EASTLAKE CITY COUNCIL

REGULAR COUNCIL MEETING MINUTES

May 10, 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 7:08 p.m.  

 

The Pledge of Allegiance was recited.

 

ATTENDEES

Members of Council in attendance were Mr. Zuren, Mr. Meyers, Mr. Kasunick, Mr. Spotton, Mr. Hoefle and Council President Ms. DePledge. Also in attendance was Council Clerk Mrs. Simons. Mr. Evers is absent and excused.

 

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

 

APPROVAL OF MINUTES

Regular Council Meeting –April 26, 2016.

MOTION: Mr. Hoefle moved to approve the minutes of the Regular Council Meeting April 26, 2016. Mr. Meyers seconded.

 

ROLL CALL: Yeas unanimous.

 

Motion carried. The minutes were approved.

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COUNCIL PRESIDENT’S REPORT – Ms. DePledge

Meetings Scheduled

Ms. DePledge: The next Council-as-a-Whole Committee Meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, May 24, 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.

 

COMMUNICATIONS & PETITIONS

1. A communication from Police Chief Reik for the purchase of a Dodge Charger and a Ford Explorer form Statewide Auto for the total amount of Fifty-Three Thousand One Hundred Seventy Dollars.

 

Ms. DePledge: This was discussed in Council-as-a-Whole Committee and will be added to the evening’s agenda.

 

1. A communication from the WPCC to amend Section 939.015 “Definitions” of the Codified Ordinances.

 

Ms. DePledge: This was discussed in Council-as-a-Whole Committee and will be added to the evening’s agenda.

 

1. A communication from the WPCC to amend Section 939.45 “Haulers” of the Codified Ordinances.

 

Ms. DePledge: This was discussed in Council-as-a-Whole Committee and will be added to the evening’s agenda.

 

COMMITTEE REPORTS

Ms. DePledge: A Finance Committee Meeting was held last Tuesday, May 3. Mr. Hoefle?

 

Mr. Hoefle: Thank you. We held a Finance Committee Meeting last Tuesday. Mr. Evers was absent and excused. Members from the Committee were I and Mr. Zuren. All other members of Council were present. Present from the Administration were Mayor Morley and Law Director Klammer. We had one item on the agenda that evening and it was to discuss the proposals of the Central Park issues with the proposals that we had. There was some discussion in regards to it and there were comments made from the residents. In the end the Committee decided to move the ACL proposal forward to this evening’s agenda. That concludes my report.

 

Ms. DePledge: Are there any questions for Mr. Hoefle? Is there anyone who would like to report on their Committee?

 

MOTION:

MOTION: Mr. Zuren moved to add Legislation No.: 05-10-(02) to this evenings agenda a Resolution authorizing and directing the Mayor and Director of Finance to purchase a Dodge Charger and a Ford Explorer from Statewide Auto in the total amount of Fifty-Three Thousand One Hundred Seventy Dollars ($53,170.00) for use by the Eastlake Police Department. Mr. Hoefle Second.

 

Motion carried Legislation 05-10-(02) is added to this evening’s agenda.

 

MOTION: Mr. Spotton moved to add Legislation No.: 05-10-(03) to this evenings agenda an Ordinance amending Section 939.015, “Definitions,” of the Codified Ordinances of the City of Eastlake. Mr. Meyers Second.

 

Motion carried Legislation 05-10-(03) is added to this evening’s agenda.

 

MOTION: Mr. Spotton moved to add Legislation No.: 05-10-(04) to this evenings agenda an Ordinance amending Section 939.45, “Haulers” of the Codified Ordinances of the City of Eastlake. Mr. Meyers Second.

 

Motion carried Legislation 05-10-(04) is added to this evening’s agenda.

 

MOTION: Mr. Meyers moved to approve and send back to Columbus, Ohio with no objections a Liquor License Permit request from the American Croatian Lodge, Inc., 34900 Lakeshore Blvd., Eastlake, Ohio to Villa Croatia Party Center LLC, 34900 Lakeshore Blvd., Eastlake, Ohio. Mr. Spotton Second.

 

Motion carried.

 

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.

 

Christen Hutchinson, 223 Traymore Blvd., Eastlake

Mrs. Hutchinson: I just want to come here tonight to express to all of you how much I appreciate what you do for us. I have heard so much on this Blockwatch page and I am such a positive person in the city. I have worked with soccer and I have raised lots of money for the kids to have new nets and to paint the fields. Now I am with EPAL, which I love. I just want to let you know that it takes a lot of volunteers, which are hard find, and to commit and to stay committed. I just want to say that we have a lot of outside people that help us. Like the Gray Riders who are doing a great fund raiser for EPAL. If it wasn’t for outside people to help us things would not happen. So I am welcoming the Croatian Hall to do what they do. EPAL has been cleaning those back lots up from broken bottles and stuff. So that people with children who rent our hall can have games back there. I welcome that they want to…they pay taxes they are one of our neighbors. They are good people and I would like to see this happen. I don’t care if it is softball kids running, which haven’t been there. But there will be soccer kids and there is nothing better for our community than our children coming up and having a great place. I want Eastlake…for people to want to come here. That is how our city will grow and we all benefit from it. I just want to say thank you for listening. I do welcome the Trivisonno’s that is beautiful energy that you see for someone with a passion and that is awesome. That is what this city needs. I would real like you to consider the Croatian Hall and I think that it is a wonderful thing for all of us. It is more taxes for us, because we need the Chief to get another vehicle, we need police officers on the roads and firemen. When I need to call for that old neighbor across the street, that ambulance is coming down the road to save them. We have it on our street all the time. That is what I would like to continue and thank you and have a good evening.

 

Ms. DePledge: Thank you for your comments. Is there anybody wishing to address Council at this time?

 

Bob Spangenberg, 1034 Eastlake Drive, Eastlake

Mr. Spangenberg: I just wanted to say that my radio show is being suspended for a while. I am taking a little break. I just wanted to update you about the radio station WINT and that our FM antenna is now up and they building a new AM antenna. I go it backwards last week at our Festival Meeting for Saint Justin’s. I said that it was the FM tower. Our FM tower is up and our AM tower is getting ready to get hooked up. Hopefully in the fall I will go back to what I am supposed to be doing.

 

Ms. DePledge: Thank you for your comments Mr. Spangenberg. Is there anybody else wishing to address Council?

 

Jessica Trivisonno, 34186 Waldmere Dr., Eastlake

Mrs. Trivisonno: Public parks are one of the few things that this city can offer our residents.   Despite not knowing the actual cost it takes to maintain Central Park. You have consistently pressed forward to give our valuable park property away to the ACL. You are starting with this fifteen year lease with the ACL. With that lease you are converting a centrally located free public park that could easily become one of our cities best assets, into a privately operated soccer facility. It will be a facility that is no more open to the public than the Lost Nation Sports Park. And for what? You are doing it for the promise that the city will eventually get back fifteen year old soccer fields to cut the non-existent cost of maintaining the grass. I know that many of you on Council believe in this plan. I think that it is time that you start believing in your residents. This still leases away almost ten percent of our city owned public parks. We can’t afford to lose the parks that we have. Families don’t want to move into a city that doesn’t offer public recreation space. Young couples like myself can’t justify staying in one. Yet this is the choice that you are making tonight. The ACL is not entitled to Central Park the residents of Eastlake are. You could have publicly asked for alternative proposals. You could have accepted the ECP lease and you could of negotiated a better proposal with the ACL. Tonight you could still vote no to bring this lease forward. I know that is not the choice that you are going to make, but you had other choices and I wish that you would have taken them. Thank you.

 

Ms. DePledge: Your comments have been submitted before and Council has had ample opportunity to consider the same. Thank you for those. Is there anybody else wishing to address Council at this time?

 

Angelo Trivisonno, 34186 Waldmere Dr., Eastlake

Mr. Trivisonno: I am happy to see other people besides Mrs. Trivisonno and myself speaking today. I truly value all of the residents regardless of how they feel on this issue today.   And with all of their involvement in helping Eastlake to be a great city. I want to mention a couple of things that I have noticed today. Yet last week I asked for a copy of the lease and a copy of today’s legislation that was just introduced a little bit differently than before. I finally received this information this afternoon. So I have only had a couple of hours to really look at it. Somethings have been added to the lease. The first thing that I noticed is in Section 2 of this resolution that will presumably be passed today. It says that this property is not need for public purpose. I strongly, strongly disagree with that statement. In fact in the actual lease it says that this property is currently improved for use as a community and recreational facility. It is a public park so it currently has a public purpose as of right now. I believe that some of the new provisions that were added in here including that the city will incorporate and address as best as reasonably possible the concerns and comments of property neighboring the premises. There was other one talking about a pre-season coordinating conference. I don’t think that either of these two provisions really have any teeth. It doesn’t actually require anyone to do anything. At best it just requires that the American Croatian Lodge sit the youth soccer and that is it. It doesn’t require that they set aside time or fields. It doesn’t specify a cost of how much it would cost these youth leagues to actually pay to use these fields. Finally I just want to mention the fact that there have been no Recreation Committee Meetings held in at least the last three years. The last Recreation Committee Meeting was last held back in 2013 to ask for a levy for money. Since that failed over the last couple of years the Recreation Committee could have meet again to talk about how to improve our parks. Councilman Kasunick provided some pictures of some things to improve. One was a bumper lying on the ground next to a dumpster. We went there and picked it up and threw it in the dumpster. If we have these dialogs with residents I think that all together we could start developing a park together before we get to this point, where we have to unload the land because we can’t afford to take care of it. Thank you very much Madam President.

 

There was no one else who wished to speak.

 

LEGISLATION PROPOSED – First number will be 2016-022

05-10-(01)                                           RESOLUTION NO.:___________

A Resolution authorizing and directing the Mayor and Director of Finance to enter into a Lease Agreement between the City of Eastlake, (“Landlord” or “City”), an Ohio municipal corporation, whose address is 35150 Lakeshore Boulevard, Eastlake Ohio 44095, and the American Croatian Lodge, Inc. (“Tenant” or “ACL”), an Ohio corporation operating in Lake County, Ohio, whose address is 34900 Lakeshore Boulevard, Eastlake Ohio 44095, individually referred to as “party” and collectively as “parties”.

 

Ms. DePledge: This legislation is affectively on Third Reading so there is no requirement to suspend the rule requiring spate readings and reading in full. Therefore is there a Motion to adopt this legislation on Third Reading as amended?

 

MOTION: Mr. Hoefle moved to adopt. Mr. Zuren second.

 

ROLL CALL: Yeas unanimous.

 

Motion carried. Legislation is adopted as Resolution No. 2016-022.

 

05-10-(02)                                           RESOLUTION NO.:_________

A Resolution authorizing and directing the Mayor and Director of Finance to purchase a Dodge Charger and a Ford Explorer from Statewide Auto in the total amount of Fifty-Three Thousand One Hundred Seventy Dollars ($53,170.00) for use by the Eastlake Police Department, and declaring an emergency.

 

MOTION: Mr. Zuren moved to suspend the rules requiring separate readings and reading in full. Mr. Hoefle second.

 

ROLL CALL: Yeas unanimous.

 

MOTION: Mr. Zuren moved to adopt. Mr. Hoefle second.

 

ROLL CALL: Yeas unanimous.

 

Motion carried. Legislation is adopted as Resolution No. 2016-023.

 

05-10-(03)                                           ORDINANCE NO.:___________

An Ordinance amending Section 939.015, “Definitions,” of the Codified Ordinances of the City of Eastlake, and declaring an emergency.

 

MOTION: Mr. Spotton moved to suspend the rules requiring separate readings and reading in full. Mr. Meyers second.

 

ROLL CALL: Yeas unanimous.

 

MOTION: Mr. Spotton moved to adopt. Mr. Meyers second.

 

ROLL CALL: Yeas unanimous.

 

Motion carried. Legislation is adopted as Resolution No. 2016-024.

 

05-10-(04)                                           ORDINANCE NO.:___________

An Ordinance amending Section 939.45, “Haulers” of the Codified Ordinances of the City of Eastlake, and declaring an emergency.

 

MOTION: Mr. Spotton moved to suspend the rules requiring separate readings and reading in full. Mr. Meyers second.

 

ROLL CALL: Yeas unanimous.

 

MOTION: Mr. Spotton moved to adopt. Mr. Meyers second.

ROLL CALL: Yeas unanimous.
 

Motion carried. Legislation is adopted as Resolution No. 2016-025.

LEGISLATION PENDING

There was 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 Madam President. Welcome everyone to this evening’s meeting. I would like to welcome Mayor Regavich from the City of Willowick who stopped in to say “hello”. The Mayor and I have been trying to help out with the transition since the untimely death of Mayor Bonde. I look forward to working with the Mayor on future projects. I just wanted to give a few updates on the pool passes. As of May 3, 2016 we have sold seventeen family passes, tow senior passes, and two individual for a total of seventy four individuals. I would ask for everyone to go out and push it for this year. We need to try and get some more usage out of the swimming pool this year. Between the YMCA and our Best Supply that donates $20,000.00 out of their funds every year to keep this pool open. I would love to see a lot more than seventy-four individuals at this point to use our pool. Some of you may have noticed that on Lakeshore Blvd. and Erie Road the building that was in disarray. Working with Principle Chauby from North High School and with Ms. Kirschnick from the Visual Arts Department they have put up some murals that look really well. I would like to thank Maureen Forney, Julia Janich, Alisa Mumow, Travis Beget, Alexis Rubertino, Makenzie Scorich, Alesha Telsrow, Jacob Voknot, Nicolas Wright and Breanna White. I am actually going to go to North tomorrow along with Principle Chauby to recognize those students. Thank them for helping out. The Engineer talked to me last week and it was in my article this month about 344^th, Eastlawn and Stevens Blvd. It passed all of the local and it usually passes all of the state requirements. We were told that this year 344^th between Eastlawn and Stevens did not make the grade through the state from what the engineer has told me. This is the first time that something happened like this so we may have to re-apply or look into the road program for next year. Saturday, May 14 will be shred day and it will be from 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. behind City Hall. There is also a Police Auction at 9:00 a.m. at the police garage. We are continuing the catch basin repair along with the pot holes. I would like to thank the Beautification Committee for the last few weeks on coming up to City Hall along with some of the corners that are throughout the city. Wal-Mart will be handing in their final plans for the light that will be installed on East 340^th and the Wal-Mart entrance. Mr. Gwydir do you have any more information on that?

Mr. Gwydir: No I do not.

Mayor Morley: The last email that I received is that they were going to send the plans to the Planning Commission. On May 21 the flags will be going up here and if everyone is out and about to please stop out and help the Boulevard of 500 Flags. That concludes my report and I am open for questions.

Member of the audience: You had talked at the last meeting about talking to developers about what was going on with Vine Street. Are there any updates on that?

Mayor Morley: They are having a meeting in Las Vegas. We are making a push for a big box store.

Member of the audience: We need a garden center or something.

Mayor Morley: We have talked about that and we have actually met with a couple of people in the last two weeks and took walks through there. It goes through the broker so that is the best update that we have right now. Thank you.

There were no further questions of Mayor Morley

FIRE CHIEF – Ted Whittington

Chief Whittington: Thank you Madam President. It is hydrant season so we are going out there and making sure that we post the area where there is going to be hydrates that are going to be flushed. You should be well aware in your neighborhood. If you turn your water on and it is a little discolored just let it run for a couple of minutes and it should clear up. I do what to make mention that we did have our mock crash at North High School and we do it every other year. This year was the first year that we actually incorporated texting and driving. Traditionally it has been a drinking and driving type of message. Between the Mayor, Chief Reik and Mayor Regavich, because the Willowick Fire Department was there we were able to use three drama students. They were very good and realistic, because we make them up a little bit. We get a car from O’Conner’s and we simulate an accident and bring them out. I definitely think that it says a strong message to at least a couple of them. Our safety trailer will be going out to the elementary schools for the second and third graders. The trailer is for the third graders and we are going to do some stuff with the second graders that is the…before they go into their summer session. Other than that I am open for questions. 

Ms. DePledge: Did you want to address the Fire Departments preparation for the RNC Committee? I know that you have been doing a lot of work on that.

Chief Whittington: As it goes along we have been working to stay ahead of it. A lot of the stuff that we did at the stadium from the fire side was to prep us for emergencies at the stadium. I continue to work hard at the County level. We have had some meetings with other County officials including Fire and Police. As far as prepping if you have read the news paper the Radisson will host the delegation. I am not sure who that delegation is as far as that goes. We will have to continue to make prepartations to prepare for a lot of different types of things from an emergency prospective. I am not anticipating any problems, but I think that we want to be ahead of that. We look forward to having the different groups coming in. I think from a cities prospective it is really neat to be able to have a different states contingent of Republicans to come and stay in our city. I know that they did visit last week at the facility and they were taken around to the different types of venues to see where to eat and shop. 

Mayor Morley: I just had another committee meeting with the RNC. We are going to have another four meetings in the next month to month in a half. With the different events that are going to be going on in the city I have reached out to the Charters in our city. I am actually going to meet with the gentlemen this week. We are going to put bags together for the delegates at each one of the hotels. The state delegations are going to probably be announced in the next few weeks. They are still going through a lot of security. As the fire Chief has said the Radisson is booked. We have the Lake County Republican Party rented the stadium for July 21. We are still working with Captain’s for a few more events for that week.

Chief Whittington: I think that we are going to continue to meet as a city. Like I said you can only imagine that we don’t anticipate any problems. For a planning prospective I think that we are going to have increased senses during the day, which allows for medical emergencies. With the events up there and with the weather it is going to be a little bit warmer season. Severe weather usually comes through and we are going to continue to plan and be on top of it. In the past anytime that we have had a major event we spend a lot of time to be prepared. Not to say that we are going to prepare for everything but I feel comfortable where we are at in the planning process and where we should be. Again we will continue to move forward. Did you have anything specific?

Ms. DePledge: I know that you have been doing a lot and I know that you had done some routine or practice runs up at the stadium with forty victims. I knew that you were preparing and I just wanted to give you an opportunity to speak about that.

Chief Whittington: Thank you.

There were no further questions of Chief Whittington

POLICE CHIEF – Larry Reik

Chief Reik: We have our Safety Town coming up on June 13 through the June 17. It is for four, five and six year olds. We are taking applications for the enrollees. We get the National Honor Society who gets their time donated for their requirements. Last year it was a really good program and we want to try and get both classes filled. We are just trying to keep the work out there. I appreciate the equipment and I know that it is two out of three meetings that you guys have a looted a good amount of money to go towards police equipment. It is nice that it is not always the Fire Department that gets everything.

Chief Whittington: He did say the last three meetings.

Chief Reik: We do appreciate that and again Mr. Slocum was instrumental in helping me put it all together. It just goes to make sure that we have operable equipment. Mr. Kane form the Service Department does a nice job for us. We want to keep things as rotating as much new equipment as possible. We appreciate the ability to do our swearing in ceremonies here. As you can see by watching his family it is a proud moment for them as it should be. One thing that I want to bring up and I totally forgot about it until I sat back down. When I was going through his file to get his demographics to properly introduce him in his background packet there was a police report from when he was a juvenile. He got arrested by a young Sergeant at that time and it happened to be me and another officer on a juvenile complaint. He was visiting a girlfriend in the area and it was kind of funny. You never know fifteen years later where you end up meeting back up. He really seems like a good guy and I think that he will fit in well. He is ready to work. 

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.

SERVICE DIRECTOR – Nick Rubertino

Mr. Rubertino was absent and excused.

There were no further questions of Mr. Rubertino. 

CITY ENGINEER – Tom Gwydir

Mr. Gwydir: Thank you Madam President and members of Council and Mayor. Just a few things the Central Eastlake televising is done the surveying to locate all of the man holes on the GIS system is done. We will be moving forward on the hydraulic analysis for the design Galilean Storm water pumping system is well under way. We are expecting to go to bids on the OPWC project that was awarded on Ridgewood Drive probably in about a week to a week and a half. I just got done reviewing the plans for that and it should go to bid shortly. With that I am open for questions.

There were no questions of Mr. Gwydir.

FINANCE DIRECTOR – Carol-Ann Schindel

Ms. Schindel: Thank you Madam President. The State Auditors are in the office doing their annual or semiannual audit.   We are pretty busy suppling information to them right now so that they can conclude and rap up with a report. That concludes my report.

There were no questions of Ms. Schindel.

LAW DIRECTOR – Randy Klammer

Mr. Klammer: Thank you Madam President members of Council and Mayor.  A resident had mentioned something about new business. I have been helping the Mayor to try and understand the zoning process now that we had that Charter amendment. That will allow and give him some opportunities to talk with some potential new business. The Mayor referred to me Mr. Constantino’s complaint and he referred it to me. I have gone back and forth with Mr. Menn just so you know about a citation there. Other than that I am open for questions.

There were no questions of Mr. Klammer.

 

ADJOURNMENT

The meeting was adjourned at approximately 7:­­41 p.m.

 

 

           ­­­­­­­­­­                                                            __________________________________________

LAURA A. DEPLEDGE, COUNCIL PRESIDENT

APPROVED: ______________________

 

 

ATTEST: ______________________________________

                TRACY M. SIMONS, CLERK OF COUNCIL