2018-02-06 Committee on Citizen Engagement Minutes
COMMITTEE ON CITIZEN ENGAGEMENT
MINUTES
February 6, 2018
After determining that a quorum was present, the Committee on Citizen Engagement convened in a
meeting on February 6, 2018 at 10:37 a.m. in the City Hall Conference Room at City Hall, 215 E.
McKinney Street, Denton, Texas.
PRESENT: Council Member Dalton Gregory, Council Member Gerard Hudspeth, and
Council Member Keely Briggs.
STAFF PRESENT: Bryan Langley, Sarah Kuechler, Melissa Kraft, Karisa Richards,
Jessica Rogers, Charlie Rosendahl, Justin Harmon, Kevin McGinnis.
A. Consider approval of the minutes of August 1, 2017.
Council Member Gregory motioned, and Council Member Briggs seconded to approve the
minutes. The motion carried unanimously.
B. Receive a report, hold a discussion, and give staff direction regarding citizen
relationship management (CRM) software.
Sarah Kuechler introduced Charlie Rosendahl, Management Analyst and Melissa Kraft, Chief
Technology Officer for the City of Denton who gave a brief presentation on the Citizen
Relationship Management (CRM) software that staff is recommending.
Rosendahl explained that in the 2016/17 Strategic Plan, one of the key action steps was to create
an interim solution to allow citizens to send requests to the City. This was done as part of a
website update that was completed in December of 2016. Currently, citizens input their contact
information with a description of their request via a form based system on the City’s website. The
request is either sent directly to the department or received by the City Manager’s office and then
forwarded to the correct department via e-mail for follow up and completion. This process doesn’t
allow the citizen to know the status of their request, they can't attach pictures, there is no mobile
application, and there are a lot of manual processes on the back end for staff.
$40,000 was allocated in the 2017-18 Budget for a permanent CRM solution. Staff first worked
with an internal stakeholder group and surveyed them to determine what type of items to include
in a CRM system. Staff then worked with Tech Services to develop a document that listed all of
the requirements needed from the vendors. Staff reached out to vendors to participate in demos,
received quotes, and checked references from other cities, including Longview, Frisco, and
Lewisville.
Staff recommends moving forward with CitySourced as the vendor based on the other cities’
recommendations, their ability to meet all of the software requirements, the cost, the functionality,
and their integration into our ESRI GIS mapping system. The recommendations were taken back
to the stakeholders group and they all supported the recommendation for CitySourced.
Some of the functionality that the software will have includes a City branded mobile application
that will be available for Apple and android devices, and there will be automatic routing and
escalation of requests. If a request is input into the system for a street sign repair, it would
automatically go to the traffic operations department. The clock would start on that request and an
appropriate service level agreement would be determined. Departments would receive
notifications as needed to make sure citizen requests are met in a timely manner.
Briggs asked who decides that time allotment for each service request, like say a pothole or street
sign.
Rosendahl, responded that they would work with the departments to determine the time frame
based on the request type. When the citizen enters a request they will receive a notification letting
them know when the request should be completed.
Langely stated that it was a great question. The routine requests should be completed within a day
or two.
Briggs asked it if will take extra time on staff to follow up and make sure that requests are
completed or is it going to absorb into the daily tasks.
Langley stated that it could be. Rosendahl has been following up on a lot of the emails and his
understanding is that is a very manual, difficult process to keep up with everything and know what
the status is. This product will help us a lot better with that.
Kraft stated it is much more automated. One of the citizen benefits that we have identified is a
large map that gives you the ability to see all of the requests that have been input into the system
and you can zoom in and see what requests have been entered into a specific neighborhood.
Rosendahl showed a preview of what the system would look like. There would be a drop down of
the different request types. There is an area to mark the request as sensitive. For instance if
you’re going to report on high weeds in your neighbor’s yard, and you didn’t want that displayed
publicly you could mark that as sensitive, and it wouldn’t be displayed on the map.
So again staff’s recommendation is to move forward with CitySourced, This would be
administratively approved by the City Manager since the three-year award amount was less than
$100,000 and it’s on a cooperative contract. The three-year total is $56,750.
Gregory asked how the system would be rolled out.
Kuechler replied that once staff enters into a contract we expect a 12 week implementation
timeframe, where we get the mobile application ready, train administration and staff, and then
launch it towards the end of April. Staff’s plan is to launch it with a limited number of request
types so we can follow up very closely on those and make sure that everyone has a good user
experience and make sure that we are following through on those requests types. Then we would
start marketing that application pretty heavily. Phase 3 would be to add additional request items
and train staff, and the departments that haven’t been using the system.
Gregory asked how it would be marketed.
Rogers replied that after the initial roll out we will develop a specific strategy. It could be by
press release, social media campaign, website, or publications going out with the timing of the
release.
Kuechler stated that it is important to do a soft launch or pilot program first to make sure that
everything is working as it should.
Briggs asked if citizens would be able to report DME outages.
Kuechler replied that it is something we can look into.
Hudspeth asked if there will there be a social media component or is it all email or mobile app
only.
Rosendahl replied that there is a comments section in the application but it is only between the
requestor and city staff. We did identify another vendor that had like a social media type of
request system and the cities that we talked to had bad experiences with those and they stopped
using it because it became a forum for people to trash talk each other.
C. Receive a report, hold a discussion, and give staff direction regarding citizen engagement,
communication, and transparency initiatives.
Kuechler presented a report on some of the items staff has been working on and will be working
on.
The first is the resident update newsletter. We have had three issues go out and have a very good
response from citizens. They like receiving it in the mail. We have so much information to
promote that we are not able to include everything in 8 pages so we are going to try out a 12 page
issue next month.
Briggs stated that she likes that it has Council information and phone numbers so people don’t
have to go to the website to pull it up. She stated that she has had more people reach out and call
her on the phone and talk about issues they are having and she thinks it has to do with mailer.
Gregory asked if there is a way for a person who didn’t get it or it got damaged in the mail, to go to
the website and find it.
Kuechler replied yes, it is on the website.
Gregory stated that one of his concerns has always been with some of the print. It is so wordy and
the print is so small, that people tend to be put off by it and not want to read it. We have a good
story to tell but need to tell it in a way that is pretty concise and encourages people to actually read
what we say. I’ve just heard forever that white space is important.
Kuechler replied I think that’s a very good comment. We’ve tried to limit the articles to no more
than 300 words, and are trying to use more information graphics and mapping and some different
visual elements to really draw people in and then redirect them to the website if there are additional
details or information.
The next item for an update is the proposed Improving Denton campaign. We have designed a kind
of brand marker for all of our capital projects to kind of unite public education and communications
in terms of what is happening around the City. From a resident’s perspective, they don’t know if
it’s a bond program, if it’s normal maintenance, or if it’s a capital project, so we are trying to find
some way to really promote what is being invested in the City and provide more information about
the projects that are happening.
Rogers gave a presentation on the Improving Denton campaign. She discussed that
Communications staff had worked with capital projects, streets, engineering transportation, to
develop a campaign brand for all construction activities and help answer common resident
questions. The campaign will introduce a one stop type of landing page on the website where
residents can get information and notifications on specific projects. Campaign components include
branding direct to resident communications (door hangers, post cards, etc.) and email notifications.
The notifications will incorporate regional projects, including those managed by TxDOT. The new
campaign will allow us to reach a broader audience with construction information, detours, and
traffic alerts. We are hoping to launch it really soon, hopefully end of February with a full roll out
starting in March.
Briggs my question is about the website. About a year ago we talked about an interactive map
where you can hover over a street and it pops up what’s going on. Is that going to be coordinated
with your site?
Rogers replied yes. We are working to get a new mapping system in place. Right now there is a
separate map for bond projects, and a separate map for general construction projects. We are trying
to integrate them into an easier to use public facing map.
Hudspeth mentioned using the Waze mapping system.
Rogers stated that they are working with the NCTCOG on the Waze integration.
Hudspeth asked about advanced notice of construction being put on DTV or the website so he could
inform the citizens.
Langley stated that we could figure out how to do it.
Kuechler stated that the Mayor planned to announce the program at State of City next week.
Hudspeth wants information to forward to citizens.
Kuechler asked the Committee if they have any other feedback or suggestions for staff regarding
communications or citizen engagement programs.
Gregory suggested continuing old fashioned way of informing people of construction with signs for
people that don’t use technology.
Hudspeth stated that using DTV to educate would be the fastest route. Signage is great.
Gregory asked about transparency initiatives such as open data events and when the next event is
scheduled.
Briggs stated that work needs to be done on the website to make it user friendly. She asked if we
are still working with same vendor.
Staff replied that we are working on how we can improve navigation, quick links, etc. to improve
the user’s experience on the website.
Hudspeth stated that he would like to see the City reach out during more events like United Way’s
Dancing with the Stars, presence at events, booth at Arts & Jazz, etc,
Kuechler stated that staff intends to get out and engage with the community and community events
more.
Briggs stated that the Community Market was an option to set up a booth.
Langley stated that we can think of opportunities for the next year and share at the next meeting.
D. Set Future Meeting Dates and Topics.
Topics:
st
Gregory stated that a meeting on the 1 Tuesday next month might be better. He requested the
following items as future topics: Smart Cities Denton presentation, update on 311 Call System, and
report on Open Data event.
Briggs suggested holding meetings on Tuesday before Council meetings.
The committee set the next meeting for Tuesday, March 6, 2018 at 10:30 am.
Staff will set up regularly scheduled meetings once per quarter.
With no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 11:32 p.m.
GERARD HUDSPETH KARISA RICHARDS
COMMITTEE CHAIR RECORDING SECRETARY
CITY OF DENTON, TEXAS CITY OF DENTON, TEXAS