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QUESTION
Council Member Stevens Asks DYCD About Strategies for Filling NAB Vacancies
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Council Member Althea Stevens inquires about strategies to fill Neighborhood Advisory Board (NAB) vacancies and the limited number of staff overseeing this task. Mike Bobbitt, Deputy Commissioner, explains the roles of NAB Liaison Unit members and their outreach efforts. Discussions include challenges such as voter mobility and the need for more effective partnerships with local elected officials to increase awareness and involvement. Suggestions for future improvements in recruitment and information dissemination are explored.
Speaker 1
0:18:26
Why why do you think that there's so many vacancies on the lab and how many people at DWRCD are responsible for covering the maps.
Speaker 3
0:18:34
Great questions.
0:18:37
Let's take this 1 first, one of the teams under community development is the neighborhood advisory board liaison unit.
0:18:42
So just use NABLU as a shorthand.
0:18:45
We've seen a director, a director, and we have liaisons.
0:18:49
And is there a job to go out in the community?
0:18:51
They
Speaker 1
0:18:52
How many how many is
Speaker 3
0:18:53
There's 4 liaisons at at present.
0:18:56
So each of them have a number of neighborhoods that they target across, as I said, the 41 boards.
Speaker 1
0:19:03
So there's 41 boards, and there's four people.
Speaker 3
0:19:07
Four line staff, and then we have a director and a senior director.
0:19:10
So the director carries some
Speaker 4
0:19:11
of the
Speaker 3
0:19:11
boards as well.
0:19:12
So it might be 8 or 9 boards per per liaison.
Speaker 1
0:19:15
Wow.
0:19:16
Top of the way you got vacancies?
Speaker 3
0:19:17
There's a lot of well, there's a lot of beating the feet that they do.
0:19:20
And To break out each board, ayc at its discretion, can seat up to six people.
0:19:27
And what we're trying to do as another wave evincing this maximum feasible participation is to partner with the local elected.
0:19:34
So we don't wanna put people in seats without the local elected fittles having referred those persons.
0:19:40
So, you know, most of our boards have 6, 7 people.
0:19:44
We wanna get them 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 people.
0:19:48
We do regularly meet and liaise with the US's external affairs team because obviously external affairs has a lot of ongoing rapport with local elected officials.
0:19:57
And and we try to coordinate strategies, including the the virtual meeting that you attended some time ago.
0:20:04
We wanna replicate that meeting.
0:20:06
As to why there are vacancies, volunteers can serve 2, 3 year terms.
0:20:13
And we do have a number of of volunteers who are who are seasoned.
0:20:17
Some people sit off the board and they wanna come back later on.
0:20:21
But I think sometimes people just live busy lives.
0:20:24
They do a term of service.
0:20:25
And like, alright.
0:20:26
I gave.
0:20:27
Sound for somebody else.
0:20:27
I think that that can be an issue.
0:20:29
Sometimes there's mobility.
0:20:30
People live in one part of the city, and now they move to a different part of the city, so they wouldn't be suitable to be on that board since it's a hyper local board.
Speaker 1
0:20:38
Yeah.
0:20:41
Obviously, especially when we're looking at communities that have so much poverty, they probably are trying to get things so they can get in better circumstances like working and taking care of families.
0:20:53
But I am concerned about the they're only being what is it like a total of six people in department that this is really good work and so thinking about maybe if there was more support.
0:21:04
They would be able to kinda do some of the light work even with, like, reminding the elected officials around the vacancies.
0:21:10
Because as we've been calling, and my office isn't be reaching out.
0:21:13
When I tell you, almost no one knows what I'm talking about, no one has no idea about what this is.
0:21:19
If if they have these appointments, what the pointies do.
0:21:23
Like, it was like everybody's like, what is this?
0:21:25
What are you talking about?
0:21:26
Like, I have been was out of my office.
0:21:27
They were lying.
0:21:29
So the outreach on this is not really happening in a way that I think is making sense than if it is supposed to be a partnership.
0:21:36
We have to really think about how are we making sure that the people who should be making these appoint appointments are aware of it and have a good understanding.
0:21:45
Because it's been taking us a long time because we've been having to do so much work on helping the elected office understand even what this is.
0:21:54
And so there's a there's a big disconnect in this.
0:21:56
So I definitely want to make sure we spend some time after this to to kinda think about how do we continue more of an information session.
0:22:04
Yes.
0:22:05
And even thinking about, right, when we leave, how do we continue to have that continuity with the elected officials because, you know, our we're term we have term limits.
0:22:14
Right?
0:22:15
But even at the city level and at the state level, I'm telling you they were just like, what are you talking about?
0:22:19
What is this?
0:22:21
And then there was, like, even people giving us Switchback, like, no.
0:22:23
That's not what they do that.
0:22:24
You don't We don't appoint them.
0:22:25
I was just like, why would I call your office in life?
0:22:28
So we definitely have to do a bit a a bigger push around information and and letting folks know what this is.
Speaker 3
0:22:34
We would welcome that.
0:22:35
There's some things that we've tried out fairly recently, but we're very happy to revisit and look at how to expand them.
0:22:42
There was a time where we didn't have some of the marketing materials that we do now.
0:22:45
We have brochures.
0:22:47
The application itself, we're able to make to streamline so that people can fill out the application if they wanna become a a board member directly We would love to routinize, maybe annualize that meeting that we were able to have that you that you attended, and I'm sure that there's more that that we could do.
0:23:03
We'd love
Speaker 1
0:23:03
to definitely need to to kinda, like, think through that a little bit more.
0:23:06
And even with the, like, the the surveys, I remember last year when that was, like, going on, I know you guys use a lot of the programs to kinda get the survey out.
0:23:13
And things like that, but also thinking about how to use that opportunity to partner with the electors who have to make appointments to also get these surveys out and use in their office.
0:23:22
As a way to engage in this process.
0:23:24
So I definitely have ideas, and and we'll definitely wanna take time to kinda talk that a little more.
Speaker 5
0:23:30
Yeah.