Tuesday night I sat in on the County Public Protection and Judiciary meeting on funding the radio system. They’re not used to having reporters/bloggers/public eyes in the room, they made some pretty unguarded comments, its a bit of a bloggers dilemma about how much to report . . . but I guess it should be all of it said during the meeting . . . the bottom line issue here is will 18 channels on this system serve the city of Madison as well as 22 and who will pay for the extra 4 channels and the $30M system maintenance and operating costs.
WHAT MOTION IS BEFORE THEM
The Executive Committee and Personnel and Finance committee have both taken the issue up, there is a sub 1, sub 2, a sub 2 with changes (which they don’t have despite the chairs efforts, since Hesselbein didn’t make the meeting) and during this meeting a sub 3. Even the committee members are confused, so hang in there, I may skip over a bit of that discussion.
DISCUSSION
Denise Duranczyk and Melanie Hampton move sub 2, same as came out of Executive Committee. Personnel and Finance has changes to that, but they are not available.
Rich McVicor and John Dejung are county IT? and 911 Center staff available to answer questions. They were at Personnel and Finance and they say that the change to the language was to the section that directed Madison and Dane County to agree on level of service. As it stands, the county could have been required to go beyond the current level of service, we are in a position to go beyond the intention with this language, they wanted to look at 22 channel max, could have been even higher than 22 channels. So, they changed the language to say “grade” of service not “level” of service, That’s on line 64, level of service was changed to grade of services, grade is capacity and number of channels. No reduction in number of channels.
Carousel Bayrd clarifies that this change insures that they cannot go above 22 channels.
Paul Rusk, the chair, also clarifies the language. The language that says Madison and Dane County would agree and build to it, that was taken out. Cap number of channels at 22.
Bayrd says Executive Committee voted on sub 1, they made some changes that are reflected in sub 2.
Rusk says Personnel and Finance worked off of sub 2. And they made the modifications described by Dejung.
Mike Willett wants to get something in the minutes, it is troubling talking about something we can’t have a copy and sponsor didn’t get notified of the meetings as is required by their laws. They didn’t know about the meetings, they were not notified. [On the one hand, they should be able to figure it out themselves, the schedules and agendas are posted on line and on the bulletin board. On the other hand, it would be really cool if the city did the same thing because with their system, it is much more likely that the weekly meetings will change throughout the week. The county is better with advanced notification.]
Bayrd says they should move sub 2 and ignore Personnel and Finance because they don’t have the information.
Rusk asks them to focus on policy implications.
Discussion about what they should be looking at omitted – I followed it, but its irrelevant.
Dejung talks about changes at the Executive Committee, he says the underlined verbiage reflects county agrees for operations and maintenance costs in 2012 and half of 2013, thinks it was unanimous, maybe one nay vote, other change was just an administrative correction.
Duranczyk says the changes are a clarification to show what was in agreement from Jan 14th(?) cities and villages meeting, it is word for word not a general statement.
Bayrd says she doesn’t agree with what she just said.
Rusk asks them to move on.
Dejung says that talking about line 57 and 58, there is phraseology non-reduction in level of service, including capacity and infrastructure. That was changed, to phraseology talked about earlier, not capacity and infrastructure, and the current level of service be documented and agreed to by Madison and Dane County and then build to that. That was unanimous.
Rusk asks if that is where the cap is.
Bayrd says they did not cap the channels at Executive.
Dejung says other change to sub 1 was about governance, O’Loughlin has a long amendment about the 15 member governing body, specified who members were which is the same as the cities and villages language.
SUBSTITUTE THREE
Willett says he has sub 3,
Duranczyk asks for moment to read.
Willett says it is Hampton’s original, and he changed it from there, no changes of other committees are in here. The new language is underlined and there is crossed out language.
Willett says two people introduced language and it is being modified to beat the dickens, but bottom line is we need communities to buy into it, if there is a way we can do that, then take away two resolutions and put forward one instead. That is what he is trying to do. This addresses two main points, there is three. [??] He has taken the percents and formulas away, county pays 100%, second change is on back, discussion and feelings about how many channels, we don’t have a clue how many we need. City thinks they need 22, staff says 18 is wonderful, if that is what it takes to get them to sign on, what do we need to do to get them to sign on. 22 channels but city of Madison is going to pay for it. City of Madison hasn’t seen that. City isn’t paying $750,000. That is the overview of what he did.
Kurt Schlicht seconds.
Duranczyk thinks there are too many motions on the table, the chair says there is not.
Schlicht says this is what the villages want.
Baryd appreciates what he is proposing, and inclined to appreciate it more, this does what you had and sticks it to the city of Madison, why hold an olive branch to the cities adn villages and and stick it to Madison.
Duranczyk says can’t support, crunched the numbers, for her two towns and city and figured that with the formula they are subsidizing the heavy users. Doesn’t understand why cities and villages didn’t look at numbers, did some simple stuff, under her calculations, if assume average household, apples to apples, all houses same price, on county levy average house $7.72 for operations and maintenance. If did cost sharing based on radios, Albion is one radio and they pay .37 per household. In Dunkirk, contract with Stoughton for services, they pass along costs of $1.38 of house, Stoughton is $6.04 so after doing calculations, why is there such a discussion at towns, city and village level that we wouldn’t support cost sharing. Cost sharing would be to advantage of towns, villages and smaller cities. Not spread costs around Dane County, they are subsidizing the heavy user, Madison. RTA discussion didn’t want trains for Madison, they don’t want to subsidize Madison. Based on calculations if put on levy and 45% equalized value in Madison, the rest is outside of Madison. Outside of Madison pay more operation and maintenance outside of county level. That is why can’t support it, not fair to her constituents.
Schlicht says cities and villages think this is a basic county service, 16,000 workers come to county for work, we subsidize them. Numbers games are good but 15-0 vote that cities and villages that this is a basic county service, paying for it anyways, 6 of 1 and half dozen of others, this is a way for county not to pay their share. That is how they feel, stick with their wishes are.
Willett asks about numbers in Albion.
Duranczyk says that they have sheriff services and EMS and fire contracted with Edgerton outside the county, so they won’t pay the share.
Willett says he has issues in his district, he has a split municipality, they could be opting out, probably fire and ambulance, not clear how billing will work. Verona was thinking of public works not fire. Agrees with some of the number, with percent of Madison, 44.9% of equalized value, that is city of Madison is $1.6M, that is $718,000 Kathleen says 6$06,000 in some sheet. This way charges city of Madison $100,000 more.
Duranczyk says that is based on one year. Not sure what radio and time will be,
Willett says we don’t know and we are using numbers based on what we don’t know.
Willett thinks all rurals will opt out. He says this is about public safety, willing to vote of the if cross more money.
Duranczyk asks if he will vote for a higher budget?
Willett says he will find more ways to cut it.
Rusk says this was worked on for years, there was never an understanding that Dane county would pay 100%, we can’t afford it, the $30M is somewhere between 2 and 3 percent on the levy as it is for 10 years. Has to be a shared system of who pays for on-going and it does matter who pays, cuz if Dane County pays too much it comes out of everything else the county does, all for the system, trying hard to help move forward, made concessions, cost is now more than $30M but has to be a shared system. Based on county taking over all of that, would create big budget issues in the future, right now it is great, but never any agreement along those lines.
Hampton says that she understand where they are coming from – Willett and Schlicht – if a family lives in Madison and works in Verona and has family throughout Dane County. Right now we have a system of systems, so in transition, if we make a major leap, requires buy in and jump in technology and in culture. In terms of what several people have proposed with cost sharing, benefit is that during this period where transitioning from many systems and culture that is segmented, the cost sharing guarantees a certain amount of local control, not guaranteed with 100% funding.
Sub three, Willettt and Schlicht vote for it.
Rusk, Duranczyk, Bayrd and Hampton vote against.
SUBSTITUTE TWO
Bayrd says that they should let Personnel and Finance explain on the County Board floor. Either way both resolution will be there.
Rusk says they have to approve something or it is not before them. Rusk says could deal with sub 2 just as printed and not get into micromanaging of the wording, Rusk thought made sure wording was coming, wanted them to have everything, it’s not here. Input form Dejung but not his responsibility to record meeting.
Hampton asks Dejung about the 22 channels. What has become clear to her, and wonders if clear to him, that if there are not 22 channels into the 800 MHz system, will the city live with it or negotiate with them.
Dejung says he does not know. Not sure what elected officials are thinking, [Not much, there was little discussion. I don’t think they understand why 18 channels can provide the same service as 22] not sure how clear about how serious they were with their resolution. Will they opt out? Suggesting they would be shooting themselves in the foot. I think they will realize at the 11th hour that their level of service is greatly improved, the greatest service of 18 channels have proven to his satisfaction more than enough for capacity – other things like coverage, reliability, new microwave system is all a great deal for the city, hoping they realize that when look at costs and benefits, saying no just because they re getting, extra channels, if they want them maybe they will buy them themselves. Not sure answers the question.
Hampton asks if ever made comments that they are not willing to accept anything less.
Dejung says yes, over lunch, Mayor’s staff tried to make a deal. They appeared to indicate he understood 18 channels was an acceptable – from an engineering and capacity standpoint. At that point they understood 18 channels was a responsible number.
Schlicht says Mayor Dave’s representative said they started with 23 channels, said that they had a real sticking point between he and county executive and they dumped telephone interconnect, so now needed 22, hard and solid on that one. Told him in the hallway.
Hampton says she is not in a position to make decision for city, what is plan b?
Dejung says if whole system not built as now designed, if Madison and others say not and decision is made that investing $30M will not be done cuz not enough users. He says there is no plan b, looked at alternatives, none have technical and operating capacity and operability that this has. They may be less expensive, capable, capacity and coverage would need to be reeled back in an alternative system. Assuming $20 Million is really the budget. Assuming not pay operations form the county level.
Hampton says she heard that 4 extra channels cost $800,000 to support what is in operation. She says the City of Madison acquired 3 new channels in 2002, investment in the system as soon as 2002, but taking them back to level from before 2002 and if Madison doesn’t sign on, we end up building a lesser system, for $800,000 if we can’t build the system as planned, is county shooting themselves sin the foot over $800K. Would Madison be shooting selves in foot if not take pay that $800,000 – she says they are going to plan b.
Bayrd says this is a resolution and important conversation, appreciates what Hampton and Willettt did. This is a resolution, step back and whatever we say isn’t going to happen. Why doing it? Trying to say everyone is working hard and not agreeing and want to keep working and know it is hard and want it to happen, so part of her thinking is that she feels like, shooting self in foot one way or another, this is just a resolution, just vote for it, doesn’t make it so, not an ordinance. On the other side, cuz its a resolution, we can put everything out there that is out, if undermining City of Madison, that is fair, then let’s do it. Put everything out there and encourage everything to happen. Intent of amendments was to talk about and agree with City of Madison, understand sticking point, want to support that. Level vs. grade is an issue. Not sure what Personnel and Finance was thinking. The intent of what is written here, intent is to go to 22, can’t we actually find the middle ground that isn’t political. Some good intent in there, let’s keep going.
Rusk thinks very close, thinks this tries to move it to fruition, not sure what members of city council would think.
Bayrd says she talked with an alder who didn’t understand the complexities and they just said, “duh, 22 channels is more than 18”. That is the problem, the problem is that it is a lot more complicated than that. The thought is that we want you to have the same service, don’t want it to get worse, just don’t think you need 22, its beyond the duh. It’s a complicated issue, closer than we think we are.
Move it forward or discussion on county board floor or wordsmith here?
Bayrd fine with voting for it.
Vote on sub 2 as is, 4 – 2. Willett and Schlict voting no.
Rusk asks about the original Willett motion on agenda. Do anything with it?
Willett moves to approve, Schlicht second. No discussion. Vote is 3 – 3 Bayrd, Willettt and Schlicht vs Hampton, Duranczyk and Rusk.
Bayrd offers to change her vote because if it stays a tie it stays in committee. Willet doesn’t care and then adjourn.
So, on to the county board floor . . . unresolved in many ways, could make the meeting long . . . .
