Travis County Commissioners Court
November 17, 2009,
Item 24
24, consider and take appropriate action on downtown master plan needs analysis, staffing projections and adjacency requirements for county offices and departments.
good morning.
>> good morning, steven coleston is here to present for your approval the staffing needs and projections between now and 2035 as well as the adjacency matrix that has gone through exhausted review, and without further ado, I would like to pass it off to steven so you can hear where we are.
>> good morning, judge.
>> good morning.
>> Commissioners.
am I on there?
okay.
actually everything that you're going to see today is -- is essentially a review because I think we've gone through it with you in previous work session and I believe each of you have -- and your staff have been briefed individually, so it should be pretty straightforward.
just a quick update on where we are on the project, an overview of our methodology and projections for staffing for the purposes of planning as we move into the master planning phase, and then a review of the methodology and the outcomes of the draft of the adjacency matrix.
we're currently in the middle part of November right now so on the schedule that you see before you, we're showing ourselves in the kind of going into the throes of the programming phase.
so we've actually just prepared the preliminary phases of the programming and we're using the input that we've received from the different offices and departments for the basis of those projections and are advancing towards having something to you in January to look at for approval of a program that we would be able to use for the physical planning in phase 2.
in terms of our staffing, the -- I want to walk through the methodology that we utilized for the general government and then for the court side.
essentially what we found was there was a basic correlation between population as we started looking at the -- we compared this also against the county budget to try to identify some trend lines and some real pretty solid basis for developing these projections as we move forward.
so one of the things that we did is we actually looked at the general fund budget, adjusted that to $2,009, looked for any other kind of trends that might impact that, and then we actually then did some correlation analysis between budget and population and reviewed those each individually by various offices and departments to see how that projected out.
what we actually found when we adjusted the trend lines based on the lease square regression, if you look to the far right, in the far right column, what we found is we looked at the staff per budget and the staff per population per thousand person population.
we found that the change over the last decade, we actually had a much stronger predictor in terms of using population.
so that became the basis for using our predictor, moving beyond a 2015 scenario for projections out.
we tested this against a couple different departments, as I mentioned, and offices, and what essentially we found was that the difference in the average growth of f.t.e.
as it compared to population is you can kind of see on the far right column is actually quite close.
so the methodology we just -- and this is essentially bullet number 1 basically applies for both general government as well as the courts, is we worked very closely with each office and department for projections out to 2015.
and what we found was there are a variety of different influences that will impact your various departments and your offices.
we have impacts that we know about related to staffing issues that may be influenced by things like budget or real estate or parks acquisitions or other things out there that there's a reasonable predictor about staffing projections out in the kind of near term window.
after we get past 2015, so that's where the 20, 25 and 35 staffing projections are developed.
we really used the population predicters beyond that.
now, I'll remind you we actually look at a couple of different scenarios for what we should use in terms of the population projections.
what you use for your cap or -- and your near term budgeting purposes is the city of Austin demographer's projections, which is actually probably a good idea for near term projections related to budget.
in talking with the city demographer, we learned that essentially they are referring us to the state demographer as the gold standard for projections in that scenario.
we worked with the county to identify which projections and we used the 1.10 projection with the state demographer's projections, which are based on a likely predictor of demographer graphic growth similar to what we've seen in the last decade here in Travis County.
so we used the 1.0 projection.
now, that was the baseline for all of the offices and departments.
what we discovered what -- that there were some nuances between some of the offices that might have us temper some of the growth, not that we might see reasonable projections out to 2015, but some of those might not grow as robustly as the trend and there were a couple identified as slightly higher and those are detailed in the more formal report that was submitted.
and then essentially we broke those down in aggregate by every department and staffing category and we're actually utilizing that now for the space projections that we have going forward.
on the criminal court side, and we spent a lot of time working with the criminal courts on this and everything that we're walking through with you today is something that we kind of gone back and forth and back and forth with on finding some resolution on these various projections.
the criminal court was found to have a pretty strong relationship to population in caseload projections to 2035 or based on those.
what we also found, Travis County has a pretty high number of cases filed per population.
so you can kind of see on the chart below the number of judicial -- the number of case filings per judicial officer is Travis County is right up there, right up there among the top of all the different departments.
well, that essentially affects the disposition rate.
which is historically typically been between 80 and 95%.
so the identification there becomes -- will need additional judicial officers in order to handle that caseload projection.
so in essence, that caseload projection is based on a population projection.
the dispositions per judicial officer are assumed to be less than the current dispositions since that typical rate is between 80 and 95%, which will account for that high number of dispositions for Travis County.
as compared to the similarly positioned counties.
on the projected number of judicial officers is the number required to dispose of project caseload adjusted for that disposition rate.
and then the criminal court staff projections follow that same method over as related to general government.
on the civil court side, we found that to be in terms of their historic data, to be a little more independent of population.
and so we ended up developing a scenario for them based more on historic caseload trend.
so the disposition rates for civil court, on the other hand, compared to criminal, have actually -- have actually been pretty adequate, and -- which has given us the perspective to recognize that the number of judicial officers is probably pretty well appropriate.
and there's this term sometimes referred to as junk cases that kind of skews some of the court numbers but we think the judicial officers projections for civil courts is essentially adequate.
civil courts are based on caseload trend.
the projected number of judicial officers is anticipated to be maintained around the same level.
and then the court related staffing projections are beyond that, beyond the 2015 to 2035 are the same as associated with the population projections.
now, before he go into the discussion about the -- or before I actually present those projections, what I would like to remind the court is all the purposes of our staffing projections here today are for planning purposes.
they are not for budgeting purposes.
they are to actually help us -- you know, that's going to fall in your capable hands, obviously, as you move forward year by year.
but what we're trying to do is get a fair and reasonable number of projections in terms of actual staff so we can actually find a correlation back to that so we can make reasonable assumptions about space projections.
and we will be getting into that in due diligence in the beginning of 2010, but we will be using these projections for the basis of converting those over into square footages.
so for the general government side, we've listed down the side each office or department.
the current staff projection -- the current staff as it stands today in the second column --
>> let me follow just one second.
>> yes, sir.
>> even during the work session when you made your presentation before, and I know that it's up to the court to deem what we need to do as far as funding some of these projections, and, of course, at that time I looked at you with a smile on my face and said, well, it just appears to me that the cost of government is going up, the cost of what you are suggesting is going up as far as some of the -- to accommodate the growth, the future growth, and I stated to you I think during the work session during the time we looked at this stuff that I felt that there should be an associated cost.
because you can sometimes projection costs also.
a house ten years ago doesn't cost the same thing as a house would cost now.
it's gone up.
>> right.
>> so it just appears to me -- in other words, the folks ought to know what they are getting along with cost.
and I know even though the court makes the decision on what we purchase as far as services are concerned for the county , we base that on the conditions on where we are at that time.
and -- but it doesn't bother me not one bit and I don't think the taxpayers would mind if to see what the cost of government will cost as we grow.
and some folks say, well, maybe we need to scale back instead of adding on, scale back because we're already burdened with enough whatever.
you know, maybe we need to look at decreasing the size of government.
i don't really know what the folks are really saying out there, but I do know there is an associated cost with these particular categories that you have bringing before the court as far as growth is concerned.
and I just always have felt that if there is associated amount of money that needs to be tied in with growth to provide certain services, a projection of what that number may be, I think, is something that can probably be put on the table and it may not be possible, I don't really know, but I'm just saying in my mind -- and I looked at you and smiled when I asked that question, I said what is all this going to cost, what is all this going to cost.
because I just think we are living in a world of numbers and figures and I think the taxpayers and the folks out there kind of want to know some things.
what it's going to actually cost us to accommodate even if a plan because they will have to buy into this thing one way or the other.
and I know that we have statutory requirements that we have to deal with, the establishment of a new court, for example.
i think it costs offer a million dollars, if my figures are correct.
if I'm not, somebody correct me.
a million dollars to establish a court.
today I'm quite sure those figures are going up because of the cost of staff and other things continues to escalate.
so even those figures may be obsolete now.
i just want to lay that out on the table and that's just me speaking, that's the way I see things.
everybody don't see things the same way, but I think it's something the taxpayer ought to know what we're looking at as far as what we're doing.
thank u.
>> well, as we move into -- as we move into the projections, one of the things that we haven't specifically been tasked with contractually, I guess, is developing operational costs of the county, which would be staffing or budget costs for your annual operating budget and costs.
however, as we do get into phase 2 specifically and start identifying the associated costs for construction related to this square footage growth projections, we will actually have numbers that will be something that you can review as part of the master plan cost projections.
so the draft staffing projections for general government, again the offices and departments to the left.
current staff is identified in the first column.
and then the second column is staff out to 2015, which is based on the program planning guides, interviews, discussions, feedback, comments, commentary, discussions with Commissioners court and each of the offices, the steering committee team.
and again, these have been reviewed and rereviewed to get the projections out to 2015.
and the projections to the column, the next column is 2025 and 2035 represent the poll population projection scenarios, which essentially give us -- we've categorized two columns to the right.
one which is the percentage change by department or office from current out to 2035.
and then the adjusted change from 2015 out to 2035.
and you'll notice a couple of those which as we go through some of the various departments in here which will appear extraordinary if we take an example of a department, for example, that will take inter government relations down at the very bottom has a projection going from two to four people in the 2015 period.
and out to 2035 represents about a 200% increase, but it's a rather small department that indicates that change so you can kind of see some of the disparity that is adjusted as you look at each of those percentage changes.
the draft projections related to the courts, we have essentially all the criminal and the civil judiciary projected right here.
again, same kind of columns with the current staffing 2015, 2025 and 2035 overall projections for staff, including courts, judiciary and then the associated courts including sheriff's transport and staging.
the next item I wanted to review with you was the adjacency matrix and a little discussion of methodology associated with that.
the purpose of the adjacency matrix, I just wanted to remind you from our discussion last time is essentially to at this early stage as we're talking with each of the offices and departments, is to set a list of priorities for which offices or departments really from an operational functional perspective feel that they have a high correlation to be next to another office or department.
for the purposes -- for the purposes of the discussion that we're going through right now, this is a number or a series of matrix that we feel pretty comfortable with.
what I will say is that as we get into phase 2, we're going to start looking at each of those milestones at 2015, 2025 and 2035, and what we'll find is that as we start taking the square footage and we start putting it on parcels of real estate and we start stacking and blocking that, we might find that there's an opportunity for some apartments that don't particularly have -- have an indication for a high correlation to be next to each other.
so possibly -- it doesn't matter if they are next to each other or not, could end up being on the same building or on the same campus.
likewise, we may find out as we goat into phase 2 and start looking at the real constraints of space that we need to revisit some of these.
but this is the priority that we'll use with your approvals for moving forward in developing the projections related to the plan.
so what exactly is the adjacency matrix?
it's essentially that tool to quantify that, to help us clarify the ideal functional relationships recognizing as we move forward we may not absolutely get into an ideal solution as we get into physical space constraints.
what we're not trying to do is report existing relationships or specific locations.
so and so is on this floor in this building in this particular, you know, address.
and then we'll use that as the tool as we move into phase 2.
we've broken down into three categories.
the first is the strong which essentially says -- and these are limited to the extent possible, really saying these functions ideally should be in the same building.
the desirable adjacency identified in number 1 suggests that there's proximity to be in or around the same campus, could possibly be in the same building, but ideally on the same campus, but wouldn't be -- their operations wouldn't necessarily be disrupted if they weren't located in the same building.
the zero or kind of minimal adjacency essentially indicates that the offices or departments don't seem to have a significant relationship one way or the other to each other.
if they are on the same floor, across the hall from each other, that's fine.
if they are, you know, in a different building across the state or across town, what may very well be as fine.
the last category is a negative adjacency, which actually suggests that components really shouldn't be immediately adjacent to each other.
in fact, there should probably be some kind of reasonable distance.
however, if you think about the case of courts holding and the actual courts, it doesn't necessarily mean something couldn't be in the same building, it just means -- it needs to be clear there is negative adjacency in terms of there needs to be some kind of medical separation that reflects the neglect sieve adjacency criteria.
so we worked with the various offices and departments utilizing information that was shared from the program planning guides.
followup interviews that we had.
understanding more about the functional relationships as we went through the staffing projections conversation, and we shared this information with all of the various subcommittees and walked through those.
had some very robust conversations about each of those.
and then -- and also got feedback from you as a court.
and then had some followup correspondence in that regard that resulted in the matrix.
so you are all familiar with this particular chart.
just as a reminder on how you read the correlation to the x and the y ix.
s, but as we move forward, we have and I believe you've all received a hard copy of this in advance so I won't try to belabor the details of every department; however, I do want to indicate one nuance, which is the white box with the h in it.
the last time we met, we had one with an asterisk next to it.
which indicated that we had identified some potential departments in some early discussions that might lead us to consider that if there was a hoteling-type space that could be utilized in close proximity to the Commissioners court, ideally a part of that second line up there, the Commissioners courtroom and support space, that those departments instead of having a one desirable adjacency to the Commissioners court could go to a y with a caveat there was hoteling space.
so the -- the hoteling space essentially would delineate that the elected official, the appointed official, the executive manager and some key support space would have a flexible working space, in particular on days of Commissioners court sessions and -- if they were located outside of the central campus proper had a place where they could function and prepare and operate and, you know, continue to make best use of the resources of the county while located down here on this campus.
or while located at the Commissioners court location.
we've also identified through our discussions and asterisk that you see next to information technology systems, which essentially is saying -- and this is kind of the part of bigger conversation that's been going on related to the data center location.
that the iff campus support space ageneral significant driver significant drivers could be serviced with some kind of multipurpose center that would allow for or assume a functional accessibility in lieu of a physical adjacency next to any one of these departments.
that's to say if i.t.s.
wasn't specifically located in close proximity to one of those, the functional relationship of accessibility of the staff and the support team would be maintained through multipurpose space when they were on the campus next to those key departments or could -- and could continue to maintain a quality level of service.
>> the -- these adjacencys were put together based on the opinions of the different officials, department heads, et cetera?
>> they were put together with -- the first pass for developing those was the generation of information that we heard from the program planning guides, which was information that was handed to us.
and then as we went through the various interviews and speaking with the various departments, we made some kind of professional judgments about especially as we started learning more about how each office and department actually operated, some recommendations that we thought might kind of push back a little bit on some of these.
and in some cases we've actually found there's been some efficiencies -- what we were trying to do is maintain the maximum level of flexibility so that as we go into phase 2, we have a voter of alternative configuration that is we could look at that wouldn't necessarily require us to have a 30-story building.
however, if something --
>> let me ask that question another way.
>> yes.
>> so if a department head believed that his or her department should be in one category, are there instances where you believe they ought to be in the two?
and if so is there a list of your twos compared to the department head's ones?
>> I -- we had a conversation -- we've kind of -- there's a couple of the different departments where we've moved between ones and zeros.
and after we've had fairly deliberate conversations, folks started out saying we need to have a one, we really need knob in same department.
as we kind of went through that conversation, we were able to say, well, think about how you functionally operate.
because we've also talked with the other department and they found that they don't necessarily feel like they have that same level of proximity.
after we got everybody together in the room, they say if we could have that hoteling option, then I think we could be a zero.
in other cases, we've had one department who said, well, I think we could be a zero and another department that said, you know, we need to be a one.
that, you know, ended up being a one because when we were able to get everybody sitting down together and they actually talked functionally about how they operate, that it actually seemed to make sense.
now, we recognize that this is kind of a priorities discussion and that, you know, some of those might end up getting challenged as we move forward into phase 2, but we're trying to identify the ideal priorities for how we move forward into phase 2.
>> based on whose judgment?
>> based on the collective judgment of the consulting team and the steering committee and input from each of the stakeholders and different department representatives and offices.
>> okay.
>> I don't feel like I've satisfied your question, judge.
>> I'm assuming you gave your best answer.
>> let me add something to this.
this has not been a process that you are familiar with with the budget process where a department says I need this and an answer might come back, well, either no you don't or find your need another way or yes, your need is absolutely real but it's unaffordable.
that is a process that is part of the county culture, but that's not what we've been doing.
this is a needs assessment and addresses perhaps what Commissioner Davis is touching upon as well.
this is what the collective wisdom of officials has resulted in -- these are the needs, these are the -- and this is an ideal set of outcomes in order to meet our responsibility.
and that's really what phase 1 is to accomplish.
that doesn't mean that everybody's needs are going to be met in reality.
but we need to know what those needs are as a starting place because reality may come forth and say two courts by 2015 may not be affordable.
but that doesn't mean the need isn't there, it means it might be 2017, as an example.
or it may be that the amount of square footage and the attendant parking that is required as a result of a downtown needs assessment is either not feasible or so substantial that some of these needs have got to be rethought and adjusted.
i'm trying to answer both of your questions perhaps with another perspective.
and I'm not denying what the consultant says because it was a combined judgment, but it is a needs assessment, not a -- what is expected given some of our history of cost and physical constraints.
>> because you want -- just to follow up, you know, one of the things that we've talked to everyone about as we've gone through the process and broadus have done a good job, the needs assessment stage is very important to set priorities and also to set out what we really think the need is so that when we are forced to make compromises, which everyone is aware we will have to make in phase 2 because you can't stack everything in one billing and you don't have the ideal green site that we're going to go build on, those compromises are made thoughtfully based on how they are going to affect business operations or the first thing in setting down the adjacency matrix and staffing projections is think about operations efficiency so we know where those compromises can be made without doing harm and with where we need to think about something drastically differently and what that issue really is and how do we resolve that issue when we come to it in phase 2, which really has to do with massing and stacking and where things get placed a well, my concern, though, and I hear what you are saying, and christian, you brought early comments that I made, but it's cost, but it's biggerren that he-statutorily we are required to provide certain services in tract, by law we've got to do it.
aen growth is going to -- and gross is going to drive some of that statutorily required things that tract must adhere to statutorily.
the voters -- the folks in Travis County, the fax pairs understand I think a lot -- the taxpayers understand a lot of about what we are required by law to deal with.
so I don't even know if this is broken down into categories where we're statutorily required to deal with stuff.
some of the things we do we do it because they think it's a good thing to do.
but there are things that the law says you must -- you shall do this and you shall do that.
and if this is a part of some of that shall avenue, then that's one thing, but if it's outside of the scope of shall, it appears that -- and there are needs, and I understand the needs and I think I've offered this point before, I understand the needs of what you are saying, about the shalls are a part of those needs, but the shall, in my opinion, is above all of that and even though we may need this, that, but the shall, in my opinion, is a big deal.
>> give an example of the shall.
you shall --
>> by law.
>> -- by law, have courts that ensure that justice is met.
that doesn't mean you need eight courts, six courts.
a lot of them say ten courts or two courts.
there are significant public implications of ten courts versus two courts.
there's where the judgment is applied.
the judiciary is saying we are interested in justice and in order to implement justice we need this.
the law doesn't say that thou shall have two more courts between thousand and 15 and 25 or 35.
>> I know that.
>> but what we have is our judiciary leadership saying this is what we need in order, and so -- and I use that as an example, and that example is -- is cut through this needs assessment because most of the law doesn't say you shall have this service that allows people to have no waiting time.
it says you shall have the service and if people have to wait receiver even days to get it, that's -- seven days, that's a different issue.
>> establish priority among the needs with regard to the shalls versus the discretionary.
that's up to us at a later time.
the needs assessment was just to provide a systematic may to address needs of all the departments irrespective of how any of us have you hadly feel about the priority in the constellation of county governance.
am I correct about that?
>> yes.
and another good example is if the Commissioners court said we must be downtown, which it has when it voted what the seat of government is going to be, that has implications.
but there's nothing in the law that says you have to be downtown.
you could be anywhere you so choose.
there's another example of judgment calls and we have taken votes of the court to -- as the direction.
but that does have considerable bearing on service levels and costs.
>> costs.
>> costs.
>> but I think what Commissioner Davis is also referring to is at some point we're going to have to go to the community to explain to them what we're doing and why and where the requirements of law come in and where other needs come in and the process that we follow in terms of budget.
but I think as we go out to explain to folks, do you have to say that 53% of our budget is spent on the criminal justice system, which county government is in charge of.
and I think we'll need to continue that education process with them.
the other thing is public safety for -- which is what we invest a lot of money in, so everybody, no matter where they live, wants to be safe in the schools, on streets and in homes.
and that is a fear that people have, it's a very real fear with all the reports that are given in the news about home invasions these days and other things.
so I think that we -- we can use the budget process as a rule, though, because that's how we invest our -- the taxpayers' money.
and so I think, you know, I think we do have to deliver certain things as a county government in order to have people feel safe and then -- and that's the whole criminal justice system.
and then -- and then other things, the indigency and the juvenile department, which is also part of the criminal justice system, so a lot of things that we do do fall into that category.
and that is a shall.
there's no doubt about it.
so to me, the courts come under the criminal justice system, which is part of getting people to feel safe, that folks who are invading their homes or creating crime are not there among them anymore.
so there is quite a bit of agreement that I could have with Commissioner Davis on this point, and I think that it's going to call for us to go out and -- and talk to the taxpayers again.
i think they appreciate it, you know, another explanation of what county government does and how it is so different from city government.
and so I think it's -- I think it's worth doing that.
>> the departments have seen the adjacency charts and been given an opportunity to provide feedback and as far as you know there are no strong objections from department heads to the information before us today.
>> that's correct.
>> anything else?
>> I believe that concludes our presentation.
>> thank you so much.
>> I didn't mean to summarize for you, but if I did --
>> you did a very succinct job of it, judge.
>> what action is required today?
>> approving the staffing projections and adjacency matrix.
>> move approval.
>> second.
>> discussion?
all in favor?
show Commissioners Eckhardt, Gomez, Huber and yours truly voting in favor.
Commissioner Davis?
>> I'm going the abstain on that because of the comments that I've made earlier.
i would like to see more detail on it.
thank you.
>> thank you very much.
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Last Modified:
Tuesday, November 17, 2009 1:40 PM
