Minutes August 17-18, 2005
Minutes of the Annual Planning Retreat of the City Council
August 17,2005
Civic Center Community Room- 2:00 p.m.
Council Pre-Discussion
Discussion of Council Procedures
Planning Staff preparation
Annexation
Residential/Offices
Topics for Discussion
Consider P&Z appointments as training for further community leadership roles
Mayor Responsibilities
The primary external contact for the City
All Council Members should work on selling the City
Evaluation of key staff operational procedures (Council requests for assistance must go through
at least an ACM. Cannot deal directly with staff members)
Retreat Discussion
Items from the exercise completed in February 2005 were discussed. Those items evaluated the
progress of the retreat items from last summer.
Item I: Council Governing and Control Algorithm
. Citizen input - Improvements had been made but there was still more to do. (Examples
Planning Quarterly Review, Tree Ordinance).
. Citizens needed to understand rationale of decisions.
. Would like updates on pending issues and how they were moving (examples: Code
Enforcement complaints, Talliferro Street) on a monthly basis.
. Feeling that items are "disappearing" from the radar screen.
. Brief discussion held on the possibility of a CRM system or other procedure to track such
items and report back to Council.
. Close the loop on citizen feedback. Need to track these inputs, newspaper, telephone,
phone, etc. and make sure some sort of response was accomplished.
Item II: Council Operating Procedures
. Council meetings improved 100% with citizen report changes.
. Desire improvements to the Yard of the Month Award. (Would like Keep Denton
Beautiful to ask for RSVP then attend the meeting in person to confirm that winners were
present for presentation by the Mayor, possibly seat them together.)
. All evaluation items would be graded higher if survey done today.
. Like the 2nd Tuesday sessions and the way they worked.
Item III: City Departments
. Reliable feedback from development community on new Development Review process -
may still be 2-3 years away in finalizing.
. Staff has heard Council direction and was "on board" (Director and Consultants); they
"get it" and improvements were showing.
. Staff will continue to count on Council for feedback and help with the bumps left in the
transition.
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August 17-18,2005
Page 2
. Agreed that a great deal of the "fat" was gone from the City fiscal/operations viewpoint.
. Police vehicle issue still not settled. Want more feedback on traffic enforcement.
. Staff still looking at question of adequate staffing and officer ratios, many standards to
consider.
. Council concerned that things were still tentative after consultant, and things should be
more squared away; Council was ready to "have an answer". Would prefer outcomes
sooner rather than later.
. Would like a report with numbers that show patterns like crime rate, areas of greatest
criminal activity, etc. and have a presentation on the findings.
. Council still committed to strengthening the police efforts.
. Public Safety is still a # 1 priority to Council.
. Acknowledged that the current system, state law, was preventing success of diversity
efforts.
. Look at changes to certified hiring and other creative measures, such as Explorer program
(in the Fire Department).
. The effect of "meet and confer" may playa role in hiring and diversity for civil service.
Item IV: Planning and Development for the City
. Have to balance future thinking with involvement in private ventures.
. Some risk was involved (land purchases, involvement in development).
. Suffered for not being proactive in the past, time to "get moving."
. Key up topics for an Executive Session to gage Council's comfort level so staff can move
forward.
. Bring catalog of Downtown properties for Council, all approximates, while waiting for
Rutherford's recommendation in the next 60 days.
Topics from the Agenda:
1. Council Operating Procedures
All of the items listed on the agenda were important as well as consideration of defining the
Mayor's current responsibilities and how to maintain Mayor Brock's relationships with existing
supportative publics. Attracting younger Council members should be considered when
appointing Board and Commission members
. Council would like routine items to be "routinized" so that things will move better and
Council can be proactive on future oriented issues.
. Need to plug into the Chamber and Leadership Denton for good candidates. Council pay
is not necessarily a solution for increasing the pool of Council candidates.
. Council was satisfied with the meeting structure. Approved of shorter staff presentations
and an expectation that Council had read the back up.
. Agenda committee was open to suggestions from the other Council Members
. Appreciate Council Assistant's calls on Tuesday morning about the consent agenda. Will
begin to tell staff if they plan to bring up an item from Consent for specific publicity
reasons in advance.
. Pleased with work session procedures.
. Liked the flow of information requests. Not trying to play "got-cha" during meetings.
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August 17-18,2005
Page 3
. Refer accepts and regrets to Council Assistant so she can track Council's participation in
events. Assistant will continue to coordinate Council activities and work to make sure
some Council representation has been arranged for important events.
. Appreciated the ability to have more open discussion when possible (legal aspects).
. Legal can provide written opinions if they were willing to have a short recess before
going into an unplanned Closed Session.
. Budget Process was much better this year. Like increased City Manager and staff
involvement. Appreciated detailed efforts to better explain the proposal.
Adjourned for the day at 6: 15 p.m.
Minutes of the Annual Planning Retreat of the City Council
August 18, 2005
Civic Center Community Room- 9:15 a.m.
Topics from the Agenda:
1. Council Operating Procedures
Travel
. Council Members will share information from seminars and official attendance at
other meetings in informal sessions (luncheons suggested).
. Council was interested in setting employee travel/training targets as a percentage
of each departmental personnel budget to keep from being either too high or too
low.
2. Planning and Development
Multi-family Issues
. Multi-family and single-family residential rental inspections were still on the
table. Needed to consider voluntary registration/inspection program for rental
property.
. Requested a session to revisit the remainder of the Code Enforcement changes
drafted by staff.
. Have a session about what was worth putting resources towards. Council will go
through Community Aesthetics white paper and look for unresolved issues they'd
like to work on prior to a Code Enforcement Session.
. Consider issues of substandard housing with attention to single family rental
property in established neighborhoods. Consider property owners mistreatment of
renters (students). Balance public safety with rights of owners.
. Be thoughtful about how to proceed. Enlist the help of the rental property
industry.
. Changes were needed to stop negative effects on economic development in
Denton.
. Code Enforcement staff currently doing proactive neighborhood patrols when
they received a directed complaint. KDB/CE/Building Inspections working on
efficiencies.
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August 17-18,2005
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. Council was willing to use additional resources for these efforts. Consider
possibility of redirecting efficiency study funding to assist with these efforts.
Possible tax support in next fiscal year.
. Have to weigh the "cost of doing" with the "cost of doing nothing."
. Would like to move forward with drafts already presented on code enforcement
issues and fill in any holes on code enforcement in the near term. Longer term
consideration then presentation of an inspection and/or registration type of
ordinance/program, and consider use of international property maintenance code
applied to Denton using the stakeholders group during the process.
Economic Development Issues
. North Denton- it was coming and there will be more when University Drive was
done.
. Council/Staff to be proactive about influencing the location of the connector to
tollway route to benefit Denton.
. Continue working on Western Blvd. Anticipated completion 2 years.
. Council was ready to reconsider possible amendments needed to the
Comprehensive plan, especially in relation to north and west Denton; Staff
initiated though Planning and Zoning.
. Need further consideration of annexation, land use and utility issues for control in
the future.
. Council willing to support use of contract help to craft well analyzed annexation
plan.
. Council would consider peer meetings with other elected officials who have
participated in contentious annexations in other communities.
. Continue working on Loop 288 West and encourage quality not just reactive
development.
Downtown Proj ects
. Downtown Taskforce still working on a strategy to make Rutherford's
recommendations into an action plan.
. Synergy around Wells Fargo.
. City participation will be necessary at some level. May work to get properties
ready. Consider use of gas well revenue for non-ongoing expenditures to get
action plan started.
. City role in making specific deals, Council role in considering creative revenue
policies in the near-term. Must have a big vision for the long-term.
. Economic Development Partnership Board and Downtown Taskforce
recommendations will be coming with considerations for future funding if
resources can be identified for the near term.
Economic Development Drivers
. Need an arts master plan for the community, when the new GDAC Executive
Director was in place (including consideration of a fashion museum, Texas artist
museum, facilities inventory/needed, long-range goals and dreams, organizations
inventory/needed. )
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August 17-18,2005
Page 5
. Possibility of creating an advisory committee to the Council on public art through
the Parks and Recreation Department.
3. City Departments
. Council recognized dramatic changes and reorganization for efficiencies.
. Continue with efficiency and operations in the Development Review Process
using a modified private sector model, and giving Planning the needed resources
to build a cadre of established folks with great development service skills.
. Need to work on flexibility. Council willing to allow staff to give administrative
relief as long as it's not circumventing the public process.
. Discussion about which group was most appropriate to review items associated
with streets, the Mobility Committee, PUB, or Council approval only. While
further discussion was desired, in the interim, use the Mobility Committee as
needed.
. Mobility Committee should establish a scheduled meeting time on a monthly
basis.
. Outstanding utility, drainage and wastewater issues seem to have been dealt with
in the budget process.
. Diversity plans seem to be effective in most workplaces. Area most at risk for
criticism is in the Asian community.
. Council to help staff with customer service by passing on name and contact
information of concerned citizens.
4. Service to Citizens
Roads
. Real solutions are going to require significant political will and funding.
. From a long-range view there wasn't a plan either to maintain or to improve.
. CIP will help as more value can be received from match money.
. Taxes would require a $0.25 increase for the $10 million deficit needed for
streets.
. 2.5 cents will get $1 million a year.
. ELAP funding will continue for a while.
. Reminder that we are behind 10 years in maintenance and capital improvements
to streets.
. Issue needs to be addressed or it will "come back to haunt us."
. In the interim, take a hard look at design criteria to new streets; may go a long
way in providing relief. Will bring recommendations to Council and the
development community.
Other Issues
. Need to encourage more citizens to vote, but don't know what process will
accomplish this issue.
. For public forums, consider going to other organization's established meetings
rather than Council hosting their own separate community meetings.
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August 17-18,2005
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5. Environmental Concerns
. Pleased with the green aspects of Fire Station #7. Would like to see good
publicity done on this.
. Consider stopping garbage bag distribution with the transition to cart refuse
serVIce.
6. Would like to have a mini-retreat to revisit these conversations after the first of the calendar
year.
With no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 2:30 p.m.
EULINE BROCK
MAYOR
CITY OF DENTON, TEXAS
PAM RAMBO-ESTILL
ASSISTANT TO THE CITY MANAGER
CITY OF DENTON, TEXAS