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HomeMy WebLinkAboutAgenda Statement 1979/08/07 Item 23CITY OF CHULA VISTA COUNCIL AGENDA STATEMEiVT Item No. 23 ____ For meeting of 8/7/79 ITEM TITLE Resolution ~~~~Establishing Position of Assistant Street Superintendent in the Streets Division SUBMITTED BY Development Services Administrator ITEM EXPLANATION (4/5TH'S VOTE REQUIRED YES NO x ) The purpose of this Ag enda Statement is to request the establishment of a new position in the Street Division. That new position is the Assistant Superintendent of Streets. A plat is attached (Exhibit A) which shows the organizational arrangement to accommodate this position. The reason for this proposal in mid-year and so soon after the adoption of FY79-80 budget is due to the extremely high turnover in the Street Division and the existing foreknowledge o.f pending resignations from either two or three supervisors. BACKGROUND Over the past year the turnover in personnel in the Street Division has been extremely high (see Exhibit B) Between June 1st of 1978 and June 30th of 1979, 21 employees (nearly 50$ of the assigned people) including three Public Works Supervisors and five Equipment Operators have left the Street Division. Since July lst of this year two additional persons including one supervisor (the Traffic Painter) have left the City and three more supervisors have indicated that they may be leaving the City in a very short period of time. Two of these persons have specific job offers from other agencies. WJR:nr EXHIBITS Agreement Resolution x Ordinance Plat X X Notification List Other ENVIRONMENTAL DOCUMENT: Attached Submitted on FINANCIAL IMPACT The additional cost for the Assistant Street Maintenance Superintendent will be about $5,500. Because the City budgets salaries at "E" Step and many of the workers in the Street Maintenance Division are new, an additional appropriation will not be necessary. Salary savings in the Street Maintenance Divisions will more than offset this $5,500. STAFF RECOMMENDATION It is recommended that City Council approve the report establishing the position of the Assistant Street Superintendent and authorize the filling of this position as soon as possible. BOARD/COMMISSION RECOMMENDATION COUNCIL ACTION Z~ `` ~I .~~~_~ ~} ~. r ~GCC. .. __. _. . Agenda Item No. 23 For Meeting of 8/7/79 Supplemental Page Two So not only has the turnover rate been high, but the turnover rate among supervisors and potential supervisors has been very high. With the recent and pending departures of supervisory personnel, the Street Division is now at a point where very few people with the experience needed to become supervisors are left. It is, therefore, very important to have a team of experienced supervisors at this time to protect against the mistakes which might be made by inexperienced supervisors throughout the Division. I believe the proposed reorganization will accomplish that goal. OPERATING PROBLEMS AND HAZARDS The importance of competent on-site supervision cannot be over-emphasized in street work for several reasons. First, the work is complicated and hazardous. Frequently several pieces of heavy operating equipment (dump trucks, front end loaders, backhoe, etc.) are simultaneously operating in one work area. It is necessary to coordinate the movement of that equipment with the movement of the ground personnel who may be performing multiple functions. This is both complicated and potentially hazardous and requires experienced people on the equipment as well as experienced supervisors and maintenance workers. Additionally, the hazards of the work are compounded because of work in the public right-of-way. Frequently automobiles will be traveling within a couple of feet of working people and equipment at speeds of 3~ to 40 or even 50 miles per hour. Other hazards include working in trenches where shoring must be in place to maintain the trench stability. Knowledgeable and experienced supervisors are required to ensure that the shoring is in when it is supposed to be, that it is properly installed and that people do not get down into the trench when they are not supposed to. This takes toughness on the part of the supervisor to give orders and expect to have them followed, as well as knowledge. Another high hazard area is tree trimming. The Trimmers frequently have to work high in trees. Climbing high in trees is precarious enough but the tree trimmers must carry heavy mechanical saws with them to do their trimming. Even the maintenance workers in the tree crews have a hazardous operation as branches are continually falling about them and they must feed the chipper, which is a machine which grinds the tree branches into small chips and is, in itself, potentially hazardous. Z Z ~~ 23 Agenda Item No. For Meeting of 8/7/79' Supplemental Page 'three All of these things are compounded by the fact that much of the work is hot, dirty, and physically hard. Therefore, there is a tendency among some personnel to rest as frequently as possible on the job. When there are a lot of inexperienced people throughout the crews, as there presently are since about half of the people have been with the City less than a year, then this temptation to rest along with the simple fact that many people do not know what procedure is next in an operation, makes supervision of the crews very difficult. Without good supervision, production will decrease - perhaps significantly. Also, these crews work in the public eye and receive the scrutiny of the citizens on a continuing basis. The public does not like to see City crews standing idle. I believe all of the reasons given above are sufficient to justify the proposed change. The large turnover in people, the additional and specific high turnover of supervisory people, the hazardous nature of the work, the difficult nature of the work, inexperience of the work crews, and the fact that the work crews are subject to continuing public view are all important considerations in this change. CHANGING DUTIES OF STREET SUPERINTENDENT There are two other things which have already happened in the past and one possible future event which additionally support my recommendation. First, with the reorganization which occurred in March, I have taken over the responsibilities and duties of a Deputy City Manager, yet must supervise not only four departments but three divisions. The Street Division (46 employees) is larger than most City departments. The amount of direction I give to the Street Superintendent is decreased because of my new responsibilities. Therefore, I have an expectation that he will function at a higher capacity. In other words, I expect him to function somewhat as a department head at the present time. This takes time away from his supervisory role within the department which at this time becomes critical. The establishment of the Assistant Street Superintendent to provide supervision for each of the several sections in that department helps to fill this very important role. TRANSFER OF TRAFFIC STRIPING AND SIGNING CREW Second, in the fall of last year I transferred the Traffic and Signing Crew from the Traffic Engineer to the Street Superintendent. The purpose of this transfer was to better ti~ ~~ Agenda Item No. 23 For Meeting of &/7/7~ Supplemental'Page~Four utilize the striping and painting crew since six positions had been deleted in the Street Division as a result of Proposition 13. This shift has proven to be very successful from the standpoint of both productivity and quality and has helped the Street Division to maintain their level of performance with only a minimal impact on the quantity of work performed by the Striping Crews. Nonetheless, this shift requires increased attention by the Street Superintendent to coordinate act9_vities as maintenance workers from the Striping Crew are now integrated into the Street Division during certain times of the year. This process requires not only the difficulties of scheduling the work of the people involved but also requires training of some personnel into new work positions - and, again, this calls f_or increased supervision. MONTGOMERY ANNEXATION The "possible future event" mentioned above is the potential annexation of the Montgomery area. Should the Montgomery area annex to the City of Chula Vista, this proposed organization will provide the potential of meeting the increased needs of City street maintenance by the Street Division much better than the existing organization. I had expected to forward such a reorganization to the Council at a later date, anyway, if the Montgomery annexation should become a fact. As Council is aware, the annexation would increase the total street mileage in the City by 20 to 25 percent. Also these streets are not in as good a condition as the streets already in the City and will require considerably more maintenance. Considerable planning effort will be required by the Street Superintendent in the allocation of his forces - both men and materials -to best meet the needs of the City. COST OF REORGANI7.ATION Since this reorganization does not require the addition of a person but simply Changes the funtion of existing personnel, the cost is minimal. Computed at the highest range in the salary bracket (as is done throughout the budged the total cost to the City would be about $5500. CONCLUSIONS So what will this proposed organization do? Even without the hiring of additional people, I believe it will provide the necessary supervision to maintain an acceptable element of safety in the work crews and an acceptable level of ti~ ~~ Agenda Item No. 23 For Meeting of 8/7/7.9 ' Supplemental Page Five quality and quantity of work performed. Furthermore, it will help free the Street Superintendent so that he may perform at a higher capacity than he has in the past and it will help meet the planning and work allocation needs required for the Montgomery annexation should it occur. If Council does approve the establishment of the new position, then I believe through the reorganization of the Street bivision all these things indicated above can be accomplished. If Council does not approve tha new position, tYien it may be necessary for me to recommend to Council the disestablishment of one of our work crews and the consequent laying off of several (probably six) persons. Reduced personnel would necessitate the cessation of several Street Division functions, such as chip-sealing, storm drain cleaning, and so forth. These maintenance programs would, of necessity, have to be accomplished by some other means probably at greater cost to the City. The City now has six fewer people in the Street Maintenance Division than it did eight years ago when I came here, yet 40 miles of street have been added to the maintenance load. It is clear to me that the disestablishment of one of the crews would not be in the best long-term interest of the City. I would strongly recommend to Council that the City not put crews into the field which might endanger not only themselves, but the general public as well. This proposed new position and reorganization is the best way that I know of to avoid this potential reality. 22 ~~ ~ ~3 EXHIBIT B STREET DIVISIONS' TURNOVER EXPERIENCE Permanent employees who have resigned from City service in Street Divisions from June 1978 to July 1979 (13 months) No. No. Assigned Resigned Public Works Supervisor II 3 1 Public Works Supervisor I 3 2* Equipment Operator 6 5 Senior Tree Trimmer 2 0 Senior Maintenance Worker 9 2 Tree Trimmer 2 1 Maintenance Worker II 4 4 Maintenance Worker I 10 6 Traffic Painter 1 1 TOTAL 40 22 Total % Turnover = 550 *1 additional supervisor will resign effective August 31 and another supervisor has interviewed for selection to a position at another agency. NOTE: These are resignations only and do not reflect the fact that the Street Divisions lost 6 permanent personnel from budget post-Prop. 13 = 2 EO's, 2 SMW's, & 2 MWII's. ~2 ~~