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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2001 09-04 Pre CITY OF MERIDIAN CITY COUNCIL STRATEGIC PLANNING SESSION / WORKSHOP AGENDA ITEMS FOR DISCUSSION Tuesday, September 4, 2001, at 5:30 P.M. City Council Chambers Roll Call: __X____Tammy deWeerd __X____Cherie McCandless __O____Ron Anderson __X____Keith Bird __X____Mayor Robert Corrie Issue #1 Discussion and presentation by John Luthy on developing a strategic plan and planning process for the City of Meridian Meridian City Council Special Workshop September 4, 2001 The special workshop for the Meridian City Council was called to order at 5:30 P.M. on Tuesday September 4, 2001 by Mayor Robert Corrie. Members Present: Mayor Robert Corrie, Tammy de Weerd, Keith Bird, and Cherie McCandless. Members Absent: Ron Anderson. Others Present: Gary Smith, Shari Stiles, Bill Nichols, Stacy Kilchenmann, Brad Watson, Ken Bowers, Mike Worley, Dave Bowman, Janice Smith, and Pauline Skeggs. Issue #1 Discussion and presentation by John Luthy on developing a strategic plan and planning process for the City of Meridian Corrie: -- the special meeting in which we’ll have a presentation by John Luthy and strategic planning (inaudible) actions that we’ll be taking. So, John you’re up and ready to go. Luthy: Thank you Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen of the Council. Let me give a quick review first of all then answer any questions you might have. I’m not sure if any of the department heads would have any questions as well. I’m just going to leave that up to you. First of all, thank you very much; I appreciate the opportunity to work with you on your strategic plan. The first strategic plan for the City of Meridian. Very, very quickly, some folks have asked about my background. Some of you already know it. I’ve been doing strategic planning for almost 30 years. I’ve taught seminars all over the United States in strategic planning mostly for city, county and state government. Over 40 agencies in this state have attended those seminars and the Ada County through their strategic plan and several other entities (inaudible) New Hampshire all the way to Bellingham Washington. So, I’ve been doing this for a long time from my headquarters here in Boise. So, I appreciate the opportunity to work with you all in this. Very, very quickly let me hand out to you just so you can have a (inaudible) also have some extra copies for the department heads if they would like some. I write extensively in strategic planning around the country. This is a pre-publication article, actually a reprint that will be coming out fairly soon. Let me very quickly say that the philosophy that I have about strategic planning is that this process is first of all very inclusive. I do not believe in top down planning. I think the departments have to be very deeply involved and as far down in those departments as possible. People need to be involved. They need to learn the process. I feel particularly strongly about this because as I’ve been doing this for so many years, I have people who went through the process 20 years ago who say it really was a career changing opportunity for them because for 20 years since then they’ve been thinking strategically. Part of the process is to teach strategic thinking and I think that’s very critical for a public agency. First of all I want you to know the philosophy that I have that this is an inclusive process. I also, very strongly encourage City Council involvement and even key people in the community’s involvement if we can round some up and invite them to participate. Also, part of the philosophy that I have is to teach this process as we go. I believe in the teach a man to fish philosophy. I would rather teach the process, guide you through this first iteration, if you will, and then kind of fall back into a coaching mode which is what I tend to do around the country with most organizations. I’ve done organizations as large as 11,000 people. So, when some folks have said gee, have you ever done any big organizations, Yes, I’ve done some pretty big ones. I’ve done some pretty good sized ones here in this state but I’ve also done some very small organizations. Very focused, we’re going to teach as we go, provide the materials, teach the process. I am going to invite and encourage as many people in the departments to attend the programs, the training programs as possible. So, we might have to do some scheduling miracles to get everybody involved but as far down as we can get, we’re certainly going to invite those people to attend. It’s a very focused process. The average plan for a department may only be 8 or 9 pages. We’re not looking for a huge volume of paper. I don’t believe in that. We want to stick to our knitting. We want to be very net. What we really want to provide the Council and for the department heads as an end result is a very, very clear goals, very specific issues based on reality here in this community, some specific objectives and actions that they want to take that then link to the budget. So, it should be very net. When you compile all those together you’ll have something and I’ll pass this around if you’d like to take a peek. This is one (inaudible). This is one for El Paso County, (inaudible). You’ll notice that the individual plans within there are very short. Of course when you compile them all and stack them up, it looks like a large document. What that means is that the individual departments will not be buried in paperwork. It will be a very simple process and it’ll be a very net process. I want to encourage people or, perhaps make them feel a little more comfortable. A lot of people think they’ll be writing a hundred page document in their departments at a time when they’re very busy. That’s not the case. We’re going to keep it very, very focused. One of the things I’d like to say to you tonight and I always do right out, is that public sector planning is different than private sector planning and the public sector planning must be issue driven. Particularly with elected officials, you have to be concerned about the issues in your community. What we want to do from the department standpoint is be able to showcase those issues so you can make decisions based on the number of dollars you have to spend. So, planning and it says this in the article, you can take a peek at that when you have a chance. We have to make sure we’re very good at articulating issues that are challenging you right now in the City of Meridian. We’re looking for a little (inaudible) clear data. A lot of the issues are going to be data driven and they’re going to be founded on some good, clear, crystal data. The reason for that certainly is that more and more public officials and department heads are going to be under more scrutiny, expectations are growing. I don’t think they’re going to go into decline in the years ahead. I think we’re going to see more and more expectations and greater demand on services. So, it’s going to be very important in whatever plans we make are crisp and clear and founded on data. Everything’s going to be measurable, clear, quantifiable, (inaudible) time specific so that when it comes time to making budget decisions, we know what it’s going to cost. I would remind you that goals cost nothing, objectives cost nothing, what costs is action and strategies. I teach this very clearly because a lot of people have some very grand goals. But the rubber doesn’t hit the road until you say how much is this going to cost us? We’ll talk about that. We’re going to tie this, I met with Stacy about 2 weeks ago. We’re going to be making sure that this all links back to the budget. I’m a great believer in performance-based budget. Wherever I go around the country, I’ll be in Philadelphia this next week doing a program for American Public Works Association, I preach wherever I go, performance base in everything. I think every program should be performance-based but again if we base everything on issue identification its easy to do. So, we’ll be tying this to the budget and again we’ll be tying it to the budget based on your budget process. Certainly not any process I will bring. So, we’ll blend what I bring to what you already have so that it’s very seamless. I said a bit ago, so I’ll say it again, because I think its important, every department and if you have some of the larger departments have sections or divisions I would encourage those sections, the larger sections and larger divisions to also have plans so they would be like sub plans within a department. If you look at the El Paso County, you’ll notice that the sheriff’s department had plans for each one of their major divisions as with some of the other major departments. Size will dictate that and we’ll talk about that as we get into the department discussions in the next few weeks. The process, if I may very quickly, the initial actions that I’ve recommended that we take. I would encourage you all to announce this as a major initiative. I think it has to be announced. It has to be showcased if you will as a major initiative so that the employees and the folks in the community understand that this is something that we’re going to do and its something that everybody has their shoulder behind. That’s something that’s important for the city. I will be meeting with the key department, or all the department directors on, I believe the 18th of September. We’ll go through a Q and A, question, answer at that time. We’ll go through the entire process, hopefully clarify the process, make any amendments we need to, start looking at schedules. We’ll hopefully pretty much get out the gate on the 18th or shortly they’re after. I will ask at that time, and I’ll at least mention tonight, I would like to make sure we have identified the key people who will serve on Meridian’s strategic planning Council. Everywhere I go, cities, counties and state agencies as well, I recommend that there be a strategic planning Council made up of department directors and other key people within those departments so that there is a group of people who will learn the process and will basically be the caretakers of this process over time. I will be encouraging between now and then, the identification of some of the key people who might serve on that Council so that we can get that going right after we have the meeting on the 18th. So. We’ll have that. We’ll establish that. We’ll begin that, actually we (inaudible) training that group will go through some special training. The next action which is the major action, actually 2 of the major actions is to begin scheduling training for all department personnel. As many as we can get into that training. Always its best, the more you can have there the better. I’ve had some organizations (inaudible) over in Oregon actually, I still don’t know how they did this but the county commissioners shut down the county for an entire day and only had a skeleton crew. They had like 400 and some people attend a big training session all in one group. I’m not encouraging you to do that but we’d like to have as many people attend as possible. We’re happy to do it in different increments and different meetings. We’ll do it however it works best for the departments. The main thing is to make sure we have everybody attend training or as many people as possible attend the training. 20 years ago, 15 years ago I didn’t emphasize training as much and I found that a lot of the planning processes dwindled, lost momentum and they didn’t have any sustainability. So, we need to make sure we do this training. It’s a critical part of the entire process. Once training is completed, we’ll begin working with the departments to schedule the actual planning processes. Then I take the lead on that. I don’t bring in anybody else to do it. I will take the lead myself. This is a process that I will do. I will begin scheduling with the departments and department personnel to start working on their plans and I’ll work right there shoulder to shoulder with them starting to develop their draft plans. Many departments get out of the gate quickly and they finish their plans within a fairly short time. They have good data. They know how to put it together. I think you’ll find that half your departments will have it done very, very quickly. Some might need a little bit more time, particularly with work schedules as I’m sure they are right now. I know that everybody’s extremely busy. I’ll work around their schedules. We’ll schedule the --. We’ll get the training over with and we’ll begin the actual planning. After that starts, usually it only takes 6 or 8 weeks to have draft plans. Its up to the Council whether or not you want to see drafts but they certainly will be available. We will compile them in a draft book, if you will, from a master book as we go. The strategic planning team will kind of hold onto that. That’s basically the process. Then we should be able to have the individual planning sessions beginning by, I would say mid October. I would say this whole process should pretty much be done by early December. Normally once it gets going it doesn’t take that long to finish. Again, as you look through some of the example plans, the individual department plans, or the section plans are not that long but they’re very specific. So, that’s the process. That’s the philosophy behind it. Any questions I can answer, I’d be happy to do so. The original proposal, I don’t know if you have copies of it but if you’d like, I have copies of the proposal. Just so you have it for your files. (inaudible) (inaudible discussion amongst Council) Bird: She’ll be back. Luthy: That’s just for your files. That’s the proposal which also lists the actions and has all the pertinent information in it. Any questions that I can answer? Corrie: The meeting on September the 18th, will be the department directors and managers (inaudible)? Luthy: Correct. Yes. I would encourage the department directors to bring any of their senior folks along. That would be great. The more I think that we get early to discuss it, talk about it, I think the better off we’ll be. Corrie: Any questions? Bird: I have none Mayor. Corrie: Okay. I’ll probably give you a call tomorrow or Thursday (inaudible) I need to get to you. Also, some of these other things (inaudible). Luthy: All right. Corrie: I think the 18th (inaudible). How much time do you think we’ll need? Luthy: It all depends on the questions, usually 2 hours is enough. Corrie: Okay. Luthy: Sometimes it goes longer but normally 2 hours is enough to clarify and answer questions and kind of get it launched. Bird; Mr. Mayor. Corrie: Yes, Mr. Bird. Bird: (inaudible) was passed over my head but have we (inaudible)? Have we passed on this already? For this to be done? I don’t recall any motion passing on this. Corrie: That’s what I’m trying to see here. Bird: We talked about it but I don’t recall – Corrie: We didn’t. Bird: -- ever having a motion on it. If the poor guys going to go to work, we’d better make it official. Corrie: Yes. Stacy, do we have that? (inaudible discussion amongst Council) Corrie: Not since you’ve been here, as far as the budget is concerned? Kilchenmann: Oh, it’s in the budget. Corrie: That’s what I was thinking. Bird: It’s in the budget but we have not accepted a formal plan. Corrie: Well, we’d better get that done then. Bird: We can take care of that in the department reports tonight, can’t we? Corrie: Yes. Bird: The only thing I question is I – its approximate fees? John, I don’t like that. Can you say not to exceed? Luthy: Whenever I sign a contract, it’s always a not to exceed the higher --. Bird: Now, when we pass it, if we pass it tonight what’s going to be the not to exceed? 18,000? Not to exceed 18,000? Luthy: My guess we’ll probably go higher than that. We’ll probably go to the higher number. Bird: The 24? Luthy: I’d say that would probably be the safer number. Bird: Not to exceed? Okay. But to pass, we’ve got to do something like that. Luthy: I understand and that’s fine. Most cities this size, it runs, I think I mentioned that in the proposal. Bird: Yes. Luthy: What we’re trying to do this time and the Mayor and I talked about this is try to net the process out. Make it as tight as we possibly can so we’re doing a little squeezing but I think that will be a safe --. Well, it will be a safe number. Bird: Okay. We need to do that tonight in the department reports. We can’t do it now because we don’t have a quorum. Luthy: All right. Bird: Thank you very much. Corrie: Thank you John. Got the other one? Luthy: Yes. Corrie: Yes. It looks like --. She said she may not be back until 7:00. Bird: Mr. Mayor. Corrie: Mr. Bird. Bird: I move that we close this special strategic meeting and workshop. Corrie: Do I hear a second? Without your second, we’re not going anywhere. Okay. Motion been made and second to close the scheduled workshop with John Luthy. All those in favor of the motion say, excuse me, aye. MOTION CARRIED: TWO AYES, TWO ABSENT MEETIGN ADJOURNED AT 5:50 P.M. (TAPE ON FILE OF THESE PROCEEDINGS) APPROVED: / / ROBERT D. CORRIE, MAYOR DATE APPROVED ATTESTED: WILLIAM G. BERG, JR., CITY CLERK