Mayor Matt Mahan and San Jose city councilmembers discussed several topics about San Jose’s community during the City Council meeting on Wednesday.
Councilmembers focused their attention on topics related to finance, AAPI issues, customer service and public infrastructures.
Anthony Sung Cho v. City of San José
At the beginning of Tuesday’s meeting, Mahan and city councilmembers approved a $200,000 settlement with Anthony Sung Cho, who claimed he was the victim of excessive force by the San Jose Police Department.
According to a Oct. 20, 2022 case report published by the Northern District Court of California, Cho alleged San Jose police officers used an excessive amount of force to restrain him after a police chase on June 18, 2020.
The first responder on the scene, Officer Rodriguez, admitted to striking Cho with a baton after alleging that Cho did not cooperate with the arrest, according to the same report.
Rodriguez is currently involved in a pending criminal prosecution in which a San Jose woman named Guadalupe Esperanza Marin alleges he used excessive force in a separate incident on July 22, 2022.
Cho claims he sustained serious injuries after the incident.
Rick Bruneau: City Council’s New Finance Director
On Wednesday, San Jose’s City Manager, Jennifer Maguire, announced Rick Bruneau will be San Jose’s new Director of the Finance Department.
She said Bruneau will be responsible for managing, protecting and reporting on the city’s financial condition and financial resources.
Maguire said Bruneau was unanimously confirmed by all council members to take on the position.
She said Bruneau will take on his duties on April 2.
“Thank you for trusting me to lead the finance department,” Bruneau said. “This is such an honor and a privilege to serve in this new capacity.”
Customer Service
The staff working for the city manager and representatives from Guidehouse, a consulting firm in management and technology, shared a report about how well the city upholds customer service in public services and their plans to improve.
“The city's customer service vision is working together to serve our community through reliable, empathetic and solutions oriented customer service,” said Kristen Jensen, Management Consultant from Guidehouse.
Maguire said it also includes setting and meeting expectations, being responsive and focused on problem solving while also exhibiting empathy.
She said customer service should help support and empower the community, while also acting as a tool for supporting inclusion.
“I know from my experience, customer service is a powerful tool for access and inclusion and that customer service leads to better outcomes and that good customer service empowers the community,” she said.
Maguire said, although the city’s public services have their “bright spots” in customer service, they also have weaknesses.
“We know our services can be complex, frustrating and at times, feel insurmountable,” Maguire said.
She said she is thrilled the city was able to engage every department to give input on how the city could improve its customer service in the public services it has to offer.
Maguire said the city also partnered with Guidehouse and other consulting companies to do research for San Jose and to find new solutions to increase the quality of customer service.
“This is a magic moment for San Jose,” Collin Lopes, a partner from Guidehouse said. “In addition to this approach, you have got a great team in place with the right ingredients to see it through and see it done right.”
Lopes said Guidehouse supported the city in understanding what it is like to have essential customer services across San Jose.
“To do this, we engaged both internally with the city, as well as externally with its customers,” Lopes said.
Jensen said Guidehouse gathered data, did analysis and mapped out the city’s strengths and weaknesses in customer service in multiple services provided by the city.
She said one tactic Guidehouse used to gather data is called, “mystery shopping,” where teams from the company act as customers and try to access services on their own.
Jensen said Guidehouse conducted 37 in-depth interviews and 170 intercepts or quick interviews to understand what it is like to use different services such as 311.
Mahan said 311 is a service residents can use to report a variety of non-emergency issues around San Jose, including illegal dumping, potholes, street light outages and graffiti.
Jensen said Guidehouse also investigated what it was like to interact with interpreters in Spanish, Vietnamese and English.
She said Guidehouse and the city also made efforts to reach out to more community members by having conversations in different community centers throughout San Jose, including the Martin Luther King, Jr. Library at San Jose State University.
Through their research, Jensen said Guidehouse discovered one of the city’s strengths was in interacting with customers.
However, she also said employees had a difficult time helping customers because of a lack of collaboration between departments and the lack of a central database for information.
Jensen said these weaknesses resulted in creating a “fragmented, lengthy and ineffective customer experience.”
“Furthermore, customers without deep familiarity of city services often struggle to navigate on their own towards resolution, placing them at a disadvantage from the start,” Jensen said.
Jensen said representatives from Guidehouse and the city said they are continuing projects and will be starting new projects to increase the quality of customer service through San Jose.
Measure T
San Jose voters approved the Disaster Preparedness, Public Safety and Infrastructure Bond Measure, or “Measure T,” on Nov. 6, 2018, according to the City of San Jose website.
According to the same source, passing the bond allowed the city to access $650 million to finance infrastructure projects that support public safety.
“The bond measure provides proceeds for disaster, preparedness, public safety, enhancements, and infrastructure improvements,” said Nicholas Cochran, the chairman for Measure T Community Oversight Committee.
Cochran said, after this bond was issued in 2019 and 2021, the budget has now expanded to roughly $210 million.
Cochran said, over the past three years, this money was used to fund money for construction and infrastructure for increasing traffic safety, paving bridges and financially supporting the fire and police departments.
He said the city spent bond money on fixing storm sewers and working on other improvements in clean water, green stormwater infrastructure, environmental flood protection and community facilities.
