HomeMy WebLinkAboutMIN 11.27.2012 CC-WMinutes of the Meeting of the Governing Body
of the City of Georgetown, Texas Tuesday,
November 27, 2012
The City Council of the City of Georgetown, Texas, met in Regular Session on the above date with Mayor
George Garver presiding.
Council Present: Council Absent:
Patty Eason, Danny Meigs, Bill Sattler, Tommy All Council Present.
Gonzalez, Troy Hellmann, Rachael Jonrowe, Jerry
Hammerlun
Staff Present:
Paul E. Brandenburg, City Manager; Bridget Chapman, Acting City Attorney; Jessica Brettle, City
Secretary; Jim Briggs, General Manager for Utilities; Micki Rundell, Chief Financial Officer; Laurie
Brewer, Assistant City Manager;
Minutes
Policy Development/Review Workshop - Call to order at 03:32 PM
A Workshop review and possible direction to staff regarding the 2013 Citizen Survey questions and process -- Micki
Rundell, Chief Financial Officer
With a PowerPoint Presentation, Rundell described the proposed 2013 Citizen Survey. She spoke briefly about
the vendor, Wyoming Survey and Analysis Center. She said, this year, the survey will be a paper survey which is
different than what has been done in the past She spoke about the Wyoming Survey and Analysis Center and
said it provided the best overall product of all RFP responses received. She said they have a national reputation
for this type of work. She said the budget for the process is $21,700 which is less than what was budgeted. She
said the survey this year will be a paper survey instead of a telephone survey. She noted many people no longer
have land lines and it is difficult to use cell phone. She said the trend seems to be more toward paper surveys.
She said this survey will have a 600 sample response. She noted the survey is designed to collect demographic
profile, citizen evaluation of major City services, areas in need of improvements, service level acceptability and
other current conditions. She said staff looked at the proposed questions and noted the purpose of the survey is
to affirm the "City of Excellence" vision. She said staff provided the previous survey questions and the consultant
rewrote some of those questions to conform to the paper surrey. She said 95% of the prior questions were used.
She said additional areas included parks and recreation and tourism. She briefly went over some of the proposed
questions on the survey.
She noted they left a lot of existing questions, particularly regarding quality of life. She said these questions
include what are the top issues Georgetown faces in the next three years, which are the most important aspects
of economic growth, rating the maintenance and condition of City streets, are property taxes in Georgetown too
high, about right or too low. She said they continue to have questions about where people get their information, if
they access the City's website as well as basic demographic information. She said the timeline for the survey is a
little rushed and noted questions will be finalized by December 11. She said a letter will be pre -noticing to the
respected respondents and signed by the Mayor. She said a draft of that letter is included in the Council packet.
She said the document will be mailed no later than January 4, with a reminder mailed on January 15. She said
the survey will not be open to the public, only to these particular respondents. She said the preliminary report will
be presented to Council on February 26. She said staff will be supplying the letterhead and logo and the Citys
GIS department will be providing quadrant information for the vendor. She noted staff will supply all previous
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survey raw data and responses as well.
Eason asked for a clarification on the type of responses from the public. Rundell said those are in draft form and
she will work with the consultant on the responses. Eason asked about the special events questions and Rundell
said the ones on the survey are the major city sponsored events, not necessarily all of them. Rundell said she
ran them by the CVB group and noted staff liked this list. Hammerlun spoke about question number three and
thirteen and the issue of picking one out of a list of eight options. He said if a respondent was equally excited
about multiple choices, they should be able to pick one and two and then a weighted average can be done. He
said the thing that was clarified on question twelve regarding events is that only people who attended the events
can answer the questions. Jonrowe asked about a couple of the questions and also about property taxes and
also the portion of the taxes actually related to the City. Rundell said the City should be in questions that most
people will understand. Jonrowe said she would like to see a question added about youth services Gonzalez
spoke about the survey and that it is important to be as specific as possible on city issues so there is no
confusion by the public. Rundell said the City has tried to do this on a lot of areas and noted what will limit the
City is the size of the survey. Gonzalez said he would like to see a larger sample size based on the growth of the
City, maybe at 1,000 or 1,200 respondents. Rundell said she spoke to Round Rock and was told they did 400.
Rundell spoke about how, after this surrey is done, staff can put this on the web to garner additional responses.
Mayor also mentioned the tax issue Jonrowe brought up and asked if the survey can indicate which percent of
property tax is city taxes. Rundell said the survey consultant said the word tax means tax Rundell said she will
visit the consultant about this but noted, if you get too much into taxes and those issues, people will not want to
spend time answering the questions. There was much discussion.
Mayor asked and Rundell reviewed the timeline for this process once more. Eason spoke about how this process
has improved because it has been more personalized. She spoke about the letter from the Mayor and how
people will feel they have been chosen and feel an obligation to fill out the survey. Brandenburg said this is a
really helpful tool and noted it validates what the City is doing as well.
B Workshop overview and possible direction to staff regarding this non -City utility franchises and related fees --
Micki Rundell, Chief Financial Officer
With a PowerPoint Presentation, Rundell said this workshop will be to review the non -city franchise fees. She said
franchise fees are payment for using the City's "right of ways." She noted it is a payment in lieu of paying taxes.
She said the payment is paid either quarterly, semi-annually or annually. She noted the revenue from these fees
is recognized in the general fund. She showed Council a graph of the franchise fee revenues from the different
companies including Suddenlink cable, Oncor, PEC and ATMOS. She described which areas each of those
companies service. She said ATMOS gas pays 5% of their gross revenues and noted that franchise extends
indefinitely. She said there will be amendment to these franchise fees over time. She said the annual revenue
received from ATMOS is $369,731. She said ONCOR pays 4 % gross revenues and she added that agreement
is indefinite. She said the annual revenue from ONCOR is a little over $53,000. She said Suddenlink is the
cable provider and she spoke about the history of the creation of this franchise. She said annual revenue from
Suddenlink is slightly less than $500,000. She added the current franchise expires February 13, 2013. She
noted this franchise will fall under Senate Bill 5 of the Texas Utility Code and she described the bill for the
Council. She noted the state Suddenlink franchise is based on broader description of revenues. She said the
one big difference is the allowance of a Public Education Grant fee, or PEG fee. She noted this grant would be
used for only the specified purpose of public education. She continued to describe this provision. She spoke
about the PEC franchise and said they currently pay 2% of their gross revenues. She spoke about how the
contract allows for an increase. She noted if any PEC's franchise fee increases, Georgetown can increase its
franchise fee as well.
Rundell spoke about some options for discussion and noted the Council can possibly increase the PEC franchise
rate or they can implement a PEG fee on cable bills, which would be effective after February 13. Mayor asked
and Rundell said these items can go to GGAF, if necessary. Rundell said both of these will require Council action
and noted staff would be happy to bring back any necessary resolutions for discussion Mayor asked and Rundell
clarified the direction staff is looking for tonight. Gonzalez said the companies should be paying at the same rate
as the City is paying. Rundell said her recommendation would be to go through the public process to determine
whether this change would be necessary. Hammerlun asked if the GGAF committee is the most appropriate party
to look at this issue. Rundell confirmed GGAF would probably be the best place for that Hellmann said this is not
entirely a tax and Rundell agreed. Briggs said a lot of the money from these fees go to the street department as
they are the caretakers of the right of way. Meigs said he likes the idea of bringing this through the regular budget
process. Rundell said the PEC fee is the one that is on more of a deadline. Mayor asked and Rundell said this
presentation was more of an educational overview and added she is hearing that Council would like this to go to
GGAF. There was much discussion. Hellmann asked and Rundell said Senate Bill
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Five is strictly for cable. Hellmann said he has a problem with the fact that Georgetown is paying more than
PEC.
Mayor asked and Rundell said she has received all of the feedback she needs from Council. Meigs asked why
companies such as Verizon are not able to offer their services in Georgetown. Rundell described why this is the
case. Briggs said Verizon is a telecommunications company and not a cable company. He added municipally
owned utilities were specifically barred from being able to offer telecommunications because of the government
lobby. He said municipally owned utilities were written out of the bill. Meigs said he will have to get more
information later offline so that he can understand that issue.
C Overview of the September 30, 2012 year end preliminary financial information -- Micki Rundell, Chief Financial
Officer
With a PowerPoint Presentation, Rundell provided a preliminary year end budget report of the fiscal year ended
9/30/2012. She said the numbers are preliminary but better than anticipated. She said this report is unaudited
and will be the difference between the actual year end and what the City thought we would have She said the
general fund sales tax was good. She said base line sales tax increased about 6%. She noted this is due to
increased revenue from building materials, due to population and recurring information services sales for
Citicorp. Mayor asked and Briggs spoke about how Hurricane Sandy has affected Citicorp. Rundell said she
thinks the City is in good stead moving forward. She said the City continues to see positive economic growth and
she noted that is reflective in the City's sales tax numbers. She said regional building activity continues to have
positive impacts on sales tax revenues. She showed a graph demonstrating the sales tax history over the past
two years. She noted the City will become stagnant without new retail facilities being built She showed Council
a graph of the sales tax per capita and noted it shows the health of community. She said the general fund
preliminary fund balance ended at $9.6 million or 100 days of reserves. She said the City has excess funds over
more than $543,000. She noted the majority was related to savings primarily in the street department She noted
development related revenues were 34.6% higher than the previous year. She noted the City has permitted the
most valuation than the City has had in five years. She spoke about other general fund revenues and said they
were just about the same as last year. She said there has been a decrease in court fines which has a lot to do
with the staffing levels in police. She noted the program revenues more than exceeded the various areas, except
for the recreation center memberships due to the increase in dues. She said the overall fund balance is $543,000
higher than projected. She said revenues are on target and within $35,000 of projections. She spoke about the
potential uses for the general fund excess. She said the Council could reduce the proposed debt, offset some
short term funding for police and fire vehicle, put it into "reserve" funds for future furniture and fixtures related to
Public Safety Facility or appropriate it for one time funding on future projects. She spoke about special revenue
funds and how the majority are higher than anticipated. She spoke about some of the internal service funds. She
said the debt service fund was $46,000 less than projections, mainly due to the timing of tax refund impacted
revenues. She said the airport fund was $712,000 less than projections. She noted the ending working capital is
$66,000 less than projections. She spoke about the utility funds and the growth. She noted there was 1.1%
growth of the electric customers including 29 customers in Round Rock. She said the water customers had a
2.9% growth and added the largest growing utility was wastewater utility with a3.2% increase. She showed
Council a graph of the utility customer growth over the past ten years. She said there was $2.8 million more than
projected in the electric fund. She said the CIP was also a little more due to timing of some of the project. She
noted ending working capital is $2.3 M more than projected. She said on water services, the total revenue was
about$ 700,000 more than projected. She said they have had more capital recovery fees than in many previous
years. She said expenditures were $4.7 million less than projected. She said ending working capital for the
water services fund is $5.4 million more than projected. She said a lot of that was related to capital
improvements. She listed the capital projects that were completed last fiscal year including Fire Station 5 and
training facility, Rock Street extension, Madella Hilliard improvements, electric system improvements, stormwater
curb and gutter improvements and South Austin Avenue waterline. She concluded and said the general fund
position continues to be positive, utility customer growth continues and the overall 2011/12 condition is solid. She
said the audit and financial statements are underway. She noted the financial statements will be on file will the
City Secretary by January 31, 2013.
Recessed to Executive Session under Sections 551.071 and 551.074 of the Texas Local Government Code --
4:57PM
Returned to Open Session and adjourned -- 6:12PM
Adjournment
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Approved:
Mayor George Garver
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The meeting was adjourned at 06:12 PM.
Attest:
City Secretary Jessica Brettle