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4. OPERATIONAL
BUDGET REVIEWS FOR ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES - EXAMEN DES BUDGETS DE FONCTIONNEMENT DES SERVICES
ADMINISTRATIFS - BUREAU DU DIRECTEUR
MUNICIPAL |
Committee Recommendation as amended
That Council
approve the final 2008 Operational Budget of the City Manager’s Office, as
amended by the following:
1. That
funding for the Rural Summit be reduced from $155,000 to $40,000.
Recommandation modifiée du comité
Que le Conseil approuve le budget
final de fonctionnement de 2008 du Bureau du directeur municipal, tel que
modifié par ce qui suit :
1. Que
le financement du Sommet rural soit réduit de 155 000 $ à 40 000 $.
Documentation
1. City Council report dated 31 January 2008
(ACS2008-CMR-CSE-0008).
2. Extract of Draft Minute, 8 February 2008.
Report to / Rapport au :
Long Range Financial Plan Sub-committee
Sous-comité du plan financier à long terme
and Council / et au Conseil
Submitted by/Soumis par : City Council / le Conseil municipal
Contact
Person/Personne ressource : Diane Blais,
Committee Coordinator / Coordonnatrice du comité
City
Clerk’s Branch / Direction du greffe
(613)
580-2424 x, 28091
Diane.Blais@Ottawa.ca
SUBJECT:
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OPERATIONAL BUDGET REVIEWS FOR ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES
– CITY MANAGER’S OFFICE |
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OBJET :
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EXAMEN DES BUDGETS DE FONCTIONNEMENT DES SERVICES
ADMINISTRATIFS – BUREAU
DU DIRECTEUR MUNICIPAL |
That the Long Range Financial Plan Sub-Committee recommend Council approve the final 2008 Operational Budget of the City Manager’s Office, as presented in the attached updated 2008 operating budget pages.
Que le Sous-comité du plan financier à long
terme recommande au Conseil d’approuver le budget final de fonctionnement de
2008 du Bureau du directeur municipal, tel que présenté dans les pages mises à jour du budget de
fonctionnement de 2008 ci-jointes.
In December 2007, during its deliberations on the 2008 Budget, Ottawa City Council approved a motion calling on the Long Range Financial Plan (LRFP) to conduct operational budget reviews for administrative services.
At its 9 January 2008 meeting, Council considered and approved a subsequent motion, which amended the schedule for the LRFP’s review of the various branches.
In order to assist the LRFP in
its work, Financial Services staff has provided updated budget pages for the various branches being
reviewed. These pages have been revised
to reflect any changes approved by Council during its budget deliberations.
The budget pages for the City Manager’s Office are attached to this report and are numbered sequentially, however they also include the reference page to the 2008 Draft Budget document in case members of Council have made notes in their budget books and want to refer to them.
This item will be advertised in the local dailies as part of the Public Meeting Advertisement on Friday preceding the Long Range Financial Plan Sub-Committee Meeting.
Any changes approved by Council
will amend the City’s 2008 Operating Budget.
Document 1 - Updated 2008 Operating Budget Pages – City
Manager’s Office
Staff from the various branches
to implement any changes approved by Council.
OPERATIONAL
BUDGET REVIEWS FOR ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES - CITY
MANAGER’S OFFICE
EXAMEN DES
BUDGETS DE FONCTIONNEMENT DES SERVICES ADMINISTRATIFS - BUREAU DU DIRECTEUR MUNICIPAL
ACS2008-CMR-CSE-0008 City Wide / À l'échelle de la ville
Mr. K. Kirkpatrick, City Manager, spoke to a PowerPoint presentation in which he discussed the goals and structure of the senior management offices as well as the relationship between his office and the offices of the Deputy City Managers. He then outlined the structure, budget, roles, activities, and outcomes specific to his office. In closing, he touched upon the structure and mandate of the Rural Affairs Office. A copy of Mr. Kirkpatrick’s presentation is held on file.
In response to questions and comments from Councillor Jellett with respect to the issue of inter-governmental relations, Mr. Kirkpatrick indicated the peer review panel had identified this aspect of his role as being out of balance in comparison to his other functions. He acknowledged this had been the case in recent years, he discussed some of the issues where stronger inter-governmental relations would be beneficial to the City, and he expressed a desire to remedy the situation in 2008. He advised that he would be bringing forward some very specific goals when he came forward to the Corporate Services and Economic Development Committee with his performance evaluation for 2007 and key deliverables for 2008.
Responding to a series of questions with respect to the Rural Affairs Office (RAO), Mr. Kirkpatrick expressed his opinion that the City received tremendous value from the $2M budget for the RAO, which was staffed by four FTEs. He noted that $800,000 of the Office’s budget was directly invested in the community and in the past two years, these funds had been used to improve rural roads. From interacting with the community, he believed the noise was significantly diminished in the rural areas and that the City was doing a much better job of serving its rural residents. Furthermore, he reporting that the RAO had been able to follow through on the vast majority of the commitments made following the Rural Summit. He recognized that Committee was looking at the City’s various functions in order to achieve savings. However, he did not recommend the City stop doing any of the work currently being done by the RAO. He maintained the City had changed rural residents’ service experience with the City and that perceptions were on the cusp of changing in that regard.
Mr. Kirkpatrick explained the performance of staff in the RAO was evaluated annually based on their workplan, which was in turn based on the commitments made by the City following the Rural Summit. Aside from that, he believed issues related to development had been and would continue to be a big piece of the work in the RAO. With respect to the involvement of the Agriculture and Rural Affairs Committee (ARAC), Mr. Kirkpatrick maintained performance evaluations should be his to make but that the ARAC could be involved in setting goals and objectives.
Councillor Wilkinson referenced the City Manager’s involvement on 34 media files and asked for clarification on this. Mr. Kirkpatrick indicated there were thousands of media files managed throughout the year. He explained that, depending on the issues, he got involved and provided direction on some of these.
Responding to a question with respect to $145,000 identified in his office budget for consulting services, Mr. Kirkpatrick advised that, depending on the issues arising throughout the year, this pot of resources may or may not be drawn upon. He noted any consulting expenditure was then reported to Committee and Council through the delegated authority reports.
Councillor Wilkinson submitted there may be times when Council might want to say how staff should use such funds. She maintained that by receiving reports after the fact, it was too late for Council to say that an expense should or should not have occurred. Mr. Kirkpatrick suggested if that was the will of Council, he could come forward with a report to ask for approval each time he tapped into the fund. However, he believed this would not be a good use of his, nor of Committee’s and Council’s time.
Councillor Wilkinson was concerned by the total content of consulting budgets and she indicated she really wanted to know what every single Deputy City Manager, Director and Manager had in their respective budgets for consulting contracts. Mr. Kirkpatrick indicated staff could provide more detailed information in terms of the consulting lines in the various branches’ budgets and how these funds were typically used. As an example, he advised that the majority of his office’s consulting budget in 2007 was used to cover expenses related to Council’s strategic priority setting exercise and the development of the fiscal framework policy document.
Responding to questions from Councillor Wilkinson with respect to the $155,000 allocated for the next Rural Summit, Mr. D. Moodie, Rural Affairs Officer, indicated this amount was based on the cost of running the last summit. However, he advised that as the process had been moving along, staff had been able to save a significant amount of money by doing things internally. Therefore, he believed the actual cost would come in under $40,000.
In light of these explanations, Councillor Wilkinson indicated she would be moving a motion to reduce the budget for the Rural Summit by $115,000.
Councillor Desroches acknowledged the mandate of the RAO, noted that things were getting better in terms of services to the rural areas, and he wondered if there was a point in time when the City Manager would look at changing the structure of the office and allocating those funds directly to programming. Mr. Kirkpatrick suggested his job was to keep an eye on this on an on-going basis. He discussed the RAO’s workplan and priorities and the fact that, as some issues got resolved, other issues tended to come up. He believed this office had enough work ahead of it, however he re-iterated this was something he would watch.
Responding to a question from Councillor McRae with respect to the nature and scope of the 720 inquiries from Council referenced in his presentation, Mr. Kirkpatrick indicated his office staff did a good job of sorting through inquiries, dealing with those they could handle on their own and redirecting those that could be handled by another office. Therefore, he believed those he dealt with required his attention, either because they required a cross-departmental focus or because they were politically significant.
With respect to the issue of inquiries and how these could be better manager, Mayor O’Brien expressed a sense of urgency so that Committee and Council could consider a clear set of guidelines. Mr. Kirkpatrick indicated he would take this as direction.
At this juncture, Committee voted on Councillor Wilkinson’s motion.
Moved by Councillor M. Wilkinson
That
funding for the Rural Summit be reduced from $155,000 to $40,000.
CARRIED
Committee then voted on the item as amended.
That the Long Range Financial Plan Sub-Committee recommend Council approve the final 2008 Operational Budget of the City Manager’s Office, as amended by the following:
1. That funding for the Rural Summit be
reduced from $155,000 to $40,000.
CARRIED
as amended