City Council

PUBLIC SAFETY COMMITTEE MEETING, TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 7, 2021 The Public Safety Committee met at 5:00 p.m. on Tuesday, September 7, 2021 in Council Chambers at City Hall, 401 Market Street, Zanesville, Ohio. Committee members attending were Councilperson Rob Sharrer, Chairman; Councilperson Joey Osborn and Councilperson Andrew Roberts. Councilperson Steven Foreman attended by WebEx and therefore is not counted as being present and will be listed as absent. Others in attendance: Mayor Don Mason; Council President Daniel Vincent; Councilperson Jan Bradshaw; Councilperson Todd E. Ware; Councilperson Ann Gildow; Public Safety Director Doug Merry; Jeff Bell, Fire Chief; Thad Krause, Doug Vandenbark, Colby Kinsey, Brady Bragg, of the Zanesville Fire Department; David Montgomery, OAPFF, Darlin Crumpton, citizen; Chris Crook, reporter for the Zanesville Times Recorder, and Susan Culbertson, Clerk of Council. Other Councilmember attending by electronic means: Councilperson Sandy Gentry. Mr. Sharrer called the Public Safety Committee meeting to order at 5:00 p.m. Roll call was taken with the following members present: Mr. Rob Sharrer, Mrs. Joey Pennybaker Osborn, and Mr. Andrew Roberts. Mr. Steven Foreman was counted as absent as he did not attend in person as he attended by WebEx. There is a quorum present. Mr. Sharrer requested a motion to approve the minutes of the special meeting on August 2, 2021. Mr. Roberts moved to approve as submitted and it was seconded by Mrs. Osborn. A voice vote was taken with all in favor. None were opposed. Motion carries. Minutes stand approved. DISCUSSION ITEMS Traffic solutions for east part of Taylor Street First, I'm going to turn to the mayor because I know that he has worked on this first one traffic solutions for the east part of Taylor Street. I know Mr. Mayor, you had a meeting and some things that came out of that meeting. Mayor Mason: In order to really make sure everyone has the same level of knowledge. There's a house on the West side of Dresden; if you would imagine a T intersection at Taylor that it repeatedly had cars in the front yard, front porch so the only thing that stopped them was really a set series of literally block fortifications. So what we've done in order to try to again address this is the Taylor Street issue is we've had two stop signs there for a while. We've added a speed hump towards the top of the hill where it's flat. My understanding is by the way, we're out of the metal braces and bolts. We're still waiting on that so we can cover some of the other areas and then we put a series of, and by the way, there's a sign that actually says stop ahead, even further before that and then you have a series of warning signs literally facing the east direction on the property. I told the property owner I hope you didn't think that we sort of overloaded his property, and he was fine with it. The two stop signs in the near future and it is on order will have solar powered red lights on them. I don't know if they're motion activated or they're always flashing. I was thinking, I think I was told they were motion activated. So if a car came over the hill and it caught it then lights would flicker. Anyway so we're hoping to make that intersection safer. Its 35 miles an hour on Dresden. Frankly, we really can't reduce it to 25. I mean, you can, but no one's going to pay attention to 25 mph so I don't know that that would actually make things safer. Page 1 of 17 Mr. Sharrer: Okay, so that one's taken care of due to the Mayor and the administration reaching out to the property owner prior to it even making it to this committee. So that's always great to see our Mayor be so proactive and taking care of his constituents. So thank you, Mr. Mayor. Mr. Vincent: If I could please with that. The people have gone through this are they all under the influence? Has that been found to be true? Mayor Mason: No, I mean, I wouldn't say everyone is, I mean, you obviously have a high percentage of people who have been to bars and restaurants that night, but I wouldn't want to just. I mean, I know one, a daughter of a football coach, not local; who not knowing our area went through the intersection probably about four years ago. She had no drink and she just didn't know our area. So I can't say that that's the sole cause. Mr. Vincent: Just kind of trying to get an idea. That might be I think it would be helpful with those that are not under the influence and for those that are maybe wouldn't make a difference but we are hoping that some of this will work. Great improvement. So it's a great idea. Thanks. Mr. Sharrer: Is there anything else from the committee on that? Anything from any other members of Council in attendance? Last is there anything from anybody here in the audience here to speak about this? Nothing? Okay, we'll move on to agenda item number 4, an agreement with Genesis they will be first on call for 911. Agreement with Genesis that they will be first on call for 911 Mr. Sharrer: I will turn that over to our Safety Director. Doug Merry: We have been putting them first and actually I believe second. We call them in the first two times because they're going to have two units available for us. Not sure where that progression is at this time. Chief Bell is here and he has kind of been working on that too, and he would know for sure, but that's our intention is having them as they bought new trucks, they're getting personnel hired and they are going to be used as first and second out. Then we will be called third. That is still very actively going through the EMS Board. Mr. Sharrer: Okay. Is there anything Mr. Mayor to add? Should I just turn it over to Chief Bell here? Mayor Mason: Just background. It was probably about the first week of July is when we were notified or the administration was that Value Care would no longer be running 911 calls after roughly September 1st. So, Genesis did tell us that they would staff up and invest in more equipment, but they needed to be able to know that they were running basically first call. So, what they're really doing is picking up Value Care and Genesis CAS calls. And then again, as you said ZFD runs number two, and if both of those are called out then based on geography, we go to the county list if it's a north end accident, they would call Falls Township first. If in the south end they would check with South Zanesville and Newton Township and others. Mr. Sharrer: It was my understanding that Chief Bell, you had some comments, and maybe some speakers to speak to us on this. Chief Bell: Yes, we have been, the Mayor, myself, and Safety Director; in with the Local 88. The IAFF (International Association of Firefighters) has been looking the last couple of years to make a presentation for fire based EMS. So, they had talked with us. Some of how we make that happen was discussed with the Mayor and the Safety Director. The mayor suggested to come to the Safety Committee, and kind of Page 2 of 17 give them some information on that to go forward. Anything that we do when it goes to fire based EMS, we're looking out years to be able to set that in place. Some of the things that had been brought forward some of it was COVID and some other. There’s just really been a real staffing problem with EMS. We have not had anybody in the city of Zanesville that has prioritized 911Squad EMS service for a while now. That's a problem that we've had. So the safety director and I have been trying to do that through the EMS Board and Ann Gildow has been involved in it a lot. Because the thing is, we all have other things pulling us. I guess percentage wise ZFD has been better than most, but we are a fire department first. We cross man our medic. So, if we have a fire, if we're called out on a MAZMAT where that medic is tied up, or SRT, we're not there for 911 calls. When we talk about Value Care, they've made the decision as a company that they needed to focus on transports and not 911 calls. So they want to do transports hospital to hospital. They want to do transports from nursing homes to the hospitals, doctor's appointments and stuff like that. As a monetary matter, its better pay. There's agreements and stuff in there. It's a higher pay than you're getting on a 911 call. Genesis and Community Ambulance has also been fighting with everything they have going on with COVID and trying to find ways to, they also have their own transports they have to worry about because they have to get people out of the hospital. As we talk to them, they may have 5 units on 1 day, but there are children that need to get to Children's Nationwide. They can't stay here. People that need to get to OSU Cancer, that need to get to Riverside Heart. There's people that need to leave Genesis and when you talk to Dr. Beight who's also on our board, sometimes they are caught having to keep people over a night longer than they need to because there's just not enough transports. Now, we've been working with other companies that are coming in like Valor care, Nurse's Heart and some others that are wanting to do that, but we have found, you know, with Ann being on our board and everything else we have found the last couple of years that no one's prioritizing that 911 service. So that was one of the things they wanted to bring forward in talking about the EMS. We've seen our runs just for example, the last time that we had ran in 2018 with our old medic, we did 232 runs with our medic. Now that counts SRT, medic assists, and transports. This year already, 8 months in to the year, we're at 1,110 runs that our medic has taken. 1,110 runs and that's with us as the mayor said, being the third option. Being the third option, we've taken 1,110 runs. So, you know, when we're looking at the numbers and stuff and Ann brought it up, because she was unable to make the last meeting that it's not getting better. So, we just want to make sure whatever we do and we can't do it at the snap of a finger. If we look at fire based EMS or what direction we go. You know, what direction we go but staffing has been a problem and somebody prioritizing 911 has been a problem for the city. To add to those numbers so far this year, counting units that have come in and just in the six months that our dispatch has been tracking it, has come in 234 times. In six months to take calls because the privates were busy. We were busy or unavailable either one and that is something that's not sustainable at those levels. We have mutual aid but the mutual aid should be mutually beneficial, and they see that we're helping them as much as they're helping us. The last month they came in seventy times. That's Falls Township, South Zanesville, and Washington. When we sit in there and Bo Keck is on our board, you know, we had talked to him and, you know, they said, what are we going to do about the problem? They do see it as a problem. They're not saying they're not going to come, but anytime they're outside, we'll have instances when South Zanesville comes in to take a call for us, because we're still delivering to the hospital and then they get a call in there in South Zanesville and our medic goes and picks someone up in there. So that's the way it's supposed to work, but it's supposed to be more measured and equal. So that's what they're going to want to talk to you about. What I will say is, that in favor of fire based EMS, and we talked about it before when I've come in front of you. You know, we are insurance, you just have to decide what insurance plan you want. You know, there is a cost. As the Mayor said Genesis has gladly and I thanked them for stepping up and saying we're going to make an investment. We are making that investment in Page 3 of 17 there so that takes it off of the citizens by making the investment but realize that there will not be a single provider EMS, because we no matter what we’ve got here, unless it's fire based EMS, they will be subsidized by our first, responder program and our medic. They have it built in knowing that well, if we can't make it your medical will take the overflow calls, so just to kind of keep that in mind. For a month we're over 500, plus runs through our dispatch a month for all entities. That's Community, us, Value Care's out now and the county squads. That's about the volume we're doing is about 500 plus, 500 to 600 calls a month, is what we're saying is, is it. Mr. Sharrer: Is it an accurate statement to say that some of the private companies are getting out of EMS because it's not profitable? Fire Chief Bell: It is less profitable and you have to see and that's where the balance comes in and where they have to look at it. There's money there. If you talk to people like South Zanesville’s Chief Russ Taylor. He’s good, but it’s because he's paying his people like $10 dollars an hour. They're happy to do a few runs a day. So he sees a profit up there. What you get into is there is more profit in the transports, like hospital to hospital. The guarantee it could be $1,200 to $1,800 dollars for a transport. We get runs Medicaid and Medicare, which are a lot within our city, which these are a lot of the runs we get because of the age of our residents, or the social and economic status of our residence, we'll turn it into Medicaid and Medicare. They may say on and they just changed our things. Now PMMG (Paumier Medical Management Group, Inc.) is our billing company. That's who does our billing. They could tell you that Medicare and Medicaid changed the rates for an advanced call where we had to start an IV or something. We can charge $900 and some dollars, but they may come back and say hey Medicaid Medicare say Zanesville we're paying you $110 dollars for that call. To give you an overall view of it before we came in, I looked at our PMMG numbers through August and we have billed 300 for our 1100 runs and that's not all transports. Sometimes you get there and they don't want to transport and there's other things, but we have billed $391,910.We have collected so far to this point $134,132 of that because the insurance company looks at it and says this is what we accept. This is what you get. There is money, there's revenue there, but the key to the privates is keeping your overall costs down. Now, Genesis has come in and said, you know, they're looking at the big picture. They're willing to say we will subsidize this knowing that it's a slim profit margin and, I think I trust them behind that, but as Ann knows stuff, as we've been through, I think their biggest problem is not buying the equipment stuff. It's staffing. It's just like every business center is having right now, getting people to staff, and it not being that constant, revolving door of getting people coming in and going out and retraining and stuff like that. That's been the biggest issue. I believe is just having enough people, because we're all competing for the same EMT’s and paramedics. We're lucky enough as an entity as most cities and stuff are, is that the people that want to do EMS a lot of them also want to do fire also. So there's the balance there. They’re like, I'll do the EMS that I like doing a little bit, but I also want the chance to do the fire, the HAZMAT, the extrications, and the things like that. So, it balances that, and also we are rewarding them with pension which makes them more loyal employees. We keep them longer and the longer you have somebody and the longer they do something the better they are going to be at it because they have experience. When you are constantly having to train new people and get new people and recruit new people it does make it harder. I do give kudos to Genesis for saying we will step up and make the investment. We just have to look and make sure whether they are going to be able to make the investment in that and what the timeframe is. Mr. Roberts: Chief Bell, I'd heard rumor and I don't know if it's anything else besides just rumor that there might be some additional ambulance companies coming to town. Have you heard anything about that? Page 4 of 17 Chief Bell: We have talked. Mr. Roberts: And then to add to that, is that for transport or are these companies looking to do EMS as well? Chief Bell: Of the ones we had contacted, and the ones Bo Keck has contacted two of the three said they are only interested in transport. Mr. Roberts: Gotcha. Chief Bell: The third said they're coming in as transport, but they would be interested in looking at 9 1 1 service in the future. If that answers your question. Mayor Mason: Mr Chairman to answer the Councilman’s question as we looked at this in July, I will just say this. You have to go with what gives you reliability. We believe that CAS and ZFD are the only two answers to reliable ambulance service in the foreseeable future in Zanesville and the reason is I don't think anybody else is going to come in and do 911. If it was profitable Value Care would be doing it and continue to do it. The fact they are not just tells me that no one else is going to have a better business model than what Value Care had. So I think CAS and ZFD are going to be the two dependable companies to make runs. Mr. Roberts: In no way was I attempting to say that you know, one I always try to promote to the private sector before giving look to doing it in the public. Too, I didn’t want us to put a bunch of mechanisms in place and then have somebody else come in here and wanted to do it. Chief Bell: Well, we worry about it and we don’t have those controls, but we can suggest and stuff and as the Mayor brought up is you want consistency with your 911 service. Mr. Roberts: Most definitely. Chief Bell: What you don't want to turn it into is having it turn out like we do with a towing company and say, hey, here's our list of towing companies we will wait for, because you have time to wait and 911 if it's your family member, right? If it's an emergency, you don't want to have to go through multiples. Are you available, no? Are you available, no? Are you available? Yes, but I'm this far away. Can you wait? It puts undue stress on the families, on the patients, you know, and that, so what we don't want to get into is what we found and the problem in the past is when you have too many entities, providing the service it's hard to hold accountability. Right? And that's something we want to do. It's easy with the fire department if you hold accountability, because I have direct. When you work with the privates, you're asking them hey, we want you to comply and the safety director's been in their hands, been in there where we have gone back and they've asked us, hey, we can do it but would you make this concession. Then you make the concession if you do it and then they say, well, we're able to make it at that point, but now we can't, you know, and it goes back to staffing or getting people. So that's the thing, right there is you don't want to have too many that you're answerable to. If you're working with community ambulance that's one entity that I have to call and say, hey, what happened with this call or your volume of calls or this or that? It doesn't get to be well, we need to do better, but they need to too. When you get multiple, you get finger pointing saying, well they're taking our people or they're doing this, or, uh, you know, we're doing better than them. So let’s focus on that. So I do agree with the mayor, you know, we need to keep the entities that are providing down to a minimum level to get the best service for the constituents and stuff. It is going to make your deliverables faster, because you don't have to go through multiple, multiple phone calls. And, you know, where they're coming from and what they're bringing. If they're not doing Page 5 of 17 something, right you have one entity to hold accountable. So any other questions before I let the OAPFF, (Ohio Association of Professional Firefighters) come up and talk a little more on their proposal. Mr. Sharrer: Anybody from the committee? Any council members present? We'll go from there. Councilmembers, esteemed Mayor, and Safety Director. My name is David Montgomery. I am a Columbus firefighter by trade. I am the OAPFF Vice President of this firefighters’ organization as Vice President of Ohio. So I travel around and basically, what I do is help people negotiate a contract. That's why I've come here many, many times actually over the last probably 2 years. In Zanesville, it has become really one of my favorite towns. To be honest with you, I enjoy coming here, I like the people here you’ve got good staff. Good people. What the Fire Chief didn’t tell you was a couple of things. One is firefighters are kind of humble by nature. What he didn't tell you is you really get way better quality of care with the firefighters here in this town, EMS. You just do. He's not going to say that, because he's a humble guy, but that's just the reality of it. You're talking about a $10 dollar an hour guy, and if you can even get them. Right? So, the reason I came to talk to you a little bit about is so, what we did, we said, well, what if I had been tossing this around what, if you went to Fire based EMS. What if the city said, hey, let's invest in EMS in the city and let's go to fire based EMS. What would it take? Right? Because it's a bigger ask, then you might think and, certainly if you're elected, government is about choices and you want to make the right ones. You want to make educated choices because the reality is, there's a limited amount of dollars, public dollars that are available to us. So, how can you do it? How can you do it efficiently and really what is the cost? What would it cost? Some of the services that the IAFF, the highest I mean, the International Association of Firefighters do is they have a team of experts that do nothing, but evaluate what those or what that would look like. So we asked them or petitioned them and they gave us a report. We can certainly get you this report. The chief has it. The mayor has it. Basically, what the report says what it would take to do Fire Based EMS. Really what would it cost? Because that's what it comes down to is what it costs you. Certainly you can do it, but what's the investment? What's the cost going to be? The report and stuff probably costs between $25,000 and $30,000 dollars. If you were to hire a company or firm to come in. It took the IAFF about a year or year and a half to get it done. It's quite a bit. So it's very, very thorough. Of course the chief has read it and made comment and sometimes it can be a little off here or there. And now its everyday getting a little bit older. So things cost a little more money. So, we talked about what that would look like, and then we talked really about how you fund it. What does that look like? You got to find a way to do it, because the reality of it, you probably just don't have enough money sitting around. I could be wrong. Of course, that's what the director told us in negotiations there's not an extra couple Million dollars to pay the firefighters. We're just taking him at his word. So, that being said one of the things that we talked about was, how would you do that? What would it look like? Could you put the initiative on the ballot? Could you put on a bond issue? And if you're going to do that, what does that look like on costs? So we talked to the director's office and with finance about 4 mills. It is a big ask, 4 Mills is a lot to get that done. And how would you get that done? What does that look like? Well, I will tell you also too, that the International Association of Professional Firefighters, and the OAPFF, is what we do is help municipalities pass levies and the reality of it is, they've created a system to help you passed the Levy that is a series of algorithms in a targeted campaign. That campaign, if you follow the model that they give you 92% of the time the levies passed. Lancaster, just passed their safety levy. Page 6 of 17 Well, they just didn't listen to us. I loved the mayor there too. He wouldn’t listen to us they failed it twice. Finally they said, okay. Okay. Okay. We'll do what you say and it past. It's strategic and actually, the guy that kind of developed it, they snagged him from Ohio and took him to Washington. D. C. and he runs it nationally this campaign, they call it a strategic campaign. So those resources will be available to you if you so choose. My suggestion is look, I mean, obviously you couldn't do it this year. If you're looking to do it in the spring you probably have to get on with it. If you want to do it and to get that initiative on about and then, what does that look like? We can certainly help you do that and the local would help with some of those resources as far as a targeted campaign. I will tell you. You're the largest city that I work with that doesn't have Fire Based EMS. And the truth is it's a sore spot here. You guys need to do it, you have a statute obligation to do it and I will tell you the privates, and that's kind of what they were alluding to is it's becoming less and less and less doable from the private sector. One of the reasons is because people just don't do that kind of work. The average burnout for a medic in this country is about 7 years and so they have constant turnover of people. Right? And so the guy gets a better job somewhere else, or he goes to be a tech in the hospital, or just goes on to different work right because of the burnout. What we found is across the country, it's really best done by the public sector. They just have the resources to get it done. I will tell you running the EMS in the city is not profitable. It's just not. You can offset some of your cost for Medicare and Medicaid and certainly help fund those costs, but doing it efficiently would do it. I would argue if you're going to do this, there are a couple of things that you probably need to know. One is don't do it halfway you have to have the experts to telling us what you need. What the resources are. Don't go short. Ask for what you need from the public and get them to give you what you need if they want, If not then don't do it. The other thing is you got to make a commitment. Right? We're willing to make the commitment, but if you're only going to be halfway in, or you only want to kind of do it or just don't do it, because it won't pass. The other thing is, you’ve got to decide who's going to be there? Is there an entity out there that's going to want to fight you that didn't want this and I don't know what that is? I'm not a player here in this town. There's people in here telling us with influence. You're going to need their support to get this done, because it's a big ask. So we did meet with the Mayor. You’ve got a good Mayor. He is sharp and I think it could be time. One of the things that happens is, what are you going to do? Here's some questions you need to ask.  What are you going to do when it falls apart?  What are you going to do when Genesis walks away? Because these guys can't do it.  But they're also not telling you is when the medic goes out they are cross staffing that so the ladder truck that we pay a Million dollars for a ladder truck in, and of itself isn’t being staffed. Don't make me clear.  Thad just told me this, but it goes with one person. You really can't run the ladder with one person. So when the medic goes out the ladder can’t go on those runs. So those are resources that are more and more firefighters aren't available to be in the station for fire runs. Those are things you've got to look at. We're seeing the trend go up. That's what the chief was here to talk about. I don't think it's getting better. We're seeing that across the state, across the country, EMS is where the work is and it's not getting slower. It's getting busier. Can I answer any questions? Mr. Roberts. David, you said 4 mills. What would that generate annually? David Montgomery: Well, I knew you're going to ask me that. Mayor Mason: $1.6. Page 7 of 17 David Montgomery: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Mayor Mason: The Sharp Mayor. Well, I work with a lot of medics. Mr. Roberts: And I don't mean to be disrespectful by this but you guys are all OFFA, so, I mean, I know it's your job to negotiate on behalf of firefighters. David Montgomery: Absolutely. Mr. Roberts: So, and I don't know what the Administration's take is on whether we go with what they're proposing or whether we need to do some other outside study to see what, like I said, I love you guys, thank you for everything you do, but. David Montgomery: Hey, you got to do due diligence too. I'll be honest with you. I believe it's very thorough and you're more than welcome to take a look at it. Mr. Roberts: Do you have that digital? David Montgomery: We can get it to you digitally. I would say it's not flawless and remember you're talking about guys in D.C., that are looking at demographics and data and so there are certain things and this is what the chief was saying, there are certain things that could be a little bit off here or there. What we see sometimes is that they say, oh, we can do it cheaper. Right? And then they go, they ask for less money than they needed and then you're always running away from your money. Anyways and then you're just behind the curve all the time. You can never catch up. Right? So that's why I said, look now what the ask is and ask for it. Right because otherwise if you only go to halfway, you just can't get it done. Mr. Roberts: So do you have any idea and I can read through the report if not. What would the increase in staffing levels be? David Montgomery: Thad, what was that number, 14? Mr. Roberts Additional 14? David Montgomery: Yeah. Mayor Mason: That was to run a total of 3 trucks. Mr. Roberts: So one at each station, twenty-four-seven? David Montgomery: Yeah, correct. Mr. Roberts: And what are we putting on the capital improvement plan for the Medics? Seven to eight years something like that? David Montgomery: Chief, that's a you question. Fire Chief Bell: And how that is going to work and what we do require now of the privates in our agreement is 7 years anything over 7 years for a frontline vehicle they have to go down to our Vehicle Maintenance and have it regularly checked and everything else, but again, to answer your question, Mr Roberts is it's going to depend on run volume. How many miles, how often it is used, that is going to work into that? Page 8 of 17 Your reserve vehicle which and that's something you do on your front line, as they go you would move one back as your reserve vehicle, so when you need to get an oil change or something like that. Mr. Roberts: Right? Chief Bell: But it's just going to depend a little bit on your run volume, but I would say, and Ann can back me up on this the agreement we have with the privates, as we say, 7 years and we figure that's about it. Mr. Roberts: That's what I figured it wouldn't last much longer. Chief Bell: And where, you know, Dave is telling you that you out run, is when you set it here, at your cost and what you want to do is you want your collections, of course, to be as high as you can and that's another decision you have to make. We do right now we just do a soft billing type model. What we do with a soft billing model is we send, you know, we collect from Medicare, Medicaid you send it out if it's not collected; we don't send it to collections or anything. Which I think is very fair to constituents. If you are in the city of Zanesville, you're supporting your EMS service so we shouldn't be sending you additional bills. What's paid is paid. You know, he paid for our service, we just want to supply a higher, or at the highest level we can. But again, like I said, as an entity, though, we are not held to that 7 years. We put that, but as a city, being a government entity, and we're going to look at more of the viability of it. We can't get like our old Medic where it was 25 years old and it’s just running X number of runs, but we have to look at what shape that's in and whether it gives us a little more, but they're looking at when Dave said you are out running the money. If you hire people in and starting pay, and then in 5 years they’re at top pay. You buy medic for $250,000, put another $50,000 to $60,000 in outfitting it, but when you buy the next one, it's going to be more than $250,000 dollars. It's going to be more so down the line that's where you need the levy to support that base money that's coming in, but then you're also supporting it with the money that you're collecting through Medicare and Medicaid insurance and stuff. Mayor Mason: Some of this, and I'd be happy to have the IAFF there. I think we ought to if you want to get into a lot of details my recommendation is it does qualify for executive session so we can start to talk numbers and methodology. Mr. Roberts: Sounds good. I'd like to read the report, too. David Montgomery: Not a problem. No problem. Chief Bell: Are there any other questions I can answer for you? Mr. Sharrer: Anything else from the committee? David Montgomery: Thank you for your time. Thank you very much. Thank you. Mr. Sharrer: Okay, moving on, we will move to everyone’s favorite topic, number 5, speed hump updates. Speed hump updates Mayor Mason: We are on backorder. Somebody wanted to know what the word of 2021 is, it is backorder. So we are on backorder for some of the, I will just call them braces and pins to put the rubber down. I think we are getting the rubber in, but it is just that we need the pins and braces to install. We have I think twenty-five locations on backorder right now. Mr. Roberts: Did they give you any estimate on timing, Mayor? Page 9 of 17 Mayor Mason: I can ask Scott. Well, you know what, it is like on the recreation equipment we ordered in June we were told September, now we are being told October. Will it be November? I ordered wheels for my lawn mower two months ago and I haven’t seen the wheels yet. They are on backorder. Mr. Sharrer: Okay, with the speed humps, I am glad to see that we got the east part of Taylor and I know we can’t put them on grades and that kind of thing, but that flat part hopefully that will help there. I know we put some down on Fairway Lane and Country Club Drive based on recommendations and I have Mr. Apperson here who has provided a little synopsis for us. I think he would like to go over this with some of us and with that coach I will call you up to the podium if you want to come up and talk about this. Then I will let you know I won’t be one of your boys when it is time to pull out the hook and yank you off of there. (Laughter broke out) I won’t be as gentle as Bucci would be or anybody like that. Ron Apperson: My wife tells me I talk a lot and I ramble and I agree. So if anybody tells me to shut up and sit down that is okay with me. I appreciate you letting me come and converse. I guess this is a conversation, but take a term from Ron Bucci, I love living in Zanesville; and I have had many opportunities to move from Muskingum County and I think what would I want to go there for? I’ve got what I am looking for right here plus I have lots of relationships. I live on Fairway Lane and I would like to speak to you and I would like to say this. I have brought this and addressed this issue for the fourth time and I promise this will be my last time. I don’t know why I am still doing this, but it is in my DNA and I just keep going. I believe in repetition and sometimes it leads to good execution. As an old coach you know that. Some of the issues he wanted to address are as he passed out handouts with these points listed: Safety issues in North/West Zanesville  Neighborhood composed of Maple Avenue, Country Club Drive, Beverly Avenue, and Military Road Mr. Apperson stated the speed humps do help. The speeds on Country Club Drive and Fairway Lane as he has lived there for 21 years and I have seen it and I live in front of a hump. I watch people. I would say 85% slow down when they go over that hump. He would just like additional ones.  A. Cause for safety concerns 1. No curbs 2. No sidewalks 3. No alleys 4. Over 50 homes with driveways to street 5. Large increase in traffic flow B. City complicit in directing traffic thru area to north end shopping 1. Left turn signal on Maple Avenue at Country Club 2. Concrete median on Maple Avenue from Wendy’s to Country Club Drive 3. A hindrance for safety vehicles (grind down and remove it to allow access to Beverly Ave. C. Residential Streets-Commercial Streets 1. Country Club Drive is 100% residential homes (42) 21 on each side 2. Beverly Ave.-75% commercial business D. Use of Streets with safety concerns 1. Walkers, joggers, bikes, motorized wheelchairs, apartments on Fairway E. Recommendations to city to alleviate problems and improve safety. 1. Delete left turn arrow light at Maple/Country Club Drive. 2. Delete concrete median to permit left turn onto Beverly Avenue, concrete can be ground down to street level-Left turn light at Military to influence left turn onto Beverly. Page 10 of 17  3. Add traffic humps-two on Country Club and one on Fairway Lane. The speed humps are at the ends. Country Club is half a mile long and straight and so is Beverly, and people speed in between so two more speed humps would reduce speed. Note: This being fourth time this issue has been addressed with no response on first three times. Respectfully request a response. Mr. Apperson said we might be going too far with speed humps because on Licking Road and I could not figure out why they put a speed hump there. Mayor Mason: We had tractor trailers doing over 35 mph there, sir. Mr. Apperson: In that little short distance? Mayor Mason: Yes and they were hauling junk cars. Mr. Apperson: That is an answer, so thank you. Mr. Sharrer: I have passed this out to everybody. I will offer you simply because you state this as the fourth time and I know you and I have talked about this before. I know that based on your previous recommendation I know that is why speed humps were added to Fairway and Country Club. Mr. Apperson: I appreciate that. Speed humps reduce the speed. Mr. Sharrer: When we started noticing these problems, especially going back through Country Club Drive and Center Drive and all of those streets back there and you are absolutely right. Those streets were not designed for heavy traffic and the amount of cars that were going through. So my colleague, Mr. Roberts and I, got together and said okay, we have an issue with people cutting through and using that and we have two issues: the speed of the cars traveling through and two the amount of cars. That is when we turned to speed humps. The sleeping police officer. We said we are going to try them in Center Drive to see how they work. We are going to see if they solve our problem and if they do, problem solved and we move on to the next. If they don’t then we didn’t blow a bunch of the city’s money on coming up with expensive alternatives. This was cost effective. When we did our traffic studies it dropped the average speed on Center Drive about 30 miles per hour. The speed limit is only 25 mph but it dropped the average speeds down that much. It also reduced the amount of traffic that was using that as a cut through. There were several people who were upset with Council, the Mayor, the administration, and speed humps and everything else and I remember distinctly somebody calling the Mayor and saying well I won’t go that way anymore, now I am going to have to travel Maple Avenue because I can’t cut down that way and the Mayor said great because this is what we were trying to get you to do in the first place. So the idea of putting the speed humps there and it was brought to this committee and to Council as a whole was because of no sidewalks, no curbs, and people walking. Mr. Apperson: No alleys is a big issue. Mr. Sharrer: People walking and that kind of thing. The left turn arrow at Maple and Country Club has been there for as long as I have been around and I am 51, I am not a spring chicken any more myself. Mr. Roberts: I can speak to that as we did add that about twelve years ago. The reason we did that sir is because there were multiple T-bone collisions at that intersection. Even thought people weren’t supposed to be driving down through there they were. They were attempting to make a left onto Maple and they got banged. Page 11 of 17 Ron Apperson: What my brain is telling me and I have frozen brain is that by doing that you are directing traffic down a 100% residential street. You have directed the traffic down there because of that and the barrier. Mr. Roberts: The traffic was already there and we were just trying to provide a safer way for them to get down through there. Ron Apperson: So why was the green arrow put there? Mr. Roberts: Because ODOT had logged so many T-bone accidents at that intersection. Mr. Apperson: I lived there and I think that is above my pay scale. I don’t understand and that is not common sense. If we don’t take that green arrow out of there it is not common sense. You are directing traffic down a residential street with 42 homes with driveways coming out and people walking on it. Why would our city direct traffic down that road? Mr. Roberts: We have a traffic light at Brown, one at Locust Avenue, several traffic lights where it is entirely residential areas so to say Mr. Apperson interrupted: Traffic lights are not arrows. You don’t have arrows there. There are traffic lights and you have an arrow here that stops and allows people to turn left. They don’t have to wait. Mr. Sharrer: If there are accidents on Maple Avenue as it is one of the busiest streets in the state, but definitely the busiest street in Zanesville. So, in order to get people to be able to turn left off of Maple whether it’s Beverly, Country Club, or Military or whatever we have to get them there safely. If the idea with the barrier in the middle, it was placed there and mandated by ODOT. We had to put it in there. Mr. Apperson: So it is part of the city’s streets. So we have some say in that? Mr. Sharrer: I understand. Mr. Apperson: So we get with ODOT and let’s grind it down. We don’t need it. Mr. Sharrer: It has cut down on the amount of accidents on Maple. Mr. Apperson: What is the number one accident on Maple Avenue? Does anyone know? The most accidents on Maple Avenue are T-Bones and rear-end collisions. My wife was just hit last week. My buddy has been hit in the rear end three times. It is rear end collisions and what causes rear end collisions? I am an old driver’s Ed teacher too so you have to put up with me. Rear end collisions are caused by following distance and then the speed. That is what you should be looking at and not T-Bone collisions. That does not happen very often. Mr. Sharrer: Again those were mandated by ODOT. Mr. Apperson: What my brain is telling me is that we are putting the safety of these people turning left over the safety over the 42 residents that live on that street and have a driveway from their garage and they back out and go onto that street; 42 of them, residents. Beverly Avenue is 75% commercial. Why in the world wouldn’t you go up there and put a turn light arrow there. Send them down the commercial street. I am not angry, I am just as this is the old coach talking. Page 12 of 17 Mr. Sharrer: I understand, but those were not decisions that anybody in this committee or on this panel made. Mr. Apperson: Well, the way things are changed is to have a contentious conversation. As long as you go along, nothing is going to change. So if we want to move that let’s get together and let’s push somebody to get it done. Mr. Sharrer: As you mentioned it was your buddy, a former Mayor, who didn’t fight with ODOT. He was able to get that center section lowered. You mentioned that it wasn’t too high. He was able to get it lowered for the protection of safety vehicles so that fire trucks and ambulances can go over top of it if necessary. Ron Apperson: Maybe the Mayor can tell me this. Who do we have to talk to at ODOT to grind that down because we don’t need it? The City doesn’t need it and the city doesn’t need that green light or that turn light at Country Club. That common sense wise it should not be there. Now if you can tell me anything different. As old Judge Joseph and I used to have conversations and if you have a feeling about something, well, I have feelings. If you have a feeling no matter what I say to you I am not going to change your feeling. I can say whatever and I can be the most common sense and I can give you the best argument. Mr. Sharrer: It is time’s up. Ron Apperson: That is it. You won’t see me anymore. Mr. Sharrer: Thank you, coach. On to number 6 the loading zone on Forest Avenue. Who has this topic? Loading zone on Forest Avenue in Front of 751 Forest Public Safety Director Doug Merry: I was approached by Mr. Vincent about a loading zone in front of 751 Forest Avenue. That is the medical building there right next to Morrison House. I talked to Tammy Howard who is in charge of the property. She said they were having trouble with the trucks going around in the back of the lot and then unloading in the back lot and it was creating a danger for kids coming in and out of the medical building from the parking lot. They have a U Shaped drive way in front of there that goes for patients to pull up into and unload for elderly, wheelchairs, and such, but they asked to have a loading zone along the curb so the trucks can unload there and wheel their stuff up and in the front door where it should be. I went up and looked at the area. It makes perfect sense for them to do it that way. I think it would enhance the safety of people going in and out for the patients in the back. Mr. Roberts: Mr. Merry, is there unregulated parking in the front of it? Mr. Merry: Yes. Mayor Mason: When I have been up there and I don’t care either way, no one ever parks on Forest. Mr. Merry: When I was up there the whole section was filled. Mayor Mason: I am up there quite often. Mrs. Osborn: Mr. Chairman, if a truck pulls up in the front will it block the U for patients? Mayor Mason: It will block the line of sight. Page 13 of 17 Mrs. Osborn: That is concerning. Mayor Mason: I would like to know who is parking in the front unless it is actually employees. Mr. Merry: They have a problem with employees. Mr. Vincent: As Mr. Merry was saying I didn’t go meet with her as I referred it to Mr. Merry. My understanding is the loading zone would be on the opposite side of the building toward where the Good Samaritan building was on that side and yes employees there are using that for parking so the parking lot they have is up around the corner. One of the second parts which I think the two decided was not needed was looking at a time there was parking there so employees wouldn’t come there and park along the street for the eight hour shift and that would keep it more open to hospice so when families come so they can park closer. It is not on the same side of the building because that would create and one of the concerns was creating a situation of blocking the view as far as people pulling out of that when they drop patients off. My understanding is it is on the other side. Is that your understanding, Mr. Merry? Doug Merry: What she showed me was right in front of the building. Dan Vincent: Really? Okay, maybe I Doug Merry interrupted saying she said it is just short term and they unload and they are gone. The problem is the cars park along there and they end up not being able to pull in there to unload. Dan Vincent: I guess I would share whoever mentioned it and shared concerns about blocking the entrance. Doug Merry: We were also going to paint the curb yellow and extend it out so people could have a better line of sight each way. Mayor Mason: I will say this, no one in Zanesville understands the set back from a radius where you are supposed to park or not park. I mean nobody does. As you know, we painted some down here on California and Fourth and we still have people who use the other facility who block and park in the yellow. I thought the intersection, there is a huge parking lot at Hazel and Forest. It is rarely used. I thought that was for employees of both the Medical Arts Building. I don’t know that they are, but that is and I could tell you how many parking places there are. Mr. Vincent: That is my understanding from talking with Tammy on the phone that is where they are supposed to park. Mayor Mason: There are over 100 parking places there. Joey Osborn: There is never anybody parked there. There is a big sign that says for volunteers and staff only. Mr. Roberts: I am sorry, I don’t want to over complicate this, but in the back of the property there is a full double lane up against the curb. They are saying they are having trouble bringing trucks in back there? Mr. Vincent: That is my understanding, yes. Page 14 of 17 Doug Merry: It is creating a safety hazard for patients coming into the back doors because there are a lot of little kids. Joey Osborn: Prime Care Pediatrics is up there on the fourth floor. Mr Vincent: Kids come running out the steps and it is right into the lane where traffic is. Joey Osborn: It is tight, you can’t go around it. If there is a truck there you are not getting through. Mr. Vincent: I suppose people coming and going and also kids blocking the view. Mr. Roberts: I am not sure what trucks are parking or that we are talking about parking there, but looking at this front entrance I mean you are not getting anything except maybe a fourteen foot box truck in between those two entrances to the view. Doug Merry: It’s mostly Amazon type size vehicles or UPS type vehicles she said that comes in there. They are not there very long. They unload a few boxes and they are gone. Mr. Roberts: So they are having problems with that on the rear side of it? Doug Merry: That is what she explained to us. Mr. Vincent: She seemed most concerned as far as the safety issue. Doug Merry: You can’t see the kids come past the truck. They are afraid somebody will be going through the parking lot and is going to kill a child. Joey Osborn: Maybe they would consider the south side of the front of the building like you had thought. Mr. Vincent: That is what she was asking for in my mind and that made more sense as far as safer and more space over there. I am surprised and maybe I was thinking different. Doug Merry: It doesn’t make any difference to me. I think she was looking at the convenience so they wouldn’t be wheeling hand carts across Forest Avenue. Mr. Roberts: Or they have this parking lot between them and Morrison House and they could easily cut three of those spots out and making that a designated loading zone. It would be completely out of the way of everything right next to a sidewalk that leads up to the front of the building. Joey Osborn: Those are the physicians’ parking spaces. Mr. Roberts: That falls into the category of not my problem. (Laughter broke out) Joey Osborn: I am just telling you. Mr. Roberts: I know. I would also show you the massive amounts of real estate they own surrounding the property. Mr. Vincent: Actually, they don’t. Actually it is Lillibridge. It is not the Franciscan Sisters, they have sold that property. Page 15 of 17 Mr. Roberts: I am not talking about this across the street. All of this pavement over here is all Genesis. Mr. Vincent: Around the Medical Arts Building, Lillibridge purchased the property. That is who Tammy works for. Mr. Roberts: Which is the third party who leases back to Prime Care. Mr. Vincent: Leases back to? Mr. Roberts: They are the third party, or landowner, that leases back to Prime Care. Mr. Vincent: All those people that are in there? Mr. Roberts: Yes. Mr. Vincent: So, Northside, Physicians, Mayor Mason: There must be 120 to 130 parking places at protected parking at Hazel and Forest is all I know. I think we ought to reopen Myrtle. Mr. Vincent: At this time I am sorry I didn’t go and meet you two there just so I was clear and had a good idea as I thought it was clear cut. Obviously, there are some concerns. Mr. Roberts: I can look at it on the way home, too. Yes, I agree with the Mayor as far as if we can put a truck in there and make use of the useless or possibly cause even more or nothing else maybe it should have no parking in front of that U. Mayor Mason: If you take a look and if we actually had the yellow paint where it is actually supposed to be no parking. Mr. Roberts: There should be no parking on that side of the street. Mayor Mason: That is what I am saying. I don’t think you could put a loading zone there unless Mr. Roberts: It has fifteen foot set off each curb cut. There is thirty foot between each one of those curb cuts. Mayor Mason: Yea, it just Mr. Vincent: So it would make more sense to have it on the south side. Doug Merry: Or like he says in the parking lot. Mr. Roberts: If they are having a problem with on-site loading. Mayor Mason: I think we move some of the doctors’ private parking places and put them over at Hazel and put a loading zone right there. Mrs. Osborn: Dan, the view, are there steps up that way, because I know there are several sets of stairs coming up the back. Page 16 of 17 Mr. Vincent: Where they unload in the front? Mrs. Osborn: Yes. That would be easier if somebody had a hand cart if they park on the south side of the street and roll it up in. Mr. Roberts: Knowing from living behind this thing for a few years and my daughter riding a bicycle down that U, it has a little bit of a slope to it. I think I would chose steps over dragging that cart up and down that thing. Mr. Vincent: No sense of adventure? Mr. Roberts: I have drug a cart up and down. Mr. Vincent: I can provide the number if anyone wants to talk with Tammy. Tammy Howard is her name. She is a city resident over on Taylor I found out. Mr. Roberts: I want to take a look at it and make sure what we are doing. Mayor Mason: We paint the yellow where it is supposed to be, do you think that will keep the vehicles from parking there? Mr. Roberts: Probably not. Mr. Vincent: I am not sure where you are referring to out front at the curbing? Mayor Mason: Yes. On the south side or the Forest side. Now we don’t traditionally paint. I think we finally have the equipment as we just purchased it I think this year. We hand painted downtown Zanesville last year, but I think we now have equipment. No, we are not the artist community. I know you were thinking that. Mr. Roberts: Okay, let’s look into this and see what we can figure out. Mr. Vincent: Thank you everyone. Mr. Sharrer said is there anything else for the good of the order? If not, I will entertain a motion to adjourn. Mr. Roberts moved to adjourn. It was seconded by Mrs. Osborn. A voice vote was taken with all present being in favor. None were opposed. Motion carries. Mr. Sharrer called the committee meeting to a close about 6:10 p.m. ___________________________________ ________________________________ Mr. J. Rob Sharrer, Chairman Susan Culbertson, Clerk for Council Page 17 of 17