> I think in terms of doing that, judge, people will be motivated if they know the reduction in their budget could go towards something else they want to do and they want to try to fund it. But I don't think I知 going to get its motivated to cut their budget so that margo can do something really cool in the sheriff's office. To me it needs to be to empower the departments to think outside the box, and if you really want to do it, then just rethink what you've got in your own departmental budget because I think that's -- people are very leery about saying, okay, i'll offer this one up. But they will think about it seriously if it means that they might be able to recapture 90 or 100% of it.
>> that was my intention, but I think we will not be able to achieve any distance towards that nine or 18 million if we do it off the top. My thinking was after we go tough our exercise, the department said okay, what I want to do is on this funding right here, shift it over to this new program that I think is within the department.
>> that's fair. I agree with that.
>> that's the thing in terms of flexibility is what you do. The flexibility and they can recapture those dollars.
>> okay. That's my short list.
Last Modified: Friday, August 8, 2003 8:52 AM