Regular Council Meeting Minutes from January 12, 2016
EASTLAKE CITY COUNCIL
REGULAR COUNCIL MEETING MINUTES
JANUARY 12, 2016
The Regular Meeting of the Eastlake City Council was held at Eastlake City Hall, 35150 Lakeshore Boulevard. The Meeting was called to order by Council President Ms. DePledge at approximately 7:07 p.m.
The Pledge of Allegiance was recited.
ATTENDEES
Members of Council in attendance were Mr. Zuren, Mr. Meyers, Mr. Kasunick, Mr. Spotton, Mr. Evers, Mr. Hoefle and Council President Ms. DePledge. Also in attendance was Council Clerk Mrs. Simons.
Those attending from the Administration were Mayor Morley, Law Director Klammer, Finance Director Slocum, City Engineer Gwydir, Service Director Rubertino, Fire Chief Whittington and Police Chief Reik. CBO Menn was absent and excused.
APPROVAL OF MINUTES
Special Council Meeting –December 29, 2015.
MOTION: Mr. Hoefle moved to approve the minutes of the Special Council Meeting November 29, 2015. Mr. Evers seconded.
ROLL CALL: Yeas unanimous.
Motion carried. The minutes were approved.
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COUNCIL PRESIDENT’S REPORT – Mr. D’Ambrosio
Meetings Scheduled
Ms. DePledge: The next Council-as-a-Whole Committee Meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, January 26, 2016 at 7:00 p.m. The Regular Council meeting will be convened immediately following the adjournment of the Council-as-a-Whole Committee meeting. As my first report one of the items that may have appeared on tonight’s agenda and it does not is that periodically Council is given an opportunity to give themselves a raise. This opportunity has come up several times during my tenure here and each and every year Council waives the opportunity to seek an increase. I am honored to work with gentlemen who are putting the City first and they have waiver the opportunity to increase their personal earnings in light of bettering the City. I wanted to recognize each and every individual for making that sacrifice and commend the today for their decision.
COMMUNICATIONS & PETITIONS
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A liquor license request from Dolgen Midwest LLC, dba Dollar General Store 16073, 36180 Lakeshore Blvd., Eastlake.
Ms. DePledge: This was discussed in Council-As-A-Whole. Mr. Hoefle you will make a Motion for this in Committee Reports?
Mr. Hoefle: Yes.
COMMITTEE REPORTS
Ms. DePledge: No Committee Meetings were held since the last meeting. Is there any member of Council wishing to address the Chair at this time? Mr. Evers?
Mr. Evers: Mr. Slocum I would like to go ahead and schedule a Finance Committee Meeting for next week if we can.
Mr. Slocum: I am going to be reviewing a draft of the budget with the managers this week and I am looking to publish one by next week. I know that we will defiantly in a position to review revenues along with what is going into our estimates. If you would like next week I can get a portion of that out by the end of this week.
Mr. Evers: Ok.
Mr. Slocum: By the end of next week I anticipate that I will have a full budget for you to review. I we just looking at the calendar and the Tuesday after January 19th is a Council Meeting but if you want to schedule anything for the remainder of that week or the following Tuesday. Because after that the following dates that are available are February 2nd along with February 9th and as for February 16th I will no longer be available. I really want to spend the time that I can and….my first day here we had a Council Meeting that started at 6:00 p.m. and we ended it at 12:15 a.m. I will spend whatever time that we have to and answer any questions and go from there.
Mr. Evers: Are we ok to hold a Committee Meeting on Tuesday? We will have a Committee Meeting on Tuesday at 6:00 p.m. at City Hall.
Ms. DePledge: This coming Tuesday January 19th?
Mr. Evers: Yes.
Ms. DePledge:Mr. Hoefle would you like to make your Motion at this time.
Mr. Hoefle: Yes.
Motions:
MOTION: : Mr. Hoefle moves to approve and send back to Columbus, Ohio with no objections the liquor license permit request from Dolgen Midwest LLC, dba Dollar General Store 16073, 36180 Lakeshore Blvd., Eastlake, OH. Mr. Evers second.
ROLL CALL: Yeas unanimous.
Motion carried. This will be added to the agenda.
RECOGNITION OF THE PUBLIC
Ms. DePledge recognized the public input at this time; she reminded the speakers that there is a 3-minute limit for their comments; all comments are to be directed to the Chair and not include any personalities or individuals.
Ted Beres, 36706 Lakehurst Dr., Eastlake
Mr. Beres: Those of you who know me know that I am a believer in prayer. A lot of people wait until things are going badly and they are in trouble before they pray. But knowing Eastlake’s financial situation I have already begun to pray for the Mayor, Department Heads, and especially for our new Council members. We have four new members, a new President and a new Vice President. I think that we will need all of the prayers to help us because things could end up going very bad and we could be in some trouble. I know that there are a lot of residents who don’t know and do not care about what it takes to run a city when you don’t have the resources that you need. They are usually the first ones to complain and criticize when something happens and it displeases them. Now last month our former Clerk of Council Mrs. Cendroski gave an impassionate plea to talk to your neighbors and their neighbors. Mrs. Cendroski loves Eastlake and I know that each and every one of you loves Eastlake. Now if we could get our neighbors to feel that love and to care about this City and then they too will care about this City.
There was no one else who wished to speak.
LEGISLATION PROPOSED – First number will be 2016-001
There was no Legislation Proposed
LEGISLATION PENDING
There is no Legislation Pending
UNFINISHED BUSINESS
There was no Unfinished Business.
NEW BUSINESS
There was no New Business.
ADMINISTRATIVE REPORTS:
MAYOR/SAFETY DIRECTOR – Dennis Morley
Mayor Morley: Thank you, Ms. President. Welcome everyone to this evenings meeting. Thank you for coming out in this extremely fun weather. It has been a good day all day. We have started to interview for the new Finance Director and we interviewed a person yesterday and we will be interviewing again tomorrow and possibly a few more after that. Hopefully we will have someone by the end of the month to present to Council. I have gotten a couple of calls and it has also been in the paper and on the news the last few weeks about the disc that was stolen from R.I.T.A. That was from 2012 and nothing from Eastlake is affected at this time. Obviously they are going to work on their security a little more. That is not an affect to our citizens. I know that they have left but thank you to the Elks and they have also donated to the Boulevard of 500 Flags in the past and we thank them for their community support. Next week on January 18th at the library Ms. Vaughn wanted me to let everyone know that they are having a meeting for the Trap, Neuter and Release Program for cats that they are going to try and get for the City of Eastlake just like they have done for the City of Willowick. Mr. Evers and I have meet with the Captain’s yesterday and I know that it is early but March 26th will be our Easter Egg Hunt at the Stadium. We are looking forward to that again and hopefully the snow will not be here on that day. This year Easter is on March 27th and we tried to go to the latest date that we could. Also discussed again was the fireworks for the 4th of July at the Stadium and I talked with Mayor Margalis from Wickliffe and he has said that he would go in with us and I am pretty sure that Mayor Bonde of Willowick will also. We will try to do that again on the 4th of July. Mr. Gwydir and I have been working on next year’s road program…Ridgewood Dr. and E. 344th St. up to Stevens Blvd. from Eastlawn St. will be the two projects from the OPWC money for next year. They will be paid in half and Mr. Gwydir can talk a little bit more about that in his report. We also have a project on Lakeshore Blvd. next year that the County is going to try and administer for us and Mr. Gwydir can also discuss that a little bit more in his report. That concludes my report and I am open for questions.
Ms. DePledge: Mr. Hoefle?
Mr. Hoefle: Mayor are you saying next year for these roads or this year?
Mayor Morley: Next year.
Mr. Hoefle: Ok.
Ms. DePledge: 2017.
Mayor Morley: This is what Mr. Gwydir and I have been working on and every year we get this OPWC money and it doesn’t come until July. We actually want to put bids out now so that we aren’t having to do what we are doing with Willowick Dr. and that is to finish it next year. Luanna Dr. was awarded with the OPWC money and we have to finish that job next year because we didn’t bid on it until June or July and by then they are busy. We want to try and get some bids out now or in the next few months so the contractors know that they can put this on their books and we won’t have the issues that we had this year with Willowick Dr. We still have to complete one thousand square yards on Willowick Dr. and we have to finish Luanna Dr. Lakeline is going to kick in to fix the area over on Oak Knoll Ave. and on Willowick Dr. That will be around March or April whenever the roads and weather are better. That is the purpose of that.
Mr. Hoefle: Mayor in regards to the Croatian Lodge for the soccer fields has there been any movement on that?
Mayor Morley: I figured that I would let everyone get settled in first on Council and then we could bring that up. I haven’t had any discussions on that. The only other thing that is open is that before the end of the year there was the gentleman at the plaza who was talking about the games. We have talked about that and we have looked at Willowick and from our end….I figured that I would let everyone settle in and get through January maybe start talking in February.
Mr. Hoefle: So we are looking at scheduling Committee Meeting in February?
Mayor Morley: With the budget coming that is pretty much what we are going to be working on in the next few months.
Ms. DePledge: Mr. Evers?
Mr. Evers: Mayor did you want to take about the Warming Centers for the weather?
Mayor Morley: Mr. Evers and I have talked and just in case we have any major power outages we are going to be using the Community Center. E-Pal will be opening that up as a Warming Center. We have talked before and if there are storms of any kind we would open up City Hall and we could open up the Senior Center. Working with Pal in relationship with my office and with Mr. Evers in E-Pal that we have started to have…that is what this is all about it is our community so we are going to continue to work together for them. Thanks Mr. Evers for reminding me.
There were no further questions of Mayor Morley
FIRE CHIEF – Ted Whittington
Chief Whittington: Thank you Ms. President. I know that everybody is thanking the Elks and they are an amazing group of people and they have always been very supportive of the Fire Department. Actually Mr. Felice called me and said that I am looking to do some grants and stuff this year. He actually extended the olive branch to that. I had explained to him and he was big on education so we have the Hazard House that we take to all of the programs for the second graders and we have the trailer that we take to all of the third grade programs. We actually have some updates that we need to make to both of those. All of that money will be put into those two programs in order to update them. I explained it to him and again to follow his wishes and his grant program for this year. Just so that everybody is on the same page we are looking…and this is the year for the Republican National Convention and I know that the Mayor has been pretty aggressive in trying to get events in the community. I am working with Chief Reik and other agencies throughout the County to try and start scheduling some training up at the stadium for sometime in April. I am opening it up for anybody who would be interested in things that they may be thinking…those types of things are what we plan these events at the stadium for. Some of the groups that we have invited in are the County Hazmat Team, County Bomb Squad, and the Swat Teams from the different agencies. The goal with this is to go through different types of procedures in the event that if we have something up there we are prepared for it. Hopefully we don’t but that is part of the plan. Just so everyone on Council is aware of that for the next couple of months as far as planning goes. I know that the Finance Director is talking about budget session so I am looking forward for the Fire Department to revise our five year plan. We still have some capital that we need to address and I am looking forward to all of that. I am open for questions from anybody.
There were no further questions of Chief Whittington
SERVICE DIRECTOR – Nick Rubertino
Mr. Rubertino: Good evening everybody and just a little heads up that obviously the snow and ice are back. We have a plan that we follow as far as clearing the roads and if our new members get a little bit better of an idea on it. We start on the main roads, bridges, hills, and then we do our secondaries, our straight through roads, cul-de-sacs and our dead ends. So if you get any calls on that again you are always welcome to call me 24/7. If there are any questions that I can help you with or to answer any of the resident’s questions you are welcome to call me yourself or have the resident contact me. We are a little bit behind on some areas but for the most part we try and get the main roads going and then our side roads and the cul-de-sacs are pushed back as far as we can then we go back later and clear them up. Originally with the Christmas trees Republic Waste told us that they were going to be out last week and this week and now they have changed it to this week. If you get any calls on the Christmas trees they should be cleared out of the property by this week. With that I am open for questions.
Ms. DePledge: Just for information purposes for our new members Mr. Rubertino what are the miles that you cover and how does it compare to our surrounding communities?
Mr. Rubertino: You mean how many miles do we cover?
Ms. DePledge: Yes how many miles and how many teams do we have?
Mr. Rubertino: Right now we have five members out there at a time. Hopefully we will have six but we did have a call off today from a gentleman who was sick. We cover six square miles of road and there are five guys out there and they have been out there since four o’clock this morning. In today’s instances you have a lot of wind that is blowing. When it’s below twenty degrees outside the salt doesn’t work that fast. Normally the vehicles crush the salt and they also help with breaking up the ice. The heat from the tires help to melt the ice and in that regard that is where we are at with it. Once it gets below twenty degree’s we are all on our own. With the wind blowing you will have a lot of spots…if we didn’t have the wind today we would probably be clear but we have a lot of blow over areas and we try to generate our attention to those areas.
Ms. DePledge: Mr. Hoefle?
Mr. Hoefle: Mr. Rubertino as far as the salt could you please enlighten the new members as far as to how you lay the salt down. If it is still just on the intersections and having the cars take it down on certain roads.
Mr. Rubertino: On the side roads we do the intersections mainly and if we can get further down we do but for the side roads we just generate the intersections. Traveling down a road that has snow on it really isn’t an issue it is where you are able to stop at the intersections so that you don’t blow through or slide through them. All of the main roads and again the secondary roads, hills and bridges we salt those repeatedly.
There were no further questions of Mr. Rubertino.
CITY ENGINEER – Tom Gwydir
Mr. Gwydir: Thank you Ms. President, members of Council and the Mayor. As a follow on to the Mayor’s report there are two OPWC projects that we are doing and they are Ridgewood Dr. and E. 344th St. The projects total cost is $1,054,000.00 and we are able to get 50% of that or $527,000.00 as a grant in which the City matches. We go for these grants every year and topically they are announced around May. They make their selections in the summer and the final selections are in the fall. There is a dual application process and I would be glad to go over that process with any of the new Council members who may want to know more about it. As far as the paving on Lakeshore Blvd. goes there are a couple of paving jobs that are going to be coming forth here and the first one is going to be this year. It is going to be done by ODOT and it is essentially going to be from Willowick Dr. and go just past Route 91 here on Lakeshore Blvd. ODOT also notified the City recently that they would give them 80% of the funds for paving Lakeshore Blvd. from where the current job is going to stop this year all the way to Eastern Corporation Limit of Lakeshore Blvd. I will be giving Mr. Slocum the financials for that here shortly. As far as Storm Water goes the contracts for the televising work for Central Eastlake are here in my folder and they have been signed and they will be sent out to the contractor. We will be getting underway with that and likewise we are starting the design for the Galilean Area Pump Station and the Storm Sewers phase one that is under the Storm Water Utility that we have with the County. If Mr. Meyers would like to speak with me about the specifics of any of those I would be glad to do so at your convenience and with that I am open for questions.
Ms. DePledge: Mr. Klammer?
Mr. Klammer: Do you still need something from me on using the funds or did we settle that issue?
Mr. Gwydir: I believe that we are set. We have been working with the County so far and before we proceed we make sure that they will grant the funds for the City to cover all of the work.
Mr. Klammer: I know that we have talked informally.
Mr. Gwydir: I believe that we are set.
There were no questions of Mr. Gwydir.
FINANCE DIRECTOR – Mike Slocum
Mr. Slocum: Thank you Madam President I do not have a Financial Report tonight since it was covered in the Committee Report. I would like to report that the former Finance Director Mr. Condren passed away two weeks ago and he served here from 1985 and he retired in 2010. We were sad to hear that and with that I am open for questions.
There were no questions of Mr. Slocum.
POLICE CHIEF – Larry Reik
Chief Reik: Again I will reiterate what Chief Whittington said and that is that it is nice to get money from organizations like that to help with some of the programs. It doesn’t put a drain on the General Funds. We recently received one about three or four weeks ago from Wal-Mart at the end of the year and that went to our Juvenile Diversion Program which has been a mutual benefit. We found that the program itself to be very valuable with cause and effect. We catch a juvenile during curfew or doing some minor violations and we put them into our program. A week or two into the program they are doing stuff like picking up trash or helping some of the elderly residents or our special needs residents in our community. We have been able to adequately staff that with some kids and not wear down the court with too many personnel and that has worked out real well for us. We have been relatively busy for those of you who know we had a bank robbery on Saturday. We have some pretty decent leads on that and typically the FBI and the US Marshalls are involved. The one suspect will probably be picked up real soon and we will see if we can tie him to ours. Typically they do not stay non-apprehended for too long. Fortunately no one was hurt. We are going to stop at all of the banks again to reiterate our policies with them and vise verse. In the past we have gone to their staff meetings and teller meeting just so they are well equip as they can be. Everyone at the bank did a very nice job and obviously the money is not the important thing it is their safety that is important. It all worked out as well to be expected other than apprehending them immediately. Other than that I am open for questions.
Ms. DePledge: Mr. Hoefle?
Mr. Hoefle: Chief Reik with the new entrance at Wal-Mart is there any issues over there?
Chief Reik: It hasn’t been going to bad. Anytime people use that center lane to turn left or right you know some people turn at fifteen feet before and some people do it at one hundred feet before. That is where some of the issues come from but we haven’t had many accidents over in that area. With the design that they came up with I think that elevated a lot more for congestion off of E. 337th St. When you use to come in or out of there it was at a pretty steep grade and now they knocked that down. I think that’s a really big difference. I know that the Mayor continues to work on trying to get an agreement to have that whole shopping center open to where you can travel from Wal-Mart all the way to the other side of the complex. That would help but I know that there are some road blocks with that.
There were no further questions of Chief Reik.
CHIEF BUILDING OFFICIAL – David Menn
Mr. Menn was absent and excused.
There were no questions of Mr. Menn.
LAW DIRECTOR – Randy Klammer
Mr. Klammer: Thank you Madam President, members of Council and Mayor Morley. I sent over updated litigation today and some of the emails bounced back for some reason. They didn’t bounce back I would get returned emails with nothing on them so if everybody would check to make sure that they got the litigation updates. I will be happy to answer any questions and I was going to recommend an Executive Session because it was a short agenda. So I was going to recommend an Executive Session to discuss the litigation involving Mr. Belich and a litigation involving Mr. Oliveri and any discussion with Council.
There were no further questions of Mr. Klammer.
Ms. DePledge: Would someone like to make the Motion? Mr. Hoefle?
MOTION TO ADJOURN INTO EXECUTIVE SESSION FOR DISCUSSION OF MATTERS LITIGATION AND MATTERS FOR ANY QUESTIONS FOR LEGAL COUNSEL
MOTION: Mr. Hoefle moves that we move into Executive Session for litigation matters with Mr. Belich and Mr. Oliveri and any questions for legal counsel. Mr. Evers seconded.
ROLL CALL: Yeas unanimous.
Motion carried.
Ms. DePledge: For those of you who are new we are moving into Executive Session and we have essentially concluded our Council Meeting and from here we go into Executive Session to discuss litigation and employment issues along with highly sensitive issue to the City. When we come back out of Executive Session we literally sit in the same circle and we take a vote to adjourn out of Executive Session and then our Council Meeting is concluded we do not discuss in the public form. So if you want to stay to the end to watch us come back in and excuse ourselves you are more than welcome too. I would advise against it and I would get myself home as quickly as possible.
Ms. DePledge: We are back on the record after adjourning from Executive Session is there a Motion to adjourn from Executive Session?
MEETING CALLED BACK TO REGULAR COUNCIL MEETING
MOTION: Mr. Evers moved to adjourn from Executive Session. Mr. Hoefle seconded.
ADJOURNMENT
The meeting was adjourned at approximately 7:42 p.m.
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LAURA A. DEPLEDGE, COUNCIL PRESIDENT
APPROVED: __________________________
ATTEST: ______________________________________
TRACY M. SIMONS, CLERK OF COUNCIL