City Council

MINUTES OF THE LAFAYETTE COMMON COUNCIL February 3, 2014 REGULAR MEETING The Common Council of the City of Lafayette, Indiana met in regular session on Monday February 3, 2014 at 7:00 p.m. in the City Hall Council Chambers, 20 North 6th Street, Lafayette, Indiana. President Campbell called the meeting to order at 7:00 pm. The Pledge of Allegiance was given to the flag of our Country. The following members were present: Present: Heide, Reynolds, Campbell, Brown, Ahlersmeyer, Weast-Williamson, Downing and Meyer. Absent- Klinker City Clerk Cindy Murray and City Attorney Ed Chosnek were present. The City Clerk stated that there was a quorum present. Councilman Campbell moved to recess for a Public Hearing on Resolution 2014-04 ( A Resolution Confirming the Designation of Certain Real Estate as an Economic Revitalization Area (ERA) and Approval of an Application by Tate & Lyle Ingredients Americas LLC for Property Tax Abatement) Councilman Heide seconded. No public comment was heard. Councilman Campbell moved to reconvene the regular meeting. Councilwoman Ahlersmeyer seconded. The motion passed by unanimous voice vote. The Clerk stated there were no Claims, Petitions or Communications. The Clerk stated the following reports are available in the City Clerk’s Office: Clerk’s Office Monthly-December Water Works Department Monthly- December Water Pollution Control Department Monthly- December Fleet Maintenance/Motor Vehicle Department Monthly- December Police Department Monthly-November & December Ordinances for Second Reading The Clerk read Ordinance 2014-01 (An Ordinance to Transfer Money from Cumulative Capitol Development Fund to Rainy Day Fund) by title only on second and final reading. Councilman Brown moved for passage, Councilman Downing seconded. Mike Jones, Controller spoke regarding the ordinance. Ordinance 2014-01 passed 7-0 on a roll call vote on second and final reading. Ordinances for First Reading The Clerk read Ordinance 2014-02 (An Ordinance to Amend the Zoning Ordinance of Tippecanoe County, Indiana-UZO Amendment #80) by title only on first and final reading. Councilman Campbell moved for passage, Councilman Heide seconded. Kevin Riley, attorney for petitioner spoke regarding the ordinance. Ordinance 2014-02 passed 7-0 on a roll call vote on first and final reading. The Clerk read Ordinance 2014-03 (An Ordinance to Amend the Subdivision Ordinance of Tippecanoe County, Indiana-USO Amendment #8) by title only on first and final reading. Councilwoman Weast- Williamson moved for passage, Councilman Downing seconded. Ordinance 2014-03 passed 7-0 on a roll call vote on first and final reading. The Clerk read Ordinance 2014-04 (An Ordinance to Amend the Zoning Ordinance of Tippecanoe County, Indiana to Rezone Certain Real Estate from R3 to NB 1800) Union Street by title only on first and final reading. Councilman Reynolds moved for passage, Councilman Campbell seconded. Michael Daughtery, Petitioner spoke regarding the ordinance. Ordinance 2014-04 passed 7-0 on a roll call vote on first and final reading. Resolutions: The Clerk read Resolution 2014-04 (A Resolution Confirming the Designation of Certain Real Estate as an Economic Revitalization (ERA) and Approval of an Application by Tate & Lyle Ingredients Americas LLC for Property Tax Abatement) by title only on first and final reading. Councilman Brown moved for passage, Councilwoman Ahlersmeyer seconded. Resolution 2014-04 passed 7-0 on a roll call vote on first and final reading. Reports of Standing Committees: President Meyer assigned all council members to their current committees for 2014. There were no Reports of Special Committees: Report by the Mayor: The State of the City Address: STATE OF THE CITY ADDRESS 2014 OPENING: Mr. President Ladies and gentlemen of the Lafayette City Council, citizens of Lafayette and those in attendance tonight. It is with a deep sense of gratitude that I present to you my STATE OF THE CITY ADDRESS. I would like to thank the City Council, Board of Works, all our Boards and Commissions for all their efforts in keeping our community moving forward, and being a citizen driven organization. I want to thank all the Department Heads, and City Team Members. I can tell you we have the most dedicated City employees you will find anywhere. They care about the community. They care about the citizens, and they take great pride in their work. I am honored and humbled to work with them, and to work beside them. A community is comprised of many parts, but the core is always the same, its citizens, and we have the greatest citizens in the world. I know all of you feel the same way, but I will say it again and again, Lafayette is special. The strength, the kindness, the compassion, the innovation, the can do spirit shines through in countless ways, every day. Tonight, my presentation will be comprised of two distinct parts. The first will be to discuss our City finances, do a brief rundown of significant projects in 2013, and major projects for 2014. The second part will be a community conversation. Discussing our human capital and those barriers and issues we must address for our community to truly reach its fullest potential. We are in sound financial condition. We continue to live within our means and yet provide tremendous City Services. From managing the general fund, to the utility budgets, to our T.I.F. Districts, we utilize sound financial principals, forward thinking, strategic planning and our underlying goal is always improving the lives of our citizens. We have cash balances in our operating funds and continue to responsibly purchase equipment, maintain our facilities, and improve our infrastructure. As you know, last month, we put an additional $300,000.00 into the Rainy Day Fund, bringing our total to 2.8 million. 2013 was a record Setting Year – For the first time in our communities history there was over a billion dollars of new private and public investment in one year. It is a staggering amount, but was made possible by an outstanding business community, a tremendous labor force unprecedented cooperation between all the governmental units, Lafayette Commerce, and the unwavering commitment of our citizens. We saw announcements for S.I.A., Heartland Automotive, the opening of the new beautiful Lafayette Community Bank downtown, Nanshan began producing aluminum and the expansion of A-Cell to name just a few. We saw significant progress on our Durkees Run Earl Avenue Project, and substantial completion of the storm water park at Jefferson High School. A portion of Union Street was reconstructed and we established our first true Bike Lane. Chatham Square was brought to full completion and the entire neighborhood was improved. We announced the Main Street LLC project, which will transform the old Home Hospital site into a new 14 million dollar beautiful rehabilitation facility. Veterans Memorial Parkway was widened and a trail added from Concord Road to US 52 to meet the continuing growth in our Certified Shovel Ready Industrial Park. The Lafayette MSA was ranked #1 in Indiana and # 8 nationally in Fortune’s Best Place for small business, # 2 in Indiana for stem job density, and #20, for best small City ranking, by the Milken Institute. Although we still have work to do, we finished 2013 with 5.5 unemployment rate in the Lafayette M.S.A. We are moving in the right direction, we will not quit until everyone who wants to work can find a job, and I am optimistic about our future. 2014 will be an extremely busy year. Work will begin on the next phase of Sagamore Parkway from Beach Drive to the entrance of Home Depot. Significant work will begin on the actual reconstruction of Earl Avenue. We are making progress on redeveloping the Midwest Rentals site in the Historic Centennial Neighborhood. We are moving forward with our Bicycle Friendly Community Master Plan, and we begin 2014 with 18 miles of trails completed, and another 5 miles planned over the next 2 years, which will bring our total to 23 miles. MatchBox, our communities co-working space and our most significant step to truly make the Greater Lafayette area the eco-system of entrepreneurship, creativity, and innovation will be a reality. The Wabash River Enhancement Corporation continues with land acquisition and is moving forward with looking at the reuse of the Old Municipal Golf Course. The once blighted Queen Anne block will become an upscale downtown living experience to compliment Matchbox and the opening of the New Region’s Bank later this year. In addition, we are working to maintain and improve an iconic structure in our community, the John T. Meyer Bridge, for generations to come. You will also see the beginning of construction on South 18th Street from Veterans Memorial Parkway to 430 South, which will include a trail, pedestrian bridge and a roundabout. In my final segment this evening, I want to go back over my last 2 State of the City addresses. In 2012, I talked about the heart and soul of our City. I asked people to consider volunteering, to be a mentor for a child, to help stop child abuse, to help address mental illness issues. How do we develop our human capital? I concluded by indicating that night was a call to action. Last year in 2013, I gave you my version of the top ten issues to moving our community forward, one person at a time. I talked about cultivating the human spirit, how do we move people from poverty to self-sufficiency, how do we increase mental health services. I spoke of restoring pride in doing an honest day’s work. I used the phrase where work ethic is admired as much as athletic ability. I spoke about education and it was time to quit pointing fingers and truly prepare our children for the future and that is not a score on a standardized test, and supporting and fairly compensating our teachers for instructing, nurturing and supporting our most precious resource, our children. We also discussed pride in our neighborhoods. The good news is there are many programs taking place in the community to address a multitude of issues, but the reality is, we still need more involvement. We need you. I believe it is important that I keep bringing these issues forward. Tonight I am going to touch on 2 key areas that I think are critical and as a community we must push forward on. PART 2 #1- EDUCATION - From early childhood development, pre K-through High school, Technical Certifications, 2 or 4 year degrees, we must develop the proper pathways for our students. Education must be adequately funded, it must be valued, celebrated, graduating from high school and then receiving some additional training must become the community expectation. In addition, we must truly value our teachers, besides parents, no one is going to have more influence over our children than their teachers. Read to Succeed is a tremendous example of what a community can do is a huge success, but that kind of innovation and spirit must be carried into other areas of our educational system. We need everyone’s involvement, whether it is being a mentor, a parent, or grandparent, helping with homework, volunteering in the school, or making our voices known at the State House, that we want an educational system that works and meets the needs of our individual communities. #2 – Strengthening the middle class: I believe it is imperative that we work on helping to create jobs that allow families and individuals to enjoy a decent quality of life and not require government assistance. That we set economic goals and expectations that gives our citizens the opportunity that, if they are willing to work hard, makes good decisions, and be lifelong learners to move up the social economic ladder. We must work diligently and focused to continue a business environment, which allows significant investments to be made in our community that creates jobs, that allow people to climb out of poverty and raises the median income in our community. So, tonight, I again call everyone to action, to put your heart and soul to work for Lafayette. I ask your help in achieving the goals I discussed in 2012, 2013, and again tonight and in particular our 2 primary goals, continuing to develop an education system that works for all students, develops the workforce needed now and in the future and gives our children the skills to be productive adults. To strengthen our middle class, which I believe will strengthen our families, reduce poverty, will reduce the number of people who are food insecure and create an expanded base of community involvement. I am an optimist and I believe our best days are yet to come, and, I believe we will achieve our ultimate goal to improve the quality of Life for all our citizens. Thank you. Miscellaneous or New Business: Kerry Smith, Water Works Superintendent gave the following Departmental Update. The following is a report on some of the main things we are working on at the Lafayette Water Works. 1. So far this season we have had 53 broken water mains and several less severe leaks, such as services and meters, etc. Our season for these runs from October to March/April. In calendar year 2013, we had 79 broken mains. We average around 65, so 2013 was definitely a banner year for us. 2. Three of our meter routes that are comprised of the new Neptune meters were read under all the snow we had during the big event of a couple of weeks ago. Of the 1,742 meters in those three routes, only 14 failed to capture. I think this is phenomenal. 3. In 2014, we will continue our meter change-out program. We plan on changing 3,000 meters this year. 4. Our new SCADA system has been built and underwent bench testing last week and should be up and running by the end of February. 5. We are in the process of installing on-site generation of sodium hypochlorite at our Glick facility. We have been making our own sodium hypo at our Canal Rd. facility since 2008. 6. Last year we installed a natural gas powered generator at the Fire Training Center to carry that facility in the event of a power failure. 7. Last year we drilled and performed pumping tests on five test wells at the Aretz Airport Site. We determined that we would be able to expect 5 million gallons per day from this site. 8. We have also been helping to plow snow this winter and during the snow, we had two fire hydrants hit and put out of service. We are waiting on parts to make repairs. Chief Pat Flannelly spoke regarding the retirement of Lt. Brad Bishop from LPD SWAT team after sixteen years. President Meyer requested the City Clerk to send a letter of appreciation to Lt. Bishop from the City Council. There were no Reports by Council. Public Comment: Perry Barbee, 3700 Redbud commended the snow plowing job that the city employees did over the last snow storm. He also advised the home owners to shovel their sidewalks in the event of another snow storm. Councilman Campbell moved to adjourn, Councilman Heide seconded. Meeting was adjourned at 7:47 PM Minutes prepared by Cindy Murray, City Clerk Complete audio of meeting available in the City Clerk’s office or at www.lafayette.in.gov