ALC-Highway Commission Review and Advisory Subcommittee

Review and advisory subcommittee to order. Chair seasonal corn you have anything to say mister cochiere. We will get started here afternoon get a couple items as not necessarily action needed but to start off we've got report the office of internal audit revised letter of engagement for our daughter I think a ricky quarter bomb is going to do that he would like to come up. And we understand that director tutor sector to had a previous engagement that she could mike so we understand that thank you for being here introduced yourself if you would. My name is ricky quatterburn when the director of internal audit of the department of the spectrum general. So the letter that you have in front of you today is basically a request to modify her engagement later that was initially presented to the committee in june of two thousand twenty two. And then engagement latter basically outlined the scope of the annual project reviews required from the office of internal audit. And that if you're a call in the november meeting there we presented a report the scope of the engagement included both an insurance component and the consultant component and the consultant component was really at review that would be internal control design within a selected number of our documentaries and then ensuring that those controls in the related risk. Were included in the aid as his control and self patrol self assessment tool and enabled management to review and have a lot of controls. Um subsequently two thousand twenty two our dots internal audit division has enhanced their involvement in the control self assessment prices and to the point now that they are a monetary and review in the control self assessment process on a continual basis. And with medicated staff to that project so we really feel now that there's a duplication that efforts between our dots internal audit division and the office of internal audit. And therefore the request in trendy today is to eliminate the consulting component of the engagement so that our limited resources can be focused on the insurance component of the senior engagement and as you have a colon insurance component is basically a review of the implementation status of our dots rules that were developed in accordance with the guidehouse sturdy and so that's really the request in front of you today and i'll be glad to entertain any questions you may have. Any question from members please. The. I don't see any questions. So thank you for your test money we will consider this review thank you. This. Next item up and kevin thorton is gonna present report december twenty twenty three in january twenty twenty four. You like come and entertainment yourself so. My name is kevin thought and I am the chief of administration for the architect apartment a transportation director tutor asked me to express her regrets for not being able to be here as well as the commission. I have several members of our staff with me today i'll bring him up if we need to in order to answer any questions you might have i'll be presenting an agenda item see which is our monthly submission of progress being made on implementing recommendations from the god house efficiency review you have two reports in front of you today. One is for december twenty twenty three and one is for january of twenty twenty four to aid you in your review of these reports anything that has changed and updated is underlined. Some of the more notable changes are for recommendation number one under the organizational structure category we said that we needed to finalize our key performance indicators and implement performance management. We are nearing final development of our operational effectiveness for k p as. In performance targets for each one. We have also developed a draft dashboard to monitor and evaluate how we will meet each performance measure. Recommendation number three under the portfolio planning category said we should publish the status of construction projects in maintenance activities are consultant garver is in the process of developing the initial version of the website. Once approved by our dot management it will be published for public and stakeholder comments. Recommendation number four under portfolio planning category said we should implement a platform that tracks all stakeholder inquiries to resolution. As previously reported to this subcommittee ask our died was made available to the public in october. We are now in the process of developing a reporting structure that can be used to summarize these inquiries and help us to be able to better address how these inquiries are coming in and what subjects they're talking about. And by the way since we have been using the ask our dod which did begin back in february of twenty twenty three we have received seven thousand seven hundred in queries from the public this is an average of seven hundred each month. And finally for recommendations twelve and thirteen under the people category people capability category. Said we should ensure staff can develop in their careers at the department and improve state staff capabilities to align with current and future organizational needs. We have recently updated our work force strategic plan it has been updated to correspond in the line to the department's strategic plan. Career path promotion program documents have been developed from most of the common career paths in the department and they are now available to employees and their supervisors. Online learning pants have also been published to allow employees who considered themselves future leaders to voluntarily enrolling courses to begin building the scales needed for future leadership. Cross training and on the job training request forms have been developed and are being tested and evaluated we expect to make them available to our employees in the coming weeks. Mr chairman that concludes my report. Drain questions on AC one and the member. The. Nothing else would be like continue with say to anything only at that presentative was actually each report is cumulative and so what I presented to you come included both reports. Shed error you have a question I do but southside the scope of this could I just be held in the queue for one of this discussion about these two items are done task another question or can I ask you now. Are you main and other business or other business if you don't mind it. Do we have any questions c one c to gate nearby where the implementation of the measured which you're imployes err can you see where there were retaining. Er employees are you all your percentages is better yes and I don't have those numbers in front of me I could certainly get those but yes we are seeing in areas where it is having a positive effect and it in in not just in the retention but also in moral as well people see a path forward for them and they see how to get there and so that helps to communicate that as well on all levels engineering levels and labor levels all levels are are. And I don't believe it's a necessarily all of them but it's in the areas where the most common progression. Wouldn't is is basically as an employee inner's into that and they begin to gain skills and knowledge and in capabilities then they were able to move up within might be a maintenance area might be a construction area might be you know within the main building or something like that but yes but but for me to tell you all of the model i'm not not at not consciouable saying that but I wouldn't I know that it's the majority thank you. After no other question we will consider the same one and take to see two review and we move on to the other business to drama thank you instead of a thirty last night which is give us an update on the. On the project down there too in counting I know there was an incident last night just for public consumption of information could you give an explanation of what happened down there last night we had excessive amounts rained you know hit everything and you know the the pot holes from her starting to pop up so could you just kind of give some review what the plan is and give us a low relief for conference on it. If if it's all right i'd like to bring up steve frizby who is our assistant assistant chief engineer for a construction are for maintenance and he can give us an update on that thank you. Introduce yourself if you were to the committee. You're back back on. My name is tea for his be assistant chief engineer for maintenance for the arkansas apartment to transportation so first could you just there's a senate last I know we had excessive flooding can you just talk about it and and where we are on having that problem fixed. To be clear now we had some significant part hole in going on down there we also had a case of some flooding there on my project as well as several parts of the state so I can disaddress both issues as far as part holes it is definitely his heart over the last few days as many of you know when you go into the winter weather in the freeze though everything freezes expands it really puts a toll on our highways and so I have to come in through such a hard freeze and then immediately following that with rainfall it's kind of a worse case scenario for bottles so we had some major partners occur down at the hascle project of same thing up and jacksonville and just throughout the state interstate thirty fifty five a lot of interstates or cruise or state wide right now I feel like they come out there fire into the front panel whatever the terminology they work so hard on the winter weather and looking forward to the thought and then these part holes are really hit specifically there at the hascle project that if courses are construction project so are contractors on board assisting with that the challenge there's with the constant heavy rains you go in and and these potholes form you do emergency lane closure and there are materials some high performance are spot mixed materials that you can put in the whole but when the rains go on constantly yesterday multiple times I would do the work and then it wouldn't be an hour in that as far as come back out it was best saver our chief engineer and he said all in water does it makes and that's that's the difficult part of as fault in the rain. Is that covered under their under their contractors that outside their scope of their contract that was a failure on the old not the new construction but the old constructions are right correct yes we put those quantities in the plan so when a contractor has a segment of highway that they're reconstructing such as this they are responsible we call it maintenance of traffic they are responsible to maintain traffic in the safe condition we put quantities for as far per cheap concrete patching multiple adams and so they are responsible for doing that work in the in that case the contractor was out doing that work yesterday if I remember it in their number people can call to report pot hole and seem like a member in claims we had this I mean that's a rear current thing coming up and claims with is there a number that people can call should people call that number a report or do you feel you got enough fires on it to know where they are we always welcome the call so are aggravated that may be what we like to encourage people to use has a link on there and you can just touch that report apart hole would not even make a phone call and it's also gotten contact number to call through that or just our main office five or one five six nine two thousand will take the will take the information anyway that we can get it but that I grab app is a very handy way of doing that thank you damage here for the low to. Representative car thank you mister chair I just want to share with you this morning as I was driving and from brand near the best pro that accident in there I was on the service road and this our dot truck drove back and I could tell he had wrote his winded down and he was looking out so the perception was one of your employees was taken a conscientious effort to not to indicate where the pot hose were so I know sometimes you guys hear bad news but I wanted to be on the record that warning your employees the perception was he was taken note the numbers on the truck was six five seven five thank you mister chair thank you. Any other comments or anything under other business. Are also reductor command or not in the north bar to state anyway for how they handle the roads up there. Got thought they did one job. If there's nothing else before this committee today which stand adjourned.