I am Alderman Peter Bergelis filling in for Chair Marina Dmitrievich who's joining us on the board.

We'll be joined by Alderwoman Cogs shortly.

We'll be joined by Alderman Spiker shortly.

To my far left, we have we're joined by Alderwoman Charlotte Moore, of course, our staff assistant Chris Lee, and legislative liaison Kathleen Bregnos.

Comptroller Christensen is here, and we'll be joined by budget director Nick Kovac shortly.

Starting with our agenda item number one, file 260241 communication from the Comptroller's Office relating to a workday pre-implementation review report.

Welcome Comptroller.

Good morning, uh committee members.

Uh thank you for uh hearing this file today.

Uh, first of all, I'd like to thank uh John Ronte and the Baker Tilly team for conducting this uh review.

I'd also like to thank all of the city staff as well as uh consultants that participated in the review.

It was uh very comprehensive and required a lot of I have a 10 a.m.

with the meeting Jason.

Yeah, what?

Thank you, Jason.

Please mute yourself from DNS.

Oh my I mean this is a riveting report, Comptroller Christianson.

Please continue.

Yes, it is very important.

So I thank you.

I appreciate that.

Um so it was initiated by the controller's office.

This was not done as part of the the workday project or sponsored by the executive committee itself, but this is a product of the controller's office.

Now that being said, I am a member of the workday project executive committee as well as the leader of an office that has primary responsibility for two of the the key work streams that are involved in the workday project.

So that being said, I wanted to be very arm's length with the uh pre-implementation review.

So the review is conducted by Baker Tilly, a third party who has had no involvement with this project up until they were um engaged or uh involved with this engagement.

So a truly independent third party neutral perspective and the sit from the city's perspective, the audit was ran by audit manager Adriana Molina and Deputy Controller Charlie Radel was also serving as a facilitator to help arrange meetings and obtain information.

The purpose of this review is primarily to be forward looking.

So looking at our go live date as set out, what are our prospects for achieving that go live date successfully?

And what is our essentially our readiness to go live and what recommendations does Baker Tilley have for ensuring that we are able to successfully go live.

So essentially what conditions need to be present and recommendations for getting us to those conditions for success.

So uh before we get started, there's gonna be a lot of little jargon and acronyms, and I'm just gonna give you a very quick background on some of these.

So ISG is our uh project management consultant.

So think of them as our owners rep.

Accenture is the implementation consultant.

So Accenture along with Workday was um procured uh essentially as a package.

Workday is the product that will the platform on which our financial human resources and payroll systems will operate after GoLive.

And Accenture is the consultant that is assisting us with subject matter expertise in implementing this.

The executive committee uh of which I am a member, along with budget director Kovac, uh DER Director Carter, um, procurement director Kelsey, and um David Hankey, uh CIO.

That is the essentially the highest level of project governance uh involved in decision making about the project.

And finally, Baker Tilley, who you're about to hear from.

Uh, they conducted this third-party pre-implementation review, and they had no involvement in the project, no stake in the project up until this engagement.

So, with that, I'd like to introduce John Runtte.

Good morning.

Good morning.

Good to be with you all.

I'm John Runtte.

I'm a principal in our digital practice.

I lead a team called Strategy and Transformation.

That team focuses on reviews like this.

I've done a significant number of pre-implementation readiness reviews and/or quality assurance reviews for other clients in similar circumstances.

And I also do some expert witness testimony work for failed projects of initiatives like this.

So very comfortable space in terms of the evaluation of a of a project of this size and scale.

The Elderman asked whether or not there was a presentation to accompany the 46-page report.

And I really like the details in the report, which is why we did not create a higher level presentation.

I will tell you that the assessment framework that we'll go through in part today is a really good summary.

So that's like two and a half pages essentially of the findings and the recommendations.

So we'll start there.

From a background perspective, there's some really important dates to think about here.

This assessment and the interviews were conducted May 25th through June 9th.

From June 9th to middle of June, there were some refinements, some follow-ups, some additional data gathered from mid-June until essentially June 20th, 24th, the report was drafted, and then we had multiple rounds of readouts with the executive committee as well as some of the consultants that were mentioned earlier.

The other key review context is that while we were contracting for the pre-implementation review, the city made the decision to move from a go live date in September to late December.

So we'd certainly encourage a structured review against these types of themes and recommendations prior to your actual go live later in December.

So let's get into it.

I'm going to hit a few of the executive summary findings.

Think of that as a 30,000 foot level.

We're going to then go through the framework that I mentioned earlier.

That's 15,000 foot.

And that's going to be findings and recommendations.

And then certainly the remaining 40 plus pages of the report are a lot of details and a lot of examples and implications of some of those findings.

Just for just for some context, we're looking for five or seven minutes, and then we want to make sure we have time for questions.

Okay, sounds good.

So with that, um, we would call the risk extreme risk.

We'd call we we saw an elevated and significant level of risk for the project based on that.

Um of the the findings that support that, um the history of missed milestones.

That's a really good indicator of future performance.

You have extremely constrained city resources.

They care deeply about the success of this project, but you've not been able to backfill them, and they still have operational day jobs while trying to do a very complicated engagement.

Theme two is really two parts there.

Uh the design of the system, a technology system starts with base functionality.

That's what you bought out of the out of the box.

There's no changes to that.

You then go through a design and and the design works through different configurations to make City of Milwaukee specific processes and workflows.

That's called configuration.

The configuration has still been moving.

It's not stable.

Um the ability for the team to do full end-to-end testing has not been validated.

It's not been accomplished.

A major change to finance in terms of chart of accounts and financial configurations have has limited the ability for the team to do end-to-end testing across integrated processes and to see what the final financial results of that.

A good example is payroll, uh, payroll accounting.

The financial accounting associated with payroll has not been able to be validated.

So that's executive summary finding number two.

Number three, we go into end-to-end testing.

This is the concept of mimicking day in the life processes.

And more often than not, the team had not been able to do that because this final finance configuration, the finance changes, really didn't end up in testing environments until mid-June.

So from mid-June until end of July, maybe that leaks into August, a really critical time frame for the city team to be able to demonstrate that they're going to be able to do these processes, and therefore that's the key thing that has to fall to be able to say we're ready to go live.

Everything must go perfect from here on out to be able to hit your dates in in late December.

I think I'm gonna pass on the remaining executive summary items and and and call your attention to essentially pages seven, eight, and nine, where we go through the assessment framework.

I'm gonna call out three major categories and then I'll be done to uh comply with the short time frame that we have for presentation.

The first risk category, top of seven, is this case for case for go live.

Certainly there's a case to get live because the financial cost of this project.

That's a great case to get live.

But the recommendations are that you need go no-go criteria at a detailed level to say have we seen these key processes work end to end?

You've not seen that to date as part of our review in the time frames that I've mentioned.

Things like garnishments and pension related adjustments, those those types of really critical processes have not been demonstrated, and the team has not been able to validate that in an end-to-end scenario.

Those would be examples of go-no-go criteria.

Have we been able to do that?

Um the second is to ensure that your functional leads are involved with this go-no-go decision process.

Their dialogue is really important.

They need a seat at the table.

And then um anchored by functional leads.

Uh functional leads are people like there's a payroll lead, there's a human capital lead, et cetera.

These different functional departmental leads that I've been working on the on the project.

Um and then finally, we'd recommend anchoring the go live decisions not only on the financial merits of the project, but on demonstrated outcomes in end-to-end um system testing.

The the other um key requirement that I would have us focus on uh from the assessment framework is um the testing readiness.

Uh we know that end-to-end testing has not consistently reflected these real world day-in-the-life scenarios.

We know that they they've been dealing with unstable configuration, a lack of an environment that had good financial data to be able to see these integrated processes, start from recruiting an employee through onboarding, through setting up benefits deductions, through a first payroll, and then the financial accounting aspects of it.

They've not been able to see that.

So that is um a necessity, and the final end-to-end testing cycles that have been occurring in July and may spill into August would be focused on really ensuring that these cross-functional, cross-departmental processes are seen and demonstrated successfully.

So I'll stop there given the the time constraints and answer any questions that the committee has.

Um thank you for that.

I think the most important significant thing you said that everything must go perfect from here on out to make the December date.

What happens when something doesn't go perfect from here on out?

I think the executive committee works with your consultants to evaluate how the issue or the challenge, how big is the issue, what's the degree of impact, and what's the degree of risk that the city has, and there will be an acceptance of okay, it wasn't perfect, we don't have a happy path, um, and we need to make a decision on whether the risk and the implications of whatever went wrong.

Um, do we need to delay or do we go?

Because the in this is the second delay for the project.

The first one cost 1.4 million dollars.

Uh our next item, which I guess um I'll go ahead and read that in.

Item number two, file 260490, substitute resolution relating to authorizing up to 4.8 million dollars of contingent borrowing to cover costs related to an extension of the ERP system replacement project for December 26th.

December 2026 go live date.

Um just so we can talk about both of these together.

Um the the result of us not being ready and meeting that last deadline is now almost five million dollars of projected cost to make it.

And now I'm hearing from you that we may not even make that unless everything goes perfect from here on out to December.

That is correct.

Yeah.

Uh and and that's where this final decision of how how much have we not seen work successfully in the system really come comes down to a critical decision the city is gonna need to make around what's the risk of going live if we haven't seen garnishments work, if we haven't seen pension revisions work, if we haven't seen invoices actually decrement uh an encumbered budget amount.

Um you don't want to try to be fixed in those things after you're live.

That that'll be a real real challenge for the city.

And I I know we have a lot of questions, but um before we get to other questions, uh is this implementation process streamlining internal city processes to be consistent with uh other municipalities that have done the same thing previously, or are we customizing workday to fit with already siloed processes in every separate department in the city?

So some of the uh report content recommends triaging different challenges that functional leads are seeing, and part of triaging is saying we can do a manual process work around.

We can configure or change or in your words customize.

It's not a true technical customization of workday, it's a configuration.

Um we can configure it to to meet a a specific process that the city wants and needs.

Um and they go through that the scenarios in terms of what options they have available to.

But are you also looking at those city processes to see if there are inefficiencies that we can correct?

Certainly there are inefficiencies that will be um mitigated with this new system.

Yes.

All right.

Um before questions, any comments?

Director Henke, Comptroller.

Um sure, David Henkey, uh Chief Information Officer with the Department of Administration, Information and Technology Management Division.

I I will say that uh I largely agree with the the results that have been the analysis by Baker Tilly.

You know, there might be quibbles on importance or uh different things here and there, but um would be my intent uh and I would say the committee's intent to use this review as a baseline um for reaching go live, what we need to do, what changes we need to make, and have already started making um to have a successful to have a successful launch with the intent of doing so by the end of the year.

Okay, uh questions, Mr.

Chair.

Alderman Moore.

Um thank you so much uh for the presentation.

Um the question that I have is what are the ramifications or how do I say this?

Um if we're not ready, will the hard decision be made to not go?

Um to not be move forward with the live date because the ramifications would be, you know, I don't want to use the word catastrophic, but not good, um, based on you know um, you know, uh end to end testing, all these you know, things that have been reviewed.

Are we prepared to make that decision if it comes to it?

Maybe my perspective, and then David, maybe you have some some perspective as well.

Our recommendation is to continue to push.

Push as hard as you possibly can to hit that December date.

And then just prior, you know, this this concept of a go-no go process in the report rec rec detailed recommendations.

We talk about doing a T minus 90, T minus 60, T minus 30 day kind of re analysis of that.

And you're gonna go right up to the end to say, but you know, hey, are the ramifications palatable if we go live with some number of open issues?

We're not striving for per perfection.

Things do need to go perfectly um to even get to a point that is not perfect.

Most go lives don't happen without um that with a clean slate.

Sure.

Um, there's some issues out there, and you just need to triage those to say are they low impact, medium, or high?

And if you have some critically high and a number of critically high without some kind of way to mitigate that, then you then the committee makes the tough decision, go or no go.

Yep.

Um agreed with with that approach.

So um as such, and as part of the findings, you know, there's recommendations regarding uh checkpoints and and and gates.

So some of those will include our testing, which we wanted to have um significant completion by the end of this week, by the end of end of July.

Um there's certain tests like uh parallel payroll two testing that has to complete by August 21st.

So have we successfully completed that, done the payroll, made sure that some of those uh contingencies that were that were brought up have been met.

So that'll be a a decision point.

Um there's our data cut where we extract from PeopleSoft what we're going to use to build the go live environment.

That's on September 17th.

So a successful completion of that would be a another gating decision factor.

Umledge assessment, making sure that people who know uh who will have to use the system at OLI feel confident that they have the knowledge transfer of how to do that again on September 17th.

Um our uh what's called the gold tenant, which is what we will go live in, build complete by November 20th is the expectation there.

And then the final go no go would be November 20 25th, um, I'm sorry, 23rd, um, to say that we will go or no-go based on the situation at the time.

Um and that that go live date is December 20th, which is you know, as we get closer in previous in in previous communications we've said we need to delay to you know end of September or end of end of June.

We have the date set.

We are making that level of detail, getting that close, and that would be the the date of go life.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Alderman Specker.

Is that designed so that the functional leads who will be nearly dead by that point have the ability to go on vacation for Christmas and New Year's because the January 1st payroll, I'm sure that's gonna be a challenge.

Um so is that why the date was picked as that or period one?

And in fact, it's quite the opposite.

It's going to be an intense period of work for especially on our payroll team.

Um pay period one begins of 2027 actually begins on December 20th.

So it's just uh a quirk of the calendar that it falls so early uh in still in 2026.

So that that actually is going to be an intense period of of work for the payroll team.

Now that being said, um, you know, myself and other members of the executive committee and other uh department heads uh who are involved in the project have asked their teams what additional resources do you need in order to make this go live successful?

So we have a lot of year-end responsibilities uh on a number of different work streams on payrolls, financials, and HR, and we are ensuring that there are supplementary resources, consultants that are available to help take the load off those folks uh so that they can focus on either their operational responsibilities or on assisting other departments, troubleshooting when it comes to um uh issues that are encountered during and immediately after go live.

So I mean, yes, it is going to be uh uh a busy time.

It's it's gonna be uh you know a lot of work, but we're ensuring that we're resourced to the point where we're able to make it work successfully.

And how narrow is the base of folks we're talking about here in these positions?

Are we talking about position a narrow base, so narrow base that if one or two people just up and leave, then we're all out of luck?

Uh I think that uh at least speaking from you know my office's perspective, I mean, that's that's definitely a concern.

Uh we have key person risk in a number of different areas, which is why we're we're ensuring that uh those folks have uh have the resources that they need in order to feel confident that um you know that they're going to be supported and that we're not leaving them out on an island that that we're we have processes and resources in place um to to assist them and get them over this challenging hump.

And I guess for Baker Tilly, if you've looked at other municipalities and seen them integrate similar systems, do you see any dangers that you could alert us about about um you know there's political pressure having put it off twice, maybe to really say this is the final go, but um is there anything you see with massaging of the no the go no go questions or any anything at all that you would like to highlight as a potential danger that we might not anticipate this far out, but we'll become more salient as it draws nearer?

Yeah, I I I to from my perspective, I think it all comes down to the success of end-to-end testing in in the month of July, and if it spills into August, and um if we have not heard from functional leads that they are comfortable in key processes, um, then that tough decision needs needs to be made.

But that's a fairly objective matter, black and white, that you can tell, hey, we've either done the N10 testing or we're not, so it can't be that hey, functional lead, you better say we're ready because we're gonna be ready.

Yeah, i exactly.

It's it is fairly fairly black and white.

And know that more often than not, functional leads will have queasiness or concerns about going live, um, just because they they'd always rather have more runway, um, more time.

But uh to the extent they've been through key processes and they've seen it work successfully, um, that should lessen that concern for sure.

And we haven't been able to do the end to end testing longer ago because there was still major the payroll accounting wasn't set up.

I mean, there were still things that just weren't cooked yet.

Is that basically the the gist of it?

That's correct.

The finance area uh and the the change to the chart of accounts um only recently allowed for financial data in mid-June into testing environments to be able to do some of that end-to-end testing.

Yes.

And if we miss uh goodness forbid um the December 20th date, it's more money.

That's the issue, the main issue.

Correct.

Yeah, we would uh the ability to go live is on a quarterly basis, so that would move that to the end of March, and similarly the costs associated with that.

So um I a couple of items to share um with regard to going live at the end of the year and the difficulty in that time.

One of the mitigating factors that we are planning is having in November a um dual payroll entry so all staff can practice on going have experience and practice in uh submitting time in work day in in that environment and doing a practice run of that citywide so that when it the actual um the actual entry is required in December, that's the people have experience with it.

Hopefully we will have you know if there's troubles that are found, those can be addressed and people educated so that there isn't the overwhelming amount as overwhelming an amount of help requests and you know any confusion or uncertainty for that first payroll.

So that's one mitigating factor.

Um I don't know.

Is that significantly more than any other payroll period?

So is there a greater need one to bring in those other resources and two to make sure they had uh a practice as it were before they think it's triggers?

Certainly fair to say that pay period one is going to be the most challenging.

It'll be people's first time entering time in the system um, you know in a in a live environment.

So it's it certainly will be the most challenging.

We do expect uh to do a lot of troubleshooting, and um, you know, that's one of the things that we are already talking about working on and and sort of putting the finishing touches on is what is the escalation process going to look like when problems or challenges are are encountered so that it's it's manageable and systemic problems can be addressed systemically instead of handling you know common problems one by one, we're able to kind of handle them in in bunches.

Um okay.

I might have some more questions, but uh there's two other committee members in the chair hasn't had the chance to circle back, so I'll be quiet for now.

Thank you.

That's right.

Um will there be a uh an open Teams chat kind of like a bat phone, not the not the bat phone to the mayor's office, but uh uh uh helpline uh bat phone that um users can users uh managers can uh immediately get an answer back.

I've been through some implementations in in my tenure in the past, and there's always been an open Teams chat where someone is monitoring uh during work days, during during work hours every workday, just because questions pop up quickly and you want a quick answer uh and not have to send an email and wait for a reply.

So there'll be there'll be a number of resources, and that's part of the um the the go live plan which is in development will have uh there's a a help tool within workday, which to avoid one person answering just phone calls and getting the same question a hundred times.

We we'll have a help uh process in workday that can hopefully you know bulk address concerns when people enter it.

Um ITMD certainly will use our um our help desk tools to help with that as well, whether it's our our our phone line, online service requests to help triage some of those calls.

There will be um resources from work day, hyper care, and uh accenture AMS, Accenture Managed Services, so that they are available for like those tier tier two or tier three calls.

So um there will be a tiered response for common questions uh and then more more complicated questions to address that.

Um an open teams uh call or chat might be part of that.

Um and that's that's in development.

Uh and then uh last one from me is what is our ultimate final go no go date decision date?

Will we know December 1st if this is going to happen?

Will we know December 19th?

Um the go no go decision with will be November 23rd.

That's when work day requires a move to reduct move to production authorization form.

And so the committee signs off on that.

1123.

Yes.

Okay.

All right.

Um thank you very much.

I believe Alder Woman Dmitrievich wanted to jump in.

Although I can't see which little box she is.

No, no, no.

I'm okay.

I just said I would unmute if I needed to.

Thank you.

All right, thank you.

Mr.

Chair.

Thank you, Alder Woman uh Dmitrievich Alderwoman more.

Um thank you so much.

Um I think one of the final questions that I have is just regarding staffing, seeing now that we're on a really really rigid timeline um with staff again doing their day job and having to um fulfill these sort of benchmarks by the November 23rd timeline.

Will there be any shifts?

Um, or how do you all plan on addressing that?

Because obviously, you know, some of the day job functions has to be done, but to not, you know, to as best as possible not extend this again.

How do you all look to address that?

Sure.

Well, I mean, what I can say is that the pedal has been to the floor for some time already.

Um, knowing that as we get closer to go live, that the demands and the needs are going to increase, that's that's why we're looking at um and you know, planning on bringing on additional consultants to um you know help us troubleshoot in certain areas, whether it's um in taking some of the day-to-day work, taking the operational load off of our critical project staff, or whether it's um you know, directly addressing some of those um problems that arise in the system, whether it's before go live or after go live.

So supplementing with with additional resources, making sure that there's really robust processes in place for you know, like uh David had mentioned with the um it's called workday cases where essentially you're filling out a ticket and those tickets can be analyzed for systemic problems.

I think that'll be um something that makes efficient use of of the time of our subject matter experts that are going to be troubleshooting, they'll be able to, like I said, solve systemic problems systemically as opposed to being on the phone for 20 minutes with somebody to solve one issue and then solve the same issue with somebody else for 20 minutes, they'll be able to address these kind of in in groups or or in in batches.

And and I think we've we've got you know an excellent dedicated, motivated project team that's working on this.

We've asked the world of them, and they have they've delivered.

And um, you know, I think they're they're dedicated to the project, to the city, and they want to see this through as much as as any of us.

And I think you'll see even in the the report that uh that John prepared.

I mean, there's it's you know, there's uh a lot of praise for the efforts of of city staff so far.

I mean, they're they're being asked to do a lot, and as I said, they're they're delivering.

So um I'm I'm I'm confident that um what we have in place is um you know sufficient to address those sort of known concerns that uh that are out there.

Yeah, and please let me add my um praise and respect to the staff as well for um going above and beyond, but just stepping up because I know this is something that is not easy when you're doing such a this is such a huge project um and having to you know continue with their sort of day-to-day operations and on top of that um, you know, um do all the duties um to make this project move forward.

So just definitely kudos to the to the staff.

We appreciate and are grateful.

Yeah, there will be some well-deserved vacations by by many when this is all over with.

Yeah, for sure.

Thank you.

After after everything is thank you very much.

Any other questions on the report?

Uh Mr.

Chair Alderman Spike.

I guess just on that.

So are the employees involved salaried?

Are they being paid overtime for this?

Are they accruing additional vacation?

Like what what is the light at the end of the tunnel for them other than surviving?

So uh staff that have been uh heavily involved with the project, what we're what we're calling our leads, uh have been earning a 10% stipend in addition to their regular wages, and that's going to continue um for some, if not most, through the the duration of the project up to go live.

You know, at which point it'll just become the normal course of business and that you know, stipend for the additional work will go away.

Um that stipend is insensitive to the fluctuation in hours though.

So if you work an 80-hour week, you get 10%.

If you work a 60-hour week, you get 10%.

Correct.

Yeah, I mean, I I can't speak for all departments, but um, you know, most folks that I'm aware of are are salaried and are not uh overtime earning.

I would note, if I may, that one of the concerns we have in December, and we are looking at this as an executive committee, is there are people that have been that involved that have built up a vacation bank, haven't taken, you know, avoided vacations, maybe asked to work over the holidays if they exceed their bank, you know, is that is that fair, is that appropriate?

Can we somehow you know extend that um so that they aren't aren't penalized for the work they're doing?

So there's a lot of that.

I don't have an answer for that yet, or what might come of that.

But those are the sort of considerations that are definitely in top of mind for us as we continue.

So if it is go live on the 20th, then you don't want them disappearing on the 21st, I'm assuming.

You want them there, or it's just yeah, I mean, as uh as an executive committee, we've we've identified a couple of uh sort of vacation blackout periods in which um you know, if folks were to take vacation, it would jeopardize the project.

And it's gonna be very selective strategic.

But but yes, I mean to to your point we can't have folks that are critical to go live taking off the you know those two three-day work weeks that would just be um you know that would have a really really bad impact on the project.

Okay.

So those folks will be mandated to hang around um if they want to keep their jobs, I guess, because otherwise um I would think so really there's gonna be no holiday ex um like the rest of the city gets for those folks, they'll be asked to not only slog through um that far in the year, but to basically put on hold holiday plans.

Well, I mean the the days off that uh are our holidays would you know we wouldn't take those.

If you wanted to go somewhere or do something, go on vacation.

Um that wouldn't be available till January, you're saying for folks.

It depends on the position and the responsibility as as Bill had mentioned, that's bringing very strategically targeted.

Um you know, based on these milestones are important to different people.

For instance, the the data cut on September 17th, that's ITMD is heavily involved with that, so that's one place where uh a limited number of staff in ITMD.

I've already we've already communicated not being on vacation that week.

It's a little easier because it's not the holiday, but it depend I guess it's an example of it depends on different critical resources at different points in the project.

Okay.

And I hope DER is keeping an eye on these employees as well.

Um and I know you know we had the report, we have um many technical details in that, but given that we're so reliant on uh a few brave folks, um it sounds like disaster if if something happens um and one concerned about their own um mental and well uh being but to the project can't go forward without them.

So an Alderman Spiker, if I may, I would just add that um for at least some of these folks um due to their year-end responsibilities, even if we weren't going live with a new ERP system, they would most likely be working all of those, those three day, those two three-day weeks during the holidays anyways.

So um for first at least some folks it'll be uh almost business as usual around the holidays.

Okay.

All right, thanks.

All right.

Uh Alder Woman or last call for questions on the report.

Alder Woman Dmitrievich moves to place item one on file, hearing no objections so ordered.

And now we're uh wrapping up item number two that we already read in.

Alder Woman Moore moves to substitute the file with sub A, which is hand which was handed out.

Thank you very much.

Uh which was handed out um and uploaded later start yesterday.

Uh that sub is my sub.

The only substantive difference is that it requires the comp controller to ask a few questions, and some of them are quite obvious uh to us, but for the watch for the viewing public, um 4.8 million dollars sounds like a lot of money.

And why can't the city find that in the couch cushions somewhere else and reallocate those funds?

Or what about a hiring freeze or a spending freeze to make up the 4.8 million dollars before the end of the year?

It's a lot of money.

Uh so this substitute changes the language that uh will borrow up to 4.8 million dollars if it's needed.

Because we've gotten some assurances that that's the ceiling that we'll need for this uh second extension of the project.

But uh Comptroller, can you answer some of these questions now?

Um what why do we have to go into additional borrowing for this project?

Why can't we shake out the shake out the the pockets or dig in the couch cushions?

Uh it this is the first time that I'm I'm laying eyes on this, so just bear with me as I uh kind of read through it.

Just so confirming that this file or this substitute does give full authority for up to 4.8 million, and then it it directs me to identify opportunities to find additional funding that would bring that amount of borrowing down.

Correct.

Okay.

Um so just off the top of my head, one challenge might be that even if savings are identified in some departments, they might not be in the right places.

So you know, we're not allowed uh by state statute to transfer from one department to another.

Now there may be you know, in a handful of of niche cases, some opportunities for um departmental savings to be applied to project expenses that happen to fall within that department, but I think that's gonna be more the exception than the rule.

But I what I can certainly do is um you know sort of look comprehensively uh across the city at what our options are and um see where there might be opportunity to to bring this down uh Mr.

Chair?

Alderman Spiker.

Um so you haven't had a chance to review this thoroughly and see whether you would support it.

My first time seeing it.

Okay.

Well then maybe we we've had discussions uh with the budget office.

Yeah.

Well, you can't advocate from the chair, so if you're gonna pass the gavel, then we can discuss it.

But um I'm uncomfortable supporting something the comptroller hasn't even looked at, much less of the unless it's just adding reporting requirements.

And the thing you mentioned was substantive, Mr.

Christiansen, I guess, about whether we could do it.

So maybe it's best to pass the original, and then if the Comptroller says this is all fine and dandy, then on Friday we can amend it.

Umless I mean I haven't had a chance to detail what the big differences are, and I hadn't even thought of the thing you just mentioned.

So I mean, whether directed or not, I mean, in via resolution, I I can certainly do the due diligence uh, you know, in the interest of taxpayers and avoiding um more borrowing than necessary and and see what the options may be, uh I guess either way.

I mean, it is there a a time is a timeline associated with this?

Okay.

Okay.

Well, um I mean it's your call.

The change the changes between the original and the in sub A are purely reporting and fact finding.

So what was the concern you had then about whether we would be able to transfer?

Well, so an example being let's just say I was we were able to identify savings that might be available at year end in um DPW.

Right.

With this project, the the workday project being housed in ITMD, were we can't just make a a fund transfer from DPW to ITMD's capital account.

Um that's that's not allowed by by state statute.

Um I thought this was focused just on DOA though.

Or was that there's a there's a few different I think if I'm just I I in fairness, NICOVAC budget management division.

I did talk to the chair about this a couple days or weeks, I can't remember a couple of weeks ago.

And I did relay some of that conversation to the Comptroller that the that the that the these kinds of questions were being asked, and I'm certainly prepared to give answers similar to what you heard from Bill on the merits of the question.

But uh my reading of this, which I think this did get placed yesterday, Chris, in the file, late late yesterday, and then it it's it uh uh the I'm re I'm reading it this morning not for the first time, but probably for the first time in great with uh great care right now.

And um it says the comptrollers directed to transfer available operating funds to reduce the amount of borrowing needed, and I think that's sort of the timing and the state law issues that that the comptroller mentioned would apply to that.

It further redirects the comptroller to determine if a hiring freeze would generate operational savings.

I think there'd be similar timing and state law issues with that, but we can discuss it if if the committee would like with that implications of that.

And then the third one that's that says directly determined if a no, the third one just summarizes the first two.

No, I'm sorry, I went in the wrong one.

Those were the second and the third.

The original effective resolved was uh existing capital funding authorizations in DOA.

Now that would not have the state law issue, but there was the issue of most of that money is already being spent on contracts and there's not enough of it.

David can speak to that.

But it but again that's oh yeah, that directs David, yeah.

So I I uh uh and I I apologize.

I I was under the impression that I was to look citywide at you know every city department.

Uh if it's narrowly focused on DOA, um I think that's you know makes the the task a lot simpler.

Yeah.

Well I can speak maybe to the Director Kovac, you are you saying I mean I would like to understand something before I vote for it, but um you're saying that based on your understanding, we're none of the resolved clause set us afoul of Well the resolved clause directs either um DOA um or ITMD director or DOA director or the comptroller to investigate.

So I I'm not overly concerned because it as the comptroller said, I mean, these are things we should be looking at anyway.

So whether whether you decide to formalize it in your resolution is telling you to do things, but we're not telling you you must do something that is illegal or impossible or something like that.

Right.

I'd rather not tell you to do that.

Right, yeah, no, and I I I guess now that I've had a chance to to hear it explained and and to read it again, I I think it's um probably more um that that concern that I had raised is probably not not there anymore.

Okay.

So in term in terms of um the timing and the amounts, the I think the chair earlier mentioned one point five was the amount needed from June to September.

That was the amount of carryover that we did use from last year from 25.

We used about 1.5 in carryover, but that wasn't the full expense of the June to September.

We we had a little bit left in the original borrowing, which was a multi-year borrowing, which this council has has is been has reviewed in the last three budgets, I think, uh of over 25 million dollars for the overall project.

So there was about a million or so of room contingency in the original borrowing authorization, plus there was room in DOA from 25 to fund.

So we did shake the couch cushions before.

That's kind of the point I'm making.

To get the reason we got from June to September without asking to borrow more money was because we already chuck them loose.

And and there's a timing issue here where if there's money in 26 to shake loose, we won't really know until we're closing the books in 27, and we got to pay most of these bills in 26.

So a lot of it's a timing issue.

Yeah.

So what's the difference between sub A and the original then?

Which are the resolved clauses that are have been added?

Yep.

The resolve clause is directing the comp controller to investigate alternatives.

Well, one says further resolved that existing capital funding authorizations in the Department of Administration that are available at the end of 26 shall be reallocated.

So that doesn't sound like much of a choice.

Right.

Well Yeah, that that is of concern to me because we do capital funding over a multi-year period.

So I don't know what what shall it um what available means that are available because for instance we funded server upgrades over multiple years for capital expenses.

So does that mean that any funding we've pre-allocated in this budget to be implemented in 27 goes away?

Um and whether we've committed to a contract, which may be the case, or that we intend to commit to the contract should funding uh be allocated in the 2027 budget.

Um that that would be that would be a concern.

Okay.

Because that one isn't just a reporting one, it's basically saying if you have extra cash in DOA, transfer it over here.

How do you define extra cash?

Yeah.

Yeah, that I think that one now that I'm looking at it closer, Alderman Spiker, would be the one the one that would be the most concerning because it's it's unclear if that triggers something automatic and when it's triggered exactly because capital authorizations authorizations do, they don't need to be carried over.

So I in order to actually implement that shall I think we'd need a little more detail.

And I think we'd want to tell you what your options were before you probably would want to know what what you were giving up before you directed us to do something.

Sure.

Surely it would.

Um so is this then something you need more time with?

It's not something you can do by Friday, or can you work it out with the sponsor and then send us the all clear by then?

Is that too aggressive of a timeline?

I mean we can take it up in September too.

You mean to to sort of amend the substitute by Friday?

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

Okay, not do the full analysis.

Okay.

No.

Well, if you think that's what we're doing, I think that should be fine.

Okay.

All right.

Do you have a motion, Alderman Spyker?

Yeah, I'd move not to amend.

Should we uh do we have any other discussion on the subject?

Yeah, I'd I'd vote against amending it now and just ask the sponsor to uh hold off until and amend it before the council so we can make sure DOA isn't doing something or that they maybe shouldn't do.

So uh Alderman Spiker, what's your motion?

I'm asking you to withdraw your amendment, but if you don't want it, then I'll move to shoot it down.

That's fine.

I'll I'll uh uh withdraw my uh amendment or my sub I'll withdraw my substitute and then the original is before us, Alderman Spiker.

I think you guys found a very clever way for this to pass without any No, I'm just kidding.

You got back to the original sub now it's even not even controversial.

So this is just the 4.8, this is just the 4.8 um of contingent borrowing to cover the cost of the extension to go to December.

And then if we are out one more quarter because November 23rd comes and we don't hit those uh go no go things, how m how much extra money are we talking for an extra quarter?

All part well the ballpark on the June-September extension was probably was about two and a half million.

And the it is higher for this one, partly because we are you know we're we're generals learning from the last battle that didn't go so well, right?

We didn't we did we wanted to be aggressive with making sure we brought in consultants to to get us over the finish line to avoid to avoid having well I'm willing to answer the question, but to avoid having to actually do the additional borrowing for an additional quarter.

So but I mean in round numbers, it's a million a month, and you have to do it in three month intervals.

So it was two and a half million from June to December, and we're now saying four eight here, but frankly, the four eight has we built in some contingency to that too.

That's why it's an up to amount.

We're hoping it's not as much as four eight.

We're hoping it's under four.

Um so in round numbers that's that's a little more than a million a month for the for the um the the Q4 of this year.

So how much it would be to go to not start till after Q1 of next year.

I would ballpark a million a month, keeping in mind that there's other you know, there's there's other factors we'd want to consider as we did more analysis.

Three million plus.

Yeah, because you're paying and you're paying yeah, three million plus, I think is a is is okay.

Is is fair.

Thanks.

Then I make the motion to recommend approval of the resolution.

Uh Alderman Spiker moves adoption of item number two.

Any objections to that motion?

Hearing done.

Any objections?

Hearing done, so ordered.

Thank you for all very much.

Moving on to our SWIFT number three, file two six zero three three six communication relating to an audit of municipal court cash controls.

Welcome back, Administrator Norfolk.

Thank you.

Comptroller's office.

Yes.

Adriana Molina, um, audit manager here at the city.

We will be presenting the audit of municipal court cash controls um results.

Uh first, thank you for the um municipal court and their team for a um assisting with us through assisting us for this audit.

Sorry about that.

All right.

We'll just move right along.

A scope included a review of the controls for collection recording, safeguarding, deposits of cash checks, money orders, and other electronic payments from January 1st, 2025 through September 30th, 2025.

And the objective was to review those controls around those processes to um ensure and evaluate adequacy and effectiveness of that control environment.

Um are procedures included similar to other audits, interviews, walkthroughs, review of documents, which included also on-site visits, um, also um observing counts of teller um drawers, um reviewing transactions of various deposits going into municipal court, and then assessing um how those controls were being completed.

Overall conclusion, we did find that controls, internal controls over municipal court operations were well designed and implemented implemented effectively.

However, we did know two areas of improvement.

Um that I will let Zach um go over the first finding and then Colleen or other auditor, go over the next one.

Good morning, Zav.

Is this is this is Zach Rilling of Associated Auditor with the comptroller's office?

Um our first finding was that the municipal court written policies and procedures were slightly of outdated and did not reflect the current procedures.

This included referencing programs which were uh which were outdated and stopped being supported by their vendor back in 2022.

Uh there were inclusions of payment methods that were no longer accepted, and some payment methods that are missing that are now accepted.

And then the position titles that are referenced in the policies do not align with current staff position titles.

Our recommendation for that is fairly simple, just update the policies.

Excellent.

Okay.

Oh, and then finding number two of the eight cash deposits that we reviewed.

Uh the municipal court remitted deposits to the treasurer's office on a similar on a semi-weekly basis rather than uh daily as required by the ordinance.

Um in addition, the process for deposit for the deposit preparation and the transfer of custody was not formally documented.

For four actually of the eight deposits reviewed did not include clear evidence of custody transfer to the to the treasurer's office.

Our recommendation on this one is for it for management to establish and implement a deposit process that complies with the timeliness requirements of the ordinance, and also develop written procedures for deposit preparation, custody transfer and retention of transfer evidence.

Excellent.

Any questions from committee members?

Mr.

Chair.

Sure, Alman Spiker.

How easy will it be to implement that second recommendation to make the uh everything consistent with the ordinance which requires daily transfers?

Um good morning, Chief Court Administrator of the Municipal Court, Teen Norfolk.

Um we are reliant on the police department to transmit transport the cash.

Um and they have conveyed to us that their staffing only allows for them to come twice a week rather than daily.

But they're in the same building.

They are.

Um we'll we'll see if uh and I mean the ordinance is written a certain way, I suppose for a certain reason, which I wasn't there when it was written, but um is there any problem with it being twice a week versus what the ordinance requires, which is daily?

No, um it does reference state statute, but state statute only requires once every 30 days.

Oh how much so is I I suspect that a lot of people used to pay their court fines and cash previously and and previous and a lot more frequently than they do today.

Um is there a concern that the daily cash drop is inadequate inadequate?

I don't know.

Like should should we need like is there so much cash sitting in the safe at the court administration building that we need to ensure that NPD shows up every day, or do we need to change the ordinance to reflect what's practical and real right now?

Okay, okay, yeah.

Um I think that that would be reasonable to change the ordinance to reflect what's practical and real.

Um I think that once upon a time when that ordinance was drafted drafted, there was a lot more cash going through the building than there is now.

Um earlier this year, MPD had um actually said they wanted to stop transporting our cash altogether, and that we would have to contract out for that service, and in running the finances for that, it was impractical to actually pay a company to transport such a small amount of cash.

Um, that's a budget decision that is beyond any one officer to decide for the court.

And chairman, just to put some numbers to it, um the the the the the the the the the actual the the total average deposit for uh for the uh for the total average deposit for all deposits in the in the period including the electronic transfers in the cash was seventeen thousand dollars a day, roughly.

So, but that's including a significant portion of that being electronic, so that is so for cash, I'd say we're talking like three about 1500 a day.

During uh good morning committee, my name is Nidcha Yay Jackson.

I am the court financial um manager.

Uh I run the accounting department um to answer the question roughly about 1500 a day during busy season, which would be the first quarter of the year, we might run into uh roughly $10,000 in cash on a weekly basis.

During uh slowed months, we're looking at about a maximum of $8,000, and then during extremely slow months, which is the last quarter of the year, we're looking at maybe $300 to $1,500 uh for that week.

Okay.

All right, it looks like we have some some work to do with changing ordinances in the future.

Any other comments or discussion questions?

I guess for director Tad who's sitting in the audience if MPD thinks an ordinance is dumb and they don't want to follow it, they should tell us instead of just disobeying it.

That would be maybe more appropriate.

So if you could convey that message, I will as well.

Thanks.

Sounds good.

Uh Alderman Spiker then uh moves to place this auto report on file.

Thank you all.

Hearing no objections, so ordered.

Thank you all very much.

Thank you, committee.

Thank you.

Moving on to item number four.

Oh, another one of my file 252089 communication from the Department of Public Works and the COPTROR relating to a historical accounting of payouts from the disposal of the material recycling facility and segregation of final insurance payout from a negotiated depreciation settlement sponsored by myself.

Uh, this really uh is just asking for a rundown on the numbers on how we disposed of the MERF.

Disposed of the MIRF.

No?

Okay.

Oh, yeah.

But uh this is I think also important uh for public works to hear um because of the planned uh uh uh implementation or um uh placement of these funds in the future.

Good morning, Mr.

Chair, committee members, Chuck Schumacher, operations administration manager for the Department of Public Works.

Uh for some quick context, uh, this was a file that was held uh from last FNP, at which the committee asked us to uh provide a written report uh that outlines the payments and uh where the money uh from the MERF payout insurance payout has gone to.

Um you'll note that that report is in your files, and if you'd like, I would uh just go through that very quickly and give you some highlights.

Um a quick reminder for the committee that uh the MERF insurance payout was due to a fire that occurred on May 31st of 2023, which resulted in the total loss of equipment um and significant facility damage.

The total insurance payout that we received was 20.9 million dollars.

Five point seven million dollars of that was due to Walkeshaw County.

That means that the city's uh portion of that and 20 million dollar payout was uh 15 million dollars.

Of that 15 million dollars, uh 3.3 million of it was uh covered expenses that we incurred relative to uh increased costs for hauling and disposal.

That leaves 11.7 million dollars as a balance that the city holds in capital accounts.

Um with that said, that's my high level overview.

If the committee has questions, uh be happy to answer anything that I can.

Thank you very much.

Uh Commissioner, anything to add?

No, just here for any questions.

And then the uh the funds are um being held uh in anticipation of uh a future need.

Yeah, so uh Joe Crush, Commissioner of Public Works, good morning, committee members, Mr.

Chair.

Um so when the decision um was made about a year ago, we've had multiple uh meetings on this topic.

Um we did a feasibility study to see first of all, could we rebuild the MERF in its same location in our partnership with Walkershell County per that feasibility study?

The return on investment for both Waukeshaw County and the city was not what it was when we first got the deal together a long time ago.

So at that time um we decided to sever and terminate the contract, um, tying us and Waukeshaw County together and decided to pivot in a new uh fashion.

Um so there's 11.7 there, and so what uh me and my staff did is try to evaluate what sort of opportunities there were to reinvest these dollars into a building in the city of Milwaukee.

And so if the public doesn't know, we have a municipal services building that is located at Canal is an extreme disrepair.

Um and so the opportunity here was to say, okay, is there potential parcels out there that we could rebuild a municipal services building, get some efficiencies, um, and also provide a you know ADA compliant code compliant building for uh our DPW workers.

And so time set for a while.

There was a property that came became available at 3282 about a year ago.

Um we had come to this committee and asked to purchase the particular parcel to relocate our folks over to this uh and rebuild a new uh municipal services building.

Um just for context, 3282 is just south of Townsend.

We have our DPW headquarters, which is at basically just south of 35th and Capitol, or just south of Capitol on 35th Street, so there's some efficiencies we could have there.

So we started to move forward, and and the goal here is to use a port this sort of dollars, which is 11.7 towards rebuilding a new municipal services building, opening up an economic development property in the valley, um, and also provide some efficiencies.

Um there will be requests coming in the 27.

I think we talked about this last year.

We tried to put a four million dollar request in the twenty-six budget, which things changed based on some changes, but in the future we're gonna continue to ask for money to basically build out a new municipal services building.

And then uh the development of opportunity in the valley.

Is there a uh an estimate on the value of that property or yeah, there is an estimated value.

Obviously, we can talk about that.

I don't want to disclose that in public just because it could.

We could get more or less depending on be more than a dollar.

It is more than a dollar, yes.

Any questions on the report?

Thank you very much.

Um much appreciated.

Uh Alder Woman Cogs has joined us, and she'll move to refer this to the public works committee, hearing no objections.

So ordered.

Thank you all very much.

Item number five, file two six zero five zero eight communication from the department of employer relations and the fire and police commission relating to policies and procedures in place to protect employees in the event of air quality incidents.

Welcome, Director Carter.

Good morning.

And in director of Todd.

This is sponsored by Alderman Brower.

Alderman.

Yeah, thank you so much, Mr.

Chair, and thank you so much to the committee for hearing this.

Thanks to everybody from Jackie and Todd and everybody who's has come on out to talk through this.

I wanted to just have a public conversation about this.

Um really appreciate it.

Our uh my brothers and sisters in Ask Me Locals 33, 46 and 426 um have uh came together a few days ago during the um air quality incidents that we had where the Canadian wildfire smokes uh came into Milwaukee and they put out a statement.

Our Union Brothers and Sisters put out a statement um just calling on the city to do calling on the city as one of the city's largest employers to do better by its employees so that we can um offer consistent um policies and more PPE for our employees.

So I wanted to talk through that.

I wanted to talk through the department's uh different departments' responses um to that and hopefully you know have this be the start of a conversation where we can you know have the city be the best employer it can possibly be and honor the concerns um of the uh the union.

So that's why we uh put this file in.

In the file, you guys will notice there is um the original statement and press release from uh AFSME uh from the different locals, and that was signed by uh Venetia uh Youngblood Campbell, the president of Local 33, which is DPW, Ian Gunther, the president of Local 47, which is DNS and Waterworks, um, and Phyllis uh Whitley, who is the president of 426, which is library and some of our uh departments here at City Hall.

Um so there's that letter, and I do really also appreciate uh DER also put in a memo on air quality responses as well, which is also in the file here before us.

Um but I guess you know I would like to you know just hear broadly from the departments that are that are present here, you know, what some of their responses were.

Um, and then we can maybe go into some specifics about what exactly you know happened um here and some of the concerns brought by the union.

Um but most of all I just really appreciate everybody being here and I really appreciate us starting a conversation so that we can be uh the best employer we can possibly be.

We obviously have you know financial constraints um to make these the best jobs they can be.

But um, I mean, overall, I think you know, dealing, having proper plans in place and you know, things that can address situations, even unknown situations, um, can be the you know way that we can you know make the commitment to our employees that they're gonna be uh respected on the job.

So I really appreciate it.

Um Mr.

Chair, and I really appreciate this being scheduled today.

All right, well, good morning, Jackie Q Carter, um, Department of Employee Relations.

Um I'll just kind of point to the memo.

Um we gave a little bit of background on the severe weather policy we have, and admittedly, um, when we think about severe weather, we're thinking usually like snow, floods, rain, those kinds of things.

How do we respond?

We do not specifically uh point out air quality.

However, there is a uh portion of our severe weather policy that talks about um any unforeseen acts of nature, right?

So in this case, the wind blowing something um that we didn't expect.

The policy really leaves the uh unless there's a reason to shut down.

We have a um practice of kind of meeting, talking about what the concerns are coming up with a plan, and the plan for that those two days was to allow department heads to use their discretion to make sure that operations were covered, but employees were also safe.

And so, in most cases, um, there's there's also from three of the larger departments that have field employees, they kind of submitted what their approach was for those those days.

Um, in most cases, staff were either sent home or assigned to do work indoors.

And so um, in many of them, there was a uh very minimal staff in case of emergency that were asked to stay on.

Um, if there were I know there was one instance where the building where staff were working, um there was some smoke.

The the building itself felt like you know, the quality in the building was not great, and so those folks either went home or were assigned to another work location.

So those are just some of the uh responses or some of the the plans that were put in place um on those days, and I'll um leave for director Todd to speak as well.

Yes, uh good morning, Lee Todd, uh FPC executive director.

Good morning.

Uh, with regard to the police and fire departments, obviously they're a little bit different.

Uh they're sworn personnel.

Uh they can't send them home.

They can't uh, you know, uh just stay in the office.

They do have to send them out for uh emergency services and the like.

Uh the departments did notify their members of the health department's advisory on air quality.

They recommended that uh they wear masks.

Uh they limited uh unnecessary activities like outdoor trainings, things of that nature.

Um I know MPD does have an exception to uh uh the mask prohibition uh in its policies uh for for this type of incident like severe weather, or I think it's hazardous material or something like that.

Uh but the members were encouraged to wear masks uh for their uh necessary duties.

Um in the Common Council office suite next to the the mail room, there's a filing cabinet in the bottom drawer had some leftover COVID era N95 masks.

But do departments as a matter of practice maintain an inventory of N95 masks?

So I I we didn't do a kind of a poll to see, but that was typically what most departments did.

So we didn't go and ask, but so we we happened on that Thursday morning to have a meeting where most department heads were present, and so that was the by stuff give people mass.

Um so most departments made those available.

Now we did not track to see you know how that was rolled out, but that was absolutely part of the protocol.

And I know the fire department does.

Uh I'm not 100% about uh police department.

I do want to have uh further discussions with them on that.

Sorry.

Uh Alderman Brower, any any follow-ups?

Yeah.

Um I guess yeah, I was also wondering about PPE being available.

Um one of my uh larger questions I have here is when we have these policies in place, how are those policies, and maybe this is a you know broader question here, but how are those policies uh promulgated?

What what process do those go through?

Do those reach the common council floor in any way, or are these policies just something that's done at an administrative level?

Um because I I would I I mean I think overall I think it would be good for us to have a collaborative public discussion that includes members of the public, the members of the council, and um and the union uh to have the policies that meet the needs.

So I guess in a broader question, how are these um policies like the severe weather policy um created and approved?

So the severe weather policy is what guided all of the decisions that is approved at the council level.

So this has been in effect.

Um it was issued 2020, revised in 2024.

So you all have seen this, it's been before the the appropriate bodies.

And what what would those appropriate bodies be?

Are those for this one it would be finance and personnel committee and then the full council.

So policies do go through the council process.

Okay, I just I just want to be called.

I didn't know if that was like an administrative fully thing, like an administrative rule, or if it was something that's adopted.

No, that when when you get into work rules, that's where it's more administrative, and then those don't come to to the body, but citywide policies, the council sees those.

And welcome to the table, Commissioner Krushke.

Uh sounds like you want it looks like you want to add something.

This is something I'm very again, Joe Crush Commissioner of Public Works.

This is something very familiar with because when we talk about weather emergencies, there's a coordination, and a lot of this is I I think as uh director Carter has said is a lot of it comes on a snow and ice or flood issues that we deal with in the Midwest all the time.

Air quality is something that's a little off.

What happens in any sort of weather emergency, the health commissioner and department of public works has a conversation on what is the health and safety of the public and also what is from our employees as well.

Um so a little context, and if we're looking for details, um I had a conversation on a Thursday morning with the health commissioner at 6 30 in the morning.

Obviously, I was coming into work, I come here earlier than most people.

Um, had seen that the air quality was down, had a conversation in past practice.

Um I think this happened in 2023 where the air quality got up around 260.

Um the threshold was set usually about 300 where it becomes really hazardous.

I think we all see that we're getting called a purple range when you're looking at air quality index.

I'm not a health professional by any means, but that was kind of the threshold was set for protection of our employees.

And so at that time in 2023, it was like, okay, you wear masks.

This time it was about 425, I think at 6:30 in the morning.

Our folks had already been in, because some of our folks work second shift, third shift, first shift.

Um I went with the middle management from DPW, pulled everyone in to make sure they weren't exerting themselves by any means.

And by about 8 30 in the morning, we basically sent everyone home at before 9 o'clock on that Thursday.

And so some of the questions come up, like, well, why didn't you keep folks home on Friday?

And so this comes into a weather prediction.

And so we were looking at air quality and with how the wind was going to move.

The suggested air quality was supposed to improve by 9 a.m.

on Friday, just like you would see a snowstorm go away by particular time.

So we had folks come in.

We did not dispatch them out into the field.

We kept them in-house.

Um we had a meeting at 5 30 in the morning on that Friday morning, determined that hey, we're we're trending in the right direction.

By about 7 30 in the morning, 8 o'clock, the trends did not come back where we thought they were.

Just like weather patterns, winds did not shift.

Uh we made the call again to send folks home.

Um, because if it was under 300, we were gonna have masks for folks and to send them in the field, but be properly secure.

Um we did keep staff on both days.

Um if there are water main breaks, etc., we have to address those.

We can't have water running for three days straight without addressing those.

Um we do have N95 masks that were in each one of our units.

Uh I know the health department and fire department, we were in a communication because people had extras.

Uh we could pick them up from the health department if needed.

Um, you know, these are unusual situations.

This is the first time that we have broke 300.

Um, and it happened to be twice.

I know there was one time it got around 300, I think in 1987, and that was the borderline, but it was an unusual situation.

I mean, I don't think there's another municipality in the state that basically sent their folks home.

I think we were probably the only one.

I mean, we take our employees' safety very seriously.

Um we do want to work with council and others to see how we can continue to make our folks safe.

I mean, our folks are exerting themselves, high stress jobs, moving garbage, recycling, et cetera.

And so that's why we sent them home.

Right or wrong, I do not regret sending them home for that day.

Our folks did end up starting on Monday working overtime, which is unfortunate to basically catch up to get us back in cycle from a garbage recycling perspective.

Yeah.

Um, I want to go thank you so much, Commissioner.

I really appreciate it, Mr.

Chair, if I may.

Um, I wanted to go to some of the um specifics that were brought um to our attention from the statement from the union um in the file here.

Um I know that there is political will, and I would generally agree with it that we should have people come into work rather than working from home.

But um what's I guess uh can you explain more uh director uh Carter about like the leeway that either individual departments have, because one of the the second um on the second page of the uh yeah, that is the yeah, the second page of the statement, one of the things that was that was brought up was um that there are workers that one of the claims made by the union was that there are workers who are capable of working from home, who were still asked to come in uh to work that day.

And I want to just explore with you what either discretion or not that we allow the department heads uh to engage in with that and what would be the pros and cons of that.

Because I would imagine if you know if we have this kind of situation and we have individuals who can work from home, um, either because they have the equipment or their job is fully online or could be could be done fully online by emailing and you know, writing and that sort of thing, which I know is not every one of our employees here in the city.

Um what do we what kind of what kind of leeway to departments have on that?

So let me let me first say we we don't play politics with employee health.

Um if if there is a need for employees to be home, nobody's counting how many days they were already home in the week and things like that.

That's not what's happening.

Um advised that if they felt that it was unsafe for them or they had um any indication that they their their health was gonna be impacted, that they should reach out to their supervisor or manager or whoever and make arrangements.

So that is an option.

Um, but we don't want to just say, well, everybody stay home because some people were fine, some people were able to work as a person who is impacted in one of those special groups.

Um I was aware, but I was okay, right?

And so the direction was given the employees, let your supervisor know, and then managers and supervisors were told to um be flexible, right?

And and allow people the option so that they can take care of themselves.

So that's always going to be the priority.

Was that given out in a written communication anyway?

Because what I'm hearing from folks in the union and on the ground is that that it was up to either individual supervisors or I know that in in DNS, um, what I've been told is that there's and I know DNS isn't here, so I'm not expecting you guys to answer for DNS, but the that there is some new quota levels as far as number of stops per day, that sort of thing for the on-the-ground workers as far as like inspectors and that sort of thing.

And so um, like what um I mean, if if it just it just seemed it just seems like there was a lot of you know individual discretion down to almost the immediate supervisor level.

Um, and and so I'm wondering if that communication, you know, how the what you're saying here at the table, how that was delivered to supervisors or department heads so that that could translate into something that the workers actually heard and were able to even, you know, if so if an individual supervisor disagreed with maybe what you're saying or disagreed that workers should be home or not, if they were how they were communicated that message.

So we and we do have DNS on the board.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Sorry, I didn't see that.

Um did you want to uh response from DNS?

Um I guess as a part of this, but also I think uh Director Carter was going to be a good thing.

Well, the the point I'm uh I'll make and then I'll hand it to the departments is we in the in the meeting we had that morning again that that first day where the air quality was bad.

Department heads were we all got the same instruction that if folks need to go home, they should be allowed.

If there are field folks who um are out, do your best to keep them inside.

We knew about the emergency parts.

But I'll um I know Commissioner Kretsky had something he wanted to add.

Uh yeah, so obviously the Department of Public Works is probably the largest department that has folks here.

So one of the things we had taken the evaluations we've the field folks were priority one.

Um the rest of the folks that were already at work at that time.

We're talking about when we decided to cut the field folks up, it's nine o'clock in the morning.

The buildings that we do have have ventilation systems in, so that was part of the reasoning.

So the air quality was safe.

If we did have a building that we felt that was unsafe, uh we got a hold of the health department to do an air quality test in those buildings, like you had heard from DNS and won't talk for them, they had to shut down a building just because of the air quality, because we do have really old buildings.

We did an air quality test at the municipal services building as well.

Um but within the in internal units, we made sure because uh I I will be straightforward with you.

If folks go home, that doesn't mean the air quality is better than when they're at work.

We have a lot of folks that work for us that probably don't even have um air conditioning.

So to send someone home doesn't mean that makes them safer by any means.

So having them at work, although if folks did not feel well by any means, we allowed them to go home without any recourse.

Um but there was no point to put them back out in the air when they were already here.

And then the next day as well.

I mean, we have great ventilation systems in the city hall complex, although Thursday you could smell some of the fire, but the air quality was still fine in the internal building, so that's why we did not send those folks home.

Thank you.

Uh Commissioner Ms.

Madeon.

Welcome.

Yeah, can you hear me?

Yes.

Hi, Bike Masmania deputy commissioner for neighborhood services.

Uh kind of echoing Commissioner Krushke's comments and the position that was taken.

Um we immediately decided to suspend field operations for both days.

Uh the air quality at our Lake Tower facility uh was not good.

Um so we did shut down that building.

Uh we had help probably come in and test, and it was shut down for a second day.

Um staff were given the option to work remote if they were capable.

Some staff that uh could not work remote were relocated to the Zeiler building uh to perform their duties there.

Any staff that came forward that expressed concerns about the condition of the air in the facilities that they were working in or just didn't feel comfortable, we're allowed to go home.

So uh no one was forced to work if they were experiencing difficulty or felt uncomfortable in the environment in which they were working.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

Um given some of the concerns brought by the union here, um, what's our plan?

I mean, I think I think obviously, like, you know, I don't we don't need to beat it at a horse here as far as dissecting all these things of the blow by blow of what happened on that day.

But what's the plan going forward um for communication and meet and confer with the union regarding um some of these things which you know meet and confer being allowed under even under Act 10, meet and confer is allowed with the union to discuss these things and potentially you know, going through the democratic process to modify policies if necessary.

Um have we had some communication to I mean, obviously, because this is this is you know, this is this is hard to see, you know, right when we when our when our workers union say so it it and I know and I'll just acknowledge you know, and for the for the folks watching that we have been, you know, since Act 10, the the era uh the situation has been um confusing and disjointed.

I mean, obviously I think it's worth saying here that we need Act 10 repealed so that we can have a collective bargaining agreement with all these unions um that as as much detail as possible um here, and so that would that I think that would be an overall benefit, and whether that's gonna you know happen sooner or later, I'm not sure, whether through the courts or through the legislative process to get that law repealed so we can have a proper collective bargaining agreement that details all of the wages hours and working conditions of our city's employees.

But going forward, what's the um you know from DER or other departments?

Um, and I would like to hear that because I believe that with each department having you know, members of the union in it, having stewards having you know these locals that are represent different departments, there is opportunities for meet and confer with management at all levels to you know go through what happened with this and potentially come up with plans going forward and the meet and confer, you know, about other issues as well.

So I'll go back to where we kind of started with air quality is not something we thought we need to plan for.

We've learned different.

Um we've already had a meeting with members of Ask Me from three of the locals that happened this week already.

Um in Augerman, you you also know because we've had a meeting with the with with representatives before.

Yeah, there's no interest in having an adversarial relationship with any of those groups.

So they're welcome to reach out to us.

Um we don't have to to play things out in the press.

We can have conversations.

So anybody who wants to have a conversation who has ideas, we're open for that.

We all want the best for employees.

Um we may not always agree on the road to get there or or what that looks like, but we all want this to be a great workplace, a safe workplace for employees.

And and I'll just repeat what I shared with them on Monday.

No disrespect, but if I have it my way, we our environment, our culture will be improved so much we don't need them.

That's my goal, right?

So totally.

No, I I appreciate that.

And I I mean we might we might philosophically disagree.

I mean, I think any sort of environment would need unions, you know, unless we have a you know fully actualized democratic economy where there's no no you know power imbalance there.

But I but I do I do hear you on that.

I mean I um I just you know, I I just worry like from what you know from DNS and from from early here, you know, it um it doesn't seem like our the what the workers have said aligns with even you know some of the stuff that's that's being said here.

I mean I just want to get it, and I think I have that commitment, but I want to get you know commitments from the departments that you know going forward we're gonna have um meet and confer and other processes so that these things don't happen.

So if if I could just the final uh comment.

If there are things that should be happening that are not happening, the Department of Employee Relations needs to know about that.

Okay, and so they should be reaching out to us to let us know.

And then we can look into those things and work with uh my colleagues so that we clean that up.

Because if if it's happening and it shouldn't be, it's because we don't know about it.

Okay.

And um for the for DNS, uh DPW here are are we committed to um like a as robust as possible meet and confer process with the union to ameliorate concerns that they have?

Yeah, I I think we discuss lots of topics with those, and and most recently, you know, we've we've allowed a lot of their folks to come into our public space areas to have conversations with employees.

So we've been constantly trying to build a relationship, and I think that's what I want to kind of put forward is we want a relationship, and we don't want to be adversarial to both sides.

Um we want to work as a compromise from a city perspective and the unions perspective to make sure, hey, I think I think we both have the same idea is to make sure employees are safe, they're compensated well.

Um so I think those conversations will continue.

That's great to hear.

I would just echo that from DNS's perspective.

We've had good productive conversations with the union when we sat down with them.

Uh there seems to be a disconnect between the statements that came out with that press release and what actually happened during those days on the ground and how we you know put our employees' safety paramount cool, and no, and I appreciate that.

Thank you.

And I I do want to acknowledge that that disconnect as well.

I mean, the way that we can avoid um, you know, that disconnect is is through robust conversation.

You know, I think I'm hearing from you that you know we need to have you know that both the union and management need to initiate those conversations um so that we're you know all on the same page here.

Um, as a as a former public sector worker, I you know it's it's so important that we have our on-the-ground workers being listened to and respected, and that we come up with we come with compromise and um and agreement, even if it's just through you know the meet and confer process, which is what's currently allowed under our statutes, um, and through the create you know, the shaping of policies here.

You know, we're I'm I'm totally open to the to my brothers and sisters, you know, who are uh our public sector workers and are in these unions.

You know, if you guys have ideas for changes in policy, I'm I'm totally open to you know putting those in and and having that go through the legislative process with the with the con you know with conferring with management, you know, on those.

I just um I really appreciate this and I want to see um such a robust process that there's not um this sort of like disconnect between what our union what our unions are saying publicly is what's going on behind the scenes and um what our departments are saying and our department heads are are claiming.

So yeah, happy to work with you clean that up.

Okay, thank you.

Excellent.

Thank you for that.

Any um any other comments or questions from code members?

I I do have a quick question, Mr.

Chair.

Um thank you.

Um I think one of the questions that I have is was there um you you all know how we received um like citywide for all staff, you know, you you receive a citywide email.

Was something like that shared out um to all employees with just talking about just specifically talking about because and and the reason why I asked is because I really didn't also understand sort of the magnitude of how bad it was.

I you know, obviously um we saw numbers about the air quality and um um but I didn't really understand the magnitude of it, and and so I was sort of trying to piece things together, and you know, yes, you know, different departments may have sent different things, but I just I I didn't feel necessarily equipped, like hey, if you go outside, make sure you wear an N95 mask, or I just yeah, so those few days was just really foggy.

Yeah.

Um yeah, so I I just wanted to make sure I didn't miss anything.

No, and and so good point.

When when there is a city wide decision, that goes out in mass.

Sure.

When there is discretion at the department level, that comes from the department directly.

So you wouldn't have made sense.

No communication.

Make sense, you know, and and I know this was you know, sort of the first time.

Um I hope in the future, um, you know, there there it's just I I think it was just education that I was that I was looking for to say, hey, this is happening.

Um if you you know need support.

This is you know, just on a citywide level, this is sort of the the protocol or you know um how to provide support, but it was just the education for me because I had no idea just how um sort of dangerous it was for you know individual or just how bad the air quality was.

So I and Commissioner Crush, you just remind me, I think the the health department sent something out in general.

I don't employees I saw that anybody who signs up, so there was that.

Yeah, thank you.

Thank you all so much.

Well, and it's always important to recognize that the city of Milwaukee leads so other uh organizations, public private, and other municipalities look to see what we're doing before they make their own decisions.

So I appreciate the early morning uh decision making uh from the city uh on this very hazy um set of circumstances.

And Mr.

Chair, really quick, uh you so just on even on that point, you know.

Um uh the uh mayor of Chicago literally came on, made like a public service announcement, and you know what I mean.

So I was just like, oh my gosh, like oh, it's really really bad.

So because it it just felt like there wasn't that urgency, you know, in our city, I was just like, oh, okay, the air is just bad, you know.

So again, lessons learned.

Um, and I'm hoping that we can, you know, move forward and just do better next time.

Just to be clear that the mayor, I and the health commissioner did go and did a press conference as well.

So they did a press conference on that.

Give Milwaukee credit too and I just yeah, no, that's good.

Yeah, I I must have missed it.

Thank you.

Thank you for sharing that.

It was a hazy morning.

All right, thank you very much.

Oh, real quick.

Um, I did want to um get uh another maybe level of exploration or commitment from from the departments.

Um and I know we're not you know made of money here, but I do want to explore to some extent how we can be prepared with PPE going forward.

So something like we have some of the city clerk's office, but like that's a very small department.

Um I know that there was uh I was told that there was some PP available at DNS.

I appreciate that.

Um so what can we do?

Can we explore so that we at least have the option of considering like how much is it gonna cost for us to have N ninety-five or higher grade masks or some other sort of PP available to workers in the event of something like this happening again?

It very well could happen next summer if this or some other type of situation that we don't know about could occur.

And I mean, you know, God forbid there's another pandemic um that happens that happens to us.

I uh you know, and we so I just want to see what we can do if I can get a commitment from departments to at least exploring, you know, that is an option um for the purchasing and so we have the supply ready to go should something unexpected happen.

Yeah, I mean from the Department of Public Works, we did have um a stock for all of our units, and I know and we had a com communication with the health department that also had masks available for pickup.

Um so right away, if my staff didn't have them, we could have picked them up between a coordination between the fire department.

But yes, I mean we talk about the next level, we're talking about full face re respirators and things like that.

Those are things a little more complicated because you're talking about an airtight fit.

It doesn't mean that we can't get those by any means, but those are usually customized, get expensive.

Um but we do want to protect our employees.

I mean, from an N ninety five five mass perspective, I mean the department does have those and will have those as we kind of move forward.

And I do see uh uh a tight fitting mask wearing department head on the board.

Uh Chief Lipske, did you have something you wanted to add?

Yeah, I just want to add that uh in real time as this was occurring the as mentioned the health department DPW, uh a number of us were in close coordination uh with a back stock.

We instantly in the fire department throughout Milwaukee County uh did a complete uh accounting for all back stock.

Uh and that we have these for regular usage for for medical purposes.

Uh it is important to note that N ninety-fives do have uh an end date.

They have an expiration date.

Uh they're still functional past that point, but in a litigious society, you might want to maintain the stock and keep them a little more current than COVID era.

Uh that costs money.

Uh I will also add that uh we we began preparing for and we had several walk-ups to fire stations of civilians asking for respiratory protection.

Uh I think that is another consideration uh if this sort of thing can be expected to continue.

Uh I think it's a consideration we may want to undertake as a city to provide protection for civilians.

Uh because they themselves aren't gonna be able to even if they sell these at Walgreens, they'll be overrun and out of stock very quickly.

That's just a suggestion.

I know that's outside the scope of what we're talking about, but uh if this if if we anticipate this continuum, we may want to have a contingency for that.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chief Lipsky.

Anything else?

All right.

Well, thank you very much for the the robust discussion.

I think it's helpful um for employees and and the public alike.

Uh Alder Woman uh Dmitrievich will move to place this item on file.

Hearing no objection, so ordered.

Thank you.

Thank you all so much.

Our next item on the agenda, item number six, file two six zero two five nine substitute resolution authorizing the Department of Employee Relations to execute a contract for administration of the city's prescription drug benefits.

Welcome uh Director King.

Good morning, Finance Committee member.

Uh just for the record, uh employee benefits director Molly King.

Thank you for taking up this file this morning.

Um I just wanted our purpose here is just basically to provide you with the overview of our prescription drug contract, the pro the RFP process and selection process.

Um with me online here is our partners at Gallagher, um Aaron, Casper and Proshki is on the line here also.

So if there are additional questions.

So as you may recall, we did come before you before for authorization to execute the RFP process because our current contract is set to expire at the end of this year, 2026.

And as the committee knows, pharmacy costs continues to grow.

So rather than just simply doing another extension, um, we decided to took this opportunity to conduct a full competitive RFP pro um process um to make sure that we're still getting the best value for the city and our members.

So DER employee um DER alongside with our partners at Gallagher led this RFP process.

Um we pulled together a team from various departments, uh, from including the mayor's office, budget office, ER employee retirement systems, the former retire uh benefits director.

We solicit his um uh services to be a part of this evaluation and review panel.

So it was just one department, we want a per wide perspective.

And the RFP process was done in a holistic manner, not just uh looking at cost, but overall perspective of everything else we want encompassing.

We look at how strong um these uh retail mailing uh mail orders, specialty pharmacy networks are so that members are not uh driving further away or have to wait longer to get their medication.

We look at how they manage specialty drugs and high cost drugs, which is a lot of the pharmacy spend are heading to that direction these days.

We look at rebates, not just how big the rebates are, but how transparent the vendors are by passing through that back to the city.

And we also took a hard look at the transition risk because switching pharmacy uh managers can mean a real disruption, both from a formulary standpoint and a network standpoint, and we want to ensure that our members are not services are not being disrupted.

Um it also could possibly mean new ID cars to ID cards, it could mean more education, new pharmacy, restarting our real new prioritization has to restart all over again.

So there were a lot of different factors we want to ensure not just for the city, but our members that we serve that all these areas are being um considered.

We also we wanted to know that whoever we choose can deliver savings without putting employees through any kind of upheal.

That was a big deal for us.

And so after we hearing all this, the conclusion was that we would stay with our United Healthcare um Optimarx carve-in program.

And the reason why we decided to do this is because it was a strongest option, really.

One of the biggest advantages of doing so is that keeping the pharmacy and medical benefits together um allows us to have a better coordination of care.

It helps identify care gaps, improve health outcomes, and manage costs more effectively than if we had a carve-out separated manager.

It created that two, you know, two different hands silos, so to speak.

And as a result of doing this negotiation was nothing, you know, it was it was well worth it in the effort because as a result, we were able to um get a savings of over north of 800,000 dollars.

Um so the proposed agreement also gives the city an important protection.

What it did is two things, a couple of things.

One, it includes a competitive pricing, rebate guarantees, a second year market check, and a flexibility to revisit the agreement if market condition change.

Because we know that's happening, right?

We see there's a lot of things going on at the federal level.

So one of the biggest components also that we consider part of this agreement was uh we know again the PBM or pharmacy benefits managers are transitioning, that whole world is being uphill at the federal level.

And we want to ensure that as the federal government and more transparency requirements are expected from these pharmacy managers, that whoever we chose can pivot and evolve quickly.

And and we know that currently United Healthcare is already on that path of um providing us with uh past through pricing model versus spread pricing model.

And so because of those and be because of their ability to so big they're able to adapt to the industry as it evolves much quicker than any smaller um participants would be able to.

Those the fact for those factors, um, we decided that this is the best direction at this time for us to move towards retaining the service with United Healthcare within a carve-in uh model, so we can have our two better our pharmacy and our medical talk to each other.

So we're so this is quite a so this is quite a big change, eight hundred and twenty-two thousand dollar savings.

But your letter writes that that's uh the included this included a revised formulary expected to save eight hundred and twenty-two thousand dollars, along with existing clinical and strategic exclusion programs that reduce costs.

Are we cutting benefits?

No benefits are expected to be covered by the code.

Nothing will be cut that's that's currently covered.

What's going to happen is you'll see things such as things that are no longer within um that are once was it within a patent, so to speak, are now becoming generic.

You'll see a lot of those um drugs becoming.

Yep.

And saving it.

Yeah, just before we move on.

And yeah, do you want to add Aaron or Proshki to this?

Yeah, the only um well, good afternoon or good morning, everybody.

Um Aaron Casper with Gagger Benefits.

Uh the only thing I would add there is that formulary um changes throughout that that happens on through any process.

Um the the savings area that you that you mentioned is is really taking a focus in on on just a handful of therapeutic classes that um would would be adjusted, but there would be alternatives available to those individuals, so it's a it's a very minimum uh impact this list in uh uh 1.5% of our population.

Can you give them membership?

Something that was covered that'll be an alternative now.

Boy, I'd I'd have to pitch left to Praty on that, um, maybe as an example on that formulary list.

If you could of course thank you, thank you, Erin.

Uh hello, uh everyone, good morning.

My name is Pratchi Raval.

I'm the clinical pharmacy consultant with uh with Gallagher.

So I did have the opportunity to look at the exclusion um which was less than one percent exact to be exact point nine percent of uh exclusions that are members that would be impacted, and it is very standard uh drugs that are particularly particularly being impacted.

One of the examples being levotiroxine, it is a thyroid medication, but the formulation of capsule is being excluded, but the tablets would be covered.

So that the exclusion is not necessarily that the whole drug as the drug as a whole is being excluded, some of the strengths or formulations, which uh could cost more to City is being excluded as part of this change, if that helps.

And then in your medical expertise, is a capsule less effect more effective.

Uh that there is no um impact of the formulation when it comes to capsule versus tablet.

It this is purely financial.

And you're making that determination from a medical perspective.

Correct.

This is based on my experience as a clinical pharmacist that uh depending on capsule versus tablet, it doesn't necessarily have any kind of clinical impacts until and unless there is any kind of medical necessity that is deemed where member is allergic to one ingredient over the other, and in that case, optum will provide a medical necessity approval as well.

Glad to hear that.

Um let's move it around for questions from committee members first.

Any anything to add or any concerns?

Oh, not many.

Uh Alderman Brower, you you um joined you came back uh when you heard United Healthcare.

Uh, was there something you wanted to add?

No, I'm just I'm just gonna listen.

I mean, I'll you know, I'll just add broadly that you know I think that we're you know, as a local employer, we're shouldered with so many of these costs until we move to a Medicare for all system here in the United States.

I mean, that's something I think that a lot of people can agree on that this, you know, um you know, the the cost of prescription drugs, the cost of an employee's health benefit um should not be an as far as an ideological perspective.

I don't believe it should be borne by the employer.

It should be portable, it should be provided by the government.

I mean, it's just um I appreciate the work of everybody, everybody here who's doing things to provide these, you know, for for our uh employees.

Um but overall this needs to be something that's you know a cost and a uh implementation that's borne by the federal government.

Um the um I guess what specific uh with this with this contract, just to confirm what I think I heard, but I want to make sure that I'm hearing everything right.

Um with this contract um for item six, does this result in a higher out-of-pocket or other cost for our employees?

This contract is a standalone.

This is just to get us for our next three-year agreement.

This is no plan design change.

The way when we you are on a second fly of the come, we'll talk about what our health care costs are unique to the city of Milwaukee would look like based on experience of their spending and things like that.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thanks for confirming that.

Just want to make sure I move.

All right, thank you.

Uh, Alder Woman Moore moves adoption.

Any objection to adoption?

Hearing that.

Before I move on, I want to thank the entire panel and evaluation.

I mean, it was no easy lift.

It was several days over and over meetings of interviews and learning things that most of us have never never heard or terms to pronounce and things like that.

So I really want to thank um all the participants and the evaluation panel for investing that time on this.

Well, and Ms.

King, congratulations on saving $822,000.

Thank you, sir.

Um Alder Woman Moore moves adoption, hearing no objection, so ordered.

Thank you all so much.

Um hold on, uh, don't go anywhere far.

Uh, item number seven, file two six zero two six two substitute resolution outlining the process and communication of twenty twenty-seven health and dental insurance premium rates.

Welcome, Director King.

Again, for the record, uh, employee relations benefits director.

Thanks again for having this file.

And it's early in early in this year compared to prior years where we bring us to you um in September, but um because of the the work day transition and staff limitations and things like that, we want to make sure that we get ahead of this information.

And where our partners are gallagher were able to provide us information sooner, so that was very thoughtful.

And as just as you know, just for um the record, uh our we work hand in hand with our consultant, our independent consultant Gallagher to help us um evaluate their actuary to evaluate um what our next year rates assumptions are going to be.

We're self-insured, remember.

So it doesn't matter what the cost, we have to pay it.

Nobody's paying this cost for us, right?

It's so but it's based on experience um of our utilization, industry trends and so forth.

The actuary at Gallagher consultant work alongside with us based on our experience to develop the the next year's 2027 um rate.

And with that, we are expecting to have a six percent increase in our medical uh premium for 2027.

And now I know it sounds high.

Um, this is coming from 104 dollars, for example, for a single coverage to 11 pre-tax dollars.

Um so six percent is high.

However, when we look at it compared to industry's uh standards, and I believe Aaron is still on there, he will tell you that most um PRCD are seeing close to double digit, if not higher, um in air increased costs.

So uh six percent we believe it's really not um out of whack by any means.

And I'm just so you know that since 2012, we've always been on their trend under the market and on there what our peers are doing.

So we take pride by that, and it's not just something that happens overnight.

I believe it happens because of all the proactive um things we put in place.

That includes our wellness program, having our clinic right next door.

One of the factors we're talking about now is consider having dispensary services right across there.

So people can go there and get that.

You can go right across the street right now and have a PCP visit.

And so we want to make sure we are where the employees are.

And you know, we talk about air quality and people breathing issue.

I go over there many times throughout the year when depending on the weather conditions for treatments.

So we are as our employer, we don't have to be reactive, we can be more proactive, and we have services close to where our employees are.

We're trying to do more of that.

As a result of that, I think it's reflective in these um premium increase.

While it's an increase, it's not as substantial as our partners and peers are seeing.

This increase also comes with no plan design change or no expected plan design change on this.

Um for early retiree, they're going to be expecting an 8.2% change.

As you know, there's already a retiree um plan that we have there pre-65 that the city still covered a retire early, and so we covered those employees.

And so they're going to expect 8.2% compared to last year, which was a 12.6% increase.

Our Medicare retiree program, as we know in 2026, this year, 2025, we did the entire robust process of transitioning to part A and Part B.

The city purview and move it out into Medicare.

And as a result of that, their medical costs is going to be zero dollar premium.

However, the pharmacy part D, which is still with the city, they're anticipated to see an increase, a substantial increase about 20 percent.

Given in 2026, they had a negative 26 almost 20%.

Um dental, we're expected, this is contractual, we have built in a 4% uh increase to our dental, that's for our delta dental and our care plus dental are expected a five percent increase.

Um what I'm hearing is that we were pretty smart to lock this in in contract because the market is trending way higher than that currently.

Uh we will be going out to RFB next year to do to negotiate these um dentist contracts.

Um then when it comes to vision, all of our voluntary benefits, we were very fortunate to work with our partners to retain all that flat.

So there are no increase to any of our um voluntary benefits.

That includes vision accident, um, critical illness, short-term disability, and long-term disability benefits.

And with that concludes uh my report and ask if you would consider approving this so that we can get start working on our open enrollment material and have all our rate charts and everything ready for open enrollment as well.

Thank you very much.

Comments, questions?

No.

Hearing and seeing none, Alderwoman Moore moves adoption.

Hearing no objection, so ordered.

Thank you so much.

Hold on one more.

Item number eight, file two six zero two six three substitute resolution authorizing the Department of Employee Relations to expand its current contract with the Mariflex for administration of the city's flexible spending, FSA and health reimbursement arrangement, HRA benefits.

Great.

Again, for the record, employee benefits director Molly King.

And again, thank you for hearing this file.

We came before you earlier this year asking for requests to do an RFP.

Unfortunately, we're still in the process to do our due diligence with the RFB, and that has not yet concluded.

Uh as a result of that, we're asking, because of timing, if we can have an extension for a one-year extension with our current contract at the same flat rate, they are not anticipated to increase any of the rates with our um Mariflex to administer our flexible spending account and our health reimbursement arrangement or HRA account.

Excellent.

Any questions?

Hearing none, Alderman Spyker moves adoption, hearing no objection, so ordered.

Thank you very much.

Thank you all.

Thank you.

Moving on to item number nine, file two six zero three nine eight resolution authorizing the issuance of sale of up to two hundred and seventy-five million dollars of revenue anticipation notes and a purpose for direct loan notes for the purpose of financing the operating budget for Milwaukee public schools on an interim basis.

Welcome, Comptroller Christensen.

And from the Comptroller's office, Jesse Higgan.

Jesse Haig.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

So this file seeks to authorize in a in a different uh a different type of borrowing than what we heard from before.

This is not contingent borrowing, which is intended to provide additional budgetary appropriations.

This is intended to address temporary cash flow issues that result from essentially a mismatch between the timing of revenues that the city receives and expenditures that the city makes.

And I'll caveat that with the fact that we the city is required by state statute, as some of you may be aware, to hold MPS's cash.

So MPS cash and city cash is essentially pooled together.

And when cash flow needs dictate that we may be at some point in the future potentially in jeopardy of not being able to make payroll, pay our bills, or make disbursements to MPS for them to do the same, cash flow borrowing becomes necessary.

So these are RANS, RANs, which stands for revenue anticipation notes, which is just as it sounds, it's notes that are issued in anticipation of revenue.

So this uh is not going to result in long-term debt service payments like contingent borrowing where we're paying it back over 10 or 15 years.

This will be paid back as in full through revenues that were are already um coming either well in this case uh to MPS.

Um thing I would note I know that the the headline number is 275,000 and you we get million.

Million, sorry.

Undersold as that.

Undersold is that 275 million dollars.

Uh but if you look at the the resolution and the resolved clause, it actually only authorizes 150 million dollars.

Uh and the reason for this is our our case.

Yeah.

Our our bond council advises us on how to how to draft these things, and uh due to previously authorized uh short-term borrowing, they ask us to fill it this way.

So it's only 150 million, and that is an up to amount.

So we are currently working, we we obtained some cash flow projections from the city treasurer's office, and we're currently working with MPS to refine those.

And with the idea being we want to minimize the amount that we borrow and the duration that we borrow for, so that costs can be interest costs can be minimized, and those interest costs are borne by MPS.

So the city is in this case merely acting as a as a pass-through.

We are executing the borrowing on their behalf, and MPS will pay back the principal with revenues that were already coming in, and uh interest with uh appropriations in their budget.

Um Jesse, if uh if I missed anything, feel free to chime in.

Yeah, that um that pretty pretty much covers it.

The idea is that you know the mismatch of revenue, you know, trying to make sure that the city isn't covering uh MPS's shortfalls at any time of the year, that they're able to have their own cash available for their own purposes, and so this kind of helps to uh smooth out those bumps in their revenue so that they can easily meet all their obligations.

Excellent.

Any questions from committee members or members presentation?

Hearing seeing none, Alderwoman Moore moves adoption.

Hearing no objection, so ordered.

Thank you all very much.

Thank you.

And now since it's past 1030, we will continue on with item number 10, file 260453.

Communication from the Department of Administration Budget and Management Analysis Division regarding vacancy requests, fund transfer and equipment requests.

We have no fund transfers or equipment requests the cycle, just a few vacancies.

And we'll start with property tax levy supported positions.

Department of Administration Information and Technology Management Division IT Support Specialist, three positions.

If there are comments or questions, please jump in.

Oh wow, I read that twice.

Library, custodial worker two, custodial worker two, auxiliary, library security guard, library securities services, library services supervisor, department of neighborhood services, building codes enforcement manager, program assistant two, office assistant three, four positions, district code enforcement supervisor, two positions, community commercial code enforcement inspector four, residential code enforcement inspector four, three positions, fire protection engineer, elevator inspector six, police department, police sergeant, three positions, captain of police, systems analyst, senior.

Department of Public Works Administration Division, Business Services Specialist, Department of Public Works Infrastructure Division, Locator Technician, Painter 4, Traffic Sign Worker, Street Services Manager, Office Assistant 4, Equipment and Tool Mechanic 1, City Hall Operator, Management and Accounting Officer, Electrical Workers, 4 Positions, Civil Engineer 2, Human Resources Representative, CAD and GIS Technician 3, Public Works Operation Division.

Vehicle Services Technician 4.

Program Assistant 1.

Anything on property tax levy supported positions?

Mr.

Chair.

Aldman Spike.

Just a general question for the budget office.

I think I've asked the version of this before, but you know, we're going into budget season after the break, and there will be a large gap that trying to uh fill.

Um so you know, customary to not fill positions or authorize the filling of positions if you don't intend to have them in the budget.

So I take it either things there's nothing here that's been giving you pause where you would want to freeze or hold off on filling.

I know some of these are very critical positions, but correct.

Yeah, we I mean we we did review these through the lens of the the mayor's proposed executive budget, which is in development.

And and um we're still you know a month and a half away from from that um being rolled out, but we're certainly actively considering positions, especially vacant positions that might be cut in order to fill the gap.

And so some were taken off this list and in consultation with the with the chair yesterday.

Um, but these these are not most likely on the list of cuts, or they're in areas of such high turnover that cuts might still be possible.

Okay, thanks.

Excellent.

Anything else?

Moving on to non-property tax levy supported positions, Department of Public Works Transportation Parking Services Supervisor, Department of Public Works, Waterworks, Water Meter Investigator, Water Distribution Investigator, Water Chemist, Customer Service Representative Three, Milwaukee Waterworks Maintenance Worker, Public Works Dispatcher 1, Public Works Dispatcher 2, Waterworks Human Resources Administrator.

Anything else?

Alderman Spiker moves approval.

Hearing no objections, so ordered.

Thank you for that.

Moving on, item 11, file 260454.

Communication from the Department of Administration informing the finance and personal committee of waivers granted for certain single or sole source contracts or contract amendments.

Welcome, Director Kelsey.

Good morning.

Uh other persons.

There are five, excuse me, six contracts included in today's file.

One contract for the Department of Community Wellness and Safety, three contracts for the health department, one for the fire department, and one contract where the funding uh resides in ITMD's budget, but the actual software is administered and managed by the health department.

Uh so the first contract included in the file is for the Department of Community Wellness and Safety.

This is the uh 4-1 for life violence prevention program contract with the Medical College of Wisconsin in the amount of $750,000 for a one-year contract term that ends the end of this year, um, December 31st, 2026.

The second contract for um just to pause on that briefly.

The contract started in January 1st, but now we're in the end of July.

Was it just a changeover or a rewrite of the contract because of the department change?

Yeah, there, yeah, yeah, uh the the delay was due to um you know the change in the structure of the department as well as some delays with negotiating terms, getting the required insurance and things of that nature.

Okay.

Anything else?

All right, please continue.

Thank you.

Okay.

The second contract is for the health department.

This contract is with standard bio tools incorporated for the purchase of a biomark automated genomic analyzer.

Um, this includes materials and services uh that uh will allow the health department, the lab, uh, to conduct surveillance, uh, monitoring and testing um related to emerging diseases and public health threats.

Um, this contract is established for a five-year term in the amount of approximately 418,000 with five annual options to extend.

The third contract is also for the health department.

This contract is with Sanders Medical Consulting to provide medical direction to the health department in the area of sexually transmitted diseases as well as family and community health.

Um matters.

This contract fosters um a contract amendment in the amount of approximately 47,000, increasing the total contract amount to roughly 92,000, and it also includes um one option to extend the contract through the end of July 2027.

The next contract is also with Sanders Medical Consulting.

This contract replaces the prior contract with uh Dr.

Saunders to provide tuberculosis medical expertise prevention and management services to the health department.

Um it is important to point out that on numerous occasions we did attempt to issue a competitive request for proposal without any responses.

And so we are in effect continuing to allow Dr.

Sanders to provide these services, frankly, at a very nominal um rate, comparatively speaking.

The next contract is for the fire department.

This contract is with first watch solutions incorporated.

Um this is the fire department's first watch watch, excuse me, dashboard uh system software platform that basically allows them to um manage you know field personnel, their resources, their fire engines, their pumpers, and evaluate um response times, etc.

Um, so this contract um amendment includes ongoing uh maintenance um support.

Um the amount of this contract amendment is 45,000, which is consistent with prior years um cost, which will yield a total contract amount of approximately 266,000 dollars.

The last contract um again, this contract is uh this software quick base is utilized um by the health department.

The funding resides in the information technology and management division of the department of administration's budget.

Um this uh particular software allows them to manage um workflows, business processes related to the lead program.

Uh this contract uh we we've increased the contract amount by roughly $54,000 for a total contract amount of now roughly $251,000.

And we've also exercised um one option um an additional option to extend the contract through uh the end of uh February 2027.

Um that's it.

All right.

Any comments?

Questions.

Uh Alderman Spiker moves approval.

I'm sorry, um, Alderman Speicher moves to place this item 11 on file, hearing no objection.

So ordered.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Moving on, item 12, file 260494, an ordinance relating to the deputy positions in the departments of community wellness and safety and compliance and engagement sponsored by Alderman Chambers.

I think the mayor's office is coming up for this as well.

No, so that's what I have in my notes.

Um, we're joined by Alderman Chambers on the board.

Uh welcome, Alderman.

Uh, good morning, Mr.

Chair and Committee members.

Um, you know, I will defer over to uh DER Andrea Nickerbacher and uh Director Reed um in regards to this file.

Thank you.

Good morning.

Morning, Andrea Knickerbacher, Department of Employee Relations.

Yes, this proposes a section 345-3 of the code to create officially deputy directors in the two departments uh of community wellness and safety and compliance and engagement, and then there is an item further on in the agenda that actually creates those classifications.

And uh this is a substitute.

We have a substitute in the file sub one from chimbers.

Okay, yep.

And what's the difference?

I can't on a original.

You can't pull up the sub because it's in the there was there was an original that spoke to special deputies, which is a different provision, but this is actually the creation of deputies.

So that was so that was title only.

Yeah.

Okay.

This is the only one that was in the file.

Okay.

Yeah, just the rich text format isn't coming up on the iPad.

Thanks.

Always good to burn a tree.

Oh, thank you.

For an extra cover.

Yeah, thank you.

Welcome.

Director, um, would you like to add anything?

Absolutely.

Uh good morning.

Uh Mary Reed, uh, director of the department of compliance and engagement here to reference uh the file in relation to the deputy position being created for the department.

I just wanted to add that uh we feel strongly that right now is the uh the perfect and opportune time to uh put in place a structure that supports continuity of services and operations and to support our staff and our team as we build, renew, and grow.

Uh there was an inquiry brought up about um costs and uh the budget, and I just wanted to uh share here uh with the committee that uh this position was classified from another position.

Uh we're also looking at uh restructuring uh uh vacant positions within our department.

We're currently operating at about a 40 percent vacancy rate.

And so we're looking at those vacant positions very carefully, and as opposed to rushing to fill those positions, we're strategizing to see where we can combine positions, uh make some necessary cuts or reclassify as we have done here.

Okay, that's what's uh anyone from DCWS wishes to Director Uh Tyler, I see you on the board.

Good morning.

Um forgive me for not being present.

I'm a little under the weather, but good morning, uh Mr.

Chair and com committee members.

So we're just uh reclassifying uh current position we had.

It was titled operations manager.

Um, but basically uh we feel the need to have a deputy director position um uh for different authorities we need uh within our department.

So if anything were to happen to me, they would be able to step in.

That was one of the reasons why um the former item in regards to MCW wasn't able to be signed.

One of the reasons was because I was going through the confirmation process and we didn't have a deputy to sign uh the contract, so we can't afford uh various delays in regards to the work, so we felt it was imperative to have a deputy director position in place.

One of the consequences of changing from an office to a department, you need a deputy.

Um comments from or questions from committee members?

Um Alder Woman Moore.

Thank you so much, uh Mr.

Chair.

Um do we already have people identified?

Um yes, we do.

So there is a proposed incumbent for this specially special deputy position.

This individual has been in a temporary role in this position uh since January.

They've shown tremendous capability in performing these uh the the functions of a deputy and their boots on the ground, ready to go.

They've already implemented a lot of strategies and ways to support the department and the community.

So we feel we have the opportune and the perfect person for the role.

Thank you.

Ms.

Tyler.

Yes, in regards to DCWS, we do have an interim operations manager um person in position, but we would um like to open it up to the community to uh do a fair process with Hangary.

So you do plan to submit a um what do you call that?

You do plan to um open it up instead of offering it to your current the current um operations manager, correct?

Correct, yes.

Got it.

Um I had one more question.

Uh job descriptions.

Um are those uh available at all or would be or will be created?

We didn't we did receive job descriptions and I believe there is a summary of the position later in the classification report, but there are job descriptions and would you like to see them?

Yes.

Okay, I'll make sure those are I think I made a request.

Uh I sent you the job description.

Yeah, I'll say that.

Thank you.

Yeah, yeah.

Would you uh can you uh copy uh the Chris Lee so that we can add it to the legislature files?

Yes.

Okay, thank you.

And then um I did uh respond back over to um the office of community, excuse me, the department of community wellness and safety.

Um so Ms.

Tyler, if you can please make sure that the job description as well gets to us.

We'll do thank you.

Mr.

Chair.

Uh Alder uh anything else, Alderman Moore.

No, thank you so much.

Um I guess uh uh director Tyler, you had mentioned that um there were certain contracts that couldn't be signed while you were on an interim basis, and um in the future, should that happen, the deputy could sign in your study did I misunderstand that?

Okay, and prior when um OCWS was an O, an office within the Department of Administration, um, who would have signed off on that if there were an interim?

That would have been Steve Mahan.

So the department had.

Okay.

Although he was on an interim basis as well.

He's in the title of deputy of administration.

He was he was interim director, but he still held the deputy title, and so he still had the permission to sign.

So what sorts of um duties would the deputy have to discharge that if there were no um department head, uh what sorts of duties would they have uh be entitled to discharge, otherwise nobody would be able to discharge them.

So the signing of this one contract you mentioned.

Are there other cases?

I could share uh well for DCWS and then for DC Sure.

So um so basically contact uh sign uh contract signing for sure, um, signatures for cost reports and just different funds, um, as well as uh positions, there's special uh signatures for for that.

So just any kind of authorization that will come from the director, the deputy could step in and take that um and make that authority.

I'm sorry, make that um approval.

Okay, and then um same question, Ms.

Reed.

Yeah.

Uh to add to that to contracts, also purchase orders, PCAR purchases, uh, travel, training requests, um, leave, uh matters involving department of employee relations, a lot of those require uh multiple signatures or a leadership role uh signature that if the director is not available, uh we need a deputy to be able to approve those.

Okay.

And I guess maybe we save this discussion for when we get into the classification studies.

But one question I'll have is the relating to the role and how it's changed, and it's not like you all haven't added employees.

In fact, you have a standing vacancy issue.

Um, same for DCWS.

So if we're not adding employees and in DCWS, we're kind of changing the title.

Um how are the responsibilities increasing to justify the significant increase in pay?

But we can we can save that for when we get to the classification studies.

Okay, any um anything else checked the board?

Right.

Uh Alderman Spiker.

Uh no, thanks.

Um we'll decline.

So Alder Woman Moore will move adoption of file of item number 12.

Any uh discussion on that motion.

Any objection?

Hearing none.

So ordered.

Thank you very much.

Moving on to item number 13, file two.

Mr.

Chair, Alder Woman Moore.

Please forgive me.

Um for item.

Um it was our contracting item for um 41 for life.

Um, if you can put me as an abstention um to that particular item.

Uh that would go back to item number 10.

Um yes.

And um, we don't need to reconsider.

All right, well, um, hearing no objection, we'll note your abstention for the first one.

The first one, yes.

Thank you so much.

I appreciate that.

All right, item 13, file 260518.

Communication from the fire department amending the positions ordinance to add positions relating to a youth carpenter apprentice program.

Welcome, Chief Lipske.

Hi, thank you very much.

Uh Chief Lipsky Milwaukee Fire Department.

We're excited to uh put this forward.

Uh specifically, what we're trying to do is uh mimic something we've done with our youth mechanic apprentice program, which we're starting to realize successes uh both for the city but also for the youth that are involved.

We just had a youth mechanic apprentice uh resigned from the fire department for a good reason because they were hired by DPW.

Uh so it is a pipeline worth investing in, and we would like to do the exact same thing uh with our department carpenter.

And so we're asking for two uh partslash full-time uh positions.

Uh and uh it'll start with one person.

Uh after that first year they'll move to uh an advanced program, and then we'll bring in another new person.

So the idea would be we'd always be moving two people through.

Uh that is the gist of it.

Um a pipeline or hose from the fire department.

Great.

I appreciate that.

Ums or discussion on the item.

Any comments or discussion on the item?

Hearing none elder woman more moves to place this item on file.

Thank you very much, Chief Lipsky.

Hearing no objections, so ordered.

Moving on, item 14.

File 260455 communication from the Department of Employee Relations relating to classification studies scheduled for fire and police commission action.

Welcome back, Director Knickerbacher.

Thank you.

Yes, in the fire department, classification of a youth carpenter apprentice in the police department for the crime intelligence manager and the crime analysts.

There's a request to change the crime and intelligence manager to be non-exempt because of the amount of overtime the position is working.

And also for the crime analyst related to recruitment to uh increase the recruitment rate for those titles, but the pay ranges remain the same.

In the police department, that's a classification of a new position of a budget manager dash police.

Police services specialist request the department to have those instead be police services specialist investigators because of the need for additional services to the department on background checks and such.

And also in the police department and accounting coordinator one to be an accounting coordinator two based on increased responsibilities.

And finally, in the Department of Emergency Communication, the reclassification of a vacant position to administrative specialist senior to work with the director and oversee staff excellent.

Alderman Specker.

And this might be for the Department for the Crime Analyst positions or the Crime and Intelligence Manager.

I didn't see anything in there about any sort of competence with AI.

Anyway, but uh it would be good to know if uh if we're looking forward in hiring our new crime analysts to make sure they're acquainted with emerging trends, like very basic ones.

So I don't know if the department can answer that or anybody.

I mean, Miss Knickerbacker, if you want to take a crack at it, you can go ahead.

I'm not familiar with that aspect of the job description.

Um is there anyone on the board from the police department?

I thought I saw April.

Yes, good morning.

This is April Wandu, Human Resources Administrator with the Milwaukee Police Department.

I can certainly find that information out for you all and make sure that you receive that.

Okay, thanks.

And is this bus this isn't a position with an OMAP?

It's in CIB or where is the position?

Um so we do have um vacancies in our um OMAP section as well as our fusion division.

Okay, yeah, and those are two areas where I would expect that sort of competent.

We need somebody with a basic knowledge to drive to keep track of what's going on.

So all right, thanks.

Yeah, please let the whole committee know.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

Appreciate that.

Uh anything else?

Alderman Spiker moves to place this item on file, hearing no objection, so ordered.

Thank you.

Moving on to item 15, file 260456 communication from the Department of Employer Relations relating to classification studies for City Service Commission.

Action.

Thank you.

Uh for the city attorney's office.

Um, Director Nickerbaccher.

Thank you.

Sorry.

Uh City Attorney Administrative Division.

This is the creation or repurposing of a couple of positions to be supervisors over staff instead of just leads to assist with the day-to-day.

And the recommendation is a legal administrative supervisor and a legal office assistant supervisor.

In the Comptroller's office, uh, based on changes in duties and responsibilities, uh, the creation of an accounting services supervisor because of the volume of work and level of work.

In the and here are the the deputy in the department of compliance and engagement, the classification officially of a compliance engagement deputy director, and that's a repurpose of a current equal rights complaint liaison.

So just reusing the position authority for a different title.

And uh also in that department create repurposing an administrative specialist senior to be a business operations specialist senior, and finally, uh just a retitle of a racial equity and inclusion coordinator to instead be a compliance and engagement coordinator.

In the Department of Public Works Operations Division, these are a couple of positions in the Sanitation Division.

All of the positions there, there's there's one current position of a communication assistant for, and the other two titles have were different.

One was a communication assistant three, and one was an office assistant for, but in truth, all three positions are doing the same duties and responsibilities.

So we were gonna make that also those also communication assistant force.

In the Department of Public Works Operations Division, a repurpose of a currently vacant vehicle body repair painting tech to instead be a vehicle services technician for because of the needs in the in the area.

And then the Department of Public Works, Waterworks, creation of a couple of titles, uh using the position authority of water repair worker three and creating a couple of um lower level titles, water distribution investigated helper two, and a water distribution investigator helper one.

In ERS Information Systems, uh reclassification based on additional duties and responsibilities and level of knowledge and skill to an information cybersecurity manager in the municipal court.

This is only a title change.

Uh we did have the title of court social worker coordinator, and we're changing it to court alternative services coordinator because we found that it's not absolutely essential that that position be a social worker in the municipal court also a bit of a reorganization.

There's one position that's being eliminated, and the duties and responsibilities are going to the deputy, as well as these other positions that will become supervisors, taking a court service assistant lead, making an administrative services supervisor, and a municipal court clerk lead and making that a court operation supervisor.

And that the court is reducing by one position.

And also based on need taking a position of a medical assistant and instead creating an additional public health educator too.

Soon it will be done.

Also in the health department, uh public health compliance officer.

This is a change based on changes to the position to a higher level.

And the clinic office coordinator instead to have the department have a public health compliance analyst.

So they're shifting uh based on needs in the department.

The next is just a title creation of an accountant two currently in the salary ordinance.

We have an accountant three and an accountant one.

And this is an accountant two.

And and and there's a backstory to that, but this provides the entire city's uh we'll save the backstory for after the later.

Much much later.

Um in the common council city clerk's office, an executive administrative assistant, placing that position instead in the temporary non-benefited series in the nines.

Uh so that's that's the change.

Uh the pay range is different, but the minimum recruitment rate remains the same.

And in the library, creating several titles for the library to use in their temporary pool when they bring in temporary uh librarians, and in this uh case it would be temporary librarians one and two.

So no additional positions, just the titles.

And I'm finally done.

All right, thank you.

Any comments?

Uh Ms.

Yeah, I guess for the so this is not one of the wholesale things that we've finished.

This is just individual departments, it's not like you look to no more market studies.

Um with respect to the deputy positions that we approved earlier their existence, but this gets into the details of what they'd be expected to do.

I guess I have questions for both of the departments there for Department of Compliance and Engagement and also for Department of Community Wellness and Safety.

Um my earlier thoughts were um I understand the extra duties with respect to signing stuff.

That's more an insurance policy, it's not a day-to-day thing, I suppose if the director is is doing that job typically, maybe when she's on vacation or something.

Um the departments be by becoming departments and not merely offices haven't increased um markedly in size.

Um they still kind of run the same, so why do we have I mean it's clear with uh um DCWS where you take an operations manager position and now call it a deputy position, and then there's a substantial increase.

Um the position in DCE is is different.

It's going from the equal rights complaints liaison to compliance and engagement deputy director.

Um but that increases, you know, almost double.

Um so the overall question is what's changed, what else are they being expected to do by just shifting to this department role now that would justify that massive an increase because it it kind of sticks out like a sore thumb?

Yes, to speak to the DCE deputy position, uh that role has been in a temporary appointed position with an increase since January in that temporary capacity, so they are no longer at the equal rights complaints liaison salary.

Uh so what we're seeing there, it looks like, and these are very very rough numbers, about a $37,000 increase.

But I'd like to uh iterate that um this person, this person in this position has taken on uh not only and is currently doing uh the role of deputy, which is managing and supervising staff on the team, creating policies, processes, working closely with community organizations to bolster our programs, working directly with uh ITMD uh to have created a complaints intake system which is going live very soon.

Um they also continue to do the equal rights complaints liaisoning, uh staff the equal rights commission, and so what we're gonna do with those two vacancies is combine them.

What that amounts to is a net one FTE savings for the department.

So although this individual uh did is will is expected to receive a substantial increase for the added duties, uh, because we're combining the two positions that she's also manning right now, uh we actually uh end up in a net savings.

So the current role uh so there's the equal rights complaint liaison, which she had occupied, and then there was another role that had a body in it at one point.

And what was that role?

Equal rights specialist.

Okay.

So the equal rights specialist position is or the liaison position is no more, or which correct, they're being combined.

So the specialist and the liaison are gone, replaced by the compliance and engagement deputy, which does what they did and maybe more.

Well, actually, the equal rights complaints, the equal rights specialist was uh held one by an individual who is no longer with us, so that position is vacant.

So this individual's uh previous role as complaints liaison along with that vacant role will be combined.

So the vacant role will be gone, it won't be in next year's budget.

Well, it'll be it'll be what we'll call it, what we intend on calling it is a compliance and engagement specialist with where they will be responsible for the equal rights complaints, staffing the equal rights commission, and taking on some ADA coordination duties.

So you won't really be eliminating a position and replacing it with one, which would bring about a real savings.

You're gonna hang on to that position, fill it, and then eliminate the lesser position of equal rights complaint liaison, and the new person will be doing some of the duties of both.

It there's there's I'm confused about how we're eliminating one FTE if it's gonna pop up in next year's budget again.

So that that new role will actually combine three roles equal rights complaints liaison, equal rights specialist, and ADA coordinator.

Okay, so we're getting rid of the ADA coordinator.

We're not getting rid of it.

We're gonna have that new role take on those responsibilities.

Uh we've done some studying within our department, we've monitored those positions, we've done time studies, uh, we've looked at the amount of responsibilities that are taking on taken on by that role, and we found we feel strongly that one FTE can manage those duties efficiently.

So the ADA coordinator position will be no more in the next budget, and there'll be some other position that covers the ADA coordinator responsibilities that used to exist and more besides?

Yeah, I wouldn't say it would be gone, right?

Well, will it be in the budget?

Will it say ADA coordinator one?

It may not say ADA coordinator.

We found that according to uh title two, uh, that the position doesn't necessarily have to be titled ADA coordinator.

We just need to make sure that we have a position that takes on ADA coordination responsibility.

No, I'm not accusing you all of ignoring the ADA.

Yes.

Um, but uh okay, so there's three positions uh now that will go down to two positions, one of them being this new deputy who and between the two people they will cover what the three did before.

That's correct.

Okay.

So then it isn't it isn't just swapping one role for another and doubling the salary, then that is correct.

Okay.

And then for DCWS, um, if I may, Mr.

Chair.

Please.

Um for DCWS, same question.

Uh so Ms.

Tyler, you were in the uh operations role for many years.

What's different about the deputy role that would justify um the substantial increase in pay, given that the department hasn't increased in size, given that the responsibilities I would assume would be pretty much the same except for the insurance of signing when you're not available.

Yeah, so I mean, basically it is just reclassifying the position.

So we do so we do have uh someone to authorize when I'm not present, but then also uh the additional roles uh just coming into our own department, uh uh with DCWS, we have emergency situations we have to deal with, delegation of not only staff but uh the entire uh community violence intervention ecosystem.

Um, you know, there may be different things that happen, like team takeovers or different things like that.

So um we have a lot of challenges.

There well, you gotta think we we have a lot of additional open positions, like for an example, we don't have a HR uh person, so they would have to take on some of those as well as uh financial duties.

We have a grant compliance I'm sorry to interrupt coordinator, but we didn't we pass a resolution in I author and didn't the council pass a resolution saying DOA don't be jerks, help out your colleagues in these little newbie departments.

So now I'm being told no they don't wanna, and that's why we need a separate HR and finance person under this new deputy role.

Uh I think there's just I'm sorry.

I'm sorry, I just wanted to mention um it does not have the ability to stand in for those responsibilities.

Each department would have its own independent authority, so they'd have their own independent authority, but does it require that there's anything other than a more ministerial role being played by that person as opposed to an active HR and active finance person like you would have in a huge large department?

I mean, these are very tiny departments now.

Yes.

And they again the staffing is fairly minimal, so it's just hard to justify that sort of.

I mean, I was skeptical in the um DCE role too, until we had the explanation that actually you're taking three roles down to two, and so that's a measure of savings, but I'm not seeing anything similar in this case.

And I guess what I heard from the director sounded a little vague in terms of what the uh what the new deputy is gonna do that the old one doesn't.

But I I guess you're saying, Ms.

Tyler, Director Tyler, that they're taking on HR and financial roles, which now are paramount to play because of the department becoming a department instead of the uh division.

Uh yes, and it's similar to DCE as well.

Um we have several open positions, and then they would have to cover um those positions or delegate to staff and just look at the operations uh to see how we can fill that.

So right now we're currently at seven positions.

Um you know, with the So are you cutting positions similar to DCE that would justify this because now instead of N people doing the job you have N minus one, and so you can pay one of those people more?

Um you know, with the so are you cutting positions similar to DCE that would justify this because now instead of N people doing the job, you have N minus one, and so you can pay one of those people more like if they're sorry, yeah.

Yeah, so if you had five people um doing a job, and now you're gonna knock it, you're gonna eliminate a position and knock it down to four, then that would justify maybe paying uh at least one of those people more because now they're taking on responsibilities that used to be carried on by somebody uh another FTE.

If that's that's what was going on in DCE.

If that's not what's going on in DCWS, love our acronyms, um, then what would justify the because you can't just say, well, there's a vacancy, and so now they're gonna have to do something till we fill that job once that position is filled, then there would be somebody playing those roles, and the deputy would no longer have to play them.

Correct, yeah.

So I mean, they would need to do that anytime there was an opening, but then also there's other responsibilities now that we are a standalone department.

Um again, going back to our financial needs and our HR needs.

Um, they would have to uh cover those responsibilities.

Okay, I think I've asked enough questions.

Thank you.

All right.

Anything else?

Well, I'll be in objection to the DCWS one.

All right.

Um other questions from coding committee members or members on the board.

Alderwoman Moore moves uh to place this item on file, noting Alderman Spiker's objection for DCWS.

She'll be manifest in later files.

Looking forward to it.

Um hearing no other objections or comments, uh, so ordered.

Item number 16, file 260-521 communication from the Department of Employer Relations relating to the bilingual designation for one position of licensed specialist two in the common council city clerk's office license division.

Welcome, Deputy Clerk.

Welcome.

And and this file does exactly what you say is to provide that designation for an additional licensed specialist too.

Any comments, questions?

I wanted to come up with the bilingual joke, but I'll refrain refrain from it.

Um Alder Woman Moore moves to place this item on file.

Thank you very much.

Hearing no objections so order.

Thank you.

Moving along, 17260523 communication for the department of employer relations amending the salary ordinance to provide an incentive rate for public health nurses assigned to the sexual sexual and reproductive health section in the health department.

Yes, and this this is one area that the Director Nicker, welcome.

Andrea Knickerbacher, Department of Employee Relations.

It's recorded people chop it up and understood.

Yeah.

Um the department has the most difficulty recruiting and retaining in this area.

Um, as opposed to other public health nurse positions.

This is the most like a clinical setting, and and the work is difficult, and sometimes people prefer other work.

So this gives a seven percent increase for any individuals that would transfer into that section or recruited externally.

And this is part of our effort to increase the ability for the health department to keep and recruit nurses.

Rebuild that that facility and so that we don't have to shut it down or cut their hours.

Exactly.

Very good.

Any questions about this?

Alder Woman Moore moves to place on file, hearing no objections so ordered.

Item seven item 18 moving right along.

Okay, file 260456 communication from the Department of Employer Relations amending the salary and positions ordinance relating to clerical or administrative corrections.

And these are corrections to the ordinance.

Any questions, concerns?

Alder Woman Moore moves to place on file.

Hearing no objections, so ordered.

Moving on.

Item 19.

260419 substitute resolution relative to acceptance and funding for the 2026-2027 HIV partner services grant from the Wisconsin State Department of Health Services.

I believe we have someone from the Health Department online.

Hi, good morning, Council members.

Um, my name is Becca Anderson, Grant Budget Specialist with the Milwaukee Health Department.

Um this file is a renewal for our HIV partner services grant from the Department of Health Services.

And it just covers about a half an FTE of one of our disease intervention specialists, three.

And this file was uh referred from the public safety and health committee.

Um thank you very much.

Any questions on that?

Alder Woman Dmitrievich moves adoption, hearing no objections, so ordered.

Item 20, 260421 resolution relating to the acceptance and funding for a 2026 Milwaukee Metropolitan Drug Enforcement Group Program Grant from the police department.

This is also referred from the public safety and health committee from the police department.

Uh Ms.

Decker.

Hello, good morning, Patricker.

Um PD.

The 2026 MDEG grant will fund a portion of salary and fringe benefits for three department members assigned to the Milwaukee Metropolitan Drug Enforcement Group Task Force.

Thank you.

Any questions on this item?

Hearing and seeing none, Alderwoman Dmitrieevic moves adoption.

Hearing no objections, so ordered.

Thank you.

21.

Mr.

Chair, could I be recorded in the affirmative for the items I missed?

Hearing no objections of uh so ordered.

Thank you.

Item 21, 260422, resolution relating to the acceptance and funding of a homeland security web STAC and uh analysts position 2024 grant.

Also referred from public safety and health.

Ms.

Decker.

Good morning, uh Patrick Decker, MPD.

This grant will fund seven and a half months of salary fringe benefits, overtime and travel training costs uh for four staff in the stack.

Is this just an old grant that's extended or it's a multi-year grant?

This is a new iteration of a grant that we've received many years in a row.

So it's a it's a new grant.

It's a new 2024 grant.

Okay.

Yes, it's um from the parent grant.

This is a um a grant from the states.

The parent group is a federal grant, and that's 2024 money that the state is awarding.

No, thank you for that.

Alderman Spiker moves adoption, hearing no objections, so ordered.

Item 22, 260458, substitute resolution authorizing attendance at conventions, seminars, and other travel.

Any questions?

Concerns?

Alder Woman Dmitrievich moves adoption.

Um Mr.

Chair.

Alderman Spiker.

I guess I can ask Dana after.

Never mind.

I'll I got a question about the leak, but I'll ask Dana after.

Thanks.

Okay.

I'll uh hearing no other discussion on the motion.

Any objection?

Hearing none, uh the item is adopted.

Item 23, 260460, substitute ordinance to further amend the 2026 rates of pay of offices and positions in the city service.

This reflects earlier action.

Any comments?

Alderman Spiker moves passage.

Um noting a objection for uh that was already expressed in item uh that was fifth seven, no fifteen was an item.

Noting uh Alderman Spikers well, then we'll have uh Alder Woman Moore move passage for item 23, noting Alderman Spikers objection to part of item 15.

Any objection on to that motion hearing none so ordered and 20 uh item 24 file 260459, a substitute ordinance to further amend the 2026 offices and positions in the city service.

Uh reflects earlier files.

Alder Woman Moore moves passage and this mic and uh noting Alderman Spiker's objection from item 15.

Previously hearing no objection so ordered.

That concludes our business today.

Have a wonderful rest of your day.

This meeting is adjourned.