the day we have five topics on the agenda for the FY 26 operating budget and amendments to the FY 25 through 30 capital improvement program. The first topic that we're going to have is Office of Consumer Protection. The next one is Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Then Police Accountability Board. Then the Police Department. The 5 through 30 capital improvement program. So first off, the topics that we're going to have is office. There we go. Police accountability board, police department, then the resolution to approve FY26 County 911 fee increase, and then followed by the prison,er Medical Services, NDA, and then the Office of Animal Services. As we begin, I'd like to thank Mr. Mia, Ms. Farag and Ms. Tranbinder for preparing the stair reports for the topics today. And for once again, an always assembling most informative packets for us. And unless other committee members have anything to say and they're saying they do not. I'm going to ask the panel of the consumer protection if he will come for they will come forward, please. As they're being seated to introduce themselves and ask if they have any opening comments and then ask Mr. and I need me to walk history the first discussion. Please, if you have any mystery. comments and then ask Mr. Knight me to walk us through the first discussion. Please if you would like to introduce yourself in the panel. Good afternoon. This is Eric Friedman on the Director of the Office of Montgomery Protection. Good afternoon. Patie Vitale on the Investigations Administrator in Consumer Protection. Good afternoon. Sean Cruey, the operations administrator for consumer protection. Good afternoon, Avasavela from the Office of Management and Budget. And you Mr. Friedman, do you have any opening comments? Now, yes, Ms. Farong. Yeah, Just a weekend for a second. Good afternoon. As a law enforcement agency, our office is proud to be part of the public safety grouping of agencies. And we're glad to provide the committee with its first briefing this afternoon before all the FY26 budget is assigned to fire rescue and the police department. Very nice. You should have seen the daggers, I mean you said no, go ahead. Go ahead. If I could have just a couple more seconds, if you're sure that's okay. As you know, our office was established 54 years ago and we continue to enhance our ability to address our changing needs of the marketplace. Thanks to our talented staff, we have launched our podcast recently to protect consumers and to educate consumers. In addition to our team of professional investigators, we recently recruited an expert automotive expert to be an investigator and an expert in home construction to investigate as well. Just a little top secret, our next press release, we will be referencing an elderly consumer who lost her total life savings of $400,000. Our investigative team was able to track the stolen refunds to a bank in Ontario. Our staff collaborated with the police in Canada and the scammer was arrested. OCP has always worked collaboratively with the, with county state and federal agencies. And most recently, Bill 625 is the most recent example of our ability to work collaboratively. The bill will bring together the efficiencies of three different chapters to the county code to provisions within DHCA and provision in our section regarding deceptive trade practices and together We will include the cloud of the county attorney's office with respect to that bill and our Managers are here Sean Karoo as our investigations administrator and patty by patty I'm going to do bill. And our managers are here. Sean Caru has our investigations administrator and Patty Bathtali to provide more information if you need as the investigative administrator with respect to that bill. Thank you. Thank you. And let us say very publicly we thank you for everything you do. You all do a tremendous amount of work from Montgomery County residents and it's many times us. It's never appreciated how you do it and that's where we are. And with that, Mr. May, if you would like to lead us through. Sure. Good afternoon. The FY26 recommended budget for those who made the same services budget. there is a net increase of $168,000, $168,000, $255,000, or 5.9% increase from the FY25 approved. Turning to page three, Table One, you'll see the breakout of changes. Essentially, it's competition adjustments totaling $195,000 offset by decreases in operating expenses of about $21,000 and other cost adjustment decreases, notably motor pool and print mail charges about $0,000,000. So essentially a same services budget for FY26. The only other discussion I had in the packet is to talk about the fiscal impact of Bill 6-25 that Council recently approved. The fiscal impact statement for that bill, as prepared by OMB, had estimated two full-time positions would be needed within the OCP complement to implement the bill and to provide enforcement investigation functions. The recommended budget did not include those two positions likely because of the timing, the bill moved through Council at the same time as the operating budget was being developed? So there is a discussion if you have to whether a supplemental preparation is coming and what other steps have been needed by the executive before we could see that preparation Stop there. I appreciate that I appreciate that I believe that that The question is at what point and they need the additional help. At what point do we put that in the budget? Should we wait for the county executive and supplemental or whatever he's going to do with it or do we do it now? There's no question it's needed as far as I'm concerned. And we have a sponsor sitting right here. So. Thank you. I mean, my understanding what the kind executive has been saying is that they're going to be in the budget amendments. And so that's what I'm expecting. Obviously, we don't have them today. But we expect to have them soon. And so hopefully that'll be in there. So we could either wait for that to land, or we could put them in now. I don't have the strong preference either way, because I've had the opportunity to discuss the two positions. Everybody has agreed that we need them. And so I think it's just a matter of a technicality. But, you know, I would be surprised if we ended up needing to deal with a supplemental down the road, because then that's just another, we know that it's coming. We're going to have to calculate it into the budget anyway. We might as well just put it into the budget now during the budget process and make sure that you all are able to get started on any of the planning work that depends on knowing for a fact that those positions are funded, which is what we want you to do, and I'd be able to line that up with the effective date of the bill. So to that point, obviously since the fiscal note and everything was prepared for the bill and now has there been any adjustment or change to what the cost would be in order to fund the two positions for OCB? Oh, yeah, it's wrong in the impact. Right. Yeah, please. Anyone? Sorry about that. I don't have the exact number, but it hasn't changed too much. the's the estimate that was provided in the fiscal impact state, but it should be very close to that number. And was the estimate that was provided in the fiscal impact statement, assuming both hires effective July 1 at the start of the fiscal year, or was there a calculation made to prorate the positions? Yes, so it does include a calculation to fund for nine months, so accounting for like three months of hiring time. Okay, super. And it's your understanding, anyone, of here, as well as what Councilmember Mink and I are aware of that this is something that will be coming over in the county executives amended budget. Is that correct? Okay. Thank you. Do we know when the amendments are going to come here? No? I don't have an exact. I don't want to put you in. Oh, no, we've got another reason. We have late breaking news right here. I would anticipate the amendments coming no later by the end of the week and hopefully sooner than that. I guess my question is should we put something on the reconciliation list knowing that it can come off because of this amended budget so that we don't forget it. I think that's more of a procedural question for a county staff in terms of what would be easier for you Yeah, that would be a prudent approach is to add it to the reckless competition list now And then when it goes to full committee for strobe will have hopefully by amendments by that point We'll be able to reconcile it that way So is the intention to come back to it within committee? I just want to make sure given that these are positions that he has said from the start and that the council agreed that would have been in the original budget as it was sent over, but it's not getting treated that way because of the timing as you noted. It didn't make it into the original budget, but I just want to make sure that it doesn't, that the level of competition that it faces is equitable with the other. Right? So if we can, if we want to put it on the reckless so that we're going to come back into committee and vote it into the budget, the same. So it's, you know what I mean? So it's, it's fair as the same as other stuff. Right. Is there a way to designate it in its placement on the reconciliation list? I don't care whether you use an asterisk or a footnote or something because this is different than when we're saying in other contexts if we want to consider something as an extra. This was always intended to be part of the budget. It's just the timing of everything through it off. So is that possible to designate it as such within the reconciliation list? For our tracking, we can include it as with an aspirist saying that this is required item to implement a bill. Thank you. Councilor Past. When we go to full council for straw vote and discussion, we will raise that. Yeah, we will have to come back to committee. Correct. Correct. Yeah, I mean, what we could also do, again, depending on the timing, if it comes through and we have an opportunity to within committee to just, I mean, if it had come before, if the amendments had come over before now, then we would just be putting it into the budget I assume. So if there is an opportunity in committee to do that instead of doing a whole asterisk thing then if we could do that that would be great and then if not I think that that's a really that's a good idea. Can't wait I don't we are going to have a committee on this. So I think that it would go to full council. Yeah, the timing is pretty constrained. Okay. Well, as we can make the same motion of full council. Yes. Okay. All right. Thanks. Anything else in there? Nope. No other items for OCP. Are we good? We are good. And you know, you're going to have to be the word Smith. How we're going to do this. And I think it's a 30 thank you all for everything you do. All right. Moving right along. The next item that we have is Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. And if they could please come forward. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. That's good to do. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah, that was. I'm trying to follow the procedure and also make sure because this is an exception that it is dealt with in a different way. Exactly. And I don't know if you all remember the sign felt skip. Well, the dinner's going to be here in five, ten minutes. That's always what happens. Yeah. Like a bunch of year and five, ten minutes. It is the Derrick. It is the Derrick. It is the Derek. Not. It is. It is the Derek. Wow. Well. And the Derek is sitting on outside. It's always good to see Derek. Harry, if the panel could please introduce themselves directly to our team. Good afternoon, Ben Stevenson, Director of Department of Correction and Rebellionation. Good afternoon, Willie Morales, the region of Managing Services. Good to see you. Good to see you. Good afternoon, Ivan Downing, Division Chief for Community Correction. Fred DeBella Warden. Good afternoon, Janet Quacul, Section Chief Data Information Technology and Data Analysis. Good afternoon, Stephen Murphy, Division Chief Medical and Behavioral Health. Thank you. Rex Tudson, did you have any opening comments? Yes, good afternoon. A couple things I'd like to highlight is we go into this budget ear from a departmental perspective is as we move into this year we will be we have been approved by the mayor and police and correctional training academy to do our first training academy on site. We have created a space, a space at at no cost or minimal cost to be able to be the first time that we'll be able to train and educate our staff versus farm out that culture to other agencies and so we we're proud to do that. Also, we're working on vacancies as everyone is in public safety. Our vacancy rates 9.3. This past year, we did two one day hiring events that Chief was able to allow us to use the headquarters to be able to carry out these events. We had about 90 people about several weekends ago, and so we have a big batch of people that we're excited to hopefully hire. Also, data analytics is huge for us. We have Janet Corco. She has been reassigned under the director's office with me to look at our data and data driving our decisions and help with our performance measures, as well as collaborating with our other departments. And then also we're moving into a medical refresh project. It's a CIP project which division chief Stephen Murphy and Warden Nebelo and also division chief Morales that we're working towards to update our medical unit. Our jail is now working on 22 years of age and it's starting to look like it in certain situations. I had to happen, did it? I know, right? remember when we were waiting for it to be built and it's starting to look like it. In certain situations. Yeah. It had to happen, did it? Yes. I know, right? I remember when we were waiting for it to be built and it finally did. And then I just wanted to talk about the data analytics. We're working on internal monitoring software to be able to track our inventory, to be able to look at our assets, and to be able to quantify our costs internally, so we can be more transparent and understand when we make those larger decisions. But overall I just wanted to thank the support from the Public Safety Committee as well as my division chiefs and sex achieves as well as those that work with us and feel like we're in a good direction. Thank you and again for all that you do, Ms. Rob please. Good afternoon everyone. The County executive is recommending about 95 million for FY 26 for corrections. That's an increase of about 11 million or 13 percent from last year's approved budget. Budget includes about $222,000 in programmatic and staffing enhancements, which will go through shortly. Another 11.8 million increases for compensation adjustments, including over time and required operating expenses. And that, that amount includes items and it reflects continuation of current staffing and service levels. The operating budget equity tool for the department states that DOCR outlines commitments across all areas of the gear framework. And I do not have any identified potential reductions for committee consideration for this budget. There are three new enhancements that are important for detention center security, and the rest of the budget is basically a same services budget. So in terms of the operating budget equity tool analysis, as I indicated, the Office of Racial Equity and Social Justice indicates that DSER outlines commitments across all areas of the gear framework. Some of the strengths that they have identified include designating one full-time equivalent position to be the office lead for RESJ work. It is also implemented five tactics to normalize RESJ efforts within the department, which includes cross-departmental communication, ensuring the completion of required trainings, integration of RESJ principles into policies, procedures, and decision-making processes, collaboration with other entities and formalized budget requests to promote RESJ throughout the department. D.O.C.R. is also designated the use of overtime pay to allow training participation. Training can be challenging for any operation that's 24-7. So opportunities that have been identified, O-R-E-S-J, recommend that D-O-C-R actively participate in larger core team lead meetings and activities county-wide to interact with peers and also engage in a learning environment so that the work is not being conducted in a silo and also recommends engaging with care partners and neighboring jurisdictions who are already developing and implementing equity initiatives and demonstrating the use of racial equity tools and equity impact in the field of corrections and criminal justice. So in terms of proposed budget changes for committee review, the first one up is adding front lobby security scanner to eliminate contraband entering the facility. The cost of that is $142,000. They're requesting to purchase an additional and upgraded X-ray scanner machine to be placed in one of the facility's lobby or back loading dock locations. Currently, they only have metal detectors at the facility entry points for incoming staff and visitors. This upgrade will allow density scanners to identify and deter individuals from bringing drugs or any other types of contraband into the facility. And the corrections advises that this request does not require any additional staff. The next item is addressing visiting phones within the facility to comply with state's attorney's office and police recommendations for evidence review at a cost of 50,000. They advise that this addition is in response to recommendations from both the State's Attorney's Office and the police department to provide recording capability of all visitor phones within the visiting section of MCCF, which is Montgomery County Correctional Facility, and that one is up in Boid. Access to those recordings would result in evidence that could be subpoenaed and used to help prosecute incarcerated individuals bringing drugs into the facility. The next item is a kitchen tool shadow board to organize and store sharps in a designated location $30,000. This is in response to audit findings. The American Correctional Association had recommended that the Boyd's location improve its system for accounting for sharps and kitchen utensils. They found that the current method using a steel cage lacked transparency and visual accountability for the objects. And so ACA suggested implementing a wall shadow board to allow staff to quickly verify utensil use. Over time, adjustments net to about 4.6 million. year, the FY25 budget added 1.86 million more for over time to reflect their increased need. This budget has two recommended changes. It eliminates that one time over time increase from last year, but it also adds 6.41 million for over time this year. The approved FY25 over time budget4.8 million, and to date they've already expended $8.3 million. So the total recommended overtime budget for FY26 would be $9.4 million. DSER also advises it's working closely to monitor its overtime use and it's leveraging IT dashboards with real-time staffing complement data that evaluate shift rotations and drafting assignments. These actions more equitably distribute shift availability so that over time use is reduced as a matter of improved operational efficiency. The next two items are addressing structural deficits, both for 680,000 each. The first one reflects inflationary increases in food services and the second one reflects inflationary increases in pharmacy services. Both of these reflect inflation in those two areas but also reflects the higher average daily population for the corrections. The next item is a pretrial assessment tool which determines release conditions and pretrial supervision. access rates for $40,000. State law requires DOCR's pre-trial risk assessment tool to be independently revalitated every five years. And that tool assesses the defendant's flight risk and a threat to public safety to determine pre-trial release eligibility. To meet the 2026 deadline, corrections will issue a solicitation for a qualified vendor or validator in the department's already consulting with experts to explore updates that incorporates supervision level assessments as well as diversity and equity considerations. The 3.3% inflation adjustment for nonprofit surface providers totals $33,000 for this department. The committees have been asked to place this 3% inflation adjustment to nonprofit service providers on the new and enhanced programs list and the council will address the adjustment as one countywide budget item for a total of $4.6 million. That process here on the council side will ensure that final decisions are applied uniformly across all the departments and NDAs that receive this adjustment. But there is a list for your consideration on the nonprofit service providers who receive funding from DOSCR. On page six and includes blackwell physicians, Adventist health care, Catholic charities, Holy Cross Health, and the Ark of Montgomery County. The next item is FY26 LAPS adjustment. This should be a negative 3.22 million. It's reducing their budget by $3.2 million. And this adjustment just reflects FY26 LAPS, as well as an adjustment for an overtime training need. The Department advises that this total LAPS amount is not expected to hinder its hiring efforts for FY26. And then a decrease cost in the elimination of a one-time item in the inmate inmate advisory council non tax fund for $140,000. This is a special revenue fund and it's designated as a non tax fund. Revenues originate from the commissions associated with the inmate commissary purchases. The funds are required to be held in trust by the county to benefit incarcerated individuals and expenditures from the account must be approved by the inmate advisory council and the deputy warden of inmate services. The reduction here is eliminating one-time expenditures from FY 25 that had been used for the purchase of ovens and kitchen equipment for the bakery program. And then compensation changes for a total of about 5.4 million reflects the negotiated compensation increases, which the council will review separately, as well as some other annual compensation adjustments. We have one CIP amendment for review today. The executive has transmitted several CIP amendments on March 14, including an expenditure schedule change to one D.O.C.R. project, and that's the Justice Center. This shifts spending from FY27 to FY28 for affordability purposes. It does not increase total project cost. And then in terms of the summary for committee decision points found on page 8, you will find the three enhancements again for front lobby security scanner, visiting phones, evidence review and the kitchen tools shadow board to organize store and store sharps. Again, council staff is recommending approval of those three enhancements as submitted. They are safety and security concerns. And then of course the 3% inflationary adjustment for $33,000. And that will be considered by the full council as a counting wide budget item. And the Justice Center CIP amendment it's an expenditure change only and recommending approval of that as well as all other items in as recommended by the executive for this year. Very good. Thank you. I obviously am supportive of the enhanced security and best practices. I mean only make sense. The one question I have was on the the laps. Has that already been subtracted from this budget? It has been so it's not. Yeah. Okay. I'm fine with it. I submitted. I don't know where everybody. I'd like to leave it as a minute. Are you good with that? I have a set of questions. Sure. Go ahead. The enhancement for the visiting phones, what is that? So we have an internal phone system for all the inmates in custody. And those phones are our monitor. They're also subpoenaed for if there's evidence of any kind of criminal activity. We're just looking to increase this to, I want to say, when it's either 25 phones in our visiting area. So that way when visitors come in, not professional visits, visitors come in. of any kind of criminal activity. We're just looking to increase this to, I want to say, there are 25 phones in our visiting area. So that way when visitors come in, not professional visits, visitors come in, is we're able to be able to track. And so that whenever something's already in the building, we don't want our visiting to be away in which people can trade off and hand off. And so these phones will allow the recordings for us to be able to conduct better investigations and also the police conducting investigations. Thank you. Are we good? We have a three of. Thank you very much for all you do. Next is the police accountability board. I can see the entire staff is coming forward. How are you? A little farthest. Hello, Iris. Wow. Okay. Any questions? Would you like to introduce yourselves please? So I got still getting used to that. Yeah. Afternoon members of the committee, my name is Forest Kilman Riley. I'm the to make it. So I got still getting used to that. Afternoon members of the committee, my name is Forest Gilman Riley. I'm the administrative director for the police accountability board and administrative charging committee here in Montgomery County, Maryland. Side to be here, look forward to talking over the recommendations of the council staff and our own recommendations regarding the budget going forward. I thank the Public Safety Committee for its historic support of the Police Accountability Program, as well as the Council and the Council staff for all of its assistance. I also like to thank the members of the committee and the board themselves who are not able to be here today. Likewise for all the support that we've received from the County Executive and the County Administrators Office. Thank you. Would you like to please introduce yourself? Hi, I'm Julie Knight from the Office of Management and Budget. Thank you, and with that we're going to use Ms. Farong to lead us through. Thanks. The County Executive is recommended a total budget for the Police Accountability Board NDA, which also includes the Administrative Charging Committee of about $891,000. This is an increase of 103,000 or 13 percent from last year's approved budget. The increase is driven primarily by compensation, although there is some funding for technology support in terms of the operating budget equity tool analysis. Non-departmental counts have not historically been subject to these and there is not one available for the PAB and DA today. So I have the budget discussion items for your reviews starting on page three and I will go through them. The first one is on page four, which deals with increased costs for trial board member compensation, $37,500. The billboard members are compensated on a $500 per DM basis for each day they serve on a trial. Board, last year, this amount assumed that each trial would last about three days and that there may be 25 trials in a fiscal year. So 37,500 for this expense was approved in the approved FY25 operating budget and it remains in the base. The board has appointed five trial board members right now and four are currently available to serve. According to staff, however, this additional funding for FY26 was not requested, and it does seem to be duplicative. The next item is annualization of the FY25 personnel cost for about $21,000. This just reflects annualization of all personnel costs, including turnover, full time staff and compensation for the board and committee members. The next item for FY26 compensation adjustment for almost 16,000. This reflects the annual increase provided to board and committee members, which as stipulated by county law, is reassessed each December and based on the consumer price index for the DC region. That adjustment was 3.22% and the following chart on page 4, table 4 reflects FY26 compensation for the various positions on both the PAB and the ACC. The next item is the PAB dashboard automation for 15,000. This funding provides for the development of the PAB dashboard automation and to address new technology requests and systems for the program in prior years. The technology enterprise business solutions department for the county or tabs. Absorb these costs on behalf of the program, but it's not able to do so going forward. I did just want to note that a significant portion of the committee's February 3rd discussion focused on the need for a fully functional case management system, given that robust data reporting and analysis would help fulfill the PAB's accountability and transparency mandates. So the committee may wish to ask at this point for a brief update on the PV's plans to further its complaint system capabilities over the next fiscal year. Okay. Well, first of I guess the first question yet is on the duplicative, the duplicative monies for the increased trial board member compensation and the trial board member training. Do you agree that that is duplicative? Yes. I've reviewed matter with the R2Si 100 analyst. It is due to what was already rolled into the budget. Okay. So that comes off, right? Yeah. I was going to, I've got the recommended potential reductions. I've got three for you. And we'll do that at the end, yes. Okay, all right. And then your question was about the... If you could provide a brief update on your complaint system, settings. Yes, please. Circle. We're looking into options for case management systems. We are currently reviewing with tabs, a product from an outside vendor that appears to comprehensively fit our needs and also would interface directly with systems that are already in place at the Montgomery County Department of Police as well as with several other departments that the PAB would receive complaints from. That vendor also provides a accompanying piece of software which provides the ability to have public portals and public dashboards, the intake and forwarding of complaints. To the best of our knowledge of what we've been able to find and I gather the Department of Police's experience on this was the same that this appears to be one of the only, if not the only product on the market that fulfills both of these requirements of a public dashboard and a fully integrated case management system that talk to one another and can exchange data right out of the box. So most recently with Tebs we reviewed any possible underlying security concerns. So we're continuing to move the ball on that. As a stopgap measure in the meantime, we did put together a system for PAB and ACC members to be able to view more detailed, broken out information about the cases that the ACC has reviewed, including breakdowns to the allegation level per case. So rather than, as with the case with the original dashboard, that the board had worked on only being able to say as to a single complaint whether an administrative charge issued or not, it can break down that in a case if there were three officers who faced allegations, each officer faced two different allegations, but only one officer was charged, we can extract that level of detail. We have extracted that level of detail. The board has that data through Q4 of 2024 available for its review presently. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for that. I just, you know, data is only as good as how you classify it as you collect it and integrate it into your system. And so particularly where there are situations where there's an individual, like a member of the public filing a complaint or, you know, I'm using my prior experience with the Safe Schools Maryland tip line, what the person characterizes the thing as and what it may be charged as may not match. And so do you have some kind of data dictionary or classification or guidance document that helps or would help with that and not again, no respecting that the member of the public who fills it out is a layperson and isn't necessarily going to know how to classify that but also knowing that the members of the PAB are going to change and rotate over time What kind of tool or guidance document do you have in place to help with the fidelity of the data that will be collected and extracted because otherwise if there are shifts over time, it's not apples to apples. As to characterization or data capture of a complainance characterization of an incident that is the subject of a complaint. We don't currently have a fleshed-out set of guidelines or requirements of how that would be reviewed or classified. There is an ad hoc group of the Police Accountability Board that is reviewing how it might wish to do that, particularly with classification of complaints from the original narrative, there can be a lot of difficulty in doing that consistently and uniformly. We have, in the stopgap system, implemented some process to make sure that at the very least the classification or categorization of the formal charges is consistent. So the system accounts not only for representing that a particular officer was charged or accused of violating a particular departmental policy as it existed at a particular time. The police accountability board is currently in the process of reviewing those policies that have been the subject of opinions and categorizing them based on their own analysis as to what type of allegation in the general sense a particular policy violation is since departments may and often do have slightly different titles or descriptions of fundamentally similar conduct. That to account for the possibility of changes in board and the changes in opinion, those categorizations themselves can be made time specific, retired, phased out in a way that the system can account for subsequently. Thank you. Okay. And as you just noted, different boards are going to classify things in different ways. have you been able to collaborate with any of your counterparts to other police accountability boards around the state as to how to potentially learn from and lean on one another as to how to make this a little more standardized so that we're really seeing again wanting to make sure if you're looking at year over year comparisons that you're comparing the same things. We are actually this week in some new conversations with the Maryland Police Training and Standards Commission about any guidance that they provide two programs throughout the state on how the quarterly review of the outcomes of administrative charging community decisions is done or ought to be done. At this point, there is not a consolidated index of how each county is handling it. We have spoken with representatives from Caroline County about their approach. Been reaching out also to Prince George's County to get some information about how their process has been working. And hopeful that we'll be able to pursue more of those partnerships going forward. But currently there neither we nor it appears any of the state agencies have a complete index of even what approaches are employed. Okay, thank you. You, please. The next item is an increase of about $6,400 for Azure Storage System. And that provides for secure digital storage associated with the investigative files in cases under reviewed by the administrative charging committee. And those files contain sensitive information that needs to be securely stored and handled. Next item is the PAV member salary for 6,000. This is an increase mandated by Bill 1224, which reflects a compensation increase for the one PAB member who serves on the ACC as well. In the last... Like we have a goat outside can someone close that door please? In the last increase... Oh, I know about goats being there. Oh that's right. Go ahead please. And McBain. And Mc the bank. Sorry. This is for the trial board member training for 2000. And the PAB also advises that it wasn't requesting an increase to the amount of funding available for compensating trial board members. For days spent in training, this also appears to be a duplication. There is the same $2,000 in the base for FY25. So I've identified a three potential reductions for committee consideration. The first two are those two items that involve trial board member compensation and training payments, again, which appear to both be duplicative in the budget. So those items would be a reduction if approved by committee of $37, and 2000. But the third one is for special council funding and I'm recommending a reduction of about 100,000. Last year the council had added 200,000 to fund special council and there's one each for the PAB and the ACC. And the PAB advises that it's total FY 25 funding for these These two special counsel positions was 250,000 total. In FY 25, which is July 1st through February 2025, which is the last available information that I have, the program expended about 68,000 total on special counsel. 42,000 was spent for services for the administrative card charging committee and 25,000 was spent for the services for the police accountability board And last year this contracts is seen $450 per hour for services So the PAB also provided a year's length of expenditures and they advised from February 2024 through February 2025 the total expenditures were about $120,000. So the committee may wish to ask whether or not the PAB anticipates a greater need for special council services in the upcoming year and if not, the committee may wish to reduce the funding to more closely match predicted expenditures. If you requested a cut of $100,000, it would have a total budget of $150,000. And again, the one-year expenditure experience was about $120. So I think that leaves a little bit of a cushion, but it would be helpful to hear from the PAV as well. Before we do that, I know Council Member Mink had just wanted to jump in. Sure, this was quick comment back to the complaint system just noting that I know that we've got a whole new system coming, which is great and very exciting. But in the meantime, the website where you submit a complaint form is like unusable. We talked about this a bit last time. If some adjustments, this seems like it should not be that hard to make it so that when you click on the link, it prompts you to go to a form where you can submit a complaint. It seems like that would be a worthwhile tweak to make in the intermittent. Right now, again, it takes you to a page where if you scroll down, you can see a link within a paragraph of text that directs you to open up a page that you then print and then deliver in person. And there's a button on the side that says next. And if you happen to luck into clicking that, then you can submit a complaint form online. It'd be great to get that adjusted. Thank you. In response to so that the feedback that we received from the Public Safety Committee at the last hearing, we did make adjustments to the complaint form, including flagging several more data entry fields as optional. So people did not feel compelled that they had to provide information that they felt uncomfortable with. As of our last review, the interface question when posting tabs about whether or not that next button could be moved somewhere, our current understanding is that is baked into the system that is employed to create the form. So we haven't been able to find a way to change that aspect. Okay. It would be even better than that, would be if when you click on launch PAB complaint form, if that form came up instead of a next, because why would you know that next means go here to write the complaint form? When you click launch PAB complaint form, it should take you to the web-based way to submit a complaint form, which is how most people want to submit things. And then at the top, maybe it could give a prompt to if you'd rather do this on paper, click here. So the default is the web thing. You just cut down like three clicks. And then maybe we would see more compliance with filling it out online, which I think we were seeing gets us better results with people submitting their gender and ethnicity, etc. Because of the paper form, there's no checkboxes. You have to hand right the whole thing before skipping it. Okay, I want to welcome Councilmember Ornitha and if you would please like to discuss the Special Council funding more than ours and if you would please like to discuss the special council funding. Certainly. So, let's take a step back. In fiscal year 24, the original allocation of special council is $50,000. Special council started their work at the PAB and VACC in August of 2020. By beginning of December of 2023, the program was $11,586.75 full-of-the-budget for special-class expenses. And when did it start out at? $50,000. Okay. By the end of this little year coming forward, special-class budget has exceeded $89,000, $320.75. That means a total expense budget program of $139,000, $320,000, $375,000. That had to be made up for the county general fund. and following about it, this goes from the five council. I'm hearing your mic. Maybe you might. I'm so sorry. Pretty much added a $200,000 that allocation to avoid the possibility of overspending. Because of the nature of special council and its mandatory representation of these that these bodies can't be advised by the office of the county attorney. There is no end to the expenses even if the budget is exhausted. The funds have to come from somewhere whether that's having to come out of another account at the county Executive's Office or an emergency appropriation. I think it's worth considering the workload in reviewing the possibility of a reduction on this front. So in fiscal year 24, the Administrative Charging Committee issued opinions in response to 30 complaints and that addressed 74 individual allegations, an allegation being one policy-specific cognizable event against one officer. In fiscal year 25 so far, the committee has issued opinions in response to 74 complaints in review of 209 allegations. 42 of those were between July and December of 2024. 32 of those have been in the first four months of calendar year 2025 alone. You can see that there has, or the, basically information we provide to council staff, there has been some decreases in the monthly expenses for special council being able to add some efficiencies in terms of our approach to staffing and responding to legal requests. But the workload is increasing and it's only going to continue increasing, particularly for the administrative charging committee as it pertains to special council. Special council is involved at every stage of processing. They're notified at initial intake. They advise the committee at all stages of its review during committee hearings. They review the draft and skeleton documents prepared by staff in advance of committee hearings that they have documents to work from. And special council also finalizes and make sure that documents are legally sufficient before the committee issues them to the complainant, the respondent and the relevant chief of police. To the extent that we have been able to use those resources more efficiently, the workload will continue increasing and will continue piling up. And at least at present, there is not another way for them to receive those legal services. There may be other ways to reduce costs, even on this line item. It was not the position of the executive that the mandatory representation of these public bodies by special counsel is necessary for the success of the police accountability program. Revisiting that requirement of exclusive and mandatory representation could allow the program to avail itself of the services of the office of the county attorney, which on balance are less expensive. Mr. Chair, my notes. Thank you. Go ahead, please. Yeah, just having come from being a government attorney, I am confused about why outside council fees would need to be incurred in order to advise this body because, you know, certainly you would not want to have the individual who advises the police department within the office of county attorney provide the advice to this public body. There are other folks within the office of the county attorney who could in fact do that. And there was another, it wasn't that long ago, I don't think that the body ended up obtaining the services of outside counsel to provide an opinion on an item that the office of the county attorney had already advised them on. And it, you know, To me, again, in my, given my background, it came across like advice shopping, right? And tax payer dollars were used to pay those outside council fees for that. And that's a problem. And so we should be doing things that curb that, have consistency. And yes, it is far more cost effective to use a government in-house attorney to do that work than it is to pay outside council fees. So could you please speak to that? To the extent I'm able, regarding the opinion of council that the Public safety committee is in receipt of. I can certainly understand the instinct of view that as opinion shopping, just to clarify temporally how that came to be, the advice of the county attorney on that subject was given in early 2023 prior to the appointment of special council. The program requested advice on how it was to do something, and based on regulations available at the time the Office of the County Attorney provided advice. The Office of the County Attorney also provided the program with some notice of changes to regulation and after review by the administrative charging committees council as they're required to do. They executed that opinion, just to ride it back to the committee. Unfortunately, the office of the county attorney is not able to provide us with any further guidance or clarification, even in light of the change in regulation that was at the core of their original advice. But yes, it is undoubtedly true that the costs of receiving advice from the Office of the County Attorney are going to be lower. I don't know of any attorneys in that office who are currently making $450 an hour. That figure of $450 an hour is subject to renegotiation, though the Office of the County Attorney would be best positioned to explain that process. The... Pardon, one moment. Sure. I'm going to go ahead and go ahead and go ahead and Some explanation and exploration of other constructions I believe believe works, Lord, at a March 15th, 2022 hearing in front of the council. Some thoughts provided by Mr. Drummer and Mr. Marcov's regarding both how the Office of the County Attorney could respond and ways that statute could be phrased that might offset potential costs to be incurred with special counsel. Okay. Thank you. So by the line is you're suggesting that it would be reduced by a hundred thousand. That's my recommendation. The Public Safety Committee can choose to either take that. I'm not reduce it all. Reduce it by a different amount. Perhaps 50,000. Turn to my expert before on the first item on the term expert right here. Please. What would you suggest? I want to go with her recommendation. For 100,000. Yes. Are you okay with that? Should we trance it at least to give us some flexibility? You can do that two trance is a 50. Sure. Can you live with that? Sure. There we go And then the the the Trouble of members in the compensation that's coming off the you're saying that that was duplicative Yes, I believe they greed both of them were duplicative and if so recommending reduction totaling 39,500 for those two items Anything else We're good three to zero. Thank you very much. Thank you so much. the chief of Police Department. Dave McBain, Assistant Chief Field Services Bureau. Darren Frank, Assistant Chief Patrol Services Bureau. Nicholas Augsie, Assistant Chief Management Services Bureau. Dave Reed, Director of the Training Education Division, Public Safety Training Academy. Good afternoon, Nick Pasterno, Captain, Director of Special Operations. And we thank you all very, very much for everything you do. You do a wonderful job. Chief, did you have any opening statements? Yeah, thank you. And thanks to the committee for having us here, allowing us to talk. As we begin our budget conversations, I just wanted to highlight a couple of things that we've accomplished during my nine months' chief, all of which are budget-related. We've made significant progress in reducing crime. In fact, our overall crime numbers in almost every major crime category has seen significant reductions. We often use our third and fourth districts as our barometer for how we're doing. And in 3D we've seen almost a 70% decrease in card jackings. Robbery has fallen by 24% and homicide by 25%. We have leveraged as I promised our use of technology. As you have heard, I have Captain Percentre here to talk about fuses and our MOCA Connect Camera Program, our expanded use of LPRs, all of which are incorporated into our new real-time information center and has helped out with our DFR expansion. Assistant Chief McBain is here to speak about our new speed on green and distracted driving efforts. The expanded use of LPRs and security improvements at our county facilities like Progress Place and how these efforts have all positively impacted safety and community well-being. We have revamped our recruiting and hiring. Recently in the last four years, say, we have revamped our recruiting and hiring recently in the last four years say we have seen an increase in our applicant numbers from 413 all the way up to most recently 838. These increases are great and I see everybody shaking their head in that you agree but my focus is not only increasing those applicants, but trying to get the right applicants. Captain Reed is here to speak about our new partnership with UMGC that will help in those efforts. That's the University of Maryland Global Campus. And advances in our training and education, especially when it comes to our push to empower minorities and women in law enforcement through advancement in their careers. He is also here to talk about the new Committee and Forward informed law enforcement seminar program that is being led by our new civilian director at our academy and our new water safety program. I have improved our relationship, my partnership with the unions, both the FOP and McGee, and I think I did see the FOP president Lee Holland in back of me here. We're placing new emphasis on our partnership in collaboration with our professional staff, I'm very pleased to announce the selection of our new ECC Director, Jennifer Ridi-Halls, who is also here. I think you're welcome. We've heard that you were coming. We're very glad you're here. Yeah. I also want to mention our CBA. It's critically important to our department's well-being. A healthy workplace is the best way to boost morale, improve retention, and provide the best services possible. Just to give you a little bit of background if you in case you need it. We're one of the few counties in the United States that have a mandatory subject of bargaining codified into law in the form of our Police Labor Relations Act. It's the background of backbone of our recruiting efforts and what what we have to offer stems from the rights that we offer our employees because we have collective bargaining. If you think about it, there are more than 150 pages of collective bargaining for rights that our members have. Many of those rights are reasons why someone would want to apply to our apartment, those rights are also effect morale. If you were to try to put together the number of appendices and side letters we have in conjunction with the actual CBA would be hundreds upon hundreds of pages of collectively bargain for rights that our members have. The CE budget, CE's recommended budget supports our continued innovation and recruiting and our overall employment excellence allows us to deliver exceptional public services to the community and it also enhances what everybody wants is for officers the ability allows them to the ability to make the best decisions possible. To go along with that salary, pension, equipment, take home cars, scheduling of overtime, health and safety, All of these things are impacted by the budget and all of these positively affect our departments morale and in turn the citizens we serve. Conversely eroding any of those rights, as I mentioned in the CBA, and not financially backing agreed upon terms can negatively affect our department and unfortunately we have seen this in the past. So I'll open it up to Ms. Farrag or any questions you have of us specifically that we can address. Well, I think what we're going to do is that Ms. Farrag go through the packet and then ask the panel to give their thoughts as well. Please. So for FY 26, the County Executive is recommended about $353 million for the police department. That's an increase of $23 million or 6.84% from the approved budget last year. Of this, there's about $2.4 million in programmatic and staffing enhancements, which will go through in a minute. It also includes $43 million increase for compensation adjustments and required required operating expenses and those items reflect continuation of current staffing and service levels. The operating budget equity tool analysis for the department states that the department demonstrates commitments in all areas of the gear framework to advancing racial equity and social justice. I have identified two potential reductions for committee consideration that were not included in the executives recommended budget. If accepted, those reductions could result in about $1.4 million in savings. And there is, you had requested additional information on one CIP amendment, which was the outdoor firearms training center project, and we'll also discuss that in a bit. So on page three, in terms of the operating budget equity tool analysis, again, the Office of Racial Equity and Social Justice indicated that the Department has demonstrated commitments in all areas of the Gare framework to advancing racial equity and social justice. The Department's response reflects a plan that if followed would greatly create the capacity needed to advance racial equity and social justice in the county's law enforcement apparatus. They've indicated indicated their strong leadership buy-in and the department has reestablished a core team with representation across all levels and divisions. The training requirement has been communicated and resources are being deployed to assist sworn and professional staff in completing the required training offerings, as well as additional training on implicit bias. The department has established strong lines of communication with ORESJ and departments that are more established in implementing their ORESJ work, and the department's undertaking activities to employ workforce that's more representative of the diversity of the county. And lastly, the department is in the early stages of determining the best method for collecting demographic information to create a baseline for data analysis and progress monitoring. There's a list on page four and five of the budget enhancements for review. Starting on page five is the first one which adds 15 full-time equivalent positions for security officers at progress place to enhance the service response and increase officer availability. This effort would be $1 million. It adds the 15 security officers to progress place. This is a facility owned by Montgomery County on Georgia Avenue in Silver Spring. The executive advises that under the umbrella of the Department of Health and Human Services, progress place co-locates three primary programs including Shepard's Table, Interfaith Works and Mobile Med, who offer services to people experiencing homelessness in the Silver Spring area. The location has been challenged with high call volumes over the past several years both for police and fire. Excluding calls taken at district stations, progress place has the second highest call volume for police calls for service in the county. There's additional detail on those types of calls on circles 44 through 46 for your review. And there's a chart on page five that just shows calls for service information from 23 and 24. Those are calendar years. So currently there are some security officers at Progress Place. They have one per shift there, but they also add an additional post for both shifts on voluntary overtime and then they fill security officer positions on voluntary overtime over the weekends. Adding the additional security officers is expected to enhance safety at the location, elevate service levels and reduce resource strain on MCPD police officers. The increase would fund 15 new security officers and assumes a 90 day hiring delay in FY26. One of my concerns was that it's a very complex population that they would be serving and I was wondering what types of training are open to the security officers who would be placed there. Well, the police department already offers their crisis intervention training and they've advised that 22 of their existing 37 county security officers already have CIT training. Another three had attended CIT training in March and that they are attempting to enroll security officers as space becomes available. But this may be a question that the committee wishes to ask about any other types of specialized training that would be helpful for security officers again to meet the complex needs of the people who are served at the location. And I appreciate that. And I have a feeling that's why Council Member Oven is, he's a former needs of the people who are served at the location. And I appreciate that. And I have a feeling that's my council member, all of it. He's a former member of Public Safety. And I know he misses being with us. So, anyhow, did you want to comment on this at all at this time? Just a couple of things. First of all, thank you, Mr. Chair, for your indulgence. And once again, Ms. Farag, I miss you. Although we've got a great central office team in helping the staff every committee. So yeah, I mean, my questions were mostly related, as Ms. Farag mentioned, on the training components. But I'd also love to hear more about your vision on how these new officers are going to interact with the three organizations who have the contracts to be able to provide services within progress place, what that might look like, and you all have been doing great work in this space for a long area of time. This is long overdue. I won't worry the lead. I very much support this, but I just wanted to better understand so I can communicate to my colleagues in HHS, and in particular, the stakeholders who are going to be partners on this. Yep, thank you, sir. So about a year ago, I had first-hand knowledge of this. This is what I was dealing with in the third district. And currently, with the way that we're staffing progress place, we're not providing 24-7 coverage. We're not providing consistent coverage. We're not providing, you know, we're utilizing overtime funds to fill the gap. There was a time when we were using security companies and we've moved away from that. What I think with having the 24-7 coverage, having it on the weekends and being fully staffed, I think that there's going to be some consistency with one, the officers that are actually working there. Instead of getting a different officer every weekend, there's going to be some consistency and the faces are going to be recognized and hopefully we can establish relationships in progress place. As far as the Mr. Rodg said it best, but most of the officers have received the CIT training. And the goal would be to get everyone who's going to be working at progress place to get that CIT training, to also to increase their training on de-escalation and just dealing with mental health crisis is because that's really what we're seeing there. The goal, and I think where we're going to see our biggest bang for our buck, is a decrease in the calls for service at progress place of our police department. Because not only does progress place affect that address itself, but there's residual that fans out into the downtown Silver Spring. And so the goal would be that hopefully that these guards, I envision they will be able to de-escalate things, keep the situation calm, and in extreme circumstances called the police. But, and then also establish relationships with interface works, with mobile med and shepherd's table to again be consistent with what each, you know, there's sometimes some miscommunication of what's allowed in and on the property of progress place. And I think that every time you'll see an established consistency, that will work. And really we're talking about driving the calls for service down for individuals that need medical help or a lot of assistance from the county. One of the things I'll point out and I'll give Dave a lot of credit, well he gets all the credit for this. He had the fourth thought of assigning an officer, Nikki Hawkins, to progress place. She's there, that's her only job and that lends to the consistency you speak about and the relationships. So just by having her there, we see the benefit on a smaller scale. We're hoping to see that on a larger scale with these added security guards. I'll just mention one other point. I appreciate all that. And maybe we can have a follow-up session once the budget is over. I think we're going to discuss this issue before it crosses over in a couple of different agencies. But the timing is also important because there's about to be significant policy shifts in the district of Columbia that will have an impact on all local jurisdictions, especially Montgomery County. And so having a stronger infrastructure in place to secure the safety and security, both of the clients that attend progress place, but the staff as well is going to be critical. And I think Ms. Frog, if you'll make a note that we do want to have a followup, and it should be a joint committee meeting with Councilmember Auburnos as well, please. And I want to give a shout out to Officer Nikki Hawkins. God bless her and everything she does and anybody who gets to see her doing her work and she always refers to everyone at progress place as her people. That's always the language she uses when she's talking about her work. And thank you for enhancing the staffing for security there and switching to this model as opposed to the contractual. I don't know who I'm getting today because a lot of what works for this population is consistency of the human that they're seeing. It means a lot and I thank you for all your work in 3D when you were there and certainly Commander Cokinos now and one of the things I thought was important after he came in even though this isn't in my district but because I'm the council's lead on crisis response was for us to go and sort of lunch together at progress place with him in uniform right and it gives them a chance to talk to us in a different way and happy to continue doing that it's something I love doing so anybody who to do it me, I am all in. But it was a really good experience and I am thankful for all that is done to be adaptive to meet the ever changing needs in and around progress place. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I have the sentiments of my colleagues. This is a really important line item. So I thank you for putting it together. It's just a program that has been needed and has been called for for a really long time. You know, contract workers work all right in some places. But this is really not one of those places where we can skimp. We have to have folks there who we know who were able to ensure that proper training is provided. And I I think that's a great idea that's the training all of that and and then have some have some controls there so that's really important and I'll you know and I will say that that's a very different assignment than a security guy who's sitting in the council building this is a CBA question but I'm just it seems like a worthwhile discussion there. And so yeah, appreciate getting this done. And I do think that this is one of the situations where if you don't, when you don't fund it, if you don't fund it, we're going to see the consequences of that. Not only from a fiscal perspective, from an officer time perspective, as we've seen, but in terms of the effects on the streets. So this is really critical. Thanks. And I just wanted to point out that I'm certainly supportive of this and I think it's the most logical thing to do. But if we can get to the point, the 12 officers or whatever that number is that we're lapsing on this, if we can get to that point, please do not hesitate to come back before this committee and have a feeling councilmember Alvin, as my join us for that one, too. We will certainly step up and try to hire as many people as we can to that degree. But for the moment, I think this makes a lot of sense. Yep. Okay. Are we good? Please item is a contractual cost increase for core program deployment for about $622,000. This reflects the total contractual cost increases over FY25 approved amounts for the Axon Officer Safety Program suite of products. And the department currently uses a variety of their products, including tasers, body-worn cameras, and car videos. And they now most recently have brought on axon fuses and axon drone scents. Contractual costs here are covering complete program costs, including replacement, technical refresh, and all upgrades of software and hardware. And because a large part of the discussion last year on this item dealt with a records management system, I had also asked for a records management update while the axon suite of licenses does have an RMS product, MCPD, has indicated they were advised by the Department of Procurement that it must now establish a new source contract with axon for the goods and service that they are currently using, which I just mentioned like tasers and bodyworm cameras. And then they have to do a full effort RFP to include the RMS for other items to use. This RFP effort should start when the new axon contract is established, which they indicate was likely April 2026. This is actually the first staff report I wrote for the budget process this year and I wrote it several weeks ago. And the department has continued to look at ways to expedite this process because that was the question I had asked. Whether or not this the RMS project alone by itself, the procurement could be expedited. And I will say, their current system is e-justice. It was acquired in 2004 and had an expected lifespan of 7 to 9 years. They first envisioned replacement in 2016, but they had to delay that internally because of a lack of subject matter expert resources, because relevant staff were assisting with the computer-aided dispatch project at the time. They ended up with a vendor in 2022 and they began negotiating with them. However, both the county and that vendor mutually terminated their contract in early 2024. The fact that this is so old and it's past its useful life and it's not supported leaves a lot of vulnerabilities and to the point where it may just not work one day. So I think it's very critical that the RMS is placed as a top priority and the department has been looking at ways to expedite that in a way that really understands how important this system is. And I can briefly touch on it, although I think the department can explain it better, but it's talking about procuring somebody to help them with the process. So I'm going to turn it over to them. I was going to say, Chief, I'm going to say, you might have heard about this. As you can imagine since 2004, policing has changed a lot and technology has changed a lot. And the data that we are asked to collect has changed. So we are in a high need for a new system that can not only serve the needs of us getting data, but also serve the community and how they interact with getting the data online being able to report. But we want to make sure we do it right because obviously we've had this current system for 20 plus years and you don't buy a new RMS system every year. So the past week we have been putting together ideas on how to hopefully move this RFP process faster and expedite it. RFP process takes a lot of work and is very time consuming and I would be assigning that to one of our directors in our IMTD as well as assistance for a management budget. So this would be on top of their other duties. We have located a vendor that's out there that does write RFPs and contracts as part of a business. We are speaking with them to get, understand, pricing for it and how long their timeframe is. From my understanding so far, to go under RFP, if we use them, would take around six months, and then contract would take around four months. So we're still looking at approximately ten months to be under contract and then at that time selection and start moving forward with the build out and so on. So this is a top priority for the department and I've been pushing it forward over the last couple months to get this going. So hopefully once we get that information next couple weeks we can look at if this So, is valuable for to use in this project. Is there anything we need to do for this budget? No one of the my concerns was ensuring that there was appropriate funding to do this process and do it quickly and I just checked with tabs today and in the public safety system on organization CIP project there's a remaining $1.9 million so that should be enough to get up and running on this. And it's something that we can just keep in touch with the department to understand progress and challenges. Chief, did you have any, I know that you were good. Okay, thank you. Please. The next one is adding digital forensic software to expedite investigations and reduce officer overtime and backlog for 319,000. This is adding the magnet automate and magnet review software programs that are tools that are used to bring efficiencies to the digital forensic extraction process. This was in the recommended budget last year and the council did not fund it. Upon my recommendation I'll take blame for that. The magnet automate offers a tool to streamline and automate forensic examinations and it allows for batch processing and extractions to occur continuously without being hands-on. The department also advises that it helps them abide by the Maryland V. Richardson case law where they can only extract the relevant information in a very targeted way. You said 319 when your notes is 317. That's probably a typo. Which I will correct for council. Thank you. The next one is enhancing the Dronas First Responder Program adding 12 full time equivalent merit positions. This would add one new site in German town and convert contractual employees toit staff for a cost of 273,000. What that is looking at is assuming the reclassification of 673,000 operating expenses that they now pay to fund contractual rooftop spotter positions and switching that to 12 Merit staff program specialist one positions. And so there's a net increase of $273,000. The DFR program currently has four operational sites including Silver Spring, Wheaton, Montgomery Village, Gathersburg, and Bethesda. The program has been considered a pilot program for the past two years, relying primarily on contractual staff and police over time. The council has included language in the appropriating resolution that provides certain guardrails for drone operation and the program's first flight occurred in October 4, 2023. There is additional information included in the staff report, including the most updated statistics available and there's a chart on page 8. What I do want to note for this one and Captain Pesernos here can speak to it in more detail. Both the technology for this program and the staffing needs are in flux. So my concern was ensuring that they could maintain appropriate contractual staff as they shift to permanent staff and have the flexibility also to look at new technology that is available. And whether or not they can ramp up the German town site how long that would take, whether or not that's something they think could go up in August or October or is it something that's more like Bethesda that took until January or February. And additionally, they've also identified an additional site in White Oak that might be, that they might be able to expand to too. So I'm going to turn over to the department to just give an update of where they are. One second, we do. Council Member Mink had a question. State Minor. I think this might be all taken care of actually. Yeah, just, yeah, we've been having some good conversations. Obviously there's been, there's interest in White Oak and appreciate the outreach that has been done there. But with the recent approvals from FAA, we've got some options here and flexibility. It sounds like possibly with this budget to possibly be able to cover white oak also. So I'll turn it over to you. Chief Joint Standing for Esther. Yeah, you're good. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Like Ms. Frog said, you're good after the fight. Very famous last words. So like Ms. Frog said, the world of DFR and the world of drones is progressing at a rate that I don't think anybody could fully anticipate it. So we're looking at a couple different things. Right now, the model that we have used, and we've been using for the last 15 months, under Captain Coquinasinas leadership and Chief Yamada's, we started a program that was kind of traditional grown as the first responder program. We were one of the largest jurisdiction that started a program 15 months ago. More and more than 15 months ago now. In October 23, following the model that was mentioned, where you have a rooftop observer, and flights happening in Rockville special operations. But we always had to maintain that visual line of sight. And the technology has very quickly changed as well as FAA regulations have quickly changed and the speed in which you can get approval for the change regulations has changed a lot more as well. So we're evaluating now is what's called remote docked operations, where instead of having a person on the rooftop who physically has to change batteries and watch the drone take off, there is now technology out there that allows the drone to land in a box kind of like your cell phone, putting it on like a wireless charging pad, where the drone charges wirelessly. And the FAA now will let us outside the flight restricted zone, which is the airspace that we have to deal with that no other jurisdiction other than us, Fairfax, Prince George's DC has to deal with, that we can now fly a drone at 200 feet without having somebody wash the drone. And what that means is we can put a dock on a building, launch the drone remotely, and we don't have to have somebody wash the drone. We are currently evaluating Gaetzberg at our six-thitches track site, this technology right now on a trial basis to see how it works. By doing so, we'd be allowed to scale operations a little bit more efficiently. But there are a couple of kind of forks in the road that we have to go through. Like Ms. Frog said, some flexibility is needed or preferred because we stopped to meet with the FAA to see if we can fly remote inside the FRZ. Because we're still going to have at least three if not four sites in that area. Also, we have to know we have the kind of the lingering issue that we're have to deal with is the end of 2026, the National Defense Authorization Act. That's going to restrict the types of drones we can fly and the types of drones we can be licensed to fly. What we don't want to do is purchase the product in summer of 25 and be told at the end of 26, you can't use this product anymore. And we have to pivot to a whole new operating system. So we're in talks right now at the FAA. We're gonna have a meeting soon with them to talk about what they see the landscape of like inside the FRZ, but we have permission right now to fly remote outside the FRZ. So that's kind of where we want to take things. We, the timelines of getting approved, one of the things that held Bethesda up so much, because we have to maintain visual line of sight with the drone, we have to be on one of the tallest rooftops in the area. You gotta be able to see what's going. with this new technology, that's not the case. So whereas before we had to get a tall rooftop and those were gonna be private, pup. one of the tallest rooftops in the area. You got to be able to see where it's going. With this new technology, that's not the case. So whereas before, we had to get a tall rooftop, and those were going to be public-private partnerships. Because we don't need to have that tall roof anymore, we can put a drone on top of a county building. It's a lot less legal hurdles to go through. It's our buildings, our property. So the timelines in information will be a fraction, I hope, going forward with this new technology than where it's been. So hopefully that kind of explains a little bit what the road map looks like. So the item line for a budget, would there be money in this budget in order to be able to do to get, I a white oak you're saying white oak and then Germantown as well right? Correct so what I would envision is if we are able to fly remote white oak still going to mean the FRZ in the flight restricted zone so at least the most of it if we are allowed to fly docks in in the flight restricted zone, we would have spanned to a docking concept up there. If we are not, we would probably move our current infrastructure in Gaseberg, move that to White Oak, and then have Gaseberg be remote. So the hurdles to get in White Oak are, I don't see their huge hurdles, we just have to have a kind of determination from the FAA, but we're allowed to do. But I see, and I don't, again, I'm being optimistic and I'm probably being a little bit aggressive, I don't think it's going to be very difficult for us to get up in Germantown and in White Oak in the next calendar. We're next just clear. It's one to clarify about the NDA, the time, how that is, how that impact, are we thinking about next January or how does that impact the decisions again? So the National Defense Authorization Act essentially said any Chinese manufacturer drone has has to, the company has to provide a white paper to the United States government explaining what technology. said, any Chinese manufacturer drone has to, the company has to provide a white paper to the United States government explaining what technologies they have on board that mitigate potential hacking. There is nothing in the NDA that says there are certain benchmarks these companies have to meet. So essentially, we don't know yet if we're going to be able to fly these drones going forward. So there are American made companies that don't have that problem and yet there's a cost associated with it. So we're evaluating right now a company that will have no NDAA implications going forward. We very well can be told by the FAA, yep, you're going to be good to go, don't worry. And then we can make an Apple's Apple comparison. But we have to plan for this contingency that, yeah, so like I said, I don't want to spend a bunch of money on a product that gets grounded in 12 months. So how much more expensive are the ones if we don't get one? I don't know for sure yet, and the reason I don't know for sure yet is I know what the off the shelf cost is, we have a contract in place, we also have the billi-negotiated scale. So it is certainly more expensive to what scale is more expensive. I'm not 100% sure yet. We're evaluating it right now to see if it's even a product that's going to meet our needs. That's the most important thing for us. Thank you. All right. We're good. The next item is enhancing the real-time information center for about 60,000. It adds three merit system full-time equivalent positions to program specialist one and one program manager two to the unit. It would shift $200,000 right now in operating expenses that have supported the contractual staff in FY 25. And so the net changed there is about 60,000 to add those three merit staff positions. The funding is assuming a 90 day start-up delay and assumes the department will use operating expenses to fund contractors until those positions are converted. Okay. The next item enhances- I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I was going to say you had a question like the last one. No questions. We like it. Thank you. I always say take yes for an answer. Okay. Okay. The next item is an enhancement of the fossil alarm tracking and billing software for about $27,000. It technically is reflecting actual program costs because they have it in place now, but it's just historically not been funded. It's an unfunded mandate. They advise that incorporating this funding into the base budget would rectify a long standing structural gap and ensures the continued effectiveness of a program that generates approximately a million dollars annually for the general fund. And that software is a specialized system that is designed to help police agencies manage and track fossil arms. It tracks the incidents, it manages buildings, including issuance of fines, fees or warnings, registers alarms, monitors compliance and provides reports in analytics. The next item is the speed on green pilot program for $20,000. And this pilot program would help identified drivers who accelerate to beat a red light. The department's advise that there are many collisions that occur when drivers accelerate to beat the red light and such collisions often increase the severity of the crash in injuries. They had at the time when we wrote this packet, they had identified one intersection at Colesville Road in University Boulevard. They were currently examining a second suitable location and I will turn it over to Captain I mean assisted chief McBain sorry. Let me start by saying the speed on green some people have a problem with that is like they think it's confusing That wasn't our deal. We didn't name it that this we just adopted what was already out there so I've had suggestions that we call mello and yellow. But yeah, we know it. You've had a lot of good suggestions. So Mr. Farag did indicate that northbound Colesville Road at University Boulevard. That is one of our sites. The other site is going to be Westbound River Road at Wilson Lane in the second district of Bethesda. And just so you know, we, just like all of our automation, it's all based on data. We work with state highway administration. We work with Montgomery County DOT. And we come up with the data based on crash data where these, it's most appropriate for the automation to go into effect. So we're going to put these two light systems on the speed on green. Just for some clarity, you do not get a speed ticket and a red light ticket. You get one of the other. If you violate both, it defaults to the red light. But while that intersection is on speed on green, it is actively doing speed enforcement as well. So while that light is green, it's acting as a speed camera at that point. So I believe we will see some good numbers there for hopefully reduction in crashes. And what I hope is going to continue to go pass in Annapolis, but our HIN bill, once that passes, we will also start looking at other intersections in the HINs throughout the county to implement this technology. H.I.N. High Incident. I apologize. For all the people at home. Yeah. I will just say mellow and yellow. That's good. That would get, I mean, that could get some social media traction. Like I I'm just, you know. You trade market for the internet. It comes with the soundtrack. Yeah. Okay, good. Go ahead, please. The next item is just a technical change on cadet position reconciliation. It has no cost. It's adding 9.75 FTEs for the cadet program. They're part time employees. They work 20 hours a week while they go to college. There were a lot of changes last year that really enhanced benefit. A lot of these positions are classified at like .38 and .40 FTEs. And this just gets everybody up to the .50. The decrease of elimination of one-time items approved in FY25 are totaled at $2.4 million reduction. That includes the external workload analysis and staffing study, removing money for the FUSIS platform integration, MPIA digitization at the districts and overtime adjustment for two million. I did want to briefly touch on the workload analysis and staffing study. They've undergone the, or they're currently undergoing the staffing study right now of the investigative services bureau. They've also advised that they can provide a patrol staffing analysis to the Public Safety Committee in June, which can conduct internally using patrol analysis and deployment software. The Public Safety Committee expects to hold a briefing on that topic at a later date. This was initially meant to look at the fact that they were having challenges recruiting and retaining police officers. And better look at existing staffing and how to deploy those most efficiently to meet their mission. It might be, I know that Chief Yamada had mentioned Captain Reed's here to talk about a couple of the recruiting issues and since recruiting is up It might be a good time for Captain Reads to fill us in on some of the the things that are going on at the Academy right now So one of the big things that we're really excited about is our UMGC Conversation that we're having the University of Maryland Global Campus When I got to the Academy of July of last year, I really wanted to find colleges that we can network with to empower and educate our officers. Where some of the colleges like Louis State, Maryland, would offer 15 college credits. Nobody would want to really know what our curriculum was about. Maryland State Training Commission requires an Academy has 750 hours of academic instruction before they go on the road. We do a thousand fifty plus four additional weeks of additional training and conflict management deconfliction and other things before they go out on the road. UMGC came over and we showed them our curriculum. They were so impressed about what we had done, whether it goes to constitutional law, Maryland law. They said we will give you 60 college credits for the completion of your Academy and FEP program, which is the FTO. Plus we're gonna give you 30 additional credits for officers that may have an associate's degree, but having completed their bachelor's degree from all the training and experience that they had. They're going to waive the admissions fees and they're going to give a 25% reduction in tuition costs. And so basically what we have found is some officers, especially in our municipalities that haven't had the time or the money to go to colleges to get their 60 college graders have made exceptional officers in those municipalities. And what we have found through our recruiting is that a candidate may check every box, but they do not have that education. This alleviates that problem. We train them in-house, and not only are we training them them in house, but we're giving them a pathway to get their bachelors, their masters. And I think it shows potential candidate. We're not only going to train you and give you some of the most advanced training of I would tell you that our instructors are probably some of the best in the country at what they do because they're really it's not like some agencies where they go in a two-year stand. These instructors come in here and they're asking the captainary can I go to this school can I go to this school they want to make sure they're giving the most advanced and it shows a potential candidate that we're not only going to hire you educate you but we're also interested in your. And that kind of goes to our other aspect that we're working on very hard right now. And that's our wellness aspect. One of our things we're doing is we understand that our applications are going forward and it is getting better, but we also don't want to forget about the officers we have on staff. An officer in a 20-year career can go for 800 to 900 traumatic incidents in their career. A civilian can go from one to two. So what we have done is we have learned that through they can have compassion fatigue. And so when an officer comes on the department, if you ask any candidate what they want to do, they always talk about empathy. They want to help somebody. Well, it's like a class that we were in today then, the instructor was talking about, over time and that compassion between, it goes from empathy to sympathy. And the difference is, empathy is, I see you're in trouble, I want to help. Sympathy is, I see you're in trouble, but I'm glad it's not me. And so what we wanna do is we're giving them a place to down- I want to help. Sympathy is a senior in trouble, but I'm glad it's not me. And so what we want to do is we're giving them a place to download all that baggage that have went through a traumatic Ansonence and where they come in and they actually talked to some Dr. A and the stress management team are super excited about this program. And where we have peer support that will respond out to an incident. This, the wellness aspect where we have a Copa San Maros and Will Wyle, they are compassionate, they are really passionate about this and where other agencies like Fairfax have an entire building associated. They just say officer's silencer now I signed over there. They have nothing they have no idea how they're doing it. We take that information and basically and basically bring them in and give them a place to decompress. We've been doing this since 2022 and we go to other agencies and these committees and we talk about what we're doing. We're so far ahead of the game. It's not even funny and I really want to make sure we keep our foot on the gas pedal to make sure that we're not only educating them to be the very best officers we can for our county but we're also maintaining them for a career where they know that if they need help they can get help. Thank you. Thank you very much. If I can just add the UMGC partnership allows us to – not – it's twofold as you've heard, Captain Reed say. It's the officers that opens the door for them to come in, but then also assist the officers that we already have. And it accomplishes this. One of the fears both President Hollen and I had was the appearance of lowering our standards. We're not lowering our standards. This partnership allows us to do all these things and not lower our standards. So it's good. Yes. Please. I just want to thank you for using the phrase compassion fatigue. We had a town hall that council member Mink organized in White Oak. It was actually the first night I met you. This is to Chief McBain. And I used that term in responding to someone's questions. And someone in the audience was sort of live, tweeting the whole thing, and thought that was something I had made up. And I had to explain, no, that is a medical concept in peer-reviewed literature, and it affects police. It affects fire. It affects EMS, it even affects, right, I have our animal services folks back there, dispatch, yes, because especially, and people don't think about this with our 911 call folks, they hear the incoming, they don't get that closure of the resolution, right? It's a lot. And so I just wanted to flag that. That that's, again, it's not something Captain Reed made up. It's not something I made up. It is real. And it must be addressed. And I appreciate the thoughtful ways in which the department is addressing. I think where we have come so far, and I think all the chiefs, because they've been 100% of the% of supportive on this since 2022 we've been facing this head on. We call it suicide prevention. We don't call it we go to other these other meetings and they call it brain reading negotiate you can't beat around the bush because you lose the officers. You have to call it what it is. I have an officer up there that's on the temp that God bless him and his family but his son committed suicide. They he talks about that and the impact it had on his family and we never saw it coming and when you engage these officers in that point blank and real we have officers walk out of the class go right into the wellness room and have a conversation because it triggered something that they went through and they said I have been waiting to get rid of this three years. And that's what that is. And did we just say that officer's life? Did we just make them a better officer? Were now they go back from sympathy to empathy on the road? I think we do. And I think with the support of the council, we can make sure that every officer has that ability. Thanks, this is exciting and really interesting. And if it sounds like, you know, maybe something to return to for more full some discussion post budget as well. Just wanted to hear if there's how this dovetails or if it dovetails with Montgomery College, with the community informed police training course and with those existing partnerships, et cetera. So obviously we have a great relationship with Montgomery College, but they go up to an associates. And so what we were trying to do is trying to empower our officers. They're the ones UMGC came to us. They're the ones we were just looking for that partnership. They wanted to, they said, we'll give you 16. And then that led up to talk about masters. Now, when you talk about the community and foreign law enforcement seminar that we come up with Through the the effective law enforcement for all review conducted in 2022, we took the recommendation and hired a civilian deputy director. We did a nationwide search. Mr. Eric Rist was hired. I took over in July. He came in in August, so we had a very sit down conversation and he came with a wealth of knowledge. He was actually awarded the Emergency Management Professional of the Year for the Commonwealth in Virginia in 2021. He's a prior Air Force, he's an instructor at the Air Force Academy. So I told him, I said, I think what when Montgomery College started with the Siles initiative, I said, I think they're on the right track, but maybe we can tweak it and do better. And so I said, look at it. I want you to run with it. And he has done a fantastic job. He's brought back, brought through a community of, of, um, instructors that come in. We had the advisory board come in and, with the officers. We had community groups come in and have lunch. We had corrections come in with inmates and talk to the group. We had Mr. Allen Banks. He is well known in the area, executive director Mary Dixon from the Gibson Bank Center for race and law She was also one of the NWACP's legal defense and education fund We had a host of instructors that came in all civilian run by a civilian and they had they had each an individual talks We actually had them look through some of the most George Floyd and some of the other events that happened nationwide. What would you do different? And then we finished it off with Rewire IV. Another Rewire IV, again with our mental health and wellness, is something I'm excited about. They come in and put the finishing touches on everything. Why does an officer have empathy? They talk about up brain and lower brain. How, you know, an officer in the lower brain, if somebody tells them no or uses profanity at them, that they can make a reaction because they feel disrespected. They're in lower brain. How to train yourself to be in higher brain so you act differently. Or if you see an officer about to take an action that you know they shouldn't, then that's why you step in and you de-conflict the situation. What he has done is phenomenal. And again, we can talk offline and I can give you the curriculum. I'm very proud of what they did, but we had 100% approval rating. Officers wrote daily journals about how they sell the community differently because of what they talked about. And like I said, we can talk offline, but really, really impressed with what we're doing over at the academy. Thank you, appreciate that. I mean, that also sounds like good things. And so, yeah, appreciate that, appreciate the work. to clarify is that. I mean that all sounds like good things and so yeah appreciate that appreciate the work to clarify. Is that building on top of the exists the MC course or that that is replacing the MC course that's replacing the MC course. Okay and had that that already happened or that is happening or what's that? Section 78 was the first one to go through. We had 77 76 and 75 went through MC. We found some problems with what we were seeing from the feedback. So we wanted to make sure it was a positive encounter. So that's when I asked Deputy Director Reese to look into it and come up with a new program. Okay, God, thank you. Yeah, I think let's definitely come back to this because this is news to me that I think will be of interest to people who are, you know, engaged in the, you know, iteration of the bill that originally generated that and there was, there had been, you know, a lot of positive feedback as well. I'm obviously mixed experiences, but, but a lot of positive feedback related to that course as well. So it would be great to get the details and talk more about them. And seven yay, and he's already graduated, right? Yeah, they just made it clear. And to clarify the, okay, so the course that is in-house now, right? And run by the new civilian director of civilian service. Okay. The previous course also was, there was a price tag, I think $75,000, that's now zero zero. Right, I'm just I'm not sure because this is off the top of my but I I think it doesn't the code say that it's not supposed to be done in partnership with a with a local educational institution I believe so. It was reviewed by our legal counsel and it met all the qualifications of the build the switch University Maryland be considered local right is that yeah Clarification house versus the question right, but you have civilian and so so judge algae for example when we used to judge is a civilian instructor at the Academy, right? And the Maryland Police Standards Training Commission allows certain subjects and certain topics and a certain amount of stuff to be taught by civilian instructors, right? That's correct. OK. And then in order to be an instructor that qualifies under the Maryland Police Standards Training Commission, you have to meet their own, they have their own rubric. It's not up to the department. It's not up to us as the county council to say it must meet whatever the Maryland Police Standards Training Commission requires of its civilian instructors or its other instructors, correct? Okay. And each segment is required to take a test, right? Yes. Okay. So there may be a switch in who or what university they came from of who is teaching it, but they have all met the requirements of the Maryland Police Standards Training Commission. Correct? Okay. Thank you. And if I could just clarify, when you say it's news to you, I sent a letter to the council and it was...ated. Yeah, sorry. And appreciate that comment also. And my question was in regards to the county code about the program being done in collaboration with a local educational institution, but just to clarify. I look forward to coming back to that and thanks. Please. Really quickly, the overtime adjustment is reducing $2 million. The total FY25 overtime budget was 13.5 million, but they've already spent $10.6 million through January 31st, and they project their total over time to be about 22.4 million at the end of 2025 Which means they might overspend their budget by almost 9 million So this 2 million reduction is actually providing MCPD only with about 11 and a half million for FY 26 for budgeted over time Even though expenditures will very likely be significantly higher. So I just wanted to put that on your radar. In terms of laps, there are two laps items which are the first one is basically a technical adjustment which restores FY25 laps. They had taken 13.7 million last year in laps. That's restored and it resets at the base. And so the total lapse adjustment for FY 26 is about 20.3 million. And then compensation adjustments again for 24 million, that includes the proposed collective bargaining agreements, which the council will consider separately, and then standard changes such as annualization and retirement, paper performance. I do have two potential reductions for your consideration today. These are non-recommended reductions. It is just providing the committee and the council with some flexibility to look at their various ways to approach the budget this year since it's very complex and seems to be constantly changing. The first one is to reduce staffing from a Montgomery Village team in the sixth district for savings of about 582,000 and six FTE those are sworn positions. Again, this is a non-recommended reduction. The Montgomery Village team is not currently staffed and reducing it by six FTEs would eliminate six vacant sworn positions. It's not expected to have any impact on current operations but it would hinder or it could hinder future hiring if the department were able to increase recruitment. The second one is eliminating. I shouldn't put it this way. The Assistant Chief Parker Loan called me this morning eliminating a gang unit. But the savings, it would eliminate if you choose to take this recommendation. six FTEs in the gang unit itself for savings of $803,000. My understand is that there are at least eight positions that are vacant. So my recommendation would be to eliminate six FTEs that are currently vacant. So again, it doesn't have any current operational impact, but it could again, or hinder future hiring if the department is able to increase recruiting. And then the last item for your consideration today is the CIP amendment that we brought back. It's a follow up on the outdoor firearms training center. You reviewed this on March 3rd. The counting executives recommended amendment to this project pushed the entire spending outside of the six year expenditure schedule for fiscal capacity, not reflecting operational needs necessarily. So one of the things that you had asked about is what it would cost to add a new program of requirements to meet the current needs because the site is old. It's got a lot of health issues as far as Emma's storage and cleaning guns and what officers are subject to when they're doing those types of activities, whether or not it meets current OSHA standards or not. So I was informed that a new program of requirements would cost about $300,000. I did have some proposed resolution language related to that since again, the training needs have changed according to prior discussions with the police department and if you chose to add this $300,000 I would recommend adding in F by 27. First of all proving the amendment as submitted which pushes all the funding out of the six year expenditure schedule which I think was 5.9 million. But then instead do a program of requirements to see what they really need at that site. And part of the language I was recommending for inclusion as a budget resolution language would be that the new POR should ensure the new project reflects updated standards for training for the appropriate NECR use of force, training for the appropriate NECR use of de-escalation, training that enhances improved decision making under stress, slight safety for officers and others who use the facility, including health and occupational safety requirements, adequate safe and secure firearms and ammunition storage, and scenario-traced scenario-based training and readiness. And I'm very comfortable with what you've written. I think it's very wrong that we keep pushing this off. And we keep saying, well, we're going to get to it next year. And next year never gets here. So I think that for training and for all those reasons that are mentioned that we need to make certain that this is on the list. And I understand it's not gonna be there this year, but it wouldn't be built in a year anyhow. So I think we need to get the updated information to see what we need and what we don't need. And then go from here. I have- I just wanted to, Ms. Joa, did I pronounce that correctly? I'm sorry. I'm sorry. She wanted from office of management and budget, just wanted to speak to this a little bit. OK. Somebody could make room for her at the table. Thank you. Now I think it's been noted that chief got you left for it. Wow, you're impressive. Thank you. You can push the side. Yeah. Makes you feel at home. Done that chief? I just wanted to say something again Veronica Howard from the Office of Management and Budget and I just wanted to push the side. Makes you feel at home. Done the chief? Go ahead. I just wanted to say something, again, Veronica, how we're from the Office of Management and Budget. And I just wanted to say something about the other potential reductions, which are eliminating vacant positions. These positions have already been taken into consideration in the determination of the lapse number. So I just wanted you to know to be aware of that since you're the social makers. And I appreciate I do and I appreciate the clarification. I still believe that for the outdoor range that we need to put that on the right list. And for the other, I guess suggestions is the reducing the staff from six to four, for a Montgomery Village team and the eliminating the gang unit. And I did want to point out that the Assistant Chief Park alone is watching you, Ms. Rock. But I reluctantly go along with that. I I, again, as we said in the very beginning, of air recruitment can get to the point that we can hire more people and get to that moment. I believe we need to immediately have discussions and ask for his uplamentals and get this accomplished. But at this point, I think it's a reality. We're not going to be able to hire this many people or get them through the program now. So it's a reluctance. That's right. Okay. Thank you. This Rachel Silverman with OMB, if I could just re-emphasize. So by taking the action on the non-recommended reduction, you are effectively increasing the department's laps, and you're more likely to be in a situation in 26 where the department may need to come back for supplemental when our resources are constrained, given everything that's going on in the federal space. So I just wanted to kind of re-emphasize that. And I appreciate that. Really, the reality is I've been here for 11 years, whatever. There are always restraints. It's always going to be that things could be worse next year. And they could be. And with this situation that we're in with the feds, it really could easily be. But we need to deal with the reality. And this is the reality for the moment. You know, that football coach said the future is now. Well, if we want a future, we have to deal with now. And then we have to deal beyond. OK, are we good? Yes. I finish preaching. Go ahead. Good. It sounds like you've hit on all the decision points. The only one I had added, and again, this was a couple of weeks ago, when I wrote it, was the drone is first responder expansion. And only looking at that amount to see if it would, you know, if realistically speaking was going to take them six months or more to get a site up and moving and whether or not If that were the case whether some reduction could be taken but as captain Pesernos stated Everything's in flux. Something's could happen very rapidly actually so yeah I can certainly understand why you put this in here given the delays with Bethesda but also knowing that we have some flexibility to move Gatheursberg's stuff down and shift and certainly that the Germantown site is one where you could use the non-manned deployment. I don't want to call it drone in a box. I'm not going to say that. I just did. Anyway, but I think we should leave that and not take that. We do want to allow for that and not assume the lapse on timing for that. That's all I have. Our recommending approval is the rest of the budget is submitted. Very good. Did everybody get a chance? I guess Assistant Chief Frank. I've done the talking for four years, sir. I was very happy to see everyone bring everything to conclusion here. Well, you know, that's one of the best speeches ever. Yeah. Um, assistant chief park alone. Did you have anything to add? Yeah. I can see you looking over their shoulder. Oh, oh. Yeah, I would just like to add that I'm going to be here for a little bit over a year, but I still would like to, if the staffing improves to increase the gang unit, those members that we've lost. And we don't disagree with you. We don't. Thank you. Anything else? That's all for that report. We're good. Thank you. Thank you all very, very much. We appreciate you every day. If you might, you don't get to leave. No, because you have 9-1-1-C. Thank you. Yeah, the 9-1-1-C. The next item is the 9 fee increase suggestion. And I guess it's almost the same panel. Thank you. My timing projections. Did you want to lead us off or Ms. Throg is going to lead us off? I defer Ms. Throg. Yeah, we do too. So on March 14, the executive transmitted or proposed resolution that would authorize11 fee to be increased from $0.75 to $0.47 on each telephone subscriber, that's estimated to add an additional 12.5 million to close a projected gap between expenditures and current collection levels for emergency center communication emergency communication center operations. Councillor Turner, Jim, whereZeleck is here, and he reviewed it for legal sufficiency. I do have a little bit of information on this. The most common county fee is $1.50 across the state. Nine jurisdictions currently charge that. The highest fee so far is $2.25 in Frederick County and eight jurisdictions charged the lowest fee of 75 cents. Just very quickly, the summary committee decision points is on page four. You could not approve the fee increase, which would result in a 12.5 million dollar funding gap. Since the CE's recommended budget assumes approval, you could approve the 72 cent increase to align revenues with expenditures and or something that Jim has talked about reviewing and setting this structure up to review and approve the fee on an annual basis to ensure that it stays aligned with actual expenditures. And I'm just recommending approval of the increase as submitted. You know, the whole idea for these increase increases in fees that they were looking at in general. I've had great angst with them. I think that we're stretching people as far as they can possibly be stretched. However, on this one, we're talking about 75 cents or 75 cents to go to $1.47 per line. And because of the way that we now receive calls for everybody as a cell phone, so therefore you have that much more of a people who can immediately let people know that they're in need of assistance. We now do tax and we do all of these other things. And it costs money. I mean, I was just over at the call center, the 911 center, and how in the world they keep everything straight. And how in the world you, both of you, in that over there keep everything straight is amazing it absolutely is amazing and you're saving lives when a momentary day every minute of the day so I'm as much as I don't want to raise fees in general I certainly am in favor of of this fee of being raised I think it literally save lives. I don't know where anybody else is. Yeah, I'm going to go private. Yes, please. Just one thing I would note, just from the legal perspective. So the authorizing language for the fee increase is in Maryland Code Public Safety Section 1311. And the way that it's written is that it says, except as provided in subsection The county 911 fee imposed by county may not exceed 70 75 cents per month It's that or et cetera, and then the exception to that is if revenues attributable to the county 911 fee For a fiscal year do not provide the revenues necessary to cover a county's operational costs for the 911 system for that fiscal year. The county may for the following fiscal year impose a county 911 fee sufficient to cover the county's projected operational costs for the 911 system for the fiscal year, et cetera, et cetera. And so my recommendation would be, as I don't recognize the administrative burden, I would recommend that this resolution be for specific to the upcoming fiscal year rather than the current resolution that this is updating was from 2003 or something like that. And so, but because the way the state authorizing language is worded, it's very specific about covering the operational costs for that fiscal year. I would recommend that. And then one other very minor administrative matter in the resolution. It makes reference to the county notifying the Maryland Public Service Commission of the update of the modified fee, but the state authorizing language also requires that the county notify the 911 board, as well as the comtroller within 60 days. So I would just also add that to the Resultex of the Resolution. I'm good with that, Jackson. And just one statement, we don't anticipate that our operating budget will be lower any fiscal year moving forward. So most likely it would be a request to either be state of same or increase in future years as our operating expenses are going to increase over every fiscal year. This panel, I didn't get it to introduce them. There's some new faces, not new to us, but new on the panel. Dale Phillips, Budget Director. Good afternoon, Tamra Maldonado, Deputy Director at the 911-1-1 Senate. Good afternoon, Jennifer Reedy. I'm the new ECC Director. Are you actually working now? Are you? I am. You're back. You're here. Well, welcome. Welcome to Montgomery County. As soon as you got here, we talked about raising the fees. That has something to do with it. So thank you. Thank you all. Okay. Are we good? And we're going to do it the way that you you'll have suggested. Some changes in the resolution language. Yes. Thank you. Okay. One left for you before animal services. Prisoner Medical Services, NDA. It's 20,000 recommended for this year for NDA. This NDA provides reimbursements for medical costs incurred by persons under arrest, but not yet in the custody of the Department of Correction and Rehabilitation. They have to pay these medical costs no matter what. And there's some expenditure history for you on page one. I'm recommending approval as submitted. Good. I think we are going to be a three-0 one that's the fastest thing of today okay thank you all thank you everything you do and next we're gonna have and last might we add we're gonna for today the animal animal services. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry of finance. She, my right, is Lex and she is our deputy director. We have Spencer, who is our manager of the shelter. And Dr. Lawrence is our medical director. And of course, everyone is Adrian. Yes, there you are. Last but not least. And I think it should be noted as we begin that you just wanted an award from the City of Gathesburg. You wanted an award. I guess all of you all wanted an award. Yeah, there you go. It's for for your service to the Gathesburg area, obviously. And we certainly are very proud of that. Do you have any opening statements I just wanted also that we had an animal control officer, officer Jensen. Jensen. We certainly are very proud of that. Do you have any opening statements? I just wanted also add that we had an animal control officer, officer Jensen. Jensen. Sorry, I always want to call him Jensen, but he just won the National Animal Control Officer of the Year Award. Wow. So they're doing a lot of really good things over there at OAS. Absolutely. Now other than we're very excited to be here, we know that this is a very difficult year for financing any community, but we are excited for where we've moved our program and where we're heading. We're moving towards a human animal support service platform which addresses issues at the grass root resource issue problem before it becomes a problem, a criminal problem. And we hopefully will keep families together. So I'm going to pass this on to Adrian because I think you're next, right? You have to present the bug. Logan, I'm sorry, Logan. Logan, please. afternoon for the Office of Animal Services. The County Executive recommends an increase of $502,521 or 4.79% from the FY25 approved operating budget. This is a same services budget. It does not include any additional funding for programmatic or staffing enhancements beyond a continuation of current staffing and service levels. A couple of informational items to go over in the packet as well as one technical change for the committee's consideration. I will note at the bottom of page one and attached at circle nine in your packet is the testimony it was provided by the chair of the county's animal services advisory committee. The committee's testimony provided advocacy in favor of retaining the $125,000 in the budget that the Council added last year for the low cost ban neuter program, which the executive has continued to recommend this year in the budget, as well as an additional $30,000 in the budget and operating funds for more dependable pet food bank for residents who need food for their pets in emergency or challenging circumstances. Some additional information regarding the background of the discussions pertaining to the department, just as a reminder for the committee in July 2024, the committee received a briefing regarding the pro bono operational consult provided to the animal shelter by Maddie's million pet challenge. One of the recommendations from the MMPC consult was to reduce the stray hold period to the minimum allowed by the state, which the committee acted on and sponsored a bill that the Council passed. OAS staff has noted that this change is anticipated to have a large profound effect on the quality of life for the pets housed in the shelter since research has shown that a shorter shelter stay enhances the well-being of pets. The other background item is just regarding staffing, which continues to be a challenge in the animal shelter. OAS currently operates with the staff of 15 animal care attendants. The ACA is responsible for providing day-to-day care for animals at the shelter. National best practices based on the formula provided by the Maddie's Million Pet Challenge Council would call for at least 24 ACA positions. Regarding the operating budget equity tool, ORESJ noted that the Office of Animal Services demonstrates a deep commitment to advancing equitable outcomes for both its staff as well as Montgomery County residents who interact with their programs. The line items are broken out for you in section E on page three of your packet. As I mentioned, these are all continuations of current programming and staffing levels. With one technical change for the committee's consideration, the executive had originally recommended a decrease of $6,165 for a uniform, decrease in the uniform cleaning service contract, which upon further consultation and consideration, the executive has advised that due to collective bargaining requirements, they will not be recommending that decrease and instead would request that the committee consider this as a decrease in miscellaneous operating expenditures instead. though that same $6,165 decrease just reclassified as a reduction in operating expenditures. There is also the 3% inflationary adjustment which for this budget amounts to about $3,200 which the full council will consider as part of the 3% inflationary adjustment for nonprofit service contracts, countywide. So, that happy to answer any other questions? Well, I think before, as we begin, I think we ought to do the accounting for the $6,165. And I think we're all in agreement and wherever it has to be moved, money is money, but wherever it has to be moved, it be moved. And again thank you all for everything you do. Last year when we did the 125,000 for the low cost Spain neutering, what is the update on that program? How is that? It is up and running. We did a slow roll out starting in March first. We had to get staff. It took us a while to get all the staff hired and trained. And it's moving forward. We're doing two clinics a month. That's all we can really handle. And it's between six to 10 animals each time. We're having a hard time screening those animals. We don't have the infrastructure to screen the candidates for that program. So our admin team is doing the best they can, but people aren't showing up or they get here and the animal has medical issues that we weren't made aware of because we can't consult with their vets as much and stuff. But sometimes we might have 10 animal scheduled, but only three actually end up with surgeries. So it's just been a little bit slow, but it's rolling out. Well, and of course it's not going to be for this budget. This budget is something and again, but I think we should, six months from now, whatever, have an update on where we are and what it would take to enhance the program and to let more people know about it. I mean, I know that that was the desire all along, but I do think we need an update at some point on that. So we've been really, really careful. We are going to do a public announced like a press release. We've done one press release because our intention is to move the program with the economy being like it is and our community has taken a tremendous hit. Animals, we're going to feel the impact first. We really are. And animals are truly a part of someone's family. And so when people, this is why the food pantry has come up and other areas have come up, you know, when you have to choose between feeding your your pets or feeding your children, the pets end up at the shelter, which ultimately is going to cost the county a lot more money than even that pet pantry is going to cost. We're really moving our program towards a more community centric programming that in the sterilization clinics part of it, but we're also looking at expanding our vaccine clinics so that it's not just rabies that we're offering, we're offering all core vaccines to people who need help so that they can be safe in their community. And I think it's really, really important that as an organization that we start looking at these programs and really think about this. But with that, there are staffing issues. We can't ramp up our sterilization clinic any further. We have to be in a minute. Right now, I have a medical director who blessing makes very good money, but he's doing all the administration for that team, including scheduling, bot purchasing, you know, managing his own contracts. This is a guy who's an incredible surgeon that we're using to push paper. So we have to really look at that if we want to expand these programs. Well, I think there again we need to get an updated at some point, whatever how many months it's going to take. But the whole thing for the $30,000 Jennifer Hughes mentioned at during her test. I'm certainly in favor of putting that on a reconciliation list and see what we can come up with. I agree with you. If we're going to have more and more and we might as well be realistic about that. So I'm good with that. And you, go ahead, please. just on the spay neuter program, noting that we only funded half of it last year. I mean, we've been the council. And there were other really necessary components of your staffing that did not get, it was a tough budget year. It was really tough. And it was really tough for across the board. But it certainly, I know that you all felt that in this department as well. But yeah, we funded half that, rather the request of that program as well as not funding several other key positions. And I know that you all have worked really, I'm just really impressed at the work that you all have done throughout this reorg to really just be as efficient as possible and get those necessary components in place and still find a way to get this program off the ground which has been so really mandated and so called for by the community and needed. And so I know that you're starting small because that's all we have funding to do and it will get more, it's going to be more efficient once we're able to scale it up a little bit. And I wish we had the funding to do that now, but I'm glad we're gonna return to it. But I just wanna commend you all for the work that you have been able to do to get that off the ground and get all these other necessary pieces in place to serve our community as efficiently as possible last year. And thank you. Good. In the whole idea for the animal care attendance, what Maddie's group. Maddie Millions. The Maddie Millions, right. Said suggested. I believe that we can't do, we're at 15, you need 24. There's no way we can do the 9. But I do think we should do tranches to see if we can get 3 total, maybe a tranche of 2 and a tranche of 1 or whatever it would be, to see if there's a possibility that we can find something to give some relief. And I know that you have a lot of volunteers that help as well. We do, but they are a specialized group of trained individuals that the volunteers just aren't that trained in and we can't always count on volunteers so it's it's something that we do need to invest in. I was interesting I was interesting listening to the police department talking about compassion fatigue. Animal control and animal welfare were recognized years and years and years ago I'm a hundred thousand years old by Tuffs University. You know you look pretty good. Thank you. It's a lot of surgery. So I was. I was in a fight. I appreciate that. So but seriously, they Tufts University did studies back in the 90s, I think it was, that showed that people who work in this industry suffer more than any other profession. And they have, especially veterinarians right now, have super high rates of suicide. And it's because they're always understaffed. Their clients, they don't only know that they're gonna die, they know who's gonna kill them. I'm just telling you the truth. And I'm somebody who suffers from it. I think every person that's sitting here suffers from compassion fatigue. We've lived the rollercoaster. We do a lot of study with that, but I think the county owes it to the staff here to invest in them. Oh, no question. For sure. So I support that 100%. Sorry, we'll off the rails a little bit. No, no, no, no. Okay, are we okay with that? Yes. I'm sorry for the record is the committee have a figure for the Sorry, we'll off the rails a little bit. No, no, no. Okay, are we okay with that? Yes. I'm sorry, for the record, does the committee have a figure for the the tranches? I I think it should be two and one. Two tranches and my idea being, I don't know that we're going to get the two. But if we did it one one and one, some of you, there's no way you'll get to two. This way maybe we can get to two. And that's I think I believe the figure would be about 83,000 for the ACA position. Well, it needed a little bit more than that, and it ran, it's in that around, I thought it was 88, but whatever. I thought it was about 83, I can't remember now. The 83 is just the mid for that grade and 30% for benefits. Yeah, okay. So whatever whatever the right number is please you you get to plug that in, okay? And then just to confirm the recommendation to add the 30,000 to the reconciliation list for the food pantry is that a unanimous recommendation as well. I think so. For the reckless? Yeah, yes. OK. Anything else? Anything else? I'm looking are we good? I'm sorry. That's it. Thank you. Are we good? Thank you all again for everything you do. We sincerely appreciate your hard work. Thanks. And with that, we are adjourned.