2010-10-22 Cost of Government Commission Minutes

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MS. NICHOLSON: So, what if, and Gloria, this sort of gets back to a question you asked about glitches in the system. What if when we have speakers, we ask them about procurement issues? It becomes one of our sort of question to any speaker no matter what we’ve invited them to talk about. We also want to ask if their department heads issues with procurement, is that MS. O’HARA: Whether they’re able to procure the services or materials they need in a timely manner. If not what are the obstacles. Any problems that the departments may have in managing the contract? The oversight for insuring that what we contracted actually is what is delivered. What their methods are and if they have problems with that end. MS. NICHOLSON: Do you think it would be a good idea when we invite the department head to come and speak to us, that we provide the information in advance that we would like them to address? Procurement issues? MS. O’HARA: Yes. That’s pretty general but just if their department is able to procure the services they need in a timely manner and what improvements might be made to the procurement system from their perspective to insure that they get the services they are asking for. MS. NICHOLSON: Any discussion on that? MS. WONG: I had met with Nancy before this and she was not aware of what she was being asked to speak on. When I told her what our three committees were then she could focus in and be ready to address our three. So I think it would be helpful if we bring in any speakers to let them know what our topics are and that they understand that we’d be looking for their strengths and weakness or issues in their particular department or looking for any sense of improvement in their department. MS. NICHOLSON: That’s a good suggestion. I don’t want us to be restricted to just what our subcommittees do because I think there are a whole lot of other larger issues in the county. So I don’t want to say address these three subcommittee issues. But I think it’s good to let them know that we have a particular emphasis on these particular issues. MS. WONG: And when I told them, the people that we met with what our committees were, I also included that the overall view is to look at policies and operations and cost of government. That helped them I think. I think we looked at my question of whether your procurement problems I was trying to look at, and then it came from the other side what kind of improvements might you suggest. And I think that takes it to the broader view. I think they got that. And this is the second time I did that to Nancy, what other thing might you want to say? And even though she knew I was going to do it, it still caught her off guard. You know, what else can I come up with? I just gave you my whole spiel, what else can I come up with? But I think that if they know that they have the opportunity, and he did, he had an opportunity to say something. The speakers can say something to us that we’ll take seriously and may present it in our recommendations. I think that’s important for them to know.We’re just not here to find 26