2010-10-08 Cost of Government Commission Minutes

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MS. O’HARA: And I got to say, what Bill said, it’s really about policy. I mean there is the law and we have to follow the law. But there is also the framework that we have devised as a county to pursue contracts. And it can be exceedingly cumbersome. But that’s just the acquiring the contracts side. Then there is the administering the contract and there’s just not a real coherent system within the county.It certainly is not flawless, let’s put it that way. And because of that, we do incur substantial additional cost in our contracting. And so perhaps it is a policy discussion. I’m not really sure. MR. TAKABA: Well, one thing we could do is, I think you’re starting to identify areas that you want to focus on. One was like technology. You wanted Data Systems to come in and explain how Data Systems or technology can be improved in the county. And maybe another one would be procurement and contracting. That would be another topic. There may be others and we could possibly dedicate one meeting to having people come in and just explain how government operates in these areas. And then whatever committee has to follow up with will do their follow up. But it seems like we’re talking about, like if it’s procurement, it would be more like operations. It would fall under the Operations, Budgeting Committee. MR. MATSUDA: If we’re having the individuals like you mentioned, coming to the commission, maybe the committee should be the whole commission – everybody. MR. TAKABA: Yeah. MS. O’HARA: Oh yeah. MR. TAKABA: They could make presentations to the group as opposed to doing it department by department. If you took functional areas and, if this commission would identify areas that you want to learn more about from whoever deals with it, then that could be a good start. And you could do it, depending on how many topics you have, you could do it in one meeting and just devote that meeting to listening to these areas of concern. MS. WONG: Let me ask, you’ve worked with the county, you’ve worked with state, I’ve worked with the state and federal. I think the majority does have an understanding of procurement contracting in local government. MS. O’HARA: And I think that that’s a good start. Our knowledge may be real specific to our experiences there. I don’t know how things are done today in 2010. MR. TAKABA: Same. MS. O’HARA: I left the county in 2006, and so policy may have changed a little bit. But I also worked for businesses that are under contract with the county and so I’ve seen that side of it too. Things are not always done in a timely manner. And there are a lot issues. And so is there an overall policy about how the county handles contracts? Is DPW on a different track then the other departments still in terms of procurement? How that all works, I mean, hearing the presentation is important from the procurement department to get an understanding, but it’s also a good idea to get the feedback from 14