Budget Committee - Regular Meeting

Well, but Great. And then the the next topic is it was sort of mine. So we, of course, put lots of time and energy into coming up with this calendar for the this the rest of this year and next year that would become the standard calendar by which we would choose topics. At this time of year, we would choose two to take us into next year and do community engagement accordingly and really try to get into a rhythm where we did the same thing every year. Then we had a mayoral election, which I think we all anticipated the election, but maybe didn't fully anticipate the effects of a mayoral transition.

This audit committee was started, has never had a different mayor or a different administration. And as I started to think about the impact of a new mayor in a new administration, it occurred to me that it might make sense, and I wanted to bring this to the group, rather than kind of plowing forward with our predetermined agreed to schedule, to pause and have some time at this committee to meet the mayor elect and her team and or her team, share what this committee does, hear how the mayor elect thinks that we could be useful. I know that she is really interested in auditing a lot of different functions and departments. And we've talked often about how we want to be working in concert with the administration as much as we can be. I think we have an opportunity for that here.

And then also, we may, probably will, be seeing new department directors in each department. And so even if we weren't going to have that conversation with the mayor elect, we will likely be working with new people in the new year. And it seems to me to make sense to give some time to figure out who those people are going to be, to see which programs are changing. We've, in the past, wanted to shy away from auditing something that is in the midst of changing, because what's the point? It's about to change.

So for all of those reasons, I wanted to suggest to the group for your thoughts and for your feedback that we pause in our topic selection process. We also have not gotten a great response to putting out our survey again. So it's not like we're seeing not like we would be rejecting lots of brand new ideas. And instead, plan to invite the mayor elect and her team to join us at our February meeting and work with her in between to hear her thoughts on how the audit committee could be useful and decide how to move forward based conversations. And again, with the hope of getting back into a regular rhythm and having our calendar figured out, etcetera, but not wanting to let that process be the enemy of meaningful engagement with administration.

So with that, I will stop talking, and I would welcome other folks' thoughts, both is this a good idea or not, and also other ideas about how we can engage with the new administration and sort of adapt to the new circumstances that we are in. I see Mr. McVeigh, go ahead.

Thank you Madam Chair. I think it's wise that we take a pause and perhaps that we can have the mayor elect and or her department heads come and meet with us. Just because, A, it's part of our broader terms of reference, And also, it gives us an opportunity to really collaborate and see where we have shared priorities both in terms of the council and the new administration in terms of our audit objectives where we can improve service delivery. I will also say that this will probably help us with better planning for next year for 2026 because I think that we can actually align our calendar to the calendar that you proposed for the whole committee. I love that calendar.

Because we are definitely behind in terms of our civic engagement with the district councils this

year. Mhmm.

And so I think that'd be incredibly valuable for that reason alone. Because I think once we do sit down with the district councils, which I will discuss more at the next agenda item, I think there'll be a greater response from the community in terms of folks actually submitting topics for us to consider. Yep. Because I'm not sure what the usual, what's the usual corpus or body of topics that we get in a given year? What has it been historically, madam chair?

In terms of how many topics, ideas do we get submitted? Yeah.

Submissions do we get in a given year usually?

That's a great question. Miss Vang, what would you say?

We get about five or eight viable topic ideas for the audit committee to consider. But most of the topic ideas that we end up selecting are those that's been forwarded by the departments. So there's greater interest there, especially with the administration, with the current administration.

Actually, it's not that bad of a number coming from the public. Five to eight, you said.

Can you repeat that?

Five to eight coming Five from eight. The Yeah. It's not that bad of a number, actually. That's quite impressive.

Like, if you compile all the information to kinda gauge exactly what topic they're seeking

Mhmm.

It leads to that.

Okay. Okay. Yeah.

Duly noted, and I think your point's about potentially right. Like, there being a virtuous benefit cycle on topic submissions makes a lot of sense. And give the community engagement more time to work, because I think the survey is one thing. But as we were just alluding to, it's often more helpful to get feedback in different ways, like from the community engagement, because people are not coming in cold. They're aware of what kind of topics are really are viable, etcetera. So I think Stephanie I'm sorry. Miss Dilworth raised her hand. Go ahead.

Thank you, chair Naker. I I just wanted to add my voice to I think it would be a great idea to have a conversation with the mayor elect and her team. We wanna be seen as a friend and not an enemy, and it seemed like, there was a little touch and go in terms of the previous administration in terms of that and how we reviewed. So I think it would be great to get on a good footing with her and her team as we move forward.

Great. Thank you. Any other thoughts or comments in general about this? I'm not seeing any. Oh, go ahead, mister Lasser.

Can you hear me?

We can.

Okay. Great. Yeah. I'm figuring out how I raise my hand on here. Yeah.

I'd like to just add to the chorus that I agree it makes sense, with the new mayor's administration. I had wondered maybe if you had connected with her or, anyone on the transition team specifically about, you know, coming to the February meeting. But, you know, I think as long as we don't have to push out our timeline too long, it makes sense to collaborate because you're gonna have better results with, you know, willing, audit partners. That's that's always been my experience. So I'm I'm hopeful, from how you described it that that's, what the situation is going to be.

Yeah. Thank you. And to that to your question, I haven't spoken to the Merelec directly about the February meeting, but I did she has been wonderful about reaching out. I know the council vice president, I believe councilmember Coleman and I have all had one on ones with her. We're also doing tours of our wards with her, which she wants to get done even before the end of this year. And in my last one on one with her, I did bring up the audit committee and she got, her eyes got wide and she was like, is really exciting. Because again, that's part of her, the values that she's bringing to this role is to really ask a lot of questions, get into the details, understand what's working and what's not. She talked about that a lot on the campaign trail. And when I said, we have a vehicle to do that with funding, she was happy to hear that. So we would need to reach out about February, and I wanted to bring this to this group first before we did that.

Obviously, it will depend on her schedule. And I hear you on we'd want to do that not much later than February, of course. I think it also helps that our current study, our audit, is underway. It did have a little bit of a slowdown, so it's not like we're in between things waiting. Wilder is working all this time.

You for the Anything from my colleagues, or any other comments from our advisors? Uh-oh, the screen went away, so I can't see. Nia, anybody? No? I'm seeing them. Okay. They keep kinda keep going back and forth between the team screen and our room, just for everyone online. No. Okay. Well, with that then, well, that will be our plan. So our beautifully laid out calendar will be slightly edited for now and maybe come back to as we get there. But our plan will be for the February 17 meeting to invite the mayor elect and Ms. Vangal. Maybe you can draft something and I can send it over to her team. We'll figure that out.

I will do that, yep.

Great. And last but not least, our last agenda item is an update on the community engagement efforts with district councils. I want to shout out to Mr. McVeigh, who has been doing yeoman's work on this, and eager to hear the updates.

So we have actually made some progress. I'm very excited that we've made some progress. Last time I was here, I think if anybody recalls, I had only been in contact with three of our district councils out of the 17 here in St. Paul. That has now increased to nine.

We 300% increase.

Yes. Yes. Indeed. Yes. Seven of them, actually, we have things on the calendar.

We have two more that I am that is to be determined in terms of the actual date. And I have more dates I need to forward to the council members on this committee. The other community advisers are wonderful staff. And I've been in touch with the council members that are not on this committee that some of them are actually going to be joining for some of these engagement events, some of these town halls. So, like, in Highland Park with where I happen to live with council member Jost that is set in stone at this point in February.

So. Right. There's another one. I'm sorry. In January, there's another one in February that is tentative right now that she may not be able to attend. So, we will see. But as we are right now, we have Como Park. That is January 7. There was a bit of confusion earlier with miss Vang that there was a meeting happening tonight that actually got rescheduled for personal reasons to January 7. Councilmember Coleman so gladly agreed to that change.

I thank you, Councilmember Coleman. We have West seventh Fort Row Federation, which I'm glad to be joining with you, madam chair. That is January 12 at seven Highland Park, that is February 5 at seven Saint Anthony Park, February 12, also at seven. Hamlin Midway, February 24 at 06:15. And, I have Capital River Council that is to be determined. I have to talk with John more about that. And Summit Hill as well with I'm trying to remember her name. It's it's slipping my memory right now. I'm so sorry. Executive Director of Summit Hill Association.

Oh, I do recall your name. And one other council, I forgot to write this one down. McAllister Groveland. I actually have a date for that one as well. I just need to repull it. I don't have it on my calendar. It's actually in my journal back on my desk at home. So I cannot give you the exact date right now for the public record, but I will make sure that all the committee members are aware of that at this point. In a similar vein, I am updating the slide deck. I was really wanting to get it done for our committee meeting today, but I had finals last week and the week before.

So I've been very busy, and I was not able to get to that. So my apologies to colleagues. So I'm going to have that done in the next couple weeks. I might even have it done this week. I'm going to share it anyway with the rest of the committee members so they can look at it. So my hope is that we have a I'm not sure how this is gonna work as the issue. I don't know if the committee needs to approve the whole presentation before I start sharing it with the district councils. What are your thoughts? We don't

saying that I'm sure. Don't think we need to do it formally. I think you can send it out via email for comments. Okay. Make them make changes and then start using it. Awesome, awesome. I have no idea what Mr. Farnsworth was out saying. No, I'm just kidding. We approved that presentation.

Okay, okay. Well, then I will hopefully have that done in the next week, week and a half, so that way you can all look at it. And I would very gladly appreciate your feedback. Great. And so that's all I have at this moment.

I do want to get I should mention one more thing. Now, think about it. I have primary literature that I've been meaning to send to the committee members that I have not done so yet regarding governance related to external and internal audit within municipal levels of government, and how the structuring civic engagement, how that impacts their functionality. And I have not gotten to that yet because I still need to put that compile that that set of references together for everyone. So I will try to do that over the holidays. So, I will be busy.

Mr. McVeigh, thank you again. Huge amount of work. I had a very busy time for you. I hope finals went well. I hope we were not the reason for any lack of academic success on your part. I know we wouldn't be, because you can multitask beautifully. I try. But really, really appreciate it. And I'm really I love also the idea of inviting other council members to be part of those presentations, not just the audit committee members because that also helps increase buy in among the whole council. Ms. Vang, do we still have our friends online?

Yes.

Okay. I just can't

see them.

Oh, they're there. Okay. There we go. Yes. So I see yay. They're here. Any questions or comments for mister McVig?

If you are a council member or a community adviser and would like to attend, I would more than happily take your company because I don't want to be lonely.

Would you I Oh, go ahead. Go ahead, miss Dulworth. Are

the meeting thank you, Shoonecker. Are the meetings by virtual or are they in person? And will we send out a kind of a calendar of all the meetings so that I was listening to them, I you know?

But are they virtual or how are they?

So most of the meetings are being structured in a hybrid format. So if you wanna attend remotely, you're more than welcome to, or you can come in person. And my goal, miss Dilworth, is definitely to have a calendar put together for all of the council members and community advisers. I just haven't gotten around to that, and I'm really sorry about that. So I would more we would gladly welcome your company if you would like to come, whether that is in person or remote. So same goes for mister Lofstetter and the other the council members on our committee as well. So

Thank you. Yeah.

Would love to see schedule and attend where I can.

Great. So we'll send that out as follow-up Okay. With And I would also just add, if you're having trouble hearing back from any district councils and you want help connecting with them, let us know. Council members can also help with that.

That is definitely happening with some of the district councils. So, I will be following up with the council members on that. I will wait though until after the holidays, because I don't want to disturb any of you folks.

It also might make sense, as someone who just said, I know we should go talk to every district council about the tree preservation ordinance that I'm sponsoring and forgot that there were 17 of them and that they might all want the presentation in the same two weeks. It's also okay to wait a beat before you reach out to the other ones because maybe you want to spread them out a little bit over March and April.

So I

think that that is also fully warranted.

May I add one more Go ahead. Yeah. Thank you, Madam Chair. At this point, our calendar is probably gonna be taking us into April. I just wanna make the committee aware of that. So we're gonna be running basically from January through April at this point. So Yeah.

Woo hoo. And that is that is totally fine. And again, especially if we're kinda taking a pause meeting with the mayor elect, we will need topics for the end of this year, for the beginning of next year as well. All right, that is everything on our agenda. As we said, it was going be a relatively short one. So thank you all for being willing to come join us in this format. I want to thank you from everyone here at City Hall and all of our millions of viewers at home as well for all of your hard work this year. It's been a joy to get to work with you on the Audit Committee. I hope everyone has a very safe, fun, healthy holiday season and New Year. And we will see everybody back in not January, but February. All right, thanks again. We are adjourned. Thanks everybody. Happy holidays.