City Hall Restructuring
By Robin Vinci | Editor at September 29, 2023 | 2:15 pm | Print
The Common Council, Wednesday night, approved taking a further look at a City Hall reorganization plan that includes the reorganization of all city departments and offices except the common council and board of education.
Mayor Erin E. Stewart called these plans, “smart changes to the structure of City Hall—a move aimed at reducing costs, making government more efficient, and better connecting developers, businesses, and residents with the services that they seek.”
The cost savings would equal about $200,000 in the first year.
“When I took office in 2013, one of the first changes I made was to the organization of City Hall in order to ensure that our employees were in the right places to put their talents and skills to good use,” said Mayor Stewart. “Three years later—and at a time when we have several veteran employees retiring—we are at an opportune time to reevaluate the structure of City Hall.”
Currently, City Plan and Community Development divisions are housed in the Department of Municipal Development and the Economic Development Director is housed in the Office of the Mayor. Under the proposed reorganization, these offices will be realigned. It includes moving the economic development director out of the Chamber of Commerce offices and to City Hall. This office will now be called the Department of Community Development.
“We have been extremely busy in this department the past two years. Developers do not know whether to go to the Chamber of Commerce or to City Hall,” said Stewart. “It’s confusing. We need to streamline that process so people know exactly where to go for the services they need.”
The Housing and Urban Development grants administration will be in the office of Community Development on the 4th floor of City Hall. Economic Development, City Plan and Zoning administration will be in the office of Economic Development—located on the 2nd floor of City Hall. This will help streamline the development process as the city grows.
“We are trying to manage a very volatile upcoming budget season because of the state’s new fiscal reality and we have a projected $15 million budget gap—due to debt payments—next year that must be closed,” continued Mayor Stewart. “We have no choice but to be creative and think outside the box for proactive solutions.”
Stewart says the City always struggles with funds and $15 million is a scary number. This year several department heads will be retiring so it is a good time to combine departments and save funds. Stewart will lower pay grades to ones the City can afford for those empty positions.
“We are losing a lot of people with a wealth of knowledge. We are sad to see them go,” Stewart added. “But it presented an interesting opportunity to restructure.”
In other areas, department and division heads will be streamlined into a new Support Services Department. The newly-created Director of Support Services will oversee managers of Information Technology, Building and Energy Services, and Public Safety Telecommunications. Other changes include moving the Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities out of the Corporation Counsel department and into Human Resources.
The Personnel Department will change it’s name to the Human Resources Department.
“This SMART reorganization focuses on efficiencies and effectiveness in City Hall. We continue to do more with less; planning ahead is key,” Stewart said. “Most of the other changes involve naming divisions that are already used, but not in the ordinance,”
Those include the Engineering Division, the Fleet Division and Field Services. They will go under Public Works.
All proposed changes would be implemented with existing employees. The proposed changes, if approved, would take effect Jan. 1, 2017.
The restructuring plan will be discussed further at a Nov. 2 Public Hearing of Admin, Finance and Law.
