Finance & Personnel Committee - Regular Meeting

I am Alderman Peter Bergelis filling in for Chair Marina Dimitrievich, who's joining us on the board. We'll be joined by Alderman Coggs shortly. We'll be joined by Alderman Spiker shortly. To my far left, we're joined by Alderman Sharlyn Moore, of course our staff assistant Chris Lee, and legislative liaison Kathleen Bregnos. Comptroller Christensen is here, and we'll be joined by budget director Nick Kovach shortly. Starting with our agenda item number one, file 260241, communication from Comptroller's office relating to a workday pre-implementation review report. Welcome Comptroller.

Good morning, committee members. Thank you for hearing this file today. First of all, I'd like to thank John Runte and the Baker Tilly team for conducting this review. I'd also like to thank all of the city staff, as well as consultants that participated in this review. It was very comprehensive and required a lot of- Hey, I have a 10 a.m. meeting with a fellow that I- Jason?

Yeah?

What? Thank you, Jason. Please move yourself from DNS.

We like the excitement around here. I mean, this is a riveting report. Comptroller Christensen, please continue.

It is very important. So thank you. I appreciate that. So it was initiated by the Comptroller's Office. This was not done as part of the Workday Project or sponsored by the Executive Committee itself, but this is a product of the Comptroller's Office. Now, that being said, I am a member of the Workday Project Executive Committee as well as the leader of an office that has primary responsibility for two of the key work streams that are involved in the Workday Project. So that being said, I wanted to be very arm's length with the pre-implementation review. So the review was conducted by Baker Tilly, a third party who has had no involvement with this project up until they were engaged or involved with this engagement. So a truly independent third party neutral perspective and from the city's perspective, the audit was ran by audit manager Adriana Molina and deputy controller Charlie Radel was also serving as a facilitator to help arrange meetings and obtain information. The purpose of this review is primarily to be forward-looking, so looking at our go-live date as set out, what are our prospects for achieving that go-live date successfully, and what is essentially our readiness to go live, and what recommendations does Baker Tilly have for ensuring that we are able to successfully go live? Essentially, what conditions need to be present and recommendations for getting us to those conditions for success. Before we get started, there's going to be a lot of little jargon and acronyms and I'm just going to give you a very quick background on some of these. ISG is our project management consultant. Think of them as our owner's rep. accenture is the implementation consultant so accenture along with workday was procured essentially as a package workday is the product that will the platform on which our financial human resources and payroll systems will operate after go live and accenture is the the consultant that is assisting us with subject matter expertise in implementing this The executive committee of which I am a member along with budget director Kovac, DR director Carter, procurement director Kelsey, and David Henke, CIO. That is essentially the highest level of project governance involved in decision-making about the project. And finally, Baker Tilly, who you're about to hear from, they conducted this third party pre-implementation review and they had no involvement in the project, no stake in the project up until this engagement. So with that, I'd like to introduce John Runter.

Good morning. Good to be with you all. I'm John Rente. I'm a principal in our digital practice. I lead a team called Strategy and Transformation. That team focuses on reviews like this. I've done a significant number of pre-implementation readiness reviews and or quality assurance reviews for other clients in similar circumstances. and I also do some expert witness testimony work for failed projects of initiatives like this. So very comfortable space in terms of the evaluation of a project of this size and scale. The Alderman asked whether or not there was a presentation to accompany the 46 page report and I really like the details in the report which is why we did not create a higher level presentation. I will tell you that the assessment framework that we'll go through in part today is a really good summary. So that's like two and a half pages essentially of the findings and the recommendations. So we'll start there. From a background perspective, there's some really important dates to think about here. This assessment and the interviews were conducted May 25th through June 9th. From June 9th to middle of June, there was some refinements, some follow-ups, some additional data gathered. From mid-June until essentially June 20th, 24th, the report was drafted and then we had multiple rounds of readouts with the executive committee as well as some of the consultants that were mentioned earlier. The other key review context is that while we were contracting for the pre-implementation review, the city made the decision to move from a go live date in September to late December. So we'd certainly encourage a structured review against these types of themes and recommendations prior to your actual go live later in December. So let's get into it. I'm gonna hit a few of the executive summary findings. Think of that as a 30,000 foot level. We're gonna then go through the framework that I mentioned earlier. That's 15,000 foot and that's gonna be findings and recommendations and then certainly the remaining 40 plus pages of the report are a lot of details and a lot of examples and implications of some of those findings.

Just for some context, we're looking for five or seven minutes, and then we wanna make sure we have time for questions.

Okay, sounds good. So with that, we would call the risk extreme risk. We saw an elevated and significant level of risk for the project. Based on that, some of the findings that support that, the history of missed milestones, that's a really good indicator of future performance. You have extremely constrained city resources. They care deeply about the success of this project, but you've not been able to backfill them and they still have operational day jobs while trying to do a very complicated engagement. Theme two is really two parts there. The design of the system, a technology system, starts with base functionality. That's what you bought out of the box. There's no changes to that. You then go through a design and the design works through different configurations to make city of Milwaukee specific processes and workflows. That's called configuration. The configuration has still been moving. It's not stable. The ability for the team to do full end-to-end testing has not been validated. It's not been accomplished. uh... and major change to finance in terms of chart of accounts and financial configurations has limited the ability for the team to do and and testing across integrated processes and to see what the final financial results of that a good example is payroll uh... payroll accounting financial accounting associated with payroll has not been able to be validated so that's executive summary finding number two number three we're going to end and testing this is the concept of mimicking day in the life processes. And more often than not, the team had not been able to do that because this final finance configuration, the finance changes, really didn't end up in testing environments until mid-June. So from mid-June until end of July, maybe that leaks into August, a really critical timeframe for the city team to be able to demonstrate that they're gonna be able to do these processes and therefore that's the key thing that has to fall to be able to say we're ready to go live. We think that although you're at extreme risk and that you have risk as it relates to being able to hit those timelines, everything must go perfect from here on out to be able to hit your dates in late December. I think I'm gonna pass on the remaining executive summary items and call your attention to essentially pages seven, eight, and nine where we go through the assessment framework. I'm gonna call out three major categories and then I'll be done to comply with the short timeframe that we have for presentation. The first risk category, top of seven, is this case for go live. Certainly there's a case to get live because of the financial cost of this project. That's a great case to get live. But the recommendations are that you need go, no go criteria at a detailed level to say have we seen these key processes work end to end? You've not seen that to date as part of our review in the time frames that I've mentioned. uh... things like garnishments and uh... pension related adjustments those those types of really critical processes had not been demonstrated and the team has not been able to to validate that in an end-to-end scenario those would be examples of go no go criteria have we been able to do that uh... the second is to ensure that your functional leads are involved with this go no go decision process their dialogue is really important they need a seat at the table and then anchored by functional leads. Functional leads are people, like there's a payroll lead, there's a human capital lead, et cetera, these different functional departmental leads that have been working on the project. And then finally we'd recommend anchoring the go-live decisions not only on the financial merits of the project but on demonstrated outcomes in end-to-end system testing the the other key requirement that I would have us focus on from the assessment framework is a the testing readiness. We know that end-to-end testing has not consistently reflected these real-world day-in-the-life scenarios. We know that they've been dealing with unstable configuration, a lack of an environment that had good financial data to be able to see these integrated processes start from recruiting an employee through onboarding, through setting up benefits deductions, through a first payroll, and then the financial accounting aspects of it, they've not been able to see that. So that is a necessity and the final end to end testing cycles that have been occurring in July and may spill into August would be focused on really ensuring that these cross functional, cross departmental processes are seen and demonstrated successfully. So I'll stop there given the time constraints and answer any questions that the committee has. Thank you for that.

I think the most important significant thing you said that everything must go perfect from here on out to make the December date. what happens when something doesn't go perfect from here on out?

I think the executive committee works with your consultants to evaluate how the issue or the challenge, how big is the issue, what's the degree of impact, and what's the degree of risk that the city has, and there'll be an acceptance of, okay, it wasn't perfect, we don't have a happy path, and we need to make a decision on whether the risk and the implications of whatever went wrong, do we need to delay or do we go?

Because this is the second delay for the project. The first one cost $1.4 million. Our next item, which I guess I'll go ahead and read that in. Item number two, file 260490, substitute resolution relating to authorizing up to $4.8 million of contingent borrowing to cover costs related to an extension of the ERP system replacement project for December 2026 go live date. just so we can talk about both of these together. The result of us not being ready and meeting that last deadline is now almost $5 million of projected cost to make it. And now I'm hearing from you that we may not even make that unless everything goes perfect from here on out to December.

That is correct. And that's where this final decision of How much have we not seen work successfully in the system really comes down to a critical decision the city's gonna need to make around what's the risk of going live if we haven't seen garnishments work, if we haven't seen pension revisions work, if we haven't seen invoices actually decrement an encumbered budget amount. You don't wanna try to be fixing those things after you're live. That'll be a real challenge for the city.

And I know we have a lot of questions, but before we get to other questions, is this implementation process streamlining internal city processes to be consistent with other municipalities that have done the same thing previously, or are we customizing Workday to fit with already siloed processes in every separate department in the city?

So some of the report content recommends triaging different challenges that functional leads are seeing, and part of triaging is saying we can do a manual process workaround. We can configure or change or, in your words, customize. It's not a true technical customization of Workday, it's a configuration. We can configure it to meet a specific process that the city wants and needs. And they go through the scenarios in terms of what options they have available to them. But are you also looking at those city processes to see if there are inefficiencies that we can correct? Certainly there are inefficiencies that will be mitigated with this new system, yes.

All right. Before questions, any comments? Director Henke, Comptroller?

Sure, David Henke, Chief Information Officer with the Department of Administration, Information and Technology Management Division. I will say that I largely agree with the results that have been, the analysis by Baker Tilly. There might be quibbles on importance or different things here and there, but it would be my intent, and I would say the committee's intent, to use this review as a baseline for reaching go-live, what we need to do, what changes we need to make, and have already started making to have a successful launch with the intent of doing so by the end of the year.

Okay, questions? Mr. Chair. Alderman Moore. Thank you so much for the presentation. The question that I have is what are the ramifications or How do I say this? If we're not ready, will the hard decision be made to not go, to not move forward with a live date because the ramifications would be, I don't want to use the word catastrophic, but not good based on end-to-end testing, all these things that have been reviewed. Are we prepared to make that decision if it comes to it?

maybe my perspective and then David, maybe you have some perspective as well. Our recommendation is to continue to push, push as hard as you possibly can to hit that December date and then just prior, this concept of a go, no go process in the report, detailed recommendations, we talk about doing a T minus 90, T minus 60, T minus 30 day kind of analysis of that and you're gonna go right up to the end to say, But hey, are the ramifications palatable if we go live with some number of open issues? We're not striving for perfection. Things do need to go perfectly to even get to a point that is not perfect. Most go lives don't happen with a clean slate. There's some issues out there and you just need to triage those to say are they low impact, medium, or high? And if you have some critically high and a number of critically high without some kind of way to mitigate that, then the committee makes the tough decision, go or no go.

Yep, agreed with that approach. So as such and as part of the findings, there's recommendations regarding checkpoints and gates. So some of those will include our testing, which we wanted to have significant completion by the end of this week, by the end of July. There's certain tests like parallel payroll two testing that has to complete by August 21st. So have we successfully completed that, done the payroll, made sure that some of those contingencies that were brought up have been met. So that'll be a decision point. There's our data cut where we extract from PeopleSoft what we're going to use to build the go-live environment. That's on September 17th. So a successful completion of that would be another gating decision factor. Knowledge assessment, making sure that people who know, who will have to use the system at go-live feel confident that they have the knowledge transfer of how to do that. Again, on September 17th, what's called the gold tenant, which is what we will go live in, build complete by November 20th is the expectation there. And then the final go-no-go would be November 25th, I'm sorry, 23rd. to say that we will go or no go based on the situation at the time. And that go-live date is December 20th, which is, as we get closer, in previous communications we've said we need to delay to end of September or end of June. We have the date set. We are making that level of detail, getting that close, and that would be the date of go-live.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Alderman Speicher.

I guess just picking up on that last point about the go-live date being December 20th, is that designed so that the functional leads who will be nearly dead by that point have the ability to go on vacation for Christmas and New Year's? Because the January 1st payroll, I'm sure that's going to be a challenge.

So is that why the date was picked as that? In fact, it's quite the opposite. It's going to be an intense period of work for especially on our payroll team. Pay period one begins of 2027 actually begins on December 20th. So it's just a quirk of the calendar that it falls so early in still in 2026. So that actually is going to be an intense period of work for the payroll team. Now, that being said, You know myself and other members of the executive committee and other Department heads who are involved in the project have asked their teams What additional resources do you need in order to make this go live successful? So we have a lot of year-end responsibilities a number of different work streams on payrolls financials and HR and we are ensuring that there are supplementary and resources, consultants that are available to help take the load off those folks so that they can focus on either their operational responsibilities or on assisting other departments, troubleshooting when it comes to that are encountered during and immediately after go live. So yes, it is going to be a busy time. It's gonna be a lot of work, but we're ensuring that we're resourced to the point where we're able to make it work successfully.

And how narrow is the base of folks we're talking about here in these positions? Are we talking about position, a narrow base, so narrow base that if one or two people just up and leave, then we're all out of luck?

I think that, at least speaking from my office's perspective, that's definitely a concern. We have key person risk in a number of different areas, which is why we're ensuring that those folks have the resources that they need in order to feel confident that they're going to be supported and that we're not leaving them out on an island, that we have processes and resources in place to assist them and get them over this challenging hump.

I guess for Baker Tilly, you've looked at other municipalities and seen them integrate similar systems. Do you see any dangers that you could alert us about? There's political pressure, having put it off twice, maybe to really say this is the final go, but is there anything you see with massaging of the go, no-go questions or any... Anything at all that you'd like to highlight as a potential danger that we might not anticipate this far out But we'll become more salient as it draws nearer.

Yeah From my perspective I think it all comes down to the success of end-to-end testing and in the month of July and if it spills into into August and If we have not heard from functional leads that they are comfortable in key processes Then that tough decision needs needs to be made but and that's a fairly objective matter black and white that you can tell hey we've either done the n10 testing or we're not so it can't be that hey functionally you better say we're ready because we're going to be ready yeah exactly it's it is fairly fairly black and white and know that more often than not functional leads will have queasiness or concerns about going live just because they'd always rather have more runway more time but but to the extent they've been through key processes and they've seen it work successfully, that should lessen that concern for sure.

And we haven't been able to do the end testing

longer ago because there was still major the payroll accounting wasn't set up i mean there were still things that just weren't cooked yet is that basically the the gist of it that's correct the finance area and the change to the chart of accounts only recently allowed for financial data in mid-june into testing environments to be able to do some of that end-to-end testing yes

And if we miss, goodness forbid, the December 20th date, it's more money. That's the issue, the main issue.

correct yeah we would the ability to go live is on a quarterly basis so that would move that to the end of March and similarly the costs associated with that so a couple of items to share with regard to going live at the end of the year and the difficulty in that time one of the mitigating factors that we are planning is having in November a dual payroll entry so all staff can practice on going to have experience and practice in submitting time in workday in that environment and doing a practice run of that citywide so that when the actual The actual entry is required in December. People have experience with it. Hopefully we will have, if there's troubles that are found, those can be addressed and people educated so that there isn't the overwhelming, as overwhelming an amount of help requests and any confusion or uncertainty for that first payroll. So that's one mitigating factor.

The amount of work that is done to get payroll one ready, is that significantly more than any other payroll period? So is there a greater need, one, to bring in those other resources and two, to make sure they had a practice as it were before?

Yeah, I think it's certainly fair to say that pay period one is going to be the most challenging. It'll be people's first time entering time in the system in a live environment, so it certainly will be the most challenging. We do expect to do a lot of troubleshooting and that's one of the things that we are already talking about working on and sort of putting the finishing touches on is what is the escalation process going to look like when problems or challenges are encountered so that it's manageable and systemic problems can be addressed systemically instead of handling common problems one by one, we're able to kind of handle them in bunches.

Okay, I might have some more questions, but there's two other committee members and the chair hasn't had a chance to circle back, so I'll be quiet for now. Thank you.

That's right. Will there be an open Teams chat, kind of like a bat phone, not the bat phone to the mayor's office, but a helpline bat phone that users, managers can immediately get an answer back? I've been through some implementations in my tenure in the past, and there's always been an open Teams chat where someone is monitoring during work hours every workday just because questions pop up quickly and you want a quick answer and not have to send an email and wait for a reply.

So there'll be a number of resources and that's part of the go-live plan which is in development. We'll have, there's a help tool within Workday which to avoid one person answering just phone calls and getting the same question 100 times, We'll have a help process in Workday that can hopefully bulk address concerns when people enter it. ITMD certainly will use our help desk tools to help with that as well, whether it's our phone line, online service requests, to help triage some of those calls. There will be resources from Workday, Hypercare, and Accenture AMS, Accenture Managed Services, so that they are available for those tier two or tier three calls. So there will be a tiered response for common questions and then more complicated questions to address that. An open teams call or chat might be part of that. And that's in development.

And then last one from me is what is our ultimate final go, no go strategy? Decision date. Will we know December 1st if this is going to happen? Will we know December 19th?

The go-no-go decision will be November 23rd. That's when workday requires a move to production authorization form. And so the committee signs off on that. 11-23? Yes. Okay.

All right. Thank you very much. I believe Alderwoman Dimitrievich wanted to jump in, although I can't see which little box.

No, no, no. I'm okay. I just said I would unmute if I needed to. Thank you.

All right. Thank you. Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Alderwoman Dimitrievich. Alderwoman Moore. Thank you so much. I think one of the final questions that I have is just regarding staffing, seeing now that we're on a really, really rigid timeline with staff. again doing their day job and having to fulfill these sort of benchmarks by the November 23rd timeline. Will there be any shifts or how do you all plan on addressing that because obviously You know, some of the day job functions has to be done, but to not, you know, to as best as possible not extend this again, there are some, you know, strict things that needs to be done in that time. How do you all look to address that? Sure.

Well, I mean, what I can say is that the pedal has been to the floor for some time already. and knowing that as we get closer to go-live, the demands and the needs are going to increase. That's why we're looking at and planning on bringing on additional consultants to help us troubleshoot in certain areas, whether it's in taking some of the day-to-day work, taking the operational load off of our critical project staff, or whether it's directly addressing some of those problems that arise in the system, whether it's before Go Live or after Go Live. So supplementing with additional resources, making sure that there's really robust processes in place for, like David had mentioned with the, it's called, Workday cases where essentially you're filling out a ticket and those tickets can be analyzed for systemic problems. I think that'll be Something that makes efficient use of the time of our subject matter experts that are gonna be troubleshooting They'll be able to like I said solve systemic problems Systemically as opposed to being on the phone for 20 minutes with somebody to solve one issue and then solve the same issue with somebody else for 20 minutes they'll be able to address these kind of in in groups or in batches and and I think we've we've got you know an excellent dedicated motivated project team that's working on this we've asked the world of them and they have they've delivered and I think they're dedicated to the project, to the city, and they wanna see this through as much as any of us. And I think you'll see even in the report that John prepared, I mean, there's, it's, you know, there's a lot of praise for the efforts of city staff so far. I mean, they're being asked to do a lot, and as I said, they're delivering. So I'm confident that what we have in place is sufficient to address those sort of known concerns that are out there.

Yeah, and please let me add my praise and respect to the staff as well for going above and beyond, but just stepping up because I know this is something that is not easy when you're doing such a, this is such a huge project and having to, you know, continue with their sort of day-to-day operations and on top of that, you know, do all the duties to make this project move forward. So just definitely kudos to the staff. We appreciate and are grateful.

Thank you. There will be some well-deserved vacations by many when this is all over with.

Yeah, for sure. Thank you. After everything is done.

Thank you very much. Any other questions on the report?

Mr. Chair, I guess just on that. So are the employees involved salaried? Are they being paid overtime for this? Are they accruing additional vacation? Like what is the light at the end of the tunnel for them other than surviving?

So staff that have been heavily involved with the project, what we're calling our leads, have been earning a 10% stipend in addition to their regular wages, and that's gonna continue for some, if not most, through the duration of the project up to go live, at which point it'll just become the normal course of business and that stipend for the additional work will go away.

That stipend is insensitive to the fluctuation in hours, though, so if you work an 80-hour week, you get 10%. If you work a 60-hour week, you get 10%.

Correct, yeah. I mean, I can't speak for all departments, but most folks that I'm aware of are salaried and are not overtime earning.

I would note, if I may, that one of the concerns we have in December, and we are looking at this as an executive committee, is there are people that have been that involved, that have built up a vacation bank, haven't taken, avoided vacations, may be asked to work over the holidays if they exceed their bank. Is that fair? Is that appropriate? Can we somehow extend that so that they aren't penalized for the work they're doing? So there's a lot of that. I don't have an answer for that yet or what might come of that. But those are the sort of considerations that are definitely top of mind for us as we continue.

So if it is go live on the 20th, then you don't want them disappearing on the 21st, I'm assuming? You want them there, or it's just...

Yeah, I mean, as an executive committee, we've identified a couple of sort of vacation blackout periods in which, you know, if folks were to take vacation, it would jeopardize the project. And it's going to be very selective, strategic. We're going to be very particular about those vacation blackout periods. But yes, I mean, to your point, we can't have folks that are critical to go live taking off the, you know, those two, three-day work weeks. That would just be, that would have a really, really bad impact on the project.

Okay, so those folks will be mandated to hang around if they want to keep their jobs, I guess? Because otherwise, I would think... So really, there's going to be no holiday... like the rest of the city gets for those folks they'll be asked to not only slog through um that far in the year but to basically put on hold holiday plans well i mean the the days off that uh our holidays would right wouldn't take those but if you wanted to go somewhere or do something go on vacation um that wouldn't be available till january you're saying for folks

It depends on the position and the responsibility. As Bill had mentioned, that's very strategically targeted. Based on these milestones are important to different people. For instance, the data cut on September 17th, ITMD is heavily involved with that, so that's one place where a limited number of staff in ITMD, we've already communicated not being on vacation that week. It's a little easier because it's not the holiday, but I guess it's an example of it depends on different critical resources at different points in the project.

Okay, and I hope DER is keeping an eye on these employees as well. And I know we had the report, we have many technical details in that, but given that we're so reliant on a few brave folks um it sounds like disaster if if something happens um and one concerned about their own um mental and well being but two the project can't go forward without them so

And Alderman Spiker, if I may, I would just add that for at least some of these folks, due to their year-end responsibilities, even if we weren't going live with a new ERP system, they would most likely be working all of those three-day, those two three-day weeks during the holidays anyways. So for at least some folks, it'll be almost business as usual around the holidays.

Okay, all right, thanks.

All right, Alderwoman, or last call for questions on the report. Alderwoman Dimitrievich moves to place item one on file, hearing no objections, so ordered. And now we're wrapping up item number two that we already read in. Alderwoman Moore moves to substitute the file with sub A, which was handed out, thank you very much, which was handed out and uploaded to Ledger Star yesterday. That sub is my sub. The only substantive difference is that it requires the comptroller to ask a few questions and some of them are quite obvious to us, but for the viewing public, $4.8 million sounds like a lot of money. And why can't the city find that in the couch cushions somewhere else and reallocate those funds? Or what about a hiring freeze or a spending freeze to make up the $4.8 million before the end of the year? It's a lot of money. So this substitute changes the language that we'll borrow up to $4.8 million if it's needed, because we've gotten some assurances that that's the ceiling that we'll need for this second extension of the project. But Comptroller, can you answer some of these questions now? Why do we have to go into additional borrowing for this project? Why can't we shake out the pockets or dig in the couch cushions?

This is the first time that I'm laying eyes on this, so just bear with me as I kind of read through. So confirming that this file or this substitute does give full authority for up to 4.8 million and then it directs me to identify opportunities to find additional funding that would bring that amount of borrowing down. Correct. Okay. So just off the top of my head, one, Challenge might be that even if savings are identified in some departments, they might not be in the right places. So, you know, we're not allowed by state statute to transfer from one department to another. in a handful of niche cases, some opportunities for departmental savings to be applied to project expenses that happen to fall within that department. But I think that's gonna be more the exception than the rule. But what I can certainly do is sort of look comprehensively across the city at what our options are. And see where there might be opportunity to bring this down.

Mr. Chair?

Alderman Spiker.

So you haven't had a chance to review this thoroughly and see whether you would support it? My first time seeing it. Okay.

We've had discussions with the budget office.

Yeah, well, you can't advocate from the chair, so if you're going to pass the gavel, then we can discuss it, but I'm uncomfortable supporting something the comptroller hasn't even looked at, much less, unless it's just adding reporting requirements. And the thing you mentioned was substantive. Mr. Christensen, I guess, about whether we could do it. So maybe it's best to pass the original, and then if the comptroller says this is all fine and dandy, then on Friday we can amend it. Unless, I mean, I haven't had a chance to detail what the big differences are, and I hadn't even thought of the thing you just mentioned, so.

I mean, whether directed or not, I mean, via resolution, I can certainly... do the due diligence in the interest of taxpayers and avoiding more borrowing than necessary and see what the options may be, I guess, either way. I mean, is there a timeline associated with this? Okay. Okay, well, I mean, it's your call on what to pass.

The changes between the original and Sub A are purely reporting and fact finding.

So what was the concern you had then about whether we would be able to transfer over

Well, so an example being, let's just say we were able to identify savings that might be available at year end in DPW. With this project, the Workday project being housed in ITMD, we can't just make a fund transfer from DPW to ITMD's capital account. That's not allowed by state statute.

I thought this was focused just on DOA, though?

Or was it? There's a few different, I think. I'm just, in fairness, Nick Kovac, Budget and Management Division, I did talk to the chair about this days or weeks, I can't remember, a couple weeks ago, and I did relay some of that conversation to the comptroller that these kinds of questions were being asked, and I'm certainly prepared to give answers similar to what you heard from Bill on the merits of the questions, but my reading of this which I think this did get placed yesterday, Chris, in the file, late yesterday. I'm reading it this morning, not for the first time, but probably for the first time with great care right now. And it says the comptroller is directed to transfer available operating funds to reduce the amount of borrowing needed. And I think that's sort of the timing and the state law. issues that the Comptroller mentioned would apply to that. It further directs the Comptroller to determine if a hiring freeze would generate operational savings. I think there'd be similar timing and state law issues with that, but we can discuss it if the committee would like what implications of that. And then there's a third one that says directly determine if, no, the third one just summarizes the first two. No, I'm sorry, I went in the wrong, those were the second and the third. The original effective resolved was existing capital funding authorizations in DOA. Now that would not have the state law issue, but there was the issue of most of that money is already being spent on contracts and there's not enough of it. David can speak to that. But again, that's, oh yeah, that directs David, yeah.

I apologize. I was under the impression that I was to look citywide at every city department. If it's narrowly focused on DOA, I think that's, you know, makes the task a lot simpler.

Yeah, well, yeah. And I can speak maybe to the... Director Kobach, are you saying, I mean, I would like to understand something before I vote for it, but you're saying that based on your understanding, none of the resolved clause set us afoul of...

Well, the resolve clause directs either DOA or ITMD director or DOA director or the comptroller to investigate. So I'm not overly concerned because, as the comptroller said, I mean, these are things we should be looking at anyway.

So whether you decide to formalize it in your resolution is entirely— Yeah, we're just telling you to do things, but we're not telling you you must do something that is illegal or impossible or something like that. Oh, right. I'd rather not tell you to do that.

Right, yeah, no, I guess now that I've had a chance to hear it explained and to read it again, I think it's probably more, that concern that I had raised is probably not there anymore.

Okay. So in terms of the timing and the amounts, I think the Chair had earlier mentioned 1.5 was the amount needed from June to September. That was the amount of carryover that we did use from last year, from 25. We used about 1.5 in carryover, but that wasn't the full expense of the June to September. We had a little bit left in the original borrowing, which was a multi-year borrowing, which this council has reviewed in the last three budgets, I think, of over $25 million for the overall project. So there was about a million or so of room, contingency, in the original borrowing authorization, plus there was room in DOA from 25. to fund so we did shake the couch cushions before that's kind of the point i'm making to get the reason we got from june to september without asking to borrow more money was because we already shook them loose and and there's a timing issue here where if there's money in 26 to shake loose we won't really know until we're closing the books in 27 and we got to pay most of these bills in 26. so a lot of it's a timing issue so what's the difference between sub a and the original then

Which are the resolved clauses that have been added?

Yep, the resolved clauses directing the comptroller to investigate alternatives.

Well, one says further resolve that existing capital funding authorizations in the Department of Administration that are available at the end of 26 shall be reallocated. So that doesn't sound like much of a choice, right?

Yeah, that is of concern to me because we do capital funding over a multi-year period. So I don't know what available means that are available because, for instance, we've funded server upgrades over multiple years for capital expenses. So does that mean that any funding we've pre-allocated in this budget to be implemented in 2027 goes away and whether we've committed to a contract which may be the case or That we intend to commit to the contract should funding be allocated in the 2027 budget That that would be that would be a concern Okay

is that one isn't just a reporting when it's basically saying if you have extra cash in deal a transferred over here how do you define extra cash out yet i think that one now that i'm looking at it closer ultimate spiker would be the one the one that would be the most concern because it's it's unclear if that triggers something automatic and when it's triggered exactly because capital authorizations they don't expire at the end of the year the way operating authorizations do they don't need to be carried over so i

in order to actually implement that shell i think we'd need a little more detail and i think we'd want to tell you what your options were you probably would want to know what what you were giving up before you directed us to do something surely um so is this then something you need more time with it's not something you can do by friday or can you work it out with the sponsor and then send us the all clear by then is that too aggressive of a timeline I mean, we can take it up in September too.

You mean to sort of amend the substitute by Friday? Yeah. Okay, yeah. Okay, not do the full analysis. Okay. Well, yeah, I think that should be fine.

Okay.

all right do you have a motion old inspector yeah i'd move now should we uh do we have any other discussion on the sub yeah i'd vote against amending it now and just ask the sponsor to hold off until all right and amend it before the council so we can make sure doa isn't doing something or that they maybe shouldn't do so uh alderman specker what's your motion I'm asking you to withdraw your amendment, but if you don't want it, then I'll move to shoot it down.

That's fine. I'll withdraw my amendment, or I'll withdraw my substitute, and then the original is before us on the spiker.

I think you guys found a very clever way for this to pass without any, no, I'm just kidding. You got back to the original sub now, it's even not even controversial. So this is just the 4.8. This is just the 4.8 of contingent borrowing to cover the cost of the extension to go to December. And then if we are out one more quarter because November 23rd comes and we don't hit those go no go things, how much extra money are we talking for an extra quarter?

Well, the ballpark on the June September extension was probably was about two and a half million. And. the it is higher for this one partly because we are you know we're generals learning from the last battle that didn't go so well right we didn't we did we wanted to be aggressive with making sure we brought in consultants to get us over the finish line to avoid to avoid having well i'm willing to answer the question but to avoid having to actually do the additional borrowing for an additional quarter so but i mean in round numbers it's a million a month and you have to do it in three month intervals it was two and a half million from june to december we're now saying four eight here but frankly the four eight has we built in some contingency to that too that's why it's an up to amount we're hoping it's not as much as four eight we're hoping it's under four uh... so in round numbers that's that's a little more than a million a month for this for the uh... the q four of this year so how much it would be to go to not start till after q one of next year i would ballpark a million a month keeping in mind that there's other you know there's other factors we'd want to consider as we did more analysis three million plus yeah because you're paying you're paying yeah three million plus i think is is okay is is fair thanks then i make the motion to recommend approval of the resolution

Alderman Spiker moves adoption of item number two. Any objections to that motion? Hearing none, any objections? Hearing none, so ordered. Thank you all very much. Moving on to our SWIFT number three, file 260336, communication relating to an audit of municipal court cash controls. Welcome back, Administrator Norfolk.

Thank you.

Good morning. And from Comptroller's office.

Yes, Adriana Molina, Audit Manager here at the City. We will be presenting the audit of Municipal Court Cash Control's results. First, thank you for the Municipal Court and their team for assisting us for this audit. We'll just move right along a scope included a review of the controls for collection recording safeguarding deposits of cash checks money orders and other electronic payments from January 1st 2025 through September 30th 2025 and the objective was to review those controls around those processes to Ensure and evaluate adequacy and effectiveness of that control environment. I Our procedures included similar to other audits interviews walkthroughs review of documents which included also on-site visits also observing counts of teller drawers Reviewing transactions of various deposits going into municipal court and then assessing how those controls are We're being completed Overall conclusion we did find that controls internal controls of our municipal core operations were well designed and implement implemented Effectively, however, we didn't know two areas of improvement that I will let Zack Go over the first finding and then Colleen or other otter go for the next one. I

Good morning, this is Zach Rilling of Associated Auditor with the Comptroller's Office. Our first finding was that the Municipal Court's written policies and procedures were slightly outdated and did not reflect the current procedures. This included referencing programs which were outdated and stopped being supported by their vendor back in 2022. There were even inclusions of payment methods that were no longer accepted and some payment methods that are missing that are now accepted. And then the position titles that are referenced in the policies do not align with current staff position titles. Our recommendation for that is fairly simple, just update the policies. Excellent. And then finding number two, of the eight cash deposits that we reviewed, the municipal court remitted deposits to the treasurer's office on a semi-weekly basis rather than daily as required by the ordinance. In addition, the process for the deposit preparation and the transfer of custody was not formally documented. Four of the eight deposits reviewed did not include clear evidence of custody transfer to the treasurer's office. Our recommendation on this one is for management to establish and implement a deposit process that complies with the timeliness requirements of the ordinance and also develop procedures for deposit preparation, custody transfer, and retention of transfer evidence. Excellent.

Any questions from committee members?

Mr. Chair?

Sure, Alderman Spiker.

How easy will it be to implement that second recommendation to make everything consistent with the ordinance which requires daily transfers?

Good morning, Chief Court Administrator of the Municipal Court, T. Norfolk. We are reliant on the police department to transport the cash. And they have conveyed to us that their staffing only allows for them to come twice a week rather than daily.

But they're in the same building.

They are.

OK. OK. Well, we'll see if, I mean, The ordinance is written a certain way, I suppose for a certain reason, which I wasn't there when it was written, but is there any problem with it being twice a week versus what the ordinance requires, which is daily?

No, it does reference state statute, but state statute only requires once every 30 days.

Oh, okay. I suspect that a lot of people used to pay their court fines and cash previously and a lot more frequently than they do today. Is there a concern that the daily cash drop is inadequate? Is there so much cash sitting in the safe at the court administration building that we need to ensure that NPD shows up every day or do we need to change the ordinance to reflect what's practical and real right now?

I think that that would be reasonable to change the ordinance to reflect what's practical and real. I think that once upon a time when that ordinance was drafted, there was a lot more cash going through the building than there is now. Originally, Earlier this year, MPD had actually said they wanted to stop transporting our cash altogether and that we would have to contract out for that service. And in running the finances for that, it was impractical to actually pay a company to transport such a small amount of cash. Plus, that's a budget decision that is beyond any one officer to decide for the court.

And Chairman, just to put some numbers to it, the total average deposit for all deposits in the period including the electronic transfers and the cash was $17,000 a day roughly. But that's including a significant portion of that being electronic, so for cash I'd say we're talking like,

About 1,500 a day during a good morning committee. My name is Nidhusha Yain Jackson. I am the court financial manager. I run the accounting department. To answer the question, roughly about 1,500 a day during busy season, which would be the first quarter of the year, we might run into roughly $10,000 in cash on a weekly basis. During slowed months, we're looking at about a maximum of 8,000. And then during extremely slow months, which is the last quarter of the year, we're looking at maybe 300 to 1,500 for that week.

Okay. All right. It looks like we have some work to do with changing ordinances in the future. Any other comments or discussion, questions?

I guess for Director Todd, who's sitting in the audience, if MPD thinks an ordinance is dumb and they don't want to follow it, they should tell us instead of just disobeying it. That would be...

may be more appropriate so if you could convey that message i will as well thanks sounds good alderman spiker then moves to place this auto report on file thank you all hearing no objections so ordered thank you all very much thank you Moving on to item number four. Oh, another one of mine. File 252089, communication from the Department of Public Works and the comptroller relating to a historical accounting of payouts from the disposal of the material recycling facility and segregation of final insurance payout from a negotiated depreciation settlement sponsored by myself. This really is just asking for a rundown on the numbers, on how we disposed of the MRF, Disposed of the MRF, no, okay. But this is, I think, also important for Public Works to hear because of the planned implementation or placement of these funds in the future.

Good morning, Mr. Chair, committee members, Chuck Schumacher, Operations Administration Manager for the Department of Public Works. For some quick context, this was a file that was held from the last FMP at which the committee asked us to provide a written report that outlines the payments and where the money from the MRF payout, insurance payout has gone to. You'll note that that report is in your files and if you'd like, I would just go through that very quickly and give you some highlights. A quick reminder for the committee that the MRF insurance payout was due to a fire that occurred on May 31st of 2023, which resulted in the total loss of equipment and significant facility damage. The total insurance payout that we received was $20.9 million. $5.7 million of that was due to Waukesha County. That means that the city's portion of that $20 million payout was $15 million. Of that $15 million, 3.3 million of it was covered expenses that we incurred relative to increased costs for hauling and disposal. That leaves $11.7 million as a balance that the city holds in capital accounts. With that said, that's my high level overview. If the committee has questions, I'd be happy to answer anything that, again. Thank you very much.

Commissioner, anything to add?

No, just here for any questions.

And then the funds are being held in anticipation of a future need?

Yeah, so Joe Croce, Commissioner of Public Works. Good morning, committee members. Mr. Chair, so when the decision was made about a year ago, we've had multiple meetings on this topic. We did a feasibility study to see, first of all, could we rebuild the MRF in its same location in our partnership with Waukesha County? Per that feasibility study, the return on investment for both Waukesha County and the city was not what it was when we first got the deal together a long time ago. So at that time, We decided to sever and terminate the contract tying us and Waukesha County together and decided to pivot in a new fashion. So there's 11.7 there. And so what me and my staff did is try to evaluate what sort of opportunities there were to reinvest these dollars into a building in the city of Milwaukee. And so if the public doesn't know, we have a municipal services building that is located at Canal. There's an extreme disrepair. And so... the opportunity here was to say okay is there potential parcels out there that we could rebuild a municipal services building get some efficiencies and also provide a you know ada compliant code compliant building for our dpw workers and so time set for a while there was a property that came became available at 3282 about a year ago we had come to this committee and asked to purchase the particular parcel to relocate our folks over to this and rebuild a new municipal services building. Just for context, 3282 is just south of Townsend. We have our DPW headquarters, which is at basically just south of 35th and Capitol, or just south of Capitol on 35th Street, so there's some efficiencies we could have there. So we started to move forward, and the goal here is to use this sort of dollars, which is 11.7, towards rebuilding a new municipal services building, opening up an economic development property in the valley, and also provide some efficiencies. There will be requests coming in the 27. I think we talked about this last year. We tried to put a $4 million request in the 26 budget, which things changed based on some changes. But in the future, we're going to continue to ask for money to basically build out a new municipal services building.

And then the development of opportunity in the valley, is there an estimate on the value of that property?

Yeah, there is an estimated value. Obviously we can talk about that. I don't want to disclose that in public just because we could get more or less depending on.

It would be more than a dollar.

It is more than a dollar, yes.

Any questions on the report? Thank you very much, much appreciated. Alderwoman Coggs has joined us and she'll move to refer this to the Public Works Committee. Hearing no objections, so ordered. Thank you all very much. Item number five, file 260508, communication from the Department of Employee Relations and the Fire and Police Commission relating to policies and procedures in place to protect employees in the event of air quality incidents. Welcome Director Carter. Good morning. And Director of TOT.

uh... spot this is sponsored by alderman broward alderman yeah thank you so much mister chair and thank you so much the committee for hearing this thanks to everybody from and jackie and and todd and and everybody who's who's come on out uh... to talk through this i wanted to just have a public conversation about this um... really appreciate it are of my brothers and sisters in ask me locals thirty three forty six and for twenty six um... have uh... did came together a few days ago during the um air quality incidents that we had where the canadian wildfire smokes uh came into milwaukee and they put out a statement our union brothers and sisters put out a statement um just calling on the city to do calling the city as one of the city's largest employers to do better by its employees so that we can um offer consistent um policies and more PPE for our employees. So I wanted to talk through that. I wanted to talk through the different departments' responses to that and hopefully have this be the start of a conversation where we can have the city be the best employer it can possibly be and honor the concerns of the union. So that's why we put this file in. In the file you guys will notice there is the original statement and press release from AFSCME. uh from the different locals and that was signed by uh venetia uh young blood campbell the president of local 33 which is dpw ian gunther the president of local 47 which is dns and waterworks um and phyllis whitley who is the president of 426 which is library in some of our departments here at city hall um so there's that letter and i do really also appreciate uh der also put in a memo on air quality responses as well which is also in the file here before us um but i guess you know i would like to you know just hear broadly from the departments that are present here you know what some of their responses were um and then we can maybe go into some specifics about what exactly you know happened um here and some of the concerns brought by the union um but most of all i just really appreciate everybody being here and i really appreciate us starting a conversation so that we can be the best employer we can possibly be. We obviously have, you know, financial constraints to make these the best jobs they can be. But I mean, overall, I think, you know, dealing, having proper plans in place and, you know, things that can address situations, even unknown situations can be the, you know, way that we can, you know, make the commitment to our employees that they're going to be respected on the job. So I really appreciate it, Mr. Chair, and I really appreciate this being scheduled today.

All right, well, good morning. Jackie Q. Carter, Department of Employee Relations. I'll just kind of point to the memo. We gave a little bit of background on the severe weather policy we have, and admittedly, when we think about severe weather, we're thinking usually like snow, floods, rain, those kinds of things. How do we respond? We do not specifically point out air quality. However, there is a portion of our severe weather policy that talks about any unforeseen acts of nature, right? So in this case, the wind blowing something that we didn't expect. The policy really leaves the, unless there's a reason to shut down, we have a, practice of kind of meeting, talking about what the concerns are, coming up with a plan, and the plan for those two days was to allow department heads to use their discretion to make sure that operations were covered but employees were also safe. And so in most cases, there's also from three of the larger departments that have field employees, they kind of submitted what their approach was for those days. In most cases, staff were either sent home or assigned to do work indoors. And so in many of them, There was a very minimal staff in case of emergency that were asked to stay on. I know there was one instance where the building where staff were working, there was some smoke. The building itself felt like the quality in the building was not great. And so those folks either went home or were assigned to another work location. So those are just some of the responses or some of the plans that were put in place on those days. leave for Director Todd to speak as well.

Yes, good morning. Lee Todd, FPC Executive Director. Good morning. With regard to the police and fire departments, obviously they're a little bit different. They're sworn personnel. They can't send them home. They can't just stay in the office. They do have to send them out for emergency services and the like. The departments did notify their members of the health department's advisory on air quality. They recommended that they wear masks. They limited unnecessary activities like outdoor trainings things of that nature i know mpd does have an exception to the mask prohibition in its policies for for this type of incident like severe weather i think it's hazardous material or something like that but the members were encouraged to wear masks for their necessary duties

In the common council office suite next to the mail room there's a filing cabinet in the bottom drawer had some leftover COVID era N95 masks. But do departments as a matter of practice maintain an inventory of N95 masks?

So we didn't do a kind of a poll to see, but that was typically what most departments did. So we didn't go and ask, but so we happened on that Thursday morning to have a meeting where most department heads were present. And so that was the advice to give people masks. So most departments made those available. Now we did not track to see how that was rolled out, but that was absolutely part of the protocol.

And I know the fire department does. I'm not 100% about police department. I do want to have further discussions with them on that.

Sorry. Alderman Brower, any follow-ups?

Yeah. I was also wondering about PPE being available. One of my larger questions I have here is when we have these policies in place, how are those policies, and maybe this is a broader question here, but how are those policies promulgated? What process do those go through? Do those reach the common council floor in any way, or are these policies just something that's done at an administrative level? Because I think overall, I think it would be good for us to have a collaborative public discussion that includes members of the public the members the council and And the Union to have the policies that meet the needs so I guess in a broader question How are these policies like the severe weather policy? created and approved

So the severe weather policy is what guided all of the decisions. That is approved at the council level. So this has been in effect. It was issued 2020, revised in 2024. So you all have seen this. It's been before the appropriate bodies.

And what would those appropriate bodies be?

For this one, it would be finance and personnel committee and then the full council.

So policies do go through the council process. Okay, I just want to be glad to know if that was like an administrative fully thing, like an administrative rule, or if it was something that's adopted.

No, when you get into work rules, that's where it's more administrative, and then those don't come to the body. But citywide policies, the council sees those.

And welcome to the table, Commissioner Krushke. It looks like you want to add something.

This is something I'm very, again, Joe Krushke, Commissioner of Public Works, this is something I'm very familiar with, because when we talk about weather emergencies, there's a coordination, and a lot of this is, I think, as Director Carter has said, is A lot of it comes down to snow and ice or flood issues that we deal with in the Midwest all the time. Air quality is something that's a little off. What happens in any sort of weather emergency, the Health Commissioner and the Department of Public Works has a conversation on what is the health and safety of the public and also what is from our employees as well. So a little context, and if we're looking for details, I had a conversation on a Thursday morning with the health commissioner at 6.30 in the morning. Obviously, I was coming into work. I come here earlier than most people. Had seen that the air quality was down, had a conversation. In past practice, I think this happened in 2023, where the air quality got up around 260. The threshold was set usually about 300, where it becomes really hazardous. I think we've all seen that where it gets called a purple range when you're looking at air quality index. I'm not a health professional by any means, but that was kind of the threshold that was set for protection of our employees. And so at that time, in 2023, it was like, OK, wear masks. This time, it was about 425, I think, at 630 in the morning. Our folks had already been in, because some of our folks worked second shift, third shift, first shift. I went with the middle management from DPW. Pulled everyone in to make sure they weren't exerting themselves by any means and by about 830 in the morning We basically sent everyone home at before 9 o'clock on that Thursday and so some of the questions come up think well Why didn't you keep folks home on Friday? And so this comes into a weather prediction and so I We were looking at air quality and how the wind was going to move. The suggested air quality was supposed to improve by 9 a.m. on Friday, just like you would see a snowstorm go away by a particular time. So we had folks come in. We did not dispatch them out to the field. We kept them in-house. We had a meeting at 5.30 in the morning on that Friday morning, determined that, hey, we're trending in the right direction. By about 7.30 in the morning, 8 o'clock, the trends did not come back where we thought they were. Just like weather patterns, winds did not shift. We made the call again to send folks home. Because if it was under 300, we had masks for folks to send them in the field, but be properly secured. We did keep staff on both days. If there are water main breaks, et cetera, we have to address those. We can't have water running forever. three days straight without addressing those. We do have N95 masks that were in each one of our units. I know the health department and fire department, we were in a communication because people had extras. We could pick them up from the health department if needed. These are unusual situations. This is the first time that we have broke 300. It happened to be twice. I know there was one time it got around 300, I think in 1987. and that was the borderline, but it was an unusual situation. I mean, I don't think there's another municipality in the state that basically sent their folks home. I think we were probably the only one. I mean, we take our employees' safety very seriously. We do wanna work with council and others to see how we can continue to make our folks safe. I mean, our folks are exerting themselves, high stress jobs, moving garbage, recycling, et cetera, and so that's why we sent them home. Right or wrong, I do not regret sending them home for that day. Our folks did end up starting on Monday, working overtime, which is unfortunate, to basically catch up to get us back in cycle from a garbage recycling perspective.

Thank you so much, Commissioner. I really appreciate it, Mr. Chair, if I may. I wanted to go to some of the specifics that were brought to our attention from the statement from the union in the file here. I know that there is political will, and I would generally agree with it, that we should have people come into work rather than working from home, but what's Can you explain more, Director Carter, about the leeway that either individual departments have? Because on the second page of the statement, one of the things that was brought up was that there are workers, one of the claims made by the union was that there are workers who are capable of working from home who were still asked to come in to work that day. And I want to just explore with you what either discretion or not that we allow the department heads to engage in with that and what would be the pros and cons of that. Because I would imagine if we have this kind of situation and we have individuals who can work from home either because they have the equipment or their job is fully online or could be done fully online by emailing and writing and that sort of thing, which I know is not every one of our employees here in the city. What kind of leeway do departments have on that?

So let me first say we don't play politics with employee health. If there is a need for employees to be home, nobody's counting how many days they were already home in the week and things like that. That's not what's happening. Employees were advised that if they felt that it was unsafe for them or they had issues, any indication that their health was going to be impacted, that they should reach out to their supervisor or manager or whoever and make arrangements. So that is an option. But we don't want to just say, well, everybody stay home. Because some people were fine. Some people were able to work. As a person who is impacted in one of those special groups, I was aware, but I was okay, right? And so... The direction was given employees, let your supervisor know, and then managers and supervisors were told to be flexible and allow people the option so that they can take care of themselves. That's always going to be the priority.

Was that given out in a written communication anyway? Because what I'm hearing from folks in the union and on the ground is that it was up to either individual supervisors or I know that in DNS, what I've been told is that there's, and I know DNS isn't here, so I'm not expecting you guys to answer for DNS, but that there is some new quota levels as far as number of stops per day, that sort of thing for the on the ground workers as far as like inspectors and that sort of thing. And so like what, I mean, it just seems like there was a lot of individual discretion down to almost the immediate supervisor level. And so I'm wondering if that communication, what you're saying here at the table, how that was delivered to supervisors or department heads so that that could translate into something that the workers actually heard and were able to even... So if an individual supervisor disagreed with maybe what you're saying or disagreed that... workers should be home or not, how they were communicated that message.

And we do have DNS on the board. Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't see that. Did you want a response from DNS?

I guess as a part of this, but also I think Director Carter was good.

Well, the point I'll make, and then I'll hand it to the departments, is in the meeting we had that morning, again, that first day where the air quality was bad, department heads were, we all got the same instruction that if folks need to go home, they should be allowed. If there are field folks who are out, do your best to keep them inside. We knew about the emergency parts. But I know Commissioner Kruski had something he wanted to add.

Yeah, so obviously the Department of Public Works the private largest department that has folks here So one of the things we had taken to evaluations We've the field folks were priority one the rest of the folks that were already at work at that time We're talking about when we decided to cut the field folks up It's nine o'clock in the morning the buildings that we do have have ventilation systems in so that was part of the reasoning so the air quality was safe if we did have a building that we felt it was unsafe and We got ahold of the health department to do an air quality test in those buildings like you had heard from DNS and I won't talk for them. They had shut down a building just because of the air quality because we do have really old buildings. We did an air quality test at the municipal services building as well. But within the internal units, we made sure, I will be straightforward with you. If folks go home, that doesn't mean the air quality is better than when they're at work. We have a lot of folks that work for us that probably don't even have air conditioning. So to send someone home doesn't mean that makes them safer by any means. So having them at work, although if folks did not feel well by any means, we'd allow them to go home without any recourse. there was no point to put them back out in the air when they were already here and then the next day as well i mean we have great ventilation systems in the city hall complex although thursday you could smell some of the fire but the air quality was still fine in the internal building so that's why we did not send those folks home thank you deputy uh commissioner ms manion welcome yes can you hear me yes

Hi, Mike Bezmeny, Deputy Commissioner for Neighborhood Services. Kind of echoing Commissioner Kruschke's comments and the position that was taken, we immediately decided to suspend field operations for both days. The air quality at our Lake Tower facility was not good, so we did shut down that building. We had Health Department come in and test and it was shut down for a second day. Staff were given the option to work remote if they were capable. Some staff that could not work remote were relocated to. The building to perform their duties there. Any staff that came forward that express concerns about. The condition of the air in the facilities that they were working in, or just didn't feel comfortable were allowed to go home. So. No, 1 was forced to work if they were experiencing difficulty or felt uncomfortable in the environment in which they were working.

Thank you. I appreciate that. Um, given some of the concerns brought by the union here, um, what's our plan? I mean, I think, I think obviously like, you know, we don't need to beat a dead horse here as far as dissecting all these things of the blow by blow of what happened on that day. But what's the plan going forward for communication and meet and confer with the union regarding on some of these things which we don't mean for being allowed under even under act ten mean confer is allowed with the union to discuss these things and potentially you know going to the democratic process to modify policies if necessary um... have we had some communication I mean, obviously, because this is, you know, this is hard to see, you know, right, when our workers' unions say this. And I know, and I'll just acknowledge, you know, and for the folks watching that we have been, you know, since Act 10, the era of the situation has been confusing and disjointed. I mean, obviously, I think it's worth saying here that we need Act 10 repealed so that we can have a collective bargaining agreement with all these unions that has as much detail as possible here. And so I think that would be an overall benefit in whether that's going to, you know, happen sooner or later. I'm not sure whether through the courts or through the legislative process to get that law repealed so we can have a proper collective bargaining agreement that details all of the wages, hours, and working conditions of our city's employees. But going forward, what's the, you know, from DER or other departments, and I would like to hear that because I believe that with each department having, you know, members of the union in it, having stewards, having, you know, these locals that are represented from departments, there is opportunities for meet and confer with management at all levels to go through what happened with this and potentially come up with plans going forward and to meet and confer about other issues as well.

So I'll go back to where we kind of started with air quality is not something we thought we need to plan for. We've learned different. We've already had a meeting with members of Ask Me from three of the locals that happened this week already. And Alderman, you also know, because we've had a meeting with representatives before.

Yeah.

There's no interest in having an adversarial relationship with any of those groups, so they're welcome to reach out to us. We don't have to play things out in the press. We can have conversations. So anybody who wants to have a conversation, who has ideas, we're open for that. we all want the best for employees we may not always agree on the road to get there or or what that looks like but we all want this to be a great workplace a safe workplace for employees and and i'll just repeat what i shared with them on monday no disrespect but if i have it my way we our environment our culture will be improved so much we don't need them um that's my goal right so totally I'm willing to work with them. They did come on Monday with some suggestions, some ideas. So we're waiting for some information from those folks that we met with this week to look at how we can maybe sharpen our policy. So when we review that, if there are changes that we want to recommend, that'll come back before the council.

No, I appreciate that. I mean, we might philosophically disagree. I mean, I think any sort of environment would need unions, you know, unless we have a, you know, fully actualized democratic economy where there's no, you know, power imbalance there. But I do hear you on that. I mean, I just, you know, I just worry, like, from what, you know, from DNS and from everybody here, you know, it... it doesn't seem like what the workers have said aligns with even, you know, some of the stuff that's being said here. I mean, I just want to get it, and I think I have that commitment, but I want to get, you know, commitments from the departments that, you know, going forward, we're going to have meet and confer and other processes so that these things don't happen.

So if I could just, final comment. If there are things that should be happening that are not happening, the Department of Employee Relations needs to know about that. And so they should be reaching out to us to let us know. And then we can look into those things and work with my colleagues so that we clean that up. Because if it's happening and it shouldn't be, it's because we don't know about it.

Okay. And for DNS, DPW here, are we committed to as robust as possible meet and confer process with the union to ameliorate concerns that they have?

Yeah, I think we discussed lots of topics with those, and most recently, you know, we've allowed a lot of their folks to come into our public space areas to have conversations with employees, so we've been constantly trying to build a relationship, and I think that's what I want to kind of put forward is we want a relationship, and we don't want to be adversarial to both sides. We want to work as a compromise from a city perspective and a union's perspective to make sure, A, I think we both have the same idea is to make sure our employees are safe, they're compensated well, so I think those conversations will continue.

That's great to hear.

I would just echo that from DNS's perspective. We've had good productive conversations with the union when we sat down with them. There seems to be a disconnect between the statements that came out with that press release and what actually happened during those days on the ground and how we put our employees safety paramount.

cool and the known i i appreciate that thank you and i i do want to acknowledge that that disconnect as well in the way that we can avoid you know that disconnect is is through robust conversation you know i think i'm hearing from you that you know we need to have you know that both the union and management need to initiate those conversations on so that we're you know on the same page here um... you know as a as a former public sector worker i you know it's It's so important that we have our on the ground workers being listened to and respected and that we come up with will come with compromise and an agreement, even if it's just through, you know, the meet and confer process, which is what's currently allowed under our statutes. and through the shaping of policies here. I'm totally open to my brothers and sisters who are public sector workers and are in these unions. If you guys have ideas for changes in policy, I'm totally open to putting those in and having that go through the legislative process with the with the con you know with conferring with management you know on those i just um i really appreciate this and i want to see um such a robust process that there's not um this sort of like disconnect between what our union what our unions are saying publicly is what's going on behind the scenes and um what our departments are saying in our department heads are claiming so happy to work with you clean that up yeah

okay thank you excellent thank you for that any um any other comments or questions from committee members i i do have a quick question mr chair um thank you um i think one of the questions that i have is was there um you all know how we received um like city what for all staff you know you you receive a city-wide email was something like that shared out to all employees, just talking about, just specifically talking about, and the reason why I asked is because I really didn't also understand sort of the magnitude of how bad it was. Obviously, we saw numbers about the air quality, but I didn't really understand the magnitude of it, and so I was sort of trying to piece things together, and yes, different departments may have sent different things, but I just I didn't feel necessarily equipped like, hey, if you go outside, make sure you wear an N95 mask or I just. Yeah. So those few days was just really foggy. Yeah. But yeah. So I just wanted to make sure I didn't miss anything.

No. And so. Good point. When there is a citywide decision, that goes out in mass. When there is discretion at the department level, that comes from the department directly. So you wouldn't have seen a citywide communication.

Makes sense. And I know this was sort of the first time I hope in the future, you know, I think it was just education that I was looking for to say, hey, this is happening. If you, you know, need support, you know, just on a citywide level, this is sort of the protocol or, you know, how to provide support. But it was just the education for me because I had no idea just how sort of dangerous it was for, you know, individual or just how bad the air quality was. Yeah.

And Commissioner Krush, you just reminded me, I think the Health Department sent something out in general. I don't think it was just to employees, it was to everybody, right? Anybody who signs up, so there was that.

Thank you, thank you all so much.

Well, and it's always important to recognize that the City of Milwaukee leads So other organizations, public, private, other municipalities look to see what we're doing before they make their own decisions. So I appreciate the early morning decision making from the city on this very hazy set of circumstances.

And Mr. Chair, really quick. So just on even on that point, you know, the mayor of Chicago literally came on, made like a public service announcement. And you know what I mean? So I was just like, oh, my gosh, like, oh, it's really, really bad. So because it just felt like there wasn't that urgency, you know, in our city, I was just like, oh, OK, the air is just bad, you know. So, again, lessons learned. And I'm hoping that we can, you know, move forward and just do better next time.

just to be clear that the mayor i and the health commissioner did go and did a press conference as well so they did a press conference give milwaukee credit too and i just yeah no that's good yeah i must have missed it thank you thank you for sharing that it was a hazy morning all right oh real quick um i did want to um get uh another maybe level of exploration or commitment from from the departments um and i know we're not you know made of money here but i do want to explore to some extent how we can be prepared with PPE going forward. So something like we have some of the city clerk's office, but like that's a very small department. I know that there was, I was told that there was some PPE available at DNS. I appreciate that. um so what can we do can we explore so that we at least have the option of considering like how much is it going to cost for us to have n95 or higher grade masks or some other sort of pp available to workers in the event of something like this happening again it very well could happen next summer if this or some other type of situation that we don't know about could occur and i mean you know god forbid there's another pandemic um that happens that happens to us i you know and we so i just want to see what we can do if i can get a commitment from departments to at least exploring you know that is an option um for the purchasing and we have the supply ready to go should something unexpected happen

Yeah, I mean, from the Department of Public Works, we did have a stock for all of our units. And I know we had a communication with the health department that also had masks available for pickup. So right away, if my staff didn't have them, we could have picked them up between a coordination between the fire department. But yes, I mean, when we talk about the next level, we're talking about full face respirators and things like that. Those were things a little more complicated because you're talking about an airtight fit. doesn't mean that we can't get those by any means but those are usually customized get expensive but we do want to protect our employees i mean from an n95 mass perspective i mean the department does have those and we'll have those as we kind of move forward and i do see uh a tight-fitting mask wearing department head on the board uh chief lipsky did you have something you wanted to add yeah i just want to add that uh in real time as this was occurring the

as mentioned the health department dpw a number of us were in close coordination uh with a back stock we instantly in the fire department throughout milwaukee county uh did a complete uh accounting for all back stock uh and that we have these for regular usage for for medical purposes uh it is important to note that n95s do have uh an end date they have an expiration date uh they're still functional past that point but In a litigious society, you might want to maintain the stock and keep them a little more current than COVID era. That costs money. I will also add that. We we began preparing for and we had several walk ups to fire stations of civilians asking for respiratory protection. I think that is another consideration. If this sort of thing can be expected to continue. I think it's a consideration we may want to undertake as a city to provide protection for civilians because they themselves aren't going to be able to, you know, even if they sell these at Walgreens, they'll be over running out of stock very quickly. That's just a suggestion. I know that's outside the scope of what we're talking about, but if we anticipate this continuum, we may want to have a contingency for that. Thank you.

Thank you, Chief Lipski. Anything else? All right. Well, thank you very much for the robust discussion. I think it's helpful for employees and the public alike. Alderwoman Dimitrievich will move to place this item on file. Hearing no objection, so ordered. Thank you. Thank you all so much. Our next item on the agenda, item number six, file 260259, substitute resolution authorizing the Department of Employee Relations to execute a contract for administration of the city's prescription drug benefits. Welcome, Director King.

Good morning, finance committee member. Just for the record, employee benefits director Molly King. Thank you for taking up this file this morning. I just wanted, our purpose here is just basically to provide you with the overview of our prescription drug contract, the RFP process and selection process. With me online here is our partners at Gallagher, Aaron, Casper, and Proshke is on the line here also. So if there are additional questions. So as you may recall, we did come before you before for authorization to execute the RFP process because our current contract is set to expire the end of this year, 2026. And as the committee knows, pharmacy costs continues to grow, so rather than just simply doing another extension, we decided to take this opportunity to conduct a full competitive RFP process to make sure that we're still getting the best value for the city and our members. So DER employee, DER alongside with our partners at Gallagher led this RFP process. We pulled together a team from various departments, from including the mayor's office, budget office, ER employee retirement systems, the former benefits director, we solicited his services to be a part of this evaluation and review panel. So it was just one department, we want a wide perspective. And the RFP process was done in a holistic manner, not just looking at cost, but overall perspective of everything else we want encompassing. We look at how strong these retail mail orders, specialty pharmacy networks are. so that members are not driving further away or have to wait longer to get their medication. We look at how they manage specialty drugs and high cost drugs, which is a lot of the pharmacy spend are heading that direction these days. We look at rebates, not just how big the rebates are, but how transparent the vendors are by passing through that back to the city. And we also took a hard look at the transition risk, because switching pharmacy managers can mean real disruption, both from a formulary standpoint and a network standpoint. And we want to ensure that our members are not, services are not being disrupted. It also could possibly mean new ID cards, two ID cards. It could mean more education, new pharmacy, restarting, a new prioritization has to restart all over again. So there are a lot of different factors we want to ensure, not just for the city, but our members that we serve, that all these areas are being considered. Also, we wanted to know that whoever we choose can deliver savings without putting employees through any kind of uphill. It was a big deal for us. And so after wearing all this, the conclusion was that we would stay with our UnitedHealthcare OptimaRx Carve-In program. And the reason why we decided to do this is because it was the strongest option, really. One of the biggest advantages of doing so is that keeping the pharmacy and medical benefits together allows us to have a better coordination of care. It helps identify care gaps. improve health outcomes and manage costs more effectively than if we had a carve out separated manager, created that two different hands, silos so to speak. And as a result of doing this negotiation, it was well worth the effort because as a result we were able to get a savings of over north of $800,000. So the proposed agreement also gives the city an important protection. What it did is two things, a couple of things. One, it includes a competitive pricing, rebate guarantees, a second year market check, and a flexibility to revisit the agreement if market conditions change. Because we know that's happening, right? We see there's a lot of things going on at the federal level. So one of the biggest component also that we consider part of this agreement was we know, again, the PBM, pharmacy benefits managers are transitioning, that whole world's being upheld at the federal level, and we want to ensure that as the federal government and more transparency requirements are expected from these pharmacy managers, that whoever we chose can pivot and evolve quickly. And we know that currently UnitedHealthcare's already on that path of providing us with pass-through pricing model versus spread pricing model. And so because of their ability, they're so big, they're able to adapt to the industry as it evolves much quicker than any smaller participants would be able to. For those factors, we decided that this is the best direction at this time for us to move towards retaining the service with UnitedHealthcare within a carbon model so we can have our pharmacy and our medical talk to each other.

So this is quite a big change, $822,000 savings. But your letter writes that this included a revised formulary expected to save $822,000 along with existing clinical and strategic exclusion programs that reduce costs. Are we cutting benefits?

No benefits are expected to be cut.

Are we cutting anything that's currently covered?

Nothing will be cut that's currently covered. What's going to happen is you'll see things such as things that are no longer within, that once was within a patent, so to speak, are now becoming generic. You'll see a lot of those drugs becoming cheaper.

So we're gonna require generics and save $800,000.

Just before we move on, do you want to add Aaron or Proshki to this?

Yeah, the only well, good afternoon or good morning. Everybody here in Casper would gather benefits. The only thing I would add there is that formulary changes throughout that happened through any process. The savings area that you mentioned is really taking a focus in on just a handful of therapeutic classes that would be adjusted. But. There would be alternatives available to those individuals. So it's a very minimum impact is less than 1.5% of our population.

Can you give us an example of something that was covered that'll be an alternative now?

Boy, I'd have to pitch left to Prachi on that, maybe as an example on that formulary list.

Of course. Thank you. Thank you, Aaron. Hello, everyone. Good morning. My name is Prachi Raval. I'm the clinical pharmacy consultant with Gallagher. So I did have the opportunity to look at the exclusion, which was less than 1%, to be exact, 0.9% of exclusions that are members that would be impacted. And it is very standard drugs that are particularly being impacted. One of the example being levothyroxine, it is a thyroid medication, but the formulation of capsule is being excluded, but the tablets would be covered. So the exclusion is not necessarily that the whole drug as the drug as a whole is being excluded. Some of the strengths or formulations, which could cost more to Citi is being excluded as part of this change, if that helps.

And then in your medical expertise, is a capsule more effective?

There is no impact of the formulation when it comes to capsule versus tablet.

This is purely financial. And you're making that determination from a medical perspective?

Correct. This is based on my experience as a clinical pharmacist that depending on capsule versus tablet, it doesn't necessarily have any kind of clinical impacts until and unless there is any kind of medical necessity that is deemed where member is allergic to one ingredient over the other. And in that case, Optum will provide a medical necessity approval as well.

Glad to hear that. All right, let's move it around for questions from committee members first. Anything to add or any concerns? Alderman Brower, you joined, you came back when you heard United Healthcare. Was there something you wanted to add?

No, I'm just here to listen. I mean, I'll just add broadly that, you know, I think that we're, you know, as a local employer, we're shouldered with so many of these costs until we move to a Medicare for all system here in the United States. I mean, that's something I think that a lot of people can agree on that this, you know, you know, The cost of prescription drugs, the cost of an employee's health benefit should not be, as far as an ideological perspective, I don't believe it should be borne by the employer. It should be portable. It should be provided by the government. I appreciate the work of everybody here who's doing things to provide these for our employees. But overall, this needs to be something that's, you know, a cost and an implementation that's borne by the federal government. With this contract, just to confirm what I think I heard, but I want to make sure that I'm hearing everything right. With this contract for item six, does this result in a higher out-of-pocket or other cost for our employees?

This contract is a standalone. This is just to get us for our next three-year agreement. This is no plan design change. On a second flight to come, we'll talk about what our health care costs unique to the city of Milwaukee would look like based on experience of their spending and things like that. Okay.

Thank you. Thanks for confirming that. Just wanted to make sure.

I move. All right, thank you. Alderman Moore moves adoption. Any objection to adoption?

Before I move on, I want to thank the entire panel and evaluation. It was no easy lift. It was several days over and over and meetings of interviews and learning things that most of us have never heard or terms to pronounce and things like that. So I really want to thank all the participants and the evaluation panel for investing that time on this.

Well, and Ms. King, congratulations on saving $822,000. Thank you, sir. Alderman Moore moves adoption, hearing no objections, so ordered. Thank you all so much. Hold on. Don't go anywhere far. Item number seven, file 260262, substitute resolution outlining the process and communication of 2027 health and dental insurance premium rates. Welcome, Director King. Thank you.

Again, for the record, Employee Relations Benefits Director, thanks again for having this file. It's early on this year compared to prior years where we bring this to you in September, but because of the workday transition and staff limitations and things like that, we want to make sure that we get ahead of this information. where our partners at Gallagher were able to provide us information sooner, so that was very thoughtful. And just as you know, just for the record, we work hand in hand with our consultant, our independent consultant, Gallagher, to help us evaluate their actuary, to evaluate what our next year rates assumptions are going to be. We're self-insured, remember, so it doesn't matter what the cost, we have to pay it. Nobody's paying this cost for us, right? But it's based on experience of our utilization, industry trends and so forth. The actuary at Gallagher Consultant work alongside with us based on our experience to develop the next year's 2027 rate. And with that, we are expecting to have a 6% increase in our medical premium for 2027. Now I know it sounds high. This is coming from $104, for example, for a single coverage to $110, pre-tax dollars. So 6% is high, however, when we look at it compared to industry standards, and I believe Aaron is still on there, he will tell you that most peer city are seeing close to double-digit, if not higher, in their increased costs. So 6%, we believe, it's really not higher. out of whack by any means and just so you know that since 2012 we've always been under trend, under the market and under what our peers are doing so we take pride by that and it's not just something that happens overnight. I believe it happens because of all the proactive things we put in place. That includes our wellness program, having our clinic right next door. One of the factors we're talking about now is consider having dispensary services right across there so people can go there and get that. You can go right across the street right now and have a PCP visit. And so we wanna make sure we are where the employees are. And we talk about air quality and people breathing issue. I go over there many times throughout the year when, depending on the weather conditions, for treatments. So we as our employee, we don't have to be reactive. We can be more proactive. And we have services close to where our employees are. We're trying to do more of that. As a result of that, I think it's reflective in these premium increase. While it's an increase, it's not as substantial as our partners and peers are seeing. This increase also comes with no plan design change or no expected plan design change on this. For early retiree, they're going to be expecting an 8.2% change. As you know, there's already a retiree plan that we have that are pre-65 that the city still covered to retire early, and so we covered those employees. And so they're going to expect an 8.2% compared to last year, which was a 12.6% increase. So... There's an increase there also, so they go to $171.57 per month for a single EPO plan that equates to. Our Medicare retiree program, as we know, in 2026, this year, 2025, we did the entire robust process of transitioning the part A and part B, we moved that out of the city purview and moved that into Medicare. And as a result of that, their medical cost is going to be zero dollar premium. However, the pharmacy part D, which is still with the city, they're anticipating an increase, a substantial increase, about 20% given in 2026, they had a negative 26, almost running up 27% premium. Dental, we're expected, this is contractual, we have built in a 4% increase to our dental, that's for Delta Dental, and our Care Plus Dental, we're expected a 5% increase. From what I'm hearing is that we were pretty smart lock this in contract because the market is trending way higher than that currently. We will be going out to RFP next year to renegotiate these dentist contracts. And then when it comes to vision, all of our voluntary benefits, we were very fortunate to work with our partners to retain all that flat. So there's no increase to any of our voluntary benefits. That includes vision, accident, critical illness, short-term disability and long-term disability benefits. And with that concludes my report and ask if you would consider approving this so that we can start working on our open enrollment material and have all our rate charts and everything ready for open enrollment this fall.

Thank you very much. Comments, questions? Hearing and seeing none, Alderman Moore moves adoption. Hearing no objection, so ordered. Thank you so much. Hold on, one more. Item number eight, file 260263, substitute resolution authorizing the Department of Employee Relations to expand its current contract with AmeriFlex for administration of the city's flexible spending FSA and health reimbursement arrangement HRA benefits.

Great, again, for the record, Employee Benefits Director Molly King, and again, thank you for hearing this file. We came before you earlier this year asking for requests to do an RFP. Unfortunately, we're still in the process to do our due diligence with the RFP, and that has not yet concluded. As a result of that, we're asking, because of timing, If we can have an extension, a one-year extension with our current contract at the same flat rate, they are not anticipating increase any of the rates with our AmeriFlex to administer our flexible spending account and our health reimbursement arrangement or AHRA account.

Excellent. Any questions? Hearing none, Alderman Spiker moves adoption. Hearing no objections, so ordered. Thank you very much.

Thank you all.

Moving on to item number nine, file 260398, resolution authorizing the issuance of sale of up to $275 million of revenue anticipation notes and a purpose for direct loan notes for the purpose of financing the operating budget for Milwaukee Public Schools on an interim basis. Welcome Comptroller Christensen. And from the Comptroller's office? Jesse Hagan. Jesse Hagan.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So this file seeks to authorize a different type of borrowing than what we heard from before. This is not contingent borrowing, which is intended to provide additional budgetary appropriations. This is intended to address temporary cash flow issues that result from essentially a mismatch between the timing of revenues that the city receives and expenditures that the city makes. And I'll caveat that with the fact that the city is required by state statute, as some of you may be aware, to hold MPS's cash. So MPS cash and city cash is essentially pooled together and when cash flow needs dictate that we may be at some point in the future potentially in jeopardy of not being able to make payroll, pay our bills, or make disbursements to MPS for them to do the same, cash flow borrowing becomes necessary. So these are, RANS, R-A-N, which stands for Revenue Anticipation Notes, which is just as it sounds, it's notes that are issued in anticipation of revenue. So this is not going to result in long-term debt service payments like contingent borrowing where we're paying it back over 10 or 15 years. This will be paid back as in full through revenues that are already coming either, in this case, to MPS. One thing I would note, I know that the headline number is $275,000 and we get. Million, sorry, undersold it there. $275 million. But if you look at the resolution and the resolved clause, it actually only authorizes $150 million. And the reason for this is our, I don't know. Our bond council advises us on how to draft these things and due to previously authorized short term borrowing, they ask us to fill it this way. So it's only 150 million and that is an up to amount. So we are currently working, we obtained some cash flow projections from the city treasurer's office and we're currently working with MPS to refine those. with the idea being we want to minimize the amount that we borrow and the duration that we borrow for so that interest costs can be minimized. And those interest costs are borne by MPS. So the city is, in this case, merely acting as a pass through. We are executing the borrowing on their behalf. and MPS will pay back the principal with revenues that were already coming in and interest with appropriations in their budget. Jesse, if I missed anything, feel free to chime in.

Yeah, that pretty much covers it. The idea is that the mismatch of revenue, trying to make sure that the city isn't covering MPS's shortfalls at any time of the year, that they're able to have their own cash available for their own purposes. And so this kind of helps to smooth out those bumps in their revenue so that they can easily meet all their obligations.

Excellent. Any questions from committee members or members present? Hearing and seeing none, Alderwoman Moore moves adoption. Hearing no objection, so ordered. Thank you all very much. And now since it's past 10.30, we will continue on with item number 10, file 260453, communication from the Department of Administration, Budget and Management Analysis Division regarding vacancy requests, fund transfer and equipment requests. We have no fund transfers or equipment requests this cycle, just a few vacancies. And we'll start with property tax levy supported positions. Department of Administration, Information Technology Management Division, IT Support Specialist, three positions. If there are comments or questions, please jump in. Department of Administration, Intergovernmental Relations, Government Relations Manager, Senior. City Attorney, Assistant City Attorney, five. City Treasurer, Administrative Specialist, Senior. Election Commission, Election Administration Services Coordinator. Department of Emergency Communications, Emergency Communications Business Intelligence Analyst, Emergency Communications Lead. Health Department, Public Health Social Worker Three, Public Health Nurse Three, Public Health Compliance Officer. Public Health Social Worker Three, Public Health Nurse Three. Oh, wow, I read that twice. Custodial Worker Two, custodial worker to auxiliary library security guard library security services library services supervisor Department of Neighborhood Services building codes enforcement manager program assistant to office assistant three four positions district code enforcement supervisor two positions and Community Commercial Code Enforcement Inspector, four. Residential Code Enforcement Inspector, four, three positions. Fire Protection Engineer. Elevator Inspector, six. Police Department. Police Sergeant, three positions. Captain of Police. Systems Analyst Senior. Department of Public Works Administration Division, Business Services Specialist, Department of Public Works Infrastructure Division, Locator Technician, Painter IV, Traffic Sign Worker, Street Services Manager, Office Assistant IV, Equipment and Tool Mechanic I, City Hall Operator, Management and Accounting Officer, Electrical Worker, four positions, Civil Engineer II, Human Resources Representative, CAD and GIS Technician Three. Public Works Operation Division, Vehicle Services Technician Four, Program Assistant One. Anything on property tax levy supported positions?

Mr. Chair. Alderman Spiker. Just a general question for the Budget Office. I think I've asked a version of this before, but we're going into budget season after the break, and there will be a large gap that trying to fill. So customary to not fill positions or authorize the filling of positions if you don't intend to have them in the budget. I take it either things, there's nothing here that's been giving you pause where you would want to freeze or hold off on filling. I know some of these are very critical positions, but...

Correct, yeah, I mean, we did review these through the lens of the mayor's proposed executive budget, which is in development, and we're still a month and a half away from that being rolled out, but we're certainly actively considering Positions especially vacant positions that might be cut in order to fill the gap And so some were taken off this list and in consultation with the with the chair yesterday But these these are not most likely on the list of cuts or they're in areas of such high turnover that cuts might still be possible Okay, thanks Excellent anything else moving on to non-property tax levy supported positions Department of Public Works transportation parking services supervisor

Department of Public Works, Water Works, Water Meter Investigator, Water Distribution Investigator, Water Chemist, Customer Service Representative Three, Milwaukee Water Works Maintenance Worker, Public Works Dispatcher One, Public Works Dispatcher Two, Water Works Human Resources Administrator. Anything else? Alderman Spiker moves approval, hearing no objections, so ordered. Thank you for that. Moving on, item 11, file 260454, communication from the Department of Administration informing the Finance and Personnel Committee of waivers granted for certain single or sole source contracts or contract amendments. Welcome, Director Kelsey.

Good morning, other persons. There are five, excuse me, six contracts included in today's file. One contract for the Department of Community Wellness and Safety, three contracts for the Health Department, one for the Fire Department, and one contract where the funding resides in ITMD's budget, but the actual software is administered and managed by the Health Department. So the first contract included in the file is for the Department of Community Wellness and Safety. This is the 414 Life Violence Prevention Program contract with the Medical College of Wisconsin in the amount of $750,000 for a one-year contract term that ends the end of this year, December 31st, 2026. The second contract is for, oh, sorry.

Just to pause on that briefly, the contract started in January 1st, but now we're in the end of July. Was it just a changeover or a rewrite of the contract because of the department change?

Yeah, the delay was due to the change in the structure of the department as well as some delays with negotiating terms, getting the required insurance and things of that nature.

Okay. Anything else? All right. Please continue. Thank you.

Okay. The second contract is for the health department. This contract is with standard bio tools incorporated for the purchase of a biomark automated genomic analyzer. This includes materials and services that will allow the health department, the lab, to conduct surveillance monitoring and testing related to emerging diseases and public health threats. This contract is established for a five-year term in the amount of approximately $418,000 with five annual options to extend. The 3rd contract is also for the health department. This contract is with Sanders medical consulting to provide medical direction to the health department in the area of sexually transmitted diseases as well as family and community health. Um, matters this contract fosters, um, a contract amendment in the amount of approximately $47,000, increasing the total contract amount to roughly $92,000. And it also includes, um, one option to extend the contract through the end of July, 20 27. The next contract is also with Sanders Medical Consulting. This contract replaces the prior contract with Dr. Saunders to provide tuberculosis medical expertise prevention and management services to the health department. It is important to point out that on numerous occasions, we did attempt to issue a competitive request for proposal without any responses. And so we are in effect continuing to allow Dr. Sanders to provide these services, frankly, at a very nominal rate, comparatively speaking. The next contract is for the fire department. This contract is with first watch solutions incorporated. This is the fire department's 1st watch watch excuse me dashboard system software platform that basically allows them to. manage, you know, field personnel, their resources, their fire engines, their pumpers, and evaluate response times, et cetera. So this contract amendment includes ongoing maintenance support. The amount of this contract amendment is $45,000, which is consistent with prior year's cost, which will yield a total contract amount of approximately $250,000. The last contract. Again, this contract is this software quick base is utilized by the health department. The funding resides in the information technology and management division of the Department of Administration's budget. This particular software allows them to manage workflows, business processes related to The lead program, this contract, we've increased the contract amount by roughly $54,000 for a total contract amount of now roughly $251,000. And we've also exercised one option, an additional option to extend the contract through the end of February 2027. That's it.

All right. Any comments? Questions? Alderman Spiker moves approval. I'm sorry. Alderman Spiker moves to place this item 11 on file, hearing no objection. So ordered. Thank you. Thank you very much. Moving on, item 12, file 260494, an ordinance relating to the deputy positions in the departments of community wellness and safety and compliance and engagement sponsored by Alderman Chambers. I think the mayor's office is coming up for this as well, no? That's what I have in my notes. We're joined by Alderman Chambers on the board. Welcome, Alderman.

Good morning, Mr. Chair and committee members. I will defer over to DER Andrew Knickerbocker and Director Reed in regards to this file. Thank you.

Good morning, Andrea Knickerbocker, Department of Employee Relations. Yes, this proposes the section 345-3 of the code to create officially deputy directors in the two departments of community wellness and safety and compliance and engagement. And then there is an item further on in the agenda that actually creates those classifications.

And this is a substitute. We have a substitute in the file. Sub one. Okay.

What's the difference? I can't. I don't see the original. You can't pull up the sub because it's in.

There was an original that spoke to. Special deputies which is a different provision, but this is actually the creation of deputies So that was so that was title only yeah, okay This is the only one that was in the file.

Okay. Yeah, just the rich text format isn't coming up on the iPad.

Thanks Always good to burn a tree Thank You Welcome, Director. Would you like to add anything?

Absolutely. Good morning. Mary Reed, Director of the Department of Compliance and Engagement here to reference the file in relation to the deputy position being created for the department. I just wanted to add that we feel strongly that right now is the perfect and opportune time to put in place a structure that supports continuity of services and operations and to support our staff and our team as we build, renew, and grow. There was an inquiry brought up about costs and the budget and I just wanted to share here with the committee that this position was classified from another position. We're also looking at restructuring vacant positions within our department. We're currently operating at about a 40% vacancy rate, and so we're looking at those vacant positions very carefully, and as opposed to rushing to fill those positions, we're strategizing to see where we can combine positions, make some necessary cuts, or reclassify as we have done here.

okay uh anyone from dcws wishes to director uh tyler i see you on the board

Good morning and forgive me for not being present. I'm a little under the weather, but good morning Mr. Chair and committee members. So we're just reclassifying a current position we had. It was titled Operations Manager, but basically we feel the need to have a Deputy Director position. for different authorities we need within our department. So if anything were to happen to me, they would be able to step in. That was one of the reasons why the former item in regards to MCW Wasn't able to be signed. One of the reasons was because I was going through the confirmation process and we didn't have a deputy to sign the contract. So we can't afford various delays in regards to the work. So we felt it was imperative to have a deputy director position in place.

One of the consequences of changing from an office to a department, you need a deputy. Correct.

Okay.

Any comments or questions from committee members?

Alderman Moore. Thank you so much, Mr. Chair. Do we already have people identified? We do.

Yes, we do. So there is a proposed incumbent for this special deputy position. This individual has been in a temporary role in this position since January. They've shown tremendous capability in performing the functions of a deputy and their boots on the ground, ready to go. They've already implemented a lot of strategies and ways to support the department and the community. So we feel we have the opportune and the perfect person for the role.

Thank you. Ms. Tyler?

Yes, in regards to DCWS, we do have an interim operations manager person in position, but we would like to open it up to the community to do a fair process with hiring.

So you do plan to submit a... what do you call that, you do plan to open it up instead of offering it to your current, the current operations manager, correct?

Correct, yes.

Got it. I had one more question.

Job descriptions, are those available at all or will be created?

We did receive job descriptions, and I believe there is a summary of the position later in the classification report, but there are job descriptions, and would you like to see them? Yes. Okay, I'll make sure those are saved.

I think I made a request.

I sent you the job description.

Oh, thank you. Can you copy Chris Lee so that we can add it to the legislature file?

Yes. Thank you. And then I did respond back over to the Office of Community, excuse me, the Department of Community Wellness and Safety. So, Ms. Tyler, if you can please make sure that the job description as well gets to us.

Will do. Thank you.

Mr.

Chair. Anything else? Alderman Moore?

No.

Thank you so much.

Alderman Spiker. Director Tyler, you had mentioned that there were certain contracts that couldn't be signed while you were on an interim basis, and in the future, should that happen, the deputy could sign in your stead? Did I misunderstand that? Okay. Yes, that's correct. Prior when OCWS was an O, an office within the Department of Administration, who would have signed off on that if there were an interim?

That would have been Steve Mahan.

So the Department had... Within the DOA? Yes. Okay. Although he was on an interim basis as well.

He's in the title of deputy of administration.

He was interim director, but he still held the deputy title, and so he still had the permission to sign. So what sorts of duties would the deputy have to discharge if there were no... department head, what sorts of duties would they be entitled to discharge? Otherwise, nobody would be able to discharge them. So the signing of this one contract you mentioned, are there other cases?

I could share.

Well, for DCWS and then for DCE.

Sure, so basically contract signing for sure, signatures for cost reports and just different funds, as well as positions, there's special signatures for that. So just any kind of authorization that will come from the director, the deputy could step in and take that and make that authority. I'm sorry, make that approval.

Okay. And then same question, Ms. Reid.

Yeah, to add to that, to contracts, also purchase orders, P-card purchases, travel, training requests, leave, matters involving Department of Employee Relations, a lot of those require multiple signatures or a leadership role signature that if the director is not available, we need a deputy to be able to approve those.

Okay, and I guess maybe we save this discussion for when we get into the classification studies. But one question I'll have is the relating to the role and how it's changed. And it's not like you all haven't added employees. In fact, you have a standing vacancy issue. Same for DCWS. So if we're not adding employees and in DCWS, we're kind of changing the title. how are the responsibilities increasing to justify the significant increase in pay. But we can save that for when we get to the classification studies.

Okay. Anything else? Check the board. All right. Alderman Spiker?

No, thanks.

So Alderwoman Moore will move adoption of file of item number 12. Any discussion on that motion? Any objection? Hearing none, so ordered. Thank you very much. Moving on to item number 13, file 26.

Mr. Chair.

I'll do one more.

Please forgive me. For item, it was our contracting item for 401 for life. If you can put me as an abstention to that particular item.

That would go back to item number 10 Yes, and we don't need to reconsider All right. Well hearing no objection. We'll note your abstention for the first the first one.

Yes.

Thank you so much. I appreciate that All right item 13 file 2 6 0 5 1 8 communication from the fire department amending the positions ordinance to add positions relating to a youth carpenter apprentice program Welcome chief Lipski

Hi, thank you very much. Chief Lipski, Milwaukee Fire Department. We're excited to put this forward. Specifically, what we're trying to do is mimic something we've done with our youth mechanic apprentice program, which we're starting to realize successes both for the city, but also for the youth that are involved. We just had a youth mechanic apprentice apprentice resigned from the fire department, but for a good reason, because they were hired by DPW. So it is a pipeline worth investing in, and we would like to do the exact same thing with our department carpenter. And so we're asking for two part slash full-time positions, and it'll start with one person. After that first year, they'll move to an advanced program, and then we'll bring in another new person. So the idea would be we'd always be moving two people through. That is the gist of it.

a pipeline or a hose from the fire department. Great, I appreciate that. Any comments or discussion on the item? Hearing none, Alderman Moore moves to place this item on file. Thank you very much, Chief Lipski. Hearing no objections, so ordered. Moving on, item 14, file 260455, communication from the Department of Employee Relations relating to classification studies scheduled for fire and police commission action. Welcome back, Director Knickerbocker.

Thank you. Yes, in the fire department, classification of a youth carpenter apprentice. In the police department, for the crime intelligence manager and the crime analyst, there's a request to change the crime and intelligence manager to be non-exempt because of the amount of overtime the position requires. is working, and also for the crime analysts related to recruitment to increase the recruitment rate for those titles, but the pay ranges remain the same. In the police department, that's a classification of a new position of a budget manager dash police. Police services specialist, a request from the department to have those instead be police services specialist investigators because of the need for additional services to the department on background checks and such. And also in the police department, an accounting coordinator one to be an accounting coordinator two based on increased responsibilities. And finally, in the department of emergency communication, the reclassification of a vacant position to administrative specialist senior to work with the director and oversee staff.

Excellent.

Alderman Speicher. This might be for the department for the crime analyst positions or the crime and intelligence manager. I didn't see anything in there about any sort of competence with AI. I know that's a very broad category. I'm not asking if they can create agents in CLAWD, which we can't use for that anyway, but it would be good to know if if we're looking forward in hiring our new crime analysts to make sure they're acquainted with emerging trends, like very basic ones. So I don't know if the department can answer that or anybody. I mean, Ms. Knickerbocker, if you wanna take a crack at it, you can go ahead.

I'm not familiar with that aspect of the job description. Is there anyone on the board from the police department? I thought I saw April.

Yes, good morning. This is April Luandu, Human Resources Administrator with the Milwaukee Police Department. I can certainly find that information out for you all and make sure that you receive that.

Okay, thanks. And this is in a position within OMAP. It's in CIB or where is the position?

So we do have vacancies in our OMAP section as well as our fusion division.

Okay. Yeah. And those are two areas where I would expect that sort of competent. We need somebody with a basic knowledge to drive.

Yes, sir.

Keep track of what's going on. So, all right. Thanks. Yeah, please let the whole committee know. Thank you.

You're welcome.

Appreciate that. Anything else? Alderman Spiker moves to place this item on file. Hearing no objections, so ordered. Thank you. Moving on to item 15, file 260456, communication from the Department of Employee Relations relating to classification studies for City Service Commission action.

Thank you. For the City Attorney's Office, Crete.

Welcome, Director Knickerbocker.

Thank you, sorry. City Attorney Administrative Division, this is the creation, repurposing of a couple of positions to be supervisors over staff instead of just leads to assist with the day-to-day. And the recommendation is a legal administrative supervisor and a legal office assistant supervisor. In the comptroller's office, based on changes in duties and responsibilities, the creation of an accounting services supervisor because of the volume of work and level of work. And here are the deputy. In the Department of Compliance and Engagement, the classification officially of a compliance engagement deputy director, and that's a repurpose of a current equal rights complaint liaison. So just reusing the position authority for a different title. And also in that department create repurposing an administrative specialist senior to be a business operations specialist senior. And finally, just a retitle of a racial equity and inclusion coordinator to instead be a compliance and engagement coordinator. And then in the Department of Community Wellness and Safety, the creation of a Wellness and Safety Deputy Director repurposing the current position of an Operations Manager. In the Department of Public Works Operations Division, these are a couple of positions in the Sanitation Division. All of the positions, there's one current position of a Communication Assistant IV, and the other two titles have were different. One was a communication assistant three and one was an office assistant four, but in truth, all three positions are doing the same duties and responsibilities. So we were gonna make that also, those also communication assistant fours. In the Department of Public Works Operations Division, a repurpose of a currently vacant vehicle body repair painting tech to instead be a vehicle services technician four because of the needs in the area. And then in the Department of Public Works, Water Works, creation of a couple of titles using the position Authority of Water Repair Worker Three and creating a couple of lower level titles, Water Distribution Investigator Helper Two and a Water Distribution Investigator Helper One. in ERS information systems, reclassification based on additional duties and responsibilities and level of knowledge and skill to an information cybersecurity manager. In the municipal court, this is only a title change. We did have the title of Court Social Worker Coordinator and we're changing it to Court Alternative Services Coordinator because we found that it's not absolutely essential that that position be a social worker. In the municipal court also, a bit of a reorganization. There's one position that's being eliminated and the duties and responsibilities are going to the deputy as well as these other positions that will become supervisors. Taking a court service assistant lead, making an administrative services supervisor and a municipal court Clerk lead and making that a court operation supervisor and that the court is reducing by one position in the health department Changing a public health nurse supervisor to a different title of health project supervisor and also based on need Taking a position of a medical assistant and instead creating an additional public health educator to Soon it will be done. And also in the health department, public health compliance officer. This is a change based on changes to the position to a higher level. And the clinic office coordinator instead to have the department have a public health compliance analyst. So they're shifting based on needs in the department. The next is just a title creation of an accountant two. Currently in the salary ordinance, we have an accountant three and an accountant one. And this is an accountant two. And there's a backstory to that, but this provides the entire city's series.

We'll save the backstory for after the commission.

Later. Much, much later. In the Common Council City Clerk's Office, an executive administrative assistant, placing that position instead in the... temporary non-benefited series in the nines. So that's the change. The pay range is different, but the minimum recruitment rate remains the same. And in the library, creating several titles for the library to use in their temporary pool when they bring in temporary librarians. In this case, it would be temporary librarians one and two. So no additional positions, just the titles. and I'm finally done. All right, thank you.

Any comments, Alderman Speicher? Yeah, I guess for, so this is not one of the wholesale things that we finish. This is just individual departments. It's not like you look to- No more market studies. With respect to the deputy positions that we approved earlier, their existence, but this gets into the details of what they'd be expected to do. I guess I have questions for both of the departments there. Department of compliance engagement and also for the Department of Community wellness and safety So my earlier thoughts were I understand the extra duties with respect to signing stuff. That's more an insurance policy It's not a day-to-day thing. I suppose if the director is is doing that job Typically, maybe when she's on vacation or something The department's by becoming departments and not merely offices haven't increased markedly in size. They still kind of run the same. So why do we have, I mean it's clearest with DCWS where you take an operations manager position and now call it a deputy position and then there's a substantial increase. The position in DCE is different. It's going from the equal rights compliance liaison to compliance and engagement deputy director. But that increases almost double. So the overall question is what's changed? What else are they being expected to do by just shifting to this department role now that would justify that massive an increase? Because it kind of sticks out like a sore thumb.

Yes, to speak to the DCE deputy position, that role has been in a temporary appointed position with an increase since January in that temporary capacity. So they are no longer at the equal rights complaints liaison salary. So what we're seeing there, it looks like, and these are very, very rough numbers, about a $37,000 increase. But I'd like to iterate that this person, this person in this position has taken on not only and is currently doing the role of deputy, which is managing and supervising staff on the team, creating policies, processes, working closely with community organizations to bolster our programs, working directly with ITMD, to have created a complaints intake system, which is going live very soon. They also continue to do the equal rights complaints liaisoning, staff the equal rights commission. And so what we're gonna do with those two vacancies is combine them. what that amounts to is a net one FTE savings for the department. So although this individual is expected to receive a substantial increase for the added duties, because we're combining the two positions that she's also manning right now, we actually end up in a net savings.

So the current role, so there's the equal rights complaint liaison, which she had occupied, and then there was another role that had a body in it at one point, and what was that role?

Equal rights specialist.

Okay, so the equal rights specialist position is, or the liaison position is no more, or which?

Correct, they're being combined.

So the specialist and the liaison are gone, replaced by the compliance and engagement deputy, which does what they did and maybe more.

Well, actually, the Equal Rights Complaints, the Equal Rights Specialist was held by an individual who is no longer with us, so that position is vacant. So this individual's previous role as Complaints Liaison, along with that vacant role, will be combined.

So the vacant role will be gone? It won't be in next year's budget?

Well, it'll be what we'll call it, what we intend on calling it is a compliance and engagement specialist where they will be responsible for the equal rights complaints, staffing the Equal Rights Commission, and taking on some ADA coordination duties.

So you won't really be eliminating a position and replacing it with one, which would bring about a real savings. You're going to hang on to that position, fill it, and then eliminate the lesser position of equal rights complaint liaison, and the new person will be doing some of the duties of both. I'm confused about how we're eliminating one FTE if it's gonna pop up in next year's budget again.

So that new role will actually combine three roles, equal rights complaints liaison, equal rights specialist, and ADA coordinator.

Okay, so we're getting rid of the ADA coordinator?

We're not getting rid of it. We're going to have that new role take on those responsibilities. We've done some studying within our department. We've monitored those positions. We've done time studies. We've looked at the amount of responsibilities that are taken on by that role, and we found we feel strongly that one FTE can manage those duties efficiently.

So the ADA coordinator position will be no more in the next budget and there'll be some other position that covers the ADA coordinator responsibilities that used to exist and more besides?

Yeah, I wouldn't say it will be gone, right?

Well, will it be in the budget? Will it say ADA coordinator one?

It may not say ADA coordinator. We found that according to Title II, that the position doesn't necessarily have to be titled ADA coordinator. We just need to make sure that we have a position that takes on ADA coordination responsibilities.

Right, no, I'm not accusing you all of ignoring the ADA. But okay, so there's three positions now. that will go down to two positions, one of them being this new deputy who, and between the two people, they will cover what the three did before?

That is correct.

Okay. So then it isn't just swapping one role for another and doubling the salary then?

That is correct.

Okay. And then for DCWS, if I may, Mr. Chair? for dcws same question so miss tyler you were in the operations role for many years what's different about the deputy role that would justify the substantial increase in pay given that the department hasn't increased in size given that the responsibilities i would assume would be pretty much the same except for the insurance of signing when you're not available

Yeah, so I mean, basically it is just reclassifying the position. So we do. So we do have someone to authorize when I'm not present, but then also. The additional roles just coming into our own department. with dcws we have emergency situations we have to deal with delegation of not only staff but the entire community violence intervention ecosystem um you know there may be different things that happen like team takeovers or different things like that so um we have a lot of challenges manager in charge of that before so what is the new deputy director doing that the operations manager didn't do before there Well, you got to think we have a lot of additional open positions. Like, for an example, we don't have a HR person, so they would have to take on some of those, as well as financial help. duties, we have a grant compliance coordinator.

I'm sorry to interrupt but didn't we pass a resolution, didn't I author and didn't the council pass a resolution saying DOA don't be jerks, help out your colleagues in these little newbie departments. So now I'm being told no they don't wanna and that's why we need a separate HR and finance person under this new deputy role.

I think there's just I'm sorry.

I'm sorry. I just wanted to mention do I does not have the ability to stand in for those responsibilities. Each department would have its own independent authority.

Right, so they'd have their own independent authority, but does it require that there's anything other than a more ministerial role being played by that person as opposed to an active HR, an active finance person like you would have in a huge, large department? I mean, these are very tiny departments now, and they, again, the staffing is... is fairly minimal, so it's just hard to justify that sort of, I mean, I was skeptical in the DCE role, too, until we had the explanation that actually you're taking three roles down to two, and so that's a measure of savings, but I'm not seeing anything similar in this case. And I guess what I heard from the director sounded a little vague in terms of what the what the new deputy's gonna do that the old one doesn't. But I guess you're saying, Ms. Tyler, Director Tyler, that they're taking on HR and financial roles, which now are paramount to play because of the department becoming a department instead of the division?

Yes, and it's similar to DCE as well. We have several open positions and then they would have to cover. Those positions or delegate to staff and just look at the operations to see how we can feel that. So right now we're currently at 7 positions. And.

So are you cutting a position similar to DCE that would justify this because now instead of N people doing the job, you have N minus one and so you can pay one of those people more?

I'm sorry.

Yeah, so if you had five people doing a job and now you're going to eliminate a position and knock it down to four, then that would justify maybe paying at least one of those people more because now they're taking on responsibilities that used to be. be carried on by somebody another fte if that's that's what was going on in dce if that's not what's going on in dcws love our acronyms um then what would justify the because you can't just say well there's a vacancy and so now they're going to have to do something until we fill that job once that position is filled then there would be somebody playing those roles and the deputy would no longer have to play them

Correct. Yeah. So, I mean, they would need to do that anytime there was an opening, but then also there's other responsibilities now that we are a standalone department. Again, going back to our financial needs and our HR needs, they would have to cover those responsibilities.

Okay. I think I've asked enough questions. Thank you.

All right. Anything else?

I'll be an objection to the... the DCWS one.

All right. Any other questions from committee members or members on the board? Alderman Moore moves to place this item on file, noting Alderman Spiker's objection for DCWS. Which will be manifest in later files. Looking forward to it. Hearing no other objections or comments, so ordered. Item number 16, file 260521, communication from the Department of Employer Relations relating to the bilingual designation for one position of License Specialist Two in the Common Council City Clerk's Office License Division. Welcome, Deputy Clerk.

Welcome.

Zeleny.

And this file does exactly what you say, is to provide that designation for an additional licensed specialist too.

Any comments, questions? I wanted to come up with a bilingual joke, but I'll refrain from it. Alderman Moore moves to place this item on file. Thank you very much. Hearing no objections, so ordered. Thank you. Moving along, 17-260-523, communication for the Department of Employee Relations amending the salary ordinance to provide an incentive rate for public health nurses assigned to the sexual and reproductive health section in the health department.

Yes, and this is one area that the, I'm sorry. Andrea Knickerbocker, Department of Employee Relations.

If it's recorded, people chop it up and...

Understood.

Yeah.

The department has the most difficulty recruiting and retaining in this area as opposed to other public health nurse positions. This is the most like a clinical setting and the work is difficult and sometimes people prefer other work. So this gives a 7% increase for any individuals that would transfer into that section or recruited externally. and this is part of her effort to increase the ability for the health department to keep and recruit nurses.

Rebuild that facility and so that we don't have to shut it down or cut their hours. Exactly. Very good, any questions about this? Alderman Moore moves to place on file, hearing no objections, so ordered. Item 18, moving right along. File 260456, communication from the Department of Employee Relations amending the salary and positions ordinance relating to clerical or administrative corrections.

Andrea Knickerbocker, Department of Employee Relations, and these are corrections to the ordinance.

Any questions, concerns? Alderwoman Moore moves to place on file. Hearing no objections, so ordered. Moving on, item 19, 260419, substitute resolution relative to acceptance and funding for the 2026-2027 HIV partner services grant from the Wisconsin State Department of Health Services. I believe we have someone from the Health Department online. Becca Anderson.

Hi. Good morning, council members. My name is Becca Anderson, grant budget specialist with the Milwaukee Health Department. This file is a renewal for our HIV partner services grant from the Department of Health Services. And it just covers about a half an FTE of one of our disease intervention specialists three.

And this file was referred from the Public Safety and Health Committee. Thank you very much. Any questions on that? Alderwoman Dimitrievich moves adoption. Hearing no objections, so ordered. Item 20, 260421, resolution relating to the acceptance and funding for a 2026 Milwaukee Metropolitan Drug Enforcement Group program grant from the Police Department. This is also referred from the Public Safety and Health Committee from the Police Department. Ms. Decker.

Hello, good morning. Petra Decker, MPD. The 2026 MDEC grant will fund a portion of salary and fringe benefits for three department members assigned to the Milwaukee Metropolitan Drug Enforcement Group task force.

Thank you. Any questions on this item? Hearing and seeing none, Alderman Dimitrievich moves adoption. Hearing no objections, so ordered. Thank you, 21.

Mr. Chair, could I be recorded in the affirmative for the items I missed?

Hearing no objections, so ordered.

Thank you.

Item 21, 260422, resolution relating to the acceptance and funding of a Homeland Security WEM STAC Analyst's Position 2024 grant, also referred from Public Safety and Health. Ms. Decker.

Good morning. Petra Decker, MPD. This grant will fund seven and a half months of salary, fringe benefits, overtime, and travel training costs for four staff in the stack.

Is this just an old grant that's extended or it's a multi-year grant?

This is a new iteration of a grant that we've received many years in a row. So it's a new grant.

It's a new 2024 grant.

Okay. Yes, it's from the parent grant. This is a grant from the states. The parent grant is a federal grant, and that's 2024 money that the state is awarding. Wonderful.

Okay. Thank you for that. Alderman Spiker moves adoption, hearing no objections, so ordered. Item 22, 260458, substitute resolution authorizing attendance at conventions, seminars, and other travel. Any questions? Alderwoman Dimitrievich moves adoption.

Mr. Chair. Alderman Spiker. I guess I can ask Dana after. Never mind. I had a question about the leak but I'll ask Dana after. Thanks.

Okay, hearing no other discussion on the motion, any objection? Hearing none, the item is adopted. Item 23, 260460, substitute ordinance to further amend the 2026 rates of pay of offices and positions in the city service. This reflects earlier action. Any comments? Alderman Spiker moves passage, noting a objection for, that was already expressed in item, that was 17, no, 15? Was it an item? 15. 15. 15. Noting Alderman Spiker's, well, then we'll have Alderman Moore move passage. for item 23 noting alderman spiker's objection to part of item 15. any objection to that motion hearing none so ordered and 20 item 24 file 260459 a substitute ordinance to further amend the 2026 offices and positions in the city service uh reflects earlier files alderman moore moves passage And noting Alderman Spiker's objection from item 15 previously, hearing no objections so ordered, that concludes our business today. Have a wonderful rest of your day. This meeting is adjourned.