AGENDA #9

February 27, 2004

Town Attorney’s Office

Initial Budget Presentation to the Mayor and Town Council

2004-2005

I. Mission Statement

The Town Attorney’s Office is responsible for protecting the legal interests of the Town of Chapel Hill.

The primary mission of the Office of the Town Attorney is the protection of the legal interests of the Town of Chapel Hill, providing legal advice to the Mayor and Town Council, and directly or indirectly, to members of the Town staff, and to the Town advisory boards and commissions on matters related to Town business.  This office is responsible for representing Town interests or arranging for that representation in judicial and administrative proceedings.

II. Brief Services Description

The key services provided by the department are

· Advice to the Mayor and Town Council

· Advice to Town Manager and departments of Town government

· Provision of day-to-day legal services to all departments of Town government

III. Departmental Revenue Estimates

This department does not generate any revenues but may on occasion collect, through judicial proceedings, moneys owed to the Town.

IV. Departmental Base Budget Cost Estimates

CATEGORY	2003-2004 Original Budget	Requested 2004-2005 Budget
Personnel	$202,160	$206,334
Operations	33,783	34,486
Capital Equipment	0	0
TOTAL	$235,943	$240,830

Key Budget Issues

No major changes are proposed in this year’s budget.

V. Programs Going Well

· Improved communications with some departments allows for evaluation of legal issues before potential problems become actual problems.

· Adjustment to enforcement procedures allows review by this office of possible code violations prior to violation notices being mailed.

· On-going working relationships with outside counsel have facilitated staff representation in manners before the Board of Adjustment when this office has served as counsel to that Board.

· Decisions on when to engage outside counsel have been managed to provide such counsel when needed and to avoid unnecessary expenditures when services can be handled in-house.

· Some expenditures for outside counsel for litigation are offset by civil penalties collected in code enforcement proceedings.

VI. Programs That Could Be Improved

· With the anticipated increase in capital projects over the next few years, it will be important for this office to be involved at an early stage in the development of bid and contract documents and consideration of details related to project management as projects are being constructed.

· New policies and federal regulations related to human resources issues will require this office to continue to become more involved with that department.

VII. Proposed Additions or Reductions

No major additions or reductions are proposed for this department for Fiscal Year 2004-2005.