Palouse City Council Minutes August 14, 2012

DRAFT ONLY.  Without council review or approval.

REGULAR COUNCIL MEETING

August 14, 2012

CALL TO ORDER:  Mayor Echanove called the Council Meeting to order at 7:00 PM.

ROLL CALL:  Council members present:  Cecil Floyd; Tim Jones; Connie Newman; Bo Ossinger; Norm Schorzman; Alison Webb.  Absent:  Rick Wekenman is working harvest.  His absence is excused.  Also present: Public Works Superintendent Dwayne Griffin; Police Chief Jerry Neumann; Clerk-Treasurer Joyce Beeson; Attorney Stephen Bishop; & Deputy Clerk Ann Thompson.  Public present:  Heidi Keen; Heather McGehee; Bev Pearce (7:30).

APPROVAL OF MINUTES:  There was request for clarification on the requested ordinance about living in RV’s.  Councilmember Schorzman MOVED to adopt the minutes of the Regular Council Meeting of July 24, 2012. 

Councilmember Ossinger seconded the motion and the motion carried unanimously.

PUBLIC WORKS REPORT:  Supt. Griffin submitted a written report.

POLICE REPORT:  Chief Neumann submitted the July 2012 activity log.  The PD received another chicken/rooster complaint.  Owners of said chickens have no conditional use permit.  The city needs clear-cut rules/ordinances on the keeping of chickens/roosters.  Garfield is getting a policy which states a maximum of 10 chickens and 0 roosters, and only with a conditional use permit approved by the Board of Adjustment.  Much discussion ensued.

NEW BUSINESS:

Award bid for Brownfields soil remediation:  There was a conference call between council and Michael Stringer of MFA at 7:20 pm to discuss the bids for excavation of contaminated soil at the Brownfields site.  The site is an old fuel storage site with gasoline and diesel in the ground.  13 contractors showed up for the site walk-through.  The city received 6 bids for soil remediation.  ½ the bids were actually below the engineer’s estimate of $450,000.  One special piece to this clean-up makes it unique; there are elevated levels of lead and there are chemicals used to treat the lead so it’s appropriate for landfills.  The bidders had to provide three references proving they’ve done lead abatement; ERRG, the low bidder, wasn’t able to provide any references that they actually did treatment of this lead-contaminated soil.  We asked them to submit more references, but ERRG subcontracted the lead abatement out, so we didn’t feel they were qualified based on that and the strict rules around public bidding; they didn’t meet the criteria laid out.  The next low bidder is PSC.  They were able to demonstrate qualifications required for this project.  To summarize, ERRG bid $420,273.00 but was not a “responsible” bidder; the first lowest responsible bidder is PSC Burlington at $436,867.68.  Councilmember Newman MOVED that ERRG has not submitted the lowest responsible bid.  Seconded by Councilmember Jones.  Motion carried unanimously.  Councilmember Jones MOVED to accept PSC Burlington’s bid of $436,867.68 as the lowest responsible bid.  Councilmember Ossinger seconded and the motion carried unanimously.  MFA will have a pre-construction meeting with PSC next week.  We should see work beginning some time next week.  Dept. of Ecology and Dept. of Commerce are both very proud of the work being done on this.  Phone call ended at 7:37 pm.

The city will have a representative from the Brownfields Committee come to a council meeting and give us periodic updates.

COMMITTEE REPORTS/REQUESTS: 

Parks, Cemetery, & Buildings-Alison Webb. Chair:  no report

Policy & Administration-Bo Ossinger, Chair:  Committee met to discuss writing an ordinance regarding people residing permanently in RV’s outside of mobile home parks. Currently, we have a policy but it’s hard to enforce since there is no one specific code that clearly addresses this.  This is something that must be dealt with from time to time and is currently an issue.  The committee will continue to research this.

They also discussed, setting up a city park usage fee for special events and setting an updated fee for dig and cover when extending water and sewer.

Streets & Sidewalks-Cecil Floyd, Chair:  Taylor Engineering hasn’t gotten back yet with an estimate for the Cove Road grant project, so Cecil will contact them because the grant deadline is soon.  The committee has not met yet to discuss the agreement with the Palouse Tavern for their outdoor seating area.

Personnel & Pool-Tim Jones, Chair:  Everything running great at the pool.

Water & Sewer-Connie Newman, Chair:  Councilmember Newman submitted a written report.  The city has received comments from DOH for the WSP, and is currently working with Taylor Engineering to respond to all the questions and comments from the initial review.  Taylor is estimating they will need until Sept. 4^th to communicate with the DOH to answer all the comments.  Taylor projects that the WSP will be available for public review and council review and approval by mid October.  The second draft of the WSP is due back to DOH by November 3^rd.

The committee is waiting to get a SEP draft from Atty. Bishop.  Once the draft is received we will present it to council for approval.  Committee will put it in a narrative format to hopefully speed Atty. Bishop along.  His workload isn’t allowing him the time right now to work on this.

Police, Fire, & Safety-Rick Wekenman, Chair:  no report

Finance, Property, & Equipment-Norm Schorzman, Chair:  no report

OPEN FORUM:

Heidi Keen – submitted a copy of the waiver which includes the City of Palouse having no liability for the Barley Bar Relay.  It will be held in the vacant lot next to the PCC.  There will be other groups using part of the lot earlier in the day so they will be very flexible if there are any spacing conflicts; they don’t need much room.

Bev Pearce – attended a meeting with WSU Athletic Director Bill Moos, Pullman Police Dept, WSU Police, WSDOT, and the communities of Oakesdale, Rosalia, Garfield, & Palouse.  There are 5 WSU home games coming up, a new stadium, and 35,000 attendees.  They are trying to alleviate a major traffic problem so they want to partner with these communities to encourage alternate routes.  There are exciting opportunities for these small communities.  They are going to work together to make brochures promoting these four communities, to be distributed to ticket holders.  Maybe Palouse can be a “WSU Cougar” town for a day, get flags to hang, tee-shirts to wear, etc.  Possibly have busses/drivers, to chauffer RV’ers if necessary.  They are brainstorming ideas.

MAYOR’S REPORT:

The Ride Around Washington Cycling club was wonderful; those kinds of group visits/stays are huge assets to our community.

Mayor presented council with a grant application to TIB Pavement Preservation for chip sealing, for $46,451 cost with $0 match required from the city.  Councilmember Schorzman MOVED to authorize the mayor to sign the grant for pavement preservation work in 2013.  Councilmember Newman seconded, motion carried unanimously.

ALLOW PAYMENT OF BILLS:  Councilmember Schorzman MOVED that the bills against the city be allowed. 

Councilmember Jones seconded the motion carried unanimously.

ADJOURN:  Councilmember Schorzman MOVED to adjourn.  Councilmember Webb seconded the motion and the motion carried unanimously.  The council meeting adjourned at 8:19 PM.

The following checks are approved for payment:

Payroll Paid, July 30, 2012.            Ck. #4185-4208 & EFT            $46,287.24

Claims Paid, August 15, 2012.    Ck. #4209-4248 & EFT            $56,837.73

APPROVED: ________________________________   ATTEST: ________________________________