##VIDEO ID:1JvaZJAek5w## e e good morning everyone we are on the record today is Monday the 23d day of December 2024 this is a budget hearing of the office of the city clerk and the office of the Council of the Jersey City municipal council at a scheduled 10: a.m. start and my watch shows 10:13 a.m. May we have a roll call for the commencement of this budget hearing council person Ridley council person prinari councilman boano councilman SLE here councilman Solomon councilman Gilmore council person Dees council person Rivera and Council president here we have two council members at 10:13 a.m. in addition at the time of its preparation the notice of this meeting was similarly disseminated on Monday December 16 2024 at 11:55 a.m. the mayor Municipal Council business administrator Corporation Council and to the local newspapers I can certify as to our total compliance with the sunshine law Madam president good morning everyone um so we'll start the budget hear it by everyone introducing thems and then um city council could start with the presentation okay my name is Tammy Richardson and I am the council administrator for the office of the city council Sean J Gallagher city clerk of the city of Jersey City Danny be not Department of Finance uh Carmen gandula Director of Finance thank you go ahead good morning council president and councilman SLE good morning this is the office of the municipal Council overview and the first page page explains the responsibilities of both the council members and the city council AIDS it's pretty self-explanatory any questions just read some of it so the so the public can hear okay so the city council um member the city council in Jersey City consists of nine members one council member for each of the city's six Wards plus three at large council members who represent the entire city every two years the members of the city council vote among themselves to select one member to serve as the city council president the council president presides over the council meeting meetings and attends bi-weekly meetings with the city Administration office who sets the agenda for the subsequent Council meetings the council president also manages the dayto day operations of the S of the Council Office the responsibility of the city council member generally involves determining city government and administration policies as well as adopting budgets and legislation the city council Aid is responsible for maintaining the council members calendar scheduling meetings screening their incoming and outgoing mail phone calls and assisting and constituents Services researching legislation and so much more next we have our table of organization the council president is listed at the top with her AIDS next to her then we have the councils at large with their AIDS listed and then you have the remaining council members with their respective AIDS there's also a part of the staff in the office set up where you will see myself who is the council administrator and also our Council receptionist next we have our Council budget analysis and the staff totals um for the staff total was increased by three however you will see a difference in the number of the full-time employees which is 22 and a decrease of one in part-time to 14 for a total of 36 employees next we have um our goals achieved in 2024 which were pay transparency right to choose Sanctuary City legislation women's Advisory Board of Jersey City legislation establishment of the Cannabis board legislation right to council legislation and the New Jersey reparation task force act legislation our goals for 25 are as follows rent control legislation Public School partnership and the annual Harvest Fall Festival last but not not least we do have our budgets budget changes listed for 2023 through 2025 please take a look at each line item and please let me know if there are any questions going to say we recently passed an ordinance regarding plastic utensils um I think council president you were the one that um I passed that will we be bringing in utensils that aren't plastic in the council offices for the next year well let me I'm I'm not not sure about that yeah I'm not sure about that as the plastic utensils are um better for us right now because it's so many but I'll find out and let you know got bamboo now they got all sorts of different you know utensils I know it's like a stupid you know it's not it's something that we passed and we we should follow you know the ordinances that we that we pass but um I'll I'll leave it to you Tammy and your capable hands cuz you can I know you could do it um I just have a question when was this passed this year it was passed this year therefore it need we need a memo to finance so that if in order to stop that purchasing would have to get a memorandum to make sure that those purchases don't happen Citywide okay I think it was for food establishments it was I don't know if it was a it was for food establishment pretty much it was pretty much the condiments like people would have to request them that's what that was so just they would have to request so I guess I'm clarifying I guess Tammy's know she's saying it's too much then it's not internal to the city right okay got it wanted us to walk the walk that we you know we talk to talk the talk so if that's the case right then we need a memo and then I'll will make sure that that that happens thank you thank you any more questions not on my end clerk okay thank you so much council president council person CLE my Deputy uh John Hen and handling the meeting for me and everybody present and everybody watching at home uh this is the office of the city clerk 2025 budget presentation our the municipal clerk is the secretary to the municipal Council secretary to the municipality Keeper of the city seal Chief election officer of the municipality and the individual respons for the records management of the city the office of the city clerk Handles open public records acts also known as Oprah requests right now 4,536 requests were filed in 2024 as of October 24th we're on a record setting Pace um we may even hit 6,000 this year who knows uh the office of the city clerk processes applications for all Vital Records our office also handles city council agenda municipal code book landlord registration forms Municipal service applications sound truck permits and all elections within the city of Jersey City any questions on our roles and responsibilities okay are you prepared for 2025 uh municipal election yes I am uh very prepared I'm having the office prepared uh as well uh I think we're going to see an ction that we haven't seen in quite some time because you know we haven't had a change of administration in the past 12 years so you know you could have maybe seven full slates of candidates running you know seven candidates for mayor seven full slates all nine council members that's 70 candidates without you know counting any um uh independent candidates so our office is going to be ready uh ready and willing and able to to uh attack the petitions as they come in um we plan on getting out the um the guide book as soon as we can we're just waiting for the state election Bureau to release the chronological um index for the 2025 elections so I don't make any mistakes on the deadlines um once I have that then I'll be able to um start Distributing petitions because I know that's a big question that's been asked of me uh it's been being asked me since September of this year so um I'm I'm thinking maybe mid January the latest late January we can start um bringing people in because what I'd like to do is bring them in that's just like you we did in the very beginning it's almost like a job interview you know we give you all of the tools that's necessary we give you a copy of the guide book which has all the important deadlines that are uh important to someone who's running for office regardless of the office who you're running for and then you'll have petitions that day with your name pre-printed um on the petition with your address on it okay thank you you're welcome all right our budget and staff totals uh from 2021 to 2025 our budget analysis is uh self-explanatory pretty much um from 2021 what we had adopted and in 2025 there's a slight increase um and it's cost the um of the um Union contracts that were settled um and the potential of the local 246 contract that is not settled yet um you see our staff totals has stayed pretty much steady um we did have a loss of an employee they went to another office but then we gained another employee pretty pretty quickly um I know I didn't budget for it this year um because I know the budget's pretty tight but we do have two individuals who um have the years of service that um and the age and they can put in their papers you know between now and before the municipal election happens so um I may ask uh or be coming to you begging for at least two new more hires uh because we're going to need you know a backup to those individuals I can't be short staffed I mean we were short staffed um earlyer this month and even the prior month we had two people on FMLA um actually three people right John I think it was three people on FMLA and when we have three people out we're a small staff we have one staff member who is offsite that's Sydney Harris who is in charge of the records uh Center so um with that with with three people out it's really tough on us because of the work that we're responsible for and the work that we do on a day-to-day basis I could just imagine if that happened during the municipal election process where we would be you know working almost 247 uh because you know the petitions are going to come in and you know the work is not going to stop so I may have to ask and beg for you guys to um help us uh with the two new hires possibly uh the next page is our table of organization as you could see um I'm the clerk I have my Deputy John henin this was made before Amanda got her promotion to Deputy so I to have two deputies okay and then you see Renee Jackson Tama hman Manuel Maldonado uh Mari Herrera Isaiah Deus that's our newer employee who took the place of Gabrielle Marcel who left our office um we have jordas spanel um Marlene sand Camp Karen Bellamy Lori Carrera Alexandra dorso baky Telly Sydney Harris and we do have a vacancy in the record Center where I would like to hire someone for to help out Sydney but before I do that I I've been putting in for cydney Harris for an increase for him for the past three years and I'm pretty sure it was budgeted for but it was never processed for some reason so I'm going to ask again for the council to help me with this to get Sydney Harris his proper due um and also jordis espanol who actually took a pay cut to come to our office back I guess 3 years ago she was working in the Redevelopment agency um we're going to get to that but I just wanted to say it now um those are the two individuals that I'm looking to increase their salaries um not by much but something that Sydney really deserves and the good news something I wanted to share with you guys uh we were in front of the State records committee on I think it was Thursday and that's why I missed the daytime budget meetings and they approved the destruction for the um Sandy records so now all of the Sandy records that would were um I wouldn't say destroyed but they were floating in the water in the city Hall's basement I'm talking about original resolutions original um um ordinances budgets you name it we had a lot of stuff downstairs and they gave us the approval to destroy those Originals because now everything is scanned okay so the next step is to meet with it and then each department who had records in the basement of City Hall will have access to their records most of our records are going to go into our website our plan John and I um have talked about this our plan is to have minutes ordinances and resolutions from 1861 to present on our website I think we'll probably be one of the first municipalities to have that length of time on our website oh will the records be destroyed exactly so document reprocesses is the company that the city hired during the emergency they have possession of these records They will shred all of those records because they froze dried or freeze-dried all of the records in order to get them scanned right so all that they need all they need from us is the approval from the state which we have now so it's just a matter of electronically signing these forms and have them destroyed and um they're supervised on how they're when they get shredded and but that's all going to be done by the company also for Doris and Sydney you said it's been three yearsis jordis jordis sorry uh jordis and Sydney it's been three years three years for Sydney jordis no jordis is is a new that I'm asking for um in this budget can uh we look into that please just cuz you know that's not uh that's not okay um appreciate it okay our office key performance indicators as you can see um the ordinances have been steady um marriage license is issued pretty much steady Oprah request it's it's growing I I know it seems like um from last year we had 5,186 and currently this is October is when we took this um you know a snapshot of how many Opa requests we had um I don't I don't know the number off the top of my head um but I'm sure we're past the uh 5,000 Mark now so again we're on record Pace uh to set another record again um debt certificates again same kind of um steady um unfortunately with that certificates our birth certificates have grown um this is another thing and I want to just State this for the record so the members of the public who are watching on the live stream and can watch on YouTube what's most important to remember is that Jersey city has never had their own birth certificates the state had them for year actually the county county Hudson County vital statistics had them for years they were shut down by the federal government back in 2001 I believe and you know now we talking about 20 almost 24 years later or 23 years later we're we're now able to is issue birth certificates the problem is we got this big big big file from the state um we don't have everyone's birth certificate to to just sum it up we don't have everyone so I have a great relationship with the state regist I'm able to email her um when it's an emergency especially when it's someone who is elderly and maybe wants to go on a cruise or something like that we're able to email the state they can email us the original record it's crypted email that no one can open except for myself from my deputy registra and we're able to issue on on spot um they do the state deals with all 565 municipalities and we're included in that uh they do know our situation and they've been very good with us uh we do weekly birth certificates meaning we send weekly requests to the state and they FedEx are the return once they're completed when what I mean by that is they look them up they send it all to us cuz anything that was on microfilm from the state we did not get a copy of unless that that person came to the state and requested a certified copy of their birth record and that means we basically we got a snapshot in time when we actually got that big humongous file from the state I hope that helps people when they and try to understand and we what we do is too as an office we communicate with the members of the public who are requesting these records whether they're doing it in person or um VIA mail if they do it via mail we email them back um and then they got the connection with like marleene will send an email to the requestor it takes like four to six weeks to get it back it's kind of true but sometimes we get it back sooner and if we do we mail it out the same day that we get it back from the state does anybody have any questions on the birth certificate process thanks for explaining it for the public yeah they have a clear understanding Kate um our budget changes again all this this wouldn't be possible without ammani brown our fiscal officer um I have to thank comman and Dany who are sitting to my right thank you for allowing Amman Brown to help um not only my office but the city council's office she's is super um she's one of the best fiscal officers that I had to deal with in um all the years that I've been here and uh she's um I she is just tremendous I want to give her a bunch of Kudos because we wouldn't have all of this paperwork because we have backups to the backups to the backups we have all explanations and we're such a small div uh department for for the city so kudos to Amani um not much change like I said you know you the salaries the union contracts basically um overtime I did increase that um and that's due to the extra work that we have with the election process so and then this past year we had four elections that we had to deal with we had two special we had a special primary and a special General right and then we had the regular primary and the regular General so next year we can possibly have three elections primary um the general and a possible runoff um we may have a Citywide runoff so if we have a Citywide runoff that's like having a whole brand new election again that also comes with the additional responsibilities that were added on to our office and I know you guys have seen it and maybe members of the public have not but if they come early voting they would see in the background all of the suitcases that are lined up so that comes from the county and we have to stuff those suitcases with the election supplies the provisional ballots and then pack them up stack them and then have them ready to go for the poll workers to pick them up and then they drop them off on Election night that's the additional duties that were added on to our office so it's another reason why I increased our overtime because we can't we have we're a very small unit yeah um and during the election the days of the election I have to thank Jake hudnut and his staff for for allowing um some of their staff to help us during election day and obviously um director kce and um all of his staff that you know the messengers Paul and and and and Company who have been super duper with us they I've been working with the messengers since I've been in the clerk's office and they've always helped us even before we have before we had this additional responsibility U but now even more so um I can't thank them enough let me ask you something Sean when it come to the pole workers um um do you have a say in that because I know sometime uh when I go around um there's always challenge with pole workers challenge with the skill set um the machines um the machines get jammed and uh I'm just trying to uh figure out is there a way we can do this better um do we have to train them earlier or I don't know because it's been a problem because we in the new machines and it's just it's been a problem with the pole workers so I mean is should there be some type of I don't know qualification I don't know because it's it's a problem sure um it's a great question so I I I I don't have the hiring capability but I can make suggestions and um Michael Harper who's in charge of hiring the pole workers who works for the Board of Elections uh he will take our recommendations not just from me but any of the members of the city council who has recommendations on people who they feel that would be a good fit for that District whatever Ward and District that you're looking at or if it's just a Citywide problem I know that they do um pole worker training the I think it's a couple of days that they act actually do it because they know they can't have every poll worker at the same time so they do it on consecutive days and um we myself John henin and Amanda bransky have attended those um workshops for the uh pole workers so they can get a face to the name name to a face and then we basically give our expectations of the poll workers um and this past election we had the messengers our Messengers deliver all of the um suitcases to the polling sites we found that a little helpful because then we didn't have to depend on the PO workers coming some of them don't drive and and you know they they're going doing this public transportation we had a presidential that we just you know went through and we certainly didn't want to be in a newspaper saying why is a pole worker taking public transportation with the suitcase because you just it sends sometimes it sends a wrong message it's nothing against anyone that has to take public transportation but that's why we took on that responsibility to deliver them um and most of them brought them back um I think we had maybe two that uh two districts that didn't bring back or maybe there was a handful of districts we we improved that situation by just doing that but to your point um I think there's never enough training that you can give to the pole worker and maybe there I can have some conversations with Mike Harper to extend the training a little bit so you know because members if the members uh the poll workers can't make the training if they have an additional day maybe we can add to it um it's a conversation I can definitely have with him but if you have any members of the public that you can see not just you council president but any member of the council that would be um a good fit for being a pole worker will take that recommendation and give it right to Michael Harbor okay thank you because now I I see that you know with a pole worker is it's the transportation too of the um the suitcase or I mean what do you call that that they have to transport it's it's the election supplies but it's a big suitcase it almost looks like you're on vacation and then you have a little mini case because that's that's the that's the electronic list of Voters and I'm trying to figure out why would they assign somebody to return that if they don't have a vehicle know that's what I'm trying to so usually there's four pole workers to each polling location right right and one out of the four would volunteer to pick up and drop off um even sometimes when they do volunteer will get a call on Election night saying that unfortunately I don't have a ride can you please send one to pick him up so that's why with the addition of Jake HUD nut's staff I had we were able to facilitate those requests from poll workers the thing is too you know the poll worker gets 12250 addition um for picking up and another 1250 for dropping it off I think we are we shortage of workers um I I can't say we're short um I think we had some extra poll workers for the presidential um I don't know if we used all of the extra ones that we had um you know sometimes poll workers don't show up on the day of the election and then we try to have like a couple of extra pole workers even floating here in City Hall so we can just send them out to the polling place the ward and District that they that they didn't show up to is committee people poll workers I mean is it required committee people to be a poll worker that's a great question I don't think there's a requirement but I would start there first um I think it's important that uh County committee members volunteer their services for that um it's a way of them learning the process um they do have a big responsibility when there's a vacancy in a in an office but you know this is a this is a uh an important process of every election this happens every every year I mean our Municipal elections happen every four years years but every year is an election yes yes so I think County committee members would be a great way to start and I think a lot of them are pole workers to be honest with you I don't think everyone is but a lot of them are I was going to ask um now that the Jersey Journal is scheduled to close how will we Sunshine our meetings and you know sessions here okay here comes my plan I'm going to spell it out so it's unfortunate that the Jersey Journal is closing um especially after 157 years of service to Jersey City um it's a sad day for for Jersey City with that we're not going to have a newspaper anymore basically you know we used to have the Jersey journal the Hudson reporter which turned into the Jersey City Reporter the daily challenge the urban times uh and the El special Leo the L special is a Spanish newspaper that is circulated in Jersey City but it's actually circulated not just Jersey City all over the place and even New York City um I found that the Bergen Record is circulated in Jersey City so I'm going to go with the Bergen Record and DL special Leo for now hopefully they stay afloat I'm knocking on wood when I say that uh and on January 15th council meeting we'll have a resolution making the Bergen Record and the L special lady the official newspapers of the city of Jersey City I'm also going to put a tab on our website it's going to be on the homepage and it's going to when you click it it's going to direct you to my page on the city's website where it's going to say Public Notices so anything that you would see in the Jersey journal the Bergen Record members of the public will be able to click on that and just see it and it's free there's no charge for us putting it on our website where now the state legislature I believe passed the bill or it's about to pass which gives municipalities the option to advertise and like The Star Ledger that is not closing they are not going to print any more newspapers but they're going to have electronic version of their newspaper and then they'll have electronic ads I say why should we have to pay for an electronic ad when I can just put it on our website and be free for for the for Jersey City not just for us but especially for the taxpayer right would save a lot of money on Advertising legal advertising but during the municipal election I'm required to advertise the ballot in full so that usually takes up like two pages in The Jersey Journal I believe the Bergen Record is is legal on legal paper I believe if I'm not mistaken um but I mean if you guys know of another paper that I can consider I I try to find find a paper and that Bergen Record was the only one that I can think of that's still printing and they are circulated in Jersey City used to have the urban times I don't I don't know where that paper is I would have to find out about right and I mean the weekly newspaper like the El special Leo is a weekly newspaper we need a newspaper that's circulated every day and the reason being especially when we have special meetings when things come up emergencies come up that's why you have an everyday newspaper um our ordinances our first reading second readings and our Professional Services they all have to be placed um you know on a deadline at a certain time um seven days prior to it depending on what type of ordinance it is if it's a bond ordinance you require a little more time so that's why you need an everyday paper so like I said on and on the January 15th meeting that's my plan is to uh have the Bergen Record in DL special DL special is already already one of our newspapers but um I just we need to clean it up because that hasn't been touched since 2002 that resolution thank you no problem um other than that any changes they're self-explained we have the backup thanks to uh Amman um our budget changes for the general and primary it's not much it's maybe a $220,000 uh change it's because of um all of the fees have gone up for printing um sending out the sample ballots which we're responsible for um get the license increase when when when your fees increase to um you increase like license fee and all of that birth certificate fee to cover the cost because it had went up we we we did do that not too long ago we increased the certified copy fee is what you're referring to so we did that for the birth certificates the um certified copy of the marriage licensees the only thing we did not increase are the death certificates um I think that was one that was Administration call um especially that was during like right after covid so they didn't want to raise the fee so like each copy of a debt certificate is 15 each additional is five now um the all the other certified copies is $20 for the first copy and $10 for each additional which I think is still reasonable if you go by any other municipality plus we don't want to Hammer you know the residents uh or former residents our municipal election budget has increased and I'm anticipating the possibility of a runoff that's why you see the big increase of $80,000 for each you know the printing and advertising and Professional Services that's the anticipation if we don't use it um you know Carmen and Danny can correct me if I'm wrong we can take that money and put it elsewhere if I don't use the full amount I I just wanted to be safe rather than sorry and have enough money for a possible runoff election next year okay our budget changes operational needs uh the justification I think I kind of touched on this already supplying Supply costs have increased due to high volume of requests for birth marriage and debt certificates as well as an increase in the price of certified paper that's the other thing we have to pay the state um their vendor who have to purchase certified copy paper that's the paper that is protected it has you know watermarks in it you can't make photo copies of it if you do it'll just say you know copy all over the place it's it's a good safety feature but those fees have grown and we're supposed to have at least a 3 to six month supply of those um that paper now with the addition of birth certificates we're OB viously increasing on how much paper we have to purchase so you know the paper I'm staying on top of that personally to make sure that we never have have a shortage like we did when we first started issuing birth certificates back in 2022 John and I had to take a trip down to Trenton more than once to purchase the paper right from Trenton because the paperwork didn't get you know done in time so we we couldn't have no safety paper in our office because then we would have to make people wait no matter if they're in person or you know doing it by mail and then we did individual trips I did one JN did one you know it was but we'll never get to that point again because now because that's only because we didn't know the volume that we were going to have with birth certificates when you never did it before it's hard to anticipate how much you're going to use you know but we're not going to get to that because again we have a um a clear understanding on how much we do um every 3 months uh advertisement costs have increased due to their advertising in multiple newspapers again I'm I don't know how much the Bergen Record is going to charge but hopefully they stay in the vicinity of what the Jersey Journal was charging us um even if it's an additional increase a little bit I I'm I'm not anticipating an astronomical amount to be increased um can you tell us what Jersey Journal was charging and what the circulation of Bergen Record is if you have that on you I don't know I I don't have those exact numbers on me but I can get them to you um I'll email the the entire council with those numbers yeah I mean I can tell you what we spent for the year um in advertising we may even have that in one of the attachments I know is amazing so um printing in advertising I I'd have to look in in detail but I'll get it to you either way and I'm not going to going to know how much the Bergen record's going to charge until we start using them um or perhaps I can give them a call and see how much if they can give me a fee schedule I'll share that with you guys do that work yes okay all right our op operational needs the clerk's office will need to raise the salaries of some non-management and management employees and promote one employee to managerial position as they already have assumed the managerial responsibilities that's basically Sydney Harris and jordis espanol uh Sydney is a local 24 six employee he makes roughly 49,000 um a year and he's doing the job of two for that price and you know Sydney is a um a long-term employee has over 20 years of service he's dedicated service to to us um he worked with my brother who was the records manager replaced my brother back in 2021 and like I said I've been asking ever since my brother retired to put Sydney in the in my brother's vicinity not exactly what my brother was making cuz obviously he was you know he was with the city for over 30 years Sydney's getting close you know he's at 20 something years 20 plus years and what I was looking for Sydney is to put them roxim me at 65,000 which I think number said he's in the union 246 and we did not um we we still negotiating with them correct yes what I was looking to do is put him into a management position okay so he to come out of 46 but he would still be entitled and budget can correct me if I'm wrong I he would or Finance I'm sorry would correct me if I'm wrong I because he's serving and has been serving in local 246 if I was to promote him and this went through um at the end of the year he would still be entitled to that increase because he served in that title um for all of the the time they've been negotiating he would I don't know if he would get the entire increase they would know better than me but I'm pretty sure he would have um uh somewhat of a he would he would be entitled to some of that increase if not all when they do settle and if they didn't want to put them in management that's fine too because record's manager title I believe is a local 246 title so just to promote him into that to get him up to where I want to put him and then he would get um the increases that he would be entitled to for being in the union okay um do y'all have anything to add with that Finance with Sydney the 246 because I know we still under negotiation with 246 would that be a problem because sometime I know I run into that you know trying to um increase you know their salaries and then find out that the uh Union contract is still negotiating because they have the same title somebody else have the same title it's like is a a domino effect that they say we have to do so could you give me some clarity on your council president as Sean eled too so if Sydney were to go into management he will still get that increase as due to him in local 246 okay or it will be prated at the time that he was made management okay so he can come out of it but still get a pro rate that is correct and that applies to all union members gotcha council president just want to add that um while Finance can you know we'll make sure that the money is there and the transfer there's that element I think the challeng that you have about the human resource manag titles Union designation management and so on and so forth so a review of titles from the human resource department would be critical I think for a lot of the employ issues that some of the Departments face in regards to transitioning whether they're going to be in management JCS um or 246 or 245 or whatever designation there is thank you record appreciate that um getting back to our operational needs the city clerk's office will need to hire at least one employee for the record Center and two employees in the clerk's office I touched on that earlier um and um um to be honest uh the employee for the record Center I wouldn't want to do that until Sydney gets his increase and his promotion because let's just hypothetically say I get to hire someone first right even if we promote it within somebody from DPW wants shows interest they want to work for Sydney in the records Management Center that person would come in making approximately 425 42,500 Sydney makes 49 how fair is that to Sydney Harris you know I know he needs help but I think we need to help him first before we can assist him with another employee and I'm only trying to be fair that's the way I operate as a as a boss um and he also helps on Election nights every election he volunteers to work he's one of those individuals that I don't have to ask he's a self-starter as well so you're saying with these hires and um you know the requisite salary increase will be able to you know have the 2025 election without any you know will be fully staffed is what you're telling me yes because G for bid if we get a surprise retirement H handed down to us we'll have those two extra employees to be able to step in and then this the more seasoned employees I'll be able to train on depending on who leaves on who retires from from my office because that does take a little time to train um because we're not talking about PE we're talking about people that have been here 40 years or more um that's longer than me that's and I'm I'm the boss so they they um whatever whatever reason that they are continuing to work everybody has their own reasons there's no problem with that it's just you got to prepare for the the possibility of losing one or maybe two individuals at a time where it's critical for our office to be fully staffed okay next the commission minute books from 1913 to 1961 should be completed by the end of the year will continue digitizing the remainder of the governing body's minutes up to 2020 when the city began using I Compass basically what that means is we'll have like I said before we'll have minutes uh resolutions ordinances from 1861 to present eventually on our website would I be able to search through them like through put in keywords or you know do like a whole search see what we've done in the past great question and absolutely yes um not only will you be able to do that but members of the public will be able to do it it's almost like going to a library on our website um that's the intention and my uh goal before I leave and retire from this great city um that's one of my goals is to have all of it digitized all online all accessible to every member of the public and especially the members who work in the administration where it starts from the mayor the council and all of the department directors we'll even give a little tutorial once we're ready to roll it out all out to everybody um last but not least there will be a municipal election in 2025 and I anticipate a Citywide runoff in December of 2025 so a year from now we can be looking at a runoff a Citywide runoff and just think of the temperatures that are outside and as it gets you know the sun the sun goes down the colder it gets it's going to be tough when you have people you're asking voters to come out not once not twice but three times last this past year four times um so it's tough so the amount budgeted must be increased from 160,000 to 800,000 um that is again we don't use it it can be placed somewhere else but I want to I rather anticipate and be safe than sorry and begging later on what's what's the reason behind the low voter turnout in Jersey City is it historically this low like what's your uh expert opinion on this that's a loaded question so I I you know I would have to say I think voter turnout basically stood the same um I know it's kind of low the primary you know what it is I think when you try to ask a voter to come out that many times it's tough because voters get a little frustrated but I don't think think the registered voters realize that there's you know vote by mail you can register the vote by mail for every election every future election I I would you know definitely try to uh encourage voters to do that because if they can't make it to the polls corre and if it's too much you know especially during working hours you're trying to you know get everything done during your work day and you're trying to hit the polls before they close at 800m and you can't make it it's so easy just to fill out that form get it to the Hudson County Clerk and you're good to go for until you don't want to use it anymore so I think that would be helpful to try to increase um voter participation in Municipal elections um not just Municipal but every election but you did see a lot of people come out for the presidential right so everybody wants to vote president and it's unfortunate on us though because we always follow a presidential election that gives us the numbers that's required how many petitions are required to run for mayor council at large and ward council so those numbers always swell and it's uh it's the way to L is it's the forkner act so um I think in 2021 was roughly 1,400 to run Citywide yeah I'm anticipating that number to increase to almost 1,600 so think about it if you're running for governor you need a th signatures to run for mayor of Jersey City you need 1,600 possibly as well run for governor I'm not saying that I'm just I'm just using that as as a hypothetical and an example on how the law is and how the law is written I also think that the state legislators need to take a look at some of these older laws correct especially with the requirement for advertising you know maybe we can set the sample for the rest of the municipalities and that's what I'm hoping for so that little public notice tab that I'm looking to do maybe that's something that uh because I mean to be totally transparent we are transparent we have our entire agenda um publicized every council meeting that that means every member of the public can look at our every um every ordinance every resolution and all the attachments I don't know if every municipality is like that so again I can confirm they're not I've looked for them and I like to brag a little bit because we should be because we're a big mun the second largest municipality in the state and we we should be setting the example and and let people follow our lead um I I think you know what the law says we have to make every effort to notify the members of the public that there's a meeting what's on the meeting and I think we've been doing that and just that the extension of a public notice tab is just another extension of our um way of letting the members of the public know that uh you know what's what's coming up what's on the agenda um what's needs to be what needs to be advertised and I'm talking about like ordinances tax abatements like it's just hypothetical I'm just using that as an example it's hard to summarize a tax abatement so we always advertise those abatements in full so whatever I send the journal will be on that tab where it says Public Notices so it's going to be One-Stop shopping for members of the public if they want to take a look at that instead of having to pay for a subscription to The Star Ledger in order to see The Star Ledger and its entirety and their ads I do want to note the uh arrival of council person preri at 11:02 a.m. it's true I guess we got to start thinking because it seemed like um paper is getting less and less as we go on I seem like that that's what's happened not just here but across the across the country I'm I'm assuming you guys are talking about the Jersey journal and where we're going to be noticing um so forgive me if this question is redundant if it is redundant I'll get the information from after this meeting but has the state made any determination on the changes of not noticing people because I I well first of all is one of the one of the two largest cities in the state we should have a paper of record so like that's that's a whole other issue but some of our noticing requirements are predicated on state law so has there been anything um from the state any sort of directive or anything with regard to to how we can be noticing electronically and in print because we only have I think one print option now which is the reporter correct um so that's it's actually a two-part answer to your question so the state legislators I believe they have something on their um uh in in the in the works where they will allow municipalities to advertise in electronic newspaper like The Star Ledger okay um you weren't here for when I was explaining but I'll Su it up really quick I've I've already anticipated and planned on putting a public notice tab on our homepage which will direct you to our page the city clerk's page and it'll have actual ad that I would send to the Jersey Journal right it'll be One-Stop shopping for members of the public but the state legislators I think it I don't know if it's out of the house or or whatever it is it's on maybe sitting on the governor's desk I it does allow the municipalities to advertise electronically into into newspapers that are only electronic not printed I did find that the HUD I mean the Bergen Record is circulated in Jersey City so the Bergen Record the special leader are going to be our official newspapers for Jersey City until further notice and in order to do that you got to designate them by resolution so I anticipate a resolution on the January 15th meeting because I believe that the um the journal will close on February 1st so any of the second reading ordinances or first reading ordinances from January 15 I want to put them in the Bergen record instead of the Jersey Journal because I don't know if I'll meet I don't know if they're going to meet the deadline for our deadline to have them published published in their newspaper they might and if they do I'll use them up until the very last time we can but we'll transition to the Bergen Record I I'll follow up with you offline on this because I don't want to be later the point and I know we're going into the finance budget hearings but yeah I'm sorry guys I I don't mean to take up your but but did the it's going to be really important how we communicate this out to our residents so I also want to know about the circulation of the Bergen Record and how many people have actually touches in Jersey City and does this mean our residents who would rather get and anyway there's a whole host of questions that are not part of the budget hearing but Sean I'll follow up with you sure or I'll just raise it at the the Caucus meeting when these resolutions come to city council and you can definitely do that um like I said I think that um it that's the only paper that I was able to find that is actually printing still so the council president actually alluded to it right before you know we're coming to an age an era where newspapers are going to be phased out no matter what unfortunately I don't mean anything bad by that comment I like reading newspapers uh I think a lot of other people like reading newspapers but unfortunately there's not enough of us around and everybody likes to use one of these so you know eventually I think everything's become digitized um then it will come back like records did too so we can look forward to that in about five 10 years there you go does any does anybody have any questions with our um we have a copy of an or chart that's there um and a a bunch of uh backup to everything that I went over as far as our contracts that we have um and the increases that I asked for as far as you know overtime is concerned amanii amanii Brown our fiscal officer did a wonderful job with helping me with the budget trans uh presentation and also Tammy um not that I want to speak for her but I think she feels the same way as I do question last question from me I swear okay um are is your office responsible for voter education as well when you're noticing um the voters or and it's in your budget request I believe to do voter education or no that's not something that we do so much I mean you know I think the county does their job with that okay they do it on social media um they do a great job actually I think I think our Hudson County Clerk Junior Maldonado does a wonderful job educating the voters and whatever he does I do share on our website so if there's like if someone wants to know how to fill out a vote by mail application there's directions in a tutorial on our website from the county that is right on a website where a member of the public can just press the button and take a look do we do do we usually defer to them when it comes to that stuff yes because the superintendent of Elections is the keeper of all the registered voters for the county so the municipalities do not keep record of registered voters we get that information strictly from the superintendent's office okay that's all motion to adjourn okay so we have a motion to adjourn for this hearing uh made by SLE is there a second second by council president Waterman all in favor please indicate by saying I any opposed okay we are adjourned at 11:10 a.m. I believe the next group is preparing to make their entry so we will take a brief pause and we will reconvene in five minutes and before before you do I just want to say thank you to council president members of the council everybody present and everybody watching that home um have happy holiday and uh in a couple of days your clerk is going to turn another year older um yeah on Christmas Day and uh be tomorrow I can't believe that um and Tammy and I would just like to thank ammani Brown and um and you know the budget staff and finance for all their hard work and you know uh we need to celebrate the end of the year um it was a tough year but we got through it and um I always say it Teamwork Makes a DreamWork thank you so much e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e okay everyone we're about to get started on our last budget hearing for the year I think nice to be in a seat that I'm normally in all right good morning everyone we are on the record today is Monday the 23rd day of December in the year 2024 this is a budget hearing for the Department of Finance with the Jersey City municipal Council we had a schedule 11: a.m. and the clock on my cell phone is showing 11:19 because I wouldn't stop talking during my budget hearing may we have a roll call for the commencement of this budget hearing I'm just going to call the members that are present you can just say here council person priner here council person SLE here and council president wman we have three council members in attendance at 11:19 a.m. in addition at its time its preparation the notice of this meeting was similarly disseminated on Monday December 16th 2024 at 11:55 a.m. to the mayor Municipal Council business administrative Corporation Council and the local newspapers so I can certify as our total compliance with the Sunshine Law I am going to turn it over to our chairperson for the budget hearing and that's council person Prince right so good morning everyone director if you want to go ahe and give presentations and we'll hold questions till the end good morning so um I'm Carmen gandula I'm the Director of Finance here with me today I have my team members I got some fiscal officers in the audience here looking to review our budget presentation our last presentation of the year um very happy this is down the second year in a row that we've had budget hearings um prely very early in the year so that we can help plan for our FAL and financial planning for the city um I will note for the record this is not a presentation on the actual budget or the city's financials uh that will be next year once we complete our AFS our annual debt statement and have gotten feedback both from the council and any changes from the administrations now that you've heard so that'll be um at a later date oh Danny good morning everyone Danny beot Department of Finance hello I'm Mercedes Drew I'm the community coordinator Finance coordinator with American Vista working under the finance team Rael Tado I'm the purchasing director while Kia Staten acting com controller Trisha Greco collector bivian web grants director okay so the we're going to start with the PowerPoint so the Department of Finance we're going to go through our introductions our results from last year who our team is um what we expect next in 2025 and then we're going to go into the closing and discussion um and questions by area so the department of finances vision statement is to empower excellence in finance through a commitment of high quality performance collaborative success and expertise in driven leadership the Department's mission statement is to foster a culture of continuous Improvement facilitating to success experties and finance celebrating tangible results and embracing new challenges and effectively solving problem our roles and responsibilities um we have various divisions that are responsible in managing the city's finances so you've got om which is the Office of Management and budget you've got collections Treasury and debt management accounts control we have our purchasing procurement area Grant Administration we have um my office our roles are to um Bill and collect invest and manage the city's cash position held in trust allocating available funds and monitoring the city's expenditures and budget process which also includes the capital budget accounting and reporting for all funds and managing the city's debt portfolio and Advising City agencies councel and other stakeholders on certain issues cases and obtaining monitoring and insurance policies so overall we have to manage functional performance close our books which we are in the middle of doing right now and in December comply with regulatory requirements and provide decision for it moving on to last year and what the Department of Finance accomplished so we have for the last two years approximately um have been ongoing with a new Erp software updating a software that's over Financial software that's over probably 25 years to the city uh we're hoping to go live on uh this first quarter of this upcoming 2025 year it was the year of data for us so a lot of my divisions focused on streamlining modernizing some of their Works whether it's creating dashboards or um digitizing things they had never done before um I know Raquel about a year or two ago got rid of her typewriter which was amazing um and so on and so forth so um so those are kind of sort of our financial management updates we've had two years successfully in a row um administering and submitting our audit on time as you know we've um comprised the fiveyear action plan we're announced the schedule the budget hearings we've conducted a second phase pilot review and a deep dive of our pilots and abatements um and we've just continued to work with the Harvard uh Harvard procurement excellent Network and you just met our Vista today who was um if you can recall two years ago we did the policy Grant there was um a hold at the federal level with um hiring the vistas and she's now here and so we'll be able to talk a little bit about that and in your folders you should have um information on uh some of the things that are going to be driving our priorities um other things that we collaborated on in the director's area is community engagement um we're partnering with different universities and fellowships um and creating a finance Fellowship one of the things that actually are starting in January is a Sig Sigma training for finance professionals and we partnered with NGIT to do that so you're really trying to do it this month but with holidays and everything of sort schedule we're going to kick that off um in January so that's something that started last year that's going to go into um into next year moving on to page 9 um some of the things that our CFO was able to accomplish was ensuring accuracy of our reporting maintaining our records better up to-date um and working on our data um our financial database one of the things by updating the new sof software so that we have to make sure that our chart of accounts are updated old accounts that have not been closed the migration of that data and so he's been working hand inand with um it to make sure that we don't have any hiccups when uh we go live at that system next year so um and again roles of the CFO is compliance oversight ensuring our fiscal roles continuing Financial disclosure on obligation of debt issuance on moving on to page 11 of the slide deck accomplishments by area by om um the department collaborated with many departments to stay within budget you'll see in the last couple of years you've had less overe expenditures and less over budget and we've been providing uh more reporting to whether it's the council and the Departments by coordinating with our kind fiscal officers we achieved a lot of our capital projects that were under the mayor's priority om drafted over 2,000 requisitions drafted over 400 resolutions and assisted with over 30 ordinances um we we achieved um in employee opportunities by um hiring seven minority fiscal officers five including females um and then there's various staff in om that have been enrolled in the cmfo course or the qpa classes so we're very encouraging on the employee front um and making sure that our staff is equipped and they're leading and that they're could be uh cross opportunities for within the department moving on to page 12 in the area of collections I am very um excited to say that our tax collector miss wonderful Trish Greco was able to recover $8.7 million in a large scale pilot audit for us and so that's been something that um we saw uh over the years she has maintained a 98% collection um rate she helped settled and L the front of uh a million dollars owed from a settlement agreement and for um another with Glen View Town Homes um for back taxes from 2016 over $300,000 so you know Trish I will have to say I have the best tax left her in this in the state of New Jersey and I'm grateful every day for her and her hard work and I promised that she didn't have to talk so you guys have to ask me the [Laughter] questions she almost didn't come up here she's like I got to go back to work I was like I know Trish I got it um um in operation improvements uh she rectified um from uh 2017 tax lean sale errors we actually had a customer constituent appreciation day that I pushed her to do and so we got we partnered with the health department in cultural Affairs and um we got the Smoothie bike down there so on actual tax day and people came in to raise their taxes we made them smoothies we gave them health awareness we gave them Swag Bags and I think people were really appreciated and really happy that I heard well this is the first time we've have gotten something having to pay our tax and I was down there leading the front saying thank you for coming in and and being a part of it our seniors love the smoothies um because seniors were very proud to come in and pay their taxes and so getting a smoothie getting bags and different things that had you know things from cultural affirs and stuff was a really like good way to lighten the mood because no one really doesn't like to come in and pay taxes but we said Thank you and everyone had a a great time um Excel training for her staff she transitioned um the software to that she uses in for the city on a cloud-based system and one of our employees was able to obtain her tax collector's license and promote to Deputy collectors two other room Ming classes and we had an employee who was approved by civil service to be the manager of abatement special taxes which is something that um he was working out title for quite some time and we're looking to review some salary disparities because it like right fit right job and he too was also part of the success of helping the pilots in abatements um with Trish hand inand um the comproller so um So currently Waka is our acting comproller she's done a wonderful job unfortunately ear this year we had someone a transition that was no longer with us and she came in and she took to to the rain to help modernize and improve our our our accounting area so she developed and enforced policies requiring clearance of any Bank reconciling items older than 60 days she established uh stricter deadlines and project milestones and deliverables she automated our journal entries and reviews for and supported mapping we implemented cash controls for receivables uh encourage culture to promote and proactive um communication among team members and successfully over this year they have processed over 9,000 vouchers um and set a timeline for framework so we saw less and less people saying I need to add something to the council meeting or I need to call the council president if we can add a payment I think you guys heard a lot a lot of less of that it's because of her attributes of managing and making sure that things are coming in um timely and accordingly and working closely with our fiscal officers as well in your handout you're going to see a report of a summary that I had asked her to repair then to look it says it should be the first thing it says financial highlight improvements of 2025 and key accomplishments I felt as though the PowerPoint wasn't enough to tell you what has been been done and I think you know wakia I think if the city historically had reconciliations issues through certain periods I think were current through were current through November and I think that's something that was noted in our audit for years that the reason why we couldn't close our books is because we were waiting for the AFS to be completed because the books weren't closed so we're current through November and that's something that you know we have to applaud to and have to key towards that we've been working um and um working towards on a either weekly bi-weekly kind of sort of basis and so the financial Improvement highlights is specifically to this report on the accounting side of things and what we've been able to to accomplish you I don't know if you want to add anything else good right so moving on to page 14 accomplishes by purch procurement so operational efficiencies the division um at over 400 bids rfps and rfqs from vendors um their audit showed better results in increasing in their compliance standards um they digitized the W9 forms for audits they processed over 6,000 requisition issued 5,000 purchase orders including 550 contractual resolutions and received over 400 bids and proposal from various renders um and I would say that in addition to like operational proficiencies training collaborations as we introduce you today we have our our Vista and in your folder you're going to see some information that we're going to be working on in 2025 as it relates to um some of the procurement Excellence reforms and some of the work that um engaging and collaborating with with vendors stakeholders engagements and so and so forth so I don't know if you want to good okay but she's here and I wanted to you know bring her to the budget hearings as our first budget hearing she will be with us for an entire year so we're excited to do that because I think we all know we've had our challenges in engaging in um diversity spending and supplies but really taking that analysis look forward to the Departments internally and then also coordinating um our some of our data systems and information to be kind of sort of that that support so um um we'll be making presentations and meeting with council members um next year sometime so we can hear from you um um as well um accomplishments by grants by the grants team so they partner with the controller to um close out grants from 2018 through 2022 and F Financial accuracy we worked with Grant right for with the Jersey Fire Department um they had over five years of overdue expenditures reports due to FEMA and so this is something that I know that Vivian worked really really hard because FEMA did come in and say hey you guys hav to the Department of fire department regards to like compliance and expenditures and so a lot of the reports had been in paper hadn't been there there was transition over there and femos almost like not took away the city's funding for that they weren't going to do it and so that was something that we spent a lot of time in curing I will say a lot of that reporting did fall on the federal governments to provide to the city that they failed to do but we got to work we issued a corrective action plan we got it back in good graces and femal was extremely proud of um of what we did and feel comfortable to continues to give us um funding um they've been working on internal Grant Management dashboards they are collaborating on a uh city-wide Grant Training as well and we are currently underway in your folder you should have information on um the project status report on um amplifund um as it relates to we've got two project stat reports in our folder we've got um one with the endmin projects that you'll see and then you'll see the grants kind of sort of um status report with amplifund so we're doing two major kind of sort of Integrations at the same time so we've got both companies kind of s working in with one another so that when we roll out the city's finance software we'll also be running out a grants platform that'll work coincide so because we know grants is a big sub budget of the city so we're kind of sort of excited to do take on some of these statuses so if Edmond um is going to be the reporting tool the amplifund feature is going to be the management tool and um compliance tool and a lot of the solicitations tools that we're going to kind of sort of need and I also say that we're also working in coordination with Community Development by former role because that's another subgrant administrator and also in coordination with HHS who tend have a lot of uh grantis as well right moving on to page 17 is our or chart you get to see our our team and the leadership here and then um subsequently I printed in your folders the actual expanded organizational chart because gets kind of sort of Lost in the PowerPoint and so again the organizational chart can compris of the director's office Grant Administration tax collection management and budget controller Treasury and debt management and purchasing so in 2025 we are looking to request about $7.1 million between salaries and wages among the seven divisions the department has about 70 employees we are asking we have eight funded vacancies eight um unfunded vacancies that we would look to need I will say the Department of Finance is a small Department among the other City departments we a very Mighty and important department so the considerations on supporting all the requests so that we can continue to improve some of the efficiencies and erors that we did not get to uh would be greatly appreciated so therefore we're going to go into our goals and if you support our kind of our funding request and your priori will be able to help accomplish our goals quicker and more efficient and so like I said is you know professional development and employing opportunity the cross departmental training as I noted that we have staff all across the department in taking their certification courses I noted to the Six Sigma training for finance professionals it's going to help spearhead you know the analyses the errors Improvement analysis and decision- making process Maps so a lot of that is going to be taught to the leadership team and in hopes that um they train their staffs and then the following year they will actually work to Su like um certification and different you know Green belts black belts and so on and so forth um the admin launch as I noted in regards to our goals for 2025 um transitioning and training and developing our full-fledged manuals um do goals for the 2025 under budget construction and budget control I think it's to empower our fiscal officers to have more control of the department uh collaborate with the directors identify actual needs under Collections and um enhancements upgrade some of the hardware and software that we've had um Implement um and align duties with our civil service titles I think there's always something to be worked on and the controller's office is to close out 2023 24 25 audit findings and clear out uh the old ones and create templates for the annual financial statements and support getting support from our RMA and CM cmfo designations um in procurement and purchasing is digitizing automating um partial payment vouchers change orders maintain um our audit standing and increasing it um participating again in doing business of Jersey City we're looking to expand that a little bit more um keeping and informing departments on legislation local public and public contracts law um and for the grants Administration is completing the reconcilian grants to date enhanced collaboration to increase um Grant solicitation among the Departments uh digitized workflow and develop Grant sustainable models uh Treasury and debt management we're looking to fully act in compliance with future audits um and strive for to Li outstanding reconcil reconciliation items between treasury debt management and accounting um and resolve any out understanding payroll issues or conversations of of check processing which a lot has been eliminated with the Unicorn system but earlier this year we did have some struggles and some things that we we are looking to help monitorize um and improve so um for 2025 we're going to have the year of mization and finance looking to lead what we end out with the Sigma corer in and training um our CMO is definitely looking to comply and have operation oversight develop deeper Dives with fiscal policy um and then moving on to page 26 our summary our business and department is getting better and good our work is getting done more efficiently expeditiously we're delivering on collaboration and acrossing working across divisions and departments uh we're complying better better with efficiencies in digitizing our our work and we are leaders and we are continue to work and explore areas to improve not only the city internally within its departments but also um externally for the constituents of the city page 27 I have a timeline steps in regards to we've been doing just I think globally overall um as we've kicked off budget um meeting and back in September we've started to conduct our financial analysis now through November and December we've collected our fourth quarter taxes we recently had our tax sill um we've had our budget workshops or budget hearings we're having our Revenue projections and expense review going into January through April we're going to be having a report on the status of the budgets amendments public hearings um budget approval will be dependent on when the local Finance board sorry not local local Finance notice will be issuing dates in regards to when the budgets are due I think that publication just came out uh Sean you sent the email last week about about that um and uh with the with the statutory change of dates and then I would say April through September we're going to kick it off again right budget management implementation midyear reviews end of year assessments the 2026 budget process hearings to be held um and help to improve the transition plan and I think that although I would like to do budget hearings again next December I think people might with the change of administration that may have to change so we probably I'll work on like somewhat of a transition status plan and then probably have budget hearings um next year but knowing that we we'll hopefully have something of a discussion in December and then for the next team and wanting to hear would be for I think it's prudent to have it um next year and hopefully they go back back to the order and structure that I've put into and work so hard to do and having it timely again so with that um I will stop with the PowerPoint and then answer any questions we may have about the Departments about our requests what we submitted in our Excel sheets and um go go from there okay thank you director um I'll open to questions thank you thank you director um you stay that you have like seven vacancies what divisions do you need to um if you look at our order chart we have a vacancy in om we need a fiscal officer an assistant fiscal officer to support in HHS um we currently have um I would say a form position that we had as a fiscal officer in the administration area but we've had um would say Cynthia covering from that area so that's in a requested position although it was a previously funded position in a prior budget year and the division of collections we have a cashier in purchasing we have an assistant vacant buyer in Grants Administration we have a grants um program manager position accounts control we have a position for a chief accountant and I will say as of um in treasuring debt management we have a municipal treasure um that was posted but someone recently just accepted that position and it won't be starting to the new year but as of today's date anything to change if the person doesn't start so I left it in in here as a funded position the treasurer start the first of the year hopefully next year hopefully I mean hopefully next hopefully next year y let me ask you a question is it hard to get um these vacancies full like the time limit that's what I'm concerned about to the timing of the yes I will say that when I draft up a job description or had the discussion about my organizational structure um I had this meeting in July and when I even got my order chart back from the administration there was errors in it and things that I didn't even discussed or I hadn't even seen and so I had go back and propose an email regards to like this is what what what the notes were and so on and so forth and even like for example like we have our acting G controller like it was told to me verbally that she'd be mov from acting she's still in the position was still waiting for a letter from HRA to give us that um I would say my tax collector also struggles in regards to just getting basic answers or just decisions and so ultimately it does make it hard and and does defeat morale when it comes to trying to get certain things done and I understand we're a big city there's a lot of things and I do work in this building so I'm sensitive to the order and the structor um but there's just things that I I think just need to be streamlined and don't need to take as long as they do right because the money is already allotted yes that's why yep get it all right Trish let me ask you a question because you you you're very good with taxes this is just a question because I I get this question from Seniors a lot you know um I don't think it could be done I fig I ask cuz somebody may be watching you know seniors are concerned because of the cost of living has went up so high and a lot of seniors that own homes are on fixed income I know they get um anchor or some type of senior um rebate which is like2 I think $50 or something like that don't hold me to the number but I know this probably has to come from the state but I know you know taxes and you may have an idea I don't know sure so the the the the 250 there's a few programs the 250 um deduction comes off their taxes that is reimbursed to the city from the state the assessor approves those applicants the 250 comes right off their taxes however the income is $10,000 or less not including Social Security so if they get a pension that exceeds 10,000 they don't qualify now the other program is the senior free the senior freeze is also through the state of New Jersey they have to apply and they have to continually apply every year what that means is their first year they apply that becomes their base year every year after every time the tax changes they get a refund check from the state of New Jersey each year so you know is it based on their income or what is the B their income as well pretty high believe it's in the 90s okay what they received back the no the income their income has to be 990,000 okay can't be more like if their income is 200,000 they're not qualifying what they get back is the difference in taxes from year to year so their base year can be 2020 their base year means the year they applied when they were 65 fast forward 3 years later their taxes are now now $5,000 more they will get the $5,000 difference from the base year to the current year from the state of New Jersey some of them can exceed 5,000 $6,000 okay it's it's it's just becoming challenging for them I I understand it but it's like when you on a fixed income as a senior because a fixed income means your income is not increasing so I I belong to the TCT NJ organization and um I just had a meeting like last week and we were told that the state is willing to come out um to do seminars for the local communities I'll send you that information I appreciate it but um let me ask you a question let me ask you another question because I'm asking you questions because I get this from Seniors some of them feel like because they do not have children in school and they are past the bearing age of children why is it that they have to pay school taxes I I don't you know I don't know if you have an answer I don't know because you go to all these tax meetings you may somebody may ask that question y May came up with an answer that's why I'm just asking no no no you don't have no answer for that one okay oh because they do ask that question you know and I understand the point though you know and I wonder how much how much do we as a city receive from Seniors through taxes I wonder do we we don't have um any um numbers on that no we we would only have the ones that qualify for the 250 and that would be in the tax collector uh the tax assessors duplicate gotcha because it would be interesting to know are how many seniors are we receiving money from you know maybe it's something that you know we could really advocate for for seniors if the number is not that high because I know government once they get your tax dollars they don't want to give it back but I'm trying to think of ways CU I could I could imagine the struggle especially for them that's on fixed income and and it seemed like uh it seemed like we don't help the seniors like you know they give all their lives and their work and now they get to the age where they just want to retire and then as soon as they retire then the taxes constantly go up but their income stays there and it's like we we're not rewarding them for contributing to the development of this country for decades that that's why you know and and I hear is the best it's the best because you're freezing the taxes you get everything you you have to pay it up front unfortunately and then you get it back you still have to pay it up front though yes and then you get it back correct and is it a long turnaround time and is it frustrating to fill out that form so unfortunately as you get older you forget things and when they get the form from the state some of them forget to bring it to our office to fill out and send it to the state that's what I'm me I appreciate it so then to ask the same question a slightly different way just on the record um if the seni if if something is mailed to one of our seniors and they come in to pay their taxes and they speak to your office there's somebody there that will help them walk through the process of filling out the senior freeze form so we F we have a specific form that the tax office has to fill out we help them with that we don't help them fill out the other part okay that's that's where I just wanted a little bit of clarity but I think it's great if the state is willing to do the workshops that we do to help our seniors I think that coming from the direct agency that does this eliminates a lot of questions that we have to take and then forward to somebody at the state level and then bring it back to them and things almost always something gets Lost in Translation there so that's that's great please do keep us posted on I will I'll send you all the information that would be great thank you um and then I do have a question I think it's great that you were able to um find like do the audit of the pilots and bring money city um so what does your office have in place to to make sure that annually we're not losing funding that way because we that's so I can tell you that Ernest bour he was promoted to manager of a baat and special taxes back in 2016 when the prior collector left three people followed her and Ernest was the only person left in a Pilots this is very dear to my heart I'm sorry um he was the only one left and he didn't have any support so when I came on board Donna Daniels who is now also a certified collector she's on the the org chart for a promotion as well we built a team together it's the three of us that work on the pilots and we're doing annual financial statements every year collecting all the money that they owe us for the back tack ta as well thank you job thank you great job to you and your entire team for the truth for getting that back on track thank you Trish let me ask you about the payroll tax how are we coming along with that I know that's discussion throughout the whole city with this payroll tax are we collecting it um as we should so the payroll tax is not like regular taxes don't build them right they have to go online and file we have no control of what they file I can tell you the CFO did a mailing and it did produce a substantial amount of additional payroll money for a few years okay but we don't enforce it we just collect it that's um the division of audit and a CFO I think are working on that okay I appreciate that I appreciate that thank you Trish appreciate it um let me purchasing hello there hello you know um I know you have a challenging position um especially when it come to diversity and inclusion because this is something that um I've been advocating for ever since I took office and I know the importancy of it because I know some businesses have complained that they don't get City contracts they don't you know get anything from the city so I just want to update for the record so the people that's watching can know exactly where are we with that because it's important that they know that they can apply you know they can always when we go out for bid you know let them know that process and um if there's any um obstacles you have in let me know that let councilwoman Prince AR know that I've been working with ODI for quite some time and we just had a workshop in November uh Jersey City wants to do business with you we had a pretty good turnout as compared to earlier in the year because we do it twice a year and now that we have our Vista it's going to help us with those obstacles that we have right now she's going to uh right now she's doing all the research MH we've given her the study she's going to collect the data we're going to do an Outreach to uh vendors local vendors and ask them what their challenges are so that we can understand their point of view but the workshop we just had in November it was very informative for them I just give them procedures purchasing wise and then Mr Dr Jeter does uh his portion in regards to uh what we buy what do they have because it doesn't make sense to get diverse vendors if we don't need their product so we have a list but do we actually buy their product so we're working on that right now so between ODI our Vista and myself 2025 I'm only going to say positive things I'm not going to say anything negative going to there's no if we are going to make this better and I would I would just add if um in your folders We have like the how-to guide that we're going to be following um from the Harvard procurement excellent Network so it's serving your vendor and Community to assess satisfaction identifying pain points because it's not just a jur city issue it's a national issue I remember two years there was over like 50 like cities with us or 35 to 40 cities very interesting and then getting in focus and using your stakeholder Focus improving your procurement process is I think that we've done good in okay identifying the issue you know creating the list but I do think when I created the in coher with Ruckel the Vista position in the community Finance coordinator often time businesses are too busy to even want to participate and so we kind of sort of have to take the approach of okay we're going to do the data identify what the the needs are but also being that relationship management piece of helping businesses to actually want to do business with jury City so how do we create toolkits and how do we create things that'll simplify the process for them that I think we haven't looked because we we work in very government text language and we all know even whether to put an RP together or to solicit things if he these forms it gets complicated and so you know our V is going to help us like say hey these are what some other cities and areas are doing so that we can have that constant piece of of Engagement and that we I think internally to the Departments that we're finding vendors that they can actually use and saying we just need to get this through get this through and I think another thing that I did not highlight in our department review is that I had om and purchasing with the help of under in the back actually create a um purchasing procurement OMB kind of sort of solicitation form and put a mapping in a schedule to understand when they're going to buy next year how they're going to buy and what they needed versus just getting hey we're going to get this dequest from the Department um to do an is an RFP and then it takes them 3 six months to do something and now it's out the window so we're going to measure it by quarters and and other intervals so that I think it's streamlined from om and purchasing and then working on the diversity inclusion and person power that I think that we relatively need yeah do do you do you think that we um could train uh or have a class with the directors or whoever orders from each department I I think part of the breakdown is that um with some of these departments because they just used to ordering from a certain you know uh Merchant or vend or vendor um they just do it you know what I'm saying it's it's a habit so is there a way that you know we can start you know having classes with them to let them know um before you purchase you know here is a list that you should look on um to um see if there's someone on the list that we can use like if you need um if we need a a whole lot of um I'm just saying salt because we in the winter season okay if we need salt and let's say we just used to getting salt from one um company okay can we break it down to two or three depends especially um if it's a small uh minority business I think sometime what happens is because we said we want to help the small business now realize when we say we want to help the small business they make canot meet the quality the quantity that we need but they can meet something okay so now if the director in that department or whoever is assigned to it because I don't know how the directors do their ordering whoever's assigned to it will start thinking okay I'm so used to you know ordering let's just say um thousands of salt from this company here and now because um we want to thrive on being diverse and inclusive cuz you know that's what we thrive on in this city we're the most diverse city in the country because we thrive on that uh maybe we could say okay let's break it down and see if we can help the small business in some way whereas okay we know he can give us a thousand but because we want to help a small business let's see if we can partner with them to get 500 from him you know that's what I'm saying and I think the directors or whoever they assign to the purchasing Depart of their you know of their Department should have that mindset it's behavior that we're trying to change here if if I keep seeing certain um certain companies keep coming back to us to vote after a while you just say we really ain't doing anything you know we are going out our way I know in our office we always always make sure the girl looks on the list to see if there's a diverse you know company out there because um we got to put our money where our mouth is that's all I'm saying and I think we need to be trained inhouse it's not so much of the small guy cuz once you tell the small guy how this goes a lot of times they'll call they'll they'll ask but if we already ordered a merchandise because we creatures of habit from some other company we can't we can't really order because we done we done put it in it done pass and that's where the money going yep absolutely we do the training we've um if talk to our about how do we do on going training because ultimately when you take the team out of it you know or TR in the trainer do we solicit out um vendors but we do know them crafting stakeholder engagement or we're going to do your stakeholder the Departments are stakeholders the community are stakeholders so a lot of that kind of undertaking and I think part of this you know exercise and working with the bu is like what are going to be the needs the ongoing needs to me you're exactly what you're saying President we are the most diverse City so looking to hire staff or is it a company that's going to reflect the services needed to provide that and so um you're spot on on on your assessment and your request and what we're going to be gearing up to do in 2025 yeah and we currently enforce the Ba's policy uh on those purchases that you don't see because you only see those high right but in my office we make sure that there's at least two diverse on anything from a dollar to $17 ,000 we do that now that's good yes just want to work on bigger contracts yeah I get you I'm with you that um my question for for some of these larger contracts larger rfps is sage still the only way that the city communicates that out or are there other avenues if people can learn about them if the state communicates on what Sage Sage Sage what Sage are you talking about bidsync or the or well I would have called it stage but it's bsnc yeah sorry iiz change names again okay that's how I learned it this so anyway so bsync yes yes um it's not just bidsync we had the newspapers we had Star Ledger and the Jersey Journal which now we're working on we're going to resolve back down the road I'm going to call ber and record today what you say um we also posted on the city's website on our purchasing page oh great so we are three ways that we put it out there on top of ODI doing their Outreach when I send them the advertisement to Odi and then they can do their Outreach as well you know what I think is important key when it come to like small businesses is the EDC and I keep saying this and nobody just listening to me I don't know why okay because I because the EDC is is a component from the city that deals with small business business now to me they should have a small business directory I've been asking them for that for a while the reason why because if they have a small business directory when there are bids we can just send it to them and they can send it out also to their directory okay which is really important because um they do a lot of business with small business and I think that is a arm for us as a city I don't think we utilize them as much as we should and I keep saying that because I meet with a lot of small businesses and I'm like well we have the EDC you know you can reach out to them you know you can get help from them um so I think that's what we have to start incorporating more is the EDC okay part of you know getting the information out there the challenge with the city and I see it when we are spread out like this we forget that we really are connected you know we are connected we can't run this city you know just one Department doing whatever we have to connect to one another especially if we want to be you know uh good stewards to um the residents of the city of Jersey City and to me we say that every time we do a ribbon cutting we go to ribbon cuting and we always you know encourage them saying small business is the backbone of the economy but I just don't think the city at this point is business is small business friendly yet I think we need to get there I don't think we're there there yet uh like I even like I said a small business seminar all that's important I said that and um I think there's more work to be done there and I think that is an arm for us to start reaching out to um because they do come in contact with a lot of small things I agree yes you know that's just my five cents we can thank you thank you I appreciate it thank you I appreciate it any other questions no grants I know um grants is such a key portion of the city of Jersey City because it fills in um fills in what a city cannot that's the bottom line all right and I know what a city do side we are not where we should be as a grant department I know you're the only one person did they give you any help yet or you just still floating in there by yourself yes we have two staff members that came on last year um basically um we're working to add at least three more people to our staff so that we can spread out more over the city um we have George quinellas and Kimberly Diaz so George does the Closeouts and Kimberly does the grant setups right now and we contract with Millennium too for Grants right we still have Millennium up until May of 2025 um we're currently under we're doing the RFP right now which is going to open on the 27th of December um that's for coordination and application and so they're going that right now Grant right has that contract but then because of we we didn't know we didn't anticipate the amount of closeouts that we had to do so they actually absorbed the entire contract within six months so we had to go out for New RFP or coordination application when you say close out explain to the audience what that what that entails so um up until probably this year when the grant period ends um we were just basically leaving everything there as and walking away from it leaving money we was leaving money right not so much leaving money okay so um most of our grants at least 95% of our grants are reimbursable okay so what happens is the city just a little insight is when we receive an award letter the city basically lends the grant department or the division that amount of money then it's for the Department to go out and spend and then they submit an expenditure report and then they will then send that to the grantor and then they would send them the money back so if they'll send that money back to this whatever was spent send that back to the city so then what happens at the end if the gror gave us a a grant for $1 million and we only asked them for $500,000 and return because that's the amount we spent on that particular Grant we we were walking away and leaving 500,000 just floating in the city's budget where that money could have been it was just like a loan that we loan to ourselves but we can't touch because it's restricted so now what we're doing at the end of each Grant period is we're going in and having them cancel out those grants to relieve the city's money so it looks like we're leaving money on the table no we're not leaving money on the table we've gotten the money back from The Grand Tour we've completed the projects from The Grand Tour now this was just some of the grants are up to and that was the the portion from what we our project to the maximum amount that this grant would give us and that was one of that's one of our biggest issues let me ask you something okay now let's say you said um we had a grant for a million okay and the city um spend 500,000 right so out there is another 500,000 so about the time that Grant comes in don't we know we got another 500,000 there so why are we waiting so late to close out well most of the time that other 500 we may not be able to spend sometimes is because take for summer Foods Sumer Foods they will give us like almost a million dollars we don't have the participation for them to spend the million dollars or the kids don't come out or you know they have different Avenues where they just it it it's just not there so that it's just like an up to number it's not you know is how much you can spend up to not necessarily you know you have to spend the full million dollars so what are we closing out we're closing out a a number of Grants um so when we close out when we close out we not losing the money no carrying it over to the next year money so you're try to simplify it's it's looking at your schedules right you got grants receivable and your grants payable right and then you have to think about the compliance of each Grant Citywide and then you have to measure like like the fiscal years versus the calendar years and so I think with the creation of the Department of Finance a few years ago bringing vigan over to streamline that and then when I came over to actually have a division we really had to start looking at what the city was and wasn't doing right and being like the former community development director and and Viv working in HHS in Grants like their their own fiscal subset rules right if a department told the that former controller oh keep this open because you know we're still getting in money they're thinking from an administrative rule not a fiscal rule so for the team here we had to go back to the department and say you haven't closed out your grants and they're like yes we did and I did all the reporting you did the administrative part the financial management pieces of Grant reporting and administration was not completed so what Vivian is explaining here is that we didn't leave money on the table because the city every year we have to appropriate what's in the budget for the grants it's about just kind of sort of clearing up end of year closing out your books the same thing you're going to kind of do for your yearly taxes and so on and so forth so that your financial management and your compliance management and your fiscal management and your project management all stands in line so that we were doing some areas not all areas and so when it seems like you know she's closing out from 16 17 20 2022 we can't speak on the past because a lot of us weren't here right but working closely with you know some of the accomplishers I noted in Our Deck with our controller and our teams we've been able to kind of sort of like put the pillars in place where the city may have done some areas but they didn't do the finance pieces and that's what Viv has been working on with her team and that we're hoping this year to add more staff to start working on increasing you know applications but we were very invested when creating us this division is the compliance cleanup I could not dump okay you know they go start getting more grants with the Grants Department when the back end of our books were still not kind of sort of there and so we we worked with like I saidan what what millennium does uh do they search for our grants or what CU I'm trying to see now because I know you said you need more help millennian contract you telling me he's up in six months so I'm trying to figure out is it worth renewing their contract or just put the people in the grant department have them search or what that that's what I'm trying to see like who searched the grants do the directors because then I hear some directors complain that they don't have time enough to search for Grants so I'm just trying to figure all this out and I mean ultimately the we we thought the same thing we were we issued an RFB last year we knew that we needed coordination and compliance and application we issued the RFB the as you know the the the matter was renewed right you had the vendor here come speak on the record and you guys had in decision to make on whether or not to extend the contract I think the Department of Finance would have been fine either way on your decision because we were looking to make you know substantial changes with the grant Administration historically it's been decentralized versus the centralization efforts so I do think yes the Departments do need help in coordinating grants because grants are a different like um management piece um but we're scaling up within the requested budget like if want to have you know two to three more people this year um I would coordinate these things and I think as we get the RFP results back we'll kind of sort of determine where the costs are going to lie and what would be fair and Equitable when we go to kind s to adopt the budget um okay um let me ask another question I see you say you conducted Citywide two-day Grand training classes was that to the staff was that to the public you know oh that was last year that was with um Community Development and it was open to all fiscal officers where they came in and they sat with they got understanding of Community Development um grants and all government grants so that was last year so wasn't to the public it was to Community Development and just the um offices just the city I mean just employees yes okay there's no class for the public so in the current RFP we did write in a request for nonprofits for the next um Grant consultant to deal strictly with nonprofits when it comes to startup grants um continuing funding and research because we do know that you've expressed and um a number of departments have expressed that um nonprofits don't have an Avenue to get grant funding so that is a part of the RFP that is currently going out in two days okay so next year we should have some type of class to the public to understand grants yes we can have the whoever that winner of the RFP can have a class and we can invite in any nonprofit yes okay now you said the winner of the RFP what will there be what would the responsibility be to the winner they would be responsible for helping them research grants and understanding grants they won't help them manage they would be own with the management but they will do the research for them okay so they will help them research yes whoever is the winner of the RFP yes and I also say and I have had our discussion in regards to whether that position of a community grants coordinator is you know um something that we the division will have as we're working internally with the department but also understand that there are like she said like nonprofits and other organizations or other people that need kind of sort of Grants so I think we're still exploring uh that aspect because we do understand that like similar to the procurement work there is a relationship management piece again being the formal community development director it's constant ta work constant assistance it's constant it's like even when we worked with some of the SIDS and trying to do the grants collaboration it seems to be like a foreign concept um and a lot of the paperwork and compliance and whether that's a a a oneperson team to do or are we putting this off to a vendor to see like what is the analysis and and the piece of what it's going to entail but we understand that grants and grants for the community is something and part of kind of sort of like goals and agenda items for for the division so th those workshops would be in addition to what Community Development has been doing yeah so it would be additive right yeah it would be additive because Community Development is all HUD based Federal and part of HHS um this would be more Global where it could include um Federal it coulde private it institutional like different types of you know uh grants that are out there right it's it's it's know I I understand it's a whole separate world and that's why I think it's great that this is part of the RFP but I think also how we communicate that out to nonprofits so they especially for smaller ones that are getting ready or trying to scale like it is it's really challenging altogether I won't yeah I think that I think it's it's a good thing that they're going to do but I also want to make sure that it's as it's communicated out is this going to be a way for them to participate with the city when we're looking for Community Partners like how we have done with the healthier JC grants things like that so well I will say that with our new software that we're getting with amplifund it does have a Search tool it's a little bit more easier and compatible to use oftentimes like for instance having worked with the vendor Millennium like they do the grant research for us so having that tool um in our own database and system will make the conversation easier guided with the Departments versus going on like grants.gov been looking through thousands and thousands of Grants or going on the State website and looking through some of their resources they do have a page of office and grants and fellowship and so on and so forth but again it's just a listing with a cover page of a web page that's not streamlined um to understand the needs of the pr so we are looking at that thanks anything else for Grants appreciate you thank you no I appreciate you Ladi you're doing a terrific job thank you director for putting us on that fiveyear plan I think we headed in the right direction um so often people don't understand the state that we really was in financially um but we are on target thank you thanks for your leadership thank you ladies all that I know it's going to get better thank you thank you ladies thank you thank you Danny thank you great job that can I have a motion to adjourn at 12:22 PM motion made by council person priner may I have a second second second by council president Waterman all in favor of the motion to adjourn at 12:22 p.m. council members present by acclamation please say I we are out of here at 12 1222 p.m. thank you so much everyone in attendance and everyone watching at home remember as I always say teamwork makes the DreamWork happy holidays everybody stay safe and have a great great holiday season