Consultants make EnerGov recommendations
The EnerGov permitting system in the city of Cape Coral has produced more headaches than permits in the nearly six months it has been in service.
Cape Coral City Council does not want problems, but answers. On Wednesday, during its regular meeting at City Hall, a consulting firm gave an assessment of the situation as well as some long-term solutions to stabilize the system.
The city has already taken the step of closing its permitting counter on Fridays and the process of hiring more people to bring permitting up to speed.
However, the city has yet to eliminate system outages and customer service deficiencies and effectively stabilize and achieve its expected permitting, licensing and code enforcement levels.
Christopher Blough, senior manager at Plante Moran, presented the assessment on the problems with system underperformance, data migration, staff turnover during the three-year implementation and the techniques and service levels employed.
“There is no silver bullet fix for what I’m going to show you this evening. There are a series of tasks that put together will add up to a whole that you can be proud of achieving, and your team can do this,” Blough said.
Mayor John Gunter said he appreciated the long-term fixes Blough suggested, including an updating of the EnerGov system in October.
“However, there is a crisis we are facing today. It’s going to take time to go through the process and get it right. We’re looking for short-term solutions that will bridge the gap until we get to the long-term solutions,” Gunter said.
Some permits, for example, require little to no review, like irrigation. Gunter said they are putting all permits into one basket and handing them in the order they come.
Blough suggested the city measure what they are doing and if the changes they are making are adding value, so the team can agree the needle is moving in the right direction.
He also said the new workers need to be trained as best as possible so they can leverage the abilities of the system.
“If you’re not well-trained, you treat the system as a black box, you don’t know the questions to ask,” Blough said. “A lot of the new people you have need formal training and quickly.”
Bill Johnson Jr., executive director of the CCCIA, addressed the council briefly on its role in trying to get EnerGov on track, with Johnson even going to Des Moines, Iowa, with city staff.
“The CCCIA supports the recommendations made in the Plante Moran report presented tonight to address the EnerGov issues,” Johnson said. “We request the city receive outside assistance from Tyler or another provider who can provide the expertise to reconfigure the system and implement the 2021 EnerGov software.”
City Manager Rob Hernandez is working on a 60-day action plan for EnerGov, including a rework of the single-family home permitting, cleaning up the 170,000 files in the system, and testing the 2021 EnerGov software so they can go live on Oct. 3.
As far as staffing, Hernandez said it’s a tough job market, with several candidates turning down the job.
“We continue to recruit and interview qualified applicants for all positions,” Hernandez said. But he added that the starting salaries for positions may not be competitive anymore with other cities or even the private sector.
CCCIA president Jeffrey Gazlay said he was hopeful the study by Plante Moran was well taken by council.
“Hopefully, we implement these things rather quickly and the city gives them resources to get these things done,” Gazlay said.
To reach CHUCK BALLARO, please email news@breezenewspapers.com