TITLE
The Mayor and City Council shall discuss and possibly give direction on a Council Project Form for the evaluation of individual Councilmember Project Requests.
AGENDA ITEM DESCRIPTION
For the past four years City staff has used the Council Request Report to track individual Council member’s project requests, of various complexities, to document and track the completion of the requests. If a Council member makes a request of staff to provide information, take part in an activity or hold an event, among other things, the request is documented and progress is tracked and updated until completion. This report is distributed on a monthly base to all Council members.
The amount of staff time required to complete these projects varies greatly and ranges from a request to install a donated TV at the Copa Center (very simple) to holding a Volunteer Recognition Event at Copper Sky (required many hours of preparation), to holding a “Let’s Move” event which started simple but grew into a project that required the dedication of significant staff resources.
One of Council’s role in municipal government is to prioritize projects by the assignment of resources. Based on the assumption that if a Council project request requires a significant dedication of staff resources, it should be brought before Council for approval to allocate or redirect required staff resources. The premise is it would be improper to allow a project requested by an individual Council member to, for lack of a better word, hijack staff resources from a project that was approved by the full Council.
To avoid the above scenario, staff has developed the Council Project Request Form. The purpose of this form is for staff to fully vet every Council Request and determine the true cost of each Council project, including staff cost in hours, materials cost, additional services cost, and the opportunity cost to other ongoing projects. Each Council Project Request will first be assigned to a Director level staff member for evaluation. The Director will then research the request and complete the Council Project Request Form including project description, identification of key project components, itemization of all staff and material cost, and identify a source of funding for the project. Based on the outcome of this cost analysis the City Manager will apply a specific three part criteria to determine if the project should be referred to Council for approval:
1. Will it require more than ten hours of staff time, combined, to complete the Council Project Request?
2. Will it require additional funds, over and above what the requesting Council member is willing to allocate from their individual discretionary budget funds?
3. Does the project have a broad policy or organization impact on the City?
If the answer is yes to any of these three questions, the City Manager will place the item on the next available regular Council Meeting Agenda for Council approval. If not, it will be treated as is.
Council may give direction to staff for possible modifications or alternatives to this form, criteria, and process as part of the work session process. By directing staff to move forward with the implementation of this Council Project Form, Council will also be accepting the approval criterion and process as presented or modified for the management of Council Project Requests.
STAFF RECOMMENDATION
Staff recommends Council discuss and direct staff in regards to their consensus on this Council Project Form, criteria, and process for the evaluation of individual Councilmember Project Requests.