HomeMy WebLinkAbout04-20-1999 Regular Meeting (2)
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REGULAR MEETING COMMISSION CHAMBERS
April 20, 1999
Augusta Richmond County Commission convened at 2:00 p.m.,
Tuesday, April 20, 1999, the Honorable Bob Young, Mayor,
presiding.
PRESENT: Hons. Beard, Bridges, H. Brigham, J. Brigham,
Colclough, Handy, Kuhlke, Mays, Powell, and Shepard, members
of Augusta Richmond County Commission.
Also present were Ms. Bonner, Clerk of Commission;
Mr. Oliver, Administrator; and Mr. Wall, County Attorney.
MAYOR YOUNG: We have someone here we want to recognize
today, and we'll go ahead and do that as we wait for a quorum
and the Commission to arrive in Chambers. I don't know if I
have to introduce this young man to you. This is Will Avery,
who has represented Augusta very well. And this is the lady
who made it all possible, his mother.
(A ROUND OF APPLAUSE IS GIVEN)
MAYOR YOUNG: Will, we're very proud of what you've
done, the way you've handled yourself and the way you've
represented Augusta, and we have a proclamation to present to
you today. And, Madame Clerk, if you'll read it, please.
CLERK: Yes, sir. In recognition of William Avery's
outstanding athletic accomplishments:
Whereas William Avery was raised in Augusta, Georgia;
and whereas William attended Augusta Westside High School as a
freshman, sophomore, junior, and represented this school as a
member of the Patriot's Boys Varsity Basketball Team; and
whereas as a freshman at Westside William average 16.8 points,
4 assists, 4.0 rebounds, and 2.0 steals in sparking the team
to a 26-3 record, the district and region titles, and the
state final four, and earning All City Basketball Honors; and
whereas as a sophomore William average 19 points, 6 assists,
5.0 rebounds, and 3.0 steals in leading Westside to a 33-1
record, the district, region, and state titles, and a #9
national ranking by USA Today; and whereas as a junior at
Westside William led his teammates as team captain and
averaged 28 points, 6 assists, 6 rebounds, and 4 steals in
leading his squad to a 25-4 record, the district and region
championships and the state final four, and was named the All
City Player of the Year; and whereas during his tenure at
Westside William set the single season record for three-
pointers with 62 as a sophomore and the school record for the
highest single season scoring average as a junior; and whereas
William now represents his hometown of Augusta as a member of
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the Duke University Men's Basketball Team; and whereas as a
sophomore at Duke William earned Associated Press Honorable
Mention All American Second Team, All ACC, All East Region,
and the First Team All ACC Tournament Honors while helping his
team to the NCAA Division I Championship Game on March 29th in
St. Petersburg, Florida; now therefore I, Bob Young, Mayor of
the City of Augusta, do declare April 20th, 1999, as William
Avery Day. In witness therefore, I have unto set my hand and
caused the Seal of Augusta, Georgia, to be affixed this 20th
day of April.
MAYOR YOUNG: Now, Will is going to leave us and go to
work in something called the NBA. We know he's going to go on
to bigger and better things, and the next proclamation will
probably take two or three pieces of paper. But as you move
on with your life, William, we want you never to forget the
people of Augusta, Georgia. On behalf of them, I present to
you a Key to the City of Augusta to take with you.
(A ROUND OF APPLAUSE IS GIVEN)
MAYOR YOUNG: You will always have a home here. And we
want to also say that we're just as proud of Ricky Moore and
his accomplishments, and we'll be doing something for him when
he comes back in town, and then later this summer we'll be
doing something special for both of you up in Big Oak Park.
We're not through yet. Is there anything you would like to
say to the group?
MR. AVERY: Just thank you. It's a pleasure, you know,
receiving this. Thank you again.
(A ROUND OF APPLAUSE IS GIVEN)
MAYOR YOUNG: We have a quorum. Ladies and gentlemen,
if you'll please rise. We'll have the Invocation from
Reverend Don Manning, Pastor of the First Christian Church,
followed by the Pledge of Allegiance. Pastor Manning?
(THE INVOCATION IS GIVEN BY THE REVEREND MANNING)
(THE PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE IS RECITED)
MAYOR YOUNG: Before we begin with the agenda, I'd like
to introduce two visitors who are with us today. We have with
us Mr. Noda and Ms. Yumada from our sister city, Takarazuka,
in Japan. They've come to spend a couple of days with us and
work on plans for the tenth anniversary celebration of our
sister city agreement which will come later this year. So we
want to welcome you to Augusta.
(A ROUND OF APPLAUSE IS GIVEN)
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MR. NODA: Thank you. The sister city agreement between
Takarazuka and Augusta was established in 1989. So after that
ten years has passed, so we came here to how to celebrate with
Augusta citizens, so we are looking forward to visiting you in
October. Thank you.
(A ROUND OF APPLAUSE IS GIVEN)
MAYOR YOUNG: Madame Clerk, do you want to move ahead
and clean up the agenda?
CLERK: Yes, sir. Mr. Mayor and members of the
Commission, we have on our addendum agenda the items listed.
We've already taken care of Item 1. Item 2 is a Resolution
congratulating Mr. Andy Baumgartner upon his selection as
National Teacher of the Year.
MR. SHEPARD: Mr. Mayor, I would move that Item 2 on the
addendum agenda be added to the consent agenda.
MR. HANDY: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: Any objection? So ordered.
CLERK: So if I could, Mr. Mayor, we'll just go ahead on
and do that resolution.
Whereas Andy Baumgartner was recognized by President
Bill Clinton on April 19, 1999, as the National Teacher of the
Year; now, therefore, the Augusta Commission congratulates Mr.
Andy Baumgartner on his prestigious achievement in his chosen
profession of education and directs the Mayor to coordinate an
appropriate recognition ceremony with the Superintendent of
the Richmond County Board of Education at an appropriate time
so that Mr. Baumgartner can be personally recognized for the
honor he has brought to Augusta-Richmond County. Let a copy
of this Resolution be spread upon the minutes of this body, a
copy be transmitted to the Board of Education and to Mr. Andy
Baumgartner. Done in this meeting April 20th, 1999.
MR. H. BRIGHAM: I move for approval, Mr. Mayor.
MR. SHEPARD: I second Mr. Brigham's motion, Mr. Mayor.
MAYOR YOUNG: Any discussion? All in favor, please say
aye.
MOTION CARRIES 10-0.
CLERK: Under our consent agenda, Items 1 through 34.
And under Item 12, I'd like to read for the record, to be
included, conditions that were approved by the Planning
Commission, but it was inadvertently left off of the agenda
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item: That the area to be zoned be reduced to Tract A-1 shown
on the file plat consisting of approximately 59 acres; and
that the ultimate use generally conform to the preliminary
concept plan submitted for the retirement community or the
zoning of the property reverts to the previous configuration.
That's Item 12.
PLANNING:
1. Pulled from consent agenda.
2. Z-99-33 - Request for concurrence with the decision of
the Planning Commission to approve a petition from
Thelma M. Ross, on behalf of Daniel Ross, requesting a
Special Exception for the purpose of establishing a
family day care home as provided for in Section 26-1,
Subparagraph (f) of the Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance
for Augusta-Richmond County, on property located on the
north right-of-way line of Massoit Drive, 617 feet, more
or less, west of the northwest corner of the
intersection of Barton Chapel Road and Massoit Drive
(3615 Massoit Drive).
3. Z-99-34 - Request for concurrence with the decision of
the Planning Commission to approve a petition from Linda
Thomas, on behalf of Linda & Darryl Thomas, requesting a
Special Exception for the purpose of establishing a
family day care home as provided for in Section 26-1,
Subparagraph (f) of the Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance
for Augusta-Richmond County, on property located on the
southeast right-of-way line of Wilbur Street, 275.0 feet
northeast of a point where the northeast right-of-way
line of Windsor Spring Road intersects the southeast
right-of-way line of Wilbur Street (3106 Wilbur Street).
4. Z-99-37 - Request for concurrence with the decision of
the Planning Commission to approve a petition from C.
Roger Bagby, on behalf of C. Roger Bagby and Catherine
R. Gibbs, requesting a change of zoning from Zone A
(Agriculture) to Zone B-2 (General Business) on property
located on the southwest right-of-way line of
Wrightsboro Road, 240 feet, more or less, southeast of a
point where the centerline of Maddox Drive extended
intersects the southwest right-of-way line of
Wrightsboro Road (3666 Wrightsboro Road).
5. Pulled from consent agenda.
6. Z-99-39 - Request for concurrence with the decision of
the Planning Commission to approve a petition from Tony
Atkins, on behalf of David Sandbach and Henry Jones,
requesting a change of zoning from Zone B-1
(Neighborhood Business) to Zone B-2 (General Business)
on property located on the southwest corner of the
intersection of Gordon Highway and Barton Chapel Road.
7. Z-99-41 - Request for concurrence with the decision of
the Planning Commission to approve with the condition,
'There shall be only one occupied building on the entire
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property (ten acres). This dwelling may be a manufac-
tured home until a site-built home has been constructed,
after which the manufactured home shall be removed and
the zoning shall revert to R-1 (One-family Residence)',
a petition from Mills Briggs requesting a change of
zoning from Zone R-1 (Manufactured Home Residential) to
Zone R-MH (Manufactured Home Residential) on property
located on the northeast right-of-way line of Seago
Road, 1,070 feet, more or less, north of the northeast
corner of the intersection of Ascot Road and Seago Road.
8. Z-99-42 - Request for concurrence with the decision of
the Planning Commission to approve a petition from
Charles Cooper, on behalf of Cornelia G. Newman,
requesting a change of zoning from Zone R-1A (One-family
Residence) to Zone R-MH (Manufactured Home Residential)
on property located approximately 345 feet southeast of
the southeast right-of-way line of Old McDuffie Road and
also being 965 feet, more or less, northeast of a point
where the northeast right-of-way line of Woodbrier Court
intersects with the southeast right-of-way line of Old
McDuffie road. NOTE: This approval for the front 400
feet only.
9. Z-99-43 - Request for concurrence with the decision of
the Planning Commission to approve a petition from Tom
Ashe, on behalf of Mary J. Perry, requesting a change of
zoning from Zone R-1 (One-family Residence) to Zone R-1A
(One-family Residence) on property located on the south-
east corner of the intersection of Old Waynesboro Road
and Taylor Road.
10. Z-99-44 - Request for concurrence with the decision of
the Planning Commission to approve a petition from Myong
Cha Cho requesting a change of zoning from Zone R-1A
(One-family Residence) and Zone B-1 (Neighborhood
Business) to Zone B-2 (General Business) on property
located on the north right-of-way line of Deans Bridge
Road, 943 feet, more or less, west of the northwest
corner of the intersection of Georgetown Drive and Deans
Bridge Road (3253 Deans Bridge Road).
11. Z-99-45 - Request for concurrence with the decision of
the Planning Commission to approve a petition from Tim
Hill, on behalf of Bryan Simkins, et al., requesting a
change of zoning from Zone A (Agriculture) to Zone LI
(Light Industry) on property located on the south right-
of-way line of Tobacco Road, 6,863 feet, more or less,
west of the southwest corner of the intersection of the
Central of Georgia Railroad line and Tobacco Road.
12. Z-99-46 - Request for concurrence with the decision of
the Planning Commission to approve a petition from
Howard M. Landers, on behalf of Amli Augusta Properties,
Inc., requesting a change of zoning from Zone R-3A
(Multiple-family Residential) and Zone B-2 (General
Business) on property located on the northeast right-of-
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way line of Wrightsboro Road, 1,250 feet, more or less,
southeast of the northeast corner of the intersection of
Maddox Drive and Wrightsboro Road.
13. S-574-I - PEPPERIDGE SUBDIVISION - SECTION XV - PHASE I
-FINAL PLAT - Request for concurrence with the decision
of Planning Commission to approve a petition from
Southern Partners, Inc., on behalf of Nordahl Homes,
Inc., requesting Final Plat Approval of Pepperidge
Subdivision, Section XV, Phase I. This phase is an
extension of Bremen Drive and Colbert Street, adjacent
to Pepperidge, Section XIV, and contains 44 lots.
FINANCE:
14. Motion to approve refund of 1997 taxes in the amount of
$129.30 to David Hamby for overpayment of taxes on Map
139, Parcel 270.
15. Motion to approve refund of 1996 taxes in the amount of
$294.32 to Richard R. Barbee for overpayment of taxes on
Account No. 24703.
16. Motion to approve refund of 1997 taxes in the amount of
$465.45 to NTFC Capital Corporation for overpayment of
taxes on Account No. 2060390.
17. Motion to approve refund of 1997 taxes in the amount of
$160.66 to Village West Home Style Laundry for overpay-
ment of taxes on Account No. 1205782.
18. Motion to approve performing actuarial valuations for
pension plans for 1998. Funded by the respective
Pension Plans.
ENGINEERING SERVICES:
19. Motion to authorize the reorganization of Public Works
and Engineering Department with the caveat all personnel
cuts be absorbed through attrition.
20. Motion to authorize condemnation against Sook Hee Chong,
owner of Project Parcels 3 and 5.
21. Motion to approve Change Order Number Two with APAC-GA,
Inc., in the amount of $28,732.25 for the Resurfacing
Various Roads, Phase V Project which is to be funded
from the project construction account (Capital Project
Budget Number 323-04-296823097) of the Special One
Percent Sales Tax, Phase III.
22. Motion to approve low bid from Ireland Electric Supply
Company and purchase of 35 Sternburg street light poles,
39 Sternburg fixtures, and 7 double-arm Sternburg
fixtures and poles at a cost of $48,404.00 for the
Street Lighting Section of the Public Works and
Engineering Department for Urban Services District.
23. Motion to approve Resolution to abandon a portion of
Indian Hills Drive.
PUBLIC SAFETY:
24. Motion to approve $6,069 for two antennas located at
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Barton Chapel Road.
25. Motion to approve the replacement of two HVAC units in
Richmond County Marshal's Department Substation at
Regency Mall at a cost of $14,806. Funded by General
Fund Contingency.
PUBLIC SERVICES:
26. Motion to approve new ownership request by Patricia
Fenner for a retail package beer and wine license to be
used in connection with Holiday Market #423 located at
234 Boy Scout Road.
27. Motion to approve new ownership request by Patricia
Fenner for a retail package beer and wine license to be
used in connection with Holiday Market #427 located at
2061 Central Avenue.
28. Motion to approve new ownership request by Patricia
Fenner for a retail package beer and wine license to be
used in connection with Holiday Market #416 located at
4127 Windsor Spring Road.
29. Motion to approve new ownership request by Patricia
Fenner for a retail package beer and wine license to be
used in connection with Holiday Market #418 located at
1770 Kissingbower Road.
30. Motion to approve new ownership request by Patricia
Fenner for a retail package beer and wine license to be
used in connection with Holiday Market #415 located at
3011 Wheeler Road.
31. Motion to approve CSRA Regional Development Center's
Overall Economic Development Program.
PETITIONS & COMMUNICATIONS:
32. Motion to approve minutes of the regular meeting of the
Commission held April 6, 1999.
APPOINTMENTS:
33. Motion to approve the reappointment of the following:
(District 5)
Mr. Joe Scott, Augusta Aviation Commission-Bush Field
Mr. Tracey Williams, Public Facilities Board
ATTORNEY:
34. Motion to adopt an Ordinance increasing insurer license
fees to $150 per insurer. (Approved by the Commission
April 6, 1999 - second reading)
MR. KUHLKE: Mr. Mayor, I'd like to pull Item Number 5
just to get something clarified.
MR. J. BRIGHAM: Mr. Mayor, I want to pull Item Number
1.
MR. BRIDGES: Mr. Mayor, I would like to know if there
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are any objectors to Item Number 3. If the Clerk would
describe that one, please.
CLERK: Yes, sir. Item 3 is a request for concurrence
with the Planning Commission to approve a petition from Linda
Thomas, on behalf of Linda and Darryl Thomas, requesting a
Special Exception for the purpose of establishing a family day
care home on 3106 Wilbur Street. Are there any objectors to
this petition?
(NO OBJECTORS NOTED)
CLERK: And for the sake of any objectors to the alcohol
beverage license requests that's on our consent agenda, I will
read those items out. And if there are any objectors, would
you please signify by raising your hand. We have an ownership
request by Patricia Fenner for a retail package beer and wine
license to be used in connection with Holiday Market located
at 234 Boy Scout Road. We also have a license for a beer and
wine license to be used in connection with Holiday Market
located at 427 Central Avenue, a beer and wine license to be
used in connection with Holiday Market located at 417 Windsor
Spring Road, a beer and wine license to be used in connection
with Holiday Market located at 418 Kissingbower Road, a beer
and wine license to be used in connection with the Holiday
Market located at 3011 Wheeler Road. Are there any objectors
to those licenses?
(NO OBJECTORS NOTED)
MR. BRIDGES: Mr. Mayor, are there any objectors to Item
Number 7?
CLERK: Item 7 is to approve a petition regarding
property located on Ascot Road and Seago Road. Dwelling may
be a manufactured home until a site-built home has been
constructed, after which the manufactured home shall be
removed and the zoning revert to R-1 (One-family Residence),
changing to a Zone R-MH (Manufactured Home). Are there any
objectors to this petition?
(NO OBJECTORS NOTED)
MR. SHEPARD: Mr. Mayor, I move approval of the consent
agenda, less the items identified by the Commissioners as
being pulled.
MR. H. BRIGHAM: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: All in favor, please push the appropriate
button.
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MR. COLCLOUGH VOTES NO ON ITEMS 26-30.
MOTION CARRIES 9-0, ITEMS 26-30.
MOTION CARRIES 10-0, ITEMS 1-25 & 31-34.
MR. BRIDGES: Mr. Mayor, just as a point of information,
could we ask the Administrator to--on Item Number 18, to
explain the time period we're fixing to go to after this
actuarial study?
MR. OLIVER: Sure. It will take between 60 and 90 days
to get the actuarial assessments done. I would expect them
back sometime late June or July.
MR. BRIDGES: But, too, I wanted it to be on record that
normally we've done an actuarial study every year, and now--we
discussed at the last meeting that we don't have to do it
every year, we can do it every two years. And after this one
we intend on doing that, for any of the petitioners that are
interested in the pension plan or that are on it. So there
won't be an actuarial study done every year, it'll be every
two years.
MR. OLIVER: You're correct. We're only required to do
it every other year, and funding to pay for those actuarials
comes out of the pension plan. And as was discussed in the
Finance Committee meeting, we feel it's better to use those
funds for benefits rather than, you know, for doing a study.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. Madame Clerk, let's take the
delegation of Mr. Bultman first to get him out of the way, and
then we'll move on with those other items that were pulled.
CLERK: Delegation: Mr. Lee Bultman, Chairman, Richmond
County Child Abuse Protocol Committee, regarding Presentation
of Annual Report.
MR. BULTMAN: Mayor Young, members of the Commission,
ladies and gentlemen, I want to take just a few minutes of
your time this afternoon to talk about the issue of child
abuse and neglect. Now, while we have no indication that he
is a victim of classic child abuse and neglect, as a victim of
crimes against children I dedicate my comments this afternoon
to the memory of Keenan O'Mailia, the six-year-old North
Augusta child who was sexually assaulted and strangled this
past weekend.
April is National Child Abuse Prevention Month. During
this month alone as we focus on abuse, 92,000 children are
going to be abused to varying degrees in the United States, 83
in Richmond County. During this month as we try to prevent
abuse, 167 children will die, on average five per day. During
the duration of this presentation, 14 additional children
throughout this country will experience the ultimate betrayal
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of trust: child abuse and neglect. The ultimate betrayal
because it occurs at the hands of parents in whom we have the
most innate trust.
As noted, my name is Lee Bultman. I'm from the Medical
College of Georgia where I coordinate their child abuse
program, and I am also Chairman of the Richmond County Child
Abuse Protocol Committee, which is why I'm here today.
Briefly, in '88 the General Assembly of Georgia mandated that
every county in Georgia have a protocol, a child abuse
protocol, to ensure coordination and cooperation between all
agencies involved in child abuse cases, to increase the
efficiency of all agencies, to minimize the stress caused for
the child by the legal and investigatory process, and to
ensure that a more effective treatment is provided for the
perpetrator, the family, and the child. Since 1988 this
county has had a protocol. And, in fact, last January,
January of '98, it was revised after a 16-month project,
signed into action, and is still in force today. Members
include such agencies as the Medical College of Georgia, the
Richmond County Sheriff's Department, the DA's Office,
University and St. Joseph Hospital, and the Department of
Family and Children Services. In total, 20 agencies gather
six times per year to review process in an effort to meet the
General Assembly's mandate.
My purpose in being here today is twofold. First, to
highlight the existence of the Richmond County Child Abuse
Protocol Committee, the Richmond County child abuse protocol,
and to present the annual report, all of which are required by
law. The protocol and the report were forwarded to Mayor
Young's office previously. Secondly and more importantly, I
am here to raise awareness in this Child Abuse Prevention
Month, awareness that abuse and neglect occurs daily in our
community, and awareness that there's an organized effort by
members of your community to combat this daily. It is an
issue that is in need to constant tenacious attention. To
quote the poet Mistal, "We are guilty of many errors and
faults, but our worst crime is abandoning the children,
neglecting the foundation of life. Many things we need can
wait, the child cannot. Right now is the time his bones are
being formed, his blood is being made, and his senses are
being developed. To him, we cannot answer tomorrow. His name
is today." Thank you.
MAYOR YOUNG: Thank you, Mr. Bultman, for that important
message you brought us today.
(A ROUND OF APPLAUSE IS GIVEN)
MAYOR YOUNG: Madame Clerk, if you'll move ahead with
the agenda.
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CLERK: Item 1: Z-99-32 - Request for concurrence with
the decision of the Planning Commission to approve a petition
from Dennis Boydstun, on behalf of Dennis and Elise Boydstun,
requesting a Special Exception for the purpose of establishing
a family day care home as provided for in Section 26-1,
Subparagraph (f) of the Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance for
Augusta-Richmond County, on property located on the southwest
right-of-way line of Merrico Street, 283.54 feet northwest of
a point where the northwest right-of-way line of Sterling Road
intersects the southwest right-of-way line of Merrico Street
(805 Merrico Street).
MR. J. BRIGHAM: Mr. Mayor, I've had several phone calls
on this, and I'm going to make a motion that we deny this
request.
MR. KUHLKE: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: Motion and a second to deny Item 1. Any
discussion? Is the petitioner here?
MR. AUSTIN: Mr. Mayor, I'm Bob Austin from the Planning
Commission and I'm just here to answer any questions. There
weren't any objectors at the Planning Commission.
MAYOR YOUNG: There are none here today either. All
right, we have a motion and a second on the floor. All in
favor, please vote aye.
MR. MAYS: Mr. Mayor, if I might ask Mr. Alston this:
What was the staff's recommendation on it? I'm just in a
little bit of limbo in the fact we don't have a petitioner
here, and you all have got approval coming out of Planning
Commission and we're dealing with a denial, and, you know,
we're not having any dialogue. I mean I know we need to ask
you for some, but I mean the petitioner [inaudible] I don't
have an objection, with all due respect to my colleague who
represents that district, but, you know, to deny and y'all
have approved it--I mean that's not uncommon business for us,
Mr. Mayor. I mean we may flip from one week to another one,
but I just want to ask what's the situation with it.
MR. AUSTIN: It's a surprise to me because haven't heard
any objection to this family day care home.
MAYOR YOUNG: And the staff recommendation was--
MR. AUSTIN: The staff recommendation was for approval,
and the Planning Commission did approve it.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. We have a motion on the floor
and we're in the process of voting.
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MR. BEARD, MR. H. BRIGHAM & MR. HANDY VOTE NO.
MR. COLCLOUGH & MR. MAYS ABSTAIN.
MOTION FAILS 5-3-2.
CLERK: Item 5: Z-99-38 - Request for concurrence with
the decision of the Planning Commission to approve with
conditions: 1) The existing residential structure be adapted
without a significant change of appearance; 2) Vehicle parking
be in the rear yard and be adequately screened from adjacent
residential land use; 3) NO changes to the front of the
property shall be permitted, except that a sign may be erected
that conforms to zoning standards for the area; and 4) That
the only business on this property shall be an antique shop or
those uses permitted in a P-1 zone, a petition from Anna &
David Avrett requesting a change of zoning from Zone P-1
(Professional) to Zone B-1 (Neighborhood Business) on property
located on the south right-of-way line of Central Avenue, 151
feet, more or less, east of the southeast corner of the
intersection of Glenn Avenue and Central Avenue (2612 Central
Avenue).
MR. KUHLKE: My question to maybe Mr. Austin and also
Mr. Wall is the conditions put on Item Number 5, do they go
with the new classification of zoning of B-1? And my point of
asking that question is you're going from P-1 to B-1, and if
these people decide to go out of business, do the conditions
that are stated here stay with that particular zoning on that
piece of property?
MR. AUSTIN: The conditions go with the property, I
believe, Mr. Kuhlke.
MR. WALL: Exactly. They go with the property.
MR. KUHLKE: They do?
MR. WALL: Yes.
MR. KUHLKE: That's my only question. I move approval.
MR. SHEPARD: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: Motion and a second. Any discussion? All
in favor, please vote aye.
MOTION CARRIES 10-0.
MAYOR YOUNG: We're going to move a few items around on
the regular agenda to accommodate the delegations which are
here this afternoon. Madame Clerk?
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CLERK: Item 51: Motion to approve Hardship Transfer
request by Susan Faircloth to transfer the retail package
liquor, beer & wine license used in connection with McBean
Package Store located at 5274 Mike Padgett Highway to 908
Hephzibah McBean Road.
MAYOR YOUNG: Is the petitioner with us?
MR. NICHOLSON: Mr. Mayor and members of the Commission,
my name is Sam Nicholson, representing the petitioner, Susan
Faircloth.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. Do we have any objectors here?
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes. I'm Irma Loy Williams.
MAYOR YOUNG: Just a moment. Just a moment. Let's see
a show of hands here.
MS. WILLIAMS: These are the objectors with us. Do we
have a total of everybody? They're all outside in the hall.
MAYOR YOUNG: Let's get an accurate count; okay? We
don't want them to come here this afternoon and not be
counted. While they're counting the objectors, may I ask is
there a spokesman, one or two people who are speaking for the
objectors?
MS. WILLIAMS: I will speak and--he's back there. He's
in the back. I will do part and he will do part.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right, that'll be fine. And, Mr.
Nicholson, you represent the petitioner. Do you have any
other people who will speak?
MR. NICHOLSON: No, but we do have some names on a
petition that we'd like to present.
MAYOR YOUNG: Okay. Did you get it, Mr. Wall?
MR. WALL: Yeah. There's none against, but two in favor
of it in the hallway.
(43 OBJECTORS PRESENT)
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. Mr. Nicholson, we'll hear from
the petitioner.
MR. NICHOLSON: Mr. Mayor and members of the Commission,
this is a motion to approve a hardship transfer of the request
of Ms. Susan Faircloth transferring her place of business,
McBean Package Store, from 5274 Mike Padgett Highway to 908
Hephzibah-McBean Road. Ms. Faircloth was forced to move her
Page 14
business because of the widening of the highway out there on
Mike Padgett Highway; therefore, she is having to transfer her
off-premises consumption license to this new location that
they have found, which they went through the zoning process
and got it zoned for the purposes of a package store. There
is no legal reason to deny this transfer. It's a hardship
transfer. She's having to do this. She's not doing it by her
own free will and suggestion, she is doing it because she has
to do it. And this is the property they found, it's properly
zoned, there's no legal reason to deny it, and we ask that you
approve this transfer. We also have here ten copies of a
petition that has--
MAYOR YOUNG: Do you want to submit those?
MR. NICHOLSON: Yes, we'd like to submit those. They
have close to 500 names on them. So we would like to submit
that into the record and have each one of the Commissioners
and the Mayor consider that in passing on this application for
transfer. And we're happy to answer any questions that
anybody may have.
MAYOR YOUNG: Thank you, Mr. Nicholson. Now let's hear
from the objectors. Would you state your name and your
address, please.
MS. WILLIAMS: My name is Irma Loy Williams, 4786-B
McCombs Road, Hephzibah, Georgia. Mayor and Commissioners, we
the people here, the community of McBean, is here to object to
a liquor license at this location. Presently we--right now 56
is held up three hours for a bad wreck right at the church.
That has a caution light. Our seniors--we have a marvelous
park for recreation out there, and we--and the senior center.
We're very proud of what y'all have done for us there. But
there is no caution light. There is nothing there. When this
road goes in--it's true that they're a few feet over what
would be legal for them to be there if you go out the door and
come around. But our children that walks across that road,
drives there, our seniors that drive in there, they need this
protection. We have no caution light there to even warn them.
There are wrecks there. I know y'all have a petition saying
there were only three wrecks in '98. It doesn't count all the
little bumpings that wasn't reported [inaudible] somebody did
not get hurt in.
We, the community, was under the assumption that the
zoning was to protect the community as well as the person. We
have no objection to a business. We've put that through the
whole time we've been here, every time there's been a hearing,
and every time we have said we have no objection to a business
there. We want McBean to grow. But not a liquor store at
this intersection because of the danger to our children, to
our veterans that walk up and down the road there, the dangers
Page 15
to our senior citizens, and to our citizens. We can only pray
because we do not have the power that y'all have to stop this.
We can only pray, but y'all do have the power to help the
community to protect our children.
She has been wrote up for her employee selling liquor to
a minor. She said, okay, you--still a business person is
responsible for what their employee does. Look at Gurley's
for an example. So you're responsible. There is nothing
whatsoever to keep a person from buying their liquor, going
out to their car and drinking it, and driving right off. We
have a couple right here, at seven o'clock in the morning they
were called, their child was hit by a drunk driver. We need
this help from y'all.
MAYOR YOUNG: Okay. You had one more person who's going
to speak. Please identify yourself and give us your address.
SPEAKER: My name is [inaudible], Piney Grove Baptist
Church, Richmond County. Honored Mayor and Commissioners, I
appreciate the time and opportunity to come before you and
speak. We're going back and forth, as you know, with--we've
got a legal issue and what we call a hardship transfer case,
which I have a hard time comprehending when somebody is
reimbursed. It looks like it boils down to a moral issue and
it looks like it boils down to the voice of the people; okay?
The voice of the people, the way I'm hearing it, and a
representation from all the people here, is we don't want a
liquor store in McBean, especially across from the recreation
center, Engine Company Number 12, and in lieu of the new
proposed widening of Highway 56 and increased volume of
traffic. Please honor the voice of the people: do not allow
the sale of liquor and wine to be in McBean. It is such a
critical intersection and pivotal point for the community. I
think it represents a black eye for the community in allowing
something like that to happen. We are not against business
coming into Richmond County, we're against the liquor issue
and what it brings. Thank you very much.
(A ROUND OF APPLAUSE IS GIVEN)
MAYOR YOUNG: Do any of the Commissioners have any
questions? Mr. Bridges?
MR. BRIDGES: Mr. Wall, can you make reference to the
hardship transfer in regards to if the state is taking
property and people have been reimbursed for their property,
is that a true hardship?
MR. WALL: I asked Stewart Walker concerning that
terminology prior to the meeting. That is not language that
appears in the ordinance. It's language that the former city
used insofar as consideration of licenses where, as a result
Page 16
of not a voluntary decision on the part of the business to
move and seek a transfer, the transfer was forced either by a
condemnation, such as occurred in this situation, or in the
event of the death of an individual and it was a necessary
transfer because of those type situations. But there is no
different criteria specified in the alcohol ordinance for a
hardship case, so to speak, versus another one.
MAYOR YOUNG: Mr. Shepard?
MR. SHEPARD: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I wanted to ask the
Attorney what objective criteria does this applicant not meet?
The backup material in the book indicates that the--from the
staff point of view, that this applicant does meet the
criteria. And there's a body of law saying that if they meet
the criteria, your discretion is somewhat limited. So where
do we stand in terms of the objective criteria? Like traffic,
we have a memo from Mr. Huffstetler saying that this
construction will have a small impact on traffic. It seems
like to me that would not be objective criteria, based on what
I've gotten from the Traffic Engineer.
MR. WALL: Well, if I could just run down the list
insofar as the considerations that you may want to apply to
this. The first one that is a standard that can be used in
exercising discretion is reputation and character. The second
one is previous violation of liquor laws, and you've heard one
reference to a previous incident involving one clerk. The
manner of conducting the prior liquor business and whether
there's been any need for any unusual police observation or
inspection in order to prevent the violation of any law or
regulation, I've heard no evidence of that. The fourth area
is location, to include the general character of the
neighborhood and the effect that such an establishment would
have on the adjacent and surrounding property values. Number
five is the number of licenses, you've not heard anything
about that. Six is dancing, you've not heard anything about
that. Seven, previous revocation of license, nothing has been
said about that. Delinquency of taxes, nothing has been said
about that. Congregation of minors, you've not heard about a
congregation, you've heard about the impact upon minors
perhaps, and the particular standard is any circumstances
which may cause minors to congregate in the vicinity of the
proposed location even if the location meets the distance
requirements. And then the tenth one is any prior incidents
involving the location.
MS. WILLIAMS: Mr. Wall, may I say something? I forgot
to say this, but McBean Elementary School is one mile from
this also and we have bus traffic.
MAYOR YOUNG: Thank you. It's the Commissioners' turn
Page 17
to talk and ask questions.
MR. SHEPARD: Mr. Wall, the distance requirement--I
heard the recreation center mentioned and the school
mentioned. I take it the staff has looked at that and they
meet those distance requirements?
MR. WALL: That's correct.
MR. SHEPARD: Thank you.
MAYOR YOUNG: Mr. Handy, did you want to say something?
MR. HANDY: No.
MAYOR YOUNG: You looked like you were poised with a
question there. Mr. Kuhlke?
MR. KUHLKE: I wanted to ask Mr. Nicholson, is the
property in question, is it going to--the entrance to this
property going to be off Mike Padgett or is it off--
MR. NICHOLSON: We have a plat here, Mr. Kuhlke. And
it's the intersection of Old Savannah Road and Hephzibah-
McBean Road, and I think you're coming in off of Hephzibah-
McBean Road. That would be the entrance, so you'd turn off
there and go in from that direction.
MR. KUHLKE: So there would be no entrance on Mike
Padgett?
MR. NICHOLSON: That's correct.
MAYOR YOUNG: And this is strictly off-premises
consumption?
MR. NICHOLSON: That's correct. Strictly.
MAYOR YOUNG: Any other questions? Mr. Bridges?
MR. BRIDGES: I'd like to ask, is this--when Highway 56
comes through, will your property border Highway 56? I know
you won't be turning off of it, but will the actual property
border that?
MR. NICHOLSON: It borders it approximately 41 feet,
almost 42 feet. It's the very end corner on this plat, up
here at the top, and that's what will be bordering Mike
Padgett Highway.
MR. BRIDGES: Mr. Mayor, if I could speak to this issue.
Page 18
MAYOR YOUNG: Yes, sir.
MR. BRIDGES: We've been going back and forth with this
liquor store for some time now, and I thought we had it worked
out beforehand. The residents didn't seem to object to the
store being there as long as it was located near where it is
presently. And, unfortunately, there was no property for sale
in that location, is my understanding, so, you know, this
issue is before us now. The attorney mentioned the distance
requirement. Of course, that's 100 yards as you walk out of
the store, and I think we're all familiar with that. There's
been enough of these issues come up that we've addressed that
issue. I asked Mr. Walker on one occasion to go out in front
of this Greene Street building, go around the building as you
walk, and go in the back door, and tell me how many--how far
that would be. That was 175 yards. And 100 yards is the
limit. So, in essence, this building, on the bottom floor, we
could operate a church out of the front and a liquor store out
of the back and we'd be within the legal limits as established
by the ordinance.
So I think in this case we need to use the discretion
that the law and the ordinance does give us as Commissioners
regarding the character of the community and the distance
requirements from a recreation center, which will be almost
right across the street from the location, across Highway 56.
The character of the community, I think, should be considered,
too. Before I came to this meeting today--I've been through
McBean several times. Before I came to the meeting I rode by
the location again just to check and make sure I knew the lay
of the land. When this store is open, if the store is the
location where the dirt pile is--and I'm assuming it's in that
area. Where is that at, Ms. Faircloth?
MS. FAIRCLOTH: At the far back.
MR. BRIDGES: But you're behind the dirt pile then?
MS. FAIRCLOTH: Down farther.
MR. NICHOLSON: Down Hephzibah-McBean Road behind the
dirt pile.
MR. BRIDGES: Okay. You would still be--even in that
location you would still be almost directly across from what
begins a residential area. In other words, you've got homes
from just behind the hardware store all the way down
Hephzibah-McBean. So this is a residential area, even though
it's zoned particularly rural, and I would encourage the
Commission to consider those factors.
MAYOR YOUNG: Would you like to make a motion, Mr.
Bridges?
Page 19
MR. BRIDGES: I will when I get through, Mr. Mayor.
MAYOR YOUNG: Okay.
MR. BRIDGES: Another thing I--you know, if there's one
community in this county that the community center is the
center of the community, it's McBean, more so than Hephzibah
or Blythe or anywhere else. These people have seniors that
they work with out of that community center, they have the
kids that come in the afternoon, they have a ball field there.
That's truly the center of the community. And we've got a
situation right here behind us where the old city built a
museum which a lot of school kids go to, and it's right behind
the Discotheque. I'm sure if we had to reconsider that again,
we wouldn't put that in the location--that museum in the
location that it is. And this is the heart of McBean. I hope
the Commission will consider the long-term effect that a
alcohol store will have here in the heart of the community.
And having said all that, I'll make the motion that the
application be denied.
MAYOR YOUNG: Is there a second to Mr. Bridges' motion?
MR. KUHLKE: I'll second it to get it on the floor.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. Motion and a second. Mr.
Kuhlke, did you want to address this?
MR. KUHLKE: Yeah. I wanted to ask Mr. Bridges--because
this is my district and his district out there. But I went
through McBean Saturday, and I'm not exactly sure where this
property is, but I do know that you've got the hardware store,
and then up from the hardware store you have a convenience
store; right? On the left-hand side? And where is this
property in relationship--
MS. FAIRCLOTH: If you go--turn down that road there's a
hardware store, and right across the store is where I am.
MR. KUHLKE: And the convenience store sells beer; am I
correct?
MS. FAIRCLOTH: Right.
MS. WILLIAMS: But that was grandfathered. There was
nothing we could do about that.
MR. KUHLKE: There was nothing you could do about that.
Okay, I'm just trying to--I'm trying to get the location of
where this is. That's all I have.
Page 20
MAYOR YOUNG: Is there any other member with a question
or a comment? Mr. Brigham?
MR. J. BRIGHAM: He said it was zoned for a liquor
store. I believe it was zoned for neighborhood business.
MR. NICHOLSON: That's correct. But, I mean, that's
allowed.
MR. J. BRIGHAM: It's allowed in that zoning?
MR. NICHOLSON: That's correct. Y'all had the zoning
changed, didn't you?
MS. FAIRCLOTH: [inaudible].
MR. NICHOLSON: Agricultural, and y'all had it changed
to neighborhood business?
MS. FAIRCLOTH: Right.
MAYOR YOUNG: Any other Commissioners with any comments
or questions? All right, we'll move the order of the day.
All in favor of the motion to deny the petition, please punch
your yes button.
MR. BEARD, MR. H. BRIGHAM, MR. COLCLOUGH, MR. HANDY,
MR. KUHLKE, MR. MAYS & MR. SHEPARD VOTE NO.
MR. POWELL ABSTAINS.
MOTION FAILS 2-7-1.
MAYOR YOUNG: And the motion fails.
MR. NICHOLSON: Thank you very much.
MR. BRIDGES: Call for the order of the day, Mr. Mayor.
MAYOR YOUNG: Does somebody want to make a motion to
approve it? All right, we have a call for the order of the
day. Next item?
CLERK: Item 59: Discuss ARC providing bus services
from Fort Gordon to Augusta Exchange Shopping Center.
MAYOR YOUNG: I believe we've got some people here from
Fort Gordon, and do we have some people who are speaking
against providing bus service to Fort Gordon?
Let me clarify a couple of things here before we get
involved with this item. This Commission, as a matter of
policy, has directed Mr. Johnson to run the Transit Department
and to come up with such creative uses and ways to maximize
the operation of that office, and a lot of that is left to his
Page 21
discretion working within the parameters of the budget that he
has. Mr. Johnson was approached by Fort Gordon and has
discussed with Fort Gordon officials running a bus from a
commercial area in Augusta to Fort Gordon and back. And
subsequent to that, the representatives of cab drivers have
written us and asked us to block that move; to veto it, if you
will. So the question before the Commission today, if we get
as far as a motion, would be to direct Mr. Johnson not to do
one of those things which we have previously given him the
latitude and discretion to do. So having established it in
that context, we'll move ahead with our presentation. Is Mr.
Johnson here?
SPEAKER: He's in Atlanta at a meeting.
MAYOR YOUNG: Is there someone to speak on his behalf
from the Transit Department?
MR. OLIVER: Heather is here.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. Why don't you come up and
bring us up to speed on where we are, and then we'll hear from
Colonel Tuckey.
HEATHER: Where we are right now is we were told to
bring this in front of the full Commission and let you all
decide. We are just asking that we run this service on
paydays, which is the first Saturday of the month and
generally the Saturday closest to the 15th when the funds
actually go into the soldiers' accounts, and provide a service
that will take the soldiers to Augusta West and Augusta
Exchange Shopping Center. Now, even though it's primarily a
Fort Gordon/shopping center route, anybody in the general
public who will be along this bus route will be encouraged to
ride it. There will be no barring anyone from this bus
unless, of course, we're at capacity and nobody else can fit
on it. But we're asking to run one bus. The schedule would
be from approximately 9:30 in the morning till about 8:00 p.m.
It will only make seven round-trips because it's going to
take--with traffic and the stops it will be making, it will
take approximately 45 minutes one way to run the route. It's
not a large service, it's not a very long service, it's not an
all day service. There are plenty of times that those
soldiers will be out that this bus will not be running. We
are just asking that we be allowed to contribute to the
community in this way, thereby giving a soldier a choice of
another type of transportation that they can take to get out
into the community and spend their money.
MAYOR YOUNG: From Fort Gordon is Colonel Thom Tuckey,
the Garrison Commander. Colonel, did you want to address this
issue?
Page 22
COL. TUCKEY: Mr. Mayor and members of the Commission,
I've lived in Augusta now for almost six years, which is
pretty unusual for a military officer to be in one place for
that length of time. And I have to tell you that the
relationship that exists between Fort Gordon and the Augusta
area is probably the best relationship that I've seen in my 27
years in the Army. And I have to tell you that my job as the
Garrison Commander is to ensure that we provide the best
quality of life for the soldiers and family members that live
out at the installation, and given the resources that we have
and the resources that they get in the form of pay and
allowances, that's often a challenge.
What we have tried to do in the past, for the past three
years, is work out an arrangement through Augusta Public
Transit to provide service to the mall. We did that on an
experimental basis prior to Christmas the last three years,
and we averaged probably between 150 and 200 riders each
Saturday when we ran that service. The Augusta Public Transit
folks were unable to reach an agreement with the manager of
the mall to provide that service, so we, in fact, came back
with another request and said, okay, if we can get to the two
primary shopping centers, which, in fact, are more appealing
to the soldiers because of the nature of the businesses at
those two locations, then perhaps we can offer the soldiers an
opportunity to go there at a reduced rate and allow them to
spend their money for goods and services rather than spend it
for transportation to get to those locations.
And the soldiers we're talking about primarily are the
trainees, the single soldiers, brand new to the Army. In
fact, they're not even allowed off post for the first 20 weeks
they're in the Army. They go to school Monday through Friday.
The only days they have off are Saturday and Sunday. And so
this was an opportunity to provide transportation for these
soldiers to get out, spend some money in the community, go to
a movie and relax before they return to the rigors of
training, which they spend most of their time doing. That was
why we generated the request. I really don't see how we're
going to put a lot of cab drivers out of business because,
again, we're only talking an average ridership of about 200
soldiers once a month. I think this is something that we can
easily do to continue to improve that partnership that we
already have established.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. We have a number of cab
drivers who are opposed to this. Could we have a show of
hands, please, so the Commission can see who we have here?
(20 OBJECTORS PRESENT)
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. How many people are going to
speak on this issue?
Page 23
MR. VASQUEZ: Sir, we've got two people to speak today.
It's myself, Leo Vasquez, and Mr. Gene Reed.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. Are there any others who
wanted to speak? Let's try to use a minimum amount of time
since we have a maximum amount of speakers on this.
MR. VASQUEZ: No problem. Leo Vasquez, I live at 1920
Blueside Drive here in Augusta. I'm a cab driver, small
business owner. Like the Colonel, I came here with the United
States Army. I am a retired soldier, so I can understand his
reasoning why he wants to help take care of the troops. We're
talking about over here a charter service. We're not talking
about a bus route, we're talking about a charter service.
This service is specifically set up to pick up the soldiers,
take them to the shopping centers on payday Saturdays. That's
the only day. We hear talk about anybody in South Richmond
County can use it. I doubt it very seriously if anybody can
use it, the bus doesn't go anywhere. It's strictly from Fort
Gordon to the shopping center.
The Colonel over here, he says, you know, they need the
bus, it's only 200 soldiers a weekend. Well, if it's 200
soldiers a weekend, I don't see how Mr. Johnson is going to be
able to make any money off of it. So it's going to be another
situation where we're going to pour more money into a bad
situation. Now, I understand that they said that they have
made money on it in the past. Now, on those figures, did they
include brakes, tires, manhours on the maintenance of the bus?
I mean this bus has got to be maintained. So did they take
that into consideration?
Another thing they were talking about on the April 6th
meeting, the Fort Gordon representative said that we're
charging the soldiers seven dollars each to go to the mall.
You all have a packet, I believe, you've got the rate
structure in front of you. We give the soldiers--the cab
drivers here give the soldiers a 50 percent discount over and
above what we give anybody else in this county -- anybody.
Now, if that's not a discount, I don't know--if that's not a
soldier taking care of a soldier, I don't know what it is.
These fares also apply to DOD employees and dependents.
They're getting the discount. We can give those discounts
because we make our profits, our money.
I stay in business on payday weekends. If you run this
bus on payday weekends, it's going to put me out of business,
it's just that simple. They don't seem to believe that that's
going to happen, but I'm a cab driver, I'm telling you that's
going to happen, not just to me but to a bunch of us out here.
Every cab driver here in this town spends about $525 a week
just staying in business. This is cash that he spends in the
community. That's for insurance, car parts, wheels on the
road. If we lose our job, all of this money is going to go
Page 24
down the drain. This is money that's spent right here in the
community. The economic impact of us going out of business is
going to be felt right here.
There is also another problem that I don't think someone
out there at Fort Gordon understands, and it's a safety issue.
I have a 19-year-old son. I drive these soldiers every day
on a daily basis. I bet you ten to one I probably have more
dealings with them soldiers and trainees than the Colonel
does. Those soldiers out there, they're young men and women.
When they have time off, they want to go out. And where do
they want to go to? They want to go to the mall. My 19-year-
old son, when he wants to go somewhere he goes to the mall.
This bus is going to drop these kids off down there at the
Augusta West Shopping Center. They're going to turn around
and they're going to cross that Wrightsboro Road intersection
between the Augusta West and the mall by hundreds. Now, I'm
sure that the Command Sergeant Major out there can turn around
and say, well, we're going to put an order out saying that
they can't do that. They're going to do it and somebody is
going to get hurt, so there is a safety issue involved, too.
MAYOR YOUNG: We have some other people who would like
to speak on the matter [inaudible].
MR. VASQUEZ: Okay. Thank you, sir. Well, I am now
finished, so Mr. Gene over here, he's going to be asked to
speak now.
MAYOR YOUNG: Very good. Please state your name and
your address.
MR. REED: My name is Gene Reed, I live at 402 Shiloh
Court. Also I'm retired military. I came to Fort Gordon and
I retired here. I'm representing the one or two-car indepen-
dent drivers. Now, this bus route, we get all our revenues
from this area that this bus is going to be working on, so
we're here--we operate on the same rates, the discount for the
soldiers also. And what we need to do, we don't want to be
competing against our tax dollars. I didn't bring the
statistics here that Mr. Leo has, but just let you know that
we have at least 15 independent operators. And I'm
representing them, and we are against this bus route.
MR. FIELDS: My name is David Fields, 1401 Waters Edge
Drive, Augusta, Georgia. Y'all know I'm against it. I've
been talking to most of you and you know the reasons I'm
against it. One, we are the contract taxi company out at Fort
Gordon and we do ride the soldiers and they are the bread and
butter for our cab drivers. I don't think it's fair for the
city to come in and take away from the cab drivers that are
there and they're hauling these people 365 days a year, and
you're going to send a bus out there on gravy time and pick
Page 25
these people back up. That's wrong. In the committee meeting
Mr. Johnson said that the Transit system is going to make
$20,000 a year off of this route, and that was his figure that
he used. According to Mr. Tuckey, if they ride 200 people a
day for 52 weeks out of the year, that's only $10,000, and
that means where is the $20,000 a year? So I think it's going
to be something that we as taxpayers are going to have to pick
up the tab, and it's going to put him in more of a deficit
than make money. And I'm all for trying to save money for the
city, just like everybody else, and I'm trying to save money
for my company. But I don't think it's right for the city to
do it. I don't think you should do it, and it's not fair,
plain and simple. The Transit system is already operating a
deficit, and I think it will be more of a deficit when this
happens. If they're going to do it, run it 365 days a year
and see how much money you make then. Thank you.
MR. HARRIS: My name is Derryl Harris, I live at 2007
Walker Street Extension. I used to be a driver for Fort
Gordon, and there was a few confrontations that resulted in me
no longer working out there, but I still work the city
nonetheless. My statement in this issue is that first they
had buses that was routed out there, city buses, and there was
a problem with getting enough people to ride the buses to
begin with. And then cab service seemed to do more business
for Fort Gordon than the buses seemed to be doing and as far
as getting people where they had to go on time and where they
had to go. And then as far as this here busing route to and
forth from where these people got to go, who's to say--for
instance, they do something wrong out there, they jump on this
bus and take off back to Fort Gordon, who's going to stop that
bus and say, well, this person done something wrong. You
know, you get the idea what I'm saying; right?
MAYOR YOUNG: All right, thank you very much. Mr.
Owens, you wanted to say something? If you'll come up to the
podium, give your name and address, please.
MR. OWENS: Brad Owens, 1562 Goshen Road. Everybody on
the Commission knows me. I'm an E-4 in the United States
Reserves. I was on active duty. I'm a member of VFW Post 649
and American Legion Post 192. In every city I was stationed
at in the world that I've been to where there was something
outside the base that the soldiers could go to and be
attracted to, there was a bus service provided by the local
government for the soldiers. And the fact of the matter is,
this isn't about the money, and everybody's talking about the
money. This is not about the money. This has to do with the
quality of life of our soldiers on Fort Gordon. And I know
most of you had military service. Mr. Mayor, I know that you
served in Vietnam.
I brought with me something that I don't think anyone is
Page 26
looking at. This is the enlisted man's pay scale, and I'd
like to cover this real quick. The fact of the matter is, is
the soldiers that would be using this bus, the majority of
which are going to be E-1 through E-4. That's a Private
through Specialist with less than two years in the service.
Now, the E-1 only grosses--grosses, mind you--$959.40 a month.
An E-2, $1,775.80; E-3, $1,117; and an E-4, $1,185. And I
would like to say that that's before taxes, so you can
subtract about 25 to 30 percent of that. And if you take the
figures that the taxi drivers are giving you--look, I've been
a victim of it myself. I've been out there after I've been
out there drinking and having a good time, and I've had these
taxicab drivers pull up and refuse to turn their meter on and
want to charge me 30 and 40 dollars to get back to post. And
they can't say it doesn't happen because it does. I've had
reports--I work at the airport, I've had reports of people
during Masters Week talking about taxicab drivers refusing to
put their meter on and want to charge 50 bucks to take them
across town.
Well, I know what it's like to be there in the barracks
as a single soldier and not have anything to do once you get
off on that Friday. All you want to do is get out in the
community, get away from the military for a weekend, have a
little drink, go out to eat, spend some money at the mall, go
see some people, do something other than stay there. And, you
know, maybe in their world it's unfair for the civilian and
military leaders to try to ease the financial burden on these
soldiers, you know, by providing cost-effective transportation
from Fort Gordon to the places that they want to go.
And it's not how many people are going to ride the bus
or whether y'all are going to lose money or make money. The
fact of the matter is that these soldiers deserve it. These
soldiers are out there, they volunteered for this, they're
serving our country. Right now we've got them in a combat
zone. We've got soldiers behind the wire that are POW's and
we're sitting here arguing about whether or not we can spend a
few extra dollars to give these soldiers a ride from the post
to where they want to go so they can enjoy themselves for the
weekend. I think somebody has got their priorities mixed up.
Because if you add up--if you add up how much they spend on
their taxicab rides, that comes up to 25 percent of their
average paycheck. Is that fair? No, it is not fair.
And so I'd like to say--I mean with enlistment and
retention rates the way they are, the Colonel here is right,
anything we can do to improve the quality of life for our
soldiers is not something we should be debating, it should be
automatic. So I'm telling you as a lower enlisted soldier, as
someone who's been there, as someone who knows what's going
through their heads--and you know why these soldiers can't be
here en masse like the taxicab drivers? Because they're out
their training. Training right now, working hard. So as far
as I'm concerned, there is no issue here. There's only one
Page 27
thing, it's a moral imperative, you have to do whatever you
can. And these soldiers are a financial asset. And thank
you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Commission. And I hope that you
vote to provide service for our soldiers.
MR. HASSLE: David Hassle, I operate out of Greene
Street here in Augusta. I'm an ex-lower enlisted soldier.
One thing the Colonel hasn't brought up, and he had a question
that we need to have on the floor so we can give our response
to it, was if we pick up these people at the mall or pick them
up at Augusta West or at Augusta Exchange and take them
wherever else they want to go in town, they no longer receive
their 50 percent discount. The only time the 50 percent
discount they're getting is in effect is if one end of the
trip is on Fort Gordon. They're going to be paying full fare
to go to Washington Road, to go to downtown, or to go anywhere
else if they get in the cab at either of these places, so that
is going to more than take away the savings they're going to
get off of this bus going anywhere else. Now, I think that's
something nobody has thought about on Fort Gordon. They're
losing benefits with this. I'm not a post driver anymore. I
did it for two years. I work out at the airport now. But
when we pick up people in town and take them to a point in
town, the rate is going to be $1.40 a mile plus the flag drop
wherever they are. If we pick them up at Augusta West, it's
going to be a $2.40 flag drop and $1.40 a mile, which is the
rate you gentlemen set for us to operate on. Now, if they go
from Augusta West Shopping Center to Riverwalk, it's going to
cost them approximately 18 to 20 dollars minimum. One person
from Fort Gordon by himself pays $10.50 to go from Fort Gordon
to Riverwalk. Two people split it. I don't think that's
something the Colonel has considered. And I believe you had a
question you wanted to ask us, Colonel. Why don't you go
ahead and ask us.
MAYOR YOUNG: I'll take care of the debate. Colonel,
you had something you wanted to say?
COL. TUCKEY: I wanted to ask how many of the taxicab
drivers that are here actually work for Radio Cab, which is
the contract service out at the installation.
MAYOR YOUNG: Well, that's not relevant to our discus-
sion.
COL. TUCKEY: But I want to make it clear that there's
only one cab service that's authorized to operate on the
installation free, gratis. Everybody else has to be called
and personally requested to come and pick a soldier up, so
they don't have the opportunity to just drive out there
anytime they want.
Page 28
MAYOR YOUNG: I believe Mr. Fields indicated his company
had the contract out there. That's on the record. Okay, do
any Commissioners have any questions or comments?
MR. KUHLKE: I wanted to ask, Heather, the route from
Fort Gordon to Augusta Exchange, is it going to stop?
HEATHER: Yes. It will start out at Fort Gordon, it'll
come to Augusta West and then go to Augusta Exchange, and then
it will make a round-trip back, and it will go down Gordon
Highway and Barton Chapel and then take the light. Right now
we have no prescribed stops. Whenever we come up with a brand
new route we pick a few major stops. As people ride the route
and become used to it, if they have safe stops that they want
to make a long the way, we always make those stops. We will
have printed schedules up. If it becomes a permanent route,
we will have them printed at the printers. They will be
dispersed just like every other schedule that we have. If
it's temporary, we'll just have the normal ones in leaflet
form that we pass out. But any stops along the way that
anybody wants to make--and I figure we're probably going to
pick up some people wanting to shuttle between the two
shopping centers that have no intention of going anywhere near
Fort Gordon, and the Ice Forum because it'll be along the way
as well, so I see where we can pick up some traffic there.
MR. SHEPARD: I don't have a question, I have a motion,
Mr. Mayor. My motion, Mr. Mayor, is to approve the service as
recommended by the department for a demonstration period of 90
days and let's evaluate it after that.
MR. BRIDGES: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: And Mr. Bridges seconds that. Mr.
Bridges, did you want to say something?
MR. BRIDGES: Yes, sir. I just had some questions.
We're just discussing Saturdays here, is my understanding; is
that correct?
HEATHER: Yes, sir.
MR. BRIDGES: Is this every Saturday?
MR. OLIVER: No, it's payday Saturdays.
MR. BRIDGES: Payday Saturdays. Okay. In your opinion,
Heather, if--I mean apparently I keep seeing the same two
people ride these buses of ours. Will we have a bigger crowd
that's coming from Fort Gordon?
HEATHER: Yes.
Page 29
MR. OLIVER: Based on the operating numbers, when we ran
to the Augusta Mall, that was by far a very financially good
route.
MR. BRIDGES: So to us this was a profitable route?
MR. OLIVER: Well, what I told Mr. Johnson was we're
looking to break even; okay? Because I can't see providing it
that way. But we clearly did on the Augusta Mall route when
we ran that as a trial.
MR. BRIDGES: My understanding, too, is if a soldier did
want to take a cab, he would still have the opportunity to
call a cab, you know, from the Fort. Is that correct,
Colonel? I mean rather than take the bus.
COL. TUCKEY: Absolutely.
HEATHER: Like, I said, it's every 45 minutes, so it's
an hour and a half round trip. If the soldier misses the bus
and doesn't want to wait, you can pretty well bet they're
going to call a cab, they're not going to wait.
MAYOR YOUNG: Does anyone else have any discussion?
MR. MAYS: Yes, sir, Mr. Mayor. I guess as chairman of
this committee, and probably at one time through inheriting it
because nobody else wanted it, and seeing us go from a period
of where people now even generally like to talk about bus
service in favorable terms. I said that sarcastically, but,
Mr. Mayor, are we not maybe missing a key point from both
sides? And I think maybe it's something that the cab folk
need to answer hypothetically. And I know the Colonel can't
speak for the entire United States Army, the city, and Fort
Gordon on something that might fail, but there's a gray area
in here. I don't think anybody wants to deny the opportunity
in terms of the city providing services to help our service
men. I think we're positive on that route with it. But we're
talking about a debate between private industry on a
specialized money-making day, period, or two days, period, in
a given month. Now, that brings us to this point. Maybe
everybody doesn't share this same vision. I personally would
like to see us have Fort Gordon as a regular routed bus stop
in our whole system, six days a week, just like we run the bus
on our regular system as is. That's my dream to see it go
that way. Now, we're talking about a different animal here
today.
Now, I guess I'd like to hear, Mr. Mayor, from the cab
drivers on a simple question to them and one to Fort Gordon.
Would you be in opposition if we were talking about proposing
the route to deal with Fort Gordon on days other than the so-
Page 30
called gravy days of pay? And my question to the Colonel
would be this: Does Fort Gordon have in its imaginative plans
any way in terms of being a community fort--and I think that
it is because we're talking about the possibility of putting
public schools there and the whole nine yards. Do you all
envision any way of helping us to subsidize a full-scale route
going to Fort Gordon that we could deal with other than on
your payday period that we could encompass within our whole
system? And I think, Mr. Mayor, that's really where the fight
ought to be in terms of whether we realistically deal with it
from those terms and work it that way as opposed to this two-
day boxing match that we've got going here and deal with it in
terms of getting some help from the fort on one hand and
finding out whether or not in the fair enterprise system of
the scheme of things do you have an objection from cab drivers
if they're on a competitive basis daily with the bus system.
And that's what I would kind of like to hear other than this
deal about the two-day fight.
MAYOR YOUNG: Well, Mr. Mays, your point is well-taken,
and that would be an appropriate area of inquiry, I think, for
your committee. But the motion on the floor is germane to bus
service on two particular Saturdays, and that's the question
before the Commission right now. So does anyone have any
other comments or questions on the motion that's on the floor?
MR. MAYS: Well, the only comment I'd make is I'm not in
a position to even qualify an answer to that until we possibly
get to the part of talking about that. Because I do disagree
slightly that this is not in terms--it may not be classified
as a charter, but it is a specialized route if you're only
dealing with it on a particular day or days. We can call it
anything else we want to call it, but if it's only running two
days, then you are dealing with specialization, and I think
that gets you in competition with your free market system of
what you're providing in private industry.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. Mr. Mays, would you like to
make a substitute motion to send it back to committee so you
can explore these issues?
MR. MAYS: Well, if they're talking about trying to put
this up to deal with a deadline time to do this, I don't know
where that puts it, Mr. Mayor, if they're trying to implement
this by a particular time. But, you know, I don't mind making
that motion of us getting it back and of working with the two
entities to deal with that on that part of an expansion.
Because, you know, I'm always hustling trying to get us some
more money. And if we can get Fort Gordon to adopt us a
little here, and even if--I would rather see us lose some
money and provide a better service to the fort than in trying
to rake in a little bit on a couple of days and say we turned
Page 31
a profit by a two-day deal and then run head on with private
industry. I think then it puts them in the competitive
business to have to truly compete because then we're providing
a service to all of our citizens, those on post and off post,
because they live--whether they vote here or not, they are
contributing to the economy and they are residents here. They
are Augustans whether they're in the service or not.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. Mr. Kuhlke?
MR. KUHLKE: Mr. Mayor, my understanding of the proposal
is we're going to try this for 90 days and then we're going to
evaluate it. If it doesn't work within that 90 days, we
certainly don't want to provide service to the fort five/six
days a week. So I understand where my colleague is coming
from, but I think maybe the appropriate time to look at that
is once the 90-day period is up, then we can see how well we
did on the best days.
MR. MAYS: Well, I can tell you how we're going to do on
the best days. We're going to do like we did at the mall,
we're going to get some good traffic on those days. You know,
it's almost like saying do you run a special to one particular
side of town--and I'm not being funny when I say this, but if
you know when certain folk get paid and you're going to run it
in a neighborhood on that day when they got a paycheck, then
they're going to have some money on that day and it's going to
be profitable. But if you're going to go on the 22nd or the
27th of the month when they money gets low, they're not going
to have any money on that day. So I mean you can answer that
before you run the bus. But I'm just trying to get us to a
point where we can eventually with Fort Gordon, Mr. Mayor,
take in Meadowbrook, where we can take in both sides of Deans
Bridge Road, where we can look at the subdivisions over in
District 4 and District 6, and even the two people that Mr.
Bridges sees riding the bus. He might even see a few more of
them from his district if they could catch the bus out there
in his district, in District 8, that would take them through
Fort Gordon and bring them into town.
MR. SHEPARD: I call for the question, Mr. Mayor.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right, the question has been called.
There's a motion on the floor to approve the bus service for a
90-day trial. All in favor, please vote aye.
MR. MAYS VOTES PRESENT.
MOTION CARRIES 9-1.
CLERK: Item 35: Z-99-35 - Request for concurrence with
the decision of the Planning Commission to deny a petition
from Gloria G. Wheeler requesting a Special Exception for the
Page 32
purpose of establishing a family personal care home as
provided for in Section 26-1, Subparagraph (h) of the
Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance for Augusta-Richmond County, on
property located on the north right-of-way line of Eastside
Court, 371 feet, more or less, west of the northwest corner of
the intersection of Peach Orchard Road and Eastside Court
(2107 Eastside Court).
MAYOR YOUNG: Is the petitioner here?
MR. BALDUCCI: Yes, Mr. Mayor, Gloria Wheeler is here,
the petitioner. And my name is Paul Balducci, I'm an attorney
here in Augusta at 342 Telfair Street.
MAYOR YOUNG: Do we have any objectors here?
(16 OBJECTORS PRESENT)
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. We'll here from the petitioner
now.
MS. WHEELER: Good afternoon, gentlemen. My name is
Gloria Wheeler and I live at 2107 Eastside Court. Back in
April of '96 I went to the houses surrounding my house to ask
if anyone objected to me caring for elderly people in my home.
They all said no. At that time I was asking for two clients,
but I also stated that one day I may want three, but I would
never have over four clients. Taking care of someone else,
regardless of their age, is a hard task and a major
responsibility. Caring for two to four clients is a personal
decision just like making a decision about how many children
you want to have. The folks signed saying they did not mind,
and I thought nothing more of it until the day of September 9,
'96, when I got to the zoning meeting and there were the
people who signed saying they didn't care. I approached one
of the gentlemen and said something like, "I'm glad to see you
here," to which he replied, "You won't be." I was in shock.
Not one person had come to my house to let me know they had
changed their mind or for what reason. They were represented
by an attorney as well. He stood before the board and told
how I was going to bring down the property value in the
neighborhood, how my yard was unsafe because I had an in-
ground pool and someone could drown in it.
After the board turned down the request, I had Mr. Patty
withdraw my request. I was going to simply leave it alone and
just keep two people, because the zoning board says you can
have two without a permit. Well, the State of Georgia says
once you have two people in your home you have to go through
the same paperwork and inspections as though you had six
people living with you unless you change to a boarding house.
So for the next three years I put over $20,000 into my home
repairing it, et cetera, in order to be in compliance with the
Page 33
State of Georgia to pass all these inspections to get my
permit. During my repair work I had a six-foot chain link
fence installed around my pool because I could see the concern
about accidental drowning, and clearly I wasn't devaluing my
property or the property of those around me. My home was in
poor condition when it was purchased in '95 and now it is up
to par with some of the nicer homes on Eastside Court.
I decided since I had not had any trouble with the
neighborhood for three years, since the last request, that I
would try it again. But as you can see, they all showed up
again. Only this time they are concerned that someone will
get run over on Peach Orchard Road because I live 371 feet,
and they're also concerned there will be too much foot
traffic. And the point has been brought up that my house is
not suitable for a care home. Mr. Barnes, my immediate
neighbor, stood before the board and stated that I don't even
have a dining room table for my clients to eat at. Mr. Barnes
has never been inside my home, he knows nothing about the
living arrangements in my home. However, several agencies
representing the State of Georgia have been in my home many
times as well as a Richmond County fire inspector who is a
lieutenant. They have approved my home already for three
clients once I get the zoning clearance. The VA has also paid
visits to my home, to which I might add Christian Barnes, a
nurse at the VA stated, "This is an ideal location for a care
home."
These people who are opposing me are just as old, if not
older, than the people who live with me. And most of these
people drive, so aren't they more at risk to be injured in an
accident on Peach Orchard Road simply because they are in a
vehicle? I notified the Engineering Department about putting
a red light on the corner of Eastside Court and Peach Orchard
Road, but after several days of testing they wrote back saying
there wasn't enough traffic. If these neighbors are really
concerned about someone getting run over, maybe they should
put their efforts as a neighborhood association towards at
least getting a crosswalk and a caution light there since the
clients in my home are not the only people who walk to Peach
Orchard Road.
MAYOR YOUNG: Let's confine our comments today to the
petition at hand and not be characterizing our neighbors.
MR. BALDUCCI: Thank you, Mayor. I will be brief. I
would just like to point out that the home is 371 feet from
Peach Orchard Road, which is obviously a major thoroughfare.
As to any complaint that having a home here would effect the
property values, this area is already highly commercialized.
I'm going to hand you a copy of the zoning map. Ms. Wheeler
is bordered by--she's three doors down from another lot that
has been zoned commercial as well as a dentist office which
fronts on Peach Orchard Road. The BellSouth building is
Page 34
directly across the street from her house. Directly across
from her lot is the parking lot for BellSouth which regularly
has utility vehicles. Next door to BellSouth is Georgia Bank
and Trust, First Union Bank, and there's another office
building behind Georgia Bank and Trust. The area is already
highly commercial, and any economic impact--or impact on the
value of the property--it's basically not going to have any
effect given that the area is already highly commercial. It's
not going to make much on an impact one way or the other.
Another concern that was raised at Planning and Zoning was the
fact that the home was not proper--by its design would not be
proper for a personal care home. As Ms. Wheeler already
pointed out, she's already been approved by the state for two
people, and she could easily hold four people within the
present confines of her home.
She is requesting today a special exception. She's not
going to make this home institutional. This is her personal
home where she lives. She has taken in two gentlemen that
live with her. They are veterans. She's able to take care of
them. She's requesting a limited exception to allow one or
two--at the most two more people. She would have four people.
This would not require her to add any additional living
space. There would be no institutional character to this
home. By its nature, it's going to be consistent with the
purpose of this residential neighborhood. She is, in essence,
providing a residence--a residential home for these persons
who don't have families that can care for them, and I would
request that you take this into consideration not just for Ms.
Wheeler but for the two gentlemen that reside with her and
potentially two other persons who could perhaps live with her
in a nice quiet neighborhood and not be relegated to having to
live in an institutional area.
Furthermore, if the persons that have objections, if
they're really concerned about the safety of these residents,
they're really relegating these residents to having to go to
an area that is yet even more commercial. They would have to
go to an area that's zoned commercial; in other words, that
have this type of care. It's more than likely going to be an
area with more traffic that would increase any threat to these
individuals. I would like to just provide these pictures that
depict the view from the front and the rear of the property,
and you can see it's a highly commercialized area. She's only
370 feet from Peach Orchard Road. You can see there's many
businesses--
MAYOR YOUNG: Okay, you're getting redundant now. Is
there anything else you'd like to add?
MR. BALDUCCI: No, Mayor. Thank you.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right, we have some objectors here.
If you'll state your name and your address, please.
Page 35
MR. THOMAS: I'm Frank Thomas, Chairman of the Eastside
Court Neighborhood Watch. I live at 2150 Eastside Court.
Your Honor and members of the County Commission, our group
asks that you deny this request for rezoning, changing, or
whatever it happens to be to increase the ability of that
particular home to provide a residence for additional people
in a personal care situation. Ours is a stable, quiet, and
proud neighborhood of single-family homes. We passed around a
picture board for you to see the quality of the homes in the
neighborhood and the condition in which we maintain those
homes. We own our own homes and take pride in maintaining
them to a high standard, as evidenced by the photos which you
have just seen. And I might point out to you, sir, and
gentlemen, we work hard to counter the reputation that seems
to be going up about the south side of Augusta. Most of us
have been there from 40 to 50 years in these same homes. Our
children have grown there, been educated there ground through
college. We're proud of the neighborhood. The majority of
our neighborhood residents, as I say, have lived there for at
least 25 years and, yes, we are elderly. No question about
it, you can look at my gray hair and see that. Forty years of
that was put on my head by the United States Army at Fort
Gordon. That's a struggle.
Introduction of personal care home residents in our
neighborhood would present a safety hazard to the residents of
the home as well as members of the neighborhood, as evidenced
by former residents of the home moving into the highly
traveled and congested thoroughfares adjacent to Eastside
Court, specifically Highway 25. And I have Mr. Barnes with me
today, who is an eyewitness of these people wandering. The
architectural design of the home at this address would not
seem to support the introduction of additional persons brought
about by the introduction of a personal care business. We as
a neighborhood protest this proposed change, as evidenced by
the large number of residents that we have present here today.
The zoning board of Richmond County has twice before agreed
with us and denied requests for rezoning. Former members of
the County Commission also agreed with us and denied the
proposed change. We would appreciate very much your
consideration for denial of this request for rezoning.
MAYOR YOUNG: Is there another speaker over here?
Please come up and give us your name and your address.
MS. PERKINS: My name is Lisa Perkins, I reside at 2101
Eastside Court. I'm the person who was here last year to get
my property rezoned. I've had my house on the market for
about three years, and economically my house is worthless as a
residence. You did grant my zoning, although I haven't sold
it yet. They do live in a nice neighborhood, they truly do,
but--and I understand that you're here to protect property
Page 36
values, but our property values were compromised when the
phone company came in and moved the house out and put a
parking lot directly across the street from her house. They're
in violating of two zoning ordinances right now. They park
within inches of the next residence and they never had the
property rezoned for a parking lot. That seemed to be okay.
Then they sneaked a little cell tower in our backyard a few
months ago, and now our phone rings all the time and I can
hear people talking on my computer when they're on their cell
phones. These four houses--
MAYOR YOUNG: Do you hear any Commissioners on there?
MS. PERKINS: We would like that. These four houses in
particular are in a neighborhood kind of separate from these
people. As proof, I've never been informed of a neighborhood
association, I've never been invited into a neighborhood
association. She was unaware of an association. So we are
cut off. Our only chance--and Mr. Barnes' house is included
in this. Our only chance of maintaining any kind of property
value is to seek some other kind of zoning. The only offer I
got for my house was $5,000 less than I paid for it 14 years
ago. And I've lived there 14 years ago and I only see two
people here that have ever even spoken to me. And we really
are kind separated.
MAYOR YOUNG: Well, we're straying off the subject. The
subject here is rezoning this particular property and not who
you know or who you've met.
MS. PERKINS: These four houses are separate, they truly
are. And I've been in Ms. Wheeler's home, and if my dad was
alive I wouldn't mind him being there. And as far as
wandering the neighborhood, I mean I see them wandering, too.
I can interpret that as wandering. They go to Wendy's, they
go to church, and they can go to the church to vote without
having to, you know, take any other kind of transportation.
So I am in support of it.
MR. BARNES: Gentlemen, my name is Barnes, J.W., 2105
Eastside Court. I've been there 35-plus years, directly next
to the lady that's petitioning for this rezoning. This is the
third go-around for this particular incident. Now, I don't
want to get into a long-winded thing, but it looks like I've
been made into the big bad wolf in this situation. But this
lady come over to my house when she first moved in this
neighborhood, and we had talked prior to her coming to my
house. But when she came to my house, she wanted to petition
for two people to move in her house and it would help her out.
Within a 500-foot perimeter of that house she had to get
people to sign. Everybody was in accord, no problem. She
didn't want but two. She had three all of last year, which
Page 37
was against the rules. She only had a permit for two, but she
had three the big part of last year.
Now, this thing has went from A to Z just like that.
Now, I have no quarrels with this woman personally whatsoever.
Now, I will personally pay for anyone's time--I'm a poor man,
but if you gentlemen would like to ride out to Eastside Court,
I'll pay for the bus fare and your time if you gentlemen will
look this situation over and say we will pass it as a personal
care home. Now, far as me being in that house, I was in that
house before she was born, I would think. Now, that house
does not having a dining room unless she's put one in there
since I've been in it, and that's been a short period of time.
And it had two bedrooms--it's really a small matchbox house
and it had two bedrooms and a bathroom. It had one bedroom
and a bathroom and a small den, which is no more than two or
three closets, added by the previous owner which is dead and
gone now. But last time we met over this thing at the zoning
board she asked for five people. Now, you tell me how five
people, strangers, can get in a house and have some degree of
privacy, closet space, and bedroom space in a house no larger
than this right here. Now, like I say, I have no quarrel with
her, but I just don't think this thing is suitable for a
personal care home.
MAYOR YOUNG: Thank you very much. Do we have someone
from the Planning staff who can speak to this?
MR. AUSTIN: Yes, sir, Mr. Mayor. I'm Bob Austin. I
guess the only thing I could add to this is the tax records
have the house at 1,221 square feet with three bedrooms and
one bath. Gloria, you might tell me if you've got more than
one bathroom. That's not listed here. A lot of times that's
the case with tax records. I represent the Planning
Commission, and the Planning Commission...
(END OF SIDE 1, TAPE 1)
MR. BRIDGES: ...sure I understood which locations we
were talking about. We are talking about a business here.
There are residents on either side of this home. And viewing
the Planning Commission recommendation, I would recommend and
make a motion that we adhere to the recommendation of the
Planning Commission.
MR. SHEPARD: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: Motion and a second on the floor to deny
this petition. Do you have any further discussion?
MR. HANDY: Mr. Barnes, this particular house, is this
where the young lady used to live that works at Gracewood and
her son was in construction?
Page 38
MR. BARNES: The lady works at Gracewood?
MR. HANDY: The lady that died. Who has lived in the
house, the particular house in question?
MR. BARNES: Well, living in that house right there, I
don't recall that person living there.
MS. PERKINS: Excuse me, Mr. Handy, that's Miss Daisy
Storks and she lives next door on the other side of me--or she
did before she passed away in September.
MR. BARNES: Ms. Mamie Smith was the original owner of
that house, and her daughter lived in it for a period of time
after Mamie moved up the street with her sister. We were
quite close and, like I say, I've been in the house numerous
times.
MR. HANDY: I've been in that neighborhood a long time
ago. It's been a long time and I was just curious about the
particular house. Someone I knew used to live there and I
used to visit a lot, and I was just curious about whether or
not it's--the neighborhood is so close and everything. Are
you worrying who would the patients be or are you concerned
about the patients themselves or are you concerned about just
having the patients there?
MR. BARNES: To be honest with you, Mr. Handy, I'm
concerned for our folks. We are a close-knit neighborhood.
But, there again, we openly agreed to two people. No problem
at all. I told her as long as didn't interfere with parking,
because we're real close--we almost share the same driveway. I
said no problem with me. She had the two, then it went to
three. I believe at one time, I stand to be corrected, but it
was four. Now, it was mostly three all of last year. The
third one left the first part of this year before the reissue
of this new petition. The house is just not appropriate for a
personal care home.
MR. HANDY: Okay. You answered my question.
MAYOR YOUNG: Anyone else with a question or a comment?
We have a motion on the floor. All in favor of the motion to
deny this petition, please vote aye.
MR. HANDY VOTES PRESENT.
MOTION CARRIES 9-1.
CLERK: The next item is Item 63.
MAYOR YOUNG: Unless the homebuilders want to wait a
Page 39
little longer, we'll just go ahead and take care of that item
now.
CLERK: Item 63: Motion to approve an Ordinance to
amend Sections 7-1-90 C (1) and (2) of the Augusta-Richmond
County Code so as to increase certain fees required in
connection with the issuance of a building permit; to provide
an effective date; to repeal conflicting Ordinances; and for
other purposes.
MR. SHEPARD: I move approval, Mr. Chairman.
MR. BRIDGES: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: There's a motion to approve and a second.
Do we have any discussion? Mr. Oliver, did you want to add
anything to this?
MR. OLIVER: We passed out information as it relates to
other jurisdictions that you have in your backup, and we
believe that it's in order, we believe that it's justified,
and we believe that the costs of running the office equal or
exceed the charges that are being proposed.
MAYOR YOUNG: Mr. Wall, do you have any questions as to
the legality of this?
MR. WALL: Well, in my opinion, it's valid whether you
deem it to be a regulatory fee or whether it is just part of
the general revenues that are assessed by the county.
However, we've demonstrated that the costs of providing the
service exceed or equal or approximate the revenues that would
be generated by the building permits. So even if you accept
the Builders Association's argument that it's a regulatory
fee, we meet the test, and so I think it is a valid ordinance.
MAYOR YOUNG: Okay. Is there a spokesman here for the
Builders Association? Come up and give your name and address,
please, sir.
MR. WERNER: My name is Tom Werner, President of the
Builders Association of Metro Augusta for this year,
unfortunately. And as far as the legalities are concerned,
our attorneys--of course, you get to attorneys who give you
different advice on different things, but our attorneys have
told us clearly that they have not won one case yet. And so--
and in Savannah they had to refund over a million dollars in
fees for the last three years. And so what I would like to do
is ask for two things. Number one, we'd like to ask for an
independent audit of the Building and Inspection Department.
This is to determine if the fees are justified, in which case
we would not oppose the increase, even one as much as 50
Page 40
percent. And we need this to tell which employees and the
items being charged to this budget. Since this thing began,
we have received two different sets of figures that have
actually been hundreds of thousands of dollars apart. We now
understand there's a new set of figures and that this supports
the 50 percent increase, and this one is different from the
previous two sets. And the point is, without an independent
audit you can move these figures around to justify just about
anything.
Second, we would ask the Commission to look at the $2.7
million in savings the recent efficiency study recommended.
To pay $150,000 for this study, which is half the increase you
are now proposing to raise from us, and then not take
advantage of the potential savings before raising our fees is
not, I don't think, in the best interest of the taxpayer. And
even if the Commission only implemented half the recommended
savings, we the taxpayers would win and no fee increase would
be necessary. To pay $150,000 to show us how we can save one
to two million is a bargain, but only if the savings are
implemented.
And those are the two items that we would ask the
Commission to consider before voting for this increase. And
we'd like you to keep in mind that no county in Georgia to
date has won in court on the issue of taking inspection fees
for general revenue. And every one of those counties that
have tried, their attorneys advised those counties that they
could win, and they have not yet to date. So just keep that
in mind, and we'd like to entertain any questions.
MAYOR YOUNG: Are there any other people here who would
like to speak to this issue?
MR. OLIVER: I'd like to make just one point. DMG did a
cost allocation plan, so there's been a cost allocation plan
that is part of the federally approved cost allocation plan,
and they have done that aspect. I mean we've tried to
provide, you know, the numbers that the Builders Association
wanted, and we've given them that information, and we are
comfortable that the costs of running the office are equal to
or greater than the fees that will be derived.
MR. HANDY: I want to offer another motion, a substitute
motion, and my substitute motion is for the Attorney and the
Administrator and someone from the Builders Association get
together and try to work this issue out and form a committee.
The reason why I'm saying that, a lot of things come before
this Commission and we set up committees and we try to work
things out. Now, I know for a fact--I brought this out. I'm
the chair of the Georgia Municipal Association committee for
GMA, and this particular issue came up on it, and what the
building people are saying is what they said in class. And so
I would like to see it worked out for the simple reason that
Page 41
the Builders Association does a lot of work here and a lot of
revenue comes through this community, and I don't think that
it's right for us not to try to sit down and work things out.
I've seen the figures. I know the figures have changed, and I
don't know why the figures changed and that's the question.
If the figures would have been right from the beginning and
the same figures still now, then we wouldn't have the problem
we have now. But some changes have been made to make it work,
and I'd just like to see us try to work it out. And I'd like
to put that in the form of a motion, or a substitute motion,
to set up a committee, for you to appoint whoever you want to,
with someone from the builders, and try to work this thing
out. We need to try to work together. Your motto when you
came here, "It's a new day," and I don't know whether this new
day is for the good or for the worse. And I don't want to see
this happening like this, so something needs to happen to try
to work things out.
MAYOR YOUNG: Well, let's see if we can get a second for
your motion, Mr. Handy.
MR. H. BRIGHAM: I'll second it.
MAYOR YOUNG: We have a motion and a second to refer
this to a study committee. Is there any discussion on the
substitute motion?
MR. MAYS: Mr. Mayor, I'll try and be as brief as
possible. When this was brought up we had a long agenda item
that day and probably a pretty heated meeting. We ended in a
basic no vote, and we've just returned to this particular
item. I support the substitute motion in hopes that the
dialogue will take place. In spite of some of the things that
have been written, some of us did not just arbitrarily reject
those fees that have been put in, nor did we turn away from it
simply because we were threatened by the possibilities of
litigation. I mean you have threats of litigation and
litigation to occur in a government all the time. But it does
concern me, whether it came out in the DMG study, where we
come up with figures in reference to those discrepancies that
were there. And I think that was something that I had hoped
when we were in this lull period of rejecting the fees and
overturning what had been done, that what will be done in the
substitute motion, hopefully, should have been--without having
to put it out here in a motion to do it, should have been what
would be the main focus, I would think, to be discussing
anyway during this interim period. Any time you've got a
discrepancy about figures in terms of their justification and
a group or a person, period, honestly and legitimately brings
into question something that you put in writing, then I think
an explanation from a public standpoint is owed, and that was
why I supported in terms of going against those figures and
Page 42
fees at that time.
And I might add that--I'll say this, Mr. Mayor, then
I'll be quiet. I didn't attend the builders' function last
night, so I didn't make the statement simply because they had
a fish fry. And I say that very pointedly, sarcastically, it
can fall any way that it wants to, but I'm going to take the
public time to respond to it. You know, I hope that we all
make our decisions about any decision based on its quality and
what it will do for this community. And I know after 20 years
that I don't make a decision in politics based on the fact of
whether I sit down and eat lunch or dinner with somebody or a
particular group. And I'd even say to the particular area in
which I was told that it was read in, since I don't subscribe
to it, that even those projects that have been supported by
the daily paper, when they call us to wine us and dine us and
fly us from here to Halifax and back when it's a project that
the publisher wants to get done, it's not written up in terms
of whether or not you ate dinner or had lunch with somebody.
So I consider it a personal insult on the integrity of those
people who sat in any given setting at which we may deal with
this association or any other association, and I think that
should be publicly brought out, Mr. Mayor, to a point that
that occurs on any given basis when people want to talk with
elected officials and has nothing to do with the decision in
which they make, and I think to not respond to it would be
basically to a point of dealing with some type of guilt in it.
If I'm going to deal with something of dealing with selling
myself, it damned sure won't be for a meal.
MAYOR YOUNG: We'll make our decision based on the
agenda and not on the menu. Are there any other comments or
questions on the substitute motion?
MR. H. BRIGHAM: I just want to say for the record, Mr.
Mayor, that I did not go to the fish fry.
MR. KUHLKE: I understand the substitute motion, but
it's my understanding that that exercise has already been
done. Am I correct?
MR. OLIVER: There are professional differences as to
what expenses should be included and what expenses should not
be included.
MR. KUHLKE: But did not you and Mr. Wall meet with the
builders' attorney and members of the Builders Association to
discuss it, and you have a misunderstanding in regards to--is
it regulatory or was it compliance?
MR. WALL: Well, it's the enforcement issue, to an
extent, and to what extent those costs are being included.
Mr. Oliver was not included in the meeting. Yes, I did meet
Page 43
with Darren Hicks and several representatives of the Builders
Association. I'm not sure who all was present right now. But
in any event, we gathered information and we furnished that
information to them. Now, in fairness, I don't know that we
have sat down after all of those figures were accumulated and
furnished, and they've asked for some new information as
recently as last week, and so we have continued to furnish
that information. But I think the basic professional
difference is what is to be included in those costs and what
is not to be included and what does a building permit--if you
deem it to be a regulatory fee, what costs are properly
attributable and what costs are not. And, frankly, I don't
think that we're going to reach an agreement on that if we sit
down and talk with them because we've just got a difference of
opinion about that.
MR. WERNER: Could I speak to that? We did meet with
Mr. Wall before the last Commission meeting, but have not met
with him since, and the Builders Association is not opposed at
all to meeting with the county in trying to work this out. We
do have a philosophical difference on what he is talking
about, whether it's a fee or a tax. And, of course, we would
like to--you know, if it is, under what authority is it done
and so forth. Our attorneys are telling us--and let me just
say I know that--Mr. Mays said that under the threat of
lawsuit you guys--believe me, we don't want to go to court.
You're spending taxpayers' money to defend the county and
we're spending our association's money, and the state is
adamant about this, that the--in fact, this would be the only
county in Georgia that has won this situation if they win.
The only one. And if that's the case, they will take it to
the Supreme Court. And that involves a lot of money on our
side, so we do not want to spend this unnecessarily. We'd
rather work with you.
If you can show us that those figures are justified, we
are going to support a 70 percent increase if that's what it
takes to get that department realistically--and I'm not
talking about these wacky numbers that we got before. You
know, before it didn't fit, and then all of a sudden we got
some new numbers, then all of a sudden we're a little bit out,
then all of a sudden we've got numbers now that are exactly
what the $300,000 raise is. You guys would ask questions,
too, hey, what's going on here? And you can cook those
numbers any way. And I'm just saying that if we meet and if
those numbers are legitimate, we are in support of the
ordinance totally, 100 percent.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. Any other comments or
questions?
MR. BEARD: Well, Mr. Mayor, I was wondering if I should
say anything or not, but in reference to this, I think that we
Page 44
do have to--and I'm going to support Mr. Handy's motion
because I think oftentimes we are too quick-trigger on a lot
of incidents here in this government that we could work out,
but sometimes we become dominant in our opinion and we want it
like that and got to have it like this. But I think any time
that we can--we have an obligation, but any time that we can
sit down--and from what I've heard from the building people,
that they are amenable to working with us, so why not work
with them. I just don't understand the rationale. I know we
said we need particular things, but I think it's best to work
it out, and I'm going to support Mr. Handy's motion.
MR. OLIVER: I would ask if you would consider, Mr.
Handy, putting a time limit on it. Because obviously it's in
the best interest of the Builders Association to prolong the
time limit. So I think if we put a time limit on it, it would
give everyone an incentive to do it in a timely manner.
MR. HANDY: I don't particularly care about what time
limit we put on it. I'll turn it over to the Mayor for him to
appoint the committee, and he can put it--next week would be
fine with me as long as y'all get together. That'll be up to
him.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. Well, let's go ahead and call
the question on the substitute motion, which is to send this
to a study committee. All in favor, please vote aye.
MR. SHEPARD VOTES NO.
MOTION CARRIES 9-1.
MAYOR YOUNG: We've been here for two hours, and the
Chair is going to declare a three-minute recess, then we will
come back and finish up the agenda.
(RECESS)
CLERK: Item 46: Motion to approve OMI as the selected
firm and authorize committee to begin contract negotiations
for cost and level of service regarding privatization of the
Messerly Wastewater Treatment Plant. Retaining a private
engineer and attorney as necessary to assist in negotiations.
MR. POWELL: Mr. Mayor and Commission, I'd like to make
a motion that we approve OMI as our--to begin contract
negotiations with OMI for the wastewater treatment operations
facility.
MR. BRIDGES: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: Okay, we have a motion and a second. Do
we have any discussion?
Page 45
MR. KUHLKE: I want to make a substitute motion. My
substitute motion, Lena, is the same as it was last time. I'd
like to move that we move forward, that we prepare an RFP,
that we accept proposals from the two top firms, and that we
hire a consultant to assist us with the RFP, and at the
appropriate time we have the Attorney associate with an
attorney in developing a contract appropriate for this
operation.
MR. SHEPARD: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: We have a substitute motion and a second.
We're open to discussion, comments, questions. Do we have
somebody that would like to address the Commission? Please
give us your name and address.
MR. PINKNEY: Mr. Mayor, I'm John Pinkney, 409 Forest
Ridge Place, Augusta, Georgia. I am an employee of the
wastewater treatment plant. Have been for 18 years. I've
been through and seen the city go through turmoil after
turmoil and downhill and downhill a downhill slope. What I
would like to see is that we move forward. Are we going to
sit and wait and continue to dilapidate, with the plant steady
going downhill, dilapidated equipment and everything, and wait
and do this study, do the other study, until we go floating
down the river or face more fines? Because in the first
place, it's never really been brought all the way out to the
public that we've had some fines and we got a lot of stuff
thrown on us and thrown towards us as a result of some sewage
leakage that didn't even get to us. We cannot treat that if
it don't get to us. We cannot treat that if we are not
adequately financed or adequately staffed. So we've had all
those problems and we're going to keep sitting around and
keeping throwing it back on the table for two weeks, three
weeks, coming back, going back, and time to study. We're
steady receiving sewage. We're losing quality employees
because none of us know what's going to be, which way it's
going. Everybody is in suspense at this time, and we have
lost two or three fairly decent employees. And at this time I
would ask that this body move to go forward, if it's OMI or if
it's U.S. Filter or whoever else that's in the running, and
let's stop wasting time. Thank you.
MAYOR YOUNG: Thank you. And I assure you that we share
your concerns for the operation of the plant, too. Any
comments or questions from the Commissioners?
MR. POWELL: Mr. Mayor, I have a representative here
from OMI that I would like the Commission to hear from, which
was our selection by the selection committee. And I'd like to
bring him up and, you know, let the Commission feel free to
ask questions or whatever at this time.
Page 46
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. If you'll come to the podium
and give us your name and your address, please.
MR. GRISSELL: Again, thank you for having me today.
I'm Dan Grissell. I'm a Regional Vice-President for OMI and I
reside in Norrisville, Georgia, at 2127 Merrymont Drive. I
represent OMI, and I've had the opportunity to work with the
city through this process when we went through your selection
committee. And some of the programs and what we try to do is
give background on who OMI is, and I've had a chance to visit
with a number of--I think most everybody up here. We are the
largest by far contract operator in the state of Georgia. We
do more facilities in the state than anyone else, or
practically all of our competitors combined.
One of the things we were recognized for in the last two
years--it's real easy for me to stand up here and say a lot of
great things about the company. You know, I've been here 14
years, so I'm a company man. But the real measure of success
is your ability to take and transition employees. And there's
a lot of good people out there. Our company is made up of--70
percent of our company is employees that used to work for
cities and counties. We're an employee company. We're 100
percent employee owned and we're 100 percent American owned.
We're one of the few last American firms in this business. I
mean this industry has basically been bought out by the French
and British water companies, and we're one of the last
American standouts. We're the second largest in this country
that does this.
To our benefit, you grow based on your reputation. The
only thing I've got to sell is our reputation. Over the last
two years we've won close to half the state--these aren't
awards that we give ourselves. The state comes in and has
peers through GWPCA going and inspecting our facilities. Over
the last two years we've won half of the state operating
awards, and, to me, that's a real testimony to our commitment.
And, again, we have nothing to sell without our reputation.
And I encourage everyone to call and talk to our clients here
in the state of Georgia. We represent a lot of folks around
here: Washington, Georgia, for example; Wrens.
One of our newest customers in the state is Rockdale
County. We had the opportunity to come in there, and it was
kind of a similar situation as what you have here. They were
facing fairly large fines due to noncompliance issues, and
they had some severe challenges associated with the facilities
themselves. We've been able to go in there, get the
facilities turned back around, and over the last five months--
we've been in there less than a year, and over the last five
months we've not had a single permit excursion. And we've had
some significant challenges to address, but we've been able to
do that without any major capital improvements.
And the reason for that is this is what we do. We do
Page 47
water and wastewater. I mean that's what we do for a living,
and right now I think it's 15 facilities or utilities in the
states that we operate. I'm leaving here today to go and
actually meet with another city council to talk about this
very issue tonight. We've got one of the longest standing
track records in the state with Hinesville, Georgia. I would
encourage you to talk to them. We've been down there, I
guess, over 15 years. We run their entire public works
department, so we've got close to 100 employees in Hinesville.
With that, I'd welcome any questions you may have.
MAYOR YOUNG: Are there any representatives here from
U.S. Filter? Give us your name and your address, please, sir.
MR. KEMP: Yes, sir. I'm Les Kemp with U.S. Filter in
Vero Beach, Florida. I represent U.S Filter on sales and
marketing in the southeast. And I could pretty much echo what
the representative from OMI said. Certainly, you know, I'm
not going to try to discount anything that he says. Where
they're the largest firm in the state of Georgia, we're the
largest firm in the United States doing this work. Clearly
they are larger in Georgia. They've done a good job in
Georgia. I'm not going to try to downplay the work they do.
We're proud of our reputation, we're proud of our ability to
transition employees. The same numbers apply as far as how
many of our employees used to work for municipalities. It's
the same situation with us. All we've ever asked is that you
not sole-source this project, that you know you're getting a
competitive situation. And I'd be glad to answer any
questions if you've got any of us.
MR. SHEPARD: Mr. Mayor, I'd like to address this
question to both the representatives. If they would address
the respective experiences of their companies in constructed
wetlands projects and the number of state-certified operators
of wastewater treatment plants that you have. If you would
address those two key factors, the state-certified in Georgia
and constructed wetlands in Georgia and nationally.
MR. GRISSELL: Those are both very good questions. What
I'll offer right now is based on my recollection, and I think
it's pretty correct. We've got well over 100 certified
operators in the state of Georgia. And, again, that's due to
the large presence that we have and the long history we've got
here. Because actually the person that serves to train people
for certification for the Georgia World Water Association
works for us, and we donate that person to train other
operators in the state at our own cost just to help the
organization out. When it comes to wetlands, I personally
have designed and built a constructed wetlands in West Jackson
County, Mississippi. We've got a number of on-staff people
that have written textbooks associated with this. We're
Page 48
probably recognized in the world of engineering as the
dominant player when it comes to designing constructed
wetlands similar to what you're talking about at your
facilities there.
MAYOR YOUNG: What about your certified operators?
MR. GRISSELL: Well over 100.
MR. KEMP: In the state of Georgia we've got about 25
operators. No question, they have a larger presence in the
state of Georgia. We've got about 600 certified operators
throughout the United States. I'm not sure what their number
is, but it's, I think, significantly less than that. As to
wetlands experience, we have one project currently. I think
all of you heard us at the last presentation and all, but we
have one project currently. But our team member, Kaufer
Engineering out of Atlanta, has provided engineering services
for about 20 wetlands projects, and we'll team with them to
bring us that experience that we need to this project.
MR. BEARD: I would just like to ask this question about
our employees. I am concerned about how they are infiltrated
into your organization and the length of time. Are they given
a choice of employment or do they have to look elsewhere for
employment, those people who are currently employed?
MR. GRISSELL: We offer everybody a job here in Augusta
that currently works for you at what he's making or better.
One of the things that they typically realize, and I'm not
that familiar with their benefits program, is what we do--
being an employee owned organization, we don't have to pay
outside shareholders, third-party shareholders, to own our
company. We're 100 percent employee owned and the stock value
or whatever goes back to the employees, allowing us to pay
enhanced benefits. For example, we pay the employee benefit
portion, say, for your family for medical coverage and you at
no cost for you, the premium itself, and that would represent
a pay raise, I think, for most all your employees. One of the
other things that we do, we pay bonuses to not only salaried
and managers, we pay bonuses to everybody in our company.
And, again, this isn't based on just a special few. Everybody
in our company qualifies for a significant bonus. And, again,
it goes back to--the reason we've got the money to do it is
we're employee owned. That's where the money is going. Over
the last year we've averaged close to a 10 percent bonus to
the employees. Again, this is hourly and salary, not just
managers, and I think that's probably unheard of in the
industry. If everybody is doing that, I would be surprised to
that effect. So, no, we guarantee everybody an opportunity.
MR. KEMP: Well, I'd certainly echo the--we would match
Page 49
or exceed the current benefits and salaries for everyone.
Everyone would be offered employment, and the worst they could
do is as good as they are now. We go through the analysis of
all the employees, and then their benefits would equal or
better what they've got now. The other thing, though, that I
would like to bring up, you know, the employee owned is not
all beneficial. I mean there are some benefits to being
employee owned, but there's also some limits to that, too, and
I think you as councilmen can share some of that. The capital
that we can put behind a project and the other things that we
can bring because we are a public company, one of the largest
companies in the world doing this, I think are some things
that need to be considered as well.
MR. BRIDGES: I didn't get how many wetland projects
y'all have done or have ongoing.
MR. GRISSELL: I don't have that number off the top of
my head, but it's numerous. I personally have designed and
built--I think I've been involved in three. As far as the
company goes, I would say it's probably, you know, well into
the--I don't know if it's 100, but it's a lot. We're the
dominant engineering operations company that's involved with
that. I've actually got--I may have a handout with me that
shows that that's actually published by EPA talking about one
of the wetlands we did. One of the other things I'd like to,
you know, talk about is corporate stability. That's one of
the other things I offer. And not to, you know, go after
anybody here, but we are employee owned, which prevents us
from being bought or sold or bartered. We've got the same
management team we've had for basically 15 years. My
commitment to you is I've been with the company 14 years.
You're going to be dealing with the same company tomorrow and
five years down the road that you're dealing with today, and
the guy making the promises is going to be here. I'm not
going to be sold off to someone else for them to say, well,
I'm not for sure who committed to you for what. And on the
capitalization side of it, we did $1.3 billion worth of work
last year as a company, and that's pretty sizeable. I'm not
sure if that makes a big difference, but we're a sizeable
company in our own right.
MAYOR YOUNG: Does Mr. Hicks or Mr. Wiedmeier have
anything they'd like to inject in this? Or, Mr. Oliver, do
you have anything you'd like to say?
MR. OLIVER: I mean clearly both firms are reputable. I
mean that isn't an issue.
MAYOR YOUNG: Mr. Hicks, would you like to add anything
to our discussion?
Page 50
MR. HICKS: The only thing I would say is probably what
you read in the agenda item, and that is that having
interviewed the firms that we did, having then narrowed it
down to U.S. Filter and OMI and then interviewing them, they
were both good firms, but we felt like OMI was better, so we
recommended them. And, particularly, they have a much better
status in Georgia. I'm familiar with them. I go to the GWPCA
meetings and I see them win award after award year after year,
so that is factual what they say.
MR. KUHLKE: I have a question. Mr. Powell and I want
the same thing for this county. I want to ask both of you
gentlemen a question. If you were sitting where I am and you
were representing the community, and you had an opportunity to
sit down and negotiate with more than one person and then
determine which person you wanted to do business with, would
you take that opportunity as an elected official?
MR. GRISSELL: One thing I would encourage--I'll start
this. What we find, and we do this day in and day out, and
I'd say about half the jobs that we pursue and work on have a
price component and about half of them don't. And what I find
is there isn't any magic dust out there about what we do. We
run water and wastewater plants, they do the same thing. They
know how to run them and we know how to run them. And there
isn't any magic dust. It's not like somebody is going to go
twist a value that's going to save you a bunch of money. The
reality of it is, when it comes right down to who's going to
do it the absolute cheapest, and I see this day in and day
out, it comes off the backs of the employees. You know, we
can do it open book. What we've offered to the city is that
we'll [inaudible] do it any way you want. And what it comes
down to is we can assure you--and I've actually got a
publication that will support this view about qualification
based selections.
MR. KUHLKE: I understand that, and I understand that
for professional services we don't have to go the cheapest
price. We go with the person that can do the best job for us.
What you just said just a second ago on how you're going to
operate it, what you're going to do with the employees and so
forth is fine. But if I had an opportunity to talk to you and
find out your ideas on it and I also had the opportunity to
talk to somebody else and find out their ideas, if you were in
my situation would you be more comfortable talking with two
people or would you be more comfortable talking with one
person and you don't know what the other person has got?
MR. GRISSELL: I guess I would support the team, as I
said earlier, that went through the process of interviewing
each firm and checking the references and all the various
steps that you've gone through to get to where you are today.
Page 51
MR. KEMP: And let me respond to that. I guess I just
take the numbers, and the numbers are that probably 90 percent
of the municipalities do get prices from more than one firm.
The sole-source option is very unusual in this business. Now,
what he's talking about, it is an option that you get
proposals from two and then price not be the determination.
And we're not saying that that necessarily has to be the
ultimate choice either, but to get only proposals from one is
very unusual.
MR. KUHLKE: If you went through that process, does it
take any longer to sit down with two firms as opposed to
sitting down with one firm? If you go through the right
process, does it take any longer to come up with a decision?
MR. GRISSELL: I guess what I would say, that's really
up to the city as to how you move forward. I mean I've been
through a number of different processes and every city moves
at a different pace, and it's well outside of our hands,
either one of us, as to how quick the process moves either way
you go.
MR. POWELL: I think that we're getting into a situation
here where we're--we've got this gentleman's opinion, which is
going to favor his company. You've got this gentleman over
here whose opinion is going to favor another process. And I
think that--you know, look, we've been through this thing, the
selection committee, and we've been as thorough as I know how
to be, and we're making our recommendation to move forward.
The reason that we picked OMI was after extensive interviews.
I'm not saying U.S. Filter is a bad company, but what we
found with the U.S. Filter firm versus OMI, in the selection
committee's opinion, was this: In the state of Georgia, U.S.
Filter had one--well, two plants actually. And they're both
water intake plants, they're not wastewater plants. We found
nowhere they operated a wastewater treatment facility in the
state of Georgia. The company that comes in and takes over
this facility is going to have to have a working relationship
with EPD, the Georgia Environmental Protection Division. Now,
do we need someone to come in and start a new position of
gaining trust and all through the Georgia EPD or do we need a
company that's there and got a good reputation with working
with EPD? We've called EPD, we've checked it out.
U.S. Filter was limited on the wetlands experience, as
far as the selection committee was concerned with what we
heard that day. Naturally you can go out and hire someone
with this experience or that experience, but when you do that,
gentlemen, when you have three different companies that you're
having to go through to get the job done, you've got three
different people that's going to say he's liable, or he's
liable, or he's liable. Whoever runs this wastewater
Page 52
treatment facility needs to be the person that is liable for
the fines. We don't need them pointing fingers at other
people, we need somebody that can basically come in and do the
job.
As I said, the selection committee was thorough. I know
Mr. Kuhlke asked questions. Look, I'm in the construction
business. Mr. Kuhlke's been in the construction business all
his life, and I know he's negotiated contracts with people as
well as I've negotiated contracts with people. And that does
not always mean that the customer gets a raw deal. Usually it
means they get a better deal. If we cannot strike a contract
with OMI, then we're going to back off and go to the second
choice. If we can't strike a contract with U.S. Filter, then
we're going to back off and do something else, but somebody
else is going to be leading the charge this time.
MAYOR YOUNG: Any other discussion? All right, we have
a substitute motion on--yes, sir, Mr. Mays?
MR. MAYS: Mr. Mayor, let me just ask this question of
both gentlemen. In reference to whether it's in Georgia or
anywhere else--and I think that would only be fair to open it
up to look at U.S. Filter's ability somewhere else because we
already know the numbers in Georgia, but I think on a level
playing field. But when you talk about the possibilities of
saving cities' money, what has been the experience with both
companies in reference to the intake of employee ratios when
you have taken a job and been asked to--whether it be outright
downsizing or in terms of cutting costs, and it usually
relates to the same thing, you're talking about people. What
has been your company's record of percentage in reference to
those cities where those costs had to be cut in terms of
employees, whether it be through layoff, whether it be through
abolishing positions, or just plain gone? And y'all can take
that, whichever one of you want to go first.
MR. GRISSELL: Well, I'm not exactly sure whether you're
asking do we lay people off or not, but we've never had any
problem--
MR. MAYS: Well, I'm not asking you whether you like
them or not, I'm asking you if you've been in charge of one.
And the same question goes to him. What have you done when
cities have said we've got to, in turn, cut costs? What have
you done in relationship to those employees?
MR. GRISSELL: We've never laid anybody off when we took
the facility, I guess is answer number one. Do we over time
work the staff down with people retiring and that sort of
thing? That's very common for that to occur.
MR. KEMP: The common practice in the industry, what has
Page 53
been instituted in the last five years, Mr. Mays, is that what
we encourage everywhere we go is you have a zero layoff. And
there is a lot of latitude in that. You know, you hear a lot
of horror stories about it, but the commitment to us and what
we've got right now, you know, to give you an idea, if there
is an opportunity--say you have an overstaffed position there
that you want to, you know, get to a certain staffing level, I
think if you look at your natural attrition rates you've got
turnover now and such as that out there, so what we do is get
there by attrition.
The other big thing for us is, just with our Georgia
presence--I grew up in the state, and very few of us really
want to move off anywhere, but what we offer through the other
facilities we operate in the state are advancement
opportunities for folks that want to get a promotion that want
to stay with the same company. They don't lose any benefits,
they keep their benefits and move around in the state and
actually grow their career. I mean water and wastewater is
really an under-utilized career that our schools don't often-
times recognize, and we encourage people that this is a career
opportunity, not just a job.
And just two years ago we won the Literacy in the Work-
place in the State of Georgia by Zell Miller for Swainsboro,
Georgia. There we run their public works department also. We
had a number of employees that were illiterate. And, you
know, the first concept is, well, wouldn't it be easier to
replace those people. The reality is if we take and invest in
training that person and give them, you know, the ability to
read and write, we've got the best employee we'll ever have
ever. I mean this guy, you've given him an opportunity in
life. And that's our view on life is you train people, you
keep people, and you promote within.
MR. MAYS: Mr. Mayor, my reason for asking that question
mutually to bring out--and neither one of the gentlemen, I
think did, any harm in terms of their answers. But more or
less in direct response to Mr. Kuhlke's question in reference
to the gentlemen, what would you do if you were in my
position? I mean both of us have been in the position of when
we were looking at proposals in dealing with the jail. The
big difference that we had at that time was that we were not
talking about people in an existing workforce as they were
there. We've sent a committee out to do a particular job, and
I realize that no committee should run a whole government, but
I think that some of the questions that are being asked at
this stage of the game are questions that a lot of minds maybe
should have asked of the committee in its stages to deal with
its professionals in terms of coming back with somebody. And
I'll say this and shut it up. I think the worst experience
we've had in terms of numbers has been the atrocious history
here of how we're finally trying to balance out our insurance
program as to where for so long we took in what was based
Page 54
totally on dealing with numbers and what they would bring
back, and many times those ending numbers were not in the best
interest of those people who worked for us.
Atlanta is a horror story within itself as it relates to
water, but there are existing ongoing horror stories with
Atlanta in reference to the fact that one of the first moves
that has been made, and it's public knowledge, has been--and I
brought that out for this particular reason of your answer,
has been the first place that they hit because they cannot
deal with chemicals, they cannot deal with equipment, they had
to deal with people, and that's the first place that was hit
in terms of their downsizing. So whatever motion passes, I
would hope that the people that work for us would be hopefully
the common denominator balance in there that we take in
consideration with the ending proposal in terms of what we do
with it regardless of whether it's the substitute motion or
the main motion that's on the floor.
MAYOR YOUNG: We have a substitute motion on the floor.
Are we ready for a vote on that?
MR. BRIDGES: Mr. Mayor, can we hear the substitute--
that's Bill's motion?
CLERK: Substitute motion made by Mr. Kuhlke, seconded
by Mr. Shepard, was to prepare RFQ's, accept the top two
firms, hire a consultant to assist with the RFP's, and at the
appropriate time bring on an attorney to help prepare the
contract.
MAYOR YOUNG: That is to get RFP's, not RFQ's. All in
favor, please vote aye.
MR. BEARD, MR. BRIDGES, MR. H. BRIGHAM, MR. COLCLOUGH,
MR. HANDY, MR. MAYS & MR. POWELL VOTE NO.
MOTION FAILS 3-7.
MAYOR YOUNG: So next up is the original motion, which
is to enter negotiations with OMI. All in favor of the
original motion, please vote aye.
MR. KUHLKE VOTES NO.
MOTION CARRIES 9-1.
MAYOR YOUNG: At the request of Mr. Shepard, we're going
to move to Item Number 64.
MR. SHEPARD: Mr. Mayor, in regard to Item 64, which is
a resolution to the Governor and the members of the legisla-
ture to change O.C.G.A. Section 48-5-380, I would move
approval. That resolution asks that the statute of limita-
tions on tax refunds be changed from three to seven years.
Page 55
MR. KUHLKE: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: Motion and a second. Any discussion? All
in favor, please vote aye.
MOTION CARRIES 10-0.
CLERK: Item 36: Request for concurrence with the
decision of the Planning Commission to deny a petition from
K.G. Watson, on behalf of Norman and Elizabeth Smoot,
requesting a change of zoning from B-1 (Neighborhood Business)
to Zone B-2 (General Business) on property located where the
southwest right-of-way line of Glenn Hills Circle intersects
the southeast right-of-way line of Arcadia Drive.
MAYOR YOUNG: Is the petitioner here?
SPEAKER: I don't think so. We're opposition.
MAYOR YOUNG: You're in opposition. All right. How
many folks do you have with you? Three?
SPEAKER: We have four.
MAYOR YOUNG: You have four objectors? All right. Mr.
Austin, maybe you could--
SPEAKER: I'm Johnson.
MAYOR YOUNG: Just a moment. Mr. Austin, if you could
walk us through this. We'll get to you in just a moment.
MR. AUSTIN: Mr. Mayor, the petitioner in this case was
K.G. Watson and the fellow who's going to operate the car wash
is Norman Smoot. I don't guess either one of them are here
today. And the Planning Commission really agreed with the
neighbors that we shouldn't extend B-2 zoning into the heart
of the neighborhood of Glenn Hills Circle, and they recommend
denial.
MR. HANDY: Mr. Mayor, I'd like to offer a motion to
concur with the Planning Commission.
MR. SHEPARD: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: Motion and a second. Let's hear from the
objector if he--if you just want to reinforce this briefly.
SPEAKER: Sounds like to me it's moving in the right
direction.
Page 56
MAYOR YOUNG: Okay. Well, that sounds like a pretty
good observation.
MR. AUSTIN: I have a plat. Can you see the yellow
spot? That's where he proposed to put the car wash, and
those--all the others around there is residential.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. Very good. Any discussion?
SPEAKER: A car wash should be on a thoroughfare, not
inside of a residential subdivision.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. I wish all our objectors were
that brief. All right, all in favor of the motion to deny it,
please vote aye.
MR. POWELL OUT.
MOTION CARRIES 9-0.
CLERK: Item 37: Request for concurrence with the
decision of the Planning Commission to approve a petition from
Derryl Fuller, on behalf of Bible Way Church of Our Lord Jesus
Christ, requesting a Special Exception to expand an existing
church as provided for in Section 26-1, Subparagraph (a) of
the Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance for Augusta-Richmond County
on property located where the northwest right-of-way line of
Grand Boulevard intersects with the southwest right-of-way
line of (1102 8th Avenue and 2101 Grand Boulevard). This item
was postponed from our April 6th meeting.
MR. HANDY: Move for approval, Mr. Mayor.
MR. H. BRIGHAM: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: Motion and a second. Do we have any
objectors?
(NO OBJECTORS PRESENT)
MAYOR YOUNG: Any discussion? All in favor, please vote
aye.
MR. POWELL OUT.
MOTION CARRIES 9-0.
CLERK: Item 38: Motion to approve $50,000 for the 1999
Neighborhood Matching Grant program from the 1998 Contingency
Fund as approved by the Citizens Advisory Council on March 2,
1999.
MR. HANDY: Move for approval.
Page 57
MR. H. BRIGHAM: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: Any discussion? All in favor, vote aye.
MR. POWELL OUT.
MOTION CARRIES 9-0.
MR. H. BRIGHAM: Mr. Mayor, the items on the
Administrative Services Committee, if there are no objections,
we would like to move for unanimous approval for all of them.
39. Motion to approve the petition for retirement on William
E. Redd.
40. Motion to approve an Ordinance providing for the
demolition of certain unsafe and uninhabitable
properties in the Turpin Hill Neighborhood: 1732 Meadow
Street, 1711 Meadow Street, 1613 Ramsey Street, 1681
Emory Street (District 5, Super District 9); East
Augusta Neighbor-hood: 209 Holloway Drive, 1906 Alabama
Road, 1920 Alabama Road (District 2, Super District 9);
Sand Hills Neighbor-hood: 2610 Hazel Street (District 1,
Super District 9); and South Augusta Neighborhood: 3212
Old Louisville Road (District 8, Super District 10).
41. Motion to approve the Housing & Neighborhood Development
Department to approve and authorize Mayor and the Clerk
to execute Subordination Agreements resulting from a
change in the rate and/or term or an equity loan
provided the equity loan and Augusta-Richmond County
loans do not exceed 80% of the appraised value subject
to the approval of the Administrator and Attorney.
42. Motion to approve the Subordination Agreement for Mary
Beth McCall which will be subordinated to a loan by
North American Mortgage Company. Ms. McCall is
refinancing her current mortgage to receive a lower
interest rate.
43. Pulled from consent agenda.
43A. Pulled from consent agenda.
44. Motion to approve the petition for retirement on William
L. Watkins, Jr.
45. Motion to approve $125,000 Recaptured Urban Development
Action Grant Loan for Mr. Shankar Balan d/b/a Palmetto
Industries International, Inc. as recommended by the
Augusta-Richmond County Citizens Advisory Council on
January 8, 1999.
45A. Motion to amend the fee policy for cleanup of lots. The
total fee charge to a property owner would be reduced by
one-half (1/2) provided the following conditions are
met:
(1) The property is homesteaded.
(2) The owner is a senior citizen, 65 years old or
older, or the owner is physically unable to main-
Page 58
tain the property.
(3) The owner household income is classified by the
U.S. Department of Census as below poverty level.
(4) Execution of an affidavit that there are no
relatives who can help clean the property.
MR. HANDY: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: Motion and a second to take the
Administrative Services items as a consent agenda.
MR. KUHLKE: I want 43 and 43A pulled off.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. We have a motion to take this
as a consent agenda, deleting Items 43 and 43A. Do we have a
second to that?
MR. HANDY: Yeah, I'll second it.
MR. BRIDGES: Mr. Mayor, could we look at these just a
minute?
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. Did you find anything else you
want to pull off? Okay, all in favor of the consent agenda,
pulling Items 43 and 43A, please vote aye.
MR. J. BRIGHAM VOTES NO ON ITEM 45.
MR. POWELL OUT.
MOTION CARRIES 8-1, ITEM 45.
MOTION CARRIES 9-0, ITEMS 39-42, 44 & 45A.
CLERK:Item 43: Motion to approve 1999 employee salary
increases to be effective with the pay period commencing
October 9, 1999 (checks distributed October 22, 1999) with the
exception of the Department Directors' whose compensation
increase will be effective the next pay period following
Commission's approval within the following guidelines:
(A) 1.5% cost of living increases to all regular full-time
employees employed with Augusta-Richmond County on or before
September 30, 1998, including the indexing of compensation
brackets; (B) An allocation of funds equal to 1.5% of each
Department's ARC payroll to be used for pay for performance
increases for regular full-time employees. This is to be
distributed based on their job performance as recommended by
each department director and approved by the Administrator;
(C) An allocation of funds equal to 5% of all Directors'
compensation to increase Department Directors' compensation as
determined by the Administrator based on their job
performance.
MR. KUHLKE:Mr. Mayor, I'd like to make a motion that
this particular item be amended whereby the department
Page 59
directors' change in salary concur with that of the other
employees of the county, which would be October 9th, and
checks would be distributed on October the 22nd.
MR. SHEPARD: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: We have a motion and a second. Let's see,
Mr. Bridges, you were first.
MR. BRIDGES: I wondered if the maker of the motion
would--if he's including as department directors those that
work for the Commission as well as the Mayor.
MR. KUHLKE: Everybody.
MR. MAYS:Mr. Mayor, I'd like to make a substitute
motion, and I'm hoping it hears a second. I'll be very brief
with it. I'm going to be probably as redundant as I was, I
guess, when I came out of the hospital the last time, so--I
came out the wreck last Saturday night, so I'm back again out
of the hospital again hoping that we can deal with some of the
things that we've been talking about in finally bringing some
closure to some of these debated salaries in reference to
particularly departmental heads. I've sat and I've watched
us, and this is only personal opinion, lose employees,
particularly in a couple of cases recently with departmental
head people. I've watched us on the same parallel basis go
with new hires. I've watch us go with hires that have been
within the mid range while we've even debated some of the
things that we've been dealing with on an entry level for
others. I think you could go down and maybe have a wish list
of what all of us think might be important and where we may
rank those things. But I am greatly concerned, particularly
with what we may debate in Item 43A, and I'm going to make the
substitute motion on 43. And regardless of what we deal with
with 43A, I think that we need to deal with getting the
situation up or down today in a vote of how we deal with
inequity, one man's opinion, and I'm going to put it out for
substitute vote--substitute motion, rather, of dealing with
the consolidated government's situation of salary for the Fire
Chief of this county. And I'm going to make a substitute
motion that we approve Item 43 as is, with the amendment to it
that we approve the salary of the Fire Chief, which would be
at $80,000, and that's my substitute motion.
MR. BEARD: I second that.
MAYOR YOUNG: Okay, we have a substitute motion and a
second. Any further discussion?
MR. MAYS: Yes, Mr. Mayor, briefly on that one. My
brief discussion on it is that this is the particular item
Page 60
that went before the Grievance Committee. It was one that was
sent back for us to make the decision. It has been one that
was recommended, and I sat in on that particular meeting, that
the Administrator bring back to us. I think we need to take
that monkey off the Administrator's back. It's been laying
there, he's been looking for direction of this Commission to
vote it up or down. We understand the politics of that, I'm
not going to be out on that limb, but it's one that the
committee that heard it in terms of hearing the grievance
strongly recommended that we deal with correcting it. They
did not set a figure in terms of where we correct it, and the
only thing that I'm putting in that motion is that we put a
number with the correction. We're talking about who we're
losing, who we're bringing in, and I think that in that area
of public service and how we deal with professional leadership
in terms of one of the largest departments in this county is
important. And some may say, well, why start there and you're
not dealing with the others. Quite frankly, let's face it,
it's probably going to be the most controversial. I'd rather
deal with it first. Maybe it shouldn't be because of this
importance, but unfortunately it is. And I think we can deal
with the question of how we deal with the other lettered
organizations, EMA and EMS, at some different time, but I
think the correc-tion needs to be made at some point and put
to rest, up or down, how we deal with the Fire Chief in this
city and in reference to that salary.
MAYOR YOUNG: Thank you, Mr. Mays. Mr. Powell?
MR. POWELL: Yes. I guess I need a little clarification
from Mr. Oliver here. Mr. Mays has thrown out a figure of
$80,000 in this one instance for the Fire Chief. If you take
the Fire Chief's salary as it is now and add the 5% to it--I'm
not familiar with what the Fire Chief even makes, to be
honest, and maybe I should keep up with all these details, but
I don't.
MR. OLIVER: The Fire Chief's current compensation is
$72,116.
MR. POWELL: Okay. Would you add 5% in there, Mr.
Oliver? I know you were an accountant and--
MR. OLIVER: Well, remember that the way this was worked
there was going to be a 5% incentive and a 1½% cost of living.
Do you want me to put 5% to it or do you want me to put 6½ to
it?
MR. POWELL: 6½ to it.
MR. OLIVER: $76,803.54.
Page 61
MR. POWELL: So it's close to 77,000?
MR. OLIVER: Yes, sir.
MAYOR YOUNG: Mr. Mays, as the Chair understands your
motion, your substitute motion is to approve this as is, with
setting the salary for the Chief at 80,000, so that would be
the effective dates that are in the motion; is that correct?
MR. MAYS: That's correct.
MAYOR YOUNG: Okay. Any further discussion on the
substitute motion? Did you want to address the Commission?
Please give us your name and address.
MR. O'NEAL: My name is Ed O'Neal, 1014 Redbird Road.
My wife is Tara O'Neal, who was Pam Tucker's assistant. We
just walked in from the hospital, having a baby 24 hours ago.
MAYOR YOUNG: Congratulations.
MR. O'NEAL: Thank you.
MR. HANDY: Boy or girl?
MR. O'NEAL: A girl.
MR. HANDY: Thank you.
MR. O'NEAL: It sounds like to me she's losing her job
today.
MAYOR YOUNG: No, that's--you're an item ahead.
MR. OLIVER: You're an item ahead, but that's also not
an issue.
MAYOR YOUNG: That's not an issue today.
MR. HANDY: That wouldn't be a good present to give a
new parent.
MR. MAYS: And I had almost wished twins on you the
other day. No, that doesn't have anything to do with that one
at all.
MAYOR YOUNG: No, this is entirely different. All
right, we'll call the question on this. All in favor of the
substitute motion--does anybody need it restated?--please vote
aye.
MR. BRIDGES, MR. J. BRIGHAM, MR. KUHLKE & MR. SHEPARD VOTE NO.
Page 62
MOTION CARRIES 6-4.
MAYOR YOUNG: Next item?
CLERK:Item 43A: Discuss/approve placing Emergency
Management Director organizationally under the Fire Department
with appointment to be made by the Mayor; eliminate
Administrative Assistant position in EMA, at an annual savings
including benefits of approximately $30,000, with person to be
retained within the ARC organization (administrative duties to
be performed by administrative staff of the Fire Department).
MR. KUHLKE:Mr. Mayor, I asked to pull this because I'd
like to make a motion that this be referred back to the Public
Safety Committee. The purpose of this request is that I feel
like this is an important issue on where we decide this
particular agency goes to perform and function in in the
future. And I think particularly it's important for us to
communicate with the industries that work with the Emergency
Management area, and I think that it needs to be discussed a
little bit further in committee and brought back to this
Commission.
MR. SHEPARD: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: We have a motion and a second. Any
discussion on the motion? All in favor of the motion, please
vote aye.
MOTION CARRIES 10-0.
CLERK: The next item is Number 47. Mr. Powell, do you
want to take the rest of those items as a consent, 47 through
50?
MR. POWELL: Yes, ma'am. I would like to make a motion
that we accept those as a consent.
47. Motion to approve Final Change Order for $19,632.50 to
Albert's Enterprises, Inc. for work on the Rural Water
Improvements Project.
48. Motion to approve Change Order #1 of $388,433.96 to
Gary's Grading & Pipeline Co., Inc. for work on Rae's
Creek Sanitary Sewer Trunk Replacement.
49. Motion to approve low bid from G.E. Supply Company and
purchase of 14 Hadco street light poles and 22 fixtures
at a cost of $24,408.00 for the Street Lighting Section
of the Public Works and Engineering Department for
Riverwalk.
50. Motion to approve Change Order Number Four in the amount
of $240,827.64 and Capital Project Budget Amendment
Number 6 for the Walton Way Reconstruction Project (CPB
Page 63
#326-04-288811015) to be funded by utilizing funds in
the existing contract due to construction underruns.
MR. HANDY: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: Any discussion? All in favor, please vote
aye.
.
MOTION CARRIES 10-0
MAYOR YOUNG: 52 through 58 as a consent agenda, Mr.
Mays?
52. Motion to approve new application request by Linda King
for a retail package beer license to be used in connec-
tion with Smile Gas/Blimpie #300 located at 1450 Greene
Street, Suite 520.
53. Motion to approve new ownership request by Brenda
Thorington for a consumption on premises beer license to
be used in connection with Pizza Hut #2022 located at
2425 Peach Orchard Road. There will be Sunday Sales.
54. Motion to approve new ownership request by Brenda
Thorington for consumption on premises beer license to
be used in connection with Pizza Hut #2020 located at
615 15th Street. There will be Sunday sales.
55. Motion to approve new ownership request by Brenda
Thorington for a consumption on premises beer license to
be used in connection with Pizza Hut #2023 located at
1719 Gordon Highway. There will be Sunday Sales.
56. Motion to approve new ownership request by Brenda
Thorington for consumption on premises beer license to
be used in connection with Pizza Hut #2021 located at
3218 Wrightsboro Road. There will be Sunday sales.
57. Motion to approve new ownership request by Brenda
Thorington for consumption on premises beer license to
be used in connection with Pizza Hut #2024 located at
3350 Deans Bridge Road. There will be Sunday sales.
58. Motion to approve new ownership request by Brenda
Thorington for consumption on premises beer license to
be used in connection with Pizza Hut #2027 located at
3031 Washington Road. There will be Sunday sales.
MR. SHEPARD: I'll so move, if he won't.
MR. MAYS: I don't have any problem with that. I'll
second it. Just in terms of--you don't have any objections, I
don't think, on the alcohol.
CLERK: Are there any objectors to the license requests?
(NO OBJECTORS PRESENT)
Page 64
MR. BRIDGES, MR. COLCLOUGH, MR. MAYS & MR. POWELL VOTE NO ON
ITEMS 53-58.
MOTION CARRIES 6-4, ITEMS 53-58.
MOTION CARRIES 10-0, ITEM 52.
CLERK: Item 60: Motion to approve sponsorship of a
table in the amount of $250 for Mayor's Prayer Breakfast, May
7. Funded from Commission Other account.
MR. BRIDGES: Move for approval.
MR. H. BRIGHAM: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: All in favor, vote aye.
MR. HANDY VOTES NO; MR. SHEPARD OUT.
MOTION CARRIES 8-1.
CLERK: Item 61: Discuss/approve three (3) year service
agreement for investment of Pension Plans for the period July
1, 1998 through June 30, 2001 with Robinson & Humphrey as
recommended by the Pension Fund Investment Committee.
MR. OLIVER: The pension committee met. The pension
committee is composed of the Mayor, Commissioner Ulmer
Bridges, and I believe Commissioner Beard is also on that
committee, myself and the Comptroller. There was some
discussion at the pension committee meeting that every month
or two there seems to be some discussion about changing who
handles the investments. Obviously you need continuity in
that. It was the recommendation of the pension committee that
it be done similarly to an audit where it be done on a three-
year period and that that three-year period commence with the
last action taken by the Commission, which was on July of
1998.
MR. BRIDGES: Move for approval, Mr. Mayor.
MR. COLCLOUGH: I'll second it to get it on the floor.
MAYOR YOUNG: Motion and a second. Mr. Powell?
MR. POWELL: Mr. Oliver, my question is to you. You
know, coming in here on a three-year service agreement plan,
is there an escape clause in here that any time we can
terminate this contract?
MR. OLIVER: We can write it any way you would like to
do it. I think one of the things, though, if you put that
provision in there, again, it makes it--essentially there's no
point in the contract. The reason that I say--are you
Page 65
following me?
MR. POWELL: I understand what you're saying, but my
theory on this is things are going good right now. Things
could go south tomorrow and even further south two weeks from
now. And, you know, if we get in a situation to where we're
locked into a three-year contract with no escape clause,
regardless of what the market is doing, we may just get some
bad management advice. Certainly that has not been the case,
but it ultimately at some point in time could be the case.
MR. WALL: I guess the question, Mr. Powell, is whether
it's a termination for convenience or a termination based upon
cause, and typically in every contract we have a termination
for cause. I mean I dare say every contract. From time to
time y'all have wanted a termination for convenience. If it's
a termination for convenience, you know, we can write that
into the contract, but--and I know we got bit on one that I
think--where we did not have that termination for convenience.
But like Mr. Oliver says, I mean although there is some
benefit in having the contract even with a termination for
benefit, it certainly weakens the contract. I mean because
that's a two-way street. I mean they can walk out--
MR. POWELL: I understand, but I mean, you know, I think
everyone up here is responsible enough to realize that if
things are all running smooth and maybe--and maybe the market
does fall. I mean we can't control those kind of things. But
the one thing that we can control is if we have a management
problem at some point with this company, or any other company,
we need a bail-out clause.
MR. OLIVER: Well, the other thing that I've seen done
is that you make it so their performance has to meet certain
minimum standards, such as the S&P 500 or something, and if it
falls below that you've got the right to cancel it.
MR. POWELL: I guess what I'm asking for is, before I
can approve an agreement I'd like to see the contract.
MR. J. BRIGHAM: Mr. Mayor, I've got a question. Who
has been our advisor for the last three years?
MR. OLIVER: Robinson & Humphrey has been the advisor
for quite some period of time.
MR. J. BRIGHAM: Okay. But if we're going to give them
a contract for three more years, is this not defeating--if
this is an audit and this is the reason we're using as a basis
to do that, that would not be the case, they wouldn't have it
for six years. And I think the law says you've got to change
every three years.
Page 66
MR. HANDY: I just want to ask a question about the
three years. I've been told ever since I've been here we
can't bind another commission. We always go two years, we
never go over two years because the way our term runs, so why
are we going three years now? That's my question.
MR. OLIVER: In defense of Mr. Wall, he wasn't at the
meeting.
MR. WALL: Well, this is also the pension that is the
one doing it. The pension committee is the one who is
selecting the advisor. You are now serving in your capacity
as the pension committee and as trustees of the pension in
addition to responsibilities, and so you've got a little
different rule there. Some contracts can go beyond the term
of a commission, and this is one that can.
MR. HANDY: This is one that can?
MR. WALL: Yes, sir, it can go three years. I don't
have a problem with that.
MR. HANDY: (Laughs)
MR. WALL: You're interpreting that wrong. Mayor, if I
may. We obviously enter into lease agreements from time to
time that are longer than a three-year period of time. Where
you're committing the financial resources of the city for a
period longer than the term of the Commission, then the
general rule is that you cannot bind that. Here you're
dealing with a pension. You're not dealing with a govern-
mental entity, you're dealing with a pension fund and you're
entering into a contract for professional services for three
years. There is presumably a justification and a validity to
having a continuity, you've heard the Administrator talk about
having that continuity for a three-year period of time, and
that's the reason I say that you can do it.
MR. HANDY: Okay. Well, let me finish my statement
since you gave me an answer. We're dealing with pension
money. It's not taxpayers' money, but it's our employees'
money and, plus, it's my money.
MAYOR YOUNG: Well, it's taxpayers' money, too, because
they've made matching contributions.
MR. HANDY: Right. And, of course, it's my money
because I'm in that pension plan. Suppose the stock market
crashes, then who is responsible for that? If I vote for
three years and that would happen--
Page 67
MR. OLIVER: The plan is--I mean I think Mr. Powell has
a very good point. I mean if their performance is not--I mean
if the stock market goes down 50 percent and everybody goes
down 50 percent, that's one thing. But if your portfolio goes
down 50 and the stock market stays the same, you've got a poor
performing management firm managing it, and I think that's a
consideration. I mean there is a track record with this firm,
and if you want to do it against some index or something, I
mean, we can put a 30-day provision out in it. I'm not
convinced, though, if you do that there's a--there's an
advantage to a contract, but there may be some--
MR. HANDY: I'm not asking for a contract, I'm not
asking to change it, I just want to know why we go from two
years to three years. That's all I ask. And if you think
it's fine, we'll leave it like that.
MR. BRIDGES: The purpose of this agenda item was
because if--somebody is going to manage the money for you.
They're in business to make money, too. I mean they want to
make you money, they want to make money themselves. And if
every three months we're asking for bids or considering
another investment company that, according to their figures--
they're Monday morning quarterbacks and they can show how they
could have made us more money than the previous person. Well,
if you're under that scenario, and basically that's the one
we're under now because we're open to people that continually
want to bid for this position, it doesn't provide a good
relationship with the company that you've got handling the
pensions. It does not get rid of the opportunity to maximize
their profits and our profits, and three years, I think, is a
reasonable period of time. We do that with the audits, we do
it with other things, and it's just an improvement over--
unless somebody needs some more meetings with these different
financial institutions. You know, I don't need any more
meetings, but that would be about the only advantage I would
see in not voting for this item.
MR. J. BRIGHAM: Mr. Mayor, we don't have a contract now
is my understanding.
MR. OLIVER: That's correct, we don't have one.
MR. J. BRIGHAM: We haven't had a contract at all. I'm
going to make a substitute motion that we don't do anything
until this thing is discussed more. I don't understand the
necessity of having this right now.
MR. H. BRIGHAM: I'll second that.
MAYOR YOUNG: We have a motion and a second. As I
recall our meeting of the pension committee, this was brought
Page 68
forward because of concern particularly by Robinson & Humphrey
that other companies keep coming to the city and wanting to
manage the money, and I think what they're doing is looking
for some protection as well as continuity.
MR. KUHLKE: Mr. Mayor, I'll just say this one time
because it fell on deaf ears. I think it was last year. But
as a result of bringing competition in or the threat of
competition in, Mr. Oliver, am I correct that one threat saved
the pension plan $280,000 a year?
MR. OLIVER: I don't remember the exact number,
Commissioner Kuhlke, but you're right, there was a savings
because the management fee was renegotiated down.
MR. KUHLKE: That's right. So the only thing that I
would say is that I wish the pension committee would consider
competition. And when I say competition, if I'm not mistaken,
the pension plan fund is 90 million dollars?
MR. OLIVER: That's approximately right, all funds.
MR. KUHLKE: And not take everything away, but split it
up. And, Mr. Powell, if you do that, that's your best yard
stick to see what sort of performance you're getting from the
different firms.
MR. POWELL: I appreciate the advice, Mr. Kuhlke.
MAYOR YOUNG: We have a substitute motion and a second
on the floor. Any further discussion on that? Let's vote now
on the substitute motion, which is to do nothing.
CLERK: Not enter into a contract, leave it as is.
MR. BRIDGES & MR. COLCLOUGH VOTE NO.
MR. BEARD ABSTAINS.
MR. SHEPARD OUT.
MOTION CARRIES 6-2-1.
CLERK: Item 62: Motion to approve contract with
Southeastern Technology to manage Incubator at a cost of
$20,000 for 1999 and $28,000 for 2000, funded from General
Fund Contingency in 1999 and to be budgeted in 2000.
MR. HANDY: I move for approval.
MR. J. BRIGHAM: Second.
MR. OLIVER: This is something that we've been working
on for several months, and I would ask that this be made
subject to the Administrator and Attorney's final review.
Page 69
We've been passing it back and forth. The incubator concept
is for them to have a receptionist that they would pay for as
well as an incubator manager. Whether that would be a shared
position or not, that would be up to them. But they would be
responsible for recruiting tenants, providing those services,
and then the rents go back into the project. They would not
be permitted to take any rents out. It's anticipated that in
'99 there will be a shortfall of 20,000 and in 2000 it'll be
28. Our financial exposure is limited to that. However, we
will be providing the insurance on the building and they will
be providing all other services. The incubator is scheduled
to be completed probably about the first of May...
(END OF SIDE 2, TAPE 1)
MR. OLIVER: ...$28,000 in 2000, and this is a multi-
year contract. Obviously they couldn't--you know, it wouldn't
be beneficial for them to move their tenants out from their
current facility into this facility.
MR. J. BRIGHAM: In other words, they know they're going
to need $8,000 more in 2000 than they did in '99?
MR. OLIVER: Yes, sir. And I believe that to be the
case.
MR. WALL: Well, that's not totally accurate because the
$20,000 is for--
MAYOR YOUNG: It's not for a full year.
MR. OLIVER: No, it's a partial year. That's true.
MR. J. BRIGHAM: Why can we not budget the 28?
MR. OLIVER: We will budget 28 in 2000, but I wanted to
disclose to you all that we're going into this with a contract
that we're going to pay 20,000 out this year and 28 next year.
We will budget for the 28 next year as part of the budgetary
process.
MAYOR YOUNG: Mr. Oliver, those fees have no
relationship to the occupancy of the facility, do they?
MR. OLIVER: Ultimately they will. Ultimately they
will, depending upon what the rental rates are. Because the
agreement provides that it's a percentage of approved square
foot fee the first year, and it goes up the second year, goes
up the third year. So there is some variability.
MAYOR YOUNG: So that would reduce the amount of the
subsidy?
Page 70
MR. OLIVER: No, this is a fixed fee. That money goes
back into the incubator project. They can't take it out as a
profit. It goes back in to upkeep the building and that type
thing.
MR. J. BRIGHAM: So you're asking us for $20,000 in '99
and you're telling us $28,000 is going to be in the 2000
budget?
MR. OLIVER: That's correct, we will budget the 28 in
2000.
MAYOR YOUNG: Any other discussion? All in favor of the
motion, please vote aye.
MR. SHEPARD OUT.
MOTION CARRIES 9-0.
CLERK: Item 65: Appointment to the Board of Tax
Assessors from Super District 9: Mr. Charles F. Smith.
MR. BEARD: I so move.
MR. H. BRIGHAM: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: Motion and a second. Any discussion? All
in favor, vote aye.
MR. BRIDGES VOTES NO.
MR. SHEPARD OUT.
MOTION CARRIES 8-1.
CLERK: Item 66: Discuss status of Airline
negotiations.
MR. WALL: Really at this point there is very little to
report other than there is a meeting scheduled for next week,
and we hope to bring back some further information in two
weeks. And just postpone this for two weeks will be
appropriate, I think.
MR. HANDY: So move.
MR. H. BRIGHAM: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: Motion and a second. All in favor, vote
aye, please.
MR. SHEPARD OUT.
MOTION CARRIES 9-0.
Page 71
MAYOR YOUNG: Item 67 we're going to take up after the
legal meeting. And we'll adjourn the Commission, and I would
encourage you--those of you who have stayed, please stay for
Item 67. Mr. Wall?
MR. WALL: Request a legal meeting to discuss possible
settlement of a workers' compensation, the drainage litiga-
tion, as well as update on some litigation.
MR. HANDY: So move.
MR. COLCLOUGH: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: Anybody objecting?
MR. SHEPARD OUT.
MOTION CARRIES 9-0.
(LEGAL MEETING, 5:20 P.M. - 5:45 P.M.)
MAYOR YOUNG: Do we have a motion?
MR. WALL: Mr. Mayor, I'd like to add to the agenda a
motion to approve settlement of the claim of Alvin Wells for
the sum of $30,000 and three months medical for maintenance
purposes.
MR. HANDY: So move.
MR. COLCLOUGH: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: Any objection to adding this to the
agenda?
MR. H. BRIGHAM & MR. SHEPARD OUT.
MOTION CARRIES 8-0.
MR. WALL: Ask that you approve that settlement.
MR. HANDY: So move.
MR. COLCLOUGH: Second.
MAYOR YOUNG: All in favor, please vote aye.
MR. H. BRIGHAM & MR. SHEPARD OUT.
MOTION CARRIES 8-0.
MAYOR YOUNG: Do we have any other business to come
before the Commission?
Page 72
MR. KUHLKE: Move we adjourn.
MR. HANDY: Undebatable.
MAYOR YOUNG: All right. We have a presentation in the
committee room. I would encourage each Commissioner who can
to stay for the presentation of Dr. Hutchins and Mr.
Zetterberg. And we have a motion to adjourn, and we are
adjourned. Thank you.
(MEETING ADJOURNED)
Lena J. Bonner
Clerk of Commission
CERTIFICATION:
I, Lena J. Bonner, Clerk of Commission, hereby certify that
the above is a true and correct copy of the minutes of the
Regular Meeting of Augusta-Richmond County Commission held on
April 20, 1999.
______________________________
Clerk of Commission