2.

(ACTION) Review minutes of Dec. 17, 2003.
Comm. Hale had questions about the accuracy of the minutes and wanted to listen to the tapes, so action on them was tabled until this is done.

3.

(DISCUSSION) Public Comment on any matter within the subject matter jurisdiction of the Juvenile Probation Commission.
Joe Berkowitz, LCRS, commented that the merger of the two classes as a positive thing.  He believed it would lead to a cost savings by reducing OT. He said that SF is the only county where there is a distinction between counselors in JH and ranches.  He mentioned a precedent already set by negotiations with supervising counselors (yrs 2000-2003) where a “side letter” recommended the merging of 8322 and 8323.  This was never done, and upon inquiry he was told by DHR that they were waiting for the Dept to initiate the request to them for the merger, and the Dept never did.

Kent Eagleson asked what the Dept would do now with the pending loss of soft monies like TANF, with those CBOs that formerly were supported by general funds, but pushed over to soft monies? What are the Dept and Commission’s intentions now?

4.

(DISCUSSION/ACTION)  Possible action to recommend to the full Commission, the establishment of a subcommittee of community based organizations, under the Finance Committee, to help review the Dept’s annual budget.

Comm Hale had concerns for this, not based on the desirability of creating such a body, but due to the logistics of doing so, given the experience of the LCRS Advisory Committee.  Comm. Ricci suggested contacting the City Attorney to see what might be an alternative means of accomplishing the same thing.

There was a discussion about possibly having community meetings/forums/panels where such input could be maximized.  The Chief said they expect to have a community meeting about this upcoming budget, and was open to other opportunities.  Comm Hale commented that the new situation calls for a complete re evaluation of how we do business, including how we work with the community.  He suggested Commissioners read the revised juvenile detention initiative (the continuum of services) that was put together last spring.

The Chief said possibly having more community meetings would do this.

Comm Bonilla asked about the possibility of doing one forum in this FY budget timeline, and the Chief said she thought they could do it.

(public comments)
NTanya Lee, Coleman Advocates, stated that the difficulty for CBOs has been in the fact that they are not given a complete data set of figures so they cannot understand the whole picture of a Dept’s budget.  They are given “snippets” of information, specific to only those things already decided upon by the Dept management, which is after the fact and negates any pro-active input or participation by the community.

Comm Hale said that there shouldn’t be a problem with getting all the information from the Dept, and asked her to make such a request.

5

(DISCUSSION/ACTION) Discuss the Dept's strategy for the upcoming budget year.

The Chief referred to the documents passed out at the meeting. M. Lui went over a list of 10 items, which are affecting the budget now and for the next year. 

He said that during the budget balancing process of last Oct-Dec, when the balanced budget plan was approved by the Commission and accepted by the Mayor’s office, the workers comp situation had worsened and now the projection was doubled to $530K for the year, thus putting the Dept out of balance again.

The Dept’s plan to carry forward accounts payables, was not accepted, leaving another $150K deficit for this year.

The State’s STC training funds is gone, so $115K is not available to the Dept

TANF Ranch money, which has been at the $358K level for past years, is now being reduced by $225K

He said that “they” looked at the revenue coming in and saw that the Dept was short $900K from TANF in prior years, but the Dept hadn’t “exercised their total spending authority” –approx. $740K—so “they”  applied that to the shortfall and left a $160K deficit.

Impacts on next year’s budget.  Personnel benefits are increasing about 5.5%  which will be absorbed by the Dept. (approx. $1.1 mil)

The State is going to divert TANF from counties, so SF stands to lose $3.6 mil.  If the State doesn’t get the bond, the City will lose funds, and the Dept will be see a 15% reduction in general fund support ($3 mil).  So the Dept has to prepare a contingency plan for that $3 mil reduction, by Feb. 20.

Summary: current year reductions: $99K ,   mandatory cuts next FY: $1.1 mil,  with a contingent plan for $6.6 mil.  so the range in cuts is from $2 mil to $8.8 mil.

The Chief reviewed the sheet approved last Dec. 19.  She said that they came back with some modifications, and wanted to show how they’re dealing with the modifications and what were the basis of the modifications. “When we went back, to look at the Controller’s state of the Dept, salary projection, and found that some of the measures we’ve put into place, like we’ve been monitoring OT and changes and doing things, we had realized it to the point where we’ve got the salary deficit is now only $226, alright? And that our fringe benefits has a surplus of $473.  so, this comes from the records of the Controller’s report that as a result of some of the things we’ve done, this is the new status, okay? However, as we said before, $250K more, in terms of the workers comp, so it became a deficit in the amount of $530.” “We’ve been able to improve with the OT and all the things, we’ve gotten into a surplus position when it comes to fringe benefits.

M. Lui said he could explain the surplus in fringe. “…because when you use overtime instead of straight time, there are fixed benefits….so they don’t increase.

The Chief said, “it’s to the reduction that we’ve made in the overtime, so that’s where you get the surplus and the, in the benefits.”  “And the TANF Ranch, as we said, there’s a current deficit of $225K, we have an average daily population of much less than the $358 TANF Ranch, and it’s now $133, so the $225 is a deficit on the basis of our daily population.”

Comm Ricci asked for a clarification of how the WC grew from $280K to $530K.  M. Lui said that this was “something suggested by the WC division, who actually project on their own, and they do that intermittently throughout the year.  And it changes, change our process. Actually, our workers comp if you look on a month to month basis, --Oct, Nov, Dec—which is what these projections are apparently based on, if you look on a month to month basis, our costs are going down. But when they come that quarter to the prior quarter and averaged it out –that’s what they do---  that's what they came up with.”

Comm Ricci asked about the TANF Ranch funds.  Is the population of LCR down because not enough youth are referred there, or is it “just” down? 

The Chief commented, “When we decided to keep Log Cabin open, well I think it’s been 3 fiscal years when we started looking at Log Cabin Ranch, I remember one fiscal year, I don’t remember the exact fiscal year, we cut off the intake totally.  That is like 3 fiscal years ago. And we started re-vamping, re-engineering the Log Cabin Ranch. We just wrote up comprehensive plan and everything.  We stopped the intake totally. So the population went totally down. We, then, the budget year, we decided that, it was proposed that Log Cabin Ranch be closed.  That kept the population down. There weren’t that many referrals, etc.  So we’ve been going through a lot of things with Log Cabin Ranch.  It’s a combination of, first the intake was cut off, then when it was re-opened, there were issues about the referrals, the judges, and we kept working with the judges, and we began to get referrals, but when we did the comprehensive plan, we started getting more referrals. Then we re engineered to keep it open. And we designed the programs, we re engineered the programs for a lesser number of students. So we said, then, that there would be a maximum of 30.  Our average daily population there has been, I guess, about 24.  So, it’s by design, but at one point it was because we were trying to get Log Cabin together. We kept the population down to change the program and get it into control.”   “Now we staff it for no more than 20.”

Comm Ricci asked if there was a cap on referrals to the Ranch.  The Chief said that they weren’t turning anyone down that was recommended for the Ranch.

Bill Johnston said there isn’t a cap on how many youth at Cabin, it’s a matter of how many kids are committed by the courts.

The Chief continued, “the TANF Ranch is rated according to the number of youth that are served there. It has reduced the annual grant.”

The Chief went on to review each line item in the balanced budget doc.

She said that the strategy they are using now is to look at everything they are doing in the dept, to reduce spending, and looking at each line item to see where reductions could be made.  She said that the biggest bill the Dept has is DTIS.  The Dept is obligated to get all their work through DTIS.  “They work order our money and is the only Dept that can take our money whether we agree or not for the services they render.”  They are more expensive than contractors.  She went line by line mentioning different items in the budget (eg. cell phones, pagers, telephones). She mentioned an emergency notification system the Dept contracted for years ago, which required a subscription to a GIS service that cost $1,667/mo to have this system, which has never been used. 

Comm Hale cut the Chief off, asking for the strategy for the upcoming budget year.  Are there any new directives?  The Chief said she was trying to explain that. Comm. Hale said he understands that the amount to balance has changed from  the 754k dealt with in Dec. to 843k now.  The Chief affirmed that.

But there is no action item on the agenda to deal with this.  The Chief said that this has already been sent to the City and the City has approved it.  She corrected herself and said that they are reviewing it now. Comm Hale asked the Chair to discuss this with the Commission President and the City Attorney to see if there’s a need to declare an emergency to act on this.  She said that the Dept would be meeting with City Hall on Feb. 2. 

Comm Hale asked if the Dept were going to do anything different than in year’s past with the budget development process. The Chief said no.

The Chief went on to talk about the “impact paper” the Dept prepared regarding potential sunset of TANF in Oct. 04.

She mentioned another paper, which showed that the Dept could face an $8.6 mil cut in the next 18 mos.

Comm Hale asked to have an item on the full Commission meeting to discuss and act on the re structuring of juvenile justice in the City.

The Chief said, “we have begun that first exploration. We are meeting with the consultant from JDAI. We’ve had the initial meeting and we are getting information about the structure of the other JDAI departments, to see how they’re compatible. Also open dialog with the courts, Judge Mahoney. We’ve talked with him to talk about his needs, and he has some ideas.  So,..”

Comm Hale said the Commission needs to be involved in those discussions.  Comm Bonilla commented that the Commission should begin using its powers and privileges to be proactive in the determination of how best to operate the Dept, rather than just reacting to the City’s directives, in fact, to reduce the need for the City to make such demands on the Dept.  It was proposed to include an action item in the next meeting, which addresses the Commission taking a lead in the resolution of the Dept’s budget issues.  The Chair of the Finance Committee will draft some language toward that end.

(public comments)
There was none.

6

(DISCUSSION/ACTION)  LCRS budget status.

Comm Hale said that this is an ongoing concern since there was a lot of effort to keep the Ranch open. Aside from wanting to know the current status of the finances there, he wanted to know what conversations have occurred regarding how to  make it self-sufficient (eg. last year’s ideas of utilizing wind and solar power, leasing/selling real estate, renting bedspace).

M. Lui went over the budget doc regarding LCRS.   He said they are showing a projected surplus in salaries and benefits of $179K.  There is one person out on workers comp.  There is about $170K in OT costs and that represents about 1.5 FTE.

Lui pointed out that there is a deficit in the TANF Ranch funds of $261K.  The Dept used $150K of the grant to pay salaries, under the direction of the Controller to help balance the budget, to minimize that budget-balancing plan they worked on with the Commission.

The short answer is the Ranch is looking at a $300K deficit at the end of the year.

Comm Hale asked if the formula for TANF Ranch allocations is given to the Dept.  Lui said that TANF is something that the State allocates, and the Dept budgets at what they think the amount will be coming in.

He said it’s a complex formula for allocation.

The Chief said, “…how that was determined about our past population at the ranch. That was how that was determined, over the years, and they took the average daily population and that’s how they made the initial grant of $358K.”

Comm Ricci asked about the future of bringing in money through bedspace.

The Chief recounted that through the budget negotiations in April/May of 03, Steve Kava made arrangements to keep LCRS open till the end of this year, and not lay off 4 counselors.  But no additional money was put into the Dept budget to pay for these 4 positions. If those counselors were laid off, it “probably would have balanced out, even with the lesser amount of the TANF.”  She said as to sustainability, she is “working with the courts, with Judge Mahoney, and we’re looking at alternative ways to deal with Log Cabin Ranch. And the Judge has some ideas that has to do with JDAI and everything… he is also working with the PD and the DA to look at how we can get some sustainability at the Ranch. We’re looking at alternative programming at Log Cabin Ranch. At the same time the Director at Log Cabin Ranch is, will be taking a trip shortly to another place, another branch that in fact rents beds to see how that works. So, we’re also following up on, it was an appraisal that was supposed to be done, and I can’t find the appraisal finding anywhere, so I’m following up on that.  I do believe that we need to have a committee especially to address sustainability at Log Cabin Ranch. I think it’s a larger issue than one that this dept alone can do, because when we start talking about leasing or renting of the land, that includes the real estate division, there are just so many things that I had a discussion with the former Mayor about. And he had suggested that we deal with the real estate.  However, that has to be a decision that this commission as well make some decision about. When it comes to the solar power, we had an evaluation done found out that the waves, hills or whatever we’re talking about, the location of Log Cabin Ranch is pretty much in a valley, and that would not work.  The solar power on the roof is a large initial investment that we have to make, so every solution for Log Cabin takes a really large survey and staff, and we need a committee….”

Comm Ricci asked which facility Mr. Sanders will be visiting.  The Chief said she thinks it’s Fouts Spring.
B. Johnston confirmed this.

Comm Hale asked what the cost savings would result in the merging of two counselor classes.  The Chief said she didn’t believe M. Lui had any costs figures at the moment.

Comm Bonilla suggested adding this topic to a personnel comm. meeting.

(public comments)
There was none

7

(DISCUSSION/ACTION)  Requests for future agenda items

Comm. Hale said that the need to look at restructuring involves discussion on how funds are allocated to CBOs.  He again asked the others to review the local action plan.

Comm Bonilla asked the Secretary to arrange with the CPO a series of potential Finance Comm. meetings in the upcoming weeks.

(public comments)
There was none.

8

Adjournment
There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 7:05pm