Communications, efficiencies part of Lenawee County update

ADRIAN — Local officials were given an update on the state of Lenawee County government Thursday, including efforts to improve communications with the public and find operating efficiencies.

County administrator Kim Murphy summarized several projects that the county worked on in 2023 and gave a look at some initiatives that are expected to be implemented in 2024 at the legislative dinner at the Lenawee Intermediate School District’s Tech Center. The dinner gave culinary arts students at the Tech Center an opportunity to demonstrate their skills.

Murphy organized her presentation into four categories: improving communications, remaining fiscally responsible and secure, improving efficiencies, investments in infrastructure, and community development.

Communications

To help address communications with the public, the county hired a marketing and communications coordinator, which Murphy said saves the county $200,000 annually over hiring a public relations agency. The county has updated its website to make it more interactive and is posting videos of its meetings. She said the county is working toward livestreaming meetings.

The county now has several email newsletters, such as the weekly “60 Second Update” and some for specific departments, that residents can subscribe to, Murphy said.

People with disabilities or who do not read English are also being considered. Murphy said assistive listening equipment has been installed in the county board chambers room to help people with hearing loss. The county’s website has a feature to help people with vision impairments, and online visitors can use Google Translate to convert the site into other languages.

“We want all of the residents of our county to be able to go to our website and understand the material that's on it,” Murphy said.

A community survey is being finished, and county officials are looking forward to sharing what was learned from it, she said.

Communications projects for 2024 include adding sound-absorbing panels to the county chambers room to further improve the acoustics and adding a “Zoom room” for more effective video conferencing. The county is also looking to consolidate the number of websites it has.

Finances

Regarding the county’s finances, Murphy said the county’s bond rating remains at Aa2.

“This means that we have high credit quality and that we will be able to bond easily when we want to bond,” she said.

This past year, the county completed an employee wage and compensation study and is beginning to implement its findings. This was done to help with employee retention, Murphy said. About 80% of the county’s positions, or about 400 employees, will be adjusted to higher pay grades and receive cost-of-living raises. This will be done over three years, with most happening in the 2024 budget that was approved this month by the county board.

The county’s 2024 general fund budget is balanced, but uses some of the county’s fund reserves, Murphy said. This was done because of the pay adjustments, the county moving about $1.2 million in spending that had been covered by its delinquent property tax fund into the general fund and because meal costs at the jail have increased. The county also is negotiating new contracts with its nine employee labor unions.

The delinquent property tax fund expenditure was moved so that the fund can be used for upcoming projects, Murphy said.

Efficiencies

Efficiency improvements take on some different forms, Murphy said.

"We want to make sure that the processes and procedures that we are doing are efficient,” she said. “And just because we've always done it that way doesn’t mean we're going to continue to do it that way. We're seeing a lot of things that have changed. So we want to take a look at those ideas and the suggestions that come in from our staff and see if there's a way to implement them to make us more efficient.”

The county has created an online Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) portal to help county staff more efficiently respond to requests for information. One of the efficiencies created by the portal is allowing staff to search to see if a new request matches a previous request to help find the requested materials more quickly.

Some other technological efficiencies are related to records management. Murphy said the county clerk’s office will be getting software and equipment to make its management of vital records, such as birth and death certificates, easier, and the rest of county government will be implementing a new records management system to use less paper and reduce records storage costs. The county is spending about $500,000 of its American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds on the new records management system.

“We see the efficiencies, we take action, we put it into place,” Murphy said.

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Infrastructure

Building and parks projects, the sheriff’s office’s vehicles and the continued replacement of computers are part of the county’s infrastructure work, Murphy said. Building projects include additions at the Maurice Spear Campus, looking at possible renovations at the judicial building and the construction of a new hangar at the county airport. A local pilot will build the hangar in exchange for free rent.

Community development

To address matters such as housing, broadband internet access and the opioid crisis, the county hired a community development director, Francine Zysk. Murphy said the county used some of its ARPA funds to pay for a housing target market analysis to find out what kinds of housing are needed in the county. The county is now working with local housing agencies on how to implement the analysis’ findings.

The broadband study identified more than 2,000 residential properties in the county that do not have broadband internet access. Murphy said the county is looking into grant funding to help expand broadband service in the county.

One of Zysk’s tasks is to coordinate how the county spends the money it is getting from the national opioid lawsuit settlements. She has conducted training sessions with county departments on the use of the overdose-reversing medication naloxone, hosted a town hall meeting to get ideas on how to use the settlement funding and organized a community book read in an effort to combat substance use disorder. She has also worked with Michigan State University to develop a community needs assessment that Murphy said will be presented soon.

Community development projects in 2024 include increasing public outreach, enhancing public participation in local government and ensuring physical structures match the “gold standard” in Lenawee County.

“We are committed to improving Lenawee County,” Murphy said. “We have a vision to see our community thrive and grow. And we want to set it up for continued success far into the future.”

When Murphy asked for questions from the audience, Tecumseh Mayor Jack Baker asked that the county keep Tecumseh city officials informed about what is happening with the potential development of the former Tecumseh Products Co. site on the city’s south side. The county bought the 57-acre parcel in 2021 with an idea to build a recreation and community center complex there. That plan was shelved after meeting resistance from around the county that jeopardized potential state funding for the project.

Murphy said she and Tecumseh City Manager Dan Swallow take part in monthly conference calls about the environmental cleanup at the site, and those calls allow them to discuss other developments with the site. She said there is some cleanup work that the Products has to complete by the end of the year, and after that the county can look at what to do with the property, including putting it back on the market.

— Contact reporter David Panian at dpanian@lenconnect.com or follow him on X, formerly Twitter: @lenaweepanian.

This article originally appeared on The Daily Telegram: Communications, efficiencies part of Lenawee County update