Council to vote on Office of Public Health and Safety oversight
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The Indianapolis City-County Council will consider restrictions on public safety funding Monday night.
The big picture: Council Republicans are pushing for stronger spending guardrails in the Office of Public Health and Safety.
- The move comes after an internal city audit of OPHS flagged multiple issues, including mismanaged contracts and no formal process for evaluating the efficacy of the programs it funds.
- These findings bolstered ongoing criticism from some councilors about the effectiveness of some OPHS initiatives.
Zoom in: OPHS aims to address the root causes of crime and reduce violence.
- OPHS' efforts to reduce gun violence get the most attention, but it also works on issues such as homelessness, food insecurity and behavioral health challenges like substance abuse.
- Councilors have raised concerns that OPHS isn't properly tracking the grants it provides to address these problems, so there's no way to tell if the programs the city is funding are actually working.
State of play: Councilor Michael Paul-Hart introduced a proposal that requires OPHS to create a centralized system for tracking and managing contracts and conduct ethics training for its staff.
- It also calls for the Office of Finance and Management to establish a monitoring system for additional oversight of OPHS.
- Paul-Hart also proposed freezing OPHS funding if those steps weren't taken by next year, but a council committee did not advance that item.
What they're saying: "This is not about ending important public safety work," Paul-Hart said in his weekly newsletter. "It is about making sure taxpayer dollars are tracked, contracts are managed, ethics rules are followed, and programs can prove results."
In response to Paul-Hart's proposal, OPHS Director Andrew Merkley warned that funding cuts could have a negative impact on services.
- Merkley told WTHR that the agency has started to address concerns raised in the audit, and pushed back on claims that OPHS failed to provide outcome data for programs.
- "Taking funding away, that part of the proposal may be a little bit premature," Merkley told the station.
The latest: A council committee passed the rest of Paul-Hart's proposal last month.
- The full council will vote on it Monday at the City-County Building. The meeting starts at 7pm.