City Council Regular Meeting

COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. May 11, 2023 1. CALL TO ORDER. President of Council Loughry called the Council meeting of Thursday, May 11, 2023, to order at 7:00 p.m. 2. Opening Prayer & Pledge of Allegiance: Prayer: Rev. Phil Anderson, Bethel Church, Tallmadge. Pledge of Allegiance: Claire Powell, 5th Grade Student at Tallmadge Elementary School. 3. Roll Call: Mrs. Allman, Mr. Bollas, Mr. Bozic, Mrs. Gutman, Mrs. Kilway, Mr. Loughry, Mr. Sisak – present. 4. Correcting and Adopting the Previous Meeting Minutes: 4-27-23 Council Meeting Minutes. Mrs. Kilway: I would like to make a motion to approve the 4-27-23 minutes. Seconded Mrs. Allman. Roll Call: Mr. Bollas, Mr. Bozic, Mrs. Gutman, Mrs. Kilway, Mr. Loughry, Mr. Sisak, Mrs. Allman - unanimous. The 4-27-23 Council meeting minutes are adopted by a vote of 7-0. 5. Financial Reports: • Transfers from the General Fund to Fire & EMS Fund in the amount of $175,000, to General Infrastructure in the amount of $30,000, to Bond Retirement in the amount of $75,000 and to Police Pension in the amount of $75.000. • Transfer from Safety Services Income Tax Fund to Bond Retirement in the amount of $105,280. • Transfer from Tallmadge Reserve Incentive Dist. TIF to Bond Retirement in the amount of $12,375 to Council on 4-28-23. • Appropriation Report, Fund Report and Revenue Report for the period ending 4-30-23 to Council on 5-5-23. • April Financial Reports to Council on 5-5-23. • Tallmadge Recreation Center Profit and Loss Report for the period ending 4-30-23 to Council on 5-5-23. • Income Tax Comparisons for the period ending 4-30-23 to Council on 5-5-23. • Consolidated Investment Portfolio for the period ending 4-30-23 to Council on 5-5-23. • Income Tax by Source Report for the month of April to Council on 5-5-23. • Revenue Comparisons for Major Funds for the period ending 4-30-23 to Council on 5-5- 23. 6. Public Hearings: None. 7. Community Input: Pres. of Council: This is the time on our agenda that if anyone in the audience would like to speak to Council, you can do so at this time. Is there anyone that would like to take advantage of that this evening? No one responded. 8. Agenda Additions: Planning & Zoning Manager, Helene Hussing, will give a presentation on the Zoning Code Section 1108 – Signs and Appendix A3. We are going to move the Agenda Additions to be part of the ordinance under reports. With that, we will move on to Item 9, Reports of Administrative Officers. We will start off with the Mayor. 9. Reports of Administrative Officers: a. Mayor/Director of Economic Development: Thank you Mr. Chairman. • We will start off with Senior Give Back Day. The graduating seniors of Tallmadge High School met on Wednesday and did a lot of cleanups throughout the parks, painted down at Mack Burleson Field, worked in the cemetery cleaning all of the headstones and also did some work out at Maca Pool and the other parks. So, thanks to the seniors. • Senior Parade, which is tomorrow will start from the high school going down East Avenue to and Middle School and then around back to the Circle, not hitting the Circle, but going back out and ending up back at the high school where I think they are having a bonfire up there tomorrow night. So, congratulations to the outgoing Senior class. 1  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. May 11, 2023 • Maca Pool. We filled the pool. Everything is moving along pretty well at the pool. We had some pump issues and that was all corrected and so hats off to Jessica and her team on that. • Let’s talk about Fire Station 2. That is the old fire station site, and you can see the detention pond there. They are moving along very well. The concrete folks will be there tomorrow to start laying out the curbs for inside the parking lot and so that is moving along extremely well. • We do have guests here for Economic Development; inSite is our contractor who is working with us for the economic development and since it is Mayor/Economic Development, I will go ahead and introduce Sean and the Katie to come up to the microphone and introduce themselves and we have a short PowerPoint to show. • Mr. Sean Joyce, inSite Advisory Group. Thank you Mayor and thanks for having us here today. It was nice to meet everyone. We are excited to join the team of the City and help serve in this role and helping to build a strategy around economic development and there is plenty to work with here in the City of Tallmadge and we are excited about the opportunity. A little bit about myself, I am Sean Joyce and I am the President of inSite Advisory Group. Katie Breck has newly joined our team as the Director of Economic Development. Our group focuses on economic development strategies, and we work with municipalities to help them assess what they have to work with on economic development and help them build incentives and strategies around that and help them work on business retention and making sure there is a good pulse on what their needs of their business community is as well as kind of help inventory what they have to work with. Development sites for instance, possible expansion within their business groups and I am also going to help maybe attract businesses into the area. So, we have partnerships with groups like Team Neo, Jobs Ohio that are really working together in collaboration with groups like our own to help really expand the footprint of economic development in the whole state. • You hear a lot of stories about mega projects and those are all great things like InTel and so forth, but there is really a lot of work to do within cities like Tallmadge that have a lot of potential and have sites that are ready or close to ready to expand especially coming back and trying to recover from the pandemic where there was a lot of pull-back of businesses. There were a lot of losses and of course all of this to the benefit of the community itself. Bringing jobs in and helping bring in those revenues and resources to do things that the City wants to do. So, we are really excited about the opportunity. inSite Advisor Group, to give you a little bit of background, we are part of Welty for Welty Building. We actually have several companies under the Welty umbrella which gives us actually access to a lot of resources and expertise especially when it comes to any types of projects that might come forward here in the City. We have access to our development group, which does major projects all over the State. You may have heard of them doing the work in downtown Cleveland for instance, building the new skyscraper for Sherwin- Williams. That is a $1.2 billion project. A company that may want to come to Tallmadge or expand their business, we have the resources to make that happen. You probably have heard a lot about the State Budget for instance; it is pretty exciting for development. Depending what the Senate does with it. Right now there is about $3.5 billion focused on economic development across the State which would be up for grabs. Our part of that is helping find projects and find opportunities for the City of Tallmadge to actually benefit from some of those dollars. So, it is a great time to be strategic and a great time to put your hand out and say we have a lot to do here and we are going to help market those opportunities and really help get everything going here. 2  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. May 11, 2023 So, I am going to bring Katie up to talk a little bit about the rest of what we do and how we approach things. Then we will be happy to answer any questions. • Katie Breck, Director of Economic Development from inSite, and I am so excited to be working with the City of Tallmadge. Most recently I have served under the administration of Mayor Horrigan working and co-leading the office of Integrated Development for the City of Akron and I spent the last 10 years working in economic development. I have worked in municipal, county and federal government and I am so thrilled to be working for the City of Tallmadge. I have been just finding ways to embed myself into the business eco system here in the City and making sure that folks know that I am here as a resource to be a liaison not only between the Mayor’s office and our businesses, but also with Team Neo, the Greater Akron Chamber and other economic development groups. I have been coming every other week and meeting with the Mayor and his team. I have started to attend the local Chamber of Commerce luncheons and most recently went to the Women’s Luncheon yesterday and just anytime that I see something is happening in the City of Tallmadge, I make sure that I am there. Like last week Seven Grains Natural Market had an event and so I made sure I went and introduced myself and just want to make sure that I am out there for any opportunity. I am really looking forward to this opportunity and thank you all so much for allowing me time to speak tonight. Thank you. Mayor: Any other questions? Hearing none, end of report. b. Director of Administration/Director of Safety: Mayor: Don is not here this evening, but he e-mailed you his report. Mr. Bozic: I just had a quick follow-up on the Ritchie Shelter House. Did we finalize the camera installation? Mayor: We have not. Mr. Bozic: Is that going to be taken care of this fiscal year? Mayor: I will present it in the budget for 2024, so it will be finalized coming forward. Mr. Bozic: Then I know we had asked the question in the last meeting of the lock- down, debriefing and I saw that the Director of Public Safety Cooper had made a comment in there about access to the public records being sensitive information and things like that. Is that something that we can internally post within our shared drive? Mayor: He had asked each one of you to come to his office and schedule a meeting and he will gladly go over all of that with you. Mr. Bozic: Is there something new that can be put within our shared drive? Mayor: I would have to confer with the Law Director. There are some sensitive items in there, strategic items. Mr. Bozic: OK. Alright. That concludes my questions. c. Director of Public Service: Good evening. At the last meeting, Councilman Bozic asked about the annual cost of sidewalks and we roughly spent around about $100,000 a year on sidewalks. • Also on 89 East Howe Rd., the bid is out for the demo so we should be getting some bids. The bid opening is sometime in early June. I don’t know the date, but it is out now. • For last month, we had 177 total permits issued. 122 of which were street openings. • Code violations. 33 open violations. 12 of which are property disrepair. • There were 4 burials. One was full and 3 cremains. 22 monument foundations were completed. • Reminder about Memorial Day on Monday, May 29th at 10:00 a.m. The guest speaker this year is Steve Demetriou, Ohio House District 35 Representative. 3  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. May 11, 2023 • Parks & Rec – Membership there is 7,262; that was a 7% increase from last year. The visits at the Rec Center were 15,921 and that is a 1% increase from last year. • Silver Sneakers has a coffee talk on May 18th. • Maca’s sneak peek is May 26th so anybody who is a member can get in that day. • Summer Camp starts June 5th. • The Community Center is open for business. They are doing touchups, so we do not have a final number for the change orders. We are renting that space out on a day- to-day basis. • The shelters are open and being rented. • Pickle Ball/Tennis Courts were repaved at Lions Park. • Maca Pool memberships you can see are at 1,734. • Keep in mind that Tuesday’s this year at Maca Pool are for members only and it just so happens that July 4th is a Tuesday. So, it will be a member only day. • We are still in search of 5 or 6 lifeguards to have everything open. When I say everything open, just so we are clear, we can open the pool, but maybe we don’t have the slides open on those days if we don’t have enough lifeguards. • Next week on Monday, May 15th, the traffic pavement marking begins and it is in the evening hours between 7:00 p.m. and 5:00 a.m. Keep in mind that in the Ohio Revised Code it is illegal to drive across the freshly applied paint that is on the ground, and they will not have flaggers and they will not have signage. It is a rolling operation, so they do not have to have either one of them. • Street Department – You can see 14 tons of street debris was removed by sweeping, 1,800 lineal feet of ditching was done, 3 culverts were jetted, 5 culverts were replaced, 14 catch basins were repaired. Most of which were down on Garwood and that is getting ready for the paving program. 2 cross-over replacements on Beechwood and Forestview were done and also are getting ready for the paving program. • The monthly training was the Ohio Ethics Commission. • The Utility Department had zero water breaks and zero back-ups. • 4,480 lineal feet of sanitary sewer lines were jetted and cleaned. The televising that occurred last week, or last month, for all of the streets that are getting paved helped out. Beechwood sanitary sewer was collapsing and that is why we do that that way we don’t pave a street and have to go in and repair it. Waterlines do break, but these things we can find out by cameras and so we try to do this and be proactive with the camera and the streets were failing. • Talked about the North Avenue sidewalks and the ARPA funds. Those green areas are the sidewalks that are being added. The red areas are the ones that are there. So, we are going to cross at Barnes. That is where the current flashing lights are at. We are going to have a flashing beacon similar to what is at Howe Rd. being added there. We do have a problem though, at the 500 block on North Munroe we have a grade issue. It deals with 3 residents. We are trying to figure it out. It can definitely be done. Some of those trees will have to be removed and we will probably end up putting a small retaining wall along the base of that grade there. We have to get this engineered now at that location. You can also see there are some storm drains in that area too. That’s it for my report. Mrs. Kilway: I just have a quick question. What type of work is going on on the west end of Commerce Drive? There is a big plate in the road. Dir. of Pub. Service: Oh, the same thing. Commerce is getting paved and the sanitary sewer at that location was failing and so we replaced that section before we paved it. 4  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. May 11, 2023 Mr. Bozic: Thank you and thank you again for the expenditures for average for a year. That is definitely helpful information to have, especially going into next year’s financial planning meetings. The only other request that I would have is on the information that we get from the Rec Center, could we have a number of unique visitors, not just total visits or total members because I think that the total member number is not a true accurate picture of what we technically have. It would be more informational to have a unique visitor number. Then my only other question would be, and it was brought to my attention, that there is a deer crossing sign on Northwest near the new facility by Crossings Circle and it might be better to change that to a duck or geese crossing. They tend to cross the road there more often than deer do. So, that might be something to look into. Thank you. d. Director of Finance: Good evening. I did submit my written report. Our income taxes are still lagging a little bit behind last year but appear to be in line with the estimates that I put out. Major lagging number is net profits. I am not surprised. I was waiting for that one to kind of fall off. We had had record increases in that area. So, I just wanted to point that out. I am getting some, this month in May, I have received several notifications from R.I.T.A. about large refund requests also, so we are also seeing some large refunds both for net profit returns and for withholdings for people working away from their work location and working from home. So, I will continue to monitor it and keep everybody up to date. Other than that, if anybody has any specific questions about my reports, I would be glad to answer them. Mr. Sisak: I have a question. Our investment portfolio: have you considered looking at reinvesting them with the interest rates going up and from what I read today, potentially being at the top of the tier for interest rates? Dir. of Finance: So, the majority of our funds are right now actually in money market accounts that are earning the most . . . I am starting to make some strategic decisions about taking some of my CD’s out a little further to kind of hedge in anticipation that possibly 2 to 3 years from now we are probably going to see a reduction so we might want to grab some of the longer-term stuff and take advantage of those so a couple years from now we are not completely whipped. I also have the curve is a little weird right now; it is actually inverted so once you go out past about 2 years, the interest rates actually start to drop. I am monitoring that every day. I actually just added a CD with 2 years and 1 year in this last round of my investments to kind of grab some of that. Mr. Sisak: I remember we had used a gentleman out of Columbus to help us with some of those investments. Dir. of Finance: He is actually out of Cincinnati and he still holds, if you look at the Investment Report, there is identified as Red Tree Investments and that is our account with him and then I have broken out the different types of securities that he has our funds in and actually just this past month, we were able to kind of flip some of that stuff around to bring our yield up. Mr. Sisak: Great. Thank you. e. Director of Law: Thank you. I just want to thank everyone who was able to attend the Ohio Ethics Training. Hopefully you all enjoyed that. It is not necessarily the most exciting topic, but I thought the speaker did an excellent job and I appreciate all of the positive feedback. If you did not have an opportunity to do that, if you could please; there was a link in your e-mail when I originally sent that out and if you need it again, I would be happy to send it to you. You can do an on-line session. We are trying to get 100% compliance with everybody internally and so if you don’t, you will be hearing from me soon. End of report. 5  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. May 11, 2023 Mr. Bollas: I saw on-line the “Do not walk posting” had gotten some traction and I had gotten some inquiries about it. Was it applicable to like . . . was it applicable to everyone to do not knock? Did I say walk; I’m sorry. I have a question as to who is that applicable towards specifically? Dir. of Law: Peddlers and solicitors. There are exemptions for non-profits and like kids and stuff that are going around and doing things for like Girl Scouts and things like that. However, if somebody posts a no soliciting sign, then everybody should be paying attention to that so posting it on your fence or gateway into your front door area is the best way to try to keep that at bay. They are supposed to be registered. They have to have registration through the Zoning Department and that is where you can also register with the “Do not knock.” If they do knock, then you can register a complaint with the Zoning Department or if someone comes and does not present a registration or permit; you can ask to see that and ask them if they have it and you can make a call to the Police Department non-emergency line (330) 633-2181 if you want to report that. Mr. Bozic: Is all of that information posted on our website somewhere? I know the quick little rundown of . . . Dir. of Law: It is there. I think that that pushout was just a way to kind of remind everybody again since the weather is getting nicer. It’s on the Zoning page. 10. Reports of Standing Committees of Council of the Whole: a. Planning and Zoning Carol Kilway, Chair Rebecca Allman, Vice Chair The Planning & Zoning Committee deals with land use, zoning, conditional uses, planning, economic and community development, and public property. i. Second Readings of Ordinances and Resolutions A. Ord. 2023-51 – Exhibit A – Exhibit A Amended – Exhibit A Tracked – P.H. on 5-25-23 @ 7:01 p.m. – P&Z Rec. approved 4-0. Amending and supple- menting Section 1108, Signs, and Appendix A3, Sign Specific Definitions of the Tallmadge Codified Ordinances. Sponsor: Councilperson Kilway Mrs. Kilway: I call Planning & Zoning to order. We have Ord. 2023-51 before us this evening. The ordinance was read into the record. Planning & Zoning did approve this to us so we will be needing to amend it. I think first we are going to have Mrs. Hussing do a presentation. Mayor: Yes, thank you Madame Chair. Let me preface this first. Planning & Zoning did meet on this and spent a lot of time on that. The Chairman is actually in the audience and a member of the Commission, so thank you Chairman and members for how well they did vet this thing out and looking at it. The PowerPoint that Helene put together is phenomenal. I know it is a little lengthy, but she did forward it out to everyone so hopefully everyone viewed it, and she is going to review it, but she is here to answer any questions. The Zoning Code was adopted about a year and a half ago and these are some tweaks from that time that we adopted it. Planning & Zoning Manager: Thank you. You did receive a tracked version and the clean version back in March, so I am sure you have had an opportunity to look at that and then hopefully this presentation also helps you guide your decision based on the recommendation by the Planning & Zoning Commission. We held a stakeholder meeting on September 7th of last year. Stakeholders from various industries as well as the Committee Chair from the Planning & Zoning 6  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. May 11, 2023 Planning & Zoning Manager (Cont’d.) Committee from City Council, members from the Architectural Review Board as well as the Planning & Zoning Commission. Two topics that we covered that were hot topics were the electronic message signs. They were presented before Planning & Zoning multiple times and the other one is the number of signs that are out there at each business. The changes to the rest of the Code were discussed. Pres. of Council: I was asked a couple of weeks ago about our banner signs that go on telephone poles, or that is probably not the right term. A lot of communities put them up to honor their Senior athletes; they want to put up pictures of Veterans around Memorial Day. Do we address that process in our Sign Code? Mrs. Hussing: For signs on streetlights? Pres. of Council: Banners . . . people want to put banners . . . Mrs. Hussing: Do we allow banner signs. Well, we will allow banner signs once the West Avenue Overlay has been mapped out. That is the only area where we would permit that or if it is on property where you don’t really see it from the road. Pres. of Council: And the Circle. The Mayor controls the Circle; correct? Mrs. Hussing: Everything else is up to . . . Pres. of Council: The flags . . . the Circle Fest yeah. So, the question specifically started as what is the process for that and I knew that the Mayor’s office controlled the Circle. But then they asked what about other communities like Mogadore; they always put their Senior athletes up and Stow has their war veterans and I said I really don’t know. Dir. of Pub. Service: What that is is you have to go to First Energy if you want to put those on the utility poles. You have to get their permission. It is not as easy as it used to be. I think Mogadore got in when it was easier to do that. We have been asked that many times, but we don’t own the poles. We own the poles on Community Drive and the poles on North Avenue. Pres. of Council: So, if someone wanted to do that then, it would be at the discretion of the owner of the pole and not the City? Dir. of Pub. Service: Correct. Mrs. Hussing: If it is . . . they are called snipe signs, so they are signs that are attached to utility poles and those are prohibited. They are listed in our prohibited sign list so those are not permitted. So, again they are not permitted, and it takes our guys a lot of work to get those removed. Mr. Sisak: How many signs would some of these changes do you anticipate falling outside of compliance? Mrs. Hussing: I could not give you a number. I think in the meeting with our stakeholders they . . . a lot of these changes are in response to that. I did fail to mention that I did provide them with the change; the same documents you received except for this presentation. I did invite them to meetings, and they have had no questions and they did not come so I am going to assume that they are happy with the changes that we have imposed. Mr. Sisak: Then number two, if a business does fall outside; how long will they have to remediate the situation? Mrs. Hussing: So, if it is a permanent sign, it is considered a nonconforming sign. Mr. Sisak: On day one. Mrs. Hussing: Yes, and unless they change it, they can keep it. Mr. Sisak: So, they are going to be grandfathered in? Mrs. Hussing: Yes. Mr. Bozic: Thank you for the work you guys have done on this. The presentation was much better than me trying to go through that reading it. Kind of going back to what Mr. 7  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. May 11, 2023 Mr. Bozic (Cont’d.) Mr. Sisak said, does that include like the billboard signs if there are any electronic ones in Tallmadge; I think there is one maybe at the corner of Brittain and Tallmadge Avenue. Mrs. Hussing: It would be any illuminants. Any lit sign would be measurable. Mr. Bozic: So, if a church puts one out and the Rec Center has their sign and our message board at the Circle, the schools have electronic signs, so those particular signs, did we run illumination level tests on those? Mrs. Hussing: We did not but they are all programmed a certain way and they can program them to be at that level. Again, we have not measured those. Dir. of Law: So, anytime that any zoning change happens, that is the way it works. So, anybody who has the existing zoning when you make a change moving forward, they don’t have to go out and make all the changes. It is just there is a section in our Code for nonconforming and once they meet the threshold to change it enough; they are modifying it enough as opposed to a simple repair, then they would have to bring it into compliance or if they are installing a new one, they have to bring it into compliance and if there is damage to I think 60% of it and they are doing something new with it, then they would have to bring it into compliance. That is how it works for any other zoning changes as well. Pres. of Council: Did any of our sign vendors have an opportunity or get invited to look at this and review it like Ellet Sign or a company that does a lot of work in our City? Mrs. Hussing: So, at the time that we had the stakeholder meeting, we had a couple of applications in our office so we didn’t feel it was right to invite them specifically, but they did provide me with information that was on the list of sources. Mr. Bollas: Did this initially come from a specific incident or was this more of a general assessment of the Code in updating it internally or was it prompted by an incident or several complaints; what prompted the changes? Mrs. Hussing: So, we are reviewing each section all the time because we practice it every day at work; we are in our office. That is one factor that we reviewed it and then we had a couple of cases before Planning & Zoning and discussions were had about specifically the electronic message center signs and then also the size of the signs and so between that and then finding a couple of errors that were missed during the final addition of the Zoning Code update in 2021, we just felt that it was good to update it especially in the spirit of trying to help businesses out. We want to be fair to businesses and give them a fair code to follow and I think we’ve accomplished that. Mr. Bollas: Thank you and then just as a clarification, regarding the existing businesses, no existing business in the City of Tallmadge will be negatively impacted by the Code change. Is that correct? Mrs. Hussing: Correct, unless they have a sign that has never been conforming which we are still attempting to get that all rectified. The pole signs that you probably are referring to maybe on West Avenue; that one is grandfathered in. They have a nonconforming certificate. If there is, for example, somebody put up a sign that they never got a permit for and that does not meet the old Code nor the new Code; that would be considered illegal. Mr. Bollas: Then the very last question I have; would anything in the proposal make it more difficult to attract new businesses based on the expertise at Planning & Zoning? Mrs. Hussing: I think it will actually benefit the businesses in my opinion. Mrs. Kilway: During the stakeholder meeting, that was one thing that was discussed quite a bit by the stakeholders was trying to make the signs a little more business friendly because that is their advertising and with these changes you’ve met those requests and I really appreciate that. Thank you. 8  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. May 11, 2023 Pres. of Council: I do not believe, and I may be mistaken, but I do not believe that we did read this into the record. Mrs. Kilway: Yes, I did. Pres. of Council: Did you read it in? Mrs. Kilway: Yes, I did. Pres. of Council: OK, I apologize. Mayor: We do have a public hearing at the end of the month. Mrs. Kilway: Is there anything else or any other discussion from Council or any questions on this ordinance. Administration, is there anything that you would like to add? Mayor: I would just like to thank the Planning & Zoning Commission who worked very hard, Mrs. Hussing and her team and Law Director Raber. We knew when we adopted the Code that it would have to be tweaked and this is the section that really needed some attention and hats off to the team that put it together. Mrs. Kilway: Yes, thank you very much and I appreciate the Zoning Department and the Commission for constantly reviewing the sections and making sure that everything matches up and is a good working document. Is there anything else on this ordinance at this time? I know we need a motion to amend it to accept Planning & Zoning’s recommendation for approval. Mr. Loughry: I move to amend. Seconded Mr. Sisak. Roll Call: Mrs. Gutman, Mrs. Kilway, Mr. Loughry, Mr. Sisak, Mrs. Allman, Mr. Bollas, Mr. Bozic – unanimous. Ord. 2023-51 is amended by a vote of 7-0. We will have our public hearing in two weeks. B. Ord. 2023-52 – P.H. on 5-25-23 @ 7:05 p.m. – Imposing a six-month Moratorium on acceptance of any zoning application for a car wash and providing for immediate enactment. Sponsor: Councilperson Kilway Mrs. Kilway: Our next ordinance is 2023-52. The ordinance was read into the record. We do have a public hearing on this on May 25th as well at 7:05 p.m. Is there any discussion on this at this time? Mr. Bozic: Kind of just thinking about this; what brought this particular ordinance to light? Mrs. Kilway: I brought this to the Administration. There have been several car washes that have come into the City and it is a great addition to our City, but we need to make sure that they are in the right positions within the City. Right now, they are conditionally approved for C-3, C-4 and they are accessory only use in C-5. I just think that if we go ahead and put a hold on them at this point in time and review where they are allowed to be, we can make sure they are in the right parts of our City where we would want them. Just go from there. So, that is why I am just asking for a 6-month moratorium so we can look into this a little bit more. These car washes are you know, several millions of dollars in order to put them in and for them to put one in within the wrong spot in the City, it could be detrimental not only to them but to other businesses as well. It is just a precaution. Mr. Bozic: Thank you. So, with that in mind though, if they are only permitted in C-3, C-4 and C-5 as an accessory which would be like a gas station or a car dealership with a car wash. So, the City though doesn’t have the opportunity to necessarily outright change that particular . . . like it is a C-2 . . . Mrs. Kilway: And someone wants to put a car wash there and it is not permitted. Mr. Bozic: It’s not permitted, but what we are saying is that if it is a C-3, C-4, they can submit and we can decide, or Planning & Zoning could decide yes, this meets the requirements or no, it’s not. So, I guess are we trying to make change to C-3, C-4 and the requirements that a car could or could not be going into those zones or are we 9  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. May 11, 2023 Mr. Bozic (Cont’d.) saying that car washes; we want to put a pause on all of them because we only want to require them to be in XYZ zones? Mrs. Kilway: We are putting a pause on it so we can do that analysis and determine exactly what you are saying. Mr. Bozic: OK. Mrs. Gutman: Especially now that we are working with InSite, it is timely to do that. Mrs. Kilway: OK. Is there anything else? Hearing none, I will close committee. ii. Additional Items: b. Finance Craig Sisak, Chair Jonathon Bollas, Vice Chair The Finance Committee deals with budget, appropriations, reappropriations, bonds, franchises, investments, and expenditures. i. Third Readings of Ordinances and Resolutions A. Ord. 2023-45 – Authorizing the Director of Public Service to advertise for bids. and the Mayor to enter into a contract for the Lions Park Shelter Project and providing for immediate enactment. Sponsor: Dir. of Pub. Service Rorar Mr. Sisak: Good evening. I call the Finance Committee to order. We currently have 3rd Reading of Ord. 2023-45. The ordinance was read into the record. Can I get a motion on this please? Mr. Loughry: I move to adopt. Seconded Mrs. Kilway. Mr. Bozic: We currently have a vendor in line for this or is it going out for bid; correct? OK, so it’s not being through our State Purchasing or anything like that. Dir. of Pub. Service: No. This is one of the ARPA projects that was discussed and agreed upon. Roll Call: Mrs. Kilway, Mr. Loughry, Mr. Sisak, Mrs. Allman, Mr. Bollas, Mr. Bozic, Mrs. Gutman – unanimous. Ord. 2023-45 is adopted by a vote of 7-0. ii. First Readings of Ordinances and Resolutions B. Ord. 2023-53 – Authorizing the Mayor to enter into a contract without competitive bidding and through the State Purchasing Program, or as authorized by R.C. 125.04(C), with Motorola Solutions for the purchase of radio equipment, video equipment, software licenses, and related equipment and providing for immediate enactment. Sponsor: Mayor Kline Mr. Sisak: We have Ord. 2023-53 at 1st Reading. The ordinance was read into the record. Mrs. Kilway: I move to adopt Ord. 2023-53 at 1st Reading as requested by Justin Delaney. Seconded Mr. Bollas. Mr. Sisak: I recall this was budgeted. What was this specifically for? Dir. of Finance: This is a contract to upgrade with Motorola. We need to upgrade the Police body cams and the dash cams, and this will get them all on the same system. We will be . . . this is actually going to be a 5-year contract and it is also beneficial because we will be using cloud storage for the video footage and so this contract includes all of that also. Mr. Sisak: So, a question with Joint Dispatch; the radio equipment will be compatible? Dir. of Finance: Yes. 10  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. May 11, 2023 Mr. Sisak: Any other comments or questions? Pres. of Council: Just to be clear, the reason for 1 st Reading adoption is to hold our pricing. Roll Call: Mr. Loughry, Mr. Sisak, Mrs. Allman, Mr. Bollas, Mr. Bozic, Mrs. Gutman, Mrs. Kilway – unanimous. Ord. 2023-53 is adopted by a vote of 7-0. C. Ord. 2023-55 – Authorizing the appropriation of funds for wireless access points and providing for immediate enactment. Sponsor: Dir. of Finance Gilbride Mr. Sisak: Next we have Ord. 2023-55 at 1st Reading. The ordinance was read into the record. Dir. of Finance: This was not requested to be passed at 1st Reading. You can give it a 2nd Reading. Mr. Sisak: Very good. Is there anything else to come before the Finance Committee this evening. Hearing none, I close committee. iii. Additional Items: None. c. Personnel Jonathon Bollas, Chair Adam Bozic, Vice Chair The Personnel Committee deals with personnel, labor relations, insurance claims, Rules of Council and State Statutes. Mr. Bollas: I call the Personnel Committee to order. We have no legislation before us this evening. Would anyone like to comment or speak in regard to the Personnel Committee this evening? Hearing none, I close committee. i. Additional Items: None. d. Community Issues Mary Gutman, Chair Carol Kilway, Vice Chair The Community Issues Committee deals with Parks and Recreation, civic affairs, and liaison between Council and the Recreation Board and intergovernmental affairs. Mrs. Gutman: I call Community Issues to order. We also have nothing before us this evening. Does anyone have anything for Community Issues? Mr. Bozic: I just wanted to recognize a few of us who were in attendance of the Bhutanese Festival two Saturdays ago. It was an absolute delight to be there and to be kind of recognized. I think what took longer than anything was recognizing all of their special guests. They were very gracious and just good people and in talking with Mrs. Gutman and Mrs. Kilway about just how we better integrate as a community; how do we find ways to be more inclusive and I really look forward to talking about those things in the future and how we can do that especially being in Ward 4 where I believe there are quite a few residents that live there. Just wanted to recognize that and say that as a member of this community for a long time, it is always great to see new faces and people come into the community, and I think that is something that we have always been really good at is embracing everybody that is new. I know my son has a friend that is in his classroom that is new this year to Tallmadge, and it has been good. A great experience for him. 11  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. May 11, 2023 Mrs. Gutman: Thank you Mr. Bozic for bringing that up. I will echo that. It was a really special experience to be invited and then to be honored as special guests when I thought it was just special that they wanted us there at their festival and they were so excited that we were there. I think we made some good connections and met some people and that will be very helpful moving forward. It was really great. I learned a lot about their culture. Things I didn’t know. Mrs. Kilway: A lot of these people have come from the North Hill area and so the Akron Councilman, Phil Lombardo, was very much in tune with their culture and helping them get the services that they needed. Mrs. Gutman: Is there anything further for the committee? Mr. Bozic: I have one other item to bring up. I know we have talked about it, and you brought it up before but we talked about the Halloween Street Dance and Trick or Treat Night as being possibilities of returning and/or changing and I just wanted to know either in Community Issues Committee or with the Administration if you have had any discussion. Mrs. Gutman: I have had some discussion and we can have a pending meeting. We would have to set a date and time with Mr. Rorar and the Mayor to decide how to move forward with that based on the budget already being set, but I will make sure that we wrap you into that meeting. If there is nothing further, I will close committee. i. Additional Items: None. e. Safety Adam Bozic, Chair Craig Sisak, Vice Chair The Safety Committee deals with disaster services, communications, fire, and paramedics, police, and health. Mr. Bozic: I call the Safety Committee to order. We currently have no legislation in front of us. I would turn it over to anyone else on Council or the Administration for questions or concerns. Hearing none, the only question I really have is in relation to the call center. I know that we have a rough date thrown out there for when we are doing a transfer. Has that changed at all? Mayor: The Joint Dispatch Center? Mr. Bozic: Yes. Mayor: The contractors are still working up there. The hopeful date of completion of the inside construction portion is in the middle of July to the end of July and then they will turn it over to the equipment people bringing in all of the dispatch furniture. We are hoping to move some of the dispatchers in for training by the end of the year. The cell tower: they started the foundation of that as we speak and that should be up in the next couple of weeks. Mr. Bozic: So, hearing no other feedback, I will close committee. i. Additional Items: None. f. Public Service Rebecca Allman, Chair Mary Gutman, Vice Chair The Public Service Committee deals with streets, highways, sidewalks, buildings, and improvements: water, sewer, electricity, gas, energy resources, recycle, waste, and trash. i. First Readings of Ordinances and Resolutions 12  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. May 11, 2023 A. Ord. 2023-54 – Authorizing the Mayor to enter into a Memorandum of Understanding between the County of Summit and City of Tallmadge for installation of conduit along the Summit Area Regional Council of Governments fiber route, appropriating the necessary sums and providing for immediate enactment. Sponsor: Mayor Kline Mayor: Just to give you a little information on this, the first loop will be from Dan Street down Evans Avenue, Thomas Road, Commerce, Industrial, West Avenue, Nottingham, Overdale, Kent Drive to the Joint Dispatch Center. So, part of that route, I have legislation that I am looking at to do to put in a secondary line strictly for the City of Tallmadge and we will have our own conduit from Thomas Road all the way up there going past 210 Osceola, Fire Station 1 which then ties into everything coming this way and then all the way up past all of the parks on that route that I just said. That would be a $92,000 installation to have that empty pipe put in at that location which also then will be going by the Osceola; that industrial park down there that we are investigating through CDBG that we could be awarded a grant to install fiber into all of the businesses down at that industrial park down there. As part of that, that grant would be no cost to the City, but our cost is having our conduit put in. So, I am sponsoring legislation to eventually put that $92,000 of conduit from Thomas Road all the way up through. We have conduit currently going from City Hall behind Our Lady of Victory and up to Stadium Drive, over to the fire station and then we would connect into that new pipe to get all of those locations. So, for that price, it would be very hard to run conduit with pole boxes that entire route. So that is part of all of this. Mr. Bozic: So, when they put in the conduit currently, there will be fiber pulled to the dispatch center; correct? Mayor: So, the County fiber; the County fiber ring going from Dan Street to the Joint Dispatch Center is one loop. They will then continue the Summit County loop all the way through Summit County to create a fiber link for the entire County. We have the ability and so do other communities to tie into that for our own municipal purposes. Mr. Bozic: So, are the additional conduit though is what I am saying, just for layman’s terms . . . you have two pieces of conduit, and one has the one going to dispatch . . . it is owned by the County and the other one would be owned by us with nothing in it currently. So, when they pull the fiber for the dispatch center would it be cheaper for the City to have them do our conduit? Mayor: We are pricing that out to pull the conduit specifically from Fire Station 1 all the way up to Overdale to the Overdale field, the Kent Drive field up to the traffic light at Howe Road. We are looking at that. Mr. Bozic: Great. OK. Mayor: We are looking at the cost to fill that conduit with our own fiber. That will all be coming as part of the CDBG grant for the industrial park. So, if we get the CDBG grant and it is feasible to run the conduit within that industrial park, we will run fiber by Fairlawn Gig, Tallmadge Gig; we are not sure yet. We are investigating it. Mrs. Kilway: In this ordinance it states that there is a Memorandum of Understanding that is attached. Mayor: It is not attached. Dir. of Law: We don’t have it yet. Mrs. Allman: Is there any other discussion on Ord. 2023-54? 13  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. May 11, 2023 Mrs. Gutman: Maybe you could clarify for me as well, but for anyone watching that doesn’t quite understand fiber, what would this mean for our residents down the road long term. Does that mean they could get fiber some day? Timeline-wise; what does this imply for them? Mayor: Fiber is just to put information across. If we are tied into . . . just like City Hall is connected with fiber between all our City buildings. It is a higher speed, and we are able to transfer information across that. Mrs. Gutman: So, is this like a service that we would offer some day. Is that the goal? Mayor: That is still yet to be determined. Mrs. Gutman: OK. Thank you. Dir. of Law: If I could just clarify, I think for the short term this conduit is literally just that. It is an opportunity to put in infrastructure at a much lower cost than it would if we wait and do it on our own with the idea that at some point, and we are exploring whether that is sooner or later, to put the actual fiber in it, but that would be an additional cost and that could be for the purpose of just serving the municipal needs or then at some point long, long in the future potentially other services to the citizens, but the overall cost for that right now in the short term is cost prohibitive to do that right now. So, the idea with the conduit for this particular thing is to be able to do it; put in the infrastructure in the short term at a cost that hopefully at some point it comes to fruition that we are able to really utilize that in a way that it will be beneficial to at least the municipal buildings. Mrs. Gutman: Thank you. I think it is good for our residents to know that it is something at least we are thinking about and considering and planning for as much as we can. Mr. Bozic: I know that Mr. Rorar likes to do his maps, so is it possible to get a map of the outline of the path that he had outlined before for the County conduit and then where the City conduit would be located. Just as a visual for us. Dir. of Pub. Service: Yes. Mrs. Allman: Is there anything else for the Public Service Committee? Hearing none, I will close committee. ii. Additional Items: None. 11. Reports of Special Committees: Mr. Bollas: Nothing specific other than just to please read over Ord. 2023-55 again. I think it would be beneficial to be passed at 2nd Reading next meeting with those wireless access points and the proposed timeline of some of the backlog of the hardware and what not. a. Council Operations Committee i. Additional Items: 12. Announcements: Pres. of Council: I have two. One is that this is National Nurses Week and I would like to recognize Mrs. Gutman and all the other nurses in our community for what they do. It’s also National Economic Development Week and there was a post today by Brad Ehrhart with the Portage Development Board and I thought it was interesting based on what Mr. Joyce and Katie said their mission is and that is that 80% of net new jobs and capital investment in any economy are generated by existing companies. So, everyone focuses on new business and those are great when you get lucky and hit a homerun, but it is really important to focus on those existing businesses and when you are built out as much as we are in our commercial zones, other than the JEDD, we need to focus on our existing businesses. I thought that was pretty interesting. Mayor: Some letters went out from Ohio Edison about our electrical aggregation. It is called a 14  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. May 11, 2023 Mayor (Cont’d.) refresh letter so anyone in Tallmadge who is currently not on the aggregation program did receive a letter and so we are starting to get those phone calls. You may get a phone call. Why am I getting this letter saying, “Dear Resident and Small Businesses.” Based on if they are not on the current aggregation program, they are being opted in and so if they want to be out of it then they have to say I do not want it; they have to react. During the opt-in and opt-out periods, people get upset because we are putting them into a program that they may not want. Well, they can opt out if they don’t want it. But by going to this program it is 4.96¢ per kwh. If you know what is going on with First Energy, the new rate coming starting next month will be the 11 to 12¢ per kwh. So, our program is extremely good at this time and so that is why they are being proactive (Energy Harbor) to send out these letters to get the folks that are not on the current program to get on the program. So, we are receiving phone calls. Pres. of Council: The last thing that I have is remember Sunday is Mother’s Day. Mr. Bollas: Next week we won’t be in session, but it is National Police Week as well. So, thank you to all of our Police. 13. Adjournment: Mrs. Kilway moved to adjourn. Seconded Mrs. Allman. Roll Call: Mr. Sisak, Mrs. Allman, Mr. Bollas, Mr. Bozic, Mrs. Gutman, Mrs. Kilway, Mr. Loughry – unanimous. The Council meeting of 5-11-23 adjourned at 8:24 p.m. sb Adopted: _______________ _______________________________ __________________________________ Susan E. Burton, Clerk of Council Dennis K. Loughry – President of Council 15