At the October 23, 2018 City Council meeting staff presented an overview of the Civic Center operations which outlined budgeted expenses, annual revenues, cost recovery information, and proposed operational changes that would work toward improving efficiencies and realizing cost savings.
Since then, staff has implemented several of these operational improvements that maintains the level of service while also helping to achieve the goal of increasing cost recovery; or in other words, working to close the gap on the amount that is subsidized by the general fund. Current projected estimates for FY 2018-19 show a cost recovery of 75%, a 2% increase over last FY. This percentage could fluctuate based on final revenue numbers.
Below is a list of some of the more significant operational changes staff has made since October 2018:
- Turn North Center and Community Center into self-service facilities:
- Starting in December 2018 both the Community Center and North Center facilities became self-service operations. This change requires renters to complete their own setup and tear down for their events as well as to perform general cleaning of the room/kitchen area. By doing this, the demand for Event Attendant staff in the two facilities has been reduced due to the minimal amount of time they need to be in those facilities to clean restrooms and take out the trash between events. This change in service continues to offer affordable facilities for the community. Additionally, there has not been any impact in rentals due to this service change.
- Contractual updates:
- At the early part of 2019 staff updated booking policies and procedures to better align with area venues that have similar operations. The Civic Center (Ballroom and Bluebonnet Hall) contract was updated to reflect new payment terms that help to minimize cancellations. The new payment terms for the Ballroom requires that 50% of the rental fee be paid 180 days prior to the event and the remaining 50% due 45 days prior to the event. Old terms only required full payment 30 days prior to the event. Staff found the old practice costly as renters could cancel their event 30 days out with little investment in the room (deposit only), leaving staff unable to rebook the date, thereby losing out on the room revenue.
-
- In April 2019 staff also evaluated hours of operations in the facilities. In order to minimize the hours staff is needed in the facilities, a full day rental is now 12 hours, whereas it was up to 16 before. Additionally, the facilities now close at 10:00 p.m. Monday – Thursday, instead of midnight, which again helps in minimizing the staff hours needed during the week.
- Website updates:
- Since making changes to the Civic Center webpages (updating room descriptions, adding photos, providing pricing information, etc.) in 2018 on the Schertz.com website, staff has seen increased web traffic and has had more than 150 rental requests/inquiries come through email/website in this fiscal year.
- Staffing changes:
- The above operational changes have allowed Civic Center staff to find staff savings by converting one full-time Event Attendant position to a 28-hour part-time position (approximate savings of $20,000). Additionally, Civic Center staff was able to forgo using any of the budgeted funds for contracted cleaning of the facilities ($20,000).
Recommended changes going forward:
- Rate structure review
- For FY 2019-20 staff is recommending changing the rate structure for the self-service facilities from a set rate to an hourly rate. After review of other area community centers and similar facilities staff has found that an hourly rate is most often applied. Going to an hourly rate gives renters the flexibility to choose how long they need the facility and more control over the price they pay. There will be a minimum number of rental hours associated with event, so staff does not anticipate revenues to be negatively impacted by this change. This proposed rate structure will still continue to offer affordable options to the community.
- A/V upgrades
- In November 2018 staff came to Council to reject the bids the city received for Audio Visual upgrades for the Civic Center. At the time, Staff had anticipated the cost to be $50,000; however, as the system has not been upgraded since the facility was built in 2006, staff discovered as the bids came in that upgrading the whole system to current technology would cost $200,000 - $250,000.
- At the time, staff’s focus was on making the above-mentioned operational changes to improve efficiencies and cost recovery. During the conversation with Council it was discussed that HOT funds could be an avenue as a funding source for the A/V system upgrade. Staff indicated this item would be revisited in 2019 once time had been taken to implement and evaluate the operational changes. As this has been done and continues on an ongoing basis, staff feels now is the time to revisit this project.
- Staff has received approval from Management, Finance and Legal to use HOT funds and is currently moving forward with this project. As of June 30, the balance in the HOT funds account is $2,055,215.10.
- On June 4 Purchasing sent out a request for proposals on BuyBoard for Audio Visual upgrade proposals for the Civic Center. On June 12 staff hosted site visits with multiple companies to view the facility and on June 21 staff received 4 proposals. Currently the proposals are in review and following discussion and evaluation, staff plans to come to Council in August with a recommendation for award of the project. In addition, staff wants to make Council aware that a Budget Amendment will have to be done, but Finance plans to take this to Council concurrently with the A/V project recommendation.
|