I feel like I created this blog at the calmest time for Ingham County in a while! Over the last 6 months, we have resolved severe budget deficits and had many cuts. We don’t start considering our next budget, though, until late summer. For now, life on the Boards is a little less crazy.
This week, our full Board of Commissioners met. We had very little controversial on the agenda. We do most of our major work (amendments, debate, etc) in committees and our Board meetings are normally calm and cordial.
The City of Lansing sent us a letter requesting that the county take legal action against M/A-Com. The background on this….About 7 years ago, the county revamped its emergency 911 dispatch system. If you live in Ingham County, you pay a dedicated millage for 911 service, and that money was used for the new 911 system. We had two major bidders – M/A-Com and Motorola. The State Police came in late with a bid as well, but it was way too expensive. After many meetings and much debate, the County Board of Commissioners voted to accept the M/A-Com proposal, which was the recommendation from the to us by our 911 Advisory Committee (made up of fire and police chiefs from the communities in the county, as well as our Sheriff).
The system was put into place and all was seemingly well. Officers throughout the county (community and county) were given new digital dispatch radios to call in emergencies (replacing the old analog ones), and the dispatch centers in Lansing and East Lansing had upgraded equipment. About 2 or 3 years later, though, we found out that officers using these new digital radios in the southwest area of Lansing were having problems. Calls were not going through and were being dropped. They complained to us and we complained to M/A-Com. We found out that several buildings in the area were not allowing for signal penetration. The contract required that 95% or so of the calls made on the radios had to go through, and this was happening county-wide. It was not happening in the southwest Lansing area, though.
So after extreme tensions and negotiations, the County Board negotiated a settlement where we paid for special devices to boost the signal in the buildings in the southwest Lansing area, and M/A-Com agreed to provide certain services for free.
The City of Lansing is upset that they had to dedicate additional staff and resources to this area because the radios weren’t working. They have requested that the County take legal action against M/A-Com. Our Controller and Board Chair and Law Enforcement committee will review our options.
Otherwise, we passed a resolution supporting the Google Fiber effort. Google is offering a super high-speed product called Google Fiber to a few communities throughout the country. Lansing/East Lansing is trying to become one of those served communities. Ingham County, of course, supports this effort.
We also accepted several Homeland Security funds from the federal government for equipment and training.
To see the full agenda, click here.
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Thursday, March 18, 2010
County Credit Gets Boost, Census and other Committee Info
I serve on two of the five committees on the Ingham County Commission – the County Services committee and the Finance Committee. So if you read this blog, you will get information mostly on those two committees when I talk about committee action. Luckily, most things go through Finance (in addition to another committee) so I should cover most relevant issues to the Board.
First, the good news. Yes, the good news. Haven’t had a lot of that in the past! Ingham County’s credit rating was upgraded from AA to AA+! Now that doesn’t sound exciting, but it is. It says that the credit bureau’s recognize that we have good management and are fiscally sound. It also means savings for the county. When we issues bonds (which means people buy our bonds and we get money for those bonds that we repay over a number of years), we will save $10,000 per $1 million issued. Most other governmental entities (including the State of Michigan) have been downgraded recently due to budget problems. But Ingham County was upgraded. YAY!
On to issues…in Finance yesterday we passed a resolution that will create a contract with a company called Luminosity Solutions. They will review our criminal justice system and provide recommendations to better manage the jail population, while maintaining the integrity of the judicial process. As most people know, Ingham County has had budget shortfalls in the past…and we expect to have them in the future. We have recommended a long-term budget fix of closing a post in the jail, and we have eliminated several deputy spots (in the out-county road commission). If we are going to have less jail beds available and less deputies in the out-county, we want to be sure we are maximizing our alternative sentencing (things like tethering). This company will help us to identify areas that we can reform and save, as they have done in other counties.
In County Services, we approved a resolution that would increase fees for the Clerk to marry people. The fee will be $50 for a marriage ceremony. We also set the fee of an expedited vital record to $20. The Clerk has been allowed to marry people since 2006 (when Michigan law changed), and this is the first increase in the fee. The vital records increase is reflective of an increase in post office fees (these records are usually mailed).
We also approved a resolution designating April 1st as Census Day in Ingham County. Filling out the Census form is one of the most important things that can be done. It will ensure that state, county and community you live in receives the appropriate dollars from the federal government. Lansing needs the money, as does Ingham County. Please fill out the form and send it back!
Otherwise, we approved several contracts and other items. You can see agendas for all committees at:
http://www.ingham.org/BC/bdocom.htm
On the right side are the five committees: Law Enforcement, Judiciary, County Services, Human Services and Finance. The agendas for all the committee meetings are available. As are the agendas for all the full Board meetings.
As always, feel free to contact me at any time at aschor@ingham.org!
Andy
Andy Schor, Ingham County Commissioner (D-SE Lansing, District 5)
First, the good news. Yes, the good news. Haven’t had a lot of that in the past! Ingham County’s credit rating was upgraded from AA to AA+! Now that doesn’t sound exciting, but it is. It says that the credit bureau’s recognize that we have good management and are fiscally sound. It also means savings for the county. When we issues bonds (which means people buy our bonds and we get money for those bonds that we repay over a number of years), we will save $10,000 per $1 million issued. Most other governmental entities (including the State of Michigan) have been downgraded recently due to budget problems. But Ingham County was upgraded. YAY!
On to issues…in Finance yesterday we passed a resolution that will create a contract with a company called Luminosity Solutions. They will review our criminal justice system and provide recommendations to better manage the jail population, while maintaining the integrity of the judicial process. As most people know, Ingham County has had budget shortfalls in the past…and we expect to have them in the future. We have recommended a long-term budget fix of closing a post in the jail, and we have eliminated several deputy spots (in the out-county road commission). If we are going to have less jail beds available and less deputies in the out-county, we want to be sure we are maximizing our alternative sentencing (things like tethering). This company will help us to identify areas that we can reform and save, as they have done in other counties.
In County Services, we approved a resolution that would increase fees for the Clerk to marry people. The fee will be $50 for a marriage ceremony. We also set the fee of an expedited vital record to $20. The Clerk has been allowed to marry people since 2006 (when Michigan law changed), and this is the first increase in the fee. The vital records increase is reflective of an increase in post office fees (these records are usually mailed).
We also approved a resolution designating April 1st as Census Day in Ingham County. Filling out the Census form is one of the most important things that can be done. It will ensure that state, county and community you live in receives the appropriate dollars from the federal government. Lansing needs the money, as does Ingham County. Please fill out the form and send it back!
Otherwise, we approved several contracts and other items. You can see agendas for all committees at:
http://www.ingham.org/BC/bdocom.htm
On the right side are the five committees: Law Enforcement, Judiciary, County Services, Human Services and Finance. The agendas for all the committee meetings are available. As are the agendas for all the full Board meetings.
As always, feel free to contact me at any time at aschor@ingham.org!
Andy
Andy Schor, Ingham County Commissioner (D-SE Lansing, District 5)
Friday, March 12, 2010
Delaying Judgeships and Costs
Board of Commissioners - 3-9-10
This week, we had a full County Board of Commissioners meeting where we had to decide if we wanted to ask the Legislature to delay the filling of a judgeship or not.
Why would we do that?
Well, anyone following Ingham County government (or most any elected board) knows that Ingham County government is hurting for dollars to provide the expected services. You want road patrol? Or health services? Or parks? Or Animal Control? Well...we need to have the dollars to fund them.
One of the creative solutions that was suggested was to not fill a judgeship for 2 years. Due to age limitations, Judge Giddings cannot run again. So we thought we might try to hold that seat open for 2 years. The state pays the judge salary, but we could reduce the support staff and the savings were estimated at about $300,000.
In the Finance Committee last week, we had a good discussion about this with Chief Judge Collette. As expected, he opposes this move. He raised lots of good points. He said this would create a backlog of cases; this would limit access to justice; this would compound the potential closure of the jail post. These were all good arguments, but we are cutting everywhere and we told him that the Judiciary needs to be included in that.
Fortunately, Judge Collette said that he is willing to entertain cuts. He will look at the Judiciary and see where they can provide savings to the county. That was great to hear. We don't want to cut the courts, but neither do we want to cut the sheriff or the prosecutor or animal control or parks.
In the end, we agreed to not move the resolution calling for the moratorium on filling the judgeship and Chief Judge Collette committed to providing budget reductions for the Circuit Court. I think everyone won on this and it will help as we start to look at reductions.
In other Board action, we approved several other resolutions including one moving forward the consolidation of the county 911 to one center. We are hopeful that this will lead to cost savings down the road. That resolution passed unanimously.
This week, we had a full County Board of Commissioners meeting where we had to decide if we wanted to ask the Legislature to delay the filling of a judgeship or not.
Why would we do that?
Well, anyone following Ingham County government (or most any elected board) knows that Ingham County government is hurting for dollars to provide the expected services. You want road patrol? Or health services? Or parks? Or Animal Control? Well...we need to have the dollars to fund them.
One of the creative solutions that was suggested was to not fill a judgeship for 2 years. Due to age limitations, Judge Giddings cannot run again. So we thought we might try to hold that seat open for 2 years. The state pays the judge salary, but we could reduce the support staff and the savings were estimated at about $300,000.
In the Finance Committee last week, we had a good discussion about this with Chief Judge Collette. As expected, he opposes this move. He raised lots of good points. He said this would create a backlog of cases; this would limit access to justice; this would compound the potential closure of the jail post. These were all good arguments, but we are cutting everywhere and we told him that the Judiciary needs to be included in that.
Fortunately, Judge Collette said that he is willing to entertain cuts. He will look at the Judiciary and see where they can provide savings to the county. That was great to hear. We don't want to cut the courts, but neither do we want to cut the sheriff or the prosecutor or animal control or parks.
In the end, we agreed to not move the resolution calling for the moratorium on filling the judgeship and Chief Judge Collette committed to providing budget reductions for the Circuit Court. I think everyone won on this and it will help as we start to look at reductions.
In other Board action, we approved several other resolutions including one moving forward the consolidation of the county 911 to one center. We are hopeful that this will lead to cost savings down the road. That resolution passed unanimously.
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