May 25, 2011 Continuation of May 18, 2011 WORK SESSION: Agenda Summary

AGENDA SUMMARY

Work Session

Item 1: QUALITY OF LIFE—Councilwoman Marie Beiser presented the Lawrenceville Neighborhood Alliance, LNA, recommended changes to the city’s Property Management Ordinance, Chapter 17, Article II, section 17-204,  "Open or Outdoor Storage” and Article III, section 17-305, “Windows”.

The alliance had requested by email that freezers, lawn mowers and basketball goals be removed from ordinance’s list of exceptions that can be stored in driveways and yards. The alliance doesn’t believe those items should be allowed in public view.

In a separate email the alliance asked the city to add language in the ordinance that regulates repair, replacement, and removal of shutters attached to a residence.

Councilwoman Katie Hart Smith made a recommendation that Dennis Billew, Planning & Zoning Director, work with Lieutenant T.E. Wallis, with Police Department and Quality of Life officer, and City Attorney Lee Thompson, Jr. to create official language that could be added to the ordinance to address these issues.

Smith asked that these revisions be presented to council during June Work Session.   

Councilman Tony Powell said that the city’s processing of these types of issues is “totally dysfunctional” and should be restructured. The police department, he said, should not be performing planning and zoning duties and that overlapping duties among departments should be addressed.

 Item 2: SUNDAY ALCOHOL SALES—City Clerk Bob Baroni asked if the council wanted to proceed with creating a referendum to let citizens vote to allow Sunday alcohol sales in groceries and package stores. This referendum was made possible when Gov. Nathan Deal signed legislation, Senate Bill (SB) 10 into law on April 28, 2011. 

Councilman Peter Martin said this item should go on the November ballot as a referendum to do what the law intended which is to let the people decide in voting for or against it.

Councilwomen Beiser and Smith both agreed that it should be placed on the ballot.

Councilman Powell said that if the council initiated (actions toward Sunday alcohol sales) he would vote against putting this item on a ballot. He said he did not mind giving the public “the gun,” because he said no one asked him if he was ready to act upon this legislation.

Councilwoman Smith said the state has put the charge to the cities, mayors and councils making them responsible for bringing this referendum to the attention of their communities.

Powell said the council could decide when to put forth the referendum -- “now, or a year from now” – and did not need to act immediately.

Councilman Martin said if Lawrenceville becomes the only city not allowing Sunday alcohol sales, it would lose out on tax dollars because people would go to drink outside of the city limits.

City Clerk Baroni said that allowing people to drink on Sunday could “sway someone to move inside or outside of the city”. He said when the county had liquor by the drink and the city didn’t a lot of “things” built up around the periphery.

City attorney Thompson said the law governing this referendum actually goes into effect on July 1, 2011. He said if the city wants to place this referendum on the November ballot, it has until September to meet the required 60 days Department of Justice notice prior to an election.  

Thompson said the city could pass a resolution in July or August, meet Department of Justice requirements and post the required 30 days public notice prior to the election in November.

 Councilman Martin asked city clerk Baroni for a reminder about this item before September. Baroni said he would place the item on council’s July Work Session agenda.   

 Item 3: TAXICAB ORDINANCE—Councilman Martin and city attorney Thompson presented the council with the revised, proposed taxicab ordinance amendments.  The amendments based on recommendations from an insurance broker, contacted by Councilman Martin, would change the amount of liability and comprehensive coverage required for cab companies and to stipulate who could provide insurance.

Thompson said currently the ordinance states that taxi companies should have $1 million of general liability and $500,000 comprehensive coverage.  The proposed amendment would lower both amounts to $300,000. Coverage would have to be provided by a state-approved and rated insurer.

Martin said the city has had some problems in the past with some non-rated insurance companies coming in insuring taxi companies, then going “belly up.”

Martin also said the city should make sure that the taxi operator is the person responsible for insuring every taxi in their fleet. If the city discovers an uninsured taxi, the operator of the taxi company is the point of contact.

Councilwoman Smith asked if that recommendation applied to operators who leased instead of owning the taxis in their fleet. Martin said yes and gave the analogy of a person leasing a car from Chevrolet. The leaser is responsible for getting insurance coverage, not Chevrolet.

Thompson said the proposed amended ordinance reads, “All vehicles used as taxicabs shall be owned or leased by the holder of the occupation tax certificate.” He said that language describing what is an owned vehicle and what is a leased vehicle has been added to clarify. He said a valid commercial lease and proper insurance should both be in the name of the occupation tax certificate holder.

Councilman Martin said that the city should require an insurance binder showing coverage for vehicles on the master policy. He said when the police department inspects vehicles, they can check to see if vehicle is properly insured.

Police Officer Jeff Smith said the police department doesn’t check for coverage, because insurance is required with the renewal of the business license or occupation tax certificate. If a business has the paperwork, he said, the police then assumes that they have insurance.

Thompson said there is a provision in the existing ordinance that taxi operators are to provide proof of insurance by sending it to the Chief of Police (Randy Johnson), 30 days before their tax certificate (business license) expires.

Martin said that the city needs to develop some type of verification process included in a renewal schedule. When Martin asked if the police department checks for proof of insurance, an indirect response of no was given.

Mr. Billew said that the city does not have an electronic method in place that would segment out and flag non-compliance taxi operators.

Officer Smith said that when business owners get their renewal notices for business licenses they will come in and pay for a renewal. But no check is done, by police department, at that time to make sure that they are still in compliance to be eligible for that license.

Smith said after the modified taxicab ordinance has been adopted, the police department would create a “tickler file”. So that it will know when and what is required for business owner to get renewal. This, Smith said, will allow the police department to be more pro-active in sending out letters to business owners asking for and informing business owners of requirements to renew business licenses.

Councilman Powell said that the burden of enforcement falls back onto the police department. He said while he doesn’t understand the proposed tickler system, the rewriting of the ordinance to add insurance requirements “will help catch fly-by-night” uninsured taxicab operators.

Council asked that proposed taxi ordinance amendments, be placed on June Business Meeting agenda as 1st Read.

Item 4: 2010-2011 NPDES PHASE I MS 4 COMPLIANCE WORK AUTHORIZATION— Paul Austin, City Engineer, asked the council to consent to Integrated Science & Engineering conducting the city’s storm water report for 2011 for $4,800, the same price the company has charged for the past three years. 

The ISE Work Authorization document states that ISE will work with city staff to collect information about programs implemented during the 2010-2011 reporting year. Information gathered will be used to create an Annual Report that will be submitted, by ISE, to the Environmental Protection Division (EPD) of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources by the June 15, 2011 deadline.

The document further states that if EPD review comments need addressing by ISE, the city will be charged on an hourly fee basis. During the course of preparing Annual Report, if ISE identifies specific additional supporting documentation not provided by the city, ISE will notify the city. If the city needs ISE assistance to complete or develop the necessary additional documentation, ISE will provide an additional Work Authorization at that time specific to the work required.

Deliverables to the city: Two copies of 2010-2011 Final Annual Report; Electronic File(s) in .pdf and .doc Formats (where appropriate)

Schedule: The work associated with the Task 1 Scope of services will be completed by the annual report deadline of June 15, 2011.

Councilman Powell asked that this item be placed on the June Consent agenda, for council’s approval.

 Powell praised Austin for “trying to figure out the procedures for small expenditures approval, which is more important than the work”.  He said “a little bit of a hitch in the audit process” was due to the city’s inability to get small expenditures onto the Consent agenda to get official approval.

Determining how much can be spent as small expenditures, Powell said, is a big issue. He said the city needs to determine what it considers small expenditure amounts.

Currently he said procurement can process payments up to $40,000 without council’s consent, but that doesn’t allow for oversight by the council. With no other option, requestors of all expenditures will continue to come before council to make their requests.   

Although the following item was not on the agenda, Councilman Martin said the council needed to discuss the City Manager Ordinance.

City attorney Thompson said the legislation, House Bill (HB) 555, was signed by the governor and became effective on May 11, 2011; allowing the city to change its charter to add the position of a city manager. Thompson drafted an ordinance “to establish the powers and duties of the city manager, and for other purposes”, that was distributed to council in February.

Councilman Martin said council had made some charter change revisions to the proposed ordinance. Thompson said that those requested charter revisions were already in the proposed ordinance.

Martin asked that the proposed ordinance be placed on the June Business Meeting agenda as 1st Read.

Councilman Powell, who had placed an item on the May 18 work session agenda titled City Manager, said his item dealt more with the actual “shuffling and moving people around to fill the positions”. And to “figure out a structure of how to operate” he said.

As an example of personnel shifting, Powell said if city clerk Baroni is moved into city manager position, then the city would need to hire a new city clerk.

A new “organization chart, and, or workflow chart” will need to be created, the council agreed. Councilman Martin proposed having the Carl Vinson Institute attend a city council retreat – before the council votes on any ordinance, Councilman Powell added – to give suggestions, input and recommendations about how the city should operate under a city manager.

After the city manager discussion, the council moved into an Executive Session.