Simple Solutions for the City.

We’re believers in the broken window policy. Meaning, we can fix the small things while working on the big ones. Below is a list of simple actions that can be taken that take little time, effort, and money but go a big way in bringing more accountability, transparency, and efficiency into the system.

These are a few of the issues that we have either presented before city leaders or ask them to consider:

• Don’t leave money on the table. Too many car tags are expired. Too many cars do not have tags. Pull a list of expired tags and generate revenue for the city. Within a year, eight abandoned vehicles with expired tags were reported on 2nd Ave N. Since August of 2020, a vehicle is on 2nd Ave N that refuses to get current tags, but finallly did in June 2021. It was three years before a box truck parked with an expired 2017 tag was tagged and towed. In May 2021, there were three abandoned vehicles with 2019 tags in the parking lot by College St and Catfish Alley-some had sat so long there was over an inch of dirt underneath the vehicle. While these have been tagged, etc. it was only a long-over due and reactionary response to citizens.

• Ethics Policy & Training. Elected officials and city employees should participate in an ethics training. The city should have an ethics policy.

• Have a schedule of all board positions and when they come up, as opposed to the current strategy of a month’s notice (an ad in the Packet.) Put the board, it’s purpose, and vacancies on the city’s website. Make the board meetings times, members, and minutes available to the public without having to make a public records request. City Hall is listening! Kind of. The purpose of the board and the minutes are not listed. Vote on individuals for the board vacancies (rather than a slate.). Keep the deadlines (don’t extend.)

• Clean up the city while generating funds. “Police need to write litter tickets and the city judge needs to fine the defendant,” said the late Steve Wallace. Successful cities are clean cities. Businesses should enclose their trash. Apartments with over six units should be required to have dumpsters or proper trash cans provided for by the landlord. Residents should place trash in garbage bins (as opposed to on the ground in plastic bags that animals can access.) Residents can pick up trash every day—and many do— but if the root of the problem is not addressed, the trash will remain. Keeping a clean city creates and encourages community pride.

• Use data to learn what works and what doesn’t. Check out the Great American Clean Up: Litter Study 2021. Many studies show that commercial properties create much more litter than individuals. Their data also indicates that a littered area tends to attract more litter so reporting littered areas to remediate quickly may be a valuable tool. The city has a some pretty good garbage anti-litter laws but the enforcement of those laws appear to be a low priority. Maybe the city could have "deputy" code enforcement for litter control targeting commercial violators. SeeClickFix could be used as a recommended solution for an app to report litter.

  https://kab.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Litter-Study-Summary-Report-May-2021_final_05172021.pdf https://kab.org/programs/great-american-cleanup/event/

• Stop Fraud & Abuse. Bring more funds in. Other places have an “exemptions audit program”. It’s a computer programs that is programmed to look for some of the most common abuses, such as multiple homesteads in one name or in a spouse’s name, automatic eliminating of all exemptions when a property sells so that new owners must apply and qualify for exemptions, elimination of over-65 exemptions when grandma dies and the under-65 children inherit, etc. We don’t do that. It should be a red-flag when a voter requests an absentee ballot be mailed to a different address than the one on their tax records-and they are claiming homestead on that property.

• Post city council minutes and agendas in a timely manner.

As of Friday, August 13, 2021 the agenda for the August 17th meeting is not on the website. In 2019, this was brought to the city’s attention. Citizens should be able to follow their city government and access the city’s minutes without physically going into City Hall, especially because of Covid-19. It appears City Hall is putting up the agenda packet for the upcoming meetings at 5pm on Friday before the Tuesday meeting. The minutes from 2019 and 2020 do not appear to be online and it’s almost 2022. In Contrast, Gulfport has their minutes online from 1898 to 2021 and Tupulo has their minutes current.

• Cross train employees. More than one person needs to be able to do a task. In fall of 2019, the city council meetings were not posted for many months because “the person who does that had a death in the family.” Of course, we’re sympathetic. But more the reason two people need to know how to do something so that the city operates like a well-oiled machine or at least not come to a stand-still when one person is not available.

• Let the citizens know who the city employees. List employee’s city contact information (email and phone) in a city directory online. Being transferred multiple times and playing phone tag is inefficient for all parties. Some of the contact information is not available for direct contact while other departments have direct contact information. Some of the direct contacts are responsive while others are less so. The lack of consistency in experience may or may not be intentional but should be considered how it is desired.

• Keep the website current and make sure links work. Too much stale information for too long. For example, the late Stacie Deans contact information was listed on the city’s website as the police contact for six months after his death. The late Gene Taylor’s is still on the city’s website today, 12/22, over a year since his passing. As of August 12, 2021, there is still conflicting information about elections, employees, and some links not working.

  *City Hall is listening! As of February 10th, the city is updating their website with information on city employees, but it’s still incomplete. Let’s hope there is more positive changes coming!

•  List the City Council’s Contact information. Ward 1 councilperson has been in office over a year and her bio and contact information on not on the city’s website as of 12/22. *City Hall is listening! Spring of 2021, a phone number has been added for Ward 1 councilperson. However, the councilman from Ward 2 email bounces back. As of August, 2021 the councilman from Ward 2’s email has been updated. There is no contact information listed for Ward 3 and Ward 6 councilpersons. Fall of 2021 all the above have been corrected!

•  Put the city’s SeeClickFix information on the city’s website. The city has used SeeClickFix since the fall of 2019 and as of 01/05/2021 it’s not on the website.*City Hall is listening! In 2021, SeeClickFix has been added to the website! Now, for city employees to embrace it and use it to its potential.

• Use only one platform for reporting issues. By having one reporting system it will save the city time and money while eliminating inefficiencies. The city is currently operating on four different platforms [SeeClickFix, user.gov, the Action Center platform, and Action Call Center]. Each require different logins and passwords. They are not in sync with the other or all monitored.

•  Use the built-in reporting systems in SeeClickFix (rather than creating additional and unnecessary reports) Currently, individual staff are responding with messages they will route the request to the correct department and get back soon. Instead, the automated message center should be utilized. Rather than departments creating their own reports, which lead to inaccuracies due to data integrity issues and quality control, the platforms have built in reporting systems that need to be utilized. This way, the council is making decisions based on accurate reports rather than ones that are just made up or incomplete. We first brought the inaccurate montly reports to City Hall’s attention in May 2020 and as of November 2021, it’s still an issue.

• When the council votes on something, follow through to see that action has been taken. Too many times, the council has voted for action only to learn months later someone did not follow the project through to completion. There was a house in Ward 4 that was unsecured with no windows. It turns out the council unanimously voted for it to be demolished in January 2020 but no one realized the work hadn’t been done until it was brought to the city’s attention in spring of 2020.

• Implement the Comprehensive Strategic Plan. The city paid a pretty good sum of money (about $75,000) for some consultants to put together a Comprehensive Strategic Plan for Columbus in 2012. And it’s pretty good! Let’s pull it off the shelf, dust of the dirt, and start implementing it. Some council members have told us they are not aware of a comprehensive plan. Questions to ask: Is this the latest long-range document? Were measurement points harvested? Has progress been evaluated?

• Hire Local. Ideally, city employees should live in the city of Columbus. We understand that recruiters are needed for certain positions, but for the most part, the city should attempt to employee qualified Columbus citizens. Some employees don’t even live in the state, but in West Alabama. So to say the city can’t find people because the pay is too low may not be accurate (because there are people willing to travel quite the distance to work for the city of Columbus.)

• Use a Headhunter. We understand it may be difficult for some positions to hire locally. Anything with a “chief” needs a headhunter to be involved to recruit and bring the best talent to Columbus. In other words, just an advertisement in the local paper for a CFO, COO, or even City Planner is not enough. Most cities, in the U.S., hire a city planner with a degree in urban or regional planning. Most cities, in the U.S. hire a CFO that is qualified. Not Columbus. We’ve had an “interim city planner” for five years that has no city planning experience. Yet, some on the council are upset we had a volunteer “interim COO” that had vowed not to stay longer than a few months. Others are upset we have an interim CFO employeed for a short while. Successful cities hire a certified city manager/COO. Successful cities hire national search firms and advertise throughout the country.

  Update: How the city is going about finding a permanent COO and CFO, is unclear, but they recently voted to advertise in the Dispatch. It appears they are not looking for a permanent city planner.

• Do the job once the right way. Drain covers in the city are not reinforced. That means when the city repairs or replaces the drain covers will not last. We’ve seen some last only a day! It’s a simple fix—just put rebar or even a mesh cover in them so they are reinforced. Until then, city employees are just doing the same thing over and over without getting to move on to new projects. Some folks have told us they have been telling the city about this “for years and years.”

• The planning commission meets on the first Tuesday of the month. The city council meets on the first and third Tuesday of the month. Sometimes a planning commission meeting and council meeting are both on Tuesday, making it less than ideal for the council and public to have time to address any concerns. Sometime, items get pushed an additional month because of those concerns, delaying agenda items even further. How about just having the planning commission meet on Wednesday’s or Thursday’s so that is never an issue?

• Govern based on governing documents. The city has been operating in an undisciplined manner for so many years people are doing things “because that’s the way we’ve always done it” as opposed to operating based on governing documents. The mayor is the administrator, and the council is the legislative body. Recently a city councilman gave direct orders to a city employee in who to hire and to advertise against the mayor’s wishes. The mayor is supposed to have hiring/firing authority. (The council does confirm certain positions, such as deptartment heads.) The council is supposed to go through the COO/mayor and not give direct orders to city employees.

• Have Checks & Balances. “The Government Finance Officers Association recommends that reporting systems incorporate an antifraud program and that financial managers periodically evaluate internal control procedures to ensure they are still working as envisioned. The Association of Local Government Auditors recommends that, at a minimum, governments have an ethics policy, established performance measures and an audit committee. State governments also cite best practices for their local governments to follow.” Our state auditor, for example, has fact sheets available to localities offering advice on financial management of fixed assets, cash receipts and accounts receivable.

• Best Practices. Just because you can do something does not mean you should. Just because it’s not illegal does not mean it’s the best way to go about something. Implement best practices.