Minutes - Council Work Session - 03/19/2024 - Special

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Councilmember Musgrove said there should be a timeframe on developing these policies rather than just consider it ongoing. She stated she would like to have these done by the third quarter of the year. City Administrator Hagen said these policies are what Work Session time is for. He noted that these items have been on the list for a Work Session; however, other items have come up with greater importance that have pushed them off. He said these items can stay on the list, so they stay at the forefront of their minds. Councilmember Musgrove asked how the items under action item 2 are going to be quantitative. She noted they have talked about these items in regard to the turf grass or having prairie grass areas; however, they have not gotten a lot of feedback on the effects of these changes. She said that under other questions there are quantitative results. Councilmember Howell agreed and stated they have been asking for this quantitative data for a long time and they have not really gotten anything in response to this. She said it would be great to see that progress is being made in this area. City Administrator Hagen said he can add a recap to show the progress of this to assess the return on investment. Councilmember Riley noted that they added action item 4 last year to review the efficiency and effectiveness of advisory boards. He asked what this means. Councilmember Specht shared that they were talking about merging the EPB with the Planning Commission or if they should keep them separated. City Administrator Hagen said they did not talk about this at a Staff level of how they analyze this and what it looks like. He added that this came up because they were short on EPB positions and then they had a huge influx of interested candidates last year and all of the Boards filled up. He explained that this would boil down to seeing if there is any overlap on any Boards or Commissions. Councilmember Riley suggested refining this and have it just for reviewing the EPB. Councilmember Musgrove shared that she thinks this should be a lower priority. She noted that her issues that came up in regard to Public Works were resolved. She added that she thinks this action item could be removed because there are higher priorities and some of the issues and concerns that they had last year have been addressed. Councilmember Riley asked City Administrator Hagen what his observations were on analyzing operations. He shared he was hoping this would be something that could be remarkable. City Administrator Hagen explained that this got moved out a year because part of the discussion was with bringing in a third-party consultant and that was not added to the 2024 budget. He shared that as far as overall inefficiencies, he does not see any major glaring issues. He noted they are City Council Work Session / March 19, 2024 Page 13 of 17