Travis County Commissioners Court
June 5, 2007
Item 22
>> number 22, judge, is already in the plan, isn't it ?
>> I think the intention was to do this position if necessary. We anticipate that sometime real soon there will be enough work for this person.
>> sure.
>> Travis County planning and budget office and auditor's offers. We have been meeting about this and they believe the expenditures are going to start showing up sometime I guess in the next month or two I think this is the auditor auditor's office want to go go ahead and post for the position for planning purposes we have already included the funding for the position in the preliminary budget in anticipation that they will need that position.
>> how much did you put in?
>> 82 grand.
>> I think right now we have 88,198. If the court approvers and they start early we could remove the one-time cost from next year's budget.
>> I'm sorry, I didn't hear your question.
>> this is in anticipation.
>> of the cdbg. And what we ended up doing, judge, as you know, the only reason we need the positions is because of the recipients recipients. That is the workload, the sub recipients. Had you done something without that, we could have handled the workload. We initially nalized the workload and thought we needed two part time positions. I have to tell you, I hate putting them in because we can't fill them and secondly we have double the benefit load. So what we thought, we can rearrange things, add one full time position, re reshuffle work in the office so a full-time instead of two half-times. I think it's a better use of the money for lots of reasons. Also, our an understanding is that starting in July there's going to be work on this. So that is why I want to start advertising we could for the end of the year, we gave pbo an estimate of what we thought we would turn back at the end of the year. I believe it was like $75 $75,000. So out of that money, instead of turning back 75, we could finance the rest this year. Once we recruit someone. But effects year----next year.
>> that sounds good to us.
>> next year I need to be sure they are putting full- full-time in the budget. It's taking us a long time recruit. It would be unrealistic for me to think we start recruiting a week or two before the need.
>> I had mentioned before you came down that the money for planning purposes we have set aside.
>> sorry. We ran down and I didn't hear what you said. As I said, I can do this year but I want to make sure you're committed to fund--
>> in '08.
>> yeah n '08.
>> was this in the plan year budget? For the cdbg as far as what they are submitting in this particular deal? That person is going to be funded, I guess. I'm sorry.
>> you know, I think that--
>> I didn't see it anywhere.
>> think what happened, there were so many discussions, I think there is not enough administrative money in the cdbg to pay for all the administrative costs for it. That is my recollection. I could be wrong.
>> all right.
>> and so, to me, it's y'all y'all's choice where you fund this one. I would have been very happy not to add a position. Remember, as we recount this that is why I was hopeful that you didn't need something with sub recipients. That is what is labor intensive for us. But you did. And I agree that the program you know, the tail wags the dog if what we need drivers what you want to do. By the same token, there is the reality of what do you need to do if this is the workload. So that is kind of how this has fallen out.
>> okay. Of I guess what I'm trying to get at, susan, though, during the discussion of having your office to actually kind of oversee some of the things that you folks are doing, you need a staff person.
>> yes.
>> my question, though, is that when that need popped up, that submission to the feds suggesting that you need the fte based on your oversight of what goes on as far as financial activity is concerned, was that, I haven't got a handle on the answer. Was that something brought up and submitted with this particular administrative cost for cdbg ?
>> yes, we have been bringing that up.
>> all right.
>> but I think the problem is, and travis, you may know the answer to this.
>> sure.
>> there is a certain percent of the actual grant that can be used for administration. I believe that the total administrative costs in Travis County exceeded, there we go.
>> right, sherry can do a better job than I can. Twenty percent administrative cap.
>> can you help us out ?
>> yes, sir, I think I k there is 20 percent allow allowable in the grant that can be used for administrative costs. In plan year one, the court made the decision to not allocate funding for the administration of the grant, that we would find other sources to pay for the administration. So in the first plan year, there was not any administrative cost allocat allocated.
>> so as opposed to sending $165,000, which is roughly what 20 percent of the 180.
>> exactly.
>> then we have elected to use general fund money to take on the administrative part of running that $843 $843,000 program.
>> that is correct.
>> so that is what we are signing up for. That question was asked about do we spend 45 percent of the allotted amount towards administrative fees to accept $843,000 from the feds.
>> Commissioner, a good example of that, we discuss add position in our office and because of the accounting rules and because we didn't think we would need a person full time, we are using a person, we knew we had bond funding coming up, you all are using general funds to fund an additional construction position, which part of that will work on this. Some of our staff has already worked on it. So you have been covering administrative costs of this out of general fund already.
>> I have a historic memory question since I'm new. Have we in the past pulled down significant numbers of federal grants? Are we expected in the future to be pulling down more of them that would, therefore, justify this expansion of fte. I guess what I'm saying, is this fte in the auditor's offers expected to have additional work in the future as we pull down more grants, or is this just for this one 800,000 worth of federal funds?
>> we have been operating at our maximum capacity and also some overtime now with our staff.
>> for the grants.
>> for the grants that we have now.
>> are the grants that we have now, would you characterize that in the historic, in the historic memory of the organization, are we high on getting grants or can we do better on getting grants? Are we anticipated to pull down more grants?
>> I'm not sure about the anticipated part. I think they have been fairly steady. Numbers maybe growing a little bit. Fairly steady in numbers. I believe the departments are the ones that bring the grants to the court for approval. I'm not aware of a significant growth need. But this grant, having sub recipients and being a direct federal grant, has additional requirements that we do not currently have to cover. That is our issue.
>> I think her question is, let's say we got another federal grant, could that be absorbed with this money.
>> with this person, center centerlyly--centerly.
>> is that--certainly.
>> is that your question ?
>> we think we can cover the '07 amount of salary savings.
>> yes.
>> that is correct. And this is how we are handlinging hhs's positions for cdbg this year.
>> move approvalsecond.
>> discussion ?
>> I have a comment. We had two folks, I believe judge briscoe and commission Commissioner Davis had met, that offered grant services and internet type. And so I kind of, we got a meeting together and called the dents together and told everybody, this is available available. But kind of put it back on the departments and pbo to decide if this is something as a countiwide group we want to use and purchase. So if you do fund that position, I know it's not this item but the other position, that is something that person would need to look at. You might need more grants and susan might need additional staff to cover that. So that is sort of a policy, sort of a funding issue that the court really needs to take on with someone in the lead on what we do in grants and how much more we want and what that means as far as staff.
>> keep us posted on where we are with that service.
>> now it's matter of if we want to do it and where we are going to get the money. I soared soared--sort of pushed it on pbo.
>> we haven't received any comments. What the service is--
>> all in favor. That passes by unanimous vote. Move that we recess until 1: 1:30.
>> second.
>> we need to go into executive session. At two o'clock we have that item. If we don't get done before two.
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Last Modified:
Wednesday, June 6, 2007, 8:00 AM