Tallmadge City Council Regular Business Meeting (2013-2019)

REGULAR MEETING in Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. February 12, 15 1. CALL TO ORDER: President of Council Donovan called the Regular Council meeting of Thursday, February 12, 2015 to order at 7:00 p.m. 2. PRAYER: Sara Courtney, First Congregational Church, Tallmadge. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE. 3. ROLL CALL: Mr. Donovan, Mrs. Kilway, Mrs. Ray, Mr. Rensel, Mr. Sisak, Mr. Stalnaker, Ms. Tricaso – present. Also present were Mayor Kline, Dir. of Pub. Service Esler, Dir. of Finance Shanafelt, Dir. of Law Raber, Economic Developer Loughry and Clerk of Council Burton. 4. MINUTES: 1-22-15 Regular Council meeting minutes. Mrs. Ray moved to adopt the 1-22-15 Reg. Council meeting minutes. Seconded Mr. Rensel. Voice vote 7-0. The 1-22-15 Reg. Council meeting minutes were adopted by a vote of 7-0.  SMR Transfer in the amount of $200,000 to Council on 1-29-15.  Fire Transfer in the amount of $100,000 to Council on 1-29-15.  Police Pension Transfer in the amount of $50,000 to Council on 1-29-15.  Appropriation Report, Fund Report, Revenue Report, and Encumber Report for the period ending 1-31-15 to Council on 2-2-15.  Tallmadge Recreation Center Profit and Loss Report for the period ending 1-31-15 to Council on 2-10-15.  Income Tax Comparisons for the period ending 1-31-15 to Council on 2-10-15.  January Financial Reports to Council on 2-10-15. Mrs. Ray moved to accept the Financial Reports submitted by Dir. of Finance Shanafelt. Seconded Mr. Sisak. Voice vote 7-0. The Financial Reports submitted by Dir. of Finance Shanafelt were approved by a vote of 7-0. 5. PUBLIC HEARINGS: None. 6. COMMUNITY INPUT: Pres. of Council: Since I don’t have my little cheat-cheat, you will get the real abbreviated version. Council meets four times a month. We have two business meetings and two committee meetings where we discuss the legislation thoroughly and we allow community input at that time. The business meetings are where we actually vote on the legislation and we have sort of a limited time for community input and that would be at this point in the meeting. So, if anybody would like to address Council; you are welcome to come forward. No one responded. I would like to welcome all the students that are here this evening. It is nice to see you and thanks for coming. 6.A. ANNOUNCEMENTS: None. 7. REPORTS OF SPECIAL COMMITTEES: None. 8. AGENDA ADDITIONS: None. 9. REPORTS OF ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICERS: MAYOR, DIR. OF PUBLIC SERVICE, DIRECTOR OF FINANCE, DIRECTOR OF LAW AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPER Mayor: Just to give you an update on the Police Department test. You know we are posting for a Patrol Officer to be hired. The test will be February 24th and to date we have I think it was a little over 120 applicants. The deadline for the applications are next week and so this will be one of the largest tests that we have given in a long time. Hats off to Civil Service and to the way it has been publicized which was in the Beacon Journal, but they also put it in some local publications for law enforcement. I am pretty happy about that. Also, coming up at the next Council meeting, you will have legislation to allow the Administration to enter into a contract for Simple Recycling, which is material, non-used clothing, tennis shoes . . . pretty much anything that you really don’t want to throw in the trash, but clothes related and household products and that will go into a bag at the curb and it is a green bag and everybody will get one these bags and on the same day as your trash pickup, you fill this up and you put it at the curb and Simple Recycling will come by and pick it up and then they do whatever they do with the clothing. It is recycling of whatever is used to turn some of the clothing into rags or ship it overseas; whatever is needed, but it is another form of recycling for us. It is stuff you can’t put in our recycling; you put it in the green bag. That has been done in different communities and you will see more on it and there are brochures for you to take a look at. We are going to ask Council for consideration in the next couple of weeks at 1st Reading and we will talk about it later. BZA met this week for 116 North Avenue on Tallmadge Circle which was the Bob’s Big Boy site and they did receive a variance for the canopy to be closer to North Avenue than the 30 ft. requirement. So that hurdle is done. That is the Bob’s Big Boy site and the next one they will be going to is Heritage Commission and I was just informed that they may not be at next week’s meeting, but it would be definitely the following one. The deadline for the Heritage Commission is tomorrow at 4:00 p.m. and they think they want to hold it because they have more drawings that they are working on and so they might do it at the following Heritage meeting. End of report. Mr. Rensel: Mr. Mayor, this additional service will be at no cost to our residents? Mayor: That is correct. Mr. Rensel: OK. Thank you sir. Mayor: Good point.  REGULAR MEETING in Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. February 12, 15 Mr. Sisak: Yes, I saw that there was a construction trailer on the site next door. I didn’t know if you had an update. Mayor: Yeah, the construction trailer was installed and they are also fencing in the old school building; that property is being transferred as we speak to Testa Builders and they did take the option from Joe Scaccio and so they will be the owners of that property and they are moving in the construction trailer to start to do some cleanup on this site. They still have to go to . . . they are applying for the OFPA Funds, but they were also cleaning up the site and just prepping. That building will be removed. They will not keep that building. They thought at first they could keep the building; they have the authority to tear it down. It is not a 100 year old structure and Joe Scacio could have done it and Joel wanted to try to maintain that building somehow and encapsulate the front corner of it, but I think the site has so much popularity to it and they are getting more clients and more contracts on that. So they are fencing that in for safety reasons to keep people out of it now that they are the owners of it for liability and they want to keep the site clean. Dir. of Pub. Service: Thank you. The indoor meters; we are down now to just 6 people that haven’t contacted us to get their meters installed and so that is a good thing. The Woodridge sub-development up at Dunbar should begin in March. Eastwood Glen Phase II will probably begin in April. We have a full salt bin; thank goodness. Our salt usage so far this season is 3,349 tons, which is $155,000 and last season 2014/2015 we used 4,000 tons and so we are probably going to exceed what we did last year. End of report. Mr. Sisak: Mr. Esler; who is the developer over there at Woodridge; do you know who that is? Dir. of Pub. Service: Hovnanian. Mayor: It was a Kollar project; Mr. Kollar sold it to Hovnanian. Dir. of Finance: You have the January reports already distributed and I just wanted to make note that the General Fund Balance is slightly over $4 million. The Rec Center for the month of January generated an operating profit of a little over $51,000. All areas seem to be on track and close to what we expected as far as the estimates are concerned. If you have any questions, I would be happy to address them. Thank you. Dir. of Law: Thank you. I just want to keep Council apprised of the situation as it relates to the Summit County Jail and the closing of several wings over at the Summit County Jail. I have been participating in several sub-committees that are Summit County Criminal Justice Committees that are trying to address the concerns. The primary concern is as it relates to Summit County Jail’s refusal to accept any misdemeanants, which includes crimes of violence. We are in a better position than many other communities because we have two jail contracts that thankfully Council has seen fit to approve over the years and so we do use Cuyahoga Falls Jail primarily and we also use Macedonia Jail. To date we have not had particular instances where any of our misdemeanant violent crimes have not been taken in, but unfortunately a few other communities have. So, we are again in a better position than most, but we are trying to continue to work through that as a community and see what other remedies there are to solve the situation. I am attending another meeting tomorrow so hopefully at that meeting we will see some form of progress, but so far it has been rather frustrating. End of report. Mr. Sisak: Mrs. Raber; is there any talk about any type of Council of Governments to come together and to facilitate more of an internal secondary type of jail system? Dir. of Law: There has been some discussion of that. Obviously anything like that is going to take some time and given the fact that communities had, for the most part, a five-day notice before they stopped accepting the misdemeanors; we are kind of trying to figure out after the fact really what to do. That is a possibility. We have approached other jail facilities to see if we could get a third contract in place just in case including the Summit County Jail who has indicated that they may at some future date want to enter into contracts to house the misdemeanants, but at this point they are not willing to enter into any additional contracts. So, we are doing what we can to try to kind of secure a third backup in the short term and then we are looking at other long term options. Mr. Sisak: Then the Oriana House; that is primarily for post . . . Dir. of Law: Post conviction and sentencing and they only . . . depending on which facility it is; they don‘t necessarily take violet offenders and so when you have a domestic violence they can only be housed in certain locations and there are various restrictions depending on which facility it is. Mr. Rensel: Is there any legal reason that we cannot go to Portage County to enter into a contract? Dir. of Law: That is one of the ones that we have approached and so far they have not reciprocated with an interest. But, we have approached them. Mr. Rensel: There is no political reason because of boundaries that we can’t do that? Dir. of Law: No, and in fact Hudson has used them as a holding facility. They are not a long term facility for them. I believe that Hudson is trying to explore other options including Solon. Solon has a facility, but for our officers; that is a really far drive and so I would much prefer to keep . . . to try to find an avenue that is more local. So before we enter into a contract way out there that we see what other options are closer. So we are in the process of doing that. 2  REGULAR MEETING in Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. February 12, 15 Economic Development: Thank you. The Mayor gave you most of the good news. Petitti’s is misunderstood . . . it is split. It has West Avenue frontage that is owned by a family trust and then you have the rear that abuts Commerce Drive that is actually owned by the Petitti family and the Petitti family leases the front. The front is now listed for sale and Mr. Petitti does have first right of refusal on it. I don’t have a firm price yet; I was just notified by the broker the other day. So, when the sign goes up; questions are going to start again and I just wanted to let Council know. 10-Minute Lube is still closed and I have not had any communication with the owner. I am going to continue to try. Radio Shack; our Radio Shack, actually all of the local area Radio Shacks will be closing. I just thought I would give Council what I think is some good news in the residential market. Last year, or in 2013, we had 48 single family homes sell for a median price of $126,000, excuse me, condos; there were 48 condominiums sold and the median price was $126,000 and 84 days on the market. Last year we had 35 sales and median price of almost $140,000 and days on the market was reduced to 73. So, that was substantial. Single family homes; were almost as good. In 2013 we had 151 sell at a median price of $141,500 and 52 days on the market and last year we had 162 sell and so that was a little bit of an increase and the price went up to $153,000 with only 40 days on the market. Now where our biggest need is, in my opinion, is in the price point of $225,000 and up. As of today we only have 5 houses available for sale. Technically we have a total of nine, but four of those are pending and we sold 13 last year. Now compare that to Stow; they have 21 available, actually 29 available and they sold 74. So, the short of this is that if we have young families that want to spend more than $225,000 then basically we have no inventory and they are moving somewhere and that is why I am excited about the Woodridge allotment because their price point is right between $225,000 and $260,000. So we have a dire need for that price point. End of report. Mr. Rensel: That originally . . . when that property came out when I was on Council the last time and since it is under new ownership . . . were they able to resolve the storm water issue and the sewage issues on that property; on that development? Dir. of Pub. Service: Are you talking about the Woodridge Subdivision? Mr. Rensel: Yes. Dir. of Pub. Service: I’m not sure what storm water issues you are talking about, but yes, Summit Soil and Water has approved all of their plans and they have EPA approvals to begin. The sanitary sewer has been run . . . it is Summit County sewer and it has been run up to the allotment from Washburn. Mr. Rensel: The issues at that time were elevation changes . . . considerable elevation change on that property and there was a station or there was supposed to be a pumping station or something put in . . . some facility . . . Dir. of Pub. Service: No, it is pretty much a downhill fall . . . Mayor: The Woodridge allotment is behind Dunbar and that is up so high . . . the lift station for that is actually down on Washburn, but that whole allotment is going to be gravity sewer flow. There is no pump station in there. It is all gravity. City water is not a problem. Storm water . . . when they started the project back five or six years ago, they did put the two detention ponds in but they never completed the other infrastructure and so all of that had to be reapproved through the EPA and they got their final approval and now they just have to go to get the final plat approved at the March meeting of Planning & Zoning and then they will be ready to start breaking ground. Mr. Rensel: Thank you for the update. Pres. of Council: We did have a lot of storm water issues . . . those detention basins were not working and . . . fortunately I live right there and in Ward 3 we had a lot of people there on Eastwood who had a lot of flooding at that point. But, a lot of that was resolved. 10. Ordinance 19-2015 At 2nd Reading. FINANCE Authorizing participation in the Ohio Depart- ADOPT 3-0 ment of Transportation (ODOT) Coopera- tive Purchasing Program and providing for - immediate enactment. Mr. Stalnaker moved for the adoption of Ord. 19-2015. Seconded Mr. Sisak. Roll Call: Mrs. Kilway, Mr. Rensel, Mr. Sisak, Mr. Stalnaker, Ms. Tricaso, Mr. Donovan . . . Mrs. Ray . . . Dir. of Law: For the record, Mrs. Ray left the room. I’m not quite sure why, but it was some kind of phone call and so I am assuming it must have been an important phone call because she is not present here for this vote. Ord. 19-2015 is adopted by a vote of 6-0. 3  REGULAR MEETING in Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. February 12, 15 11. Ordinance 20-2015 At 2nd Reading. FINANCE Declaring that certain City-owned vehicles ADOPT 3-0 obtained through criminal forfeiture to be excess and authorizing the Director of Public Service to dispose of such vehicles in accordance with law and providing for immediate enactment. Mr. Sisak moved for the adoption of Ord. 20-2015. Seconded Mrs. Kilway. Roll Call: Mr. Rensel, Mr. Sisak, Mr. Stalnaker, Ms. Tricaso, Mr. Donovan, Mrs. Kilway – unanimous. Ord. 20-2015 is adopted by a vote of 6-0. 12. Ordinance 21-2015 At 2nd Reading. FINANCE Declaring certain City-owned vehicles to be ADOPT 3-0 excess and authorizing the Director of Public Service to sell such equipment at public sale or trade-in and providing for immediate enactment. Mr. Sisak moved for the adoption of Ord. 21-2015. Seconded Mrs. Kilway. Roll Call: Mr. Sisak, Mr. Stalnaker, Ms. Tricaso, Mr. Donovan, Mrs. Kilway, Mr. Rensel – unanimous. Ord. 21-2015 is adopted by a vote of 6-0. 13. Ordinance 22-2015 At 2nd Reading. FINANCE Authorizing the Mayor to enter into the ADOPT 3-0 necessary contracts for the purchase of a 2-½ ton truck through the State Purchasing Program and the ODOT Cooperative Pur- chasing Program, or local preference as allowed by ordinance and providing for immediate enactment. Mr. Sisak moved for the adoption of Ord. 22-2015. Seconded Mrs. Kilway. Dir. of Law: For the record, Mrs. Ray has entered back into the room at 7:26 p.m. Mrs. Ray: Yes, I apologize. Roll Call: Mr. Stalnaker, Ms. Tricaso, Mr. Donovan, Mrs. Kilway, Mrs. Ray, Mr. Rensel, Mr. Sisak – unanimous. Ord. 22-2015 is adopted by a vote of 7-0. 14. Ordinance 23-2015 At 1st Reading. FINANCE Authorizing the Mayor to enter into a con- tract for the lease/purchase of an EMS squad vehicle through the State Purchasing Program and providing for immediate enactment. Pres. of Council: Ord. 23-2015 is at 1st Reading and is assigned to the Finance Committee. 15. Ordinance 24-2015 At 1st Reading. FINANCE Authorizing the Mayor to enter into a con- tract for the purchase of two 2015 Ford SUV Interceptor police cruisers for the Police Department through the State Purchasing Program and/or pursuant to T.C.O. 144.06 and providing for immediate enactment. Pres. of Council: Ord. 24-2015 is at 1st Reading and is assigned to the Finance Committee. 16. Ordinance 25-2015 At 1st Reading. FINANCE Authorizing the Director of Public Service to advertise for bids and the Mayor to enter into a contact for replacement of the roof at 46 North Avenue and providing for imme- diate enactment. Pres. of Council: Ord. 25-2015 is at 1st Reading and is assigned to the Finance Committee. 4  REGULAR MEETING in Council Chambers @ 7:00 p.m. February 12, 15 17. Ordinance 26-2015 At 1st Reading. PUBLIC SERVICE Amending Chapter 160.06 of the Tallmadge Code of Ordinances for economic develop- ment programs, demolition of real estate program and providing for immediate enact- ment. Pres. of Council: Ord. 26-2015 is at 1st Reading and is assigned to the Public Service Committee. 18. ADDITIONAL ITEMS: Pres. of Council: I just have to mention that there is a Richardson Trust Fund meeting following the Council meeting. 19. ADJOURNMENT: Mr. Rensel moved to adjourn. Seconded Mrs. Kilway. Voice vote 7-0. The Regular Council meeting of 2-12-15 adjourned at 7:28 p.m. sb Approved: _____________________________________ __________________________________ Susan E. Burton James M. Donovan Clerk of Council President of Council 5