FINANCE COMMITTEE OF COUNCIL

                                               CITY HALL, 100 LOCKVILLE ROAD

                                                     TUESDAY, MARCH 23, 2004

 

                                                          REGULAR MEETING

 

                                                                      7:30 P.M.

 

1.         ROLL CALL.  Mrs. Riggs called the meeting to order at 7:30 P.M., with roll call as follows: Mrs. Riggs, Mr. Hackworth, Mr. Wright, and Mr. Wisniewski were present.  No members were absent.  Others present were:  Mike Sabatino, Mitch O’Brien, Frank Wiseman, Lynda Yartin, Linda Fersch, Susan Crotty, Jan Eichner, and others.

 

2.         APPROVAL OF MINUTES OF February 24, 2004, Regular Meeting.  Mr. Hackworth moved to approve; Mr. Wisniewski seconded the motion.  Roll call was taken with Mr. Wright abstaining, and Mr. Hackworth, Mrs. Riggs, and Mr. Wisniewski voting “Yea.”  Motion passed, 3-0. 

 

3.         FINANCE DIRECTOR:

 

A.        Review and request for motion to approve draft ordinance amending appropriation ordinance 2003-97.  Mrs. Fersch stated the Committee had received a draft appropriation ordinance this evening.  She stated the ordinance includes the appropriation of the $2,000,000 we will be borrowing on the Diley Road realignment for the contract that Council awarded; $45,500 in the Police Fund for the FOP contract wage increases; $24,900 in the Street Fund for engineering services on the Diley Road project; $21,000 in the Water Fund to repay a meter charge that was incorrectly paid for water meters; $3,800 in the Sewer Fund for an incorrect capacity fee payment that should have gone to Canal Winchester; $50,000 in Park Capital Improvement for the additional funds for the DeWolfe property; $24,900 in the Downtown Revitalization Fund for inspection services; in the General Fund transferring $91,900 which is an appropriation increase of $14,900 for the streetscape, $20,000 for the parking lot behind BJ’s per the easement agreement, and $57,000 for ODOT’s 256/I-70 project share; and $77,000 in the Street Capital Fund for the parking lot and the ODOT project.  Mr. Wright moved to approve the appropriations as outlined by the Finance Director and forward to Council; Mr. Wisniewski seconded the motion.  Roll call was taken with Mr. Wisniewski, Mr. Wright, Mrs. Riggs, and Mr. Hackworth voting “Yea.”  Motion passed, 4-0.  

 

B.         Finance Director’s Report:

 

            (1)        Health Department.  Mrs. Fersch stated she had provided a written report to the Committee and she would be happy to answer any questions.   She stated she has been appointed to the Facilities Committee that will review the funding of a new building for the Health Department.  

 

            (2)        CORMA.  Mrs. Fersch stated she had no report this evening. 

 

C.        Review and request for motion to approve draft ordinance rescinding Ordinance 2003-108 relative to the issuance of $490,000 of notes by the City in anticipation of the issuance of bonds for the purpose of paying part of the cost of street improvements known as the Hill Road Connector.  Mrs. Fersch stated since we are not going forward with this project at this time, we need to rescind the legislation for the borrowing.  Mr. Hackworth moved to approve and forward to Council; Mr. Wisniewski seconded the motion.  Roll call was taken Mr. Wisniewski, Mrs. Riggs, Mr. Hackworth, and Mr. Wright voting “Yea.”  Motion passed, 4-0. 

 

D.        Review and request for motion to authorize borrowing for Diley Road/S.R. 256 Intersection Improvement Project, Phase II.   Mrs. Fersch stated as she had reported in her appropriations, we need to borrow the money for this project.  She stated U.S. Bank has provided a memorandum saying they will lend the $2,000,000.  She continued the bank prefers to have all of the TIF issues due in the same month, and we have several TIF issues with the bank.  She stated this issue would be an 18 month issue so we would not have to go out again in September, and it will be due the following September.  Mrs. Fersch stated she will not get the final approval until April 2nd, but she does have tentative approval that they will do this on the same negotiated issue that we have done on our other TIFs, which means we would pledge any TIF revenues plus our income tax as a backup.  Mrs. Fersch stated this is not on the ten mill certificate, and as this is not a renewal, it is a new issue, she needs authorization from Finance Committee to go ahead with the borrowing.  Mr. Wright moved to authorize Mrs. Fersch to proceed with the borrowing; Mr. Wisniewski seconded the motion.  Roll call was taken with Mr. Hackworth, Mr. Wright, Mrs. Riggs, and Mr. Wisniewski voting “Yea.”  Motion passed, 4-0. 

 

E.         Review and request for motion to approve draft ordinance amending Chapter 882, Municipal Income Tax, of the Pickerington Codified Ordinances.  Mrs. Eichner stated this ordinance contained mostly housekeeping issues due to House Bill 95 passed by the State.  She stated the State is trying to standardize city income tax as much as possible and unfortunately, this will be an on-going process.  Mrs. Eichner continued this will bring our ordinance into compliance with Ohio Revised Code 718.  She stated the major change in this ordinance was how “S” Corps were handled. She stated basically we will only be allowed to tax pass through income for “S” Corps that have a presence in Ohio or an apportionment to Ohio.  Mr. Wright stated as these are usually small corporations there will probably not be much of a change.  Mr. Wright moved to approve and forward to Council; Mr. Wisniewski seconded the motion.  Roll call was taken with Mrs. Riggs, Mr. Wright, Mr. Wisniewski, and Mr. Hackworth voting “Yea.”  Motion passed, 4-0. 

 

Mrs. Riggs stated Mrs. Fersch was going to contact a consultant to bring forth a proposal to look at our fee schedule.  Mrs. Fersch stated she had received a draft proposal from Doug Plunkett of Circuit Rider Management Group for a fee of $10,600.  She stated he would review the city records, interview staff, review engineering records, analyze the building and zoning fees, utility fees and charges, administrative fees, the police regulatory fees, parks and recreation fees, and compare all of our fees to the central Ohio fee structure.  She stated he would then make recommendations for adjustments, deletions, additions, and provide a framework for a periodic in-house review of city fees.  Mrs. Fersch continued he would also provide development impact fee analyses and a recommendation based on current law.  Mrs. Fersch stated the projection for completion of the assessment would be approximately 12 weeks from the date the agreement is signed.  Mr. Hackworth stated this agreement did not require committee action as it fell within the contract authority of the City Manager, and Mrs. Riggs stated that was correct, she just wanted everyone to know what we were looking at and let everyone have the opportunity to provide input. 

 

4.         PERSONNEL:    No Report.   

 

5.         DEVELOPMENT DEPARTMENT:  Ms Crotty stated she had provided a written report on all of her topics and she would answer any questions.   Ms. Crotty stated she did provide some information on the Clean Air Challenge, which is a program MORPC has designed to promote air quality issues.  She stated there is a good chance that Fairfield County could be designated as a non-attainment county for air quality standards. 

 

A.        Development Director’s Report: 

 

            (1)        Chamber of Commerce Report. 

            (2)        Rt. 33 S.E. Regional Growth Alliance Report. 

            (3)        Fairfield County Visitor’s and Convention Bureau Report. 

            (4)        Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission Report. 

 

B.                 Project Updates

 

            (1)        Business Retention and Expansion Study. 

 

Ms. Crotty stated MORPC does promote public transportation, however, Fairfield County is not a part of the COTA taxing district.  She stated it had been discussed to contract with COTA for limited services, however, it would have to be done cooperatively.  She stated when COTA was running the express route, they did a survey and about 25 of the 125 riders on the bus were Pickerington residents.  She stated some of the riders were from Columbus, a large percentage were from Violet Township, and there were some riders from Lancaster, Millersport, etc.  She stated the City was willing to pay their portion of the contract, but not all of the other entities could participate in it so it fell through. 

 

6.         LEGAL DEPARTMENT:

 

A.        Monthly review of law director services.  Mrs. Riggs ascertained the Committee had received a copy of Mr. Mapes’ monthly report and there were no questions. 

 

7.         CHAIRMAN:  Mrs. Riggs stated she had nothing to bring forward. 

 

8.         OTHER BUSINESS:   

 

Mr. Hackworth stated he was concerned with the amount of our current debt when we are getting ready to do the wastewater treatment plant expansion.  He stated this might fall into the area of the fee analysis, and questioned if our fees were to low.  Mr. Hackworth stated further he received some draft legislation dealing with delinquent accounts and questioned if we had a real problem with that. Mr. Wiseman stated the problem is that we have no mechanism to remove a delinquent account at all.  He stated there are circumstances such as the resident moving, passing away, or for some reason they are no longer available, and we have no means of ever removing them from our books.  Mr. Wiseman stated he was requesting Service Committee review this issue to determine a policy that can be used on these accounts.  Mr. Wiseman stated there is not an extremely large dollar amount involved, it was just being able to put a policy in place to handle this issue.  Mr. Hackworth asked Mrs. Fersch if he could get an amortization of what the minimum number of tap fees for the wastewater plant would be, and Mr. Wiseman asked Mrs. Fersch if she could have that ready by the next Council meeting.   

 

Mr. Sabatino stated Safety Committee had made a motion to see if there was funding for three police officers in addition to the two replacements that were being hired.  Mr. Wiseman stated he had spoken to Chief Taylor and the Chief would prefer to let our current hiring list expire and then start the process over again toward the end of the year.  Mr. Wiseman stated when doing next year’s budget we will look at staffing needs throughout the City.  Mrs. Riggs stated the performance audit we are considering will show what staffing we need in all areas.  Mr. Sabatino stated he felt the police staffing was not anywhere near where it should be, and Mrs. Riggs stated by looking at the Chief’s report last month she did not recall our staffing level of officers being extremely low.   Mrs. Riggs stated Safety Committee could revisit this issue as the Chief is present at that meeting. 

 

9.         MOTIONS:  

 

A.        Motion for an Executive Session under Section 121.22(G)(1)(b), Matters involving an employee’s or public official’s employment, Section 121.22(G)(2), Purchase or sale of public property, Section 121.22(G)(3), Conference with law director regarding pending or imminent court action, and Section 121.22(G)(4), Matters involving bargaining sessions with public employees.  Mrs. Riggs stated there was no need for the Executive Session this evening.     

 

10.       ADJOURNMENT.  There being nothing further, Mr. Hackworth moved to adjourn; Mr. Wisniewski seconded the motion.  Mr. Hackworth, Mr. Wisniewski, Mr. Wright, and Mrs. Riggs voted "Aye."  Motion carried, 4-0.  The Finance Committee adjourned at 8:30 P.M., March 23, 2004.

 

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED:

 

 

________________________________

Lynda D. Yartin, Municipal Clerk