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From YouTube: 21-03 Podcast City Manager Al Braithwaite - AUDIO
Description
Oldsmar City Manager Al Braithwaite joins Experience Oldsmar to discuss the 2021-22 Budget, Council/Manager Form of Government, and what his experience has been like as a City Manager during COVID-19.
A
A
A
See
so
based
on
your
financial
background
with
the
city,
this
time
of
the
year
was
always
special
to
you,
I'm
talking
about
budget
time,
so
our
audience
may
not
be
aware
that
our
fiscal
year
runs
october
1st
through
september
30th.
Currently,
city
departments
have
pretty
much
completed
their
preliminary
budgets.
So
what
are
the
next
steps
involved
to
adopt
the
2021-2022
budget.
B
Well
I'll
say
that
the
most
of
the
city
departments
have
completed
their
preliminary
budgets.
I
think
the
city
managers
department
is
still
missing,
but
we'll
get
around
to
that.
The
next
steps.
Normally,
what
we
do
is
we
have
meetings
with
staff
first
for
capital
budget
and
then
for
operating
budget.
B
Then
the
council
has
a
workshop
for
the
capital
budget
to
make
kind
of
big
picture
decisions
on
our
priorities
and
what
we
want
to
spend
money
on
and
when
it
goes
out
to
about
six
years,
which
is
part
of
the
comprehensive
plan,
and
then
the
operating
budget
is
kind
of
where
we
bring
everything
together.
Talk
about
personnel,
talk
about
assumptions
for
staffing
levels
and
what
we're
going
to
spend
our
operating
money
on
there's
a
budget
workshop.
That's
normally
after
we
submit
the
budget
to
the
council
by
charter.
B
B
B
I
certainly
can
because
this
is
a
interesting
topic,
even
in
pinellas
county,
as
you
said,
generally
speaking,
there
are
two
types
one
would
be
referred
to
as
council
manager,
which
is
what
we
have
and
the
other
is
called
strong
mayor
now
in
larger
cities,
specifically
in
pinellas
county
saint
pete
is
a
strong
mayor.
Form
of
government
in
hillsborough,
county
city
of
tampa
is
a
strong
mayor,
former
government
and
now
in
those
two
situations.
B
The
mayor
actually
is
the
chief
executive
and
administrative
official
in
that
they
have
a
great
deal
of
power
and
be
able
to
make
decisions,
regardless
of
whether
the
council
necessarily
agrees
oftentimes,
they
hire
an
administrator
to
execute,
but
in
that
form
of
government
the
mayor
is
literally
a
decision
maker
in
our
form
of
governments.
The
council
manager
form
the
mayor
is
a
ceremonial
figurehead
and
a
spokesperson,
but
all
of
the
votes
for
the
five
council
members
of
which
the
mayor
is
one
count
equally
so
in
council
manager.
B
B
A
Yeah,
okay,
so
of
course
many
cities
across
tampa
bay
experience.
What
I
like
to
call
a
shut-in
effect
when
cuba
19
made
its
way
into
our
region.
It's
hard
to
believe
that
was
already
a
year
ago.
You
know
just
facilities
were
closed.
Programs
stopped
events
were
canceled,
I'm
just
curious.
What
was
it
like
for
you?
As
city
manager,
experience
a
pandemic.
B
Yeah,
well,
obviously,
nobody
had
any
experience
in
it,
so
it
was
brand
new
territory
on
some
levels,
pretty
scary,
because
you
weren't
sure
when
the
rules
that
came
down
from
the
state
and
then
the
county
to
us
tied
our
hands.
So
to
speak,
to
say
we
either
couldn't
allow
people
in
public
buildings
or
we
had
to
be
closed
to
the
public
for
a
certain
amount
of
time.
B
B
We
paid
a
lot
of
attention.
We
still
try
to
pay
a
lot
of
attention
to
how
our
employees
are
handling
it,
because
you
don't
often
times
know
exactly
what
they're
going
through
at
home.
We
did
have
a
few
surprises
that
I
would
say,
were
pleasant
in
the
sense
that
none
of
this
is
pleasant,
but
when
we
were
sending
people
home,
I
really
thought
we
were
going
to
have
a
tough
time
getting
them
back
and
they
wanted
to
come
back
in
droves.
B
B
He
was
a
little
bit.
I
didn't
miss
any
work.
I
came
to
the
office
every
day
and
I
believe
in
that
you
know.
If
I'm
going
to
lead
this
organization,
then
I've
got
to
be
willing
to
do
whatever
that
entails.
So
I
I
didn't
think
of
it
as
something
that
I
wanted
to.
You
know
do
from
home,
we
do
have
meetings
via
teams
and
we
did
have
meetings
in
some
cases
from
home,
while
the
department
heads
were
you
know,
operating.
B
However,
they
could,
but
at
the
end
of
that
kind
of
the
first
year
of
it
or
something
we
found
out,
that
we
were
pretty
functional,
no
matter
how
we
were
doing
business,
which
was
you
know,
a
pleasant
surprise,
so
yeah
we
learned,
I'm
a
dinosaur.
I
some
of
my
people
had
been
kind
of
begging
me
to
allow
telecommuting
for
years,
and
I
was
always
against
it
because
you
know
my
theory
is
well.
B
If
you
serve
the
public,
you
got
to
be
here,
so
they
can
come
yell
at
you
and
if
you're
not
here,
they
can't
come
yell
at
you,
but
the
the
forced
experiment
of
people
functioning
from
home
proved
to
be
very
productive.
And
again
I
can't
say
enough:
I
I'm
so
proud
of
our
employees,
for
you
know
the
exposure
that
they
have
with.
You
know
just
kept
doing
what
we
do.
B
We
just
didn't
miss
a
beat
you
you
could
argue,
there
might
have
been
a
couple
things
we
did
slower
and
a
couple
things
that
we
weren't
allowed
to
do.
But
you
know
we
had
summer
camp
and
we
had
no
exposures,
no
positive
cases
there,
and
that
was
you
know,
kind
of
a
thought
to
be
a
high
risk
situation.
We
we
executed
so
many
things
that
we
would
normally
do
in
this
environment
and
our
employees
did
it
just
willingly
and
with
great
attitude,
I'm
I'm
so
lucky
to
be
around
these
guys.
Yeah.
B
Yeah
a
good
example
that
anthony
did
those
which
you
guys
are
involved
in
the
production
of,
and
I'm
grateful
for
that,
but
the
reading
you
know
getting
the
publisher
permission
to
do
those
on-site
readings
for
the
children's
program.
I
mean
we
could
name.
You
know
a
bunch
of
new
innovative
things
that
we
did
to
just
keep
it
rolling
to
keep
something
pushed
out
there,
but
I
I'm
more,
I'm
so
impressed
with
how
dedicated
they
were
to
doing
what
we
do
without
just
missing
a
beat.
B
Well,
the
book
I'm
reading
to
admit
this
is
called
greedy
bastards
and
I
think
I'll
leave
it
at
that.
There's
also
a
book.
I'm
reading
that
comes
from
a
leadership
seminar
we
attended.
It's
called
call
sign
chaos
by
general,
jim
mattis
and
chaos.
I
think
implies
erroneously
that
here's
this
you
know
highly
regarded
general
united
states
army.
A
marine
specifically
and
chaos
really
stands
for.
Colonel
has
another
outstanding
solution,
so
that
became
his
call
sign,
but
we
attended
a
webinar.
B
The
department
heads
in
more
than
just
the
department
heads
to
listen
to
general
mattis
speak
and
it
was
life-changing.
So
I've
been
catching
up
on
the
book.
I
heard
him
speak
before
it.
We
have,
as
you
know,
a
book
club
for
leaders
like
yourself
and
people
are
trying
to
just
make
themselves
better.
I
I
skip
over
the
greedy
bastards
one
because
it
it
does
relate
to
city
government
in
texas.
I've
heard
about
this
book
yeah
and
it's
it's
not
quite
what
the
title
suggests.
It
is,
but
it's
been
interesting.