Budget Committee October 07, 2025   10/7/2025

At this time, I'll ask the clerk to call the roll so we can verify the presence of a quorum.

Council Member Payne.

Present.

Rainville.

Present.

Vita.

Present.

Cashman.

Present.

Chavez.

Present.

Let the record reflect that we have a quorum.

I will also remind my colleagues that we will be using speaker management today, so please make sure to sign in.

Welcome, Director.

Happy to answer any questions.

I'll first recognize Vice Chair Koski.

How will this affect that, us being able to

we're still in the process of getting to that kind of gold standard of where everyone is trained fully trained in all of these roles and that is a many many year process so having one training this one year is not going to make such a substantial difference either way.

I maybe just didn't, I wanted to make sure I'm understanding what was the total federal grant that we had before and is it my understanding that it's reduced to $10,000 and what, or I just want to make sure, could you clarify what it was prior and then what it is now?

Like I said, just late last week we learned that for the upcoming fiscal year grant that would start sometime next year for us, we were allocated just $10,000.

Can you describe what you utilize the $900,000 for?

That funds those Yes, I am told that's correct 6.5 staff.

So do we have you know, what right now is the plan B in order to think about how we plan for this shortfall that's gonna definitely gonna happen next year at some point and

I don't know what that specifically will look like at this point.

Or can people still continue to register?

We're tackling actually in the second half of this month exactly what the schedule will look like for 2026 and how we will be delivering that with community education, outside of community education, and we certainly would love to work with you all on helping ensure that that information is communicated as widely as possible to get more people into those classes.

So thank you so much.

Next I will go to Councilmember Cashman followed by Councilmember Vito.

You have ten staff in the department and there are multiple assistant directors, so I'm wondering a little bit the thinking behind having the four assistant directors in the department even though one has the majority of the other staff underneath them as supervisees.

It actually echoes an emergency operations center structure in which we have those more or less those same four section chiefs.

So, you know, we're all going to have to step up to be a much more resilient city in the years to come and I know you're up to the challenge, so thanks for leading and thanks for helping us get through this.

Next I will recognize Councilmember Vitale followed by Councilmember Rainville.

Is that correct?

I would defer to Councilmember Koski.

Thanks.

I love that you reach out right away.

And as with everybody else here, I pledge support to help you get through this dramatic cut in your budget.

I'll note that we have been joined in this committee by Councilmember Chowdhury and recognize her for some comments or questions.

Thank you.

Welcome, Director.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I will recognize Council Member Rainville.

I apologize if I've missed this, Director, but did you mention how many union contracts would be negotiated next year?

We still have about 10 to negotiate for 2025.

really have the police force that we've always wanted so thank you for that and then I also wanted to thank you for keeping an eye on the budget you know to come in under is very important we're in a hard time here for the city as we just heard from our emergency management we're gonna get a lot of cuts from the federal government so thank you and your staff for everything you do and keep up the good work thank you

I will recognize Councilmember Cashman.

I was just wondering if you have any vacant positions in the talent acquisition or other areas, either open positions or anticipated open positions?

Madam Chair, Council Member, we do have the one position that we are holding that we are anticipated to be reduced for 2026 as part of the mayor's recommended budget.

And then, what is the leadership and change manager role and function that you're interviewing for?

And so there is a lower level role on the learning and development team that we will be opening pretty shortly to try and fill.

I also wanted to ask if, you know, this department was established before my time, the Racial Equity Inclusion and Belonging Department, but I'm wondering what your thoughts are on whether that department should be within the HR department or a standalone department.

So we do work very closely with REIB and are looking at a plan to ensure that equity is embedded in all things that we do and that is the one thing that I would say that the Director Corbett and I agree very seriously on and are working every day to make happen.

Thank you.

Can you just help me understand what that means?

as quickly as possible at the first or second step so that we do not have to move to arbitration or litigation or anything else.

and then the second part of what I'm trying to understand is are there systems changes that have been put in place that allows for such a significant increase in that target between 2023 and 2025?

I'm going to ask our Director of Labor Relations to come up.

Welcome, Director Deloni, if you'll first begin by introducing yourself.

Madam Chair, could you please restate your question?

So I'm both trying to understand what's the volume of grievances that are before you to achieve resolution and then are there systems changes that have been put in place over the last two years that allow for such a significant increase in those grievances being resolved at the lowest level.

Arbitration can be costly.

Okay, awesome.

You're very welcome.

compensation study was completed and what we learned.

But we do have more detail for you and we have a written response that will be coming to you probably today.

So that's where that was coming from.

So over 90% of our workforce has a market study that's conducted in conjunction with negotiations every three years when they're at the table.

I know there was an example from, I want to say last year, a couple years ago, where the city attorney's office, I believe, ended up going over budget that year because it had been a long time since they did a study on compensation and then a similar, I think it was the city assessor that shared a similar story with us when she came in to present her budget.

So those are probably the studies that were not done in the time frame, but when it comes to actual market studies, we do look at the market whenever we're at the table and negotiating new rates.

Welcome, Director.

And I stand for any questions.

I see Council Member Jenkins and I want to recognize that she's joined us in this committee.

that you discussed in your presentation?

So we have a theory and now we're working on sharing that theory with employees as well as creating issue papers and case studies for how that repair harm model or that Truth of Reconciliation process can be applied at the individual level, at the community level, and at the systems level.

building trust through repair and harm is sort of the replacement of that work or the next phase of that work, maybe?

Alright, thank you.

Thank you everyone.