Budget Committee
BUILDING INSPECTION COMMISSION (BIC)
Department of Building Inspection (DBI)
BUDGET & ORGANIZATION COMMITTEE
Monday, January 29, 2001 at 2:00 p.m.
Adopted July 18, 2001
City Hall, 1 Dr. Carlton B. Goodlett Place, Room 408
MINUTES
The meeting of the Budget & Organization Committee was called to order at 2:10 p.m. by President Fillon.
1. Roll Call - Roll call was taken and a quorum was certified.
COMMISSION MEMBERS PRESENT:
Alfonso Fillon, President Bobbie Sue Hood, Vice-President
Esther Marks, Commissioner
Ann Aherne, Secretary
D.B.I. REPRESENTATIVES:
Frank Y. Chiu, Director
Amy Lee, Assistant Director
Taras Madison, Manager Administration & Finance
2. 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 comment.
3. Report, discussion and possible action on the proposed budget of the Department of Building Inspection for Fiscal Year 2001-2002.
President Fillon stated the last time the Committee met there was some information that was requested from the Commission and in particular Commissioner Marks. President Fillon asked if it would be helpful to have staff answer any questions that the Committee had. Commissioner Marks said that it would be helpful if staff and the Committee could go over the budget, division by division, and that would probably be the easiest way to proceed.
Commissioner Marks said that she did want to go over a memo that she had received from Local 21, Planners Association and wanted to know when this item should be addressed. Director Chiu stated that Commissioner Marks could discuss the memo at any time. Commissioner Marks said that she had a question about whether enough money has been allocated for the shuttle service. Commissioner Marks said that she was not clear about the situation; both departments would use the shuttle service and the public goes to Planning as well as DBI, so it should be a shared cost, and not DBI's sole responsibility. Commissioner Marks said she wondered if that formula was worked out or some agreement was made on that. Commissioner Marks said that the second issue that was brought up was about the open-space. Director Chiu said that regarding the shuttle agreement, his understanding was that when the condition was set, DBI did not communicate with City Planning about the funding, but his understanding with Steve Young was that DBI could find the money for the professional service of $60,000 for this fiscal year. Director Chiu said that money has been allocated for next fiscal year, but DBI has not talked with Planning as to how they would provide their portion of the money. Director Chiu said that City Planning needed to put this item into their budget for the service. Director Chiu said that he was not sure about how many trips were going to be made daily, but thought it was about six, back and forth from City Hall to 1660 Mission Street. Director Chiu said that the number of trips was determined eight or nine years ago when the permit approval for 1660 Mission was issued. Director Chiu said that regarding the open space of a rooftop in the new annex, there was a rough estimate supplied by the architect of approximately $1.5M. Commissioner Marks said that the Planners were proposing to meet with Steve Young or someone from the Department about alternatives and are proposing use of the annex rooftop for potential open space. Director Chiu stated that for the annex rooftop, there were some estimates that were still $1.5M because there needs to be two separate stairs. Director Chiu said that it is still going to be an occupier for space and the elevator needs to be extended, so there are still additional costs. Director Chiu stated that in speaking with Steve Young, Steve was a little bit concerned because Local 21 seemed to come up with new ideas every time they met. Director Chiu said that he felt it would be reasonable for the Union to come up with some sort of plan to come as to what they want, and maybe do their own study. Director Chiu said that Steve Young has come up with four or five different scenarios and this is costing a lot of time and Local 21 has not pinpointed exactly what they want. Director Chiu said that perhaps Local 21 could come up with some sort of proposal that they could live with and give DBI some plan. Director Chiu said that they should do their own study as well, rather than coming up with ideas and then when DBI comes back with figures, the Union feels the figures don't make sense. Director Chiu said that Steve Young would like to send this back to the Union and have them come up with something reasonable to see if it is doable and what the cost is going to be. President Fillon asked if the current budget that the Committee was reviewing contained all of the construction costs for the expansion. Director Chiu that the budget did not include anything for the proposed rooftop. President Fillon said that this should probably be covered in another discussion or meeting. Ms. Taras Madison said that this item was not included because the Department has to do two separate budgets; there is a capital budget and an operations budget. Ms. Madison said that up to this point everything that deals with the 1660 Mission Street annex has been in the capital budget and the Committee is just reviewing the operating budget. President Fillon said that he wanted to stay on the operating budget. Director Chiu said that President Fillon should tell Commissioner Marks when the best time would be to bring up expenditures on the capital budget. Ms. Madison said that the best time to bring it up would still be around this time, as both budgets will be submitted at the same time; it is just that they are two separate budgets. Ms. Madison said that it is her understanding that DBI has not even started this year's capital budget; there was $2.4M for fiscal year 2000. President Fillon asked if because there were no changes, the Commission had to approve this budget. Ms. Madison said that it was the same deadline, but at this point in time, after talking to the project managers for the capital budget, the project is still up in the air. Ms. Madison said that the Department couldn't show that much progress was made on what was proposed because DBI has been waiting and the money has not been spent for this fiscal year. Ms. Madison said that there is already $2.4M allocated for this fiscal year and it won't be used, as it is already January; the Department will just wait to do another capital budget next fiscal year. Ms. Madison said that this money (the $2.4M) would be carried forward next fiscal year because for all intensive purposes everything that was going to happen this fiscal year just hasn't happened. President Fillon said that when the current project gets done, then the Department would deal with any additional capital budget. Commissioner Marks said she wondered if in terms of timeliness, because this issue comes up repeatedly, she feels that there should be some resolution. Commissioner Marks said it does seem reasonable to say to the Union that if they could come up with some concrete alternatives, then DBI could estimate the cost and make a decision from that information. Commissioner Marks said she would like some kind of timeframe. Director Chiu said that because the money has not been spent in this fiscal year for the capital improvement, it sounds to him that Ms. Madison is saying that the Department will get by for this year. Director Chiu said maybe next fiscal year when the Department knows exactly how much is needed for the annex, more money will be requested. Ms. Madison said that given that it is still up in the air as to how much is going to be done and how much it will cost, DBI does not need to request that money for next fiscal year; the money for this fiscal year has not been used. Ms. Madison stated that if all of the projects that were going to be done this fiscal year could get moving next fiscal year then the following fiscal year, once there is some agreement about what is going to be done with the budget, then the Department could submit a better picture of what the capital budget should be. The roof garden was something that was going to be done afterwards anyway. Ms. Madison said that right now it is all speculation as things are still up in the air and given that the $2.4M has not been touched it is enough for the Department to carry forward next fiscal year. Ms. Madison stated that her understanding is that the Department is going to get the details hammered out, but that won't stop DBI from having the money appropriated for next fiscal year. Director Chiu said that it sounds like the Department still has time in the future to apply for a supplemental if necessary. Director Chiu said that the base money is already set aside for the project and it is easier to go and ask for more money if it is appropriate. Director Chiu said that the Committee needed to remember that the capital project has a separate team composed of other department heads and every time a department goes for a capital improvement there is this committee that has to be dealt with. Ms. Madison said that this group is called the CIA (Capital Improvements Advisory Committee) and given that there are questions, the Department could not just go in and say that it needs $1.5M, not for next fiscal year, but for the following year, because the Department does not have the details. Ms. Madison said that it is better to get those details in hand and then go in with the real capital budget. Commissioner Marks said that she is concerned that it appears that this project is just being put off and asked what steps should be taken now so there is some resolution of this. Ms. Madison stated that it was her understanding that Steve (Young) and his team are actually working with the Planning Department and there are still meetings going on. Ms. Madison said that the project went before the Board of Appeals. Director Chiu said that the Board of Appeals upheld the project sponsor's proposal and Local 21 people are filing a Discretionary Review with City Planning. Director Chiu said that he did not know if there were going to be any more meetings, as there has been an appeal filed. Director Chiu stated that he had spoken with Steve Young a few days ago and Steve Young said that everyday Local 21 are coming up with new ideas. Director Chiu said that there should be some kind of a concrete plan for what Local 21 wants; Local 21 should come up with estimates of cost, rather than having DBI researching ten different scenarios and then saying that the Department is not trying to cooperate. Director Chiu said that Local 21 should do more research. Director Chiu said that it sounds like the Department has more time for the capital budget. Commissioner Marks said that it is her concern that something is done so that Local 21 does not feel that DBI is just shoving them aside. President Fillon said that this was not on the agenda and it would be better if there were a full staff report on this issue when the public has a chance to comment. President Fillon said that there is not much time for working on the operating budget and would like to get into it. Commissioner Marks said that the shuttle is one issue and the capital project is budget related. Commissioner Marks said that she did not think a lot of time needed to be spent on it, but again something should be done so that there is some resolution at some point. President Fillon said that the Department was going to keep working on this as they have been to keep the door open, but the Department cannot predict what may happen because of the process. Commissioner Marks said that the Local is claiming that Steve Young refuses to meet with them, which she does not know to be true. Commissioner Marks said to avoid a problem; it would be better to take some action to deal with it. Commissioner Marks asked Director Chiu to speak with Steve Young to ask him to talk with the Union about these issues, and let them know if it is acceptable for them to come up with alternatives and then discussions could be started. Commissioner Marks said that Steve Young has to do something. Director Chiu said that two or three weeks ago, he instructed Steve Young to ask the Union for a more concrete plan and then the Department would revisit that and that is where communication left off. Director Chiu said that, in other words, Steve was not going to come up with ten different ideas. Commissioner Marks said that Director Chiu had gone over that already. Commissioner Marks stated that the second issue is the shuttle service and said that there should be some agreement between Planning and DBI as to what the percentage of shared costs would be, or if it is 50/50 or whatever. President Fillon asked if Director Chiu could have this information available for a regular meeting. Director Chiu said that this should be put on an agenda so that the public can participate.
Ms. Madison asked if the Committee wanted to go over the goals and accomplishments by division. Ms. Madison said that she had included three different things, the first being fiscal year 1999-2000 goals and accomplishments for each division, the second page has and here Ms. Madison said that perhaps she should start with going over performance measures and goals and accomplishments because it looks like a lot of different numbers, but they are basically the same thing. Ms. Madison said that a memo showed goals and accomplishments and the last page showed performance measures; it is basically the goals and accomplishments summarized. Ms. Madison said that for instance, Inspection Services, in performance measures it would show a measure of completing 100% of customer related inspections within 48 hours and then on each of the Inspection Divisions it shows that same goal. Ms. Madison said that the Department records this on the budget for performance measures as just Inspection Services in general and this is basically an average of all of those divisions. Ms. Madison said that it looks like a lot of different things are being measured, but a lot of the performance measures are just summarizing all the different division goals. Ms. Madison asked if the Committee wanted to go over each of the division goals. Commissioner Marks said that would be fine.
Commissioner Marks said that the Committee had read the information, so it was not a matter of going over the information in detail. Ms. Madison asked if any of the Committee members had questions about this or if she should actually go over each division. President Fillon said that it would probably be easier to go over any questions. President Fillon stated that he had no questions. Commissioner Marks said that from last year the Department's strategic issues had been identified and Commissioner Marks said that she could figure out most of the items over the course of the year and what was happening. Commissioner Marks said that one of the strategic issues was to reduce holdovers in the insufficient or inadequate submission of plans by educating customers and doing outreach programs to industry professionals. Commissioner Marks asked what specifically had been done and what is the status of that. Ms. Madison said that some of the things that are being done are, for instance, in Technical Services Division, brown bag lunches; in Planning Services there are preplan meetings for big projects where the customer comes into the Department for review before they actually turn in their plans so that mistakes can be caught on the front end of the project. Ms. Madison said that these are two types of outreach. Director Chiu said that the Department did resume the Public Advisory Committee and stated that he utilizes that monthly meeting to talk about what some of the major deficiencies are with particular areas, such as the Disability Access requirements, which are still an ongoing problem. Director Chiu said that at the PAC meeting, he promised to bring issues back to the Department and asked the groups that had attended to go back to their committees and let them know what some of the deficiencies are. Director Chiu said that on the larger projects, the Department is insisting on meeting at least two or three times before the project is submitted as it is an education problem. Director Chiu said that a number of architects and engineers are still having trouble grasping laws that have been in place for years. Commissioner Marks said that it seemed to her that the holdovers would be measurable. Director Chiu asked if Commissioner Marks were talking about how many plans are being approved without holdover. Director Chiu said that initially two or three years ago when this program was started, before there was major outreach for pre-application, a survey was done and there were 60-65% of projects that were just out of whack and did not comply with the code. Director Chiu said that hopefully this percentage has been reduced because the more education that the Department does, than chances are that these incomplete plans or incorrect plans will be less and less; Director Chiu said that he must admit that there has been no recent survey to figure out how this has been reduced. Director Chiu said that things are better than before, but feels that the Department needs to continue to do this kind of outreach to the public. Ms. Madison said that it was her understanding that because of the pre-application meetings, the plans approval rate should go up significantly because now the Department catches those things on the front end. Ms. Madison said that initially maybe a large project would take two months for approval, where now they are being approved in 30 days or within 7 days. Ms. Madison said that in this fiscal year, performance measure was bumped up a bit. Director Chiu said that in response to Commissioner Marks' question, the Department should see much faster approval, but that is all related to more education and more time spent at the front end to screen projects better. Director Chiu said that Commissioner Marks was right, if the Department does a good job and the public attends these meetings and takes advantage of the pre-application meetings, then the approval rate should increase. Commissioner Marks said that the reason she was bringing this up was not just because it was identified as a strategic issue, but stated that, the Department can hold the bag lunch and have no one show up. Commissioner Marks said that the effort should be to try and identify ways that the Department can reach the identified population that needs help. Commissioner Marks said that in her mind this is something that is worth looking at in terms of other ways of doing it. President Fillon said that the PAC is very well attended. Director Chiu said that the Department offers a Saturday morning class for Disability Access and at one point it was very popular, but gradually the class decreased and there were no more participants. Director Chiu said that Commissioner Marks was right, there is only so much that the Department can do and if there are no takers than this frustrates everyone. Director Chiu said that he felt the Department needed to continue to do the outreach to show the public that DBI is here to work with the customer to get projects approved faster and to help them comply with the Code. Director Chiu said that all the Department can do is to continue to talk and educate the public at every possible meeting to let representatives get information back to their group or agency and let them know that the Department wants to work with everyone to improve Code compliance. Director Chiu said that he will continue to offer the service, but whether people respond or not, he has no control over that. Commissioner Marks said that this could be effective, but for her measures are helpful because she felt that the Commission or the Department does not really know if the outreach program is effective. Commissioner Marks said if it is not effective, than other ways of outreach have to be looked at. Director Chiu said that he did not want to say that the program doesn't work. Director Chiu said that this program was started a couple of years ago and recently the program has been stepped up. Director Chiu said that based on the approval rate compared to the last two or three years, the efficiency rate has improved. Director Chiu said that he remembered five of six years ago that hardly anything was approved over the counter; today, the average of approval over the counter is 80%. Director Chiu said that this is true for a lot of reasons and said that he could not pin point just one reason, but all of the things that have been done, outreach, continued education, pre-application meetings, have all contributed. Director Chiu said that sometimes the Department is still frustrated because there is a class and a good number of people show up, but other times there is not a lot of interest. Director Chiu said that he did not want the Committee to think that the Department is wasting energy and the process is not improving. Director Chiu said that in looking back at the past few years, the performance has increased. Director Chiu said he hoped he had answered Commissioner Marks' question. President Fillon said that said that he felt very comfortable with the budget and felt that there was nothing out of line or excessive. President Fillon said that, after having been on the Commission for a number of years, he has seen a lot of improvement and has seen the Department open up to the public to make it more accessible. President Fillon stated that he has seen more efficiency in follow-up for violations of the Code and also in his own practice he has heard a lot of co-workers and associates say that the Department has vastly improved over the past five years. President Fillon said he felt very comfortable with the budget, but said that he did not want to make it seem like there was no room for more improvement, as there is always room for improvement.
Commissioner Marks said that the other strategic issue that was identified was to implement on- line complaint tracking. Commissioner Marks said that this was considered Phase IV of MIS and asked how long it would be to have this actually carried out; what is the timeframe. Director Chiu said that he would be meeting with a vendor at 3:30 p.m. who is going to help DBI put this program into place. Director Chiu said he would have to admit that this has been delayed and said he was frustrated with the progress. Director Chiu said that he would like to put it on the calendar to talk about those online issues, online permitting and complaint tracking. Director Chiu said that this was something he hoped to have implemented by January and now it looks like time is slipping away. Director Chiu said that DBI needed to do a better job with the vendor and at his 3:30 p.m. meeting today was to find out what the glitches are and what the problems are that are holding this up.
Commissioner Marks said that it was brought up last year about the difficulty in filling vacancies. Commissioner Marks said that throughout all of the reports, this is a major problem. Commissioner Marks referred to Customer Service, or one of the divisions where almost half of the unit had vacancies. Commissioner Marks said that she noticed that one of the goals in the Department is to fill all vacancies and said that this had been spoken about peripherally at Commission Meetings, about the difficulty because of the economy as it was hard to get qualified individuals to apply for the positions. Commissioner Marks asked how the Department was planning to fill the vacancies. Director Chiu said that last year the Department did a very good job in filling vacancies, not to say that every area has been filled to 100%, but in the most part Personnel was able to hire a number of temporary personnel. Director Chiu said that the majority of the divisions, through the temporary positions, cut through a lot of the Civil Service red tape and most divisions were at a level of comfort. Ms. Madison said that the Department has been working with DHR and part of the problem was not having exams; now some of the exams have been completed and a job can be offered to a person provisionally, which doesn't make it as attractive as coming on as a permanent employee, so it is hard to compete with the private sector for those things. Ms. Madison said that actually as to new positions for this year, most of them are filled. Ms. Madison asked Commissioner Marks which division she was referring to that had a number of vacancies. Director Chiu that last year there was a problem in plan check, but that had been taken care of. Commissioner Marks said that while she was looking for her notes on this matter she had another question to ask.
Commissioner Marks said that in terms of Housing Inspection Services, last year the division reported a code enforcement backlog and the goal for the coming year is to try and reduce the backlog by 25%. Commissioner Marks said that in the report that was presented last year, it showed that considerable advances were made in reducing the backlog. Commissioner Marks said that obviously the Department gets continuous complaints, but wanted to know if it was a matter of the Department not being able to keep up with complaints, as it is not just the inherited complaints. Commissioner Marks said that if it were just the inherited complaints, this problem would have been done with by now. Director Chiu said that there was very little backlog now to abate these complaints, however, there are some complaints that take a little longer to get abated. Director Chiu said, as to whether there was anymore backlog as to the response to complaints, he did not feel there were any complaints that have not been addressed; it is just a matter of some cases taking longer to abate or some cases, under the direction of the Commission there are some cases that are not high priority cases. Director Chiu said that those are cases that the Department is not really pursuing. Director Chiu stated that in the last couple of years, HIS has been bombarded with routine inspections and SRO inspections. Director Chiu said that last year, the Department did not hire two additional people as planned, but the Department is going through that process right now. Director Chiu said that the Department is focusing on SRO hotels, for example, last fiscal year 1999-2000, HIS did a total of 295 residential hotel inspections; the first fiscal quarter of this year, the Department has done 93 SRO hotel inspections. Director Chiu said that the Department is paying more attention to some areas and allocating staff to do a better job where there is a high priority. Director Chiu said that the Department is doing a lot of creative things to achieve the demands that the public has made. Director Chiu said that this is shown in the first quarter of fiscal year 2000-2001, where HIS has done, in those three months alone, 93 hotel inspections. Commissioner Marks asked what it meant in the report where it says the goal is to reduce the inherited backlog by 25%. Director Chiu said that since the creation of Proposition G of this Department, the Department inherited about 6,000 - 7,000 backlog complaints and that means that some of this backlog has not been touched, but that was not the intention. Director Chiu said that every year, the goal has been to try and reduce this backlog by 25%. Director Chiu said that he did not believe that there were more than 500 - 600 backlog cases and those are the cases that are not high priority and for the most part, the backlog of 6,000-7,000 cases have been addressed. Director Chiu said that there is a log of new cases that come in and they also create a backlog because they take time to abate. Director Chiu said that this is what the Department has now and there is no huge backlog that was inherited from DPW five or six years ago.
Commissioner Marks said that she did find the division she was speaking about earlier, it was the One-Stop Permit Unit that set a goal of hiring a permit manager, permit coordinator, plan checker and secretary. Commissioner Marks said that this division only has ten staff positions assigned to that unit. Director Chiu said that One-Stop is currently going through vacancies because DHR is going through a reclassification. Director Chiu said that there are two or three vacancies in that unit at the moment because sometimes when DHR is going through the civil service process, and when there are vacancies, the Department cannot hire until the process is complete. Director Chiu said that this process is taking a long time and it is out of DBI's control because DHR says that the Department cannot hire while DHR is developing an exam. Commissioner Marks asked what percentage of the staff positions is vacant Department-wide. Assistant Director Amy Lee said that it is less than 4% and the Department has been very good about filling all positions by October 1st. Ms. Lee said that with One-Stop, the reason there are some vacancies is because DHR is reclassifying these positions. Director Chiu said that this particular unit is having difficulty because when the One-Stop Co-ordination Program was initiated, the Department did not know what classification staff should be and the Special Assistant classification was utilized. Director Chiu said that now two years have passed and it has taken this much time for DHR to come up with what they consider a permanent class for these positions. Director Chiu said that this is the process the Department is going through now and sometimes this is the price that is paid because staff was hired without knowing what classification they should be in; now DHR feels that they have found a class, but there has to be an exam process. Director Chiu said that the class that is being recommended is not just a class that DBI has control over, because there are other departments that utilize this class. Director Chiu said that now DHR has to work with other departments that have this class to come up with an exam. Director Chiu said that this is often a frustrating process, but overall Director Chiu said that the Department has been very good about filling vacancies. Ms. Lee said that the vacancy rate is very low, and also when there is a vacancy the Department tries to hire from within so a lot of times the vacancies are actually double because when there is a high level position, the Department tries to promote from within; if someone is qualified then they get that position and ultimately vacate a lower position and there is a backfill. Ms. Lee said that then the Department is doing double the work, but this year Ms. Lee said that the Department has been doing an excellent job of filling all of the new positions from the prior year by October 1st. Ms. Lee said that all of the legwork was done during the summertime so that appointments could be made as soon as possible when the funding was available.
Commissioner Marks said that there was an issue she forgot to mention that was in the memo from the Union. Commissioner Marks said that she received a memo from the Local 21 over the weekend that identified several issues, one being the shuttle service. Commissioner Marks said that the memo questioned if the amount that DBI had allocated for the shuttle service was adequate, but Commissioner Marks stated that her question was if the Department has an agreement with City Planning that they share the cost of providing the shuttle. Commissioner Marks said that as explained earlier, this should be checked on. Commissioner Marks said that the other issue was still the open space, but there was a third issue of working with City Planning on Code Enforcement. Commissioner Marks said that she thought this was a good issue to bring up, but the two positions that Local 21 had identified that they wanted assigned were two positions that DBI had requested for follow up with abatement matters. Commissioner Marks asked Director Chiu what was his reaction to this proposal about City Planning and DBI working on Code Enforcement issues together. Director Chiu said that he was seeing the memo for the first time this afternoon and Director Chiu said that Code Enforcement is something that DBI has been doing for a number of years and stated that Planning is just revisiting the process. Director Chiu said that the Department would have no problem working with Planning depending on what their function of Code Enforcement would be. Director Chiu said that even with additional staff and even within the Code Enforcement unit, DBI has always wanted, along with City Planning to make the entire City Code Enforcement unit work better. Director Chiu said that he did not see a problem. Director Chiu said that in concept, it seems like a good idea to work together; however Director Chiu said that the last thing he wanted to do was have his staff go work for Planning. Commissioner Marks said that she did not think that was the intent and Commissioner Marks said that in her mind two positions were not needed to come up with a plan on how to coordinate the efforts. Vice-President Hood said that perhaps Commissioner Marks should know some of the background on this issue. Vice-President Hood said that DBI has tried to do a number of other things with Planning, for all of the time she has been involved with the Commission since 1995 and the Planning Department is structured differently from DBI and financing is also a problem. Vice-President Hood said that because Planning is funded from the general fund, they do not have as much flexibility in meeting their own internal goals, as they would like to have. Vice-President Hood said that it is very, very difficult to get any kind of cooperation. Vice-President Hood said that the departments have tried to issue reports together and those became very, very difficult and these are things that just have to be done only one time. Vice-President Hood said that this enforcement thing is very complicated and the reason is because traditionally DBI has had to sort of "hot button" areas in the Building Code, for example, demolition or building without a permit. Vice-President Hood said that typically these are Planning Department issues and people already have an entrenched way of thinking about them in both departments that make it difficult to cooperate and find a new solution. Vice-President Hood said that she did not know what the job descriptions were of the two positions, but said that she would like to point out how very difficult the task is, as it ranges through a lot of activities, not just Code Enforcement. Commissioner Marks said that she knows what the problem is from being on the Planning Commission as funds have to be set aside specifically for Code Enforcement; if it is not a priority for the Commission than the monies are not set aside. Commissioner Marks said that when looking at the example of demolition and trying to more clearly define what criteria should be used in defining demolition, as has been brought up in the BIC three or four times this past year, each time the way it is dealt with is that it will be brought up again and discussed. Commissioner Marks said that nothing happens and she feels that what Local 21 are suggesting is that someone from Planning and DBI work together on a task force to come up with some solutions that are workable. Vice-President Hood said that the particular issue of demolition is a political problem not an enforcement problem or a definition problem. Vice-President Hood stated that if there were a political will to do it one way, it would be done. Vice-President Hood said it was not a matter of definition or enforcement or anything like that; it was almost purposely made ambiguous so there would be some flexibility in the interpretation. Vice-President Hood said that people, both from Planning and Building, both Commissioners and staff, had worked together very frequently in the past on this issue and they put something out and it got shut down by people up above. Vice-President Hood said she was talking about people from the neighborhoods or various industries and said she felt until there was a consensus about what to do politically, it is never going to get solved. Commissioner Marks said that from her perspective, if there is a will to do something, you do it. Commissioner Marks said that in thinking about it maybe everyone on the Commission should receive a copy of the memo being discussed and this could be on a future agenda if it can't be discussed at this meeting. Commissioner Marks said that it would be helpful to have a history of what has happened before and why it happened. Director Chiu said that he would agree as he had just received a copy of the memo today; if Local 21 has some proposals they would be welcomed to come into the Commission and talk about them. President Fillon said that these are items that are prime candidates for being on a regular meeting agenda so that the public, or whoever, can come and testify to present their case. President Fillon said that this Committee really needed to focus on getting a recommendation to the Commission for the budget. Commissioner Marks said that something like this is part of the budget because it is talking about a program and the Department has to then fund the activities that need to be pursued. President Fillon said that Commissioner Marks was talking about the scope of the program and the Committee was not present to redefine this program. President Fillon said that, at the most, the Committee was here to assess that the performance level is present to justify the funding that is being requested and this is what Commissioner Marks wanted to do. Commissioner Marks stated that program couldn't be separated from budget. President Fillon said that the wheel couldn't be reinvented at this point, and today the Committee needed to focus on whether this budget is acceptable, in order to forward this budget to the regular Commission to ask for approval. Director Chiu said that he would have to agree with the President that this is something that unless the Commissioner is asking that the Department hire two more people, and Director Chiu stated that he did not think that Commissioner Marks was saying this, he believes that the Commissioner is just asking how the Department can better work with the Planning Department. Director Chiu said that he certainly wants to work with Planning to make the entire Code Enforcement process work better and said that he thought that DBI has been doing a lot of the legwork for Planning for the last five or six years. Director Chiu stated that he wanted to continue to do this and is happy that Planning is coming up with these suggestions, but Director Chiu said that he could not say that the Department would go with this proposal exactly. President Fillon said that there has always been a difficult relationship between DBI and Planning and the process has always been uneasy. President Fillon stated that there are a lot of things that could be done to improve the relationship and the Commission should focus on this as one of its missions. Vice-President Hood said that at least assigning these people to the program as proposed would be a step in the right direction in getting it done. Vice-President Hood said that the exact program could be worked out over time. President Fillon asked if Commissioner Marks had any other performance related issues to discuss. Commissioner Marks said just to finish this issue up, she wanted to know if this would be calendared for one of the Commission meetings or how would this be handled. Director Chiu said that he would advise, that since Local 21 put this together, they probably have an idea of what they would like to discuss and Director Chiu said that the would welcome the Union to address the Commission as to what they would like to see. Director Chiu he did not believe that in looking at the memo, staffing was the issue; there are already two or three people in the agency task force and Planning is not one of them. Director Chiu said that the Department works very closely with the City Attorney's Office on a lot of issues and right now there is one Housing Inspector and one other Inspector that spends a great deal of time with all of the multi-agencies. Director Chiu said he did not know if Planning is asking for additional people or just to work better with existing staff. Director Chiu said that he wanted to hear what they have to say. Director Chiu said that he was not about to assign DBI people to the Planning Department because DBI has more experience with Code Enforcement. President Fillon said that if Commissioner Marks would tell him when she wants this item on the agenda, he would put it on. Commissioner Marks asked if it could be scheduled for the next Commission meeting. President Fillon asked if the Committee could get back to the budget.
Commissioner Marks said that the other issue she had questions about was again in terms of reviewing Code Enforcement. Commissioner Marks said that there were fiscal year goals and accomplishments included in the budget package and regarding the issue of responding to lead hazard inspections within 48 hours and 24 hours, after that response, she wanted to know what was accomplished. Director Chiu said that a number of things were accomplished such as citing the property owner, referring cases to the Health Department or taking cases to abatement. Director Chiu said that in terms of lead paint inspections, particularly if it is painters that are causing the problem, the painters are cited or taken to a hearing. Director Chiu said that in the past the Department was accused of not even responding. Director Chiu said that what is tracked is if somebody files a complaint, the Department should be responding as quickly as possible and then following up with whatever steps need to be taken. Director Chiu said that for example, today someone would file a complaint and hopefully within a day or two, depending on the severity of the complaint, sometimes the Department responds instantly meaning the same day, and then as a result of the inspection, the inspector has the discretion as to whether the person needs to apply for a permit right away or determine when the situation needs to be taken care of. Director Chiu said that if they fail to comply with the inspector's decision, then the next thing is a second Notice of Violation or to set up hearings and sometimes cases are referred to other agencies. Director Chiu said that every scenario cannot be tracked as to response, as in order to do that every Notice of Violation would have to be reviewed, but the goal is to respond to every complaint and to make sure that the Department is following the entire Code Enforcement process. Director Chiu said that this is how the Department measures whether the job is being done or not; it is the same with Housing Inspectors where in the past the Department was accused of not responding to complaints for 30 to 40 days. Director Chiu said that now this is not done and the Department is doing its best to take care of the violation or complaint as soon as possible. Director Chiu said he felt the Department was doing a good job.
Commissioner Marks said that there was another issue that she brought up at the last Commission meeting and that was regarding the Housing Inspectors. Commissioner Marks said that she knew that in theory there was going to be a task force meeting to identify what additional training there should be, but there was no indication in the budget that money was set aside to fund whatever was going to be agreed upon. Commissioner Marks said that again this is another activity that she could not imagine it would take that long for someone, or a group of people, to come up with the areas where people need additional training. Commissioner Marks said that she was assuming that this would happen within this fiscal year. Director Chiu said that the Department has been meeting with Union members. Director Chiu said that the Commission did have this item on the agenda a few months ago and the general consensus from the Housing Inspectors was that there was no additional training needed for the scope of the work that they are supposed to do. Director Chiu said that the Department is working to figure out whether these people are being worked out of class. Director Chiu said that this is not to say that the Department is not going to provide anymore training, but the Housing Inspectors felt that providing training for going beyond their expertise for example to look for structural things such as Commissioner Guinnane was suggesting might be challenged by the Union. Director Chiu said that DBI needed to scope the work to make sure that the Housing Inspectors are not being worked out of class. Commissioner Marks said that at the one meeting where the Union representative was present Commissioner Guinnane was suggested that the qualifications for the position be changed. Commissioner Marks said that she could see where there was disagreement about that, but the last meeting in December, which she did not attend but did read the minutes, it did say that there was going to be a committee of Building as well as Housing Inspectors to come up with areas where additional training was needed. Commissioner Marks said that this was agreed upon at the Commission. Director Chiu stated that he and Deputy Director Jim Hutchinson were working together to revisit what the scope of the Housing Inspectors work is, and what training is needed; they will then work with Commissioner Roy Guinnane to see if that he is comfortable with what is proposed. Director Chiu said that initially Local 21 Inspectors were opposed to doing additional training where they felt it was outside of their expertise. Director Chiu said that one example DBI is looking at is where a permit is required for a violation and perhaps a Building Inspector should be sent out on a complaint rather than a Housing Inspector. Director Chiu said that a number of things are being looked at to make sure that the Union, not just Local 21 but also Local 22 the Building Inspector's Union, is not overstepping the other Union's jurisdiction. Director Chiu said that right now there is no finalized agreement, but DBI is continuing to talk with members to make sure there is a solution that all parties will approve. Director Chiu said that he does not have a timeframe, but wanted to present this to the Commission to make sure that both Unions are happy and that Commissioner Guinnane is also satisfied with the proposals. Director Chiu said that he has met with the various parties two or three times on this issue. Commissioner Marks asked if there were funds in the budget to pay for this program. Director Chiu said that the Department could elect to move funds around from one division to the other. Director Chiu said that HIS are opposing these types of changes and they have not requested any funding, but regardless Director Chiu said he felt that the money could be found for whatever training is agreed upon. Director Chiu said that a lot of Local 21 people are not happy with doing something that they feel is working out of their class. Ms. Madison said that the Department can always find money, and this year there was no budget for training for certain things, but when training came up the money was found. Ms. Madison said that with this budget a placeholder could be put in housing for training, but for the most part things can be juggled around, particularly between training and travel. Ms. Madison said that many times the Department will budget for three people to go on a trip, and maybe only one will go so there will be money for training, as opposed to travel. Ms. Madison said that given that this particular item is something the Commission is interested in, a placeholder for housing/training could be put in the budget to make sure there is enough money set aside. Ms. Madison suggested that perhaps the amount be $3,200 as training should only be about $400 per person. Ms. Madison said that she would assume that the training would be something that would be tailored for the Department. Director Chiu said that he thought it would be more, as this is division-wide. Director Chiu said that there are about 26 Housing Inspectors. Vice-President Hood asked if this would involve just one course; say half a day's training. Director Chiu said that when the Department identifies a trainer for the entire division then perhaps that trainer could come to DBI and this is usually cheaper and more convenient for the staff. Director Chiu stated that he thought that the amount would be more like $10,000-$15,000 to hire somebody to come on board. President Fillon said that some existing staff could also provide training. Director Chiu said that this could also be done, but this training is going to be division-wide. Director Chiu said that the amount could be included in the budget and then the Department would have to justify it. Ms. Madison said that there are a couple of other divisions that are requesting in-house training and she would use an average number and put that amount in for this budget. Vice-President Hood said that she thought when people want training it is a good idea as a rule. Director Chiu said that in this case most of the Housing Inspectors don't want any training as they feel that the Department would be training them for more than is required on their job. Vice-President Hood said that there is a lot more going on besides training. President Fillon said that the budget-wise the Department needs to be ready for the worst-case scenario. Ms. Madison said that there has been two in-house training session this past year and the cost was about $6,000 each; one was for mechanical and one was for another plan check service. Director Chiu suggested that $10,000 be added to the budget and if the Department is short a few thousand dollars, it can always be moved from another item. Vice-President Hood asked what MBO meant. Director Chiu said that it stands for Management By Objective. Ms. Madison said that she would add $10,000 to training for Housing Inspectors so the new number will be $275,972. Director Chiu said that he did not want the Housing Inspectors to feel that they are being forced to have training even though they don't want it. Commissioner Marks said that the reality is that obviously Commissioner Guinnane has brought this up a number of times in the past year and it is an ongoing concern. Commissioner Marks said that the problem is that the people who are hired to do a job, if for whatever reason, are not able to do the job, the Department is providing them a service by giving them the opportunity to bring up their skills and knowledge. Director Chiu said that it was hard to understand why some people are against the training, as the training is paid for and the inspector is getting paid on City time, but that is a side issue. President Fillon said that this was an over simplification of the issue. Director Chiu said that sometimes no matter what the Department wants to do, the fact is that the Unions have to be dealt with.
President Fillon asked if the Committee were ready to made a recommendation that the Commission approve the budget. Vice-President Hood said that she was ready to that. President Fillon asked for a motion.
Vice-President Hood made a motion, seconded by President Fillon that the Committee recommend to the full Commission that the budget be sent over to the Mayor's office to be approved, with the additional $10,000.00 for training of Housing Inspectors.
The motion carried unanimously.
RESOLUTION NO. BIC 007-01
There was no public comment on this item.
4. Discussion and possible action t set a meeting and identify items that could be placed on the agenda of future meetings of the Committee.
President Fillon said that there was a Special Meeting scheduled for Wednesday, January 31, 2001. Director Chiu asked if the meeting was necessary. President Fillon said that this meeting was for the whole Commission and Vice-President Hood said that it was required that the budget be heard at two public meetings. Director Chiu said that he would not be at the meeting on January 31st, but felt that the meeting could continue without him. Director Chiu said that he would have Assistant Director Amy Lee, along with the Deputy Directors, represent him.
President Fillon asked if any of the Commissioners had any other comments. Commissioner Marks said that since it was in the minutes she would like scheduled for the next regular meeting, the issue of working with Planning and the history of what has happened in working with Planning in Code Enforcement. Commissioner Marks said that she would like all of the Commissioners to have a copy of the memo she received from Local 21. President Fillon said that it could be included as a communication item or as a staff report. Vice-President Hood said that at the January 31st meeting this could come up when topics for future agendas were discussed. Vice-President Hood said that by then all of the Commissioners would have read the memo and should be able to be specific. President Fillon said that this is a very large issue and he thought it deserved to be dealt with at a regular, rather than special meeting, so that everyone interested has a chance to give their input. Secretary Aherne said that the agenda for January 31st had already been posted and sent out and this memo could not be added as a communication item, but it could be put on a regular meeting and everyone would get notice that this was being addressed at a meeting. Vice-President Hood asked that the Secretary fax a copy of the memo to the Commissioners for the Wednesday meeting. There was no further comment by the Commissioners and no public comment.
5. Adjournment.
Vice-President Hood made a motion seconded by Commissioner Marks that the meeting be adjourned.
The motion carried unanimously.
RESOLUTION NO. BIC-008-01
The meeting was adjourned at 3:10 p.m.
_______________________
Ann Marie Aherne
Commission Secretary
SUMMARY OF REQUESTS BY COMMISSIONERS
Progress of shuttle service for 1660 Mission Street and the possibility of sharing cost with Planning Department. - Commissioner Marks Page 4
1660 Mission Street Expansion - open dialogue with Local 21, Planners. - Commissioner Marks Page 4
Future agenda item - Online permitting and complaint tracking. - Commissioner Marks Page 7
Code Enforcement task force with Planning Department - Commissioner Marks Pages 10-12 and 14-15
Prepared by Ann Aherne