Charlottesville City Manager Sam Sanders has been in his position for over three years, providing an era of relative stability after a succession of several people holding the position for a short while.
During that time he has shown the status of his work plan on a quarterly basis. On November 2, Sanders presented the City Council with a review of the first quarter of this fiscal year that had a theme of “quality and consistency.”
“This plan for this year was focused on strategic execution, basically meaning that we are trying to get things done,” Sanders said. “Within this quarter, we moved beyond some critical capacity concerns citywide.”
Sanders said what he calls his First Team of administrators is now full again after a series of departures in the past year. India Adams-Jacobs has taken her place as Assistant City Manager.
He also said the city is retaining personnel allowing the local government to get work done. In all, there are 1,123 positions authorized in the city’s budget.
“Our vacancy rate is down to 6.5 percent,” Sanders said. “It was 18 percent in 2023. So we are no longer hemorrhaging or struggling to get things done because we don’t have the key seats filled.”
Sanders also gave an update on the development of a full strategic plan for the first time since 2018. Council adopted a “strategic framework” in September 2023 as I reported.
As part of the new plan, Council came up with five new strategic goals at a retreat earlier this year and these will be developed into a new document to guide the city for three years beginning in July 2027. The items in the work plan are now framed around these five goals.
As part of that work, departments have been asked to present various “key performance indicators” through which their work can be measured.
“Our strategy team led by Jen Hendrick is really focused on the idea that it’s time for us to get back to strategic planning,” Sanders said. “That’s another piece to the quality and consistency framework. They’ve been working on making sure that we put accountability and transparency more in the limelight.”
Sanders also provided an update on 2000 Holiday Drive and said 80 people are staying there as of November 2. He said work is underway to begin the shift to permanent operations for people who need a place to stay.
“We’re adding staff in our Department of Human Services, and we are working on the transitional housing opportunity next because we need them to have a place to go, and outside is not that place,” Sanders said.
Sanders also turned to the development of the next budget. Internal budget presentations are currently underway with departments making their case. Council will also get a budget briefing at each of the next three meetings. The one on November 16 will be on parks planning and transit expansion followed by community investments and social services on December 7. The third on December 21 will be financial projections and capital improvement planning.
Council will also have a pre-budget retreat on January 15.
“This will be focused on decisions, decisions, and money bags, because we will be very much deep into the FY28 budget process,” Sanders said.
Sanders said the report for the second quarter will provide more details on several projects that are in the works.
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