Public Safety Committee Special Called Meeting Transcript – 08/06/2020 Title: City of Austin Channel: 6 - COAUS Recorded On: 8/6/2020 6:00:00 AM Original Air Date: 8/6/2020 Transcript Generated by SnapStream ================================== Please note that the following transcript is for reference purposes and does not constitute the official record of actions taken during the meeting. For the official record of actions of the meeting, please refer to the Approved Minutes. [10:04:54 AM] >> Present. So it is 10:04 A.M. Calling the meeting of the public safety committee to order. I am councilmember Flannigan, chair, vice chair councilmember Casar and mayor pro tem Garza also present. Also councilmembers alter, pool and Renteria and I know a few more are on the way. Our first item very quickly is to approve minutes from our prior meetings. Can I get a motion to approve the minutes? Moved by mayor pro tem, seconded by councilmember Casar. Without objection those minutes are approved. Fantastic. Now we can move into our second agenda items. I think councilmember Ellis is here. A few more. Here they come. Councilmember Ellis, very good, there's the mayor. All right. [10:05:54 AM] Councilmember Ellis, would you like to test your audio? >> Ellis: Can you hear me? >> Flannigan: Sounds great. Councilmember kitchen. >> Kitchen: Can you hear me? >> Flannigan: Sounds good. Mayor Adler? Can you unmute yourself, mayor, just want to make sure your audio is working. Well, hopefully at some point the mayor will have his mic on. Just as a reminder, as I always like to do at the start of these meetings, we've gotten into a really good pattern, but try to keep yourself muted. I will mute you if you forget, please don't take it personally, and I think what we'll do today is have a presentation by staff, somewhat brief, talking about 911 call analysis, then we've got time slated for questions from councilmembers. That should take us to just [10:06:56 AM] before 11:00. We'll then do an initial conversation, presentation from Ed van eenoo on continuation from our conversation Tuesday. We'll take a quick lunch break and then we'll come back and finish our conversation hopefully, finish our conversation on the public safety agenda items. The intent today mostly for the public to understand is council committee meetings are not places where we take votes, we're not adopting any final decisions today, but hopefully we'll narrow down the conversation to what will hopefully be voteable objects we can take into the budget conversation and meetings next week. So narrowing the field a little bit to things councilmembers can vote on hopefully is what I think we can accomplish today. Mayor Adler, do you want to test your audio? >> Mayor Adler: Can you hear me? >> Flannigan: Very good. Councilmember harper-madison? >> Harper-madison: Testing one two three. >> Flannigan: Sounds good. [10:07:59 AM] Okay. Kerry and Jonathan, are you ready to take us through 911 analysis? >> Good morning. We are ready. >> Flannigan: I am going to get your presentation pulled up. How does that look? >> Looks good. >> Flannigan: Okay. Go ahead. >> Good morning, committee chair Flannigan and mayor and councilmembers. My name is Kerry o'connor, I'm the city's chief innovation officer. I'm joined by my new colleague who comes to us recently from the university of New Haven where he was an associate professor of criminal justice. Would you like to introduce yourself? >> I'll just --. >> Sorry, you are on mute. >> It's not allowing me to [10:09:00 AM] unmute. >> Flannigan: You are unmuted. You are good, Jonathan. Thanks to everyone, excited to be here and excited to get started with this. The work we've been doing with innovations has been really good in terms of setting a partnership we hope to realize moving forward to kind of answer your questions with the data we have to the best of our ability. Thanks. >> I want to note that we worked together with lieutenant Ken Murphy in APD and the innovation officer to bring you this presentation today. So if you move to the next slide. This is our agenda. We'll try to be relatively brief so we can get to questions and answers. Next slide. The purpose of the analysis that Jonathan and I and our colleagues undertook was to really think about that future orientation of how might we use police calls for service and related data to reimagine public safety. [10:10:00 AM] Secondly, we really need to iter rate frequent on this analysis with all your help. We want feedback on the dashboard for future development along a longer data time series. Of note the dashboards are with January 2020 data and I will get into why that is so. We do not yet offer conclusions given the time limitation of the data that we're using. As we discussed caveats, we need to directly architect the data framework so that's part of what we're doing here today. Next slide. I'm going to turn it over to Jonathan. He's been the immaculate professor in teaching me about some of the data caveats and I think you might better hear from him exactly what we need to be concerned about when looking at this data. >> All right. So I want to get started. The issue that we have here and this is very important [10:11:00 AM] because we want to establish a very active relationship in terms of portraying the data that are within the police department to answer as many questions as possible. The real challenge comes from the fact the data systems in the police department are built for administrative purposes. They are not built for research purposes. Very often these systems are built to comply with state and federal organizational mandates. So you have a lot of issues where data come pat jacket is not nearly as good as you might hope. We really want to thank ah data to get this topic started, but this gives a sense what we're going to look at today. How some of these issues and the underlying process that drives the data uses can render situation where analysis of the data can be incomplete, can be easily misinterpreted, and it's worth noting it's very common phenomenon that and lists get their feet held to the fire because it's very [10:12:02 AM] easy to render conflicting findings. So I hope this presentation that we give gives you some sense of this and provides a foundation for moving forward. So we can't really think about the data themselves without thinking about the underlying process that [inaudible] The data. Looking at 911 calls, we might think about this this way. Think about a call coming in and a call taker getting some information and giving that information to a dispatchers. And so when a dispatcher gets this sort of initial bit of information, they are going to assign it a problem code. This is our best guess as to what's happening. The general public doesn't know legal code, the general public doesn't know classifications and many times when you review dispatch data or 911 call data, it's often amazing to hear what people are saying to understand that phenomenon. We're going to -- dispatch is going to take a guess at the best likely event that's happening and assign that to it. And that basis both what the event is and features of the [10:13:03 AM] event are going to link it to what Austin police department uses as a priority code for dispatch. Importantly the highest priority codes are assigned to events where it is believed based upon the situation that immediate intervention has a public safety benefit. Those are the ones we're going to try to immediately get to. Now, when we look at these codes, remember that these codes generally may not actually represent what's happening on the scene. So that's one of the problems we get into as we move forward. The other thing that happens is when we think about these incidents, we have to remember the fact we have multiple officers at times responding. So getting to scene sometimes you are going to have a primary, sometimes backup showing up. This creates a challenge in that things understood at the incident level may actually be incorrect because we have to compensate for the number of individual officers who are involved. That's one of the reasons the initial 911 work that analytics did captain be thought of in the time use study. We can jump to the next [10:14:04 AM] slide. And so thinking about this kind of administrative problem, you know, what we have is we have these data elements that are being generated like the number of primary codes, the different dispatcher codes, and you have ways that the system is used. Very often it's very common in police department data systems, it will not be built to do certain things that would be very useful and so a process will be developed where the system will be used in a way it can be used to actually -- the very common thing, you might notice if you look through Austin police department data, some of these problem codes will have letters like a Z, X. It's alphabetical. That's the way we move data down the screen because that's not a feature that exists in the current data system. There are all kinds of nuances that happen because of the way the system is [inaudible]. The computer aided dispatch system the cad, is on the front end. This is collecting data [10:15:06 AM] based on what's called in, the patrol elements are doing related to that call. So on the back side of it, we have an entirely different system. The records management system. And all of the information that's post-incident, everything that tells us what the officer actually concluded happened, anything they did in response exists in a that entirely different data system. Jump to the next slide. So when we think about that conceptually, what we see is quite clear is that the information we have on the front end, which is very often the information that we have available to make choices about how to respond, that information is uncertain both in a process standpoint and also recorded data. As we move through the process and get officers on scene, get a response, we get more detailed information about what's happening and it becomes a little more clear. Once we get into the data in the R and S system, we're starting to deal with what [10:16:06 AM] is recorded as the actual event and those data are obviously the most certain and it's important to understand we can't make decisions based upon those data at the point we need to make a decision. There's a lot of analysis looking at data at any particular time slice that's necessary to figure out what the best practices might be. Jump to the next slide. And so when we think about -- when we think about these types of analysis, we also have to recognize that we have a number of issues in the data themselves. And these -- and we're beginning a process of working through understanding these issues since I'm new to the organization, but you might think about it in terms of the time spent. So if we want to understand how long officers spend on an event, what we want to do is we want to take the response time, the very first time which is officer takes the call. And there's a period of time until they arrive on scene. [10:17:06 AM] There's going to be another time stamp there. Officer work time to get to the call. So the backup is going to post in when they take the call. They are going to start arrive time stamp. As we move forward, we're going to get a call cleared time stamp. Now, importantly, and this is Monday in cad and other organizations I've analyzed as well, you have a lot of missing data. You have instances where it can be as simple as an input error, it can be as important from safety standpoint as an issue that necessities immediate removal and so we have a lot of missing data, so it's important to also understand our analysis will always necessarily be incomplete and we factor that in to the way we interpret it. Next slide. I'll turn it over to Kerry so she can talk about the differences between athletics work as well as move into the dashboard. [10:18:07 AM] >> When we last spoke and you asked me to offer a few words about the analytics reports, I I definitely concurred with some of the categorization. It's quite confusing with the vast number of administrative codes. And that tends to make it different to really pull the signal out that you would like as an analysis. What we have here through Jonathan's help and lieutenant Murphy's help is picking out the data that analytics did not have access to. If you only have the initial problem code, you may try to derive which one is officer initiated and which came from a caller. I know because because I tried to do that but when we could look for another data element it was very clear which one was initiated by an officer and which one was initiated by a caller. For the time spent analysis, we were able to get the data [10:19:07 AM] element around either a primary or a backup officer and the time stamp that they arrived. And we were able to get a look at some of the update codes for both the initial problem as well as the priority. As we move forward in this work, we'll be crossing over into the records management system to find out how the disposition code was updated as well as linking it to any arrest records and getting the FBI offense codes. As I was doing my sort of independent desk research, I could see everybody from the police data initiative to the 911.gov to a bunch organizations talking about updating to nibers. I think that's also at play in how we really categorize this work. Without access to these data elements, the ah athletics [10:20:12 AM] is necessarily incomplete, but like I said it was a really good start in getting us to think about how to make this contextually and locally complete. We're getting ready to move forward to the dashboard, but because of the complexities of this data and wanting to get it right, we're working only with January 2020 data. We wanted that smaller sample size to make sure we get our data architecture correct. We want to honor, unpack and align those lines of inquiries that I asked all of you to send to me as well as ones we received from civil society groups and management that helps us make sure when we're pulling some of these data elements and putting it together, we're honoring what it is you want to get out of the data. Hopefully with those in mind, we'll get your feedback on the dashboards and make suggested changes and update it with a longer time series. I would note that the January data was pre-covid [10:21:13 AM] for the most part. We hadn't start implementing protocol changes, but I'm understanding around March, April, you will see variations in the data because of how officer protocols had changed in response to the pandemic. Some sample lines of inquiry that I received was time spent on mental health calls, time spent analysis, repeat properties and signals for preventive intervention. If we have a no report signal, does that mean we can solve for it differently because it didn't require moving forward in a legal sense. What are the ranges of disturbance, different problem times. You will see disturbance, other disturbance service, disturbance urgent. What is all of that actually mean. What is the time spent on specific problem types. And maybe what is the day in the life of an officer according to this data. Those are some of the questions we received. And if more come up, please [10:22:15 AM] do send them my way. We'll continue to tailor the data available to answer these questions. Next slide. So when we go into the dashboards and visuals, there's only one we're going to do a live demo of right now, but in this presentation there's a link to tab low where all of these dash boards are publicly available for anybody to look at and provide feedback on any changes you would like to see. I have screen shots and one of them will go into a demo. Next slide. This is a screen shot of a general call for service. Here you can see the data broken down by service priority. In the back of this presentation which we will not be presenting on screen but will make sure everyone has is sort of an archive of what these definitions are. So zero is the most urgent where property or life is in [10:23:17 AM] danger and police -- everybody is on the scene and the police response will make a difference between life or death. So it's really urgent. All the way down to three, where that is not the case. The police officer response on the scene is not critical to saving lives, maybe someone has already left the scene and that sort of thing. So you can see the degrees of severity of priority, and you can see that through police sector along the bottom. You can see how the different priorities are shaped through the time of day. We have some real spikes in priority 3 calls towards the end of the day. Whereas priority zero calls are relatively stable throughout the day. We have a count of primary and backup police officer responses. So this is where we've counted every single primary and backup officer who has responded to each priority. [10:24:18 AM] And then a time spent analysis, we've broken it down into two parts. The first part is the average response time, so when the call comes in to when the primary officer arrives on the scene. And then the average time on scene, which is the time from when the primary and the backup officers arrive on the scene to the time that the call is cleared. So that we have some different ways of breaking out the data here. If you go to the next screen, this is one where we would like to actually do a quick demo. Actually if you could, councilmember Flannigan, look for the one that's the officer initiated versus dispatch. There we go. So in this dashboard we've tried to break apart the different trends by whether a call was dispatched from 911 or whether the officer initiated the call. What we've done here is you can see in January 2020 [10:25:20 AM] there are far more dispatched calls than officer initiated calls. We have a list of the problem types, the initial problem types. You can also look at it relationally. It's the same data, just two different views. We have differences in friends in the calls received by hour of the day. The bottom left corner, you have count of calls by disposition. Here you can see whether a report was written, no report was written, whether it had a mental health flag is also in the disposition. You can see the count of calls by police sector. And count of calls by priority and a time spent analysis. So this dashboard is interactive. So councilmember Flannigan, if you were to click on the relational view, click on disturbance other, you would see the tool tip pop up like you just did, and then you will see the entire dashboard start to render -- [10:26:20 AM] if you go ahead and click on it, the entire dashboard renders the changes about the calls that were dispatched for disturbance other. If you click on that same thing again, the disturbance other, it will return the dashboard to its regular state. You can do the same thing if you go down to report written. And you can click on -- I think you can click on the actual words report written. And you can get the data for both dispatched and officer initiated where reports were written. If you click on that same thing again, it will return the dashboard to its original state. So if we can go back to the presentation, I'll show you two more screen shots. Next slide. [10:27:27 AM] Sorry about that. Maybe I shouldn't have made the images a hyperlink. We've created a mental health dashboard for January 2020. And in this view remember it's January 2020, and they had just started initiating the protocols for the mental health flag and just started receiving the training for [inaudible] Some of those calls. As we get more time horizon on this data, we'll see some changes in the trend line. We have a very similar type of analysis here called by hour of the day. We have a count of the calls by initial problem categories. We have a time spent analysis on the bottom which is a little bit different than the time spent analysis that we've offered in the other dashboards. For mental health calls there's such a wide range of how much time officers may spend on that call that we [10:28:28 AM] thought we would give you more of a view of the edges, including the gray band, the darker gray band is really where the median is on the time spent analysis. Again, we have a count of the primary and backup officer responses and it's categorized here by whether it's a confirmed or potential mental health component, whether the counselor was transferred to a eligible call, and we have a few that are not categorized. We anticipate probably making some tweaks to this with your feedback, and as we pull in more data from a longer time horizon. If you go to the next slide. Sorry about that. Make a note to self about adding hyperlinks to screen shots. This is an initial call problem view where you can [10:29:30 AM] sift and sort by the initial call problem and the call disposition. Now, if you remember from our data caveats, there's a couple steps missing from this analysis. This does not include how the call problem code may have transformed. When an officer goes to the scene, the situation could easily deescalate as well as escalate. And what happens on scene could look very different than what it sounded to like the dispatcher and initial call taker. We would like to be doing a call problem transformation analysis, but this will give you a rough sense of how the calls come in and how they were -- what the disposition was. And you'll be able to kind of click through the different call problems and priorities, so you can do some sifting and sorting here on this view. You can collect -- go to the next screen. This is where we tried to look at the false alarm data [10:30:34 AM] analysis. So everything that has alarm, robbery or burglary in the word of the call problem is where a false alarm would apply. The call disposition here shows how many of them are false. That's the top graph on the left. The bottom graph shows you the count of officer responses. So that's a count of primary and backup officers who responded. And then you can see the count of calls by initial problem category and its disposition. There's more to be done, I believe, on this false alarm. As I was looking at some literature about different analyses people are doing on 911 calls for service, Manchester in the U.K. Did a fair bit of data modeling using officer experience as well as the data to determine what we might [10:31:34 AM] actually be able to do to lower the number of false alarm calls. My understanding is right now we try to offer a disincentive for repeat false alarms by having a fee associated with that. But I do think this might be an example where some data modeling and learning of an algorithm over time might help us get predictive or proactive around this. As noted by some, you don't know it's a false alarm until you get there, but this is where perhaps machine learning might be able to aid us in the future. Next slide. So this brings me to next steps in a future analysis. We definitely want to extend the dashboards to a longer time horizon. We want to look at call problem transformation and continue that journey into the records management system, the rms data. We would like to look at call outcomes. What is the ultimate disposition when it comes to [10:32:37 AM] the criminality element, the nibrs code discussed in the data analytics code. False alarm, continued analysis in how modeling and prediction might help. We're going to do a location based analysis, but as Jonathan mentioned, there are some challenges just in the location data we're going to have to go through and correct or account for. I would like to take a look at the gentrification maps and calls for service correlation. The innovation office I-team has been spending the better part of a year working on gentrification and displacement. We do know gentrification stages can signal the uptick in evictions, at least in a pre-covid era. So it might be interesting to see if there is any correlation with calls for service in, say, pre-stage [10:33:38 AM] gentrification or susceptible -- range in types of incidents. We would like to do journey maps. What's a day in the life of officer responding to calls. We definitely want to represent this data not just in dashboards for open format. Dallas and San Antonio have slightly different reputations in their open data portals and igs portals, so we would like to see what we would like to do for Austin in that regard. Next slide. And I leave you with this quote, the institute of justice issued a literature review in July 2019 of all kinds of 911 data, you know, research and models and what they said was that an analysis of calls for service provides a huge and largely untapped opportunity for research and [10:34:38 AM] practitioners to transform policy and practice. What this led me to believe is that because of the data challenges, because these systems were developed administratively, because they are about 16 years old and we all know what technology looked like as it was getting started, you know, the fact that we put a Z or X in front of a word, it scratches my eyeballs, drives me crazy, but what might have seemed fine 16 years ago, there's just this huge area of innovation here that is wide ranging in ems the of what does this data mean, but what kind of data systems do we need to be building for the future. I would like to open up for questions for myself, Jonathan and I believe we also have lieutenant Murphy available for questions as well. >> Flannigan: Thank you, Kerry. Councilmembers, questions where you want me to leave the slides up first. If you want me to pull my slides up for a question you may have or I can take the screen down. [10:35:40 AM] Councilmember kitchen. >> Kitchen: First off, let me thank you both. This is -- I'm really excited about having data that we can look at that can help us with the reimagining that we're doing to determine how we can best answer calls. So can you go back to the dashboard you've created around the mental health calls? Now, I think I want to just make sure I'm understanding. And let me back up for a minute. This data is going to be made available to us or perhaps it's already in our in boxes, right? >> It is -- yes. I don't know if it's in your in boxes, but it's been given to Katy powers and the dashboards are live currently, yes. >> Kitchen: So the public will be able to see it also. >> Yes. >> Kitchen: This is one month, right? >> Correct. >> Kitchen: And so you will be -- so one question is you'll be continuing to do this for all the months, [10:36:40 AM] right? >> Yes. >> Kitchen: Planned. Is there any conclusions that you drew from this data at this point? I understand the presentation on the various parameters and limitations that you just spoke to, but is there any conclusions that you would have -- that you think we could take from this page? >> I would say not, actually. Other than this is a good view into the very first month that they really had a lot of implementation on the mental health flag. I believe December is when they started implementing, so this would be the first full month of implementation >> Kitchen: It might point out to us the -- the level of calls that are potentially available to divert, would you say that? Or what do you think? >> Yeah, I would say that [10:37:41 AM] and at your recommendation I had a conversation with bj from the medors institute and she indicated there hasn't been a lot of study in the call problem categories and their correlation. Like she has a hunch based on her work across the state of the top areas and maybe some areas that are underestimated or under looked at. But I don't think -- I think this would be the beginning of really taking a look at how the initial problem categories relate to mental health and what changes we may be adjusting to over time. >> Kitchen: Okay. That's great. I think having this data right now helps us chart a course forward, but it also -- and councilmember Flannigan, thank you for initiating get this work done, but I think it's the kind of -- the kind of tracking and analysis we [10:38:41 AM] need to do to actually -- to actually get to the point where we're going to achieve our goals. So thank you very much. >> Flannigan: And really, thanks to the whole council and for staff for leaning on this 911 call analysis. We've all been askinger to it. Mayor pro tem. >> Garza: Just more of a comment. I think that, you know, this information is -- that last quote really just summarized my thoughts as we were going through this presentation and I feel like we haven't -- we really haven't dug in to this enough and I'm glad we're doing it now. Thank you for staff and our chair for allowing us to have these indepth conversations, because so much of what happens on a 911 call is based on the response. And if we can -- you know, there's discussions about making dispatch independent, and if we can get, you know, this is where I feel like [10:39:42 AM] the real reimagining comes into play. That split second when that call comes in and what questions are asked to determine what the response is is so necessary to what the response is. And so I did -- remind me, I remember we had the discussion about the initial 911 call, and I'm sorry if I missed this in your presentation. If I remember correctly, the initial call is do you need fire, police or ems. And did we add or mental health? Is that part of it now, fire, police, ems or is this a mental health -- >> I'm going to have to defer to lieutenant Murphy on that one. Before bringing him on, I will remind everyone that in February 2020 the auditor report on 911 operations came out and it does include that more holistic view. So my earlier slides really only tried to link the police data elements to [10:40:42 AM] [inaudible], but the larger process for 911 operations, do you need police, fire, ems, the auditor's report did a good job of that overview for anybody who wants to read up on it. If lieutenant Murphy is on the call, I believe he can answer about the mental health question. >> Bringing lieutenant Murphy in. Now. >> Good morning, councilmembers. Can everyone hear me? >> Flannigan: Yes, sound great. >> Thank you. So mayor pro tem, we have not instituted the fourth question yet into the initial triage of 911 calls because in order to do so we really need a crisis counselor on scene here at the dispatch center 24 hours a day. Because of the way the system is set up, we have automated greetings and we cannot have duplicate greetings or two different greetings based on time of [10:41:43 AM] day. We can only have one. So the hope is this next budget year we'll be able to add or have the crisis counselor on scene 24 hours a day so we can add the mental health question or option to the initial triage. >> Garza: Do we happen to know if that's in the proposed budget, the additional crisis counselor? >> Yes, ma'am, it is. >> Garza: Okay. Okay. And then lieutenant, I believe -- most of my experience in this is from the fireside and I believe it's the firefighters in dispatch. I don't think that's the same for police, though. Are they sworn dispatchers? >> No, ma'am, everyone is civilian with the exception of me. I manage and oversee the division. We have civilian 911 operators, call takers and civilian dispatchers, and then, of course, civilian [10:42:43 AM] supervisors. >> Garza: Okay. And could we get a possible,, like, synopsis, not now, but can you send councilmembers that kind of training those call takers get? >> Yes, ma'am, we have different training and I will send it to you. We have a specified training for 911 operators and then a different training path for dispatchers because they are different job functions. Equally as hard but different. >> Garza: And then last question, is ems sworn call takers or are they civilian? >> Ems, they are all sworn, just like fire, yes, ma'am. >> Garza: Thank you. >> Yes, ma'am. >> Flannigan: I would be interested also in whether or not we want the first question to be that question. By chance and anecdote, I had a constituent email me [10:43:43 AM] saying they are house was struck by lightning and she was so glad that APD showed up to make her feel better. But it seems if there's a lightning strike you send a fire truck. Because the danger seems to be in the structure. I think there are a lot of dispatch questions about what resources we're sending to what areas. I'm going to take the slides down for a moment. Councilmember pool. >> Pool: Thanks. And, of course, my appreciation to Kerry and her staff and Jonathan, it's nice to meet you. Really good work. I appreciate digging into the data. For me it's kind of a realization, this overall presentation is kind of a realization we've been making, the city has been making decisions and all been crafting our assumptions about crime on the data that you hear are [10:44:44 AM] showing has holes in it and it's in'complete and in some ways potentially unreliable. I'm not being critical, just trying to capture the presentation you've provided here in what I hope is an honest way. So I think it looks like with the data you started collecting in the beginning of January that we have progressed by light years both in our systems and in the data and how we are categorizing it from the early data collection, so I'm really optimistic that our understanding of crime in our community will be more accurate and more robust and will be frankly more helpful to us as policy makers and future councils as policy makers, making sure we are actually addressing the level of crime that we're able to measure. Am I right in that assumption? It looks like we're on the road to better measuring and accumulating and interpreting our data within [10:45:45 AM] the system? >> Councilmember pool, I would say that we made a lot of progress in our analysis, in our understanding of the data. I think Jonathan coming on board and our data scientist parker coming on board capabilities sorely needed. However, our systems still are 16 years old. The cad system, the computer aided dispatch system was originally an ems system so certain category changes they cannot make because the system doesn't operate that way. So I think this is the beginning of a shift, but we're desperately going to have to look at technology and -- to get it to where it ought to be. I mean a lot has changed in technology in 16 years. And my understanding of the whole public safety arena, based on my conversations during the Obama administration with a lot of [10:46:45 AM] officials back when I was in the federal sector, largely untouched by the modern design movements, right, where you would have a lot of user center design, user experience design on the interfaces. You would probably have a lot of content strategy, categorization. And the dispatchers would have a much more seamless ability to navigate instead of putting an X or Z in front of a problem code in order to get their screens the way they need them to. I think there's still a lot of clunky things goings on in the bound. I often say people in government have to run a marathon in ski boots and we do it gladly. But as the years move on, we really do need better technology tools at our disposal to meet the needs that you all set before us. >> Pool: I think that's true and I think that this dais is well positioned to [10:47:46 AM] push that, push very hard on that particular topic. I think just about everybody is interested in the array of communications that we have within the police department and throughout the city, and I just think that's pretty exciting opportunity and we can really make a difference and actually see it. And then just the second thing I would like to offer and then I'll be done, with regard to the gentrifying areas, that one slide towards the end of your presentation, I would be asked at some point when we get the data better organized and it's more robust and accurate, I would like to see whether and how crime may change in areas that are gentrified. How does it shift? Are the needs of the neighborhood different before, during and after, and how can this be proactively positioned itself to be able to respond in those, because we already have the U.T. Tool, the tool that U.T. Gave us to measure where gentrification is and [10:48:46 AM] how far along the spectrum it is. Maybe we could match up community involvement on the ground with those neighborhoods be they business, residential, whatever, so we can have our finger closer on the pulse of what's happening on a particular street in a particular part of the city. I see all of this as a really great runway for us to make a lot of really nice positive change. Thanks so much. >> Flannigan: Just as a time check, it would be great to get to Ed's presentation on the budget so we'll take a few more questions, but try to make them as brief as possible. And I want to give committee members a chance, harper-madison or Casar, did you want to add anything at this point? Greg? >> Casar: I'm looking at this spread sheet and I want to make sure I get the number right. What percentage of the burglar alarm calls were false alarms versus not [10:49:47 AM] false alarms? I think you are on mute. >> Sorry. I'm having to pull up the dashboard. >> Casar: Is there any way to know residential versus commercial on that front? >> Yeah, thanks for bringing that up. That is going to have to be correlated to a different data base. So it's -- I understand it's related to a permits data base. As part of the location analysis we'll be doing next, we'll be cleaning up those location data elements and then we'll be asking to pull the permit data so that we can cross-reference between another data base to get that information for you. Percentagewise, we don't have percentages this year, we have counts. Would you like me to transform or put -- >> Casar: The counts, I've got a calculator on my [10:50:48 AM] phone. >> Oh, great because math magics. Calls by disposition. The false alarm is 2,091 for the month of January 2020. >> Casar: And then the verified, 2 ones it was indeed a burglary? >> Report written is 130. >> Casar: Meaning it was a burglary or some portion of those may have [inaudible]? >> The definition of report written means that there was some law enforcement action that had to be accounted for. >> Casar: So it's 2091 plus 130 is the total number of calls, so about 2220. And 22 -- >> I would say there were 38 unable to locate. So perhaps there was something there they were unable to locate. >> Casar: But overall it [10:51:48 AM] sounds by 94, 95% false alarm. That's helpful to understand. I really think what the breakdown on is on commercial versus residential is helpful because we want to be especially sensitive if someone is having their house broken into, but with thousands of calls and 95% of them being false alarms, it's something we should be looking at even if we don't know what the answer is right now. Thank you for that. >> Absolutely. >> Flannigan: Councilmember harper-madison. >> Harper-madison: Thank you for this presentation. It's been very helpful. I am very curious about some of the gentrification specific data. I had a mentor tell me one time when I asked how do you slow gentrification and he said you keep crime high and so I think what he was talking about was how when the neighborhood changes, oftentimes what happens is [10:52:48 AM] there's suddenly a lot of attention being paid to the people who have been in that neighborhood. And a lot of that attention is very negative by way of introducing law enforcement. Some of the information that I'm interested in being able to analyze is, you know, I go to a lot of neighborhood association meetings and a lot of what we talk about pertains to law enforcement is the increase in calls for addressing issues that, you know, are -- is sort of part of the neighborhood culture. So what we're talking about is people who move into a neighborhood and then criminalize the original inhabitants of the neighborhood. I'm curious about something we struggle with in district 1 is people making false reports who call and when they make their report they say people are fighting or some other thing, then when law enforcement arrives those things aren't happening at all. It's people who are [10:53:49 AM] hypersensitive to -- to their original neighbors and they want them to not exist and/or bother them with their sounds or their presence. So I'm curious to get that data and try to figure out how many of those calls result in -- especially the sort of rapidly gentrifying areas, how many of those calls result in no action whatsoever. How many of those calls result in law enforcement arriving and saying that this was not a law enforcement call, this was an inappropriate call, this was a false call, this was -- I'm curious about that. You one of the things I would like to start digging into is holding people accountable for making false reports and calling law enforcement and involving law enforcement unnecessarily. Because a lot of what we're talking about with reform has to do with introducing law enforcement officers to situations that they didn't need to be involved in. And I think there's some degree of accountability that should be held by way of the person who picks up that phone and dials 911. [10:54:51 AM] So I'd like to break that data down in that way. Not sure exactly what the approach would be, totally open to any suggestions about how to best analyze those concerns. I expressed the concerns just so you know what it is I'm looking for. Thank you. >> Thank you. I've taken notes. >> Flannigan: Councilmember alter. >> Alter: Thank you. We submitted some budget questions related to the false alarms, but I'm wondering if you are able to tell from the data repeat false alarms. So it seems like you may have situations where you are getting five to ten calls in a year from one house or one business and that may be a different situation in terms of addressing it. But do we have that level of data? >> Councilmember alter, that will be part of the location based data that we're going to do next. We have to go through and [10:55:52 AM] kind of clean up and understand all the variations on the geo location data and then we can start to conduct that analysis. >> Alter: I thought if we looked at it carefully, we're likely to find a lot of repeat offenders is not the right term, but repeat false alarms that may be taking a lot of resources. It may be that check in in connection with that alarm company if you are going to have a lot of false alarms they have to take certain steps or there may be things we're still legally able to that can cut down on the number of calls if we have that better data. So my second question is that in the reimagining public safety seat that the city manager gave us about his plan for reallocating the $11.3 million in funding to alternative public safety strategies, there's a piece in there that's a $2.3 million reallocation [10:56:53 AM] within the APD budget to replace the department's 15-year-old records management system which will allow for more efficient records keeping. I don't know if you can answer this, Kerry, or the lieutenant or somebody else, but how does that relate to the challenges that we've identified here for being able to mine the data? Is this part of that problem? Would this be part of the solution? Can you tell me a little bit more about what that 2.3 million and how it relates to opportunities for data mining that you have been talking about? >> Flannigan: I'm pulling in deputy city manager if they wanted to also have an. >> Thank you. I wall streetn't to ask the question. I think it is important. >> Again, mayor pro tem and council members, the safety code, I don't have the technical [10:57:55 AM] background or specifics, but I would say generally, yes, we are operating as I think was briefed in a previous session that the records management system is -- I think as Carrie o'connor characterized, what has been built around a different or specific system with regards to UMass -- and looking forward, part of the opportunity to update our system so that we can capture the information that can be very helpful in determining how we might reimagine public safety. I think either lieutenant Murphy or perhaps chief of staff Troy gate, who I think also has been the attendees section can more specifically address what are the particulars fooches we are looking for that would be inclusive in a new records management system. >> The chief has not signed in but officer Murphy, go ahead if you have some of that. [10:58:58 AM] >> Councilmember, can you hear me? >> Yes. >> Yes, ma'am. So currently we have disparate systems, we have an rms system and we have a cad system and they do not communicate with one another, however they are linked by the master incident number. So when we have a call for service come in, it is assigned a master incident number. Then when an officer writes a report in our rms system, again, separate systems, they are linked by the incident number. However, what would be highly beneficial when we talk about data and data mining is to have an integrated rms and cad system, so they speak to one another and there is a continual flow of data not broken up by two systems. Does that make sense? >> I think it makes sense as a goal. What I want to understand though is what are we funding if we proceed with the 2.3 million? Generally I would like to know [10:59:58 AM] more about what that is funding but also how does it -- you know, is it just the rms side of that or is it the integration? Is it the whole kit and caboodle for 911 and something else? What is that? What is that funding and -- yes. >> Yes, ma'am. And I do not have dollars on the rms on that part of the discussion since I deal essentially with the cad system. However, again, I would hope as we are moving through the process we would look at purchasing an rms system. We can integrate with our cad system, so we have the data flow we need without the separation. So when questions are asked about how do cad calls relate to ucr and final -- and final reports, we have one system to go to instead of pulling the data from two systems and trying to collate the data. [11:00:59 AM] >> Chair, if I may, chief of staff -- we can certainly respond in a level of detail on your question -- >> I was just going to add, thank you councilmember Flannigan and hello to the council. I was just going to add in speaking to ctm director Stephen Elkins earlier as the budget process was going on, it really is indeed to sort of replace the legacy system that is currently there. It is imagined by ctm and according to ctm it will allow us to have, to share data with other agencies, to integrity great a bi tool in it right now which it does not have a business intelligent tool. Today they use a third party business intelligent tool. Into third party systems like cad and have those better workloads put in. We can certainly share with you some additional bullets but it is intended precisely to not [11:02:00 AM] only better communicate between our systems but, frankly, the belief is that it will help us continue to bring out the kind of analysis that we are looking for right now in the 911 data and do that in-house. >> Jonathan, did you have something to add? I keep muting you. >> That's right. That's what I wanted to add is that -- in looking at systems, when we think about reenvisioning policing we may also think about reenvisioning the police department uses data. Right? So going to a new rms system gives us flexibility. This is very labor intensive, right, and involves a number of steps, a number of experts and it is error prone. So for those of us familiar with the data we can make sure the findings are actually -- are actually valid, but it is harder to actually guarantee what they are generating. So the flexibility rms system that can tie into a tool can provide these type of products much more quickly in an open [11:03:01 AM] source framework, that's really one of the big advantages we see in the transition. >> So if chief day is not on -- I am sorry. The budget question answer that gives us a detail for that system, and the benefits of that system and then how it would facilitate data analysis that might be useful for reimagining public safety, because I think this dais really wants us to be data driven and I think all of us believe that if we can understand what is going on on the ground we will be in a better position to find new ways to send the right tools to the right problem and make sure that our officers are spending their time where we believe they should be spending their time, not just where they are driven to, because that's where they are driven to. But I think we need to understand that before we make any decisions one way or the other about that system and its [11:04:05 AM] value. The other part of that I would also like to know the timetable for that. There is another piece in our budget which relates to the hr systems where, you know, I thought we were getting electronic time sheets. Not long ago, a while ago, those are still not fully operational and so I am just concerned about the speed with which we are able to manage these programs as well. So if you can get us a timetable for its implementation as well, that would be great. Thank you. >> As a follow-up on that -- >> I want to -- I will recognize councilmember kitchen, I want to make sure we wrap up our 911 questions for Carrie and Jonathan and then we will have Ed do his presentation before we take a lunch break. >> Sure. I just wanted to wanted to add, reimagining policing is about connecting the right person to [11:05:06 AM] the job. And so -- and that's what we are talking about. Data is essential to that. So my ask is -- and we can talk about this more off-line is, I think that I would like to see the equity office and the innovation office involved in the creation of the specifications for the new system. The kind of things we are asking about a is all about the specifics which specifications is just another word for what do we want this system to be able to tell us? The other thing that we need to understand is the protections for privacy. There are concerns in our community about data sharing with vice and other agencies and so we need to understand that what we are doing is helping us with data for reimagining, but with the protections in place. And so I know councilmember Flannigan you are very familiar with this and councilmember alter I appreciate your questions. [11:06:06 AM] This is a huge part of our opportunity to reimagine. We just need to make sure we are all understanding what we are doing and we are doing it in conjunction with community in terms of understanding what we are getting from it and how we are protecting against the concerns that people have. >> There is probably some good work to be done by finance and audit on these systems too, so that we can consider that too. >> Chief joined the plea mean. Anything to add before we transition to the budget presentation? >> No, sir. I thought the deputy city manager and Jonathan sort of cleared it up by the budget proposal is for just the rms system, but because it would be more robust system it does give us the flexibility to integrate with not only the current cad system but hopefully integrate with potentially future opportunities with other cad [11:07:10 AM] vendors. >> Thank you so much, chief. I think we are ready to move on. I am going bring Ed into the meeting. Thank you, Carrie. Thank you, Jonathan, for your hard work and your continued work on the data analysis side. Ed, do you need me to bring others into the meeting for me? >> No. Just myself and -- and deputy city manager -- >> Excellent. I will bring the presentation up and then you can dig into it. Thank you, councilmember and good morning to all of the other council members on the call. I will try to be brief .. But I was asked to kind of do a presentation to summarize and at set the stage based upon some of the proposals we have seen so far. I categorize it initially around a things that in my perspective, [11:08:11 AM] and I do want to say this is my perspective and I haven't had time to really work closely with the police department on it but the things from my perspective that can be done on the short-term, things that seem more of a medium term proposal and some things that may be longer term proposals. So let me get right into that and go to the next slide, councilperson member. Councilmember, I will start off with the short term ideas. These are things we can get done as part of the fiscal year 2021 budget and result in savings that could be reallocated to other areas. This current page has to do with proposals of delaying additional cadet classes and further reducing unfilled vacancies so I will just take a step back to say based upon the resolution that was passed on June 11th, staff has relayed to the academy, the academy was going to get started last month, and as a result of that in look at our projections we are proposing [11:09:11 AM] to eliminate 70 vacant positions from the police department currently. Some of the proposals we have seen vary from delaying one of the cadet classes to all three of the cadet classes that are currently scheduled for fiscal year 2021. And we can see on this first blue bullet the classes that are currently planned and budgeted for are November class, a March 2021 class and a June 2021 class. These classes typically start with -- cadets and attrition rate about 65 cadet graduation class. They process $2.3 million to fully fund one, to fully pay for one of those cadet classes. That is primarily salary that goes to the cadets while they are in the training. And then if we were to eliminate all three, we will see more on this later, to eliminate all three classes next year it would [11:10:13 AM] be $2.3 million in staving it is not exactly linear because some of those spill over into fiscal year 2022. Depending on what happens with the cadet classes, that really drives number of vacancies we will have in the city budget. We are projecting right now that they have current vacancy trends in the 2021 budget, we are going to start fy-20 21 with about 80 vacancies. Those 80 vacancies have budgeted $9.4 million and they will be filled over the course of time as a result of running with cadet classes. That kind of, at council is looking at what are the vacant positions we can further cut, 80 would be at the high end of it, because anymore than that we actually would be in a situation where we have for people currently hired than we have positions to put them in. Vacancy savings and reporting considerations here, you have all heard me talk about that before but vacancy savings [11:11:14 AM] is something we actually put in a department budget as a negative dollar amount. So the police department, where there are sworn positions we have budgeted a negative -- million dollars is which is a reflection of our estimates how many positions they will have vacant at the beginning of the year and what is going to happen throughout the course of the year. So just need keep to keep in mind as we talk about removing vacancies and lowering the department personnel budget, well, that has to be offset to some degree by also lowering that negative dollar amount but simply adding back to the department's budget. In other words we already accounted for -- the savings that will occur throughout the year, revenue, from these vacancies and this is where it gets a little bit complicated. I have more on this later so I will move on for the time being. Some other short-term proposals we have heard about, we are reducing the over time budget, fy-21 is budgeted at $12.9 million. That over time is used for a whole variety of things. [11:12:16 AM] I have put in bold italics the areas that to me, not that they couldn't -- if they were to be reduced there would be consequences to those things and the chief can speak to that and we heard some of that from chief man think other day but those are the areas where I think if you want to talk about reducing over time perhaps that would make the most sense when we think about things like over time or -- where an officer needs to stay on their shift longer because they have a call that is running past the end of their shift, well they need to be paid for that. That time is in their contract and they have to go into court and testify they need to be paid for that, fallback time, reimbursed over time, doesn't make a lot of sense to cut, we are just cutting the reimbursement as well so again that is kind of focusing in on the bold it tall sized areas, if there would be a discussion about over time I think it probably should focus on those areas and really get the police [11:13:16 AM] department to inform me about what the consequences would be. I put a note at the bottom, the three- year average is $5.1 million, but currently with the high number of vacancies they have, they have been losing more than $5.1 million. I think in fy-21 we would expect them to utilize more of the 5.1 million of that budget for -- current high number of vacancies. >> Ed, will you try to lean into your Mike? It is getting a little muffled. We want to hear what you are saying. >> >> So on this next slide, some additional short term ideas that have been talked about are just eliminating certain units. But at least my understanding has been eliminating these units, transitioning personnel to other areas, other functional areas within the department, so the amount of patrol division is close to a $2 million budget. [11:14:18 AM] That fund is 13 or 14 of sworn personnel as well as civilian, so if you look at eliminating the amount of patrols, you are really just talking about the commodity costs associated with running the stables and caring for horses, which is around $326,000. Similar story for the explorers, most of the cost associated with the explorers program, associated with -- to oversee that program, there are only about $11,000 in a contractual commodities that would go away if we were to retain those employees in the program and finally the K 9 program as was mentioned, similar story there, most of the budget related to the sworn personnel, running those canine animals, about $36,000 of savings from the commodities aspect. So the final area we have seen that really is short-term in nature is this idea of shoring up the budget around quote [11:15:18 AM] unquote over funded line items which I certainly understand the interest in looking at their budgets, scrutinizing it and see where there may be areas to reduce it. I just would caution folks when you do that and look at a department's budget, somewhere around 4,700 line items, I asked my staff to go back and look and for the fiscal year 2019 they actually had 2,300 line items this their budget where they came in or where they went over budget and they had 2,400 where they came in underbudget so it is about half-and-half. The budget is simply a plan, one thing I can guarantee you that is going to happen is those line items won't come in spot on as to what they budgeted. There will be pluses and minuses and if you want to go through the line item budget you have to look at it in its totality at this which I tried to do at the bottom of this slide and look at the total bottom line savings .. For the police department over the last five years and then a projection for fiscal area 2020. [11:16:20 AM] This is the department of the budget in excess of $400 million and they typically expend 99 to 99 and a half percent of that budget in operating their programs and fulfilling their mission t1 anomaly is in fiscal year 2018 where they actually turned back to the general fund $15 million, and that had to do with money that was put into the budget for the contract and when there was a different contract than what we expected that resulted in savings, and also in 2018 there was unexpected savings from lower medical premiums that all departments realized and we were able to reduce the -- employee benefit fund that year. So fiscal 18 was really an anomaly, typically about 99 to 99 and a half percent of the budget is expended annually. So not a lot of wiggle room in my mind in terms of knocking down line items that appear to be over funded. So next, are things I would put [11:17:21 AM] into maybe like a medium term perspective and these proposals all had to do with ideas about moving nonsworn functions out of the Austin police department into other areas. So -- support, communications, forensics -- services, our -- some of the ideas that have been put on the message board. And I kind of look at these more as medium term. Budget Taylor it doesn't take us very long .. To take these budgets and put them some place else but the thoughtful discussion and thinking through where will they be located? Will we create a single stand-alone civilian department that supports police? Would these get branched out into individual offices like thein investigation office and office of police oversight? Maybe in some cases it would be combined with the -- maybe public health or in some cases like forensics, maybe it just gets outsourced completely away from the city and is done by a third party agency. [11:18:22 AM] But until we have the answers to these questions or all of these different service areas, it would be hard for us to know what to do budgetarily, we are not at the point yet to bull the trigger on moving these things around until we understand these different -- the answers to the different questions. >> And Ed I would suggest a different met appear, keep that in mind. >> As I said that, I said that I was hoping nobody noticed and I apologize .. The next slide I would is called longer term ideas, these are proposals to transition various sworn police functions to nonsworn areas. And so I am not going to read them all. There are a lot of ideas that have been put forth and we would expect over time there could be savings that some of these functions were transitioned to be delivered by nonsworn [11:19:22 AM] personnel. But it is going to take time to do that. It is going to take time to stand up a new unit that would fulfill some portions of the police department's current mission to stand up the new programs, to hire the staff, to transition officers away from doing those duties, quite frankly things that are going to take some time. So that is kind of to me the longer term ideas. I am going to go quickly through three tables that were a part of our budget question response to how much savings do we get as a result of delaying cadet classes, one, two or three of them, and eliminating further vacant positions so I mentioned we are currently anticipating the start of this fiscal year with 80 vacant positions. I have a slide that will show you that in a minute. I won't spend lot of time on that right now and we will need those 80 positions -- ever if we are going to run three cadet classes next career we will need the 80 positions plus the [11:20:23 AM] positions that will -- over time to kind of get us to fully staffed up some time in early fiscal year '22, that's how we landed at the 80, based upon running three classes next year. If we are to delay the November class, we project we could reduce another 47 positions, so delaying that November class, all seven runs in that November class fall within fiscal year '21, that is 3.3 million of savings by removing another 47 positions at $5.3 million of savings by cutting those positions, but think about that vacancy savings dynamic as I take $5.3 million of budgeted salaries away from the police department their ability to meet that $8.2 million vacancy savings, is severely impacted so that is my we would recommend putting some money back into their budget to lower that vacancy savings on the negative 8.2 to 6.7 million to get you to a net ruck shun of $6.1 million. [11:21:24 AM] Before I go on to the other two scenarios I won't spend as much time on keep in mind also that the cadet savings, the cadet class savings should be viewed at one time, eliminating a position that is permanent, we are not going to put the position back, but the cadet classes if we are going start running cadet classes again in fiscal year '22 we believe we can put that money back into the police department's budget in '22 so they can run those classes. So scenario 2, it is all kind of the same concepts, just the dollar amounts are different. But scenario 2, delay most the November and March cadet classes so only one run cadet class next year the one that would start in June, at that point we could eliminate all of the 80 positions that were projected to have vacant at the beginning toffies Cal year and no new positions being brought on to the force during the year, so we will move on the vacancies, that scenario savings a total of $9.2 million and then scenario [11:22:26 AM] 3 the only difference is that we wouldn't run the June cadet class so you get a few months of additional savings from that June cadet class, and we want to pay the cadets in June, July and August, so we save about -- more money on the cadet side but nothing changes in anything else because again we can only cut 80 positions at the most, because that would get us down basically to being a fully staffed up, fully staffed department relative to its authorized positions at the beginning toffies Cal year. That would get the total up to $10 million. I just have two more that should be real quick, but I hope this helps a little bit as we put together this graphic showing what the projected vacancy savings levels are, the blue scenario is what we proposed in the budget, and the red scenario is that scenario three, the red scenario is the idea we would not hold any cadet classes next year and how does that -- and we have cut 80 vacant positions. [11:23:26 AM] So in July, August and September of 2020, the red line and the blue line, they are the same line, that's the fiscal career we are currently in. We promise by settlement we will have 192 vacant positions in the department. That would rise by another seven positions in October, but polls in October that is when we eliminate the seven positions from the budget for what we have proposed to council and also in October we have cadet class 143 will be graduating and we anticipate there will be 47 graduates from that class and so that math gets us down to 82 vacancies at the beginning of fiscal year '21. Why do we not cut the 82 then? Why do we only propose cutting the 80 in? There is uncertainty in these numbers and we don't want to be in a position, we want to be cautious and we don't want to be in a position where we have more filled positions than we have authorized positions so we are trying to get ourselves a little bit of wiggle room there. You can see in October, though, for the red scenario, if we were with to cut those additional 80 [11:24:27 AM] we are down to only two vacant positions at the beginning of October and then you can see, we lose about 7.2 per month so these month to month changes are going to be about seven or eight per month depending on rounding but our average over the last five years has been attrition rate of 7.2 per month so you can see how the vacancies grow and then going back to that blue scenario, we would promise if we were to run the November I can't debt class, we would graduate 65 cadets in June of 2021 so you would see a vacancy savings number come down in the red scenario we are with not running any cadet classes and not graduating any cadets so that red scenario -- >> On the next slide, my final slide I just kind of flip it on its head and let's look at this in actual filled bogs. These boots on the street, these are not authorized strength this is actual strength we are currently at 1,700 and 82 filled positions in July of 2020, that [11:25:30 AM] drops by that same roughly seven officers per month based upon the at electricity rate, it will pop up in October due to the graduation of class 143 and then it starts coming down again. It is not until may of 2021 that you would see any variation between what we have in the proposed budget and this scenario 3 because in the proposed budget in may of 2021 we would graduate 65 cadets out of class 144 and in the scenario 3 version we don't. That just kind of helps you get an understanding of during fiscal year 2021, actual authorized strength by month vary from what we have proposed versus this scenario 3, and 15 this is just not until later in the year that you would actually see that separation. So that is everything I have for you this morning, council members and again we have staff online to respond to questions. >> Thank you, Ed. Questions, if you want me to [11:26:30 AM] keep the slides up, maybe hit those first, councilmember Casar, would you like to start us off? >> Okay. I am going to do this at my own peril, because I think I tried this last time together. And I don't think we have got to the answer. I -- there are a lot more savings associated with that third cadet class that aren't explained by that slide, right? Because there are a lot more savings that then roll into fy 22 much greater than -- it is millions of dollars, right? >> Because you are not having to pay the salaries of 60 more people, which is millions of dollars. >> Yes. There would be adjustments we would have to make in fy 22, we would -- you go to fy 22 and we are still thinking through how to do this analysis and a lot of [11:27:32 AM] the projections we would have a higher vacancy savings numbers. If we go to the next slide, councilmember, real quick we see that the vacancy savings we are budgeting in this scenario 3, the vacancy savings we are budgeting in scenario 3 for fiscal year '21 would have a starting point of only 2 vacancies. By the time you get to September, we would have 81 vacancies and so clearly for fiscal year '22, if we are starting that fiscal year with 81 vacancies instead of two vacancies we would bump the vacancy savings number way up so long story short there would be additional savings as a result of that a in fiscal year 22, but at the same time we will have to put money back into the department's budget to run the cadet classes to get those cadet classes in fy-20 -- >> That's why my understanding of why canceling all three, that is way more than 800,000? Is that you can actually spend 10 million in recurring [11:28:32 AM] rather than that 5,000,001 time if you cancel all three, because you know that there is going to be at least an extra $8 million in savings the next year. So you don't have to back it. It is not -- you don't have to subtract that 5,000,001 time, right? We could spend 10 million in recurring this year if we cancel all of those cadet classes? >> It would be -- and I don't want to commit to the 10 million, it could be slightly higher or slightly lower but I hear what you are saying and we need to run that number. We are working on it for fiscal year '22. Again, we have to put that money back, that cadet money has to go back so the savings will be more but let us run the numbers on that but I do think it will be more based upon that whole dynamic. >> I mean, in the Q & a it said we would get an extra eight to fin million the next year. So then you would have to back [11:29:33 AM] out -- back out the five and you still have well over 10. >> Yes. >> So I mean, and I think for the council and the committee to know, it is not like canceling one class gets you 6 million and canceling the third one only gets you 800,000. Canceling the third class also saves millions of dollars but primarily turning the one time money into recurring money if we so choose, I think, is my understanding from the Q & a. >> I think that's right. It is also maybe on the next slide, councilmember it is a question of what happens with the 81. Clearly the eight to $9 million we talked about was if we end the year with 81 vacancies and we are just to get rid of all of those 81 as well, that would be eight or $9 million in savings. If we decide no, we tonight want to get rid of those 81 we want to fill them then we need to kind of do a calculation of how long will it take for them to get filled and how do we need to adjust that vacancy savings numbers in which case it would [11:30:34 AM] be less than eight or 9 million. It just kind of depends on a lot of factors what do we want to happen in fy 22. Will we start the next cadet class in October or would we wait until some time later in the year? A lot of variables but -- >> Understood but the, but the point being I think the really important for us to grapple with is that, is that if we want to do significant investments in hiring staff and hiring -- doing things for emf that are recurring in the family violence chapter or supportive housing that is ongoing services, then we would need recurring dollars and not second and third cadet class provide recurring dollars if we -- if we basically say, we are just -- we have got 143 cadet classes and just taking a break this year, then that would be what actually generates those recurring dollars by basically [11:31:34 AM] banking on the packet that fy 22 you would have less staff. >> I hope that made sense but it is more than $800,000. >> It does and we need to get that information out to you in the numbers and we are work on it. >> So I think, you know, and I should have prepassed the conversation with this. We want to try to, what we want to try to get to today is how are we setting up accurate decisions for us to all vote on during budget next week. So getting more data back is an appropriate conclusion for today and I am mostly saying this to the public because I know you all know this because we have all set it up this way but I think there is -- there is a good, important question about when we have confidence about canceling the cadet class and I will put this -- I will use I statements I am confident canceling November I am not confident yet in canceling March I might be comfortable canceling [11:32:36 AM] March months from now if the training research is not done and if we don't have training more -- and so rather than the kind of deep, line item analysis that we are inevitably going to get to, for me it is more of well let's just not spend it on anything yet, let's not promise we are going to -- also not where we spend the money and can put that to the side as we continue the work in kind of this immediate term. That's the way my head is thinking of it. Are there other questions, councilmember harper-madison. >> >> Harper-madison: Thank you chair and I really appreciate you offering us that opportunity for clarification there. I think it is very helpful not just for us but for the general public to sort of see that there aren't da that many of white house are operating with definitives. There are so many variables so, you know, there are multiple if this, then what scenarios and that is one of them for me, you know, what happens with the [11:33:37 AM] continued assessment and audit of training materials, curriculum, et cetera, including, you know, one of the things that I am deeply concerned about, and I would like to see some movement on is not just a curriculum but who is delivering that curriculum. So I appreciate that, you know, you presented it in a way that it is fluid and flexible. So that gives us options. I don't want to offer people anything in the way of definitives because frankly I don't think it is appropriate. I think it is a potential for setting us up to say we told you we were going to give you X and didn't. I don't want to do that. I would much rather disappoint people on the front end with asking for flexibility than disappoint people on the back end, I by promising them things we can't deliver on. I really fell very strongly about not doing that. I would say often, a lie by omission is still a lie and a lie by over promising is still a lie and I don't want to lie to our constituents. [11:34:38 AM] But there is a slide where I just have a quick question. A lot of this, you know, we have already asked these questions. We already all talked to Ed so I think a lot of this we don't have to belabor but there is a question where there was a breakdown line by line and one of the -- I am sorry, I didn't catch the page number, this one. You just passed it. The one with the blue -- the two separate blue columns. This one year is one that has been brought to my attention on multiple occasions. Special investigations -- that is one that has been brought to my attention on multiple occasions by firefighters and the fire department, there tends to be sort of a distinct frustration about, you know, the road continuing to be obstructed and not being able to clear the road, et cetera, et cetera because there is the requirement and I am not sure where this requirement lies but apparently there is a requirement that pd has to make the call to the wrecker so like the firefighter can't make the call to the [11:35:38 AM] wrecker, the citizen can't make the call to the wrecker. Pd has to show up and make the call to the wrecker. Chief gate, can you expand on that for me and tell me if that is in fact the case because I really appreciate this line item, this $.7 million. Not just for the savings potential but because I think it is an inefficiency in the system. >> Councilmember I really don't have the answer for you. I would believe that any public safety entity should be able to call a wreck tore clear the roadway but I will get that answer for you and if that is an inefficiency then we will figure out how we can change that. >> That would be great. And unless they are really mistaken I have heard from at least half a dozen firefighters this is a point of frustration them not being able to clear the roadway because they can't call the wrecker. >> Okay. >> The other one on here that I am curious about recruiting $3.6 million, and so my thought here is, look at all of the [11:36:39 AM] statistical data that you have about recruiting, recruits, et cetera. What I was able to recognize is, over 50 percent upwards of 60 percent of our recruits are white male and Christian is how they identify. And so that is to say I would be comfortable with this 3.6 million dollars being less but I would also want to make certain that we didn't take away the opportunity to do diversity recruiting. It is clear to me by way of the numbers that I am looking at we don't need to recruit white male Christians but we do need to have some efforts towards recruiting black and brown folks and women and so I don't want to see this entire 3.6 be subtracted from our options and possibilities especially because I would like to see some degree of effort placed for its recruitment in communities that are ubledz represented in the [11:37:40 AM] Austin police department. That was all I had. >> And I would, just for the public to understand, you know, some of these proposals are cuts and some of them are opportunities to reimagine with nonsworn staff I think your point is on the nose that councilmember harper-madison, that there may be ways to rethink how we do recruiting. I don't think that anyone has proposed eliminating it. I may be wrong about that. But how we structure it is another question. Also under the longer term budget to your point maybe should be a little shorter term if we are with talking about recruiting but if we are not doing cadet class there is is kind of a conflict there. >> Harper-madison: That's what I understand about the variables, all of the IFS and whats I really, really want to encourage us all to be very careful with what we are saying to the general public and what we are promising people. >> Thank you. Councilperson member kitchen, your hand was up. >> Kitchen: Yes a quick data question. I think I got answer but I want [11:38:40 AM] to ask. So the vacancy estimates, Ed, it is an interesting slide. When we estimated vacancies do we have any deeper or more detailed level of data in terms of which departments or functions we are seeing those vacancies in? >> We do have that data. I would be happy to share it with you by department. We generally budget the vacancy savings amounts based on historical trends. Our goal in the budget office is we don't want people to not be able to pull their positions because we gave them this huge vacancy savings number but we do want to reflect the vacancy savings numbers which is reflective of their historical trend, this treadmill of people leaving the organization and in the time it takes for us to bring these people on and that vacancy rate varies by department from anywhere as low as zero percent to maybe as high as 12 to pen percent a, depending upon the department [11:39:41 AM] and, you know, hiring freeze going on like we do right now. But we have all of that data and I would be happy to share it with you. >> Kitchen: I should be clearer I don't mean by department I mean by the different understands within the police department so -- and you don't have to tell me now. I can get it later. In other words, if we -- you know, if we are estimating nine vacancies on November 20 or 89 depending which line you are looking at, what -- I don't know if I call them functions or areas or, you know, subdepartments of the police department, I would just like to know what that you have that breaks that down for me. And if you could send that, we can send you a formal request on that. It sounds like you do have some data. Is that right? >> I will have to check with the police department. I don't want to say for sure we do or don't, but -- >> Okay. >> I would be happy to if they move their staffing around so they have a real high number of vacancies in first response -- [11:40:41 AM] then they need to move something away from a different unit to fill that need, and so I will have to get a big department to see -- for us to track the vacancies by unit or -- >> I am not asking how they are filling them. I am asking who is leading. In other words, so another question I have. So if, you know, it looks like we are in the same spot by June of -- either scenario we are in roughly the same spot difficult pending where whether you look, June, July, August or September of next year so I am just wanting to understand better particularly since we are thinking, although we don't have data of course about it yet, is that by freeing up some of the functions from the police that frees up police, you know, sworn police to fill other areas in need, so that's eventually what I am trying to get to and I know [11:41:43 AM] we don't have all of that data right now. So -- okay. Thank you. >> And I would add to that, to what councilmember kitchen said, unlike other departments where the council authorize as single fte number, we authorize by class, right? We authorize a specific number per rank which is very different than vacancies in other departments or ft in other departments and if we are -- if what we are doing is, as folks are retiring, it is very likely that they are at the higher end the data will hopefully show some of that. If we are moving people up because once with those vacancies appear people want to get promoted I worried about the top heaviness of the department and whether we need to be thinking about vacancy reductions or if they are thought of being distributed across the classes. And maybe we are in such small [11:42:44 AM] numbers as we are talking again to the public we are talking about, you know, 50 to 100 within an 1,800 size department so maybe that's a nuance at this level in this next fiscal year isn't much of a distinction but something that has been running around in my head. >> Real quick, councilmember, we can get vacancies by units, we will follow up with your office and councilmember kitchen. >> Ed, I want to make sure I understand this chart. This shows vacancies, right? I guess there are two-way easy you can create a vacancy. You can -- adjust a vacancy number either by removing the position or by filling the position. And both of them have a similar vacancy, so this has us under both scenarios being closer in the June, September time frame. >> Yes. >> But there are two -- let me [11:43:44 AM] make sure I understand. They are getting there different ways, right? So there is a difference in the number of officers that are there that -- at least that chart, that's the total number of officers. >> That's what this chart shows. Now the vacancy chart yes the vacancies between the two sides is very close together by the end of the year, but the difference in boots on the street grows as those lines come together. So that's why I wanted to give it to you both ways. >> Okay. Thank you. >> I think I understand. >> Other questions? >> So I think the -- it seems somewhat clear that there are some kind of vote objects that pardon my programmer speak, but vote objects we have identified at least on the cadet classes. There are these other questions I want to make sure that we all have an opportunity to ask Ed or better clarify for ourselves how [11:44:46 AM] these might be considered next week. Councilmember alter. >> Alter: Thank you, I had two questions. So going back to councilperson member ca's question, councilmember Casar's question on the savings from the cadet class, .. So when you get back to us with that data, we clarified when something is recurring in that it is money saved in fiscal year '22, that's one time, but that we could be thinking about as money that we could program versus money that is in fiscal year '22 that is recurring money that would also be available in fiscal year '23, assuming we have some cadet classes in fiscal year '22. Does that make sense? I heard that you have recurring, that was recurring over time, albeit it may be recurring in that it is in fits y'all, fiscal year '21 and fiscal year '22 but [11:45:46 AM] if between hire people we need to have money in fiscal year 23 and 24 as well. >> Yes. So I think we can lay out all three of these scenarios where there is a column that will be the column for fiscal year '21 and another column for what it would look like in fiscal year '22. We can do that and get that out quickly. I know that is an important distinction. As I heard differently from the unless we hear differently from the group we would assume in fiscal year '22 we will be running cadets classes and go back to the three class as year regardless of whether we delay one, two or three classes in fiscal year '21, going to fiscal year '22 we would go back to three on that assumption we could run a set of numbers for you. >> >> And the over time -- >> Do you mind if I interject there? >> I have to get back. >> Of course. No. But I really appreciate that. And that is important I think to [11:46:47 AM] all of us. And I think the -- and your point is exactly right. We want to know what is in 22, '23 and '24. I think what we are asking for is not how you categorize in the budget recurring versus one time in your categories, but actually what money, if we wanted to spend the recurring moneys -- hire people, what could we hire people with? Not how do you have it coded in your system? >> I understand that perfectly. >> There is a corollary to this also, which is in fiscal year '21 we have to take the vacancy savings but in fiscal year '22 there would be no vacancy savings budgeted. So -- and you would have just made that, you know, in the course of moving forward as the standard practice. So somehow we have to capture that side of it too as I understand it because those positions as you projected into [11:47:49 AM] fiscal year 22 would have been at the full rate in the projections. If we are talking about projections as opposed to just moving money. So my other question on the specifics here is for over time. >> And so we do not have south by southwest this year. Can you tell me what happened to that over time money? >> It is part of the department overall $12.9 million budget, so I don't know what their actually year-to- date spend is. Again, the budgets are planned so they may go over budget on over time and may come in under budget on over time. It is a little hard to say exactly what happened to it. It is just part of their base budget. It will be a part of the year-end savings that they have at the end of the year. [11:48:49 AM] >> So we can get year-to-date for the over time. >> We could get the year-to-date for sure. >> That would be great. And then I just wanted to say how much I appreciate councilmember Harper Madison commends about how .. We should be clear in our messaging in what we are doing and understand what we are able to deliver. I am interested in transformational change, I am less interested in moving pieces on a chessboard, and I am still looking for the ways forward that we really do reimagine how we are delivering services and how we are making everyone in Austin safe and there are -- there is value in moving certain things out of the police department but I am not sure that that gets us ultimately to where you want -- we want to be and figures out that dynamic as [11:49:51 AM] we also deal with the fact that we are a growing city and there are challenges. So I appreciate those comments and wanted to recognize that. Thank you. >> Councilmember pool. >> >> Pool: I wanted to go back and look at the -- I am not going to -- special events in particular traffic. I know that -- I know that officers are the only ones with authority under state laws to do the traffic control. Are there -- setting aside the sworn officers, and in both of those offices are there administrative, in other words, civilian positions that could be used in the case of traffic, in the transportation department? [11:50:56 AM] >> >> This is -- >> Most of our -- I can't tell -- >> >> I am sorry. Most of the slots in our special events in our department are sworn personnel. We do have a few administrative staff that are civilian. >> Do we know what a few is? >> I will have to get you the exact number. I think it is one or two, though. >> Okay. All right. Good to know. Thanks. >> Councilmember Casar, did you have something and then councilmember harper-madison. >> Two things. On that -- on over time, it would be very helpful, a bit of my understanding in part of what we put into the spreadsheet was that if there were not cadet [11:51:56 AM] classes my understanding is that you would then have patrol officers time freed up, that would have been participating in those classes and I think that would likely create some number of hours that would with not -- that wouldn't have to be back filled by over time. And so that would be really helpful for the department budget to e-mail to us as well. And that scenario 3 where all three classes don't go on, whether there is additional over time savings that we could realize. The second thing that I wanted to raise, I think it is fully in Klein with what the chair, what you said along with councilmember alter and harper-madison we have to realize some of this work, even if we move something in the budget is going to take time and I think maybe we put something out there on the message board insofar as budget direction goes if we say internal affairs or forensics or something else is [11:52:58 AM] really important to have independent. If we pull it out of the budget all at once, like you said, the city is ready on October 1st to have the answer on exactly where forensics goes but if the council makes the decision to say it is so valuable for it to be independent that we make it independent, what kind of direction we can include so that the council harp, councilmember harper-madison we are very up front with what we mean is we do want it to be independent, we have voted to make it a separate line item .. And the manager is going to separate it, that does not necessarily mean that it is hosted in a new department come October 1 because I think understandably it would take some time for that process to happen along the fiscal year. That is my expectation and I want to keep saying that out loud so folks know what it is we are doing. >> Councilmember harper-madison. >> Thank you. [11:53:59 AM] Thanks for assist chairman Flannigan. I actually have what I hope to be a quick question. There was -- there was -- you said something about the three cadet classes. It was my understanding that until this year, where we were going have one in the -- have one in February, one in July, and then one in the fall, that it is not customary we have three cadet classes. I thought custody barrel we had two cadet classes and that this year was an anomaly. Is that not the case in is it that we adopted the three and then moving forward we are going to perpetual I will have the three? Can somebody clear that up for me, maybe chief gate? >> Yes, councilmember. We historically have had two large classes and then one lateral class. This year, was the first year that we did not hold a lateral class. [11:54:59 AM] Those classes are usually smaller. So in order to come up with our staffing plan we had three full academies that we usually see anywhere from 70 to 80 in each class. Our lateral laterals usually are less than 30. >> Okay. I guess, you know,ly try to get with you off-line to get a little more clarity there, because it is still a little bit confusing about what we do customarily for me to be able to think through what are we doing differently here? And to councilmember alter's point, not just move in pieces .. For the sake of accommodating any particular ask or, you know, any particular sort of independently driven agenda, I want to know what do we normally do and how are we making true transformational sustainable change? So I got your e-mail and I will respond to that and ask that [11:55:59 AM] question additionally. And then other thing I wanted to ask you to clarify for me, the councilmember Casar said free up patrol officers and not have to back fill because of their involvement with academy. I was under the impression that there was a separate and aside specific set of groups who are the academy appointed trainers, educators, mentors, et cetera, is that not the case? Can you clear that up for me as well? >> Absolutely. Great question. We do have permanent staff at the academy, but there are certain times throughout the academy that we do scenario based training and then we utilize our field training officers that are in the field and we pull them back to the academy for a few weeks throughout that 32 week period. So -- but usually that is managed and those are planned [11:57:00 AM] events so it usually would not cause a back fill situation because the supervisor's plan for those situations to where when those fto's would be assigned to the academy. So normally a shift will allow two people to take vacation off but if someone was off on internal assignment then for that week they would only allow one. So usually it would not cause a back pill. There was someone that was sick on top of that, then, yes, it would cause a back fill situation. >> Did you see how Ed presented the information earlier in the scenario one, two, three? I wonder if you could work with my colleagues and I do have us be able to better see what those scenarios look like. You said usually, but what is unusual, what is usual, what are the implications of what is usual and what is unusual, think think knowing that would be helpful for us to understand some of those variables as we [11:58:01 AM] move forward with this decision making. Especially if that is one of the things that we are taking into consideration and that is what over time category. Is that something you all can help us produce for us? >> Absolutely. I appreciate that and I am certain my colleagues would also, thank you rchlts we are two- minute until when we want to break for lunch if anyone wants to get a quick comment in and then I will telegraph what -- telegraph what I think the afternoon will be. >> Yes. Just a quick this does illustrate the difficulty that we're facing in wanting to be responsive to the community, who have put us in these positions. And so while I absolutely agree that we need to be careful in the promises that we're making, I think we also need to be careful in referring to [11:59:02 AM] community asks in certain ways, too. And I think we're all -- we all have the same desire to keep our community safe as possible. I 100% agree with how councilmember alter explained and characterized the motivations of all of us, but this having been -- will be my sixth budget, I know how hard it is to get things done in every single budget. And I'm just really concerned that we really need to make some drastic decisions and drastic changes, otherwise I've seen it time and time again, how things -- how the can gets kicked down the road. I can give you one zillion examples of that in my time on this council. And so many of us, I think, are being responsive, wanting to be responsive to community asks. [12:00:04 PM] And we've seen this overwhelming involvement, people calling in and saying this is the first time they've ever called city council. And I think it's important that they know that we're listening. And we all want to do the same thing, we just have maybe different timelines. And I understand there's comfort levels on timelines. But -- and maybe it's just me coming from a position where this is my last budget as a city councilmember. And I want to really be part of seeing some real change. And I'll just stop there. I don't want us to kick this can down the road. We have this moment. We need it. >> Flannigan: Thank you, mayor pro tem. I really want to get to you, councilmembers, but I think we should take a lunch break, because I don't want to have difficult conversations while hangry. If you can be brief, councilmember kitchen and councilmember alter. >> Very brief. [12:01:09 PM] My values are public safety and investing more in our community, in health and social services. I share the mayor pro tem's sentiment. As a community and as a country, we are way overdue and way past time to invest in people. And so I'm looking at this through that lens. >> Flannigan: Councilmember alter. >> Alter: My comment is a nitty-gritty comment I wanted to flag for folks. Two years ago in the budget, we tried to create mobility officers that would take over some of the roles that police were doing. In trying to look through some of the traffic things, and sort of seeing where things got impacted by covid, etc. And we have discovered that there has been certain roadblocks. And I wanted to let folks know that I'm going to be putting forward an amendment asking for [12:02:10 PM] $30,000 to do a classification and compensation study so we can do the next step for the mobility officers. The transportation department is all ready to be able to do this. There was a delay because they had to do a broader classification and compensation study for all of their classifications because the officers have to be a step in there. But there is an opportunity that once the parking revenues come back, that we'll be able to fund the mobility officers from parking revenues, as was the original plan. They had to step back because of the drops in parking revenue and those positions are not currently in the budget. So I will be putting forward an amendment that will be asking for that $30,000 from general fund because we don't have the parking revenue to do it from that. But it will set the stage so as that parking revenue comes back we'll be in a position to have mobility officers who can help [12:03:10 PM] with bike lane enforcement, towing vehicles out of alleys, and ordering vehicle immobilization, standing up street barricades at events and other things. And that will be fairly quickly once our parking revenue gets back up that we will be able to think about getting those officers. But we need to take that step of that classification survey before we can take those next steps. >> Flannigan: Okay. So here's the plan. We'll recess for lunch for 30 minutes, come back 12:35. Ed, if your team could be ready when we come back from lunch. If there are remaining questions you think need to be answering before voteable proposals can be drafted. We don't have to decide which ones we want, we just need to be able to know they'll be written in such a way you understand what we're asking for. I think as many folks have said, [12:04:12 PM] there will be some that are budget amendments, some that are riders, some that are direction. That's all fine. But I want to make sure today we understand what those option are and we vote on them next week. I want to make sure in the afternoon we're talking about the ems proposals, which a lot of us are really concerned about, and any other proposals that fall in our public safety budget, police, fire, ems, code enforcement, courts. Hopefully by 2:00, by the time we adjourn, we'll have an understanding of what the items are on the table so that staff can prepare us for the budget next week. Any questions before we recess? All right. Thanks, everybody. We'll see you back at 12:35. We are recessed. (In Recess ) [12:38:45 PM] >> Flannigan: Back out of recess. So, as I said before we went into lunch break, it would be great, Ed or any of the staff, if you all have questions or areas where you think the councilmembers need to provide some more specific direction or indication of what we want to see for next week. >> Discussion, people - - I think we're pretty good. We're feeling pretty good about what's been posted to the message board, the conversation we had at the work session on Tuesday, and the conversation we had today. We will be reaching out to you probably while this meeting is going on, Diane and others will be reaching out to your offices to take some of these concepts into the specific budget amendment language we will need to have to be considered next week. And we would like to get that planned out as soon as possible so that we can get it available to council as soon as possible so it can be considered next week. [12:39:45 PM] But I don't have any specific questions or clarification for council at this point. We might have had some one-on-one, but I think right now we're okay. >> Flannigan: That's great. I would like to review quickly -- I don't know that there's a presentation for it, but there are ems items from some councilmembers to increase resources. And my recollection from Tuesday was that there were timings involved in that. So there was the ems proposal I think talked about adding an ambulance at one point, and then another six months later adding another ambulance. Councilmember alter, I'm sorry to interrupt your lunch. I'm pretty sure that was your proposal, if you want to turn your mic on and weigh in. Sorry, you're on mute. >> Alter: You want me to outline? >> Flannigan: I don't have it in front of me at the moment. [12:40:47 PM] Were you laying out -- it was over several different date time points. >> Alter: Yes. We right now have one full-time ambulance coming on board in October and one full-time ambulance coming on board in January of '21. And then the eight field clinical specialists who are staffing our paramedic consult line which is so critical right now with covid are coming online in October. Our four communication specialists are coming online in January. And our five field commanders are coming online in January. And that was based on when ems and emsa thought were the best times -- most efficient times for those to be added [12:41:50 PM] staffing-wise. We can certainly have a conversation with that if we think we have additional money to bring them online sooner. But that was where I had gotten those dates. And then we are working on the additional support staff and that timing, but I don't have that detail ironed out. But that's under about $300,000 for the support staff with adding all of these ftes that would be needed. And just so folks recall with ems there's a whole billing component. And so some of these support staff are critical if you're adding more of these ftes and more of these vehicles, etc., as well as just the staffing challenges they have with how they have to staff things given the current staffing structure, since we've not yet moved to 24/7 two staffing. There's another proposal which I don't want to speak for councilmember kitchen or pool, [12:42:51 PM] but I'm a cosponsor on the chp, listed as potential additions at the bottom of the original ems amendment. Those were put in a second amendment. I think councilmember pool and councilmember kitchen were the lead sponsors on that. Which I think I'm on, too, and a couple other folks, which is about $700,000 for those. And I do not know when those come online. >> Okay. >> Tovo: Ann is waiting to be admitted. >> Flannigan: I see her now. >> Pool: Great. >> The chief medical officer is also related to ems. We also have some timings on that. But most of that is coming on. And it's timing over the two years as opposed to timing within the year. But we will have that where we have been waiting on the numbers since we're trying to have it [12:43:54 PM] funded by additional ambulance transport fees. That's just taking a little bit longer to get all of the numbers in terms of the funding side for that proposal. But we're almost ready to go on that. >> Ed, do you think that there'll -- the fee stuff I'm really interested in. Will that be ready for next week? >> Yes. We'll get that analysis done. We are working on that right now, the proposal. >> Flannigan: Okay. So we've got to be ready to adopt that in conjunction with the additional staffing. But we might be able to connect those two things, I guess is what I'm saying, next week. So that's very exciting. Thank you, councilmember alter, for laying all that out. Councilmember Casar, in your -- of -- amongst your proposals, one of them was a calendar. I would like to talk about the calendar as we move forward. As we talked about earlier, [12:44:55 PM] there's some stuff we're going to do that are ready to go with budget amendment, and there's other stuff that are going to show up as budget riders and direction. One of those elements is going to be a calendar of the work moving forward. Have you -- do you have more to add? I have thoughts, but I want to hear where you are on that. >> I appreciate that, chair. I think that we should get together at least quarterly and potentially we just have designated all committee meetings or something to be checking up on the questions that we're not able to answer in August. It's been a little tricky for me to decide what things to put on the calendar given that there is still some continued debate on council about what might get done in August versus should get done over time. But I think that there is some really clear ones that the council has raised and I appreciate the deputy city manager saying that she wants to [12:45:55 PM] work with the community to find out what they think. But some of them that we can't answer right now in August are things like if we don't want to potentially sometimes escalate protests by having so many police and we want to have some other people fill in that role, what are the cost savings and how would that be implemented, for example, that's something where none of us have fully fleshed out an idea and we aren't going to be able to get done. Rather than potentially having each of those items in a calendar, we might just want to set that we're getting together every quarter or something and then have the community and the city manager with input from councilmembers flesh that out after August 12th, especially once we see what we've done in the budget. That's where I sit now, but I really welcome y'all's thoughts. >> I think that makes a lot of sense. My straw proposal on that would be that next week we can adopt [12:46:56 PM] in direction the schedule of budget amendments without specificity, but directing the manager to have staff put a budget amendment item on the council meeting agendas in November and February, just for two months, right. I am more comfortable with quarterly. I think six months is probably too long, to the mayor pro tem's point. If you wait six months, you've got to work a lot more in the middle. And then committee meetings come and fill those gaps. This committee would be filling those gaps, making sure that we're heading into those quarterly posted budget amendment items, working through what we think should be done, because it's just going to take a lot of work figuring out what's ready at what point. The overlay -- Ed, this is going to be part of what I'm hoping we'll see as staff kind of gets into amendment language. When there's a proposal, like councilmember alter articulated [12:47:56 PM] that implements over 20 years, how much -- over two years, how much of that is decided in August, how much might be decided in November, how much might be decided in February? So if there are decision points we can also attach to that that, because we're saying we want to do things now, but there are question marks on Kay death cadet classes. There is a little bit of that we can think about. It will be good to know for budget amendments when we can adopt it in the budget, but also by this date it's too late to undo. That would be true for cadet classes and any proposal that doesn't start October 1st. Does that make sense, what I'm saying? >> Councilmember, I do think that makes sense. I like the notion of sort of thinking about this maybe coming back in November and January and thinking -- and again if we have something earlier we can certainly come to you, either in [12:48:58 PM] committee or the full council, however that looks like. But I do think that that enables us. We are thinking to convene that task force soon. We believe our consultant could be available as soon as August 17th as well. We are anticipating hopefully three meetings this month still. And hoping to flesh out a calendar that we can then talk to you and your colleagues about what does that look like and what do we think. And we'll have some more answers then. But I do like the notion of setting a placeholder for quarterly meetings where we can come and speak to you about it. >> And I think to that point, you could do it one of two ways. You could adopt everything you want in August, presupposing the cannot change dates, or you could not adopt those things, but reserve the money, put the money back in budget stabilization, knowing the must [12:50:00 PM] decide by dates. There's a couple of ways to think through that. Councilmember alter. >> Alter: Sorry. My other phone is going off right now. So, I appreciate the quarterly check-ins. I'm not sure ems is the right example for saying these go in in January. There's trainings and other things that have to happen, and there's covid and different things like that. And I'm not sure I'm voting for this budget if it doesn't include these basic for the ems, because I feel so strongly they need to be in there. So I think the idea is sound. I would not apply it to the ems stuff, because what we did is we worked down to the most bare bones of what we needed to make things work and be safe. And I think that I would hate for that to be penalized by not getting funded because we were responsible about when things came online and thought through [12:51:01 PM] the different pieces rather than assuming it was all year. And I know that's not what you intended, you were just using it as an example, but I feel pretty strongly about that for ems. >> Flannigan: Yeah, that's good clarity for the public, too, because kind of my point that I hope staff will be able to answer that question is, just because you say an ambulance comes online in January doesn't mean you don't have to spend money until January. You have to train, recruit, do things. >> Alter: We would be probably be buying both ambulances at the same time, but the ambulance takes a while to get delivered. You have another ambulance you can use. But you have to buy the ambulance and then you have to -- but you can't staff two ambulances if the ambulances don't exist, but you may have one ambulance you can staff. So there's some details there, the logistics that we tried to accommodate in there. >> Cool. That's good to know. Councilmember kitchen. [12:52:01 PM] >> Kitchen: I think councilmember Casar may have had his hand up first, I'm not sure. >> Flannigan: I called on you first. >> Kitchen: All right. So, you were categorizing the kinds of changes we had. Just to bring another kind up for awareness is that I did post to the message board this morning the budget rider I talked about yesterday informal and a large part of that is the second-year funding item and it relates to the investments in homelessness. I am hopeful we can make some of those investments this year. But my intent -- and I know councilmember Casar has that in his proposals. But my intent with my budget rider this morning is for us to make a commitment now in a direction to our staff now to include in next year's budget the modest investments that were identified by our consultants related to homelessness. [12:53:01 PM] In other words, I don't want to wait until next year for direction that we want to see that, those things in next year's budget. So that's a little bit different characterization of timeline, but I wanted to let you know that there is a budget rider that does that. >> I'm definitely interested in budget riders that direct future. That's a great place to be. Councilmember Casar. >> Casar: Before we lose the thread on ems, I just want folks -- I really appreciate councilmember alter's proposal. Hers is -- I do think -- a good standard of what we should get done in this budget, minimum standard. But I want to call folks' attention to what I posted includes about a million dollars more. As councilmember alter described there may be things we can do if we can find more money, including getting ambulances to 24 quicker, getting to the 24/72 [12:54:03 PM] quicker would be about a million dollars extra. So I think we've all expressed that if we can do more, we should try. And that's what's in mind. I want to call folks' attention to that. And same thing. I support councilmember kitchen saying let's meet those consultants as soon as we can. I would hate to say we're going to do it but then not do some now because we only have two years to meet the goal. So if we want to meet the goal in two years, we've got to take a big chunk out of it now. I posted to the message board some questions or criteria that I suggest we use when we're thinking about where to reallocate the really limited dollars, because of course I support everything everybody has posted. I don't think we'll have enough money for all of those things. And so the three questions that I think would be important to me in this moment about where to send limited funds would be to ask does it reduce harm or [12:55:04 PM] violence, does it make us more safe, are these investments the ones that will push equity the hardest be that racial, economic, gender, etc. Does it make us more just. And will this reduce the need for 911 because it prevents challenges before they happen, for people's health and well-being. Does it reduce the reliance on over-policing, because if we're going to pull dollars out of policing our shared goal is to try to make up for this in a reimagined way of public safety. Those three questions for me, some things really hit all three of those points. So I would like -- I would prefer to consider those things first for limited dollars as we try to sort our priorities. And it's the job of the dais to deliberate what meets -- matters to you, and everybody's got their vote. But I want to see if that might be a useful framework as we head to that. >> Flannigan: I would definitely agree with that characterization. And mayor Adler gets to run that [12:56:05 PM] meeting, so I don't have to make those decisions or call on folks in what order for that. So, good luck, mayor Adler, next week. Any other comments? I feel like we've done some good work today. I feel like we've clarified. Councilmember alter. >> Alter: If councilmember harper-madison is back on, I wanted to ask if she could speak to the investments that she was talking about with councilmember pool about the recreation centers on the east side. >> Harper-madison: I'm here. I just chewed my last Brussels sprout. Is there anything in particular you'd like for me to expand upon there, the facilities investments? >> Alter: Yes, that's what I would like to know about, the facilities investments, a little bit more of a picture of what those are. >> Harper-madison: I think a specific question would be helpful, but if I'm being [12:57:07 PM] extraordinarily broad there are a lot of needs as far as facilities that are concerned that are just sort of basic needs and then some of those are beyond that. The millennium youth entertainment complex, $281,000 -- they've been awarded $281,000 that we haven't to date been able to give. But it doesn't matter because they need five times that in order to take care of some of the needs in the facility, the hvac, the roller rink, the theater that's been out of operations for years at this point because they were operating on this obsolete reel-to-reel system, the arcade, so there's a lot of need there. And I could go on specifically for each center but it's mostly that kind of capital investment. >> Is it mostly deferred maintenance or new capital investment? >> Harper-madison: Both, but mostly deferred maintenance. For example, with the millennium, being able to repurpose that theater space [12:58:09 PM] would be a new investment of sorts. It's a space that they already have, but they can't use it how it's currently designated. So that would be a relatively new expenditure. And then additionally, we're thinking about how to -- as everybody is making these adaptations, we're thinking about how to repurpose that space so we have this giant roller rink, for example, that could be used -- the board is discussing how they can repurpose that space for virtual learning opportunities. Given the sheer size of it. There's so much in the way of possibility around distancing and exercising an abundance of cautious but having our scholars be able to utilize that space. Them being able to take that into consideration, us being able to have somebody make an assessment about the viability of what it is that they're taking under consideration would be new. >> Alter: Okay. I want to throw out there an idea I have that would be able to be used for deferred [12:59:09 PM] maintenance, building rehabilitation, of the millennium center and other recreation centers on the east side, depending on how far the money would go. As part of one of our financial policies, we set aside a certain percentage of funding that is for facility rehabilitation and betterment. It's mostly for deferred maintenance. And reviewing what's already budgeted in that right now, there's $750,000 that is budgeted. Let me just make sure I have the right number here. There's $750,000 that is budgeted to improve the track at the police academy. And since we're talking about not having an academy until March or later, I believe that that money might be better spent improving our recreation centers on the east side, which provide the alternative spaces for young [1:00:10 PM] people and others to go. That is money that if we can figure out how to program it so that it fits within our financial policy, then we could easily reprogram it. There is some additional money for the training center, for some items that are smaller but have to do with bathrooms and flooring, and boiler replacements and stuff, which seems like it probably needs to happen. But the track seems to me something that could be better spent on something that many, many people will be using over the course of time. I believe that is also -- Ed, can you clarify if that money comes out of the police budget? Is it a separate pot? >> For the track? >> Yeah. >> That's coming out of our [1:01:12 PM] capital fund with the [ inaudible ]. >> Alter: I'm sorry, I didn't hear you. >> We have a separate fund, the capital fund -- >> Alter: Okay. >> The 700 and some-odd thousand dollars would come from that fund. >> Alter: Okay. So that fund though, that money does have restrictions on it. So this can't just be spent on, you know, anything that we want or for ongoing, but it is designed to be helping for these deferred maintenance things. In my mind, that budget has very little in it for pard in general. And I think this would be an excellent use of funds for us to show a commitment to addressing the recreation needs of those centers. >> Flannigan: For my part, I would support that. That was some good work we did creating that fund. [1:02:12 PM] We never got into the equity decisions of how that fund picks its projects and in what order, so that's an excellent conversation. >> Alter: I will add that if -- when you look at where the fund is going, there is some money in there for ems, for various ems needs as well, just as we're trying to highlight the priority that we are placing on addressing those needs there. I don't know what the total amount is for that, but I think it's about $2.7 million in rehabilitation work for ems that's in that fund. So I think that's an important opportunity. The other funding things are for the muni court and then various things for building services that are smaller items. There is money in there for a park, for new light poles in various places around the city. [1:03:14 PM] So, maybe councilmember harper-madison, we can work together with pard to build on that and see how far we can get with that money. It may just be that at this point in time the best thing is to say that this is going to rec center needs on the east side and we don't have any on the west side, anyway. But the east side, you can put it in there generally and then pard can go through the process of identifying what's most important and what would be most impactful that would be over a longer time period. I don't think that has to be completely programmed out. >> Harper-madison: I'm certainly open to those considerations. I want to make certain that we don't lose an opportunity to additionally take some things into consideration. We were already operating under the -- what's the best-case scenario here. And I think that was a conservative estimate. So let me think through some of those numbers and you and I can work together on what that looks like moving forward. [1:04:14 PM] >> Alter: I don't want to preclude other money if we can find it. What I had identified was a pot of money that was $750,000 that can only be used for those types of uses. And I have not heard other ideas come up from council that have to do with deferred maintenance. And I always thought that this pot of money could help a lot for pard. And so I don't mean in any way to preclude in we can identify other ways to fund those other things. But this money does have certain constraints on it for us to fulfill our financial policies. >> Flannigan: Mayor Adler. >> Mayor Adler: Just a question. Councilmember alter, that's a good catch. And that makes sense to me. And I like looking at that fund with an equity lens. We really haven't done that yet. But just so that it's clear to me, that's a fund that recognizing the achievement that as a council we made in terms of making sure that we were now caught up on and doing the [1:05:14 PM] maintenance work every year. But that's just a policy, there's not a legal prohibition on the use of that money or that fund for anything in particular. Is that right, Ed, or is there something that would stop us from moving it out of that to something else if we wanted to? >> It's just a policy, mayor. It's general fund dollars. By policy, allocated to capital rehabilitation. >> Mayor Adler: I was not recommending that we take it. Making sure that we were doing maintenance every year to keep it is a really good thing. Thank you. >> I want to underscore that, you know, that policy saves us money over time and improves working conditions for our employees and conditions for our residents in some really important ways. And we have shifted now, it's my understanding, to be more proactive instead of reactive in a lot of those things because [1:06:14 PM] we've been able to make some of those investments other the years. And that is saving money and creating much better conditions -- hvacs in Texas are really important. They're also really expensive. And they're not always the sexiest thing to fund, but they do need to be funded so that people can go through their work lives and take advantage of city services. So, I would not be in favor of moving that out of that. If there are other things besides the pard recreation centers that rise to the level of being where we should spend, the deferred maintenance and rehabilitation money, I'm open to considering that. But I don't believe we should spend it on a track and pard and recreation amenities fixes is a good place to do that. >> Flannigan: Councilmember Casar. >> Casar: Thanks, councilmember alter, for suggesting that. That makes a lot of sense on maintenance. And then councilmember [1:07:15 PM] harper-madison, I think that if something doesn't fall within the maintenance category, if you'll remember just at the last council meeting, the manager committed to by this fall bringing back a plan on how parks bond dollars could address some of the inequitable levels of park development, including rec centers in parts of the eastern crescent. There's more dollars for capital dollars in the bond than sometimes in these individual budget items. So one thing for us, maybe, to consider would be, you know, for us to move some of this money for maintenance over and then to actually formalize what the manager committed to last council meeting in a direction saying we want to plan in the fall to show us on parks dollars, how it is that you will do things like make, you know, redo the theater space at the millennium or build out that soccer field on that empty parks land that we've had forever or [1:08:16 PM] whatever it might be, since we've already had that part of the conversation. There might be a way to manage both. >> I appreciate that. And if I may, real quick, one of the things we definitely need to take into consideration if we're going to go through that process is there's money that's already been allotted for givens, allotted for the carver, for the millennium and a few others. There's no money that's been allotted for Walter E. Long, but it's a part of the equation. So it would be beneficial for us to go through an asset mapping process, what money has been allotted, what has been expended. I think if I remember correctly, less than 2% of the money that's been allotted for givens has been extended. It would be helpful to go through those points of consideration as we expand on this conversation. >> Flannigan: I don't want to get too far afield from public safety, since this is a public safety committee. But, of course y'all can talk about whatever you want to talk [1:09:19 PM] about. [ Laughing ] Councilmember alter. >> I just did find my copy of the policy. There is room for different things that have to do with betterment that are not just deferred maintenance-type things under that policy. We can go through an exercise with pard and look at that. Broadly speaking, this is not necessarily for maintenance. That's outside that doesn't have a facility, kind of, connected with it. So that should be fine for the indoor stuff. I don't know for Walter long if it could be used for that, but certainly there could be a discussion over the best use of all of the parks money that is available, including that. But I just wanted to flag that I saw something new in there. >> Flannigan: We've done great on time today, folks. I feel like we've discussed all the concepts that have come out. I hear from staff that they feel [1:10:20 PM] like they can present to us voteable items for us to do in our final deliberations next week. Are there any other concepts that haven't been brought up, stuff that we should be acknowledging, specifically in the public safety realm that folks are planning to bring next week that we should be thinking about? Any other comments that folks want -- councilmember harper-madison. >> Harper-madison: I would like to take this opportunity to field some questions from my colleagues, if there's any unclarity or uncertainty about what direction we're attempting to go with the amendment that I'm going to bring forward about six months' worth of the budget being allocated to the police department budget and six months being held in a separate reserve bucket. I'd like to take this opportunity to say I'm happy to answer questions here or offline. [1:11:21 PM] >> Flannigan: Councilmember kitchen. >> Kitchen: Thank you. I'm not -- thank you for inviting that, councilmember harper-madison. I'm just not understanding what that means. And so maybe Ed could speak to that for us. Does that present any issues for us? Or is that different than just adopting a budget, but then -- I'm trying to understand. I'm hearing a proposal from councilmember Flannigan, and your proposal. I don't know if they're the same proposal or not, which was to say -- is the proposal to only adopt six months for the entire APD budget and put all of it in reserves, or is the proposal to say, here's the set of things that we know we want to examine in more detail, that we know that we would like to see moved, and that we're just going to hold the budget for those items, which I thought I heard [1:12:22 PM] councilmember Flannigan say that. So I'm just trying to understand if these are the same proposals or if there's some difference between them. Or maybe I'm not understanding them at all. >> I think there's a lot of questions there. One is for councilmember Flannigan, one is for Ed, and then the latter I think would be for me. If there's any additional clarity that you need. >> Kitchen: Sorry. I didn't mean to -- >> Flannigan: Mayor pro tem, would you like to weigh in? >> Garza: Yeah, I have additional similar questions to councilmember kitchen in that I don't -- it honestly sounds like the madison-flannigan-casar proposals are the same in so many ways, because, you know, councilmember Flannigan, you laid out yours, which I'm still trying to understand the differences. And then in reading and hearing councilmember Casar's, it also [1:13:23 PM] recognizes that while we -- for me, it gives the direction that we are going to come to an agreement on what things that should not be under the APD umbrella, with the understanding that it's going to take time to do that. And so it's like a similar, delayed -- I don't want to say delayed. It's a similar -- I guess, the intent of delay for reasons of better -- more time for discussion. I don't want delay to sound bad, because I know -- I think we're all on the same page with wanting to make sure we are making informed decisions. I just feel like there's so many similarities in everything that's on the table and I don't understand. So, this is specifically for councilmember harper-madison. Are we saying $440 million -- you're only going to be allocated $220 million? I'm trying to understand the half part. [1:14:24 PM] Or are we saying you are only funded for six months, and then maybe Ed has touched on this, about the legalities? We're required to fund for an entire year, is my understanding, in our budget. So then I want to understand that a little better. And then are we saying it's like a budget rider where we say we're allocating -- I know these aren't the exact numbers. You're getting your $440 million but we're coming back in six months and changing the rest of the six months? There's a lot of confusion on what the six months means for me. >> Flannigan: Do you mind if I address >> Flannigan: I think you've hit the kind of the right place there, mayor pro tem. I'm hearing the similarities too, and I think it's a -- kind of a general acknowledgment that the work doesn't end next week, that the work continues, and it's [1:15:25 PM] more of a mechanism question on how we set up those continuing conversations and those continuing work. And I -- I poorly articulated it earlier in the meeting, but there's an option that says allocate the whole budget and don't worry about anything that you can't actually reallocate next week. Just allocate it out. Then schedule budget amendments and make changes to the budget. That's kind of the like the most straightforward. Then you have a version that says most of that budget we're going to allocate. There are parts that are decision points, cadet classes two, three and four, right? Instead of putting the money in the budget for cadet classes two, three and four, or instead of not putting the money in cadet classes two, three and four and put it in reserves and decide in three months. That's another version. Another version is to say [1:16:25 PM] this question is even bigger than that. I don't want to approve any budget beyond six months and from now that the whole council has to readopt with significant changes in six months. So there are definitely similarities there, kind of heightened levels of impact and consequence. Councilmember harper- madison, does that generally reflect what your proposal says? >> Harper-madison: It's helpful. But for what it's worth, just to be entirely clear, like you laid out, you know, multiple iterations. In minds the last iteration, the v3 was the source, the motivation. Let's not do anything beyond [inaudible]. Another point of clarity we're still trying to work out, and that's my [1:17:25 PM] hesitation with saying too much because I hate for people to see all the working iterations, but I know there's questions. One of the things in terms of what the practical application of the proposal looks like. What can we do, what can't with he do. Another thing I want to make certain to address is I know there are questions about what does that number look like if and when we include all the amendments that will come to a certain amount. Does that change the amount that goes into reserves and does that affect the amount that we are setting aside as an approval for the first six months. Those are the questions that we're still working the kinks out because in my mind's eye, it seems to me, it seems to me as though we should be able to by Monday, but the 10th when we've all submitted our amendments, be able to calculate what the total is on those amendments and subtract that number from the big number and then make the determination about what [1:18:25 PM] gets allocated by way of the six-month budget and what goes into a reserve. Those are some of the question marks for me too that I know folks have questions about. Ed, I think there were several questions asked that you can help with. I don't know if you were keeping track, but mayor pro tem has some questions that I think you can help with, and then councilmember kitchen also asked some questions that I think you can help build out. Her confusion about what are the implications of the six months, what does that mean. And I think mayor pro tem's question was do we have to allocate the full year's funding, because I was under the impression we did not have to, that we could go for just the six months, which was sort of the motivation for this timing recognizing that we have the mandatory, you know, we have to revisit this in six months anyway, so the six months was recognizing, like mayor pro tem said, we need more time to deliberate. In fact we're a molest than we should be is problematic [1:19:27 PM] in a lot of ways. We're all saying the same thing, we all want true transformational change as we address reimagining public safety, and I think 30 less days is really difficult to do that. I want to buy us more time to more carefully examine, deliberate and be intentional, but I also want to make certain people don't feel like that means somehow there's -- I appreciate that she clarified like the day. That's the question, that's the concern for folks. I'm going to find a word that doesn't, you know, make -- give people that sort of reflex reaction, but yeah, any technical information that you can build out there would be helpful. >> Flannigan: Mayor, do you want to jump in before Ed responds? Hold on. You've got yourself muted. We're both doing it. [Laughter] [1:20:27 PM] Okay, now. >> Mayor Adler: Got it. Thank you. Yeah, just because I think it might have Ed -- I supported councilmember harper-madison's proposal and I know we're fleshing all these things out, but what I had in my mind's eye when councilmember harper-madison spoke and I don't know if it relates to what's in her mind's eye or if it's possible to do. But what I understood was is you pass the budget for the year. Those items that are in play would be in a transition budget, which is just a category or an aggregation of those items which you could total. But the budget is a year budget. But in order to make sure that there's never a default scenario if the council doesn't get its act together that you go more than six months, you don't authorize [1:21:28 PM] the actual expenditure out of the budget beyond that six-month period of time. So the council would have to come back together again to actually authorize the expenditure. The budget would still be adopted, it would still be a year budget, but it would only authorize the expenditure of the first six months of both the police item budget, those things that would ordinarily have been spent in the first half year, and in the transition budget, those things that would be spent in the first half year, but the council has to meet again to authorize the expenditures for the remaining six months. And I saw that as - - what I heard on that that I liked was how it changed the default. Because the default was is there were no expenditures authorized -- the budgeted items for the second half of the year were not authorized to be spent even though they were budgeted and allocated that way. I don't know if that works. I don't know if that's what [1:22:29 PM] councilmember harper-madison had in mind, but I like that about what I thought it was. >> Flannigan: Councilmember kitchen, I know Ed is biting his tongue, but I want to make sure folks have an opportunity to weigh in. >> Kitchen: In that scenario that the mayor described and others have described, is there impact in that scenario on the new hires that we want to make? So an example is the mental health program. Does that -- can we go ahead and hire and get them started when we -- if I'm hearing you correctly, we haven't approved them for a whole year. I was thinking more in terms of we approved -- we approve the parts of the budget that were not at issue and went ahead and approve for the whole year and then created that bucket and those were the ones that were maybe not authorized for the whole year. My question for Ed is what are the implications for wanting to hire and get started on these programs [1:23:29 PM] that we have said that -- and it's not just mental health, ems is in the same boat too in terms of hiring new positions. >> The way I'm understanding the proposal, I don't think there would be any implications or consequences what we're talking about. If we make changes next week during budget adoption, reductions to one area of the budget, increasing the budget in other areas, reason for the additions we're making to ems and mental health [inaudible] To be impacted anyway what we're talking about. I would request that council give us some time to work on this. This is not something we've ever done before and it's not something I'm aware of happening other places. There are a lot of things in state law about what we can and can't do and we want to make sure we're doing everything correctly. I feel like I fully understand. I think councilmember Flannigan did a good job [1:24:30 PM] laying out the different options, and hearing what council is wanting to accomplish and I would just ask give us a little bit of time to work with our law office to determine how we can structure this in a way that it is both legally appropriate and [indiscernible] >> Flannigan: I do want to acknowledge councilmember tovo has joined the meeting. >> Tovo: I joined a bit ago, but you have the -- >> Flannigan: I haven't upgraded you with the meeting. You've been with us, just not in the screen. Councilmember Casar. >> Mayor Adler: Be careful because he will start playing with your buttons. >> Casar: And mayor, I think you are unmuted and it's making some noise. >> Mayor Adler: Sorry. >> Casar: I think there are three concepts on the table and I think as the mayor pro tem said all [1:25:30 PM] compatible. One concept is -- is decoupling functions for the police department or re-- and reallocating funds away from policing. And I for one can only vote for a budget if we are doing that and moving money into things like ems and the family violence shelter and violence prevention and, you know, those sorts of needs. I can only vote for a budget if we're actually moving money over to those forms of safety. But that doesn't stop us also from doing the second and third thing. The second thing being only if we legally can, only authorizing expenditures for six months so that we can come and check back in in six months on a variety of things that we need to show progress on. You know, if we separate internal affairs, separate forensics, how is that going. If we're trying to figure out what we're going to do about parks policing, that would be a good time to check in on those things. And we have this quarterly [1:26:31 PM] calendar so we can hopefully be checking in before too. Then the third thing which I think is related but a bit separate that the mayor has mentioned, if there are things still in contention, if there are things we have still not figured out how to transition over, having a reimagining safety budget line or transition fund that we are chipping away at amongst that calendar, I'm fine with too. But, and I think where some of the potential miscommunication has been has been that we have to choose one of those three versus the others, when in fact we can do all three of them this budget. And I think what we're going to have to sort out on the dais is how much of each one do we do. And again, I think I've made it clear that I -- I will not vote for a budget if all we do is number 3 or number 2. We have to also start doing some of the reallocation and decoupling I think is important to do right now [1:27:35 PM] and having that transition and six months for things we can't sort out. >> Flannigan: Mayor pro tem. >> Garza: Yeah, well, as I said, councilmember Casar just said, I think they are all so similar. I think what I'm missing and hearing in the six-month transition period is how we invest in other areas of public safety. Because what I'm hearing in the six month is we're just going to wait six months, and I haven't heard the details on how we are shifting the public safety focus. I think councilmember Casar just said the exact same things, but I had raised my hand. I don't see that part in the six months, and that's what concerns me the most. And so I -- and where I think we are so close is that we really do have to make some hard decisions and hard votes in this next week. And then see where we are in [1:28:36 PM] having what I hope is having shifted investments into family violence, into food access, into all these community things that our community has actually been asking for for years. This is not -- this has been various meetings with community advocates asking for that shift in public safety investment and how we think about it. So that's what I'm not hearing in the six-month proposal. For me it just sounds like we're just waiting and that's where I can't get to that support of that, but I feel like it's the same thing, it's just we're going to have to make some really tough decisions to see where -- to show that they are making -- we're shifting investment and I don't see that in the six months. >> Flannigan: Councilmember kitchen. >> Kitchen: Yeah, this discussion is helping me. Councilmember Casar, I like the way you defined it in the three buckets, and I [1:29:37 PM] agree, and thank you mayor pro tem for articulating what you are thinking. I need to do all three. And I really want to see actually moving dollars into some of these other programs because that's where I see that we actually get something done. I don't think that's different from what others are saying, I'm just trying to articulate where I'm at. I don't see these three things as inconsistent and I think we can do all three and that's where I would like to be. We've talked about, you know, we'll have to decide how much we can move right now and then which ones we want to tee up, and that's why I brought my budget amendment about the homeless investments. I understand that we can't do all of that this year, but I think we can commit to it this year. I want to see some commitments made by this council to what we want to see happen. So that's where I'm at. [1:30:40 PM] >> Flannigan: Councilmember harper-madison. >> Harper-madison: There it is. Thank you again. For some reason it's like it's sticky. I'm pushing but it won't unmute. I appreciate all of that and glad I brought it up because everything that's been articulated, I might have hurt my neck nodding in agreement. Because all of that, especially the way councilmember Casar was able to lay it out, the way I articulated it was take all the things we know we want to do, and he more eloquently expressed where those dollars are going and what our shared desire for community investment looks like. So yes, all three of those things and exactly that thing. And so -- and yes, to mayor pro tem's question about whether or not the proposal is that we just wait six months, it's absolutely the [1:31:42 PM] antithesis of that. Part of the problem we haven't completely fleshed out the amendment in its entirety so I've been intentionally vague because I really, really just try to be very careful about the information that we share, especially if I'm concerned that it may potentially shift, but just a couple of bullets that are helpful even without a completed draft of the -- a completed draft of the amendment would be -- so we would like to empower the deputy city manager, working alongside the police monitor, office of police oversight, fair [inaudible] To have worked through their process in order to and there's several things for them to accomplish, evaluate and recommend as appropriate transition time line and logistics out of APD of items laid out in the transition budget so that council is in a position to vote on those items prior to or as a part of midyear [1:32:42 PM] budget authorization in six months, and I don't think it's prior to or as a part of, I think it's both. Like, you know, very much like councilmember Casar laid out. To evaluate and recommend additional items for council to consider, to really achieve that reimagining of public safety so council is in position to vote on those items and then an established time line of no longer than six months after the August budget adoption, with transparency, super transparent structure and a calendar, which councilmember Flannigan, I think you hit the nail on this one, that allows for that public input, that allows for public involvement, ab deputy city manager definitely touched on that. To be certain we have adequate resources that should be appropriate to complete the evaluation and [1:33:43 PM] preparationer the recommendations before the midyear budget authorization process. Including obviously but not limited to staff support, research, public engagement participation, retention of consultants if need be, and then finally I think one more point of consideration, and, you know, my hope is sort of thinking through this, you see where my head is at and where we're headed and it answers some questions. So staff should be able to report to the public and to city council, frankly, periodically as appropriate with final report issued at least one month prior to the beginning of the council's public midyear budget process. So that's not all, it's a short -- short list of points of consideration, but that's the general direction, and I hope that's helpful. We intend to post amendments tomorrow, so if that's not as clear as it needs to be, my hope is when we post the amendments we'll give you a [1:34:43 PM] better idea about direction and what things we hope to accomplish. There's nothing that councilmember Flannigan, mayor pro tem Garza, councilmember kitchen, councilmember Casar, there's nothing that any of you said that I would disagree with. It's all of those things. >> Flannigan: Ed, did you want to weigh in? We've gone a full round practically. >> I would just maybe weigh in again that there are some complicating factors here. You know, when you think about appropriation, fancy language, planning authority, when council approves a budget [indiscernible] Appropriations. Gives staff spending authority to advance a program. That plays into our tax rate setting. To only partially appropriate some of the funds plays into the tax rate calculations that we [1:35:43 PM] would be setting and [indiscernible] And this is a different year and a lot of -- councilmember harper- madison can't hear? >> Flannigan: You are just muffled, Ed. I don't know why your mic is having a hard time picking you up. >> Should I start over? >> Flannigan: You're good, keep going. >> Alter: If you could start over, I wasn't able to hear the prior part. >> Flannigan: Sorry Alison. >> I'm suggesting council give us time to work with the law office and work through the details of how appropriations would work, if there is any aspect of state law, that state law does speak to adopting an annual budget so how does this play into that. But my biggest thing I want to make sure is how this would affect our tax rate setting. If we're going to appropriate less than the full amount of the budget, that affects the tax rate and then how does that play [1:36:44 PM] into the maximum rate and the rate council adopts and the -- [indiscernible] They would be over and above adopted rate. It's kind of a complicated dynamic and I think we need some time to work through that. Not a lot of time, but sometime. >> Flannigan: Mayor Adler. >> Mayor Adler: What I -- I agree with what Greg said. I was also thinking of this as being able to do multiple kinds of things. I also agree that some of the things we have to do now and I think we're going to be in a position to be able to do those. Ed, I wasn't thinking in terms of not appropriating the whole year's budget, but I don't know that having appropriated a whole year budget the council can't also instruct that before there are actual expenditures made for the last six months of the year. You have to come back to council for approval. We don't have to do that. [1:37:44 PM] We can appropiate a year budget and not having said anything, you can just go spend those monies. Sometimes with contracts over the year you come back for councilpproval, so it would be in the nature of that, as I understand it. So you would be appropriating the whole year budget, you would be doing the tax rate to raise the money for the full amount of the full appropriation. There just wouldn't be authority to actually then write the check until you come back to council. I think there's a lot of precedent for that. And then Greg, and you don't need to explain this now, but I'm uncertain about your second and third categories. If we know that we wanted to move the forensic lab, for example, I don't know how we would move the money and still -- I don't know what we would actually be doing with the forensic lab in the first -- on October 1st. [1:38:46 PM] Or whenever the day is. So I just need greater clarity about that period of time when we're going to be transitioning but we're still paying for the old system because there's not a new system yet. And that part I'm unclear the mechanics and the logistics of some of those things. Because I think that one of the things that giving us that six-month period or up to six-month period would be figure how to do those logistics we want to make, and some of them would be we need to hear more to make sure that it's the right thing to do. You know, there are some things on the list that I really want to hear pros and cons arguments with respect to that. So I don't know how in your mind's eye you see some of those logistics things happen. [1:39:48 PM] >> Flannigan: Councilmember Casar. >> Casar: And I want to give you my sense of that and then would be really interested where people stand on these issues if they have an opinion already. In my mind, mayor, the things that would be in number 2 would be things where we already feel -- sorry, I got distracted by the sticker on your hand. The one your granddaughter put there. The things in category 2 would be things separated that we already feel comfortable knowing they should be separated. I think we have a choice about whether to move it out of the budget once it's already separated or move it out of the budget out of the APD budget when we know that it should be separate. Now, to your point, there might be some things where you or others may still want to hear the pros and cons. In that case I think it best [1:40:48 PM] goes into category 3 as something we're working to reimagine but might need quarterly reports on. I for one feel already very comfortable saying that internal affairs and forensics should be separate, they should be separate at some point in this coming fiscal year so I feel very comfortable having them have their own slice of the budget with the understanding for the manager that that means get it done this fiscal year. Of course, let us know how it's going, let us know where you are going to put it, but for me those things I already feel comfortable because we've debated and heard lots of pros and cons over those. But if you want to hear new pros and cons around aren't quite sure exactly where it's going to land, then that I think goes into the third category. If that makes sense. >> Mayor Adler: It does. I'm also comfortable on some of those things, and the forensic lab I think we've already studied and I think we can make a decision on that with the partners. I just don't know having [1:41:49 PM] made that decision how you reflect that in the budget. >> Casar: I can see -- yeah, on the pie chart it would be its own slice and it would have the budget amount and the understand because the manager would get it done this year. It's not saying get it done between here and October 1 because it's a year- long planning document is the way I see it. I would be interested what other folks thought about forensics or that kind of a process. >> Flannigan: Mayor pro tem. >> Garza: Okay, quick first question and then I will explain in -- to me just generally what simplisticly I was imagining in this scenario. So for Ed, when we appropriate the money for the budget, do we -- is it as specific as on March of [1:42:52 PM] 2022, this amount of money will be -- on March 13 of 2022, this amount of money will be spent for this purpose within departments? Do we get that specific when we appropriate funds? >> You do not get that specific. >> Garza: Okay. So what I -- maybe this helps Ed and again I really like this conversation because I feel like it's getting to the meat of what we're really trying to do here. In my mind it's very simplistic these numbers are going to be off. But 440 million, right, if we split that in two, 220 million, 220 million. That first 220 million is the first four months, six months, whatever it is, is going to be used as it's being used for the most part now. But there's that second half of dollars, and that's where I feel like we make the commitment that we're changing things. We use that second -- part of that second, when we make the decision to invest in the family violence stuff, the food access, we use that [1:43:54 PM] second half to fund those things October 1 in a month from now. So that's what I thought how we were doing this. We're using -- because I think we all agree we're not transformatively changing the police department in two weeks for a budget that starts on October 1st. But we need to make commitments to get. To Ed's question of how do you appropriate, if my mind you appropriate it the same technically. To the mayor's question of how do you logistically -- what happens on October 1 with forensics, it would be the same essentially on October 1 logistically, but it is those few dollars that have been appropriated in the year to APD that we start using to fund all those other things, all those community-driven things. So that's how I -- and we [1:44:55 PM] start, you know the fees or whatever it is funding the non-profit, that's how I envision this. I don't know if that's possible or helpful, but that's what I was thinking. >> Flannigan: Councilmember pool. >> Pool: I think that sounds right what Delia is talking about. >> Flannigan: Councilmember harper-madison, did you have your hand up? Is it not letting you do it? >> Harper-madison: I got it. I was going to say no, that really does help me get to the heart of what -- any sort of hesitation or concern you might have, and I think like you said earlier, we are close egger to direct alignment than you think. I think being able to -- that's helpful and when we're able to articulate the amendments, because if it wasn't entirely clear for you, it won't be clear for the public, I'll make certain to be as explicit and specific in laying out the amendments as possible. [1:45:55 PM] Thank you for offering me the opportunity to really hear what the concerns are there. >> Flannigan: Councilmember kitchen. >> Kitchen: I just to repeat so I make sure I understand. I think everybody is saying this. So if we make a commitment to fund a particular item, like ems, I'll use that as an example, we are making that commitment now for the entire year. Assuming that's something we all agree to. We're not setting it aside in transition, we're making the commitment that that's done and over and that money is going so that those programs don't have to come back to us in the middle of the year and ask for permission again. Am I right about that? Okay. And mayor pro tem, if I'm hearing you correctly, that's the kind of thing that comes out of the half you are talking about, right? >> Garza: I mean that's what I thought. [1:46:55 PM] You know, and not because none of -- all of the funding that has been [inaudible] So far that gets reinvested into the community, public safety, imaginary [inaudible] Is less than 220 million. So that's -- I know these are very basic, I'm just trying to -- I feel like we can fund those things and that puts the -- what's it called? The urgency that we're going to change -- because there's not going to be money in the second half. And it gives the urgency, shows that we're serious. These things are going to have to get done. We know it can't happen overnight in two weeks, but it shows there's urgency, so that second half money I keep referring to has already been committed to something else. And then, you know, if we get to the -- I guess you guys, if you get to the six months and, you know, you'll [1:47:56 PM] be able to as you are approaching that deadline, as our councilmembers are approaching that deadline, we're able to make adjustments as we approach it. But it shows we are committed to a second bucket that has already been allocated. So we know we can't even pretend that we're going to kick the can down the road, it's been allocated, the ems people have been funded with that money, if that makes sense or -- >> Flannigan: Other comments? We're down to our last ten minutes. Councilmember alter. >> Alter: So I'm not sure that I'm totally following all of this or in agreement with all of the pieces. I want to kind of go back and watch it and make sure I'm understanding. I think what we're trying to do and we're all in agreement is that we need some additional accountability mechanisms moving forward. And simply the framework [1:48:58 PM] we've been given from the city manager's office is not confidence we're going to make progress and there's deadlines and things that have to be met. And I think that's what we're searching for. I'm not sure that we landed the plane on that yet as to where we're going. There are, you know, as difficult as we found it to be to identify ways to cut, and most of what we've identified are moving things out that we think should be better handled by people outside of APD, I don't think we can be spending huge amounts of money without having identified where those cuts are going to be. I think that we should be having willing partners on the part of our staff and our city manager and our police chief to help us to identify places where we can cut and we can stop doing things also along the way so we can make those investments. I have not seen that as part [1:50:00 PM] of what we're doing. If you look at, like, L.A., their police chief has a -- and I don't know the best way to do this and obviously we want a say over what gets cut, but their police chief has embraced this process and provided directions, as I understand it, to each of his divisions to identify cuts, et cetera. And those don't have to be huge cuts in order to be able to get significant funds to begin moving further down the path to reimagining safety. And so I'm just not there yet on the path to get that accountability. I agree with everyone that we need the accountability, and certainly a check-back in six months is fine and appropriate. I'm not sure that we should spending money that we haven't yet cut in the second half, but I think there is money that we can spend that we have already identified, but as in any budget we're not going to be able to do everything everyone wants to do. [1:51:00 PM] It's just the way the budgets work unless we identify other cuts. And I think there's been a concerted effort to find what we can at this point in time, but I don't think we can spend money unless we identify the cuts, but we can come up with better accountability mechanisms. >> Flannigan: And I would just add to that, you know, we've all experienced kick the can down the road with different resolutions that the mayor pro tem articulated. I feel this time we are better positioned to not allow that to happen because we have formed a committee who is committed to keeping our eye on that ball, and there will certainly be a heightened level of accountability when that structure is in place. And I think if we are clear in the riders and direction next week that we want staff putting budget amendments on future agendas, then we'll also be telegraphing to the community here is your next [1:52:02 PM] time to speak because we're not going to only give you two weeks of warning, we're going to give you three months of warning. This is going to be the time when we're going to be able to say to the public and the manager and the chief, whichever chief we have to say to the public this is what we did in three months and we want to hear from you. Here's what we did the next three months and we want to hear from you. I think that's a better -- it gives me more hope than I think I've had with major initiatives that have failed to launch in the past. Chief Rodriguez, you put your hand up in the meeting and so I brought you in. >> Thank you so much. I appreciate it. I jumped on the call because I wanted to say thank you to everybody that is in this discussion and let you know how much we appreciate hearing all of these amendments and all of the positive support for ems. We certainly need it. Our department is desperate for the resources that we need. We really are where public safety meets community [1:53:02 PM] health, where we meet health care. And we are, of course, multiplier for equity in our community. I think we're the only ones that have in our commission statement that we care for anyone, any time, anyplace. It's that literal for us. I want to take a moment to say thanks to all of the men and women of austin-travis county ems and for everything that they are doing right now. Right now they are the frontline for the covid pandemic. And as you know, it's getting hot outside, 90 to 100-plus° every day and donning ppe to protect themselves as a huge load for them in terms of physical challenge. They -- [inaudible] Avoiding taking it home. So it is nice to hear that we are supportive of everything they do. I just wanted to take a [1:54:03 PM] moment to thank you and thank them for everything they are doing. I realize you have very difficult decisions to make. I certainly don't want to try to lean you in any particular direction. We know that you support us and that's what matters to us. In regard to timing, as we look at all of the different amendments and everything that potentially could affect our department, I've asked our team to go back and look to see how we can optimize implementation of all the different components. So right now they are actually looking at how we might better align our staffing equipment, technology needs and all those pieces that are important. So I think they may already be in contact with councilmember alter, your office, to talk about timing on some of that. We're not assuming that we're going to get anything. But we do want to talk about realistically what some of our challenges are if we get [1:55:04 PM] anything. So that being the case, that's all I wanted to do is to say thank you, how much we appreciate you and mostly take a moment in public to thank my people because they are working hard and doing a good job. They are making a huge difference in our community. That's all I wanted, so thank you. >> Flannigan: Thank you, chief. I promise my colleagues I did not ask chief to do that, but that is a hell of a stopping point. I feel like we've done some good work today. I'll recognize folks to speak. I feel like it's now to the point we have to put pen to paper so that we have things we can use the normal process and language and amendments as we get into budget options next week. So I feel like we've really made some good progress and mayor pro tem, you said it, I feel like this was a very substantive conversation to air out people's thoughts and concerns. Thank you, councilmember harper-madison, for pushing us to a more deeper conversation at the end of [1:56:04 PM] the meeting. I really appreciate that. Any final comments before we close up? Councilmember kitchen. >> Kitchen: I just want to make sure I understand next steps. So Ed, you may have mentioned this before. Will we have -- I'm just getting specifics. So we'll have a packet of amendments and are you doing a list like you did last time? And then part of this may be for the mayor on what the process is that we're going to go through for our voting. If you are not sure now, you can post on the message board. I just think it's important for us to understand specifically how we're going to go through the amendments. And we've done that in years past so that we all understand up front the way that the conversation is going to go. First question for Ed, are you putting together a packet and spread sheet? Is that how that's working? >> Yes, we are. We have put out, we sent to you all a standard form for [1:57:06 PM] your budget amendments we would like you to use so we can gather all the information and have, like, a standardized starting point for the budget adoption process next week. My staff stands by in the evenings and through the weekend to help you get from where we are now to getting those amendment forms done. We've already seen a number of them being posted the message board, but between now and, say, next Monday, we need to get all of these things posted so we can compile a packet of information for everybo to work off at the council meeting. >> Kitchen: In years past you've done a running total. This is more complex, but in years past you've done a running total for us so that we knew when we were voting for things we wanted to invest in, we knew what that totaled to and voting things to cut we knew that. Will you be doing that for us too? >> Yes, ma'am, we'll be keeping track of everything and keeping you apprised where you are relative to [1:58:10 PM] [inaudible] >> Kitchen: Mayor, I don't know if you know yet how you are thinking to manage that meeting. Is there anything you can tell us now or are you just going to put it on the message board. >> Mayor Adler: I'll put it on the message board. The broad principles will be having the same, you know, where we'll have the ability to discuss all of the things that people want to be able to discuss. That there won't be a benefit if you are the first person recognized or the last person recognized in terms of getting something on. So that everybody will be able to discuss all of the things that go on, and that is it are active and -- iterative and can move. So there's not a race to see who gets recognized first because that shouldn't advantage anybody. And trying to make clear that the savings are separated from the spending so that if a majority of us want to cut savings, we can do that without necessarily tying it to something else. But the same general principles that we've been [1:59:10 PM] working on for the last several years. We'll post something on to the board. >> Flannigan: Thank you, mayor. Councilmember pool. >> Pool: I had asked staff how many civilians were in special events and got a response back from chief gate that said due to workload, we merged emergency planning with special events for more efficiencies. The total number of civilians is three ftes. We'll be putting that into the one-pager and the amendment [inaudible]. >> Houston: Mayor pro tem. -- Zan mayor pro tem. >> Garza: Is this our last public safety meeting before budget approval. >> Flannigan: That's correct. We have immediately following to dig into mental health, first response. We're working on a committee meeting to talk about homelessness initiatives and, of course, our ongoing oversight of budget implementation that we'll [2:00:11 PM] continue to do. >> Garza: Okay. Then I just want to similar to the comments chief Rodriguez made. I want to thank you, chair Flannigan, I got the request for some public safety meetings in in addition to project connect and budget hearings, but I really do think this has been incredibly helpful and I also wanted to extend a thank you to our fire and police, this is a public safety committee and so all our public safety that are out on the front lines, and I appreciated how he mentioned the families too because I'm not only a former first responder, I'm a former daughter of a first responder and I know the toll it takes on families, especially having to quarantine to keep themselves safe. Thank you so much to all our public safety first responders and for being out there and protecting our community and keeping us safe. >> Flannigan: Thanks everybody. It's 2:00. Any final comments? With that, make sure everybody checks with Ed, [2:01:12 PM] get your stuff posted to the message board and we will see probably everybody on Friday, tomorrow for project connect and next week for budget. It is 2:00 and I am adjourning the public safety committee. Thanks everybody.