Northlake Fiasco and Is $1 Million a Lot to You?

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Much of the very long October 6th PBG City Council meeting was spent discussing Palm Beach County’s Five Year Road Plan – which was on the City Manager portion of the agenda. Included in the plan is a proposed $500k to study widening Northlake Boulevard to 8 lanes. Several people made public comment, Sal Faso, President of NCNC spoke on behalf of several organizations and communities as well. All were in agreement that widening Northlake, and wasting $500k tax dollars and studying it was a non-starter. Joel Engelhardt of Ongardens wrote an in-depth piece covering the proposal and discussion entitled “Northlake widening study pits county vs city. Again.”

Vice Mayor Litt pulled Resolution 64, 2022 from the Consent agenda and the Council had considerable discussion on whether the report “Review of 2022 Key Strategies and Initiatives” from PFM Group Consulting LLC, which had been the subject of the August 17 Workshop, should be adopted as a Council Strategic Plan. Interestingly – none on the Council had input to the report, nor did any residents or other interested parties and the data used was about two years old as the study was delayed due to Covid. Nevertheless, after discussion – the report was adopted by the Council 5:0. The report was in the Resolution and can also be found here.

First Reading of Ordinance 13, 2022  raising the threshold for purchasing limits not needing Council Approval from the current $65K to .5% of the City Budget or $1 Million had a lot of discussion. Km! Ra, Purchasing Director, City Manager Ferris and City Attorney Max Lohman were very much in favor of the move as were Mayor Reed and Council Member Woods. Council Member Tinsley was very much against the move, Council Member Marciano had some trepidations and Vice Mayor Litt was searching for a compromise that might keep transparency in the process. Km! Ra’s primary argument was that in Purchasing ‘best practices’ if a line item budget has already been approved by a council, there is not further need for approval by that council in the implementation of that budget; his ideal situation would be to not have any limits but suggested that the .05% or roughly $1 million would be a “baby step” in the direction of this “progressive ideal.”  See the discussion here.  On first reading the vote was 4:1 with Tinsley opposed. 

PBG Watch is also opposed and here are key points why stated in an email to Council on Oct 12:

You are the elected officials given the public’s authority and trust – not the City Manager and Purchasing Department.

Consider:

• You perhaps were not given a thorough answer to the question – what are thresholds requiring board/council approval in other municipalities?  All of the following have larger populations and budgets than does PBG.   
  • PBC limit is $200K – (see code here)
  • Boca Raton limit is $100K – (see code here)
  • Boynton Beach limit is $100K – (see recent ordinance here)
  • Delray Beach limit is $65K – (see code here)
  • Jupiter limit is $50K – (see code here)
• 20 points on 200 points criteria for purchasing organization excellence awards’ is not a reason to make a significant policy change
• One of the cited issues was speed of action to obtain approvals.  Rather than ceding your responsibility and authority to the administration – perhaps you should consider ways to speed the approval process:
  • Have more frequent meetings?
  • Have an email and/or online or zoom way to obtain your approvals meeting sunshine and notification,  to proceed
  • Rather than providing an informational list of upcoming bids (as was suggested by one of you at your meeting) – perhaps have the quarterly list of upcoming bids for you to pre-approve threshold-wise with your votes.
• While you may have utmost confidence in the current position holders in purchasing and City Manager at this time – they will not always be the holders of these positions nor will you be on the council.  Yes – you are setting policy and one council person’s glib answer about ‘if you don’t like what the City Manager is doing – just fire him’ is not policy!
• Inflation is clearly here – but rather than set a ‘baby-step’ of $1 million dollars – adjusting the $65K upward is clearly needed – but not 15x in one step and not as a blanket policy.

Also on the agenda:

• Recognition of Jim McCarten’s retirement as General Manager of the Gardens Mall and his contributions to the community over the last 33 years
• Consent Agenda passed 5:0
• City Manager report, beside Northlake Blvd Widening Study covered a short summary of the assistance our Fire/Rescue and Police Departments are providing to the hard hit communities due to Hurricane Ian, and in November the Council will hear from Scipps and Jupiter Medical Center for future plans for a research hospital on the Briger tract.
• All other Ordinances and Resolutions passed 5:0 and there was no City Attorney Report.