Common Council - workshop

so there's a there's a reason Meeting is about to start. We're having some technical difficulties with the mic. Would you like mine?

Can you hear me now? Excellent, okay. So we're gonna start our session. Thank you everybody for joining us. Councilor Caldwell, so let's see. Councilor Jones-Rouser, would you take the parks items? I mean, I'm sorry, the education.

Yeah. Councilor Jones-Rouser standing in for Rashida Caldwell. She has item number nine.

Good afternoon, Council. Rick Elsie, Director of Human Resources. Item nine is to enter into one year, another one year agreement with Excellus. We traditionally run three plus one plus one in our contracts. Excellus wrote us a contract for six years. So extending one more year will allow us to take advantage of savings that they built in five years ago that they were not prepared for. Or not necessarily not prepared for, that they didn't count for happening this year. So it'll save us a bunch of money and our cohort with outside buying partners have all agreed that the savings for this outweigh the... And then we will go to RFP after that. Correct. We'll start the RFP because then both of our contracts are technically done. So we're just keeping up with their contract for the savings and then we'll RFP starting in January for July of next year.

So since you're keeping up with the RFP for the savings, do you have a dollar amount as of yet, what the savings would be?

We anticipate it being millions for this year.

Millions?

Yeah.

How many millions?

Well, between all of our partners, I think it's somewhere in the neighborhood of like $8.5 million, and then it's split up between us, the school district, and the county.

Between who?

the school district and the county and a clarification we do self-fund right correct we're self-insured we're self-insured and that is the three combined contracts they're self-insured correct yeah we pay them to administer the contract or the the insurance for us yeah Does that mean that we get to set the deductibles that we want for the services that we want and the contracts that we want?

Yes and no. So we can, but there's a lot of layers to that. Yeah.

So we are splitting call between city school district, who else? In the county. In the county. We're a buying consortium, yeah. Okay, so how is that? Is that by percentage of employees or how is it split?

Well, so it's essentially how many belly buttons that we're putting on our plan is the easiest way to put it. So the more belly buttons we put on our plan, the more savings we get. And so the three of us buying together reduces our cost for the administration of the plans because we're considered one giant group, even though we have separate plans and all of that.

Have we surveyed city staff? to see if the plan is working for them and or what they would like to see for the next round?

We haven't done a formal survey, and the plan won't change in the next round. It's just who administers it. Understood. But we don't have complaints about our insurance currently.

We haven't asked people for their feedback.

I mean, people are pretty vocal when they're not happy.

If they're not happy.

I mean, we went through the whole prescription thing, and yeah, yeah.

For the moment, Excel is the only option, right? Is that?

I mean, we could RFP, but we would lose out on savings for this year.

For the consortium.

Yeah, they wrote these savings in five years ago. And so the market has changed drastically, and this would allow us to keep those savings. So.

I'll talk about PROAC. That's your prescription plan?

Correct.

They're based on PBM. Has there ever been discussion with PROAC if they want to do a 90-day supply except people coming every 30 days?

PROAC offers that. They offer a whole variety of options. We can't force people to take a 90-day script. No. But they allow a 90-day script. They allow mail. They allow monthly whatever. They have a whole bunch of options.

All right. So you say there is an option. Okay. Thank you.

Thank you.

Any other questions?

Anything else? All right.

All right. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam President. I have item 10 to 33. Commissioner, so for item 10 and 11, just before we get into it, could you just give an overview to somebody listening what this is? Go ahead. Number 10? Yeah.

Number 10 is for bonding for the chlorine conversion out at Skaneateles Lake. Right now we're using gas, which was put in in the early 90s, which is obsolete. It's considered now a hazard material. We're looking to convert over to hypo, which we use at our reservoirs at Woodland and Westcott, switching over to a liquid form instead of a gas form. New York State Health Department EPA recommendations that we come up with a plan to remove the gas. We're looking to move this forward. I guess it's been a project that's been talked about for quite a few years. It just hasn't moved anywhere. We're looking to move it forward.

And so I think it was in the last agenda. And part of the reason we held it back was it came in as application and agreement as well, right? It was both?

No, you held it back because you said you was gonna possibly have a committee meeting.

Okay, but the other piece, okay, so thank you. So the other piece is you said that this has to also accompany as we apply, right?

So to apply for a grant, you have to have approval to bond for the project, and then you get reimbursement for the grant. We're a few days short. We sent them a letter saying that we're going to be bonding for it.

to normally do an application agreement, you always identify the funding source, and that's pretty much what was identified in the legislation, that it was gonna be, the funds gonna be identified through bonds.

Okay, so with that identification, do we need to pass this as well, since we have already made a pledge to the state?

This is separate, but you guys wasn't planning on not looking, passing it or looking at it. You just was planning on having a committee meeting.

Right.

That's all you was planning on having.

Yeah, and the reason I asked that commissioner is some counselors were trying to, instead of passing the bond, we wanted to wait to get the grant, to actually get the grant.

Yeah, if we don't have approval to bond for the project, so everybody's trying to get the same grants. So they're not going to give a $5 million grant on the hopes that we approve the project. We have to approve the project to be eligible for the $5 million grant.

All right.

It's $500 or $5 million? It's a $5 million grant on a $10 million project. That's what we're looking to get. We submitted, the deadline was the 27th. We submitted it within a letter saying that we're in hopes to get this approved today. No, this week, during this legislation.

I just thought that you said 500 grand. No, five million. Okay.

So the deal is to even apply, we have to pass this. Is that the idea? Because I was under the impression that so long as there's an indication that we were going to bond for the rest, for the half of it, we don't have to pass it until we get the grant back. No, I don't believe that.

We would have to state our intention to do the project. And by passing the bond, we're going to do the project.

That's what we did in the legislation, Councilor. That's all I'm saying. Like I said, I didn't see that you guys was going to hold it until we get the grant. I mean, being that it's a project that the commissioner said need to be done, you guys was gonna just look at this as a project point blank. The application was gonna be a benefit if we got that additional money.

Because even if we don't get the grant, we have to move forward with this project. It's an EPA and state health department saying chlorine gas is a hazard to the community.

So wait, I'm sorry, you were, what was it that you're saying?

It's a human health issue if we continue to have chlorine gas on hand. It's very dangerous.

No, I understand that I just is that what I'm not concerned about the issue in itself It need to be addressed is the process that And then we hope we get the grant because a grants not a guarantee we're applying amongst other people that are applying for grants as well we're hoping because this is such a health and safety and

issue you know so okay so you're bonding for the two i mean you would like to vote for the full ten yes and what happens if you get the grant what happens to the five million of the ten that is going to be covered by the ground then oh so wait we're kind of confused on it

Interim Commissioner of Finance, if we're bonding for 10, it depends if it's a ban, are we doing a ban or a bond? So when we get grant funding, we typically can't double dip, so my team will have to take a closer look at that and get back to you. Sorry about that.

We don't have to expend the full amount of the bond. We would only expend the amount that we would need of the 10 million.

Exactly. So the project of what you guys are authorizing, you guys are authorizing a $10 million project. That's how much the project is going to cost, period. That's how much they're going to spend on it, whether they get the grant money or not. So if they get the grant money, $5 million won't be spent in this area right here, unless they come back to you all and say, hey, can we spend, we need additional money.

So when we don't use, because you seem to know this, Katie, when we don't use the full amount of the bond, how do you get out of it?

Yeah, we don't have to get a wiggle out of it. We just don't use that amount of the bond.

So it's just there if we need it? Yeah.

So we can transfer the use? No, the bond, yeah, right, exactly. The bond is going to, if we get... If we get the grant amount and everything, that's gonna be five million towards that $10 million project. So we won't, we won't. But can we use the other $5 million?

$5 million for anything else we want?

Having to do with water, but.

If the project cannot be more than $5 million. Not for anything else, it's just water.

For water, but in another aspect of whatever water needs.

No, it only can be, the bond only can be used for what it's being bonded for, right? And so if they get that additional $5 million, they're going to. That other $5 million just won't be used. The city saved $5 million. Just say it like that.

Okay. Yeah, and typically our office goes to bond after expenditures incur. So we will bond for what we've already spent and we replenish. We do it backwards to avoid any arbitrage issues or holding on bonded money intended for a purpose and not being used. So that's another way we'll have to coordinate with your office.

Okay.

I just didn't know the process. I'm sorry.

And we normally do this. We normally buy for the project amount to give them, you know, the ability to start the bids and all that other stuff, you know. And it's just this one right here, the reason why it got confusing because there was an application agreement that was put out there for the same purpose.

Patrona, you wanted to add something to that? No, no, it's okay. You okay?

I have two quick questions, sorry. I don't want to leave on this, but besides the safety improvements that we're gonna see with this, what are the long-term operating or maintenance cost savings? Do you see any of those, or is there going to be increased costs, or?

There'll be some increased costs, because Hypo's more expensive than gas. Not much more for the risk versus reward. the chlorine gas is the direction everyone, I mean, is getting away from. It will be more of an expenditure just on our part for the Hypo.

And what is like the life expectancy of this new system, do you know? 40 years? Okay, all right.

I mean, with maintenance and update and stuff like that.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you. The next one is to... purchased vehicles, two SUVs for $94,000 out of our capital equipment. It's for two SUVs that have, I mean, they've ran their lifespan for the people that are using them. They're not, won't pass inspection. And so we're looking to send them off and get two new vehicles.

Does the Department of Water have a fleet vehicle policy? Are you looking to transition to hybrid or electric? What are the major qualifications for replacement? Are you looking for haulage? What can we do to have the least environmental impact and the longest longevity for these new vehicles?

Right now, we're not using hybrids. I think that becomes difficulty on the maintenance side of it for the city. I don't know if we have a lot of people that can work on hybrids down the road, and we keep these vehicles 10 years or more. Right now, we use basic fuel. We use four-wheel drive vehicles.

Is it a basic package on the SUV?

Yeah. There's... Little extras because we get the lights, the strobes, everything put into the price. When we pick them up, they're ready to go.

So dump truck, forklift, compressor, backhoe, SUVs. You said two SUVs? Two SUVs, correct.

Listed on there.

Yeah, right.

It seems like in light of our climate action plan, it would be a good idea to have people who could work on hybrids and maybe be able to save some gas mileage. It would be great if we could get mechanics, too. I mean, I think that most mechanics know how to work on hybrids these days. It's not a, no? We've got to shake in the head back there?

Trying to find mechanics is the issue that we're having.

I think we're having trouble finding a lot of different specializations.

We are. Citywide.

Mm-hmm.

We put them out for bid. We get many bids back on them, and we select what meets our purpose for what we're using them for, and that's how we purchase.

We don't get them off of the state contract or anything like that?

These are just... We have county contracts, I believe, maybe state contracts. I'm not sure how. We go through fleet management. We send them over to them. We tell them what they need.

And each individual department bids for these kind of vehicles on their own?

No. Fleet management, Jeff Fregolo handles that. We tell him what we need. He sends them out. He sends us over to select which ones based on the bidding.

All this equipment is already there, right? You're just getting new ones.

Right. These are 2021 capital. This is money we had left in that. We've gotten the dump trucks and the compressors and the backhoes. believe this is, SUVs are the last for this expenditure.

What year were these SUVs? SUVs are new. I thought you were saying you replaced them.

No, this is a 2021 capital. This is money that we had left over in that for vehicle purchases that we're just finishing out.

These are going to be two new SUVs? Two brand new SUVs.

Do you have a current one at all, or you don't have any? The ones we have are gone. Yeah, they're not roadworthy.

Councilor, if you notice, the money value did not, I mean, the funding for this, it didn't change. The only thing that, they're switching up with equipment, equipment only.

And for more money, we're just switching what we're purchasing.

No, I was just wondering if switching money and getting new SUVs, are you trading the old one out and bringing new one in?

No, we use them right to the last, I mean, they're falling completely apart. They won't even pass inspection anymore. We drive them right to the end of life.

And then what do we do with them? Like the ones that are falling apart, what do we do with them?

We send them to auction, through a state auction, I believe it is.

What's the average lifespan on these vehicles?

For us, for like SUVs and stuff, eight to ten years. Okay.

All right. You can't always just keep on patching.

Yeah. We've passed them quite a long time. They've been passed down through employee after employee after employee quite a long time. Yeah. Well, these are for like our underground locator who has a ton of tools he keeps in them. And for, you know, we do a lot in the winter. So, you know, four-wheel drive is what we kind of look for. You know, we get called out at all different hours of the night. You know, so these are most efficient for us. And we got midsize.

You got Marty convinced, but I've seen a Subaru go pretty hard.

I don't think it would be feasible for underground locators.

I'm just suggesting.

I mean, they have a ton of equipment and tools they carry in the back.

All right. Any other questions?

Any other questions? All right. Thank you. We have 13 to 17 that are...

Waivers of competitive bid, Ann?

Hi, Ann Fordock, first deputy commissioner of Syracuse DPW. So number 13 is for Binghamton Truck Body Incorporated, and it's for parts and repairs on our Packers.

Are these, so they're pretty much repairs, right? 13 and 17?

Yes, so all of these, actually, 13 through 17, are various companies we use for repairs and parts.

Okay. And we are waiving the bid because?

Yep. So number 13, they are... Our number one thing that we send to them are the tippers on the back of the trash carts. And so we have to get the parts from them. And when it's something that we can't fix, we have to send it back to that manufacturer to get them to fix it.

So they are the only one that can supply that?

The parts are typically specific to the manufacturer. So maybe they do that way on purpose. So 14, unless you have more questions. 14, echelon supply and services. And so hydraulic repair services on parts on various trucks. And so for that one, it is a waiver for the hydraulics. And we have talked to county purchasing about this, and there is no contract for hydraulic hoses and fittings that the county can refer us to on this. But for what we've found, we would consider these sole source vendors, and that Omni's in Syracuse, and so location and availability of parts and pieces do matter.

I appreciate that you've tried to find a local vendor.

Yeah. 15 is Fleet Pride, so driveshafts, axle shafts on medium and heavy-duty vehicles, and... So this is a Fleet Pride waiver. They are an area sole source vendor for drive shaft and axle shaft repairs. In the past we had piggybacked on the Monroe County contract for these. The scope hasn't changed drastically. And so they are in Syracuse and we have investigated other options. S&W services, repair services parts and fuel keys. And so that is the fuel island that we have that everyone uses. And so that's for fuel tank readings, fuel keys, and all of those are proprietary to that company. What's left, 17, Syracuse Truck and Trailer, or Tri Tank Corporation. And so open and enclosed trailers. And so 17, we have the waiver for them. They're also called STS, Syracuse Truck and Trailer. And so they sell enclosed trailers, open trailers, fuel tanks, trailer breaks, and lift gates. There's no contracts or national purchase agreements. They are located in Syracuse and they're who we typically use for this. Any questions? You'll see me again. I have more items coming. All right. Thank you.

Good afternoon, councillors. John Killian, Department of Engineering. I have items numbers 18 through 31. Item number 18 is to accept three streetlights being installed by Syracuse University at no cost to the city. The lights are being installed in the 500 block of University Ave.

They take care of the maintenance after installment and all of that, right?

Pardon?

They take care of the maintenance and...

No, once they install them, we'll accept them. So the city will be responsible for maintenance. They're street lights.

So they will be owned by the city?

Yes.

Oh, okay.

Owned and maintained by the city?

Owned and maintained by the city of Syracuse. Okay, okay.

All right. Items numbers 19 and 20 go together. They're to amend existing ordinances for agreement. Authorization and New York State DOT. We're switching out local funds of 410,000. We secured federal funds of that amount. So we're just switching fund sources. That's for the North, South, East, West Interconnect project. Items numbers 21, 22, and 23 go together. They're to amend bonding. An agreement with New York State DOT and project authorization for the East Cobham Street paving project. We're increasing the project cost by $1,032,500. Project costs have increased. We just went out to bid with our project. That's why we're seeking additional funds to cover the increased cost of the project.

I know this is off topic, but is there somebody after the meeting that I...

I'll come to you, Councillor. Items number 24 and 25 go together. They're to amend, excuse me, item number 24 is its own item. It's revoked permission to amend an existing revoked permission with WL LLC to operate and maintain an existing underground vault. We're amending it to reimburse the company for sidewalk installation and the installation of cafe style lighting in the 100 block of Bank Alley from a DASNY grant total cost not to exceed $100,000. Is Eric here?

We had a meeting last week about this down there, so I guess this is the item, right? Right there by the bank alley with the bell?

Correct, I'm sorry. Okay.

Yeah, I mean, the plan is, this is really needed, because when you look at the storefront at the bank alley, the street really needs them.

Tendercare is scrambling yeah The owners responsible vault underneath there's a vault underneath and basement underneath the sidewalk So he's response for the structural repairs of the vault But then the city's going to reimburse him for the actual sidewalk construction above the vault through this grant I just want to speak in favor of this because we did have a meeting last week with Eric Ennis and This area is starting to build up.

There's a new tea house just got built there And we have some really good businesses in that corridor. And this is going to just make such a difference for them and improve the aesthetics and walkability in that area.

So you're good with it? I think it's great. Okay. Council, it's in Councilmore District.

Very good mention, too, in the email this morning. It was this morning that he wouldn't be here.

Okay. All right. Well, thanks, John.

Item number 25 is to amend an existing revoked permission to Alliance Energy Transmissions to construct, own, and operate a 12-inch high-pressure gas main. We're amending it to now include installation in Vineview Place. As a result of the 81 construction, they have to move a section of their pipeline into the city's right-of-way. We're also amending the cost for that, and the total cost for the amended agreement will be $19,152 a year. Item number 26, is there another revoked permission to Syracuse University to construct, own, operate an underground duck pen system in a city lot down by Van Buren Street? Because again, this is a result of the 81 construction in this area. The resultant fee from this permission will be $2,565 per year. Item number 27 is another revocation to Syracuse University, again to operate an underground electoral duck bank system. The resulting fee from this will be $1,004.72 per year.

Can we go back to 25 for a second?

Yeah.

The fee structure that's changing, that is increased fee structure or decreased fee structure?

It's an increase.

649. Increases every year in the consumer price index. So we've increased the cost base in the current consumer price index and also the section of gas they're transferring into the city right away has also increased the fee. Let's see, an increase of $4,275 just for the installation in Vineview Place.

Have we worked with Alliance Energy Transmissions before?

Back in 2013, we did the original permission with them. At that time, we did have a public meeting down in the Syracuse Housing Authority. There was concerns with the public. We did have a meeting with them, and those concerns were addressed back then.

The concerns about?

They were just nervous about having a high-pressure gas main. They just wanted to know more about the system.

I, too, am concerned about having a high-pressure gas main anywhere near residential. Have we had any problems with this company?

No.

No. They've been diligent on maintenance.

Diligent, yeah. It's a regulated company. They're providing by all the current regulations. We've had no issues with them.

Thank you.

Okay. So we were on 28.

Item number 28 is to amend an existing ordinance to adopt a negative seeker. We're just amending it. For the Creek Walk Phase 3 project, we're just amending it to add revised secret forms. We're not changing the negative declaration. We're just adding the revised forms.

Which section is this? I'm sorry.

This is from Colvin Street to Dorwin Ave of the Creek Walk. Oh, from Colvin to Dorwin. All the way to Dorwin. So this is the complete Creek Walk.

Okay. Okay.

Items number 29, 30, and 31 go together. There to amend the existing ordinance for bonding New York State to your agreement, project authorization, adding the detailed design phase for $886,000. This is for the Creek Walk from Kirk Park to Ballantyne Road.

That goes with 30 as well.

It's 29, 30, and 31. Okay. Three companion pieces. Okay.

All right. And I need to.

Issues related to pre-qual down there, that portion. Not that portion. Not that portion.

That's what I was just about to say. I need to talk with you for the next portion. There's still some questions with residents in that area. Okay. All right, so that's it.

Thanks, John. Thank you.

Thank you. And the item 32, Deputy Mayor Dayou, is to confirm and Fordock has, right?

Good afternoon, Councillors. Corrie Dunham, Deputy Mayor. So this is to appoint Ann Fordock to the vacant position that the mayor has for her appointment to the OCRA board.

I can't think of a more qualified candidate. Me neither.

Me neither. Thank you, councillors.

Thank you. And item 33 is a resolution thanking the governor for the moratorium on data centers. And then in addition to that, this resolution is urging the governor to do two things, to pass the current legislation that was passed by both the Assembly and the Senate to pass it before the end of the year because it's more comprehensive than the moratorium itself. So data centers. It's a big issue, and we want to make sure we move quickly in terms of regulating it better.

Anybody? I would like to be on board. We would like to be on board. Oh, absolutely. Absolutely.

I thank everyone. Absolutely.

Okay.

And we are also working with the county to see if they could do their portion as well. That's it? That's it. Was that short enough? Yeah.

Okay, thank you, thank you, Councillor Ehrenreich.

Thank you, Madam President. I have items 34 through 36.

Good afternoon, Council. Saisha Bird, Commissioner of Parks. Number 34 is the bond ordinance authorizing $1.7 million for Westminster Stairs Reconstruction Project. 35 is the authorization of that bond, which includes $450,000 from one account, $250,000 from another, $600,000 from New York State D'Anthony Grant, with a total project cost of $3 million.

Three million?

Sasha, have we already selected someone to do the construction of the stairs?

No, it's just, no, we haven't. We have not. All right. Yeah.

So we think the three million is going to be the cap? I mean, are we pretty confident we're not going to go over that?

I believe so. Okay. That's never. Yeah. I did send some questions in the email. Did you respond to those? Yeah.

About the, yeah, I thought I sent an email back about, it's just construction documents that we have worked on and worked with one contractor to do that work. Currently, I mean, we have done some research on grants, but the ones that we keep coming upon don't cover total reconstruction.

Not that, I asked some questions after. It was about, so you haven't selected a contractor, so we haven't done an RFQ.

No.

Or RFP? Nope. Okay, so I guess that's the thing. The amount is based solely on concrete, is what I was asking. It is. So we have to look at the price for slabs.

I believe, and I can confirm with Josh, they're more expensive than like a... bring the hose down the hill and spray the concrete, right? It's heavier to lift those slabs. It requires more labor. It's more costly. So this is the, I believe, the cheapest material we could rebuild the stairs with that would last.

One more question. What is the timing of the, what is your projected timing to start this project?

You think? The goal is spring. Well, I mean, our timeline has, over the last couple years, have moved a lot, so...

And as it moves the cost, it moves as well. Well, yeah, it gets worse.

Because materials are more expensive. Yeah.

Any other questions?

So go out to bid in the winter so that we could start in the spring.

Thank you very much, Commissioner.

You're welcome. And 36.

Mr. Hargis. No, the whole bid process. You know, it could come in under the $3 million. It could come in anywhere, right? Who are the local firms that might bid on a project like this?

You're more knowledgeable than the firm.

Josh Wilcox, landscape designer planner with the Parks Department. We have several possible contractors who've reached out to us just to express their interest on the project. A lot of our bids, we're getting a lot of responses back with them. So we're confident that we could find a local contractor that meets the city's requirements Oh, a lot of local contractors.

Okay, thank you. Any other questions?

Moving on to number 36 is authorization for agreement with Onondaga County on behalf of Parks for the deer intake management program not to exceed $45,103.10. And I know you're going to ask, how many deer last year?

No, no, I was waiting for it. No, it just feels funny not having, what's his name? Greg Lowe. Yeah, Greg.

Greg doing this. I believe Eric Ennis has taken it on along with ourselves. Chris, on the park side, Chris Abbott has been managing and partnering with both Greg and Eric to manage the deer intake program.

Just a side note, I hit one on the thruway the other day. I could have donated it to you.

Say it again? I hit one on the thruway.

I could have donated it to you.

You could have donated it to the food bank. It goes to food banks so that the meat could be distributed.

No questions? Commissioner, I have a question. We had talked about reaching out to Cornell Cooperative Extension about any other bio-friendly methods of tick extermination.

I did reach out via email. I'm still waiting to hear back from them. Yep, to control, because it has increased this year. Even me as a mom taking my kids out, I had to take one off my kid's neck. I had to take one off of his leg. So they have increased, because we have an increased population of deer. It's not just deer. It's mice. It's rabbits. They all carry them.

It's throughout the Northeast, but it's going to continue to get worse, so we really need to be proactive. Thank you. That's all from me. Thank you, Madam President.

Thank you. Councilor Hodgson.

Good afternoon, Councillors, Vinnie Scipione, Chief Information Officer. Item number 37 is for a platform we use to do fleet management. So just the questions that we were referring to earlier, this is a platform used by DPW. Well, DPW is definitely a significant user. The Police Department and the Fire Department also use this platform to manage their fleet and all the components and aspects that go into that.

Did we have something in place already for this?

Did we have something in place already, you ask? Yes. This is one we've used for many years now. You can see, of course, it is a waiver that we're asking for for this. The intention in this upcoming year is to RFP so we can ensure that we're getting the best value for the platform that we use for fleet management. There he is. Item number 38, seeking approval to enter into an agreement for a free trial for an asset and work order management platform. This was a platform that was in front of you all just a few sessions ago, which we had... you know, asked for a waiver on and doing our due diligence here of trying to identify some alternatives. I'm sorry, this platform, not specifically. There was a, our current platform, City Works, was just in front of you, but this is another one to see if this could be a viable successor. Ultimately, we would RFP for a new platform, but just trying to see if this, you know, some of the, let's say, hurdles that we're experiencing right now with our current platform could be resolved with this one.

Do you have any criteria on what the long-term and short-term costs are?

Long-term and short-term, I can tell you our current one, CityWorks, our current platform that was approved a handful of sessions ago, it's about $186,000 a year is what we're spending on that. This is a platform, sorry, which, for example, the Water Department uses this on a daily basis for their operations. What's that, sorry? This one. This one, yes. The Water Department uses this on a daily basis for their operations to manage all of the... you know, operations that they are undergoing. We're also seeking to expand the digitization of other work order and service requests processes throughout other departments in the city.

Vinny, what would the, you know, talking about three-month trial period, what would the build-out look like? How much data do we have to share? Do they give us a sandbox to play with? Like, how does that all...

Yeah, this is essentially a sandbox, as you said, for us to test the configuration with some of our other systems. It's a system that we would maintain ownership, I say ownership, or a platform that is exclusively ours, and we would just test some of these integrations, because we have various systems that are dependent on Something like a work order management system, C-click fix, for example, which I'm sure you are all aware of. You know, making sure that those systems talk with each other, link accordingly, so there's less manual handoff between systems. So things of that nature. And then a subsequent RFP would allow us to fully understand the implementation timeline that any given proposal would include. Yeah.

Council President, I think you, as far as like the SAS, I think that it's just like various departments have, I think that's probably what you're looking at when you said haven't we done this already. Various departments have this type of software. Like a work order management software? Yeah.

This is the only work order management, you know, platform that the city has.

No, I'm just saying like for, like 37 is one for DPW, 38. eight is one for another department. That's what I mean, right?

I'm sorry, I'm not following. The software service. Yeah. Yes.

So you have a number of them for different various departments. I thought that's what you was asking.

Okay, my apologies. Misunderstood that.

I wanted to know what is going to be our short-term and long-term costs on this equipment.

I suspect there will be a sustained cost year over year for, a sustained cost year over year for something of this nature.

And let me ask you this question though, Vinnie. When we keep, I know technology changes rapidly, probably every day. So at some point, are we ever gonna be caught up with this technology? Are we gonna continue to be spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to come up to speed every year?

Yeah, I think this is a tell old tale or question right as we modernize. There's this is an example where we have, you know, paper or manual operations that exist within the city. as we want to modernize and ultimately create a better experience for constituents, both on like, you know, from the way they interface with government operations, but also the behind the scenes of the government operations, which ultimately impact them. It's that, you know, I would say return on investment of by, you know, the cost of doing business for a more robust economy. operational, you know, city is a trade off of this expense. And you can quantify that. And again, are we doing things manually on paper? How long do they take versus digitizing and having a more comprehensive record of those things?

The system that we're using right now is also at the end of its lifeline.

It's, yes, that there has been an end-of-life date announced for the system that we have currently. So that's another driving factor is managing that technical risk of, you know, as that approaches, what is our plan to migrate to something that's going to be supported.

So what we're migrating into, if we end up making that decision, it would be with the same company, right? It might not be. Or is it different? Oh, it might not be.

This could be different. Correct. Because every year we have different companies, so it could be different.

Councilman Joke mentioned the payroll modernization project that we have not heard a lot about. We haven't gotten any updates recently. Could you or your department or people involved in the project provide some type of written update to the council on where we are with progress and benchmarks and where we hope to be and where we are? Happy to. Thank you.

That would be great.

Alrighty, item 39, final item on the list here. So this is with Cisco. You may all have heard this name be floated around in the past or not, but we have Cisco equipment all throughout the city, whether it be in City Hall, pretty much every single municipal building, I would say, including fire departments, police station, et cetera. This is what I would consider core networking equipment, so the way that all of these facilities communicate with each other. We buy hardware from Cisco on a regular basis. Cisco's the industry leader of this equipment. It's the most serviceable from that perspective, I would say. I'm sure there are other providers out there, but they're more boutique and less people or professional service groups that are able to service that type of equipment. And so Cisco, again, we buy the hardware on a routine basis based on just typical hardware life cycles. The same way that there's any other asset that has a life cycle to it every handful of years need to upgrade, you know, or it reaches end of life. You need to, you know, get the newer versions. There's also licenses associated with operating that equipment. So right now, or historically, we have purchased all of that on a pay as you go or an a la carte basis. This is an opportunity for us to enter into an enterprise agreement with them. effectively locking in those prices for five years. And, you know, on a yearly basis, we would, as again, we buy more equipment just based on their end of life.

211 is guaranteed for five years.

The overall, well, so the rate, the individual rate that makes up this total not to exceed, you know, because we've got line items that for all the different types of hardware that we buy, the price specific to the line items is a fixed rate. So we could scale that up and say if we buy one type, you know, a quantity of one specific switch or network equipment, we lock in that individual per unit cost and that can scale to where like if we need five more of those, we're gonna get those at that same price over that five year period as opposed to, so it's more locking it in at that level. And then this total not to exceed is at our current consumption, that's where we would end up over the course of five years.

And we have to lock in for five years?

That is the best negotiated term, the best term to negotiate in our favour. Whereas if we went shorter, it would likely be either more for a per-unit cost, because You know, Cisco as a company is not going to have those guaranteed. You know, it's beneficial for them because they're going to guarantee that that expense or that revenue. But we would also not be looking, quite frankly, to change from Cisco in that time frame either. And so I think a five year time span is very reasonable for.

And I love your confidence in that because, as I said before, we're changing quite rapidly. So you're confident that we're not going to change from Cisco within the next five years?

I am confident in that. It would cost a lot more, sorry, I would just say it would cost a lot more than the $5 million over, I'm sorry, $1 million over five years than to switch everything out across the city, so.

I want to point out a typo. Yes. If you notice that there's no such thing as 1325 after 21, so that one should be in front of the comma. Yes. 21,000. It's 211,000. 211,000, yes. 211,000, not 21.

budget director also reminded me that this contract allows us to cancel for convenience as well. So if there was a scenario where we decided to migrate to a different solution, we would be able to get out of it, terminate this contract and get out of it. So effectively, I don't see a downside in, you know, three versus five years, given the fact that we can exit it if we, so, you know, saw it to be advantageous.

Yeah.

And one more question for you. What cybersecurity attacks does this system address?

Yeah, so you've probably heard the common term of a firewall before, and that is something that essentially blocks any... bad actor we'll put it that way from accessing certain components of our network you know we allow certain traffic in certain traffic out there are uh appliances both hardware and software or you know licenses associated with this agreement that provide us uh protections to make sure that you know monitoring and other protections to make sure that if there is any anomaly that occurs uh we are not uh or one it protects us in that manner and notifies us and makes sure that we are CONFIGURING THINGS ACCORDINGLY TO NOT BE VULNERABLE TO SOME OF THESE POTENTIAL ATTACKS.

OKAY. AND LAST QUESTION. I SAID LAST QUESTION BUT NOW IT'S A LAST QUESTION.

WE'RE COUNTING HOW MANY TIMES.

SO WHAT STANDARDS AND ACCOUNTABILITY DO WE HAVE THAT'S GOING TO ENSURE THAT THE CITY GETS WHAT THEY'RE PAYING FOR?

So there's hardware, right? Part of this, as I mentioned, there's hardware that we purchase, which is a thing that we get in person. If we don't get it, we don't pay for it. As part of this enterprise agreement, there's SLAs that will be associated with the services we receive, so ensuring that any licenses and services being provided are traceable back to terms within this contract.

I'm going to echo what Councillor Williams said.

With all of these different things that we're approving, at some point, the Council needs to have some type of report on where we're at and how we're doing with this.

Absolutely. Thanks, Council.

Thank you. Are you all set? Do you want to take 4D?

Okay, Sharon has been a business owner in this city for the last 30 years. Sharon is the first black daycare facility that's relocated in the downtown Syracuse. And she's also been a childcare provider for 20 years. Sharon has given a lot to this community. Sharon has mentored a lot of young women when it comes to childcare and business. So I think that, I mean, and when we talk about resolutions and honoring people, this is one way that I think that it would be good to honor Sharon for all of her hard work. Not to mention she has a lounge, she has two childcare facilities, and she's opening up another telemarketing company. So she's employing people and she's doing a lot of work in the city.

I'll just speak a little bit to more of Sharon's good deeds. She has done Thanksgiving dinners for all of her families every year. She's gone out of her way purchasing clothing, additional toys, and things that the children take home with them. She's an excellent person when it comes to looking out for the youth that attend her centers. She's She specializes in kids with certain disabilities. She's very attentive to their needs, regardless of some of the state stipulations, I should say. She wants to go above and beyond.

She does sensory with the kids and she has like different things that she works with. You know, just a little background. And not to mention when Petrona said that she buys things for the kids that they can take home, she actually provides support and resources to the families as well. So it's not just the kids.

Yes. Thank you. Okay. Thank you madam president I have item 441 with New York State Department of Transportation I

Hi, Ann Pordock back again. And this is an agreement with New York State DOT for the Traffic Management Center that operates at DPW. And this is an agreement where we get an 80, 20% match.

Where's the center located?

It's at DPW. We can give you a tour next time you come down. Okay.

All right.

I did ask Joe Driscoll He's out of town, have a representative, if they had any questions with DOT. So I'm going to ask my colleagues, do we want to go forward to this for Monday, or do you want to hold it and have, and I appreciate, Ann, if you want someone from DOT, if we have any other questions. So I'm going to ask my colleagues now.

My only question is on the consultant fees, what consultants are included in this?

I don't have that. But we can certainly find out. I mean, just to give you a kind of a So this gives us, the traffic is interconnected, right? And so it's a manned traffic control center where they keep staying abreast of situations as they're happening. So when you are driving with Google Maps or Apple or whatever device, it's gonna tell you about street closures real time, because that information is communicated to them constantly too. So if you, I mean, we're in Syracuse, so maybe you don't have it on, because you know where you're going, but it really is helpful for live road conditions and updating that. And we coordinate, obviously, with New York State, with their traffic control, and with ours.

We're working with New York State.

Yeah, and so that is a requirement of this, that we have it manned and serviced the way it is at DPW in order for us to get that New York State funding.

All right, so this comes out of DPW, we work with the state.

It's like almost an annual or something thing there.

It is, and I just have to say this. I've got to ask this question. When you talk about monitoring and with the Traffic Management Center, I'm not taking anything away from anybody, but I've seen how it works. And sometimes it's a little scattered all over the place. Okay. Because I've called Jeremy on it a couple of times. So I hope that we are going to have better oversight so that we can know exactly what's going on. And with my Google Maps, it didn't give me the... A closure. The Burnett. Okay. It didn't put that on there at all. Yeah. So I don't know how up to date this is.

It makes me wonder... if we're getting all the closures from all the other departments. Because, you know, it's not just DPW working on a road. It could be, you know, 10 different bureaus doing 10 different things. I get that, but you're saying this is what this is for. Yeah, yeah, exactly. That's the case that we're using. Because I tried to go down Sealy the other day and it was closed because a car crashed into a house, right? But I certainly didn't check, you know, to see was it covered on there. Maybe it was, but...

I mean, there's also the tech companies, right? I mean... However, many buses and vehicles have hit the Onondaga Lake Parkway Bridge really started after GPS started getting widely adopted.

Yeah, you're right.

Which we really need to name that bridge. I think that that should be a council priority, honestly. But fire has the ability to do traffic control changes through this system or is that a separate system?

I would call it separate. It kind of like overrides a signal so that they can get green lights. It's a little different, but yeah. Thank you. But it ties in, right?

And do you have any idea when the DOT is going, or the state is going to change the exit numbers?

Oh, great question. I don't. I think that might be a JoJo's goal question. It'll confuse me as well, though, when it happens.

I don't have a problem with putting this through.

All right. If there's no objections, we'll put it through, but I will reach out again to Joe if he could come, and so if you have any other questions. Okay, thank you. I appreciate it. I have item 42, and this is going to be a resolution, and we're going to do an installation of an honorary street sign at the intersection of Butternut and Lodi Street, and this is gonna honor the Lombardi family, and the Lombardi family had began, it began in 1970 out of the old Five and Dime store, and they've been there 56 years, and every time Mr. Lombardi and family look out there, so many changes, not to the north side, but so many people come from out of town Binghamton, all these areas, they want to go to Lombardi's. They go to Lombardi's, they get their sausage, their fresh cold cuts, the meats, the produce, and it's just an outstanding, and I felt this was long overdue. I went to see Dominic Lombardi yesterday and his family, and we wanted to make sure all the Everybody was included on this. And so I really ask my colleagues to join me in honoring this longstanding institution. Thank you. Thank you.

All of us on that? Yeah.

All of us are on that? Yeah. This is just an ordinance. It's not a resolution. It's just an ordinance. It's not a resolution. Okay.

It's a resolution. No, it's an ordinance.

We'll talk afterwards, Mark. Yeah, we'll talk afterwards.

Yeah, okay. These street signs are ordinances. They're not resolutions. Oh, okay. Yeah. All right, be honest. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Councilor Moore.

Thank you, Madam President. I have items 43 through 59. We've got a lot today.

Good afternoon, I'm Mike Mons, the fire chief. This is for the fire department to enter into an agreement with Auburn Hospital to get our medicine we need for our paramedics and EMTs. When patients are in critical condition, these meds are used to sustain life on the alarms we respond to.

Chief, can I just ask one question? Why do we use Auburn Hospital?

There was a law passed a few years ago that only certain pharmacies could give fire departments with paramedics and ambulances, medicines, AMR, they go through like a big national distributor, which we don't need that many meds. We only need a few for our ambulance. That would be way overkill trying to go through the same method they do. So this is the only area hospital locally that we can purchase from.

Okay. Donna, we've been doing this, like, what, the last three or four years, Chief?

Yes, and different prices. We were going through Krause and Upstate and Auburn, but Krause and Upstate can't provide the service anymore, so now we just get everything through Auburn.

Okay, makes sense.

Okay. Okay, thank you.

Thank you. Thank you.

Good afternoon. Jason Tom, Deputy Chief, Syracuse Police. I have item number 44. It's to enter an agreement with Galaxy Media Partners. This is a Syracuse-based company to assist with marketing and advertising for our hiring of police officers. There is a request for a waiver of RFP. We currently have an RFP out there. Unfortunately, it wouldn't be completed in time for when the window is open to register for the police exam. That's why we're asking for this exception.

So you do usually RFP for this?

We did do an RFP, and we are RFPing. We don't control when the window opens. The state does, and they dropped it on us, and now we have about a month to advertise for the exam.

So this is our current contractor?

We don't have a current contractor. You don't have a current contractor? No, no.

So you said that when the RFP goes through, it wasn't an attorney. So you go with Galaxy Media. What happens when the RFP comes through? Do you stay with Galaxy or do you move forward?

No, we'll evaluate every person that applies for the RFP and then see which is the best option for us.

And the RFP is out there now?

The RFP is out there now, yes. Okay. Yeah. Additionally, I did bring some flyers. These are for if you know of anyone who wants to be a police officer. I'll leave them in the back of the room. All they do is scan the QR code. We work with the county to waive the fee. There's normally a $35 fee to sign up to take the police exam. So I encourage you, if you know of anyone who's interested in becoming a police officer, please have them go online. They can register right online. It's for free.

Chief, I have one question. So do we reach out to the black minority LGBTQ community? Do we reach out to them? So it may be reclusive.

What Galaxy Media can do is they can target specific groups, demographics to get the word out. We're going to focus mainly in Syracuse, right? We want to get residents from the city of Syracuse to become police officers, but we'll identify and do our best to identify them. Okay, thank you. The deadline is September 1st, just so everyone knows. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. 45.

Hi, Councilors. Rich Trudell, First Deputy Chief over at the Police Department. Under item number 45, we're looking for permission to enter into a contract agreement with our department chaplains. The amount not to exceed $25,000 for Reverend Darren Hymie and Reverend Kathy Hodge-Davis.

Any questions on that? Okay, 46. Anybody here to speak on 46? Oh, there you are.

Dave Metz, Deputy Chief, Syracuse Police Department, Investigation Bureau. It's to enter an agreement with Prime Info for essentially what is a software program that allows us to integrate our emergency ordinance disposal teams, our hostile negotiation teams, our tactical teams with a program which allows us to collaboratively combine data, operational plans, geolocating, that means using GPS devices to track where our members are out on operations, It is a reference for the overall operations that allows us to categorize stuff, do risk assessments, and combine all our data into one central location. It's basically a huge overhaul of our tactical operations. It's an invaluable asset to us to bring us up to speed where we need to be.

Is this the only company that provides this service?

It does. It's a very unique company. They provide tactical services to multiple agencies throughout the state. Okay.

So, Chief, kind of thinking about what we, well, really the reckoning nationwide occurring with flock cameras and kind of the different organizations and companies that our law enforcement community is operating with, it's tough to find any information information on Prime Infill. Not a whole lot out there, and part of the vetting that I'm concerned with is making sure, again, that we're contracting with a good actor. Is there any additional info you can provide on the company, on Prime Infill?

Yeah, I could tell you that it is a nationwide company. Rochester PD is actually using their service as well, specific to this. I'd be more than happy to actually take the program out, pull it off my computer now, and show you after the session if you'd like to see exactly what it entails and what it can do for us. But yeah, our PD and ourselves are two of the primary users in upstate New York for it.

And you mentioned a major overhaul in terms of your operational capacity. $18,000 annually doesn't feel like a lot of money for any type of major overhaul.

Your question, sir?

It just seems like a small amount of money for, you know, you mentioned that it would be an operational overhaul.

It's more towards our categorizing our operations in terms of high risk, medium risk, low risk, taking the information data. software program to really modernize what we're doing. It's not so much going out and doing physical executions, but it's an overall of our documentation process through EOD, HNT, and SWAT. So that's where the overhaul is, not in actual physical operations.

Artificial intelligence, is it AI-based platform?

No, no, it is basically all input generated. Thank you.

So I have a follow-up question for Evans. Evans? Thank you, Chief. So I know a few months back we had passed a resolution to institute a mechanism on the RFP process. Now, with that being said, how do we make sure that these agreements that we are passing through, we are waiving, These companies are in compliance with where we are trying to go.

Councilor Evans, Loving Budget Director. So as you said, there's a resolution passed to incorporate asking a question during the RFP process about how they're using our data or sharing it with third parties. If something is below the threshold or already has like a state contract, for example, that's just due diligence that we need to do on the departmental and the IT side. So it's still a question that we can ask and make sure that we've clarified everything. there's any use of our data to a third party but it wouldn't be built in because obviously wouldn't necessarily need the RFP process so for the RFP process for large software's we would have that and then we just need to integrate that into our departmental process so I think I think personally I think it would it would help me being comfortable with these agreements especially with with the work that

that departments are doing and we are waiving these RFPs. So what would that look like? Do we just create a form that you would put this organization through to just verify them or how would this work?

I think the most straightforward thing is I'll work with Vinnie and I'll work to talk about how we can have a standard process for departments to verify.

I'm glad you brought that up too, not to cut you off because my mind is going there because I'm looking at all of this IT stuff running through here. So is that going to translate over to Vinnie?

We can work on a process that will cover us in any instance that we would be procuring something Supposed to

And my clarification question is just, 45 and 46, are they being RFP'd or not? They're not.

No, they're waived. No. 46 is a waiver RFP. It's in the letter, it's not in the short form.

Okay, okay. So 46 is a waiver item? Is a waiver RFP? So 44, 45, 46 are waivers.

forty-five is uh... forty-five uh... uh... waivers that's not i'm sorry it's a different one yes so which one of your so forty four forty five they are both agreement but they have been viewed been waived so i guess my question was if we are waiving these rsps and we already have a stipulation in place that we are supposed to be vetting these parties on whether they're they are using our data with the with the third party behind, how do we make sure that they are in compliance with what we are trying to do here?

That was the question. And I don't understand why we're waiving this one.

46.

46.

Probably because the amount is,

The number 46 is actually below the threshold. So from a technical standpoint, we don't need to waive the RFP. We wouldn't be required to do an RFP for something at this threshold. Historically, they have been listed as waivers in the ordinance.

I thought the threshold was $10,000. The threshold is $10,000. This is $18,000.

The only reason why I was saying that most likely is because it's so little up under the threshold, but the threshold is $10,000.

Okay, so in any rate, my whole question here is we are waiving, once we waive it, how do we keep it in the radar to make sure that it's still in compliance with what we're trying to do?

It sounds like there's an internal policy that Evan can put in place with Vinny that will help us assure that. But it would be helpful if that detail is included for us in review of waived items.

Let me look at that before Monday then. The one thing I'll say is when we enter into agreements specifically around software with any entity, the law department does a lot of due diligence in ensuring that

the terms within those contracts are favorable to the city regarding data governance in terms of ownership, utilization, et cetera, like all those things. So I think there's multiple areas completely heard and I understand exactly where you're getting at and agree. And I think another layer to have as a protection there is right when our corporation council is reviewing these contracts, they're also ensuring that the provisions in there relative to data governance are again favorable to the city.

I think the concern is the general public, and if any information that we enter into our system of theirs is being shared, I think that is where the concern lies. So that's what we want to ensure is not happening.

Understood. Thanks.

With that, is Prime Infill a closed-loop system, like we own the software that we're putting our information into? We went all the way to the back, you gotta come all the way to the front.

That's no problem. Yes, it is a closed program. It's all shared internal data. There's no outside agencies or sources coming in to go and filter, mine, or review any of our data. It's a closed program.

And the data is stored on our servers, not in routes.

Yeah, everything's stored internally.

Thank you. And how long ago?

Chief?

Back. No, I just want to know how long is the data stored? I think it's three years. How long is the data stored? How long?

The data will be stored. What we do is they'll store it with the program, and then essentially we'll copy the stuff over, so we'll maintain our own internal files, and we'll keep those files forever. Because once we do an operation, we can't let that stuff go. So it's pretty much until the case is in or closed, or we determine that something could be disposed of. But it's in excess of at least 20 years.

Thanks again. You're getting your steps in today. I'm sure everybody's good. Item 47.

Hi, Councilors, 47 is to increase an award amount from a grant. These are for hard tokens. You all likely have them where when we go to log into our accounts, our city accounts, there's multi-factor authentication. It's a generated value that allows you to securely log into your account. So this is to increase the award size. We are able to get additional funds, therefore more tokens for our staff.

Vinny, is this going to be an annual fee that we're going to be seeing?

We buy tokens on a yearly basis. It's just there's ones that break. I mean, there's ones that one is our staff size either grows or shrinks as well. If we don't get them back, sometimes it's just lost ones, et cetera. So, yeah.

Okay.

Thank you.

I wouldn't say that, you know, it's not always to this degree, but, you know, while we can get them with this funding, we will.

Yep. Thank you. Yep. Anybody else? 48.

Councilor Trudeau, first deputy chief. Under number 48, we're looking for permission to application an agreement with New York State Division of Criminal Justice for a law enforcement technology grant in the amount of $1 million. We're currently going through that application process right now, but we're looking at cameras, computers, some total stations for crime scene and traffic crashes, speed trailers, comms for communication, BWCs. We're looking at a potential Axon product that translates through the body-worn cameras rather than to have to call a translator or a third-party service. So those are the types of things that we're looking to spend on this technology grant.

And Chief, when will you know what exactly you're, do we, you know, we apply for a million dollars, do we get a million dollars and then determine how we're going to spend it or do we have to document in the application a kind of line item, you know, 500K here, 250K here? When do we determine what products we're going to be purchasing?

So we're going through the process right now to decide that. We have to apply letting them know what we want to put in there. And that's September 2nd, I believe. Early September is when the application is due. And then we'll know within a few months, a few weeks actually, if we're successful. So we can provide, if that's what your question is? Yeah, pretty much. We'll provide exactly what... we are going to apply for.

And the question is, should we vote on Monday or should we hold it, given that we don't know what the technologies are?

We were just talking about holding this for the committee hearing.

So you're going to hold it? Is that for a committee meeting?

Committee meeting, yep. I mean, not a committee meeting, just until we have a list of the technologies.

Yeah, if you could provide us a list of the technologies that we're going to be looking for, then we don't have to hold it if we can do that.

But I'm sorry, I won't have that by Monday.

You won't have it by Monday?

No, no, I won't have that by Monday. So we're going through the process of evaluating it, getting pricing. We're just looking for that initial approval to enter the application. So I can provide it after that once we have it, you know, but I don't have it now. When's the deadline for these applications? September 2nd, I believe. So we have the month of August to prepare for that.

or do you have to have the prices with it? No, all she needs to know is the items. Just the items.

On our end, we need to know the pricing of the various items so we can decide what we're going to put in for. So the pricing may eliminate something, so I will need that pricing on our end to decide whether we're going to put it in the application. Once we make that decision, then we can come to you with our thoughts on what we want to apply for, for sure.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you, Chief.

Item 54, or I'm sorry, 49.

Okay, so 49, this is again an application with the New York State, this is for the Department of Justice. It's a split grant. The total amount of the grant is $151,005. We share that equally with the Sheriff's Department. We are looking, our portion of it will go towards soft targets, security supplies, and emergency response equipment. And I have a bit more specifics here. Sorry, we have quite a few items on the agenda here. Okay, so one of the first items is hardening critical infrastructure in the terms of the new public safety building. These are concrete security barriers that will go in front of the windows on that first floor. We had them at the old PSB that will prevent vehicle-borne attacks on that particular building. That's one item. We're looking for $40,000 to purchase additional barrier systems for street closures, like the St. Patrick's Day Parade, those mobile ones that can be moved efficiently and effectively, and they, again, stop vehicle-borne attacks. Some $3,000 for emergency response team equipment to deploy less lethal munitions. It's a munition release pole. It's a remote thing that you can stick through and release munitions without putting an operator at risk. Some storage dry boxes. and some drone maintenance for about $5,000 in drone maintenance for our existing drones that the props break on a deployment or something like that, we can fix those drones. And then there's a small amount of personal costs in terms of OT costs of $4,000 on that grant for the total of the 75 that I described.

Anybody have any questions on that?

I have a question. It's probably not in either of these. I've asked it before. Not to you, but there was funding that was requested about a year or two ago, and it was about... When you, it was an attachment for the cameras. If something was drawn off of your belt, then it turned on the camera automatically. Did that ever happen?

You're talking about signal sidearm through Axon. No, we do not have that. I'm not sure if we ever applied for it. I wasn't familiar with that.

Okay, yeah, we did. Yeah.

And it's also, you know, when somebody draws their holster, that individual's BWC comes on, but then the individuals around you also come on as well, those BWCs. But we can look into that.

Okay.

Right now, I'm not aware of any plans to get that at this point.

Well, I think we should find out. Not saying that we won't. We need to go back to grants, I think, and find out if we ever even... wrote for it or figure out? Yeah, because we absolutely had okayed it. I can look for it. What was the name of the grant?

I'm not familiar with any grants. I'm familiar with the product, which is Signal Sidearm through Axon.

Signal Sidearm, yeah. I'll look for it.

Deputy Chief, since Clinton Square is under construction and these grants seem to be well poised, is there collaboration with DPW to talk about installed concrete security barriers for our parade routes or other systems like what New Orleans put in place to stop vehicle-borne attacks?

Absolutely. We coordinate with DPW. Right now, because we don't have the barriers, we contact DPW and they bring the dump trucks in and large vehicles to help us with that. Not ideal. because they need staffing, that sort of thing, to do that, and overtime. So we are definitely in communications with DPW, and that's the impetus for trying to get some of this stuff to avoid some of that taxing work that we ask of DPW.

Just safety for everybody, right? Absolutely. Safety for officers, safety for parade goers.

Yep, but there is definitely...

But we are looking for those solutions within these grants, too?

Yeah, that's what this is. Yep, absolutely. I love hearing that. Alright. I think we're at 50, right?

Yep, 50.

Item number 50, this is a cash capital request to appropriate funds in the amount of $150,000 for technology server upgrades. These are for the firewalls that Vinny talked about, the servers that keep our network up and running. They get to a point where they're at the end of their life and they need replacing. This money would go towards those replacements of our network infrastructure. And there is collaboration with Dave Proak and Vinny on all of this stuff.

I was going to ask that question. I'm going to ask it real quick before I sit down. That's all right. I knew you were coming back, Councillor.

I knew you were coming back.

Coordinating with Vinnie and everything. Yes. Is there any point, Evan, where are you? Because maybe Evan can answer this question. Because I know Janet Burke does a lot of work in the research, right? But do we have, let's just say for this part of the year, do we have a total amount of all grants citywide? Do we have that number?

Can I say something? Council President Janet do send a quarterly report. She just sent it not too long ago.

Is police included in that? Because I know police.

It's everything, the application agreement, whatever grant we got, you know, I'm assuming. I can answer that.

Council, to clarify, are you asking for how much has been spent on grants or how much has been received, both, or applied? Both. Okay. Janet, I believe, has that information. Janet's not here today, but she'll be able to provide at least something to a certain date.

Okay.

Are these end-of-life servers, are these something that's not at the new building? I thought we got all new equipment over there.

No, no, we brought a lot of equipment. Now, there's some new equipment for sure, but we brought a lot of equipment from 511. We had multiple servers, multiple firewalls, multiple switches that were brought from 511. We didn't buy all new network equipment by far. There was quite a bit of stuff. Any questions on 50? Okay, item number 51, again, looking to appropriate funds from cash capital in the amount of $400,000. This is for a replacement of our cops cameras. We have upwards of 500 cops cameras across the city. This is money to replace broken ones and fix them and bring them back online. 52.

Can we get a number of the broken ones? Can we get an account of the broken ones?

Yeah, our IT department tracks how many were replaced last year type of thing. Is that what you're looking for?

Yeah.

How many are currently down?

Yeah. Again, what's the lifespan for those? Because it just seems like we're asking for this every year. I don't know if the amounts changed every year.

Yes, they do.

It just seems like a lot.

Absolutely. And it is something that we ask for every year because these cameras do have an end of life, and these cameras do go down. And there's a lot of them out there. So in order to – it's kind of like our vehicles, right?

Yeah, I was about to ask. These are the body cams that we're talking about.

No, these are the cameras that are throughout the city streets. Oh, okay, okay. Not our body cams. No, those don't go down. No, no, no.

Okay, I thought you were talking about body cams.

No, I'm sorry. I wasn't clear. These are the cops' cameras on the street corners.

Okay.

All right?

Okay.

If you have a chance, could you give me a list of where cameras are in my county?

That's correct, though. I have a lot of questions from constituents. Where are they? Why are they not here? I have a lot of questions.

Yeah, sure. Just so you are aware also, they're the ones with the blue lights. These are not covert cameras. So if an individual or a citizen wants to know, these are the blue light cameras. They're very visible. We want to make sure that folks know.

I'd just like to pinpoint where they are. Sure, we can do that. All right, thank you.

And I'm sorry, I'm not familiar with this program. Could you give me a little background?

Okay, so this would have been going back probably 2001, 2002. We started putting police, I don't want to say owned, but police-operated cameras in communities in the city of Syracuse in high-crime areas. We started with the high-crime shots areas. Would have been the near west side area. Since then, we have expanded that program where we have put them in other areas of the city, not just necessarily shots fired crime where they started, but overall crime problems throughout the city. And they're governed by a policy on retention. They're governed by a policy on usage. And that program has been largely successful in terms of capturing crimes. preventing crime because they are visible and people see them. So that's that's a quick.

Yeah, absolutely. But we own them.

Yes.

And who watches them?

So we have a series of retired police officers that watch them live. They work in our crime analysis center, kind of like a real-time crime situation. And then also, you know, detectives or officers on the street have the ability to watch those cameras as well.

How long do we store those?

So data on that is stored, there's a set timeframe, and I don't want to get this wrong, but I believe it's 30 days, I'll get back to you. And then if, and thank you. I know it's right on top of it. 30 days. And then if the camera is downloaded because it's associated with crime, then the retention follows the normal retention on that crime. And it can vary from misdemeanors all the way up to major felonies that are stored forever.

Okay, 52.

All right, moving right along here. Okay, so this is another capital. This is a bond ordinance, though, authorizing the sale of bonds for department rifle-rated vests for our officers in the amount of $380,000. Right now, our officers are outfitted with level two vests that will basically defeat handguns. Based on recent events with officers getting shot at with rifles, we need higher-rated vests for our officers, so this would buy vests that... Level three, level four, that would defeat rifle rounds.

How many would it buy?

That's a great question. It's $380,000, and we're going to buy vests for everybody, all of our sworn officers. How long do vests last? They do have a shelf life, just like our vests, but it's, I think, five years, J.D. ? I think it's five years.

Yep.

Or until you can get a new one.

I'm sorry?

Or until you can get a better technology, a better build, right?

Yeah, I think a lot of them do have a shelf life. And we have vests in our range that we test out after 10 years, and they still stop rounds. But the manufacturer will tell you that it's five years.

Do you have a disposal plan for both the level two plates and level three plates?

Yes. Yep. Just like we do now. Yep. What that is, I'll have to get back to you, but we do have a, yeah, they turn them in.

But wasn't part of it at some point, didn't we give some equipment or some of the stuff we had to some other country or didn't we do?

To Ukraine.

I know we gave something to somebody.

Yeah. Ukraine, yeah. Yeah, to Ukraine, yeah.

Was it two years ago? Two years ago?

Oh, boy, it was all of that, yeah. Yeah. I think it was right at the beginning of the start of the war, if I remember correctly. Correct. I remember that. Okay.

For the disposal plan and the number of vests.

Yes. And I hope my colleagues in the back are keeping notes on what I have to do.

Item 53.

Oh, 54, right?

Oh, 54.

Yeah, 52 and 53 is the bond and authorization, sorry. Okay, so item 54 and 55, this is to amend a previous bond authorization ordinance. We came to you asking for $750,000 in 25-26. We are asking to amend that to increase it by a million dollars, bringing it to a 1.75 for our command post. This is a mobile vehicle that gets deployed on critical incidents. Right now our current command post is a 2016 model, so it's 10 years old. Has multiple issues with it in terms of the roof leaking. It's just end of life. Exhaust system, vehicle maintenance, that sort of thing. That's one aspect of the problem. The larger aspect of the problem is we've simply it's not big enough. We've grown out the capacity of this vehicle, both in size and the technology that's in this vehicle. So. It's, you know, we operate based on the national incident management system. It's a nationwide model on how you handle a critical incident. And in that command post could be upwards of 10 different people, all with different roles from the chief to the incident commander, the operations commander, communications, the CID liaison, the negotiator, the bomb, the SWAT. All of those folks are in this room and what is critical to a successful outcome on these is communication and coordination and to not have a good base of operations for these definitely affects how this scene develops.

Deputy Chief, tremendous sympathy in all the world with the ideas that, you know, of coordination. I liked it better when you put the $18,000 proposal, though. I'm sorry? It's a whole million dollars in addition to the $750,000 previously authorized. So what does that get us in terms of enhanced coordination?

So it gets us a new vehicle that has that extra capacity that I spoke of. I'll give you an example. When we had our officers getting shot down at Tyler Court, that was a major incident. We outgrew the interior of that command post very quickly. FBI couldn't come in. State police weren't in there. So just the capacity and the ability to hold the number of people, because new command posts, and I don't want to call them an RV, but everybody's familiar with a mobile RV that's got the hydraulic bump-outs now. You double your space very quickly. Whiteboards, computers. And that's the next thing I was going to say, capacity in terms of people, but capacity in terms of I want to be able to deploy the state police drone, and I want to be able to see that as an incident commander or operations commander on the screen. We couldn't do that. It was very, very difficult. So this, you know, we asked, knowing that this was a staged thing, right, that this vehicle potentially cost about $1.8 million. We knew that from the start. We're staging this in 750 and now a million. So it gets us a new vehicle with all of that extra features that I talked about.

But the original capital improvement bond was for a new vehicle. So why is this one more expensive?

It's staged. The original amount that we asked was just for part of it. Now we're in the following year or the next year, we're asking for the rest of it to be able to pull it all together.

And what's the lifespan of something like this?

Well, this one lasted 10 years. This one, we did not have a place to store it, so that hurt it. Right now, we are looking for a place to store this inside. That'll help the lifespan. And one other thing, I know we've been talking a lot here, but I want to make sure I hit this point. We have been told that Senator Mannion has allocated $1 million of... Congressman Mannion? Senator Mannion?

Congressman Mannion.

Congressman Mannion, sorry. My apologies. My apologies. Thank you. Congressman Mannion has appropriated... That's what I thought. So anyways, there's a potential for this $1 million to come back and reimburse, or the same way we were talking about the last bond, if we don't spend that million dollars because we get this appropriated money, the city will be on the hook just for the $750,000. Where do you buy these? There's a number of places. This would be an RFP item. This would be something that we would look to spec out, lay out all of our needs and wants in terms of it, and then see who responds to us in terms of what that looks like.

Are these custom builds? Are they also specific contracts?

You don't go to, like I keep saying, an RV dealership. This is a company that takes that base model and then outfits it with the needs of a mobile command post.

the fire department also have a mobile command post?

I'm sure they do. I'm sure they have a command post.

Can I go back while we were talking about mobile command posts? Because I think this is very important. I was at the Valley last week, Valley Plaza. We had a police center. The sign that still says, Frank Fowler, police chief, Ben Walsh, mayor. Similar to what we had on Westcott Street and on Butternut Street. We had community policing. And I wanna mention this now, I think we have to go back to community policing. I think that there's locations, and even though some of the plazas might not be fully full, I think it's important that we have more police presence, that we return, get the funding where we have these little community centers that people live in these neighborhoods can go to a place where they can talk to a police officer. But until then, I think And I'm looking over Bonner Plaza where the sign is up, Ben Walsh Mayor, Chief Frank Fowler, it's 10 years ago. Yeah, we still have them, but it's empty. And it doesn't look good. And I really think in the future we have to look. Go back to community policing. I think the command posts are good, but I think we have to go back to where we were. I know there's been a lot of calls having police officers on the beat on the north side. I hear it in my council district, but I just wanted to say that.

Is everybody okay with item 54, or do you want me to hold it?

I'm okay with it, but I have a question that I feel goes hand in hand with this. We've had several incidents where, such as the Tyler Court one, there was one on South Lyon Street where individuals needed to be evacuated from locations. But during these evacuations, and you might have did what you needed to do, and I just don't know about it, but during the evacuations, a lot of people were outside. One of those incidents was in the winter.

Yes.

What have we invested in a van, a bus, a trailer, something, or are we working with Central? What are we doing so that people aren't outside because they don't know how many hours some of these things can be in effect?

Yeah, super good question. So we do. We do all of what you just said. So I'll give you an example on Tyler Court. So we had to evacuate a number of people from their homes there. So we negotiated with Central Bus, who picked them up in a safe location. And then I worked with Lateef Johnson to identify a church. And that bus took all of those individuals down to a church. I know I wasn't the incident commander on it, but up on Park Street when they had the house explosion not too long ago, we worked the Salvation Army on that. So we definitely have, and when I went back to the command post, there's an individual that sits in that command post that's the logistics chief, right, that identifies, okay, I need that resource, and I'm not the incident commander, I don't have to worry about that stuff. My job is to get in touch with Centro and identify a church or a location for these citizens to go to. So, yes, all of that is done.

Okay.

Chief, I think I'm going to hold 54 as well for a committee meeting.

Do you, by chance, know what the square footage would be on this vehicle?

Square footage? No, I don't. No. But it's all... Do you? Yeah, it's all readily available. And I understand, I know we talked, committee meeting does sound in order and we can have all of, we can have examples of what we're talking about. We can have what we have now.

A bake sale?

Yeah, a bake sale.

And what do we do with the old command unit?

I'm sorry?

What do we do with the old command unit?

Well, we'd like to keep this, the old command. It's great for just what we talked about. If we have a short-term situation where we have to bring people in and warm them.

But you would take all of that equipment out

Yeah, it'd be a different purpose, but we'd still like to use it. If there's an overflow in terms of people we need to put into a bus, then this is a perfect place to put it. It's just, we've outgrown it.