When Mayor Wiederspon called for public comments under last night's agenda, City Attorney Jordan Ball rose to the podium. Ball made a statement in which he suggested Council take a different approach in dealing with the public comments section of the bi-monthly council meetings.
Getting back to business
Citing the recent controversies over the ordinance related to the City Manager/Economic Development Director position, Open Meetings questions and what he termed, "orbital issues," the City Attorney said that he felt those issues had been addressed sufficiently and that Council should leave those issues to, "other forums."
Ball detailed the substance of his comment by stating, "Since the first Council meeting in January where council members were presented a motion to revise the ordinance combining the City Manager/Economic Development Director positions, the majority of the time during council meetings has been devoted to public comments or question and answer sessions on this and other orbital issues."
Ball went on to advise the Mayor and all Council members that the question and answer format no longer be entertained under general items or public comments. Ball felt that the comments sections should just be one way, with the public making statements, but council should listen respectfully and resist the temptation to respond.
"There are some things that have come up, that everybody feels compelled to give an answer, certainly I would say that from my standpoint," he added.
Addressing the current needs of the City, Ball continued, "It's time for Council to get back to the functioning for services and projects that need your attention."
Ball indicated a potential issue with the legality of debate being applied during public comments or general items versus hearings. When public comments are discussed and not identified for discussion in the agenda Ball said, "Any discussion of public comments in that regard arguably violates the pubic meetings act."
"A full airing of the issues has been had" the best procedure is to listen respectfully to the public comments, " he said. Of future comments, he told them to just listen, "Even if you may want to respond to them."
In Ball's opinion, "The discussion as to whether the present city manager should be retained should be moved to other forums, the newspaper, the radio, the blogs, etc, etc, etc."
Ball concluded his remarks by saying, "It's time to move the discussion, charges, counter charges out of the council chambers, to other forums. Council can focus on the needed projects and services. We have a number of them tonight."
Candidate Response
In an email response to TheGuardiaNnews, Council candidate Tim Hackleman, who was in attendance had this to say of Ball's statement. "There definitely needs to be a balance of getting the work at hand completed, as well as giving the public fair and reasonable time to voice opinions." Hackleman said he thought that moving the agenda items around might afford a solution to the problem as well. He concluded by saying, "I do believe it's fair to hear all comments directly related to an agenda item, during that item."
Other Comments
Julie Young said that Marv had filled out the disclosure forms she said had been lacking and thanked the Councilman for doing so. She later told theguardiannews that she was just doing what she said she said she would (in checking on the disclosure form's status) and that included thanking the councilman for getting the form filled out.
March 1 thorugh 7th officially proclaimed
"SIDNEY JAYCEE WEEK"
Citing the group's encouragement of others to volunteer in community service and their credo which in part reads, "We believe that faith in God gives meaning and purpose to human life," and "That service to humanity is the best work of life," Mayor Wiederspon proclaimed that March 1 through 7th as Sidney Jaycee Week. If you are interested in learning more about the Jaycees, please check out their website at www.sidneyjaycees.com.
Electrical project gets switched off, then on again
Public Services Director John Hehnke asked the council to formally reject all bids for the North Substation transformer due to some issues with how the RFP was prepared. Citing additional issues that had arisen with some of the submitted bids, Hehnke said that it would be better to scrap the bids and reform the request.
"The efficiency standards that I talked about in my memo of the total operating cost of the transformers, we believe we had that in the specifications and unfortunately when we reviewed it and put it out, we kind of missed it."
Hehnke said that the total operation costs over the lifetime of the transformer should be the focus of the bid. "That's what we should truly be evaluating."
Councilman Wendell Gaston asked what an load tap changer was. Hehnke turned the question over to Electrical Distribution Superintendent, Rod Fries.
"A load tap changer is attached to the transformer coils," said Fries. "As the load changes during the day, that tap changer will automatically change where the coil is tapped and increase the voltage, decrease the voltage."
Asked by Gaston about the component's impact, Fries added, "Its a big deal, it's a major part of the transformer."
The council took the advice from the Public Services Director and voted to reject the current bids. The next steps are to send notice to bidders of rejection and refile. Hehnke told Council that he would expect to return with a new set of bids within 5-6 weeks.
Just the facts, man
The Mayor's questions on whether or not there were potential conflicts between the council Code of Conduct (CoC) and the open meetings laws led to some clarification and a little more confusion.
His first question was regarding the CoC provision that "council members give early warning to the Mayor and/or city council whenever substantial opposition is anticipated to an agenda item, so that appropriate staff/council response can be prepared.
Gaston said his reading of that was to make sure that all councilman are prepared to discuss agenda items and that, "everyone has the appropriate materials for that agenda item."
The question of advising the Mayor as to whether substantial opposition to an agenda item is fine, but the manner in which that information is conveyed to the other council members could be seen as under the table, if it isn't done properly. The CoC does not appear to detail a procedure for how it should be done, only that it be done. This leaves an ambiguity that should be questioned.
A more complete reading of the CoC and as a result several other questions have been sent to each member of the City Council, the City Manager and the City Attorney for a legal opinion. Those results will be reported at a later date.
The Mayor next addressed the concept of gifts, but the discussion turned to whether trips to league of municipalities meetings were considered a gift, coming under the heading of continuing education. Discussion then turned on whether a gift could be considered something received from council or given to council.
Generally, gifts would be termed something given to the council by an outside entity. Under the current rules, nothing may be accepted by a council member that would not be afforded a regular citizen. Trips approved of by the City Council by its members of staff, should not be considered gifts per se.
When asked about whether a gift should be disclosed, Mayor Wiederspon replied, "What is a gift?" The discussion on this item was more or less left to Ball to find out what constituted a gift.
The mayor next requested that a line item summary be presented for projects such as the Deadwood Trail for bills affected by the project. Geri Anthony said that claims for that category could be presented as are done for Hillside Ventures and others broken out from other claims.
Whose FICA and what's he doing with my money?
That line from an old commercial about the impact of taxes on a fast food worker's paycheck reminds us on the current situation on how sales taxes are handled, especially in funding economic development issues.
Council took action to formally endorse LB967 with an amendment that would seed the fund with a one time, one month collection of all sales tax in the state. The initiative would then become self-funding thereafter. Council approved the endorsement.
I got my mind on my money
The city's January financial position was detailed by Geri Anthony. So far, all of the departments have been under budget for the year, but she also said that the busier months for the city are in the summer months.
He ain't heavy, he's my brother
Under reports, Wendell Gaston gave a bit of an update on the work Gary is doing in Lincoln on LB967. People still remain somewhat hopeful that it will make it out of committee, but prospects for passage in the unicameral remain difficult. Each year helps getting something done, but he added that other communities who have been growing, are now interested in talking to us.
Gaston said more people are interested in talking to Sidney. "Four or five other towns. in Nebraska who have the same problem... Bridgeport being the first one who lost probably 80% of their sales tax last month for the first time and are projected to maybe not get another check for two years."
Gaston did speak about his time at the Nebraska League of Municipalities meeting, including examining the costs associated with researching public requests. According to Gaston, some localities charge for research time in addition to copy fees, though Sidney was one of the few localities in the state who doesn't charge for service time. He did mention how other municipalities are taking advantage of social media avenues such as twitter and Facebook as a means of getting information into the public's hands.
Getting in a TIF
"Tax Increment Financing (TIF) is probably here to stay," said Gaston. "If you want your town to grow, you'll either TIF it, or your taxes will double."
Citing the cost distribution borne by the localities, Gaston added that, "Cities are responsible for infrastructure. If you can tif it, you don't have to put it on the general bond, so the public as a whole ...don't have to pay for the improvements." Additionally, Gaston said that employing the use of TIF funds also puts the developer on the hook for the bond repayment.
TIF projects do come with a price, however. When a development project is put up with TIF financing, it is important to note that 100% of the property tax that could be collected goes to paying off the TIF bond first. Only after the TIF is paid back, usually 10 or more years, can property taxes be used for other services.
If the locality incurs other projects such as the school bond, or the debt associated with the waste water treatment project will be borne by the rest of the property owners in the community, either increasing their taxes, or the length of time required to pay back the debt obligations associated with the new project.
Makin' a new plan, Stan
The city one and six year road plan will be addressed in a separate post, as we are waiting on some additional information presented at the meeting. Council did take action to approve the plan as submitted by Hank Radke.
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