Travis County Commissioners Court
October 20, 2009,
Item 2
Now, let's call up number 2.
2.
receive presentation of best practices awards from the Texas association of counties.
>> it's not just the judge who thinks you did a good job, joe.
the association of counties thinks that you and bruce.
>> good afternoon, judge, Commissioners.
>> I'm larry
>> [indiscernible] with the Texas association of counties.
and drafted to -- to make the presentation, I did a little research this morning on the foundation itself.
it's a twofold program.
the awards presentation is one fold.
and the second is the -- the actual leadership class.
we've had four of these starting in 2002, 4 and 6 and the last one, 2008, Travis County Commissioner dolores ortega carter was the most recent graduate.
the best practice awards as far as eligibility goes, the programs they have to be in full operation by the submission date, programs must be replicable, which is a big criteria.
must have been established within the previous 36 months, also have measurable results and have county officials and/or staff that played a leadership role in this.
now, as far as the classes go, there's three.
we're talking innovation, achievement and service.
the categories themselves, public safety and corrections, health and human services, financial general management, technology, and community improvement.
and carol autrey, former board chairwoman and former randall county tax assessor stated: this program is one of the most exciting things that the foundation does for county government.
people are coming up with such creative solutions at a time when counties have so few streams of revenue.
every good idea that can be shared is terribly important.
now, you might ask how are these awards chosen.
and I asked that same question this morning.
and I was told it's a secret.
so I said, well, I work for tac, I don't have anything to do with these awards, same response.
i said well, what's the make up of the committee, judges, Commissioners, treasurers, constables, tax assessors, it's still a secret, folks.
so beginning so far year to date, we have actually given 140 of these best practices awards.
winners are featured in county magazines, they are highlighted at conferences and in local and state-wide media.
for 2009, the best practice awards totaled 21 and were given to 13 different counties.
now, for 2010, best practice award deadline is April 21st, 2010.
on our website, www.county.org there's a tutorial, the appropriate forms and a search feature that allows you to see all of the best practice awards year to date.
now, enough of the history lesson.
i would like to introduce to you Travis County constable bruce elfant, vice-president 2009 board of directors, 2009 board of directors executive committee member, affiliation committee member and service corporation member.
>> bruce.
>> thank you, larry, I'm bruce elfant, also a Travis County constable.
happy to be here this afternoon.
we're here to give out awards to three Travis County departments that won best practices, not that I'm biased and they didn't let me vote in this.
i don't know how to get it, either.
Travis County's three were more awards than any other county won.
i'm very proud of that.
the first award is for achievement and community improvement for parks, capital improvement program.
the program went beyond parks planning to green printing, the selection committee said it was the second largest bond issuance in the nation.
the second award is for delivery of services and financial and general management for its efforts in educating struggling taxpayers about their payment options.
there being so proactive, the selection committee said, and did a really good job in utilizing the media and realized the media needing help in explaining the options to taxpayers, they made the process simple for taxpayers, they retrained their staff to make it positive and not negative.
they did a good job telling people pay what you can, given that our tax office has the highest collection rate in the state of Texas, I think they are doing a fine job.
the third award is for innovation and technology for its e issuance program and for choosing to e-mail
>> [indiscernible] and non-disclosure filings.
by ordering electronic civil process filings the county was able to save time and money and track paperwork more easily.
these significant services that these -- these are significant service that's certainly caught the selection committee's attention and that's what the best practices awards are all about.
and we have a brief -- brief videos that the association of counties put together for each of these.
>> [ _ music playing __ ]
>> the Texas association of counties leadership foundation presents the 2009 best practices awards for achievement in county government.
achievement awards are presented to programs that promote outstanding community leadership.
community partnerships to maximize resources and one-time achievements that benefit the county and the public.
Travis County population is expected to double by the year 2030 to approximately 1.6 million.
the county committed $62 million in 2005 to improve existing parks and to protect green ways from development in an effort to improve quality of life, attract new businesses and protect water and wildlife resources.
>> we have found that the people in Austin really want green spaces, open spaces, they're a young population, they want to get out and exercise, enjoy the environment.
most recently, we had a bond election in 2005 that allowed us to purchase the rhymers ranch on the pedernales river.
as a result of that we now own 3 miles of pedernales river and over 2600-acres of parks and open space in southwest Travis County.
we are now in the process of acquiring open spaces along onion creek and when we're done we'll have a greenway that connects up city and county parks and state parks from interstate 35 all the way to the confluence of onion creek with the colorado river.
it will be one of the longest greenbelts in Travis County.
you need to go see it.
>> [ _ music playing __ ]
>> there should be two more.
>> stand by, rolling the next one.
>>
>> [ _ music playing __ ] the Texas association of counties leadership foundation presents the 2009 best practices awards, celebrating delivery of services in county government.
delivery of services awards honor programs that provide an enhanced level of service that exceed the established performance standards.
>> did you remember to pay your property taxes by the deadline?
fortunately, the majority of --
>> with the perception that the economic downturn may affect some taxpayers' ability to pay on time, the Travis County tax office took a proactive approach to informing taxpayers about not only the deadlines and consequences of late payments, but also by promoting payment arrangements.
>> we put more -- concentrated our effort more into getting people information up front.
before the tax bill, starting before the tax bills even went out.
>> the traction tax collector used local tv and radio as well as their own local website.
>> there are serious consequences --
>> Travis County television's own capable television channel also played a role in helping get the information to the public and making sure they were aware of payment options.
>> we have always made that option available, but this time we publicized it more.
>> the result of all of their efforts?
>> in spite of the economy, we still are going to end up at 98, 99% collections at the end of the year.
stand by, third one coming.
>> [ _ music playing __ ] the Texas association of counties leadership foundation presents the 2009 best practices awards, for innovation in county government.
innovation awards are given to programs that increase productivity, customer service, or cost savings for the county.
going from slow and expensive to almost instance and pretty cheap, wins the award for the Travis County clerk's office.
they are bringing Travis County into the future by changing from legacy systems with a lot of printing and snail mail to using an e-mail system for court paperwork.
>> the process, the district clerk's down load the paperwork and they disseminate it according to zip codes.
so we get the work the same day that it's filed instead of several days later.
it's faster for the clerks, it's faster for us on the receiving end.
>> if we are having to go downtown to the office, the deputy has to come back to the office, take it, serve it, now it's all done via e-mail.
>> the result is a lot less papers to shuffle.
>> normally the agencies would -- would receive twice a month a stack about this big.
whereas now they are receiving a stack this small.
>> it's making this office be more responsive.
it's also making us be more -- more -- saving time for other people.
and being able to give people the -- the public what they need.
>> it's cheap, quick and easy.
>> I think that's all of them.
i wish that we would have won four or five, but I think three will have to do for this year.
let's hear from our award winners and then we can present the plaques and take some quick pictures.
>> before I begin, I wanted to thank my staff.
i have several staff here who made -- actually there are two programs we're being recognized for, but they combined it into one for innovation and technology.
i want to recognize
>> [indiscernible] our it manager and also the business analyst that needs to be recognized for all of the work that he's done.
burnet can you please wave?
thank you so much.
and then we have norma juardo, what has been with our office for a long time, she is in charge of all of the functions and non-disclosures program and has worked with outside law enforcement and governmental agencies to make this process a lot smoother and streamline the whole process.
then we have gwenn rodgers, who also was involved with the e issuance program and helped train the staff at constable staff and actually worked with them to make sure that they had all of the resource that's they need understand terms of how to access the system.
i'm losing my voice, I'm sorry.
and also I see some constables here, without them this program wouldn't have been successful.
we started out with a pilot project with precinct 3, constable precinct 3 and then extended it to all of the other five constables, I want to thank them and all of the constable staff for being part of this process and making it successful.
thank you very much.
>> I want to first say thanks to the Texas association of counties for encouraging us by having this annual awards program.
they -- they keep us on our toes.
because if you want to compete for one of the awards, you have to -- you have to come up with things that are innovative and new and our program that won the award this time in the area of financial management was centered around the difficult economy.
when the economy tanked, people were in a bit of a panic.
more than a bit.
the county thought it wasn't going to get its revenue and you do.
revenue is not down.
we -- we focused ourselves outward towards taxpayers and provided them with more information than we had in the past.
and in different ways and we want to thank media services for -- for the work that they did in helping us to get our message out, to people that -- that payment plans were available for people who were struggling, having a hard time with their property taxes.
and if they weren't able to pay in full by the deadline, we would sit down and work with them and try to work out a payment plan where they could get their tax bill paid.
eventually.
and it was -- it was very beneficial to the public and I would like to -- to say -- I would like to say thanks to the members of the tax office staff who participated in the development of the program and at the implementation of the program.
tina martin who is here today, who is our director of public information and training, took the lead on this project and was able to contact the local media and get the information out to people that she spent a lot of hours working with neighborhood associations and homeowners associations to set up town hall style meetings with the people in the neighborhoods, various associations, so we could get the information to them directly.
tina?
she waved.
it's just a matter of getting people more information up front before the tax bills even go out.
so that they will know what's coming, what to expect.
and how they can be helped with getting their taxes paid.
thanks to the Commissioners court for the support and funding that you gave to us get our work accomplished.
>> thank you.
>> thank you.
this truly is a county award.
Travis County has evolved its park system over decades and it starts, I think, really with the Commissioners court for consistently supporting that effort.
allocating the resources to do that.
and the -- and the support of the voters of this county.
i would like to -- to give especial attention to wendy, our parks planner, who put together our park plans, given us a compass to go by and also the parks department charles berg and his staff for giving us the ideas and the direction as well.
and then steve manila in the public works department for putting into the ground the things that the voters approved.
as a result, we have a have ver, very good parks system, one that I'm extremely proud of.
thank you.
>> thanks to y'all.
you all have done a good job.
>> [ applause ]
>> thanks all of y'all.
if you all have a couple of minutes where we can pose for pictures with them and present their plaques.
>> okay.
down front?
>> all right.
are we waiting on the sheriffs to come on the boxing item?
okay.
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.
Last Modified:
Tuesday, October 20, 2009 1:40 PM
