City Council

Minutes Forsyth City Council Meeting May 3, 2021 Call to Order Mayor Wilson called the meeting to order at 6:00 p.m. Pledge of Allegiance, Invocation and Roll Call Mayor Wilson led the Pledge of Allegiance. Mr. Stroud gave the invocation. In attendance for the meeting in person was Mayor Eric Wilson, Councilmembers Julius Stroud, Mike Dodd, and Chris Hewett. In attendance for the meeting via zoom was Councilmembers Melvin Lawrence, and John Howard. Also, in attendance for the meeting in person was City Manager, Janice Hall; City Attorney, Bobby Melton; and City Clerk, Regina Ivie. Councilmember Greg Goolsby arrived in person for the meeting at 6:01 p.m. All members of Council were in attendance for the meeting therefore all unanimous votes will be six votes (Goolsby, Howard, Stroud, Dodd, Hewett, and Lawrence). Approval of the Agenda Mayor Wilson stated an additional requisition for All Seasons Tree Service for $5,600 needs to be added to the agenda for item number XII. Mr. Hewett offered a motion to approve the amended agenda. Seconded by Mr. Stroud; the motion carried unanimously. Approval of the Minutes from the April 19, 2021 Council Meeting Mr. Stroud offered a motion to approve the minutes as presented. Seconded by Mr. Hewett; the motion carried unanimously. Bicentennial Update by Richard Dumas and Ralph Bass Mr. Ralph Bass provided an update regarding the Bicentennial Celebration Festival scheduled for September 25, and 26, 2021. He stated that a highlight during the weekend celebration will be a ceremony in which the committee hopes that Governor Brian Kemp and other elected officials will attend bringing state recognition to the County’s Bicentennial. Mr. Richard Dumas reviewed the current financials and recent pledges for the Bicentennial Celebration. Mr. Stroud offered a motion to pledge $5000 to the Monroe County’s Bicentennial Celebration. Seconded by Mr. Dodd; the motion carried unanimously. Employee Recognitions Mr. Will Davis recognized three City employees based on a BEST OF poll that is ran every January in The Reporter. Mayor Eric Wilson as the Best City Official, Hunter McClendon was recognized as the Best Firefighter, and Jeremy Malone was recognized as the Best Law Enforcement Officer. Ms. Hall stated a proclamation for Municipal Clerk’s Week requires approval; to acknowledge all that the City Clerk, Regina Ivie does to keep the City running efficiently. Mr. Hewett offered a motion to approve the proclamation. Seconded by Mr. Dodd; the motion carried unanimously. Mayor Wilson presented a proclamation to Regina Ivie, City Clerk for Professional Municipal Clerk’s Week, May 2 through May 8, 2021. Pellicano Construction – Review of Progress by Michael Garrison Mr. Garrison provided a current progress report for the new City Hall Building. He reviewed tasks to be completed in the upcoming days and weeks.  Page |2 Public Hearing of a proposed ordinance for the alteration and amendment of the corporate boundaries through annexation. Mr. Melton stated the proposed annexation application by FJH, LLC and Timber Assets, LLC and an ordinance is for the alteration of the corporate boundaries through annexation of 591.14 acres of land; which are located on Smith Road, Johnstonville Road and Mays Road; all parcels are contiguous as an aggregate to each other and contiguous to the present corporate limits of the City of Forsyth. The zoning will be upon annexation to as close to current zoning as they currently are zoned within Monroe County, but under City’s codes. Planning and Zoning recommended approval at their March 22, 2021 meeting. The public hearing notice was advertised in the Monroe Reporter on March 31, April 7, 14, 21, and 28 th, 2021. Per Georgia Law a notice was delivered by certified mail to Monroe County on March 24, 2021; more than thirty days has passed, and no response or reply has been received from Monroe County regarding the annexation. Mayor Wilson opened the floor in favor of or against the proposed annexation ordinance. Mr. Tye Hanna at 4268 Riverview Drive Peachtree Corners, GA reviewed charts and stated the application for the 591.14 acres of land was submitted separately for annexation due to different legal entities owning the property. The first large tract of property that was annexed into the City was all zoned agriculture. This annexation request for this 591.14 acres of land will be zoned if annexed into the City as close to the current zoning within the County. Mr. Larry C. Evans at 31 Marshall Road Forsyth, GA spoke in favor of the proposed annexation ordinance. He explained that infrastructure is currently needed in that area. He requested support for the annexation of the property. Ms. Lynette Mazyck at 2041 Zellner Road Forsyth, GA spoke in opposition of the proposed annexation ordinance, traffic, and property value concerns. Ms. Teresa Hobbs at 1828 Zellner Road Forsyth, GA spoke in opposition of the proposed annexation ordinance. She stated she doesn’t want to live near industry. She expressed concerns regarding property values, and issues with the highway traffic. Mr. Greg Head at 294 Rocky Creek Road spoke in opposition of the proposed ordinance. He stated the Monroe County residents have no say as to what goes on at the property since City of Forsyth are not their representatives; no way to hold Council accountable or responsible for what is done on that property. He further stated the County citizens have legitimate concerns as to what is placed on the property. Mr. Michael Robine stated he will be a future resident of the area; he’s currently in the process of building a house. He further stated he’s against the annexation. Mr. Tye Hanna stated for the last fifteen years at the encouragement of Monroe County and the Monroe County Development Authority acquiring property for development in Monroe County; in that time frame, we have been working to obtain water and sewer to the property. We were advised that the only way to get services to that property was through annexation; Monroe County has no services to offer. Without sewer and water to the property options for development are very limited. Mr. Hanna further stated that after utilities are on the property, he would love to see meaningful development on the property, residential and light manufacturing. There being no further discussion for or against the proposed annexation ordinance. Mayor Wilson closed the public hearing. Mr. Dodd offered a motion to approve the ordinance as presented. Seconded by Mr. Howard. After some discussion, the motion carried with four votes (Goolsby, Dodd, Howard, and Lawrence). Councilmembers Stroud and Hewett voted against the motion. Forsyth City Council – May 3, 2021  Page |3 Forsyth Convention & Visitors Bureau Appointment Recommendation Ms. Hall reviewed the recommendation from the Convention & Visitors Bureau’s Chairman, John Howard for the current vacancy on the board. Mr. Goolsby offered a motion to approve the appointment of Ms. Alondra Ochoa to the Convention and Visitor’s Bureau Board. Seconded by Mr. Hewett; the motion carried with five votes (Goolsby, Dodd, Hewett, Stroud, and Lawrence). Mr. Howard recused himself. Approval of budget amendments for golf course superintendent Ms. Hall reviewed the budget amendments request for the golf course superintendent in the amount of $69,361 for revenue and expenses. Mr. Dodd offered a motion to approve the budget amendments for revenue and expenses in the amount of $69,361. Seconded by Mr. Hewett; the motion carried unanimously. Approval of legal services agreements for water and wastewater relating to USDA loan. Mr. Hewett offered a motion to approve the legal services agreements for water and wastewater for the USDA loan. Seconded by Mr. Stroud; the motion carried unanimously. Approval of Requisitions Greater than $5,000 All Seasons Tree Service $5,800.00 All Seasons Tree Service $5,600.00 Mr. Stroud offered a motion to approve the requisitions as presented. Seconded by Mr. Hewett; the motion carried unanimously. City Manager’s Report Ms. Hall provided the following report: • Main Street is looking at possibility of Food Trucks for food at the fireworks. Before they go too far with that, wanted to make sure council does not have a problem with food vendors being included in the fireworks. Previously asked for permission for fireworks only and would return with permission for additional activities. Mr. Stroud offered a motion to approve Food Trucks for the July 3 rd Fireworks event scheduled. Seconded by Mr. Goolsby; the motion carried unanimously. • Tree Board Golf Tournament June 11; Tammie Pierson is working with them to help organize the tournament; registration ends June 4; if interested in participating please contact Tammie to sign up. • Forsyth United Methodist Church is having the steeple cleaned this week and will have equipment parked in the parking spaces at the sanctuary portion and will have a lift to get to the steeple. Those parking spaces will be blocked off all week for their equipment and safety. • Carl Hofstadter will come to the May 19 meeting to review water/wastewater plant upgrade projects, where they are so far and what steps need to be taken at this time. Additionally, two of the projects included in the overall project have today been approved as emergency by USDA. • Continue to experience issues with the contractor for the Blount Street area waterline project; project included 20 inspections; Hofstadter has to-date performed 77 inspections; we continue contact with contractor requiring full crews on site; temporary asphalt was placed in the road cuts, so they are better than the open cuts • West Main Street water line project is nearing completion; all lines and services are in; old line from MLK to sawmill is isolated and all new service connections and fire hydrants are on the new line; old line and hydrants from MLK to Phelps are still active along with new lines; working to find the valves to isolate that section as well. • Golf Course underground electric relocation is complete; old line and poles have been removed; will work to have easement surveyed. • Pedestrian lights around the square were changed out to LED last week; working to replace those on E Johnston Street as well; huge thank you to Mike Batchelor for research on this for cost savings to change out rather than replace fixtures. • Experiencing issues with materials orders; transformers have at least a 6-month lead time. Forsyth City Council – May 3, 2021  Page |4 • Sidewalk crew is finishing up on the sidewalk replacement project on South Lee; once bid approved for removal of trees on Indian Springs, they will replace the sidewalk in that area. • Auditors have received almost all documents they need to complete the 2020 audit, just waiting on a few additional documents from other entities. • Received initial draft of new rate schedules from Electric Cities Group; will meet to review and then submit to council for review and adoption; also working on revised Fee Schedule for review and approval; this will add some new fees and possibly increase some fees that have been unchanged for years. • Instructed Hofstadter to do design for bidding to correct water drainage issue at Lee/Adams to eliminate water getting in the Welcome Center; should have ready for construction to begin when we move out of building, so that construction does not interfere with employees or citizens trying to get in the building; once project complete, will be able to move CVB back in building. • Temporary railings scheduled for installation on Sunday on W Johnston in front of Pickled Okra, Harbin Engineering and Hometown Boutique; this will be 2 horizontal rails with 3 openings for access; will advertise for bids in fall so construction does not further impact the businesses in that block. • Scoops is purchasing the old city hall building from the DDA; we will work next Monday to clear out all remaining city equipment and material still stored in the basement. • Having repeated issues of parents leaving children unattended at the Splashpad, so additional signage is being installed to hopefully stop this, if not we will have to take additional measures. Not sure what happened with Splashpad over the weekend and continued in to today, but it was closed today before the rain set in while David tried to correct all the issues. • Bid is being advertised for concrete work to replace driveway pad at fire station. • Regional Commission had so many CDBG and LWCF applications to submit for their governments, they have not been able to work on redraft of City Personnel Manual; all those applications were submitted on Friday and they hope to have final draft back to me by end of next week. • Rendering for City Cemetery signage has been submitted to Georgia Department of Transportation for approval to install on South Lee Street. • Shop Local 1st Saturday event held this past weekend. Zoning Public Hearings: • May 17 public hearing for CastleView Development Partners rezoning request from R-1 to R-2 and NS • May 17 public hearing for Dentavious Traylor for Conditional Use in R-3 to allow personal services at 158 Martin Luther King • May 17 public hearing for amendments to Alcohol Ordinance Ms. Hall provided the following regarding the recent system issues. Our Incode system which is the City’s financial software that we use to process billing and other processes is currently down. This was taken down early Thursday morning due to an attack on one of the City’s servers. We are in the very early stages of analyzing our systems. We do know that there is no evidence that any of our information was looked at or taken from our systems. Our systems are protected, and we have taken additional measures to add more protection. I was notified by Incode at 5:30 today that the system was back up. We apologize for any inconvenience of customers not being able to pay their utility bills and will extend due dates and disconnects accordingly. I recommend extending those dates by the number of days we were down. Mr. Stroud offered a motion to extend the due date and disconnect date by three days per Ms. Hall’s recommendation. Seconded by Mr. Goolsby; the motion carried unanimously. City Attorney Report Mr. Melton had no further business to report. Mayor’s Report Mayor Wilson had no further business to report. Forsyth City Council – May 3, 2021  Page |5 Council Board Reports Councilmembers had no further business to report. Additional Business Mr. Hewett inquired with Mr. Dodd regarding the irrigation system at the Golf Course. Mr. Dodd explained it’s a patchwork; an estimate is being obtained to replace the irrigation system. Mr. Stroud requested reserved parking for veterans at the new City Hall parking lot once complete. Mr. Stroud stated he receives complaints regarding the burned down house on his street. Officer Malone provided an update to the current case regarding the burned house. Public Comments No one came forward for public comments. Executive Session No executive session was held. Adjourn There being no further business to discuss Mr. Stroud offered a motion to adjourn the Council Meeting. Seconded by Mr. Goolsby; the motion carried unanimously. The meeting adjourned at 7:33 p.m. Forsyth City Council – May 3, 2021