Traffic division asks for ITS technician to staff traffic‑management center five days a week

Krystal Craig and Matt Ricks described recent traffic operations accomplishments and asked the council to fund one additional ITS technician to operate the Traffic Management Center (TMC) five days a week.

Craig noted traffic is a top concern in the city’s citizen survey: 38% of transportation comments addressed congestion and 41% mentioned signal timing. She outlined the TMC’s functions — travel‑time and corridor monitoring, signal timing adjustments, large‑event timing and incident response — and said the TMC currently is staffed two days per week because of staffing limits.

Craig and Ricks proposed adding one ITS technician at a loaded cost of just over $76,000 to increase coverage, provide overlap for cross‑training, and maintain/expand the city’s ITS infrastructure (cameras, controllers, battery backups and signal cabinets). They gave an operational example: when an interstate incident closed ramps and diverted traffic to local interchanges, one TMC operator changed all four affected signals in about two hours at a cost staff estimated at $100, versus an estimated $420 to dispatch four staffers to intersections — a per‑incident operational cost savings cited to illustrate TMC value.

Staff also described vacancies within the traffic group — four unfilled FTEs, three of them open more than a year and requiring electrician licensure — and said recent pay adjustments and active recruitment were increasing interview activity.

Council members discussed prioritizing hires and suggested reallocating funds from long‑open vacancies if recruitment does not fill existing roles by July. Staff will include the ITS technician request in the FY 2026 budget materials and report back on recruitment outcomes for long‑open positions.