Mayor & Council

MINUTES Town of Smyrna Council Meeting Monthly Meeting Monday, April 15, 2024, 6:30 pm - 8:00 pm Council Chambers, Town Hall MEMBERS OF THE PUBLIC WILL BE PERMITTED TO PARTICIPATE IN THIS MEETING by teleconference by calling 1-301-715-8592 and entering Meeting ID number: 859 0356 0336 Passcode: 394788 or by visiting Join Zoom meeting at: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/85903560336?pwd=7knRMePuQORbbpYIPZcSg5gTAQ148P.1 1. 6:30 PM - Public Hearing​ a. An ordinance to rezone 439 parcels to the zoning districts of corridor commercial (CCM), industrial/office/research park (IORP), institutional and recreational (I & R), limited office (LO), planned village community (PVC), and R-2 residential (R-2) in compliance with the comprehensive plan of the Town of Smyrna Jeremy Rothwell made his presentation for the rezoning of 439 parcels. Several residents spoke about the need to decrease the number of homes being built in Smyrna, the increase in traffic and travel times, the need for more business and less homes and developments. The owner of a property located directly behind the Wendy's Restaurant had his attorney speak about excluding this property from the rezoning ordinance. Several people were confused about the discussion and wanted to speak about water towers, trash, and election notifications. Mayor Johnson advised them of such and asked them to stay for the regular meeting to speak. 2. 7:00 PM - Call to order – regular meeting Meeting was called to order at 7:10 pm By Mayor Robert Johnson 3. Pledge of Allegiance/Moment of Silence Led by Mayor Robert Johnson 4. Roll call Led by Mary Bowers-Johnson. All councilmembers were present including Vice Mayor Rasmussen who was participating virtually. 5. Additions/deletions to published agenda There were no addition or deletions to the published agenda. Move: Gerald Brown Second: Tabitha Gott Status: Passed 6. Consent agenda: Approved a. Council minutes of 04/01/2024 Move: Valerie Forbes Second: Gerald Brown Status: Passed  b. Executive Session minutes of 04/01/2024 Move: Valerie Forbes Second: Gerald Brown Status: Passed c. Treasury Report Move: Valerie Forbes Second: Gerald Brown Status: Passed 7. Non-agenda Items: a. Mayor & Council Members Mayor Johnson welcomed everyone who came out tonight. He addressed the tax increase. Overall capital budget $63 million over 5 years. Which will help with building up the infrastructure for business to come into Town. He broke down the tax rate over the last 10+ years. All the information he spoke about is in the audit on the website. Business is the main thing we need to get here. We are trying hard to get business to come here. Councilman Brown stated he understands the tax increase. He stated they made mistakes over the past years but are trying to correct them. He reminded residents of the circuit upgrade and the fact that the water tower plan was in place for 12 years. He said misinformation is out there on Facebook. He proposed to Council to extend the senior tax exemption until June. Councilman Pressley had nothing. Councilwoman Upshur urges people to come forward to speak with her. Not at her front door but to call her. She spoke about running her campaign on transparency. April 30th the Rotary is having Mental Health Awareness month and State Planning workshop. Councilwoman Gott thanked everyone for coming out tonight. She spoke about the Arbor Day memorial tree planting, many people would like to be involved in Parks and Rec., Relay for Life was a huge success. She also urged people to come out and speak with her. Little League will be starting on Saturday. May 3rd - Carry the Load. Councilwoman Forbes stated they received the Growth Award for planting more trees. Mayor Robert Johnson swore in another member of the Election Board. Councilman Rasmussen stated the Mainstreet Coordinating Board is this Thursday. He hopes everyone saw the new banners downtown. He said he had a lot of people who have reached out to him. He encourages residents to reach out and ask questions so they can understand. b. Police Chief Nothing to report. c. Town Manager Thanked staff. Had a staff meeting on the Town side. He stated he would be supplying a staff report to council from all department heads. 8. Old business, including Discussions & Possible Action on the following items: No Old Business 9. New Business, Including Discussion & Possible Action on the following Items: a. An ordinance to rezone 439 parcels to the zoning districts of corridor commercial (CCM), industrial/office/research park (IORP), institutional and recreational (I & R), limited office (LO), planned village community (PVC), and R-2 residential (R-2) in compliance with the comprehensive plan of the Town of Smyrna Jeremy Rothwell spoke about the 439 properties to be rezoned. A roll call vote was taken and was passed with 6 yes and 1 no. A roll call vote was taken and passed unanimously. Move: Valerie Forbes Second: Tabitha Gott Status: Passed b. Discussion and possible action on An Ordinance to Amend Chapter 2 (Administration), Article III (Finance), Division 1 (Generally) to Establish a Capital Reserve Account* This is Councilman Rasmussen. So, we obviously all just went through a tough budget. Part of the reason why we ended up in a position where we are with the escalating debt that the mayor mentioned is that we have not built a capital reserve to reflect the ongoing infrastructure needs that we have. So, it has been recommended and we've voted on and approved multiple times when we approve our rates study we need a capital reserve accounts that are set up to include the funding necessary to be able to meet maintenance upgrades and those sort of infrastructure requirements around our water, sewer, and electric systems been recommended for a very, very long time that we have this now that we have done the hard work of creating a tax rate that can support operations for the town and we are not taking all of the money out of our water sewer and electric fund to pay for operations alone. We need. to be planning for the future capital needs of this community and creating these accounts and begin. to fund them appropriately is vital to making sure that we can afford all of the new infrastructure as well as the maintenance of the existing infrastructure that we have in this community and also the other thing about it. It's like when you said this is part of the process of reducing the need to continue to raise taxes in the general fund. You have this reserved that we have to put in external downloads every year. but hopefully the infrastructure and like you say the main thing is to reduce the need to raise taxes and not to get to the points like this like we're opening up basically open up AA saving account for the word fund and for the electric fund. So, we have to continue to fund it for, so you do what we need to do of our shipping treatment now but some discussion another questions. When did we first hear about this and when did we first get a copy of this to rate today? it was sent to your Boardpaq. I would add in so be the numbers that are in here the amounts that are included for water sewer and electric. These are the recommended numbers that have been in our utility rate studies that Chris Simms from Smart Utilities Management has proposed that we've actually approved in the past. These are the recommended amounts that we should be putting into these specific capital reserve accounts to make sure that we have the right amount of money they use that you'll see the 4% of system equity that basically says that for every dollar worth of pipe we have in the ground we should have $0.04 of reserve for that so that should we have emergency should we need upgrades those sort of things that we have that capital in place for it. So those numbers aren't just pulled out of nowhere. They're the recommended numbers they've been part of our rate study in the past and well may discuss these to a month or so. But as we go on to the budget because we've heard what discuss over on that month and 1/2 over is the legal aspect of having to implement it. Do we have staff members that know this that'll actually do this and assure that we're where we need to be to make sure we don't get back to where we're at today and that's what we discussed that the money needs to tell us about it. Do we have a staff member that knows that this will be in place and will actually act on it is my question. Yes,  the Town Manager. This is an exact transcription of this discussion. Move: Michael Rasmussen Second: Gerald Brown Status: Passed c. Discussion and possible action on An Ordinance to Amend Chapter 2 (Administration), Article II (Town Council), Division 1 (Generally) to Establish Regulations Governing the Hiring of Relatives of Council Members* This item was tabled due to the lack of documentation from Mary Bowers-Johnson. d. Appointment of 3 council members to the assessment appeals committee The assessment Appeals Committee will consist of Councilwoman Forbes, Councilwoman Upshur and Vice Mayor Rasmussen. e. Recommendation to appoint Allison M. Schuette to the Shade Tree Commission Everyone should have her bio as listed in Boardpaq. Mayor Johnson made a motion to approve the appointment of Allison Schuette. Seconded by Councilwoman Gott and carried unanimously. Move: Robert Johnson Second: Tabitha Gott Status: Passed 10. Presentation and public comments (3 minutes) Hi my name is Rose Laurie Hamel and I live at 4.1 is coming. It's wedding in the villas and quite honestly, as we only have, I'm going to leave this statement to you guys because I don't expect the answer is because there's a lot as well as we only have three minutes. that that was what I'd like to do. And I will still have copies for all the council. OK, I first first let you know the neighbor in mind have attempted to get answers to these concerns at town hall and spent two hours speaking with the staff in intro town manager Corey Jane. We also came to meet the candidates session on April the 8th and spoke at length with Mr Brown even. lately searches of the town's website have not provided any answers to our concerns I appreciate that everybody's time is valuable and that you have a great deal to consider it is time. However, your vote to double our property taxes, especially without any of these answers, has truly taken up the fact and caused us great concern over the future of our community and our ability to keep and enjoy our own. We have not seen any proof or justification such that for such a significant increase as the town has not accomplished an annual comprehensive financial report since 2020 a budget since the 2022 drift which was submitted September 2021 a financial statement since 2021 or a revenue nurtures expense report since 2021 it appears that none of the town's finances have this day public or published on the website since 2021 further we were told that the budget approved by Council left out of the feline items and was in the process of being tweaked. I've had a couple of questions. How can you justify and pass such a tax increase without an explanation to the taxpayers as to the documented we explored the additional revenue and without notice you have about a minute left. When will we see a year end financial statement for fiscal year 2023 to 2024 when will we see a budget drafted or actual for fiscal year 2024 to 2025. will we see these reports published before our taxes are doing payable due. to the magnitude of the increase as the Council have any plans for consideration deferment or forgiveness for homeowners who can justify an inability to pay the increase without significant financial hardship or the possibility of losing their bones. What is the town's basis for our property assessments and what is the calculation for our payable traffic? This is a simple question in the mind of the taxpayers and one they're entitled to. Yet we've been unable to get an answer from anyone in the town for your assistance with understanding our request. I've attached an article published in the Daily News daily state news on April 8th 2024 a simple a simple notice similar to this would have provided once you've information we've been asking you for all right your time is I've got to shut up just a couple little more minutes here. We've been told that the same for our pilot technology provided the exact for Kent County and the town of Smyrna. So why are these test values so much higher from town? Ken County assessment for my home for 2023 or $52,100 for the town Smyrna. the same year was 211,100. What guarantees the town's council offer that once we pay the increased doubling our property taxes that you won't vote to double them again next year. We have no idea where our money is going. What is your plan for providing disclosure of town finances that the taxpayers provide for and what is your pay and plan for disclosing what has happened with their funds since 2021 you've definitely exceeded your time. I'm sorry for you guys. OK I'll be at the point I answered one of your questions. The budget for 22 and 23 are online. I'd like to know where because I've searched through the town website and cannot find them. Can I use computers all the time and we just need to make sure that we provide that information I'm gonna go to special when you go to the town website go to departments. go to finance, see the budgets. But maybe we should treat another lot to make it easier for the rest to go to. But that those are online. The 21 I was there today and couldn't find them at the gathering and send me in another it is there and for the 2223 you guys spoke about that earlier about that there in process we had you know a lot of change staffing with the with our finance department so. 22 should be done in May 22 and 23 2223 should be done by about six months later this year. Thank you Miss Hammond. Anyone else? Hi. My name is Vicki Blair. I live on 900. It went South Street England. Couple kept. questions for Council and I probably won't get the interest tonight, which is fine. The first thing I want to know is how do you go about calculating what our property assess is at between with the the town gives me and what Kent County gave me. There's a huge discrepancy. So I'd like to know how you come off with the town's numbers The other thing is about the zoning everybody says tonight we have an increased taxes in 20 years or whatever. First of all to me I run a household that makes no sense to me. You have to increase taxes every year because the cost of everything goes up every year. So the Council to not have done tax increases for that mall. That's very sad in my opinion. OK the other thing is is if you're charging me electric and you are charging me water at more than what your cost is, there should be money left over in those funds to do maintenance. OK, so where did that money that was set to do those maintenance go There should already be a stockpile there. And I do believe that we do need a capital reserve for such things. But you already have that built into your electric and your water. So no. sure where that one anyway. And that's for the one topic that was tabled about hiring relatives on council personally. I think that's a no-go because yeah kinda shady there just my personal opinion. Alright, I give you guys credit for doing what you do and I know it's a hard job but to hit the taxpayer with a 97 cent increase is almost physically impossible for the average year to me. My husband collects a pension. I have. X amount of bills everyone and because if you're increased we now have to struggle to put food on the table. If you would increase my taxes every year for the last 15 years, 345 cents. We would have been more manageable Haven't had so and I know it's not used specifically. Tell council has failed this community is and you got the school board now coming to us asking us for more money. But what are tower was approved? How many years ago? Why wasn't it done? All this freezoning has taken place years ago. Why wasn't it dressed dead? You can't throw your mistake on the taxpayers back. It's not there to us. When I moved here, I moved here for 2 reasons. I. thought this was a really great community. You had a good school system. People could afford to live here and not bust their **** Part of my language. Not that way anymore. The school district is going down the toilet and it's. not the town. I moved into. If I was moving here today, I wouldn't move to this town because of all of this things I am getting just the comic persons opinion. But I think. a lot of people feel that way. I have. I'm gonna have to say it. I just. I've just heard about this today. Where are all these periods in September and every other one never beat it and. I mean, I live in the people by West. I moved here 24 years ago. It's a great place to live. Lately. there's so many things that are going on like my water. What I really did. I go to watering system building system on the whole house. I can't drink aluminum. Second animal. You know, I don't have an election or council it was word of mouth. How can you don't know when it's nothing. Don't tell me computers or Facebook's. I don't go on there. and there's certain things like the litter in the street like crime I hear these things that are going on, but it doesn't seem like anything's being, you know, happened. One thing that bothers me and that I have 5 kids I've always said we should have uniforms for all the kids in school. They should. They all should feel the like. They should all have the same shoes. So there would be no growing it. I was not having mother. I was there for all the kids in the neighborhood. What's everybody else went to work. If I said stop the children in the neighborhood. Listen, they don't listen anymore. I must these people want to be their friends Sit up your children's friends through their pants and those rules out there. And we have to go and follow them. We cannot defund the place. We have to have respect. I don't care what color they are. What nationality aren't they have to have respect? It's like people. It's not this. It's not the shape or time that I wrote it. I wrote the city of Lloyd the streets. Well, the streets to your body. No problem. But we need to have changes. And. I didn't mean to leave up here. But. I you see how the meetings all the time and they don't care. And I have long located them now for the previous and I'm not contagious. That's another thing. Nobody knows what it is. I go to John Hopkins and think there's nothing you've got about 45 seconds left. But anyway, bring town. We just need to go and follow some rules and we need to clean up some of the litter. We have people out there that do something that the kids do something wrong. What about there to pick up and then. if you don't have any comps or anybody like that thought Garden. Send it out their parents and putting in a shirt on. So that the parents will go out there and be embarrassed because their little child littered or maybe he stole something or you didn't want to be one of my children. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Next please. sing. Trolls are on. I am here. Ramison. I was in Hickory Hall. I have heard of God. You were saying that you needed businesses to come into the town. II agree with you. But you also told me is medical facilities I can't get a doctor's appointment here. 6 months after go back to the room and see my doctor. I tried to make an appointment with the dermatologist and it was a 4 long plane. It says it was, you know. it's down here it is. Maybe here Wilmington Philly. But I mean maybe if you make it attractive. I know the reason I cannot get an appointment is because the doctors and the P. A. S and they're overwhelmed. The amount. of people that are coming in. They can't see anyone really. The only person that I can call right now get AC which I don't want to is the dentist No, III I'm necessary that's just you can get an appointment with but I think that's a factor where you can try and pull some in you know make it attractive to them. so thank you. OK next who else? come on sir. They just take your name please. Have everybody out of ours. Catalytos. Why is that open now? I'm from Milford branch over on Tamara Correct. And I just wanna a couple of things. I've I've raised some of these, but I can either reiterate some of the things that I've heard trash. ever since you guys brought in waste management. IIII know they are tired of hearing from me in public works. I called them our community over there that just that little B shape they come in a dump trash everywhere and mostly recyclables that this past week they did something where I don't know why a bunch of tangerines were in the street but we we had a serious problem with waste management too. The style of trucks or whatever they're doing another. thing that the very interview with Captain's. in our communication you say opened I personally worked well I'm a disabled veteran and I worked at the base and I was a network administrator for 20 years. I just retired in 20 but. I had to maintain a website and if I had a broken leak I heard about it right away and I was told to fix it. Your town website has so many places where you click in it either a 4O4 or a. there's some information for instance II don't understand why I can't get to then it's some meetings. Is there is there some reason you don't publish men's meetings for past meetings. there's men's agendas and minutes which the Bible nothing shows up your telephone system. I spent 1015 minutes just today trying to find out about this meeting communication is a problem when I when I call a town you have six or eight options and then you go to one of the options and then you got 6 or 8 more options. Is there no one person that could just simply answer the phone and and tell me is there a house so many tonight I got to the I think it was option 6 and then it lasted a whole bunch of neighborhood I don't know who to who to talk to in April Larry and then I can go number one got about a minute left. and so they're not here and on and on but Facebook I agree with one of my previous people in Facebook is not the place to put the stuff I signed. I signed up for the minutes the tidbits and I don't get them. I don't know why my wife does so I depend on her the other the other thing about that sometimes since Ginette up body is a trash there's only two other people in my neighborhood to get it or two people in my neighborhood get it the the statements forget it so you're. so your electric bill is a good place to put it you know perhaps you know advertising in an earned and and because everybody gets it once a month I wouldn't recommend that it was to give information out use that and the website put it right on the front strolling message or something like click it into something simple. Thank you very much. Thank you so. you won't come out long time come out or talk like we got. we got somebody's hand up to him here. This is what we're talking about. Yes, I've been there but there's there's other place somewhere up here that says minutes it's not on this page. II hear you Larry. says the agenda's event. My name is Sarah Christensen. I love you. II. mimic what the gentleman just said that the communication is is small you know. if you look at the age of folks that are on his room on no offense But anyhow and and my neighborhood alone most of these folks like my family there they don't go on Facebook looking for stuff they don't know how to use the Internet and I'm I'm on the computer all the time and I am troubled navigating your website I mean it's it's awful it's awful recipes. I mean went out like putting something out front where. you know there maybe in a glass case out front or something so that those who come by they can see it you can post stuff out there that says you know these other communications or like the gentleman said in Mr Brown and I talked about at the last meeting right then I'm on the backside of the it should be there on that post date there out in that glass box they said I mean but nobody know like nobody knows to come out of say that either you know so like we talked about it put it on the outside of the bill but some you know dates for some items just to give folks some idea the other question I still have is I'm still I mean I'm really good at math I'm still trying to figure out how y'all are calculating my tax assessment compared to how Kent County calculates for that access. I came into the office who spoke to folks like Red Rose reset green hair for a long time. Initially they told me that the only reason the same assessment that Kent County is and I said no you're not she said yes we are I said no you're not and then she said I'll show you we are and I said to God at least show me and she pulls it up and she's like ohh we're not. That's what I can try and tell her thank you know y'all are charging me 155 of my asset you know assessment or and but then when I go to the Kent County website it's 49 too and I understand that there may be a difference in the rate you know obviously you're not charging the same rate but. No one asking is, how are you getting there? And if you're telling me you're using the same assessment, did not on there. Tell me how are you getting to the assessment? Because no matter how long I've tried with the math skills I have, I don't know. I've been able to back into that **** about 40 seconds. All right, my last question is, how are you? What are you doing and how are you going to attract businesses here? I mean, no, no. Need another fast food restaurant. We need some. We need some restaurants or we need some business that's going to take care of this. The documents are, I mean, it's ridiculous. What are you doing? A couple things that we had going on to shut them down. And that's why they moved to build town. I mean, everything that happens. could accommodate businesses, but we don't have the control of selling to or authorizing and the industrial park. There's a private owner for the industrial park. We don't have the industrial park So that would be a really great idea. But he isn't looking to do it, which goes the same show again then all those phones that are going on up there, those phones aren't going to be working around here. They're going to be commuting and clogging up the traffic has enough N which is going to add an additional time frame onto it, which is going to people aren't going to be attracted to moving down here when it's going to increase when the time is going to take them to get up north to their jobs is going to increase those  significantly. Thank you You want anyone else Mary Grace Kemp Sky live on black for Grand Spring Road. I know Middletown Hill Tree decent sized developments, but they put Amazon in and they didn't build them prior to Amazon. They built them at the time. Amazon people in the open, but now they don't put three new ones up there. Newark Air Newport is out there now. They only amplify 2000 people, but because they didn't do drastic huge developments, I think. they're hanging in there. The homeowners are staying But Yeah, it takes more than chip array or something to call those houses and have people pay for them. Amazon pays $20 an hour, which isn't all that great because it's much better than those other things from pay because not only even if minimum wage is 20 they don't give you full time hours. So you don't make up. So to just stop us keeping us in hands with no one to live in, I don't need to stop. It's not very well. And thank you. It's going to be you and you nailed it. I in a structure has failed for years. We have to do better because we can't entice businesses to come here. I can't emphasize enough that when you turn your life with you want it to come on. We have been talking about and I've I think few of you had a discussion with me in reference to we want to build a new substation not only for those 2000 homes that are coming here but if we get a business that industrial park if we fill that up I don't like. it's going to pull on our grid. So I just. I don't know I just like to say that a lot of things that you have said this evening we have got a good point that we have talked about So I just want to say I appreciate you you're getting ready some compensate that we already had and we are definitely going to be looking at everything that you spoke about and will be transparency as Council about should I mention and we will keep you abreast as to where we succeed especially we want is trash and as far as trying to do the need for property tax that the purpose of the capital observe in the bill that's in the Council we don't have to continue to make a big throw for the average for the last 12 years the average almost bring the $4 million to take the money in between the water and what she fund fund the general fund the general fund in the non except not maintain the stone status the Police Department and public work facing youth all the money the city general fund and don't top of that majority of our public work or or in the general fund so and that's the people who get you on the street it takes you about a lot of things in town. So we have. so we have to fund the junk funds or we have to move people from the general fund appointment. What if or something like that but you have to look at a better way to get general fund to become self sufficient. It's safe first universal problem a majority of the local governments keeping well in cities like Wilmington and even with even even with the state of Delaware you don't put it is not funded 100 percent. though and I was you know so well that's just please I have a quick question on that philosophy and would you want your household like that man you you've had your three minutes ma'am I'm sorry that's all I have to say I'll say OK John. 11. Executive session to discuss personnel matters in which the names, competency, and abilities of individual employees will be discussed. 29 Del. C. § 10004(b)(9) 12. Possible action on matters discussed in executive session 13. Adjournment Posted on 04/08/2024 at 4:30 PM Posted on 04/09/2024 at 4:30 PM *Agenda was amended to include items of a time-sensitive nature. NOTE: This agenda as listed may not be considered in sequence. This agenda is subject to change to include additional items, including Executive Sessions, and/or deletion of items, including Executive Sessions that arise at time of meeting.