City Council

City of High Shoals Regular Council Meeting June 13, 2023 • Call to Order o Mayor PJ Rathbone called the meeting to order at 6:30 p.m. In attendance are Dennis Cash, Denese Cook, Bo Rhyne, Bobby Vassey, Kathy Rhyne, and PJ Rathbone. Councilmember, Jimmy Laws, was not in attendance. • Invocation • Pledge of Allegiance • Approval of Agenda o Kathy Rhyne asked to add discussion/action Church St., motion to add, seconded by Denese Cook. All approved. o Motion to approve amended agenda by Mrs. Cook, seconded by Kathy Rhyne. All in favor. • Approval of Minutes o Motion to approve made by Kathy Rhyne, seconded by Mrs. Cook. All in favor. Citizens’ comments/concerns: The City of High Shoals Council offers citizens the opportunity for Public Expression issues per NCGS 160A-81.1 (limited to 3-5 minutes per speaker). o Ms. Judy signed up to speak. She wanted to speak of three things. She wanted to say that she has noticed more police and witnessed an arrest. Second thing is they’re working on telephone poles. They are wanting to add a guy-wire in her yard. The third thing, someone checked under her house and the yard is still saturated. PJ said there is concrete is a vent block that is turned sideways. The mayor went under her house and states it isn’t sopping wet and there is a moisture barrier and moisture under the barrier which is common. PJ stated that he doesn’t believe that the grading the water company did, didn’t cause the issue. PJ said he would go with Ms. Judy to explain the goings-on. Ms. Judy said they did not dig a trench. PJ said they did remove some bank and the silt fence. The mayor said it may need some finessing. Good of the Order: This is a time set aside for members to offer comments or observations (without formal motion) about the organization and its work. The good of the order is also the time to offer resolution to bring disciplinary charges against a member for the offenses committed outside a meeting. We did have a meeting with councilmembers and employees. PJ said a few meetings ago, we spoke of approvals and how we move forward and budget. Workers’ Compensation, evaluations, raises, pretty much whatever is on the Human Resources side. Currently we have a wage rate of $125 an hour; however, we did cut some of that off to adjust the budget. Our labor rate per hour right now is around $80 per hour. We have around $25 per hour to work with. If it pleases the council, when we do the wage reviews and employee evaluations, is the council ok with giving me the ability to do so. $3 across the board for the men in the field, and $4 for the City Clerk, which would still leave us with some money to answer the phone if Brandi is out. Is the council aligned with the evaluations, or do we need to go into closed session to do such? Denese asked about the two campers that are at 103 Frye Street. We can have the camper towed, as a city, at the owner’s expense. I feel we should give them a deadline. PJ spoke with Mr. Poole, but he doesn’t want anything to do with it, but he doesn’t want to see it towed. It was originally moved by Michael. PJ said he would go speak with them and give them a week to have it moved, or we will have it towed. ➢ Departmental Reports: • Police Report-Gaston County • Financial-Dennis Cash o CHECKING: $464,133.23 o SAVINGS: $160,236.45 o SAVINGS 2: $ 11,102.43 o CAPITAL MGMT: $ 45,324.05 o TOTAL: $680,796.16 • Cemetery-Denese Cook ➢ We had some problems with someone dropping their tree limbs. ➢ Yellow Jackets treated at cemetery. • Water/Sewer-Bo Rhyne ➢ Water leak at concession stand, we need to contact Tim. • Streets/Maintenance/Sanitation-Kathy Rhyne ▪ We still have the gentleman jumping the speed bump. Kathy will get a work order generated for a new pole to be put in. ▪ A work order has been issued to level out some of the dirt at the ballpark, so people can drive in. PJ has the workorder for it. PJ said if we slope this off, it will bring dirt onto the ballfield. Kathy said that we could maybe spread it out gradually, up to the fence. Needs to be built up from settling over the years. • Parks/Recreation-Bobby Vassey ➢ Yard of the Month: Robert Bryan • 168 Harry Robinson • Had put in a work order for the park to be sprayed for ants ➢ Update on 50-year celebration • This is the 50th year that the city has been incorporated. We are doing the planning piece now and would love to have some community involvement. • Event is set for October 14th, 10 a.m.-9p.m. o Vendors 10-4 o Rides 2-7 o Music/bands 5-9 o Fireworks at the end of the night o We will need a lot of help with committee meetings, broken into segments. o Phone calls, research needed o We can have 3 council members or 2 council members and the mayor at these meetings o Our next meeting is 6/20 at 6:30 • Vehicles-Jimmy Laws • Administration/Mayor Report-PJ Rathbone ➢ We’re all aware that we have an employee that got injured. He tripped. To mitigate the hazard, we painted the ramps on the trailer to make them more visible. He did sustain an injury to his hand. ➢ We have applied for the next piece of water improvement, for River Street. It will require tearing the road up. The existing water line is in the middle of the road. We will need a good execution for parking on River Street. ➢ County zoning meeting, PJ attended due to some residents there asking questions. It was passed on the county level for zoning. We will have our city Public Hearing in July. The feedback from the residents was actually positive at the county meeting. ➢ Open Public Hearing: Budget • Motion to open public hearing by Mr. Cash, seconded by Mrs. Cook. All in favor. • Total of all expenses = $738,551.28 ➢ Close Public Hearing o Motion to close Public hearing by Mr. Cash, seconded by Mr. Rhyne. All in favor. ➢ Old Business: • Discussion/Action: Budget ordinance 2023/2024 ➢ Budget shall be adopted for 2023-2024 fiscal year. Motion to pass the budget by Mr. Cash, seconded by Mr. Rhyne. All in favor. ➢ New Business: • Discussion/Action: Request to shut down Thompkins Street August 5 (Fire Department) ➢ Mr. Cash asked if they could close the street for recruitment and special events day for 4 hours. Dense makes motion to shut down Thompkins St between 10-2, seconded by Mr. Rhyne. All in favor. (Dennis, did not vote) • Discussion/Action: Resolution for Local Water Supply Plan ➢ Motion to approve by Ms. Rhyne, seconded by Mr. Rhyne. All in favor. • Discussion/Action: Resolution for Water Shortage Supply Plan ➢ Motion to approve by Ms. Rhyne, seconded by Mr. Rhyne. All in favor. • Discussion/Action: Request for county to supply information of zoning/building approvals. ➢ PJ said he would contact zoning/building and have approvals forwarded to us. ➢ We adopted the county’s rules and regulations so we will utilize them. • Discussion/Action: City Hall Parking ➢ Parking that takes place during the day. May impede parking for residents trying to do business. PJ said he would walk across the street and try to rectify the situation. If not, then next meeting we can speak about a sign that states **THIS LOT IS NOT FOR PERMANENT PARKING** • Discussion/Action: Park Trees ➢ Bradford Pear trees at ballfield that follow walking trail, the resident is complaining that the trees are leaning over into his yard. The trees are on the city’s property. The one closest to the road is partially deceased. • Motion to be performed to be completed in July by Kathy Rhyne, seconded by Mr. Rhyne, all in favor. • Discussion/Action: Workorder structure for employees ➢ There are 6 zones within the city. Each zone, PJ wrote down the activities within the zone. Each one of these are for recurring. If something does not need to be completed, the employee must denote such, and each employee must sign off on their work order and work quality. If any of the offenders come to help, then their names will be on it as well. Each employee is responsible for their work performance. Each one of you can add or take away. Mowing needs to be completed more frequently than others. • Discussion/Action: Bathrooms—Unlocked for daytime M-F (at least for the duration of the lunch bus) ➢ Daily workorder for the next month to have the bathroom unlocked from 10:30-12p.m. • Discussion/Action: Vendor fees ➢ Craft vendors for $35 Food vendors $45 non-profit $20, motion made by Denese Cook for the anniversary, seconded by Bobby Vassey. All in favor. • Discussion/Action: Church St. This was cleared and excavated. It is backing up. It is improving but it is going uphill. ▪ Motion to Adjourn ▪ Denese Cook made a motion to adjourn, seconded by Bobby Vassey. All in favor.