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 DRAFT Meeting Summary
Meeting 18 – November 20, 2003

Members:
Richard Bonewits
Richard Derham
Mark Endresen
Dave Gering
Steve Goldblatt
Arun Jhaveri
Sharon Maeda
Jim Montgomery
Bill Ptacek
Kathleen Royer
Steve Williamson

Consulting Team:
Berk & Associates, 206-324-8760
Marty Wine, Senior Associate

Council Staff:
David deCourcy, Council Chief of Staff, 296-0343
Scott White, Council Staff, 296-0324
Gennevie Cook, Committee Assistant, 205-5079

The Commission on Governance meeting was called to order at 2:07 p.m., 44th Floor, Wells Fargo Building, 999 – 3rd Avenue, Seattle, Washington by Co-Chair Dave Gering.

Commission members present: Richard Bonewits, Richard Derham, Mark Endresen, Dave Gering, Steve Goldblatt, Arun Jhaveri, Sharon Maeda, Bill Ptacek, Kathleen Royer
Absent: Jim Montgomery, Steve Williamson

Audience Members: Christel Brunnenkant, League of Women Voters; Marissa Alegria, Department Community & Human Services; Dave Regnier, Prosecuting Attorney’s Office; Charlie Bush, City of Bellevue City Manager’s Office

1. Approval of November 6 Meeting Summary: Steve Goldblatt moved, and Richard Bonewits seconded the approval of the November 6 meeting summary. The motion was unanimously approved.

2. Overview of Today’s Meeting:

wrap up Phase 2 recommendations and get started with Phase 3.

3. Reviewing Phase 2 Draft Recommendations: How Services Should Be Provided.

The group and reviewed and discussed recommendations in 5 areas as drafted.

    a. Intergovernmental relations
    b. Employment policy
    c. Criminal justice
    d. Human services
    e. Management approaches

Changes since last packet: intergovernmental relations and management approaches information is new.

Q: How did the BATF handle giving specific dates to their recommendations? A: Up to the group. BATF was specific about dates where appropriate and their recommendations focused on the 2004 budget. Also had executive summary and full report and appendices.

Intergovernmental relations: Check with Jim Montgomery about whether the jail services contract was a good or a bad deal for the cities and counties. Basic framework of the recommendations is that a dialogue should be initiated among the cities and County, and if it fails, the state should become involved. Delete “urban” relating to parks and pools. Point out Broward County investment in infrastructure and White Center model of a national foundation working with and investing a community with local foundations matching over 10 years (reference Seattle Times article 11/15). Others are faced with similar situations – show how others handled it. Re-word the timing about when the State should take action so it’s contingent on local actions first. Change items 3 and 4 so that the first clause is the same as items 1 and 2; and add #5, “Clarify the state’s funding obligations to the cities and counties.” This could be included in phase 3. Marty will specifically interview Broward and Multnomah counties and the Association of Washington Cities regarding how the agreements are set up, and shop these draft recommendations with the cities and County.

Employment policy: Marty will route the draft of what the employment policy subgroup has been discussing with the full language to all Commission members. Steve Goldblatt may add a finding about the complexity of labor contracts and whether costs grow by “accretion.” What could the Commission say about what we heard about interest arbitration adding to costs? Item 1 should be called a finding and some members questioned whether the statement was accurate. The Commission has focused on three issues as part of its discussion: 1) system of bargaining; 2) size of workforce; 3) relative level of salaries. So far the finding is that none of these appear to pose significant problems to the County – labormanagement relations are reported to be good; and salaries do not seem significantly higher or lower than the norm; if increases are greater than inflation it’s due to the step system, not cost of living increases. Commission needs somewhere to handle issues where there was no consensus – such as contracting/competitive bidding. In item 7, deleted reference to “urban.” Marty will route these drafts to those who have participated with us: Kathi Oglesby, Dustin Frederick, Rick Hayes, Susie Slonecker.

Criminal justice: Prosecutor and Sheriff will present to the Commission on 12/4. Marty will send questions already forwarded to these speakers and the Commission will identify additional questions and forward them to Marty. The BATF recommended consolidation of the administrations of District and Superior Court. Marty will interview Paul Sherfey, Tricia Crozier and one opponent about governance about what is possible and describe the governance benefits. Human services: Focus of these recommendations should be that the County should be a regional provider, benchmarks set at a high level, and have an overarching vision of excellence – that regional services are provided and executed so well that others are willing to help fund it, and shows our regional capacity to deal with these issues. Commission members were impressed by the chart showing who funds what – the County funds a lot, but investments are second to Seattle and in a very small part, a few other cities. An example of regional system and network and voluntary funding for it is domestic violence – they are jointly funding services. This recommendation and all the language should be included into the intergovernmental recommendations.

Management approaches: Add language in #2 saying that internal service functions should be unified including those housed with separately elected officials (Sheriff, Prosecutor, Courts, Assessor) should also be centrally located. Separately elected officials should provide data in the same format as other departments, but Prosecutor should be able to make their budget presentations as separately elected officials. The policy differences can remain, but functional operational staffing should be unified. Item 4 should include something about excellence in project management and limiting the scope of projects to make implementation stronger and well-supported for technology projects. Item 5 is related to item 4 under Employment Policies – need to include all items that make up total costs. Start shopping these recommendations around to those who have participated with us.

Developing Phase 3 Recommendations: How Services Should be Funded.

The Commission and Marty reviewed a packet focusing on workplan items, including how cross-subsidization of urban unincorporated King County was calculated; an assessment of the revenue tools available to the County, the recommendations of the BAT Force and Tri-Association legislative agenda. The overall point of the presentation was that:

• Most sources are restricted in use and limits on rates and revenues exist.
• Counties are beholden to the state and voters.
• The property tax has been the most stable source of revenues and with recent limits cities and counties will increasingly be in the “levy lid lift” business.
• GMA will restrict sales tax revenues to counties.
• Future legislative agendas will focus on easing restrictions on revenues or cutting back mandated expenditures.

Phase 3 Recommendations should focus on:

• Finding: Impact of all past initiatives on ability to provide services.
• Reserves and financial policies should be adequate.
• The County should have a taxpayer’s bill of rights.
• An ongoing educational effort should be undertaken to help citizens understand where funding comes from and how it is spent – what happens when dollars are taken out of the system.
• For mandated services, funding should be granted directly to counties and not “passed through.”
• Criminal justice functions mandated by the state should be funded in larger part by the state, with the State of Washington taking more responsibility for funding and operations.
• Aggressively seek grants from Congress.
• Does it make sense for funding to be increasingly dedicated when flexibility is needed to respond to changing needs.

4. Next Steps, Preview of December 4 meeting: The next meeting is in the Wells Fargo Building at 999 - Third Avenue on the 44th Floor, 2-5 p.m. Speakers include the Prosecuting Attorney and Sheriff and the Commission will wrap up criminal justice recommendations, Phase 2 recommendations and review and finalize Phase 3 recommendations.

The meeting adjourned at 5:10 p.m.