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Base Motion for Community Reinvestments

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 3:10 pm
by Greg Casar
Colleagues:

I think we are all OK with the Mayor's procedures for running the budget meeting. In the Mayor's post, he describes that we will start with a base motion.

Rather than begin with the City Manager's budget as the base motion, I believe we should have a base motion that incorporates the work done by the Mayor and Council Members. Rather than debating dozens of amendments that already seem to have majority (or unanimous) support, I recommend our base motion incorporate those amendments.

If you can support this idea, or have suggestions, please respond to this thread.

The following amendments (as laid out in the chart) would create a base motion:
• Harper-Madison 2 / Alter 4
• Harper-Madison 4
• Harper-Madison 6 ($200K one-time, $200K ongoing)
• Harper-Madison 7 (which can help fund Pool 3)
• Harper-Madison Budget Rider 1
• Harper-Madison Budget Rider 2
• Garza 1
• Garza Budget Rider 1
• Garza Budget Rider 2
• Casar 1
• Casar 2
• Casar 3
• Casar 4
• Casar 5
• Casar 6
• Casar Budget Rider 1
• Kitchen Budget Rider 1
• Kitchen Budget Rider 2
• Flannigan Budget Rider 1
• Flannigan Budget Rider 2
• Flannigan Budget Rider 3
• Pool 2
• Pool 4 ($100k one-time, $50k recurring)
• Pool 5
• Ellis 1 (with COs for trails and $300K in O&M)
• Ellis 2 (Budget Rider)
• Ellis 3
• Ellis 4 + Budget Rider
• Tovo 1
• Tovo 2
• Tovo Budget Rider 1
• Alter 2 + Casar 7
• Alter 3 ($1.4M recurring, $450K one-time)
• Alter 5/Casar
• Alter 6
• Alter Budget Rider 1
• Alter Budget Rider 2

This list of amendments would result in the spreadsheet we have been maintaining here:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... sp=sharing

Any part of this could still be debated or modified after the base motion is made. A Council Member would just make another motion to make another modification or amendment.

After the base motion is made, we can use our limited time to debate those ideas where there are still questions or issues to be worked out.

I know there is unity on the dais on addressing safety, justice, quality of life, and civil rights with this budget. I hope this helps advance that. Please let me know your thoughts.

Greg

Re: Base Motion for Community Reinvestments

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 4:01 pm
by Ann Kitchen
Greg

I support this approach as the base motion and thank you for pulling this all together this way. I appreciate the efforts of all of our colleagues and the ideas they have brought forward which are included in this base motion.

Our colleagues have all expressed their commitment to advancing safety, justice, quality of life, and civil rights with this budget and I agree that this approach will help us all move forward through a unified approach.

Best
Ann Kitchen
City Council D5

Re: Base Motion for Community Reinvestments

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 4:10 pm
by Delia Garza
CM Casar,

I support what you have laid out and would like to second the motion you make tomorrow adding this as the base motion.

All my best,

Delia

Re: Base Motion for Community Reinvestments

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 4:17 pm
by Leslie Pool
Greg, I agree with your approach in establishing as our base motion the combination of amendments we have all laid out and as you have incorporated them in your latest spreadsheet. We do seem to have reached unanimity on most (if not all) of them.

I am proud to be a member of this council as we pull together to reimagine public safety, and advance civil rights and justice in a way that elevates the voices in our community that have, for too long, gone unheard.

Thank you for your hard work, Greg, in establishing this foundation for our budget discussions.

Leslie

Re: Base Motion for Community Reinvestments

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 6:14 pm
by Alison Alter
Colleagues,

Thank you CM Casar for pulling together most of our proposals into the proposed base motion above. For clarity and simplicity, I’d like to ask that we pull all budget riders out from the base motion. I believe many budget riders require additional discussion for the benefit of the public, staff, and the Council as well as to ensure their appropriate implementation.

Additionally, I have slightly updated the language and costs for ALTER 1 (Office of the Chief Medical Officer). I am sharing the new form and summary in the links below.

Summary: http://assets.austintexas.gov/austincou ... 165743.pdf
Form: http://assets.austintexas.gov/austincou ... 165823.pdf

Since the OCMO amendment expands community access to physician services and is fully funded by fee adjustments (increased ambulance transport fee and a fee for AFD vehicle crash services), I would ask for ALTER 1 (OCMO) to be included in the base motion.

In addition, I would like some further clarification on a few things:

1. I understand you are trying to fit a lot on the spreadsheet, but I want to make sure the conditions previously outlined via asterisks for victims services still apply.

2. I also wondered what happened with the Juneteenth proposal.

3. The amendment we saw for Harper-Madison related to APH was very specific and seemed to require ongoing funds for 33 FTEs. It is now listed as APH-COVID one time funding. I would like to understand what that $3.9 million covers, how those expenditures are structured, and whether FEMA funds might be applicable. If we are constrained to one time funds and want to use them for COVID recovery I think we should weigh the choices before us and also consider funding the Make It Now Rapid Retraining Initiative start up which is laid out in NHM #8 and requires one time funding. (Note I still believe some of the EMS costs which are a response to COVID, especially the 24/72 proposal, should be eligible for non-general fund federal COVID related sources.)

I look forward to the testimony and the discussion tomorrow.

Regards,
Alison Alter

Re: Base Motion for Community Reinvestments

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2020 6:52 pm
by Paige Ellis
Thank you, CM Casar, for keeping track of all of our amendments in one location. I support using this as our base motion for budget discussions. There has been great collaboration between offices on our amendments, and I'm proud to take this important step with you all toward truly re-imagining public safety in ways that better serve and invest our community.

Thank you,
Paige Ellis

Re: Base Motion for Community Reinvestments

Posted: Wed Aug 12, 2020 11:23 am
by Lauren Hartnett
On behalf of CM Harper-Madison:

Thank you for your leadership, CM Casar, in helping us move forward with this truly collaborative process. I'm grateful that we were able to find what we needed for:

-Desperately need full-time Epidemiology staff for APH: http://assets.austintexas.gov/austincou ... 111624.pdf

- A Solutions Architect / Systems Analyst to evaluate of the effect of Austin’s policing technologies on racial disparities and make recommendations on best practices: http://assets.austintexas.gov/austincou ... 112136.pdf

-To up-skill and support low-income Austinites experiencing unemployment due to the pandemic: http://assets.austintexas.gov/austincou ... 111927.pdf

Additionally, I have updated my proposed APD budget rider to reflect updates made in your long-term change proposal: http://assets.austintexas.gov/austincou ... 112228.pdf

Kind regards,
Natasha

Re: Base Motion for Community Reinvestments

Posted: Wed Aug 12, 2020 11:35 am
by Natasha Harper-Madison
Colleagues,

We are so fortunate that this process allows for some creativity and flexibility. I'm pleased to say that a collective effort has successfully found the resources to move forward with the much needed Records Management System update. The ability to capture accurate data is critical to the accountability our community demands and that we're all working towards.

Kindly,
NHM

Re: Base Motion for Community Reinvestments

Posted: Wed Aug 12, 2020 11:42 am
by Greg Casar
Thank you, Council Member Harper Madison for the above.

I have made a final update to the spreadsheet, in order to accomplish the following:
(1) Provide APH the recurring funding that they need in Harper-Madison 4
(2) Funds Harper-Madison 5, the Equity in Policing Technology amendment
(3) Funds Harper-Madison 8, the Workforce Development amendment at $1.37M
(4) Corrects the “commodities/contractuals” line to all be a recurring reduction (rather than split between 1 time and recurring), as confirmed by the budget office
(5) Puts us back in position to get the new records management system this fiscal year. The Deputy City Manager has confirmed that, at $1.9M instead of $2.9M, we can still purchase the new system on time, as long as we make up for that $1M gap over the course of the coming months either through some savings or through the Reimagine Process

Updated spreadsheet:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... sp=sharing

I have updated my amendment sheet to reflect the above as well:
http://assets.austintexas.gov/austincou ... 111935.pdf

-Greg

Re: Base Motion for Community Reinvestments

Posted: Wed Aug 12, 2020 1:09 pm
by Steve Adler
I support this work. If this is the will of the Council, we will take this up as the base motion. We will then take up any monetary budget amendments. When that is complete, we will take up any budget riders. Finally we will take up any items related to fees.