The Carpinteria City Council today is scheduled to review the 2023 Annual Work Plan, considered the city’s primary document that guides new or significantly modified staff work for the coming year.
The council will meet at 4 p.m. in chambers, 5775 Carpinteria Ave. The meeting is expected to run about four hours.
“The city’s Annual Work Plan defines and prioritizes projects, programs and services to be undertaken over the next year, and is an important part of the city’s implementation of community goals and objectives,” city officials said.
Staff will present the draft Annual Work Program and Strategic Plan to the council, which is slated to discuss it and make any changes it deems appropriate for incorporation into the final Plan.
Council members will receive public comment regarding the Work Plan before making any decision to approve, amend or reject it.
“The Annual Work Plan is an important precursor to the drafting of the budget for the coming fiscal year,” staff said. “Through the budget development process, which begins in March and concludes with City Council adoption in June, it will be determined what projects and programs are to be funded, and the basis for determining program/service effectiveness through performance measures.”
Further, the Annual Work Plan “is an opportunity to identify work that can help address legal, financial and other types of risk” facing the city, staff said.
Each year in late January, the city council, city manager and staff department heads meet to discuss strategic issues and the Annual Work Plan.
The Annual Work Plan includes a brief description of all departments, including a mission statement and detailed information about each department’s proposed work for the year. At the council’s request, the chair of each appointed board, committee and the Planning Commission was invited to attend the Work Plan meeting.
The Work Plan “includes the identification of strategic issues facing the city, a discussion of the proposed approach to addressing these issues, and implementation measures set out through the Plan,” staff said.
“The Plan’s strategic initiatives represent key long-range interests of the city that are not easily resolvable or entirely within the control of the city.”
The Strategic Plan also includes a discussion of progress, resource issues and adjustments concerning each strategic initiative.
Each Work Plan item proposes some type of discrete work matter.
A Work Plan item may be a new city program or service or changes to an existing program or service, or can reflect a new or ongoing major capital project. Although work matters may influence or be affected by routine or ongoing work, the Work Plan is not a comprehensive description of day-to-day work of the city organization, staff said
Creation of the Work Plan is educated by the Strategic Plan and changes in context that are affecting progress addressing it, progress and/or completion of Work Plan items in the prior year, and direction provided by action of the council in order to stimulate strategic thinking in advance of the meeting, each council member was provided a questionnaire to fill out.
The city also solicited comment and participation by the public by publishing an ad in the local weekly newspaper, and announcing the meeting at a recent past regular council meeting.
To date, no public comment had been received, staff said. Any comments received prior to the meeting will be provided to the council and be made available to the public at the meeting.
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