And I appreciate that, and I hope to live up to your expectations on this. What I'd like to do, if it's okay with the Committee, is to go over what I had planned, and then if you would like, I'm happy to respond to some of the comments that were made. I'll leave that up to the Committee if that's the Committee's pleasure to hear that, but if I could, I'll do a brief overview of where we are.
I'd like to start by saying that we probably could have done a few things a little differently at the inception with respect to Recovery. It has been a learning process for us as an administration. I think that we are quickly learning what needs to be done and what needs to be done well in order to be effective at not only applying for grants, but receiving them, as well as being sure that the dollars begin to hit the street as quickly as possible. Having said that, one of the major challenges that we have is that the federal government itself is still trying to put in place the set of rules that are consistent, that are clear for us to use. And I'll get to that in a moment, but there is still the fact of the matter that there is a great deal of inconsistency at the federal level with respect to how we are supposed to report, what the expectations are in terms of 79 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 those reports and how we proceed. With respect to the job count issues, that is one of the areas where there is some inconsistency at the federal level. You should know, you may know already, that each of the departments has, in essence -- cabinet-level departments at the federal level -- has in place its own methodology for job counting. It is not consistent. It is something that I have actually talked to Ed DeSeve himself about, the White House Recovery point person, as well as to Danny Werfel, who is the Controller for the United States and is in OMB. We have the benefit of direct relationships with those individuals. They are relationships that I maintain and will continue to cultivate in an effort to be sure that we have up-to-date regulatory information, and if we hit a snag, we can get that resolved quickly, as was the case when we were doing some 80 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 of our reporting, and I can talk more about that later. We also have the benefit of a federal liaison who was appointed to us the first week of October right before our reporting. That individual is the Acting Regional Administrator for GSA. The federal government has designated a number of liaisons for cities around the country. This individual has responsibility for being liaison not only to us but also for the City of Baltimore, which allows us to get answers quickly to a number of issues, as well as to compare notes, and because of that, we're going to start comparing ourselves with Baltimore a little more carefully and try to share information with them directly regarding where we are. Having said that, it is clear that we're not the only city that is running into the following impediment, which is while we may have applied for funds, we may have been awarded funds, 81 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 the actual receipt of dollars into the City coffers has not happened quickly. We have a sort of running average right now that is approximately two months between when we have received an award letter and when dollars have actually shown up in our treasury. We are still waiting for dollars. In some cases, the delay is almost four months between the actual award letter having been received by a City official and the dollars manifesting themselves in our treasury. That's an issue, and it became a particularly acute issue over the summer where we were faced with the prospect of do we spend dollars as a city that we anticipate receiving even if we have an award letter while we are in the midst of a fairly significant cash conservation issue, so that we did not run out of funds over the course of the summer, as you all know very well, as we waited for the state to take its action with respect to issues that affected our 82 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 budget. We do have a new structure in place with respect to Recovery, however, because there were some things that needed to be addressed. I am the Recovery Officer.
There is an Executive Committee that I report to that consists of the Managing Director, the Finance Director, the Planning Director, our Chief Integrity Officer, our Director of -- our Chief Technology Officer, the City Solicitor, a member of the Deputy Mayor for Transportation staff and the Mayor of -- the Deputy Mayor for Health and Human Services staff. I report to that Steering Committee. I will be reporting to them on a biweekly basis in order to keep them apprised of what we are doing. I also then have a group of approximately project managers who I 23 am also meeting with on a regular basis 24 at biweekly to be apprised of what's 25 happening with Recovery issues. I have 83 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 also implemented a requirement that before any grants move forward that are Recovery related, they have to be reviewed by the Recovery Office and approved by the Executive Committee so that we can address some of the coordinating issues that indeed were apparent as we were looking through this. We've also taken a step that is in addition to what is required by the federal government. As we move forward and as we completed our reporting for the October 10th deadline to the federal government, I asked -- actually, required that anyone who was reporting on a grant and was reporting either directly to their cabinet agency or their granting agency, whether that was state or federal, that I was requiring a certification by the program or project manager responsible for that particular grant, that the information that they were filing or the information they were providing to me was correct to the best 84 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 of their knowledge, so that that certification now exists in a file for each and every one of the grants that we have reported on, and I anticipate that as we move forward for our quarterly reporting requirements, that we will indeed maintain that certification process. While it is not required of me, I am also then providing a certification letter to the Mayor -- and am happy to provide that to you as well -- regarding the report to the federal government and what was included in that report. We are also, as I mentioned, reporting as well as talking to counterparts, particularly at the state level. We've been in communication and we've had a couple of meetings with the state's Recovery Office led by Ron Naples. We in some instances are learning about requirements that they have that are slightly different than ours, and in some cases, after talking to them, we've implemented some of the 85 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 reporting or information flow procedures that they've adopted, because we think that they represent best practices. Within two or three weeks, we will be implementing a new software package from Microsoft called Microsoft Stimulus 360. To date, we've been doing all the reporting basically through spreadsheets and templates that we've created ourselves. Microsoft Stimulus 360 is, in essence, the state of the art. It's being used by a number of offices, Recovery offices, throughout the United States both at the state and the local level. We've had a number of training and sort of introductions to this. We feel that it will not only allow us to capture information more comprehensively, but also more accurately, and we intend to implement that in the next two or three weeks. We did indeed report on October 9th for the October 10th reporting period. We were one of many who reported 86 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 on time. There are a handful of reporting entities, both cities and I think other jurisdictions, that did not meet that reporting deadline requirement, and for that reason, the federal government provided an extension for them to provide their reports on stimulus. Thankfully, we did not have to do that, because we had all of our information in and, to our knowledge, pretty much all of it was correct.
We are planning -- we've been discussing a briefing with our federal delegation in order to let them know what was going on and keep them apprised, as well as conversations with this body, to be sure on a going-forward basis that you are aware of what we are doing. And depending on how frequently you'd like to see me and others, we can do that in order to accommodate your interest and curiosity and desire to hear about this. With respect to the dollars -- and I don't know if you have this in 87 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 front of you, but I did send a letter to the Councilmember to provide you with an overview. 8 million in Recovery-related funds. 6 million to date. We have spent approximately $776,000 to date, and we believe that we have retained approximately 52 jobs. Let me go through the breakdown of this a little more, and I'm sure you're going to want to know why we have spent what we have spent as opposed to a larger number. I think that's a very fair question. 8 million in Recovery funds that have been allocated based on formula. And I can go through that very quickly. 9 million in employment and 88 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 3 million in Community Service Block Grants that were awarded at the end of July. 7 million, another Airport project for one runway and taxiway rehab that was awarded in August; 434,000 in 89 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 8 million for weatherization that was awarded in September. Of the funds we have spent, 714,000 was against the Byrne grant in the First Judicial District for the replacement of activities that were part of the budget that was adopted by the 90 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 Council, approximately 12,000 Healthy Homes Daycare and 49,000 in Senior Community Service Employment. What we actually have in hand in awards, unfortunately, does not mirror what we actually have in hand in terms of dollars. What we have in hand in terms of dollars is approximately $14 million. 6 million, and the bulk of that is actually in the Byrne area. The number that you read in the newspaper was incorrect. That is not Miss Lucy's fault. That is my fault. I gave her the incorrect number. I apologize for that. But the actual number that we have is $13 million in hand. Why there has been such a delay in the dollars actually arriving at our doorstep, we are not sure. There is a very extensive process. There are numerous hiccups. I can tell you one that comes to mind -- and I'm sure Deputy Mayor Cutler and representatives at the Airport can tell you more about this, but 91 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 we have $33 million awarded with respect to Airport projects. We are currently in the process of getting those out to bid, if not bids already being completed, but we are waiting for Federal Aviation Administration approval before we can actually spend those dollars. There are numerous instances where not only have we been awarded and not received dollars, but we then have an additional administrative hurdle that we have to have in place. We are clearly very interested in who gets jobs. We're clearly very interested in where the jobs are being created, but because we have spent so little at the moment, it's hard to capture that. We are also, because these are all federal dollars, cognizant of the rules that the federal regs impose with respect to bids and how you distribute dollars, and we're trying to be cognizant and knowledgeable about that as we move forward to be sure that we're not 92 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 catching ourselves afoul of any federal requirements. I can go into greater detail. I'm sure you have lots of questions, and perhaps it would be better if I just stopped and let you ask the questions and get to the information you'd like to hear about.
Sure. I have a couple of quick questions, and I know there are a number of questions from members of the Committee and members that are present. You kind of touched on this first one. When SEPTA was testifying, Mr. Casey indicated that the money was flowing. Is there a difference between Recovery Act dollars going to an agency versus the City in terms of the timeliness of it or the access?
Councilmember, I'm not sure about the SEPTA grants. Ms. Cutler can probably speak a little better. I do know that there were a 93 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 number of grants that were already in place, or granting vehicles; most notably, Community Development Block Grant funds. What was done by the federal government was to expand that particular program, add additional dollars, label it as Recovery dollars, but because there was a process in place already, they could get that money out the door quickly. That may be the case with the SEPTA funds. I don't know that for a fact. With many of the other grants that we are receiving now, they don't fall necessarily into that category. Those that have come a little -- or where the awards have come a little faster are clearly the formula driven, where there's an allocation based on population or other criteria, like the COPS grant. Those awards are flowing faster, but the dollars are still in delay, and we don't have -- I don't have an answer for you for that. I'm not sure that I can 94 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 explain why that is the case. There is also then the competitive grant process --
I'm not sure what's happening on the federal level that's slowing those dollars coming down.
My expectation, if we have an award letter that is dated July 30th, as is the case in the Community Service Block Grants, that the dollars associated with those would flow no later than 30 to 45 days after that. Well, it's now October, almost November and we still don't have those dollars in hand.
Are we having conversations with our federal delegation?
I am not having 95 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 those conversations. I think right now we've been in a process of gathering the information and trying to understand. I think that on a going-forward basis, that's got to be one of the things that we talk about with our federal delegation, with representatives in the White House and, if necessary, representatives at the actual cabinet agencies.
Okay. Because I really -- it would be very helpful, because I understand that the Housing Authority has actually been able to access dollars now. They're actually out cleaning out homes in preparation for renovation.
And I just don't understand why they would make that money available in a timely way to those agencies and not the City of Philadelphia. So if you could figure 96 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 that out.
I will ask. Again, my guess at the moment is that they're funding vehicles that were already in place and so it was easy --
I'd rather you not guess. If we could just find out exactly what the problem is.
What the difference is in terms of those Recovery dollars, if at all possible.
Earlier you mentioned the team, the Recovery team, that's in place, and throughout this conversation, we've talked about working in the spirit of cooperation. This subject matter actually came up at a hearing last week about this initiative to determine vacant property usage, disposition policies and things of that, and it was suggested in that hearing that Council be given some role, particularly 97 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 given the fact that at the end of the day disposition/acquisition must go through Council. And my next question will be about Council's role as it relates to Recovery dollars actually being spent. What do you suggest -- and if you can't answer right now, I understand -- Council's role should be in this team approach that's currently in place on a more consistent basis as opposed to us having to have a hearing -- this is, I think, our second one -- to be in a position to have just what I call productive interaction?
Councilmember, members, I would suggest that as we go forward, I think there is room for regular briefings, whether it's in a smaller group or here, whether that's every other week or monthly or quarterly as to what the activities are. I would suggest that because the Recovery reporting requirements are quarterly, that, at a minimum, as we make our 98 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 reports to the federal government, I think you would want to see those reports as well, and I think we should come back and plan to be back here at least on a quarterly basis. With respect to what we apply for and how we apply for that, I would suggest that we -- the Administration is trying to coordinate what we're doing carefully so that we can maximize the dollars that we're receiving and use them to leverage some other things. With respect to the strategy, I'm probably the wrong person to talk to in terms of how Council should be involved in terms of the strategic moving forward. I think that needs to be a conversation, as we used to say in the federal government, at a higher pay grade than mine.
I understand. I have one of those, too. Last question that I have before I come back. During the course of 99 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 the discussions on the Recovery dollars informally and actually formally in an earlier hearing, it was always believed that Council in its appropriations role would either have an appropriations bill/resolution, some mechanism to authorize the expenditure or the appropriations to departments. What is your understanding on that issue?
That's my understanding as well, and it's for that reason that we have introduced a transfer ordinance to ensure that we have the appropriate appropriations authority in departments. One of the things that I have been concerned about as the Budget Director is that departments do not move forward in spending dollars where Council has not taken a dispositive action to say, yes, we've appropriate that, yes, we should spend money on, and that is the reason we've introduced an ordinance that would appropriate about $52.3 million for 100 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 purposes of stimulus. I think that over the summer, given what was going on with the budget and given our own cash conservation and the slow flow of dollars, there really wasn't the imperative to do that right away. We didn't really need to do that. But I think moving forward, it may be the case that we may want to come to you on a regular basis, perhaps even monthly, to say, We just want to have a scheduled item on the docket so that we can move the appropriations quickly so that dollars get out into contracts, into people's hands as quickly as possible.
Is there an instance where there has been an appropriations of dollars that should have gone through Council approval process or Council review process?
There is one instance of that, and I've talked at length to the First Judicial District about this. It was my understanding 101 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 during our Council hearings on the budget that there was an expectation Council would receive from the Administration what those Byrne dollars were going to be spent against. An appropriation would then be adopted by Council, if they saw fit, that would then allow those dollars to be spent from the Byrne grants. In the case of the First Judicial District, they received a Byrne grant. They started spending dollars in order to preserve 52 positions at the courts. The expenditures there are approximately 700,000. And that's the one instance where we needed to have -- we should have had an appropriation ordinance before you before that happened. That is in the appropriation ordinance for you now in order to clean that up, if you will.
I do not believe so. That was the intention. The intention was do you not spend and wait 102 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 for the appropriation ordinance to move forward and do you put yourself in peril with the feds for not doing that. So we were trying to walk a fine line. But, yes, that was something that probably should have come to you in advance.
Right. I'm going to come back on that. Councilman Jones and then Councilman Kenney.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I really learned a lot from your testimony as to how we can start to move in the right direction, and I appreciate you crystallizing that for us. I want to go to the team again, and I would be interested in understanding how that team will put together a formula as to prioritize what competitive grants we go after and why. My question becomes an example of -- we're spending -- we went after $7 million for anti-poverty-related money 103 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 versus what we might have been able to go after for renovation of housing at PHDC or something like that, and what was our thinking -- or not so much retrospectively. What will be our thinking going forward as to what is worth us going after in light of what you said about it costing us money to gear up on some things versus just expending dollars and letting the paper trail catch up to us?
I see the Chief Integrity Officer and others leaving. I have a question related to them, so they might not want to go just yet.
And what I want to know -- if you would come up, both folks. (Witnesses approached witness table.)
There is a great deal of emphasis by the federal government -- and I have knowledge of that based on my relationship with the Philadelphia delegation -- that they're paying a lot of attention to how we spend money.
And I was pleased to know that you're a part of this team that we're developing, and I wanted to get a sense of how you're going to vet and review some of these projects and how we're spending money to make sure we don't wind up in more trouble than it's worth.
Actually, why don't we each introduce ourselves -- COUNCILMAN DiCICCO: Excuse me. 105 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 Would you each identify yourself.
Yes. I'm Amy Kurland. I am the Inspector General. I am actually not on the team. My role is to come in later if problems are discovered in how the money is spent. Joan Markman is on the team with Mr. Agostini, as he described, and I'll let Joan speak for what her role is.
Yes. Good morning. Thanks for asking. Joan Markman, Chief Integrity Officer. What my concern is is that the federal authorities have appropriated some $80-some million for inspectors general to come in and investigate after the fact how the money is being spent. I also understand that the public wants to know that the money is being spent in particular ways, not just monies being spent for this category or that category, but you want to see if, for example, there is money being spent for housing projects or for particular streets. You 106 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 want to see where the money is going, addresses. You want to see your money being spent and accounted for. And where I am coming in is working with the project managers on the various grants to say, Okay, if you're awarding money to contractors, how are you ensuring that the money is being spent, where is it going, do you see invoices, these are the kinds of records you should be looking for, these are the kind of controls you should be putting in place to make sure that when we say money is going to a particular project, it really is going to that particular project. Amy and I have invited several months ago someone from the Inspector General at the Department of Justice to conduct training for project managers about what to look for in grant fraud so that we can avoid that going forward.
I have been in touch with various inspectors general on the federal level. They have a huge 107 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 influx of money being awarded to them to come in and review different projects that have been started as a result of the stimulus money. My role is to make sure that Philadelphia polices itself and that we make sure that our money is being spent appropriately so we don't have the federal inspectors general coming in and criticizing the City for how the money has been spent. As Joan said, one of those individuals from the Department of Justice Inspector General has been here to speak to project managers. My investigators in the Inspector General's Office are also being trained on how to recognize stimulus money fraud, grant fraud and loan fraud.
And I appreciate that and I wanted to get a clear understanding, because I know there is an emphasis on making sure that I's are dotted and the T's are crossed, and I know in our haste to try to create jobs, 108 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 I don't want us to create a bigger problem than we should. In light of that team also -- and I appreciate your testimony -- I wanted to get a sense of if we're including -- one of the goals was to include as many minorities, females early on, and if that is indeed the case, are the chambers of commerce, minority, African American, Latino, women chambers of commerce, being afforded an opportunity to get this information, not the day the contracts are let, but early on in the design phase so that they can participate fully as a part of the team?
Councilmember, I'll answer that question, then go back to the other questions that you asked. I believe in May, I think the date was May 11th, the Commerce Department actually held what they called a Recovery 101 sort of symposium and outreach to the community, and I believe they had a couple of hundred participants 109 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 there. That was one of our first efforts. I know that we are continuing to do that on a moving-forward basis. I know that Kevin Dow over in Commerce has been prepared to speak to some of those efforts and what we're planning to do going forward. I think some of that is, yes, we're trying to reach out. We're kind of juggling a couple of balls at the same time, and I hope -- I think you can appreciate. One is to be sure we can maximize the applications that we're going after, and I think that was the gist of the efforts by the staff, if you will, before we started to coordinate. Let's get as much money as we can. So that's one ball. The other is, let's be sure we're reporting, because as Ms. Kurland and Ms. Markman said, we do not want to run afoul of any of the federal reporting requirements, because it's a very bad place to be when you got a federal IG 110 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 breathing down your neck. That's not where you want to be. A third is to be sure that we are actually doing what we're supposed to be doing, which is creating jobs, that we're identifying those jobs and that the dollars are doing what they can do to generate the economic activity in the community. That is the purpose of the stimulus, as Mr. Massarro had said earlier. So we're trying to juggle all those. We're learning the process. We're learning the regs. The regs have been changing. They're very dynamic. I've gone through them myself a number of times. If I miss a week having gone through the regs, I've missed something substantial, and so I've got someone, thankfully, who is doing that almost exclusively to be sure that we're on top of that. It's not -- I'm not trying to give you that as an excuse. It's just 111 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 that we're trying to juggle lots of balls at the same time. We're getting better and we're getting better faster at it and we'll be able to address a lot of the issues in terms of outreach, in terms of getting information to people, in terms of the efforts of OEO. We have to do that, and we will.
Mr. Agostini, saving us from financial collapse is not a juggling. It's a major undertaking. So we get that part. Going forward is where we're going, and I asked -- the original question was about the formula for priorities in one application over the other, and what pops out at me is $7 million to MOCS and what is that specifically going to go for versus what could be money for -- and I'm for anti-poverty programs, believe me. My heart is there. My district is at least percent under the -- and 24 probably you'll tell me more, but I would like specifically to know how they ranked 112 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 over the stimulus formula versus PHDC, which also creates those blue-collar lunch pail jobs that we so desperately are going after.
Two things, and the first is that you should have received in your packet a summary, a one-page summary, of each and every grant that we have moved forward with. I will let the individual responsible for the MOCS-related grant come up and speak to that for you. On a going-forward basis, what we are trying to do and what we've implemented is, there needs to be the coordination to be sure that we are leveraging the dollars, that we are coordinating, being sure that they are hitting the priorities that we as a city have. We were not doing that prior to implementing this new policy where everything that is applied for has to come to the Recovery Office before the application goes out. And that is what 113 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 we're now focused on, how do we coordinate, how do we be sure we're maximizing and leveraging and that it hits the policy priorities that this city has. COUNCILMAN DiCICCO: We have a point of information. Councilman Rizzo.
Thank you, Mr. DiCicco. Mr. Agostini, we use the term regularly around here "shovel ready." Maybe you or one of your colleagues can tell me whether projects that are heading towards greening, like some of the debris and dirt that we have unfortunately in our city, could qualify for some of this fund, lot cleaning, et cetera, and I know there's a criteria that it has to be something --
I'll let someone else answer that. Basically in the shovel ready, we have tried to meet the definition set by the feds. Arguably, the Airport projects were shovel ready. 114 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 They've been in our capital plan for at least a year, but for the reasons I hinted at earlier, we're not getting the dollars to get that done.
The reason I brought up shovel ready, there's nothing more shovel ready than dirt and trash. (Witnesses approached witness table.) COUNCILMAN DiCICCO: Thank you. Are you ladies --
I'm sorry. We were going to answer a question about MOCS and stimulus dollars. COUNCILMAN DiCICCO: Hold on one second. Mr. Agostini, do you mind staying at the table? Just pull up another chair.
What I wanted to get was, I understand that this is a formula -- COUNCILMAN DiCICCO: Excuse me for interrupting. I think -- were you 115 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 here to answer Councilman Rizzo's question?
Good morning. My name is Mary Mariner. I'm the Acting Executive Director of the Mayor's Office of Community Services.
I'm Jennie Sparandara and I'm the Mayor's Senior Policy Aide.
And your question was where the money was going, the $8.3 million for CSBG? Primarily it's going into job development. We're going to be working with PHA to place 160 City residents into construction trades. We're doing -- we're working with 116 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 Community Legal Services to give legal services to 2,000 individuals -- and these were all citywide services -- individuals who were having problems, either they were laid off from their job for the wrong reason or they're having problems in their job where they need other legal services. We're providing employment services to 300 homeless people to get them connected to employment, both in training and placement and support services. And all of the services that we're providing through the Community Service Block Grant are citywide services. We're working with the Contextual Literacy Program so that we are -- people who work in the Clean Corridors have the opportunity to improve their academic skills and get work through the Career Links to get better jobs. Some of the things --
Councilman, if part of your question is why are these 117 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 funds flowing through MOCS as opposed to a different agency, they have to flow through MOCS. So MOCS is the designated community action agency, and that means for all Community Services Block Grant dollars, they have to flow there. What we've decided to do, kind of acknowledging the broader anti-poverty question that I think you're referencing, is get those dollars out the door straight away and get them into workforce development programs, literacy programs and then programs that we know will help connect people to services that they may need particularly at this time, such as unemployment insurance, public benefits, that sort of thing, and that's the Community Legal Services piece. But we were always intending that these dollars be used as part of an anti-poverty strategy instead of direct services coming out of one agency over another, and we've worked with Deputy Mayors of Public Safety, Health and Opportunity and 118 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 at Economic Development in part to make sure that we're all referencing each other's programming.
What would be helpful to me as a part of this committee is to get where the connectivity happens between you. Are you at the table to -- the question becomes, the SEPTA opportunity -- we did this in the beginning. The stimulus money, the Recovery money that came to SEPTA that now creates a project, which will create a job opportunity, how do you plug in? And that is what the matrix of how this gets to 60th and Market in my district.
So that's why I'm concerned. COUNCILMAN DiCICCO: Point of information. Councilwoman Sanchez.
Thank you. As a member of the Board of MOCS, 119 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 I'm a little concerned about your focusing the anti-poverty money for job development in light of the fact that both WIB and the Workforce Development Corporation are getting millions of dollars for job development. So I'd like to know how that's connected to what they're doing as it relates to the work on workforce development, because it would just appear to me that MOCS may not be the best entity unless it is absolutely coordinated through those.
So let me describe a little bit of the structure, because those are very legitimate questions and concerns, and I think that Councilmembers -- I hope that this addresses it. So we have a group of policy 21 deputies and project managers that, for a 22 period, met every week and now is meeting 23 every two weeks. Each of those meetings 24 has an individual who represents a deputy 25 mayor for the City, and each one of those 120 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 deputy designees, if you will, does indeed know what is going on with the activities in these related, affiliated entities. So, for example, with respect to the Workforce Investment Board, Andy Rachlin, who sits on the committee as a representative of Commerce, and Alan Greenberger, the Acting Deputy Mayor, is aware and has been following, and for a period we actually had debate internally as to whether we should report on the WIB's dollars or not. But we are indeed trying to coordinate and stay abreast of what's happening there. Similarly with Ms. Cutler, her Policy Deputy, Andrew Stober, is also in attendance at all those meetings. He stays on top of what's happening not only with SEPTA but with the Airport and others. So we try to stay abreast. We're trying to coordinate. Again, it's been a fairly significant effort to be 121 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 sure we're all getting into the same direction, but we are communicating, we are aware of what's going on. This is the case with PHA and the School District as well, although because they are separate political jurisdictions, our ability to manage, control -- our desire to manage, control is sort of in question and a gray area, and so given everything else we had on our plate, we decided we wouldn't try and take that on.
I'm going to yield, because my colleagues have been real patient with me as a freshman, and I'm going to do that, but please have a heads-up that I'm going to pay particular attention to that aspect of it. I love the bridges and the stuff that's going to get built, but where the jobs are created and moving people from poverty to self-sufficiency with stimulus dollars is going to be my focus. I sent you a letter to that end October 15th and I'm awaiting a response on it. I'm going to 122 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 pay laser beam attention to job creation. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
May I answer Councilwoman Sanchez's question just real quickly. We've been working specifically with the Workforce Investment Board and PWDC on these programs to make sure that these funds, which may have some more flexibility in terms of providing for literacy or case management, are augmenting the efforts that are going on over there. So I think it's really important that we're all kind of in lockstep, and they've been really great partners with these dollars.
Just because we're still dealing on the organizational chart, it would be helpful for us if you could submit to the Chair that work group organizational chart and 123 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 the workflow processes and the communication piece for it so that we can visualize what are the interactions.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Agostini, somewhere during the course of this hearing we were handed what seems to be about 100 pages or so of work product that contains a heading for each page relative to the Recovery Act and the department that's applying for or is proposing to be funded. It includes a program description, a rationale for program description, projects' objectives and the job creation numbers for every one of them, and some of them are Mayor's Commission on Aging, Mayor's Office of Faith-Based Initiatives, Office of 124 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 Housing and Community Development, Philadelphia Department of Public Health Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program summary. Is this work product -- did you provide Council with this work product?
There is a work product I did provide to Council that has -- I can't -- my eyesight is failing. But there is a document that we provided that was a one-page summary that I think looks like what you're showing me there.
But they're one-page summaries, but it's for all the programs.
That represents, I believe, through the reporting period, but let me -- through the reporting period of October 10th.
But the 125 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 work product -- this is the report that's through October 10th. This represents applications or ideas or discussion how far back?
So over the eight-month period this is the work product?
It was. In fact, I put that together in anticipation that we were going to have an appropriations hearing in the coming weeks and I felt it was incumbent upon me to get as much information in a summary for you to see so that you understood and had an ability to ask questions about 126 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 each of the --
And when you did provide it to Council, where did it go?
I provided that to Ms. Chapman, who I believe provided that to staff to Council.
I believe we did that early in the week. I believe Monday or so or Tuesday morning.
I mean, I've had my ups and downs from time to time with the Administration relative to certain issues, and we discuss them. Sometimes it works out; sometimes it doesn't. But I think that it's important for two reasons. Number one, for fairness, that this work product existed and that work was going on despite what past testimony would indicate. And, secondly, I don't want to get a reputation that the City can't do 127 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 anything relative to the stimulus dollars to put in people's minds in Washington that we're not able to use the money effectively. And I want to make sure that we come out of this hearing with a new-found sense of cooperation with Council, and part of the problem goes back to the issue of communication, which I've had discussions with just about everybody in this room from the Administration on that, but I don't want to come out of this hearing with newspaper stories that basically say we've been tripping down the road the whole eight months. This would indicate to me, if it's accurate -- and I have no 18 reason to believe it's not -- is a work product that has been an ongoing work product for eight months.
Well, it has been an ongoing work product and it is important to me that it is accurate to you, because it is the basis by which I make the reports to the federal 128 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 government. And I'm very conscious, having been in the federal system as a CFO, that that is not something to dally with, that it is really not a place to be to have a federal agency's IG unhappy. So I'm trying to be sure that that's --
I'm not even at that level. I'm not even at the malfeasance level. I'm at the -- or the non-reporting. I'm at the level of cooperation between Council and the Administration is an issue and it will be an ongoing issue, but somehow the promulgation of the testimony that was given earlier that you guys have no focus and haven't been doing anything for eight months I think is unfair, and I don't want it to be understood in the media that somehow someone in Washington gets a copy of a story that says these people can't run a one-car parade, which I don't think is accurate.
I don't think it's accurate. I think it would be 129 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 unfortunate if that was the case. Councilmember and members, there are some things we could have done better. I'm not going to dispute that with you, some of the coordination and communications things that we could have done a little more crisply, in a little more organized fashion, but I will tell you that a lot of the issues that I have raised in my letter to the Mayor, I think we're addressing, if not have put in place a structure to address, and I believe on a going-forward basis, we will be a lot better, a lot more effective for many of the reasons that I've laid out here.
And earlier you indicated that we have applied so far for how much?
In fact, that is 130 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 a question that I have asked the staff to put together for me, because I want to get the universe, if you will, what's available. I do not have that right now.
It will be very different in the case of New York City because they're getting direct funding from the feds for things like Medicaid, for unemployment insurance. We don't get that.
So a New York-Philadelphia comparison is not apples and apples?
No, I don't think so. But I'm calling my counterparts in all of these other cities 131 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 to get a grasp of what they're doing to find out are there things that we are not doing well and should do better. So I'm trying to do that.
And one of the reasons why the dollars have not been here yet is because it's out of our control?
In some instances, FAA approval, other issues and things like that?
Before that, Mr. Agostini, with respect -- and I concur with Councilman Kenney's assessment that it's about getting things done and not about placing blame or whatever or sending a signal that we 132 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 don't -- when exactly did we receive anything on the stimulus?
No. I'm sorry. Documents relating to stimulus, because I've been -- the reason I ask this question, because I have been raising this issue about what's going on personally with the stimulus program for a while, and up until the notification of the hearing, I haven't really gotten anything. So, I mean, unless something was forwarded to us over a period of the summer and leading up to this that I didn't know about.
-- in the Recovery Office, I believe the documents you received this week in anticipation of this hearing -- 133 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540
You just received that. I was under the impression you were receiving weekly minutes from the meetings we were having as a committee, but it appears that that may not have been the case. And, again, if that isn't, that is something I'm more than happy to provide to you on a weekly basis, every other week that we meet so that you can see the work product of that work group, because it's --
I just want to make sure that I wasn't missing something, because I had been asking because I'm concerned, and we want to be in a position to help wherever possible. So that's --
Mr. Chairman, if I may add -- and I agree with you, and it goes back to -- we could avoid -- I don't think this is a bad process here, because everybody is 134 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 learning, but you can avoid some of the contention by communication, because what happens -- and it's been happening a lot -- is that without information, it's rumor and exaggeration, and we wind up in a forum like this where we discover that, God, you have been working, look, you've been doing something with this hundred pages. And why the reasons why things are slowed down, delayed, whatever, if that's communicated to us or communicated to the Chairman or any other Councilmember that asks the question early, we avoid all this. So I hope you take that back and understand that we want to be partners.
I understand, Councilmember. And, again, I offer that if it is meeting with you regularly, whatever your desire is to do that, I'm more than happy to do that.
Thank you, 135 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 Councilman.
Councilmember, if I might, I'm not sure we responded to Councilmember Rizzo's question on the shovel ready.
That's what happens when I leave the room. I'm sorry. I won't do that again. (Witness approached witness table.) DEPUTY
Good morning. Rina Cutler, Deputy Mayor for Transportation and Utilities. I am happy to respond within my own area, which is the transportation and infrastructure side, what the definition is of shovel ready for stimulus dollars, and I think it's really different in a lot of the categories. I think shovel ready is really a term that is specific to infrastructure. I am not sure that 136 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 other types of stimulus dollars have the same specificity for shovel ready. In the transportation and infrastructure side, shovel ready, for example, for road and bridge projects is, you must have a contract in place within a year. So that would be February of '10 is a year. And you must have all of the dollars expended within a three-year period. So for Transportation, those are the criteria that came. And so if a project can be put out to bid and awarded within that first one-year piece for Transportation and all of your funds can be expended within three years on eligible pieces, then that project is deemed shovel ready for Transportation. For Water, for example, and for the Airport, both of those have the same front-end criteria, that the money must be obligated within a year, but I don't believe Water must be spent by -- I don't believe that's part of that criteria. Airport does not have the back-end 137 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 requirement either. So I can only tell you the definition, Councilman, for ours.
I got that part, but the other part I guess the Streets Department would probably have to answer. All right. Let's use -- DEPUTY
That is Streets. What I just described is the Streets Department.
Doesn't the Streets Department do some cleaning of areas that are trash strewn? DEPUTY
Primarily within a subscribed area. There may be some sanitation piece. You may be correct that there may be a sanitation piece that picks it up. I think they work jointly with CLIP now, and we're expanding it as best we can citywide with the resources we have. But none of those 138 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 dollars -- the Transportation dollars could not be used to clean vacant lots.
I understand that. All right. Let's just go back, and this is just a quick question, and I want to thank you for working out the cell phone lot at the Airport. Would that be eligible, the money we're going to spend there? DEPUTY
It's an interesting question. It does not fall within the Airport criteria for projects. I would have to check to see if it would qualify under the general infrastructure category.
Yes. I think, though, the problem is, if I had to wager an intelligent guess, is that we 139 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 are doing the cell phone lot with our internal resources, and so I don't believe there's a contract to let.
And, again, I'm still not clear on using stimulus money for the project that I described whether or not -- DEPUTY
Well, no. 18 Could CLIP recover some stimulus money for their work? DEPUTY
I have not yet seen a category in the competitive group of stimulus dollars that would qualify that.
But it would be interesting -- you indicate your 140 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 workload -- that maybe with this money, additional money, that possibly you could figure out a way to get some. You could escalate the work because you have more money to work with. DEPUTY
Right, but I would need a category of stimulus dollars for it to fit into.
I described it earlier, clean a lot and it's then eligible for greening. I believe that's a category that works. DEPUTY
Well, they still didn't answer that question, so we'll come back at it.
We'll come back. All right. Thank you, Councilman. Councilwoman Brown. 141 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540
You'll be back. We were just on a point of information. It's a procedural issue. So the Councilman will have your full attention in a very short matter.
For legitimate reasons, we've been all over the map in terms of this hearing. I want to get back to two principal criteria or priorities or goals to make sure we're at the same place with regards to why we're even here. Do you agree with the premise that the primary purpose for these dollars were two things as I've heard, hire local residents, retain local companies?
I don't agree with that. I believe that the dollars 142 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 that were provided by the federal government in the Recovery were set aside or appropriated for the purposes of jump-starting the economy, and to jump-start the economy, the expectation was that jobs would be created throughout the country, including those places that got the dollars, as well as providing lifts to companies so that the economy would get restarted. But I think first and foremost, it was an attempt to jump-start the economy.
So if we narrow that vision specifically for Philadelphia, would the definitions you just presented still apply?
I think it does, but then I think then my definition and your definition merge, because to jump-start the economy, we have got to put people to work, we have got to get companies in a situation where demand for whatever they do is increased because we're spending more of the federal 143 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 dollars. So, yes, I would say then the measure of success, the proof in the pudding, if you will, would be jobs created, which is why that's one of the requirements to report, as well as the number of dollars that are being provided to local companies and companies in the region.
Okay. In the document Councilman Jim Kenney presented, is this a federal application or one that was created by the City of Philadelphia?
We created that document, Councilmember, in order to have a handy summary of everything that we were doing. I have a file here on each one of these that runs many pages and I thought that was not going to be helpful to people who needed to get a quick understanding of what the grants were.
That's correct. 144 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540
-- of each applicant? Where my concern rises is a disconnect between what we just viewed the primary purposes to be for these dollars and that being reflected on this document, unless I'm not seeing it. Maybe it's in the subsequent back-up documentation you have, but a continuation of that purpose I believe is essential if we're going to honor the initial goals and objectives for these dollars. So I need to know or would like to know in your biweekly meetings now, is that viewed as a criteria or a priority for those who ultimately --
Absolutely. The job creation numbers are critical. They are one of the things we have to report to the federal government, and so I am very cognizant in trying to be very careful about how we capture and to be sure that we're accurate and comprehensive. 145 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 And the other issue that we are required to report to the federal government -- and I think speaks to your concern -- is that we also need to report contracts, the value of the contracts, in some cases the sort of makeup of those particular entities that are receiving contracts from us. So there is a whole reporting requirement that you haven't seen, but you will see as we start to spend more dollars.
That's what I haven't heard, and what that composition looks like, local companies, companies owned by women, companies owned by people of color. You're telling me that that kind of information is forthcoming?
We are not required to report that to the federal 146 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 government, but we have had a number of discussions internally about how we capture that kind of information to provide that to you, because, one, I think it's important. I think citizens will want to know what that is, and it's something that should be part of the reporting. We just haven't hit on exactly how to do that right now, and we're still having conversations internally. And if for anyone who is listening to this, if there are suggestions on how we can do that, I would like to hear them, because it would be helpful.
Thank you. There are many, many members of this body that deeply care about that and we want to see it in the future reports. Lastly, what types of actions have you taken to tighten what you view to be and what you stated to be in a piece of correspondence a centralized approach for this competitive grant 147 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 application? What one, two or three steps are you now doing to improve where you are going forward?
The most significant step is that we have sent out instructions to all departments, all City departments, that they are not to apply for grants unless they have been approved beforehand by the Steering Committee for the Recovery Office.
And so those that did make application prior to the structure of this committee did that, I guess, in absence of the committee?
Well, to answer that, they did it before the committee was in place. We've asked everyone to give us everything that they have applied for, and we think we have the full universe of that now. But then on a going-forward basis, we have, in essence, said we have to have sign-off authority in the Recovery Office before an application can be submitted to the 148 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 federal government.
Thank you. I think it's important for the record that you give us an indication of when this committee was structured and -- so since when have you been meeting and the project managers have been in place? I think it's important, because I think it goes back to Councilman Kenney's point of there was work being done, but I think you've acknowledged that it came together partly as a result of us having these hearings. So when did this committee formulate itself? And then when I finally get my round, I'd like to ask some questions around decision-making.
My last question, therefore: Communicating 149 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 internally is vital. I also believe we have responsibility to communicate to those who never see City Hall, but read about it in the news, hear it on CNN about what is my city doing to make a difference with these dollars. And so what strategies do you have in place or what timeline do you have in place to -- I don't know the status of the website, but when I look at what other cities are doing, that's a vital opportunity to tell citizens, Here are the dollars, these are where the dollars are going, this is what's happening in the 1 through 10 councilmanic districts so that we can connect with the average citizens that our city is doing the right thing for these dollars.
Councilmember, you're about to see probably within the next ten days a total revamp of the website. The website will have sort of drill-down information where you will be able to call up a one-page summary like 150 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 the one you have in front of you on the program, the actual report that we submitted to the federal government, probably the application itself and other information that we think would be useful to people so that they can see it. Right now I'm trying to reconcile what was on the website. We had some incorrect numbers, and we're going to fix that. I spent last night for a little bit of time looking at the New York City Recovery Office and their website. We're trying to take examples of best practices from other places, so that we use the website to drive information to people, to use it as a way for citizens to get some access to information, and then if they want more information, a contact person they could talk to.
Yes, yes, yes. So making it user-friendly is different from making -- for the professional that's going to read that and want to know the intimate details. 151 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 Thank you. Thank you for your testimony.
Thank you. Councilman DiCicco. COUNCILMAN DiCICCO: I just have a public service announcement, if you will, on a much lighter note. For those of you who may not remember receiving a little insert in your paycheck over the last two weeks, we're talking about spending money locally. Macy's tomorrow is offering all City employees an additional discount to their regular discount beginning at 8 o'clock tomorrow morning. It's an opportunity to spend money locally. We'll see some benefits as a result of that, and you will also get a much deeper discount on any products you might like to buy between now and the holiday season. So it's really a great thing. All you need to do is show your City ID tomorrow and you will get an additional 152 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 percent off. Thank you.
Councilman 5 DiCicco -- 6 COUNCILMAN DiCICCO: Spend it 7 locally. 8
This 9 message was approved by Councilman 10 DiCicco. 11 COUNCILMAN DiCICCO: It's been 12 approved by the ethics. I already went 13 through this whole thing. 14 Right, Ms. Markman? 15
Thank you. 16 Councilwoman, one quick 17 question, real quick. 18
That's 19 how they treat the freshmen around here. 20
I'm sorry. Mr. Agostini, you had asked in response to your earlier questions about ways of getting involvement of the local citizens and DBEs, MBEs and WBEs. I'm not going to ask for an opinion today 153 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 unless the City Solicitor is prepared to say that these bills are illegal, but next week we're having a hearing. We introduced Council -- we introduced two bills, one on a local preference for stimulus spending and a bill that requires an attachment of an Equal Opportunity Plan. So next week when we have the hearing, we're going to obviously ask, and it would be helpful if the Solicitor could say we're within our rights to implement such a program.
I don't want to hear today unless she's prepared to say yes. We'll wait until next week, after we need a little time to try to soften you up over the weekend. But we just think it's important, and there's a way -- we actually apparently I think have some information on a couple of other municipalities that have introduced some 154 10/28/09 - FISCAL STABILITY - RES. 090540 sort of equal opportunity plan mechanism in their local stimulus, and we'll have that at the hearing.