HomeMy Public PortalAbout05-22-2012 Collins report FAMorrissey Boulevard
Boston,MA 02125-3393
EDWARD 1. COLLINS,1R. CENTER FOR PUBLIC MANAGEMENT P:617.287.4824
U MASS JOHN W.MCCORMACK GRADUATE SCHOOL OF POLICY AND GLOBAL STUDIES R 617.287.5566
BOSTON UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS BOSTON mccormwk.umb.edu/centers/cpm
collins.center@umb,edu
May 9, 2012
Mr. Michael J. Driscoll
Town Manager
Town of Watertown
149 Main Street
Watertown, MA 02472
Dear Mr. Driscoll:
The Edward J. Collins, Jr. Center for Public Management at the University of Massachusetts
Boston is pleased to submit its proposal to conduct a Staffing and Operational Assessment of
the Public Works Department of the Town of Watertown. Our proposal is based on our
discussions with you, the Personnel and Town Organization Subcommittee, and our team's
extensive experience conducting similar projects in Massachusetts and in other locations across
New England.
I will serve as the project manager for this project. I will be assisted in this engagement by Mr.
Rob Haley, who has consulting experience encompassing over 100 projects related to public
works, public utilities, parks and recreation, and fleet management operations.
This proposal is being submitted by a public instrumentality of the Commonwealth of
Massachusetts. The Collins Center is not responding as a private vendor. If you have any
questions, please do not hesitate to contact me via the contact information above or via e-mail
at stephen.mcgoldrick@umb.edu.
Respectfully,
Stephen McGoldrick
Deputy Director
TOWN OF WATERTOWN,MASSACHUSETTS
Proposal to Conduct an Analysis of the Department of Public Works
A. BACKGROUND AND STATEMENT OF STAFF EXPERIENCE
We believe that the analysis of the Town's Public Works Department requires significant
experience in these types of engagements. The following sections provide a more detailed
description of the background and experience of the Collins Center and the staff who would be
assigned to this project.
1. THE COLLINS CENTER
The Collins Center (the Center) is dedicated to improving the efficiency and effectiveness of all
levels of government. The Center has developed a comprehensive set of services to increase
the productivity, performance and accountability of government. Such services include:
Performance Management Services
• Technical services
• Training
• ConsultingThe Collins
• System development dedicated to improving
• New England StatNet coordination the efficiency Online professional development course effectiveness of all
Regionalization Services levels of • •
vernment
• Capacity sharing, including shared dispatch
and shared staffing,such as veterans agents and health officers
• Developing and negotiating inter-municipal agreements
Charter Change and Government Study Committee Services
• Drafting of charter revisions or amendments
• Drafting of Special Acts
• Research
• Public Presentations
Municipal Turnaround Assistance
• Budget and management advisory assistance
• Interim management services
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Proposal to Conduct an Analysis of the Department of Public Works
Government Services
• City/Town—School collaboration
• Information Technology Assessments
• Organizational Reviews
• Departmental Operational Analysis
• Public Meeting Facilitation
• Community needs assessments
Executive Recruitment and Interim Management Services
• Recruitment
• Interim Management
• Transition Services
Education and Training Services
• Online Performance Management course for Governments and Non-profits
• Myers Briggs Type Indicator assessments
• Management, supervisory and leadership training
• Human Resource Crisis Intervention
• Customized Professional Development
• Personnel Coaching
There are several key characteristics of the approach taken by the Collins Center project team,
as summarized in the following points:
• Our staff are service area specialists, not generalists. Our project team includes analysts
with extensive experience analyzing organizational issues in Massachusetts and
elsewhere in the New England and across the country as well.
• Our projects are approached with a firm grounding in analytical methodology. You will
receive detailed analysis of your specific issues. All impacts are identified and analyzed
in as much detail as possible to ensure that recommendations can be implemented and
that our clients can understand the reason for change.
• Our projects are characterized by extensive interaction between consultants and client
staff, management and policy makers.
ROB HALEY, ASSOCIATE. Mr. Haley brings over 23 years of local government consulting
experience to this project. Mr. Haley has conducted a wide variety of operational and
organizational studies, financial analyses of public services, shared service and consolidation
feasibility studies. His recent Massachusetts clients have included Lowell, Wellfleet, Somerville,
Gardner, Winchendon, Ashland, Hopkinton, Southborough, Dudley, Webster, Plymouth County,
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Proposal to Conduct an Analysis of the Department of Public Works
and many others. Mr. Haley holds an M.B.A. from Georgia State University and a B.S. from the
Georgia Institute of Technology.
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Proposal to Conduct an Analysis of the Department of Public Works
B. PROPOSED WORK PLAN
This section of the proposal provides the Collins Center project team's understanding of the
background and requirements of this project, and our approaches to conducting this study.
1. SUMMARY OF THE SCOPE OF SERVICES TO BE UNDERTAKEN
The Town desires to perform an assessment and identify opportunities for improvements in
efficiency and cost effectiveness of operations to meet the needs of Watertown. The study is
to be a multi-faceted analysis and review of the operational structure of Public Works, including
operational procedures, internal and external operational demands, work methods and work
flows, seasonal variations, written and past practices operational procedures, communication,
project management, revenue generation and information systems and practices. The study is
also to include a review of current work planning and scheduling throughout the Department,
and is to assess the adequacy of staffing to accomplish short and long term goals.
Specific items to be addressed in the study include the following:
• Evaluation of the Department's existing structure to determine if personnel and
resources are being utilized in the most efficient manner based on the mission of the
Department, and whether the current configuration of divisions is appropriate.
• Review of the Department's capacity to handle an increasing volume of large and
complex capital projects and its ability to respond to extraordinary circumstances and
emergency situations.
• Evaluation of the efficiency and cost-effectiveness of in-house versus contracted
services to manage roads, intersections and sidewalks, sewer and water systems,
athletic facilities and fields, public work buildings and facilities.
• Evaluation of systems such as fleet management, pavement management, capital
project management,work orders, and preventive maintenance.
• Performance of a benchmarking analysis of Public Works operations versus comparable
communities, as well as leading practices in the field and to standards of efficiency and
effectiveness developed in the industry.
The study process will include the following elements:
• Interviews with Town Council members, and members of the Personnel and Town
Organization Subcommittee.
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• Interviews with other stakeholders who have interest and insights into the Department
of Public Works.
• Interviews with Department management and staff.
• Review of any previous reports on the Department of Public Works, or any reports
issued that impact its operations.
• Development of an inventory of staff, services, workloads, budgets and responsibilities
of Public Works.
• Comparison of Public Works practices to those of "best management practices", as well
as to comparable communities.
• Discussions with the steering committee regarding findings and recommendations.
• Development of a final report that documents our project team's recommendations.
Project Deliverables: The draft report will be delivered to the Town within three months. The
report will contain suggested best practices and concise, practical recommendations for any
recommended modifications to Departmental operations, staffing, reporting systems,
management and planning methods, work procedures and flows, use of information
technology, and other elements. These recommendations will be practical, achievable and
have a great likelihood of being implemented. The recommendations will show estimated
savings and rankings of proposed changes.
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2. PROPOSED WORK APPROACH
The following is a detailed description of the work we would undertake to conduct the analysis
of organizational structure for the Town of Watertown.
Task 1 Develop an In-Depth Understanding of the Key Issues Impacting the Public
Works Department.
To evaluate the operations of the Department of Public Works (DPW), we need to develop an
understanding of the key issues impacting and shaping service requirements. To develop this
perspective, we will conduct interviews with Council's Committee on Public Works members,
Town Manager, Department Superintendent, and division managers in the Department.
Further, we would interview any others whom the Town designates as having specific
knowledge of the Department. These interviews would focus on exploring issues and attitudes
in the following areas:
• Goals and objectives of the departments and their divisions with regard to the delivery
of services, and the extent of performance measures and measurement systems.
• Adequacy of management systems, and the extent to which managers utilize this
information to make meaningful managerial, operational, scheduling and staff allocation
decisions;
• The outsourcing philosophy of the department and any steps taken to outsource or in-
source services in recent years;
• Issues regarding the coordination of services with other departments in the Town and
other local governments;
• Impacts of increasingly stringent regulations such as regulations regarding storm water,
CMOM, GASB 34, etc.;
• The extent to which technology is effectively utilized, such as SCADA, to enhance the
efficiency of staff;
• Key internal issues that need to be addressed (i.e., adequacy of technology investment,
etc.); and
• The adequacy of service levels, and perceived gaps in existing levels of service.
These initial interviews will provide an opportunity to identify and isolate factors and
constraints that impact the effectiveness and efficiency of the departments and need to be
addressed as part of the subsequent analysis.
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Deliverable:Based on the results of these.initial interviews, we will prepare a detailed project
work plan for the weeks that follow.
Task 2 Develop a Profile of Departmental Operations and Services.
The purpose of this task will be to develop a detailed description of the Department and
component divisions, including how services are delivered, staffed, managed, and the levels of
service and costs associated with the delivery of those services. The development of this
detailed description will be based upon interviews with the Superintendent, division managers,
first line supervisors and other staff members. The project team would also provide an
opportunity for employees of the department to meet with the project team and provide their
perspective regarding their respective divisions.
The project team would base this understanding on the collection of the data portrayed in the
paragraphs below.
• The current organization of the existing divisions including:
— The structure and functions of each division within the Department;
— Staffing levels of each division;
— The basic job responsibilities for management, supervisory and operational staff
in these functions; and
— The budgets for the current and two prior fiscal years at a level of detail showing
the authorized budget for each division including both costs and revenues, by
source.
• Document all key programs and operations including:
— Program scope and content;
— Facilities in use;
— How staff are scheduled and deployed;
— Approaches to managing projects such as capital projects;
— Workload data;
— Basic service levels;
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— The fleet maintained by the Department, including number of equipment by
class,the age of the fleet, and the annual utilization; and
— The extent of contracted services by type, size, cost, and methods utilized to
administer and manage the contract.
• Document management systems available to support operations, including:
— Financial reporting and budgeting systems;
— Departmental business processes and procedures;
— Use and capabilities of any maintenance management and program scheduling
systems;
— The type of systems employed to manage and control capital projects
(scheduling; cost performance; staff loading and time utilization;
performance/status compared to milestones), including examples of appropriate
reports and documents related to systems employed;
— Performance monitoring systems;
— Customer service monitoring and reporting; and
— Technology in use such as CMMS, CRM, SCADA,AutoCAD, GIS, etc.
• Documentation of the infrastructure maintained, repaired and operated by the
Department. For example, for the maintenance of streets and pavement, we would
document such data and processes as the following:
— Square feet of paved streets;
— Percentage of each pavement type replaced, reconstructed or resurfaced over
the past 5 to 10 years;
— Service level targets for the response to emergency repairs, potholes, shoulder
and curb repairs, etc., and the degree to which these are measured and
reported;
— Response times and routing for snow removal, as well as the costs and
outsourcing philosophies for this service; and
— Targeted service levels for pavement markings and lane striping, and the degree
to which these are measured and reported.
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Proposal to Conduct an Analysis of the Department of Public Works
Once these initial data collection activities have been completed, the project team will prepare
a summary descriptive profile that presents our understanding of the current organization,
staffing, operations and costs of the Department. This profile will be circulated among
management and staff for comment to ensure the accuracy of our understanding. The profile
would then be presented to the project steering committee.
Once completed and reviewed, the profile information will provide the basis for analysis
conducted and completed in subsequent study tasks.
Deliverable: The deliverable for this task would be a descriptive profile.
Task 3 Compare Departmental Programs and Practices to Those of Other Cities and
Towns and to "Best Management Practices."
The purpose of this task is to evaluate the Department in the context of best management
practices in the profession and also other departments delivering comparable services in other
cities and towns.
This task will initially consist of the selection and refinement of a set of benchmark measures
for the use in evaluating service delivery in the Department against other cities and towns.
These could include measures regarding services delivered by contract, productivity, service
levels, expenditures, staffing levels by function, the extent of inventory maintained by the Town
such as lane miles of roads, etc. Once these measures have been selected, our project team
would select at least twenty cities and towns, in consultation with the project steering
committee, for purposes of this comparative survey. These would be jurisdictions of
comparable population, service provision, and other factors. Upon collection of the data from
these other jurisdictions, we would identify findings and conclusions based upon the
comparison of these other cities to the Watertown Public Works Department.
In addition, our project team would evaluate the Department in the context of best
management practices. This benchmarking would focus both on quantitative and qualitative
measures. The best practices comparison would be completed for each key function in the
Department. Examples of the functions that we would evaluate and the scope of these best
practices are provided below.
• Organizational Structure and Management. The project team will examine the current
organizational structure focusing on the appropriateness of functional responsibilities;
staffing levels; supervisory span of control, standard operating policies and procedurps;
workload management systems; customer service programs and protocols; procedures
for setting priorities; employee training; and coordination of efforts across division lines.
• Asset Management. The project team will evaluate the efficacy of the asset
management practices utilized by the departments. This would include such best
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practices such as the installation of an asset management system that includes an
inventory of the plant to be maintained with details (e.g., size of mains) about
components to be maintained and where the components are located; a computerized
maintenance management system; ongoing condition assessments; maintenance and
rehabilitation strategies; and sustainable funding levels for maintenance and
rehabilitation for these assets.
• Capital Project Management. The project team will evaluate the adequacy of project
management for capital projects using best practices regarding the use of cost of
construction guidelines to document staffing requirements for all of the capital projects;
the development of a Gantt chart for capital improvement projects for a two to three
year period; the development of clear, easily read capital project status reports that
match the level of detail needed by the expected audience; the use of a project cost
accounting system to enable comparisons of planned versus actual costs; the
development of capital project scoping and cost estimate documents before the
commencement of design; etc.
• Wastewater Collection. The project team will evaluate the wastewater collection
system using best practices regarding how the wastewater collection system compares
to benchmarking performance indicators developed by the American Water Works
Association; the level of service for cleaning of wastewater mains and catch basins,
televising of wastewater mains, and inspection of manholes for 1/1 problems; the
effectiveness of the energy management program such as the use of variable
speed/frequency drive pumps and high efficiency pumps (95% to 97%); the
effectiveness of the FOG program; the overflow rate per 100 miles of main; the crew
sizes utilized; the certification levels of staff; the use of a SCADA system;etc.
• Water Distribution. The project team will evaluate the water distribution system using
best practices regarding how the water distribution system compares to benchmarking
performance indicators developed by the American Water Works Association; the level
of service for preventive maintenance of fire hydrants, exercising of distribution valves,
flushing of dead ends, pressure regulation stations, and water storage tanks; the extent
of water loss; the crew sizes utilized; the certification levels of staff; the use of a SCADA
system; the effectiveness with which the Town meets the AWWA Standard G200 -
Distribution Systems Operation and Management; etc.
• Highway. The project team will evaluate highway maintenance using best practices
regarding the mix of preventive maintenance strategies used for roads; the use and
application of a pavement management system; the crew sizes used for highway
maintenance; the repair strategies used for road maintenance including crack sealing,
base repair, and skin patching;the level of service provided for street sweeping; etc.
The best practices utilized for comparison in this task would be based upon the project team's
accumulated knowledge and experience with efficient and effective organizations across the
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country, as well as through accepted industry benchmarks from such organizations as APWA,
AWWA, and others.
Once the results have been completely analyzed, the project team would utilize them as a
component in the definition of a detailed issue list that would highlight potential issues and
improvement opportunities related to Department organization and operations.
Deliverable: The deliverable for this task would be an analysis of the Department in
comparison to best management practices and against the practices of other comparable
cities and towns.
Task 4 Evaluate Staffing, Work Practices, Management Practices, Facilities,
Equipment, and Service Levels in the Department.
In this work task, the project team will analyze the staffing and service levels within the
Department. Examples of the types of analytical activities the project team would perform are
portrayed below.
• Evaluate the levels of the service delivered by the Department. This analysis would
focus on profiling the levels of service, and assessing their adequacy. These levels of
service have important cost implications. Examples of the types and levels of service we
would expect to find in the Town include the following:
— Wastewater mains are cleaned every two to three years and catch basins are
cleaned annually;
— Street centerlines and pavement legends are painted once annually;
— Distribution valves are exercised annually, dead ends are flushed annually,
pressure regulation stations are preventively maintained annually, and water
storage tanks are inspected and cleaned once every three to five years;
— Potholes are patched within one workday of receipt of the complaint; and
— Sidewalks are inspected on a 3 to 5 year cycle to identify tripping hazards and
small tripping hazards eliminated with the use of a concrete grinding machine
within one workday of identification.
• Evaluate the adequacy of major work practices. This analysis would focus on the
identification of opportunities to streamline work practices to increase productivity
and/or enhance the effectiveness of these service levels. Examples of this analysis are
presented below.
Document and analyze crew sizes to assure they are appropriate to the type and
volume of work performed. We would expect, for example, that a one-person
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crew would be utilized for sign repair, a two-person crew for pavement legend
painting, a five-person crew for base failure repair, a five-person crew for crack
filling, etc.
— Document and analyze work practices to assess whether these practices could
be altered to reduce workload. For example, is AutoCAD utilized for the design of
capital projects, is SCADA used to monitor the water distribution and wastewater
collection systems, is GIS linked to an asset management system to enable the
graphical depiction of repair records to document frequent locations of main
repairs and replacement needs, etc?
• Evaluate policies and procedures. We will analyze all pertinent policies and procedures
of the Department to determine completeness, frequency of updates, communication
of changes to affected staff and Town departments, extent of overlap, effectiveness in
controlling liability and risk, and other elements of the sufficiency of operating policies
and procedures. We will evaluate the necessity of revisions to policies, procedures
including time, attendance, payroll, or collective bargaining agreements that may be
necessary to meet the Department's needs.
• Evaluate work planning and scheduling. This analysis would focus on systems and
processes used to plan and schedule work in the Department. This analysis would
evaluate the overall maintenance management program employed to support the
Department to include levels of service; maintenance standards; staff assignments to
maintenance tasks; and systems and procedures employed to monitor performance of
both scheduled and unscheduled maintenance programs.
• Evaluate the productivity and staffing levels against work output guidelines. Over the
years, our consultants have developed guidelines for staffing in a variety of service areas
based on analysis of industry standards and actual work measurement of typical
activities performed by Public Works, Water and Wastewater utilities and Parks,
Recreation and Cemeteries organizations. This includes such guidelines as cost of
construction guidelines for Engineering, vehicle equivalency units for fleet, comparisons
to benchmark performance indicators developed by the American Water Works
Association, the application of productivity benchmarks such as the number of
distribution valves a crew can exercise in a crew day, etc.
• Evaluate overtime utilization of the Department. This would involve the evaluation of
overtime utilization of the Department by key overtime causes, as well as policies and
contract impacts on overtime utilization. This may include staffing of services at levels
that minimize "built in" overtime in order to provide basic services to the community,
utilization of temporary and/or part-time employees where cost effective and
appropriate, the recovery of full-costs of overtime, including benefits and administrative
expenses for services provided and billed to external agencies, etc.
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• Evaluate the procurement practices of the Department. This would examine the
Department's procurement policies, procedures and practices, as well as review the
coordination between the Town's procurement functions and the Department's,
including such practices as the use of e-procurement, the use of an automated
purchasing system that is integrated with the Town's automated financial system, the
purchasing limits for bids, the extent of procurement planning, the extent of use of
cooperative purchasing with other local governments, the use of procurement cards,
etc.
• Evaluate Communications. This will examine the adequacy of internal workings of the
management team including internal and external communications and customer and
stakeholder relations and communications.
• Evaluate the adequacy of asset management by the Department. The Department is
responsible for the maintenance of a significant and expensive infrastructure such as
roads, water and wastewater infrastructure, parks, cemetery, etc. In the evaluation of
the adequacy with which the Department manages these assets, we would analyze the
preventive maintenance and renewal of these assets. For example, in evaluating road
preservation and preventive maintenance, we would consider such issues as the
following:
— What is the Road Surface Rating(RSR) of the Town's road system?
— Is the Town effectively utilizing a mix of preventive maintenance strategies for its
road system?
— Are the levels of funding for preventive maintenance sufficient to maintain an
appropriate RSR?
— Is road maintenance utilizing effective preventive maintenance practices such as
crack sealing?
— Are effective utility cut practices used?
• Evaluate the adequacy of facilities allocated to the Department. We would document
the facilities currently available to support the Department's operations, compare
current space availability to the amount actually required based on application of
accepted space and program standards, identify facility deficiencies by organizational
unit and function, and document their impact on operations.
• Evaluate the fleet assigned to the Department. This evaluation would be focused on
how well the fleet meets the needs of the Department in such areas as the age and
reliability of the equipment. We would also analyze opportunities to reduce the fleet
through pooling or eliminating duplicative pieces of equipment. This analysis would
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include the evaluation of the life-to-date mileage of equipment, the age of the
equipment in comparison to replacement guidelines, the annual utilization of the
equipment in terms of miles or hours, the extent of use of mileage reimbursement
versus assigned vehicles, etc.
• Evaluate the adequacy of financial controls utilized by the Department. The evaluation
of the adequacy of internal controls would include such aspects as the following:
— Proper authorization of all transactions and activities to reduce the possibility
that incorrect or fraudulent transactions or activities occur;
— Assigning different people the responsibilities of authorizing transactions,
recording transactions, and maintaining custody of assets to reduce the
opportunity for any individual employee to both commit and conceal errors or
evaluate the theft of assets;
— Design and use of adequate documents and records to help ensure proper
recording of transactions and events; and
— Adequate safeguards over access to and use of assets and records to reduce the
possibility of theft of those assets and concealment of illegal activity.
• Evaluate the potential for outsourcing. At this point in the project, the project team
will have an understanding of the functions and services performed by in-house crews,
and, through financial analysis, will also have an understanding of the costs of these
services. We will also have compared these services to those to those of best practices
in the industry in order to identify any potential candidates for outsourcing or,
alternatively, to begin to perform in-house. This analysis is a complex one, and cannot
simply be made on a cost basis, but rather must incorporate other elements such as
proximity and reliability of private services, impacts upon staff, and other elements.
• Evaluate the goal setting of the Department— short and long-range. The project team
will evaluate the goals, objectives, and performance measurement systems utilized in
each division.This would include such steps as the following:
— Document the use and application of goals, objectives, and performance
measurement as a way of doing business in the existing divisions;
Identify the different and varying goals, objectives, and performance
measurement needs of the various stakeholders including Directors,
departmental management, and first-line supervisors;
Identify key goals, objectives and performance measures at all levels in the
Department;
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— Develop recommendations for the development of goals, objectives and
performance measures; and
— Develop data collection plans for capturing the performance measurement data
including accountability for data collection and reporting, and controls that will
need to be put in place to ensure measure accuracy.
Upon the completion of the preceding tasks, the project team will develop an important interim
report that will provide the results of our operational, management and staffing analysis of the
Public Works Department. We will review this preliminary assessment with the project steering
committee as well as with staff.
Deliverable: The result of this work task will be a detailed analysis of the staffing, work
practices, management practices,facilities, and service levels in the Department.
Task 5 Evaluate the Plan of Organization for the Department.
In this task, the project team will evaluate the plan of organization for the Department. The
project team uses a number of principles in evaluating organizational structure. These include
such principles as those presented below.
• Do the organizational structures of the Department foster accountability?
• Is the organizational structure for the Department too "tiered" or too "flat"? Do the
number of layers of management and supervisors result in tall, narrow organizational
structures?
• Are divisions and sections placed too high or too low in the Department in regard to
their importance?
• Are spans of control for the Department too broad or too limited?
• Are the plans of management organization in the Department providing adequate
communication/coordination to minimize the number of handoffs/exchanges required
among the divisions providing service to the public? Does the structure enhance shared
knowledge and understanding among divisions?
• Do the divisions and sections in the Department distribute/share workload across
divisions to maximize the productivity of staff through peaks and valleys and offer cross-
functional capabilities?
• Is the plan of organization enhancing career development opportunities, training, and
recruitment and retention?
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• Is there sufficient support for the management of the Department to enhance
managerial effectiveness?
• Does the plan of organization minimize administrative overhead?
• Does the plan of organization foster the standardization of processes to enhance the
efficiency and customer responsiveness of services (e.g., response to customer
complaints)?
• Does the plan of organization enable staff in the Department to provide better service
to the public in terms of cycle times, user friendliness, performance management,
quality control, and consistency in the application of policies and procedures?
• Are management and supervisory personnel within the Department spending their time
on high priority work? Are management and supervisory personnel in the Department
properly utilized?
In addition to evaluating the organizational and management staffing structures in the
Department on their own merits, we will also utilize comparative information drawn from
similarly sized communities with operations of comparable scope,
Using the criteria above, the project team will analyze the feasibility of re-organization which
may include consolidating one or more divisions; creating an umbrella division within a
department for certain functions (i.e. fleet maintenance); regionalizing or privatizing certain
functions; and creating and/or eliminating certain position titles.
Deliverable: The deliverable for this task would be the development of alternative plans of
organization and management staffing, analysis of organizational alternatives, and a
recommended plan of organization.
Task 6 Develop and Present a Draft Report.
Once the work tasks have been completed, our findings, conclusions, and recommendations
will be documented in the form of a detailed final report for the Town. We will review the draft
report with the project steering committee to assure the thoroughness and accuracy of the
materials, to discuss suggested priorities and the basis for our recommendations, and to assure
complete understanding of the recommendations and their implications.
Our report will contain, at a minimum,the following components:
• Executive Summary describing our findings, recommendations, study methodology, and
options for consideration.
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• Listing of best practices and comparisons of the operations in the existing divisions to
these practices, as well as the results of the survey of similar cities and towns.
• Any position descriptions that we recommend to be modified or added.
• All supporting data and information.
• Implementation tables that describe our recommendations, responsibility for
implementation, cost impact, and the timing of the recommendation.
Once staff and the project steering committee have reviewed the draft final report and
implementation plan, and required modifications completed, we would present the final report
to the Town Manager and Town Council.
The Collins Center project team will be prepared to make a presentation on the final report to
the Town as requested.
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C. PROPOSED SCHEDULE
The chart below shows our proposed time schedule for accomplishing each of the tasks
described in the work plan. We are prepared and able to commence the study within two (2)
weeks of issuance of authorization to proceed and take approximately 12 weeks to complete
this study.This would include completion of the work plan as proposed in the previous section.
Initial l nterviev, 6/4/2012 6/11/2012 _
0escriptfve Profile 6/11/2012 7/2/2012
Survey and eest Practices 7/2/2012 7/30/2012
Stafrin&Work Practices 7/16/2012 7/30/2012
Analysis of Organisational Structure 7/23/2012 8/3/2012
Final Report 7/30/2012 8/21/2012
We would be prepared to present the final report to the Town in an appropriate forum to be
determined.
The Collins Center for Public Management Page 19
TOWN OF WATERTOWN,MASSACHUSETTS
Proposal to Conduct an Analysis of the Department of Public Works
D. PROJECT COST
The Collins Center proposes to complete the scope of services described in our task plan above
for$20,000.
In addition to the professional fees, the Collins Center will bill monthly for actual expenses
necessary to successfully complete the work, including long distance telephone calls, facsimile
transmissions, postage, photocopying, meals, travel and other necessary and proper
administrative costs that are advanced by the Collins Center. The Town will reimburse UMASS
Boston for these expenses upon presentation of the receipts and an itemized statement.
Unless there are special circumstances, we expect payment within 30 days of the statement
date. Expenses shall not exceed $1,000 unless prior approval is obtained from the Town.
In the event the Agreement becomes impossible or unnecessary for the Collins Center to
perform due to supervening circumstances beyond the control of either party, the Collins
Center shall be discharged from completing the scope of work and the Town shall owe nothing
beyond the performance at the rate agreed to in the schedule above. Either party may
terminate this agreement by providing the other with seven (7) days written notice.
The Collins Center for Public Management Page 20