Budget Review Committee

BUDGET REVIEW COMMITTEE MAY 7, 2013 A meeting of the Budget Review Committee was held Tuesday, May 7, 2013 at 7:16 p.m. in the Aldermanic Chamber. Alderman-at-Large Brian S. McCarthy, Chair, presided. Members of Committee present: Alderman-at-Large David W. Deane, Vice Chair Alderman-at-Large Mark S. Cookson Alderman-at-Large Jim Donchess Alderman-at-Large Lori Wilshire Alderman Mary Ann Melizzi-Golja Members not in Attendance: Alderman Richard A. Dowd Also Present: Alderman-at-Large Barbara Pressly Alderman Kathy Vitale Alderman Daniel T. Moriarty Bill Mansfield, Radio Systems Manager PUBLIC COMMENT – None COMMUNICATIONS – None UNFINISHED BUSINESS - None NEW BUSINESS – RESOLUTIONS R-13-109 Endorsers: Mayor Donnalee Lozeau Alderman Diane Sheehan Alderman Michael J. Tabacsko Alderman Richard A. Dowd Alderman-at-Large Brian S. McCarthy AUTHORIZING THE MAYOR AND THE CITY TREASURER TO ISSUE REFUNDING BONDS OR LOANS NOT TO EXCEED THE AMOUNT OF THIRTY MILLION DOLLARS ($30,000,000) TO REFINANCE ALL OR A PORTION OF CERTAIN OUTSTANDING LOANS OF THE CITY OBTAINED THROUGH THE STATE REVOLVING LOAN FUND ADMINISTERED BY THE STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENTAL SERVICES IN ORDER TO ACHIEVE INTEREST COST AND OTHER SAVINGS MOTION BY ALDERMAN WILSHIRE TO RECOMMEND FINAL PASSAGE ON THE QUESTION Alderman Deane How are we going to be kept apprised of the process? Chairman McCarthy I would imagine we’ll see it in two ways. We’ll see it in the recap of outstanding debt in the budget process, although I doubt this will be done in time for this budget so we’d see it next year when it’s been Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 2 refinanced. I can certainly ask the Mayor and the Chief Financial Officer to send us some indication when the refinancing has taken place and what the new rates are. Alderman Deane That would be appreciated. I’m going to write that down. Thank you very much. Alderman Donchess I had a question which I’m not sure if there’s anyone that can answer it, and I don’t need it answered this moment if there’s no one that can. As a follow up to last night, my question is: what proportion of the $30 million assuming refinancing goes forward would be related to the wastewater treatment fund bonds? Chairman McCarthy I don’t know. I suspect that it’s a fairly large proportion because we have a number of loans outstanding from the State Revolving Loan Fund which we can replace with substantially lower interest through this mechanism. Alderman Donchess And I think, Mr. Chair, last night you pointed out, I haven’t tried to redo the math, myself, but for every $1 million of wastewater treatment bonds that are refinanced the city may save as much as $50,000. Chairman McCarthy I’m trying to remember whether it’s actually that much or is it $5,000. We’re saving a half a percent which would be probably $5,000 per $1,000,000 but it does wind up to be a Alderman Donchess Something. I’m not suggesting that we hold up on this because of that question but if there would be a way to get an answer to it that would be helpful. Chairman McCarthy I think by the way that we actually did get information on that a couple of months ago when the Mayor presented that we were going to pursue some of the refunding. I think it’s just a question of distributing that another time. Alderman Deane In the wastewater budget under debt service, I would imagine this is everything combined but this year there was $1.421 million in principle and $858,000 in interest that was budgeted for a total of about $2.28 million for what we have for projects. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 3 Alderman Pressly If they take all of these loans and lump them together, how does it affect the loans that have different termination dates and have different timeframes and all. Do they all have the same timeframe or is each one handled separately or are they all lumped together? Chairman McCarthy I think we normally do that. We structure them so that they are staggered. Alderman Pressly I’m sure some of them will conclude earlier than others. Chairman McCarthy We don’t extend the term of the bonds when we do this generally. Alderman Pressly That seems sort of complicated. I hope they know how to do it. Alderman Deane We don’t want to extend the lengths of the terms of the bond. Chairman McCarthy And we don’t do that. Alderman Deane Every bell and whistle in the city should go off if that’s going on. MOTION CARRIED R-13-111 Endorsers: Alderman-at-Large Brian S. McCarthy Alderman-at-Large Lori Wilshire Alderman Richard A. Dowd Alderman Mary Ann Melizzi-Golja Alderman Michael J. Tabacsko Alderman Kathy Vitale Alderman Diane Sheehan AUTHORIZING THE MAYOR AND CITY TREASURER TO ISSUE BONDS NOT TO EXCEED THE AMOUNT OF ONE MILLION DOLLARS ($1,000,000) FOR THE PURCHASE OF PUBLIC SAFETY PORTABLE RADIOS MOTION BY ALDERMAN WILSHIRE TO RECOMMEND FINAL PASSAGE Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 4 ON THE QUESTION Alderman Donchess Could we ask Mr. Mansfield to address Mr. Sheldon’s questions regarding the warranties and the like? Mr. Mansfield Each of the radios will come with a one-year warranty. We normally don’t purchase extended warranties on the radios because it’s not cost effective for us to do that. We are not purchasing any extended warranty on these particular radios. With regard to interoperability and being able to communicate with each other, our current radio system, we have ten channels in the system that are specifically set up to be able to be interoperable with everybody, every entity in the city. When I say every entity, it’s not just public safety. It’s schools’ it’s fire; it’s police; it’s DPW; it’s planning, zoning. Every portable and mobile radio in this city has at least five channels where we can be able to talk and communicate together throughout the city. When there’s agencies that come into the city from outside, we have a 800 MHz radio system. The other cities around us in New Hampshire have a VHF radio frequencies. We have purchased several different bay stations that are tied into our 800 MHz system where if an entity comes into the City of Nashua, they can communicate over our radio system or on just the VHF system so we’ll have interoperability communication in the dispatch centers as well as in the cruisers and fire trucks as well. Chairman McCarthy I think there might be some misconception about what this purchase represents. We’re not changing what we we're going to do at all in terms of what equipment we’re purchasing. We’re simply taking advantage of the fact that Motorola currently has an overstock of the radios that we were going to buy anyway. Is that correct? Mr. Mansfield That’s correct. The plan that we have and that we’ve been discussing is replacing the entire radio system. That includes every portable radio in the city and every mobile radio in the city at some point in time. This is just something that came up where we now have adjusted the five year plan that we have and moved up the portables to the next fiscal year for bonding. Then we’ll move on from there with the rest of the system as we pursue moving forward. Alderman Deane What’s the terms on the bond? Mr. Mansfield This one should be ten years. Chairman McCarthy I don’t have the legislation, itself, in front of me. I don’t know that it’s specified. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 5 Alderman Deane Last night we had a little discussion about the depreciation and GASB 34. Contrary to the beliefs of some people, I’m a believer in depreciation. What I’d like to know, Mr. Chairman, is what is the life expectancy and the depreciation of these radios versus the ten-year bond. Mr. Mansfield The life expectancy is ten years on the radios or longer. The current ones that we have is 13 years old. Alderman Deane And we have significant problems with basically just getting parts because they are obsolete. Mr. Mansfield That’s correct. Chairman McCarthy They are ten-year bonds by the way. Alderman Deane Are there certain components of the radios that failed more often than others? Mr. Mansfield The radio that we’re purchasing has only been out for two years. Once a radio has been issued an end of a life, a portable or mobile radio, you have a five-year timeframe where they’ll guarantee you parts and accessories for that particular radio. Because we’re getting this at the very early stage of the product being released, I’m anticipating we won’t have any issues for 13 years of getting parts for them. I expect that this product line will be out for at least another seven years. Alderman Deane How have these radios been rated and how have they been holding up? There must be people out there that have been using them obviously if they’ve been out for a couple of years. Has there been any reporting on them? Mr. Mansfield This particular radio, the Apex radio, was designed by members of an organization that I belong to. It’s called the Motorola Trunk Users Group. It’s users from across the country that basically gave input to everything in this radio. They are rated probably the highest quality radio that is out there. We’ve actually done testing in the State of New Hampshire. I was involved in the committee earlier this year when we received radios from the state. On that committee there were chiefs of police that took a wide variety of radios back to their agencies and tested these radios out. The pros just outweighed everything else that was out there for a product. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 6 Alderman Deane Is the radio like the other ones, like a brick with an antenna attached to it or are they more compact? Are they lighter? Mr. Mansfield The battery technology has changed over the years so they’re a little bit lighter but they are still large radios. Alderman Deane And they are strictly for police and fire. Mr. Mansfield Correct. Alderman Deane And one special elected official. That’s all the questions I have, Mr. Chairman. Alderman Cookson Mr. Mansfield, you had mentioned in your comments during the public hearing that the radio committee had come together and thought this was a good idea to move forward with the purchase of this and brought it forward. Who makes up that radio committee? Mr. Mansfield It’s City IT, a representative from DPW, myself, the radio tech, the Emergency Management Director, the liaison from the Board of Aldermen, the CFO, Angelo Marino from GIS. We have a wide variety of people that are involved. I apologize if I left anybody out. There’s a representative of the fire department and police department as well. Alderman Cookson IT, is it the Director of IT? Mr. Mansfield The acting director at the time which is Nick. Alderman Cookson When was the last time that the radio committee met to discuss this potential because we’ve had an IT Director for some time now. When did you meet? Mr. Mansfield It was in March. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 7 Alderman Cookson Who on DPW? Is it the director? Mr. Mansfield No, it was somebody that was designated by the Director. Andy Patrician. Alderman Cookson Alright. Thank you. Alderman Wilshire, you’re the liaison. Is that correct? Alderman Wilshire I’m not on that committee. Alderman Cookson Who’s the liaison? You are, Alderman McCarthy. Thank you. Chairman McCarthy I was not present at the meetings where this was discussed, however. Alderman Cookson Okay well I guess that leads me to my next question. Do we know who was present? You’ve identified who the members of the committee are. Do we know who was present at that March meeting to move forward with this recommendation? Mr. Mansfield I believe everybody was there except for Alderman McCarthy and the CFO. Alderman Cookson Very good. Thank you very much. You had also mentioned during the public hearing that everyone within fire and police would now have a radio available to them. Mr. Mansfield They currently have one available to them. This replaces what they currently have. Alderman Cookson Very good. And the radios that they currently have, what’s going to be done with those radios? Mr. Mansfield I’m talking with the school department. I can’t tell you exactly what we’re doing because I don’t know yet what we’ll be doing with them. Eventually they will not operate on our system once we turn it over, but in Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 8 the meantime, I have a plan that I don’t really want to discuss because it hasn’t been all sorted out with the school department yet. I do intend on utilizing them within the city for a time period. Alderman Cookson How many radios does that encompass that are going to potentially be used for another purpose? Mr. Mansfield I would say it’s going to be right in the area of 293 radios. Alderman Cookson We may be giving up 293 and we may be receiving 400 in return. Is that correct? Mr. Mansfield No, we’re only purchasing 293 radios. Motorola received 400 back. Alderman Cookson Thank you. That’s the number I was referencing. I guess my last question, the way that I phrased the question was how many current radios or portables that we currently have are operational? Mr. Mansfield I couldn’t give you an exact number. Alderman Cookson But it’s less than the 293? Mr. Mansfield The 293 that we are buying we’re cutting down, we’re reducing the overall numbers that we have in the city for radios. There are caches of radios for specialty units. We’re reducing 30 radios just at the police department alone. We’re reducing in the area of 15- 20 radios at fire. We’ve looked at inventory and figured out how we could make the radios that we’re purchasing more usable for the employees that are out there to reduce the amount of radios that we’re buying for the city. We do have probably around 400 radios in the city for public safety. Alderman Cookson And again these radios that would be purchased through this bond and resolution, 13-111, are just for fire and police and not for public works or any other group within the city. Mr. Mansfield Correct. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 9 Alderman Cookson Except for the individual that Alderman Deane had mentioned. Mr. Mansfield The portable radios that are utilized by everybody else in the city, I’m specifically saying portable radios, they are about five to six years old. Those radios can be upgraded for $75 per radio for our new system when it comes on line. There is no intent to get rid of those portable radios at this time. Alderman Cookson Very good. I know you had given a presentation earlier several months ago, and it was a five-year plan. You mentioned the five-year plan just recently. This just moves up the bonding for these new radios. Will there be any additional purchases or radios beyond this? Mr. Mansfield Eventually there will be mobile radios that will be purchased, 119 mobile radios for police and fire. I believe there’s another, I don’t it with me at the movement. We’re looking at approximately 200 mobile radios for the rest of the city. It’s probably closer to 230 radios additionally. Alderman Cookson So you said 200 additional mobile radios for the rest of the city. What was the number of the mobile radios for police and fire? Mr. Mansfield 119. Alderman Cookson Can you quickly refresh my memory. What’s the distinction between your portable radio which are the 293 that are under consideration within this resolution and the 119 mobile? What’s the distinction between those two devices? Mr. Mansfield The portable radio is carried on your hip. The mobile radio is mounted or installed into a vehicle. In some vehicles we have several installed. Alderman Vitale This goes back to the five-year plan. You’re moving these up in the five-year plan. How does that readjust the rest of the five-year plan, the timing wise that you think you’ll be kind of on? Mr. Mansfield We’ve moved some items. Like this particular year, we were going to buy three channels to our radio system. That was the plan. It’s more than just channels. They’re bay stations that are out at different Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 10 sites. It was right around $1 million for that purchase. We moved that out of 2014. We’ve also moved out purchase of mobile radios because we’re going to break them up in pieces and parts. We’ve moved all the mobile radios out of there. All the mobile installations we’ve moved out of there. Another thing we just received grant money for two bay stations that came before finance last week. that was on the five –year plan. We moved those out because now we’re purchasing those through a grant. We moved out replacing consolable furniture at police. We have moved a lot of items out of 2014 and moved it over to 2015. Then we have to look at as a radio committee and eventually as a city to figure out what’s going to be the best bang for the buck if we replace everything now, meaning all the bay stations in the city all at once, is that going to be cost effective for us compared to replacing them over a three-year period as we initially had planned. Alderman Vitale Many times different things come up and people say I didn’t know. Where could one find the information on the five-year plan and how it consistently changes? Sometimes more than once a year it will change. For example this changed the five-year plan. How would somebody be able to track planning such as this and the changes that take place within a plan? Mr. Mansfield The five-year plan is for the most part between the radio committee, the CFO, as a matter of fact the CFO and I were on the phone today adjusting this again making sure that everything is lining up. The CFO has it. I have it. The committee has it as well. It’s not really a public document because on a daily basis it changes. If something comes up like we ended up getting rant money. Alderman Vitale Once a year say at budget time, does it come up so here’s what it looks like at this set point in time? Mr. Mansfield I think we could do something like that. Put something together for the Board of Aldermen to do that. I’ll try to get that for our budget review coming up. Alderman Vitale I recognize that it’s a fluid document but there must be a set point that it’s presented. Mr. Mansfield I’m more than happy to share that. Alderman Donchess My question just goes back to the presentation. How much did you say was being saved by taking advantage of the fact that these radios had been returned to Motorola? Mr. Mansfield $500,000. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 11 Alderman Cookson I actually wanted to make a different request than what Alderman Vitale had. Knowing that we’ve seen the five-year plan before this committee, what I was hoping to ask and most likely prior to our next Board of Aldermen when we take up this resolution as a full Board, I was hoping to see a previous state and the current state as we understand it this evening of the five-ear plan. In particular just those changes that you walked us through. I think it would be hopeful for the rest of the committee. It would be my hope that we could have that information prior to our next full Board of Aldermen where we could see a previous state and the current state as we understand it this evening. Chairman McCarthy I don’t have the previous state. I do have the sheet that Mr. Griffin produced today if you want me to distribute that. Mr. Mansfield I don’t have the previous state with me this evening. Alderman Cookson It’s part of our minute, isn’t it? Chairman McCarthy Ya, but I don’t know where. We can certainly find it and distribute it. The difference in the bottom line is basically the $500,000 at this point, right? Mr. Mansfield Yes. Chairman McCarthy So last year’s cost went down. Mr. Mansfield Correct. Off the top of my head, I want to say that since we started this process we’ve already had a savings of $1 million so far. It was upwards of around $10.5 million when we started. The current figure today is $9.2 million. Just by what we’re trying to do to save costs, it has come down. Alderman Deane How I look at it is with the due diligence that was done, you’ve created a cost avoidance. You really haven’t saved anything. You’ve avoided the cost by the diligence that’s been done. We kind of knew this was coming, but was there any push back from the administration on the funding mechanism? Chairman McCarthy Not that I’m aware of. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 12 Alderman Deane Normally we get a two-page letter like when we funded the school security. We got a two-page letter on why not to do that and how someone else wanted to do that. So there was nothing? Chairman McCarthy In the past in the exercises where we’ve gone through the bonding plans, these numbers have been held in that plan. As far as I know the administration is fine with these numbers in terms of what they do to our indebtedness. Alderman Deane I’m happy to hear that you’re going to find some sort of useful function for the balance of the radios that are coming out of every day use. I think that’s a good thing. I don’t know what sort of investment we’d have to make to try to cobble that equipment together to get as many years out of it as humanly possible, but at least it will serve some sort of a purpose which I think is a good thing. Thank you. MOTION CARRIED NEW BUSINESS – ORDINANCES – None TABLED IN COMMITTEE Chairman McCarthy I did receive this afternoon a memo from the Emergency Preparedness Director regarding R-12-83, in response to a question I believe Alderman Deane had raised. Alderman Deane When was our last meeting, Mr. Chairman? Chairman McCarthy A couple of weeks ago, I think. Maybe last week. Alderman Deane The explanation by the Office of Emergency Management for the City of Nashua pertaining to this emergency preparedness trust fund is to provide a mechanism to pay for unintended expenses during either a non-declared disaster; pay for unanticipated expenses during a disaster with a limited declaration; temporarily pay for any disaster related expenses that would not fit within an existing account until the reimbursement check arrives. Then he uses the Snowtober as an example. If those are the three purposes, I really don’t have a problem. But if we’re using it for food and lodging and travel then I have a problem with that. If there’s unintended expenses, Chairman McCarthy I’m not sure unintended is the correct answer there. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 13 Alderman Deane I don’t think so either. Chairman McCarthy He probably means unanticipated. Alderman Deane Ya, and I think the a’s should go too. If my father was alive, I’d have him go through this. He could probably put it in one sentence. He was a technical writer. We’re not going to be reimbursing other departments with this money in lieu of waiting for the federal government to get the presses churning in Washington before they mail us a check, are we? Chairman McCarthy I don’t think that’s the intent. Alderman Deane Is this small time things? Chairman McCarthy Ya, but I can see where we have a major event that requires overtime that we would not have otherwise paid, that may be the kind of expense that you want to carry out of that. Alderman Deane Overtime for who? Chairman McCarthy If we have public works crews out 24/7. Alderman Deane There’s plenty of money budgeted in overtime. More than they know what to do with, if they can pay people to work overnight on a Sunday night in the pouring rain pouring concrete. I don’t really have a problem with this. I just don’t think we should be reimbursing different departments. I guess if there was a financial issue, I think we’d be dealing with it anyways because if it was so catastrophic towards the end of the year, if this account had that kind of money in it to cover the cost then there would be quite a bit of money in this account. What are we looking at putting in to open this expendable trust account up with? Chairman McCarthy I don’t remember the number, but $50,000 sticks in my head. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 14 Alderman Deane That’s what was escrowed, I believe. Chairman McCarthy I think I’d be willing to go ahead with creating it and see how it gets used. I tend to agree with you that reimbursing departments for example if they have a substantial overtime budget doesn’t make sense from the purpose of a trust fund because then it’s just going to wind up, we’ll take money out of the trust fund and it will become surplus and lapse into the general fund at the end of the year which doesn’t seem like the intended purpose of the trust fund. I would anticipate that we wouldn’t do that unless we had a substantial problem. Alderman Vitale If we were opening it with $50,000 which you said kind of stuck in your mind, was there an amount that we were working toward? A total, like we’d always keep it around $500 or is it going to fluctuate or is it a fund like we would do like we do the snow removal? We kind of project what the snow removal is going to be on any given year and it might be higher or lower. Chairman McCarthy I think the ultimate intent was that we’d keep it at some level which would be $50,000 to start with and then as we saw what happened, we’d adjust it from there. Alderman Vitale Adjust it from there, kind of like they do snow removal. Chairman McCarthy We can deal with the amount that’s in it every year at budget with what we choose to appropriate into the account since it has no revenue source associated with it. Alderman Deane This $50,000 through my notes came from the welfare department. It authorize the mayor as the agent to expend. The balance remaining in each fiscal year will not lapse. It will be closed out in the general fund eliminating this expendable trust fund. If the mayor wants to replenish overtime accounts in the streets department she can do that. Chairman McCarthy I suppose that’s true, although I don’t know whether the authorization to expend means to transfer the money somewhere else or actually expend the money out of the account. Alderman Deane If the time had been accounted for some sort of disaster related event then the transfer could take place. What qualifies? There would have to be a non-declared disaster which can be most anything. You can have the tire fall off the front of the fire truck like did happen. That’s a disaster. Or a disaster with Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 15 limited declaration. Number two and number three delineate a purpose. Number one is left up to the imagination, I guess because we both could have a different opinion of what a disaster is. But the transferring and expenditure of funds out of this account can be accomplished. Even in the memo it says: “…the public works conducted what beyond moving limbs to the side of the road would not be covered for reimbursement. In addition, a chipper was rented as a precaution for this storm and was not deemed eligible for reimbursement because it was not a debris removal declaration. The trust fund could be used to obtain this equipment without affecting the typical department lines.” I have a problem with that. I think these budgets have more than enough money in them. They have to be careful what they spend it on. That’s just my feeling. I would need more of a defined purpose other than reimbursing departments because hey, we didn’t know that tree was going to fall down. We didn’t put $400 in our budget to rent a chipper for the day to clean it up. Is that what it’s going to boil down to? Alderman Cookson Here’s my concern. When we spoke about this at the last budget review committee, I believe the request was to actually have a conversation with Emergency Director Kates, not receive a memo. There as we’re discussing this hypothetical going back and forth, what does this mean, what does that mean, we’re spinning our wheels. I would formally like to request that Mr. Kates join us for a conversation to better understand what exactly, which was the original request at the last budget review committee meeting, that we absolutely understand what this trust fund is going to be used for. The initial value is $50,000. We also discussed what is the cap? Will there be a cap? How will that work? I’m not sure if there’s a motion on the floor right now. Chairman McCarthy There isn’t. Alderman Cookson Just discussion? Chairman McCarthy I wanted to see if there was a sense that anybody wanted to take it from the table. What I would propose is Director Kates will actually be here to speak with us in the not too distant future and why don’t we just roll this up into the budget discussion when we review the department. Alderman Cookson So in addition to speaking to the departmental budget that will be presented in a formal setting, you want to take up this one piece of legislation while he’s in our audience. Chairman McCarthy We can certainly have the discussion with him. I don’t think there’s anything urgent about passing the legislation at the moment. Alderman Cookson Those are my comments. Thank you. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 16 MOTION BY ALDERMAN DEANE THAT THE RULES BE SO FAR SUSPENDED TO ACCEPT THE COMMUNICATION FROM DIRECTOR KATES MOTION CARRIED MOTION BY ALDERMAN DONCHESS TO TAKE FROM THE TABLE R-12-60 MOTION FAILED Alderman Cookson What was the division? Chairman McCarthy I believe it was 3-3. Alderman Cookson Who are the members of the committee? Alderman Deane We’re missing Alderman Dowd, I believe. Alderman Cookson Alright. R-12-69 Endorsers: Alderman-at-Large Jim Donchess Alderman-at-Large David W. Deane Alderman-at-Large Mark S. Cookson Alderman-at-Large Barbara Pressly Alderman Arthur T. Craffey, Jr. REGARDING ACCOUNTING FOR THE COSTS OF THE MAIN STREET PROJECT  Tabled 9/18/12  Also assigned to the Board of Public Works; Tabled 9/20/12 R-12-83 Endorser: Mayor Donnalee Lozeau Alderman Michael J. Tabacsko ESTABLISHING AN EXPENDABLE TRUST FUND FOR EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS  Tabled 12/13/12 O-12-28 Endorser: Alderman Diane Sheehan PROHIBITING THE CITY FROM CHARGING FOR THE COSTS OF CERTAIN OFFICIAL VISITS AND CAMPAIGN EVENTS  Also assigned to Personnel/Administrative Affairs Committee; Indefinite Postponement Rec. 12/17/12  Tabled – 11/28/12 Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 17 GENERAL DISCUSSION Alderman Deane I don’t know who was it at the Personnel meeting last night, but we ended up getting the wastewater legislation sent to us. What I’d like to see, Mr. Chairman, as we move along, do you realize, you know that truck we have at the wastewater plant that has a little crane on the back for pulling pumps out of different pump stations? You’ve never seen that truck? Chairman McCarthy No. Alderman Deane They’ll bring it into pump stations and they can drop a cable down instead of setting a wench up and all that. Do you realize that was towed around the city last year because it has a blow transmission in order to use the crane? When we look through this annual wastewater capital reserve replacement schedule, and I hope it would exist, I would like to see since we have citi-stat, we should have a very well defined list of what our inventory is for backup and replacement equipment for our treatment plant such as pumps and grinders and things like that. What we have and what we don’t have. At our last finance meeting we purchased a pump because the other pump was failing and we’re going to have the one that’s now in there taken out and rebuilt and shelved and the new one put in. That way because I believe there’s three of them at the plant we can swap them in and out while one is getting rebuilt and things like that. I’m wondering what sort of list exists because when we went through this last night, I was looking at it briefly, it’s just kind of strange how they don’t call it depreciation here, but that’s what I do when you look at it. They have the year of install and then the year of the replacement date. I said if something was installed in 1989 and it has to be replaced in 2013, then you’re dealing with a 24-year depreciation of that component. I’d like to know if we can get our hands on a list. The other thing as we go into our budget season, and I’m going to put some Right-to-Know requests into the administration, I want to know how much our electric bills are at the CNG plant. I want to know what our trucks are getting, four miles to the gallon on that stuff, and what it’s costing to compress that gas in the wintertime. All we hear about is this $2.35 diesel equivalent or gas equivalent, but there’s a lot of other things that aren’t factored into it. One of the facts is if you go to Browning Ave and you see one of those trash trucks try to go up that hill, it struggles. As soon as you get half a load on those trucks, they don’t go anywhere and it takes 45 minutes to compressed natural gas in them. You have a line. I’d like to see the man hours that are wasted filling up those vehicles. Are they going to reconfigure some of this because last evening when we went over those two lines, especially the one that had that significant deficit, what is the plan Mr. Griffin has with that? Chairman McCarthy I don’t know yet. I had some conversations with the Mayor today about that. I’m going to follow up with Mr. Griffin. I did ask her about the urgency of the legislation and there isn’t any. I think I’d like to have some discussions with Mr. Griffin and better understand it and then bring them into this committee. I think I have some suggestions for some things we can do to make the impact on the rate payer less. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 18 Alderman Deane What I found interesting last night was when he brought up the fact that he was looking at this 15 percent increase and then he goes then we’ll have to look at next year. If we need something it would be proposed. Then when you look at his rate analysis, next year with the analysis that was done to cover the perceived costs that are built into this, you’re looking at 10 percent and 15, 10 percent and 16, 10 percent and 17, 5 and 18, and 5 and 19. Those are already built in. I’d really like to find out who did this capital replacement schedule. Chairman McCarthy I’ll ask for more details on that replacement schedule. The next time we meet to talk about that, we’ll try to have those. Alderman Deane And the list of what we have shelved. Do you think citi-stat would have that? Chairman McCarthy I don’t know. I’ll follow up on it. Alderman Pressly I appreciate the fact that the Mayor was here and asked to table the sidewalk effort but I came here hoping we could talk about it. I would like to just bring up what we can do if anything to help with the traffic while this is going on. This is the second year of a three or four-year effort on Main Street. I bring this up because it affects me daily. To get out of Clocktower I usually go out Main Street and Amherst Street. Every morning I have to think now what’s the best way to avoid all this mess and get to where I need to go. It really truly is a bottleneck. It’s half way down Amherst Street. Although this is a public works project, most of the people come to us as the Board of Aldermen Since we have the geographic distribution, we really are considered the policy board. Most of this was decided by the Board of Public Works. This is just the beginning of the season. This is the second year and this will run, I predict, four years at the rate we’re going to get to where they need to go. It’s going to take four construction summer years to get this done. I’m not a traffic expert. I have no ideas what to do, but I think we’ve got to do something to deal with having four summers in a row with the congestion involving Main Street, Amherst Street and the area. I don’t know if people put out flyers to encourage people to go to other routes. I don’t know what can be done, but the people that are inconvenienced come to us and not to the Board of Public Works. I can appreciate the fact that the Mayor wants to be here, but if we don’t discuss what she thought we were going to discuss could we talk about the traffic and what we can do. Chairman McCarthy No we can’t because this it he Budget Committee, not the Infrastructure Committee. This is not the appropriate venue to have the discussion you’re asking to have. The item that’s on the agenda has to do with the costs of items having to do with Main Street not the logistics. I believe the points you’re bringing up are important, but that would be a better discussion to have either at the Board or at the Infrastructure. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 19 Alderman Pressly Well let me bring up one cost factor that I have brought up in the past, and one thing that has concerned me and some of the merchants and people have mentioned it, is going to be the maintenance particularly of the small I call them mini parks. They have different names for them. I brought this up before and you said we would deal with that. I don’t know if this is the time to deal with it or not, but it seems to me there are going to be a lot of maintenance costs associated with the design work that we’re having. I don’t know if it comes under the park department. The Mayor has mentioned that a lot of merchants want to adopt those old parks and take care of them, which sounds nice. I did bring this up before, Mr. President. You did mention that we would take it up at another time. I think it complicates the snow removal and I understand that a bicycle crashed into one. A bicycle should not have been among the sidewalk but they did. I don’t know what has been addressed with that issue. I don’t know what to do at this point, but I would like for us to have some venue where we can talk about these things because it’s the citizens that come to us with the problems. The traffic I think is affecting the whole region. I know I’ve sponsored legislation in order to get a topic before the Board and people get angry and upset with that. Do you suggest I sponsor legislation? Chairman McCarthy No. Alderman Pressly What do you suggest I do? Chairman McCarthy I will forward the request on and we’ll get a meeting put together where the Mayor will be there to discuss the issues that you just brought up. Alderman Pressly Would it be appropriate then for us to sort of make out a list? I think the traffic is definitely an issue. Again the only thing I can think to do is to put out an all points to everybody that travels through Nashua to make sure they understand that there are going to be delays. It’s going to take longer to get to their destinations and then we could diminish having people angry and upset that they missed their meetings. They don’t get to their places on time. Chairman McCarthy Alderman Cookson, when is the next Infrastructure meeting? Alderman Cookson Unfortunately I was moved out of my slot tomorrow evening which would have been the next regularly scheduled one. So it will be the fourth Wednesday of the month. Alderman Pressly Would we only be able to discuss it if the Mayor is there? I don’t know how this is going to work. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 20 Alderman Cookson It will be the 22nd. Chairman McCarthy Since much of it is administrative, I suspect that the conversation is a lot more productive if the Mayor was there. I will ask her if she can attend the Infrastructure on the 22nd and have that discussion then. Alderman Pressly Maybe other people have some ideas they would like to add to this. The two that I’m aware of is the traffic. It’s going to be four summers in a row that we’re going to have just a traffic nightmare downtown. The other thing is getting access into the shops so that their businesses are not as impacted anymore than they already are. And those planters, I think if we could get some idea as to how they are going to be maintained. Who’s going to keep up the planting part of it and who’s going to clean the snow around them. It’s going to be a complicated snow removal. The reason I bring this up, very often I’m able to attend early morning meetings. So I do go to the downtown group. They have a lot of questions like this too. I don’t think we’re in any way stepping on their toes. Alderman Cookson One of the other thoughts and again budget related, if there’s a way that we could understand the cost comparison of day time work versus evening or overtime, some time when traffic is less dense downtown. Again, I don’t know if that’s our committee or if that’s a Board of Public Works. If it is the Board of Public Works, can we make a request of them to understand the cost comparison and see if there’s something that we can do to address the needs of the citizens who are either driving or walking or using downtown during business hours? Chairman McCarthy I’ll ask about that. I think that’s a very good suggestion. Even negotiating some sort of side bar to allow for off hours work on a regular basis during this project, I think it would probably be beneficial to do so. I’ll take that up with the administration. Alderman Vitale I was just thinking of what Alderman Pressly was talking about the traffic part of it since I always coming the Broad Street, Amherst Street route. Alderman Cookson’s Infrastructure meeting is later in the month, it might be something like in the past we put up these little electronic signs that just says beware. We’re going to have traffic delays to do Main Street construction. I think we’ve put them in the past. I don’t think there’s one out there now but regular commuters already know it’s happening. It’s anybody else that’s not a regular commuter. I don’t know, it’s got to be a pretty minor charge to put that up coming in from that direction. It doesn’t really affect Kinsley Street at all that I can see. Alderman Cookson Great point. I was curious. I know that we just recently approved CodeRED. Do we know when that application will be available for the public? Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 21 Chairman McCarthy I do not. Alderman Cookson Could we find that out? Chairman McCarthy Ya. Alderman Deane While we are on associated topics, or different topics, I wanted to, you’re the Chairman of the Public Works Pension Board, aren’t you? You know, they promoted a guy at Public Works, had 25 years of service in. They gave him a $23,000 raise, now he’s ready to retire. Public Works pension plan is predicated on your final year’s salary at 65%. Now the guy makes $83,000, $23,000 raise. I’m going to bring the legislation in that forbids that type of activity. I do realize that the State pension plan is different, they take the last three years of earnings, you can put all your accrued, your overtime, your sick time, your vacation, all that other stuff in to drive your income up, you know for someone to use the formula, there’s certain groups that can do that but you know it disturbs me to no end that I wouldn’t even think that the pension plan was even taken into account while that sort of nonsense went on. And, it’s going to happen again. Now, this plans for more promotions, and more people so other people can go out and deal with their visionary issues or whatever they’re doing. I was on that pension board for 7 years and we did a lot of leg work when Mr. Hussey was alive and served on that board for over 20 years and the plan’s been solvent and the Public Works employees that pay into it, know always wanted to change everything when they first got on but then when we finally explained to them there was a long term plan they finally calmed down the masses but I just, I’m going to talk to the Legal Department to see what we can do about that because I just think that’s gross negligence on the Public Works Director’s part. And, anybody who was a part of that promotion process. I think the increase in the pension should be taken out of their hide and not out of the pension plan cause that’s just plain wrong and there’s nothing to stop it. I’m going to talk to the Legal Department about seeing if we can, if I can bring a piece of legislation in that would curtail that or make them serve in that position for 10 years. It’s not that I want to stop people from being promoted from within but that was just a little ridiculous and you know now the pension plan is saddled with that. So, when that individual retires, the plan’s got to make up the difference for as long as that person collects out of the system when they never paid in on that salary total. That’s not right. It’s not right. Alderman Donchess Yes, Mr. Chair. I think that at some point there needs to be a vote on the merits on R-12-69. It contains two of what I consider to be fairly simple propositions. Number one that on a multi-million dollar project the city should be able to report on costs and provide some backup. Number two, there should actually be a budget for the project which there is not. The Board of Public Works is operating that project without budget. We could debate whether the legislation has merit or not; obviously I think it does. But I think there needs to be a vote. This isn’t the first time that I have unsuccessfully tried to take that off the table. It’s either the second or the third. I’m just saying that at some point I think there needs to be a vote on the merits. I hope this will not be dealt with by just holding it in committee forever. Thank you. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 22 Chairman McCarthy I will just comment that the last two minutes the Mayor has been here, and there was no motion to take that from the table. The Mayor will be here at our next meeting, and there’s an opportunity then. Alderman Donchess In response to the Chair’s comment, that may be correct. I don’t remember. Once a motion to remove from the table has failed once or twice, I’m supposed to guess when the majority is willing to do it? At some point I just figure it will be the same result that it was last time. I don’t remember when the last time I moved this was, but no one at that time said we’ll take it off the table when the Mayor is here. I guess it’s a chicken and an egg problem. I still think the Mayor is here, the Mayor is not here. At some point there needs to be a vote on the merits. Alderman Moriarty I have a question about the budget. Several people have asked me the same question, and I can’t answer it. Somewhere around page five is a itemization of all the department budgets of salaries which include benefits. The rest of the 200 pages of the budget for each of the departments does not include the benefits. For example, if you go down and you add up the total school department budget it’s around $96 million. That’s the number that you keep hearing. When in reality if you include the salaries, it’s more like $240 million. For the life of me, I can’t figure out why the budget is written that way. If you add it all up, the entire city budget is $264 million, or $260 million. If you go on the page that includes the salaries and benefits, it adds up to $260 million. But if you go to the remaining 200 pages of the budget, it doesn’t add up to $260 million because of the department’s budgets in there are listed at a lower number than the number on page five. If you were to look at the departments, for instance, what percentage of the total city budget is the school department, it’s often quoted as 40 percent. But in reality it’s 51 percent because it’s a $240 million budget out of $260,000 city budget. I’m wondering why do they do it that way? Chairman McCarthy Because the budget that we review is the budget of expenses that are offset either by non-tax revenues or property taxes. There is a large amount of expenditure that we receive in grant funding and other funding which never sees its way into the budget, itself, particularly in the school department which I think compensates for the discrepancy that you’re describing in terms of what you see in that front page and in the rest of the department budgets. Alderman Moriarty There certainly are special revenue accounts. Some of the schools have special revenue accounts. Then the wastewater has special revenue accounts. But still if you have a pie piece, it’s a $264 million city budget. The benefits are not included in the departments. Where are they included? Alderman Deane In the insurance account. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 23 Chairman McCarthy In the insurance account, and in the pension account. There are separate operating budgets for the insurance contributions. There’s one for the pension contributions. They appear in there. Alderman Moriarty I understand what you’re saying now. You imagine the pie chart of the budget. Chairman McCarthy This year’s budget will in fact show them, I believe. They’re rolled up and actually bottom lined in the two accounts I just discussed. But from what I understand, they are also rolled up in the department budget so they are easier to see. The budget this year will look substantially different than what you’ve seen in the past. We’re setting up a meeting, I think, prior to next week’s Board meeting. There’ll be a session to go through the budget and look at what the new format looks like. I’m working on setting that up with the Mayor at the moment. Alderman Moriarty In the upcoming budget once I flip to the section that’s the school department and add it all up, it should add up to $140 million. Chairman McCarthy That’s not exactly what I said. The numbers within the budget will add up correctly and you’ll see the department’s portion of that. There’s still the issue of the grant funding that doesn’t come through the budget itself which I don’t think we’ve corrected. There are positions that are fully funded by grants and the benefits are funded by grants, and they don’t appear in the bottom line of the budget at all. Alderman Moriarty So you’re saying there’s money in addition to the $264 million? Chairman McCarthy I’m not entirely sure because I don’t know exactly how they arrived at 264, but that may well be the case. Alderman Moriarty Assuming I’ll be here at the next Budget Review meeting to support the resolution on the Main Street Project Account, I’ll bring the budget and go through some specific numbers. That will be easier to ask the question and answer the question. I have another question. Tuesday we’re going to be discussing the police union contracts and the idea of the half percent per year pay increase which all the city employees have agreed to so far. I’m told that the merit employees averaged a three percent raise. Is there any way we can find out what the true average merit employee pay increase was? Chairman McCarthy? The merit employees in the police department? Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 24 Alderman Moriarty No, just city government. Non-union, I guess, is the other way to say it. Alderman Deane That’s all predicated on they have to be reviewed. Alderman Moriarty Right. Certainly if they are non-union, they are individually assessed. But still there’s an average. There’s going to be some sort of pool of funding. Alderman Deane There’s steps and grades. Alderman Moriarty Is there somehow we can get a handle on that? Chairman McCarthy I’ll ask. Alderman Moriarty That would be good to know. Thank you. Alderman Deane This new budget process or the way it’s going to be laid out, are there going to be individual positions shown in the budget such as this? Chairman McCarthy I don’t know; I have not seen it yet. Alderman Deane I find it difficult when we get our warrant or chart of expenditures or whatever she’s changed the name of it to. Every department is clustered into one number. There is no way you can find out or look through and see which positions have had money transferred out of them. You can go through the transfer sheets but this is what April? Well today’s May, right, and we still have the last. These are March 31, but there’s no way you can look through these and see what’s been expended out of each line. Like when you look at the Mayor’s Office, wages, full time. It’s got $294,000 in there; $166,000 remaining and $127,000 expended year-to-date. So, how many positions are vacant there? Nobody knows. I really have an issue with this. And I don’t buy this crap that Lawson can’t produce this. I just don’t buy it because every employee here in the City of Nashua, including us, we get our W-2's. We’ll be listed on there. Our earnings our listed on there. Every employee that works here has all of what their gross wages were, what their overtime was, what their taxes, their FICA, right through the whole thing. I’m told Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 25 they’d have to jump through hoops to do this. I don’t buy that. If that’s the case then this Lawson system, although some people think it’s the second coming, I think it’s taken everything and just kind of balled it up into these single numbers. You can’t track anything. If we could somehow have the availability to access the financials other than the stuff that’s posted on the internet and sometimes I can’t even open any of that, that would be very helpful to me anyways because every person that comes in here, every department head, I’m going to go through this old budget and if the positions aren’t listed, I’m going to go through every damn position in this book and ask them if it’s still there or not and what the new number is. I just think it’s gotten to the point where we should be able to understand the full time equivalence for each department and what the costs are, not just receive a line item with a large number in it and say here you go. You don’t know how many positions are open, whether people are being paid within their salary grid. Do we know this stuff? I look forward to seeing this new budget layout. As much as people didn’t like this, I thought there were a few issues but for the most part, I thought this budget book was pretty self-explanatory. You’d look at in the police department and see there’s 35 sergeants that are funded. You’d look and see that there was a 105 patrolmen in the budget. Then you could walk through it as you went through these financials with the old system that we used and you could see the positions. As the money was paid out, the number would start to deplete. But you could find in some of the smaller budgets, you could see things weren’t changing. There’s a position that’s been funded that’s open. What’s being done about it? Is the money being used to compensate somebody else for filling in a portion of that position? These are things that I would like to know anyways. Alderman Pressly I just want to clarify, I just learned from my colleague that the budget is going to be coming in next Tuesday. I guess I need to understand. I know throughout the year I have brought up questions that you said we’d take care of that later, and I know particularly as far as the Main Street project and the labor costs. All of that is going to fall under discussion at the general budget discussion? Chairman McCarthy Some of it will. I don’t know which specifics. There are things that we will take up in the normal course of things and that’s what I would have said. Without knowing what thing it is, I don’t know exactly when we were going to take it up. Alderman Pressly It just seems to me it’s an awful lot to try to accomplish in a short period of time. The other comment I would like to make as far as the budgeting, I’m not a budget expert. I know we have many on our board that are. It’s like breathing. They can figure out the budgeting and where to look for things, but it seems clear to me not having been around when they hired this group to readjust all the budgeting, I don’t think there was much consideration given to the governing board that has to review the budget. I think the plan that they’ve put together is for their convenience, the people that manage it day-to-day and not for the Board that has to review it, understand it. The things that have come up in finance and what I’ve heard at budget also tell me that we need to really take a look at making sure that the Board of Aldermen is getting what they need in order to review the budget from this Lawton Group that created this new system. I don’t know if the Board of Aldermen was consulted in any way. It appears as though they were not as far as what did the Board of Aldermen need in order to review and be part of the budget process. It seems to me there’s lots of things that need to be adjusted to that this governing board can do its job and not have to ask the same questions over and over again. It should be visible in the budget. Thank you. Budget Review – 05/07/13 Page 26 PUBLIC COMMENT REMARKS BY THE ALDERMEN POSSIBLE NON-PUBLIC SESSION ADJOURNMENT MOTION BY ALDERMAN DEANE TO ADJOURN MOTION CARRIED The meeting was declared closed at 8:35 p.m. Alderman Mary Ann Melizzi-Golja Committee Clerk  City of Nashua Justin Kates, Director Office of Emergency Management (603) 722-0288 229 Main Street katesj@nashuanh.gov NASHUA, NEW HAMPSHIRE 03060 Chairman McCarthy: The Mayor asked me to provide some clarification on the Emergency Preparedness Trust Fund. The intended purpose of the Emergency Preparedness Trust Fund is to provide a mechanism to:  Pay for unintended expenses during either a non-declared disaster  Pay for unanticipated expenses during a disaster with a limited declaration  Temporarily pay for any disaster related expenses that would not fit within an existing account until the reimbursement check arrives For example, during the “Snowtober” event, it was looking very unlikely that the City would be able to apply for any Federal assistance to manage the debris removal process. In this case, the City would have had to pay for the entire $862,836.14 rather than 25%. In the end, only Hillsborough and Rockingham County were approved, many months after the incident. In the case of Hurricane Sandy, Hillsborough County was federally declared only for Emergency Protective Measures, rather than full Debris Removal. In this case, any of the work that the Public Works Division conducted that went beyond moving limbs to the side of the road would not be covered for reimbursement. In addition, a chipper was rented as a precaution for this storm and was not deemed eligible for reimbursement because it was not a Debris Removal declaration. The Trust Fund could be used to obtain this equipment without affecting the typical department lines. Finally, in the event of a catastrophic disaster in which unique equipment, services, or contractors are procured by the City, this fund can provide the financial resources necessary. In an example, if we needed to set up a disaster feeding and recovery site, this would be a mechanism to pay for portable toilets, generators, and other necessary equipment, items which the City does not budget for. Thank You, Justin Kates