CITY OF BERKELEY LAKE

4040 BERKELEY LAKE ROAD

BERKELEY LAKE, GEORGIA 30096

PUBLIC HEARING/COUNCIL MEETING

Full Minutes for April 17th, 2003

Those in attendance for the Public Hearing and Council Meeting were as follows:

Mayor – Lois Salter

Council Members: Betty Covington, Frank Lombardi, Ken Massaroni, Delicia Reynolds, and David Steventon

City Attorney-Richard Carothers

City Clerk-Claire Grimes

Public Works – Marcie Zielazienski

BLEMA-Tom Kitchens

Citizens Present-2

CALL TO ORDER

Mayor Salter called the meeting to order at 6:05 PM at 4043 South Berkeley Lake Road.

CITIZENS' COMMENTS

There were no citizens' comments.

MINUTES

Council Member Reynolds motioned to accept the Minutes as filed. Council Member Lombardi seconded the motion. Council Member Massaroni stated that on page 3 under Ordinance Chapter 17 Septic Systems under the amended motion to read, "Council Member Lombardi seconded the motion and approval to amend the original motion was unanimous."

Council Member Lombardi motioned to accept the Minutes as corrected. Council Member Massaroni seconded the motion and approval was unanimous.

FINANCIAL REPORT

Council Member Reynolds moved to accept the Financial Report as filed. Council Member Massaroni seconded the motion and approval was unanimous.

STAFF AND COMMITTEE REPORTS

Mayor Salter announced that she has received the following reports: BLEMA and OEO.

ANNOUNCEMENTS AND APPOINTMENTS

The Mayor announced that she has talked with the battalion commander with the Berkeley Lake Fire Dept. in regards to the fire in Miramont a few weeks ago and the long delay in the response time of the fire dept. The problem was that there was an eleven- minute delay between the call coming in to 911 and the call getting to the firemen. This has not been entirely explained as yet except to say that there was a new system in place at 911 and there was a trainee operator manning the phone at the time. There was an error on the computer screen and the street did not come up on the screen and the operator had to dig in a book in order to locate where to dispatch the fireman. Once the firemen got the call they were on the truck in forty seconds. They have now fixed the system and all the streets in Berkeley Lake are now in the computer.

OLD BUSINESS

Appeal of P&Z Variance Denial for Holliday

City Attorney Carothers stated that he and Mr. Sipe are working on this issue and will present Council with an option within the ninety-day limit Council has requested to solve this problem. There was much discussion.

Home Occupation Ordinance, 2nd Read – Sipe

There was much discussion about the changes that the P&Z had made at Council's request at the March Council meeting. Chairman Sipe was asked to make further changes and present to Council at the May Council meeting.

Berkeley Lake Conservancy Exploration

The Mayor announced that the working session in preparation for the Town Hall meeting would be April 29th at City Hall at 6:30pm. The Town Hall meeting will be May 10th at 10:00am.

City Hall Planning Update – Massaroni

Council Member Massaroni stated that he has presented the proposed changes to Mike Penny but due to busy schedules he has not been able to meet with him. He will meet with him and report at the next meeting.

Public Works Projects – Zielazienski

Marcie Zielazienski reported on the Public Works projects currently in progress. There were many questions asked by Council.

Property Maintenance Ordinance, 2nd Read

Council Member Massaroni passed around copies of the Ordinance with changes suggested by Council Member Covington. Mr. Massaroni suggested that he post the Ordinance with these suggested changes on the website so that Council will have the opportunity to study the Ordinance and make any other changes before the next meeting.

Berkeley Lake Track Club Request

There was much discussion about establishing guidelines for the Police coverage of the upcoming walking event. Council Member Lombardi will coordinate the swap of the allocated hours for covering the event with the normal daily police coverage. The time and date for the event will be announced in the near future.

Other

There was much discussion about the problem of the bicyclists in the City. There was discussion about having police patrol on bicycles. Dates and times were established for police to patrol the City to look for violators and talk with the bikers to remind them that they must observe all traffic laws including stopping at stop signs and not crossing the yellow line and not exceeding the speed limit.

The Mayor reported that there have been citizens complaining about the police giving unwarranted tickets for minor violations like not coming to a complete stop at stop signs. The general opinion of Council was don't speed and stop at stop signs.

NEW BUSINESS

City Manager/Administrator

The Mayor asked if everyone has read her posting about the City Administrator. Council Member Lombardi stated that the job description posted on the website was supposed to be the result of collaboration between the Mayor and the City Attorney. The City Attorney stated that the collaboration took place to the extent that he commented on the City Administrator Ordinance, but he stated that he had told the Mayor that the two approaches are so different that there is no real collaboration there. Mayor Salter stated that Council needs to decide if they are willing to consider a City Administrator, which she suggests as a part-time person which would cost less, or whether Council wants to go ahead with the City Manager, which would be a full-time position with more responsibility and power and more costly. Council Member Lombardi proposed that there be a full-day Council Working Session to include Council, Mayor, City Attorney and any interested residents. This session would involve an in depth review and analysis of the City Charter relative to developing a strategy that will work for the future Administrative and Executive management of the City. There needs to be a thorough understanding of the form of government we have now and the interaction between the Legislative and Executive/Administrative branch and where there may be conflicts; then determine what is the best course of action to go forward to manage the City's business on a day to day basis. If we start off with "everything you ever wanted to know about the City Charter but were afraid to ask" and if we are all on the same page we will be in a better position to focus on what we do next. We need to spend that time and it is worthwhile for us all to be on the same page and then go forward to decide whether we need a City Manager, City Administrator or a full time Mayor. Council Member Reynolds asked if the Mayor's position could actually be defined as a full-time position. Attorney Carothers answered in the affirmative but stated that it is almost never done. Council Member Lombardi explained that the reason he gave Council the print out on the Council/Manager form of government is that there is good information in the article and there are some things we would like to accomplish written in the article. He further stated that he is not suggesting that the City go with the Council/Manager form of government but there are some things in the article that we need to consider. Council Member Covington suggested that Council hire a facilitator for the proposed meeting from the Georgia Municipal Assoc. to facilitate the discussion after the City Attorney goes over the Charter. Having a neutral person facilitate it will benefit the discussion. A facilitator from Athens who would know all about city government could cost up to $850.00 a day. Ms. Covington further stated that she is in the business of hiring consultants and any good consultant could charge a corporation over $3000.00 a day. The $850.00 may be more than we want to spend but it is not an unreasonable figure. The Mayor asked if a whole day was needed. Mr. Lombardi stated that he thinks a whole day would be necessary. There was much discussion about how long it would take for the City Attorney to thoroughly go over the City Charter. Attorney Carothers stated his portion of the meeting would probably not take even an hour. It was decided that the meeting should last four hours and then possibly have another meeting another day. The Mayor asked if anyone knew of a person that knows a lot about city government who would be willing to facilitate the meeting for free. Mr. Lombardi stated that given the importance of the meeting the $850.00 ensures that we are doing things right the first time. Ms. Covington stated that she is continuing to make calls to other organizations and will report back to Council. Attorney Carothers stated that he would help by making calls himself. Ms. Covington stated that since she makes a living finding facilitators her only caveat is that she is all for finding someone for free but we don't need to waste all of our time because we have someone who is inept at leading a group of strong minded, opinionated, aggressive and verbal folks. Whatever it costs or doesn't cost, the success is more important. The Mayor stated that it has been agreed in the past that we ought to make decisions about the government in a non-subjective way based on evidence or data or something objective. She further stated that she doesn't understand what evidence there is that there is a need for significantly more money to be spent on this. Her perception is that it is working well and certainly better than it has. Council Member Lombardi stated that he is looking to the future and making things better for the citizens. The Mayor asked if there is evidence that the City is going to change significantly in the future because we can't grow much larger geographically. Mr. Lombardi stated that he agrees but that things change in the City and around the City and clearly there is a desire for increased efficiency, effectiveness and professionalism. There are increased demands for cities to perform a wider range of services and we need to be visionaries and see down the road to the larger needs in the future. The Mayor stated that we could see down the road for example to the new City Hall and that we will need someone to man it. That is not to say that it needs to be a professional City Manager. It could be someone who would be in a more clerical position. Mr. Lombardi stated that we still need to investigate what the possibilities are and we have talked about this for a long time about having someone manage the day-to-day business of the City. Council Member Reynolds stated that in fact the position is provided for in the current budget. The Mayor stated that in order not to raise taxes she is seeing that we may need to pull more money from those kinds of things in order to cover costs of increased public works projects and at this point she has not heard anyone express concerns about things that are not getting done. If there are concerns then it is the responsibility of whoever sees that to let that be known so that some improvement can be made. Council Member Reynolds stated that the public works projects which have been discussed recently are all already in the budget. The Mayor asked if the streets in Miramont and Berkeley Walk and Berkeley Commons and the pipes under Bayway Circle were considered in the present budget. Council Member Reynolds answered in the affirmative. Mr. Lombardi stated that it was his understanding that we had budgeted for these things for several years; the work wasn't done and the money was never spent. Council Member Covington stated that when she was appointed to Council, it was clear to her that the decision to have a City Manager had already been made and the discussion was more about what the guidelines should be for a City Manager. The Mayor stated that there were some problems in the past with City Managers and the issue that the City Attorney raised about the overlap of powers between the Mayor and the current City Manager Ordinance were not clearly understood before. Ms. Covington stated that this discovery doesn't change the fact that there is still a need or at least the feeling that there is a need to have someone in place to do those things. The Mayor stated that they should at least try to live with the less expensive solution to the problem before jumping to the more expensive solution. Even if the money is in the budget, if there is no need that anyone has expressed then she would be in favor of spending the less money first. Council Member Covington stated that we shouldn't start with the cost; we should start with where it is we are trying to go and what our objectives are and defining the picture and then make a choice. We need to start at step one. Mr. Lombardi stated that a City Manager normally possesses far greater administrative authority than does a City Administrator. Council has agreed that we need someone running the City business on a full time basis. If we are going to have that person they should have the authority to run the City. We need to get rid of the capriciousness of the powers given to that position and those are some of the things we need to work out when we structure whatever it is we decide to go with. The Mayor stated that most any business would start with a needs assessment before hiring someone for a position. When you say that Council has decided to hire a City Manager, don't you think that is a subjective thought based on no needs assessment? Council Member Reynolds stated that she remembers that this was thoroughly discussed at the September Retreat and everyone including the Mayor agreed to have a City Manager. Council Members Lombardi and Covington stated that the current proposal is that there be at least some hours spent discussing this issue so that there will at least be a common picture. There was much discussion about the timing and length of the meeting. Council decided to have a working session on May 17th from 9:00am to 1:00pm. A location would be determined in the near future.

Other

There was no other new business.

CITIZENS' COMMENTS

Jeff Pahl 881 Lakeshore Drive – Jeff stated that some of the Gwinnett County police have bicycles and they might have a better chance of catching up and having a discussion with the bicyclists. He thanked Council Member Reynolds who sent him an email to let him know that the Property Maintenance Ordinance was back on the Agenda. Please continue to put all the Ordinances on the website. Jeff also stated that if the citizens of our community feel they are getting too many speeding tickets they should quit breaking the law. If you are not speeding and you are stopping at stop signs then you won't get tickets. If your tires are still moving, you didn't stop. Jeff further stated that he is afraid to walk on Lakeshore Drive and he doubts that is cut-through traffic. "You could fund a police force by sitting in my driveway and writing people tickets for speeding and being over the center-line when they come around the corner in front of my house. Write more tickets!" Jeff stated that he has had a lot of comments made to him by his coworkers that there is a lot of police presence in the City and it is making a large impact on the cut- through traffic. Jeff made another comment that he did not like the price of trash collection going up and the yard waste pick-up going to every week and he wants to go on record as opposing an additional fee for a useless service.

Marcie Zielazienski asked where people could make their opinions known about the May 10th meeting in advance. Council stated that there is a place on the website to make comments.

COUNCIL MEMBER LOMBARDI MOTIONED TO ADJOURN THE MEETING. COUNCIL MEMBER STEVENTON SECONDED THE MOTION AND APPROVAL WAS UNANIMOUS. THE MEETING ADJOURNED AT 9:00PM.