#3 Overview of retreat objectives
CITY MANAGER’S MEMORANDUM
June 10, 2009
TO: Council President Truman & City Council
FROM: Eric J. Levitt, City Manager
SUBJECT: Retreat.
For your preparation for the retreat, the retreat has been divided into two primary
categories. Goal setting and budget discussions will be the two components.
Prior to beginning discussion on those two areas, I plan to open with an ice-
breaking question.
I have attached several attachments for discussion and reference at the retreat.
Some of the attachments are self-evident in their review, while others will
become more evident of their importance during the meeting.
Goal Establishment
The first part of the retreat will have the City Council working on major short-term
and long-term goals. It is ideal to maintain broad goals and limit the goals to 4 or
5 short-term goals (12 months) and to have 4 or 5 long-term goals (greater than
12 months).
We have requested a preliminary set of goal proposals, but anticipate that further
goals will be added to the board for discussion at the meeting. The first step will
be for individuals to provide a brief overview of the meaning of their goal. Then
we plan to have discussion on the merits of the proposed goals.
We will finalize by applying the attached rating system to prioritize and select the
goals that the Council wishes to pursue. I will then provide an outline of next
steps in the organization to achieve the overall goals.
Budget Discussion
The City is in a period of uncertainty nationally and locally. In preparing the
budget this year, I believe it is extremely important to receive quality guidance
from the City Council in its expectations of what tools the City will utilize for the
upcoming budget season.
At this time, I believe that the City budget and related services need to be
reviewed at a base level, or put in other terms we need to establish a new
baseline for the City budget. In my opinion, if we continue to evaluate the budget
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on an incremental basis we will both create further strain on service levels and
employees in the organization, and will be unable to ultimately create a
sustainable budget moving forward.
I am proposing taking a different approach this year in order to reestablish a new
baseline of expectations and ultimately begin the road to achieving a sustainable
budget.
I want to first highlight the opportunities and challenges as we head into the
budget. First, the opportunities:
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I believe that Janesville is in a similar position to many other cities,
counties and state governments in tackling its budget.
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The City has a solid staff support system and has the capability to
maneuver through the upcoming challenges.
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The City has had a fiscally conservative management approach for some
time and that should assist us in moving forward.
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City Management in collaboration with the City Council has begun
addressing the budget issues with over $300,000 in salary savings.
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We have brought certain functions in-house like major recruitments for a
savings of close to $50,000.
Now the challenges:
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The City faces many revenue reductions from a variety of revenue
sources such as interest earning, new build starts/development and state
shared revenues.
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The City sees a budget short-fall of approximately $1.8 million in 2010
under the current service level conditions and without a levy increase.
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The City sees an additional $1.2 million structural deficit that needs to be
addressed in the coming years.
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The City has seen expenses come with less than 1% of budgets over the
last 3 years, which means there is a small margin for unexpected
expenses.
I have attached a matrix for the Council to discuss and provide guidance to my
office on possible approaches to resolving the budget short-fall. In addition, I am
a strong believer that is important to work collaboratively within the organization
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to find savings or look at services that should be reduced or eliminated based on
various factors including low utilization.
In addition, to the operating budget, I anticipate discussing a prioritization
mechanism for evaluating the upcoming 2009 Note Issue.
As many of you know, working through budget challenges has been strength of
mine in the past. I turned around a financial situation from a City to the extent
that outside bonding companies upgraded its ratings from a BBB to an A. The
last upgrade occurred in the Fall of 2001.
I believe with proper planning and the organization and Council working as a
team, we can together create a sustainable budget scenario into the future.
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