Good morning.

It is May 7th.

This is the budget and public employees committee is 9 39.

Madam Clerk, please call the row.

Auto Woman Sanyer.

Vice Chair Browning.

Present.

Auto Woman Velasquez.

Alderman Devotee.

Present.

Chair Aldrick.

Present.

Auto Woman Sanyer.

Auto Woman Velasquez.

Three present.

Thank you.

With that, we have a uh call to roll.

Next order of business will be item number four board bills for review, which is board bill number one, which is a FY27 budget fiscal year.

Uh budget.

Uh we are holding that, and we are going to item number six, which is committee discussion.

Today we will hear from the building division, followed by corrections, uh small little break in between.

To get started, we have the building division here.

Uh so if they want to come on up, whoever's presenting the budget, state your name, your title, and if you have any members here with you from your team that you want to introduce, and then you can jump right on in.

Uh there's a little button to turn that mic on.

And we've also pulled up the presentation.

There we go.

Uh no.

What about now?

Yeah, we can.

Just make sure you speak, you speak into it.

Okay, how's everyone doing today?

Good.

So I am Tim Jeffries.

I'm the acting building commissioner for the city of St.

Louis.

And I did bring a little team with me today.

I will introduce.

We have Dylan Moser, he's the deputy building commissioner.

Marcus Sanford, he's our accountant.

And John McLaughlin, program manager too over vacant buildings, problem properties, and so forth.

So we'll I guess we'll get right into this.

So see the first slide.

Dora.

Aura.

That's not the first one.

Can you go back one?

There you go.

The mission.

Okay.

I will start by just reading this to you, and then we'll talk about our mission.

Building division does enforce the city building code issues building permits, conducts inspections, demolishes vacant buildings, and enforces the zoning code to ensure the health safety and welfare of the citizens of St.

Louis.

And as a mission statement, that pretty much sums up what we do.

There is uh some things that we we do in the building division that probably need to be worked on as far as a mission of ours.

If you have people are aware of some problems we've had.

I thought I think we have a good operations in place, but we probably need to do what we do better, maybe more efficiently as moving forward in the future.

So that's can we go to the next slide?

Next slide.

Okay.

Getting into the operations, the overview and the functions.

We are broke down into 14 separate sections.

As you can see here, inspections, trades, plan exam.

A lot of these are are to support what we do, which is code enforcement.

So we're bound by the uh the ICC building codes is what we adopt.

We're on the 2018 cycle now.

So when we adopt the codes are adopted pretty much verbatim, and we change them within the the abstract is where you change anything you see in the abstract is the only the changes to the code.

We don't we don't adopt the appendix unless you specifically adopt it, which we do for the floodplain.

That's I think that's one of the one of the only ones we do.

Um, but we also have standalone ordinances like HCD, the cold air mold, which some of those are more recent short-term rental, which is on hold right now.

We have a hold on from a judge, and like rental registry.

So we we we get into uh anything, anything code related and enforcement.

We take uh CSB calls too, you know.

For that's that's more property maintenance issues, and that which in turn will get you back into the vacant buildings and the some of the derelict properties.

Okay, next slide, please.

All right, we're gonna talk about accomplishments.

I made a short list.

There's probably more than this, but this was kind of short term for me.

So we recently installed the pay credit card system, which is now up and running.

We it's been there for a little bit.

We now have it up and going.

Um, but because of the online building permits, which is new.

I have that up there.

Blue beam software.

I think the online is going really well.

It it's taken up a lot of the probably the in-house, you know, to credit card system because you can pay online, you can download or upload plans and whatnot.

And that's how we're that's how we're rolling out for for building permits at this time.

We also demolition of derelict buildings.

We we all know that the city has a lot of vacant buildings, a lot of problem properties.

We try to take as many down as we can.

Um when they're LRA, it's easy to do.

You know, that's that's that's just us doing it for for us.

When they're privately owned, it we get into more legal things, we can do it.

But it gets a little takes a little more time to get through that.

Also with within demolitions, we we did have money left or which we transferred.

That's wrong.

3.4 million.

We we had 3.9 million left in demo, so we sent 3.4 to the uh tornado zone and kept 500 back, and we're using some of that as we speak now on the South side.

Also, we we do pay for the the illegal unsafe structure at the homeless encampment, the tenth in cash that the homeless encampment seemed to be a problem for us at times, but that was an illegal structure there.

So we had to pay to get that uh to get that removed.

Okay.

Um you go to the next slide.

I think I'm gonna bring Dylan up here.

Come on up, Dylan.

All right, Mr.

Moser is going to present this section.

All right.

And any uh individual just come up to state first, last name and just title the department.

Sure.

Dylan Mosier, Deputy Building Commissioner, Building Division Department of Public Safety.

Thank you for having us.

Nice to see you all.

So uh right here, we're looking at actually just a portion of the building division budget.

If you would go ahead and next slide real fast and then give it all right, so yeah, and then why don't you bounce back if you would.

So still big, still as complicated as ever.

Um if we would go back one slide, I'm sorry, we had to break that apart into two separate slides.

Uh what you're looking at is uh budget of approximately 32 million.

Um it's spread out across 10 cost centers.

Uh the proposal will be for 217 FTE.

Um, though we currently have approximately 150 active employees.

Um despite a lot of variation that you're seeing across what was requested at the budget level and then is being proposed to you all.

By and large, I'm actually going to kind of try to point out that this is not a major change year over year what we're doing here.

Um I'm gonna highlight the very top uh fund and cost center, our 1000 fund, uh, some changes that you'll see there, um, as well as a couple things in the 1110 fund, uh 6200 two and fund 1121 62007, which is on the next slide.

Uh but yeah, um why don't you pop over next slide if you'd be so kind?

So and one more, I apologize.

Again, big arduous budget that takes up two slides to show everything.

Um so yeah, our uh our 1000 fund.

Um you do see more than a million dollars in deviation between what was requested and what is being proposed.

Um I'll start by saying that despite the the the cut of more than a million dollars, we will be able to make that budget work.

Um, you know, largely it's because of kind of chronic understaffing.

We wind up with a budget surplus just due to like salaries.

Um some of the things that did wind up getting nixed, and I think we'll still be able to pay for through and whatnot will be um let's see.

Uh with the new online building permit system, we did hold off on kind of doing major upgrades to hardware such as larger monitors, different types of you know, equipment that our staff would use to review plans.

Uh, we held off on that to see how they you know, let them figure out what they think they need after they actually start actively using the thing.

So we didn't just wind up investing in a bunch of stuff that people didn't wind up needing.

Um there was talks of monitors that were this big and like this big, and and you know, that was a speculation at the kind of administrator level, but staff actually didn't really want that type of stuff clouding up there.

Uh cubicles, so we do have some money set aside for buying new equipment, but we sort of want to make sure that it's what the actual staff wants to do their job the best because they know how to do their job.

Um other things that were sort of sliced out again, still think we'll be able to pay for them.

Is uh we did go through an RFP a few months back to acquire a third-party plan review service company.

Um, and we do do have well, we we did have a hundred thousand dollars set aside to fund the contract with that company.

So we did select a company is safe built.

Um so what I'm talking about here is actually a company uh that's whenever we're down on staffing, or if we are have a major backlog in uh building permit applications, we'll actually be able to throw to this company to help us do our work.

So it's kind of uh, I think of it as staff augmentation.

Um you all probably heard your constituents talk about um how long it was to take uh how long it was taken to get a building permit, probably particularly you were hearing it a lot around 2023, 2024, just why is it taking 60 days to get a building permit?

Um it was we were down at we were down on staff at the time.

We're actually doing pretty good staff level wise, but this contract will help us make sure that in the event that we're hit with hard times, or if there happens to be a construction boom for whatever reason, uh, we'll be able to manage the load of applications that come in without needing to just necessarily hire more employees, ask for more employees, or you know, and then be left with excess staff, you know, whenever that sort of boom uh subsides or or what have you.

So we got that.

Um we also have some software development things.

Uh we will be acquiring a software known as Beam that will be utilized by our Office of Building Performance.

It's an office that measures and sets standards for greenhouse gas admissions, well, for utility usage in the name of reducing greenhouse gas admissions.

Uh, but again, despite sort of the major cut from 12.2 million to 11.15, uh, we we do still think we're gonna be able to, you know, make things work.

Next slide, if you would.

And again, as I I stated, um, you know, largely what I've seen over the years is you know, it's a budget surplus due to understaffing.

Um currently we're at 62 vacancies.

Um, I think after close of business tomorrow, that becomes 63 um vacancies.

Uh half of that does come from our boots on the ground inspections workforce.

So inspector one, two, and then the supervisor level.

Um you know, I mean, being down 30 plus inspectors doesn't feel good.

Uh the vacancy rate is with the inspectors is on par with the amount of um uh uh our workload that they are our staff that they make up.

So I mean, they make up about half of our staff, and so it makes sense that if we're down a significant number of vacancies, that it's about half of that, you know, uh from that that section.

Uh next slide, if you would.

Um another major change that you're gonna see out of two cost centers is uh just a significant amount of money put in uh in preparation for increasing the number of demolitions that are gonna have to occur this year um associated with the tornado.

So what you're looking at is uh an additional um uh three and a half million dollars uh slated for demolition purposes.

Uh next slide, I will get into some of our strategic priorities for 2027.

Uh I'm gonna start with new positions that we've put into the TO.

Um the two that I'm gonna highlight, um, you know, they they are uh, well, the first thought that we're gonna highlight is a program manager for our led program.

The head of our led program uh uh is a program manager too.

Um the long-standing head of that uh uh section retired last year.

Um part of one of his suggestions in an exit interview that we did with Mr.

Carico was that he suggested that we reinstate a program manager to work under sort of the head.

So it's kind of a commissioner, deputy, director, deputy sort of dynamic, just kind of a head person and then sort of somebody to help do day-to-day things and then be available, you know, um, when that person is away and whatnot.

So we've asked for a program manager one, um, and and that's really something that was reinstated a decade ago.

We had this position, somebody serving in this specific role.

Um, I wasn't working in the commissioner's office when they decided to do away with that position.

I don't necessarily know what the story is.

Um I was a little surprised during the exit interview that they said, hey, we need to put this position back in, because frankly, my thought was why didn't we talk about that years ago?

Um, but we got by.

Um, but the new current head of the local uh led program also suggests that we put that position in.

I certainly support it.

Uh the next position I'm gonna talk about is a customer service manager.

This is a completely newly conceived role in the building division as far as uh my tenure goes.

I I don't know that we've ever had anybody serve specifically in this capacity.

What we're trying to accomplish by hiring a customer service manager.

Uh, this is a position that would be in the office of the building commissioner, so kind of at that top administrative level.

The goal would actually be that they would be a staff member that would be accountable for uh folks from the community that are coming in asking questions about the fines and fees associated with code violations uh and and things of that nature.

Um I think it's a fair criticism that I've heard of the building division that folks, you know, they they've got questions about processes and why they're hit with certain level of fines and fines have doubled, and now they're faced with a tax sale.

Um, and and you know, by the very nature of an inspector's job, they are out in the field, they're actively doing work, they're not sitting at a desk available to make phone calls or take phone calls.

Uh they've got specific hours that they you know, send emails and respond to emails.

So the purpose of this role, uh, one piece of that is to just kind of add a greater level of accountability.

When somebody walks into City Hall, they should be able to find a human being that will be able to answer questions about fines and fees that they owe the city of St.

Louis.

Uh the other piece uh of this position's role will be actually uh to be the building division representative uh for all matters related to kind of the tax sale process.

Over the last three to five years, there's been a little bit more of an organized cross-departmental effort to sort of talk about and understand what properties are kind of funneling into a system that ultimately results in them reaching a tax sale or you know, being put on a tax sale.

Um and there's just been a lot of you know, bi-weekly meetings, I think, or or monthly meetings, I'm not sure.

There's uh confirming amounts before they're put, you know, out uh listed on the for the sale.

Um, there's just a lot of work that's really just bubbled up.

We've been kind of making do by throwing additional work at our accounting team, at our uh assistants in the commissioner's office.

It's not been super sustainable because you know, we really need one key person or you know, team of people to sort of do this and so that people in the community know who to talk to, other departments know who to talk to.

There's been a lot over the years of shuffling between the building division, forestry, uh, the collector of revenue, uh, you know, and and you know, I as somebody who really thinks about the customer service aspect of what we do here in City Hall.

Um, I I personally don't love, you know, sending people to another office, you know, and and we're not able to abandon our posts, so we're sending them without kind of shepherding things.

So just trying to have a kind of a better level of accountability uh so for those processes.

And and you know, it's it's it's growing more and more complicated.

So I think it's high time that we have somebody whose sole focus is that.

Um, so those are two new positions we've requested.

Um next, I want to talk about well, we've we've really touched on it, uh, but you know, obviously another high priority this upcoming fiscal year will just be uh demolitions and repairs associated with tornado damage.

Um so you see that there's a lot more money put in the budget for those purposes.

Um building division works with the recovery office to sort of make sure those things go as smoothly as they can.

And I think it's hitting a place where hopefully that process should start moving.

Um, and and we should see more of that.

So, you know, we're trying to be prepared for that as well.

Um the next item um is the new zoning code.

Um the uh uh it's not so much impacting our fiscal year budget this year, but right now the planning department and the zoning office inside the building division is working with a consulting team to sort of develop what a news code might look like.

Um, and they'll be working on that through I believe most of this fiscal year.

Um we haven't made any changes in preparation for what a new zoning code would look like, but this is actually just kind of a one-year heads up that I do assume that whether we do fully have a new zoning code this time one year from today uh or not, we will be seeing the light at the end of the tunnel of you know, implementing a new zoning code is is my assumption.

So, more than likely it will affect our FY28 budget, and it is something that our staff is putting a lot of man hours in and thinking a lot about right here and now.

So it's definitely a major priority for this upcoming fiscal year.

Uh next slide, thank you.

Um I talked about this a little bit, but um after the start of the fiscal year, we'll have money to put towards a contract for company known as Safe Belt, Safe Built.

Uh, it's that third-party plan review services company that I talked about.

We've already been through the RFP process, they've already been selected.

So uh after um after July 1, we'll kind of start entering into kind of a contract and getting that part finalized and and implementing them into our workload.

So that'll be a major priority and and a big win.

Uh another priority will be the rental registry uh as part of uh 71835.

Um that for our purposes in the building division, a lot of that will actually just be a tech integration into the residential occupancy permit, application process, and inspection process.

So uh a lot of that um will be just kind of building in new information and data that we're collecting at the application level and at the inspection level.

Uh, but that is a goal that we're trying to accomplish this upcoming fiscal year.

Um another major uh strategic priority for the next year will be ceasing all operations inside the building division and city halls, sort of a legacy software system known as DataFlex.

I don't know if you all work with DataFlex or not.

Some departments do, some don't.

Up until February, we were processing all of our building permits inside a 1989 black screen with green text hitting a lot of F8, F1 uh software.

Um, and so with the rollout of the building permit application inspection module in our STL City permit system, we've ceased probably 99% of our operations inside that DataFlex software system.

There's still a few other integrations that we need to uh add into STL City permits or elsewhere.

So getting off of any dependency of that old antiquated software is gonna be a major priority for us.

So some of the money uh associated with uh software and tech development will go towards new integrations to get things like kind of the more abstract stuff that you don't hear about a lot, like incidental business waivers.

That's uh it's a waiver that allows businesses to get a business license without having to get a full occupancy permit because they're already operating inside of a building that has an occupancy permit, just kind of stuff you don't necessarily hear about, not the big sexy stuff, uh like occupancy permits and things like that.

Um so integrations there.

Um, and then the last thing I wanted to touch on uh was uh as of a few weeks ago, the building division's uh Office of Building Performance.

Uh they entered into their second cycle.

It's a relatively new office, it's relatively new legislation.

I know you all are aware of it.

Um, and it works on I think four or five year cycles, and we've moved into cycle two.

Uh so that's kind of a major milestone.

Um it's not directly related with the start of the next cycle, but uh it is high time that we start using Beam software, uh, which is kind of the gold standard for other municipalities that have similar programs across the country.

So, you know, we're just more in line, more in sync with um uh the full ecosystem of this world.

And and and that makes a lot of sense given that you know, people who have large pieces of real estate, you know, multi-story buildings and things like that.

They own they own buildings across you know, multiple municipalities of all major cities in the country and whatnot.

So it's nice that we'll be using what is great software uh that will integrate well with the ordinance and the regulations that we enforce, uh, but then also kind of consistently for uh those property owners is definitely a good thing.

And with that, uh those are the major strategic priorities that I was wanting to highlight.

I'll bring acting commissioner Jeffrey's back up uh to close us out, and then we'll move into any questions you all might have.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay.

That was pretty well said.

I don't have a whole lot extra uh to add to that if you want to just go straight to the questions community.

We can we can do that.

All right, thank you.

Acting commissioner, I saw it in order of seniority with Alderman Browning.

Vice Chair Browning.

Uh thank you, Mr.

Jeffries.

Um, I just want to start out by saying I've had several chances to communicate with you on several different issues in the ward, and I always appreciate your responsiveness.

Um I think we can agree that vacant buildings, deteriorating buildings, old uh just very old buildings are one of the biggest problems in St.

Louis.

Uh they exist in every neighborhood, and uh they pose a significant public safety risk to either people that are occupying them or when they're vacant, just to the community.

And so um in the interest of just making sure that we're taking care of this issue, especially in the wake of uh a tornado that um hit a significant portion of our older housing stock and uh now and also just a lot of vacant buildings that now have become pro like more advanced problems for uh the people uh that live next to them.

And I I want the best for those communities and I want to make sure that we're not making people live among that.

So I'm I'm glad to see that there is um more money, uh even more money than you asked for in the demolition unsafe buildings fund under contractual services.

Um so let's start with there.

Uh you requested three million, but uh the proposed budget is five point five million, uh which I think speaks to the need.

Uh but uh I'm kind of I'm curious, there uh there is uh a number of funds that have gone unspent in the past.

And I'm wondering what uh what is the holdup when it comes to getting that money out the door and getting those demo contracts?

Is it contracting capacity?

What tends to be the the problem?

Speaking of the demo money specifically that we haven't spent?

Yeah, specifically um looking at this uh like page two seventy-nine of this giant budget we have.

Um let me I want to start in a logical place, so let me go back to the so uh what I'll I'll I'll I'll approach this one question at a time.

Um the do we anticipate that that that additional amount in that um contractual and other services, this is 561 502 demolition and unsafe buildings.

Uh that additional 2.5 million dollars that you're getting beyond what you requested, that's in coordination.

I'm guessing this in coordination with the Office of Recovery and is that for tornado damaged buildings?

I'm gonna assume so at this time.

I I but the mayor, the mayor wanted money before from the last account.

Do we shifted money and I was unaware that that was going to be here?

Um kind of newer to the budget anyway.

But when I saw that speaking with Mr.

Moser and everybody, I'm pretty sure that's where it's all gonna end up.

Commissioner, you kind of like it a little bit more on the mic when you when you speak.

Sorry.

So um I'm just curious because uh in the past uh we we've seen a struggle with demolishing vacant buildings and elsewhere in the city, but now we have this emergency and normally uh and um do you think there's going to be additional capacity to continue to deliver uh demolition of unsafe buildings elsewhere in the city while we handle this emergency?

Yeah, I th I think I think it could be business as usual.

In the tornado zone, we're doing the condemnations and and we're involved in the process, but we're not running the actual demo.

So our demolition team, we have a supervisor and an actual demo inspector who kind of creates the the packages and the bids and puts it out for bids and everything.

We're not we're not involved with that.

So whatever money they get, they'll have to just do whatever there because there's there's different facets of the tornado zone.

SB1s, that's a state bill one, and that's that we're that's kind of hands-off for us.

So in the other neighborhoods, yeah, we're gonna we're gonna just keep moving forward with whatever.

Um I wasn't aware that we would that this number was this large to begin with.

So we we do have a capacity to probably tear down more than we have been doing.

Like I said, it de There's some there's some sticking points of uh at times within private property, LRA, no problem.

If it's private, we kind of there's a different if we condemn the building, you know, and with the condemnation, they they can appeal everything and when we go to tear it down.

If it's an emergency demolition, nothing they can do.

Otherwise, they can get a TRO, temporary restraining order.

But as far as the money side of it, if we have the money, we will move forward with whatever and we get a lot of alderman requests and just CSBs in general from citizens and uh Mr.

Moser touched upon manpower, that does become an issue at times, you know, to just getting enough people to put get eyes out there because we have so many things we do in the city, we do a lot, whereas in other jurisdictions, they they kind of branch it out.

They'll have residential, commercial, property maintenance.

Our guys have a set area and they do everything within that area.

So it's a volume, you know.

So manpower, it's always gonna be thing.

But yes, we will continue to demo and if outside the tornado zone.

If it's private property, uh you said there's a little bit of hangout, but unless it's an emergency, what happens in that case?

know to just getting enough people to put get eyes out there because we have so many things we do in the city we do a lot whereas in other jurisdictions they they kind of branch it out they'll have residential commercial property maintenance our guys have a set area and they do everything within that area so it's a volume you know so manpower it it's always gonna be thing but yes we will continue to demo and if outside the tornado zone if it's private property uh you said there's a little bit of hangout but unless it's an emergency what happens in that case is that build to the owner of the property or that just depends on the Yeah with the 10% surcharge that will get built uh believe it or not when we tear them down though I we've we've had requests that people want their building torn down they want us to I guess our bid somehow is cheaper than what they're what they're getting and so we'll do it but there's the the 10% that is a surcharge we keep that money that's for time and effort I guess so people that are wanting their building demolished and you it's rare but it's happened it's happened.

For for whatever reason if we're if we're doing someone if someone wants the city to demolish their building for them I hope that we can charge them the appropriate amount not not be the cheapest bidder per se like no well it goes out to bid and you know there's license contractors, D and L list of names whoever whoever usually the lowest it it it will be the lowest bid normally I think that we pick.

But it depends if if everybody's busy and it's not the lowest bid and the other ones can't get to it then yeah we'll take what we have to take.

And it depends on the the the condition of the building you know in if it's a standalone building in North St.

Louis it's as much as a if you got you know housing right next door to us.

Yeah I understand and and that that makes sense uh it obviously it's in the interest of public safety and you know that's that's what that priority has to be.

Um moving on I did I hear that you have sixty two vacancies right now and you said most of that is an inspector one, two or supervisor.

Yeah yes sir uh so looking at um the the staffing numbers uh and and maybe I'm just not looking in all the right places but um I I was seeing that you have for instance uh in last year under uh building inspector one you had 14 positions budgeted 13 of them were occupied this year requested 14 uh our proposed budget is for 14 uh I'm always hearing that we don't have enough inspectors that uh it's that you're stretched in well we're always trying to play catch up you know it we every time we get six names come to us we'll do six interviews well we want to do six interviews sometimes four people show up and only two people take the job so it's a constant process we're constantly asking for new requisitions to keep filling and at that time then some people people leave retire you know or go other places so you're saying this is kind of a snapshot that might not tell the whole story and that you're constantly dealing with vacancies.

What do you think is driving that vacancy?

Probably a it probably a various number of things salary would be one starting salary we're we're definitely paid lower than other jurisdictions you know I think I think that that job study proved that maybe conditions I don't know you know I it's just you we don't really do an exit survey to see why they're leaving but we do ask them where they're going.

We've had people go to different bigger cities you know and we've we've had people go to Spire go back to the trades.

It just depends money seems to be the driving issue to me that's what I hear is it that we're is it that we're taking them in and training them giving them skills that then they can take elsewhere that are much more market that's absolutely happened.

And are you working with the dire the personnel to try to make sure we can either offer competitive salaries or other bonuses or other requirements because we we face this in other things too.

We faced it with refuse right where we train people and get them a CDL and then they'd go work for uh waste management and make twice the amount of money.

Um I'm not most places want some kind of construction andor code experience and you're right when they come to us if they year in and somebody says hey come out here and we'll give you 10,000 more then that that's they've already you know broke the ice with us.

You know so and so are you working with personnel to look at those salaries and figure out how we can retain more because I I just it seems so wasteful to be training people and then and then facing the deficit of of people yeah I we're not currently holding you know regular communication with them.

I mean director light is new and it seems that new things are happening uh but no we're not currently talking about what you're discussing which is we bring people in for a handful of years we give them a lot of education, pay for it, and then they wind up within five years going off to you know a municipality in St.

Louis County or somewhere else uh and and we would love to have that conversation um and and I think that there's a chance for that to happen because I hear a lot of great things about the new personnel director.

I mean this is I consider building division to be a an integral part of public safety in our city.

Uh vacant buildings especially uh they they become problems in many more ways but as far as our city is concerned what they're doing is they're not really paying us taxes but they're costing us a ton in city service.

So it's just not something our city can afford uh to to go and address um I would say anything that you alderman can do to help us sort of make those discussions happen we're here for it.

Um yeah definitely absolutely absolutely and and you know I've been supportive of you in the past I've tried to get you more money and fines and fees and uh trying to just uh direct it but like without the inspectors to go out and do that work the fines and fees aren't as effective as we can as they they could be uh and so I want to make sure we're doing that.

Yeah and I would say with the customer service manager position that we highlighted we are trying to set the table for a new environment where you know we can be more effective and either you know I I don't want to use too colorful of a word of hammering you know these um uh non-responsive you know uh absentee property owners or whatever but uh you know we are trying to set a table where we can be more accountable and sort of have more coordinated approach but yeah absolutely and I will say thank you for all the discussions we've had in the past and and all your support in the past and and really to all of you.

Yeah I think we're moving in the right direction as a city uh but sometimes I worried the building division is being left behind in uh in the discussions and so um I want to make sure that we're bringing you up and and modernizing this department as well as we get a new zoning code and we get um you know all these new services uh spe speaking of which um I I'm curious you mentioned short term rentals are on pause uh but and I'm aware that's a court order uh assuming we're able to resume that or figure that out what's your capacity to uh enforce that if we're already short in other areas first can I uh I want to go back to the demo money did you say your first and last name of position sir I'm sorry John McLaughlin I'm with the building division special projects unit um the manager of that and then lastly if you could just kind of talk a little bit more to the mic how's this it's that's better it's better thank you John yeah usually I can uh talk without a mic and people can hear me halfway down the hall so uh so you you you asked about the uh the monies that were in the demo uh budget that were left over a lot of times we have to keep money we hold monies back because in case we have a large building that would catch fire that we would have to do an emergency demolition we have to have those funds available so that we can take those buildings down.

So we sort of strategically try to keep some funds behind that we can take those type of buildings down.

We've had those issues uh the one that was downtown near the uh stand usual veterans bridge was one that we had to take down right away we needed the money and it was very expensive.

It was that was a warehouse fire.

Right.

Yeah yeah and I think every almost every one of us has a large building in our ward that is you know speak to that yes um ready to catch fire ready to burn down ready to maybe hurt people or or you know and I've expressed my own uh frustrations with the the preservation process in this city because I say that it doesn't preserve anything so much as it says that you can't knock down and then it just leaves it to nature and then it just hurts the community and so I can just think of um probably a half dozen buildings in the ninth ward alone that are just waiting so for to catch on fire.

And I I hate that for our fire department and I hate that for you guys because then you have to s leave a bunch of money unused so that we might can knock it down if it if it ends up in that situation.

This just seems a really inefficient system and I'd love to help you out figure out how we can make this better.

I I really think the city ought to be we have a limited number of buildings we have a set number of land in this city.

I think we ought to be identifying what we want to save and doing what we can to save it and then knocking down the rest.

Oh can I speak to that as soon as I answer your question about short term rentals.

Yeah so we do have the short-term rental uh ordinance would be under my special um um projects uh supervision we do have the manpower in that uh in that unit we have uh two inspectors right now we had three we have two inspectors and we have a supervisor and I am the manager of that special project unit at the current it since we're on hold with that process right now we have sort of farmed out those inspectors to are to do area inspector duties.

So once that comes back into play and we get the green light, they will go back to their duties with regards to uh to regulation of short-term rentals.

Okay, so there will be capacity.

Yes, okay.

Um, but I hear also heard that we're contracting out permit review.

Is that the this build was it?

What was it called again?

Safe build.

Safe build, yes.

Is that that's permit review that's being contracted out?

That will be for plan review services.

So you see construction documents.

Um we have a staff of I think four, we could have as many as six.

Uh these are licensed architects and engineers or folks who have similar expertise in that area.

So they review just standard construction.

Um the the need for that contract was long lead times to approving building permit applications just simply from staffing issues.

Just had a really from my perspective, we had somebody reach retirement age, somebody who retired around the same time as Frank Oswald, the former building commissioner, uh, and then somebody actually passed away.

Um so we just for whatever reason the stars aligned.

We were left with only uh one plan reviewer at one point.

Uh so that contract, I view that as kind of a tool that will keep mostly in the toolbox.

It's not so much related to uh short-term rental or or anything like that.

But in the time in the event that we fall in hard times where we're having trouble keeping up with the building permit application flow that we're receiving, we'll have a whole other team that we can throw it to who will know our codes uh and everything and and be able to help our staff.

So it's when was that that you were down to one permit reviewer?

Oh gosh.

I when I was making the presentation, I was really thinking about the transition from about 2023 to 2024.

Um, but I don't know.

Everything's a blur.

I'm trying to remember.

It was actually right around.

If you can speak into the mic, sir.

This was this that was actually right around when uh former commissioner Frank Oswald retired and then former commissioner Ed Wer came in.

That's when we were that's when we were hustling to try to find planning examiners.

And I I believe, and I'm gonna try to summarize best I can off memory here, but I believe there's been efforts at the state level to uh basically put in measures that say we have to approve permits within a certain amount of time or that we automatically approve.

There was a statute right now trying to Yeah, I'm I'm concerned about that because I it feels like we don't have the capacity to do things that quickly, which could I could see it going one of two ways.

Either we just end up denying a bunch of things because we can't review them fast enough, or the time limit runs out and things get approved that maybe shouldn't have been approved.

Uh are you concerned about that at all?

That effort and is there plans to address it if it goes into effect?

Well, it's absolutely a concern, yes.

Yeah, there it is a it's a big concern.

Uh um we definitely have to make sure that we have the the personnel if the if indeed that passes that to deal with that.

Yeah, and not to keep harping on the state again, but it's this is a trend with the state to give unfunded mandates.

I I'm my opinion, if they want to sign permits and approve them in a certain amount of time, then they should send us some inspectors and pay for them.

Uh, but this state loves to tell us what they can do and or what we have to do and then not fund it.

So um I I just it feels like we're getting pressured from every single certain angle on this.

And uh to me, I don't want to see the building division put in that spot where either we're we're slowing down progress because we just can't keep up, or uh we are approving unsafe buildings to be built.

Yeah, the the contract that we're talking about with safe build is directly to address you know that type of scenario.

We have in personnel directors past petitioned them to um increase sort of the minimum salary that we would hire uh what we call senior plan examiners, these are licensed architects and engineers who would work for the building division to uh to approve or deny construction documents, uh building permits.

Um we petitioned them to increase sort of the salary for that position.

It was denied at the time.

Would love to, you know, bring that conversation back up, you know, and and consider it again because you know, uh for a you know, a architect or engineer, you know, that's it's really really hard for the city to be competitive in the marketplace uh against the private sector as far as the job opportunities that they would have.

I can I can appreciate that, and I I hope that we can um I hope we can get there.

Uh as far as the the rental registry goes.

This is a program that was passed a couple years ago, I think.

Uh, but uh and although insonia champion that uh and I'm sure she'll ask about it too.

But um, where are we in in getting that on the books and rolling?

Would you like me?

Well, the so right now we're we're awaiting a decision from the city counselor's office with regards to the the uh judge's order to move forward.

And my I think it's short-term rental.

Oh, yeah, short-term rental register.

I'm sorry, go ahead.

Yeah, rent rental registry is a different thing, yeah.

Um, uh from a you know nuts and bolts sort of process perspective for us in the building division trying to regulate this thing.

Um, it it's gonna require sort of tech integrations.

It's gonna require uh us to gather new information at the application level.

So just for example, right now, when somebody applies for residential occupancy permit, um we don't ask the question, you know, is this property going to be occupied by an owner-occupant or a tenant?

Um, so just simply adding that question into the process will be one of the things that we integrate into that.

Um, I believe that there will be some integrations as far as data collected at the inspection level.

Um, so right now our timeline is really to address that.

Some, you know, we're we're kind of just in the back end of the building permits going online.

And so that is one of the sort of next things that we might kind of push in tandem.

Um is the rental registry.

But yeah, we're definitely looking forward to it.

And it'll be it'll add great context for us at the staff level when we're looking at properties that have code violations to know whether there's a renter in there or whether that's an owner-occupant or or what have you.

Yeah, I think that's part of the problem we have too, is just all these buildings that are owned by LLCs, and we can't figure out who exactly is behind them, and yet they're some of the most serial offenders when it comes to building condition and uh how they treat their tenants.

And so um, I I get why someone might use an LLC structure to own a property, uh, but it we shouldn't have that prevent us from identifying the owner and holding them accountable.

Yeah, and having a point of contact, which is a critical piece of the legislation will be excellent um uh as well, and and requiring them to be you know relatively local and and and able to respond within I believe one hour is the requirement.

Um so yeah, it's it's high priority, it's it's reaching the front burner as we speak.

Okay, all right.

Um did you have something else?

Yeah, I wanted so that that also folds into because you you mentioned a couple things early on.

You said over and over again, vacant buildings, vacant buildings.

Yeah, okay.

From the building division's perspective, we look at that as a way to solve that is strategic code enforcement.

Okay, so we want dedicated resources to address vacant buildings, to address chronic landlords, to address people who own properties that aren't moving forward with uh development or with uh our code code-related issues.

So with regards to that strategic code enforcement, first thing we need to do is we have to make sure that our frontline people are in place.

Our inspectors, our frontline inspectors have to be in place.

Those are the eyes and ears, those are the people who are doing most of the work in the community.

Now, if we're gonna look at it from a strategic code perspective, the idea that we've been bouncing around is to bring in specialized our other inspectors to look at those properties.

And I I'm gonna give you an analogy.

So you go to the doctor, you go to your primary care physician, and your doctor gives you an exam, looks you over, gives you know, treats you for certain ailments.

But when the doctor finds that you have uh a specific ailment or problem, he then sends you to a specialist.

Well, that's what we're looking at trying to do.

We want to send those type of vacant vacancy issues, those type of code-related behavioral issues to a specialist to an inspector who would be in charge of that problem, that property from start to finish to a per to an inspector who can then work to bring all that information together with regards to a chronic problematic property owner or landlord.

Let's face it, the area inspectors, the building specter ones, the ones that go into the community, they do a really good job.

But they're reactive.

They react.

They can't be proactive.

We're looking at these specialists to be proactive.

We're looking at these specialists to bring take on these type of projects.

And then that takes it off the plate of that area inspector and then allows that area inspector to be more proactive.

So it's a win-win.

Now, in order to do that, we have to have those frontline inspectors in place.

And then we need to find the money and find find this funding to fund the three specialized inspectors.

We already have a supervisor that has a background in dealing with problematic landlords and problems.

He's in the he's in the special unit uh special uh projects unit.

Alderman Rush Aldridge, he works the parking lots.

He just started that.

He has been putting many, many a lot of pressure on the uh parking lot owners uh with regards to the the the ordinance that you guys have passed.

It's all in the early stages uh right now, and we're getting a lot of good uh positive feedback from the owners themselves because they're tired of the renegade parking lots that are just doing what they want without following the ordinance.

But we need people like that that have the time to go out and start a project from start to finish.

So those vacant problems, vacancy problems that you're talking about, those inspectors would be the ones that would be in charge of that.

And those are the people that we're currently struggling to keep hired.

No.

The frontline people are the ones we can't we haven't filled yet.

Those are the ones we have to fill before we can think about the strategic enforcement aspect of this.

What's being done to fill those?

Well, I'm sorry.

Well, you you're saying we really need these frontline, but what's being done to fill those positions?

So we're we're trying to do some interviews, do some hiring.

We have a requisition.

Usually they give us six names.

We need really more than six names at one time.

Like I've mentioned before.

For every six people, it seems like we retained two people, and we hope they stay.

So what we're trying to get the hiring process, but what he's speaking to is we want seasoned people that know what they're doing with these problem properties, because it's it's it's it may be vacant and there's no one there that day, but we have a lot of homeless population going in.

We have you know the drugs and whatever else is going on these buildings.

So we want people that know what they're doing.

The district people is the ones we're trying to fill first, but then we'll build that unit, you know, having the money funded have that unit have three uh seasoned inspectors, probably have a like a central corridor, a south and a north, you know, break it up, something like that.

But getting getting the district people in place right now, this Sonye's ward, we had somebody quit her last day's Friday.

There's only one inspector in Ward 7.

That's a man, that's a busy warrant.

So you have a that guy's got in, he's fairly new.

He's probably been here, I don't even think he's been here a year, maybe a year.

I don't know.

I have to check with him.

So that's our problem.

You know what I mean?

So what he has to do is the residential you know occupancies, any other occupancies, he's got to do this stuff to have when you have to go meet with people.

So the ES and some of this vacant stuff, it just sits there because he doesn't have time.

He's got to build a schedule to figure out where he's going, who he's meeting with.

So it it comes down to hiring people and keeping people, that's really what it is.

Hiring and retention, I'm I'm sure you hear it from everybody else, but we're no different than that.

So once we get the district inspectors in place, then we'll pick people out that want to do this because you want somebody that wants to do that.

That's that's you know, obvious.

And you know, when I met with Director White, I asked him about the hiring timeline, because we hear that St.

Louis is notoriously slow at hiring to the point where we make an offer and they already found a job months ago.

We've seen that.

And he indicated that we've basically cut the time in half uh recently, and we're still reducing that time.

So we're making a lot of progress there.

Um I come back to just saying that I think that uh it would behoove the building division to work closely with personnel to fill these positions.

I I understand that we want experienced people, but you know, the only way we're gonna get experienced people is if we get young people in there and get them the experience.

Uh so uh, you know, um at this point, warm bodies would be a nice change uh from vacant positions.

Uh but uh changing lanes here.

Um the lead remediation fund.

Uh we have struggled to expend the allocated funds from this account for a number of years now.

Uh what are the primary barriers that prevent us from being able to implement that program as with the lead remediation?

Yeah.

I don't I don't know a ton about it.

I I know uh that's that's one of the jobs we just filled was the manager two position, and like Dylan mentioned uh the manager one.

I th I think maybe not having that other position that we're now putting back into the field was causing issues.

It was breaking it up and they were they were slow to get things done.

Again, that I I can't guarantee that that might be manpower also because what we did have a lead inspector who's now a building inspector.

He just he moved down is on the North Broadway campus up at Broadway and Palm Street.

So I don't know a lot about it.

My guess would be maybe manpower, but maybe a slight mismanagement because we didn't have that extra position that we all that was always there.

And then two two commissioners ago, he took it out for some reason and we're putting it back in.

So we just need more efficiency in that.

So, like under that, under the lead remediation fund, though, for instance, like computer and tech system development.

Um, we had 260,000 budgeted in FY26.

None of it was expended, uh at least none has been expended so far.

We're not done yet.

Um, but we're rebudgeting the same amount this year.

And I'm just wondering like what's the holdup on on spending some of these two.

I can't answer that, but I can get you an answer.

Okay, I appreciate that.

Can you answer the um you're on uh 274?

Is that correct?

Yeah.

Yeah, you're speaking to the uh 260 uh thousand.

Um yeah.

Uh so we have a contract uh that stipulates we can spend up to, I think it's somewhere in the ballpark of 1.3 million, as I've always understood it.

We have to have that budget year over year.

That's how it was explained to me in years past uh in order to engage that contract, I suppose.

Um we don't necessarily, you know, that's that's that's improving our uh STL City permits system is ostensibly what it is.

That's at least the lion share of what that would mean.

Um, you know, we don't necessarily have the capacity to put that many integrations into the system year over year, uh just because it takes staff training, it takes sort of, you know, you want to monitor the development of things.

Um so I that specific line item, I actually, you know, would advocate that we could probably be more strategic with that number, but it was always conveyed to us that we have to have that number in place because we have a contract that says, you know, we can spend up to that much.

Um it was one of the problems that former commissioner Oswald was actively wrestling with around the time of his retirement, and I sort of made it somewhat of a pet project to sort of figure it out.

So uh one of the first years, I believe it was FY23 that I was involved with the budget was making sure we had the right amount of numbers to make sure that we were able to engage that contract.

So uh there's that one.

It doesn't speak to the whole thing that you're asking about, but this money's not going spent.

So it just is it just reverting back at the end of the year and going into our surplus or that's my understanding.

And similarly, on the next page 275, you can see there's a line that that you you referenced 1.3 million dollars.

Major projects, uh, contracts and services.

Uh last year was adopted budget of 1.3 million dollars.

None of it was spent.

Uh we're re budgeting the same amount this year.

It's worth noting that FY25 also had 1.3 million dollars.

Uh so it just doesn't seem like we keep putting 1.3 million dollars in this, but keep not spending it.

So what what is the holdup?

Yeah, I mean, we're gonna I'll I'll say this, it's not the best excuse.

You know, we're in a tough position trying to prepare a budget without you know, that this process started with a commissioner that was starting to retire.

So I, you know, I imagine from his perspective, he probably didn't want to change things too much year over year.

We also don't want to rock the boat too much because we're gonna have a new boss at some point who will be our strategic leader and whatnot.

So some of these numbers might be being carried over.

I don't necessarily know the story behind that that line item, but you know, that's been part of the philosophy that we've used is is to if it worked last year, we'll carry it over this year.

I mean, I would be happy to um help coordinate meetings to have a kind of more um uh in-depth conversation about these things and whatnot.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Um, you know, similar note on um page 283.

Uh we again under uh lead abatement, we had 173,000 uh for 173, 420 for five lead abatement workers.

It doesn't look like we ever filled those positions.

Um have we made progress in that program filling those positions, or what is really prevented us from implementing that?

Yeah, could couldn't speak to right now.

I mean, it might be worthwhile evening, you know what level of staffing do we need for the program.

Um we've you know I've never worked directly on things related to the lead program.

The one thing I've consistently heard is that we've made great strides in our city to uh get rid of you know unsafe lead conditions inside the housing stock of the city and whatnot.

Um if you think about it that way, theoretically, there would be a there could be a point where you would eradicate all of the unsafe lead and all of the buildings because the city isn't growing, you know, uh geographically or anything like that.

So um uh yeah, I know that's kind of a non-answer, but uh again, would love to have a forensic conversation, you know, with the actual lead team about what the truth is okay.

And the last thing I'm gonna ask about here, because I do want to give my colleagues a chance, and I'm just taking up all the questions.

Um the uh page 279, uh the public safety sales tax to uh fund uh for uh building demolition.

Um I think you know I'm gonna I think you've detected the trend here.

Uh there's 2.244 million dollars budget in FY26.

We've spent zero dollars of it.

Is this a result of not knowing what's being reimbursable via FEMA or like what is the holdup on spending?

I again I I know there's just immense demolition needs in the city right now.

Um, and uh that money's just not moving.

Is that uh due to confusion with federal government stuff, or like what's the issue?

I think that is part of it.

The way that I see uh the interplay between the recovery office and the tornado response and the vision is that the recovery office is trying to make the most out of available money, which ostensibly means taking the full slate of demolitions that need to occur and figuring out how to spend federal and state level money first before we rely on the city money.

Um so you know, each individual demolition, you know, it's it's essentially can we spend out of this bucket, can we spend out of this bucket?

And the city budget being sort of the bucket of last resort, which we know will require a massive amount of money.

So I mean, I I think what the Spencer administration and the building division is is gearing up to do is be prepared to spend a lot of city uh uh funds on demolition.

Okay.

So Marcus, the accountant just advising me that we we did spend that money, we gave it to SDLCOR covers.

So that was to the recovery office.

Yeah.

And that's why I think what when we're looking at the demos money when I was speaking of it earlier, why it's so high, we're getting a lot more than we're even asking for.

That's where a lot of it's being held back to go too.

Because I don't know what the where they're coming up with their money from the state and uh in FEMA and our state CEMA, but we have to have some in our budget just to keep it rolling.

So gotcha.

Okay.

And last question I have is uh there's a line on that same page for security.

Um it's $750,000.

What's what's that for?

Those that that money is there for those types of properties like the railway exchange building, which has been uh in the news quite a bit, and we uh to had employee security to make sure that that building is secured and squatters and urban explorers and scrappers don't get inside and cause a catastrophe with a fire in it.

So we do are we spending 750 on just that or is that no it includes uh the not just that, but I mean, as you said, there's a there's a building like that in nearly every ward.

That is probably our uh the first time we've did it.

Uh and we know that done right it works.

And if I had my if I had the ability to put 10 million dollars into that account, I would, because then I would be addressing all of those buildings with security.

Boots on the ground work and it costs money to do it.

I I imagine it does cost a lot.

And this is where I come back to talking about how vacant buildings cost us so much money services.

Uh, but um I'm curious about the comment you just made when it's done right, it works because I keep seeing the people are in the railway exchange building, you know, uh they keep finding people on the roof, they keep seeing people inside of it.

Well, buildings in my ward, which are active drug densite being secured.

And look, I get it.

The board up crew, I argue they should call themselves Sisyphus, right?

Because it's like that the task they do, they board up a building, the boards get ripped off, and it's the same thing again next week.

And I I feel for them, I'd rather just tear down some of these buildings that we can't secure, but the railway exchanges want to tear down.

So when you say when we do it right, it works.

What are you imagining and what do you imagine that costs?

Well, I can tell you how it worked why it works.

So when in a year and a half that I had that I had the supervision of the railway exchange building, we did not have a breach.

In one year and a half, we had zero breaches.

We transferred our responsibility over to another agency.

They hired another security company and they had breaches.

I took it back over yesterday.

I can guarantee you that I'm going to do everything that I can to make sure that we go back to the old ways of making sure there are any breaches.

When I say done right, that means making sure that your suit your security company expects what you expect of them, giving them expectations that they can meet, supervising them, making sure that you go down there and check on that building and make sure that they're doing the job they're supposed to be doing.

That's what I did, and that's why I'm gonna what I started yesterday, and I'm sure you're gonna see a more positive outcome in the future there.

Well, thank you, John.

I I look forward to that.

And um I really appreciate you all taking time today.

Thank you, Chairman.

Uh, I usually start off by giving a lot of gratitude, and hopefully you all know as a bidding division, I'm really grateful for you really responsive.

We had a shooting in a building, you guys came out at night, but I'm gonna be really quick because we got 15 minutes left and four people that have to still ask questions.

I'm just gonna get straight to it.

Um to that um uh do you guys have a little bit of more time to stay around?

Because and I'm gonna talk with corrections to see.

I know we have a uh a break in there that was meant, but we may need to expand some time.

Um so that we can, I know the building is very, you know, it's important to uh a lot of folks up here, so it may eat into the corrections time, but we'll come back there, like figure out and figure this out, but don't feel too limited, elderly.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Um my first question is just really specific to actually some of the questions you just answered about the inspector one positions.

Is there currently a list of qualified candidates um sitting with the personnel department, or how is your process going for hiring for those?

Yeah, there's a there's a list.

Um we we just put another requisition in maybe I maybe about a week ago, but I haven't seen any names yet.

There isn't a hiring list because there's one one gentleman from the street department, he's a street, it might be a street inspector, but he wants to come over to us and he couldn't do a lateral, so we had to tell him to apply just like everybody else.

And he's and he called me already.

He's on the list, he's waiting, but he hasn't received anything.

So we're waiting to get personnel in line to give us the names, you know.

And I'm assuming they're gonna give us six names as usual.

I'd like to ask for 12 names and because like I said, for every 10 or so people, we only retain three or four.

So the more names we get to do the interviews, the more we can get on board and get get the inspector ones.

But and also we have a good person from the airport where I think I can do a lateral transfer of him.

Um I would like to put them in ward seven in your ward.

He's been around for a little while, but he he could he work out fine.

So there should be a list.

Yes, that's the answer.

Um, for the turnaround times for approving and denying the various permits, which you all do, uh building permits, electrical plumbing permits, mechanical permits, housing conservation.

Um, do you know what the like what is the timeline for getting those reviews?

It it varies, it really does vary.

And again, we'll go back to manpower.

I think in the trades, which is MEP mechanical electrical plumbing, mechanical seems to struggle the most.

Um they're kind of understaffed and they do their own plan review.

This well, the supervisor does the plan review MEP.

And he's in the streets all the time because they're behind as is a lot of people are.

So when he goes out to the street to do mechanical inspections, he's not left behind to do any plan review.

So if he gets to it three days a week, then that's what happens.

But as far as the R side of it, building permits, it depends on what it is.

It it really does vary.

Small permits, fences and decks and porches are quick, bigger projects, bigger time.

That's just kind of how it works.

Go ahead.

Yeah, uh a great number of smaller residential level projects are approved in one day.

They're approved over the counter.

People come into room 425, they sit across the table from a staff member uh with the building division, and they get a permit on the spot, whether that means they've got perfect plans ready to go.

We have some supplemental materials that they use so that they don't have to draw what a footing needs to look like and they know specifically what a footing needs to look like.

So a great number of applications are approved same day permit issue same day.

Uh related to what you're asking about with our new integration with the permit online system, we have started collecting data about what the timeline of an approval looks like from application to permit being issued.

Um, because you know, an architect designs a project, they may have some flaws in it.

We give back revisions and say we can approve you if you do X, Y, and Z.

Otherwise, we'll have to deny you, and there could be an appeal process for that.

So we've started what we call like a chess timer.

If you've seen people play chess, uh where they, you know, they make their move and hit the thing, and then the other guy or gal, they have some time to think, and then they make their move and they hit their thing.

So the interesting thing that I would hope to be looking at next year is how much time an application uh takes sitting in the ballpark of the applicant, meaning the applicant needs to make a revision to their proposal design-wise.

I know from experience that that sometimes takes weeks, months, that sort of thing.

So we're doing a lot of interesting stuff to collect data on that.

More to come on that one.

Uh one of the other big things that causes a permit to take a long time to be issued is our zoning code.

And and as we talked about, we're working on developing a new zoning code.

So one of the chief goals of that process is just to reduce the amount of uh zoning variances required across the city because it is a god-awful lot of projects have to be approved through zone uh zoning variance.

And that process takes a minimum of six weeks.

When you're down on staff, it's gonna take more than that.

If there is a contention in the project and it won't winds up taking multiple hearings and whatnot because things have to be continued or there's negotiations that occur, it takes even longer.

So we got long lead times right now for variances, and we're hoping to just do away with a lot of the variances even needing to be required because we'll have a zoning code that is from 2027 as opposed to a zoning code that's from 1957 or whatever, 47, whatever year zoning was initially up um uh implemented into the city, and then all these little band-aids through legislation have been put on it.

Um, and that is a great segue to my next question, which is just um in regards to the conditional use hearings and our zoning variance hearings.

About how long does it take for someone to get those right now?

Yeah, um right now, I I I worked in the zoning office for about seven, eight years or so.

That's where I started with the city.

Um, you know, rule of thumb is that it is uh a conditional use is four to six weeks.

Uh a variance is six to eight weeks.

That's what we would tell developers when they just cold called us to just kind of get a sense of things.

Uh, my guess is it's probably about 30% more than that, because I do know the lead times are I I didn't, I'm sorry, I didn't ask the zoning team.

Like I could normally just say, hey, if I applied for a variance right here, right now, what date would I get?

And that could tell us the answer.

My guess is that if I applied for a variance right now, I'd probably get a hearing in July, would be my guess.

But that is a guess.

I'll just throw that out there, but just to give you a sense of things.

For in regards to the rental registry, it would be lovely working on that together.

Appreciate it getting to pass that legislation.

Um, you said that you needed to work on incorporating some questions into some of our processes and some technology.

Is that technology that you need to do that in this budget that is in front of us, or do you have a timeline of when those questions will be incorporated into our processes?

Yeah, money is uh in the budget for those integrations.

We've already met with our contractor and and plotted out what that would look like.

So when we do those types of integrations, we we literally hand over the legislation, we get their take on sort of what would putting this enforcement into our workflow look like.

They've developed uh some preliminary materials on what it would look like.

So the goal will be I don't have an exact time frame now, but the goal will be that soon we actually sit down, have the initial meeting of, you know, this is what it looks like, uh, and we develop sort of the actual particulars of that, and then um uh we would execute the transaction for that implementation to occur, and then they would bring in developing it.

But you don't anticipate a situation where you wouldn't have you anticipate that you'll have all the money you need, the financial resources for whatever technology you might need.

You anticipate that this budget has that.

Absolutely more than enough, yeah.

And you can't give an exact timeline, but do you think that it's in the next six months you'll be able to, these questions will be a part of our processes?

That definitely before you're in front of us for next year budget again.

We'll it's a goal for FY27.

I'll say that.

I I apologize that we don't have like a day one start time here and now, but yeah, it's it's it is one of our next highest priorities.

I know it's a major priority for you.

And I believe, doesn't the ordinance say that the building division is obligated to have that uh implemented within a certain time frame?

And I know that's coming up.

Yeah, I mean it does, but I mean I want to be honest, we know that there was a tornado, right?

So I'm not at all expecting that the timeline that we discussed when we were working on legislation and putting those things in place.

I was clear that there was tech, you know, some other needs that need to be in place.

And even as the champion of that legislation, you know, we intentionally pause because you guys had a lot more of a workload for the tornado.

So I'm not necessarily upset about any original timelines.

We can't predict natural disasters, but I do, you know, want to make sure that we get back to it because I do think a lot of the issues we're having ongoing that if we could get that going addressed.

Um, and I think it would even be helpful in the tornado impact areas because a lot of the issues, as you know, it's the building division that we're running into is just the parcels and that they're not they're not all owner occupied.

Some of them we're not even sure exactly who the owner, you know.

But I just wanted to raise that as something.

It would have been fantastic to have the rental registry stood up.

Um, as soon as the legislation was passed and have it in place when the tornado came through, that would have been excellent information for us to provide better services to people in their the darkest moments of their lives.

Um my next question is just definitely around like vacancy.

Um, have you had a chance or is the building division had a chance to read through the vacancy collaborative report that came out?

Uh when did that report come out?

I believe I did thumb through that.

Uh it's been a little bit, right?

Yeah, that actually this time last year, I think I was sitting in a room on this exact date, and they were kind of revealing um their findings and probably published it a few months after that.

So if it was in May, maybe by August it was published.

Yeah, I think that was I I do think I personally looked through that.

I I I couldn't take a pop quiz on it right now, but yeah, I I do recall that.

Um of the things that they talk about a lot in the report, and then I know even my colleagues, they did a series of bills around Prop V to kind of update some of our vacancy processes, but in alignment with what Mr.

McLaughlin mentioned, and I know I've had conversations with you all about kind of this strategic code enforcement um component of it.

Um not you all needing reminders, but we have 24,000 vacant properties in our city, just about that's in that vacancy collaborative report.

Um it and expect um says that probably about 3,500 individuals are impacted daily um by some sort of issue related to vacancy.

And it also estimates that we spend and end up spending about 21 million dollars annually as a city addressing vacancy problems.

And so um a lot of the times that cost is because of things we uh are not doing on the front end.

Um so then we haven't end up having to be reactive and and do things on the back end.

I've been um able to contact you all, and you've been very helpful on the back end.

But the goal with strategic enforcement is that you would have a set of inspectors, whereas right now, like the one that is in my the one that I have in my ward, he's responsible for the entire code.

Uh anything that is wrong, every single issue.

I've try to be very cautious of like what I'm putting on page.

But the idea with strategic um code enforcement is that there are inspectors that are specifically focused on vacant nuisance and problem property parcels.

So they will not be responsible for the entire code.

They are sorely focused on that.

Um, and there are many instances that I've seen as an alder or um, you know, just in several capacities where if we would have had those inspectors that could be constantly given citations that could be constantly doing the work to uplift that, you know, even to a judicial process.

Um, I think it would be a huge benefit to our city.

I don't see that in the budget um today.

I do see that it is, you know, I see the acts for just inspectors in general level one, but nothing specifically for strategic code enforcement.

So my question around that is do you feel like it would be beneficial to perhaps have some inspectors who are specifically enforcing things around nuisance and problem properties and vacant properties?

100%.

I'm all for that.

Yes, I think that it's sorely needed.

I think we we put band-aids on big problems, and all it is is a reaction.

We need something that we can use that we can move forward with code enforcement and then partner with development.

That is what keeps buildings moving.

Development as well.

We can do we can we can work on our code enforcement portion of it.

And we can, if we have the three those three dedicated inspectors to deal specifically with that, that also gives your area inspectors the ability to be proactive in your communities.

So it's it's twofold.

So I want to say also I agree with John.

Yes, we definitely want dedicated inspectors for that.

Uh not only will they address vacancy and you know the nuisance properties, it'll it'll lighten the load from the district people who are out there.

So collectively, you know, as the building division, hopefully we get everything caught up.

But I will and I and I will say right now, we've had it for a while, a long a long time.

We've we do have a vacant building registry.

It's a list of just vacant buildings.

And you know, there's an ordinance out there as soon as it's vacant for six months, it can be added to the list.

It has to be residential.

It can it can be residential or attached to commercial, but you have to have some residential units in it.

And and that they come up every six months.

So every six months it comes up for another fee letter.

We send the fee, you know, we do we do our things.

So that that is up and going.

And we and the IT built it into the into our system to where if you're out there and you and you're doing what we call an ES letter, which is existing structure, we don't have to do two letters to speed up the process.

We can just link it to a vacant building and it'll pump out a vacant building letter at the same time.

We're kind of getting a two for one there.

So but we do have a list of those, and and and so that's really already up and going.

So that's what the if we get that unit going with the three people, that'll be the crux of what they're doing, along with nuisance properties, and they'll see those to the end of you know, till they're demolished or whatever, you know.

So and we'll we'll be able to then partner with those groups like the Peter Hoffman's of the world and help us move that forward.

So it's not just citing it, it's also looking at the development part of it as well.

That's how you solve it.

Yeah, yeah, the goal of the strategic code enforcement is they would be in charge of just following up that is.

Well, we don't want to take properties and then let them should, right?

Because we're not gonna we're gonna solve anything like that, right?

We we gotta have we gotta work together to try to come up with some type of development on it.

Understood, and Mr.

McLaughlin or Mr.

Jeffries, um, do you if we were to um I'm very interested in this in these, you know, maybe a few positions to specifically focus on strategic code enforcement within your division.

Um, I definitely want to ask you though, how do you think that would impact the other inspectors that you have on staff?

Oh well, yeah, like I mentioned there, um it it's a big part of what we do, and it depends on the neighborhood.

It's gonna vary vary from ward to ward, you know.

But the wards that are impact with a lot of vacancy, then the it'll free up those other inspectors to you know do everything that it is they do on a regular, you know, basis day to day.

So the day-to-day operations will be more efficient too with taking some of that off their plate.

Because like I I mentioned, a lot of other communities and even other cities throughout the you know, United States, we do everything.

That one inspector you have in your ward, he does everything commercial, residential, demolitions, vacants, all of it.

So it's a lot, but that's that's how we that's how we roll with it.

I understand so part of the duties of the area inspector is to be in the area to look at what's going on in the area.

So if we take these responsibilities that we're talking about off of their plate, again, we talked about being more proactive, making sure that they're writing their area and seeing things, putting eyes on things, that's important.

Documenting things, that's important.

Those are things that one uh one inspector in your ward, I'm sorry, we're we're it's it's it's it's not it's not gonna be uh expensive.

Human capacity.

Right.

It's it's impossible.

Um this is my last question.

Um it is just about I don't see anywhere in the budget or in a presentation um anything in reference to uh mode.

And I know that mode is something that comes up quite a bit in our city.

So my last question is really is there is Mo something that the building division is having conversations with the health department about because it is a very serious issue.

Yeah, we well, there is a mold ordinance, and they did give us the enforcement part of it, the health departments involved in it.

We we really can't cite for actual mold because it the the ordinance states you have to prove it's mold.

We don't test, you know, that would have to be sent to some lab to be tested, but we can cite for the source of the mold, water and things.

And there is we do have a mold violation that we just loaded into the STL City permit system.

So we can cite for it, but we can't prove you know that there the mold is a tricky one, it's always been kind of you saying because it's hard to you guys need some specific equipment or some sort of tool to verify if it's mold.

Well, that that's a whole nother ball game.

That's really that that that's a specific training with equipment and you have to be certified to do all that.

Would that usually be a health department function?

To me, I th I thought it was in the health department, but I they're giving it to us, they're giving us the enforcement of that particular uh ordinance is what they're doing.

So okay, thank you.

Okay.

Alto of Velasquez.

Thank you, and thank you.

Uh acting uh commissioner Jeffries and Mr.

Moser and everybody else from the building uh division here.

I'm gonna try and keep it short.

Um, I know that you all have a lot of work to do, and I'm grateful for the work that you do.

I know that I've called for some sort of emergency building inspections, and you all have been out there very quickly.

So I I definitely appreciate that.

Um my questions are really I think pertaining to vacancy, and uh we've had some of these conversations, as you know, prop v passed, and then uh myself, Alderman Browning and Alderman Boyd and I uh filed, and the board pretty much unanimously passed a slate of bills related to vacancy, and part of that uh into increasing the fines and fees for uh various violations and also illegal demos.

And in that bill, we had um some positions specifically for that.

One was I think a building inspector two in your division, and then one is uh an attorney in the city counselor's office.

And I know that uh when I've spoken, the office manager is part of it.

And back to Mr.

McLaughlin's uh uh comments.

I mean, I'm just gonna be honest here.

It seems like we can legislate all we want, but if but it if if we can't implement it, it doesn't, you know, we're uh we're we're stuck, right?

And I I feel like we're in this gap.

So, you know, with the fees specifically, I think as Alderon Senier mentioned, um they've estimated there's something like 20 million dollars in unpaid fines and fees.

So certainly if we focused on getting some of this, there's a return on our efforts and probably more to help build capacity, but wanted to talk specifically about um what that how those positions are getting filled and how they're getting prioritized.

And again, back to the strategic code enforcement and just you know, we need the people on the ground to make sure that we're following the new laws that we set.

Um, but that also some of this does bring a monetary return to us, which would make it easier for us to pay for some of these things.

So um that's what I'd like to hear from you all about.

Okay, are you speaking to how we're gonna fill the positions?

Um I I have to look into that.

Is that that's in the budget for this year?

You tell me it's it's it should have been.

Uh it wasn't filled last year.

The law we we pushed it out to start the start date in September.

Um, and obviously this was before the tornado, but for that for those positions to get set, and it's and I know you're not the city's count city counselor's office.

It's it's my understanding that position hasn't been filled in the city councillor's office, right?

So the whole the whole part of really having a dedicated team to look at uh picking up those fines and fees and enforcing them and getting them back, which would actually uh, you know, I don't know if we're gonna get all 20 million dollars, but surely a few hundred some money back that would pay for those positions would seem to you know help with this capacity issue.

So, yes, my question specifically is about the building that that position and how that's working with the legal component.

And I know that the office manager was something that was a part of that set of uh ordinances, but it sounds like it's actually key to making it work.

Um, and I feel like we're all kind of talking about the same thing.

It's that we need more people, we can't keep the people, we're not paying them enough.

And if we don't do that, we're not able to enforce, and also we're not able to collect those fees, which cut down on our revenue, which limits our ability to give to hire more people and or raise their um salaries.

You got anything.

Yeah, I think you touched on this.

Yeah, the the customer service manager positions will would be a key part of that process.

Um to be able to help manage all these additional fines and fees being issued, as well as the response from the property owners that finally, in many cases, finally come out of the woodworks whenever we they finally get hit with uh a big enough uh uh uh bill for for neglect on their property.

Um I don't think any of the three of us can completely speak to why those new fines and fees haven't been implemented yet.

I know since Commissioner Ware has retired, um, I've spoken with the mayor's office about kind of coming up with a plan to implement that process.

Um so we do have an eye towards that.

Uh I so I've had a conversation specifically with someone you all know, Caitlin Smith, uh who formerly worked under uh Alderman Browning about it.

So right now I think the plan is to sort of come up with a real strategy because it is gonna be a big change of things.

Um I know you want to uh you know, maybe try to slow roll it and and and and um uh even maybe find a couple properties kind of see how it plays out.

And I totally agree with that position.

So it it's it's gonna be a priority of ours.

Um and we hope that it's a priority of uh the next building commissioner.

Uh but yeah, we do plan to um uh implement those fines and fees.

Okay.

So Alder Woman, I want to agree with you.

The strategic code enforcement is very, very important tool that we have underutilized, and we need to we need to follow that path more.

I think that what we talked about today is a good plan.

I think that we have uh processes in place that would dovetail into that right away.

We would see an immediate uh action if we started doing those things if we got the if we had the personnel to do it.

And I think that's what we're headed to, we're headed in that direction.

So uh we could we could do a lot better, a lot of better job with regards to strategic code enforcement.

I think that our internal talking and talking with you guys, I think that we are on the right track.

We have the laws in place.

It's not going to be something we have to wait on other than personnel, and it would be very successful.

Thank you, Mr.

Sergeant McLaughlin, and I appreciate all the work that you do too.

I I I didn't mention your name at the beginning.

And I actually I am not I'm happy to not slow roll it.

I've got a list of properties that I could give you in my ward.

Um I think that's uh the city's been slow road for for a while, and those residents who live on those blocks are there is vacancy and they have those derelict absentee landlords are ready to move on things as fast as uh they can.

And I would just say from I think what you're hearing, but from my perspective, uh, you know, the building division is critical in almost everything that we do.

I mean, for all of us on the on the alderman side, and certainly for the residents, and so you know, um, I think to Alderwood and Sanye's point, ways that we can figure out how to support you with the budget and with uh person power is important because again, we can create new ordinances, but it doesn't really matter unless we can get them enforced.

Um and so just trying to think about ways that we could get some of that money back, and I know that again, back to the vacancy issue.

I mean, they were able at in an ad hoc way to collect 200,000 of that 20 something million dollars.

So, you know, thinking about, you know, there is a way to kind of help us pay for it, you know, if we do it, but that requires uh commitment and strategy and also you know, juggling all the pieces that you all are.

So um that's all I'm gonna ask today.

I appreciate all your uh time and work and all the uh the and the responsiveness to my calls and to my residents' concerns, so thank you.

Alderman Devotee.

Yes, thank you all.

It's uh it's been an enlightening morning, and I appreciate your uh uh the the information that you've provided to us.

Um I uh you know at this point I'm just gonna ask a handful of follow-up questions.

Okay.

Um both of which, or at least the first couple start with how.

Uh we've talked about uh personnel issues, both with respect to frontline uh inspectors as well as the three specialists.

Uh I think the information you provided was fascinating.

I think it was fascinating.

I guess my question would be how.

Uh how do we get those people in place, and then once we have them in place, how do we keep them in the employment of the building division?

How, how, how?

That's a good question.

It's not an easy answer, but I will say uh that the the simple just put putting it out to the public is how you get people to want to apply.

You know, that's that that's something I don't know if we have to do social media somehow.

It's on the website, so we can go in there actually and look and pursue the job, but maybe we we could look at other things, a way of putting something out there.

Again, I'll circle back and say money, because the people that have left, you know, like I said, we don't do necessarily an exit, you know, survey on them, but uh that's what that's why they're leaving and in work conditions.

Some of them we lost two inspectors at back to back to Webster Groves for some reason, and I've talked to one of them, and uh basically they have one job.

They do building permits, and that's they don't do all the other things like we're talking about, vacancy that they have one job and they make them more than they made here, and so it just seemed to be a better deal all around.

But as far as the raising the you know flag of here we we need people, that's just I don't have an answer.

One and answer for that one.

And I understand that.

And and I guess that's that's what I'm getting to.

Is it is it strictly a financial component?

Uh is it an organizational component?

Is it the way your particular office is organized?

And I know, and you've said it a couple of times, we don't do exit interviews, a formal interview, and I understand that.

But but certainly, I mean, we know when somebody leaves, there'll be a typically there's a conversation.

We know why.

Yeah, we usually know why.

I I was gonna say, right.

I mean, you know why.

There's the grumbling, there's the the statements.

We don't need necessarily a formal interview many, many times.

Does it come down to money?

Compensation.

Short answer, yes.

Okay.

Um what one of the the dirty words or phrases that that I have learned since since taking this position is is salary savings.

I I just, you know, the the idea being that we as a city, no matter what the department is, we budget for a given number of a given number of positions.

I just, you know, the the idea being that we, as a city, no matter what the department is, we budget for a given number of a given number of positions.

But we know we're not ever going to spend those funds because we we aren't employing people in all of those spots.

It amounts to a savings in salary.

And during your presentation, I kept thinking about that and kept thinking about it.

Just is churning in my brain.

If if at end of day our building division is losing folks to Webster Groves because of money.

Has there been discussions with Light or his predecessor about something as simple as potentially eliminating positions that we haven't filled in many, many years, and taking that allocation of salary and putting it toward the inspector one to manager, the creation of this specialist position so that we're appropriately compensating people so that if anything, somebody is going from Webster Groves to the city.

So I mean it sounds like a good thought.

I wouldn't know how to go about achieving that within the building division.

Are you talking about within the building city in total?

I'm talking about within the building division.

Yeah, I we we we would probably have to sit down, look at the TO and see where the spots are with what you are talking about, and there would be a process to have to go about doing that.

Excuse me, Alderman.

I'm sorry, I I was at another meeting.

Um yes, we're Director, could you state your first and last line?

Sorry, I'm a director of public safety, Sean Dace.

And yes, uh to answer your question, we have had some uh top-level conversations with Director Light uh for not only the uh building division, but SEMA too.

We're in the process of of restructuring buildings division has had, I mean, with the with the exit of the uh commissioner ware has put us in a bit of a uh tailspin with the audit and everything.

But to answer your question, which is you know, which is would really help our cause in regards to retaining employees, because we ain't just losing the Western Grove.

I mentioned this in my presentation.

We're in competition with every municipality, north, south, east, and west.

So your point is well taken, and we are in the process of of doing just that.

I I appreciate that that director, and thanks for for coming up.

Um it just seems to me, and and I know we need more inspectors, and that's kind of what we're talking about here.

That's the context of our conversation.

But if we are consistently, and maybe I'm making this too simplistic, and you can correct me if I'm wrong.

No, you're not.

You're really not.

But but if we are consistently not filling those positions, why not simply eliminate them and take that salary and apportion it to the positions that we do have so that when we get a good person, we hold on to them, and they they thrive and they prosper.

And I know that's a very simplistic statement.

It's easy for me to say from my chair.

But um I I know it's been done in other uh situations.

I mean, I can think this past year we did it in with respect to the city councilor, uh eliminated two positions, and that those salaries were allocated to higher folks, so we didn't lose high-end good solid lawyers.

Anyway, uh I appreciate the uh the the comment.

Well, I appreciate that, but I I think I mentioned this in my presentation on Tuesday.

Uh we're trying to build synergy, uh, enthusiasm.

We've been we've been able to do that in the corrections.

So those positions we're we're we're gonna do a better job of being more aggressive in trying to uh locate people that want to be a part of the city and want to be a part of buildings.

Uh right now we the stigma is not very positive, but those are things we are expecting to change.

And again, um we get a uh uh uh uh put a commissioner in there to help us uh strategically get everything going in a positive manner.

Uh but we are um we are focusing on uh trying to fill those positions and do a better job of that.

I I appreciate that.

And and you spoke about those challenges on on Tuesday morning or afternoon.

So uh message received loud and clear, and and maybe the the second part of my comment or question was really aimed at at maintaining, keeping those folks in place.

Uh I realize that it's very difficult to hire six people at a time, or I would imagine it would be very difficult to bring on six quality folks at a time.

But even if we're chipping away at that, once we get those folks in hand, man, it'd be nice to to hold on to them uh and and keep them uh keep them in our building division.

Yeah, and that starts with changing attitude environment there.

Hopefully, uh you you all have been very generous with your time today.

The the one question or the one other subject that I wanted to follow up with and and maybe um uh uh uh commissioner, if if I could ask you, uh there were some questions very, very early on by Alderman Browning with respect to uh data collection and and computer.

Uh and I I think you made mention or maybe it was uh maybe it was Mr.

Moser made mention that with resc with regard to software or maybe hardware programs.

Uh there was a certain amount budgeted, uh, but then with respect to the actual proposal, I think it was about 600,000 or maybe 650 light uh as I'm looking at it.

And anyway, what we've talked a little bit over the last hour and a half about technology and the use of new software programs.

Um how confident or how concerned are you about meeting those software or those technology concerns with the difference in what request was and what the budget proposal is with respect to computers, tech systems, and software.

Is your question uh uh do we feel we have enough money to be able to integrate everything that we intend to integrate over the next uh fiscal year?

Is is that the question, or is it around that we've budgeted a large number that has gone unfully not fully spent year over year?

No, because it it it it looks like with respect to fiscal year 25, for instance, uh spent about 646,000.

I know what you're gonna do by chance.

What's that?

What page are you on, sir?

I'm on 271.

Okay, thank you.

Go on.

This would be under contractual and other services.

The line is 5600 three.

Um I I assume that there was a reason for requesting 1.5 million dollars with respect to tech system development computers.

Um but maybe your question is better than mine, which is are you concerned about meeting what you had in mind if the budget uh allocated is six hundred thousand dollars less.

Uh I mean, I I s I'll say that everything that we intend to do in terms of tech development, I feel fully confident that we'll have enough money to do those integrations.

Okay.

Yeah.

And and that's from either a hardware or a development side or software.

Uh I mean 003, the line item you're specifically referring to.

Yes.

So my understanding, that is just for software development.

Um uh so actual hardware would would come out elsewhere.

But I also feel confident that we've we'll have all the computers and all the the things that we need in terms of hardware as well.

Okay.

And fair enough.

I just want to make sure we're crystal clear because I've heard a lot of responses today uh in with respect to other alder's questions.

It talks about the use of technology, uh, the use of computers, the the the planning moving forward.

But but if you're good, that's very good to hear.

Okay, fair enough.

Uh again, I appreciate your patience.

Thank you, gentlemen.

Thank you.

Thank you, Alderman.

And thank you to the uh building commission uh and your team for being here there.

Clearly, this is uh um, you know, you know, when we talk about public safety, I know you guys are in the public safety budget.

A lot of times when we talk about public safety, policing is the first go-to.

But uh buildings is such a huge uh component to public safety, as many as my colleagues have said today when you're talking about the the masses amount of vacancies that we have and the vacant buildings and at some point the city of St.

Louis with the massive amount of LRA vacancies that we have, we also need to hold ourselves accountable, not just the outside individuals because we are a large stockhold of some of these vacant buildings that are catching fire and falling down, uh, which is not a yacht department, but um it's critical to start a you know uh address these in and in a lot of communities like mine, you know, these vacant objects uh that they see for decades, or you know, as I drive down certain areas in the 14th continue to see those uh vacant buildings become a kind of mental negativity on people my frame of neglect, disinvestment, and feel like things aren't going to change, and and that my frame and that energy sometimes circulate into uh well, you know, negative thoughts and negative actions that then potentially may need policing, all right, or need to have stuff like Office of Violence Prevention to do the proactive things.

These vacant objects uh that they see for decades, or you know, as I drive down certain areas in the 14th continue to see those uh vacant buildings become a kind of mental negativity on people my frame of neglect, disinvestment and feel like things aren't going to change, and and that my frame and that energy sometimes circulate into uh well you know negative thoughts and negative actions that then potentially may need policing, all right, or need to have stuff like office of violence prevention to do the proactive things.

Um, but your department is so critical to, you know, I don't think we really uplift how you know eliminating one or two vacant buildings can go a long way of a psyche uh of individuals have been living next to these vacant Paul McKee properties.

Let's just say for 10, 15 years, you know, we it's one thing to talk about is another thing for some people to live and see it.

So ultimately I want to thank you all for the work that you do in trying to address public safety uh from the build-in division aspect.

However, with that being said, you know, you start with the flowers and then you dive straight into like how do we I think from this budget committee, a lot of questions I was asked really is how can we support um you know, just either from an all different budgetary standpoint.

And uh hopefully I had a some things that I want to ask, and hopefully I don't have them out of thought because there's been so much good conversation.

I just want to get some questions on some vacant positions and what they are.

So customer service manager.

I see uh you all asked for this year uh and was a new position.

That's the one that you're talking about will be front facing.

Can you go a little bit more detail?

Because I know that you already have like customers or continuing on that, you're looking to get a customer service supervisor, and then it looks like another customer service.

Just one, a customer service supervisor.

You already have customer service representative.

Um, you already have customer service representatives number two and one.

So there are people in the office that and I tend to go up quite often.

I appreciate uh you, Mr.

Dylan and uh former commissioner uh Edware and as well as Frank Oswald and and Mr.

I don't know why it's blanking me.

McLaughlin, as we worked on the public nuisance bill, um and just the great work that you all do up there.

But there's already some fun front facing customer service individuals in the building division, correct?

Yes, correct.

And this new customer service manager would be somebody who can take that to the next level or yeah, the vision is that this person would be able to questions related to active fines and fees that people are already they're they're faced with.

They are expected to pay the building division.

Uh the hope would be that this individual would be able to explain what happens if they don't pay those fines and fees, which would ultimately result in in the property landing on a uh on a tax sale.

Um and so uh so it's in my mind it's sort of two parts.

A level of accountability in-house for somebody to be able to speak to fines and fees associated with the code violation.

Because the inspector, it's a bit to ask the district inspector whose mind is totally you know focused on the violation itself and what it would mean to remediate the violation.

But what does it mean to have this level of debt because of the code violation?

So we want that person to be able to speak to that um and and them to be you know available during regular business hours to do that as opposed to that question being posed to a district inspector or that inspector's supervisor when those folks are actually out in the ward, you know, uh boots on the ground doing day-to-day inspections and everything.

Um the other part of that position would be that there's been a lot more work as part of kind of this cross-departmental uh process for how tax sales work.

So there are, I can't remember right now if they're bi-weekly or if they're monthly, but there are monthly meetings where everybody comes together to talk about things.

So everybody knows who all the players are.

Uh every time there's a tax sale, and I believe it's six times a year, there have there are there are fines and fees that have to be confirmed uh to make sure that the number that this this property is gonna go up for auction, uh, make sure that that's an accurate number.

Um, and and there's lots of quagmires that will come out of that.

You know, I mean, uh I can think of one instance where um someone was disputing a code violation.

I mean, it was poor timing on whether, you know, to dispute whether the code violation existed or not, but you know, you've got less than a week, we'll say before a tax sale, and then you know, we're talking about whether or not the violation even existed or whether it was a uh grandfathered, you know, feature from a historic home or something like that.

So it's just become very complicated.

And right now we have about three or four different working various aspects of it.

So that's what the customer service manager would be doing.

That's that's the vision.

I mean, a CSR one, those are the folks that um uh just process building permits, you know, they're they're taking paperwork they're taking, uh directing people, you know, to the cashier window to pay for their permit or their application or whatever.

I I think um, yeah, yeah.

Uh I'm not sure if I've answered your question directly or or what.

No, I think you did, and uh I also, you know, I was gonna say it like a closed mouth, don't get fed.

So it's glad that you all are asking for this new position that is new to see how we'll you know it will work to upgrade it, I guess, or to elevate the office.

I guess one of the questions that I was gonna have is um, and like I say, you gotta start somewhere.

Is one position for one person that would be taking phone calls from ward one all the way to ward 14 on different fines and fees enough.

Uh or or what are we are we gonna be creating the same cycle of putting so much on one person that they you know run ragged and then they get burned out, like is there a thought to try to go to two or uh I mean it may be something, you know.

I mean, if if you know, after we implement the position and see how it works, we'll that'll be really enlightening, you know.

Um similar to the way that I spoke about buying a bunch of hardware because we got a new building permit online system.

You know, we we we didn't want to buy a bunch of stuff to find out that we didn't need all of it.

So um I I mean I will say that uh we did ask for an administrative assistant one position.

Um that was part of our request.

It it it didn't pass into the proposal that's before you today that's on page uh 282.

Um we currently have two uh administrative assistant ones uh and we were asking for a third and and the third would actually work alongside the customer service manager.

Um so I mean we would have loved to have had that.

Uh we still would love to have that.

Uh but yeah, I mean, uh right now we're dealing with nobody whose sole job it is to do this one specific thing.

Uh so one is is better than than zero.

And and and maybe, you know, if we find that we're collecting more money because of it, it'll be an easy sell to say we need two customers, you know, an FY28 or something like that.

Gotcha.

And three other quick questions, and then even though we took a lot of your time and we push back corrections, I do want to thank corrections for being flexible.

We probably can sneak in a little break.

I see the legendary uh and legendary individual also over there in the corner.

Good to see you.

Um I think my my my colleagues sit on the building inspection inspector part.

It's super critical that um, you know, part of it is in the building division.

But when you know the new personnel director has been amazing, figure out what it will it take to keep uh you know more building inspectors.

I think we covered a little bit of the lead uh kind of fund that we have.

We're basically just putting money in a fund to put it back in our general revenue because we're not doing nothing with it, which go into reserves, which I guess makes sense why all the lead abatement workers um are never occupied, even though we put positions for them in the budget.

Um if I'm just looking at 283 led uh worker um five positions, it wasn't occupied last year.

Um the next page, which comes from I guess grants.

Uh two positions was not occupied for another uh led abatement worker.

So basically we I think the ultimate from the ninth answer that and still maybe some questions from the department of what's that fund's clearly not being utilized and you guys aren't doing anything with that money or those positions, correct?

Well it looks like yes.

Or who would who's the person who needs to get the clarification on that program?

Uh so we just hired a new head of our led program.

Uh it's somebody, great guy, his name's Frank Borzig.

Um he's worked in the program, so it's what you'd really love to see somebody rise through the ranks over the course of about five to seven years or whatever it's been for him.

So he is now the head of that program.

Um I mean, I would love to broker a conversation amongst any of you, any of you all along with you know, Mr.

Borzig, possibly it's something that maybe even happens after we get a new commissioner, but happy to do it, you know, prior to that.

Um, you know, and maybe just check the health of what is that, what is that section of the building division actually need?

You know, are we year over year asking for positions that maybe we don't necessarily need anymore?

Because I think of public safety again, if we know that those five positions are in there, and I mean maybe we strategically do that five positions, only 173,000.

I'm horrible at math, but if you take those five and divide it, I don't know who would take those positions.

I would assume probably maybe two uh for 173,000, but you know, five scheduled in the 1730.

I think I mean clearly those placeholders are there knowing that they never gonna be used, but look, every cent and penny counts.

And if we know we're not gonna use those, I could just think of public safety as we had OVP in there.

You know, why aren't we allocating that money to you know of uh Office of Violence Prevention instead of just putting it in the budget to put it back in the budget to never use that money?

Um two other questions, and I'll be uh done.

Surface parking lot.

I know John covered this a little bit.

Maybe he can uh speak with me on it before Mr.

Edware went out.

Um I wanted to just kind of get an update on the surface parking lot.

I think you covered it a little bit.

There was a one-year effective date.

One thing about that those shoes are going to be billed for whoever the next commissioner is.

I didn't even have to pull up the ordinance for him to already just start going through and was like, oh, I remember this and this and this, and this is a requirement.

I was like, Jesus.

And I had it in my hand, and I had to review it, and I'm the one who wrote it.

But he was saying that they're gonna start like that process.

Can you tell me what I think you mentioned it, what role or what is the position who will be going out checking these surface parking lots, making sure they do the requirement and has that process started?

The process has started, and it was delayed because of personnel related issues.

We have a supervisor that's in place that a month ago started regulation of parking lots.

And we have one person who's actually in special projects that also does uh day cares and and things like that, who is also going to be assigned to the uh parking lot enforcement portion of the ordinance.

Gotcha.

Well, I will work with uh you, John, and maybe the building division um to just continue to stay up to date on that.

I know that's been a concern with some of the downtown um uh residents and organizations and just in general.

I think there was uh a recent story on the news of some vandalism that has happened uh mainly on the street, but it brought back up the surface park a lot.

And then my last question, and then we will uh fit in a break for everybody.

I think this question is probably for director dates.

Um as we're talking about new commissioner, you know, again, building division is uh just soup just as critical as any public safety director, I mean department outside of like policing.

What are how are you guys going about looking to uh um re to fill this position for the building commissioner?

Well, as I mentioned before, we we have a nationwide search out.

We're looking for somebody who has good organizational skills, um uh a person that uh has a track record of managing people.

The the building division is gonna have to take an entire overhaul.

So we're gonna look for somebody that can um that can come in that has um experience in regards to uh the building division, but somebody who is is organizational skills would be um a must uh in filling that position.

And um I'm not opposed to necessarily outside search.

I think our police chief has uh he wasn't my first pick when they was doing the outside search, but I think uh Chief Tracy has done a good job.

Uh as well as a new streets director has I think done a very good job.

Is there any conversations of outside of doing the national search?

I think the building division, while it does need some cleanup and overhaul, even though there's a lot of great men and women that's doing great work, you know, it's very unique.

Are you guys looking also in-house or are you?

Oh, of course, yeah.

Yeah, I mean, we're not we're not eliminating anybody.

Uh actually, we're I'm meeting with uh several people um in the next couple weeks to talk about um some influence and folks to uh to recruit and help me recruit uh in regards to uh filling that position.

So yeah, no, we're not I'm I'm I I if you know you you're absolutely right.

There are some things unique to St.

Louis that um someone who who's been here would have uh would have that knowledge about.

So that that's that's definitely those folks would definitely be considered.

Thank you.

Thank you, Director.

Any other burning questions from uh my colleagues?

No.

Seeing none, uh thank you, building commissioner for uh being here extending the time a little bit.

Uh we uh have the department of corrections that we push back that will be coming at 12.

So with that, I'll take a recess to recess into 12.

So move.

I'll take a motion to recess to 12.

Move by the all the woman from the seventh, second by the all the man from the ninth.

All in favor, aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carries budget and public employees is resuming from our recess.

I'll take a motion to come back into session.

So moved.

Move by one from the second, move by or second by the all the men from the ninth.

Uh, all in favor, aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carries.

We will continue our conversation with the budget.

And next we have the department of corrections.

So if the commissioner wants to come up, introduce himself and anybody they have with him.

You can jump straight into your budget.

And from our end, it looks like we are uh muted.

Okay, I think we're unmuted.

So you're ready whenever you are, Commissioner.

All right, good afternoon.

One second.

Okay.

STO.

Okay.

All right.

Uh just in case if people didn't hear us, we're starting back the budget conversation around the uh budget, and we have a department of corrections in front of us.

Commissioner, you may proceed.

Good afternoon, everyone.

And commissioner, uh, just pull the mic up and make sure they're talking to it so that we can uh hear you.

Okay.

Good afternoon, everyone.

My name is Nate Haywick, Commissioner of CJC.

Right.

So I made a PowerPoint for you guys to see some of the things that we completed over at CJC since I arrived September 16th.

So on that.

I think it's uh up on the screen.

You ready?

Okay.

All right.

Yeah.

So yeah, so the first thing I want to talk about, some of the main strategy goals, and I'm not gonna read everything.

I'm just hit some of the highlights that we completed.

Uh safety and security, uh, that we you know made sure that we got uh training for staff, letting them know about the safety and security of the jail staff excellent.

Uh that's something that we've been promoting.

Uh offender accountability, you know, meeting with residents and uh getting feedback from them, talking to them on regular basis.

Uh we complete uh commissioner rounds just to get some input on some of the things that's going on inside the jail with administration.

Uh some uh some of the key service provide uh that we have is the security operation, housing supervision, um that we make sure that everyone's patrolling, doing the tours that they're supposed to be doing, uh the intake and release, uh booking and classification.

Uh we just started a classification unit.

Um we just hired a supervisor down there and and classification.

Uh next we're gonna get our four more uh uh classification case managers down there to help out.

This is going to allow us to classify these residents the proper way that they should be classified that don't want to be mixed up where they don't supposed to be.

And then also the contraband control is something that you know we've been working hard on.

Uh we've just brought a scanner for uh the legal mail that's coming in the jail.

You know, we have people that's uh going to Amazon, find fake uh legal mail stamps and sending it in.

And so this is gonna allow us to scan the legal mail just to make sure uh no contraband is on the legal mail.

They soaking the papers with all types of liquid drugs.

So that's some things that we're doing.

Uh we're doing more searches up in the uh in the jail, trying to prevent people from using contraband.

Um the facility operations, you know.

We upgraded a lot of things in the jail.

Uh you know, we started uh the cleaning crew also painting crew with the residents.

So we completed like all the all the floors on exterior uh with the painting, and now we do the sales trying to get majority of the sales painted uh emergency response and reporting.

That's something we're trying to make sure that we uh stay on top of and safety and operation on the next page.

You'll see that you know, we just started body one cameras, and it's gonna have accountabilities for both the staffs and the residents.

This is something that is needed in all jails.

Um we just put this in place with the captains about two months, about a month ago, and then we're gonna start with the lieutenants, and then 30 days later, the officers will be having body cameras also.

And this will have everyone with a body camera on, you know, whenever they re respond to an incident, also turn on their body camera.

Uh the body scanner is something that is needed that we have.

Uh this is something to prevent contraband from coming into the jail.

So this is something major that we have, and then also we we have plans of putting one down in PD section uh for when residents uh get arrested by PD, that they can be scanned.

Uh the MC box is something that we put in place on the second floor, uh an admission area where we with corrections at right now.

We still dealing with PD, trying to put one down there also.

But right now we have one on the second floor, and this is uh where when they when residents are locked up, they can voluntarily put drugs inside that box.

And so far I've been helping out a great deal.

You know, we found heroin, uh, uh cocaine, weed.

They just put uh all type of contraband inside this this box.

So it's helping out, trying to get people not to bring drugs into the jail.

Uh the newsletter is something that we just put in place about three months ago.

It's an excellent newsletter, you know, being transparent with everyone letting them know what's going on inside the jail, other than just sending our emails all the time.

And I just mentioned about the classification unit.

Every jail should have a classification unit.

And so that's what we've been working on over at CJC.

Staff and leadership, uh the recruitment, you know, since I arrived, uh we reduced the shortage.

You know, we was like 85 uh officers short, and we brought it down.

We hired at least 50 officers, but at the same time, uh you have officers that come in and they stay, and then they move on to St.

Louis County or St.

Charles for better pay.

And that's what's been happening with us, and so we continue to hire people as people leave.

Uh just hired a major and the deputy commissioner and the chaplain.

Uh the chaplain is over our programs.

He's doing an excellent job with that.

Uh the training coordinator, this is something about the training.

When I came over the last time, I talked about revamping training.

Uh, this training coordinators is doing a great job over there, not only with the new uh staff that we getting, but we have a training uh online training for current staff that's in the jail.

And that was something that I asked uh staff when I first arrived when the last time they had some type of training, especially leadership training.

And that that'll be my next thing I'm talking about.

Uh the leadership training is so important.

Uh that's what it starts at from the top.

So your leaders need to understand the procedure of the jail, and that's what we lacking in.

And so now uh that we had outside training coming in, uh training our leaders, and that's what I want to continue to do, uh, bringing outside uh resources in and also having our leaders go to different conferences to understand uh what a leader's supposed to do.

And then the recognition committee.

This was some of these things was in Mr.

Burris' uh report before he left.

Uh he put in there about the ERC employee recognition committee.

Um we started this already.

This has been going on now for I believe three months.

Um they put together the correction officer week that's going on all week this week, and they doing an excellent job dealing with that.

We started the employee of the month, recognizing employees that's doing outstanding job, and this is going well also.

Is the work, the work crews that I mentioned, you know, to have the the paint, the paint crew, the scrub crew, the power wash crew, uh the upkeep of the jail, um, uh the tablet access.

Now we have all residents have tablets.

You know, at one point when I first arrived, I think we probably had about 10 in a unit, and you had about 60 residents in a unit.

So you always had altercations with tablets.

Uh out of the cell time, uh, we increased that letting the residents out.

I know when I first arrived, the feedback was from the residents that they was complaining about not coming out they sales uh to call their loved ones.

So that's what we did.

We increased coming out and we did it in sections because of staff shortage.

Commissioner rounds is something that we created when I first arrived that the commissioners go upstairs and go inside the uh units and be seen by the residents and also the officers.

Uh this is something that was real important that we need to do.

Uh this is another recommendation in Mr.

Berris' report that we you know conduct rounds and at least three times a week.

And we try to we try to do five, but we do do three a week.

Uh facility upkeep, the lobby floors.

You know, when I first arrived, the lobby was kind of dull.

Now it has a shine to it.

Make sure they they scrubbing and mopping and waxing, looks a whole lot better.

Okay.

Now we're gonna go to the general fund.

Uh I requested 40 million, and you know, the proposal was 33,757, and 362.

You know, I know if we can't get the 40, I'll be happy with the 36.

You know, uh, and I'm gonna break that down in the presentation.

Um, you know, I know the budget is tight.

I understand that.

Uh the thing is, you know, we're trying to make CJC successful.

And you know, when I first arrived, that was my goal.

Uh the correction phone commission is 955,000 uh both sides, and then the jail facility improvements is 900,000.

Uh the staffing overview uh was requested for 254 uh the proposals 228 right now, and then also I have a breakdown of the medical services.

I think uh Ms.

Frazier said it did go up, Ms.

Frazier to uh 200,000.

So this number might not be right what I have right now because we just received this information.

Uh the quick stats, uh 40 40 million, 699 or 11, and this includes with salary uh building maintenance and medical and food services.

This is the breakdown on that.

Okay.

Uh the strategies and priorities, some things that uh that we need at the jail is the uh accreditation uh manager and a pre-coordinator.

A pre-coordinator uh is prison rape elimination act.

This is something that's needed in all jails.

Um we don't have a pre-coordinator right now in that CJC.

Right now we have our major substitute in this position.

Uh this is an extra duty for this major.

This is something that I would love to have because whenever you have an assault, anything like that, you gotta be careful that you don't get any type of lawsuit.

Uh staff uh development.

Uh we want to make sure that our staff is getting trained.

You know, uh, we're looking at like sending some out, especially our leaders to NIC uh conferences and AGA conference, increasing off site leadership training to help them understand, you know, the ends and out on being a leader.

This is some of the things that uh we promoted when I was at St.

Louis County to try to get everyone trained properly.

Uh the honor guard, most jails in the United States have honor guards.

At St.

Louis County, we did have honor guard.

Right now, we don't have one at St.

Louis City.

But I'm looking forward to having something like this at St.

Louis City.

Like I said, I want to make sure that we make CJC successful, and this part of the plan of making it successful.

Operation safety, you know, we want to make sure that we are doing everything correct, the procedure and compliance, making sure everybody's following the rules and the policy and procedure.

The budget, we have key personnel training to build uh professionalism, uh accredited for the division.

This is something that you know I've been sending out emails about professionalism.

You know, when you come into a culture that has been, you know, so lax on professionalism, it's a lot of work.

And this is what we've been doing, the administration that's on hand right now.

Uh key funding, uh staff development, what we talked about, retention, recruitment.

All this here is some of the things that Mr.

Burris had in this report, and so we try to follow that as much as possible.

Uh you know, he mentioned about uh the training, making sure we uh get retention going and and also uh recruitment.

And so what we've been doing with the recruitment, you know, I've been putting it out on LinkedIn, Facebook, um, Instagram, just promoting different positions, and that's how we've been doing our recruit.

Uh reentry programs.

Um we're trying to make sure that we're giving these residents all the programs that we can, making sure that they uh don't have to come back to jail.

So with the serve safe program that we've been uh doing, uh this was here before I arrived.

Um I know it was successful at St.

Louis County because I was over that program.

A lot of residents that got out got jobs at major hotels, major restaurants, became managers and doing successful.

So that's a big program that I love to see uh with residents getting involved.

Uh the educational and vocational uh programs is is going well.

Uh Reverend Gray is doing excellent job with all these different programs.

Uh the mental health support, uh, the mental health team.

They just started a yoga, a yoga class uh during the week for the females, and this is uh excellent program.

Uh when we walk around, administration walk around, the females always talk about that program that they love to attend.

And also uh we have the computer class now, and also uh for the they get on the computer and look up uh how to do resumes and different things like that on the computer.

So that helps out a great deal also for when they get out, they could be ahead of the game.

Uh jail assessment.

Uh when I first arrived, I did assessment of the jail.

And this is before I even looked at Mr.

Burris' report.

Uh and some of the things that was in line with some what he mentioned in my report.

Uh, when I looked at it late on, like a week later, I noticed that we had some of the same things.

Uh the jail uh need repairs, that's what we've been doing uh since I arrived, you know, with the painting and also fixing different things inside the jail.

Uh technology uh and security, we have a lot of cameras that need to be fixed over there at the jail, and that's one of our priorities that we want to make sure that we have eyes in the jail when we're not there, you know, for we could know what's going on and making sure that we holding people accountable for things that's going on in the jail.

Uh the population, you know, it it changed from when I looked at the population last year, I believe it was about 680, you know, before I arrived.

Now we at 782.

So the numbers went up.

But we still at the same pay of salary for this year, you know, that they recommending.

So I I mean, I just don't uh understand the numbers, so that's why I want you all to think about it and see what we're talking about once we get completed with this and the questions we could finish up on.

So the population numbers went up, uh food went up, um, the medical care went up.

Okay.

So I brought down six core strategies that we would like to attack.

Uh staff development, that's something I talked about, re-entry, support, uh facility maintenance and security tech and compliance and the population readiness.

These are some of the things that we would like to attack for this next budget.

And also, if you look down at the bottom, I put down it about the accreditation.

This is uh the plan.

You know, when I read Mr.

Berris' report, he mentioned something about the accreditation.

You know, St.

Louis County was accredited for about seven years.

I believe last year and no, this year in January.

Somewhere like they failed the accreditation, now they're trying to get it back.

But this is something that I'm looking forward to for CJC down the road in the future.

So this is why I would like to hire a PR coordinator and also accreditation manager.

This will help us in line in getting uh compliance to all rules for accreditation.

And this is why I put down them two positions because you have to have a pre-coordinator and accreditation manager to be in compliance.

And then operation excellence focusing on safety and security and staff leadership.

That's so important.

That's why I keep talking about leadership, and that's why we meet so much with our leadership team, trying to get them to understand how important it is to be leaders at a jail.

And that's the end of the slide.

Thank you, Commissioner Order Sayorti, uh, Vice Chair Browning.

Thank you, Commissioner.

Um, first off, I want to extend my congratulations on the hiring of 14 new correctional officers and the promotion of two officers and one to captain and one to major.

I think that adequate staffing the CJC is one of the most important things we need to do uh to ensure that we're providing care for the detainees there.

Uh so I'm aware the past struggles of the CJC have been related to staffing, uh, and that it's just need you need people to watch other people and make sure that they're staying safe.

And often um I I think that people's uh uh concern for the safety of people comes back to just having those staff members that are there and making sure that the the uh CJC is running correctly.

So this is excellent progress that I'm seeing on that front, and I'm see it.

Um just a couple questions for you.

Uh one is uh there's a line item on this budget, and and just to understand, I'm looking at this budget, and you know, same as you uh I see these lines and I'm just uh don't know what certain things mean.

So um I'm looking at uh page 294 in this budget book.

Uh there's uh item for health and safety capital asset.

Uh it seems to be that there was um a request for 150,000 dollars that wasn't budgeted, but on the next page under uh corrections phone commissions, I see that that was added under there uh for the same item health and safety capital asset.

Is that just being moved elsewhere in the budget?

Is that the same thing?

Yeah, that's the radios, um, our staff radios, and and the reason uh when I reason why I put that there is because when I first arrived, we didn't have radios in the jail, and we went out and purchased 50 radios, and we still short on radios, and you know how important it is to have a radio when you're inside the jail.

And so my goal is to uh get an equipment room.

So right now we have uh um contractors, uh they building a wall over at the CJC, and also they building us uh uh equipment room.

You know, this is something that's needed because people uh misplacing the radios, and that's why I believe they were so short on radios.

Now we're trying to hold people accountable, making sure that they uh have the radios, sign them out and sign them in.

So it just moved to a different part of the budget is is the same amount.

Okay.

Um and uh similarly for facilities and ground services.

Um noticed that there's been a decreasing amount in the past few years.

Um is that just being shifted over to the facilities and ground services line under the jail facilities improvements category?

What's that?

Uh could I call Ms.

Yeah?

Oh, yeah, yeah.

That's uh the we had uh we have a grant for the uh the shower project right now, and they not completed with it with the project.

So what's what's gonna happen if they not complete it by I believe October that we're gonna have to pay you know for that shower project and it won't come out the grant.

So uh right now um we we started when I first arrived, but they had this, they had this project, I believe over a year before I arrived, and we just getting to it.

So and this is what's going on with that.

So that's what that amount is for right now.

Okay, that's helpful.

Um, and then last question I have uh for you is um in the personnel schedule on um page 297.

There's a title uh 2333, correctional classification assistant.

Uh there has been eight positions that were budgeted for.

None of them were filled last year.

We're rebudging eight positions this year.

I'm just curious what is that?

What is that position?

So um on them eight positions, we took four of the positions and put people back into where they're supposed to uh be because they was they had them labeled as correction officers.

So now they're gonna be labeled as uh classification instead of correction officers because they're not correction officers.

And so that's that's what's going on with that.

And then also the other four will be part of the classification unit that I was uh um mentioned earlier about classification.

Uh we have a supervisor down there, and we just have one classification uh case manager down there.

So the four that we want to hire, they're gonna be part of the classification unit.

And and and just to let you know, this is an important uh piece of a jail, you know, every jail should have a classification unit.

You know, and right now, right now we don't have the complete unit, but we do have a supervisor that we just promoted about a month, month two months ago.

Okay, that's helpful.

Um, and does that mean then we're short of officers then?

Oh, you say are we short officers?

Well, you said they were classified as officers before, but they're actually not that.

So do we need to hire people to replace the yes?

Okay.

Yes, so the four that we moved, so that's gonna be four more officers that we can have in the building.

So that'll help those numbers as well.

Yes.

Okay.

Uh, and then last question I have is um I'm just curious.

Uh we employed two full-time locksmiths in the correction facility.

Is that accurate?

I is this just that the locks require constant maintenance or uh I didn't realize we kept two locksmiths on staff at all times.

Is that that's always what I'm reading in the budget?

No.

So I what I did was I asked for another locksmith, but we never did hire another locksmith.

Um the pay uh didn't match what people was looking for, so we could never hire uh another locksmith.

And my goal was to get another locksmith because we had so many problems with the locks.

And so when this other locksmith go home, they call him in the middle of the night.

So I wanted someone to be there, you know, on a second shift.

So that's what that was my goal, but we didn't hire that other locksmith.

Okay, that's helpful.

Thank you.

Yep.

All the one attack.

Thank you, Chairman.

Uh hello, Commissioner.

Nice to see you.

Nice to see you.

Uh, you've been here for a short while, but I do just want to start by saying that I'm impressed.

Um I've been uh following just your ability to kind of staff and do hirings in the department.

I think um if I'm understanding correctly, you've been able to um get upwards of 50 folks hired in your area in your department.

Yes, that's not including uh support staff.

I believe it was 10 support staff also.

I'm very supportive of those efforts and happy to see them.

I think that a lot of the issues um that happened within our CJC, specifically the deaths that happen.

Um a lot of times what I hear is a lot of the ability to kind of catch things proactively really depend on your manpower um that you're able to have on the ground in real time.

So I'm happy to see you moving in that direction.

Um I did just want to ask you in general um what has been your process for getting that 50 um hired and just some details that might be helpful for us to know as a budget committee.

I I think the hiring is something that a lot of departments mention is kind of a struggle, uh, particularly you gotta get a list from personnel, you have to, you know, that kind of process involved.

So I would love to know your thoughts there and how you've managed to get 50 folks onboarded in such a short span of time.

Well, um what I what I usually do is when I get home, about seven, I just get on my laptop and start uh putting up all our different positions at CJC on the LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, all the social media, and then uh people will apply, and we'll contact personnel, action personnel, you know how many people we have for this position, and then you know, they'll send us a list.

And then also we had two job fares.

So this helped out a great deal when we had the two job fairs.

Um we the first job fair we had um here at City Hall, uh we had 28 people uh applied, and then we had 21 that we um interviewed.

Okay, um that is excellent.

And I did, and also echoing the 14 hires that you had yesterday and the promotion of the two folks are really good to see.

So knowing that you've been able to hire that, I'd say one of the things that does surprise me in your budget is it does look like the biggest cut in your budget was actually for officer positions for CO level one, you asked for 133, there's 113 being proposed, and then for CO level two, um, you asked for 26, there's being 21 proposed.

Is there any context you want to share with us as a budget committee as far as your conversations with the budget director and what that discrepancy is, or if we were somehow able to get you, you know, your manpower on the ground, is it really impacted by not having the acts?

You know, again, a lot of my core interests um is definitely the safety of the folks in the facility and how we can prevent issues.

And so I want to make sure, especially since you've demonstrated an ability to hire the proposed budget that's in front of us, specifically for CO level ones and CO level twos.

Do you feel that it gives you what you need to keep everyone as safe and have the quality of you know care that should be within our detention facility?

Thank you for asking that.

Um, I don't think the number that we have right now is keeping everyone safe.

So uh just to let you know, um, like I said earlier, uh 2025, I believe the budget uh was 133 staff members.

Now we have more residents, and now we bring in down the number of staff that we can have.

Um also I want to mention fully staffed at CJC, the number should be 195.

Okay.

So I went lower because of the budget and said, can I have 133?

And so the proposed came back with 100 and I believe what, 19?

So that really took us down bare minimum.

So we can't function with that amount of staff.

We're still gonna be short.

Understood.

Um, and then I know you mentioned uh sort of something that we see in other departments is when folks come, sometimes they get their training and then they go other places.

So has any issues with your correction officers been related to, you know, have you also had issues with bro bringing folks on board and then training them and them going to another municipality that might have a more competitive pay?

Yes.

Um so St.

Charles, St.

Charles Directors and St.

Louis County acting director, you know, we all meet and talk.

Um so we have several people that went out to St.

Charles and St.

Louis County because of the pay.

So they'll come here and get trained, and then they'll go to these different uh organizations because of the pay.

And that's something that I didn't want to bring up because I knew that we was going through a budget crisis right now.

So I didn't ask for extra pay for the COs.

That's all I've been doing is trying to hire more.

And um, that's what we've been doing since I've been there.

And one of the positions that I see in your budget or I guess you didn't get it, um, but it would be the PRIA coordinator, uh, which for folks working at home, a PRIA coordinator is it's a prison rape elimination act, um, and it is a role that follows up on complaints of sexual assault, sexual harassment, things of that nature.

Um, I think it's pretty key.

It's a pretty standard position in most other uh municipal detention facilities.

Um it's also needed for a lot of the certification standards within the facility to show that there is a standard of care that's being maintained.

It doesn't look like that was granted to you.

So if you could share more with us on this, the PRIO role, if you think that it is needed for you to have um operational excellence and to actually be able to follow up on I know that we have had um you know any contacts around sexual assaults reports we have had, and if you feel like the budget in front of us, and particularly not having that role, um, does it allow for you to do what you need to do in terms of protecting staff and following up on complaints with as a facility you are obligated?

Yes, uh Priya the PRIA coordinator is important inside of a jail setting uh for staff and also for residents.

Um if anyone uh touch someone inappropriately, the PRIA coordinator does investigation and and that role is important because you know they follow up and they have the experience to know the questions to acts.

And for you know, uh residents or staff wouldn't feel uncomfortable.

Right now we have a major that's filling in this position, and since I arrived, this is something that I wanted to put in place.

A pre-a coordinator, every jail should have a pre-a coordinator inside the jail.

Is there uh is there a conflict of having a staff member uh that is serving as a measure, also being the PR coordinator?

Isn't that typically an independent role?

Yes, it is.

There's an independent role.

Okay.

Um and is the major train to do this is because it I guess what the committee needs to know is just is that actually work?

Like are you just doing what you have to do to say that you check the box, but that we should actually be aware that you really do actually need someone to slowly do that role, or is does the major get the training and somehow able to avoid what might be some conflicts there?

No, so since I arrived, this was the position that they had in place.

And I'm not sure if the major is trained to be a prayer coordinator, and I doubt if a person is trained to be a prayer coordinator without having that experience.

So this is why this role is so important to have at the jail because then you'll have someone that's trained and educated to do the job properly.

Thank you.

Um do you know since your tenure, how many incidents have you had of sexual assault that you can recall?

Um I want to say at least five, probably the top of my head, probably about five.

Okay.

Um my next question is also kind of connected to accreditation.

Uh there's a accreditation manager.

Um I would again, I've just really been learning all about this because I really care about what happens inside our jails.

We got residents that are really um active, and there's been a lot of concerning things that have happened, and a lot of my constituents in particular just made this an interest.

So I've kind of been able to learn about what are the standards and places that there are in other municipalities that we may not have here that are impacting um the outcomes there.

And so I saw um kind of the accreditation managers, the ACA, the American Correction Association.

If you could speak to us about uh the accreditation there and the role connected to that and provide some light to the what that specific certification is.

Yeah, accreditation managers is very important because uh they keep you updated on all the uh procedures that need to be done inside of a jail to keep you updated on like different the chemicals that's in the jail.

They let you know you know the operations of the jail, what we've done wrong.

And these the uh the accreditation person keep you updated on uh different uh areas of the jail, making sure that we compliant to ACA rules.

So that's important because right now we don't know if we in compliance or not with the rules because we don't have that person with the knowledge just going off of what I know and my administration know, uh that's what we're going off.

So we need accreditation manager inside CJC.

And is that a position that's pretty standard around the country and specifically is that a position that exists uh within the county and within St.

Charles?

Yes, we we had accreditation manager with St.

Louis County.

I was there for 32 years.

We had one there for that long.

Um and then my last question is kind of tied to the just the facility.

I had an opportunity to get a tour a while back, and one of the things that we discussed is actually that the cameras that you all have in the facility does not fully cover the parameter of the facility, and that there are some blind spots.

And so um, is there still blind spots in your camera technology?

Is there something in this budget that would allow for you to address that?

I think that you know it is we're not the best ranked jail, one of the worst ranked jails in the country.

And so I know that surveillance and footage and being able to see what's happening is important, and so just wanted to check in on those blind spots.

Do they still exist?

And if they still exist, is there something in the budget in front of us that will allow you to get the camera to get make sure we have no blind spots?

And uh we've been working on trying to update uh the camera system, but is we gonna need more into that budget to make sure we get uh completed with all the cameras inside the jail because some areas don't have all the cameras uh properly uh working, correct?

And so this is why this is one I'll keep things that we will want, you know, completed.

So uh is that granted to you in the budget?

Does is there funds for that in this budget that's being proposed?

I believe I believe we did put this in the budget, but uh I'm not sure if it's um approved.

Approved.

Yes.

Do you know how much that costs specifically?

Not off the top.

We can follow up off record.

I definitely be interested in getting that number.

Thank you for your time and thank you, Chairman.

Thank you.

Okay, yeah.

Alderman Altaman Devotee.

Uh Commissioner, it's good to see you.

I don't know that you and I have met, but uh it's been enlightening listening to you this afternoon.

So thank you for coming before us and educating us about what's happening at uh at the Justice Center.

I do have a couple of questions.

Uh one of the benefits of asking when I do is I get a lot of times to play cleanup.

Um I found it very interesting uh about your discussion of detainees from the the beginning of your tenure just this past September uh to where we are now.

And if I understood you when you began, uh we had 680 folks at the Justice Center.

By year's end, we were up to 726, and the most recent number uh available to you was 793 detainees.

Does that sound about right?

Yes, sir.

What would you as a layperson, and I'm not in your profession, uh, but but that amount of increase over a relatively short period of time, seven, eight months, that seems like a lot to me.

What do you attribute that rise in prison pop or jail population to during that period?

More crimes on the street, I believe that's that's uh, you know, we uh deal with uh more people coming to the jail whenever things happen outside.

And you know, everybody get dropped off at the jail.

Um so more crime, and I guess by implication it means that more arrests are being made and more folks are being held at the Justice Center, essentially waiting their day at court.

Is that fair?

Correct.

Okay, fair enough.

Um to provide us a bit of context or perspective, what is the I don't know the right way to ask this.

What what is the maximum capacity at the Justice Center?

I believe it's eight a thousand sixty-seven, but that includes uh adding like uh whether it is a boat, something like that, like adding in the sales.

How many well maybe another way to how many beds how many beds do you have at the at the Justice Center today?

You mean fill?

Oh.

Well, I filled them I'm I'm guessing you've got 793.

How many beds do you have available as of today?

Okay, so we have if you subtract a thousand, what sixty so thousand sixty-seven?

Yeah, that's the capacity, thousand sixty-seven, and right now we have uh five so it's like I would say eighty-five.

Somewhere around that.

I didn't hear you on the 85.

85 beds.

85 beds, yes.

Okay.

Um when you talk about fully staffing, I think you mentioned that ideally you would have 195 CO1s on staff.

Is that right?

For fully staffed.

For fully staffed, yes.

Correct.

Uh the minimum from your standpoint is 150 CO1s.

Is that right?

Yes.

Um, can you educate us a bit?

I think it's important for us to understand why the ideal number of fully uh fully staffing the Justice Center is 195.

Can I share the paperwork with you?

Please do, yes.

And also and also I want to mention that with the mental health unit, you know, they are in sales alone, so you have to keep them separate.

Understood.

Yes.

Um from an educational uh standpoint, again, when we're looking at the proposed budget for uh fiscal year 27, um, how do you, as a professional in your field, come up with the number 195 as an ideal fully staffed unit?

So what I did was uh I went and put you you you have the bubbles that's at CJC.

So you put your yeah uh you have four bubbles up in the in each unit.

So you put four officers in that bubble, then you put four officers down low on each floor, and then you have your officer that's at the unit control, and then you have a uh Lieutenant on that unit.

And then also inside the programs, they have an officer with the program.

And so that's one unit.

And so that's what I did with the full.

So when you say 195, would that include both uh correctional officers one as well as two?

In other words, uh also management or supervisors, correct?

Yes, sir.

Understood.

I get it.

You used the term of art on me, bubbles.

What's a bubble?

Oh, I'm sorry.

Uh is what the officers sit in.

It has like the control area where they hit, you know, they push the buttons to let the doors open, and also uh they can look down at the officer that's conducting the tour, and that's what I mentioned when I said bubble.

So let me ask a better question.

Um when we talk about um uh ideal fully staffed uh correctional officers one, is that the number of officers that you requested 133?

Yes.

Okay.

And of course, when you talk in terms of historic precedent, looking very, very recently, uh I believe that you mentioned in 26 we had a 133 CO1s budgeted, is that right?

Yes.

Okay.

So tell us from your standpoint, and and I know Alder Woman Sanyer asked about discussions with with the budget director, but what concerns do you have uh should the budget as proposed be adopted, and you have at your disposal funds only for 113 officers or CO1s?

You say what what are your concerns?

My concern is that the jail is gonna be understaffed, you know.

And and that's that's my main concern.

Some of the areas where you should have officers, you know.

Um and then also it's gonna be more officers that have to work overtime and getting locked in.

And that's where we are at right now.

It and and so at the end of the day, you must provide minimum staffing.

If you have less often officers on staff, that is gonna by necessity lead to overtime, correct?

Yes.

And of course, when we pay overtime, that increases uh the pay for our officers or the expense to the city.

Fair statement?

Yes, sir.

Okay.

Um to make sure we're all on the same page and we understand the importance of a CO1.

We probably shouldn't be assuming.

Can you tell us very generally?

What are the duties, the responsibilities of a CO1?

What role do they play in the operation of the Justice Center?

Uh correction officers play a uh important role inside the jail.

Uh they basically uh they have to document all the information after they conduct their rounds and tours.

Uh they make it sure the housing unit is safe and secure for the residents, making sure no one is getting jumped on, uh making sure that uh that everyone is uh doing everything they are supposed to do, following the rules and the regulation inside the unit, and then the person that's up in the bubble, you know, they managing the controls of the housing unit.

You know, whenever that officer at the at the lower level acts and the officer by the, you know, when they call over the radio asking them to open up cell eight, open up cell 15.

So this is uh some of the roles that they play up in the bubble.

Uh I know you share older woman Sanier's concern for the safety of our detainees.

That's that's something that that I'm also concerned about.

Um from a a safety perspective, it sounds to me that adequately staffing, fully staffing the Justice Center with CO1s, uh the those folks that have the most and and highest day-to-day interaction with the detainees.

Sounds like that's essential.

Would you agree?

Yes, sir.

Okay.

And and then secondly, again, to make sure we're all on the same same page.

What is a CO2?

How does that position differ from a CO1?

So the CO2 uh they uh the supervisor on the unit.

So they also have to go inside and could conduct tours.

Uh they usually with the medical staff when they go inside the units, uh, they have to go in and whenever the altercation that two have to go in and make sure that this altercation doesn't get out of control at the same time, they have to protect the officers that's on the floor, and also uh uh CO2s have to uh complete a uh report at the end of the night of what happened on a unit.

Um we've we've talked a bit about uh in May excuse me, detainee uh safety and health.

You just referenced uh the the need from time to time for medical care.

I know we had a very serious issue this past year uh with respect to um uh providing prompt transport of detainees requiring medical care from the Justice Center.

Um have issues been ironed out with the sheriff's office with respect to that particular aspect, that is the transfer of detainees demanding or needing medical care.

So uh right now, uh the Sheriff Department uh is short staff, even we short staff also, but what we agree to is when they send one deputy, I send one officer to help them.

So this even make us more shorter than what we already are.

So this is what's the problem that's going on too.

So from one perspective, that's that's very good to hear.

There is collaboration between the Justice Center and the Sheriff's Office to address uh uh a demand and a need that has popped up.

I I'm very, very happy to hear uh about that.

But then having said that, that would seem to support your request that again, CO1s, I assume it's a CO1 that is making that uh that uh that that transfer, all the more important that that particular position is fully funded.

Yes.

Is that right?

Yes, sir.

Okay.

Um I know you mentioned to us, and I uh I I am not a numbers guy.

I'm not a numbers guy at all.

So I do my best to follow all the details here.

You made mention at one point.

Uh of course, the the requested budget by your office was 40.7 million roundabout.

Yes.

The proposal after consultation with the budget director is 33.9 million roundabout.

I understood your your testimony that you would be happy with 36 million.

Um was that did I hear you right?

And and if I did hear you right, my follow-up question is going to be where do we need, where do we need to find that $2 million?

Is it for personnel?

Yes, sir.

Okay.

So then that goes back to all things being equal, I can live with the proposed budget with one exception.

Guys, I need you to fully fund my request for CO1s and CO2s.

Are we on the same page?

Yes, sir.

Excellent.

Okay.

Okay, you used another term of art.

This is maybe out of the budget discussion a bit, so I apologize.

But what is a classification unit?

Okay.

Uh you are giving me too much credit at least.

Yeah.

So a classification unit is a uh uh unit that's down in your mission area intake area.

Uh these these case managers uh go through the queue of asking questions.

And this is when you uh meet with the detainees when they come inside, you ask them have they ever been uh uh ever try to commit suicide?

Uh are they on drugs, have they complete high school?

It's just a questionnaire, and that's what that's the part we missing.

And so these detainees are not getting what we need.

Um it and okay, so now I understand why that particular person or position is so important, because it helps you identify from the moment the detainee walks in the building, their special circumstances that helps you prepare to house them for whatever period of time they're under your care, correct?

Yes, sir.

And also I forgot to mention you have to classify them by the cases also.

So that classification unit would classify them instead of having people mixed together, you classify them and keep everyone where they're supposed to be.

If you have like a level five, level four, level three, different things like that.

Thank you.

I appreciate the education.

I do have one comment.

I know you made a con uh a reference to tablets.

Uh and and our Justice Center is unique, I think, in that we don't have any uh outside recreation or access area.

And I and I guess that would then go to the importance of having things like tablets available to detainees.

Would that be fair?

Yes, sir.

Okay.

Um just a for what it's worth, and and I did have some discussions with uh in relatively recently, I don't know if this hits your desk or not, with respect to detainee tablet use.

And my one request of you would be that that we look at or you look at policies of outside communication.

In other words, I am aware, and you may be too, but we need to nip it in the bud of detainees uh reaching out to harassing inappropriately contacting victims.

And that's something, and I'm sure you would agree.

We it absolutely must stop it once it comes to your attention.

The appropriate person's contention, it's it's gotta cease, right?

Yeah, so now I can uh comment to that.

Uh when I was a deputy uh director at Silwis County, the prosecutor would call me and let me know, and that person would lose their access to calling uh the victim right away, ASAP.

And so this is something that we doing also at CJC.

You know, we're not gonna tolerate that.

Thank you, sir.

Commissioner again, I really appreciate your education and information.

I appreciate that.

Thank you for your service.

Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner.

A few questions.

Uh sticking on the the tablet conversation.

What all does a tablet offer if I'm a what is on that tablet?

So right now we have uh uh download the grievance form uh process.

That's something that you know uh went away for a while.

Uh so we have that going.

Also, we have uh education, um, different education uh programs that's on the tablets.

We also have we right now we working on oversight.

Uh I know they're trying to put something on there too on uh tablets that our IT people is working on too.

Uh we have uh you know your regular Netflix, you know, um different different things that they can you know watch on uh TV.

Uh it also has uh like um uh they could do uh video chat with their loved ones and messaging with their loved ones also.

Okay.

And it sounds like uh you're working with uh DA the DFOB board.

I hear you say grievance, one of the things who did that right now, if they write a grievance, who does that grievance go to?

So right now it's going to our IT and our uh investigators right now because what what we're gonna do is once it's in place, it should go to the case manager that's on that unit.

Gotcha.

I love the idea of working to get hopefully with the DFOB, uh an independent uh process.

I understand you got in-house, but um, it's good to have uh opportunity for them to probably send it to somebody who they feel uh wouldn't share that information with the correctional officer that work with in that department.

You know, that's um I think glad to hear that there is that coordination going on while there is a grievance process, but if somebody gets it, there the CO know that an inmate sent something on them, you know, retaliation is real no matter what department it's in, if it's here at the Board of Alderman, or you know, it's always good to have independent uh eyes on that.

Um to correctional officer once, so it looks like this year you as we continue to say you asked for 133, you got 113.

The year prior, uh about 85 was actually occupied.

Out of the 113 right now, and it sounds like you've done a tremendous job of actually um filling those positions.

How many are CO1s or filled out of that 113?

So right now I have my paper.

Right now I have uh 85.

So you got 85 field.

85 fill.

I guess during the process of and maybe this is like a budget more for Paul Payne or maybe yourself, say you fill those 113, there could be an opportunity um for you to go to the budget department or ENA and request, hey, we need five more positions.

That that is a another way to get those correct.

Well, yes, that's and that's what I mentioned also.

That's what I did in St.

Louis County, went back to the county council and asked for more.

Okay.

Because I know that we are we're we're talking about the the the filling of the roads, which is extremely important.

But I think maybe one of the things maybe the budget director do is he look and say, Well, have you historically been able to fill the rows?

And um if we if we can't get up to that, let's give you a cushion, but let's not give you the full thing just yet until maybe you know there's a a track record, and not necessarily on your end, but I think probably is done with various departments of let's give you some, but maybe not in Paul's conservative and good, but not give you all.

Um to the recreation, yes, I think our CJC is one that as we know, there's no outside lighting or things for them to do.

However, there are, and I've uh taken tours of the CJC, there are spaces where um residents could go to a pod or a space and play basketball or whatever, a handball.

Last time I went in the facility, uh I I think I've said it before, the balls was flat, there was no hoops, so even though there's no outside space, it doesn't seem like in the inside recreation space is available either.

Could you give an update on where we are with those inside recreational spaces for residents?

Yes, sir.

So when I arrive, uh the gates that's inside uh the units that comes down, we just had all that fix because uh all the gates was broken, and so we also put the basketball hoops that you mentioned.

Everyone has a basketball hoop, and now we're in the process of on the third floor where you letting them go to wreck.

You know, we're doing it like in moderation right now to try to get everything under control, make sure we don't have no hiccups, and this is what we doing because we finally got the hoops up and new basketballs also.

And last question, uh what is the lockdown time for residents?

How many hours do they get out?

Well, what we've been doing is we've been going in sections.

So we let one unit out for three hours uh section, then we let another unit out for three hours like that, because when we when I first arrived, we didn't have no type of order.

And and then on second shift, we let them out, you know, the two hours and then another group out for two hours.

So if I was just in one unit alone, when you say three hours, is that one hour in a day, one hour in the afternoon, one hour and night?

What does that look like?

I'm sorry, you said when you say units, I'm a thing I'm assuming you you talking about like the whole pod.

Yeah.

So that unit you you let that unit out for three hours, but you don't let you don't let them all out at once.

No.

So if I am a resident at the CJC and I'm in unit A1, how many hours am I getting out a day?

Just me, not the whole unit, me as one individual.

Yeah, you you should get out the four hours.

Four hours?

Yes.

Out of that, because you're gonna break it down on first shift and then on second shift, you're gonna come out also.

So I typically would come out during we're in the daytime, like breakfast, lunch, dinner, like is what you mean?

You're gonna come out in the morning.

We start letting them out about seven in the morning, and then uh the next group will come out at nine, and then on second shift, they'll let people out at 230, and then they go from there.

If we have more correctional officers, I know in the past the CJC would let, and I think Miss Ross, am I saying that right?

Ms.

Ross, Ms.

Ross is there.

I know post-COVID has changed things, but I would love to see us get back to a place where it is safe that we're not doing five here, five there, five, you know, you could let them out more, and then they'll have more timeout.

I think the more we keep them in, that's where you have, you know, frustrations build up, anger builds up, and then you see some of the things we had.

So are we working to get back to a place?

Well, two-fold question.

When we was letting them all out, will we understaff?

When the whole unit to either one and if you can speak on the mic.

Yeah.

And just say your first and last name.

Uh Deputy Commissioner Tammy Ross.

Back then, we pretty much had staffing, and the structure was a little different.

Where the instead of having a bubble, we had direct supervision.

There was always an officer on the floor to monitor that.

Right now, the way it's made, we have the bubbles, which is an officer upstairs and a person rovering.

What we need with those extra correctional officers will be staff to monitor the wreck areas where they're having wreck inside those rooms.

Or we look to get to a place where we go backwards where we let the full pods out, which would I guess give them more hours out to instead of doing this side, the back side, and left side, you know.

Yes.

We will be able to do that with a lot more staff because we need staff to monitor those 80 people that were on the floor.

We need at least probably four officers to do that, at least rovering in those areas.

Okay.

This is my last question.

I think we all say this up here, like one more question.

The programs.

Could you just quickly go over some of the programs that the uh CJC offer?

Yes.

Um also I want to mention also about uh, you know, we have uh a talent show.

I like for you to come up.

The guys up in 3A, they uh usually do talent shows and different things like that.

And I think it's awesome.

You know, the guys be singing gospel, doing different uh poetry and uh comic acts.

So I think uh that'd be nice if you want to come up and and see that.

No, absolutely.

I know Ms.

Ross and I've been over there a couple of times uh from Clemens Abdullah to Burris, always willing to uh come over and just even sit down and talk with them.

Yep.

Okay, so yeah, so some of the programs that we have right now, uh like I was saying earlier, since we hired uh uh Reverend Gray, uh we've been you know increasing our programs.

Um right now we have prisoner re-entry program, uh we have addiction uh recovery uh program, the anger management counseling program, uh we have bridge program, uh we have high set GD program, English second language uh program.

Uh we have uh Missouri ID support services that's uh started May 1st.

This is uh another great program.

Um we also have like bus passes for these guys when they get out, when they get released, they don't have to just stand around in front of CJC anymore.

They could get bus passes and uh leave from the area.

So this help out a great deal.

Also, we have Jacob's uh ladder ministry.

That's a behavior change for success.

Um justice movement.

And right now, Alderman, uh like you to know that we have so many programs now at CJC that we have a waiting list because we have a lot of people that want to participate and help out.

Uh we have the surface program that I mentioned, the veterans program, uh unlock labs, that's with the laptops.

They go inside the uh uh MP room and they you know get on the laptop.

Uh also uh we have pending right now uh construction uh um a program for for uh residents to learn how to do construction.

So this is coming soon.

That's what we uh that's what I was telling you.

We have a waiting list for, and then also um we have a waiting list for uh the chess master program.

They they I know Reverend Gray has been working with him on that, so they supposed to be coming.

And also um he has a program uh assess assessment evaluation tools for programs and services that he's been working with this group on.

Uh then you have the Catholic uh mass that come by weekly.

Um he has the um different uh Baptist uh church groups that come in, um, Muslim groups.

So he has a lot of different programs that's going on over at CJC right now.

Are y'all working on an honor wing?

Yes, that's the one with the talent show.

Okay.

Yes.

Okay.

I'll be in contact either with you, uh, Deputy Ross to come over and then I'll probably utilize the ordinance that I pass to do like a surprise pop-up so we can not have all the the super cleaned up and everything, but I appreciate the work that you have.

Alternative state clean.

Okay.

I'm gonna check it out.

I'm seeing again.

Thank you, Commissioner.

Thank you, Deputy Commissioner Nahote for being here.

Appreciate you, sir.

All right, we're gonna move right on over to the next uh uh department that we have as we stand kind of around public safety and corrections.

We actually had a department of civilian oversight here with us to present the budget and uh Commissioner Please come on up, say your name.

You can say who's here with you, it can go straight into your budget, and we'll pull up the presentation.

Good afternoon.

Thank you so much for the opportunity.

Um, my name is Commissioner Dr.

Barbara Mylan, and joining me is our program manager, Ophelia Hughes.

We also have our government analyst, Dotlan Badesi, and we also have Louisa Lyles and Louisa has a longstanding experience in regards to our office and also supporting investigation procedure protocols and other city offices.

So we are happy to present to you today our fiscal year 2027 budget.

The mission of the Division of Civilian Oversight is to conduct thorough investigations, support building public confidence and civilian oversight by promoting transparency, fairness, and public accountability through impartial and independent professional standards and inquiries into allegations of misconduct.

Our vision is a city where trust, accountability, and transparency define the relationship between law enforcement and the community through independent oversight, policy recommendations, and meaningful public engagement.

The division of civilian oversight strives to enhance public safety, fairness, and justice in St.

Louis.

We have two budget pillars, but before I go into that, our uh primary functions are to investigate complaints, review operational causes, and provide recommendations, develop policy recommendations to address systemic issues and practices and corrections operations, ensure that detention facilities operate under safe sanitary and respectful conditions that protect the rights and dignity of detainees, the safety of the public, as well as the CJC workforce, develop education and outreach materials to inform the community.

Our accomplishments include we were invited to provide an assessment for Bravo at the City Justice Center.

We have created and implementated a program that supports public awareness, our roundtable program.

We established a strategic partnership with Harris Stowe State University, including internship placement, the publication of the division of facility oversight board annual accountability and quarterly reports, the publication of the civilian oversight board annual report, the analysis of misconduct allegations during the years of 2020 to 24, and completing required training for staff and board, an established partnership with regional oversight offices in Kansas, Ferguson, and Columbia, Missouri.

Our budget, we have requested 1.144385, and it has been proposed one million one five eight three thirty.

The manual will incorporate existing policies, procedures, the in-take flow chart, the intake handbook, and other related oversight documents into a single cohesive document.

The codification will enhance operational efficiency.

It will create a tangible document that is vital for enhancing training, building the intellectual capital of the division of civilian oversight, and the ability to quickly and accurately train new staff and ensure all personnel are following standardized documented processes is paramount to DCO's mission.

The budget will also support us to attend a mandatory annual conference provided by the National Association for Civilian Oversight of Law Enforcement Conference.

We are a member of NACO.

It provides monthly training and it provides the certification of our investigators.

We did not attend the conference in last year, but it is imperative that we attend the conference this year.

The budget pillars are pillar one is complaint and investigation complete accountability and review.

For the first time since the division of civilian oversight was established in 2015, our investigators are able to interview and meet with the men and women incarcerated at the City Justice Center regarding their complaints.

Additionally, our investigators have been invited to CJC for the dorm rep meetings.

I am scheduled on a monthly basis to meet with Commissioner Hayward.

Currently, our investigators are in the process of reviewing our files from the early part of 2020 up until this year.

Pillar two is related to public awareness, building trust and legitimacy.

The strategy outlines a comprehensive community outreach plan, which is responsible for investigating complaints against corrections personnel.

The primary goal is to build and maintain public trust, to ensure accessibility to the complaint process, to foster productive relationships with diverse community stakeholders, and effective outreach is essential for increasing transparency and encouraging the reporting of misconduct.

We are in the process now of updating our brochure with assistance from one of our detentions facilities oversight board members and also involving our staff.

We are also looking at other updates as it relates to our display banner and yes, our display board and our display banner.

Thank you, Commissioner.

I will say if you and your team can send over the PowerPoint, I think the PowerPoint you sent to us was the FY26 budget one instead of the FY27.

Even though we are able to follow along with some of those numbers, it would be good to have that so when the public want to go back and look at the presentation.

Start in order of seniority.

Thank you.

Let me start by saying I think civilian oversight is a very important role.

It is necessary to have independent and people-oriented oversight on any position of power and for many positions of power, those are the that's the voters, but for the police and our our detention facilities, uh those are not elected officials, and so we need to have an additional way to make sure that uh any complaints are properly investigated and um really fleshed out so that everyone has their uh their rights protected and really make sure that we are treating people with uh the respect they deserve.

Um the latest state takeover law uh for the police essentially made uh civilian oversight in the city is essentially blocked oversight in the city and said that the new Board of Police Commissioners is that oversight.

How are you operating in light of that new law?

Well, thank you for the question.

I will say that um two things happened besides the state taking over the police department is that the our volunteer board, the civilian oversight board has reached out to the state board on several occasions and has not received any response.

One of the requests that I know that our chairperson made was just the possibility of meeting with that board to introduce the civil civilian oversight board.

So as you have pointed out, uh Alder Person, it is imperative that there is oversight.

We have provided an analysis of misconduct that goes that goes over several different years.

And we don't the trends are going up in terms of misconduct instead of going down.

Our board was scheduled to hear the presentations by the investigators regarding the complaints, and that was when we had the change related to um the state taking over the police department.

So our analysis reveals that the need for oversight is not diminished by jurisdiction jurisdictional shifts.

And between 2020 and 24, there was a steady rise in documented misconduct allegations, specifically regarding uncivil treatment, abuse of authority, and discourtesy.

The evidence of is of grave concerns of these three categories alone account for nearly 40 percent of all the complaints.

The likelihood of future incidents indicate a moderate to high likelihood of misconduct.

So while direct investigations are not able to occur, we still must have indirect oversight.

We have a board of volunteers who are continuing to meet, in spite of the fact that we really don't have a relationship with police.

Now I have to say, before the state took over, we were able to meet with SLMPD on a monthly basis.

That was very important as a commissioner and new to the city and to this role for us to establish that relationship with SLMPD.

We even had uh Chief Chase Tracy attend one of our programs along with other hierarchical representatives of SLMPD.

So we think that expanding the scope of public safety uh is important, we need to be addressing root causes, and we also need to support information to the public as well.

Thank you for that.

And I think I'd just add to that and say that this state law, which I hope will be found uh invalid and unconstitutional, uh is just another example of how it flies in the face of justice and public safety in our city uh when the board of police commissioners, which is itself stated that they're basically there to be to approve what the police ask for, uh to give them what they need, but also just to not question them at all.

Uh and it it's laughable if it was it's not funny, but it's laughable that they think that that board would be uh capable of being able to properly do oversight, uh especially with the blatant conflicts of interest some of them have.

Uh so I I hope that the the work that your board does can continue to proceed.

It's good that you continue to collect records in the meantime uh of the complaints and the issues where uh people may have had uh may have had incidents of or of disrespect or or harm being done to them.

And uh hopefully hopefully we proceed in this case and are able to uh have some accountability in the future.

Thank you.

That's that's all my questions.

Thank you.

Are there other questions?

Uh all the ones, Sanye.

Thank you.

Uh hello, hello.

Thank you for being in front of us today.

Uh we've certainly had a lot of conversation about the uh this board in particular quite a bit.

Um so it's definitely great to see you in front of us and be able to get some things on record.

Um, I don't really have many questions.

Uh I was wondering, just in preparation for today, I was looking for the most recent report I could find was from FY25 for any report.

Is that the most recent?

Or is there another one?

Uh yes, it is.

And we are in the process of no, we're putting together 2025.

And our published reports were for the periods of I'm gonna have our government analysts come up so we can give you the exact information, but the published reports for detention facility oversight was of this FY25 2025 is the latest one I could find.

That was the oversight for each board.

Yes.

DFOB, I'm Doc Limbandesi.

I'm the government service analyst for the division in oversight.

The oversight report was published for DFOB for fiscal year 25.

Okay.

Um, is there anything?

I guess my questions are really just kind of broad.

Is there anything based on the reports that you are fine that you've just kind of been uh focusing on implementing or putting into place?

I see just kind of like general recommendations for them in terms of improving transparency and complaint handling and things like that.

So we'll just love for you all to speak to um any of the ways that you focused on some of the recommendations of that report.

We have a mandate to make sure in regards of our file system and information that it is reaching the the high standards in which we seek to operate.

We have found and we've had an analysis regarding some data data information and which we could not establish the validity of the data.

We also are seeking to make sure in terms of the procedures in which the investigations operate, that all of that information is in writing, that it is up to date, and that it is in our file system.

That is the standard in which we are seeking to operate, and at the current time we know we need to work on that.

So I have been instructed, focus on our file system, and we are going to do that.

Do you have anything else to add?

Um I think that's really that was really my only core core question.

So thank you.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you for the opportunity.

I love my job.

We're doing good work.

We are absolutely thrilled that the city justice center doors have been opened for our investigation, and you will be hearing more as we proceed.

Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner.

I was just gonna end it by um echoing one.

It looks like you have budget.

If anything is pretty uh actually, you requested less.

You got a little bit more, probably some just errors in salaries.

Um it looks like mainly everything from that looks to be the difference mainly in the salary uh like I say, probably it was just an error there, everything else from materials to rental capital leases, non-capital, uh computer supplies, everything is uh the same as your request that you got, and as well as um staff, you requested uh 11 and received 11.

So I also echo.

I'm glad to see the cooperation between the DFOB board and the uh CJC.

Hopefully that continues.

Uh as soon as you guys get the update of the report, please send that out to the board of Alder because we like to uh have that information as uh as this board under Clark Hubbard, who started the legislation and then I amended it.

Truly cares about uh oversight, even though we struggle with what that looks like with COB with the state control.

But thank you for being here and thank you, your team for being here.

And I think that's all.

Thank you.

Thank you.

With that, I'll take a recess into 2 p.m.

Take a motion.

So moved.

Second, move by element from the night, seconded by all the women from the seven.

We go into recess to 2 p.m.

All in favor, aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carries the license, if you don't mind, uh Mr.

Chair, I'd like to do an opening statement.

And so the license collector's office is authorized by Missouri State Statutes as a county office in a city, not within a county.

And we are instructed to license businesses that operate the city of St.

Louis.

Accordingly, we are a fee-based revenue generating office that is not funded through the city's budget.

Our fiscal year runs from June 1st to May 31st in the last fiscal year from June 2024 to May 2025.

We collected 74,729, 1810 and distributed 72 million two hundred and eighty-three thousand fifty-one hundred dollars to the city of St.

Louis and various entities as directed by not only the Missouri State statutes, but also the city ordinance.

And so, Mr.

Chairman, you provided us with uh some questions, and I'll go over those.

I think it's about three or four of them.

Yes, ma'am.

Question number one budget overview and changes.

Summary of the FY 2027 budget requests and key changes compared to uh FY 2026.

As stated in my opening statement, the licensed collector's office has no budget request for the city and appears before the budget committee to offer a picture of our yearly revenue projections and to assist the city in the preparation of their budget.

Primary cost drivers, major factors contributing to issues, uh increases or decreases of the budget.

Our response.

Major factors contributing to the increases or decreases in our budget are driven by the rise or fall of the number of businesses in the city.

And so on any given day, you can have just as many going out of business as we have uh coming in as new businesses.

Question number three staffing and operational capacities, our current staffing levels, uh vacancies, or it says current staffing levels, vacancies, and any proposed changes.

Our response.

Question number four: priorities and service impact.

Key priorities for FY 2027.

Our response.

Presently, our key priority is working through the current my migration of City Hall's new automated database, as well as the software operations system, such as CityWorks and PayIt.

And B, how the proposed budget supports these priorities.

Our response.

Our budget supports the hiring of our own in-house consulting uh consultant who provides reasonable expectations for our operations for the upcoming year.

And so we have to hire a uh incoming uh in-house IT consultant.

And uh question uh number three part to that is any anticipated service impacts based on funding levels, and our answer is no, because again, uh we do not we are not funded by the city's budget.

That's all I have.

Any questions, Mr.

Chairman?

Thank you.

Uh Madam Licensed Collector.

I will give you a go star.

This year we did it a little different by sending those questions out to each department to kind of have them uh just anticipate what the questions are.

And so far it's the first week, but you're the first to actually answer those questions outside of the budget.

It wasn't mandatory, but I'm sure, like in high school, you always did the extra credit.

I feel like this is extra credit, plus five.

Uh Vice Chair Browning.

Thank you, Ms.

Thompson.

Uh I I don't have any questions for you today.

I just want to say I appreciate your work in your office.

Uh you've uh continue to just prove that uh public service is the best way we can uh provide for our city and our residents, and uh I appreciate the smooth operations that you continue to make sure happens so that we can keep having uh business, commerce, and uh recreation in our city that keeps it moving.

So thank you.

I appreciate you, sir.

Thank you.

Aldo Montanya.

Thank you, Chairman.

Hello, Madam Licenses Collector.

Um I just want to thank you for your work and your service to our city.

Um, I've definitely enjoyed the opportunities I've had to interface with you, particularly why I served on a red tape committee.

Um, I appreciate some of the things you brought forward about, you know, I think some broader policy conversations about some of our licensees process, but your budget seems pretty straightforward, and I just look forward to thank you for being here in front of us today.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Alderman Devotee.

Uh I'd like to just echo what uh my colleagues have said.

Uh your office runs like a top.

So thank you for your service.

Thank you, sir.

Uh one just quick question.

So I know the city doesn't provide funding to the licensed collector office.

You all uh provide funding to the city.

How much do you provide annually to the city of St.

Louis from the license collect office?

Well, for the last year, those are the figures that we put down for the uh question.

No, it's in our opening statement.

And so again, for the uh fiscal year, our fiscal year runs a little different, and so from June 1st to May 31st, and I will repeat, and so for the 2025 fiscal year, uh we collected 74 million seven hundred twenty-nine thousand one hundred and eighty-one hundred dollars, and we distributed out of that just about everything except for the 2.1 million dollars that we uh are allowed to keep from each license type to operate our office.

Gotcha.

And that's a letter uh and everything that we submit to the comproller's office to the comptroller's office every year.

Thank you.

Well, thank you for being here.

Thank you for your team and thank you for the work you do.

I think what is uh amazing about uh this office outside of many things, you know, you could just stick to the um just having folks have licenses and doing that kind of uh nine to five thing of collecting that.

But I know your office go above and beyond not only um just making sure folks have their license, but you do a lot of supporting the small businesses in the rotunda.

Uh usually that's on payday, so there's no excuse for folks to not support small businesses, but uplift those small businesses that are on the rotunda.

You have forums that also inform people in the community, especially our seniors on the different resources that your office in the city offers.

Uh, this is one of the offices I've also had the uh pleasure to see and work firsthand.

It's very professional, it's very hands-on with supporting uh folks try to cut the red tape of getting licenses.

You have also um worked, I think, which is extremely uh helpful from this board, but have worked with the board and been collaborative when it comes to legislation.

Um, and just thank you for your leadership.

Thank you for coming today, uh, and thank you for running a uh very tight, good uh accountable ship at the license collective.

Thank you.

Appreciate you.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

With that, that includes the day.

Uh we do not we have the board of Alderman meeting tomorrow, and then we'll be back at a next week.

Everyone has a schedule for folks watching.

That schedule is also online.

Uh any written testimony, madam clerk?

We have none.

Any announcements?

Seeing none, no members need to be excused.

I'll take a motion to adjourn.

So move can we get a second?

All right.

Somebody will wake up.

Mote move by the Alderman from the night, second by the Alder Woman, second by the Alder Woman from the seventh.

All in favor, aye.

Aye.

Opposed.

Motion carries.

Thank you.

Goodman.