Building Inspection Commission (BIC)

BUDGET & ORGANIZATION COMMITTEE

Committee Meeting of January 15, 1998

Adopted January 29, 1998

1660 Mission Street, Room 6034, San Francisco, CA 94103

MINUTES

The meeting of the BIC Budget & Organization Committee was called to order at 10:15 a.m. by Commissioner Vasquez.

1.	ROLL CALL - Roll call was taken and a quorum was certified. Commission Secretary Banico reported that Commissioner Guinnane was still unable to attend meetings due to his recent surgery and has declined to be a member of this Committee.

COMMISSION MEMBERS/STAFF PRESENT:

Armando Vasquez, Chair	Mona Cereghino, Vice-Chair

Maria Banico, Commission Secretary

D.B.I. REPRESENTATIVES:

Jim Hutchinson, Deputy Director for Permit Services

William Wong, Deputy Director for Inspection Services

Carla Johnson, Assistant to the Director

Paulette Hooey, Manager for the Administrative Services Division

Alfredo Delemos, Principal Accountant

2.	Election of Chair and Vice-Chair of the Budget and Organization Committee.

Commissioner Cereghino moved to nominate Commissioner Vasquez to be the Chair of the Budget and Organization Committee.

Commissioner Vasquez accepted the nomination. Since there were no objections, Commissioner Vasquez assumed the Chair of the Budget and Organization Committee.

Commissioner Vasquez moved to nominate Commissioner Cereghino to be the Vice-Chair of the Budget and Organization Committee.

Commissioner Cereghino accepted the nomination. Since there were no objections, Commissioner Cereghino assumed the Vice-Chair of the Budget and Organization Committee.

3.	Report, discussion and possible action on the proposed budget of the Department of Building Inspection for Fiscal Year 1998-99.

Deputy Director Wong informed that Director Chiu was ill and not able to attend the Committee meeting today. He then proceeded to report on the proposed budget and referred to the documents provided to the Committee members.

Deputy Director Wong referred to the summary of requests ("wish lists") received from managers of all the divisions. He then referred to another document which was the Director's Office proposal based on the managers' requests. Mr. Wong presented the highlights of the report and described the various areas of department enhancements or new programs being proposed by the department. Mr. Wong then proceeded to describe the budget requests for his programs in the inspections services side of the department.

Deputy Director Hutchinson described and presented justifications for the budget requests for work improvements or new programs for the plan check services side of the department.

Ms. Carla Johnson referred to new summary sheets listing the proposed increases in the budget which were distributed at the beginning of the meeting. She said that this list was not new information and was part of the budget proposal sent with the Committee's packet earlier. Ms. Johnson said that the new summary sheets had an additional column that compared the current budget request to corresponding allocations from the current fiscal year's budget.

Commissioner Vasquez said that the format of the budget presentation did not facilitate easy review. He said that the requested budget increases and their justifications did not stand out. In some cases, the budget requests and positions did not match the amounts or the positions listed in the cover summary page. He recommended that the document be reformatted to facilitate the review. He also recommended that the staff positions for line functions such as those for Project Management be moved from the Director's Office to the appropriate permit or inspection services budget line.

Commissioner Cereghino asked about the Project Management Program which was earlier described by Deputy Director Wong as a program where two new permanent positions and thirteen temporary positions were being requested to form project teams that would be assigned to the plan check of major projects (e.g., Giant's Ballpark). She asked what would happen if the work on a project was not yet finished and the temporary staff was at the end of their contract.

Commissioner Vasquez agreed that this was a concern. He asked about problems in continuity.

Deputy Director Hutchinson said that the newly hired or the temporary staff would not be assigned to the major projects. They would be hired to relieve current DBI staff from their routine duties so that these more experienced staff members could then be assigned to the major projects.

Ms. Paulette Hooey, Manager of Administrative Services, said that the summary sheets contained an error in the number of new positions requested and the total expenditures. She said that there are 55 new employees being requested and that the total expenditure for new staff was $1,952,775.34.

Ms. Hooey said that she had just received approval from the Controller's Office on the revenue projections. The proposed budget expenditures were over the projected revenues by about $1.5 million. In response to Commissioner Cereghino's questions, Ms. Hooey described the budget procedures. She said that she was required to submit projected revenues for next fiscal year for approval by the Controller. Once approved, the projected revenue is then used as the baseline for expenditures. Ms. Hooey said that the Mayor's Office has allowed city departments to propose budget expenditures up to the approved projected revenues. This is different from last year when the directive from the Mayor's Office was a no-increase budget from the previous year.

In response to Commissioner Vasquez's questions, Ms. Hooey said that she did not include the projected revenues from the major projects such as the Giant's Ballpark in the revenue projections submitted to the Controller's Office. She said that the projections had to be conservative and based on current year revenues. There was a lot of uncertainty on the timing and processing of major projects.

Commissioner Vasquez directed staff to prepare a revised budget proposal for review by the Committee and subsequent review by the full Commission at its January 21, 1998 Regular Meeting. He requested that the revised draft take into consideration his earlier comments on format and clarity. He also said that the total expenditures should be trimmed to be within the Controller's approved revenue projections.

4.	Discussion and possible action to set a meeting and identify items that could be placed on the agenda of future meetings of the Committee.

Commissioner Vasquez suggested that the Committee meet to review the revised budget proposal on Tuesday, January 20, 1998 at 10:00 a.m. There being no objections, he directed Commission Secretary Banico to schedule the Committee meeting and send out the notice.

5.	Public Comment: The Committee will take public comment on matters within the Committee's jurisdiction that are not part of this agenda.

There was no public testimony received at this point in the proceedings.

6.	Adjournment.

There being no other business, and on a motion made by Chair Vasquez, seconded by Vice-Chair Cereghino, the meeting adjourned at 11:45 p.m.

The motion passed by unanimous vote.

________________________________

MARIA BANICO

Commission Secretary

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