Bureaucracy Busters!!!
This (below the line) was just published in the Santa Barbara City Administrator's report for September (page 3), apparently an initiative from the City administration and not necessarily by Council direction (not that the Council disagrees with busting bureaucracy, we presume).
A staffer in the Waterfront Dept. is the point-person for public comments about:
"improving City processes that may have become outdated or may have room for improvement."
Be nice.
--------------------------------
Introducing the Bureaucracy Busters
Bureaucracy Busters is a recently formed interdepartmental team of staff dedicated to identifying and improving City processes that may have become outdated or may have room for improvement. These volunteers include staff members representing a diverse cross section including Department heads and general staff.
They will be working together over the next several months to identify areas of inefficiency, improve interdepartmental communication, locate potential safety issues, evaluate cost-saving ideas and discover methods to improve service to our most important customers, the public!
We invite the public to help identify areas that would improve customer services, safety, save time and money, or enhance communication. The public’s views are important when considering current City processes and procedures.
Ideas can be sent to Scott Riedman, Waterfront Business Manager, at sriedman@SantaBarbaraCA.gov
A staffer in the Waterfront Dept. is the point-person for public comments about:
"improving City processes that may have become outdated or may have room for improvement."
Be nice.
--------------------------------
Introducing the Bureaucracy Busters
Bureaucracy Busters is a recently formed interdepartmental team of staff dedicated to identifying and improving City processes that may have become outdated or may have room for improvement. These volunteers include staff members representing a diverse cross section including Department heads and general staff.
They will be working together over the next several months to identify areas of inefficiency, improve interdepartmental communication, locate potential safety issues, evaluate cost-saving ideas and discover methods to improve service to our most important customers, the public!
We invite the public to help identify areas that would improve customer services, safety, save time and money, or enhance communication. The public’s views are important when considering current City processes and procedures.
Ideas can be sent to Scott Riedman, Waterfront Business Manager, at sriedman@SantaBarbaraCA.gov
Labels: black holes, Bureaucracy, head-exploding frustration
posted by Citizen Stringer | 9/13/2007 09:11:00 AM
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19 Comments:
How about going to the old schedule and not closing City Hall every other week.
Improve he City Website and get City Council meetings on YouTube.
Well, it was deemed that closing City Hall every other week would solve traffic congestion on the 101,reduce greenhouse and petrochemical emissions and global warming, give employees a three-day holiday every other weekend, and therefore improve employee recruitment/retention in a city where no city employee will ever realize the dream of owning a home.
Didn't work. Still traffic, still vacancies posted on the City Website, and now harder to do business with the City.
Then again, having City Hall open earlier in the day and stay open later makes it easier for working people to do business with the City.
Improve the city calendar, with weekly updates, posting ALL open-to-the public city meetings, a week in advance.
ALL PUBLIC MEETINGS!!!
That calendar that is there now on the city website is not even a joke.
For instance: Write in "calendar" (without the quotes) in the search box (santabarbaraca.gov/home)and all you get is a listing of the teen programs, March-June, 2007 (plus other uses of the word "calendar") but no listing of ALL the PUBLIC commissions - committees - and their subcommittees.
These committees are staffed by volunteers, supposed to do the public work. Some, many of them are televised on Channel 18 (and that schedule acts as a bit of a calendar, faute de mieux).
Also, in that line: where is there a calendar of all the public (yes?) forums that will be held for the this year's City Council race?
This may not have to do with bureaucracy - but it has a great deal to do with IMPROVING CITY PROCESSES.
There's little way we, the people, can participate in our government if it is next to impossible to find out what is going on.
It would also be helpful if the city web team got some non-geeks to look at the city web site and see how easy or hard it is to find information. My feeling and I am somewhat familiar with the processes, is that it is quite hard to find information on planning issues, for instance.
Beverley Hills City employees never dream of owning a home in that city too. Get over yourself, and take your 3 day holiday every other week and like it.
This blog sucks. Inermittent postings, bad grammar, overuse of exclamation points and not enough on the big stories.
More Bob Giuliano, please. Reading him is like watching a train wreck! What a goof!!!!! (sarcastic punctuation)
Stick to the NP story. That and the Nowak twins' burglary saga.
This is from the same people who evaluated election reform and decided the best way to improve things was to give themselves a extra year in office. How long Lord, how long?
when is the next exciting political play of the week? this blog needs more postings - every monday and thursday just isn't cutting it.
I'm sorry, but the Citizen Stringer coverage is a farce. And a poor one, at that. I gave it time, hoping it would get better, but to no avail.
Try as he/she might, this individual's writing cannot be made to fit a journalistic framework (or even a quasi-journalistic framework, such as a blog). The trite cliches, the bad grammar and syntax, the ridiculous analogies, the sensational punctuation -- it all makes the New York Post read like the Christian Science Monitor.
Everything Citizen Stringer writes is a literary train wreck. And I can't be bothered to wade through the crap any longer, seaching for some semblance of legitimate news.
Thanks for the ride, Sara, and best of luck.
Fix the city website and make it ADA compliant, please.
I do not know what the problem with with "NiceFLguy" here.
"Citizen Stringer" seems almost as good as Trixie the Angry Poodle, daring to write what many think but do not say on important subjects that are being ignored by the mainstream media.
The subject here about "Bureaucracy Busters" is from an obscure online newsletter provided by the city. That seems like legitimate news to me, especially that the city is requesting comments about its public service at a time when lots of people are bitching about the bad service provided by the city.
Seems like "NiceFLguy" is not so nice and should stick to his New York Post instead of Santa Barbara politics and culture.
This reads like a last-minute directive from City Council to protect the incumbents from the charges that will undoubtedly come their way during the upcoming campaign--notably that the city planning staff and many of the council members are typically rude, unkind, dismissive and unpleasant when dealing with anyone who dares to question their findings, conclusions, process. And why stick this joke with the waterfront guy, instead of an independent consultant???
Keep it inhouse and keep things from getting done. I like it.
Good observations people. A campaign ploy and a guaranteed dead end project. What a shame because this is so needed.
We need fewer people to work smarter and harder to get twice the work done, than is getting done now.
Less is more, when it comes to city government.
How about a good union contract for the Fire Department.
They'll probably have to hire a consultant to sort out the mess they make of this and then start a new department to administer it.
How about City meetings on YouTube. I want to be able to watch them on my IPhone.
Thank you.
Sam
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