Howdy!
This week's meeting was a big one. It was a full house, and the longest meeting yet. Here is a recap of some of the high points:
- Winners of the 1st Annual Mayor's Photo/Art Contest were recognize. Congratulations to the winners, all the art work was beautiful.
- Recognition of Chuck Branch. Chuck and his wife will be leaving Ozark for Tulsa soon, and we took a moment to recognize the huge contribution he has made to our city. You can read more about Chuck's impact on our city here: http://www.ccheadliner.com/articles/2009/07/08/news/doc4a537de57f15a353933464.txt I would like to thank him and wish him luck.
- 1st Reading: Bill that will allow the LCRA board to refi a certain portion of the loans they possess on downtown properties. This refi will allow the city to make interest only payments for one year. I believe the refi was initiated over a year ago and is just now coming before the board to be finalized. Refis are tricky, especially when involving tax payer dollars. It will mean that the taxpayers will pay less now, which may be of benefit in this tight economy, but it also means that the taxpayers will pay a larger amount over the life of the loan. Steve said he would provide the exact numbers at the next meeting before the 2nd reading and passage/failure of the bill.
- New appointments to the P&Z: Kenneth Washam, Charlie Powell, and Darrell McGuire. Congratulations!
- New appointments to the Parks Board: Shea Lane, Josh Tinker, and Eric Griessel. Congratulations!
- Steve gave us an update on the goings on of the Old Community Building. Ozark has received a Brownstone grant which is allowing DNR to come down and evaluate the state of building. They will analyze contaminants in the building (asbestos, dung, mold, etc.) and let us know what needs to be done to remove them. All this, free of charge to the city. Steve has also opened up bidding for an appraiser to find out just what the building is worth. Although there are not yet definite plans for the building, these steps will help us evaluate the state of the building and what it is actually worth so we can move forward.
- The police department was also awarded a grant for security purposes. This grant will pay for a large walk through metal detector for the municipal building, hand held metal detection wands, and equipment for security card access to the municipal buildings. I am really excited about this.
BILLS 2ND READ AND PASSED:
- Bill 2459 was passed. It revised some typos in Title 4 (the land use section) of the municipal code.
- Before passage of the budget amendments, Parks Director, Mrs. Matthews went over the parks department 651 Budget. You can read the high points of that here: http://tinyurl.com/mfzuxc . Mrs. Matthews stated that the budget was doing better than they anticipated considering the May opening. The only possible problem comes in a $200,000 overage for the FEMA building of which you can read about in the above article.
- Bill 2460 was passed. This bill addressed a number of budget amendment. Most of the general revenue amendments were revisions due to unforeseen changes in revenue and under budgeted items. General revenue expenditures increased by 5.79% and revenues increased by 3.1%. The amendments will require us to allocate $137,697.85 from last year's carryover leaving a balance of $285,560.46. Because of the possible $200,000 shortfall in the Parks Budget, I asked for an amendment that would allocate $200,000 from the carryover balance to set aside in case the Parks Department could not come up with the funds by their December deadline. I feel it is prudent for the city plan for such a large expense while we still have the money to do so. It is very possible that the Parks will be able to make up the difference, and that would be great, but we should still be prepared in the mean time. Finding $200,000 at the end of the fiscal year could prove difficult if we have not taken the necessary precautions. After much discussion my amendment to the budget did not make it into the bill, and the original budget amendment bill passed 4 - 2. I will be bringing the amendment back to the board at the next meeting in it's own bill. Dennis voted no on the bill due to an increase in leased vehicles for the parks department. I voted no because I did not want to see a budget increase without setting aside the funds to cover the FEMA building.
SIGNING THE INVOICES:
- I discussed my thoughts on signing the invoices at each meeting. For those of you who don't know, each alderman has been tasked with signing the invoiced for a particular department at each meeting. My department is the Public Works department. At each meeting I get a stack of about 100 invoices. It is nearly impossible for me to read each invoice and sign it if I get to the meeting an hour early. Not to mention, since that is the earliest I can get the invoices, there is no way for me to verify the true validity of those invoices, and thus I have been very concerned about putting my signature on them.
In my search to find a remedy to this, I found that there is no statutory or municipal code requirement that the board should sign the invoices. In fact, according to our code, the city Administrator is the sole purchasing agent for the city. We, the board, approve the budget, and Steve deals with the day to day expenditures. At least that's how it is officially designed. As long as the expenditures are within the approved budget and under $5000 the specific expenditures are not required to be approved by the board.
Although I would not be opposed to never signing another invoice again, many on the board feel like it provides them an extra level of oversight, which I can understand. Since that seemed to be the consensus, I suggested that someone should sponsor a bill to revise the municipal code. If the board is going to be given a responsibility, that responsibility or rule should be clearly defined and in the code book, especially when dealing with our signatures. I believe someone will be presenting a bill for this at the next meeting.
SPONSORSHIP OF BILLS
- I also discussed the sponsorship of bills by members of the board. Currently, board members are arbitrarily assigned to bills and resolutions as sponsors. A sponsor is defined as "a person who vouches or is responsible for a person or thing." It is difficult to be responsible for a bill that is arbitrarily assigned to me, that I see for the first time on the Friday before the meeting. Because of this, I have requested not be assigned as a sponsor to any bill or resolution that I did not write, ask for, or was previously asked to sponsor.
As we discussed the topic, David proposed a process that would alleviate the issue. Since the each board member is assigned a department, if that department needed a bill of some kind, that department head would need to contact their respective board member and ask for their sponsorship of said bill. If the member will not agree to sponsor the bill, the bill would then go to the Mayor Protem in hopes that he could locate a sponsor for the bill or, if he desired, he could sponsor the bill himself.
Having the bills arbitrarily assigned is not breaking any rules or regulations and has been done in the past, I believe, out of necessity. To make the board function as a true legislature and follow a process like the one David suggested requires an engaged board who is willing to get 'knee deep' in the goings on of the city. The discussion went very well, and I think now, with the current board, we are in a perfect position to make these types of positive changes happen.
OC MEMBERSHIPS
- At the Mayor's request, the board gave an approving nod to change the OC's definition of a Family membership to a Household membership. This will allow 2 adults dwelling in the same home and 3 children to get the $425 membership. Current the adults have to be married.
I will get the video up this weekend, and the community breakfast will be July 25th this month.
