Public Works Tops Shared-Service Wish List

Local elected officials from around Union County started brainstorming shared services ideas during a summit meeting Wednesday night in Scotch Plains.

The summit, organized by the county government, served as a way for the county to promote shared service programs n their level and to allow for networking between local elected officials on the issues. It is the eighth in a series of shared services forums sponsored by the county and the first geared towards elected officials.

“The people in this room are the people with the willingness to take this to the next level,” County Manager George Devanney said in his opening remarks.

Attendees from most of the county’s 21 towns, including appointed officials, networked before the formal program, which included remarks from State Senate President Stephen Sweeney (D-West Deptford) and State Sen. Ray Lesniak (D-Elizabeth), along with visiting booths from various county departments. The booths centered on county programs geared towards shared services, including the Sheriff’s Labor Assistance Program, emergency management programs and recycling.

During remarks to the officials, both Sweeney and Lesniak focused on the need for increased shared services, citing the current tax situation in the state. Sweeney, focused on his work in implementing shared service as the freeholder director in Gloucester County, He said many of these programs can be replicated in other counties and said he is working to provide more incentives for shared services to occur.

Union County Freeholder Chairwoman Deborah Scanlon, who has made shared services a highlight of her tenure, stressed that the workshops following the speakers would be the biggest benefit to attendees. She said that the county is looking to hold more meetings to provide local officials the chance to discuss shared services.

“Your attendance shows a true commitment to strengthening your communities,” she said. “Together we have shown the value of connecting people.”

Officials in attendance were given the chance to cast several votes on topics for short term shared service programs that could be implemented between the county and towns. Posting their votes as stickers on a bulletin board, shared recycling and garbage collection led the balloting with 53 votes.

Other top vote getters included shared street paving contracts, sharing and maintenance of major equipment, merging municipal courts, grass clipping and bulk material disposal, sharing administrative programs including payroll and summer recreation programming.

Topics such as shared training programs, shared personnel and shared web services were at the bottom of the vote total, with shared legal documents catalogs having the least interest with two votes.

Officials attending from communities around the county expressed a variety of interests in what they were looking to get out of the conference.

Westfield

Town Administrator Jim Gildea said that public works issues toped his list in the area he wanted to discuss more of during the workshops. He said he can see increased shared services coming in the areas of leaf collection and disposal, along with curbside recycling and road paving contracts.

Gildea said that one area he would like to explore is utilizing his town’s conservation center as a regional asset in terms of leaf collection and disposal, which is already part of an agreement with Scotch Plains. He said this would be a benefit to the towns without conservation centers, along with bringing revenue into his community.

Gildea said he also was planning to discuss Westfield’s current shared service programs, including the leaf program with Scotch Plains and the Westfield Regional Health Department servicing eight communities around western Union County. Westfield Health Director Megan Avallone attended the conference as part of the town’s four-person delegation.

Cranford

Township Administrator Marlena Schmid, who attended along with Finance Commissioner Edward O’Malley, said she has been attending a variety of shared services workshops and finds public works topping her agenda. One area she wanted to explore is in terms of curbside recycling and seeing if the county could take this state mandate from the towns, which she said has been the long standing practice in Mercer County.

“I am wondering if there are economies of scale,” she said. “It is a state mandate and there are administrative costs.”

Schmid, whose community also has a conservation center, said she is interested in exploring the same issues as Gildea on sharing the use of the center for leaf collection. Schmid also wanted to look into shared recreation programs and possibly sharing payroll services.

Scotch Plains

Deputy Mayor Mary DePaola said she and others in her community were looking to gather more ideas in the realm of shared services. She cited that her town has been working closer with Fanwood in implementing shared services and continuing a process that began in 2009. DePaola said one area she wanted to look at is the police dispatch program Fanwood implemented with the county last year.

With government consolidation advocates proposing a consolidation between Scotch Plains and Fanwood, which share a school system, DePaola said she did not know if consolidation would happen between the communities, noting that a study would need to be done to identify the financial aspects.

Fanwood

Mayor Colleen Mahr said she was looking to identify additional ways to share services with other towns and the county. She was promoting the shared police dispatch program, which is estimated to save $250,000 over the life of the contract. County officials were also citing the Fanwood program saying it could be duplicated with other towns countywide.

While Mahr wants to explore more shared services topics, she said consolidation is not on her priority list at the present time.

“Consolidation is a much different animal,” she said, noting the state laws on the issue of consolidation.

She said she also believes that shared services programs can be implemented sooner and deliver a faster savings to residents on tax bills.

Summit

City Administrator Chris Cotter said he and members of the Common Council who attended were keeping an open mind to new shared services opportunities. He said there are a variety of programs the Hill City has already implemented and that the city is currently studying shared dispatch with New Providence and Berkeley Heights. Cotter, a former fire chief, said that the fire department has been working for several years on shared services issues, including with Millburn.

Cotter also promoted Summit’s participation in the Westfield Regional Health Department, which succeeded a former joint health department between Summit, New Providence and Berkeley Heights.

New Providence

Councilman Robert Munoz echoed many of the comments from other officials in attendance, noting that areas such as public works and emergency services topped his priority list for the program. He said discussions between his community and Berkeley Heights and Summit on dispatch are part of the issues he wanted to promote to other towns.

Clark

Councilwoman Angel Albanese said one area she wants to look into is possibly sharing information technology services between towns. She said many local governments do not have full time IT staffers in-house and she could see a way for these services being shared.

County officials stressed that the county’s top priority was the networking and highlighting the services provided by county government. They noted the Fanwood dispatch program and said other programs could benefit local leaders.

“A lot of towns will see savings,” Freeholder Chris Hudak said. “The best part of today is getting these municipal leaders together with the department heads and asking what can we do.”