Agenda Highlights 8/22/23

The Fort Smith Board of Directors meeting scheduled for 8-22-23 will begin with recognition of Robert Turner’s contributions as a leader of World Changers, a Christian student ministry that performs housing repairs for the needy (especially for senior citizens) including siding, window replacement, and wheelchair ramps. The organization in the past 13 years has performed 196 projects in Fort Smith. Through Community Development Block Grant funds, their partnership with Lowes, and the labor provided by the youths, they have done $500,000 worth of repairs.

The Board will also discuss waiving the fees for the required building permits and inspections for projects done by World Changers.

The Board will review the yearly presentations from the departments regarding their 2024 Departmental Service Objectives and the outcomes of their 2023 objections. Some highlights of the presentations include…

District Court in 2023 began accepting online payments and sending eCourt appointment reminders and implemented the DUI court and a new inmate work program. They are developing a RISE court for adult drug offenders that will be open in August of 2023 and has 15 people on the wait list to participate in the program. In 2024, they plan to add an alternative docket and programs that include a sobering center. In 2022 the Community Service program had 290 offenders who put in 17, 380 labor hours The District Court exceeded their target for case clearance with a rate of 87%. They fell short of their warrant clearance target of 80% with only achieving 67%.

Specialty Courts hit their goal for 98% program compliance and 100% goal for no new arrests for graduates of their programs. In 2023, 7 people entered their programs and 3 graduated. The goal for 2024 is set at 13 people to enter the program and 6 to graduate. Currently, the program is over capacity with 16 participants.

Human Resources offered 6 safety classes to City staff in 2023 and developed a recognition program for employees including a recognition breakfast held in February.

The City Clerk reports that deeds issued for Oak Cemetery fell short of the goal of 65 with only 13 issued in 2023.

Finance plans to apply for a GFOA Certificate of Achievement of Excellence in Financial Reporting in 2024. In 2023, they implemented an Enterprise Resource Planning system to help monitor and track grant funding. They also implemented a new system for reporting the Annual Comprehensive Financial Report to make it more streamlined for external financial statement users. A 2023 restructuring of the cash and investment pools resulted in a 200% increase in interest earnings in pooled accounts compared with 2022.

Purchasing fell short of their goal of only 20 emergency purchases, with 41 emergency purchases in 2023. They achieved their goal of averaging 5 (the top score) on satisfaction surveys sent out to suppliers.

The IT department in 2023 hired a cybersecurity administrator and completed a full IT and cybersecurity assessment. Their 2024 goals include implementation of a mobile device management strategy and a complete upgrade of Police Department IT systems.

Engineering hit their goal of keeping construction costs on change orders to within 10% of the original contract amount.

Planning and zoning is finalizing their transition to the Cityview system to offer user-friendly digital submission and tracking of applications and payments.

Building Safety issued 3138 building permits and conducted 5690 inspections, They conducted 359 commercial and 268 residential plan reviews and conducted 8232 environmental code inspections and 2886 property maintenance inspections.

The Police Department in 2024 has plans for a new police precinct on the East side and goals of reaching 60% of the population through non-enforcement public relations contacts, rolling out the Public Safety Cadets program, additional training for the communications unit, additional training for officers in topics including diversity, communication, leadership use of force, and de-escalation, and additional training for detectives in investigation methods. They are in the process of implementing a new CAD/RMS dispatching system. In 2023, Criminal Investigations had a case clearance rate of 92%. Crimes against Persons had a clearance rate of 91%. Crimes against Property had a clearance rate of 89%. Special Investigations had a clearance rate of 95%. They exceeded their goal of responding to the highest priority (Priority 0 and Priority 1) cases in under 5 minutes by responding to Priority 0 cases in an average of 3 minutes and 2 seconds and Priority 1 cases in an average of 3 minutes and 47 seconds They narrowly missed their goal of responding to Priority 2 cases in under 5 minutes with an average response time of 5 minutes and 14 seconds. They fell short of their goal of a 6% reduction in vehicle collisions, with 2023 seeing a 1.68 % increase in collisions. They soundly beat their goal of reducing theft reports by 5% with 2023 seeing an 11.94% decrease in thefts.

The Fire Department in 2023 had an average response time of 3 minutes and 38 seconds and saved 97% of the property where they responded to fires.

The Water Department fell short of their goal for bill accuracy of less than 10 corrections per 10,000 bills with 2023 seeing 20 corrections per 10,000 bills. Water leaks were up to 512 leaks (over 2022’s total of 392 leaks) and fell dramatically short of their goal of less than 100. Sanitary sewer overflows were down from 2022’s total of 39.2 per 100 miles of pipe to only 21.8 per 100 miles of pipe in 2023, soundly beating their goal of less than 40 per 100 miles of pipe.

The Parks Department for 2024 looks forward to a new Creekmore pool bath house, improvements at John Bell Jr. park including a pavilion and basketball and pickleball courts, adding a basketball court at Creekmore, improvements to the walking trail and basketball court at Tilles, and construction on the Chaffee Crossing Trail and Maybranch Trail. They fell short of their goal in 2023 of decreasing vacant landscaping beds due to a shortage in supply of plants locally and hope to achieve their goal on that in 2024 by looking outside of Fort Smith to obtain enough plants to fill the empty beds. In 2023, multiple improvements to Carol Ann Cross park were completed.

Solid Waste reports that they fell short of their goal of 3000 tons of recycling with only taking in 1,119 tons of recycling in 2023. They plan to return to weekly recycling pickup (rather than every-other-week) in 2024. They took in 266,066 tons of garbage at the landfill and expect to take in 320,000 tons in 2024.

Transit ridership fell sort of their goal of 220,000 riders with 2023 only seeing 114,719 riders and they set a goal to have 280,000 riders in 2024. The cost per passenger in 2023 was $11.85, beating their goal of $11.97 and down notably from the 2022 cost of $12.70. They set a goal for 2024 of $10.18. For 2024, they are working with ARDOT to acquire electric vehicles for the demand response fleet and they have submitted a grant application to partner with Francis Energy to install 7 electric vehicle charging stations around the city.

The Board will discuss cybersecurity insurance. The discussion will include the possibilities of renewing with Brown Hill Clark or buying coverage from Arkansas Municipal League.

The Board will vote on whether or not to enter negotiations to purchase land from Acme Brick for a park and a flood-reduction detention pond. The City’s recent request for Acme to donate the land to the City was declined. The land is in 3 parcels, the former quarry site proposed to be developed as a mountain bike focused park valued at $1,372,140, the former kiln site proposed to be developed as the detention pond valued at $1,219,680, and the third parcel valued at $608,840. The issue to be voted on at the 8-22-23 meeting if approved, would only authorize beginning negotiations on the property, any purchase would have to come back to the Board for a vote at a future meeting.

The Board will vote on whether or not to negotiate a price and make an offer not to exceed $500,000 on the property at 4501 Burrough Road that was formerly the Whole Hog Cafe to purchase it to become an additional police precinct. The existing building there would be modified to serve as a police station building.