Development Services Review. Final Report. Zucker July 2016

Morgan Hill, California

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Zucker Systems

former practices and philosophies, which is adversely changing the culture in some

instances.

In an earlier part of this report we recommend that all functions set aside 2% of the

personnel budget and 5% of employees’ time for training.

A review of the Fiscal Year (FY) 2015/16 budget showed total personnel salaries at

$1,044,857 for the Division. The total training allocations, which include training,

conferences, meetings, memberships, and subscriptions, totals $25,567. Zucker’s

general rule of thumb is to set aside at least 2% of the Division’s Personnel Budget for

annual training of employees, which equates to $20,897

(e.g., 2% of $1,044,857). The

training budget that has been allocated is likely sufficient to provide needed

supervisory and training for staff.

However, it appears that more time needs to be allocated for internal and external

training of professional staff. We typically suggest that about 5% of staff’s time be

devoted to annual training. The new TRAKiT system will also add to training needs.

See also our recommendations under “Policy & Procedures Manual” regarding

creating/completing a Policy Manual to assist with training of new employees and

cross training of existing employees.

OLICY

SSUES

Expedited Review

The Division offers an expedited development review process for an additional fee

that is open and available to any developer that elects to pay for the service, whether

residential or non-residential or economically important or not that is intended to

provide a quicker review service to customers, without compromising project quality

and city policies and regulations.

We are advocates of these types of services as long as the fees charged for the service

are transparent and the City is able to demonstrate added value to justify the added

cost.

See our discussion and recommendation under the “Fees” heading of this section

regarding using a labor based methodology to update fees and showing expedited

fees on the updated fee schedule.

To demonstrate the value of the expedited review service, as well as justify the

additional fees to customers, best practice communities establish Performance

Standards for expedited review services that are tracked, monitored and compared