City Council Regular Meeting

COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. June 8, 2023 1. Call to Order: President of Council Loughry called the Council meeting of Thursday, June 8, 2023, to order at 7:43 p.m. (There were only 2 Council members at 7:00 p.m. and so they were allowed to wait for up to an hour for other members to arrive). We do have a quorum so I would call the regularly scheduled meeting of City Council. It is June 8, 2023. 2. Opening Prayer & Pledge of Allegiance: Prayer: Fr. Mike Matusz, Our Lady of Victory Church, Tallmadge. Pres. of Council: We will dispense, if that is ok, with the prayer, but we will stand and do the pledge of allegiance. Pledge of Allegiance: 3. Roll Call: Mr. Bollas, Mr. Bozic, Mrs. Kilway, Mr. Loughry – present. Mrs. Gutman was excused, and Mr. Sisak expects to be late. We knew Mrs. Allman could not be here this evening. 4. Correcting and Adopting the Previous Meeting Minutes: 5-25-23 Council Meeting Minutes. Mrs. Kilway: I would like to make a motion to approve the 5-25-23 minutes. Seconded Mr. Bollas. Roll Call: Mr. Bozic, Mrs. Kilway, Mr. Loughry, Mr. Bollas – unanimous. The 5-25-23 minutes are approved by a vote of 4-0. 5. Financial Reports: • Fire & EMS Fund Transfer in the amount of $180,000, Street Maintenance & Repair Fund Transfer in the amount of $200,000 and Bond Retirement Transfer in the amount of $100,000 to Council on 5-26-23. • Appropriation Report, Fund Report and Revenue Report for the period ending 5-31-23 to Council on 06-06-2023. • May Financial Reports to Council on 06-06-2023. • Tallmadge Recreation Center Profit and Loss Report for the period ending 5-31-23 to Council on 06-06-2023. • Income Tax Comparisons for the period ending 5-31-23 to Council on 06-06-2023. • Consolidated Investment Portfolio for the period ending 5-31-23 to Council on 06-06- 2023. • Income Tax by Source Report for the month of May to Council on 06-06-2023. • Revenue Comparisons for Major Funds for the period ending 5-31-23 to Council on 06- 06-2023. Mr. Bollas moved to accept the Financial Reports submitted by Dir. of Finance Gilbride. Seconded Mrs. Kilway. Roll Call: Mrs. Kilway, Mr. Loughry, Mr. Bollas, Mr. Bozic – unanimous. The Financial Reports are accepted by a vote of 4-0. 6. Public Hearings: None. 7. Community Input: Pres. of Council: This is the point on the agenda for those that are in the audience that if anyone would like to address Council for up to 2 minutes on anything that is not on our agenda, you may do so at this time. 8. Agenda Additions: None. Mayor: Yes, thank you. David O’Neal was here earlier to do a presentation on the Joint Dispatch Center. He could not stay around any longer and I will try to reschedule him in the future. 9. Reports of Administrative Officers: a. Mayor/Director of Economic Development: Thank you Mr. Chairman. Just a couple of items. • Congratulations to the Girls Softball Team winning the State Championship. It was a great 2 games that I attended last Thursday and last Saturday. They represented Tallmadge very well and Tallmadge Schools so congratulations to the girls softball team. 1  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. June 8, 2023 • Update on the Fire Department. The doors were delivered. They are sitting in the back of the station. We are still waiting on a couple of boxes to come in for the installation of the hardware. As soon as we get an update on that, I will be able to update you. • I would ask for your adoption of Ord. 2023-54 as amended to be adopted tonight at 3rd Reading. End of report. b. Director of Administration/Director of Safety: Pres. of Council: Everyone should be in receipt of Dr. Cooper’s written e-mail report. Anything to add to that Mayor? Mayor: No. c. Director of Public Service: • I would like to request consideration of 1st Reading adoption of Ord. 2023-57 and 2023-58. Mayor: We won’t be able to do that because we only have 4 Council members and anything at 1st Reading does not go into effect for 30 days and we do not have enough Council people here to do business. Dir. of Public Service: I just want to mention that we received the demo bids for 89 East Howe Rd. They came in on Tuesday, and we received 7 bids. The lowest and best bid was Pro Quality Demolition for $638,000. • Zoning Department: We had 165 total permits issued. 101 were street openings. Code violations we had 29, 15 of which were property disrepair. • Cemetery: We had four total burials; all of which were cremains. • Parks & Rec: Memberships there you can see were 7,221 which was a 9% increase from last year. The actual members who went into the Rec Center in a month was 2,177 members who actually used the Rec Center. Visits at the Rec Center were 15,000 and that was 15% above last May. A couple of events coming up are Touch a Truck on June 10th, The Chardon Polka Band – Music on the Circle on June 15th, Farmers Market starts on June 15 th and the Akron Symphonic Winds – Music on the Circle on June 29th. • Community Center is open, and the majority of the work is done. There is still some touch-up work. It is difficult for the contractor to come in because now we are open for business. They need a couple consecutive days, and we just can’t offer that to them right now. • Playground surface upgrade at Memorial Park: It is to begin on July 5th. We are taking into consideration the holiday. • Pickle Ball/Tennis Courts: They are being color coded this week. • Maca Pool Memberships: There were 2,019 passes. The gates around the perimeter fence at the pool were always chain locked which didn’t really serve the purpose in case of a safety issue, so Jessica Simons came up with this idea of a panic bar gate and that way there is an alarm on it so if it is opened from the inside to let somebody in, it does put out an alarm. Great news: the slide pumps are repaired, and they are working well. The only problem is that the pool isn’t open. That is a picture of the pickleball courts. They are blue, but the kitchen area is green and I’m not sure, but you are not allowed to play in the kitchen area, so it was important to delineate that area. The black asphalt has been covered up, so the border is all in green. They have one more coat to apply and typically the supplier is stuck but they will be back in on Tuesday to wrap this up. • Street Department: There were 80 hours of berm mowing; 500 lineal feet of ditching; 2 culverts were jetted and videoed; 3 culverts were replaced; City-wide annual flowers 2  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. June 8, 2023 • Dir. of Pub. Service (Cont’d.) were completed; City-wide annual mulch was completed; City-wide sidewalk program started; City-wide pavement marking was completed, and I have to be honest; that is probably the best pavement marking I have seen. I’m serious. That was a great job. • Ohio EPA Audit: This was the water audit. So, we had a storm sewer audit in January, and we had the drinking water one in April. On the EPA audit, Tallmadge received an issue notice of violation in 6 areas. He informed Council of what those were and the ones that have been completed. End of report. Mr. Bozic: First one comes in from a citizen that had questions about the homestead exemption for sanitary sewer or water and the question was, when did the homestead exemption start for sanitary sewer if you are aware of that date or year. Has it been recent; has it been around for a long time. Mayor: It has been around a long time. Dir. of Finance: It has been around for a long time. It has been part of our rates since before I have been here. Mr. Bozic: So, the particular citizen had brought it up because they have had some issues with their water bill and have called the City several times and every time, they call they are never aware that there is a homestead exemption. They are not made aware that there is a homestead exemption. So, my question is to the Administration or Mr. Rorar, what can the City do to better notify our residents that do qualify. Do we have a mechanism in place that will notify our citizens? Kind of walk me through what those steps are. Dir. of Finance: So, I believe it is on our City’s website that that is available. So, when we talk to somebody on the phone, we don’t know their age; their financial circumstances or any of those items and so the best thing a resident can do is when they apply for the homestead exemption through the County, so because of their property tax; they have to apply for that and then when they do that they can bring verification for their parcel number that they have been approved as homestead or they can just come in or call us with their address and we will look up the property tax value or the property tax record to see if it has been marked as homestead exempt and then we give them exemption. Mr. Bozic: OK. Mayor: But we do instruct them to call the County because the City can’t do it. Mr. Bozic: Right. Mayor: We tell them to call the County, but like Mollie said, homestead exemption has been around longer than I have been on City Council. Mr. Bozic: I guess that was pretty much the biggest gripe is that they have called pretty much every year for I don’t know how many years, but, and I understand you don’t know and you are on the other side of the phone and you don’t know how old they are and what their income status is but I guess when somebody is just asking a general question, what can I do to help lower my bill and are told you can’t do that; there is nothing available. There is no discount. Dir. of Finance: Well, typically when somebody is calling to ask that, I think we are under the impression that they are asking for some kind of financial assistance that we do not have any programs for that. I will be glad to have my staff, or I can also talk to Heidi in the Water Department and their staff who are answering those phones to, you know, ask somebody; do you have a homestead exemption that you could be eligible for, but then if they do, they are going to have to go down to the County and go through that process. Mr. Bozic: Which I’m sure they would happily do to get the discount. I do understand that it is going through the County, but I am just saying . . . 3  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. June 8, 2023 Mayor: Can you provide the phone number of that person so we can call them? Mr. Bozic: I certainly can; absolutely Dir. of Finance: I believe it is listed and I will double-check, and I believe there is a note on the back of their water bill that identifies that there is a homestead exemption, but if there is not, I will look at also revisiting that it be placed on the back of the bill. Mrs. Kilway: Yes, I just wanted to let Mr. Rorar know that with the work that is being done in my neighborhood and Village Green with the cement work and the asphalt work and the curb work, I talked with Mr. Weigand, and we came up with a letter and passed it out to everybody before anyone started construction and I think that worked out very, very well. I had very few phone calls or complaints or anything like that. I just wanted to thank you guys very much for working with me in getting this communication out. We have a couple of streets done and it looks very, very nice right now. Pres. of Council: On the demo for East Howe, we received a grant for that for more money than our bids came in, so is our grant project specific or can we use those additional funds to demo anything else? Dir. of Pub. Service: It is specific. d. Director of Finance: I presented a written report, and I will be glad to answer any questions on it. End of report. e. Director of Law: I also e-mailed Council earlier today and I would request that if you had any questions that you see me directly in private. Thank you. 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 Amended - Amended Exhibit A 06-08-23 Tracked Amended Exhibit A 06-08-23 Ord. 2023-51 Amended - Exhibit A Tracked Exhibit A Amending and Supplementing Section 1108, Signs, and Appendix A3, Sign Specific Definitions of the Tallmadge Codified Ordinances. Sponsor: Councilperson Kilway Mrs. Kilway: I will call Planning & Zoning to order. We have Ord. 2023-51 Amended with the Amended Exhibit A which was on 6-8-23 and we also received the Tracked Amended Exhibit A and that was amended on 6-8-23 and Ord. 2023-51 Amended - Exhibit A and the Tracked Exhibit A. The ordinance was read into the record. This is at 3rd Reading and we have had a public hearing on it and we did ask for changes with the marquee signs and the changes that were presented to us are not exactly what we had agreed upon during the last Council meeting. Mayor: We do have Ms. Hussing in the audience and thank you for sticking around. She can explain the updates if you would like. Mrs. Kilway: Yes. We have already spoken verbally, and I do understand where she is coming from on this, but I just wanted to get it out there because it is not exactly what we were talking about or what Council had agreed to. Planning & Zoning Manager: Well, I believe at the May 25th Council meeting you asked us to draft new language to allow portable marquee signs allowing them for a maximum of 10 days in 2 years. I did not take that as word for word because there was discussion and you wanted us to look further into it. It is my opinion that the marquee signs should remain prohibited. I think it is not a substantial benefit to a business to 4  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. June 8, 2023 Planning & Zoning Manager (Cont’d.) have that in their sign toolbox. I also think that they have plenty of temporary signs in their toolbox, banners and yard signs, etc., and as you may remember, as I explained earlier to recap the temporary signs; they do not require a permit. They are regulated in number, size and by definition of a temporary sign as well as the maintenance of the sign. So, I don’t think that the amended version should be adopted. Nevertheless, together with the Law Director I prepared this amended exhibit dated June 8th. The changes are in green. On page 229 you will see that the portable marquee sign was removed off the prohibited sign list, but the portable electric message center does remain because it really is a different type of message center sign. The best place to place a portable marquee sign would be on page 249 in the portable signs and I added that in green so that portable signs are those tent signs; the signs that you see on sidewalks, etc. The A-frame signs are not prohibited but we moved the portable marquee signs to that section because they are also portable. So, what we did was put portable marquee signs may be permitted as part of a temporary special event and shall be approved pursuant to the approval of a temporary use permit in Section 1104.09C1 and that is in the use section of our Zoning Code and that section, Temporary Special Events for Community Activities require an event permit and the event permit also incorporates the sign permit for that event. We added the number, the area, the height and width and placement of the sign, the regulations and then temporary special events are permitted for up to 3 days and anything beyond 3 days under 45 days require a conditional zoning certificate. So, I know it is not 10 days every 2 years, but it could be multiple times in the year as long as they get a special events permit. So, that is the solution I came up with but again I still think that portable marquee signs should not be permitted. Pres. of Council: So, Mrs. Hussing, I like what you did there. I think it will be much easier to enforce. The user comes in and they get an event permit, and we know it is only for 3 days. I think that is much simpler for your office. Planning & Zoning Manager: Thank you for understanding. There was further discussion regarding this ordinance. The audio file is on the website. Mrs. Kilway: So, is Council OK with the way Mrs. Hussing has put the marquee signs into this part of the Zoning Code or would you rather have them completely pulled out? I know the last time we talked; everyone was OK with allowing marquee signs in. That is what we need to decide right now. Mr. Bozic: In reference to the marquee signs, these are the ones just pictured; they are not mobile electronic ones; they are not . . . they are only basically what we just saw on the photo? Mrs. Kilway: Yes. Planning & Zoning Manager: Or similar. Mrs. Kilway: That was the big part that we changed. That is why I want to make sure that you guys are OK with this and are we OK to go ahead and approve this ordinance tonight. Dir. of Law: Well, you can’t. You would only be able to adopt the amendment because at the last meeting just for clarity, there was discussion about it that might be OK, but everyone wanted to see it in writing and so this is the written amendment in front of you. So, once you amend it reverts back to 2nd Reading because it is a Zoning ordinance it has to have 3 readings, so it would be amend tonight; it would revert to 2nd Reading and then it would not be able to be adopted until 3rd Reading at the next meeting. 5  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. June 8, 2023 Mrs. Kilway: And then if they decide that they don’t want to allow marquee signs, we can . . . Dir. of Law: You could amend it again. Or, if you choose not to tonight to amend and allow that, you could just not adopt the amendment and then you could adopt the whole Code without the amendment now because it is at 3rd Reading now. Pres. of Council: So, I want to make sure I understand; so, if we decide not to allow them then we have an ordinance in front of us tonight that is ready to be adopted? Dir. of Law: Correct. Pres. of Council: So, I must not have heard everything you said exactly Mrs. Hussing. What . . . why are you against the marquee signs? I mean from the way it impacts your department. Planning & Zoning Manager: I don’t think it is the way it affects my department; it is more about the whole intent of the rewrite of the sign code was to eliminate the clutter and to regulate signs better and to be more business friendly. Well, now we are going to start permitting temporary signs again and this type of sign through the special events . . . I just don’t think that having that extra sign out front of a business is necessary. Pres. of Council: So, here is what I would tell you; just my opinion. Again, Mayor Kline and I have been in here where big projects ended up being stalled over a sign back a long time ago. I haven’t had one businessperson, one realtor, one . . . nobody contacted me good or bad about this rewrite of the sign ordinance. Then specifically in the last 2 weeks I have not had any business contact me and say, oh, that is what I have been needing to bring more traffic into my business. I have not heard anything and so I would be more inclined, based on what I haven’t heard from our business community, to adopt the ordinance that we are ready to adopt tonight. That is just my opinion. Mr. Bozic: I just want to make sure that I am clear on what it is we are looking at. The ordinance without this recent amendment; the marquee sign is a prohibited signage altogether throughout the entire City. It doesn’t matter what it is, doesn’t matter if it is a special event or anything; it’s out. What Ms. Hussing has brought to us is the marquee sign is permitted but only as a temporary sign under whatever permit number it was. Is that correct? Dir. of Law: That is correct, and the issue was really raised because the initial amendment added the electronic messaging to what was pre-existing as the marquee signs and that is what prompted the discussion just as prohibited and then that lead to the discussion whether or not to carve out the marquee. Mrs. Kilway: We did have a business in Tallmadge say that they would like to use them. Dir. of Law: Once every 2 years. Mayor: Madame Chair, but they do have an option of putting banners up for a period of time for that special event and so as Mr. Goodwin was at the last meeting and that is what prompted all of this conversation for his anniversary. He could put a banner up saying my anniversary for a period of time without a permit. Mrs. Kilway: I understand that totally. Pres. of Council: I will make a motion and again I will probably need help from Mrs. Raber. I would move to adopt Ord. 2023-51 as amended at our last Council meeting. Mrs. Kilway: Which was 5-11-23. Pres. of Council: Correct. Mrs. Kilway: That motion then would not allow the marquee signs. Is there a second? Pres. of Council: I will second it just so we don’t have it standing. Mrs. Kilway: Do we have discussion? Pres. of Council: Well, my discussion would be if we would vote to not adopt this what does that do to the whole ordinance? 6  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. June 8, 2023 Mayor: It just stays on the floor. Dir. of Law: If you don’t have a majority, because you need 4 votes tonight one way or the other to move legislation forward one way or the other, you would have to be unanimous tonight to move it in either direction. So, otherwise it stays on the floor. Pres. of Council: So, my concern was that it is not going to kill the ordinance? Dir. of Law: Right. If you had all 4 of you reject it then it would kill it, but you would all 4 have to reject it. Planning & Zoning Manager: Based upon the recommendation from Planning & Zoning; is that the amount to reject it? Dir. of Law: They can . . . let’s see what it is and then we will . . . Planning & Zoning Manager: It would be overturning their . . . Dir. of Law: You would be overturning their decision, so I think actually you have to have the 5 to overturn. Pres. of Council: It would be 5 to reject. My concern was just that I didn’t want to kill all of the work that everyone had done because of what I was trying to get passed. Mrs. Kilway: We have a motion and a second to adopt Ord. 2023-51 as it was amended on May 11, 2023, accepting Planning & Zoning’s recommendation. Any discussion? There was discussion on the amendment. The audio file is on the website. Mrs. Kilway: Any further discussion? Roll Call: Mr. Loughry – yes, Mr. Bollas – yes, Mr. Bozic – no, Mrs. Kilway – yes. Ord. 2023-51 will stay on the agenda by a vote of 3-1. Mayor: What about the amendment of June 8th? Dir. of Law: It didn’t get adopted. Unless someone makes a motion for that . . . it is a proposal. Mrs. Kilway: So, it is still at 3rd Reading and we will wait until our next meeting to vote on it again. ii. First Readings of Ordinances and Resolutions A. Ord. 2023-58 Authorizing the Mayor to enter into a contract without competitive bidding as authorized by TCO 143.03(8) with Opengov for the purchase of Planning and Zoning Department permitting, licensing and code enforcement software and Street Department asset management software, appropriating necessary funds and providing for immediate enactment. Sponsor: Mayor Kline Mrs. Kilway: We will go onto Ord. 2023-58. The ordinance was read into the record. This was in the budget. Mayor: Let me just give you a brief update on this. This was, like you said, in the Zoning Department budget and they had $70,000 for the purchase of a software program. In reviewing the contract and the proposal it was determined that if we add the software for the Street Department, the Asset Management Program, that would save us about $6,000 to $9,000 in the first year. Keep in mind that this is a multi-year contract and a system that you will always have costs going in and so what this ordinance does is reduces the Zoning Department budget by $36,000 and puts it in the SMR so they can purchase the Asset Management Program software and the software for Helene. Mrs. Kilway: So, it is $36,000 for each department; correct? Mayor: No. Mollie. Dir. of Finance: We are taking $36,000 from . . . we started with $79,000 and $36,500 7  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. June 8, 2023 Dir. of Finance (Cont’d.) is going to Street and the remainder is for Zoning. So, for this year, that is the cost. Then moving forward, additional costs annually for both of these departments for that software that will have to be in the budget, but we were able to, in the purchase of the software, provide it to work within the appropriation that Council had given in 2023. Mrs. Kilway: Do we know what the costs are each year? Dir. of Finance: I do. I apologize. It is sitting on my desk. I will make sure that I have those numbers. I will send out those numbers to Council, so you have them for the next meeting. Mayor: You cannot adopt it tonight because you don’t have enough Council members. Pres. of Council: This can be for anybody in the Administration or Mrs. Raber and Mrs. Gilbride. When we look at software; there is specific software and then there are suites of software with all kinds of different modules and I guess this is just more for edification, if there is anyone watching; do we evaluate when it is good to buy a standalone product as opposed to something that may be for multiple departments? How do we do that evaluation? Dir. of Finance: Well, actually that is kind of what happened here. We really set out to only buy Zoning software, but in that process they discovered that there was an opportunity because of how closely the Zoning Department works with the Street Department with the inspections and that kind of stuff, that was something that . . . that is why we are presenting it this way because it was going to help the two departments actually work better together in sharing those responsibilities. We can make departments work together better based on the software that we purchase, and we definitely look, when we are buying software, if there are opportunities to integrate with our Finance software or you know helping the departments more easily communicate is always an advantage. So, I think we always try to do that when we can. It’s not always possible, but when we can. Mr. Bozic: Well, it is a question, or more of a statement; I do like this idea of having the Asset Management software. I know at my time at the Rec Center and Mike Rorar, if you recall, I did bring up something to you before about doing some asset management for the Parks and Rec Department that would be utilized mostly within the Rec Center but also it could be utilized at Maca Pool and at our parks. So, that is everything from the restrooms to the HVAC systems at the Rec Center to the pumps and the pool slides. So, if that is something that this is including, great and if it is not, then I think we should definitely reassess and look at all of those areas if possible because I know when I was given the presentation for that particular software at the time it was very robust. It had a lot of capabilities within it to where you could pull up a blueprint; you could pull up an aerial photo, street departments guys could pinpoint the exact location of an issue or if there was a watermain break or whatever it is and it just keeps track of it and it is just a running log for all of time and so I know that there is a lot of good software out there. So, again if it is not including some of those other departments, I think maybe we should reassess and look at that if possible because I believe the amount that we are talking about at 79K or 36K or whatever it is . . . Mayor: It is $280,000. Dir. of Finance: Over 3 years for these two pieces of software. That seems rather high because the software that we were looking at at the time was a lot cheaper than that; a fraction. Dir. of Pub. Service: So, you have to keep in mind that this is really for the Zoning Department and that is how this got started and so the Asset Management can cover the parks so there is an option there, but Helene’s permit software is outdated and has no support so we have to get that moving and it just so happens that the Street 8  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. June 8, 2023 Dir. of Pub. Service (Cont’d.) Department’s permitting goes with the Zoning and so it works out well and so the Parks can be included; it wasn’t budgeted; it wasn’t there. We can look at that moving forward for next year’s budget, but the thing is that this is year 2 that we are trying to get this software for the Zoning Department done. We couldn’t score it last year and this is the one that scores well, and it comes recommended and it is good software. Mrs. Kilway: Any other questions at this time. Anything else to come before Planning & Zoning? I will close committee. iii. Additional Items: None. b. Finance Craig Sisak, Chair Jonathon Bollas, Vice Chair The Finance Committee deals with budget, appropriations, reappropriations, bonds, franchises, investments, and expenditures. i. First Readings of Ordinances and Resolutions A. Ord. 2023-59 Authorizing the Mayor to enter into a Second Amendment to the Lease Agreement with Summa Health System for space at the Tallmadge Recreation Center and providing for immediate enactment. Sponsor: Mayor Kline Mr. Bollas: I call the Finance Committee to order. We have Ord. 2023-59 at 1st Reading. The ordinance was read into the record. Mr. Mayor, is this considered housekeeping? Mayor: No, you can’t adopt it tonight. You don’t have enough Council people. Mr. Bollas: Any discussion on this? Dir. of Law: We have just gotten the agreement with Summa as to the exact wording. We were close, but we just got that so you don’t have the actual contract yet so we will be forwarding that to you before the next meeting. Essentially the big change for this and the reason it is in front of Council is the change to the rent and so before there was quite a bit of language and the adjustment was based off of the Consumer Price Index and so on and so forth and this just cleans it up and makes it be 5% per renewal period and it just makes it easier for Summa to plan and budget accordingly and it makes it easier for us but it is not something that is not as readily known, so it is just making it cleaner and then they are exercising for the next 3 years and then extending that for another 3 3-year terms. Now that we have that worked out, we will give you that agreement and you will have that for the next meeting. Mr. Bollas: Good. It seems like a really good partnership, and it seems like we can do a really good mutual agreement. Is there any discussion? Mrs. Kilway: We are very lucky to have Summa Health Systems for the rehab and they are top notch. Mr. Bollas: I agree. Alright. Ord. 2023-59 will remain at 1st Reading. Anything else for the Finance Committee? Hearing none, close committee. ii. 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. 9  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. June 8, 2023 Mr. Bollas: I call Personnel to order. We have no legislation before us. Is there anything to come before the Personnel Committee this evening. Dr. Cooper did e-mail us a report giving us several updates, so please take a look at that and let him know if you have any questions. With that, I will 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. Kilway: I call the Community Issues Committee to order. We have no legislation before us at this time. Is there anything from Council on Community Issues? Mr. Bollas: I just want to thank Mr. Rorar and Ms. Hussing for taking all of my questions from the community input this past two to three weeks. I just really appreciate the time they put into investigating all of those cases. Mr. Bozic: I was not at the last Council meeting where you guys discussed some of this, but I did watch the livestream after the fact. Have we gotten any other updates or feedback from Metro in relation to the bus stops? Pres. of Council: I have not, but there was a big article in the Beacon Journal prior to today. I am still getting messages from people that just feel like we were left out in terms of having open discussion within our City about this. Not so much . . . I am getting some complaints about just . . . some people just don’t want bus traffic going down East Avenue. They already feel that they are dealing with enough traffic, but I try to make them understand who Metro is trying to help and I try to make them understand that the bus doesn’t stop on East Avenue unless someone wants to get on or get off. The biggest complaint I get is about the process. You know, we invited them to be here two weeks ago. They told me they wanted to come. We invite them and then in the same breath; well, we are not available on the 11th. If it were my company and it is not my company, but if it were my company my community engagement person would have been here tonight and they would have been on our agenda. But Metro doesn’t need us to do what they want to do and when you don’t need an entity this is how you get treated and it is unfortunate. I think that they are being very disrespectful to us, well I think they are being very disrespectful to the Mayor, and they are being disrespectful to us because we are taking heat that is their fault and so it is very frustrating to me. Mayor: But I do have a commitment from them to evaluate the bus stops and if they are not being utilized, they will pull them out and it is public transportation. Citizens in Tallmadge do need public transportation. The bus going up East Avenue is going to the Cascades for a specific purpose to allow residents to be able to go there to shop, turn around, hop on the bus and go back to their residence. Half of them don’t know it is even running there. I travel East Avenue a lot to try to see and watch and see if anybody is stopping. I have seen two or three buses and that’s it and now I am getting phone calls that they are there every hour on the hour. Mrs. Kilway: I just saw on social media today that someone said how do you get your 15-year-old child to their job during the summer when you work. Now they have a bus, and they can jump on the bus, and they can run to the Cascades, and they can work at one of the retail stores or something like that. Mayor: One little unknown thing that Metro needs to educate the residents that ¾ of a mile off of East Avenue in both directions, so that is 1.5 miles going in each direction and they will send a private bus to a resident free of charge to pick them up and take 10  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. June 8, 2023 Mayor (Cont’d.) them just about anywhere they want to go within the bus routes. Not that bus route, but in Summit County. If somebody on East Avenue wants to go to the Cleveland Airport, they could hop on the bus and make it to the Cleveland Airport from East Avenue by hopping in a bus. Now it may take you a few transfers, but it goes to Independence. Mr. Bollas: When the East Avenue Widening Project comes about, will that impact the stops or the route in general perhaps? Mayor: I would certainly think so because it will be a mess. Mr. Bozic: I have a follow-up question. Do we know if their signage falls within our sign codes. Does it meet the requirements? Do they not need to meet the requirements? Mayor: As a public entity, they need the requirement to be there I would have to say. As an informational piece of the bus stop. Dir. of Law: That was reviewed by the Zoning Department already. There is not anything that is out of . . . Mr. Bozic: Did they seek approval to put the signs on the telephone poles from the utility companies? Dir. of Law: That I don’t know. That is between the utility company. Mrs. Kilway: Anything else for Community Issues at this point? The only thing that I have is Circle Fest is coming up in a couple months. Is Council doing a float or golf carts again? Pres. of Council: Well, I have been thinking about this because I am kind of a planner, but I will be willing to do it and try to find two golf carts like we did last year or maybe even something else if we had a commitment from Council to do it. Mrs. Kilway: OK, so since we don’t have everyone today, I would do it absolutely, but we will talk about this at the next meeting. Pres. of Council: OK. Mrs. Kilway: Anything else for Community Issues? Hearing none, I 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 have no legislation before us. I will open it up to the rest of us on Council and the Administration. Do you have any input? We did receive an update as Mr. Bollas had mentioned in relation to an update from the Chief as well as from our Dir. of Public Safety. I won’t read the entire thing into record, but I would like to know if our Dir. of Public Safety will be present at any future meetings because I believe he has been absent for several meetings and there are probably been some . . . a lot of questions circling around a lot of different things going on at the moment that I think would be prudent that he be here and answer those questions. Mayor: I’ll take that under advisement. Thank you. Mr. Bozic: Thank you. It was just made a comment this evening that he is not obligated to be here that’s all. Mayor: None of us are on this side of the table, but we were here at 7:00 p.m. today. There was additional discussion. The audio file is on the website. 11  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. June 8, 2023 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. Third Readings of Ordinances and Resolutions A. Ord. 2023-54 Amended–Exhibit 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 Pres. of Council: I will run Public Service this evening. We have Ord. 2023-54 amended- Exhibit A and Ord. 2023-54. The ordinance was read into the record. This is at 3rd Reading and it is ready to be adopted. Mrs. Kilway: I move to adopt Ord. 2023-54. Seconded Mr. Loughry. Mr. Bollas: Just a clarification on this. Going back to the last meeting, we had received an estimate from the County; correct and then it didn’t include certain line items or labor. That was in the amount of $55,000? Mayor: Yes. Mr. Bollas: And then in evaluating that quote and then the change . . . Mayor: So, the original price they gave you was for installation only and not the material cost. So, the County said sorry we forgot to tell you that we have to add material and so to run a 2” conduit or 1.5” conduit from N. Thomas Road, S. Thomas Road through the industrial park, West Avenue, Nottingham, Overdale, Kent Drive, Allendale, Howe Rd. to the Joint Dispatch Center we will have additional conduit earmarked strictly for the City of Tallmadge throughout that distance. It is about $10 a foot to have that pipe installed in the ground. It then allows us to connect from our fiber system to Lions Park, to our property on Howe Rd. back to City Hall through the Fire Station. Mr. Bollas: The actual deployment of the fiber itself; that will be at an additional expense on the City? Mayor: That is correct. Mr. Bollas: Do we know what that is? Mayor: No. That would be at a later date. Mr. Bollas: Is it a certainty that by laying the conduit it is most likely going to happen or is that still . . . Mayor: That our own fiber would go in? Mr. Bollas: Yes. Mayor: That would be up to future administrations. There was additional discussion. The audio file is on the website. Pres. of Council: Is there any other discussion? Mrs. Conti, please call the roll. Roll Call: Mr. Bozic, Mrs. Kilway, Mr. Loughry, Mr. Bollas – unanimous. Ord. 2023-54 is adopted by a vote of 4-0. 12  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. June 8, 2023 ii. First Readings of Ordinances and Resolutions B. Ord. 2023-56 ~ Exhibit A An ordinance to approve, adopt and enact the 2023 replacement pages to the Codified Ordinances; to repeal Ordinances in conflict therewith; to publish the enactment of new matter; and providing for immediate enactment. Sponsor: Director of Law Megan E. Raber Pres. of Council: Next, we have Ord. 2023-56 – Exhibit A. The ordinance was read into the record. This is at 1st Reading and we cannot adopt it this evening so it will stay before the Public Service Committee. Dir. of Law: Just that this is a housekeeping matter, and this is the part where we are reconciling to the State changes and so our codifier will go through and make the changes so that it is just our local ordinances, criminal and traffic reflect what the State did for the year and so that is what this is. I would not ask for 1 st Reading tonight. Pres. of Council: I don’t have a question on this ordinance, but what I do get questioned about sometimes and I just don’t know the answer is how we determine or how you determine when we codify things or when we wait. Dir. of Law: So, we at least like to do an annual codification. If we have . . . this also just puts into the Code, the things that we have adopted through whatever timeframe it is and so it kind of depends on what is actually codified so all of these ordinances that Council adopts; not all of them are codified ordinances. In fact, most of them are not. Most of them don’t end up in the Code. So, I try to take a look at how many of them are there and not wait too long to judge it, but there are budgetary constraints as well. Since we are on this topic, I would like to take the opportunity to say that I am excited because as part of the 2023 annual appropriation there was budgeted for us to be able to switch codifiers and use the codifier that is associated with our website now and once that happens . . . it is an 18-month process so it is not going to happen anytime soon, it will be well into next year before its done, but they are doing a review and going to clean it up and you will get all of that before that is officially done but also it will make searching very easy so people can go to our website and just put a key word in and actually be able to search our codified ordinances and not have to go to a separate host which is what is happening now. It will be much more user friendly I think and has a lot of really cool features that we will explain further as we get closer to that and again that is in the future, so it will be a little bit of time before I get into detail with that. C. Ord. 2023-57 Authorizing the Mayor to contract with Equix Integrity Inc. for CCTV inspection and cleaning consulting services related to City sewers and providing for immediate enactment. Sponsor: Director of Public Service Michael Rorar Pres. of Council: Next, we have Ord. 2023-57. The ordinance was read into the record. Again, because we only have 4 present this evening, we cannot entertain adopting this. Mrs. Kilway: Since there have been several ordinances that we really wished to have been able to adopt to speed along the workings of the City, I would be all for having a special meeting next week if we can get everyone together. Mayor: I appreciate the thought but we are not available. Mrs. Kilway: Not available; OK. Mayor: These can wait. Mrs. Kilway: I just wanted to make sure. 13  COUNCIL MEETING Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. June 8, 2023 Mayor: I should have said we are not available. We can make ourselves available, but I think these can really wait two weeks as long as we have 5 people here next Council meeting. Pres. of Council: We will be fine. So, is there anything else for Public Service? Hearing none, I close committee. iii. Additional Items: None. 11. Reports of Special Committees: a. Council Operations Committee i. Additional Items: None. 12. Announcements: None. 13. Adjournment: Mrs. Kilway moved to adjourn. Seconded Mr. Bozic. Roll Call: Mrs. Kilway, Mr. Loughry, Mr. Bollas, Mr. Bozic – unanimous. The Council meeting of 6-8-23 adjourned at 9:13 p.m. sb Adopted: _______________ _______________________________ __________________________________ Susan E. Burton, Clerk of Council Dennis K. Loughry – President of Council 14