The Fall River City Council Committee on Ordinance and Legislation convened on October 24, 2023. The meeting began with the approval of minutes from the August 22, 2023 meeting. The committee then addressed two proposed ordinances related to traffic and handicap parking. The first ordinance, concerning new handicap parking installations on streets including Eddie Street, Forest Street, Fountain Street, M Street, and Stafford Road, passed through all readings unanimously. The second ordinance, for handicap parking removals on Birch Street, Forest Street, Fountain Street, Osborne Street, and Swindell Street, passed its first reading unanimously. The primary discussion revolved around a proposed ordinance to establish a new position: Finance Management and Compliance Analyst, later suggested to be renamed "Administrator." Administration officials, including CFO Alman, explained that this would be a cost-neutral position, replacing an unfilled Assistant Auditor role and the vacant Purchasing Agent position. The new role would provide high-level analytical support across the finance department, including budget analysis, special projects, and oversight of procurement and the city's 160+ grants. Councilors expressed concerns about the long-term cost neutrality and the potential need to refill the eliminated positions in the future. Councilor Dion and Councilor Washington raised questions regarding the permanence of the cost-neutral status and the potential for the city to end up with three positions instead of one. They also inquired about the history of grants management and the current consulting role of Mr. Aapon. After extensive discussion, a motion to table the proposed ordinance for the Finance Management and Compliance Administrator position passed with a vote of 4-1. The meeting then adjourned.
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Council
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2:58he Council committee on ordinance and legislation will come to AUM Madam clerk will you call the role please here here hereon here here pursuant to the open meeting law any person may make an audio or video recording of this public meeting or may transmit the meeting through any medium attendees are therefore advised that such recordings or Transmissions are being made whether perceived or unperceived by those
3:42present and are deemed acknowledgeable and permissible first item on the agenda is citizen input is there anybody who signed up for citizen input seeing none move on to item number two minutes from the August 22nd uh 2023 meeting motion to approve second motion to approve was made second and any discussion seeing none all those in favor I opposed so voted motion carries item number three is a proposed
4:09ordinance uh traffic handicap parking which was referred to the uh committee on September 12th and October 10th uh Eastern a West Side 200 feet south of uh Downing Street Eddie Street West West Side 120 feet southside of Bady Street Forest Street East Side 140 147 feet south of Park Street Fountain Street West Side 82 feet south of William Street M Street wests side 239 feet north of Warren
4:39Street Stafford Road uh West Side 110 ft south of Peckham Street motion for emergency Preble motion soit second uh mam cler Rec call the role yes coun Liberty yes counos yes Council Washington yes chair yes motion to pass through all readings in ordination motion to pass through uh all readings in ordination was made is there a second second second discussion seeing none all those in favor I I
5:11opposed so v a motion carries unanimously number four is a proposed ordinance traffic miscellaneous referred to the committee on September 12th uh this is for handicap parking removals uh this going to be removing uh sign at BIR Street North Side to 150 ft east of King Street Forest Street East Side 140 ft south of Cottage Street Fountain Street Westside 85 ft south of Williams Street
5:39Osborne Street Southside 60 feet east of uh Ridge Street uh Swindell Street West Side 116 ft north of Pleasant Street motion to pass the first reading second motion was made and second in discussion seeing none all those in favor I opposed so voted motion carries unanimously and then the uh final item on the agenda is the proposed ordinance establishing the position of finance management and
6:02compliance analysts this was referred to the committee on September 26th I'll ask the administration to come
6:25down so resource no pun ended I so much faster I'm playing checkers and's playing swear to God all right so I know we've got a letter before us kind of describing in the job description but do you want to just F the record just describe what the intention is yeah so um this position is uh something that we've identified a need for uh in the last several months I'm going to
6:58turn it over to the C in a moment just a sort of a kind of Preamble here um first of all it's a cost neutral position um we have had an assistant auditor position budgeted uh and unfilled uh for some time and what we've determined is that it's really not where we need to have our Personnel Resources in the financial management team uh what we really need is somebody who can be a
7:24resource for all of the divisions within uh the finance team um whether it's the treasurer collector um the auditor the assessor or um helping the CFO when it comes to budget time uh when it comes to special project when it comes to doing a very deep analytical dive into how we are building our budgets how we are Distributing our resources um how we're using our resources um and so this
7:53position this financial management um and compliance and we originally called it analyst we wanted to have um you know near a director level um level of authority in order to make sure that um everyone that this person would be working with understands the level of uh of training the level of um background um the level of work that this person is going to be doing so we would actually
8:24request for an adjustment if you're willing to support this to call it the financial management compliance administrator um so it's not a department head because it's somebody that works within the financial services team but that person would be working with um and providing analytical support for um the entire Mission uh of the team the reason it's a cost neutral position is that we have the assistant auditor
8:51position open um uh CFO Alman has taken a really deep dive over the last year or so into that team to understand what the needs are um and at this point there's a sense that the auditor position uh has become very much a Non-Stop full-time uh City accountant basically between payroll for both the schools and the city um and a number of other functions that person doesn't really have the
9:20capacity anymore to be doing highlevel analysis and budget work on the other hand an assistant auditor is really not what we need to do that work what we need is somebody that's going to be part of all the different divisions in addition to that we have an open purchasing agent since the purchasing agent that we did have left what we found is that there are a lot of ways that we want to conduct purchasing um
9:45that are different than the way it's been being done um nothing necessarily wrong with how it's being done but for a city this size it just hasn't been as robust as we would like it to be and not as much oversight as we want it to have and so in the meantime over the past several months months we've sent a number of city employees to purchasing training to get them certified um so
10:05that what we can do is we can put the onus on departments to begin some of the RFP and RFQ processes have oversight within the financial team of those processes and make sure that everything we're doing uh from a a procurement and purchasing standpoint um one has the buyin of everybody has total oversight and accountability all the time uh and the way to do that is not just to have a
10:30single purchasing agent uh so at this point we don't intend to fill the purchasing position we intend to um re-evaluate what the needs are within that department but at this point we are on the cusp of having uh five or six people within city government purchasing certified um which is I think going to be a very different um uh a very different picture than what we've had before and I think it's going to to
10:54really make it's really going to professionalize how we've dealt with procurement but by not filling that that position what we're proposing here is a revenue neutral uh position in the creation of the of the administrator I'm going to turn it over to the CFO to get a little bit more into uh the details and the numbers about the position um so this position is I mean at this point the auditor really is a
11:17service person to all of the finance all of the Departments within the city and again it um the city auditor is extremely busy just handling like day-to-day going through all the purchase orders I mean this time I think we have roughly over 900 purchase orders a month and creating new fund accounts and I mean it's there's just not enough time to help do all these other things I don't know if you're all familiar with
11:41like for example the city of Brockton and the excessive overspending of their um Grant funds so and we're we have over 160 Grant and side funds that we need to be doing like reviewing so it's really to provide like more of a highle statistical analysis to be paying attention to all these things and helping getting a lot of our systems talking together because right now everything is very manual so that's I
12:06mean I'm asking you to all support this we're not asking to create any FTE we're just asking to um questions Council proposal question on the um the two budgeted positions the purchasing agent and the assistant audit do you know what those are budgeted for recall so the assistant auditor was budgeted around 72,000 but the auditor was just promoted to auditor Y and so we had 125,000
12:34budgeted an auditor and I think we have about 62,000 budgeted and purchasing okay all right and then the position you're proposing here is a per contract position correct based on whatever that becomes an offer um and then the one thing I did ask here is in the letter it mentions that for functions throughout the city of for River and the forer public schools so is this being completely funded by the city and not by
12:58the schools in anyway this is at this point being completely funded by the city but we are responsible for oversight of the schools okay he thank you Council Dion so the individual that would take this position would they be um familiar with procurement laws will they be overseeing the department people who are going to start taking part in the procurement process so they would certainly have a highlevel supervisory
13:27role in procurement no question about It ultimately procurement begins and ends with the CFO uh because you know one of the reasons we move procure or we move purchasing into the finance department is that we felt like it was just too far away uh from the financial services and financial functions of the city where it originally was which if you recall was I think in DCM um and so if you look at
13:51how it's normally done it's either finan sometimes it's in facilities here um the CFO will have oversight over this new person this person uh will have significant involvement in purchasing um but what we're trying to do also is is as we move forward distribute out more of the purchasing knowledge and and sort of professional best practices to the Departments so they're part of their
14:14purchasing as well um and it really keeps departments from inadvertently doing things outside of the purchasing rules without knowing that it's it's wrong um and so there's been a pretty significant effort to make sure that everybody's part of this so at this point in time because of the purchasing department and the assistant auditor position at this point in time it's cost neutral
14:39correct are we going to an ordinance remove assistant ordit the assistant auditor position from the budget where this person basic where I'm kind of hearing we don't need that individual anymore so you want to answer that I can answer that yeah let me let me grab that so ultimately I think that's the goal um you know I'm I'm not interested in just continuing to you know add FTS and not
15:05get rid of the ones that aren't needed that's crazy that said right now we we have a strategy that we think is going to work and not just work but it's really going to benefit the city and and make um the processes that we have going on more efficient more effective you know deeper dive that said I would probably wait for one cycle uh to get rid of that FTE just
15:28to make sure that yeah this was the right call this is you know if we we find the right person that we're able to find the right person um and then after that I I would agree wholeheartedly that we don't need to keep holding on to FTE just to have them right so I would follow also up with you said at this time uh the purchasing department um you wouldn't get rid of that position at
15:47this time either but is this in the same vein that if this does work out the way that you're hoping it will that both of those positions will be eliminated or do you see down the road at some point Point still filling the purchasing um vacancy because if so at that point this is no longer cost neutral right yeah so um yes the the purchasing agent as it exists right now um will very likely
16:13prove not to be a necessary position that said I think going forward as we're looking at this and looking at the number of people that we're getting certified to to be part of this we're going to probably have a conversation about what it is we actually need and I don't think we really know um like I think that that what we've been doing is uh we've had kind of a reactionary
16:33approach to procurement uh off and on uh different people in the job and people filling in and doing the best they can but you know maybe not everything that we have needed as a city of this size with as many different things going on um so we're going to look at that uh I think we'll probably come to the conclusion that we don't need that position but we need to identify some
16:53points of contact some people who are responsible ultimately for purchasing it may not be the best committee approach um but I think at that point um we're going to know that that position uh is probably no longer needed but I would again probably wait a a fiscal year to do that okay um so and then looks let's look at the other side of it let's say that it doesn't work out the way you're
17:18anticipating um the other two positions you get to the point you feel they need to be filled does this position get eliminated because again if you have three people people now it's no longer cost neutral so now you now you're now you're uh creating two essentially two extra positions I know they're there they exist now yep but you're G you know it's still going to be three people as opposed to
17:42one so now we're kind of in the realm of like a like a law school essay problem right we we're we're way down the road right we have a lot of different variables I can't in good faith say yes absolutely we will do x y and z um all I can say right now is is that after a tremendous amount of study we believe this position is really important um for the health of the financial department
18:08going forward um and we don't believe that um the purchasing agent as its constituted right now the assistant auditor as it's been for however long are necessary positions within the city I can't I just it would I understand that I'm just like I'd love to speculate but I just it's so hard to know exactly what's going to happen and how things will change uh and I just think it would
18:31be it would be unfair to be like you know yes because you know it supports what I'm trying to get you to do when in fact I just I don't know what would actually happen I just it would be dishonest I mean if it's truly cost neutral and we're going to ultimately have one person I can work with that if it's going to lead to three people and it's no longer cost neutral I can't work
18:54with that I'm I'm much more F fiscally conservative than that and and um so that's my quandry at this point the plan is a single person the plan is cost neutral the plan is not to fill those positions um all I can say is that if we feel like there is a different need than we've identified or we feel like the need wasn't accurately or fully identified we'll come back to the
19:18council and we'll explain exactly where we stand and uh at that point if you can't support what we want to do I certainly understand that because because we're trying the best we can to to be responsible with the resources that the residents of the city give us to do the work um so I all I can tell you right now is what's planned and what's planned is is this one person to
19:40not fill those positions uh and to empower that one person to to do the work we need them to do so my last question would be do you have somebody in mind are you going to advertise it where are you in that process how comfortable do you feel with being able to fill this position I believe we can fill this position um there are some folks that I think we would Target um there certainly there's
20:06a person that I think we would Target um but at the same time I would be open to any qualified person um but at the end of the day um you know this is a a really specific skill set it's a very high level skill set um and so it would you know ideally you know obviously you want to create the positions that you need but in this state and age in this climate it would
20:29be hard to do that without having some sense of who might be able to come in and help us immediately so we have a sense of that uh I just wouldn't say it's any more than that a sense thank you with that I yield thank you Council Liberty thank you Council Deion asked um most of my questions I I feel the same as she did that it's only cost neutral
20:48to the end of the fiscal year and then it's a possibility of not being cost neutral anymore after that um you were going to answer that question before I apologize I no that's okay um can we hear your opinion on it I just want to say that I mean the assist the traditional auditor and assistant auditor rules have dramatically changed um so we need different things now and so I can fully wholeheartedly believe
21:11that this position um we do need I don't think that we need the assistant auditor as it stood I think so and again purchasing we're we're really evaluating and trying to make the most cost effective plan for the city I mean right now we are our purchasing department is the smallest I think probably in the state it's definitely for a city our size I mean if we look at comparatively
21:36so we're not trying to like blow it out and be robust about it but we're also trying to make sure that we're in compliance and that we're following all of the mass procurement laws um so I would feel better as well if if these were you know removed and in order to put this one in it you have it as per contract but you have somebody in mind do you have an idea in your head of
21:58where you see this position landing at we haven't salary wise uh I mean I have a sense of where you know somebody at that level would probably ask to get paid um at this point there is not any sort of agreement or conversation about where that person um whoever ends up being the the best candidate would end up um but I would imagine it's going to be more than what is budgeted for um the assistant auditor
22:28um it's probably going to be close to to what we would be paying a department head the assistant auditor is budgeted at 77 you said yes and purchasing is 63 62 okay with that I yeld thank you Council Washington I just have a a couple of comments and I'm so the assistant order we had the assistant order acting as the auditor for a while he's moved up so it looks like the
22:56assistant that position is you're saying is no longer needed it looks like it's going to be almost like an assistant for you so is how I'm looking at it so there's been a lot of Consulting in that department instead of putting in a job right now that in a year we may need other jobs no one it's kind of like no one really knows we may we may not instead of putting that on the taxpayers
23:19to create a job and then in a year we may need a job how about a consultant for that position can we consult with someone for a year in that role as an like so if we going to pay a consultant in that role you're going to pay over $200 to $300 an hour well so you're probably looking at a $200,000 so I'm looking at in a year and
23:38a half two years that we need all three of those positions filled and what does that look like long term as far as benefits go as far as um you know insurance goes fringe benefits all of that longterm what can we do in the short term if we don't even know there's so many unknowns here if we don't even know we don't know if the assistant order he's new to that position does he
24:00really not need an assistant anymore you're needing an assistant to look at some of these grants we don't know the purchaseing agent well we haven't filled that we're going to train six other people and see we may not need that position to me it just feels like a lot of unknowns to create a position that we may need these positions it's not a definite out of your own words that we 100% don't need those
24:23positions so I feel very comfortable that this position that we will not be reling the assistant auditor position and I also believe that this person or this this position would also be working very closely with the auditor um and helping I mean traditionally the auditor position had time to do a lot of these things right now there's not that time I mean that department had traditionally
24:48prior to co had there was over seven people in that department so we're we're trying to find a higher level candidate that can do more in less time because of the experience they have and also try to provide assistance to all of the financial City departments so this person would also be helping this candidate would be helping fill in you know where needed in treasury if we're short in treasury helping fill in gaps
25:13in other departments as well so who now over you said you have 160 grants there over 160 grants in special Revenue funds who traditionally has overseen them we had a grant manager prior to this and that's Jane right no thater no this was a like an accounting so that position has not position has never has not been filled in um six seven years so no one has been overseeing 160 grants in
25:40special fund the city auditor was int you know trying to do all of that but we're eliminating the assistant auditor that would help that so traditionally they had an auditor an assistant auditor and a grants manager yeah we don't have and the grants manager hasn't been filled in how long seven years yeah yeah so I can provide some history so um probably 2012 fish we created the grants
26:06management position so we had two um positions so prior to that it was just the auditor assistant auditor um we recognized obviously there was a lot of Grants there was a lot of uh deficits with the grants that were kind of eating into our free cash so um we established the grant manager position um we had those two positions filled I want to say um the second grants manager person left
26:29within a year year and a half um and then it was Jennifer ago uh she was the last grants manager and then um when Chan left and she moved up to the auditor it was never backfield never backfield yeah yeah um so that's all I'm saying I feel like there's just a lot of um unknowns here um so with that I yield um counil of Liberty I just one question is Mr Aon still Consulting
26:59uh Mr aapon is Consulting probably about 5 to 10 hours at most a week with and he's working directly with our auditor I any further discussions questions motions Jo that
27:26you
27:33I make a motion to Jour do you need more time for consideration if that's the case motion to table if you're comfortable with it a motion to table second motion of the table was made by Council Liberty second by Council Washington um no discussion on the motion of the table so U M Clark we call the role just coun yes coun yes councel Roso yes councel Washington yes no motion carries so the items tabled
28:09thank you motion to adjourn motion toj second made by Council reposer second by Council Dian all those in favor I oppose so voted motion
28:26carries
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