Council President Mr. D’Ambrosio opened the meeting at 7:00 p.m.

 

ATTENDEES

Members of Council in attendance were Mr. Licht, Mrs. Quinn-Hopkins, Mr. Evers, Ms. DePledge, Mr. Hoefle, Ms. Vaughn and Council President Mr. D’Ambrosio. Also attending was Council Clerk Mrs. Cendroski.

Those attending from the Administration were Mayor Morley, Law Director Klammer, Finance Director Slocum, Service Director Rubertino and City Engineer Gwydir. Police Chief Reik and Fire Chief Whittington were absent and excused.

LEGISLATION PROPOSED:

06-24-(01): Amendment: Section 1145.02 “Schedule of Permitted Buildings and Uses,

subsection (a)(1)”

06-24-(02): New Enactment: Section 505.15 “Harboring of Honey Bees; Abatement”

Mr. D’Ambrosio: These were discussed in Ordinance Committee. Chair, Mr. Hoefle was absent and excused so Mr. Evers chaired the meeting. Mr. Evers?

Mr. Evers: These were discussed in the Ordinance Committee meeting on Tuesday, June 17^th and appear on the evening’s agenda. There will be discussion during the regular Council meeting.

Mr. Hoefle: I was absent and excused last week when they had the meeting to discuss the ordinance on honey bees. I started looking at this upon my return and there are a few things I would like to review. I am recommending these items be referred back to Committee for further review.

Mr. D’Ambrosio: Are there any objections to referring these items back to Committee for further discussion?

There were no objections.

Legislation No. 06-24-(01) and Legislation No. 06-24-(02) are referred back to Committee for further review.

 

There were no further questions or comments.

 

06-24-(03): Memorandum of Understanding: City of Eastlake & Lake County Board of Commissioners/Stormwater Management Agency

Mr. D’Ambrosio: We had a couple of meetings on this and during the first meeting the Mayor suggested this be placed on three readings. This was presented at the Service/Utilities Committee meetings – Mrs. Quinn-Hopkins?

Mrs. Quinn-Hopkins: We had a thorough discussion on this issue and all agreed it would be a benefit to our City and that this issue should be moved forward. We are agreeable for First Reading.

Mr. D’Ambrosio: This item will be on First Reading tonight. Our next meeting will be July 8^th and then we will be on Council Break. Perhaps we do not have to let this linger for a month and if everyone is comfortable with it we could move it forward for vote on July 8^th?

Mrs. Quinn-Hopkins: I just want to make a point that Mr. Miller asked us to be sure to get it done by September. If we had three readings the last reading would be the end of August. If we had the full three readings we would pass it in time as Mr. Miller had mentioned.

Mr. D’Ambrosio: We can do that – we will see what everyone wants to do.

There were no further questions or comments.

 

06-24-(04): Adoption: May, 2014 Codified Ordinance Replacement Pages

Mr. D’Ambrosio: We adopt the replacement pages quarterly. This is a housekeeping matter.

There were no further questions or comments.

LEGISLATION PENDING:(Placed on First Reading 05/27/2014)

                                                (pLACED ON SECOND READING 06/10/2014)

05-27-(06): Resolution to Submit: 0.5-Mill Fire Levy Renewal

Mr. D’Ambrosio: We put this 0.5-mill Fire Levy Renewal legislation on First Reading May 27^th and Second Reading June 10^th. This will be on Third Reading tonight and voted on by Council.

There were no further questions or comments.

                                                (PLACED ON FIRST READING 06/10/2014)

06-10-(02): Resolution to Submit: Amendment: Income Tax Rate

Mr. D’Ambrosio: This item was placed on First Reading June 10^th and will be on Second Reading this evening if there are no objections.

Mrs. Quinn-Hopkins: I have been looking at what has happened in Euclid since they raised their income tax to 3.85%. It is clear that when they did that it caused businesses to leave and people who are wealthy enough to live where they wanted to choose to live elsewhere and they are left with low income people who have to stay there – they don’t have a choice. The monies they get from those people – it is obviously not an improvement. I really think we need to give this reconsideration. Also, considering – logically – if I were a business I would look at what city has the lowest income tax. If I were a wealthy individual considering what city I would live in I would also look at what city had the lowest income tax.

I think it would behoove us to consider going the opposite direction and being competitive with our surroundings rather than to raise it and not be competitive at all.

Mr. D’Ambrosio: How do you suggest to raise the revenue?

Ms. Vaughn: Where is the $800,000 coming from?

Mrs. Quinn-Hopkins: We would raise revenue because of increased business and increased residents. Of course not overnight. But, I also believe we should do a performance audit by the State Auditor. There is a program where they nearly guarantee that we would save money and if we didn’t we would space out our payments over the course of an extended amount of time.

Mr. D’Ambrosio: You realize we have to raise $800,000? If we had another dozen Rally’s that would not work.

Mrs. Quinn-Hopkins: I understand that.

Mr. D’Ambrosio: A couple of WalMarts would not work.

Mrs. Quinn-Hopkins: Still, how can we raise taxes when we are giving people pay increases?

Mr. Evers: First off, Euclid went to 3.25% – we are going to 2.75%. I would like to see the factual evidence from the City of Euclid where it says businesses moved out of Euclid because of that. You are talking Euclid or South Euclid – which one?

Mrs. Quinn-Hopkins: Euclid.

Mr. Evers: I would like to see the factual evidence from that City that says businesses moved out of there due to the income tax hike. We need to raise $800,000. If not we will make some very severe cuts in this City. And, I don’t hear anyone coming up with any plan – anywhere – to do that. I was on the financial task force two years ago. We spent over a year – we will leave it at that.

Ms. Vaughn: I was at a presentation put on by the State about the program Mrs. Quinn-Hopkins indicated with the Auditor’s office. Mr. Slocum can support my statement when I say it would be extremely costly to the City and we saw no benefit at that time – Council or the Administration. Although we did not agree on a lot of things we did agree on that. I see no benefit to it now. It is great to talk about how it is going to hurt the poor people … we have no money. Don’t you understand? We will not be able to pay our bills. We will have policemen working 8 hours a day instead of 24 and will have to share fire departments with Willowick and maybe Willoughby when they can get here and we will snow plow just the main streets and maybe a side street in a couple weeks. We have to come up with $800,000. We tried 9 levies. Property owners do not want to increase their taxes. This way an income tax increase impacts the working people – and they will be renters too – it will not tax social security or pensions – it will tax the working people. My kids live in a different city and they have been paying extra income for the 20 years they have lived there. That is a city that had money and they still voted it on their ballot 20 years ago and they pay an extra percentage. And they don’t whine.

Mr. Slocum: First of all – the rate in Euclid is 2.85% and not 3.85%. Secondly, we just lost a business in this City that had over $5 million in payroll that relocated from a 2% City to Euclid with 2.85%. And this happened within the last three months. It was announced last year that they relocated out of Eastlake to Euclid. The income tax I do agree is a factor in attracting businesses and the like but it is not the only factor. There is a lot to be looked at. The fact that you go to 2.75% is not going to kill us. I was actually working in Maple Heights when their tax was raised from 2% to 2.5% and we did not have an exodus of businesses occur after that tax was raised.

Mayor Morley: I think what you need to look into – we can do a study with the Auditor but we don’t have that time. What we need to start doing – when you have these items you need to come up with what your plan is instead of just reading a script.

Mrs. Quinn-Hopkins: I have no script.

Mayor Morley: Reading from other areas that people are doing. You need to tell me what you want to cut if we don’t do this. And I am okay with cuts because if the levy fails we will make the cuts we have to make. But we cannot continue to say we don’t want to do something. We have a responsibility to run this City. If that is the route you want to go – I don’t want to do this – I don’t want to do that – you need to tell me what you want to do. That is what I am looking for from you. Tell me what your alternative is to us going to the residents and asking for help.

Mrs. Quinn-Hopkins: Okay.

Mr. Evers: The first thing that will happen if we don’t come up with the $800,000 is the State will come back in. I was on the State Oversight Committee and worked with Mr. Paul Marshall for over two years. The first thing they are going to do is reciprocity. The voters will not have a choice. At least with what we are trying to do now the voters have a choice.

Mr. Slocum: As for the Auditor’s efficiency study – when I was hired here I came out of industry with over 20 years of industry experience in banking. I am a Certified Public Accountant and a Certified Fraud Examiner and I will put whatever the auditors will do compared to what I have already done for this City. I think it would be a wasted effort and anything they would bring would be marginal at best. Is there ways of saving money? Sure – you fire “x” amount of people. If we remember when the State Commission left they had a 95 item study that was a wish list of things to do and of that maybe 30% was implementable. The other 30% was too cost prohibitive to implement. This is the same people the State says to bring in. I will put my credentials against theirs any day.

Mr. D’Ambrosio: I personally do not think that anyone here really, really wants to do this. I do not want to pay more taxes. I have to pay for it myself and I don’t want to do it. But it is the situation the City is in and it is not something we want to do – it is something we need to do and that is why we are hoping to put it on the ballot. Are there any other comments? If everyone agrees this will go on Second Reading tonight.

There were no objections or questions.

MISCELLANEOUS:

WPCC Expenditure Authorization: 2014 Capital Improvements Project: $150,000

Mr. D’Ambrosio: Mr. Slocum?

Mr. Slocum: This is an expenditure that needs to be made for the WPCC. They need our approval for it and we recommend it.

Mr. D’Ambrosio: This is all budgeted?

Mr. Slocum: It is budgeted in our budget to go into theirs.

Mr. D’Ambrosio: Willoughby passed it.

There were no further questions or comments.

 

Contract Extension: Lake Business Products: $20,282.70/annual

Mr. D’Ambrosio: This was discussed in the Ordinance Committee under miscellaneous. Mr. Slocum?

Mr. Slocum: This is a two year extension. We are not getting new equipment and are retaining the five year old equipment we have. We are getting it for about $5,000 less a year than what we previously got. If we looked to change with another vendor chances are we would go back up. We did shop this with another vendor and putting in used equipment and Lake Business still came out ahead. Furthermore Lake Business is an Eastlake business. The fact that they came in cheapest we highly recommend it.

Mr. D’Ambrosio: This was moved forward to tonight by the Committee.

Mrs. Quinn-Hopkins: I am thinking this is a typo but it says $.13 for black and white and $.08 for color copies – maybe that is reversed?

Mr. Slocum: It is $.013 cents per black and white.

Mrs. Quinn-Hopkins: You are right – so sorry.

There were no further questions or comments.

The meeting was adjourned at 7:15 p.m.

dac                            

                        

                                                                                    APPROVED: ________________

                                                                                       DATE: __________________