Fiscal Note
This resolution appropriates $15,000 from the Contingent Reserve to fund the salary and benefits of hourly employees performing median maintenance as part of a pilot project. The budget amendment would be as follows:
GN01-51200-535000 $13,935
GN01-52000-535000 $1,065
From Contingent Reserve ($15,000)
Title
Amending the 2012 Operating Budget for Engineering to fund a pilot program to perform landscape maintenance for traffic medians with City staff and appropriating $15,000 from the Contingent Reserve.
Body
PREAMBLE
The City of Madison Engineering Division is responsible for maintenance of medians on select arterial streets most of which are considered gateways to Madison's Downtown and University of Wisconsin Campus areas.
These main traffic corridors are the first, and sometime, only opportunity we have to make an impression on visitors to our City. As such, it is important to keep them looking good.
The total square footage of these areas, and the cost to maintain, has increased significantly since 2000. Unfortunately, the difficult economic situation the City faced in preparing its 2012 operating budget required reducing the amount budgeted for maintaining these areas by nearly forty percent.
Historically, Engineering has contracted with private firms to maintain the City's landscaped medians. Engineering reviewed the existing contracts for maintenance to identify opportunities for savings. Staff met with the private companies currently under contract to provide this service and successfully renegotiated a 12% decrease in their pricing for 2012. Eliminating the watering component from these contracts resulted in an additional savings of $16,500 in out-of-pocket costs. In the event watering is required Engineering's night crew will perform this task.
An additional 32,000 square feet of recently constructed landscaped medians become the City's maintenance responsibility this year and are not included in existing contracts for maintenance. These medians include:
· East Washington Avenue - Phase IV 17,101 square feet
· Campus Drive@ University Avenue 4,600 square feet
· Lien Road Roundabout 8,152 square feet
· S. Park Street (Badger to Ridgeway) 2,216 square feet
In order to maintain the current level of service and protect the significant investment the City has made in these medians Engineering will pilot the public-ization of median maintenance using these new medians. Existing Engineering staff supplemented by seasonal labor will perform the same scope of work at the same frequencies as is required by current contractors. The same process and standards used to evaluate the quality of work performed by private contractors will be applied to Engineering crews. This pilot program will enable the City to determine if it is more cost-effective to bring this service in-house or continue contracting it out.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, to hereby amend the 2012 Operating Budgets for
Engineering to hire additional seasonal employees to perform landscape maintenance for specified traffic medians;
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the budgetary target for the Engineering Division's 2013
Operating Budget be increased to reflect this increase in hourly wages and benefits; and
BE IT FINALLY RESOLVED, that the additional funding of $15,000 be appropriated from the
Contingent Reserve to fund this pilot program.