Cameron Montemayor
ST. JOSEPH, Mo. (News-Press NOW) — City Hall will see the launch of a new department on Tuesday designed to coordinate and strengthen the management of large city projects and asset across all of the City’s departments.
Monday’s City Council meeting saw the approval of a measure to amend the City’s code of ordinances to create a General Services Department, a reorganization of staffers who will help coordinate and provide oversight to a variety of vital functions such as capital project management, procurement, engineering, fleet operations and building maintenance, among other common services that until now have existed across various departments.
“The feedback that we received from our community was that we needed to strengthen all of these areas, to improve how we’re procuring things and the quality of work that we are seeing across these capital projects,” Assistant City Manager Dawn Lanning said. “The purpose of this is to take those already existing positions and to put them under consolidated management. Make sure that we’re overseeing our assets and maintaining them properly.”
The department’s overall goal is to improve efficiency and accountability by ensuring consistent project monitoring, contracting and ongoing maintenance of City investments.
“As the City has grown, the scope and complexity of these functions have increased, requiring improved coordination and oversight,” an ordinance explanation from the City states.
The measure prompted some questions from councilmembers who sought clarification on department staffing and whether any budgetary changes had to be made to support the department’s creation. The only change is a slight salary increase for the new director which is already offset by related savings from the department’s creation.
To help oversee a successful transition, the 13-person department will initially be led by Laurie Thompson, the current human resources programs and risk manager, as its director. Thompson will report directly to City Manager Mike Schumacher.
The City Code will be updated over time as more functions move into the new department.
“You’ve got a parks department fleet, you’ve got a street department fleet, you got all these different fleets. They’ve all operated on their own. Now we can bring them all under one and be more efficient,” St. Joseph Mayor John Josendale said. “The management of those will fall under this department. But with input from those directors. They’ll still be very much involved.”
On Monday, councilmembers also approved a $280,000 work order with HDR Engineering to oversee and facilitate a key phase of design and construction work for development of the new landfill cell 9.
The scope of the project includes site grading, soil stockpiling, terrace construction for stormwater diversion; installation of a recompacted clay liner and a flexible membrane liner and construction of an in-cell leachate collection system and groundwater control system, among other specifications.
HDR will also provide daily and weekly observation reports, reviews of site conditions, and the documentation of ongoing activities and any required corrective actions.
Monday’s meeting also saw the approval of a wide-ranging $1.6 million Police Sales Tax-funded agreement to modernize and integrate key public safety-focused software for the police department, including a computer-aided dispatch system, records management system, jail management system, electronic citation and digital information management system.
The contract with TBL Systems, Inc. will provide the St. Joseph Police Department with a fully integrated public safety software suite that allows for data sharing between dispatch, patrol and other emergency services, a boost to critical areas like 911 call handling, officer dispatch, report writing, jail operations, court interface and digital evidence management.
Other bills approved by City Council:
Change order no. 3 with E.L. Crawford Construction Inc. in the amount of $108,584 for additional work necessary to complete building construction for the aviation complex project at Rosecrans Memorial Airport.
Purchase of two new Chevrolet Silverado 2500 LT Crew Cab pickup trucks in the amount of $106,276 utilizing Parks Sales Tax funds and a new Chevrolet Express 3500 passenger van from Reed Chevrolet in the total amount of $48,482 utilizing Marijuana Tax funds for the Park Maintenance Division.
Submission of a “Building Communities for Better Health” grant application with the Missouri department of Health and Senior Services in an amount not to exceed $90,000 to support activities aimed at reducing barriers and promoting a healthier community.
Submission of a non-motorized safety support program grant application with the Missouri Highway and Transportation Commission under which the MHTC will provide funding in an amount not to exceed $10,000 for the purchase of signage for the safe across program.
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