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HomeMy WebLinkAbout02-06-1996 Regular Meeting REGULAR MEETING COMMISSION-COUNCIL CHAMBERS February 6, 1996 Augusta-Richmond County Commission-Council convened at 6:00 P.M., Tuesday, February 6, 1996, the Honorable Larry E. Sconyers, Mayor, presiding. PRESENT: Hons. Beard, Bridges, H. Brigham, J. Brigham, Handy, Kuhlke, Mays, Powell, Todd, and Zetterberg, members of Commission-Council. Also present were Nancy Morawski, Deputy Clerk of Commission- Council; James B. Wall, Interim County Attorney; and Cathy Pirtle, Certified Court Reporter. MAYOR SCONYERS: Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the Regular Meeting of the Augusta-Richmond County Board of Commission-Council. The invocation this evening will be by the Reverend Harry Sims, Pastor of Crestview Baptist Church, and if you'll remain standing we'll have the Pledge of Allegiance. THE INVOCATION WAS GIVEN BY THE REVEREND HARRY SIMS. THE PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE WAS RECITED. MAYOR SCONYERS: Do we have any additions or deletions? CLERK: We have two deletions from the agenda: Item Number 12 and Item Number 30. And we have two additions to the agenda: The first is approval of an agreement between Southeastern Technology Center, Inc., and Richmond County; the second is an approval of an appropriation in the amount of $250,000 for construction of the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame. MAYOR SCONYERS: What's your pleasure, gentlemen? MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I so move. MR. J. BRIGHAM: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: Mr. Todd made the motion, Mr. Jerry Brigham seconded the motion. Any discussion? MOTION CARRIES 10-0. MAYOR SCONYERS: Item 1. CLERK: Review of a report from the District Attorney regarding Shop Investigation. MR. CRAIG: Good evening. At the conclusion of the investigation of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation I made our presentation to the Richmond County Grand Jury, and then last week, after having advised the Grand Jury that I was going to do so, we had a press conference -- actually, a joint press conference with the Solicitor of the State Court, Mr. Bo Hunter, and myself. And I've prepared a little press release that outlined some of the basic facts and findings and observations about the investigation and certain conclusions that had been reached as a result of the investigative report, and I thought it'd be best if tonight I would share those items on that press release with you in case any of you have not gotten the entire scenario there from having read whatever you've read in the newspaper or seen whatever there was on TV. And then I would like to add just a little insofar as observations that I made to the Grand Jury. I won't share with you what the Grand Jury's observations have been or what might be included in the general presentments that will come at the end of this term, but I'll proceed in that way. First of all, I have the GBI report with me, and I understand -- Ms. Beazley told me this evening that some of you actually have requested copies for yourself. And we kind of run on a tight budget over at the DA's office, and so I have left the original with her and she's going to allow the Print Shop to make whatever number of copies are necessary to satisfy each of you, and also to make one additional copy at the Print Shop to be sent to the Augusta Library, and it will be at the reference table at the Augusta Library so any person in the community can go in and take a look at the GBI report. The GBI, as I said, has completed its investigation and the Grand Jury has received its testimony, and the presentments insofar as their observations on their civil function will come out at the -- on Friday before the third Monday of March; that will be the conclusion of the January term of Superior Court. And there will be no indictments, at least insofar as what we have gotten in information through the investigation at this time, and you will be able to see why -- even a lay person will be able to tell from a review of the GBI report why there will be no felony indictments. There is simply no evidence from which we could prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt of any felony having been committed, and that's the standard that we apply at the District Attorney's office. Sometimes you will find prosecutors in other areas will apply a different standard. They sometimes refer to that as shaking the tree, and they will return indictments on cases they know that they absolutely can't prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt on in hopes that just the return of the indictment will cause certain people to thrown in their cards and maybe enter guilty pleas or negotiate some sort of a plea, and we don't operate that way. We feel like if we don't have the evidence to prove someone guilty under the standard that's imposed in our Superior Courts, we just -- we won't seek an indictment. So that's the stage that we're at with regard to the indictment at this time. And who knows, you know, we always have our ears open and our eyes open, and maybe something will develop that if there has been a crime committed there or anywhere else in the county or in government that we'll be able to pursue, we haven't closed the door on being able to pursue anything where information might become available to us. But with the information we have, again, we won't be pursuing felony indictments. The investigation, I think, was exhaustive in scope. I told the press that last week and I'll tell you again. I've reiterated that several times to other members of the press as they've called during the week, and it's important that you know that. I have no criticism of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation's investigation of this matter. And I'd like to take you back to April the 1st of last year when, thanks to investigative reporter Sylvia Cooper of the Augusta Chronicle, she reported that there were apparent inventory shortages at the Shops, and there was. And what she reported was accurate, and it called for an investigation. And there was reason for us to be alarmed because our purchase orders or invoices at the Shop, minus the parts inventory that was there and minus what our computers indicated had been used on vehicles, indicated to us that there was a shortage which could possibly have been two to three or four hundred thousand dollars, and that could easily, at that juncture, have been accounted for by theft as by parts usage or by failure to enter documents into the computer. As it turns out, the bulk of the explanation can be found, or any other number of reasons, so the investigation was called for. It was professionally done. It involved the work of several GBI agents initially. It developed toward the end of the investigation as we got to about August and proceeded on through November and the first part of December that we only needed one GBI agent full time working and trying to reconstruct records and to determine what records had actually been entered into the computer and which ones had not. But assuming that we build in the cost of the investigator's salary as a cost of the investigation, I said last week and I think it's about accurate that it cost about $60,000 to run this investigation. There is reason to believe that some thefts of parts, tires, and equipment did occur prior to April 1, 1995. And I say that because I think that anytime a County employee or any government employee accepts a gratuity that it's just theft. There's just no way that you can refer to the acceptance of something without an adequate consideration because of the position that you hold as an employee of a government as anything but theft. There was documented one occasion where the Goodyear Tire employee --and I will be careful not to mention names, and I'll explain to you why in just a few minutes -- where the Goodyear Tire employee who was in charge of dealing exclusively with the County Shop employee in charge of purchasing tires had provided that employee with a set of tires and, at most, he paid $1 per tire for that set of tires. I've estimated the value of a set of tires, knowing what I've paid for the tires to put on my family car, at about $500, and so I think that our thefts must include that figure. And the thefts that occurred prior to April 1, 1995, would be at least $500 and they could be as high as $10,000, as I said last week. The reason that I can't give you any more definite figure than that is because we have had a number of records destroyed. We know that one truckload of documents that were work orders that should have been put into the computer in order to account for the usage of parts was, in fact, not put in the computer but was taken to the landfill and dumped, destroyed, and we will never be able to get those documents. And we can't reconstruct those documents, but what I did is, based on the records that were available to me and taking an average daily volume of usage of parts for the three years prior to April 1, 1995, I was able to at least come to some reasonable figure insofar as the value of the parts which should have been used during that time for which records are not available. And we realized, taking that information and having programmed those work orders which had not previously been put into the computer by those employees responsible for doing that and correcting that obvious error for which we do obviously have figures, that we could not be dealing with a theft which exceeded $10,000. In all probability, the amount of thefts was on the lower end of that scale, and it could even have been as little as $500 to $1,000. I believe that it's more than $500, that being that set of tires I spoke about, because we had one occasion where an employee -- and, again, I won't mention his name -- had taken a paint sprayer and some other equipment, probably with a value of less than $500 -- we're dealing with misdemeanor thefts here -- had taken that equipment from the Richmond County Garage Number 2 and had taken it to his family's paint and body shop which is outside of Richmond County. And it was there when the GBI told him they wished to engage him in a polygraph examination and told him it might be advisable if he had removed any parts or equipment belonging to Richmond County to return those prior to the polygraph examination, and he brought back a paint sprayer prior to the polygraph examination and then proceeded to miserably fail his polygraph examination. The exact amount of the loss, as I say, can't be determined. The investigation revealed the amount of inventory shortages at the garages was not nearly as large as initially appeared. The discrepancy between purchase invoices and actual inventory was accounted for by the failure of County employees to log work orders into the computer system after parts had been properly used on County vehicles and equipment. Many of these work orders were recovered by the GBI, but at least one truckload was dumped at the landfill by Richmond County employees; therefore, the materials usage for the missing work orders could only be estimated, as I indicated, by an average daily usage. Access to parts and equipment during the period covered by the investigation was so restricted that there is no reason to believe that any abuses or thefts were committed by government officials or County employees outside the Shops themselves. There was some suggestion by some, probably not anyone within County government, that County Commissioners and perhaps County administrators or assistant administrators or people within the Purchasing Department or Comptroller's Department were having just ready access to the Shops and to have their personal vehicles worked on, and that's just not true. As you'll see from the report, we have no indication that that was occurring out at the Shops, and so we have no reason to put any one of you under oath or ask any one of you to take a polygraph exam with regard to the thefts or shortages which occurred out at the Shops. You should understand as you read, again, that under Georgia law a theft of less than $500 is a misdemeanor, and that if there were any thefts with regard to that paint sprayer or tires or any other incidental pieces of equipment, that they would be prosecuted, and still can be, and might be prosecuted in the State Court of Richmond County. I'm not the prosecutor in that court, and Mr. Hunter would be the person who would have to make that decision, and I'm sure that, as I would not, he would not reveal to you now what his intentions are with regard to that prosecution. He had initially stated, and I think it's been accurately reported in the newspaper, that he didn't see anything on first blush and first review of those reports which would indicate the need for prosecution. I understand that he may be taking another look at that. There also were two charges made in the early stages of the investigation for tampering with evidence. Both of those are misdemeanor charges as well. Again, I don't prosecute misdemeanor cases; they went to State Court. They have not been dismissed at this juncture. The indication we got last week from Mr. Hunter was that he was considering the dismissal of those two cases. Again, I would think that you would have to confer with him with regard to his intentions in that regard, if they are still the same, but I'm sure that he's not going to be able to share with you all of the details of his investigation in that regard or his intentions with regard to prosecution until the case is closed; that is, until a dismissal has been entered. I think that's about all I have insofar as an overview. I'll be happy to answer any questions that any of you might have. MR. TODD: Mr. District Attorney, I guess you're telling us that none of the charges that the GBI found falls under your scope or responsibility as far as prosecuting, that everything was basically misdemeanors per the GBI's findings? MR. CRAIG: Yes, sir. Those things that would suggest criminal activity would have all fallen within the misdemeanor jurisdiction of the State Court. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I'd like to make a motion that we call on the Solicitor's Office to fully pursue and prosecute anyone that's stolen from the taxpayers of Richmond County, and that's in the form of a motion. MR. POWELL: I second that motion. MAYOR SCONYERS: It was seconded by Mr. Powell. Further discussion? MOTION CARRIES 10-0. CLERK: Item 2: Consider approval of a proposal from American Cadastre, Inc. to perform Quality Control work for the Cadastral mapping being done by Analytical Services, Inc. MR. HORNSBY: Mr. Mayor, we have presented to you a contract from AMCAD, who has been our consultants on the GIS project. What it basically does is it affords us an opportunity to do quality control work for all of the Cadastral mapping as it's being delivered. That material, those mappings are being done now by a firm in Colorado, ASI, for which we had contracted with, and we feel that it's necessary to do quality assurance work in order to assure ourselves and everybody else that we've got a quality product and the best possible product that we can have. The cost actually for this is going to vary because it's on a basis by which we can set the rates at which we do the testing. It's just a test really to see the integrity of the data as it's coming in. If there are scratches or something like on there, then of course we send it back. It's been done throughout the rest of the report as the material comes in, and now we're asking for the approval of this contract to go forward. George Patty may have some additional information to add at this point, or I'm open for questions. MAYOR SCONYERS: What's your pleasure, gentlemen? MR. KUHLKE: Mr. Hornsby, the people that you hired -- and maybe Mr. Patty can talk on this. It would appear to me that when you hire these people they should have credentials that they can do the work, they can perform it, that they're responsible for doing it. Why do you have to hire somebody to check the people that are doing the work? MR. PATTY: Well, there were only a few firms nationwide that bid on this project that do this type work, that create tax maps from scratch by going to the Records Room and searching through every record. It's extremely tedious work. The records in the Records Room -- this is not, you know, a dispersion on anybody, but the quality of the records, the quality of the microfilm, the third generation that these people actually ended up with, and the fact that the deeds that are recorded up there, so many of them don't have meets and bounds, it's simply, you know, between the property of Brigham and Kuhlke and located on such-and-such a road, and they found that the basic data that they had to pull this information from was really lacking. Plus, this company, ASI, which is nationally known and one of the few companies in the country that does this kind of work, went through a management restructuring and the person that they assigned to this project had a heart attack, so they had a lot of problems. They underbid it. All the other bids were over $800,000; their bid was around $600,000. They underbid it. The gut feeling I have and the advice of AMCAD, which has led us to this point, is that this quality control work needs to be done. I think it would be a serious risk of the investment that we have to date to not do it. And like Mr. Hornsby said, we've got control of how much of this we do. This simply sets the rates for this quality control. We're going to feed it to them in the amounts that we want them to do this work, and those amounts may be small or they may be large. There are actually three phases to this contract. One is to check maps. That's something personally I feel that we could train our personnel to do in fairly short order. The second is to check parcels, and that's the largest part of the contract, and the percentages on that, I would think, would be dependent upon the initial checks that AMCAD does. The first thousand parcels that they delivered, when they delivered them -- in the end they were pretty good, but we had a real shaky start because of the problems with the basic data and the problems that ASI had. The third part is highly technical. That's checking the digital data. There's simply no way that anybody but AMCAD can do that. That's only an $8,000 item, but I feel that they would have to do that. So I don't think you're -- you know, of course, I can't give you an amount of money that we're talking about here, but I think you're talking about work that's got to be done. We've made a tremendous commitment to GIS, the previous Commission did, and I think you're really risking the quality of this work that you paid so much to get if you don't approve this contract. MR. KUHLKE: And you are recommending that? MR. PATTY: Yes, sir. MR. TODD: I guess my question is, what percentage are we going to check? You know, if we're talking QA/QC we should be looking at a target, 5 percent, 10 percent, et cetera, and then if we run into problems and that influence, you know, increasing it to 30 or whatever. And I don't think we necessarily need to let the company know what we're going to do per what our findings are, but certainly I think we need a percentage, and I wonder is that in the criteria. MR. HORNSBY: Yeah, I think it's in your packets what the recommended amounts are throughout the whole thing. Of course, it may vary up or down. MR. TODD: If we have to check 100 percent, we also should know what the cost is going to be for doing 100 percent of it. And I certainly would like to know what that's going to be, because if it's going to be as much as doing the work itself, then maybe we need to go on and let somebody else do it. MR. HORNSBY: It's not going to be as much as doing the work itself, and I think you've got a listing of what we estimate those costs, if we go by those percentages, parcels and all we check. MR. ZETTERBERG: Mr. Mayor, I have been reviewing the GIS work for the County and the City, what has been done so far, and I've met with Mr. Don Jones of the company that is going to be doing the quality control work. I am satisfied that this work is absolutely necessary. If we don't check it in the front end and start using it in the middle, I can guarantee you the back end, the data coming out, will not meet our requirements. We're spending an awful lot of money. This is absolutely bedrock data that we need. It is important enough to have somebody doing some quality control work. I can't answer Mr. Todd's question right now on the percentage of that work, but I know it is a percentage and it is variable. As we find that the quality of the work is going well, then we will cut back more on how much of the sample is going to be, but I can assure you we're not going to be checking 100 percent of the records on the project. MR. KUHLKE: Mr. Mayor, I move approval. MR. HANDY: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: Mr. Kuhlke made a motion to approve, Mr. Handy seconded. Further discussion? MOTION CARRIES 10-0. [Mr. Mays exits.] CLERK: Item 3: Consider approval of minutes of Augusta-Richmond County Commission-Council Meetings held on January 2 and January 16, 1996. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I so move. MR. HANDY: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: Mr. Todd made the motion to approve, Mr. Handy seconded. Further discussion? MOTION CARRIES 9-0. [MR. MAYS OUT] CLERK: Item 4: Consider approval of a recommendation from Mr. Jim Leiper to change policy at the Landfill to allow receipt of waste from outside Augusta-Richmond County. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I so move. MR. HANDY: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: Mr. Todd made the motion, who made the second? Mr. Handy? Okay, good. Thank you. Further discussion, gentlemen? MR. POWELL: Yes. I'd like to hear the report. MR. SMITH: Mr. Mayor, Commission-Council, basically what the Landfill is requesting is that we be allowed to accept waste from sources outside of Richmond County. This will allow us to compete and get the revenues that we lost when we lost some of our waste stream to a private company and will allow us to reach our efficient production since we've already expended the funds for the construction, the personnel, the equipment, et cetera. The receipt from this will be used to offset and keep competitive rates so we can ensure that we have a solid waste system that's competitive with other systems and provide the service for the community in the future. [Mr. Mays returns.] MAYOR SCONYERS: Further questions or discussion? MR. TODD: Yes, Mr. Mayor, if I may comment briefly. When we initially submitted for a permit for the Richmond County Regional Landfill, the intent was to run a regional landfill even though this enabled us to speed up the permit process. We debated over this I guess approximately a year ago and we didn't feel that we were ready at that time. I think the entire Commission felt that we had some bugs in the municipality landfill and we had some problems as far as procedures go and we wasn't ready. We've, you know, pretty much purged all those bugs out. EPD is pretty much pleased with us. We're probably at the verge of coming out from under a consent order or very close there, and I think this is something that we need to do. Certainly as it's come through the Engineering Service Committee there were some criteria that we would meet, we have a contract, we would have restrictions on certain type waste, et cetera, and it's up --this Board can regulate at any point it want to by a contract what come into the Richmond County Landfill. This won't be just a automatic open door, anyone can bring anything to the Richmond County Landfill; it would have to be other cities/counties that want to do business with us sign a contract or an agreement, and this Board would have opportunity to ratify those agreements. MR. KUHLKE: Mr. Todd, do we presently have guidelines set up for the transfer of waste from other communities into our landfill? MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, the answer is no to my colleague's question, that we don't have any transfer -- we don't have transfer stations, but there is other entities that have transfer stations and those entities would -- solid waste management entities would actually handle their waste or that county or city would do the transfer themselves. And our rate would be based on putting it in the cell, not actually hauling it to the cell. I don't think we would want to get involved in something that the private sector is doing a good job as far as service delivery. MR. KUHLKE: I think that what I was asking, Mr. Todd, and I'll ask David, if we are going to begin to attract refuse for the landfill outside of Richmond County, are you in the process of developing guidelines that would be part of a contract with an adjoining county? MR. SMITH: We are, and there already has been some guidelines set up, such as inspections. A lot of this is already covered in the rules and regulations from the EPD which would require us to do random inspections of the waste load, and we definitely want to do that to ensure what we were getting. But as far as anything in writing in a package deal, that has not been done yet. MR. KUHLKE: But are we going to do that before we -- MR. SMITH: Yes, sir. MR. KUHLKE: Okay. MR. BEARD: I would just like to know how will this affect the longevity of the landfill itself with this -- and bringing other surrounding counties? MR. SMITH: All right. The waste stream basically -- when we lost the waste stream of what was removed from out there, approximately we lost 25 percent of the waste stream. During the same period of time we opened up the inert cell, which we diverted 17 percent of the waste stream, which was yard waste, forest waste, waste of that type that we're going to use in a composting operation in the near future for land reclamation and things of that nature. All right, this -- we still have the same expenditures for personnel, equipment, engineering, environmental, everything, so we are not at our full production now. You take this into account that we add all this back in, such as doubling our waste stream for the subtitle D cell, we have approximately nine years of life left in the cell we're presently permitted for, which is 2C, and we have over 100 years minimal in the footprint for the site in itself, which is 1,187 acres, which part of that can be used for landfill, part of it can't. MR. H. BRIGHAM: Mr. Smith, I was just wondering, how has the reaction been from other agencies to maybe come in? And I guess the second part I'd like to ask is, are we doing anything now about recycling where you have tires coming in and -- not only coming in but put on the side of the road or what have you. Do we have anything in this particular package dealing with recycling, especially as it relates to tires? MR. SMITH: There is nothing in this package to deal with recycling. What we have coming to you in the near future, and we already have one part of it down, the first part that we're going to send to you is the composting operation to make material for land reclamation such as materials we need at the landfill and other departments. That is the package that is fixing to come to you. The second thing that's going to be coming to you is the courtesy area being redone. And it's under construction right now as far as the pad and all, where we will come to you and ask for you to ratify a contractual agreement with someone to handle tires to make sure the people -- the citizens can come to the landfill, get rid of their white goods such as your washers, dryers, refrigerators; get rid of the batteries to be recycled; get rid of the car tires, bring them to that point. Of course, there is a charge, because they have to leave the landfill and go somewhere else. So we would have to charge a fee to bring them in, and then we would have to pay once we got rid of them, but we would be that single point so that people would know where they could bring this material to. Most of your landfills are starting to do this. So there'll be one point instead of people having to worry about what can I do with this, what can I do with this. Right now what we do is maintain a list of people who will take this stuff. But we still have a major problem with tires being thrown out on the side of the road. We cannot put those in the landfill; that is not allowable under the EPD at this point in time. But we can provide a service where those are brought to the landfill, they pay the fee right there, and then we have them shipped out in a trailer, utilizing our labor force to put them in the trailer. MR. ZETTERBERG: I noticed in these figures we're only FY '94 and '95. Any offhand projections on what we might see in '96? MR. SMITH: No, sir, I cannot give you that until we get something in concrete, on paper, what's going to come in. Right now everything that we have talked to people about is not in concrete because it's -- we're not sure that we could have done it at this point. MR. ZETTERBERG: I have no other questions. MAYOR SCONYERS: Further discussion? MR. MAYS: Yes. I don't want to seem like the grinch whole stole Christmas; I'm glad this isn't a close vote where you're depending on me to make it. I think my colleagues that have served with me in the past already know my feelings in reference to this, probably from day one when we got started. And I applaud our director out there, Mr. Smith, as well as Commissioner Todd started off the environmental and ecology committee and in reference to the time he probably has personally taken with the landfill. And I think he was excellent in saying that we were all concerned about some of the kinks that were there and trying to iron out some things possibly before being -- I won't use the word dumping ground, but before taking on everybody else's waste probably before we were able to maybe manage our own. But I think if we are going this route -- and I know we needed the time and we had to deal with the permitting in the order in which we did, but I still probably have some concerns in reference to the fact -- and this may not have anything to do with what we are voting on today, but I think where we basically have seen the advertisements that have been out in reference to flow control and in the absence of it and the amount of money that we've actually spent in that landfill, I'm wondering if we're going to do some simultaneous things with that aspect of what we have to the point that -- you know, I think that's equally as important in trying to make up that percentage from somewhere else. Because I know that you said we would not be increasing personnel and the cost, we'd have the same people there, but I think what you have in terms of monitoring it here in Richmond County, are there going to be controls from what I would actually maybe from a layman's standpoint call third-party type of waste to be brought in? Say if we are contracting with another county and that county may be -- whether they are legally or illegally contracting with somebody else to bring waste into their county, they in turn bringing it into ours, in terms of that type of monitoring and that type of control, are we equipped personnel-wise to deal with that and will we be able to do it out of existing personnel that we already have? MR. SMITH: I can answer that. At the present time we have four certified operators at the facility. Our inspector is certified through the State and we have a layman inspector that assists him. And we do a minimum of four random inspections every week, and that is put in our record, our daily operating record, and that in itself assures us that our waste stream is the best it can be. Now, there's no way anybody can be 100 percent sure of the waste stream, whether it come from this county or whether it come from another county, of what is actually in that waste all the time. But the operators are trained. The time when we got some chlorine -- some granular chlorine out there, our operators spotted it. We called the HASMAT people, notified them; we followed procedure in containing that and did it by the book, noted it in the operating record. And that's what you've got to do, you've got to look at your waste when it hits the ground. Your spotter, your operators and all have to be trained to find -- if you have a problem with waste, then you're able to track it real quick. You know the trucks that come in, you know where they come from, the generating point and all that as far as the transporting of the truck, and you can handle it that way. MR. MAYS: That was my point, gentlemen, and I agree with you in terms - - I think you've come a long way with that aspect of it. I think we all that have been here can appreciate the leadership that you've given out there. But I think wouldn't you also admit that in terms of helping to do that, along with that training, some of that has come from one aspect that you've mentioned, that you also know where some of those are coming from. I guess maybe just from a green standpoint or lay standpoint just of asking the question, since this has been somewhat a point of contention of moving from local to regional or moving out of what we know, I guess probably, quite frankly, may be the fear of the unknown. You know where you're getting a lot of those things from. You say that you know the trucks, you know others, but I'm talking about those that are gathered from someplace else that we have no ability to track, or unless we are going to put personnel and go there and monitor them at those stations and to see what we're actually bringing in, would we then be stuck with what is delivered on our doorstep at that point, say, from maybe a county that might be 200 miles away, to bring in -- MR. TODD: Mr. Mays, if I may try to help. We would only be receiving household waste basically; we wouldn't receive any industrial waste. We're talking about other counties' household waste, solid waste. And we would put a audit on that waste at the landfill, and there's two ways that's done: one is at the tipping scale that you would pull random checks; the other is when the guy on the compactor, once it's unloaded is spreading it out, he would also observe what he's spreading. And we would pay close attention to those trucks that's not our trucks, you know, that's coming in on contracts. They're going to have paperwork when they come to the tipping scale, and from that point we would treat that waste differently from any other waste. We would probably also have a surcharge on the outside counties or entities that's bringing it to Richmond County. And this Board would probably decide at some point what we would want to do with that surcharge, but the late Bob Daniels wanted to take it and do things, use it for non-profits or do non-appropriated fund -- support non-appropriated fund entities like nonprofits, et cetera. I'd like to also say that we learned -- I learned more about the landfill probably when we had the unfortunate incident with the young lady winding up at the landfill from DFACS. And based on that and the --following the manifest, et cetera, we went back -- Mr. Smith and the landfill operation folks, went back to the truckload that she come out there in, on pulling documents and pulling information from where -- the manifest showing where it was picked up from. So I'm comfortable in that. I'd also like to thank Ms. Beazley also for her involvement in the landfill in the last couple of years, 'cause she put a lot of time in there, and several other Commissioners. MR. SMITH: Mr. Mays, in a closing statement on that item which you were talking on, we're able to track -- if someone was to come up a year from now and want to know exactly where we placed some waste on a certain day, we could track back to that day and know exactly where that waste went in and go to that point, due to a grid system that we have and also the lift system that we have out there. So it is tracked on a daily basis; we know what area something is put in. That's -- you know, the unfortunate incident he is referring to, that's exactly how we knew where that was. MR. HANDY: Mr. Mayor, I call for the question due to our lengthy schedule we have here tonight. Even though if this passes tonight, we're still going to have to come back when we set our rules and regulations and look at this again, so it's not going to be final, so I call for the question. MOTION CARRIES 9-1. CLERK: Item 5: Consider approval of a deed of dedication, maintenance agreement and road resolutions regarding Walton's Landing Subdivision, Phase II. MR. HANDY: Mr. Mayor, since we've got 5, 6, and 7 are similarly the same thing, if we could take them all three together, please. MR. TODD: I so move, Mr. Mayor, that we put them in a consent agenda. MR. POWELL: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: Mr. Todd made the motion, Mr. Powell seconded. Any discussion on that? MOTION CARRIES 10-0. CLERK: Item 6: Consider approval of a deed of dedication, maintenance agreement and road resolution regarding Pepperidge Subdivision, Section 11-B. Item 7: Consider approval of a deed of dedication, maintenance agreement and road resolutions regarding Bobby Jones Business Park. MR. HANDY: We're ready for 8 now. MR. POWELL: We approved those as a consent agenda. CLERK: Item 8: Consider approval of a recommendation to delete the installation of a traffic signal at the intersection of Walton Way and Camellia Road and to reprogram funds for this project in the amount of $45,100 back into Phase II of the Special One Percent Sales Tax Fund. MR. MURPHY: Gentlemen, we have a project that is programmed for three intersections to receive stop-and-go signals; those intersections are Laney- Walker Boulevard at East Boundary, Walton Way at Camellia Road, Pleasant Home Road at Crane Ferry. And in reviewing the traffic volumes and the intersection accident history at Walton Way at Camellia, we find that that signal is not warranted. Not the first warrant has been met in accordance with the manual on uniform traffic control devices, and we recommended that that project be deleted from this program project and the $45,100 be phased back in and recaptured into Phase II. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I so move. MR. HANDY: Second. MR. KUHLKE: I've got a question, Mr. Mayor. Jack, why was it ever considered to begin with? MR. MURPHY: I understand it was -- it's been on the burner ever since Art Durshimer's been here. And apparently, because of whatever reason, it might be the two-way left turn lane there at Camellia, the traffic has fallen off. And in reviewing the process, there are no warrants for the signal at all at this time. MR. ZETTERBERG: If there's a possibility that that was by a citizens request, since it's in my area I'd certainly like to have that feedback so we can get back to the citizens to tell them that that has been taken off the thing. MR. MURPHY: Yes, sir. All right. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, it's my understanding that this was one of the items on the agenda for the Engineering Service Committee and was passed. And it seems to me that we could do a consent agenda with those items, and everything that was passed at that meeting, that we vote on them and that's that, with a majority of the committee; and anything else that we sent back to the full Board, that we would actually vote on those items, but if it did not pass, then certainly it should be before this Board. And I call for the question. MR. KUHLKE: Mr. Mayor, in following up on Mr. Zetterberg, you know, if there is some request from some citizens in that community, which is in my district also, I would like to reserve the right to come back and talk further on this issue. MR. MURPHY: What you have to keep in mind, gentlemen, I have two others out there. And it's all right with me if you delay them, but I'm ready to go to letting with the other two if this one is deleted, or go with all three. But keep in mind, now, the warrants are not met, there are no warrants there that can be met, and you're placing a liability on the local government if you place the signal, something happens like an accident and you find --and somebody investigates, you have no reason for the signal being there. MR. KUHLKE: I wasn't suggesting that we delay, Mr. Murphy, I was just suggesting that if as a result of the traffic light not being there, if traffic is being diverted to another location because there isn't a light there; and if the citizens have a reasonable request when the request was made, if the traffic count at that point warranted it. Okay? So I'd just like to have the same information Mr. Zetterberg has asked for. MR. MURPHY: All right. MR. MAYS: Mr. Mayor, if I might. Jack, it's kind of like maybe the Alexander Road situation and Washington Road whereby when the count got very low up there and there was no signalization to go a certain way, a lot of the people were going through the shopping center yard. And where you had the rope at -- you didn't, but where it was not coming up to meet the count because a lot of folk knew they couldn't make the turn, so they cut through Kroger's before they got to it. So I think that's all that Bill is trying to say to a point, are they avoiding it or is it, you know, where you're getting a true count that's in there. Sometimes at some intersections where there's been a need, people will find an alternative route of going there rather than going to that route when actually they know they can't make a turn or go through a certain way. MR. MURPHY: Keep in mind, too, if you decide to delete this and put the $45,100 in the recapture funds we will continue to monitor the site. It's not lost forever. If it comes back up as a need, we'll do it. MR. ZETTERBERG: My question is following up on Mr. Todd's comments. Is it -- well, let me go ahead, I'll cancel that question right now. MR. POWELL: Mr. Chairman, I'd just like to make a clarification. When this came up on the committee meeting there were no citizens there to protest, and I received no calls on it, you know, anyone that was displeased with this, so I didn't feel that we had any opposition out there is the reason we went ahead with this. But in the future -- you know, it's on the committee agenda. I don't know of any way that we can reach the other Commissioners to make them aware of it, but we'll look for other avenues to get them the information so that they'll know what's going on on these agendas. But it's sent out in the committee meeting and there was no opposition there. MR. J. BRIGHAM: Mr. Mayor, as I expressed my concern in the committee meeting, that we do not delete this project, I still think it's a worthy project. I'm planning on voting against this, but I will go on and call the question right now. MAYOR SCONYERS: Thank you. MOTION CARRIES 9-1. CLERK: Item 9: Consider approval of a recommendation to place the proposed intersection improvements on Laney-Walker Boulevard, Central Avenue, and Wrightsboro Road Corridors on the County Contract Projects Construction Priority List. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, again I raise the concern. Who made the decision, once we voted on it in committee, that it need to be pulled and put on the agenda to vote on again? I'm going to make a motion that we not put those projects on the priority list because there is projects in this county that merit being on that list more on a cost benefit and the importance of the project. If you take a quarter of a million dollar project, put it on the priority list, get a State contract for it, you're talking about 40 percent of a quarter of a million dollars possibly. If you take a two or three million dollar project and send it to the Commissioner of DOT, you're talking 40 percent of two or three million dollars. And there is projects that need to be on that list, and I think the decision pretty much was made that day, I may be speaking incorrect, that we would not add those projects to the priority list. And I'll make a motion that we don't add those projects to the priority list or, if we do, that they go to the very end of that list. We're talking about a relatively small project here. And that's in the form of a motion, that we -- I'm going to just say we don't add them to the priority list. MAYOR SCONYERS: Motion dies for lack of a second. MR. HANDY: I'd like to make a motion to add it to the list, but -- in our past we would always know how to put it on -- to prioritize all those already -- that's already in progress. We're not going to bump any of those; they'll just be on the list and when the opportunity comes for money, then they can be added for a State contract or whatever. So I'd like to put in the form of a motion to add them to the list, please. MR. POWELL: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: Mr. Powell seconded Mr. Handy's motion. Any discussion, gentlemen? MR. TODD: Yes, Mr. Mayor. I guess that I made the motion that we add them to the list at the committee meeting but we prioritize the list later, so -- and I thank my colleague for correcting me there. And is that my understanding what we are doing, that we're not -- MR. HANDY: That's exactly right, Mr. Todd. MR. TODD: Okay. MR. POWELL: I just wanted to clarify that for Mr. Todd. That process is already underway. MAYOR SCONYERS: Further discussion, gentlemen? MR. TODD: Yes, Mr. Mayor. I guess my question again, is it a waste of my time to go to the committee meeting if we're going to take each individual item and vote on it versus voting on what we voted and passed at the committee? And I call for the question. MOTION CARRIES 10-0. MR. ZETTERBERG: Mr. Mayor, I have a procedural question. On items that are placed before us, we had talked about a consent agenda, is there a requirement for the Clerk to read every single one of those for the record or couldn't the stenographer place those in the record for us? MAYOR SCONYERS: I think we're going to straighten it out by the next meeting. MR. ZETTERBERG: Thank you, sir. CLERK: Item 10: Consideration of the proposed Water and Sewerage Rate Structure. MR. POWELL: Mr. Chairman, this was -- the original proposal was deadlocked in committee and passed on to the agenda here. We since have had another proposal brought to us by the Comptroller. This information has just been received today. I'd like to make a motion that we table it for the next Regular Meeting and bring it back up again at that time. MR. HANDY: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: We have a motion by Mr. Powell, second by Mr. Handy, that we table this. Any discussion? MOTION CARRIES 9-1. CLERK: Item 11: Communication from the Public Works Director requesting approval of a Local Government Project Agreement from the Georgia Department of Transportation regarding the I-20 Welcome Center, Phase II. MR. MURPHY: The Georgia DOT proposes to upgrade and improve the Welcome Center on I-20, and we've received a Local Government Project Agreement in that respect. And normally what happens is the Local Government Project Agreement causes us -- the local government to be responsible for any utilities that need to be removed or relocated. In this instance, according to information from Georgia DOT, there are no costs involved, but by signing and approving the Local Government Project Agreement it indicates your support of the project. We recommend approval. MR. TODD: So move, Mr. Mayor. MR. J. BRIGHAM: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: We have a motion by Mr. Todd, second by Mr. Brigham. Any discussion? MOTION CARRIES 10-0. MR. POWELL: Mr. Chairman, I'd like to make a motion that we take the rest of these items as a consent agenda. They've all been approved and there's no controversial issues here. MR. TODD: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: Is that 13 through 18? MR. POWELL: That's 13 through 18. [Item 13: Communication from the Interim Attorney regarding the sale of remaining property located at 2443 Windsor Spring Road. Item 14: Consider approval of an option to purchase right-of-way on the Wheeless Road Drainage Improvement Project, known as Tap Map 85, Parcel 186, which is owned by Thomas M. Blanchard, et al. Item 15: Consider approval of an agreement between Corbin C. Carter and Richmond County for the right to use the pond as a detention area and to perform periodic maintenance, including silting. Item 16: Consider approval of condemnation proceeding against Harold M. Boardman of Parcel 52 of the Jackson Road Project. Item 17: Consider approval of an option to purchase easement on the Rae's Creek Channel Improvement Project, Phase II, known as Tax Map Parcel 17-4:35 (Project Parcel 58), which is owned by Albert H. Partridge and Laura H. Beveridge. The option amount and the appraisal amount is $10.00. Item 18: Consider approval of a request from Mr. Sydney Carter regarding two additional items for the Richmond County Drivers License Facility.] MAYOR SCONYERS: We have a motion by Mr. Powell, second by Mr. Todd. We needed to add something on 18, didn't we? MR. MURPHY: I'd like to make a request on 18, if I may. What 18 is talking about is there's some additional work that the State Patrol needed at the Drivers License Bureau. In addition to this, we've got two concrete poles sitting out there on State Route 56 at the entrance. We're about to construct the decel lane, and when we get through with the decel lane, those concrete poles -- which are of no value now because we've transferred the pull wires off of concrete poles to some temporary timber poles. When the decel lane gets constructed finally, these concrete poles are going to be about three to four feet off the edge of the pavement, and I doubt very seriously that the Georgia DOT is going to allow us to open that facility up and put traffic over there on that decel lane with these poles that close. What I have done is obtained a quote from Mabus Brothers to take the concrete poles down, remove them, and the total cost is $3,500. And what I'd like to do, if you will, is to add it to the change order on the billing itself. MAYOR SCONYERS: Does anybody have a problem with that, gentlemen? MR. KUHLKE: I move -- we've already got a motion. MAYOR SCONYERS: Right. And this was already included when she read this earlier. MR. TODD: Yes, Mr. Mayor, we just accept it as an amendment to the motion, the consent agenda. MOTION CARRIES 10-0. CLERK: Item 19: Consider approval of a request for a Capital Project Budget Amendment in the amount of $43,240 to make repairs and purchase equipment for the JLEC Expansion Project. MR. J. BRIGHAM: Mr. Mayor, this item was passed by the Finance Committee and we bring it to you in the form of a motion. MR. HANDY: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: I have a motion by Mr. Jerry Brigham, second by Mr. Handy. Any discussion? MR. TODD: Yes, Mr. Mayor. Is there other -- my question is, is there other agenda items that was passed by the Finance Committee that we could go on and do a consent agenda, or is that just one and that's it? MAYOR SCONYERS: I think that's the only one on Finance. Any other discussion? MOTION CARRIES 10-0. CLERK: Item 20: Communication from Mr. Jerry Saul regarding a request for the enforcement of ordinances in effect regarding the issuance of business licenses to businesses who owe delinquent taxes. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I so move that we give him the authorization to enforce the ordinances before he issues the business licenses. MR. ZETTERBERG: Second. MR. MEYER: Might I address this, Mr. Mayor? MAYOR SCONYERS: Yes, sir. MR. MEYER: I think this does involve my department, and one phone call from Mr. Saul would have prevented this from being on the agenda. We have had no communication with him on this matter. I am fully aware of the requirements that was in the County Code previously; I think it was Section 8- 25, Subparagraph 4. It's also in the new ordinance that you adopted, 95-10; it carried over into this ordinance. But there's one real vital element that we need in my department to carry this out, and that is an unedited, unaltered, non-negotiated list of businesses that owe delinquent taxes, and that can only come from his department. I can't generate it; I don't have it. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I amend my motion to request that the Tax Office send License Inspections a copy of the delinquent taxes. MR. ZETTERBERG: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: Thank you, Mr. Zetterberg. Further discussion? MR. BEARD: Mr. Mayor, I just have one little concern with this, and that is for the -- and I guess I'm always looking [out] for the small business people. Is there anything -- and I have not read that ordinance, but is there anything in there where if these people are paying -- if they're behind and they are paying, why would you put them completely out of business if they are completely delinquent in tax and they are paying and make an effort to catch up with their taxes? Is there any provision in there -- MR. MEYER: The ordinance is very explicit. It says if they owe delinquent taxes to the Tax Commissioner, that we cannot sell them a business license. And this is why, you know, for political reasons or whatever I would not like to have a list that had a lot of negotiated deals on it that, you know, we're leaning on some people but not others. And that's why I'd like an unedited list of delinquent taxes, and we will enforce it. And come April 1st when we get by the 90-day requirement by the State of Georgia on delinquent taxes, as of that date we won't sell a business license if they haven't paid, and we'll also issue a citation for doing business without a business license. And that's the only way to enforce it as it's written at this time. MR. KUHLKE: And I don't see any problem with that. I don't have any problem with that at all. MR. ZETTERBERG: I'd like to call the question. MOTION CARRIES 10-0. MR. MEYER: I will point out that the City will -- the urban area will bill probably the 1st of March. They will have some delays, and this same requirement is going to be placed on them also that will apply to businesses in the urban district. MAYOR SCONYERS: Thank you, Mr. Meyer. MR. ZETTERBERG: Would it be possible that we could run an ad in the newspaper just telling the -- in the business section, what the new ordinance says and how it will be applied? MR. MEYER: Better than that, we will correspond with each business that has delinquent taxes and give them a copy of the ordinance and make them aware that they cannot purchase a business license till they pay it. MR. ZETTERBERG: That's fine. Thank you. MR. MAYS: Mr. Mayor, if it's at all possible and we had a meeting with everybody who basically was connected with Public Services, I think Mr. Meyer stated something at the very beginning that would be very helpful. Something of this magnitude -- and I have no problem with the motion, but I do think if it's going to -- particularly out of your office, not a Clerk's office -- if it's going to be assigned to a particular committee, I do think that it ought to be at least forwarded to us. Or if it's going to concern money, and I don't mind it -- if it's concerning money, I don't mind it not coming to us at all, but I think it ought to at least come through that assigned committee or it ought to go to Finance, one of the two. And I know some problems, which I won't get into today, which I know you've had in terms of trying to police that situation, Miller, already. And you have a different set of rules currently existing in the urban district than you have in the suburban district, and I just want to make sure that if that is going to be placed on you, then we give you the operatives that are needed in order to do those type of things and not just land it on you in that manner. And I know you didn't necessarily want to say that, but that's been landed on you before in order to try and take that and to make it work, and some of the people here may not realize that that has been a problem. So I think if we're going to get into that magnitude of doing it, then it ought to be at least coming through this committee or it ought to come through Finance, and that's my only comment on it. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I think what this motion do is say that we're going to enforce the ordinance. We should either enforce the ordinance or repeal the ordinance. And, you know, so I think that basically what it's calling for, and it's calling for some cooperation between the License and Inspection and the Tax Office -- Tax Commissioner's Office as far as sharing information so, you know, we can facilitate the two departments on enforcing the ordinance. And this is not a new ordinance, this is a ordinance that was passed some time ago, from my understanding. MR. KUHLKE: Miller, have you talked with Mr. Saul, or did you just find out about this tonight? MR. MEYER: When I saw it on the agenda. MR. KUHLKE: Yeah. Are you going to talk to him tomorrow? MR. MEYER: I definitely will talk to him or somebody tomorrow, you can rest assured. MR. KUHLKE: Good. Just so we don't have some, you know, hollering and screaming between people. MR. MEYER: Over the phone there might be some hollering and screaming, but I will talk to him. MR. KUHLKE: Well, that's okay. MR. MAYS: And I merely stated it, Mr. Meyer, because of procedure. I'm not -- in terms of talking about the violation of the law, Mr. Todd, I think the law is very clear, but I think if we're going to operate under a set of rules with the agenda it would help if we're going to follow that for all committees. CLERK: Item 21: Consider approval of recreational contracts with various people regarding sporting events sponsored and scheduled by the Augusta-Richmond County Recreation Department. MR. BOYLES: Mr. Mayor, those of you that served on the previous County Commission and for those of you that are new to this body, those are the officials who work the basketball, baseball, softball, soccer -- whatever sport that may come up. Under the previous County Commission agenda they were listed by contract number and approve officiant's contract. The way this is worded on the agenda could be a little bit confusing if a person is not used to it, but I see in your agenda book, as I was reading Mr. Dillard's, that those contracts are there. These folks are considered independent contractors and not as County employees. That was set up probably 10 to 12 years ago by the Comptroller and the Risk Management Department. I think it would simpler for -- or maybe everyone will understand now the terminology of that, but that is no more than the people who are paid per game to officiate basketball games as they may be going on right now tonight. That protects Richmond County, or Augusta- Richmond County now, from the liability should someone be hurt and it is not proved negligent on Richmond County or City of Augusta's fault. I think the difficult thing here is the new terminology and the way that it's placed on the agenda. MR. HANDY: Move for approval, Mr. Mayor. MR. KUHLKE: Second. MR. ZETTERBERG: I just have one question. Is this part of -- this is part of your ongoing budget? MR. BOYLES: Yes, sir. That is -- MR. ZETTERBERG: Is there anything, Mr. Wall, in the rules that say that Mr. Boyles could not contract himself with these people? Why does it have to come to this level? MR. WALL: Because all contracts that are paid for out of public funds have to be contracts entered into by this body. MR. BOYLES: I've never had the authority as the department head to sign contracts. It had to come to the Attorney and then to the Chairman of the County Commission. And that's different now, so. MR. KUHLKE: Mr. Mayor, I -- Tommy, what I wanted to say to you is, we've got about three things on the Public Services agenda that are coming up tonight that I think it'd be appropriate to come through that committee prior to coming to this body, if you could, since you've got one or two new people on there. But Mr. Saul was the same way, so I'm not just pointing to you, but -- MR. BOYLES: Mr. Kuhlke, may I explain that? These are handled -- from my department, when a person is technically employed they go to the Purchasing Department and then they're out of Recreation's hands. Purchasing puts these on the agenda. At that point I have no control as to when they appear. I agree wholeheartedly with you in what you just said, but at that point they leave Recreation, they go to Purchasing, and then they were added to the agenda without us knowing the exact timing of when they're going to be there. MR. KUHLKE: Okay. Could you have some control over that and make it happen that way from now on? MR. BOYLES: If one of the administrators would pass that word to Purchasing, I would like to have that. MR. J. BRIGHAM: Mr. Boyles, none of these people are currently County employees, I assume? MR. BOYLES: I've not seen the names. I've not -- [Mr. Boyles looks in book]. I don't recall one that I see that is, Mr. Brigham. If you'll point it out. I don't think there has ever been a County policy against -- MR. J. BRIGHAM: I didn't think there was one, I just wanted it to be verified there wasn't one. MR. BOYLES: There has not been, because several of our game officials have been members of the Fire Department, they've been members of the Police Department, Sheriff's Department; both City and County employees. They're paid in a separate -- and not where they would reach the point of overtime service. It's paid through a different, separate fund. MR. J. BRIGHAM: I was just curious. MR. BOYLES: I mean, since this began, you can see, we're at the 9,100 - - 91,405 people since this began 12 years ago and I don't keep up -- can't keep up with all of them. MR. KUHLKE: I call the question, Mr. Mayor. MAYOR SCONYERS: Mr. Todd had his hand up. MR. TODD: I was going to call for the question, Mr. Mayor. MAYOR SCONYERS: Oh, okay. Thank you, Mr. Todd. MOTION CARRIES 10-0. CLERK: Item 22: Consider approval of a request from Nancy Betts Miller for a tax refund on property at 1230 Augusta West Parkway. MR. WALL: Mr. Mayor, according to the information that's in the book, she has received a refund for the last three years. In my opinion, that is all that the Commission-Council can -- could have granted her; that's already been granted to her. I think that the Commission-Council is without authority to go beyond that period of time, to go back from 1988 to 1991, and it is my recommendation that y'all do not do this. MR. HANDY: So move. MR. H. BRIGHAM: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: We have a motion by Mr. Handy and a second by Mr. Henry Brigham. Any discussion, gentlemen? MOTION CARRIES 10-0. CLERK: Item 23: Communication from the Interim Attorney requesting approval of a Resolution requesting the Richmond County Delegation amend the Consolidation Act to delete the provision for two new members to be recommended by the Richmond County Delegation and to provide that all members of such boards, commissions, committees, panels, authorities or other such entities affected by said Section 13 (f) of the Consolidation Act be appointed by the Commission-Council. MR. POWELL: Move for approval. MR. KUHLKE: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: Further discussion? MR. TODD: Yes, Mr. Mayor. I'm going to vote present, and I would hope that my colleagues would allow me to do that in the sense that I'm not sure whether we can do this within the first year, or ask the Delegation to do it, so hopefully you'll extend me that privilege. MAYOR SCONYERS: Any further discussion? MR. MAYS: Yes, Mr. Mayor, in that resolution it says that we will make those appointments. In that resolution, is there a provision in there for how they are to be outlined if this Commission is to do it? I know some where we've done officially or unofficially whereby a Commissioner or Council member -- Commissioner does them according to their particular district, whether or not it's done, you know, as a whole, or what will be the new provision that's in there? MR. WALL: Mr. Mays, the Consolidation Act provides that insofar as those boards and authorities are concerned, that one will be from each district. This resolution that I prepared at the instructions of Commissioner Handy and at the request of Senator Cheeks does not deal with that part of Section 13 (f); the only thing it does is request deletion of the two members that were to be recommended by the Legislative Delegation to the Commission- Council for appointment. So rather than a 12-member board or a commission, it would be a 10-member commission, or one from each district. MAYOR SCONYERS: Further questions? MR. J. BRIGHAM: I call the question. MAYOR SCONYERS: Thank you. MOTION CARRIES 7-1-2. [MR. TODD AND MR. MAYS VOTE "PRESENT"] CLERK: Item 24: Communication from the Interim Attorney requesting approval of an Ordinance to provide a Code of Ethics for members of boards, commissions, committees, panels, authorities, or other entities appointed by the Augusta-Richmond County Commission-Council; to provide an effective date; to provide for a hearing on violation charges; to provide a notice of hearing; to provide for removal of a member from such board, commission, committee, panel, authority, or other entity; to provide for filling of vacancies; to provide for judicial review; and for other purposes. MR. KUHLKE: I move approval. MR. POWELL: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: I have a motion by Mr. Kuhlke, have a second by Mr. Powell. Discussion, gentlemen? MR. TODD: Yes, Mr. Mayor. I guess my concern would be who would be the review -- or the entity that would have the hearing? Are we calling on the Local Delegation to put them under the State's ethics board or we're talking about setting up something here and the local government hear the cases and remove individuals from the boards and authorities? And if we're talking about doing it here, then are we doing this with the -- you know, will we have the authority to remove individual's from State-wide boards, authorities, et cetera? And I think there is some concerns and some questions need to be raised on what we're talking about the extent. If we're talking about having this authority as far as local delegation or created authorities and boards, I can live with it. If we're talking about all and any boards and authorities, which would include the State-wide, then I think we have a problem. MAYOR SCONYERS: Mr. Wall, do you want to respond to that, please, sir. MR. WALL: In Section 1 it defines who it applies to, which would only be those entities, boards and commissions which this governing body makes the appointment to, so it would only apply to -- it would not apply to the State- wide authorities, it would be limited to the one's where y'all make the appointments. MR. BEARD: Mr. Mayor, I fully approve of an ethics -- a Code of Ethics, and I think we need it for people who are going to serve on this, but I do think with 24, 25 and 26, that there should be some discussion and maybe some more input from the Commissioners. And it appears to me that we are going to be getting together in the next couple of weeks, and I think this would be a good time to really look at this and discuss this and move forward on it, and that would be my suggestion at this time. MR. HANDY: Would that be a substitute motion? MR. BEARD: Yes. MR. HANDY: I'll second it. MAYOR SCONYERS: Further discussion, gentlemen? MR. J. BRIGHAM: Mr. Mayor, is this not the first reading of an ordinance? Does it not require two readings? MR. WALL: It does. MR. J. BRIGHAM: Can it be amended on the second reading? MR. WALL: It can be. MR. J. BRIGHAM: I really don't think the motion is necessary if this is only the first reading of the ordinance, and -- MR. HANDY: But it also -- if we don't necessarily have to read it, we're going to study it, it don't need to be on here entirely, it could be taken off. Either way it'll work the same way. MR. J. BRIGHAM: But if we're going to proceed with this matter we've got to vote to accept the first reading, I believe, and that way we won't be marked before we even get around to adopting this. MR. BEARD: If we accept the first reading of this and we want to make any changes in this, Mr. Wall, can this be changed? MR. WALL: Yes, sir, it can be changed on the second reading -- so long as you don't completely re-write it, I mean. If you change the whole tenor of it I think that you might want to go back and re-advertise it. But obviously if there are some technical changes or some amendments to it, then that can be done at the second reading. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, my concern is are we placing the Richmond County Board of Commissioners under this, and would we want to make rude to enforce ethics on other boards and authorities that we're not willing to live by ourselves? You know, we just went through a situation with County employees where, hell, we -- excuse my French --we had folks stealing from us and everything else, and it seems that we found a way to handle it without, you know, enforcing the little code of conduct that we have as far as employees go. And so my question is, you know, would the maker of this -- or the author of this resolution be willing to include the Board of Commissioners in it and have a administrative judge set up of some type where if we are violating the Code of Ethics, that we could be taken to court also? MR. BEARD: I'll withdraw the substitute motion. MAYOR SCONYERS: Okay, substitute motion is withdrawn. MR. H. BRIGHAM: I was going to comment on the motion, but I guess there's not one out there now in the sense it's been withdrawn. I was going to talk about -- MR. KUHLKE: I don't think I withdrew my motion. MAYOR SCONYERS: No, no, you didn't. The substitute motion. MR. H. BRIGHAM: The substitute motion, right. Substitute motion. I think that the discussion period, if we can in fact have some input at that time. I know we have an excellent Interim Attorney, but I think that a little discussion probably would have, you know, helped prior to this time. And I realize we can do it before the second reading, but there's not a motion on that now, so I'll rest my case. MR. KUHLKE: In answer to Mr. Todd, I think if you'll look at the next ordinance that comes it does speak to the elected officials -- separate ordinance. MR. ZETTERBERG: At an earlier meeting I had brought up the question about the Georgia Code of Ethics and never really did seem to get an answer other than the Richmond County Code of Ethics was similar and wordy. But I understand there are mechanisms within the Georgia Code of Ethics to allow people fair review of these things, and there is a mechanism, and I suggest we take a look at that before we fall in and create something new. MR. WALL: If I may respond to Mr. Zetterberg's comments. This is copied from the State Board. The difference is the State Code of Ethics has a state Ethics Commission that reviews it. I substituted the Commission-Council for that review board. In other words, a committee appointment where you make the appointment, if there is a charge of a violation, that comes to the Commission-Council. This Commission-Council serves as that -- in lieu of what would be the State Ethics Commission and reviews that. There is a process built in here insofar as due process so that the charges are given to that individual, he knows what charges he's confronted with, he has an opportunity to present evidence to be heard before this body, and then has a judicial review beyond that. So this is patterned after the State ethics -- these are the State ethical standards. It's taken directly out of the Code. MR. POWELL: Mr. Chairman, my question is for the County Attorney. As far as the Board of Commissioners, aren't we regulated by the State Board of Ethics for our conduct? MR. HANDY: I can answer that one for you. Yes, we are. MR. WALL: You're regulated insofar as the election is concerned by a code of ethics. I think that State Code of Ethics -- I'm not sure it extends to the County Commissioners. I would have to look at that, I'm not sure off the top of my head. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I would have a serious problem voting for a ordinance that would put this entity in charge of handling the hearing. I think that you could easily put it before an administrative judge, a citizens committee, you know, possibly the grand jury, et cetera. This Board is too political to referee a chicken fight, you know, and certainly I don't think this is the appropriate place for it to be. I'm not saying that it's not needed; I'm saying that it should not fall here, you know, to this Board to referee it or decide whether there is ethic violations because we are a political entity. MAYOR SCONYERS: Further discussion, gentlemen? MOTION CARRIES 6-5. [MAYOR SCONYERS VOTES "YES"] MR. KUHLKE: Mr. Mayor, a clarification. Is that just considered the first reading? MR. WALL: Yes, sir. MAYOR SCONYERS: Yes, sir. CLERK: Item 25: Communication from the Interim Attorney requesting approval of an Ordinance adopting a Code of Ethics for government service; to provide an effective date; to repeal conflicting Ordinances; and for other purposes. MAYOR SCONYERS: What's your pleasure, gentlemen? MR. J. BRIGHAM: Mr. Mayor, I bring this to you in the form of a motion. MAYOR SCONYERS: Mr. Brigham has a motion on the floor. Do I hear a second? MR. KUHLKE: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: Mr. Kuhlke seconded the motion. Further discussion? MR. TODD: Yes. Mr. Mayor, again, there is a -- who would actually hear this one? MAYOR SCONYERS: Mr. Wall? MR. WALL: Since this applies directly to the employees and to you as members of the Commission-Council -- if it involved an employee, then it could be used as a --a violation of this is grounds for disciplinary action, then it would go before the Personnel Board. That has been done in the past. Insofar as any of you are concerned, I think that it could be used as grounds for a recall if there was a violation of it, but there is no entity set up to hear any violation by any elected Commission member of any of these codes. MR. TODD: Mr. Wall, I'm going to differ with you in the sense that I don't think it could be the grounds for a recall. This body is a political body; this body should not be involved in hearing complaints against colleagues. You know, we don't have a ethics committee; this is not the U.S. Congress. I agree that we need something as far as State legislation go to deal with the ethics and conduct of elected officials, and they should have to be accountable as far as ethics go I don't care who they are or what level they are elected at, but I don't think we can govern ourselves in that sense because we are all political entities and it's got to be the County grand jury or it's got to be somebody else versus this Board here. Now, I don't know where we're headed. There's a -- you're repealing a Code of Ethics that was put in place for employees and the Board basically where we had a standard or a code that we agreed pretty much when we voted on it to go by. As far as anyone enforcing it, it would be enforced if somebody violated the law. For sure law enforcement or the courts would enforce it. I don't have a problem with the employees and this Board dealing with it; I do have a problem with my colleagues doing it, whether it's the colleagues sitting here, a future commission, or a past commission. And the reason it won't work is we are a political entity, again, individually and collectively. MR. WALL: Either I misspoke or Mr. Todd misunderstood me. You would never consider these violations of this ordinance. This does not come before you except on behalf of an employee. Once he goes through the Personnel Board, and if he is discharged for violation of the Code of Ethics, then that employee would have the right of an appeal here. However, if one of you were charged with a violation of this, then it would never come before this Board. There's no mechanism for your fellow Commissioners to decide whether or not this is a violation. When I said it could be the subject of a recall, if there's a violation of the ordinance, then a voter -- and the process for initiating a recall petition, then it could be used for that purpose. MR. POWELL: Mr. Chairman, I just have a question for the County Attorney. How has this been handled in the past? Isn't this the same thing that we've been doing? MR. WALL: This was adopted by resolution by the Board of Commissioners in the past, and this is simply doing it by -- this particular ordinance is putting it in as an ordinance. But, yes, this is exactly what was adopted by the Board of Commissioners insofar as the County is concerned as a resolution. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, is there a difference as far as the effect and the ability to enforce a resolution and a ordinance? MR. WALL: Yes, sir. MR. TODD: I'm not really sure that it was a resolution, but I'll take your word that it was in the form of a resolution. I think I authored the code of conduct for the employees and the Board. I don't have a problem with going to a ordinance if that's what we feel a need to do, you know. The bottom line is that the State law dealing with the Grovetown law dealing with recall sets the criteria of what you can use for a recall and when a recall can happen, so I think that it's ludicrous to say that we're going to sit here and pass a ordinance that could be used in a recall. And I'll call for the question. I don't have a problem on voting for the ordinance, you know, it's pretty much what we have, as long as my understanding that we're not going to be having ethic committee hearings on individuals here on the Board. MOTION CARRIES 10-0. MR. ZETTERBERG: I do have one question, Mr. Mayor. Under what conditions -- or who would hear if one of us did something in violation of the Code of Ethics? Nothing happens unless a citizen would want to start recall procedures? Nobody else hears it? The State of Georgia doesn't hear it? MR. WALL: That's correct. Unless it's an election law violation, then it would go before the State Election Ethics Commission. MR. ZETTERBERG: Does that mean that we're not really bound by a Code of Ethics? I would think that if you had a Code of Ethics you would have to have some way to enforce that, and I think what we ought to do is look into that because all of us want to fall under -- MR. MAYS: Mr. Mayor, if I might halfway answer Mr. Zetterberg -- and not to take Jim's place, 'cause he's getting a little bit more than $12,000 a year, but I think what would be helpful is exactly what you said. And to expound upon that, he doesn't have to go with it word for word, but I think the now-defunct City Charter which was given up during the consolidation referendum, if you'll go back to the provisions which are in there for the censoring of elected officials, it can be done by that particular body. I think the things that deal with actual criminal offenses, then the State has that power; and the Governor, under those acts of felony, can remove; and then I believe you have your provision there for reinstatement, which can be done if that person is cleared through indictment. But I think while we are coming forth today with all the ordinances that are dealing with everything else, boards, commissions, and everybody other than us, then maybe it might be a good idea, Rob, to take your advice and maybe do a little something for ourselves that would place there. 'Cause it looks as though we got everybody that come under the auspices maybe of 205,000 people other than the 11 that's sitting here, so maybe that ought to be the next ordinance that we probably write. And I think that old charter, which I think still has some good reading material in it, could be looked up and refined upon, Mr. Attorney, a little bit, and I think there's a provision in there that can pretty much cover all of the activities regarding conduct other than the criminal offenses. And I just wanted to answer that, that there was provision in that government for you to do that. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I guess my question to the County Attorney, that the winter session of the Grand Jury don't look at County government and also look at the elected officials, so if we have -- I think we should come under something, too, but -- and I have a problem with putting the employees under something we're not being. I have a problem with this body making the decision on whether I have a ethics violation or not, and I think that we need to possibly, in the second reading, amend this ordinance to let the winter quarter of the Grand Jury that look at civil matters look at this issue, you know, and if there's charges brought, then the Grand Jury do it versus the sitting board here. MAYOR SCONYERS: Item 26, please. CLERK: Item 26: Communication from the Interim Attorney requesting approval of an Ordinance providing for the appointment of members to certain boards and authorities; to provide qualifications for appointment of members of certain boards and authorities; to establish term limits for members of said board and authorities; to prohibit appointment to more than one board or authority; to provide an effective date; to repeal conflicting Ordinances; and for other purposes. MR. J. BRIGHAM: Mr. Chairman, I move that we adopt this ordinance. MR. BRIDGES: Mr. Mayor, I've got a question over on Section 2. Well, I guess the first question I have, is this a copy of the existing ordinance by the County? MR. WALL: No, it is not. This, again, was adopted by the Board of Commissioners as a resolution and this is now being presented in the form of an ordinance. MR. BRIDGES: Okay. What I'm asking, is this verbatim of the resolution that was adopted? MR. WALL: The substantive provision is -- I guess I'll say it's verbatim. I mean, it's obviously been expanded to include the City Council. MR. BRIDGES: Yeah. The question I have is over on Section 2 where it says no persons who has served two consecutive full terms shall again be eligible for appointment to a board or commission or whatever until a lapse of a year. Is that the present practice? MR. WALL: That is a part of the resolution that was adopted, but it was waived on occasion. MR. BRIDGES: My concern there is that if you do this you're limiting the ability of the Commissioners to appoint who they want to those boards, and if you've got some -- you know, I can understand term limits for somebody that you really want off, but if you've got somebody that you want on there that's good, that knows -- if he's on the Personnel Board, been there for years, he knows the laws and rules and regulations, you don't want him skipping a year and then coming back after a year's time. So my question is -- my, I guess, concern is with Section 2 there; I think it should be left up to the Commissioners who they want to appoint to these boards. And I'd like to place that in the form of a substitute motion. MR. HANDY: And I second that, Mr. Mayor. MAYOR SCONYERS: Well, the other motion died for lack of a second, so -- MR. KUHLKE: I don't think I had a chance to second it. MAYOR SCONYERS: Oh, okay. I'm sorry. MR. BRIDGES: Then I make the substitute. MR. HANDY: And I've seconded it already. MR. J. BRIGHAM: Will you repeat the substitute? MR. BRIDGES: What I'm saying is the restriction on who a Commissioner can appoint as far as the one-year -- as far as after he served two consecutive terms and then he has to wait a year before he might can be considered for another appointment, my substitute motion is that that be dropped from the ordinance. MR. J. BRIGHAM: If it's good enough for us, gentlemen, why is it not good enough for our appointees to our boards and authorities? We have to live with a two-term appointment, and if we want to seek re-election we have to wait for our next available term to run where we can run, so I think if it's good enough for us, I think it's good enough for the committees we appoint. MR. KUHLKE: Mr. Mayor, I seconded Mr. Brigham's motion to get it on the floor, but I tend to agree with Mr. Bridges in that you've got some good people that are on some boards that you don't want -- you need that expertise. And I would say that I would tend to agree with what he's saying, Mr. Brigham. MR. J. BRIGHAM: That's fine. MR. BRIDGES: You know, I can appreciate Mr. Brigham's comment there. Term limits is certainly a concern of mine. We're limited to an eight-year term, and after that a new person is going to take our seat and he could appoint who he wants to, so really these board appointments will have term limits as well. They'll be limited to as long as we're there. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I believe we said that the ordinance that was passed earlier on was verbatim. I don't recall in that ordinance saying that you can only serve on one board, and we have individuals serving on more than one board now. I think that when we look at the -- MR. J. BRIGHAM: I believe it was in the original resolution. MR. TODD: And we made some appointments. And the other thing is that we have a lot of resolutions and ordinances that come up, and certainly it would be helpful to me to be able to see the old ordinance that I'm voting to do away with or replace in the book also if I'm repealing one, and probably would be helpful to have a little more time. You know, we get hit with a lot of paperwork and a lot of ordinances to read and try to make the best decision for this community. And I know this is the first reading and there's opportunity to amend it, but I'm concerned about that, and also concerned about whether there is public notices put out as far as these ordinances go so the public will have a opportunity to participate also. I don't think that they should come in on the second reading or the third reading; they should have a opportunity on the first reading. And I guess that's in the form of a question to the County Attorney. MR. WALL: Well, in response to the first part of the question, the more than one board was a part of the resolution that was adopted by the Board of Commissioners. You do have situations, however, and in those situations what happened was -- well, the ones that happened since the resolution was adopted, y'all made the appointment, then the Legislative Delegation appointed the same individual to another board, so the individual was appointed to more than one board. Y'all have made exceptions in the past to the two term. I don't know -- I can't recall of an exception, but there may have been one insofar as more than one board; I'm not certain about that. Insofar as public notice is concerned, as with any of the ordinances, we currently do not have a provision for the advertising of ordinances prior to their being presented to you for consideration. MR. TODD: Well, Mr. Mayor, I think certainly when we send an agenda out on Thursday, that we should have a reading room that we send the ordinance to so that a citizen that is concerned about the ordinance or that it may affect would have the opportunity to go by the main branch of the library reference desk and pull the ordinance and actually read the ordinance. Most folks out there have no earthly idea what we're dealing with, including the press sitting here, you know, because they haven't read or seen the ordinance. And I call for the question. MAYOR SCONYERS: Okay, we're going to vote on the substitute motion first by Mr. Bridges, seconded by Mr. Handy. Do y'all need that re-read, gentlemen? MR. POWELL: Yes, Mr. Chairman. MAYOR SCONYERS: Okay, would you re-read the substitute motion made by Mr. Bridges, please. CLERK: To drop the second section from the resolution -- from the ordinance. MAYOR SCONYERS: Did y'all catch that, gentlemen? MR. ZETTERBERG: I wasn't too sure what the second part was when she said that. MR. WALL: Section 2 is the part they're talking about, which is the term limitation. MR. ZETTERBERG: And we're removing the term limitation? MR. WALL: Removing the term limitation. MOTION CARRIES 8-2. MAYOR SCONYERS: That kills the first motion, so -- MR. J. BRIGHAM: We're on the next item then. MR. HANDY: Mr. Mayor, I'd like to make a suggestion. In the near future, that instead of working on some ordinance like this, work on the ordinance that's going to change the government first and then we come back and do these little small ordinances and take care of this stuff. Because we've got some ordinances that combine the City and the County together that we've never even touched yet that's much more important than this particular ordinance here. MAYOR SCONYERS: Item 27, please. CLERK: Item 27: Communication from the Interim Attorney submitting a letter from Doug Batchelor concerning the submission of a list of three eligible persons to the Board of the Hospital Authority for each of the five vacancies currently existing on such Hospital Authority. MR. WALL: Mr. Batchelor contacted me. The City of Augusta Hospital Authority is attempting to take advantage of the interest rates and do some refinancing, and they need an active board in order to carry forward with that. I recognize that y'all have not had an opportunity to consider who you might want to appoint to these vacancies, but I bring this to you for your consideration to show that there is a need to fill this board. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, it seems what we have here is a duplication in two entities that need to be merged, and I would be for taking this authority here and making it the authority and let them take care of everything in this county as far as a hospital authority go. It probably wouldn't set well with some in here, but the bottom line is that we don't have a City of Augusta, we have a new consolidated government, and when January 1 rolled over the consolidated government was responsible for, I guess, setting up boards and carrying out the duties that this other board was carrying out. Now, it seems to me that we have duplication, and we only need one hospital authority in this community, not two, and if we -- and, you know, I heard this argument for a good while as far as the consolidation debate go, so let's look at whether we need two hospital authorities, and if we don't, do away with one, charge the other one with the responsibility of these other entities that need representation. MR. WALL: Just for the benefit of the Commission-Council, let me address the concern, because I raised the same question with Mr. Batchelor and also did some research. The Hospital Authorities Act specifically allows more one than one hospital authority in municipalities or counties that have populations greater than 100,000. I think there is some very valid reasons that you would want to keep both hospital authorities. First of all, I don't think that you could compel the combining of them because the Hospital Authorities Act gives them perpetual existence, and the second thing is that - - at least this hospital authority has outstanding bonds, and so it has got to maintain its existence, and I suspect that the other one does likewise. The other thing is that when you've got two hospital authorities dealing with two competing hospitals insofar as bond information, insofar as other things that would come before the authority, there's certain confidential information, secret information, that could put one at a competitive advantage over the other if that was shared between the two authorities. So I think that, although at first blush to say it's a duplication and maybe you need to combine them, I think there's some very valid reasons that you would want to keep them separate. MR. J. BRIGHAM: Mr. Mayor, I make a motion that we advertise these positions for 30 days and that we appoint a list at the first meeting in March to submit to this hospital authority for nominations to this board. MAYOR SCONYERS: Do I hear a second to Mr. Brigham's motion? MR. KUHLKE: I'll second the motion. MAYOR SCONYERS: Mr. Kuhlke seconded the motion. Further discussion, gentlemen? MR. HANDY: Yes, sir. Will there be 30 days between now and our next meeting in March? MR. J. BRIGHAM: Well, 28 days, whatever it is. MR. HANDY: Well, why couldn't it be the third week in March if we got to have it -- MR. J. BRIGHAM: That's fine with me. I'll accept that as -- MR. HANDY: Well, how much time do we have, Mr. Attorney? MR. WALL: You've got as much time as you take, obviously, but they are -- they would like to push forward if we can do it by the first meeting in March. They were really hoping they would have something in place by the last of February, but I think under the circumstances, since this was just brought before us -- MR. HANDY: Okay. Well, we'll settle for the first meeting in March. MR. TODD: Mr. Wall, how do this affect the legislation on appointing additional members if we're going to keep a board or an authority, and -- and I'd like to at least hear that, because I believe that we're supposed to do them from each district, et cetera. MR. WALL: Well, first of all, this board -- this Hospital Authority, as well as the County Hospital Authority are not, in my opinion, affected by the consolidation act insofar as expanding the membership. These are created by general law and the special law -- local act does not change that. These were activated by a resolution of the old Board of Commissioners and the City Council, so the membership of this is set forth in the general statute. And I think there is one question that I do -- the municipality says it's got to come from the district that it represents. I will need to get back with you as far as whether or not all members of this need to be from the urban services district, and that is an open question right now that I don't have the answer to and I'm looking at. MR. TODD: I would think that if the Hospital Authority is representing the best interest for service delivery and the citizens of this community, then there wouldn't be a conflict on one serving -- you know, one authority serving, but I'll call for the question. MOTION CARRIES 9-1. [MR. TODD VOTES "PRESENT"] CLERK: Item 28: Communication from the Interim Attorney submitting a Road Extension and Cost Sharing Agreement between Richmond County, Georgia and Augusta Exchange, L.L.C regarding plans to extend and upgrade Skinner Mill Road Extension and Agerton Lane. MR. WALL: Mr. Mayor, in November the Board of Commissioners basically approved a similar type of agreement, with the exception that the -- and had the $1.681 million cap on it. There's a few changes in this insofar as the landscaping. I met with Mr. Dickerson and Mr. Timberlake last week and they have approved this agreement, is my understanding. And, again, the substantive revisions are identical to what the Board of Commissioners approved in November, but it was never executed. MR. HANDY: Move for approval, Mr. Mayor. MR. TODD: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: I have a motion by Mr. Handy, seconded by Mr. Todd. Further discussion, gentlemen? MR. TODD: Yes, Mr. Mayor. I understand the turn-around as far as the money we're investing is going to be fairly short, and I think it's a good agreement. MAYOR SCONYERS: Further discussion, gentlemen? MR. J. BRIGHAM: I call the question, Mr. Mayor. MOTION CARRIES 10-0. CLERK: Item 29: Communication from Mr. Matt Stovall regarding a proposal to rename the Augusta Golf Course in honor of Mr. George Fisher. MR. STOVALL: Mr. Mayor, Delegates, thank you very much. I wrote a letter to the Augusta City Council in its last meeting and asked them to do this, and they recommended that I come before this Board at one of your first meetings of the year. It is simply -- if you have a copy of the letter you can go through it yourself. Basically it says: George Fisher, who was voted Augusta's Favorite Radio Personality of all time by the Readers Poll in Augusta Magazine -- and so forth. Something permanent needs to be established in his name, I think, and so with the help of a couple of other people, including Tax Commissioner Jerry Saul, who also was a personal friend of George, and some sports writers: Al Ludwick, David Weston and so forth, and also the manager at the Augusta Golf Course right now, Mark Avery, we would like to ask that you change the name of The Patch, the Augusta Golf Course, to the George Fisher Memorial Golf Course. George loved golf, he loved especially The Patch. You could always find him there on every Wednesday and Saturday that it wasn't raining -- and George used to say it rained every Wednesday. But he did more for that golf course, I guess, than anybody else as far as getting people out there, and he was also on a couple of different boards concerning the golf course in the renovation of same and also the possible buy-out of that golf course at one time. And so I think George Fisher Memorial Golf Course has a nice ring to it, and I hope you agree. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I'll so move. MR. J. BRIGHAM: I'll second that, Mr. Mayor. MAYOR SCONYERS: We have a motion by Mr. Todd, seconded by Mr. Jerry Brigham. Any discussion, gentlemen? MR. HANDY: Yes, sir, Mr. Mayor. I think that this should be taken under consideration and send it to the committee who's overlooking the golf course now and let's get our heads together before we make that move because there's other things that we may be confronted with of changing the name or putting it on someone. I don't have anything against Mr. Fisher, 'cause he marched me out to school and marched my kids out to school. And I don't have a problem with that, but I think it need to go before the committee that the golf course come under and then make a recommendation back to the full body before we make that move. That's just my thoughts on it. Because, first of all, you got to have -- should need a resolution to change it and we haven't done that, that hasn't been prepared, and there's just some things that we may not know of right now. Not saying it's not going to get done, but I think I need some more information on it before I can vote on it. MR. KUHLKE: I have to say that I thought the world of George Fisher, too, but I'd have to agree with Mr. Handy at this point. I think the golf course is one of the things that this Commission is going to have to take a look at, determine what the future of that golf course is. I think it'll be there, but in whose hands it will be, we don't know at this point, and I think to immediately do something by changing the name of it, that may hinder us in some respects in doing some things to make the facility a better facility than it is right now. I think it's premature. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I'd like to withdraw the motion and allow someone to make a motion to send it to the Public Services Committee and send it through the proper channels. MR. J. BRIGHAM: I'll withdraw my second. MR. BEARD: I so move, Mr. Todd. MAYOR SCONYERS: Now we have a motion by Mr. Beard, seconded by -- MR. TODD: I'll second Mr. Beard's motion. MAYOR SCONYERS: -- Mr. Todd, that we send it to Public Services. Further discussion on that, gentlemen? MR. MAYS: Yes, Mr. Mayor. We would welcome it over there in that particular committee. I also would --I think I can speak for the other committee members that would also welcome the support, Mr. Stovall, of you and that committee that has been working on that. In terms of information, I think Commissioner Kuhlke is absolutely right, that we do need to determine the permanency of what happens with it. Because I think on one hand where we may be concerned of wanting to do a memorial, whether it's to anyone, and particularly if government is in charge of it right now, we need to make sure of how that's going to go along because I think the worst thing that could be done is that something happens and then it's not in the control of the people who named it and then we get into a situation that might be negative, and I don't think that would be a proper and fitting memorial whether it's to Mr. Fisher or to anyone else, and I think we can work together on that and I welcome it coming over there. MAYOR SCONYERS: Further discussion, gentlemen? MOTION CARRIES 10-0. CLERK: Item 31: Communication from Mr. Thomas L. Lamb regarding the smoking restrictions in restaurants. MR. HANDY: Did we miss 30? MAYOR SCONYERS: It was deleted. MR. HANDY: Okay. Sorry about that. Go ahead. MAYOR SCONYERS: Is Mr. Lamb here? MR. HANDY: Mr. Mayor, I make a motion that we table it until he can be aboard to come and speak on his own behalf. MR. POWELL: Second. MR. J. BRIGHAM: Mr. Mayor, I make a substitute motion we receive it as information rather than having to deal with it again. MAYOR SCONYERS: Do you want to withdraw your motion, Mr. Handy? MR. HANDY: No, we need to let him have his say-so. It can still be information, but we need to let him have his say-so. MR. J. BRIGHAM: I think he needs to address this with the Board of Health, not with us. MR. HANDY: I mean, we've heard some before from other people, so give him the benefit of the doubt, that's all. We're still going to refer it to the Board of Health because we can't do anything about it anyway, but we can let him talk, can't we? MR. TODD: I'm going to second Mr. Brigham's substitute motion to get it on the floor. And, you know, I recall that -- I thought I had some authority over smoking in restaurants until I was told by the Board of Health that I did not, and by the local legislators that I do not, so I don't know why I'm hearing it if I don't have any authority or scope of responsibility. MAYOR SCONYERS: Further discussion, gentlemen? We'll take the substitute motion first, that's Mr. Brigham's motion to receive it as information. MOTION CARRIES 6-5. [MAYOR SCONYERS VOTES "YES"] CLERK: Item 32: Communication from Mr. George B. Cunningham regarding the proposed Water and Sewerage Rate Structure. MR. CUNNINGHAM: Mr. Mayor and Commissioners all and what little bit of public that's left here, I came here today and wore my best suit to come down here and convince this Commission that they needed to delay action on the water and sewerage situation. And I want to tell you that I've been coming to this chamber since 1977, which I wrote that letter and I quit coming 'cause everybody wondered who I was when I come up here and everywhere else they knew me. But I want to tell you that I have witnessed here today the most harmonious, the most democratic function of anybody that I've seen in this county since 1977. I mean, you fellows today put my faith back into this government, and I hope that the public knows that what you are doing -- I mean, they just need to know the difficulties that you have had to get -- the difficulties this community has had to get to where we are today, and I just want to tell you, thank God for you fellows. I know we've had to have divine guidance to take and get his far, and I just say thank God for y'all and keep on keeping on, and I'm going to be right there with you. Thank you, sir. MR. HANDY: Thank you, George. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I move that we receive it as information. MR. J. BRIGHAM: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: We have a motion by Mr. Todd, second by Mr. Jerry Brigham, to receive it as information. Further discussion, gentlemen? MOTION CARRIES 10-0. MAYOR SCONYERS: Any other business? MR. J. BRIGHAM: We've got a couple of other items, don't we? MR. WALL: Two more items. MAYOR SCONYERS: Oh, okay. CLERK: Item 34: Approval of an agreement between Southeastern Technology Center, Inc., and Richmond County. MR. WALL: Mr. Mayor, first of all, I appreciate your adding this to the agenda. Southeastern Technology Center is a non-profit corporation that is -- was formed in order to allow some of the technology from SRS to be utilized in the private sector. And this is an agreement whereby they will undertake to have remediation performed at two sites within the county at no cost to the county, at an approximate cost of $400,000 that will be funded through the DOE. It's a win-win proposition insofar as the county is concerned. They're anxious to get started. They've had their own bidding and proposals, and the subcontractors are ready to go to work. And we have reviewed this, been dealing with their attorney and worked out the details of the agreement, and it's in order, and I recommend approval of it. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I so move. MR. HANDY: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: Further discussion, gentlemen? MR. TODD: Yes, Mr. Mayor. I'd just like to add that, you know, through technology transfer this is something that we talked about on a chamber trip, the previous Commission, and former Commissioner Lee Neel served on one of those boards over there and I served on one for a short while, and this is something that we certainly want to take advantage of, letting the DOE spend a little money in our community. MAYOR SCONYERS: Further discussion? MOTION CARRIES 10-0. CLERK: Item 35: Approval of an appropriation in the amount of $250,000 for construction of the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame. MR. J. BRIGHAM: Mr. Mayor, this item was voted on in Finance Committee on January the 23rd, and we recommend that we advance them $250,000 out of our reserve till the sales tax dollars come in so they can start this project, and the committee will bring that to you in the form of a motion. MR. TODD: Second. MAYOR SCONYERS: We have a motion by Mr. Jerry Brigham, second by Mr. Todd. Further discussion? MOTION CARRIES 10-0. MR. TODD: Mr. Mayor, I move that we adjourn. MAYOR SCONYERS: All right, sir. We're going to have a Special Called Meeting Thursday afternoon at three o'clock. I just want to make y'all aware of that. Did I hear a motion for adjournment? MR. TODD: Yes, Mr. Mayor. MAYOR SCONYERS: This meeting is adjourned. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. MEETING ADJOURNED AT 8:17 P.M. Nancy W. Morawski Deputy Clerk of Commission-Council CERTIFICATION: I, Nancy W. Morawski, Deputy Clerk of Commission-Council, hereby certify that the above is a true and correct copy of the minutes of the Regular Meeting of Augusta-Richmond County Commission- Council held on February 6, 1996. __________________________________ Deputy Clerk of Commission-Council