Overrun O'Connell? Does the City Manager spend too much?
Times are tough, that's for sure, as anyone who owns a gas-powered vehicle can attest. Food prices are up, foreclosures are up. Heck, everybody's pinching pennies, right? Well, maybe not everybody.
How about the City of Charlottesville? In the last several months, City Manager Gary O'Connell (pictured left) has come under fire for his role in promoting three major projects
¢ââ??¢ a $143 million water supply project,
¢ââ??¢ a $7.5 million rebricking of the Downtown Mall, and
¢ââ??¢ a $1.25 million gift and free 40-year lease to the YMCA as part of an extensive– and, critics say, unnecessary– McIntire Park overhaul.
The three projects are launching during an economic crunch, a time when some people say saving City taxpayers– who already pay a third more than their county counterparts– might enjoy a rebate or at least the comfort of some City savings.
"Are we being stewards of people's money?" asks Kendra Hamilton, a former Democratic city councilor who was one of two councilors to vote against the YMCA project, and who a month ago penned a blistering open letter blasting the pipeline-dependent water supply scheme– and O'Connell for his role in it.
"The thing that might behoove us to do," Hamilton says, "is to really look at 'What are needs?' versus 'What are wants?""
Does the Mall really need rebricking, for instance? Developer Oliver Kuttner says the cracking surface of the 32-year-old Mall should be treated as a maintenance issue rather than something needing replacement. He believes a team of masons could simply move along the Mall repairing damage at a cost of $200,000 a year. At that rate, they could keep working for nearly 40 years before equalling the cost of rebricking.
Does McIntire Park really need an overhaul? Many of the 2,000 members of the City's largest recreational league, which has used park's two softball diamonds for decades, don't think so. And despite the guarantee that Charlottesville High School students will get swim lane priority at the planned YMCA, Hamilton believes the deal was not in the City's best interest.
"I was against it, against the idea of giving the land to a private entity that we didn't ourselves control," she says. Also troubling Hamilton is that the park's "master plan"– and final cost estimate– were not complete, even when City Council offered various approvals.
"What sense does it make," asks Hamilton, "to vote on it before you've been told the cost?"
O'Connell defends the expenditures and says the economic downturn is no reason to put off key projects.
Investing in capital projects, he says, allows savings in the operating budget. Wading into yet another controversy, O'Connell notes that closing the City's Crow pool and repairing Smith pool will cut the cost of water leaks. Replacing the bricks on the Mall will obviate repairing them. And cutting operations costs is not the only reason to spend now, O'Connell claims.
"This is the time to build," he says. "This is the time to get the best prices, to invest in longterm infrastructure. Rates are excellent."
Still, he admits, "I can understand people asking the question."
His critics are doing more than asking. In her open letter late last month, Hamilton blasted the community water supply scheme, which involves building a new reservoir and pipeline system that's seen as fiscally and environmentally worrisome.
Dubbing the project a "pig in a poke," Hamilton claimed she was duped when she voted in favor of the plan on Council, insisting she had no idea that private dredging estimates would come in at approximately one tenth the over $223 million figure the city's paid consultant, Gannett Fleming, put forth.
"There is no way that I would have supported the current water supply strategy without significant changes had I been aware of those numbers," Hamilton wrote, further criticizing a resolution O'Connell presented at the June 2 Council meeting asking councilors to once again endorse the official water plan without considering dredging options. That hastily drawn resolution also irked City Councilor Holly Edwards, who questioned whether reconsidering the council-manager form of government might be in order– seemingly a dig at O'Connell.
"I do think it would be healthy for the City, and probably for Gary, to have a change in management," says former City Councilor Rob Schilling, a Republican who has blasted O'Connell's role in promoting the water supply project.
"The information given to Council by the City Manager," Schilling– now a talk radio host– told his WINA-AM audience last month, "was filtered or shaped to promote a certain point of view or direction that was desired by staff or the City Manager."
Despite his ability to unite former political foes in questioning his judgment, O'Connell finds favor with at least two current leaders.
"I think one thing Gary is good at is giving us lots of information, laying a choice out, and allowing Council a chance to make very informed decisions," says former mayor and current Councilor David Brown.
City Councilor Satyendra Huja also comes to O'Connell's defense. "It is easy to criticize, especially the staff," says Huja. "I don't think the criticism is warranted."
O'Connell says next year's budget will, for the first time in recent memory, reflect the declining economy because of expected flat real estate assessments. Yet, with votes on both dredging and the Downtown Mall imminent, and with softball players crying foul [see this week's cover story–editor], one thing is sure: the spending debate won't soon abate.
21 comments
O'Connell: "This is the time to build,¢Ã¢â??¬ he says. ¢Ã¢â??¬Ã?â??This is the time to get the best prices, to invest in longterm infrastructure. Rates are excellent." This is exactly the kind of misinformation that Mr. Schilling was talking about. Does low interests rates offset higher materials and labor costs? If things are so much cheaper, why has the Mall renovation gone from $7.5M to $4.5M to $6M when basically they're supposedly replacing the brick and thrown out the fluff in their plans?
O'Connell: "Replacing the bricks on the Mall will obviate repairing them." And replacing the chandelier will obviate replacing a light bulb. That always happens when you replace the old with the new.
O'Connell: "... closing the City's Crow pool and repairing Smith pool will cut the cost of water leaks." Smith is not being repaired, it is being re-built. Misinformation? Spin? Mis-speak? Do pool owners completely replace their pools every time they have leaks?
O'Connell: "Investing in capital projects, he says, allows savings in the operating budget." So, extending the Mall in front of City Hall reduces the operating budget? Moving the bus garage into new facilities in the county out Avon Street is reducing the operating costs? Providing city employees with a 50% reduction on daily parking garage fees is doing what? Giving city employees yearly raises, across the board pay-for-performance bonuses, and market-rate adjustments in the salaries is providing savings in the operating budget? I guess the idea is the more you spend, the more you save.
Did Mr. O'Connell mention the as-yet-unfunded city's entire water and sewer lines replacement program and the impending fees (taxes) for storm water management and the reporter forgot to mention these expenditures? And, is WiFi-ing the downtown mall to compete with those businesses whose bread and butter is derived partially from providing those services actually decreasing operating costs or just allowing ranking city staff to spend the day at luncheon while still keeping up with their email?
Of course our former city staffers who are now on council support the manager who's in charge of their retirement and medical benefits. Most people love being the beneficiary of large spending.
Former mayor, David Brown: "I think one thing Gary is good at is giving us lots of information, laying a choice out, and allowing Council a chance to make very informed decisions," is exactly the reasoning behind our not having more than one option for our water supply. If all Mr. Brown is going to do is rubber-stamp Mr. O'Connell's recommendations, why is he on council?
I'm not going to bring the still on-going installation of the new computer system at a cost that Overrun O'Connell doesn't bother to divulge anymore. I'll have to wait for the next round.
Same old rant from the Hook, and no new facts. Hook articles have become one cynical complaint after another, all in the guise of "investigative journalism."
I thought this was Hawes' beat, but I guess Courtney's carrying the water now. The Hook....worth a glance at the article titles, but that's about it.
Anslie...
Talk about a cynical complaint...rant? did you even read the article? Oh, I forgot...you just read the titles. Are you out of your mind? The Hook is the only rag in this town worth reading...my god, the Cville publishes an actual rant page...have you ever read that stuff? You need to have your head checked, girl. Without the Hook around I doubt very much that there would be a dredging study being done right now, I doubt that 200 people would have showed up at that public meeting on the Mall project the other night, and I am positive that our government officials would feel alot more comfortable spending our money.
I actually did read the article. My point is that it's nothing more than a recycling of several previous articles, spiced up with some new quotes from people whining about Mr. O'Connell. There's literally nothing new. I thought O'Connell's points about investing in projects now to save tax payers money in the long run made perfect sense.
Hello,
When will you folks wake up and vote all the local liberal legacy seeking tax spending democrats out of office??????? That is the solution rather than rant and rave.
Anslie said "I thought O'Connell's points about investing in projects now to save tax payers money in the long run made perfect sense." Everybody agrees that it makes perfectly good sense, but can you give real examples of his recommendations that actually do this? I'll answer for you. No. There's a difference between "intent" and "deed." I have given you quite a few examples to the contrary and you still believe this Emperor Has New Clothes.
Country Farmer, as long as the general populace continues to have a child-parrent relationship with government, it will continue to vote the same.
Cville Eye sez: "as long as the general populace continues to have a child-parrent relationship with government, it will continue to vote the same."
I largely agree with you, though if voting actually changed anything it would be illegal.
I'd also like to thank The Hook for running these stories, as well as for apparently having a sense of humor when they run stories about a guy buying his old car back.
As far as the local government go, I'd love to see an actual poll of City Council's approval rate. If it's higher than 40% I'd be fairly surprised. Too bad Republican is such a dirty word in this town.
Jamie D., I'm beginning to come to your conclusion.
And, how could I have forgotten in my old age the cost savings Overrun O'Connell expects with his proposed new $10M fire station to be built in the Fontaine Avenue area on UVA Research Park property. That's saving $5M over the county's new plush Hollymead station. And, of course, the cost savings of duplicating the award-winning services now provided by the Charlottesville Albemarle Rescue Squad shouldn't be omitted from the discussion. And don't forget those nine miles of new roads in the Ragged Mountain natural area - that will not only save money but much more! If we keep letting Overrun O'Connell save the city tax payers money, we'll be millionaires.
Cville Eye-
It is odd that we live in a culture where wealth is determined by how much debt one can assume or control. Politicians merely reflect that corruption and generally don't possess the forethought to change it.
This reminds me of a technique that we politicians often use to undermine our opponents, occasionally to great effect -- hit them where they're strongest. As in: John McCain is perhaps most admired for his experience as a POW in Vietnam, so Wes Clark asserts out of the blue that McCain's stay in the Hanoi Hilton does not qualify him to be Commander-in-Chief. Go right for the jugular.
Say what you will about Gary O'Connell; Lord knows I've had my differences with him on a variety of policy, personnel and fiscal issues, and have been quite at odds with him on more than one occasion. Trying to assert that he is a poor fiscal manager, however -- regardless of however effective a political strategy it is -- just doesn't hold up in the court of fact. Don't take my word for it; listen to the people who actually KNOW SOMETHING about municipal fiscal management, the fiscal experts and bond agencies who analyze the finances of thousands of cities and counties each year and who consistently heap praise upon Gary and his staff for their financial stewardship and for the City's overall fiscal health (which, while imperfect, is the envy of many other Virginia localities). To quote Kevin Rotty, financial advisor with Morgan Keegan & Co., from just last month: ¢Ã¢â??¬Ã?â??The City of Charlottesville continues to be at the forefront of the best managed localities in the Nation. The City's conservative financial practices and its ongoing economic development initiatives have enabled the City to grow and prosper despite a slowing economy.¢Ã¢â??¬ Both Standard & Poor's and Moody's once again gave Charlottesville their highest possible bond rating this year, citing the City's management and budgetary practices (under the leadership of, yes, Gary O'Connell) as key factors in their decision. Charlottesville was one of only two Virginia cities to receive an AAA rating from both agencies. You can't just make this stuff up.
Oh, as for the YMCA -- ironically, Gary's support came late to that project. There were a number of people, myself included (I'm quite proud to say), who were pushing hard for the YMCA to happen before Gary warmed to the idea. I won't rehash all of the arguments for the YMCA here, but suffice it to say, building a new YMCA and a new Smith Pool will produce two brand-new, state-of-the-art community facilities that thousands of City residents will be able to enjoy at free or extremely low cost for decades to come, in a deal that saved the taxpayers tens of millions of dollars versus the City building and managing two new facilities of its own (which is what others were proposing). Dramatically improved public services at dramatically lower cost to taxpayers -- hard to see much of a downside in that. (Even if the City had just decided to patch up its existing, antiquated facilities, the numbers showed that building a brand-new YMCA and Smith Pool would still have cost the taxpayers approximately the same in the long run.)
And as for the 50-year water supply plan -- much room there for second-guessing (again, won't go into all of that here), but one fact you're not hearing very often is that IF you work from the same set of assumptions that this community was working from during the entire multi-year water supply plan development process, it doesn't matter if dredging the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir would cost $25 million or $50 million or $220 million, as a water supply solution it STILL WOULD BE MORE EXPENSIVE THAN THE PLAN THAT WAS ADOPTED. Now, we can go back after the fact and say that the original assumptions the community was using were off-base -- specifically, as the present-day critics are asserting, that we should put a lower value on restoring the ecological health of the Moorman's River than the current plan does, which would require less costly infrastructure -- but to simultaneously criticize Gary O'Connell for downplaying dredging as a water supply solution and for championing an overly costly water supply plan just doesn't...well, hold water.
" To quote Kevin Rotty, financial advisor with Morgan Keegan & Co., from just last month: 'The City of Charlottesville continues to be at the forefront of the best managed localities in the Nation. The City's conservative financial practices and its ongoing economic development initiatives have enabled the City to grow and prosper despite a slowing economy.' Both Standard & Poor's and Moody's once again gave Charlottesville their highest possible bond rating this year, citing the City's management and budgetary practices (under the leadership of, yes, Gary O'Connell) as key factors in their decision. Charlottesville was one of only two Virginia cities to receive an AAA rating from both agencies."
Evaluations for the purposes of bond ratings does not go any further than reviewing recent audit reports, reviewing the budget adoption process for transparency, reviewing the budget document itself for clarity, an evaluation of revenue and expenditures, an evaluation of limits on debt service, evaluation of past bond successes, and,importantly, if the city has set aside a special fund equaling 10% of the current year's budget (in this case $14.2M) is a special non-appropriated account solely for the purpose of guaranteeing the bonds. Any municipality not willing to have this stagnant account (obviously all but two in Virginia) will not get the rating according to Overrun O'Connell. Council used to question the purpose of this fund every year until recently. Bonding evaluations do not evaluate cost overruns, law suits and settlements, exorbitant salaries or benefits, disposal of assets, etc. In other words, a town could replace its fleet of police cars every year to get a different color and it would not affect these evaluations. Looking at the Mall, W. Main, Preston and Cherry Avenues, the only signs of economic development that I see going on is the hospital's expansion. Home building is not economic development. Revenues are up because taxes and fees are up.
As for the pools, many people who use them said they were not looking for State-of-the-art facilities and that they would have been satisfied to have the city spend the $6M it would take to restore the two indoor pools. Ambassador Norris is talking about how the YMCA is saving the tax payer money, but, since no money has been spent, how is it being saved? The final evaluation of that project is way in the future and depends upon how much money the city will have to feed into that endeavor through fees and infrastructure construction, maintenance and repair since the city is the landlord. Until those figures are in, it would be wise to withhold judgment.
"Now, we can go back after the fact and say that the original assumptions the community was using were off-base..." Yes, most people, with the exception of maybe P.E.C. and the Nature Conservancy, agree that the input information was faulty at best, so why would anyone continue to make decisions using that information as part of their justifications? If FALSE, then TRUE is an interesting tautology.
"This reminds me of a technique that we politicians often use to undermine our opponents, occasionally to great effect ¢Ã¢â??¬” hit them where they're strongest." No one was considering the fact that the city has lots of pots of money, like "Strategic" accounts, housing accounts, gas accounts, surplus accounts, etc. sitting around in the banks drawing almost no interest, but it's sad to only be able to say Overrun O'Connell's strongest asset is his ability to secure AAA bond ratings at a huge expense to the tax payer who's providing that $14.2M. Perhaps Ambassador Norris should spend less time directing Richmond, Washington, the U.N. in New York and Beijing and spend more time finding out about the real management of tax payer funds in the city. I guarantee it will prove to be an eye-opener.
In this week's Hook cover story: "As for the cost city taxpayers will bear, Svetz was quoted in a May 7 Daily Progress article as saying that he would announce an estimated cost at the May 19 meeting. And even though no estimate was offered that night, City Council went ahead and unanimously approved the master plan with no price tag attached. Even now-- over a month later-- Svetz tells the Hook it would be "irresponsible" to guess the potential cost."
This shows that councilors are in no position to judge Overrun's ability to generate cost savings. It seems he's unable to generate cost estimates. This is amazing.
Thank you Dave Norris! Amazing that it takes the Mayor to provide objectivity, rather than the media.
I would hope that someone's personal, many years in the past grudge would eventually wear off. Thank you to our Mayor for defending someone who is paid to serve and does well. As I have said before, there is a world out there that is positive and productive, I would hope that some regulars on this blog and in this newspaper would discover it. It is not to hard to find, step away from the mouse and keyboard, walk outside and breath. It will do you a world of good.
Once again the dredging surveys to get the information needed for the community to find out the exact bid for dredging the Reservoir has been stalled with the appointment of a task force.
The majority of the member organizations of this group have already stated publicly that they have no interest in the dredging surveys as part of the water supply to decrease the cost and the environmental damage of the current plan. It is the Ratepayers and Citizens who will be the losers if we do not insist that this information is provided BEFORE any construction is allowed to begin on the $100million dollar dam and pipeline.
With a 100% cost overrun built in it is more likely to reach $200 million
The cost of the pipeline to connect the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir and the Ragged Mt. Reservoir, which will pump water uphill and need to be pre-treated with chemicals first, is a complete boondoggle. The consultants have provided sketchy assumptions about it's cost and feasibility (see discussion from the Albemarle Service Authority Meeting below)
Rooker switched gears and asked Frederick for a cost estimate on the new pipeline to connect the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir with the Ragged Mountain Reservoir. Frederick said the $55.9 million estimate first provided in 2006 still stands, a figure that assumes parts of the pipeline can be built along the right of way obtained by VDOT to build the Western Bypass, a road project that is on indefinite hold. Rooker wanted to know if the plan to utilize the right of way was still valid.
¢Ã¢â??¬Ã?â??There are people who have thrown out statements that VDOT cannot legally allow the right of way to be used for this kind of thing,¢Ã¢â??¬ Rooker said. ¢Ã¢â??¬Ã?â??It would seem to me to be wise to, as soon as legally possible, to initiate discussions with the right people at VDOT about our use of that right of way. If they don't build the bypass¢Ã¢â??¬Š they may be selling that right of way back, so it would be wise to get the easements in place before that might occur.¢Ã¢â??¬
County Executive Bob Tucker said VDOT officials have told him that the right of way ¢Ã¢â??¬Ã?â??is secure¢Ã¢â??¬ until 2012. Slutzky asked if any utility easements would survive any future sale of that land back to the original owners. Frederick did not know, but Rooker said that was exactly the kind of question he would want to have answered.
Sean Tubbs & Brian Wheeler
Posted on July 07, 2008 at 12:10 PM
The lack of questioning from most of our elected officials about the cost and feasibility of the RWSA dam/pipeline is appalling!!
Thank you Mr. Rooker and Mr. Slutzky
Are those bricks really that much of an important issue? I see people spitting and dogs relieving themselves on the bricks. Get real people! There are way too many other important issues than the size of our bricks!!! I really do not think anyone would be notice or care...4x12 or 10x5...WGAS!
The question of the bricks is the question as to whether 10% are replaced or 100% replaced; it's a question of $M
Once again the solution is to get rid of these tax and spend liberal democrats that profess a love for the pastorial quality of
Charlottesville life while at the same time groveling for proffers from the big developers that are in fact the malignancy that spoils the countryside and not the small landowner that the BOS has targeted with so many code changes. All you have to do is see how these liberal democrats have found ways to circumvent the loss of revenue from stagnant real estate assessments by increasing fees on auto tags, the sale of homes which is bad for the mortgage crisis, the millage rate etc. What gives these tax and spend liberal democrats the right to expect a 15% increase in revenue spending every year. You do.
"tax and spend liberals".....Given how much money is being spent by the current conservative administration at the Federal level, I don't think you can throw that generalization around any more.