City Council

Office of the Clerk of Council City of Gahanna 200 South Hamilton Road Gahanna, Ohio 43230 Meeting Minutes City Council Thomas R. Kneeland, President of Council Stephen Renner, Vice President of Council Karen J. Angelou, Ryan P. Jolley, Brian D. Larick, Jamie Leeseberg, Michael Schnetzer Kimberly McWilliams, CMC, Clerk of Council Monday, March 16, 2015 7:00 PM City Hall A. CALL TO ORDER - Invocation, Pledge of Allegiance, Roll Call Gahanna City Council met in Regular Session on Monday, March 16, 2015, in Council Chambers of City Hall, 200 South Hamilton Road, Gahanna, Ohio. President of Council Kneeland called the meeting to order at 7:00 p.m. An Invocation was delivered and followed by the Pledge of Allegiance. Agenda for this meeting was published on March 13, 2015. Present 7 - Karen J. Angelou, Ryan P. Jolley, Jamie Leeseberg, Stephen A. Renner, Michael Schnetzer, Thomas R. Kneeland, and Brian D. Larick B. ADDITIONS OR CORRECTIONS TO THE AGENDA. Motion by Angelou, seconded by Larick to remove the minutes from the March 2, 2015 meeting from the Consent Agenda. The motion carried by the following vote. Yes: 7- Angelou, Jolley, Leeseberg, Renner, Schnetzer, Kneeland and Larick C. HEARING OF VISITORS: 1. Lee Tucker - Parks & Recreation Foundation Annual Report Lee Tucker said thank you to Council for letting me come up here. Hopefully you have just received this little pamphlet here. On the inside, what I’m here to talk about is the Parks and Recreations Foundation, most of you know all about us. I have been a resident here since 1987 here in Gahanna. I love our city also, and I am very proud to be the chair of the Parks and Recreation Foundation. Today we are here to celebrate the successes of the Foundation in 2014 and to give you an update on ’15, what we will be doing this year. Hopefully everyone knows that we are a non-profit 501C3 charitable City of Gahanna Page 1 City Council Meeting Minutes March 16, 2015 organization and we were established in 2008 to improve the quality of Parks and Recreations Services for the healthier, a healthier Gahanna. Our volunteer Foundation is led by a group of Board Members assisted by staff of the Gahanna Parks and Recreation Department. Since the beginning, the Foundation has contributed over 75,000 dollars toward initiatives supporting our Gahanna community related to Parks and Recreations. The funding donated by the Foundation has supported scholarships, park improvement, public arts, school collaborations, and family entertainment. Going to 2014 we kind of get a highlight on here, on your hand out the first ever Creekside Hops and Vines Festival Fundraiser, this last year had over 450 attendees, and raised over 16,000 dollars for future foundation efforts that we’re going to be doing from now on. I know a lot of you came to the event, and thank you to those of you that were there. We do have presently 13 volunteer Board Members on the Foundation. We also supported the Parks and Recreations efforts through contributions of over 10,000 dollars toward community projects related to Parks and Recreations. Specifically, 34 camper weeks were made possible through the scholarship funding of the Foundation last year. We’ve contributed funds to the Learning Garden, Gahanna Learning Gardeners and partnerships with their schools. So again, we’re working with everyone in the community. We sponsor the Arbor Day celebration, at Goshen Lane, and Middle School South. Also as our fundraiser, the Hops and Vines, hopefully, if you were there, you walked down and saw the bench at Creekside. The Foundation assisted in the placement of the ‘We live Here’ by artist Christina Gross. The sculpture was commissioned by the Foundation and hopefully you’ve had a chance to go by and look at it. I was walking there Sunday with my granddaughter and I saw a couple sitting on the bench watching the water go by. It was going by pretty good on Sunday, but it was nice to see people are using it. You can face the creek and in the spring time face the spring garden. It is a nice addition to the arts in the Creekside area. Coming up for 2015, we’ve already committed to over 15,000 dollars for projects in Gahanna out of the Foundation to expand the offerings for the summer camp scholarships, as well as spring break, and winter camp. We want to make sure that the Gahanna kids have access to programs to keep them outside and active. A portion of the funding has also been set aside for area youth leagues that may have kids that can’t get in the program, if they come up to us, we are going to City of Gahanna Page 2 City Council Meeting Minutes March 16, 2015 have funding for that also to help them out. Also, as to planning stages, we have a couple major things going on. There is a coalition of a group of downtown businesses that want to keep the Creekside Live series going. We have already had a couple of meetings with some businesses and people that are involved with some other community groups, and I am pleased to say that it is going to happen. We are going to make it happen. We’ve got verbal commitments now, we have almost three quarters of the funding. We are still looking for more sponsors. Contact me, or contact Zack at the Parks and Recreation Department so we can let people know that were are going to be able to make it happen again. All the businesses want it. Everybody wants it; the community wants it. Last year as you know, we had so many people down there, around 4500 people. Last year it took place for six weeks. We hope to bring it up to nine weeks. So there is something going on Friday nights down there. So the community and the businesses are going to support it. It’s also going to be very nice. Everyone is going to enjoy it. Also we're doing a meeting with some experts in the community to consider a plan to lead a major capital expansion campaign starting this year and going into next year. There will be more coming about that. This is what our Foundation is trying to do. We are trying to plan for bigger and better events. We’ve done a lot of small things; we love doing those but we also want to do some new projects and we are working on them also. That is what I have to basically update the Council and the Mayor. If you have any questions I would be glad to answer them. Angelou inquired about how much money was donated. Mr. Tucker said they have donated over $75,000 to P&Rs. Kneeland commended Tucker for his commitment; your organization is what community is all about. That really helps the city in many ways. I just want to thank Lee, the Foundation, and the team itself for Creekside Live and this year. Not just because people are there, but to bring the community together. The activity it brings and how it is supporting businesses is another move forward. It is phenomenal. Mr. Tucker said your absolutely welcome. Because you’re going to have more involvement in it, more ‘skin in the game’ as they say to make sure it happens and goes well, it is well promoted and I think we are already seeing a big push, and we really have not gotten the word out enough. So we’re going to be doing it and we’re looking for more help, sponsorship and more involvement for some nice events. Maybe City of Gahanna Page 3 City Council Meeting Minutes March 16, 2015 have more Arts out there, have other musicians play in a different location. Also before the concert starts just to get it going and to bring some live music to the Creekside area. D. EXECUTIVE SESSION A motion was made by Schnetzer, seconded by Leeseberg, to enter executive session to go into Executive Session under authority of Section 5.40(a) of the Council Rules of Procedure to consider the appointment, employment, dismissal, discipline, promotion, demotion or compensation of a public employee, official, licensee or regulated individual unless such public employee, official, licensee or regulated individual requests a public hearing. The motion carried by the following vote: Yes: 7- Angelou, Jolley, Leeseberg, Renner, Schnetzer, Kneeland and Larick Council rose to Executive Session at 7:12 p.m. Council rose to report from Executive Session at 7:19 p.m. with no action taken. E. INTRODUCTIONS AND ASSIGNMENT TO COMMITTEE: Items under section E. were introduced. Ordinances - To Be Introduced and Assigned to Committee: ORD-0036-2015 TO ADOPT THE PARKS & RECREATION MASTER PLAN UPDATE, DATED FEBRUARY 2015, BY PROS CONSULTING INC. FOR THE CITY OF GAHANNA, OHIO. This Ordinance was introduced. ORD-0037-2015 TO ACCEPT DEED OF EASEMENT FOR SLOPE EASEMENT FROM GEORGE R. BRIGHT, JR. This Ordinance was introduced. ORD-0038-2015 TO ACCEPT WARRANTY DEED FOR 0.035 ACRES ON CARPENTER ROAD, FROM GEORGE R. BRIGHT, JR. FOR RIGHT OF WAY PURPOSES, FOR CARPENTER ROAD BRIDGE REPLACEMENT ST993. City of Gahanna Page 4 City Council Meeting Minutes March 16, 2015 This Ordinance was introduced. ORD-0039-2015 TO ACCEPT WARRANTY DEED FOR 0.0708 ACRES ON CARPENTER ROAD, FROM BRIAN D. BURFORD AND KAREN BURFORD FOR RIGHT OF WAY PURPOSES, FOR CARPENTER ROAD BRIDGE REPLACEMENT ST993. This Ordinance was introduced. ORD-0040-2015 TO ACCEPT WARRANTY DEED FOR 0.0468 ACRES ON CARPENTER ROAD, FROM MICHAEL CELENTANO AND ALISON CELENTANO FOR RIGHT OF WAY PURPOSES, FOR CARPENTER ROAD BRIDGE REPLACEMENT ST993. This Ordinance was introduced. ORD-0041-2015 TO AUTHORIZE THE MAYOR TO ENTER INTO CONTRACT WITH URS CORPORATION FOR DESIGN SERVICES FOR THE CARPENTER ROAD BRIDGE REPLACEMENT ST 993. This Ordinance was introduced. ORD-0043-2015 TO AUTHORIZE THE MAYOR TO ENTER INTO AGREEMENT WITH PLUG SMART TO PERFORM AN ENERGY AUDIT ON 6 CITY-OWNED FACILITIES; TO AUTHORIZE THE MAYOR TO SUBMIT APPLICATION FOR GRANT FUNDING FOR SAID PROJECT; AND TO DECLARE AN EMERGENCY. This Ordinance was introduced. ORD-0044-2015 TO AUTHORIZE THE MAYOR TO ENTER INTO AGREEMENT WITH ZOKO CONSULTING SERVICES, INC., FOR UTILITY BILL VALIDATION TRAINING. This Ordinance was introduced. ORD-0045-2015 TO AUTHORIZE THE MAYOR TO ENTER INTO EASEMENT AGREEMENT WITH GEORGE AND VIVIAN PARKER FOR BIG WALNUT TRAIL, SECTION 5. This Ordinance was introduced. City of Gahanna Page 5 City Council Meeting Minutes March 16, 2015 ORD-0046-2015 TO AUTHORIZE THE MAYOR TO EXECUTE AMENDMENT TO CROSS ACCESS EASEMENT AGREEMENT WITH GEORGE E. PARKER JR. AND VIVIAN M. PARKER FOR THE BIG WALNUT TRAIL, SECTION 5. This Ordinance was introduced. ORD-0047-2015 TO AUTHORIZE THE MAYOR TO EXERCISE THE OPTION TO PURCHASE GAHANNA WOODS-FOXWOOD RESERVE E AND TO SUPPLEMENTALLY APPROPRIATE $216,000 THEREFOR. This Ordinance was introduced. F. CONSENT AGENDA: Ordinance: Introduce, Waive Second Reading, Adopt as Emergency: ORD-0042-2015 TO AUTHORIZE THE MAYOR TO ENTER INTO CONTRACT WITH ABM ONSITE SERVICES- MIDWEST, INC.; FOR JANITORIAL SERVICES; TO REPEAL ORD-0004-2015; AND TO DECLARE AN EMERGENCY. This Ordinance was Adopted on the Consent Agenda. Ordinances on Second Reading: ORD-0031-2015 SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATION - Police Duty Weapon Fund This Ordinance was Adopted on the Consent Agenda. ORD-0032-2015 TO AUTHORIZE THE CREATION OF THE PARK RENTAL ESCROW AGENCY FUND. This Ordinance was Adopted on the Consent Agenda. ORD-0033-2015 TO REAUTHORIZE AND CONFIRM THE PLANNED TRANSFERS AS APPROPRIATED IN ORD-0163-2014. This Ordinance was Adopted on the Consent Agenda. ORD-0034-2015 SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATION - Court Case Files. This Ordinance was Adopted on the Consent Agenda. ORD-0035-2015 TO AUTHORIZE THE MAYOR TO ENTER INTO AGREEMENT WITH City of Gahanna Page 6 City Council Meeting Minutes March 16, 2015 THE GAHANNA PARKS & RECREATION FOUNDATION, INC. AND TO SUPPLEMENTALLY APPROPRIATE $16,256. This Ordinance was Adopted on the Consent Agenda. Resolution: Introduce, Waive Second Reading, Adopt: RES-0002-2015 TO AUTHORIZE THE MAYOR TO MAKE APPLICATION FOR CLEAN OHIO CONSERVATION FUNDS FOR THE ACQUISITION OF PROPERTY WITHIN THE HOMEWOOD DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION'S GAHANNA FOXWOOD SECTION 3 SUBDIVISION FOR WETLAND PROTECTION. This Resolution was Adopted on the Consent Agenda. Motion Resolution: MR-0016-2015 A Motion Resolution that this Council has no objection to the transfer of a D5 liquor permit from VBR Corp, dba Gahanna Lanes to Bowl for Fun Inc., dba Gahanna Lanes, 215 W. Johnstown Road, Gahanna, Ohio 43230. This Motion Resolution was Approved on the Consent Agenda. MR-0017-2015 A Motion Resolution to appoint Rick Duff to a three-year term on the Records Commission expiring December 31, 2017. This Motion Resolution was Approved on the Consent Agenda. Approval of the Consent Agenda A motion was made by Larick, seconded by Schnetzer, to approve the Consent Agenda. The motion carried by the following vote: Yes: 7- Angelou, Jolley, Leeseberg, Renner, Schnetzer, Kneeland and Larick End of the Consent Agenda Minutes - To Approve: 2015-0063 3-9-2015 Special Council Meeting Minutes G. PUBLIC HEARINGS: None. H. STANDING COMMITTEES: 2015-0062 Committee Minutes 3-9-2015 City of Gahanna Page 7 City Council Meeting Minutes March 16, 2015 Committee of the Whole - Renner No report. Finance - Schnetzer No report. Service & Safety - Leeseberg No report. Development & Parks - Larick No report. I. CORRESPONDENCE AND ACTIONS: Clerk - None. Council - None. J. SECOND READING OF ORDINANCES: None. K. FIRST READING OF ORDINANCES: None. L. MOTIONS/RESOLUTIONS: None. M. REPRESENTATIVES: Community Improvement Corporation (CIC) - Larick/Kneeland Larick said meeting is tomorrow at City Hall at 7:30 a.m. Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission (MORPC) - Angelou Angelou stated we had lots of business coverage this past Thursday; for starters, the State of the Region is April 2nd, Mr. Kneeland; is sold out which is one of the first times they have ever been sold out two weeks in advance of the event so that is about 750 people that are City of Gahanna Page 8 City Council Meeting Minutes March 16, 2015 going to be at the Hilton on April 2. The speaker is Jeffery Tomlin, who is the Principal and Director of Strategy at Nelson/ Nygaard Consulting a transportation and planning engineering firm. Tomlin has provided transformative transportation plans throughout the world and has led award winning plans in cities from Vancouver to Moscow and Abu Dhabi. And also has been part of Central Ohio projects like the NextGen plan with COTA and the Multi Mobile Thoroughfare Plan with the City of Columbus which I believe has now been put out so it is ready to go. So I hope those members of Council who are planning to attend will enjoy. There is an intern pilot program being sponsored by MORPC, we have interns that are going out to various cities, there are about 40 that have actually applied so they are looking for other places like the City of Gahanna or if it is possible for a summer session intern these are all juniors in college who are the at the top of their class. This will be a 3,000 dollar investment for ten weeks. So if we are interested in that, maybe we can get one of those interns. MORPC was at the NARC convention in Washington D.C. at the beginning of February so they go every year and have met with all of our representatives at that time and have brought back some interesting concepts from that particular convention. MORPC has won the Employee of the Year award for advancing women in transportation; a very good thing for our region to have this award. Some of the interesting things that happened, we did accept the Village of Sunbury which puts us at a number of 60 now of participating communities in MORPC. As a Gahanna resident Ilene Moody is doing a great job on bringing in more and more into the MORPC family. We did pass some resolutions. The first one is supporting MORPC as the host agency of the 2016 National Safe Roads to School Conference. This is an international movement and actually MORPC was asked to apply to do this. This is about a 300,000 dollar budget for this conference which will be held April 5-7 of 2018. They are expecting between 600 and 700 people at the conference. MORPC felt that they would like to take on the events because we have taken on a number of event such as the Eco summit or the sustainability summit. Plus it also focuses on key areas; pedestrian and bicycle planning, safety planning and public health. In 1969 50% of school age children walked to school. Now it is less is than 15%. The idea is City of Gahanna Page 9 City Council Meeting Minutes March 16, 2015 making walking and bicycling a part of daily life to lead to better health. Eric Miller mentioned that each one of these people coming to the conference spend between 50 to 75 dollars a day so it will be bringing an active part of the economy. Tourism does that. It adds to the economy on a daily basis. So that one was passed. The next one was the U.S. E.P.A. Proposal to Strengthen the Ozone Standard. This is an interesting situation because our region is actually meeting the 75 ozone standard as of this point. Ozone is a colorless, odorless gas and in this particular region it comes mainly from mobile sources. It goes right along with that 2050 plan; we are going to have 500,000 more people so we need to make places more walkable and have public transportation and this really does fit very well into that. The standard is 75. We are currently at 75. They want to lower the standard to 70 then to 65 parts per billion. The standard is a difficult compliance. We did add as a caveat to the whole thing that indeed extra funding from federal sources would have to be there for us to commit to getting this level down to 65 parts per billion. It is going to take additional funding and we have put that as a caveat into the support of this because it is good for our communities however we should not have unfunded mandates from the federal government. That did pass. Authorized the Executive Director to procure and enter into agreement to receive local funds related to Insight 2050 Phase 2A1. There are many phases to the Insight 2050 Phase program so we did pass this one to accept 380,000 dollars from federal and local sources to implement the 2050 Phase 2A Plan. Again this is an exciting project for our communities. We did have Keith Campbell come and give us a spotlight on the Jet Taskforce Report. I think, Mayor, you have been a part of that task force. It kind of advances Port Columbus as our regional transportation center. The information given was pretty inclusive and I believe there is a website for it that will have all of the information an will be on and ongoing basis. There have already been successes with the Taskforce as Southwest is providing flights to San Francisco. The purpose is to make Port Columbus a vital regional transportation center. That was an excellent presentation. We had building committee. Looking to partner and collaborate with Columbus State. It is in the initial stages of discussion. The Data site task force. Gahanna was well represented. Anthony Jones will give an update on how that is going. MORPC being a data site for all of the communities. Interesting they are working to get the budget for the state there. It looks as though local government funds will increase 44%. This is still City of Gahanna Page 10 City Council Meeting Minutes March 16, 2015 pending. Transportation Policy Committee: All of motions were passed. Federal funding and projects. All in all a pretty nice meeting. Thanks so much. Bd. of Education, Gahanna-Jefferson Public Schools - Jolley No report. Convention & Visitors Bureau (CVB) - Jolley Jolley gave another reminder of the Annual Meeting on Thursday at 7:30 at the Creekside Convention Center with Executive Director Laurie Jadwin, today she said she has heard from all but two folks on Council whether they can or cannot attend. It is a great event and we’ve got a really good speaker this year. I will just encourage anyone that is able to come out and encourage the GCVB, see the swearing in of our Board, interact with the local businesses. We will be there giving out several awards as we do every year. It is fully growing and doing very well. The Creekside Blues and Jazz Festival, even though it is in June, is a yearlong project. We are three quarters of the way through our fundraising and we need support so if there are any businesses that you know of that might want to support this, let us know. N. OFFICIAL REPORTS: Mayor Mayor Stinchcomb said CVB Breakfast Thursday Morning. Jack Parks the speaker, I will be swearing in the Board. Second Item as Karen mentioned April 2 the MORPC Luncheon I will be attending. If any Council Members are not attending let me know because KEMBA’s having their grand opening at the same time and my efforts to get them to change that were unsuccessful so I would love to have someone from the City to represent Gahanna at the KEMBA opening. Two other things. We obviously had quite a bit of flooding this weekend. The United States Geological Survey reminders are coming every hour and it got to eleven feet which is when we have to put our floodwalls up. I don’t think they ended up going up, but we came real close. Mark and everyone has been working really hard to clean that up. It is going to take a couple of days to get that cleaned up. But we should be back in business down there real soon. City of Gahanna Page 11 City Council Meeting Minutes March 16, 2015 And the last thing as I mentioned Thursday during my State of the City Address, the potholes are in full bloom and are continuing to bloom. So I would like to give you our process. If you know of potholes that seem to be bad, during business hours, please contact the City and let the Service Department know so they can pass it along to our street crews. If they are after hours and you think they are potentially dangerous, please contact the Police Department, non-emergency number and then they’ll check it and deem if we will bring in overtime crews or not or if we can fix it on the next business day. I had gone down Beaverbrook this morning and it was pretty bad and I know they are all over the place. So we are addressing them just as quickly as we possibly can. The last two hard winters have been particularly tough on the roads. That’s all I have tonight. Thank you. City Attorney No comment. O. COUNCIL COMMENT Angelou said there will be a presentation at Planning Commission on Wednesday; State of the City was a nice presentation; Niel Jurist did a great job on the videos; go Bucks; hope they do well; congratulations to the boys and girls basketball teams. Leeseberg said he enjoyed the weather. Jolley said good job to the Mayor; kudos to the Mayor. P. ADJOURNMENT - by Jolley at 7:37 p.m. Kimberly McWilliams, CMC Clerk of Council City of Gahanna Page 12 City Council Meeting Minutes March 16, 2015 APPROVED by the City Council, this day of 2015. Thomas R. Kneeland City of Gahanna Page 13