Dave Hansen opened the meeting talking about the budget. We’re in much better shape this year than we thought six months ago. His highlights were in Ask Dave sent yesterday. He encourages everyone to check out the Budget link on VBGOV.com which is here: http://budgetdata.vbgov.com/#!/year/default The public can drill down on every detail of our budget. Hint – We are under Economic Vitality. Give it a try. Want to see part of what it cost to operate VBCC? Check out our power bill here, among other things. http://budgetdata.vbgov.com/#!/year/2017/operating/0/business_area/Economic+Vitality/0/department/Convention+and+Visitors+Bureau/0/budget_unit/Virginia+Beach+Convention+Center/0/appropriation_category/Other+Charges/0/fund
- Dave announced a few structural changes to the organization including a plan to move Strategic Growth Areas Office under the Planning Department. Agriculture and Parking would also go under Planning. He announced the creation of a new Deputy City Manager for Safety and apparently the Resort Management Office will be returning to the CVB.
- Dave wants to make sure we all have the City’s Core Strategic Principals close by. They include:
- Engage in Systems Thinking
- Achieve multiple positive outcomes
- Maintain a long term view
- Be proactive, prevent problems
- Create positive community image
- Create relationships and partnerships
- Value and promote diversity
- Ensure sustainability
- Jeff Rodarmel gave a presentation on his agency, Risk Management
- Escalation of costs to the City’s self-insurance program
- Encourage everyone to create a Culture of Safety
- The doors to safety swing on the hinges of common sense
- Four City employees are injured every day on the job – a factor four times higher than many area cities.
- The City pays the first $1.25 million in workers comp claims
- Legislation this year may allow for reductions in reimbursements for many of these claims.
- Auto Liability – Self-insured for the first $2 million
- City has been self-insured since 1976
- City’s expense for insurance is $17.2 million, 78% of this is for workers compensation
- Top 10 departments = 99% of claims (CVB isn’t one of them)
- Self-insurance for the first $50,000 in property damage
- VBCC is the City’s most valued insured asset by a long shot at $147 million – no other structure is even close
- The City has a future liability of $31 million (think long term disability or long term medical claims yet to be paid each year)
- Jeff encourages us to
- Speak with staff about these numbers
- Promptly file DF 75 (accident report form)
- Provide good background investigation of accidents, the who, what, where, when, and witnesses
- Build a Culture of Safety
- Dave Hansen followed up the meeting indicating he was going to start holding department directors responsible for workplace safety
- Judy Weiss followed up Jeff’s presentation about Occupational Safety & Health
- Introduced new Occ Safety and Health Manager Scott Kalis. He’ll be coming around to all departments meeting leadership to best determine needs.
- Stressed regulatory compliance
- Encouraged all to use good practices and share lessons learned
- Encouraged everyone to take advantage of services they offer including safety training, drills industrial hygiene, First Aid & CPR training, CDL and defensive driving, lock out tag out – and more
- 6,000 participants in programs in 2015
- Future – Make safety personal and decentralize safety
- Rod Ingram, Deputy City Attorney, presented FOIA (freedom of information act)
- Nancy Bloom has left his office to join Dave Hansen’s team
- New FOIA paralegal is Melena Johnson 385-4052
- All FOIA requests should be sent to FOIA@vbgov.com
- State laws provide public access to most records
- Act applies to existing documents
- Act is very broad and includes just about any kind of communication imaginable. Partial list includes:
- Emails relating to City business (but not non city business like a message from your vbgov account to your spouse to pick up a gallon of milk on the way home)
- Letters
- Texts
- Recordings
- Hand written notes
- Messages to and from your personal devices if they relate to City business
- In most cases, non-citizens of Virginia or prisoners can’t file FOIA requests – but there are exceptions
- Requests must be reasonably specific
- Requests are time sensitive and the City only has 5 business days to respond from date and time of receipt. Date stamping requests is critical.
- Compliance with destruction of documents helps. Example: A request can be made for 10 years’ worth of documents, and we would have to comply if we have them. But State records retention laws only require that we hold records for a prescribed number of years.
- If we wish to withhold documents, we must be very specific why and cite the code section under which the denial is being requested. Some exemptions include: personnel records, medical records, documents marked with attorney client privilege (never forward a message with this information, or the privilege is lost), land appraisals prior to purchase, closed sessions of City Council meetings, tax records – to name a few. If in doubt, ask the CAO.
- Administrative Directive 8.01 discusses City employees requirement to comply
- Identifies one person per department to coordinate FOIA requests – for us, it’s Brande
- Photo copy or scans are charged at $.03 per page
- Staff time to copy records is billed at the lowest wage of the qualified staff person
- Requestors are made to pay for time to locate and duplicate. Deposit must be paid if estimate is over $200 per request.
- FOIA office can often deter requests based on dollar estimate to locate and copy information. Often refining the scope of a request helps.
- Requesters can review volumes of documents if they wish to narrow the scope
- Employees can be held civilly liable if they knowingly withhold information
- Last Meeting – Deputy City Manager Cindy Curtis
- Interim DCM, Human Resources Director Regina Hilliard