San Diego Budget Review Committee Meeting on FY18 Communications Department Budget - May 10, 2017
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San Diego Budget Review Committee Meeting on FY18 Communications Department Budget - May 10, 2017
The Budget Review Committee (BRC) of the San Diego City Council met on May 10, 2017, at 5:30 PM to review the proposed FY18 budget for the Communications Department. The meeting was chaired by Barbara Bree, with Council President Cole, Councilmember Kate Sherman, and Councilmember Gomez present. No public testimony was offered. The committee heard a presentation from Communications Director Katie Keach and discussed the department's performance, budget adjustments, and upcoming initiatives.
Discussion Items
- FY18 Communications Department Budget Presentation: Director Katie Keach presented the proposed budget, highlighting a slight overall increase of just under $70,000 and a reduction of 2.5 positions (a vacant senior public information officer, an executive secretary who transferred within the city, and an unused hourly intern position). She reported that the department is on track to meet its key performance indicators, including 52 features posted online. Social media engagement has grown significantly: Facebook likes increased from 4,400 to over 6,200, and Twitter followers rose from under 3,000 to nearly 5,300 since July 2016. The department also centralized communications functions and is developing a citywide photo library, a social media policy (including personal use for employees), and a citywide communications plan that serves as a living document.
- Revenue Projections: The Independent Budget Analyst (IBA) representative, Trisha Tackey, noted that the department's revenue projections were discussed in the IBA report, but no additional comments were needed. Director Keach clarified that the current year's expenditures are under budget by approximately $24,000, mitigating the revenue shortfall and ensuring no undue impact on the general fund.
- Vision Zero Education Campaign: Councilmember Gomez and Council President Cole expressed support for the campaign. Director Keach confirmed that the campaign will target all roadway users, with a "heads up" message against distracted walking, driving, and biking. The department plans to use Cox Communications PSA packages (earned media) for the campaign, and it will be part of a broader Vision Zero plan presented to the council.
- Community Outreach and Engagement: Councilmember Gomez emphasized the need for better communication during community plan updates (e.g., Claremont and Kearney Mesa). Director Keach noted that the department is exploring tools like Facebook Live for meetings and suggested door hangers as an effective outreach method, as recommended by the chair. The department works with client departments to develop tailored communication strategies.
- Social Media Policy: The social media policy is under development, with a draft focused on departmental accounts. The department is collaborating with HR to add a personal use policy for employees.
Key Outcomes
- No formal votes were taken; the committee received the presentation and discussed the budget.
- The BRC will hold an evening hearing on Monday, May 15, 2017, at 6 PM to take additional public feedback on the budget.
- The committee will reconvene on May 18, 2017, to review the May revise and the 2017 year-end budget monitoring report.
- Final budget modification priority memos are due to the IBA by May 22, 2017.
Meeting Transcript
Good morning, everyone. Welcome today. Forum is now present, consisting of Council President Cole, Council members Kate Sherman, Gomez, and myself, Barbara Bree, the chair. Clerk, please introduce the item and then proceed with any public testimony. Thank you. Currently, we have no public testimony. Our presentation this morning is on the communications department. Director Katie Keach is here. Ms. Keach, how much time do you need for your presentation? We have two and a half hours, right? I'll take four and a half, five minutes. Thank you. Sure. Good morning, Chair Bree and Committee. I'm Katie Keach, Director of the Communications Department. And with me today is Esther Warinitz, our senior management analyst. Our deputy director, Tracy Morales is chairing an interview panel to fill one of our two vacancies, and is sorry she can't be here today. We are happy to present to you the proposed FY18 communications department budget. And as much as I'd like to take the full time this morning, Esther's daughter is in labor with her first grandchild. So we're going to keep the presentation somewhat limited, and then I'll take all your questions. Also to include more internal communications as well. And this is done with a team of dedicated professionals who love all the opportunities and challenges that we get to deal with every day. Starting July 1st of 2016, for example, we had about 4,400 likes on Facebook. This is for the official City of San Diego account. And just under 3,000 followers on Twitter. As of Monday, the Facebook likes have jumped up to over 6200 with Twitter followers at just under 5300. We've also further centralized communications functions of the city. Obviously, this is a key factor in making our government more accessible to more people. And a shout out to Jason Hendrick, who is directing City TV for the first time today. And this has been a major project that we've been working on with the IT web team this year. It was not foreseen as a part of our work plan, but we're happy we're making this happen this fiscal year. It's going to make a big difference for information sharing and employee engagement for all of our 11,000 employees. We've seen, as I said, a steady increase in engagement with the city's social media accounts on Facebook and Twitter, and next door also continues to grow. We're considering some options to further strengthen our engagement in the coming year on those channels, and also increasing our content and engagement on link on LinkedIn and Instagram. LinkedIn, just for a moment, want to mention we we've learned it can help us target information to very specific audiences and segments. Um and we see great opportunities for topics like recruitment, economic development, and incentives, innovation, and also our finance sector. We're also looking forward to building a citywide photo library. Wanna share a note about our key performance indicators? We'll absolutely hit the mark of our 52 features posted online, but we're moving the content from inside San Diego to our department website in FY18 and focusing on promoting it via social media and other means because we found that to be more effective than having a separate site. Um our proposed budget includes over a slight overall increase of just under $70,000 and a reduction of 2.5 positions. In more detail, the positions proposed for reduction, our senior public information officer position, which is vacant, our executive secretary, which was filled until last Friday and is now vacant, as she already found a good great landing spot staying with the city. And our hourly intern position, which we haven't used in the last year. And I also finally want to briefly mention our revenue projections as I know that's of interest. What's not shown in the budget, the proposed budget or in the IBA's report is that our expenditures for the current year are also under budget. And this means our overall year-end budget projection is will be coming in approximately $24,000 under budget. And that takes and that takes our overall revenue shortfall into consideration. So that means the general fund is not being unduly impacted. This year we've done all the work asked of us by our enterprise funded clients. The work that they needed just didn't amount to what was projected last year.
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