February 8, 2011 MinutesCITY OF DENTON CITY COUNCIL MINUTES
February 8, 2011
After determining that a quorum was present, the City Council convened in an Annual Planning
Session on Tuesday, February 8, 2011, at 9:00 a.m. in the Facilities Management Department
Training Room at 869 S. Woodrow Lane.
PRESENT: Council Member Gregory, Council Member Engelbrecht, Mayor Burroughs, and
Council Member Watts.
ABSENT: Mayor Pro Tem Kamp, Council Member Heggins and Council Member King.
1. The Council received a report, held a discussion, and gave staff direction regarding the
development of a draft city-wide strategic plan including, but not limited to, the
following:
a. The Pavement Management System Report and its impact on the strategic plan
b. Council's objective of developing community leadership through boards and
commissions
City Manager Campbell stated that the strategic plan was a project staff had been working on
with Council and the Leadership Team for over two years. He hoped the information presented
was consistent with the objectives formulated by Council in 2009.
Bryan Langley, Chief Financial Officer, presented the Strategic Plan Update.
Overview and Purpose - Discuss the goal of the strategic planning process; review the history of
the city of Denton's strategic planning process; discuss vision, mission and value statements;
provide an overview of the key focus areas, goals and objectives; and review next steps.
What was a Strategic Plan and Why Now? A strategic plan was an action-oriented roadmap to
achieve a vision. It defined who the City was, where the City wanted to go, and how to plan to
get there. A strategic plan was needed to sharpen the focus of the City and enhance the resource
allocation process. It was long-term in nature, should be a fundamental tool to prepare and
monitor budgets with some goals and objectives that later might need to be re-evaluated.
Council Member King joined the meeting.
Goal of the Strategic Plan - Provide a "high level" overview of key policy goals with more
specific detail for objectives developed in departmental plans. It ensured policy and
administrative decision-making based on a proactive approach. It created stability for the
community and organization. A strategic plan incorporated citizen feedback and communicated
a desired service level to citizens and employees alike. It linked organizational direction to the
City's established vision, mission, and values.
Langley reviewed the Strategic Plan timeline which included the citizen survey, a Leadership
Team retreat, City Council Planning Session and Leadership Team strategic planning meetings.
He reviewed the vision statement, mission statement and values statement.
Council discussed the time frame for citizen surveys which were done every couple of years.
Langley stated that one was due in the next year or so. He reviewed the Leadership Team draft
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February 8, 2011
Page 2
Strategic Plan that included areas of community of choice, sustainability, community governance
and management principles.
Where are we now? - The Strategic Planning Steering Committee created a draft strategic plan,
utilizing Council reports and the Leadership Team's planning document. The draft strategic plan
introduced key focus areas, goals, and objectives to assist in the prioritization of resource
allocation.
Key Focus Areas - included organizational excellence; public infrastructure; sustainable
economic development and environmental stewardship; safe, livable and family friendly
community; and partnerships and regional leadership.
Langley reviewed and Council discussed the Key Focus Areas and the goals for each of the
areas. Mayor Burroughs stated that the goals of the key focus areas were how to implement the
key focus areas and determine if the process was working. Getting feedback and the quality of
feedback would be important to determine if the process was working.
Langley replied that the key was to have good performance measures and good performance
management based on the information.
Council Member Gregory stated that it would be important to pay attention to perceptions of the
citizens.
Council discussed the various key focus areas, goals and objectives and made suggestions for
wording changes and additions. Individual tasks would be included under each objective as the
process progressed.
Mayor Pro Tem Kamp arrived at the meeting.
Next steps for the process included incorporating the Council feedback and distribute a final plan
to city staff, utilizing the strategic plan in the FY 2011-12 budget process; and developing
performance measures and a scorecard for the next fiscal year.
a. The Pavement Management System Report and its impact on the strategic plan
Howard Martin, Assistant City Manager, presented details on Key Focus Area 2: Public
infrastructure and objectives associated with that key area. An objective to the goal of
improving the quality of city roadways was to manage city street funding based on the overall
condition index.
Council discussed the wording for the various key focus areas, goals and objectives and made
suggestions for wording changes and additions.
Martin reviewed the pavement condition score in terms of cost per square foot. He indicated the
lower the score for the pavement, the more cost that was involved. A five-year transition to the
proposed $10 million funding for street maintenance was discussed.
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Council discussed funding issues associated with street maintenance and any upcoming CIP
bond issues and elections. Suggestions from city staff and boards and commissions on the needs
for CIP bond projects would be helpful in formulating any future bond programs.
b. Council's objective of developing community leadership through boards and
commissions
This item was not discussed.
Item 44 was discussed.
4. Receive a report and hold a discussion regarding a ten year review of The Denton
Plan/Mobility Plan.
Fred Greene, Assistant City Manager, presented an update on the Denton Plan. He stated that
the Mobility Plan, the Denton Development Code, and the Criteria Manual came out of the
Denton Comprehensive Plan. It involved both the engineering side and planning side for the
Development Review Committee. The Comprehensive Plan was over 10 years old and if any
changes were made to it, there would be changes in all of the above mentioned plans. It would
change the way the City did business.
The Denton Plan was adopted in 1999 and had multiple elements that included land use,
infrastructure, urban design, parks and open space, historic preservation, environmental
management, community development and an implementation section. The land use element
guided land-use decision making by public officials, residents, and existing and potential
property owners. The Denton Plan had not been reviewed or updated in excess of 10 years. It
was estimated that the cost to update the Denton Plan would be $600,000-$800,000 and would
take up to 12 months to complete.
The Denton Mobility Plan defined street type, width and right-of-way requirements for all streets
in Denton. It was applied along with the Criteria Manual, to all development and used to define
street exactions and right-of-way for applicable development. The Mobility Plan should reflect
the land use, urban design and infrastructure recommendations defined in the Denton Plan. Both
plans should work together to reflect the direction the city chooses to undertake for future
development. It was recommended that the Mobility Plan also be updated along with the Denton
Plan to more completely provide a solid direction for the city.
It was recommended that a Request for Proposal for the new Denton Plan be published within
the next two months in order to allow for review and recommendations to the Council for award
before the end of the third quarter 2010-2011. The new Denton Plan should be undertaken
before the Mobility Plan was updated. This allowed for the recommendations from the new
Denton Plan to provide input for a new Mobility Plan. The Mobility Plan study should
commence when the Denton Plan was at least 3/4 completed. At this time, the cost of the
Mobility Plan update was estimated to be $150,000.
Council discussed the scope of the Requests for Proposal.
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Greene stated that a new Denton Plan would have changes to all of the other components such as
the Mobility Plan and the Criteria Manual.
Langley indicated that last year part of the cost was included in the non-airport gas well funds
but was pulled out in terms of the budget. The funding was still there and could be used with a
budget amendment. It would be his suggestion to use the funds from the non-airport gas well
funds.
City Manager Campbell stated that staff needed direction on whether or not to start the process.
Consensus of the Council was to proceed with the RFP process and return with an action item for
consideration.
Item 43 was considered.
3. Receive a report, hold a discussion, and give staff direction regarding City sponsorship of
special events.
Jon Fortune, Assistant City Manager, stated that the City had no policy or guidelines addressing
requests for co-sponsorship of special events. Requests for support had included the use of city
facilities and equipment at no charge or at a reduced rate, assistance from City staff such as
Police, Fire and Parks for setting up or working during an event without charge to the organizer.
In November staff had discussed with Council co-sponsorship of special events with the general
consensus of Council to formulate a policy or guidelines to determine the City's co-sponsorship
of special events and at what level.
Based on those conversations, staff was recommending an established application period each
year when event organizers could request support. It was recommended that the application
period coincide with the Hotel Occupancy Tax Recipient application process to be considered
and reviewed by the Hotel Occupancy Tax Committee. The application would be evaluated by
staff to determine the costs of co-sponsorship and if resources were available. With that
information the Committee would review the applications and present their recommendation to
Council for approval in advance of the event.
Organizations seeking first-time support outside of the annual process would complete an
application to be reviewed by staff and be considered by Council on a case by case basis.
Subsequent applications must be made during the normal annual process.
Key considerations for the guidelines, process and application materials included (1) determine
that co-sponsorship was based on available resources, (2) define eligibility of the organizations,
(3) determine that co-sponsorship would be made prior to the event, (4) determine the level of
co-sponsorship, (5) include Parks and Recreation Director flexibility, (6) determine whether to
allow service to the City in return for co-sponsorship, (7) enforce applicable city ordinances, (8)
determine how to deal with the eligibility of organizations with outstanding balances and (9)
determine the number of consecutive events the City would co-sponsor.
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Council discussed consideration of what the event was doing for the city of Denton and for-profit
events versus non-profit organizations.
Council Member Gregory and Mayor Pro Tem Kamp left the meeting.
Mayor Burroughs asked about the waiving of fees.
Fortune stated that in return for the exclusive rental of a facility, an organization would provide
the City some level of service in return.
Mayor Burroughs questioned co-sponsorship as a means to help new events get established. He
was not in favor of denying an old event sponsorship in favor of sponsoring a new event as the
new event might not work out. He suggested considering a sustaining a co-sponsorship at a
lower level than the original funding.
Fortune stated that there could be several levels of seed money for ongoing events as opposed to
new organizations.
Mayor Burroughs stated that the sustaining level could be tied into the amount given back into
the community.
Council Member Watts questioned how the financial impact on the community would be
verified. A determination needed to be made on how to allocate the resources based on the
impact. In-kind contributions should also be included in the process.
Council Member Engelbrecht stated that co-sponsorship implied participating in the cost of the
event. A consideration might be made to changing the term to sponsorship.
Fortune stated that these were not city events but rather outside events that were asking for city
funds to help with the cost of the event. He questioned the eligibility of organizations with
outstanding balances and how the Council would like to proceed with issue. It was the staff s
recommendation that an event would not be eligible until any outstanding balance was taken care
of.
Consensus of the Council was to have everything spelled out cost wise and the event would not
get more funding if a prior bill was not paid.
Fortune stated that co-sponsorship did not deal with health inspections and vendor fees and those
would not be waived.
Council Member King suggested considering adding outstanding balances to the next year
funding as some organizations might not have funds until next event occurred.
Item 42 was considered
2. Receive a report and hold a discussion regarding various development improvement
activities.
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Fred Greene, Assistant City Manager, provided an update on the Development Process
Improvements. Those improvements included (1) a Builder and Developer's luncheon, (2)
formation of a Developers Committee, (3) creation of the Development Review Committee
Administrator and reorganization of the DRC process, (4) the relocation of Development Review
Committee meetings, (5) taking minutes at DRC meetings, (6) requiring the applicant to be in
attendance at the DRC meetings, (7) pre-application meetings, (8) revised submission deadlines,
(9) a reduction in a project intake processing time, (10) a published timeline for DRC projects,
(11) staffing internal DRC engineering reviewers, (12) proportionality assessment procedures
established, (13) adoption of performance measures, (14) the purchase and implementation of
ProjectDox plan Review software, (15) Laserfiche Project implementation, (16) development of
a process flow chart, (17) neighborhood planning, (18) revising the Park Exaction Formula
Application, and (10) Denton Development Code amendments.
The development process improvements also resulted in the adoption of the Planning
Department's first strategic plan which provided clear direction and focus; established the
mission, a shared vision, defined critical issues, set goals and prioritized strategies for achieving
the goals; and provided performance measures to determine the department's success.
5. Under Section 551.042 of the Texas Open Meetings Act, respond to inquiries from the
City Council or the public with specific factual information or recitation of policy, or
accept a proposal to place the matter on the agenda for an upcoming meeting
AND
Under Section 551.0415 of the Texas Open Meetings Act, provide reports about items of
community interest regarding which no action will be taken, to include: expressions of
thanks, congratulations, or condolence; information regarding holiday schedules; an
honorary or salutary recognition of a public official, public employee, or other citizen; a
reminder about an upcoming event organized or sponsored by the governing body;
information regarding a social, ceremonial, or community event organized or sponsored
by an entity other than the governing body that was attended or is scheduled to be
attended by a member of the governing body or an official or employee of the
municipality; or an announcement involving an imminent threat to the public health and
safety of people in the municipality that has arisen after the posting of the agenda.
There were no items suggested by Council.
With no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 3:00 p.m.
MARK A. BURROUGHS JENNIFER WALTERS
MAYOR CITY SECRETARY
CITY OF DENTON, TEXAS CITY OF DENTON, TEXAS