- that I'm gonna go ahead and call this deliberation session of the Bloomington-Cottman Council to order
- here on December 10th at 631. Will the clerk please call the roll? Okay, I'm not doing this in the usual
- order, so bear with me. Council Member Rosenberger. These are not working here. Fine. Hello, this one works.
- Here Here here I got Here daily here Stossburg here Piedmont Smith here Rallo here Flirty here. Okay.
- Thank you. I
- Thank you so much. As I said tonight we are having a deliberation session. We're going to be discussing
- outcome based budgeting and believe it or not twenty twenty seven priorities because municipal budgeting
- starts early.
- So I want to thank in advance councilmember Piedmont Smith who organized The discussion this evening.
- We will discuss outcome based budgeting and the progress so far Various outcomes that we already have
- in city plans and really kind of the main goal I think tonight is to try to as a council prioritize
- outcomes Which didn't really happen last year because you know, this this is a process We will have
- public comment in there and then next steps and then we will adjourn
- So I think at this point I'm turning over to councilmember Piedmont Smith Thank you so I do want to
- mention I'm chair of the Fiscal committee special committee of council and we did review this Agenda
- or the general ideas that went into this agenda tonight, so it wasn't totally flying solo here and
- So I just wanted to remind everybody about the context that both the mayor's administration and the
- council agreed to move towards an outcome based budgeting process. The council passed a resolution in
- June of 2024 regarding this and of course during the budget process for the twenty twenty six budget.
- the administration did move towards outcome-based budgeting, sort of an in-between step, which they
- call priority-based budgeting. And really the big difference is that compared with how the city budget
- was created previously, is that previously we would basically take the budget from the current year
- and just tweak things. We need more for this. We need less for that. This costs more now. We need another
- staff person, et cetera. With outcome-based budgeting, we look at what outcomes we want to achieve.
- Then we back up and look at programs that will get us towards those outcomes. And then we back up further
- and look at what those programs cost.
- And I know that our Deputy Mayor Gretchen Knapp, who's here, and our Comptroller Jessica McClellan have
- been working on evaluating all the programs and putting them in categories so that we can better track
- what exactly they cost. But I think one of the big questions at this point is which
- programs do we prioritize and to look at what we prioritize we really need to go back to look at the
- outcomes that our city plans have said we are all working towards. And since we can't do everything
- we also have need to prioritize those outcomes and kind of decide given our limited funding what outcomes
- are most important for the community. So hopefully my colleagues all got a chance to take a look at the
- packet that came with this for this meeting. Are there any questions before we kind of dive into the
- outcomes? Yes. I really appreciate that we're doing this. I also had a lot of structural questions about,
- I'll just surface a small one without getting into a lot of detail.
- a lot of things that need to change to accomplish our outcomes are not in fact expenditures, they're
- policy change, they're legislation and policy change. So that's just an example of a number of structural
- issues that inform how we might engage in this exercise. And I'm just getting into the agenda and getting
- it pulled up from my file, so apologies if there's like adequate space on the agenda for discussing
- that, but I was curious for
- the suitability of a topic like that at a session like this and just wanted to get your input as the
- person running the meeting. I think that's a really good point. I think that we could probably talk
- about that through the course of the meeting as we look at the outcomes that I've collated from our
- city plans and we can say OK you know if a majority of council members say this outcome is the most
- important. Well is that do we influence that.
- just by budget or by policy as well. And kind of we can definitely should consider that once we prioritize
- our outcomes. Does that make sense? It does. I worry that my structural questions are going to have
- like an impact on the potential utility of the exercise. But I think let's proceed. I'm sorry. I'm always, yeah.
- No, no, I think these are all good questions and I think the whole this whole movement towards outcome
- based budgeting is necessarily going to be messy. So I think we just need to dig in. Exactly. And if
- council member Osari were here I would also ask him if he had anything to add since he was
- kind of spearheading the move towards outcome based budgeting. But hopefully he will arrive shortly. Yes.
- I'll also add to kind of address that question like to some degree I think like that kind of legislative
- or process or policy changes falls under the umbrella of the effective governance. What's that bucket
- called high performing government. And so that could be that kind of idea like if something might take
- a lot of legislation and go well if that's like how much time is that going to take because time ends
- up being say like staff hours and so like prioritizing that as part of staff hours under
- high-performing government might be, depending on what it is, a pathway. I'm at a little bit of a loss
- right now as chair of this meeting, whether or not Councilmember Piedmont-Smith should be chair or should
- be kind of recognized as chair right now because she's organizing this discussion. So Councilmember
- Piedmont-Smith, do you want to just keep on going? Not necessarily.
- I mean, I think it's, I shared my game plan with you also. President Stossberg, if you want to go through
- it, that would be perfectly fine with me. Okay, well, that was maybe the context, which is part A in
- the game plan, which is page three of our packet tonight. Would you agree? Yes. Great.
- Part B is outcomes and city plans. And so Council Member Piedmont-Smith made a list in the packet and
- has two discussion questions here. Does everybody, is everybody interested in adding an environment
- category or bucket? And then also, I'll give a little bit more context to this since I'm on fiscal committee
- too, is should we be open to adding to the outcomes listed in these three city plans?
- You know so how should we add outcomes basically like we kind of started with the plans because they
- were established documents of the city. But are there other outcomes that we should consider. Are there
- other plans or studies we should consider. How should we consider those things. Councilmember Piedmont
- Smith what do you want to start with. Well I guess I would like to start with the summary of outcomes
- that I've drawn from
- The three plans listed, the Comprehensive Plan, the Climate Action Plan, and the Safe Streets for All
- Action Plan. That last one basically just has one outcome to reduce deaths and serious accidents to
- zero. So I guess I'd like to get some feedback whether looking at these, where I've categorized the
- outcomes is appropriate.
- And I did assume we would add environment. But if you feel like we should distribute the environment,
- ones among the other existing six categories, you can speak up about that as well. And just want to
- get feedback. I don't want to assume that I have done all of this accurately. I did my best. Yeah, why
- don't we speak to the environment question first? Does that work for people? How do people feel about
- adding environment as a category?
- Council Member Daly? Yes. Anybody else? Council Member Zulek? I'm in favor of this as well, and I hear
- from a lot of my younger residents and constituents that the environment is a very strong priority for
- them. And so definitely on behalf of District 6, I vote yes. OK. Other comments about adding? Council
- Member Aralo? Are my mics not always on?
- Yes, to me, it's implicit in human flourishing to have attention to the environment. And it, of course,
- appears it is explicit in our comprehensive plan, sustainability action plan, climate action plan. So
- I think it should be included as its own topic. And I appreciate Council Member Piedmont-Smith describing
- all of those categories within the proposed new category.
- topics, I should say, or goals. Councilmember Flaherty? Yeah, so I'll try to bring in some more systems
- questions where relevant. And I think here's one. Sure, we can have environment as a category, if we're
- in categories. I must say, and I know I wasn't involved in the groundwork that did that this year, but
- I didn't find much usefulness for the buckets of categorization in the priority-based budget framework
- this year.
- It felt like a pretty arbitrary exercise. And I actually felt like I had less transparency and visibility
- into the budget than ever before. Because we used to use a process where at least departments set goals
- for themselves and reported on those goals every year. There was actually a public dashboard with all
- those goals. I think that wasn't always tied well enough to our city plans. And so I think there were
- some shortcomings from an outcome-based framework with that old approach.
- It's just an example. I found that more useful as a council member than simply saying the transportation
- budget and this percentage of the public works budget and this whatever, you know, is transportation
- category. Like I just didn't find much value and that's I guess I'm challenging the, or the assumption
- that we want buckets of, you know, six or seven, eight broad categories of outcomes or goals. I guess
- my question would be like to what end? Like is it serving us?
- Not to like, sorry, I feel like I have a lot of cold water kind of suggestions tonight, but again, I
- really do appreciate all the work that's gone into it and the work of the committee this year to try
- something new and to, you know, to, yeah, grapple seriously with the question of what it would mean
- to have an outcome-based budgeting system that we're all buttoned to.
- I don't know. The fiscal committee has talked a little bit about that bucket thing and I don't know
- at this point if Councilmember Piedmont-Smith or Rallo or I who are all on that committee or Deputy
- Mayor Knapp or Comptroller McClellan might want to come to talk a little bit to that question that you
- have because the short answer is it was kind of like step one and the usefulness might come more at
- steps two or three and there wasn't time this year to do that.
- Deputy Mayor is kind of creeping up to the table. So why don't you go ahead and talk about that a little
- bit in terms of how you see the future of these buckets. And while you're doing it, my question about
- the environmental, the environment bucket is do you think, and this might be Controller McClellan, I
- kind of asked her this at fiscal committee, but maybe you guys have talked about it since, whether we
- could easily put things into an environment category
- because they're so directly related to that. So for the record, Deputy Mayor Gretchen Knapp, the way
- the accounting software is set up, you do have to have a top-level category. So there is value within
- the process that we have to follow as a whole to have those top-level categories. The data that we all
- really want to see and that we couldn't get to in time this year was the more detailed
- numbers by program because and i've said it before but i'll just keep saying it because it's complicated
- um when we go through this process in order to be able to say uh we've spent x dollars on um updating
- um green energy stuff in the building for example for city hall we have to allocate every single dollar
- that the city spends to a
- into a category and so that's why we had all these annoying questions about how granular do you want
- to be. So it's completely possible to add a category for climate and in fact because ESD has sort of
- three different areas, the controller did already set up their budget this year with a new split so
- that they could more easily track what they're spending in terms of the arts,
- small business and long-term economic development and climate and transportation demand management.
- So there's kind of a natural process for that has already started. But those big buckets are still valuable
- because as we do go into the more granular work, there has to be within the program software a bigger
- bucket. And so that's still helpful in terms of creating a dashboard from the data that we ultimately
- get out of that system.
- It doesn't mean that we can't have you know many finer points within that but we do need big buckets
- to start so to kind of speak maybe if I'm paraphrasing councilmember Flaherty is like concern like systematic
- concern like what what kind of because I would also agree like just having those big categories
- Felt a little bit empty compared to say establish goals for departments, but what could we? expect to
- see in the future in terms of those budget presentations and and meeting categories and potentially
- other more granular goals and
- I think it's a great question, and I think it in part depends on how granular you want to be. And my
- observation is that each of us has issues that we want to be very granular about and other issues that
- we're maybe not as interested in being granular about for whatever reason, more administrative areas
- or things that just aren't passion projects. But the goal has always been to get to measurable outcomes
- and goals. The problem is that the work it takes to put
- to go through and say for every dollar that you're spending, exactly how are you categorizing that and
- what is the program and if you're parks, you have, you know, your youth programs, is youth programs
- one category or do you treat it more like CFRD, which thinks of things in terms of individual events
- and themes that they work through. So the time that staff spend doing that is time that goes away from
- writing extensive, you know, narratives about what they're doing, which is why we were so short on narrative
- this year, is that we put so much time into trying to learn the software and get started with it. So,
- you know, once we know what the program areas are that we want to track, then it's much easier to say
- what is the goal for that. And of course, for most work that staff do, they already have goals. This
- will just be a way of, you know,
- capturing some of the things that we already do that may be invisible to all of us, and then making
- sure that the things that matter most to us are definitely visible to all of us that we may not have
- a name for right now. Council Member Flaherty, just that. Small clarifying question, which is, are the
- tags mutually exclusive? You have to pick one and you can't have two applied to that thing?
- The way I, and I've, it's been a minute since I looked at the software, but my memory is that there
- was a top level and then a secondary level, so yeah, you would probably,
- you know, in order to be able to say we're spending X on this area, it can only be assigned to one area
- or another. Got it. Even though obviously there's lots of overlap. I could offer a brief reflection
- on what I heard if you'd like, which is just I'm not certain that it would be useful for me to know
- that we spend $473,000 on X, you know, activities at like a, you know, drilled down granular level.
- in the context of outcome-based budgeting. I think I do care about the dollars and cents to a degree.
- I more care about are we funding and doing the activities, the actions, and the outputs that we, to
- the best of our good faith ability, believe are going to lead to the outcomes in sort of a logic model
- framework. OK, here's the outcome we want. Here's a set of actions that we use staff expertise and consultant
- expertise to develop to try to get to that outcome.
- are we doing those things? And I think we're gonna talk about that a little bit more as we talk about
- like adding outcomes and what it looks like. But I guess it seems relevant to this tagging question
- because I very much don't want to have like make work for staff on tagging all the things. I'm curious
- for other council members perspective around the utility of like an actual specific dollar figure for
- X as opposed to or in contrast to just being able to say
- these are the actions that we are taking that directly support X outcome. And they are funded, you know,
- at staff time or whatever it is, like. Council Member Piedmont-Smith. Yeah, I think both are important
- because, so the question, are we funding and taking the actions that we believe will lead to the outcomes
- we want, right? Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
- The proof is then, OK, we have this program, which we think is going to lead to the outcomes we want.
- But we need some measure of whether it really does. And we also need to know how much money we put into
- that program, and then do a cost benefit analysis. It's like, OK, we're getting positive outcomes for
- like 20 families, but we're putting in $100,000. So I think both what you just said is important, but
- also understanding what
- Inputs we give as far as time and money. Yeah, and time is money. I understood. I agree Actually for
- those coming in there was another meeting so we've just gained another couple council members. We're
- kind of discussing our six buckets of outcomes the proposal of adding environments as a seventh and
- also just generally
- Kind of the general question of the usefulness of buckets and how detailed we want to be about it and
- understand a little bit more about the the Accounting system and how that plays into it. So Council
- member Olu Yeah, my question for the deputy mayor is It kind of broadly speaking the priority based
- viewpoint versus the outcomes based which is we've
- made explicit here in this document. The outcome-based is largely based upon guiding documents, which
- I think are very important. They were community-derived, spent a lot of time and money developing these.
- They were adopted by council, supported by the previous administration. Are these documents that you're
- utilizing for, okay, I just wanted to get to that basic
- Because, I mean, every, you know, you're a relatively new administration. You have your own priorities
- too. But, you know. We're not in the business of reinventing the wheel in areas that we've hired and
- appointed people, you know.
- to bring their expertise to bear and they and their teams are continuing to use those documents as they
- always have. I think we do have areas in the city where there are not guiding documents. ESD doesn't
- have guiding documents per se. CFRD doesn't have guiding documents in the same way that
- Transportation and some other areas have have documents. So there are gray areas in there, but no one
- is ignoring any of those plans I've read them all yeah, and so I'm aware of them and you know, I wasn't
- implying that no No, I I'm just saying there I want to reassure everyone that no one has abandoned those
- plans and if I can just say one more thing and then if you don't mind I'll take a seat unless you need
- me again, but
- to Council Member Flaherty's point. I think what you're wanting to see is how much are we spending on
- something and is it really achieving that goal? Something to understand about our accounting program
- the way it currently works without this overlay is that there's no way of tracking a program's or an
- outcome's expenses except by a spreadsheet. All it tracks is general categories of spending like printing or
- personnel or whatever so if we want to in any variation be able to say What are we spending on XYZ outcome?
- Output you know anything we do have to add a layer and spend the time to put that money in and whether
- we can get in this
- new cycle to getting all of those numbers in I imagine that we will all have a learning curve once we
- see the detail of like oh we're spending that much on fill in the blank or you know wait we only spend
- we don't spend anything on this other thing whatever that might be. So I don't imagine that we're going
- to all be 100 percent satisfied with the budget this time but we should make a lot more progress in
- terms of being able to see real numbers and have a more meaningful conversation.
- At least for now, I mean, I don't know how much you might end up having to walk back and forth this
- evening, but you'll get your steps in Are there other comments from anybody about the utility of adding
- a bucket for environment or How we're using those categories Councilmember sorry
- We should. It helps to track things. It helps because these conversations, as we're realizing, you sort
- of set them. They seed future conversations. And so it is an area that certainly all of us individually
- care about a lot. It's something that all of our constituents care about an awful lot. It'll help us
- to be very clear about how we're operationalizing plans that exist that are relevant to environment.
- So I would be a very strong yes for that.
- Thank you. And thank you to Deputy Mayor Knapp for coming up and working some things out with us. I
- think there are multiple ways to do it, and I think that whatever way we choose is fine, but when we
- think about input versus output, I do think that, especially as we are in this multiple-year process
- of getting to the outcomes-based budgeting, that understanding our capability for input would
- will be able to help us more easily identify what we're capable of in terms of providing outputs and
- so what those goals are and the specific numbers because we can't, I don't think we can make a proper
- goal setting chart until we fully understand what our inputs are. Can I ask for clarification?
- Yes like so so specifically like inputs being like our revenues and our priorities being like like actually
- prioritizing our buckets. I'm referring to the the recent budgets that we've had and how the numbers
- were sorted out. I think that it will be helpful moving forward to understand how that was decided for
- next year if that makes sense.
- Any other thoughts on this question. Yeah. I was getting at I'm sorry. I don't know. Like do you mean
- how the initial budgets from this year like however much was in the different departments. Yeah I do
- think I do think it was helpful just moving forward. So now that we have a baseline we can kind of figure out what
- What we're going to do next year now Like in terms of what buckets we might want to switch to get closer
- to those outcomes Councilmember Flaherty, thanks that was helpful input input About
- where we're trying to get and how that might serve us. I agree there will be surprising outcomes and
- I think it will have some utility. I think what I'm grappling with is to make sure it's a juice is worth
- the squeeze on the thing. And yes, metrics and quantitative data are helpful to the extent that they
- are telling you the thing you want to know. And I worry a little bit, there's a lot of actions that,
- let's just talk about a multi-use path on a high crash corridor.
- That is mitigating emissions, because it is helping support mode shift through infrastructure investments.
- It's increasing safety, trying to reduce deaths on our streets and serious injuries. It might involve
- narrowing a street, which allows for more tree canopy. There are other, it might increase the viability
- of a business there. There's economic development components. Just knowing enough about our plans and
- the types of things we do. And you could say there's a main thing, or you can pick one.
- I worry about us reading too much into, we're spending X here and only Y here when you've got that type
- of dynamic, cross-cutting almost anything we could do. So that's it. Councilmember Asari. And I think
- to that point as well, to the point that both of you are making, it is, and I think we've raised this
- in multiple other instances, is that thinking that way is a challenge as well, because not all that
- we might have
- goals that are of equal priority to us, but they're not all gonna cost the same, and so it also sort
- of changes. We might be doing a lot of things under a particular bucket, but it's because they're all
- cheap things. And then just as a follow-up to that, I think one of the reasons, though, why I'm particularly
- interested in having sort of a robust set of buckets, and particularly around something that we sort
- of in a narrative fashion agree on,
- is because I think, and I'll just say it and please disagree with me if I'm totally wrong or off base
- or if you guys don't feel this way, but my feeling is that we have a lot of plans. Some of, you know,
- it's kind of a contested question, because some of them are like real plans, some of them are unofficial
- plans, et cetera. I think that was sort of the tail end of what Deputy Mayor was saying. But my feeling,
- sitting there often is that we kind of, not we, but generally when people are presenting to us, they
- kind of pick things, sort of do this like, oh yeah, that's in the whatever plan, and they sort of attach
- it to something they wanted to do anyways. And I'd like to think about one of my personal
- goals for advocating so much for outcome-based thinking, even just, is to get us thinking the other
- way around, that it's not like, oh, I want to do this thing, and then you go, well, where can I find
- a plan that supports it, but that we say, well, we went through this long process of coming up with
- these plans that have this clear set of goals and activities and outcomes, and that we follow them,
- and that we can show, and maybe some of them, we can have the clear conversations, like, yeah, you know,
- we don't think we need to do that, or we can think of better ideas now, great, fine. But I think that
- there needs to be that clear set of thinking, not just appending nice words from plans onto ideas and
- programs that we're already pursuing. And to wrap that up, I think that by having a category, I think
- that's the value of these categories, is it does sort of give us a focal point for that conversation
- so that we keep having it and keep having it.
- Yeah, thank you. I want to second both of those concepts, that idea of starting with the outcome and
- then doing something that supports the outcome instead of doing something that you want to do and then
- figuring out what it supports and then also being really, I don't know, deliberate, careful, conscientious
- about how we categorize things, understanding that things fall into so many categories at the same time
- as I think based on
- At the time that council member Piedmont Smith allocated, she put about 20 minutes into talking about
- these outcomes. I think nobody said that environment should not be added. So environment is the seventh
- bucket, sounds good over here. And then perhaps we need to shift into part C, which is an activity.
- that might help further our conversations about prioritizing. Does that work for folks. Councilmember
- Piedmont Smith do you want to talk about what it is that we're supposed to do. OK. So I didn't have
- time to write the categories on these posted sheets but I will do that real quick. And the idea is for
- each council member to grab a post it note and a pen or some more.
- Sharpie and write down for each category What your top three? What you think are the top three most
- important outcomes And if you could only think of one or two that's fine, but right, you know one two
- and three if you do multiple for each category and your initials so that we know who it is and
- Stick them in the categories on those sheets and then after we've had some time to do that The plan
- is to come back and look at the sheets one by one and see where we might coalesce around prioritizing
- certain outcomes in each category and I would like to go on the record here and say that I prepared
- for an activity that was different and I clearly did not understand
- Yeah, I think I did the homework wrong too. Are we allowed to work together if we need to? Sure. OK,
- great. Councilmember Flaherty? Are the things we are writing down supposed to be verbatim what is in
- pages seven through nine of the last four pages of the packet? Here's an example. The quantity and quality
- of green space within the community has increased. If that's one of my top three priorities, I would
- write that sentence down and put it up there. Well, I think you could shorten it and just say green space.
- OK. OK. But what if there's multiple things that speak to green space? So if we're trying to say, this
- is a set of outcomes that are in our packet, and those are the set of outcomes that we're choosing from
- for this exercise? Yes. OK. But what if we have other outcomes? In the previous part of tonight's agenda,
- we were supposed to talk about, and we don't, you know,
- We can we can go back and do this too. We're supposed to talk about are there things that are not on
- this list that should be included and then on what basis should they be included. So they're not in
- the comprehensive plan of the climate action plan. Yeah. So where did you get this and should we include
- it. Now we could certainly do that later and redo this exercise or redo some version of this if we want
- to just move ahead. But yeah I don't think we have to be limited to these in general but
- For this exercise, I wanted us to have some agreement that it's not just an outcome that we're taking
- from the sky and writing down. It's something that's in our plans. OK, so understanding that, I will
- once again say I definitely did my homework wrong. Do we want to go back to the prior section B, and
- are there particular outcomes that anybody wants to add
- the list that councilmember Piedmont Smith started for us Councilmember Flaherty, what do you want to
- add it? Where do you want to put it? So I'm not gonna answer that directly. It's my answer like I think
- it's already been brought up at least by the mayor and we're sorry that We hit there's an unevenness
- to where we have formal city plans Which I would characterize as plans that went through a community
- process driven by administration and had formal adoption or approval of some count by the City Council
- that's occupying
- a portion of the pie, you know? And in the other areas, we don't have that. And it's something I raised
- in last year's budgeting sessions when the administration was coming forward with priority action plans.
- And I asked repeatedly, how's the council going to be involved? Are these going to be approved? The
- answers were not really a no. And those are mayoral priorities. And that's fine. The mayor can have
- priorities. I think we run into limits about being able to use those priorities for
- this purpose because they're not in fact, they haven't gone through the process of what the COMP plan
- did or what the climate action plan or the transportation plan has. So I think if we want to do this
- holistically, like it's, I mean we can do the exercise that's prescribed for us tonight, I just think
- we need to recognize its limits. And if we want to approach outcome-based budgeting holistically, we
- need to have both a confronting of the fact that there's whole areas of city government for which we
- don't have,
- Formal city plans and maybe develop them and then second which is that these plans that we have even
- Warrant all designed using the same framework Which I think is reflected in the fact that the safe streets
- for all action plan has one outcome and that the transportation plan has none I wouldn't characterize
- either of those plans that way at all. Actually, I would say that Implementing a shared street design
- on Kirkwood is it is you know an outcome or if you want to go farther downstream from that that
- a vibrant, like maybe it wasn't stated in the right language, that a vibrant downtown connector between
- Sample Gates and the square in a pedestrian street plaza enhances economic vitality, safety, blah, blah,
- blah. So none of these plans were designed necessarily with outcome-based budgeting in mind, nor were
- they designed to interlock consistently with one another. And so that's the other major structural challenge
- to using the existing plans
- verbatim to Do like-for-like analysis of priority outcomes? Okay, that's myself box I Mean I think we
- can We can go one of several directions here we could just use the The outcomes that I've summarized
- in the packet as a
- a guideline and come up with separate outcomes that we can defend through various ways, if asked, and
- carry on with the exercise. Or we can take a step back, not to the exercise, do it another time perhaps,
- and talk about areas where we don't have plans. I mean, clearly public safety, there's no plan. So I
- wrote down some
- I would want to see but you know, it's it's nothing that we've all agreed upon so Either way, I don't
- know what the will of the majority is You said that we when you were listening it said to qs speaking
- to your microphone Sorry that you when you said that we can defend Does that have a light? It's on yeah,
- it's on we can hear you that we can defend
- You know our outcome priority some you were you were referring to the ones that have plans that we can
- point to that were community developed based by Well since we don't have a plan for everything
- as councilmember Flaherty said We might consider just adding outcomes but we don't want to just add
- them willy-nilly, you know, you want we want to say well, I
- my constituents really care about this, and I've heard this, or the community survey has indicated this,
- and therefore I'm putting this in. You know, not just, well, I really like goats, and so I'm gonna put
- that in. Yeah, I just wanted clarification on what you meant by defense or defend. Yeah, I didn't mean
- like put up your dukes. Like we had an ideological bent towards something that's not what you meant
- by defend. You don't have to defend your,
- Your priority that way if it's if you just acknowledge that it's a personal priority as opposed to something
- that's laid out in a community-driven Generated plan I get I guess so. Okay, I mean Right, I mean I
- think that there can be space for personal priorities, but if we're gonna count them as I
- kind of an outcome that we as the council agree on, I think then you have to basically like defend or
- convince us all that it's like, that it deserves to be on the list. I think that we have two options
- right now on how to proceed. One is to proceed with council member Piedmont-Smith's activity with the
- list that has been provided with us. And then maybe the second option is to go through these buckets
- one at a time and add outcomes.
- In that defense kind of you know, like where are we getting the outcome? What are people prepared for
- and interested to do right now? Councilmember sorry Why don't you do the second why don't we do the
- second thing first and then time permitting do the first thing? All right, great Let's do housing and
- homelessness first. I feel like we need to have somebody help take notes so that then if we add a
- outcomes Yeah, yeah, we can go ahead and and Make a make a sheet. Well, let's just have one sheet for
- each for each bucket. So let's start with housing and homelessness It's just housing and homelessness
- Because affordable housing would be would be a piece of housing overall so I
- Underneath this category, we have A, B, and C, so we can start our list up there on the board with D,
- and then maybe our packet, our packet can get amended later on to include all these. So we have, for
- the public at home who might not be looking at the packet, increase the range of affordable housing
- options that are universally designed and environmentally sustainable from, I think that's the comp plan.
- Be improved access of neighborhood housing to community amenities employment and essential services
- and then see increased diversity within neighborhoods and all of those look to be in chapter five of
- the comp plan council members who look what would you like to add to that well Sorry, I have a question
- first and then potentially in question when we say in see increased diversity within neighborhoods Are
- we talking about people or are we talking about housing stock? Does anybody have the comp plan
- Okay, that would be helpful to clarify Okay, um, how about Who wants to look that up? I I'll look that
- up real quick. Okay, well we continue on As long as as long as C is discussing housing stock and
- I don't have anything to add Councilmember sorry, I would add something along the lines of increasing
- the How long how quickly people can get permits Making it no I made that sound like I want to make it
- take longer the other way around making making building things here faster or something like that
- easier. Increasing the ease of permitting or something. Is that an outcome? I mean, I would think that
- the outcome. We can do semantics later. But I don't know. I guess that's a good important question.
- Do we want to spend a lot of time right now talking? Because I agree that it's not
- eloquent way of saying it I think that there's it needs to be measurable needs to be like a lot of things
- that we need to Go through but I'm just saying generally speaking. That's the area in which I'd like
- to see some change Sure, but if we want to have the conversation about like how would you exactly phrase
- it we should have I guess I feel like the point of that is to get more houses built and
- and so the outcome is to get more houses built and a way to get that housing. Reduce time to build or
- approval is an outcome. Yeah, I'm particularly interested in the time to approval. Can we reduce time
- to approval then up there instead of permitting time? Potentially the outcome could be that local developers
- are able to feasibly make the investment.
- future properties we hear We hear all the times that local developers can't make that investment because
- of the time that it takes to just be approved for the permitting process Okay, what what was
- that councilmember Rosenberger I
- Added conditional use is one of the reasons that time and money is added to press It causes delay Okay
- councilmember Rallo I think that that topic deserves a debate because I'm I'm not I'm not in favor of
- just expediting development and with the idea that the outcome is going to be a community good and
- I think that there are ways to achieve that. For instance, the South Bend model of having a pallet of
- housing types and saying, you know, if you choose one of these, we can expedite it. But I'm very weary
- of seeing buildings go up that are frankly unesthetic and shoddily designed. And I loathe the idea of
- Reproducing that just under the banner of this is going to yield housing for people cheaper housing
- Not sure that's going to occur but anyway, so it deserves a deeper discussion Councilmember Piedmont
- Smith, do you have an answer to council members who looks original question? I
- Yes. So the outcome increased diversity within neighborhoods is both about types of housing and people
- because it has indicators such as neighborhood diversity index to view changes in racial and ethnic
- diversity in neighborhoods over time. It also has ratio of ownership to rental units by neighborhood
- and other things. So and then I also had something I wanted to add.
- Okay, should we keep going on the the question the doctor that Councilmember Rallo brought up? About
- maybe phrasing of I feel like it's phrasing of the outcome versus the way to get to the outcome Councilmember
- sorry, I would just say that I think I think that that's that's a I agree with the with the concern
- And to me it's a question of two different, there's two different toolkits question. We can address
- that issue separate from the budget. But if the, I think to me the test here is if the planning department,
- if the mayor's office came and said hey, we'd like to invest in another position in planning so that
- we can speed up the times that we can get approvals of things that are already in the UDO, like that
- may be something we would support.
- If they said, hey, we're going to invest in more technology so that we can raise how quickly we're able
- to approve things that are already approved within the UDO, that might be something we support. So it's
- a slightly different question. I think it's a valid concern. It's one that I share. I'm really interested
- in exploring. But I think that it's a separate question than the budgetary priority of, can we make
- it easier to
- Do things that we want to see done in the city? Does that address comes over Rollo your concern in terms
- of That is of as an outcome, even if it's not perfectly framed right now. Yeah, that helps Okay, comes
- my repeat month Smith. You said that you had something that you wanted to add as well And then I'll
- go over to councilmember Rosemarger. I Wanted to add make homelessness brief rare and non repeating That's
- from directly from the heading home plan. Does anybody want to challenge or ask Councilmember Piedmont-Smith
- to defend her added outcome? I think I have a similar reflection to what was just being discussed a
- little bit, and I sort of piped in from over here.
- Activities and outputs and indicators that might be like leading measures of achieving something later
- There are also outcomes that we might frame as near-term medium-term long-term outcomes sometimes in
- logic models You see the long-term outcomes framed as impact. I think what councilmember Piedmont Smith
- just stated is probably in that like Impact category zero deaths on our street by 2039 might be another and
- Well, I agree that those are great visioning impacts. I think we're going to have to deal with that
- maybe isn't the most useful in the end for all the things. I don't know. I mean, it is useful. It is
- useful as the set of priorities. Maybe impact type big outcomes are long range outcomes are the best
- thing to have an overarching vision. But I guess I feel like there's often a disconnect between the
- thing we say we're trying to achieve and then our ability to implement
- the actions and achieve the near-term milestones and outcomes, potentially, like reduced permitting
- time, right? That's a shorter-term outcome, more discreet, and often we struggle to draw the connection
- and then actually do the short-term things, and when we're talking about annual budgeting cycles, yes,
- the grand vision's still important, we need to understand it, but we're gonna need
- So that's not like a, you know, vote against what it is. Well, just have very much support. I'm just,
- again, kind of reflecting on like from a systems perspective, like what is it that we actually need
- to be able to like operationalize this? Yeah. Okay. Can I maybe bring something in from fiscal committee
- that I feel like what, especially Councilmember Flaherty, what you just said and that idea of
- outcomes that are long range or short range. I mean, I feel like this is like layers of an onion or
- like a thought tree or something where it's like we could put lots of things underneath these outcomes.
- So maybe there can be more outcomes underneath that one.
- And whereas the permitting thing might be underneath something else, but I'm not sure that we have the
- capacity tonight to nest that, but I'm kind of saying it as back from fiscal committee, because I feel
- like I've heard both our controller and our deputy mayor talk about that nesting and that that's something
- that staff is like doing right now, trying to figure out some of those sorts of things.
- I think it would be maybe the best use of our time to just put the outcomes up there, whether they're
- short term or whether they're long term, is if we can agree as a body. Yeah, it should go up there.
- I don't challenge that it's legitimate, even if it might be a longer term versus a shorter term. Can
- I triangulate on that? To triangulate on that, because I think that's exactly right, hits the nail on
- the head to me. But just to think about it, I mean,
- Because we're in one year cycles, there is some benefit in us knowing, to use the metaphorical language,
- our North Star is making homelessness rare, brief, non-repeating. What is in our budget that's going
- towards addressing homelessness? And then on a year by year basis, now you go,
- hey, OK, if we're going to continue funding these things, are we seeing a reduction in the homeless
- population? And so when you have the long-term goal, it is actually really helpful for us, because later
- we'll start talking about there's different mechanisms by which it's not just an up-down conversation.
- Some of it's like, yeah, we continue that. We want to enhance that funding. We might find, hey, this
- is actually doing well, but we want to raise that by 10x that this year, because it's going so well
- in years ahead.
- And so it is useful to sort of tie those rather to the big thing so we don't get Yeah, so I mean because
- otherwise we'll end up setting ourselves goals like, you know reduce homelessness by one person or something
- like that And that's worth a million dollars or right? Yeah, I mean, absolutely I just don't think we
- have the capacity for that. Yeah, we don't do it today Yeah, I'm just saying because I think it was
- such an important point that we shouldn't that's sort of to to finger. Yeah Okay councilmember Rosenberg.
- I said I go back to you
- Something to add up here. This is about permitting so like an hour ago My thought was I thought like
- the bigger Outcome is like more people talk about more having a more predictable process. So whether
- that is Ready-made homes or easier permitting, you know, I
- Those are just two of the things to make a more predictable process. So if somebody knows they're going
- to be asking for all these variances, the predictability of that is you're not going to get to do this
- kind of thing, right? But then if you're building in our code, then it's most likely you are. So I feel
- like it's about predictability is a bigger word for it. Do you want to add that word up there? You have
- the marker, so I think you have the power.
- Other things to add to the housing and homelessness category councilmember daily Better coordinated
- homeless outreach response Wraparound services that type of stuff Does anybody want to ask councilmember
- daily to defend her position on that comes member Allah could she expound on that? What is that?
- What does that entail wrap-around services and You know all sorts of social services that go along with
- trying to get people housed So coordinated wraparound services services for unhoused. Yeah Yeah for
- sure If the mic didn't pick it up council members who look at it including preventative services. Yes.
- Thank you. I
- Coordinated not necessarily increased preventative and wraparound Homeless response services Other thoughts
- on that one Okay, other ideas for housing and homelessness outcomes
- I'll say just because in the ideating stage but increasing increasing numbers of temporary shelter or
- something like that something along those lines beds, okay temporary sheltering options for unhoused
- I Feel like both of those might be subcategories under making homeless brief
- Sure rare and non repeating and I'm Yeah Another one count councilmember Rosenberger. Oh, yeah, please
- go I would like to say I sometimes have to re scroll so There is improved access of neighborhood housing
- to amenities, but the other side I think is like transit oriented development. So we are focusing our
- density on
- areas where people can more easily get around walking or on a bus and then yes transit. So I think it's
- different than like this one feels like one B to me feels like bringing amenities to communities where
- I think we should you know increase our density around amenities. Transit oriented development walkable
- neighborhoods you know anybody. So so basically instead of
- B seems to imply expanding amenities amenities as opposed to putting housing around amenities. Yes.
- Second I think that that could be I think that B could be both could include both of those things but
- that maybe a subset under B would be those two different options. But I don't know.
- Is different do you want to add it as its own thing? I think you have the marker. I think whoever whoever
- volunteers to take the notes has All right, any other burning housing and homelessness ones or can we
- move on to high-performing government? Councilmember sorry This is context dependent so it's not it's
- maybe not as um
- write it on the board. Yeah, I don't know. You guys decide what you want to do with it. But something
- along the lines of Hopewell Summit, seeing those make progress should be a thing in our budget. Oh.
- Well, I think that that's the, yeah.
- I'm sorry, I said it might be a little too specific. Yeah, maybe that's too specific is exactly the
- point I was saying before I said it. But maybe that just falls under A already. I would actually argue
- that that's not too specific, especially if we're talking about goals for 2027. Maybe it could fall
- underneath any of a number of things. But framing it almost like,
- continuing development pace of Already planned projects or something like that or follow through maybe
- follow through on already planned projects Yeah, go ahead and add it comes member Rosenberger Follow
- through on already planned projects and then specifically it's hope well and summit and
- And then we're gonna move to high-performing government. Would somebody else like to take the notes
- for high-performing government? Or Councilmember Rosenberger, do you like having the, okay. Thank you,
- Councilmember Piedmont-Smith. So under high-performing government, we have four items. We have engagement
- processes are inclusive and representative. Community engagement is strong. Responding to the results
- from the community survey
- Those three were from the comprehensive plan and then last one is from the climate action plan new financing
- Mechanisms are achieved to fund city climate action plan implementation Councilmember sorry, would you
- like to Thank you does anybody have anything to add to high-performing governance Councilmember Flaherty
- I think I'm
- actually this system and in particular having a set of plans that broadly reflects the major range of
- city responsibilities and services is to me maybe the highest, like a very high, high performing governance
- goal. So public safety is an example, right? We wanted to work on public safety with the administration
- The prior administration, we weren't successful in being able to find a collaborative structure to do
- that. So we created a community advisory and public safety commission. They did a bunch of community
- engagement outreach, created a plan, or at least a set of recommendations, right? I think how much better
- that could be if it was a mayoral council process like other city plans. And so how much that could
- actually get alignment around shared goals and vision for the public safety system at large that we
- often struggle to do now.
- Surely there are some operational type things that aren't going to enter that sphere. But I think there
- are major categories missing from what I would call city plans. And I think actually moving toward that
- would be an important outcome. Achieving that would be an important outcome. So city plans for things
- that don't currently have plans? Yes.
- or collaborative system with with with jointly developed community uniforms city plans that broadly
- reflect the full range of city services and Operations, I don't know councilmember Piedmont Smith, however,
- you want to shorten that I'm gonna leave that to you I think that's something we should discuss further
- because the question is like a budget because I agree I agree with the with the goal but then budgetarily
- I'm like, OK, how do we do that? Is it like we want money for more consultants? Do we want like, right?
- And so what's the, I suppose that there is a, just think budgetarily, because again, I think your example
- is a really strong one. But it's like, how do we stop that from being a runaway train of like, oh, we're
- just going to do all these plans, which is contrary to also the conversation we had last year with budget,
- right? No, we'd have to agree on budget.
- what's missing, what needs updated, and reflect what's a reasonable scope. I mean, that would be entailed.
- I think it would have to be funded. Often, we don't have either expertise or capacity in-house, at least
- to independently and fully develop something like that, especially something that could have a fairly
- uniform system of outcomes, metrics, KPIs, leading indicators that could actually allow us to have a
- whole system. So that will entail funding. It will entail some conversation to have agreement on where
- we're headed. Absolutely.
- a set of budget it's like relatively minor it probably in terms of overall budget impact and how long
- that would last but it does cost money so yeah but but I think and it's just following up to that the
- thing I was laughing about earlier is because this is I mean
- Reading it again in this context, object C, thing C, respond to the results from the community survey,
- I think, is such a fascinating statement, right? It really is, because it's like a contested thing.
- We're always like, well, the community survey says this. It's like, ah, well.
- Other things say other things and so it like it's I think I just think a very fascinating thing to bring
- up here But it raises it does get back to take councilman Flaherty is structural point here Which is
- there there may be a reframing of see a little bit to be like we actually need the capacity to do that
- like this is a nice intention and and I think that
- I wonder the extent to which we can actually do things like that. I would argue that that's not the
- question that we're talking about tonight. You don't think so? I would argue that if we as a council
- all mark that as our top priority in high-performing government, then what we're doing is we're asking
- the administration to figure out a way to fund that. I'm with you. So we're not trying to figure out
- how to fund it today. I'm with you. I'm still talking. Oh, OK. I was still talking before when you started
- talking. The thing about the response
- the results from the community survey, the thing that I was saying is that the question about structure
- is like I think there's this interesting point here that should be on high performing government which
- is like funding our capacity to do things like responding to the results from the community survey.
- That's what I'm saying. Not we need to figure out how do we do this. I'm just saying like to Councillor
- Flaherty's point, what are the structures necessary to actually act on the plans that we're going to
- develop is an interesting thing to put on.
- as an outcome there. Preconditions kind of, like they need to be, enabling conditions, they need to
- be in place to be able to do the whole thing we're trying to do. Right, exactly, yeah. I don't know,
- I was asking what it was before I was told that we weren't allowed to say that, so I don't know, but
- that was what I was trying to explore, the question of like, what would that be, this question of
- You know increasing our capacity to be responsive like but that seems circular to the topic. So That's
- member Rosenberger Question 2d Where did that specifically come from it feels so specific compared to
- a BNC so New finance financing mechanisms are achieved to fund the climate action plan I mean
- Because well, that is my question Councilmember Piedmont Smith Well, that was in the climate action
- plan to find new funding mechanisms, yeah, that's why it says cap goal, whatever Okay, because I I guess
- I think for all of our plans Well, they all need to all of our community goals and plans. They need
- to be funded and
- So it's OK, I guess, that the climate action plan actually typed it out. But I think of high-performing
- government, a lot of this is based around resident engagement. Well, the first three are. But I think
- two, engagement is inherently unequal. And there's nothing in here about a high-performing government
- that is governing for those that are not
- the meetings and so like to me that is data driven and and also like our community plans and goals driven
- so to me a high-performing government is a government that is reaching its goals sometimes without having
- to check 20 times with the public to be like can we still do this goal so like it's also I mean it's
- about being efficient so
- I mean just like transportation plan related, right? We have this community like high priority network
- and still we're going back and doing a year at a time to study a street. But we already have a transportation
- plan with kind of changing these streets. So I guess I think like acting on our goals is high performing.
- And then you know kind of doing something about how like public engagement is not a subset
- of our, it's not representative of our population, right? It's just not like an evaluation survey or
- something. It's just a group that came out. Sorry about mine. So can we, can you tilt the board so that
- we can see it? So should that increased capacity to, from council member, sorry, be complete, increased
- capacity to,
- Implement City plans the or implement existing plans. Is that what just I don't think it has to be connected
- to that I mean, I think high-performing government is So do you just want to be implement? Yeah, like
- this work on like attaining city agreed on goals, right? Like I think that is high-performing to me.
- I guess So implementation of existing plans as well does anybody want to I
- challenge councilmember Rosenberger's assertion of putting that as a as an outcome All right next other
- high-performing government additions Well, it's related maybe I think would be helpful to have a status
- report of maintenance of maintenance and services the city in other words
- Where are we in terms of road paving and scheduling and priorities of road paving or whatnot? There
- was a point when, totally unknown to me, that the fire department fell into great disrepair. Their fire
- engines literally had holes in the floor, and to his credit,
- Mayor Hamilton stepped up and Discovered this and we made a lot of capital investment in fire engines
- It took everybody it took most of council by surprise. So if we had you know some basic Report status
- report of departments in terms of you know capacity of water treatment or you know You know whatever
- it is then we would have a baseline of
- I think that we could refer to So councilmember Piedmont Smith wrote that up there as maintained city
- assets. So would that be the overarching? And then maintain city assets assets. Yes. Yeah. So then there
- would be potentially several, you know subcategories underneath that of how exactly to make sure all
- those things are maintained but does that
- Yeah, and I would assume that every department had is already aware of this and could communicate it
- and you know a brief presentation during budget time Okay, you know And that way this it's also informative
- to the public I mean the public a Lot of the public doesn't know everything the city does and you know
- these basic services and maintenance would be helpful to them to know and
- All right, other outcomes to put under high performing government. Council member, sorry. I think we
- need something about council and clerk's office here too, but I'm struggling to think. So I'm just putting
- out there and again, hoping that we can talk about it like things around
- time of our meetings, accessibility of our meetings, things of that nature. I think maybe investments
- in accessibility might be relevant. For our 2027? Sorry, I'm hesitating on that because we're federally
- required right now to invest a whole ton in accessibility. So I'm questioning whether that should be
- an outcome for 2027 that we want to focus on.
- I think broadly there's council functioning, clerk functioning needs to fall under this banner of high
- performing government and we should have some discussion about that too. Okay, council member Zulek.
- Thank you. I have a different comment. Just when we think about the engagement process, if we truly
- want it to be inclusive and representative, the majority of the people who are most impacted by the
- decisions that we make are never in this room.
- And so when we think about the engagement process, what we should be thinking about is what rooms do
- we need to be in as individual policymakers that will help better inform us for the people who cannot
- be in these rooms because they're working or taking care of their children or both. Thank you. Is that
- does that go into one of our into an outcome category in some way that can be like
- categorized or does, I mean, I feel like that kind of falls under A, engagement processes are inclusive
- and representative because I do feel like that includes the onus on us as government to go to places
- where people are and not just expect them to come to us in terms of those engagement processes. I feel
- like that includes a whole lot of stuff. Yes, it does. I just wanted to make sure that I said it because
- it's very broad and so if we left it broad, I just wanted to make sure that I
- Made that point. Okay, so we want a subcategory underneath engagement processes that is a focus on Going
- out instead of expecting people to come in. Yes, I think the owner should be on us. Okay So reaching
- out as part of engagement I guess yes
- Any other additions for high-performing government and I do want to note that it's 747 right now and
- we have like four more of these to go councilmember Rallo I think it's a great idea. I think that You
- know councils done it before and in the past it sometimes helped coordinate with the administration
- to have You know relevant department heads maybe join us In You know our
- Outreach to the public or going outside of council chambers meeting in various places in the city So
- it's something to coordinate with the administration Okay, do you have another thing to add because
- just for clarity I'm I really want to want to get us through making the list so that then we can prioritize
- the list that we make Otherwise, we're never going to get to the prioritizing part councilmember Rosenberger
- What I would like to say is I don't think we're getting through the list but number two is I Think that's
- okay. Number two is Based on our meeting that we had two hours ago plus other things that come to light
- sometimes maybe I don't know if councilmember I was saying this but There's no high performance right
- now between the administration and City Council and I don't know What that looks like, you know, but
- it's definitely not learning about something a couple days before
- There's a $7 million vote, you know? So maybe, you know, being brought in, having council be seen as
- a co-equal branch of government, I don't know exactly. I mean, we can say words like collaboration and
- communication, but I think those don't really go anywhere. So I don't know if anybody has a good outcome.
- I mean, I guess it's an outcome, not yes. Well, I don't get to call on you.
- Something about information exchange maybe? It may not be budgetary. Sometimes in like smart goals or
- smart e-goals context, when I'm having a hard time finding exactly how to measure something, just like
- an as assessed by X through Y process can kind of get you there. And so, you know, if we had mutual
- set of questions and ratings from
- the mayor and her chief people about engaging and functioning with the council and vice versa. Just
- some check ins on how's it going. Do we feel like we're part of the conversation on important policy
- matters? Do you know like actually measuring that like could help move beyond just like being frustrated
- about a thing and speaking about it. I don't think that's like necessarily a budget priority but I do think it.
- Well, it's high performing. It matters. High performing government. That's true. I think that it's an
- outcome. I don't know if it's a budgetary implication, I guess. Yeah. Well, I think that goes back to
- what Council Member Asari was saying earlier. I think it was time that some things cost a lot, and some
- things don't cost as much. But they can still be important outcomes. Sure, sure. Right. And to the point.
- Maybe communication systems. To the point kind of at the very outset of the meeting, which is that a
- lot of things to achieve outcomes are actually just policy changes that they might not entail.
- real discernible budget item at all So Okay, I think that this is going to be my goal I think that my
- goal is to get through economic development as a third bucket and then we can prioritize Within those
- maybe we can take public comment after we make our lists and then after public comment we can just do
- the ranking of the three things that we have done so
- Economic development has a whole lot of outcomes that are already listed in our packet and some of them
- I think have already or are already currently occurring like number one quality wired and wireless
- connectivity is available throughout the city be income inequality is reduced across and between all
- ages races and genders and
- C, career pathways and training are engaging residents and businesses. D, entrepreneurial activity has
- increased and a culture of entrepreneurialism is being sustained. E, wages, jobs and GDP are outpacing
- population growth. F, enhance the arts and culture industry in Bloomington. G, downtown events are frequent
- and well attended. H, the downtown business environment is vibrant and sustainable.
- Ni downtown buildings and sites with blight or disrepair have been identified and remedied all of those
- are from the comp plan Then we have two climate action goals one the local marketplace is resilient
- to climate change and to Increase number of businesses that are committed to sustainability and climate
- goals Who has something to add to the economic developments outcome list
- Councilmember daily attract employers offering living wage jobs Which is maybe a subcategory under e
- for creation of wages and jobs but a very specific Metric of living wage
- Anybody want to want to debate that one with councilmembers daily All right other additions under economic
- development I Know it's already a pretty big list for economic development councilmember Rosenberger.
- You look like you might I think though. Thank you. I think the list is it's like weirdly more specific
- than other lists and I don't know if we
- That matters right now. I mean just sort of downtown events are frequent and well attended is It doesn't
- it doesn't feel like it's on the same level, but I guess you said earlier we're just gonna put stuff
- out there and then Decide if it kind of stays or moves around later That's it Other things that people
- can think of to add I
- I see a couple of people like almost saying something like like they almost have an addition in this
- way Councilmember Rosemarger because I don't have the thought formed like it's fine. It's just usual.
- I'm really burnt out after that last meeting I I don't know where this goes or exactly but it's like
- It's kind of modern-day economic development that is very like it's more about like creating third places,
- I guess the
- the top phrase, buzz phrase, right? How we talk about Kirkwood as a shared street, so a place that we
- don't have in the city where people can go outside and be in this place where they can eat and drink
- and shop and buy things. Without the constraints of needing a car or something. So it's kind of like,
- I think this, to me, this economic development goal that is connected to
- comprehensive plan of more like neighborhood hubs or like just that We have these areas like neighborhood
- hubs in third places. See how this isn't properly formed, but like it's Thanks, I think it's because
- I feel like this is a lot about businesses a Through K kind of but like economic development is also
- about creating the place the places that make community and feel like a community and
- And I feel like that's not like really one of the outcomes that's on here right now. OK. So Councilmember
- Piedmont-Smith, create vibrant third places or maybe slash that. Neighborhood hubs. Neighborhood hubs
- because that might be more understandable to a more. Does anybody want to question or challenge Councilmember
- Rosenberger's addition?
- I feel like that's in the comprehensive plan somewhere, too. The hub is, for sure, yeah. Yeah. Yeah,
- I think that in the comprehensive plan, it might be under housing. But I think it's one of those things
- that can go into multiple categories. Councilmember Rallo. I'm in agreement. I think it jibes well with
- some of these other goals. Downtown business environment is vibrant and sustainable. Downtown events.
- so it seems important to have public spaces where people gather and then support businesses and to the
- extent that people feel Welcome and safe and that it's an aesthetic place and that you know it's conducive
- so Councilman Rosenberger you were Kind of reiterating what you said All right any other economic development additions
- Councilmember sorry Empty spaces there's empty, you know processes to fill empty Store friends, etc.
- Okay And Are you mostly thinking about the first floor retail first for retail things on the square?
- This and maybe a subpoint to you know spaces are activated right but which is on here already and
- But what can we do to get more businesses into places if there's some way to do that through investment?
- Yeah, I think that that could be a new one, activating currently vacant spaces. Because you don't necessarily
- need to activate it with entrepreneurial activity, which is D. And those spaces aren't necessarily in
- plight or disrepair, which is I. But they just, yeah, it's that first floor retail that we required
- people to build
- But did not require that they fill Does anybody want to challenge that as an outcome councilmember rough
- Well, I'm not sure I want to challenge it but you know, I like that we we don't really have any place
- that I seen here that Suggests that growth in the physical environment or even our population is necessarily
- Goal in its own, right? Just just growth So maybe under that one we're talking about D entrepreneurial
- activities increased maybe Putting per capita in there because one could have an entrepreneurial activity
- increased but actually not Benefit Because it per capita it's not really helping you're just growing
- things and maybe having the total of
- of more entrepreneurial activity. So maybe just having something in the repertoire. So per capita income
- growth or per capita economic growth, is that? Well, yeah. But that particular one, D, entrepreneurial
- activity has increased. In total, that doesn't necessarily tell us anything, whether it's benefiting
- our other goals, our economic goals, unless we say,
- If we want more entrepreneurial activity, are we talking here about just more, or are we talking about
- more per unit, per capita, per more entrepreneurial initiative and activity and encouragement and investment?
- Can't tell if you're suggesting a new outcome or if you're just kind of Commenting on an existing one
- that you are not sure of It's the only thing I see in the whole List that doesn't that's it that suggests
- that maybe we're just talking about just more and
- I've been thinking about this is that I wonder if this bucket might be better called economic health
- or something like that than economic development, which to your point, I think we've done a good job
- of not framing it all as just growth for growth sake or anything like that.
- But I was just thinking about like to this broader point about space making, place making, which I know
- we've considered, but I think as we continue to have this conversation about economic development, I
- think it would be useful for us to think about, it is a very wide category, and think about what we
- want to prioritize in terms of this, you know, the years ahead, things that we really want to see invested
- in to create more vitality and health in the economy.
- And so I also, in addition to like vibrant third places, I'm thinking about a vibrant art scene,
- for example, more spaces for performance, you know, studios, and I know a lot of that's in progress,
- so, but thinking about some things like that, I think people often call those like backwaters as well,
- sort of in art scenes, interested in that. I'm also interested in thinking about, there's some demographic
- conversations here, so we talked about
- about attracting businesses that pay living wage, yes, but it's also about how do we attract that age
- group that's sort of missing in Bloomington. Yeah, so thinking about those broader categories I think
- is useful too. Yeah, and this starts to kind of blend in a little bit with community health and vitality,
- which is one of the topics. Right, exactly. Because there's also the arts and cultural events in that
- section as well. Exactly.
- Exactly where they're overlapping a bit Well, and I would also like to point out that councilmember
- Piedmont Smith made this list kind of an isolation to the best that she could in terms of what things
- fit where And that another piece of comment could also be hey I think that you know This thing should
- actually go under a different bucket instead of the one that it's under that We're not tied to these
- lists being in certain places. But to that point do we need to add? Something
- Okay, this is what I was thinking to add instead of being a called economic development, you know to
- be economic health As the title like does that matter in terms of what we think about going under I
- Like helps does does anybody want to come to councilmember Piedmont Smith? I
- I'm trying to understand how to capture the conversation that, or the comments from Council Member Ruff
- and Council Member Osari as another point here. I mean, I think coming up with a new label for the heading
- that is not as important as making sure to capture what was said as like, so Council Member Ruff, how
- would you express this desire to not have growth for growth's sake as like an outcome? Actually, Council
- Member Osari,
- He did a great job of getting at what I was getting at when he referred also to, for example, the arts,
- right? It's not just more. We want more per to enrich. But you don't necessarily get enrichment just
- from having more. So it's quality over quantity. Is quality a word that you want to stick in there somewhere?
- Well, but it's also this whole idea of per unit.
- like this per capita. That's what we're trying to, that's our goal ultimately, right? That's how things
- are made better. So I kinda like Councilmember Osorio's idea of using this term health or somehow making
- it more clear in the general and then we wouldn't have to specifically identify
- Like the specific sub areas if we've captured it with this larger conceptual term, I don't I don't So
- so doesn't necessarily go on there is an additional outcome but that Were you just not sure that's what
- I was thinking initially, but after a couple members. Sorry Mase comments. I'm thinking it captures
- more to have a kind of something beyond just an outcome and
- I just wanna make sure that we get something up there if there's something that you want up there, but
- I'm still not sure what it would be that you would want up there. But Council Member Piedmont-Smith
- just wrote per capita. Yeah, I mean, I'm happy with that being just in D, but I like what Council Member
- Starry was getting at,
- This is really a lot of our whole larger goal here because economics should include Things he was mentioning
- like, you know, we're enriching the arts people's lives through the arts quality of life here It comes
- I don't know maybe you're kind of talking to you about like I when Council members sorry I was talking
- I thought it did also kind of like go under like vibrant third places and hubs just like it feels kind of like
- almost like enhancing those communities more, like the arts community. I don't know if that's kind of
- like making it a draw for like, oh, I wanna go create in Bloomington because people are creating in
- the space in there, like warehouses that you rent. I don't know, I just, maybe you're saying,
- it to me sounds, yeah, more like a space making or place making specific, I don't know. I mean, because
- it does in here say enhance the arts, right, but you're not,
- That's not it, it sounds like you're more of... Yeah, I'm not sure I catch it, but it just stemmed from
- seeing what Council Member Piemont Smith had kind of given us here and noticing that it was pretty clear
- that we weren't talking just about growth for the sake of growth, but then I saw that on D,
- on item D, that it just simply said, increase entrepreneurialism.
- got me to thinking we want to be consistent with everything and That could be misinterpreted.
- But I mean, I'm okay not to add anything. We had the discussion and it was productive. I feel like Okay,
- I do want to note that that councilmember Piedmont Smith did add per capita economic slash arts enhancement.
- So Yeah any other additions under economic development? Councilmember Rallo I was still under economic
- development
- Yeah. I mean, this is sort of land use related, but I think we've ignored a whole section of within
- the land use chapter, which has to do with economic development. And that is the concept of an urban
- village center. So I mean, it's a big ask because there's a lot entailed, but that does appear in a
- comprehensive plan. Is there any effort devoted to urban village centers?
- Well, I think that that's what's up there right now under vibrant third places or neighborhood hubs
- the neighborhood hubs. Oh Great. Could you just write urban ieve urban Village Center? Okay, because
- that's how it appears in the comp plan because I would think is it is it in the comp plan as urban Village
- Center except that was in there in their neighborhood hub in the planning chapter Okay, might be both
- There's the food
- systems there as well, which plays a role, yeah. All right, any other additions up there? I realize
- this probably goes more on high performing government, but as I talked about permitting for housing,
- I think business permitting also matters here, sort of licenses and permitting falls somewhere in between
- these two. So I'm just throwing it out there. And so same thing, improving the speed, ease,
- customer service, you name it, of people trying to do business here.
- Trying to put signs up as well Other additions or are we ready to go to public comment right now? Alright
- seeing no other additions I do want to go to public comment next because is 820 and so or 810 and so
- I want to recognize that we do have a couple members of the public in the room and I see that there
- are some online participants as well so we'll have public comment and during public comment if council
- members can think about more than one thing at a time and
- Think about how you might pick your top three priorities amongst these economic development, high-performing
- government, and housing and homelessness that we have really drilled down on this evening. And if members
- of the public would like to speak, I see somebody coming to the table in person. If you're online, you
- can go ahead and raise your hand using the Reactions tab.
- But we'll go ahead and start here in chambers Go ahead and state your name for the record and then you'll
- have three minutes and I the The clerk is out right now, but we'll figure out a sign-in sheet for you
- in a minute. Go ahead Good evening council. This is Christopher energy from the Greater Bloomington
- Chamber of Commerce And I think this is the closest I've been next to you during public comment. It's
- very close and
- Deliberation meeting and I I don't think it's quite you're gonna hit your greatest hits album But I
- think there are some good notes that I want to disconnect to talk about when we talk about granular
- improvements One thing with the outcome-based budget I worry about that This is going to be all too
- encompassing and you'll get a lot of places and then ultimately nowhere so keep it that incremental
- improvement on where you're at and
- One of the things I wanted to talk about that I just sort of circled I highlighted was Councilmember
- Rallo statement about maintaining city assets This is what you have data on already from all of the
- departments I know Public Works has their software and take a look at that where we're at on just paving
- or cars and with the Parks Department
- and see where we are on that. If that is a priority, that's something that you can dig in right away
- and have a really good deliberation meeting with these department heads and see where we're at on that.
- Because I think that's one probably outcome everybody wants. I mean, there's probably universal. The
- one thing I also want to then go to that you just talked about was on the economic development front,
- where we just don't want more for more sake.
- I mean, as we look at SB1 and look at where the revenue is going to come to pay for these outcomes that
- we want, it's going to come from local lit. What is local lit going to take working people here? So
- what growth we want is specifically working-age people here in the community living here. And that would
- go against certain other residents who maybe aren't full-time residents here.
- Unless on ones that are not working So there those are things that we have to look at because as we
- look at the economies of scale that piece of pie We need to have to grow that with income where we're
- not burdening Too few too few residents and not getting the outcomes we want There's anything else on here
- And I just think one thing to work on, if you're not this round, this is the year to sort of look at,
- if you're not getting the data you want, is start looking at some dashboard ideas on getting that for
- the future. So you'll really have great indicators. I'll go, what are we missing here? What data do
- we not have on some of these outcomes that we want? You're supposed to make the best decisions possible.
- And if you don't have certain data, this is the time to start looking at how we're going to get that.
- All right. Thank you for your time tonight. Appreciate it.
- Thank you. There is a sign-in sheet there right now. If you could sign in, that would be great. Did
- anybody raise a hand on Zoom? Wonderful. Let's go ahead to Zoom next. And if somebody else in chambers
- wants to make a comment, you can come on up. Whenever you're unmuted on Zoom, go ahead, state your name
- for the record, and then you'll have up to three minutes. My name is Kevin Keough. I'm a longtime accountant,
- auditing professional, and born and raised Bloomington resident.
- I appreciate the city's move towards outcome-based budgeting because it aligns with professional best
- practices for accountability and financial stewardship. My goal tonight is simple, to help strengthen
- transparency and ensure that this process delivers real value to the public. I want to highlight two
- fundamentals that are absolutely critical to the success of outcome-based budgeting. A clear understanding
- of fixed costs
- and the use of meaningful key performance indicators. Outcome-based budgeting only works if the city
- has a precise understanding of which costs are locked in. These are fixed costs that the city is obligated
- to pay, such as debt services, contractual obligations, baseline personnel costs. But there's also flexible costs.
- These are the variable cost or semi-variable cost, and these costs can be adjusted. They can be trimmed.
- They can be expanded depending on strategic needs. Right now, the city is preparing to prioritize outcomes,
- housing, safety, economic development, transportation, health, and tonight, the environmental category
- is that. But unless we know the true cost structure of the city operation,
- we risk prioritizing outcomes that cannot be financially supported. As fiscal pressures grow,
- and they will, especially with SEA-1, reducing our revenues, Bloomington must be able to act with agility,
- including making difficult decisions when necessary. That requires distinction between core, unavoidable
- costs and areas where efficiencies can be introduced.
- Without clarity, prioritization becomes symbolic rather than strategic. Moving on, the key performance
- indicators. The outcomes-based budgeting only works if outcomes are measurable. The comprehensive plan
- and the climate action plan, they already have excellent indicators. These are exactly the kinds of
- performance measures that should anchor
- this new budgeting process. But to be efficient and effective, KPIs must be few in number, not dozens,
- but few in number, directly tied to these outcomes, regularly reported to the public, and also used
- to make budget decisions. If the city sets priorities today without simultaneously establishing these
- key performance indicators, real measure of progress
- The process becomes aspirational instead of actionable. I want to encourage the council to require that
- every prioritized outcomes be paired with a very small set of measurable indicators before funding decisions
- are made. I commend the council for moving in this direction. Thank you, Mr. Q. I'm out of time. Yep,
- you're out of time.
- What are we trying to achieve? How much does it truly cost? And are we making progress to the goal?
- Those are the three top items. Thank you. Thank you so much. Has anybody else raised a hand on Zoom?
- Okay, and nobody else came forward from chambers. So I think that we'll close public comment period.
- Thank you to those who commented. And for our last 15 minutes, because we usually try to end these at
- 830. Council members, let's go ahead and
- notate our top three outcomes from what we have. And I do wanna make clear for Mr. Keough that we're
- not actually setting priorities today. There's just not time for that, but that this is kind of the
- first discussion of many for 2027. So give everybody a few minutes to write down and wander around and do that.
- Could you clarify again what we're doing? We're doing the activity that you wanted us to do in the beginning
- with writing the top three things down but we're only looking at the the three Outcome lists that we've
- no on your post-it note Write down your top three. Yep put your initials So so and and so we need to
- see where the housing and homelessness sheet is. Oh, okay It's kind of we'll just move one of those
- to another place. So go ahead and put a
- your post-it notes. So for example, under housing and homelessness, if you want to rank your top priority
- as A, your second as B, and your third as C, then that's what you do. Put your initials on it and stick
- it on the board. So you should have three post-it notes. And on each post-it note, there are three items.
- Three post-it notes and three items. What about the ones that are here listed on the computer? Wait, what?
- One item proposed it three priorities total across all categories Well, no, that's why I was figuring
- you were gonna we have to write some things on post-it notes So I was I was going to suggest we Write
- what our priority our top priority is put a number one by it put our initials by it and then stick it
- on the relevant board Okay, so we should have three post-it notes per sheet. Yes
- So we should have nine post-it notes. Okay, but we do have to write what our priority is on the post-it
- note because some of our priorities are on the computer and some of them are on the big piece of paper.
- I'm sorry, Councilmember Flaherty. Councilmember Piedmont-Smith, we're doing nine post-it notes or three?
- Three for each area. Two for each board. Or if you can only think of two, that's fine. Two or three
- for each board, please. Okay, I'm going to struggle with the combined hybrid
- We're all doing the best we can So we've moved one to the wall, oh yes, please note economic development
- is all the way over there and They're very
- really took a toll.
- on one sticky note.
- That's what I like to do. Let me clarify. Exactly.
- Can I ask to what goal is that referring? Diversity one? Yes.
- Don't forget what's on the art. Economic development has so many on the computer.
- Did you get married? Hey, congrats. Congrats. You should have done it at a council meeting. I'd really
- like to walk out of here at 830.
- Yeah, you should report. You need to report about this. Yeah, we need to get that on the agenda. Sorry,
- sorry. Sorry, sorry. Do you want to see this one about income inequality, OK? Yeah, that's all right.
- That's good. It's a canal of development. Yeah.
- What about this? What is true?
- All right, well that was fun.
- Gosh, Isaac, I'm seeing yours. I'm going 1A. Who's categorizing in A, B, and C? I was like, oh, wait,
- no, that's not me. Sorry. I totally realized that halfway through and only caught some of them. Like,
- exactly. The one over there, right? Where is it? Where is it? I'm doing it right now. Yeah, it's ridiculous.
- This is ridiculous. I didn't even put three on there.
- Just like, I saw it over there too, and I was like, what, hey? I was like, who's doing that?
- I saw that too.
- It's everybody finished with our with our assignment for the evening Can't councilmember Zulek
- and councilmember rough If we play our cards right we can we can socialize in just a moment I have a
- feeling that It would have been great to go through all of our number ones twos and threes but that
- we just do not have the capacity this evening to do that and so
- my thought would be that we need to repeat this maybe two or three or six or seven more times next year.
- So I had to slip that in for my kids as well. So saying that, does anybody at this point have any last
- comments? I think that the next step should be that somebody fiscal committee wise will need to
- record all of these responses from us as council members and then use that as a jumping off point for
- the next discussion about this. And I guess I would be open as a fiscal committee member, I would be
- open. People saying right now, would you rather have part two be talking about what we've done here
- or part two being like doing what we did here for
- public safety transportation and mobility community health and vitality and Environment because we have
- to also go through all of those outcomes In the same way that we just did so Councilmember Rallo. Yeah.
- Well, I have some concluding comments but specific to that I Would like to see where this shakes out
- Because that would give me some Perspective on evaluating
- the other topics coming forward. Because this is a learning process for me. I find out what priorities
- my colleagues have. And it's good to have this discussion because my mind is open. It changes. I mean,
- I found some of the things that were said tonight very compelling. So it's a learning process to me.
- So I'd like to actually go through next time and just evaluate where we're at with that. OK. All right.
- Everybody good with that Great. We'll kind of take that then and go with it. Does anybody else want
- any closing comments councilmember Flaherty? Yes good with that as the next step also just want to like
- express and some caution in like Doing side-by-side comparisons of comprehensive plan goals that went
- through extensive community informed vetting processes legislative processes with like this is important
- in like this meeting right which is like not to say it's not important but like
- I don't want us to lose sight of the fact that, yes, to Mr. MG's point, we need to make incremental
- progress. If we are going to adopt a framework where it's like, hey, actually, these plans need to be
- updated to speak a common language around a limited set of KPIs that are useful to us to achieving their
- outcomes, and we need a public safety plan and something else plan that does that too, if we make those
- types of decisions, we're not going to have those plans in hand this year for the 2027 budget. So I
- think it'd be helpful also to have a structural conversation about,
- Can we get our alignment eventually around some of those things, also from the mayor's administration,
- obviously? And then what does the kind of like bridge process look like? Obviously, you all were engaged
- in that this year or two, on like a bridge process. So I think that's just important to continue to
- keep in mind as we grapple with this. Yeah, I second that. I also kind of went through and at some point
- realized, oh yeah, we're supposed to be thinking about 2027 specifically.
- that was a little missing maybe from our conversation. Councilmember, sorry. Just also seconding what
- Councilmember Flaherty said and taking a little further just a thought that occurred to me through this
- process is that in agreement of, yeah, this has helped us start to realize areas where we need more
- plans, 100% also concur that some of our plans have gone through.
- comprehensive, I should think of a better word, but, you know, like full processes. One of the things
- that I have a lot of hope for here is that we get to take steps in the direction of creating plans through
- this budget process because it requires at least a twofold with ideally a lot of public engagement.
- So, you know, we sort of get to
- in some type of agile way, go through some of that planning that can start building some of those building
- blocks to sort of more formalized plans in these areas where we're missing. And so with that said, to
- the question on the table of what do we want to do next time, I'm totally for us continuing to talk
- as we have. But I would just say, as we've said multiple times, I'm hopeful that we do this
- process of talking through the budget and our priorities and the things that we would like to see in
- the shape like continually not in some episodic fashion that we sort of do it and then we say okay we
- did it here this is what we came up with you know you guys do it the rest but that we you know keep
- working through this for the rest of the year I'm really excited that we started this so early that
- we'll get a lot of opportunities to continue other closing comments councilmember Rallo
- I wanted to respond to public comment and I Totally agree with Kevin Keough that performance indicators
- for every outcome is a very important thing to keep in mind It's not enough to just say this has been
- addressed or you know, we've made an effort but really to determine to what extent The other thing is
- I wanted to respond to mr. MG that with budget limitation limitations adding more people
- to Bloomington to raise revenue via the lit is one way to operate. However, more people require more
- services and require more infrastructure, and that should be recognized too. Another approach could
- be to raise wages. That doesn't entail adding expenses with more people, but it raises more revenue.
- So that's my comment. Thank you. Other closing comments?
- Use the microphone so that then Sorry councilmember Flaherty's comments. It's sort of means that Where's
- the one? Microphone communication with council and mayor is That's sort of got to become the number
- one priority almost if we're gonna do That was my comment
- He did All right coming back together any other closing comments Okay, my closing comment has to do
- with council schedule Next Monday the 15th. There is a special session that was called by the mayor
- regarding the Hopewell development it is at 4 p.m. And I actually meant to
- Get on my calendar what's what room it's in but that is not on my calendar right now Can staff help
- me out with what room that session is in on the 15th? Great. Thank you so much It is a special session
- council meeting. Yes, the mayor called it According to code the mayor can call a special session There's
- an email about it Yeah, you did maybe thank you
- I think you may have responded to oh, maybe I responded. Oh, yes. Yes, there's too much of a time lag
- in my I'm so glad that I mentioned it. Yes. Yes. Thank you That is scheduled at four o'clock and a quorum
- of councilmembers did indicate that they could attend though Not everyone indicated that that was a
- good day for them I don't think anybody indicated it was a bad day for them. Just not everybody responded
- So hopefully that all works on your calendars 4 p.m Monday the 15th is it McCloskey or is it?
- It is Allison and Allison conference room upstairs and that of course is open to the public. It is kind
- of like a Hopewell related work session but the mayor has a plan for that. And then our last regular
- session of the year is next Wednesday at 6.30 on the 17th. Can we manage the last bit of this meeting?
- Councilmember Piedmont-Smith, do you have a note on schedule?
- Yes, we have a committee on council processes meeting tomorrow evening at 6 p.m. In the Allison conference
- room great. Thank you so much No, we don't All right barring other announcements about schedule. Thank
- you very much and we are adjourned