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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2024-06-11 Policy & Services Committee Summary MinutesPOLICY AND SERVICES COMMITTEE SUMMARY MINUTES Page 1 of 6 Regular Meeting June 11, 2024 The Policy and Services Committee of the City of Palo Alto met on this date in the Council Chambers and by virtual teleconference at 7:00 P.M. Present: Kou (Chair), Lythcott-Haims Absent: Call to Order Chair Kou called the meeting to order. The clerk called roll with all present. Action Items 1. Presentation from Downtown Streets Team regarding the Downtown Streets Team Program Chris Richardson, Downtown Streets Team, provided a slide presentation describing the Downtown Streets Team Program, what individuals describe as being the worst part about being homeless, DST's philosophy, DST's mission, DST's core model, building community, success team meeting, Street’s Team Enterprises, and a map and description of League of California cities. Julie Gardner, Downtown Streets Team CEO, resumed the slide presentation discussing claims and a disagreement against DST that had been resolved and an overview of the vision of DST. Council Member Tanaka joined at 7:03 P.M. Council Member Lythcott-Haims asked how someone would become part of DST. She was interested in the terms and conditions of being a part of DST and what the individual gets. She wanted to know how many members of the yellow-shirt team were in Palo Alto. She inquired what percentage of the beautifying the city efforts in downtown was handled by DST versus other venders. She thought having the team members march in the May Fete in their yellow t- shirts behind a banner would proclaim DST as an integral part of Palo Alto. Mr. Richardson answered that it is predominantly by word of mouth and peer-to-peer outreach. He explained that the non-cash stipend individuals receive are based on basic needs and a focus on their strengths paired with existing community resources. He stated there are 35 SUMMARY MINUTES Page 2 of 6 Policy & Services Meeting Summary Minutes: 06/11/2024 yellow-shirt and 7 teal-shirt team members in Palo Alto. He stated that DST a small piece of the puzzle in the city beautifying efforts but that was not their focus. Their mission was to provide a pathway out of homelessness with the added benefit to business owners, project partners and the City. He stated they would love to participate in the May Fete Parade. Ms. Gardner described the two divisions of programming within Downtown Streets Team and the opportunities offered. Mike Wong, Assistant Director of Public Works, explained how the Downtown Streets Team is one of several contractors used to help clean the City along with city staff. Council Member Tanaka stated that he heard about downtown not being very clean from members of the public as well as business owners. He wanted to know how each vendor was held accountable for their part of the cleaning. He asked what the performance measures that are independently measured in terms of the cleaning. He wanted to know what the contractual obligations included. He wanted to know if the packet showed the staff’s report of their performance, the number of times they have gone out, and the number of times they were observed doing what they needed to do. He wanted to see an independent validation. He asked questions about the core mission of helping people who are unhoused and the amount of money required. He further asked what the dollars per replacement were for other Palo Alto agencies. He thought that metric would be beneficial when approving these contracts. Chantal Cotton Gaines, Deputy City Manager, answered the responsibility for the cleanliness of the City was with the Public Works Department. There are multiple contracts and staff working on keeping downtown clean including Downtown Streets Team but is not solely their responsibility. She explained the contract that contained the performance measures would be included in the packet for the June 17 City Council meeting for Downtown Streets Team. She invited questions about the contract amendment to be sent to Staff for response. She stated there are a wide variety of agencies that service their population and she did not have the dollars per replacement information available at that time. She thought that was a broader discussion that may come up with something like the gap analysis work they have as a Council priority objective project. Mr. Wong described the monthly performance measures Downtown Streets Team is required to provide. He stated the only one not self-reported is the audits conducted by the Public Works Department. He added they have a strict timed route they have to follow and they would report to the management team if there was an issue. Kiely Nose, Assistant City Manager, indicated it is not an attendance audit. The services provided are services that require crews to be walking certain areas on certain schedules. As part of that walking activity, they are providing the service of cleaning. They are audited by observation of the cleaning activities. SUMMARY MINUTES Page 3 of 6 Policy & Services Meeting Summary Minutes: 06/11/2024 Mr. Richardson described other metrics that have to be hit within the contract. He stated there were significantly less resources in Palo Alto than in some other communities especially when it comes to housing subsidies. He stated it was last measured at being under $50,000 a person. Chair Kou thought the packet included the extension of the contract and not the actual report about DST's performance. Melissa McDonough, Assistant to the City Manager, provided a brief synopsis of what would be included in the packet being provided for the June 17 City Council meeting. Council Member Lythcott-Haims reminded her colleagues that this was a discussion of a volunteer effort in performing cleaning around the City and the measure of success would be different than with a vendor whose purpose is to clean up the City. Ms. Gardner added that looking at the human impact to dollar ratio was challenging but they have a robust metric system on the human impact side that measure barriers to employment that are removed and transformational barriers. Chair Kou queried if 35 yellow and 7 teal was just for this year. She wanted more detail on the 2022 SF regulatory disagreement. Mr. Richardson answered that is the team size they can hold at any given time. He discussed that it was being questioned if the volunteers should be 1099 employees. The solution was changing to the STE model and also have the volunteer component. They limit the stipends to be for joining team meetings and workshops instead of shifts. Ms. Gardner explained that in 2022, the City of San Francisco brought a regulatory disagreement upon DST questioning their volunteer model in context of the way they delivered basic need stipends. When they have team members engaging in daily meaningful activities, it is voluntary. In closing, she asked the Committee to be thinking about how Downtown Streets Teams can evolve into their vision for the City. NO ACTION TAKEN 2. Approval of Office of City Auditor FY2025 Task Orders Late Packet Report, Presentation Task 1: Citywide Risk Assessment Task 2: Preparation of Annual Audit Plan Task 3: Selection of External Financial Auditor and Annual Audit Coordination Task 5: Preparation of Quarterly Reports, Annual Status Reports, Provision of City Hotline and Other Ongoing Office Administrative Functions Kate Murdock, Baker Tilly, provided a slide presentation discussing the task order change approvals being sought by the City Auditor including Task Orders set to expire at the end of SUMMARY MINUTES Page 4 of 6 Policy & Services Meeting Summary Minutes: 06/11/2024 June to be extended to the end of December 2024, approval of the FY25 Task Order 5 with work to begin on July 1, 2024, and a request to amend FY24 Task Orders 5 and 6 to realign the authorized budget. MOTION: Council Member Lythcott-Haims moved, seconded by Council Member Kou to recommend the City Council approve various Task Orders with Baker Tilly for Internal Audit Services. 1) Extend deadline for FY 2024 Task Orders Task 1: Citywide Risk Assessment, Task 2: Preparation of Annual Audit Plan, Task 3: Selection of External Financial Auditor and Annual Audit Coordination 2) Executive New FY 2025 Task 5: Preparation of Quarterly Reports, Annual Status Reports, Provision of City Hotline and Other Ongoing Office Administrative Functions 3) Amend the budget for FY 2024 Task Orders MOTION PASSED: 3-0 3. Office of the City Auditor Presentation of the ALPR Technology Contract Management Audit Item removed from the agenda Item Removed from the agenda 4. Office of the City Auditor Presentation of the Public Safety Building Construction Audit Report Robert Zellmer, Baker Tilly, provided a slide presentation discussing the Public Safety Building Construction Audit Report objectives, findings of immaterial billing errors, and recommendations. Chair Kou queried if it is often that there would be zero errors on a project as big as this. Mr. Zellmer explained every project has its own set of risks and contract documents. He has audited projects similar in value to this project where there were zero or very small findings and others with a large amount of findings. This was a successful audit in that the amount of errors related to the billings were minimal. Council Member Tanaka recalled there being an issue on this project and questioned if there should be a wider scope on a project of this size. He wanted to know if there were any other audits planned for this project. He queried what kind of other audits were done for a project of this size. He asked how much the change order dollar figure was of the 106. He asked if $6 million would warrant a change order audit. He asked if the cost was over $6 million in total, less or more. He asked how the cost of this building compares to some of the other ones they have seen. Mr. Zellmer stated he did read about some delays in the project but assessing those delays would be outside the scope of the audit and he had no insight into the specifics on those. The SUMMARY MINUTES Page 5 of 6 Policy & Services Meeting Summary Minutes: 06/11/2024 scope they presented on the audit was the scope that was accepted. He added they did have a recommendation in the report that a closeout audit could be performed on this project to carry the audit through in the current scope verifying that all billings were contractually compliant and the controls continue to operate as intended. That would be at the City’s discretion. His team specifically does audits related to billing compliance. Specialty audits required specialized firms to do the audit work. He explained there was approximately $6 million in the construction contract which was approximately 7 percent of the contract. He stated they looked at the supporting documentation behind the change orders to verify contract compliance on all those items. He was not able to comment on whether $6 million was too small or too large to warrant a special audit. He said 10 percent was typically the ballpark benchmark. He did not have insight into the total cost for the project. Ms. Murdock said it was hard for her to comment on what decisions went into determining that this audit would be done and what the concerns were and what risks were being considered. The initial scope of this audit predated her by several years. She offered to look into it and come back with information. She stated no other audits were planned for this project at this time. Other audits she has seen in this space included change orders and things like that. She stated she looked at change orders and other audits in the past. She remembered a figure of 10 percent was typically in the ballpark of what people see on construction audits. She did not have the total cost numbers. She did not have experience looking at this type of construction or building but she would do research on that. Assistant City Manager Nose did not have the totality of the CIP in front of her. She confirmed the audit was commissioned at Council Member Tanaka’s and some of his colleague’s behest. She said that on substantially complex construction, the City allocates and assumes a 10 percent contingency to deal with change orders and they are within that. She agreed to have Staff follow up on how much was budgeted and how much they went over. MOTION: Council Member Kou moved, seconded by Lythcott-Haims to recommend the City Council approve the Office of the City Auditor Public Safety Building Construction Audit Report. MOTION PASSED: 3-0 Future Meetings and Agendas Deputy City Manager Cotton Gaines announced assuming Staff items would be organized as planned, the August meeting would include an item related to the Council referral on discretionary spending that relates to the $2000 recommendation from the Procedures and Protocols, a race and equity update report, a few audit items, and if there is time they will have the Boards and Commissions Handbook review with some of the proposed changes that came from the City Council Procedures and Protocols discussion in the month of May. She will try to balance the agenda and maybe request a slightly earlier start time. SUMMARY MINUTES Page 6 of 6 Policy & Services Meeting Summary Minutes: 06/11/2024 Chair Kou asked who the nonprofit reports go to and if they can come and do a presentation to Policy and Services. Assistant City Manager Nose harkened back to the efforts underway with the nonprofit audit outstanding and the expectations they want to set with their nonprofit partners moving forward. Their current reporting structure depends on the contractual relationship with each of them. Council Member Lythcott-Haims asked if CEDAW would sit with this committee. Deputy City Manager Cotton Gaines answered CEDAW is in the 2024-25 Equity Action Plan. Because Council had previously given them direction to do that, they do not have to come through this Committee but it could come through this Committee, but they will always bring updates to the Committee. Adjournment: The meeting was adjourned at 8:22 P.M.