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Charter01-04-11Min City of Longwood 2010 Charter Advisory Committee Longwood City Commission Chambers 175 West Warren Avenue Longwood, Florida MINUTES January 4, 2011 7:00 P.M. Present: Chair Bruce Kubec Vice Chair JoAnne Rebello Member Steve Debole Member Greg Cetera J. Giffen Chumley, Fishback, Dominick, et al. Katrina Powell, City Administrator Troy Hickson, Police Chief Sarah M. Mirus, Recording Secretary Absent: Member Doug Damerst 1. Call to Order. Chair Kubec called the meeting to order at 7:00 p.m. 2. Election of Officers. A. Chair. Member Debole nominated Mr. Bruce Kubec as the Chair. Nomination carried by a unanimous voice vote with Member Damerst absent. B. Vice Chair. Chair Kubec nominated Ms. JoAnne Rebello as the Vice Chair. Nomination carried by a unanimous voice vote with Member Damerst absent. 3. Approval of Minutes — November 9, 2010 Regular Meeting. Member Debole moved to approve the Minutes. Seconded by Member Cetera and carried by a unanimous voice vote with Member Damerst absent. 4. Public Participation. None. Charter 01- 04 -11 /1 5. Old Business. A. Section 12.03. Members. Chair Kubec said at the last meeting, they asked Chief Hickson to attend the meeting, and to address some questions and make some comments that he would see fit about the Charter. Vice Chair Rebello said public safety was an important part of the Charter and they were discussing numbers. She said for the Fire Department, it was very ambiguous and the Police Department was tied to the population. She said they were trying to get ideas and thoughts from the Fire Chief and Police Chief. Chief Hickson said currently the Charter states 2.2 per 1,000 of population and that used to be the industry standard for many years. He said his personal opinion on that was it is antiquated and it's inappropriate to base your staffing decisions on the capital population. He said he thinks you need to address important things such as the level of service, types of service, the citizens of the jurisdiction, and the inherent problems /issues within that jurisdiction. He said your staffing should be based around that, and you need to base your staffing around the needs of that particular jurisdiction and not numbers. Vice Chair Rebello said in other words it could change yearly. Chief Hickson responded in the affirmative. Discussion was held regarding the traffic issues in the City of Longwood, the needs changing from year -to -year, and the City limits of Longwood. Member Debole said if Chief Hickson was suggesting not using . population and asked what would be his recommendation for a quantitative representation or other options to determine how many officers were needed. Chief Hickson said based upon the numbers that were currently in the Charter, based upon the services, response time and the expectation that he believes the City of Longwood has, they could not properly service the City of Longwood with thirty -one (31) officers. He stated they currently have forty (40) officers and it's difficult to service with proper response times. He said response times can be subjective and provided an example of an incident. He said they were busy in the City of Longwood and had the numbers that he could provide to them that they have steadily increased from year -to -year on the calls for service. He then discussed the response time for the Police Department. Charter 01 -04 -11/2 Vice Chair Rebello inquired if they were tied with First Response. Chief Hickson stated they were tied to a Mutual Aid Agreement and said in one point of time; they would strip the City of Longwood of all of their officers. He said they have a minimum staffing level that they have in place, even when staff was out on vacation. Ms. Powell said she wasn't sure there was an easy way to do that; and would not know how you would put a number to that. She said the calls for service were ridiculous, and cannot tie it to the population and would only increase with SunRail. She said this was something that needed to be taken into consideration when moving forward and outlined the City's responsibilities for SunRail. Chief Hickson provided some statistics that were based on the industry standards. Chair Kubec said it sounded like Chief Hickson was recommending for the Committee to base it on response time or some other level of service measurement as opposed to what is currently in the Charter. He said he wouldn't feel comfortable to say "as needed" and said it would need to be based on something. Chief Hickson said if the Committee was going to use the 2.2 that number was outdated. He said that number needed to be increased based upon the current trends, if the Committee wanted to have a minimum number based upon population. He said currently the average in the State of Florida was 4.15 per population of 1,000 and the City was at 2.96 per population of 1,000. He said he would suggest it at the bare minimum, and set it at minimum at what they were right now. Then have the additional clause to where if the Police Chief brings it forward to the City Administrator, who then brings it to the City Commission and the Commission can decide whether or not to add additional personnel. He said based upon their call load, they cannot operate with thirty-one (31) officers. Kubec said that he knows what rush hour is at its heaviest. He said they have a lot of people come into the City to work. Member Cetera inquired to Chief Hickson, how often was the • national number updated. Chief Hickson said generally it was updated every year. He said you have to be careful with statistics and comparing agencies to Charter 01 -04 -11/3 each other. He said the calls have not decreased and should be a baseline minimum. Discussion ensued regarding the current staffing levels for the Police Department in accordance with the City Charter versus the current national standard and the possibility of tying it to a response time. Discussion was held regarding the minimum number of firefighters and the minimum number of police officers being included in the City Charter and if the information was necessary to have in the City Charter. Vice Chair Rebello provided the history of why the minimum number of firefighters and the minimum number of police officers were included in the City Charter. Discussion continued regarding the minimum number of firefighters and the minimum number of police officers being included in the City Charter. Member Cetera said they were tasked to bring modified language to the Commission to approve or not approve and to try to get it out to the public to update the Charter. He said what they may bring to the Commission, may not go any further. Chief Hickson said that the police -to- population ratio, as he said at the very beginning, he thought was not applicable in today's world. Discussion ensued regarding the minimum number of firefighters and the minimum number of police officers being established in the City Charter and proposing the adoption of the national standards. Chair Kubec reviewed the proposed changes to Sections 12.03 and 12.05 of the City Charter. Discussion was held regarding the proposed ballot language and the possibility of combining Sections 12.03, 12.04, and 12.05 of the City Charter, and entitling it "Responsibilities ". Member Cetera said they could tie it under that Section instead of a number and tie it to not fall below the National Uniform Crime Report. Chief Hickson said the Uniform Crime Report was where the number came from. He stated in 2009, the Uniform Crime Report showed an average of 3.0 full -time law enforcement employees per Charter 01 -04 -11/4 1,000 per inhabitance. He said in the south, cities reported a rate of 3.4 and suggested referring to the reported ratio of southern law enforcement agencies. Discussion continued regarding cleaning up Sections 12.03, 12.04, and 12.05 of the City Charter, and entitling it "Responsibilities" and tying the minimum to an industry standard. Vice Chair Rebello recommended combing those three (3) Sections and to get rid of a lot of the wording and to simplify it. She suggested hitting the high points as far as "Duties and Responsibilities" and meeting or exceeding the quality standards. Ms. Powell suggested adding language stating, "...these departments can only be dissolved by referendum ". She said it would provide a comfort level and the Charter doesn't say it had to go for referendum. Vice Chair Rebello suggested combining these three (3) Sections together and to come up with their suggestions. Chair Kubec asked Vice Chair Rebello and Member Debole to put together their proposed language for Sections 12.03, 12.04, and 12.05 and to submit the proposed language to Ms. Mirus before the next meeting. B. Review previous recommendations made by Members of the Charter Advisory Committee. Chair Kubec asked this item be placed on the agenda for the next meeting. 6. New Business. None. 7. Agenda Items for Next Meeting. None. Chair Kubec thanked Ms. Powell and Chief Hickson for attending the meeting. 8. Adjourn. Chair Kubec adjourned the meeting at 8:39 p.m. /4JXZZ Bruce Kubec, Chair TTES .7 / / Sarah M. Mirus, MMC, MBA, Recording Secretary Charter 01-04-11/5 •