No, absolutely. It's an easy fix, but it is huge. It has huge impact, right? And so, the deputy at the Office of Human Resources, Marsha Greene-Jones is constantly looking at the landscape of city benefits to figure out if there are opportunities for us to expand particular benefits like parental leave and other things in order to gain retention. We're also looking at -- we have programs like Credential Based Bonuses, Tuition Reimbursement, and so there's a variety of programs. I don't think it's a one size fit all, right? For retention, I think we need to sort of attack that issue from various angles.
Yeah, I've gotten -- I ask about it. You know what I mean? So I talk to the police officers when I see them and I talk to others. And to be honest, there's no, especially for police officers, once they get their 25, it's not really beneficial for them to stay here, which is kind of harsh. I mean, their pensions are capped at, I think 65 percent for the police, just -- and that's just the one I know off the top of my head. So why would somebody stay once they hit their time and they can't get anymore? Again, you know, maybe looking at that and also looking at our benefits and the longevity of our benefits, it is something that maybe we need to start looking to try to make it more attractive to stay here in the city. The fact of the matter is, the city is fairly a good job. You know, people -- you can -- you can survive, you can raise a family a lot of times on the city wage. But, you know, people do these jobs for a long period of time and they get good at it. And then other people want them. And so they leave and they go get more money. We just need to figure out how do we attract employees? Like I said, when I was a kid, I remember a city job was it. You know, you got a city job, you were set for life. You know what I mean? I always give the example of my father was a port authority cop, and my uncle was a sanitation worker, and their house always had more than our house had because he got all this overtime, you know, which I don't believe somebody should have to work overtime in order to make a pay that should be optional if he wants something extra. But for me, it's about how do we retain the employees that we have in order so that we can actually catch up on the employees we need. CAO DUCHAUSSEE: And I think we have been - this is a question that has been at the forefront of all of the work that's been done across the administration. I know that you-all are very much aware that the home initiative also includes incentivizing or creating affordable housing for very specifically members of our workforce. There are a lot of different kind of innovative things that we're trying to work through to get to a place where --
I get -- I'm sorry to cut you off, but I get that. But since you mentioned it, that program's really not doing like we thought it was going to do either. From what I understand, talking to employees again, is that they actually can't afford the houses. These are supposed to be work for houses for our employees. Again, we mandate that our employees should live in the city, but we don't pay them enough to live in the city. And then we're trying to start a program to help them to live in this city, and they can't afford the program that we started. You know, for me it's different. I was in the administration. So I was in the Street Administration. I've seen a lot of things go on before I left there. I seen him do a lot of things. I learned that government does not need to make a profit. We get subsidized on these housing things. Remember when John Street was building houses, Council President? A few people were here. Some of those houses cost us upwards of $260,000 to build. You know what we sold them for? 65,000. People could think because we don't have to make a profit. Subsidized. Most of it wasn't actual city money. It was federal and state money. My thing is, we -- why you brought it up and we need to get that program -- CAO DUCHAUSSEE: Yes.
-- on steroids as the Mayor says because I believe that it can be a good thing. We just have to make it affordable for our employees. CAO DUCHAUSSEE: Oh, absolutely.
We know what we're paying them, so why can't we make it so that they can afford it on their pay? CAO DUCHAUSSEE: Right. And I believe we are aligned there, right? And so the experience that I've had working in the Federal Bureau of Prisons for some odd years was just 12 that. 13 You'll find that retaining 14 employees in the prison system in 15 particular is a prickly and difficult 16 challenge to crack -- not to crack, 17 right? What we found was housing was 18 an incentive, right? Where we had -- 19 where we built correctional 20 institutions and provided staff housing, that was a very significant incentive where we provided other supports, where we got out into the community and understood what were the things that were specifically important to the folks who were moving to those areas was the work that improved our retention and recruitment in the Federal Bureau of Prisons. That's exactly the work that's being done here. I will tell you a lot of the work around return to learning, the work around CCME upskilling, creating different pathways so that, yes, you get into the city's government and you decide I want to pivot to a different path, making that available, making it less difficult, creating more conversation around exactly what you just said. The importance and the pride in working in the public sector, right? There -- we have created within CCME an entire class program that's built around understanding the importance and the value of civic engagement and public service. And so all of those things are pieces to the issue that you've raised. How do we attack retention? I think all of these things and all of the work that's being done is geared towards that.
Thank you very much. I will hope that -- and we want to be partners in this, because we are on the front line right now, right? Local government is really the last option of resort for a lot of people. And as we see people being laid off on a federal level, and I have people in my neighborhood who have been laid off and they're looking to us. And this is just a prime opportunity to really go hard and recruit as many people as possible to fill these positions as a result of the policies that are coming down from Washington, D.C. having an impact on our community, too. So we would like to be partners in that and really address it with a sense of urgency, right? Because even as we build and preserve 30,000 units, if people don't have good paying jobs, right, then we'll just have 30,000 --
-- preserved vacant units that people won't have the opportunity to move in. And so we want to be partners from that aspect. And anything that we can do to address this with a sense of urgency, I'm sure members of council -- CAO DUCHAUSSEE: Absolutely.
-- will join you in your efforts. The Chair recognizes Councilmember Jeffrey J. Young. Oh, it was you?
It was Jamie Gauthier. See what happens when you-all leave? It was Jamie Gauthier, then Councilmember Jeffrey J. Young, and then we'll officially go into -- one second. Councilman Lozada, do you want to wrap up this first round before we go into the second round?
Okay. All right. Just before we go into the second round, if you would like to ask a question, ma'am. Councilman Jamie Gauthier.
Thank you, Councilman President. I have questions for the tax review board. Good morning. The biggest issues my constituents have with property appeals are unclear timelines and communication. When folks submit their appeals, they typically do not receive confirmation that it was received unless it's submitted through our office. They also do not know who their reviewer is until they receive the decision. What steps can the review board take to improve communication and give people updates at every step of the appeal process? And what can the review board do to improve transparency for how long the process will take? The five-year plan reads that it takes five to six months, but most cases really take up to a year.
Good morning. My name is Melissa Andre. I am the Executive Director of the Philadelphia Tax Review Board. And unfortunately, I believe you're -- some of these questions are for the board of revision of taxes which deals with the assessment of the appeals. The tax review board takes care of -- or can help petitioners deal with the interest in the penalties that have accrued. So two different boards, but I think the questions that you asked were more for the board of revision of taxes. However, the tax review board has a very -- we hold very fast to a three to six months for the initial appeal. So if you come into our office and you file a hearing, it takes approximately three to six months. We do have a backlog in one category, which is license and inspections for the bills for those taxes. But that is being controlled. So generally we are at a three to six-month window for a petition and for a hearing.
Thank you. I apologize. I'll just -- I'll move on to a different set of questions so I don't use all my time. But thank you for coming up here.
I have a question for OIT. I know that in 2020 the city released a digital equity plan with the goal of getting everybody online. Is that -- we are in a new administration. But I wanted to ask, is that still a goal of this administration? And if so, where are we with that?
Thank you. So, yes, this is a goal continuously through the Verizon Franchise Agreement. We are placing free Wi-Fi broadband services in all 183 locations. Right now we have 50 of those locations lit up. But what is really exciting is that we just launched the new Wi-Fi finder. So right now you can go online and identify what locations where you can find free Wi-Fi here within the city, which includes the recreation centers as well as the libraries. And as each location gets lit up, it gets added in the -- in the finder so constituents can use that today.
And are we tracking how many people are connected through these efforts and which areas of the city still need the most work?
Yes, I'm glad you answered -- asked that question. What we want to do is find a way to have more lasting transformative relationships with constituents. So we have hired our -- we are bringing in-house our digital navigators where they'll start to work with individuals in -- as far as distributing devices, but providing them digital skills training, then identifying, are we being impactful in their lives, right? So I want us to really develop a relationship with the constituents and make sure that they get the digital training as well. So, because when you think of the three tiers, Wi-Fi is just one layer. Then you need the device, right, to get on. Then you need the skills that you need in order to actually take full advantage. And then we could even take it even further where you think of how is it that an individual could qualify for some jobs here in OIT, right? By us starting and building on those blocks, we would then be able to start training individuals to qualify for the positions. But with the vision that I have is really, imagine that every single rec center in the city of Philadelphia, and instead of a young girl or a young boy getting a football in their hand, you give them a computer. A computer is a job just as well, right? Esports. And there's so many other things that we could be teaching our youth.
Thank you so much. It would be great if at some point when you all are ready, if you could just send us a progress report on where we are with that. I think this is a very important goal for the district, my district and for the city as a whole.
Just a point of information regarding Esports to the gentleman, Councilmember Thomas.
Thank you, Council President. You read my mind. I -- we have been pushing for Esports in a lot of different spaces and places, especially in our rec centers and our libraries. Wasn't going to ask this, but you brought it up. I mean, are we talking about the initiative you have where you're talking about distributing 50 computers in each council district?
So -- and let me talk to you a little bit about why that came about. We were contracted with a company called PCs for People. And PCs for People, they do the refurbishing of the computers, but then they charge the constituents for the computers anywhere from 50 to 175. I didn't think it was fair. I feel like we should be giving the computers away for free. So now what we -- we've changed the program around a little bit and what we're doing is going in each council district distributing the computers. But we also have an extra effort in order to repurpose the computer labs within the rec centers. Then we are creating a program for digital skills training right there in the rec centers. And Esports is one of them. As a matter of fact, I have an appointment with a school somewhere in Delaware, and they have a very elaborate Esports center and we're going to take a trip there to see how they built theirs out and get some more information for ours.
So just to continue, how much like that initiative -- that's going to cost us about $1.6 million? Is that accurate?
No, I don't have a funding source for that exactly. So what I've been doing is taking the funding that we currently have in digital equity and figuring out a way. But there's also -- we get grants all the time. There's always different ways to do it. But the digital skills training specifically will be -- we'll start off with -- we are hiring six new individuals who will do the digital skills training just to start out for FY26 in the rec centers. And then we will start a volunteering program as well for individuals like myself who would like to go in and do some training as well.
So, Council President, I'm just going to ask that we have a coordinated effort with our office throughout the course of this initiative, specifically around gaming. It seems like we're meshing digital access with gaming, which are two totally different things. And if we were really talking about promoting and pushing gaming, and if you talk to the people in the gaming industry, they'll tell you they'll rather be in the libraries than the rec center. So if we can have more of a coordinated effort moving forward so we can figure out, because some of the places that you're talking about going to in Delaware, we have a whole task force that produced a report that has all of these recommendations for the city of Philadelphia specifically around gaming. And maybe we could share that and bring some of these people together so we can be able to move in a way that's a little coordinated.
Thank you. Thank you, Council President. Sorry about that.
And I just want to say in terms of just bridging the digital divide and as we address the issue of AI, because that's also a space that I expect that we'll be in, in the future as well, when our chair of technology has been working on this issue. And also as a Dad, I just want to say, right, and I blame Member Thomas in the event that it goes down this way with my little ones, right? As a dad, I just want to say that we are mindful when we are introducing them to technology, just making sure also we're protecting them.
You don't know who's on the other side of their group chat when they're inside the rec centers and they go on like Roblox or they go on Fortnite. And once they go into a chat room, we don't know who's over there talking to our young people. So making sure that education component is a part of it. And then also the mental health component that comes along with screen time. I recognize that and working with other parents, and I've been to other workshops that really talk about, I guess I call it screen addiction for children.
Right? And once you take their screen away from them, have an impact on their behavior because they want to still be involved in playing again, rather it's Roblox, Fortnite, and there's a thousand other games that are out there. And then also just making sure that they aren't spending their parents' dollars and cents on their credit cards on -- so those are just some of the things that as we expand and go into this space, I say it jokingly, but in my -- in my other life as a dad, I've been to workshops really around protecting my sons from, and the other students at the school they attend from when they go on these websites, particularly making sure when they go in them chat rooms, who are you talking to on the other side of room? And if you have rec centers where the ratio might be 40 kids to like two recs -- two recs leaders, they aren't monitoring everybody who's on the computers. They're kind of, like, free at place. So I think the education component goes a long way to it, but we are here to be partners with that under the leadership of Councilman Rue Landau and Councilmember Thomas. The Chair recognizes Councilman Jeffrey J. Young?
Thank you, Mr. President. You know, I just have, you know, just -- you know, in support of, you know, the e-gaming industry and the -- and the billions of dollars that can come from that, you know. And hearing from the experts who say they want to be in libraries which is why I am very supportive of increasing the capacity, increasing the square footage of our libraries in order to have these types of programs. Because again, our libraries are not equipped for 21st century ideas. And so I just want to put that out there on the record. And first question I have is for -- I guess it would be for HR. One thing that I do notice and that I see is that whenever I'm at a job fair and the city is there, the city's line is the longest line by far compared to any other prospective employer that's there. So it looks like to me that there is a lot of interest in still working for the city. And with -- but this interest doesn't seem to turn over into the actual job. So can you talk to us about what you are seeing? Like, is it only a specific type of job that people are applying to that have all this interest versus the level of vacancies that we see?
Sure. So there is definitely a lot of interest. When we're at -- so 60 percent of our recruitment events are community events where you're seeing us boots on the ground with or without the hiring bus. And so we're engaging over 4,000 prospective applicants, 71 percent of whom are residents. And so that spans across various career pathways. And so there are very particular jobs. So jobs that are open on an open competitive basis are the jobs that we are in when we're doing community recruitment that we're getting our residents into. So that includes custodial worker, a laborer, management trainee, some of our entry- level engineering positions. And so we do have a breakdown of what those applicants look like across all of those industries that I can follow-up and provide. But it is not in any particular job industry. When we are sourcing for candidates, it is really across all of these critical positions that we're looking for to recruit open competitively in.
Thank you. And so when the city -- years ago, the city had a need the clean vacant lots, so they created the CLIP program, right? The Community Life Improvement Program, which is based out of the managing director's office. And from my understanding, these members -- these workers are not civil service employees. But -- and I believe they weren't civil service employees and They were not civil service employees because that need was so critical, and the speed of getting those folks hired was critical. We're looking at a lack of -- a lot of my rec centers don't have staff, right? There's no staff there for events, for programming. And the community members, you know, you have to have at least two staffers there at a rec center. And community members cannot have events there with the lack of staffing. And so, because I feel like this is a dire issue, a dire need, is it possible to create a similar program to CLIP for our rec centers where we have, you know, these staffers that are under the Managing Director's office, but work directly in these rec centers to fill this critical community need?
Just a point of information. Member Young, we do have a program and -- we do have a program that will allow you a pathway to -- you won't be official RS1 rec leader, but you will be able to work under Parks & Rec. And remember this program under the cap of level I, because the barrier in our neighbors that you have people who volunteer day in and day out. They know the kids in the neighborhood, they work at the rec centers, and then they get the seasonal jobs, right?
But the issue is they don't have degrees. And because they don't have a degree, I guess, to be the RS1, right? And they also have to take the test. But there is a program, could you elaborate on, that will allow you a pathway into the system without going through civil service?
Yes, absolutely. So I'm going to ask Janine LaBletta, deputy for hiring services to come up to talk about that particular pathway and the work that we're doing with Parks & Recreation in particular. CAO DUCHAUSSEE: And while Janine is making her way up here, I would also like to say that it is -- it's this collaboration and the work that makes CCME so vital, right? It's closing that gap between the number of applicants that we have and the skills that they have to fill the jobs that are available. Sorry.
Hi, good morning. Janine LaBletta, deputy for hiring services. Thank you for having us. So we do have two titles in civil service that don't require degrees: Assistant recreation leader and recreation outreach worker. So we do post those and recruit in the community to fill those. And then to the Council President's point, that would be the role called recreation specialty instructor, which is filled directly through the Parks & Recreation Department. And we do direct candidates in the field or if they call our customer service, how to reach the Parks Department website, and they can apply directly for those roles.
And with those roles, and there seems -- there seems to be a disconnect from community members, right, who are at rec centers all the time, right? In programming, they're in friends of groups and actually getting hired by the rec department. And so I'm just trying to -- how can we bridge that gap? I'm thinking of three rec centers off the top where there are folks who are there all the time who would love to be getting paid for what they're doing, but they're there for the love of the community. So how can we bridge that gap if we have these programs, right, and they're -- and they're not civil service, right? Because folks -- everyone can't pass the civil service test for whatever reason. It just is what it is. But how do we bridge that gap between the community members who want to serve and getting hired by the department of rec in some capacity at that rec center to expand our capacity there?
Yes. So Parks & Recreation is having a job fair coming up. Hopefully all of the councilmembers have that at The Dell.
At -- yeah, we have that. That's fine. But again, these are -- I'm talking about how can we create a position -- positions, right? We have -- these fairs are there. A lot of those folks, you know, don't have degrees, so they're not going to be able to qualify for rec leaders as they created the assistant rec leader program. Like, how do we, again, bridge that gap? We got the seasonal program, that's seasonal, right? How can we, again, bridge that gap between -- we have folks who are there everyday at the rec center who are just there on a voluntary basis. What can we do to get them hired by the city in some type of role at the rec center. If they can pass, you know, all the child clearances, things like that, how can we get them to be in -- to be employees to actually carry out their duties that they're already volunteering to do?
If they have high school and I think it's three seasons, but I can have us send you that, they can qualify for permanent civil service roles.
Again, civil service. We're saying -- I'm not saying civil service, right? Because again, folks are not able to get over civil service for whatever reason. When I mentioned the example of CLIP in the Managing Director's Office, that's not civil service, but those folks work for the city full time, right? And they're out here doing these jobs. So that's the type of model that I'm looking for our department of recreation. A full-time position, not necessarily just something that's seasonal. CAO DUCHAUSSEE: So I appreciate the question and we are very happy to partner with you on that because we've already had some preliminary conversation about just what your -- the model -- expanding the model that you're mentioning, creating where we can civil service roles, but also exempt roles to bridge the gap. I know CCME, I've said it a lot. It's not the panacea for all things, but it will allow us to create spaces to provide upskilling, training, qualifying experiential opportunities, to do exactly what you're suggesting here, which is bridge the gap between those who have either a penchant or have demonstrated the ability to do some work or the aptitude to do the work and get us from point A to point B.
The Chair recognizes the Vice Chair of Parks & Recreation, Councilmember Bass.
I -- you know, I -- what comes to mind from Jeffrey -- Councilman Young's questioning is Philly Future Track, which is a way that was used -CAO DUCHAUSSEE: Uh-huh. Exactly.
-- you know, to find a faster path to employment in the streets department and in similar departments. So something like that, if we did it for that particular agency, I think we can recreate it and maybe just -- or even expand future track so that it's not just the streets department, but that it could be for Parks & Rec and some other departments.
So where -- oh, sorry. So where there's a bridge, I hear you. Where there's a bridge and possibly an exempt opportunity that then leads to civil service in the future. Agreed. We should have that conversation.
Thank you very much. We are in the second round. The Chair recognizes Councilmember Brooks.
Thank you, Council President. I'm going to go right to my questions. One is, how many OIT staff are dedicated to maintaining the PVSSP camera network? And what percentage of OIT's annual personal -- personnel budget is consumed by the PVSSP maintenance? And my other question is, what is the estimated annual savings for a family enrolled in PHLConnectED and how does this free up income for other essentials like food or rent? Right.
Could you repeat the question? The first question, Councilwoman, was how many staff members are designated?
Okay. I'll have to get back to you on the exact number of -- and we will get a response back to the Chair for the number of staffs specifically.
And then part 2 was the OITs annual personnel budget. How much is that consumed by the maintenance of that program?
Just in case. I just want you to have the full question if you have to get back to us. Okay.
Okay. Yeah. So we'll get back to you about the number of how much specifically for the maintenance.
Okay. And then the other question was the angle savings for PHLConnectED.
I'll have to -- I don't want to just blurb out random numbers, so I'll get back to you about that as well.
Thank you very much. The Chair recognizes Councilman Quetcy Lozada. Then we have Councilmember Gilmore-Richardson and Councilmember O'Rourke.
I just want to follow-up on a question that Councilmember Young was just referring to. If I'm not mistaken, I remember, I believe it was the Mayor that mentioned that HR would look at all of the jobs that were -- that we had that were open and available in the city and determine which ones of them had to be civil service, which one -- which ones could be exempt, which one didn't need degrees. Can you tell me if that assessment has been done and how successful it was and what -- if it wasn't, what were some of the challenges? CAO DUCHAUSSEE: Sure. I'm happy to turn over to Candi Jones. But -- so what you're referring to is the executive order 0324. And it really was our economic opportunity executive order by which we were going to assess the entire universe of positions across the city, but specifically exempt roles for other pathways to qualification. And so that work continues. As you can imagine, there are a lot of exempt titles and exempt titles continue to be created. And that work is in full steam. A lot of adjustments have been made, and Candi will speak to that, where we have changed the qualifications to include pathways other than a bachelor's degree or advanced degree.
We do that to those positions that are civil service. CAO DUCHAUSSEE: We're doing it for all positions.
And can you tell me how many thus far have been filled and how many are still vacant?
So to answer the first question, about 63 percent of the civil service job descriptions do not require a four-year degree. Those jobs, that 63 percent is occupied by about 19,000 employees. And so about two thirds of the workforce are in jobs that don't require four-year degree. The other one-third are your, like, medical classes, engineering, financial accounting, where the degree may be industry standard. We've changed -- in 2024, we changed -- we identified 15 civil 9 service positions where we could 10 include an alternate path, and so 11 where there were an alternate 12 education requirement other than that 13 bachelor's degree. We've had some 14 significant success stories there. 15 For example, the land administrator class, which is an IT title. We actually were able to add eight more employees to qualify for that by removing that degree requirement. For exempt titles, there are approximately 1,200 job titles for exempt roles. And then in 2024, about 10 percent of those job descriptions were reviewed and then alternate pathways identified. And so I can give you the -- we have the comprehensive list in the report on which job titles that we changed for civil service and exempts. We can provide that separately. But we have made significant progress in looking at those titles, identifying alternate pathways to employment other than the bachelor's degree requirement.
Can we as councilmembers receive a list of what some of those available positions are so that when we are out in the community and folks are asking us, you know, I want to come into the city's workforce, what is available? Some folks don't have access to phila.gov. Or sometimes, you know, there's a true digital divide in the city of Philadelphia. So is there somewhere where we can say, reach out to the office, here's a paper?
I know I used to get a paper copy back in the day, so I don't know.
We can. Absolutely. We can. We're happy to provide that information. Our recruitment team is also happy to partner because we're -- we've realized that hosting a set of information sessions is helpful for community members to talk about these opportunities that are available where bachelor's degrees are not required. And so we can provide you with a comprehensive list, but we'd be happy to do some more targeted outreach and provide that information one-on-one to community members as well.
And then I have a question around procurement. Do I have time still? I'm taking advantage that he's talking. At one of the Economic Opportunity Review committee's hearings, we heard concerns that vendors were not notified when they win or lose a bid. The guest speaker stated that the lack of communication leads to wasted time and resources for businesses, particularly small and minority owned vendors who rely on timely feedback to improve their bids and plan accordingly. Implementation -- or implementing a formal notification system could enhance transparency and efficiency in the procurement process. Are you guys aware of this? And what steps is your department taking to implement a solution that ensures vendors receive timely notification? CAO DUCHAUSSEE: So we are very much aware of it and we have created templates for standard forms to be sent from our departmental procurement teams to vendors for just circumstances like what you've described and others, and have required that they be distributed within a certain timeframe.
Thank you. Katherine Gilmore-Richardson, then Councilmember Nicholas O'Rourke, Rue Landau down to Councilman Jamie Gauthier. But I just want to say one thing just in terms of sense of urgency. In this budget, we're spending $300 million more for FY26 than we spent for FY25. And so hopefully as part of your plan to hire folks and recruit folks, if we do maybe like a massive recruitment campaign like Power 99, WDAS. When you turn on the TV, the city of Philadelphia is hiring. We got, like, a portal, right? DC has something called like DC1, where you type in, you go to this portal and it's like pretty much everything that the city has to offer. And so again, we are addressing the issue of poverty by making sure that these vacancies we have, we're putting people to work. That might just be something to take into consideration in terms of your budget request, or if we are doing it, maybe I missed it in the process.
We do. So OHR has a significant communications budget for this current year and hopefully for the upcoming year. And so our Philly fully campaign, which resulted in our 40 percent of our increase in applications, so we're doing just that, right? So commercials, bus shelters, digital media. So it's having a significant impact. But also to your point, so we established two different websites over the past year. So one is work.philly.gov, which is that centralized hub, right, where you can see everything that we're recruiting for and currently have open. But then we also have employee.philly.gov, which is our external facing Intranet. And so anyone, current city employees and city residents interested in working for the city has access to that Intranet site. So it talks about all of the benefits of working for the city, our comprehensive benefits packages, all of sort of kind of what that experience looks like for an employee. And so both of those websites were also launched under our communications campaign. It's certainly --
So when's the last time you've been on -- it's not the Breakfast Club. What's -- Mikey Dread? We, CAO DUCHAUSSEE: We are -- we are --
I'm going to keep -- I'm going to keep -- CAO DUCHAUSSEE: -- diligently working on it
-- because we got to meet people where they at, right? CAO DUCHAUSSEE: Absolutely.
So we get you a Frankie Darcell, Patty Jackson. CAO DUCHAUSSEE: So we've been -- we are working very, very diligently in creating partnerships with all the media, WURD. If this face needs to be on media, yes.
Look, we're partners in this, and so we just thinking different ways to get the word out to people. CAO DUCHAUSSEE: Right.
No, absolutely. We have this -- so this year I did engage with Patty Jackson. We were on the show.
And so we do have those relationships and we'll continue those partnerships. CAO DUCHAUSSEE: Absolutely.
Yeah. We get on the radio like, oh, we hiring as a city. Here's the process to how you go about doing it. CAO DUCHAUSSEE: We hear you.
I just call it meeting people where they at. And again, we want to be partners in this. Majority Leader -- Member Thomas.
Just in the energy of the Council President, he just inspired me. Quick question. Have we ever thought about partnering with content creators? Right? That's a whole new thing out there. So have we ever thought about partnering with content creators to be able -- and just same energy as Councilmember Young. Just to be a little more innovative in making sure that we're meeting people where they are? Sorry, Council President. Sorry, Majority Leader Richardson. Just wondering if that's something that might be in the works.
Like if Waldo was going to say, city of Philadelphia is hiring then, you know, we probably, like, the vacancies would be done tomorrow.
So we -- I'm sorry. Yes. So a part of our communications campaign is digital media strategies, right, how to leverage the current technology. And so this current year, we're looking to kind of lean into our Instagram presence more because I think that that's a space for opportunity that we haven't. So to agree with you, we do have to meet the people where they are. And I think a lot of our recruitment efforts needs to be also on Instagram and on social media pages. Agreed.
You're welcome. Majority Leader Gilmore-Richardson, then Member O'Rourke.
Great. Thank you, Council President. And I neglected to say this earlier. We also want to thank our OIT commissioner, Melissa Scott. President, you mentioned the new Land Bank website, and I was actually on there this morning. And the mobile interface is even great. So we just want to thank you and your team for your work and for the excellent meeting that we had to talk about some of the work even in the recreation centers. So I just wanted to put that on the record. I didn't see you sitting up there and I neglected to say it, so thank you very, very much. I wanted to go back to something that we have been working on since last year. My colleague, Councilmember Harrity, sort of, alluded to this regarding the advantages of working for the city. And so I wanted to thank Vanessa Garrett Harley for the meeting that we had. And we continue to work through the process regarding the childcare study. You know, that was something that was important to me last year. And also paid parental leave which is something that we had worked through in the last budget process, and I intend to work through again this budget process. I just want to put that on the record. Because that was something that I thought we achieved that we did not achieve that I wasn't told until the last minute. So I'm just putting that on the record. But I wanted to go to the program when I initially asked about the childcare support. In doing the study, I was told that initially those dollars were transitioned to set up the program, Wellthy. And I will tell you, I think it's a wonderful program. I think it's a great program to ensure that our employees who need, you know, last minute support and help are able to get that during their journey. And it's not just for young people, it's, you know, for, you know, for their caregiver as well. So I wanted to ask how many city employees have taken advantage of the program thus far?
So for a number of signups for participation, we have 678. For cumulative days requested, 719. And then for the days used of that is 603. The average number of backup days that are being used by employees that are enrolled is about five days.
And then we have some additional data that I can send separately about the types of employees that are enrolled. The age of the dependents and things like that, we can share.
And they can use up to eight days, right?
But you can't carry over, but you can use up to eight days per year.
Okay. And then you could also self-identify a provider and then get reimbursed, right?
Okay. And I just found out about this yesterday, so I got to put this on the record. I just found out -- I think you know where I'm going. But the amended W-2s for those employees, I don't think anyone knew that when they signed up for the program, that the amount that the city subsidizes for them to receive the care outside of the co-pay is now added to their wages as a part of their wages, which may change the tax bracket for some of these employees. So I don't think people knew that when they signed up. And I don't know that you-all necessarily knew that. Maybe that's coming from the program. But I need to understand that because people signed up for the program thinking once they pay the co-pay, that that would be it. That because of the benefit it would be subsidized. But now folks are receiving -- I mean, it's almost April 15th, the tax deadline. They're just receiving amended W-2s, W-2Cs from the city regarding an increase in their wages and they didn't know anything about it when they signed up for the program. So I think that because the city probably didn't know when that occurred, that the city should not hold those employees. The 678 employees that you mentioned, those folks should not be held accountable for that this year. Because they signed up for the program under the pretense that once they pay the co-pay, that that was it. Now, let's -- I'll give you an example. Say if they use, you know, the average five days, and that was $2,000, you know, worth of subsidy that the city provided for that period, now that $2,000, say if they made 50,000, now it says they made 52,000. But they weren't aware of that when they signed up for the program. I get it moving forward, because you can tell them that, but I don't think that that's fair, and I think that that should be rectified for those employees.
I'd like to ask Marsha Greene-Jones, the deputy over benefits to come up to offer comment on the question.
And I just -- I literally -- this was not in my questions. I literally just found out about this yesterday. And I want to put on the record that I think it's a great -- like, I really think it's a great program, and I applaud the city for standing it up. But I just think that for this year, you can't hold those employees accountable because when they signed up for the program, they weren't told that those charges that the city would be covering for them would be added to their actual wage amount where it makes it seem as if they made more money than they did, you know.
Marsha Greene-Jones, deputy director of human resources responsible for health and welfare. Thank you very much for your question today. One of the things that the city did realize later on in the process is that because this was considered to be income, it had to be taxable income. We made a concerted effort upon us realizing this piece to actually get out W-2s, corrected W-2s to employees no later than February 19th.
And we also sent out additional communications to every single employee who was enrolled in a program, notify the -- notifying them of the fact, number one, that this was taxable income, and number two, that they would receive a corrected W2 no 24 later than February 19th.
Right. No, and I understand that. Meaning when they signed up for the program, were the 678 employees made aware that this would be taxable income? Meaning they thought, I believe they were supposed to pay the co-pay, the $15 or $20, whatever it is, and then that was it. You understand what I'm saying? Because it was a benefit. I don't believe that anyone knew when they initially utilized this program that it would be added as actual income.
I completely understand your question. The issue is, more importantly, is the fact that it was income provided by the city, and we are the first city in the United States. I don't know that anyone realizes that, in the United States to actually offer this benefit, so we're very proud of it. And one of the things that we are committed to is continuing to communicate more effectively with employees as we proceed with the program.
No, I agree. I think it's a great program. I want to underscore that. But is there a way to calculate how much that is for the city to cover that this year, and then next year moving forward or as of now moving forward, just when people use the benefit, when city employees use the benefit, to say this is to be charged as a part of your actual income. I'm not disagreeing with you. I think it's a wonderful program. I really, really do. And I think it was an important benefit, you know, as people were coming back to work full- time as well. But I don't think they knew in advance that this would be a part of their income. And for some people who don't have the benefit of making certain salaries, it changes their tax bracket. And so, you know, we talked -- I heard one of my colleagues, Councilman Rue Landau talk earlier about, you know, like, pay equity and how some employees were making 37,000, I think you said, in one department and others were making 140. And so for the folks making 140, it doesn't matter to them. But for someone who may be right on the cusp of, you know, their taxable income going from one percentage to the next, it does matter.
Sorry. I think we can work with finance on that piece to understand the total impact to employees for this past year and then make some considerations and decisions based on that. I don't have the total number, but I completely understand the impact. And I agree with you that understanding that it is part of income may change the utilization for some employees.
Right. And just to see how much it is, how many people, you know, were impacted in total, and then what we can do as a city to support those workers who utilize the benefit unknowingly that this would be added to their taxable income. That's all I'm saying. Then going forward, at least they know.
And we can follow-up once we have that information, I can share that with you as well.
Okay. I'll submit the balance of my questions because I have a lot more, but I'll submit them for the record.
Okay. Thank you very much. And thank you for making us number one again. Okay.
Thank you, Mr. President. And thank you for joining us. Commissioner Hovey?
Yes, sir. I want to acknowledge days in and you already happen to sit before the council. Courageous man. I thank you for your -- for your service already. I did want to say that it's important for both council and the public to know the vital role that administrative departments like procurement play in delivering public services and maintaining public goods. But the question I had has to do a little bit with prison procurement. Do you -- you may not necessarily know yet. Is the person who deals with prison procurement here today? They might better come and deal with this question.
We could certainly get you an answer if it's not something that my team --
No 6 worries. No worries. Could you provide us with a brief overview of how your team works with other departments to evaluate new and existing vendors and contracts?
Can you -- could you provide us with a brief overview of how your team works with other departments to evaluate new and existing vendors and contracts?
Okay. So I'm going to let my deputy talk a little bit about the existing process, and then I want to talk just very briefly about some of the initiatives that I have in mind.
LaShawnda Tompkins, Deputy Commissioner. Can you ask the question one more time?
Yes. Could you provide just a brief overview of how your team works with other departments to evaluate new and existing vendors and contracts?
New and existing vendors. Okay. So when we work with the departments on the contracts, we meet with them so we can understand what their needs are and what that assessment is. When we're looking at MWDSBE participation, we direct them to look at OYO's registry, do a -- just cascade a registry to see what vendors there are that can help with the needs that you -- that you are looking for. Also, when we are posting the bids and PHL contracts, they're going to post a bid and then it's going to be visible to all of the vendors that are certified with the city. So that's how they'll be able to pull in the vendors that provide the services that they're looking for. And if they have any businesses that need to get certified with the city, we put them in contact with our vendor engagement unit. If they're a local business entity, we educate them about the local business entity certification and kind of go through all the different things that they should be proactively doing before looking to participate with the City of Philadelphia.
Thank you, Deputy Commissioner. I'm going to ask the balance of my question because I just heard the bail. I'm going to get this out and then please respond if you can. I'd like to discuss this one contract that actually concerns me in particular for a moment. YesCare. YesCare previously known as Corizon has provided healthcare at the Philadelphia Department of Prisons for years. Across the country though, they have been sued more than a thousand times over claims of substandard care. Their current iteration appears to only have been created to allow them to pay pennies on the dollar for many of these claims. Locally, we're still seeing more deaths in our jails than in New York City, yet the size of this contract has increased by $140 million since 2022. While we are not here to discuss one contract, it is good reminder of the responsibility that we have to ensure that we are doing our best by our city. My question is, what range of options are available to the city when a contractor is not meeting their obligations?
So contracts could be terminated for cause or default. I mean for cause or at -- for convenience. Most contracts are written that way. And generally if you're going to cancel a contract, I've actually never engaged in a -- in a cancellation for cause. And that's just because of the hurdles that arise legally and the costs associated. But you always do have the ability to cancel for convenience. But that does mean that you have to go through the sourcing and be ready for the next -- the next step to replace what's going away. And one of the things that sort of answers the first part of your question and this one, too, is kind of how we'll be handling procurements in the future. And one of the things that I'm looking forward to to do here is really push the organization to a more strategic sourcing direction where we work very collaboratively with our stakeholders, not just in a particular area, but across sort of associated needs or where there's, you know, sort of equivalent needs across departments to leverage the community of vendors to the maximum ability and to sort of front load contracts and get them in place before needed whenever possible. But also to look at -- strategic sourcing also looks at all of these questions up front in terms of what are the performance standards, what are the risks associated with this contract that could come into play? And then you sort of measure that during the process. And that measurement is typically done at the departmental level by the stakeholders who are part of a scoring team. So actually when I came here, I was impressed the city does do some strategic sourcing. They have contracts in place across some sectors, but that's something that we truly want to maximize. That's sort of the state of the art in procurement. People are usually put to sleep by procurement content, but that's sort of state of the art for procurement in the private and the public sector.
For whatever it's worth, some evaluation about this particular contract, like I said, I'm not here to talk about just one, but this is very troubling to me.
That the folks who we are incarcerating in our city are getting substandard care by a widely known bad -- may be bad actor is a bad word, but certainly offering substandard care. And so if there's some way to be able to shift on that and do whatever we can do to find somebody else that might be in the best benefit of us as a city to make sure that we are treating people correctly, even our citizens who are behind the wall. I did have other questions I'll submit for -- to be sent in. But I did have some questions around hard numbers around attrition. If you could provide the city's attrition rate for the past three years, and if you've seen any significant spikes in departures following the return to office policy. If you could submit that, I won't have to talk -- I don't want to take time.
Three years. I'm sorry. I didn't hear the -- attrition for over the last three years?
Yes. Attrition rates for the past three years and if there were any significant spikes in departures after the return to office policy went into place.
Thank you, Mr. President and thank you all for your responses. CAO DUCHAUSSEE: We certainly can provide you that information, Councilmember O'Rourke. Thank you for the questions. I will also say that there is a mechanism within the procurement process for how we review performance of our contracted partners. Happy to have a more specific conversation with not only you, but of course the impacted department to make sure that we are understanding what that impact and how that vendor has been performing relative to the concerns that you've raised.
Thank you. So as we wrap up this round before we go out to lunch, I'm going off the queue. Councilman Rue Landau, then Jamie Gauthier, Young, and we will wrap up with the gentleman Harrity. That's the line.
And I just want to just also say just because we are on the timeframe for your break, that we want to be direct and a direct response, please.
I have a few HR questions, then some OIT questions. I've got a couple procurement questions. I'll just put on the record. I'll start with HR. I think you have all done a great job to start modernizing our hiring process. I worked for the city starting in 2008 and it was very different than it is now. There seems to be two different websites, work at philly or, and -- work at Philly and jobs. And I think it's really important that we streamline how people are thinking about what they want to do and how they get there. So most people want a job and when you Google that, it's going to bring you to the job site, which looks much more archaic than your work site. I love how your work site is connected into categories. If you want to work in public safety or public health, when you get to the job site, you might know that you want a city job. You might know that you want an entry level job at the law department because you might want to be a paralegal, but you don't know what to call it. Would love to hear your comments on how to fix that and how to interconnect both of these. I also want to put out two more questions while we're there. If there's any obstacles in the civil service system right now that is hampering your efforts to hire, like, how long the lists last when you do create a list to moving on to the next job. And three, I wanted to know about your successes with Fair Chance Hiring. I also have a couple of IT questions, but can we just get quick answers on that first?
Thank you, Councilwoman. I'll answer the question about the website. So part of our request in the budget is, and I mentioned earlier for the re-platforming what we will do is it'll allow for a more modernized look and feel similar to what you see on the landing page and similar to what you see in the work site. Right now, the platform that our engineering team is working on doesn't allow for those functions and features. But when we re-platform, we'll be able to work with departments such as HR in order to bring back -- bring that modernization, but also to organize the data so it's more user friendly for individuals to be able to click and get to where they need to go quickly.
Okay. And I think that addresses the beginning, but then there's also a piece when you go to the actual application part, right? And that's also -- that can also be a part of the barrier to the process. It's very lengthy, it's a little cumbersome. And so we are launching the new application track -- the applicant tracking system which was funded in this year's budget. And so that is, I think the third part. Not just the landing page for work, and then the jobs page. But when you're actually going through the process of applying for a position, that also needs to be streamlined. It also needs to be kind of user friendly, right? Agile. And so the new applicant tracking system in July will then cover that last piece, right? So once you engage the applicant, once they go on the website, that'll be a streamlined process. For time to hire specifically, that applicant tracking system will also assist that. So I did send the visual for time to hire and there's a -- no, so there's a component part that is -- that we talk about. There's, like, a departmental part, that section in the beginning -- in the middle of that when you're engaging candidates for interviewing. The scheduling process may take some time. That onboarding piece that isn't necessarily owned by OHR, but we are certainly responsible for the entire kind of body of work, right, from list to hire. And so the applicant tracking system will also take care of that piece as well, right? There's going to be scheduling components in there, there's going to be onboarding pieces and constant candidate communication. And so we're really looking at it holistically, not just the first thing you see when you're looking for the job, but the websites that shepherd you through the entire parts of the process. Sorry.
Thank you. I'm just -- can I throw in a -- just a couple of -- it's AI. You like AI.
You can ask the questions. She can provide them to you for -- in writing.
Okay. So I wanted to know the successes with Fair Chance Hiring to get people with criminal records jobs. To OIT, can you speak to the amount of funding the city spends on automated decision making systems or artificial intelligence and any plans or policies you have or developing to govern the use of AI within city governments departments? And then also wanted to dig down a little bit more into PHLConnectED that connects families with K-12 students to internet access. How many students or kids are signed up for PHLConnectED? How do you measure the impact of that program? Do you think there will ever be the potential to expand the program to help low income Philadelphia residents who don't have K-12 students at home? And also we know that internet bills strain household budgets. What's the estimated annual savings for families enrolled in PHLConnectED. How does this free up income for other essentials like food and rent? For procurement, I'd love to know how we're doing with OPAL, which is probably a mix here. And also following on Majority Leader Kathy Gilmore-Richardson's great work on our contracting process. Wanted to dig in deeper to hear about the RFP process in general. What changes you've made to make contracting easier, better, and faster with the City of Philadelphia. Thank you very much. I'll put them all in writing for you.
Thank you very much. The Chair recognizes Councilman Jamie Gauthier, the next, Councilmember Young and wrapping us up for today prior to our break will be Councilmember Jim Harrity. Just please be direct with your questions as well as your response.
Thank you. My questions are for the CCME. Thank you. I'm very excited that my council district will be home to the city's new state-of-the-art for forensic science center, and I'm heartened to hear that PPD will implement a comprehensive staffing plan to recruit, train, and retain highly qualified forensic scientists and support personnel, as well as to have a strong community engagement component to help Philadelphia students get interested in STEM. So my questions are: One, are we exploring a school or community college to forensic scientist pipeline? Can you speak to any plans to use these positions as a workforce development opportunity for Philadelphians in need of a stable income? And which workforce training providers do you plan to partner with? And what kind of budget will be dedicated to creating a training and hiring pipeline?
Thank you for the question, Councilwoman Gauthier. I've had some initial conversations with managing director, Michael Garvey about the expansion and the needs within the department as they move to the new location. In fact, at the five-year budget hearing, we followed up with some of those conversations. The -- in particular, the needs around technician, we've been talking to Community College of Philadelphia and adapting some of their programs that they already have in the life sciences for technicians to be relevant for the forensic technicians. The scientist level positions do require four-year degree. And but the issue is, is that there's no direct connection from the community college to those four-year degree program. So we've been talking about how we can get CCP connected to those local four-year degree programs so that there's an accelerated path from CCP into those four-year degree programs so that they can qualify for the scientists' roles. But yes, there are ongoing conversations. We're not yet at what I would identify on the CCME side of the equation about what the workforce development program or budget would be. But I know that the police office has -- and Michael Garvey in particular has been working on that and putting out an RFP for training as well in facilities around and in Philadelphia. So we can get more information about that for you.
I would love to see a serious effort in this area. I know that we already have amazingly skilled forensic staff, but I want this to be an opportunity for people who live here. And so, you know, I would love to see an actual budget, an actual plan that takes people from our school system all the way to forensic sciences and all of the jobs in between to go along with the expansion of our center.
One of the specific career pathways for CCME is in the STEM area, and this is a particular passion of mine as well. And in particular, I think one of the other aspects that we've been talking with the Science Center around is CTE programs in the life sciences and in the biosciences space. So that is also something that we need to connect to this initiative as well.
Yeah. And just to -- just in closing, I think one of the things that excited me most about having the forensics lab on the corridor of science is that there are so many partners that we can engage in this training, and I hope that we take advantage of that.
I just wanted to quickly follow-up on that comment. So OHR does work with the -- there's a CTE program for biotechnology. And so we use that for the fingerprinting. So that's not the title that requires the four-year degree, but perhaps we can bridge though that particular cohort with a future CCME program to your point, right, so that they can go from that program that requires high school into a four-year degree program, perhaps through CME as a -- as a conduit.
That'd be great. Thank you. Thank you, Council President.
Thank you. The Chair recognizes Councilman Jeffrey J. Young.
Thank you, Mr. President. Just two quick questions. One is for procurement. I met with a vendor of -- let's just say like swag gear, right? And we went over some numbers. And that vendor, a local minority vendor here in Philadelphia, cannot compete with some of the applicants who apply for this RFP who are, you know, have direct connects to China, essentially, right? So what are we doing about -- or what can we do to provide those more opportunities for local vendors where we have to compete in this global market, particularly for items like swag items that, you know, every department has -- uses and particularly in the industry that can provide jobs here locally.
I'll go first. So we give a preference to local businesses currently which advantages them in the -- in the bidding process. We still have to follow the bidding rules, but beyond that, I'm going to turn it over to LaShawnda.
Deputy Commissioner Tompkins. So we have the LBPI -- the LBPI initiative, which increases the threshold for LBE businesses. We also have the LBE preference that Commissioner Hovey spoke about. And also there are -- there are micro and SOPs, like small order purchases that these LBEs can take advantage of as well, which are more of an informal bidding process, which will allow them to work with departments, build a relationship, and also just do more business with the city through those smaller projects and kind of work their way up.
So this one vendor in particular had a relationship with the city, had previous contracts with the city. But again, because of how things are shifting globally, you know, the opportunity to compete just wasn't there. And so what are we -- or how can we increase those chances? Because I looked at the city's awards for that particular type of contract, and none of them were local. None of them were local. So I was just trying to figure out what can we do to increase that participation in those types of industries where we know that there are people in Philadelphia that can fulfill those roles.
One of the things that I saw in my last venture was that as soon as we -- and we raised it several times over the last few years, once we raised the small purchase or here the micro purchase threshold, we saw an associated level of participation of smaller businesses because things could be more easily directed in terms of awards to local businesses or small businesses. In that case it was small businesses.
So what I think, Mr. President, what I'll do is I'm going to share the information that I have in writing with you all with a couple questions that I have to see if you can answer that on how we can allow more opportunities for our local businesses to compete for city business rather than some business that is based in San Francisco, but really is based out of China, CAO DUCHAUSSEE: Councilmember, I appreciate the question and the sentiment. I will say that this year for the first time during our, kind of, budget preparation process, we embedded procurement in the departmental conversations, right? And so what this allows us to do, because similar to OHR, we do have a federated model for procurement, and you have departments with their own procurement teams. But what -- embedding Procurement, big P, the Procurement Department into those conversations allows us to do, is to identify those opportunities that maybe the departments are not aware of, right? So there's a component of education to this, not necessarily for the vendor, but for our departmental partners. And we're working very hard to embed ourselves in those conversations about procurement planning, contract planning, so that we can always lift up the opportunities for our local businesses and other businesses that are registered in the city.
Thank you. And just one more question just about the Bureau of Administrative Adjudication. I saw in the five-year plan. The goal was 120 days for some of these -- to review some of these cases. But FY25, it was 90 days. So why are we taking longer to review these cases than -- why we have a goal of a longer review period than a previous year? CAO DUCHAUSSEE: So we are trying to -- and I will ask Melissa Andre to come up to speak to the question. But what we've seen is a significant increase in some areas that are under the purview of the Office of Administrative Review. Such significant uptick that we do have to build in more time to hear appeals and so on. So while we appreciate and agree that we don't want that time limit to go up, we are also being very intentional about putting a specific performance metric to even exponentially increase number of hearings that we're experiencing in that area.
But similar to the line of questioning from Councilwoman Gauthier, you know, folks, when they file an appeal, they don't know that their appeal is filed particularly for like a parking ticket, right? They don't know it's filed. They don't hear anything. Everything is just online. They don't get to talk to a person, they submit it, and six months later they get a decision, right? So, like, how can we streamline that process?
So I think it really depends on what kind of hearing you're talking about. Oh, I'm sorry. Again, my name is Melissa Andre, executive director, Office of Administrative Review. So I really think it depends on what type of hearing you're talking about and what kind of appeal you filed. So if you filed an appeal with the parking authority for your red light or your speed camera ticket, you're getting notification that you filed a ticket and the timeframe it's supposed to take. If you are requesting an in-person hearing, then those time frames are much shorter than an online review because of the backlog of the online reviews. So I think if you could provide me with maybe a specific example of the type of hearing you're talking about, or --
It's not -- it's the hearings that the BAA would adjudicate, essentially, not the red light tickets, not those, not the camera tickets. We get that. These are regular parking tickets that folks would get.
Uh-huh. Yes. So I think because of the increase of just the parking tickets that are being issued, it caused us a backlog. We had kind of come up to a really good place after COVID because there was so many -- there wasn't any parking tickets being issued, but I think there's been a very -- a significant increase in parking tickets and that caused a delay. And so now we're trying to get ourselves back up to speed. And I think the problem occurs when the online ticket requests are being delayed because we're being in flood -- the boot and tows have gone up. So there are two different types of hearings. And so if you walk into the BAA today, you'll get a hearing on demand because your ticket -- your car has been booted or towed. But the -- that has taken a back -- that has been prioritized over the people with just a regular parking ticket because of the influx of the boot and the tows that are -- that we are experiencing. So we're trying to level it -- level it out. We've hired approximately six new hearing officers this past year and we're getting to a better place.
Thank you very much. Member Harrity, take us home, sir.
Council President, I'm going to make it real fast. You can give me all these in writing, and I'm going to read them off pretty quick though. Your testimony states that -- this procurement. I'm sorry. Your testimony states that department aims to reduce the average bidding timeline from 225 days in 2024 to 200 days in 2026. The public works bidding process, according to the testimony, currently takes an average of 140 days with the FY2026 target remaining 140 days. How does the timeline compare to similar programs in other cities? Are there any planned efficiencies that could further reduce the timeframe, especially for public works like Rebuild? So you know where I'm getting at. And does this timeline lead to a disparity between the initial project cost and the final cost?