City clerk, PWD, and Library discuss strategic goals during Wasilla Strategic Meeting

Wasilla City Council met Nov. 14 to hear from city administration, directors, managers, as they laid out and discussed strategic planning to move Wasilla forward.

Each department from Parks and Recreation to Public Works, to Director of Finance and Library Director were given 15 minutes to present their vision and strategic goals. Each presentation was followed up with an additional 15 minutes allotted for questions and answers from the council.

The meeting lasted over five hours. Given the length and the breadth of the meeting, significant portions of the meeting will be covered over a series of articles.

Mayor Glenda Ledford had three focuses for the city: The first, to increase the economic development by looking for ways to diversify the economy; modernize the city’s policies, procedures, and practices; and build a healthy community and strong workforce.

The mayor’s second initiative is a city-wide customer service focus. And her third initiative is to connect and work with community and organization leaders to increase the trade and vocational-technical education while using Wasilla’s facilities.

Each department and office was tasked with sharing how their respective departments would align to fit the mayor’s strategic initiatives.

Jamie Newman, Wasilla City Clerk, got to sit on the opposite side of the desk to discuss her vision for the Wasilla City Clerk’s office for the next few years, focusing on modernizing and updating her department’s record-keeping.

“This is the goal we’ve had for some time…it’s going to expand the records management program to incorporate electronic management whether that be conversion of paper records to digital records, email management,” Newman said.

She told the council that her office intends to develop and implement a plan to manage and create electronic records, from creation to disposition in partnership with IT, data owners, and record coordinators. Newman said that her office would be looking to industry standards to determine best practices that could apply to Wasilla.

Shifting to the Mayor’s second initiative of customer service, Newman said, “We provide our customers with trusted service through the compliance, consistency, and innovation by investing in internal and external partnerships that deliver superior customer service,” adding, “I’d like to think that we do that and will continue to do that.”

She also said that her office is specifically looking for ways to improve through the lens of the customer.

“When you think about it, who do we best serve our number one customer-the public? So I’d like to look at how I am providing services, and how is the customer using them, and what is the balance of what we do and what’s best for the customer?”

Public Works Department director Eric Schaal provided his department’s vision, saying: “Providing safe, reliable, and efficient services and infrastructure for the city of Wasilla, businesses, residents, and the broader Mat-Su community because we know that we serve so many that aren’t technically within the city limits but they come to our facilities and drive our roads every day.”

For Schaal and the Public Works Department (PWD), supporting growth within city limits and surrounding area with infrastructure resiliency, redundancy, and critical infrastructure expansions, upgrades, replacements, or increased connectivity is a key strategic goal.

“We need to continue to look at our infrastructure and identify not only the ones that are past their useful life but ones that put us at risk,” he told the council.

One strategy he discussed is to build a strategic relationships with agencies and local partners to construct new infrastructure growth, citing the idea of combining wastewater and water revenue with state programs to address growing needs as one area to address. Shaw also said they need to revisit utility rates and structures to finance commercial expansion.

Another area of concern for PWD is the need to revisit ongoing projects that have been languishing for years that would not only give Wasilla residents but others who visit the city a better experience. One barrier that Councilman Stu Graham pointed out is that much of the cost will come down to the city, something Shaw is also concerned about.

“Everything is going to boil down to finances. We have a strategic plan. We have a CIP (Capital Improvement Plan) to paved unpaved roads and keeping up with currently paved roads’ maintenance, so we will look at cost-effective opportunities to repair really bad sections without spending.”

Meanwhile there are a slew of other issues that Councilman Tim Johnson would like to see PWD address, such as adding streetlights something he has yet to see anyone address in the 2 years he has served, and would like to see PWD expand their goals to include that.

Turning to the mayor’s second initiative of customer service, Shaw said he would like to reduce the process complexity for PWD programs for internal audits and computer maintenance management software work orders and streamlining.

“We have existing programs so we’ve brought on some new programs to look towards our relationships with our customers

Echoing the city clerk’s customer service goal, Schaal told the council “We want to provide services to the public that meets their needs, that are timely, and that are useful.”

One are of customer service that was addressed for PWD was how the public can report problems, from pot holes to damaged street signs, which Shaw explained is currently done via the Mat-Su Borough website, then his department is alerted via email too any items PWD needs to address.

“We just signed a collaboration agreement with the Borough where are formulating a way to have our own access to that portal so that we can update the status.”

“I think one of the threads you’ll see is that each one of us is trying to identify our role and our contribution as clear as we can.

Deputy Administrator Crystal Nygard addressed increasing economic activity through marketing and partnerships, building relationships to brand the city as ‘open for business.’

“It’s one thing to say you’re open for business; it’s another thing when you can’t deliver.”

Nygard discussed the impact of the CEDS (Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy), which identifies the current state of the economy, addresses strategies to improve Alaska’s economic resilience, and provides a roadmap for future economic growth.

“CEDS is one of the strategies, a blueprint of our long-term plan for our economic development; like the blueprint if you’re building a house,” she said.

Nygard said part of that plan includes working with regional partners to bring economic development funding to this region.

She also told the council that the department needs to identify, research, and coordinate those economic development activities in conjunction with the mayor, city offices, and planning consultants to ensure plans for downtown Wasilla, the airport, and wastewater are included in a conversation.

“When businesses come here, they want to know they can flush their toilet; they want to know they’re going to have a workforce. Those are all components of economic development that’s very hard to communicate if you don’t have a comprehensive plan.”

Zane Treesh, the Wasilla Public Library Director, had a much simpler strategic vision for the library, which is to continue to meet the informational and recreational needs of the library patrons.

“We have a great facility. We have computers that people use every day to do everything from applying for jobs and benefits to playing video games to printing.” Treesh added that when people are looking to move, in addition to looking at fire and police protection and safety, often people are looking to the library.

“Some families look at what kind of programming do they have for kids, how are they going to be educated, and how is the library maintained. I think we’re doing a good job of that and we want to continue doing that and serving the needs of all our patrons in the community.”

Addressing customer service, he identified a need for an additional half-time worker to assist with circulation duties and keeping the library collections in the best manner.

“The reason for this is we’re the third busiest library, based on circulation numbers, in the state.” Treesh cited that Fairbanks and Anchorage Public libraries, while significantly bigger have robust staff upwards of 50 personnel, while currently the Wasilla library has 10 full time staff trying to meet the needs of 200+ visitors a day and circulation numbers in the tens of thousands (books needing to be returned and reshelved).

Treesh said another goal for the library is to diversify and increase the programming opportunities for community members of all ages.

“Right now we have a really good Children’s Programming Department…we would like to see that diversity in areas that might not see so much, maybe such as adult programming, and looking at programs for teens.”

Another customer service goal Treesh addressed is expanding service hours, specifically on Mondays and possibly Saturdays. Currently the library is only open from 2:00 pm- 6:00 pm on Mondays due to staffing issues.

Treesh commented that while there has been a recent national trend in the decline of printed materials, the Wasilla library has been bucking that trend partly because of the influx of new people coming in to the area, but he also credits his staff at the library.

“We have a really good staff that selects the materials, weed (out) materials that aren’t being used, they look for those items that people are interested in, and when you have a staff that is doing that, and when people are coming in and finding what they’re looking for, it naturally drives our numbers higher.”

“Our library is reflecting the needs and wants of our community.”