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HomeMy WebLinkAboutRegular Commission Meeting June 17, 2014 REGULAR MEETING COMMISSION CHAMBER JUNE 17, 2014 Augusta Richmond County Commission convened at 2:00 p.m., June 17, 2014, the Hon. Deke Copenhaver, Mayor, presiding. PRESENT: Hons. Lockett, Guilfoyle, Mason, Williams, Johnson, Jackson, Davis and G. Smith, members of Augusta Richmond County Commission. Absent: Hons. D. Smith and Fennoy, members of Augusta Richmond County Commission. Mr. Mayor: I will go ahead and call the Commission meeting to order. And I know that he was running a little late but is Reverend Chavis L. Boyd here to do the invocation? Well, fortunately we have a back up. And my good friend Sister Mary Kingcannon. Sister, could you come forward to the microphone please? Please stand. (The invocation was given by Sister Kingcannon). Mr. Mayor: Sister Kingcannon, thank you for that wonderful invocation as well as for your friendship. Madam Clerk, on to the delegations. And I believe we’ve got a requested addition to the delegations. The Clerk: Yes, sir. Mr. Mayor: That would be Mr. Lucien Williams, garbage and trash pickup. Do we have unanimous consent to add Mr. Williams? Commissioner Guilfoyle. Mr. Guilfoyle: Mr. Lockett can take over. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Lockett. Mr. Lockett: Agenda item number 24, Mr. Mayor, I think it would be appropriate to add that to the delegation as opposed to having it buried down in this document. Mr. Mayor: Um, --- The Clerk: Do we have unanimous consent to add Mr. Williams? Mr. Mayor: Do we have, yeah. First, let’s, do we have unanimous consent to add Mr. Williams? Okay. And we’ll just pull agenda item 24 if that’s okay with everybody and take it with the delegations with the request. Commissioner Lockett. Mr. Lockett: (inaudible). Mr. Mayor: Okay, Madam, let’s start with the delegations. 1 The Clerk: DELEGATIONS A. Ms. Angela D. Avery, MPA, IFS Securities, Inc. regarding minority inclusion on the upcoming bond refinancing of the Water & Sewer transaction. Mr. Mayor: And if you could keep it to five minutes, please, ma’am. Ms. Avery: I will try my hardest. So first of all I say thank you so much for giving us the opportunity to come before you today. Today I am here with our Vice President, Mr. Craig Walker, of Investment Banking, our Vice President of Sales and Trading, Mr. Gilsham, and our wonderful intern Jeremy Cross from UGA. One thing we want to thank you for allowing us to come today. We are IFS Securities. We are a full service brokerage firm out of Atlanta Georgia. We are a minority business enterprise with the State of Georgia and we are proud to say that we are the largest minority broker dealer in the southeast. We have 90 registered reps, 12 executive staff, 6 bankers and of course our wonderful intern. We focus on underwriting sales and trading, municipal corporate finance, equity sales trading and we have an advisor network. Please don’t count that against my time. Okay so I am here today actually I’m pretty excited. IFS, we strive to bring ideas to the table and I started with the firm in October so I was really eager to begin researching. And one of the first places I thought of was Augusta, Georgia. So in that I began to do a little research and I found a wonderful opportunity to save the Commission, the city the county upwards of $30 million dollars. And so with that excitement I brought that to our Vice th President and as you’ll see on the timeline that was done last month on the 19. We did a debt service analysis and found the true savings was actually there. So we wanted to bring that idea st forth. So then on the 21 of last month I emailed Ms. Donna Williams after I actually left a voice mail message with her. I’m really looking to have a meeting to share the idea with her. The meeting was declined but she did send an email saying thank you for your interest but Augusta had a financial advisor that has expertise in that particular area. So with that I actually did email Mayor Elect Hardy Davis to share the exciting news as well not knowing that he wouldn’t start until January. But then we wanted to begin to come to meet the Commission and come to Augusta to share this exciting news. And when we began to look online you know to th see meeting dates we actually found to our surprise that on the 27 the idea was already proposed and had already gone through the Finance Committee with agenda item 6, a motion to rd authorize this to move forward. And then it was in the Commission meeting on the 3 to once again to authorize. And we saw a team beginning to be formed and so we were quite surprised. So with that being said we did begin to email the Commissioners and the Mayor and really working to try to set up meetings to say hey, this is a great opportunity, we know this was really an idea of ours. And so we were as you can see we eventually did get to meet with Dianne McNabb who is the Financial Advisor and she told us the bid would go competitive and she did welcome us to participate in that. However, oh I’m sorry one more thing to note that we did not find in any documents prior to this that there was any talk of this particular bond being refinanced. With that being said Dianne did day that the bid would go competitive and she did encourage us to participate in that. However with the competitive process one thing that’s very important to note that that somewhat excludes minority firms like myself, women owned firms and disadvantage firms. They had a large capital requirement that really does not allow for firms 2 such as ours to participate. So it looks like they had firms in place we have McKenna Long fantastic firm, Murray Barnes these were all within the Commission meeting minutes. Once again those are all majority firms and if the underwriter portion goes to the competitive process once again we will be not allowed to participate in that. And we do believe that if we go the negotiated route we’ll have an opportunity not only to participate but to actually provide you with better rates and we will go into explaining that. So today we’re here to highlight the negotiated verses the competitive process, express why Augusta should consider transitioning to the negotiated process in which you’ll be able to have the lower costs we have the analysis and then once again it will provide for the inclusion of minority participation. With that being said I’ll transition over to Mr. Craig Walker. Mr. Mayor: And I really apologize you’ve got about ten seconds left on the five minutes. I do keep it on a clock to be fair and so it’s, that’s why sometimes it’s better to bring things through committee to where you’re not limited on your time. Mr. Walker: Well, we’d certainly be happy to come back to committee, Mr. Mayor. I apologize we have conducted an analysis for the Commission. We think it’s essential and important to understand that in today’s market the competitive bid process is inefficient of the regulations have changed where banks now have a larger capital requirement to bid on bonds. And so the negotiated route is actually one that is where the cities are saving money. And I’ll just we’ll end here. In this chart we’re showing your 2013 deal where you did do a competitive sale and you can see that not only where the rates, the interest rates were higher but more importantly the underwriters discount was $11.34 cents per bond and the cost of issuance was frankly a little high at $13.65 dollars a bond. And then we show in comparison here southern cities in North Carolina, Norfolk, Virginia and Durham, North Carolina these were all negotiated deals. They were able to achieve lower rates and they were able to do it at extremely lower costs. And the costs that we prepared that we proposed in our proposal was $5.00 dollars a bond which is less than half then what you paid in your last deal and really would give the city, but I think and to close I think that what’s important we brought a team here that is representative of the City of Augusta. This is an opportunity that’s bigger than a bond issue it’s about an opportunity to have for the first time in the history of Augusta a minority firm serves as the lead prime contractor. And in 2014 where there’s an opportunity an idea we brought it seems to be the American way. We think it’s a great opportunity to bring the city together and where we can have inclusion of all aspects to have an all majority firm doing a $160 million dollars bond issue in a city that has a predominantly African American population doesn’t seem fair in today’s environment. And with that --- Mr. Mayor: Okay. Mr. Walker: --- Mr. Mayor, I appreciate your extending me the courtesy and I will close. Mr. Mayor: Thank you, sir. Mr. Walker: We will be sending these by email to all of the representatives so you can study them. 3 Mr. Mayor: And this and I’ll come back down this way. I know there’s some hands up. But it is once again the time constraints of doing a delegation to five minutes. And a financing transaction you know this complex I think that would be the best way to run it through the Finance Committee. I’ll come back down this way, Commissioner Lockett, Commissioner Guilfoyle, Commissioner Mason, Commissioner Williams. Mr. Lockett: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I see Ms. Avery indicated that the large capital requirement was more or less disqualified for some of the smaller companies or minority firms. And I would like to know do you think that this is something that’s intentionally done to prohibit or to preclude minority participation? Mr. Walker: Well, sir, I won’t say it’s intentionally done primarily because 85% of the market in today’s market goes negotiated only 15% is in the competitive. But it is kind of the antiquated way and so it’s interesting you asked that question. I just put up the best practices of the Government Finance Officers Association and in there they say that to do a negotiated deal it is recommended to include minority and women owned firms. It’s really the rules of the capital requirement but it’s also, those same capital requirements that have now increased for the larger firms that is now when you do a competitive deal because they are required to more capital they charge more money which was reflected in your 2013 deal where you paid what was upwards of $25.00 dollars a bond over a half million dollars on which should have been about a $250,000 dollar fee all in. Mr. Lockett: In order to be effective is it really necessary to have a large capital requirement? Mr. Walker: No, it’s not, sir, and in fact the team that we brought together today we have significant experience in doing this plus we have over a hundred wealth advisors that will distribute the bonds. It actually helps us market the bonds both locally here to the Augusta residents, local within Georgia and so it will actually help distribute the bonds among all the people who are interested in buying the bonds in a more efficient manner because we usually have a one to two week premarketing period and we are able to get indications of interest. And so the capital requirements that are required for negotiated sales kind of go away because we’re able to pre sell most of the deal at a very aggressive interest rate and therefore the capital requirement has left. Mr. Lockett: If you and your firm feel that you can save this government approximately $30 million dollars by using the negotiated route I would really be interested in hearing more. I realize this is not the particular forum and I hope that you and your associates would be able to come back real soon and talk to us. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Walker: And I appreciate it. I just have on the, I want to clarify. We have joined up with Siebert Brandford Shank which is the largest minority firm in the country. And on this chart you can see these are all the water and municipality utilities they’ve worked with around the country. They have tremendous expertise in this area. We came up with the idea sent it to the city but we knew with this kind of situation that we would go out and find the best partner 4 that we could work with to help serve the city so you could get the maximum best service, lowest rate, best cost in a way that’s inclusive for all. Mr. Mayor: Okay. Commissioner Guilfoyle then Commissioner Mason then Commissioner Williams. Mr. Guilfoyle: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The gentleman that was just speaking I was wondering if I could ask him some questions please. How long has your company been in the security industry? Mr. Walker: Our firm came in the securities industry in 2006 and the firm that we’re proposing with Siebert Brandford and Shank came into business in I believe in 1996. Mr. Guilfoyle: So in 2006. Do you have your Series 7, Series 52 license? Mr. Walker: Yes, I do, sir. Mr. Guilfoyle: Okay. And as far as what other bonds have you done in Georgia and what was the amount of the issuance? Mr. Walker: As it relates to Georgia again our partner in this Siebert Brandford Shank --- Mr. Guilfoyle: As far as IFS. Mr. Speaker: IFS Securities, we have done over $9 billion total nationally. Mr. Guilfoyle: In Georgia. Mr. Walker: In Georgia we’ve probably done around $10 million because we do Charter School financing but as I indicated we knew that we sent in the idea our capabilities within the state of Georgia may be of concern. And that’s why we went and got Siebert, Brandford Shank as our partner. They just recently let a $900,000 million dollar deal for the city of Atlanta. They’ve done large sewer deals for the city of Atlanta and in effect by having the big brother partner in this transaction we’re insuring that the city, the county of Augusta gets the absolute best service. Mr. Guilfoyle: All right. And you said the industry standard was 85% of negotiated versus --- Mr. Walker: It’s about 85-90% negotiated. Mr. Guilfoyle: Have you looked and see what Augusta was doing? Mr. Walker: Yeah, I saw that Augusta had been doing a lot of competitive bids and that’s why we brought up the last deal. If you look at your last deal, sir, you paid a fee, if that was a negotiated deal we would’ve, the fee on that deal would’ve been approximately it was 5 $13.65 dollars a bond. Even at twenty to two and a half million on a negotiated basis we would propose a fee of $5.00 per bond. The cost of issuance, that’s not under our control but it seemed high for a transaction that basically was just the indenture for your water and sewer. Those were built a while ago so really the bond documents you just kind of put in new numbers, update the numbers, put in the structure that may be applicable. So if you notice in this we saw a $25.00 dollars a bond on a competitive bid sir. And not to mention the rate was basically about 200 basis points so it’s taxable. So we measure that as a spread to a US Treasury Bond and it was basically about 200 basis points over the tenure treasury which was again we brought our underwriter here Mr. Bill Golshum and we would say, he will tell you that if we were doing that transaction last year you would’ve been about 100 basis points over the US Treasury. So it’s not anybody’s fault it’s the inefficiencies of the market that you know there’s lots of bonds coming to bid. Competitive bid is a misnomer in the finance industry because it’s changed so much that any given day the, you’re investors may decide you know what I don’t want to take any risks today so I’m going to bid this at a very high rate and a very high fee so I protect myself. Mr. Guilfoyle: I understand that and you know when this original bond went out the circumstances now is different than it was last year as far as finding interested people to actually. Mr. Walker: Well, I agree and that’s why we feel that the negotiated method rather than saying okay on this specific date you’re going to sell the bond. Well on that date Chase Bank may announce bad earnings. There’s so many things that could happen. What you do in a negotiated sale is we say okay we’re going to price at our around a certain date and then we’re able to take two to three weeks and premarket the bonds where we’re calling investors or we’re calling wealth managers in your area. We would look to do a selling group of your local brokers so brokers who live here in Augusta because if you live in Augusta and there’s a competitive sale and you say I want to buy that bond well you’re going to have to wait for the bonds to get sold for all the institutions to take what they want and then you’ve got to figure, your broker is going to have to call somebody and have them sell him the bond. Well, that’s a secondary markup trade which will cost your residents more. Mr. Guilfoyle: Well, I look forward --- Mr. Walker: But what we can do in an negotiated sale we can make the Augusta residents get preferential treatment so if they put in orders they will get the orders filled, retail and they will have first opportunity to purchase those bonds at the original issue price. Mr. Guilfoyle: Well, I appreciate the information. I look forward to seeing you on the Finance Committee. Mr. Speaker: Thank you very much, sir. I appreciate your questions. Mr. Mayor: Mr. Mason then Mr. Williams. Mr. Mason: Thank you, if you could remain at the podium there. What I’m getting out of what you’re saying here and correct me if I’m wrong is I’m looking at the competitive versus 6 the negotiated. You are basically making a pitch that negotiated is the better method versus competitive? Mr. Walker: Yes, sir, I am saying that in a transaction of this type of this size and of this credit one of the things that you noticed in the other it would better for the city in terms of achieving the lower, lowest overall interest costs and having the lowest fees would be through a negotiated amount. For example I said $5.00 dollars a bond. You have a financial advisor they may say well you know what we want to come back and do it at ‘x’ amount a bond. That’s, we basically would be bound to that. Mr. Mason: And so what would be a reason or some reasons to use competitive if in fact the goal would be to save money. What would be the purpose of using competitive or reasonings? Mr. Walker: Well, I think a lot of it is just practice and what we’ve always done. Mr. Mason: So you’re saying that’s industry standard competitive is more industry standard? Mr. Walker: No, it’s not an industry standard I’m saying that some cities tend to just, this is the way we’ve done it all the time so this is how they continue to do it not recognizing that if you notice in the example I sent to the two cities you know some people say well we have a great credit so we don’t have to go and negotiate it. But if you look at the cities, this is Winston Salem, North Carolina, Norfolk, Virginia, Durham, North Carolina these are conservative cities in the heart of the south and they have good credit rating. But they understand that it’s better for their city to go a negotiated route. And you can see the underwriters did count in Norfolk was two dollars. And Durham, North Carolina it was $3.68 and then you look at the competitive bid that you had last year and it was $11.34. So I’m saying that not all the information is always available but that the way the industry has changed particularly with the Dowd Frank Bill changing the capital requirements for banks to buy these bonds the cost of competitive continues to rise and so that’s why you see the market play currently at about 85-90% does it in a negotiated route. Mr. Mason: Well and my last thing is getting minority participation is always a good thing but I need you to bottom line it for me in terms of dollars saved under your scenario in terms of what you believe that if you were you or someone of your nature in using a negotiated method what would be the bottom line savings to this, to this government? Mr. Walker: To your water and sewer system the bottom line savings on a gross basis would be approximately $35 million dollars. And somewhere actually depending upon rates because rates do move but it’s going to be in that $35 million dollar range in gross savings to the city, to the water system. And in fact one of the again kind of nuances you may have looked at, excuse me is by refinancing basically what you’re paying at this level so we refinance and so your payments go down to this level and that’s where the savings is. But your you may have needs of $30 million or so, twenty or thirty million so instead of reducing your annual cost you would just add new money on top and your payments would stay the same but you’d have 7 twenty or thirty million dollars of capital improvements that you could make on the system without paying an additional dime in terms of your debt service on an annual basis. Mr. Mason: All right, thank you. Clearly we need some more talk on this Mr. Mayor. Mr. Mayor: That’s what we’ve got Finance Committee for. Commissioner Williams. Mr. Williams: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I’m a little bit leery on several things. One thing is why I hadn’t heard this before. Why hadn’t someone else brought this to me and I need to know what are the risk factors. I hadn’t heard any risks. Now ya’ll are talking over my head when you go to talking about millions. I have to refer to the Mayor when I’m talking about money like that but I mean I need to understand what are some of the risks. I hadn’t heard anything about that. What’s the difference in what we’re doing? And I understand we, you know you go a certain way home and that’s, you keep going the same way and there’s a lot of shorter cuts and a lot of places you don’t see and a lot of things you miss when you drive the same way all the time. But can you tell me is there any risks different from what we’ve been doing? Is there any safety factor that we ought to be leery of? Mr. Walker: Yeah and the answer, there’s no additional risks to the city by doing a negotiated deal versus a competitive sale. Mr. Williams: Okay. Mr. Walker: In fact there’s probably some risk avoided. Again not wanting to cast anything that could happen but I’m just saying certain times that I’ve seen in competitive sales a certain date is picked because you have to pick the date a week or two in advance. And then some news comes out of Washington or something comes that spooks the bond market and so rates start rising but your sale is set in stone and so you pick one of the rising one, rising rate environments. And this is a very, again I brought my underwriter. This is a very volatile interest rate environment. Through a negotiated sale we can monitor the market, we can work we can pick a date to see certain things happen. We can move the date so that we look for the absolute best time when the market is either calm or we see interest, I’ve seen in transactions I’ve worked in we’ve accelerated the process because we saw rates were falling and we said okay, the interest rates are falling so let’s get these documents wrapped up and let’s jump in there now because that’s the best time to sell is when you have a falling interest rate environment. Mr. Williams: Mr. Mayor, my other question is that you know this is on here that this has been proposed to us and I hadn’t heard this. I want to hear from the underwriter. You say you brought him too. If I can get him to just see if he’s going to sing the same song that you’ve been singing. Mr. Walker: Sure I’ll bring him up. Bill and sir to answer your question Bill is well as a Series 7 registered and a Series 52 (unintelligible) an experienced individual in the business. 8 Mr. Williams: I just, I mean ya’ll lose me. I’m on the Finance Committee but that don’t say too much. They don’t give me a voice too much. They keep me quiet. At least they try to I’ll say that Mr. Mason, they try to keep me quiet. Mr. Speaker: I think, good afternoon, what Craig was trying to tell you guys, Mr. Walker, is that we don’t know where rates are going to be. With everything going on overseas right now I mean just you know it’s going on here nobody knows that. Mr. Williams: Okay. Mr. Speaker: No risk to you guys. Right now negotiated we feel is better. We’ll save you guys money. I think that’s what it’s all about. Our team has done a fabulous job of putting this proposal together for you guys and it’s a significant amount of savings. I can’t sit here and tell you where rates are going to be in six months or a year from now. All we can suggest as a team what we believe is best for you know your city and I think the team has done a phenomenal job. And that’s why we’re here. We’re trying to work with you guys and grow our business as well. Mr. Williams: Well and I would like to hear some more and get some more information at least get this on the table to at least to be able to discuss and talk about to compare. I want to see compare apples to oranges and see exactly what we’ve got. I have no problem with that. We won’t have a committee Mr. Mayor until when? When is out next committee meeting? th The Clerk: July 7. Mr. Mayor: Next Thursday? th The Clerk: July 7. thth Mr. Williams: July 7. We won’t have a committee meeting until July 7 but I would love to see this on Finance and be able to have some more conversation and be able to talk about it. And also talk with our people to see what they’re proposing and you know --- Mr. Mayor: I’ll give you two more? Mr. Williams: --- thank you, Mr. Mayor. To see what our people who we talked to already about refinancing and what’s the difference. But I thank you, Mr. Mayor, for the time. I thank them for the opportunity. Mr. Mayor: Absolutely and thank you guys for the presentation. And I’ll say if you knew where rates were going to be in a year you’d be retired on an island someplace right now and wouldn’t be standing in front of us. But thank ya’ll so much and we look forward to having you in front of the Finance Committee. Can I get a motion to receive this as information? Mr. Lockett: So moved. 9 Mr. Jackson: Second. Mr. Mayor: We have a motion that’s been made and properly seconded. Commissioners will now vote by the usual sign. Mr. Fennoy and Mr. Smith out. Motion Passes 8-0. Mr. Mayor: And, Madam Clerk, on to the next delegation, please, ma’am. The Clerk: DELEGATIONS B. Ms. Sara Seago regarding Solid Waste Vacant lot fee. (Requested by Commissioner Marion Williams) The Clerk: Ms. Seago? Mr. Mayor: And if you could keep it to five minutes, please, ma’am. Ms. Seago: I came today in opposition to the proposed garbage pickup fee on vacant lots, lots with no buildings no structures no houses no people hence no garbage. This is an oppressive fee for nonexistence service and I’d sure like for you to nix this proposal. Mr. Mayor: Thank you, ma’am. Do we have any questions? Mr. Johnson: Mr. Mayor. Mr. Mayor: Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. Mr. Johnson: Yes, thank you, Ms. Seago. We will be discussing that today so if you’re going to stick around you’ll hear what we’re planning on trying to do and get a recommendation from the director --- Ms. Seago: Thank you. Mr. Johnson: --- of Environmental Services. Mr. Williams: Ms. Seago, before you go. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Williams. Mr. Williams: Ms. Seago, could you stand there for a minute? And I thank you for taking your time. You explained when I talked with you that you were not sure if you’d be able to attend. We think that you did what any citizen should do to come and complain. A lot of people don’t like to take their complaints but we’re in that department so you can always 10 complain with us. Sometimes it don’t do any good but we certainly understand your complaint today. This vacant lot pickup is certainly not right and like Mayor Pro Tem Johnson said that we are going to address it. We’re going to try and find a resolution to it not just for you but for all the residents of Augusta Richmond County because it was not put in or not noticeable I guess to me as a Commissioner when it was brought forth. In fact it was hidden in the detail and I get accused a lot of times like I’m doing now I do a lot of talking but if you don’t talk you won’t understand, you won’t get an understanding of what’s going on. But I thank you again for coming and I appreciate you taking the time out to come by and at least let us know that you’re interested. Ms. Seago: I appreciate your attention. Mr. Williams: Thank you. Mr. Mayor: Thank you, ma’am. And then we had the addition to the agenda to the delegation agenda Mr. Lucien Williams and then we’ll take item 24 as a delegation. And if you could keep it to five minutes, please, sir. ADDENDUM 27. Delegation: Mr. Lucien Williams RE: Garbage/trash pickup (Requested by Commissioner Grady Smith) Mr. Williams: Yes, sir, I appreciate the opportunity to speak to you today. I’m sort of on the same page as Ms. Seago. I currently own thirty lots in Richmond county parcels separately taxed that in the past I paid no solid waste fee because like Ms. Seago said there’s nothing, there’s nobody there. All I do is cut the grass and my guys leave. So I’ve asked the question, what will I receive for this $155.00 fee on at least thirty lots. Well, you can put the debris on the street. Well, I have no debris. All we do is cut the grass therefore I think it’s a, it’s not very fair or equitable. Maybe at the mill rate if this has been built into the mill rate before maybe the mill rate should come down to make this a specific tax increase just a same sort of tax we have every year. This will cost me almost $4,600 dollars in extra taxes and I’ll don’t believe I’ll be getting any services for this $4,600 dollars. Now just because I own thirty of these parcels doesn’t make it special. It doesn’t matter if you own a hundred or thirty or one the concept, the principal is the same. And I think the Commission may just want to take another look and see maybe if we could opt out. That would be very fair and equitable. I, we I have no problem with my rental houses of payment of $310.00 fee that’s very fair, everybody’s going to pay that. So that’s really you know the same sort of thing that Ms. Seago said. And I appreciate ya’ll letting me have the opportunity to talk to you. Mr. Mayor: Thank you, sir. Okay, we have agenda item 24 we’ll take. The Clerk: Ms. Karen Zipperer. ENGINEERING SERVICES 24. Presentation by Ms. Karen Zipperer regarding the increased cost for solid waste pickup in District 1. 11 Mr. Mayor: And if you could keep it to five minutes too, please, ma’am. Ms. Zipperer: Yes, sir. I’m a homeowner is tax District 1 and last year my taxes actually my solid waste went from $155.50 to $310.50. And I called the Commissioner, Board of Assessors and they said it’s not a tax, it’s for the solid waste fees but it’s on tax requirements. So basically if I don’t pay this trash fee you can put a lien on my house. I don’t think that’s very fair and there’s no other alternative that’s made an option for trash services. And that seems to be a bit of a monopoly, a forced monopoly at that when the consequences can be devastating to people who can’t afford the extra money for the solid waste services. And that’s my major concern. Mr. Mayor: Okay, thank you, ma’am. And I think as was mentioned by the Mayor Pro Tem we will be discussing this on an agenda item that’s on this agenda. So I would encourage people to stick around to listen to that discussion. Ms. Zipperer: Yes, sir, thank you. Mr. Mayor: Thank you, ma’am. Okay, Madam Clerk, on to the consent agenda. The Clerk: Yes, sir, our consent agenda consists of item 1-13, items 1-13. Mr. Mayor, if we could on item number three a correction needs to be made regarding the Director of the McDonald Transit. It should be General Manager minus the interim title there. Mr. Mayor: Okay. The Clerk: And to delete item 13. Mr. Mayor: Okay --- The Clerk: Consent agenda items 1-13. Mr. Mayor: --- gentlemen and lady, do we have additions to the, Commissioner Jackson. Mr. Jackson: If there’s no objections item number 17. Mr. Mayor: Okay, do we have any further additions to the consent agenda? Come on ya’ll. Okay, do we have any items to be pulled for discussion? Okay, hearing none can I get a motion to approve the consent agenda? Mr. Williams: So moved. Mr. Lockett: Second. CONSENT AGENDA PLANNING 12 1. FINAL PLAT – HAYNE’S STATION, PHASE 2B-S-818-II-BA request for – concurrence with the Augusta Georgia Planning Commission to approve a petition by Cranston Engineer Group P.C., on behalf of Coel Development Company Inc., requesting final plat approval for Hayne’s Station, Phase 2B. This residential subdivision is located on Rosland Circle and contains 29 lots. DISTRICT 3 PUBLIC SERVICES 2. Motion to renew the Sec. 5311 Rural Transit grant application between the Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) and Augusta, Georgia for July 1, 2014 to June 30, 2015. (Approved by Public Services Committee June 9, 2014) 3. Motion to approve Mark A. Dorner as the new Interim General Manager for McDonald Transit. (Approved by Public Services Committee June 9, 2014) ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES 4. Motion to approve the FY 2015 Metropolitan Transportation Planning Services contract between Augusta, Georgia and the Georgia Department of Transportation. (Approved by Administrative Services Committee June 9, 2014) PUBLIC SAFETY 5. Motion to accept grant award in the amount of $69,477 for the Richmond County State Court Accountability Court Programs for Criminal Justice Coordinating Council. (Approved by Public Safety Committee June 9, 2014) 6. Motion to approve a Memorandum of Understanding between Augusta, Georgia and Georgia Emergency Management Agency. (Approved by Public Safety Committee June 9, 2014) 7. Motion to approve the acceptance of State Grant Award for Superior Court Felony Drug Court. (Approved by Public Safety Committee June 9, 2014) 8. Motion to approve the acceptance of State Grant Award for Superior Court Mental Health Court. (Approved by Public Safety Committee June 9, 2014) FINANCE 9. Motion to approve allowing members of the Augusta Commission to purchase their respective chamber (surplus) chairs in the amount of $25 each in accordance with IRS regulations of depreciation. (Approved by Finance Committee June 9, 2014) PETITIONS AND COMMUNICATIONS 10. Motion to approve the rescheduling of the July 1, 2014 regular meeting of the commission to Thursday June 26, 2014. 11. Motion to approve the minutes of the regular and Special Called Commission meetings held June 3, 2014 and June 19, 2014. APPOINTMENTS 12. Motion to approve the appointment of Mr. Brian Kyzer to the General Aviation Commission-Daniel Field due to the resignation of William Welsh representing District 6. 13. Motion to approve District 8 appointment. 13 ENGINEERING SERVICES 17. Motion to approve an Option for Right-of-Way between Walter F. Tereshinski and Augusta, Georgia for an easement consisting of 0.314 acre (13,670.06 sq. ft.) in fee, more or less, and 0.015 acre (4,555.41 sq. ft.) of permanent construction and maintenance easement located at 4822 Windsor Spring Road for a total price of $100,440.00. Mr. Williams: Mr. Mayor? Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Williams. Mr. Williams: I just need some clarity on item six. We want to approve a Memorandum of Understanding. Can somebody address that? Mr. Mayor: Do we have somebody here to speak to agenda item number six? Chief James. Chief James: Mr. Mayor, Commissioner Williams, this is demurral mutual aid agreement that we do with GEMA so like right now we have a GEMA trailer out there that we use for disasters. It’s the mutual aid agreement. The other day we went to Jefferson County to decontaminate a body. It’s the mutual aid agreement when GEMA reaches out or we need to reach back the GEMA for assistance or help to get things done. And we redo this you know every year or so we have to redo the Memorandum of Understanding. Mr. Williams: Okay, Chief, I’ve got no problem, Mr. Mayor. I just, this lot cleanup got me leery of approving something I don’t know what’s there anymore. Chief James: And this is just to help --- Mr. Williams: I just get an understanding. No problem. Mr. Mayor: Okay, we have a motion that’s been made and properly seconded. Commissioners will now vote by the usual sign. Motion Passes 8-0. [Items 1-3, 17] Mr. Mayor: Okay, Madam Clerk, on to the regular agenda, please. The Clerk: PLANNING 14. Z-14-35 – A request for concurrence with the Augusta Georgia Planning Commission to approve a petition by Mary Kingcannon, on behalf of John Cropper, requesting a Special Exception to establish a Family Personal Care Home per Section 26-1(H) of the Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance affecting property containing .27 acres and is known as 3307 Emerson Drive. Tax Map 123-3-079-00-0 DISTRICT 6 14 Mr. Mayor: Ms. Wilson. Ms. Wilson: The Planning Board heard this case at their last meeting and the reason that it is not under consent agenda is that we had a person attend who voiced and objection to this use. And we had an objector call into our License and Inspections Department. The staff reviewed this case and determined that it was in keeping with the standards that we have in place for Family Care Homes and we recommended approval and the Planning Board recommended approval. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Jackson. Mr. Jackson: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I’ve got a petition signed by the neighbors of 22 individuals that live in the neighborhood and I understand that this is an issue that’s going to be going on for years to come with the potential closing of Gracewood. But you know when people voice their opinion and you know we’re elected to stand up and stand for them I’m going to make a motion to deny. Mr. G. Smith: Second. Mr. Mayor: We have a motion that’s been made and properly seconded. Could we hear from the, Mr. Mayor Pro Tem? Mr. Johnson: Yeah, I was going to say can we hear from the petitioner. Mr. Mayor: Please. Ms. Johnson: Ms. Kingcannon? Mr. Mayor: Ms. Kingcannon. Ms. Kingcannon: And then if you, if we’ll give you five minutes and then if there’s an objector here we’ll give them five minutes as well to be fair. If you could state your name and address for the record. Ms. Kingcannon: Yes, my name is Mary Kingcannon. I live at 930 Deer Crest Circle and we were looking for a nice home. We have a nice home, a nice neighborhood for five elderly ladies to live in. It wouldn’t be a problem in the community. They wouldn’t be hurting anyone, harming anyone. It’s a nice clean home and this is a place where elderly ladies can come and go in a peaceful quiet environment. They wouldn’t be harming anyone, they wouldn’t be harming any children but they would be living there having a nice life so that they can enjoy the rest of their lives. Being elderly people and we really don’t see anything that would, we don’t see where it would cause a harm to the community. I mean they’re not going to be knocking on people’s doors, they’re not going to be hollering and screaming. They’re not gang bangers they’re not going to be robbing anyone’s home but they’re going to be living in their home enjoying the rest of their life that God has given them from 60 years old to 70 to 80 and why wouldn’t these elderly people be able to enjoy their lives in a nice quiet neighborhood 15 without harming anyone. There wouldn’t be loud music going on but they’re looking for a place to live. They don’t want to go to a nursing home. So they’re looking to live in a personal care home where it would be there home, a nice quiet clean home. Mr. Mayor: Okay, thank you, ma’am. Commissioner Lockett. Mr. Lockett: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Ms. Kingcannon, you said age 60 and above would be the approximate age of those that would be residing there. Ms. Kingcannon: Yes, sir. Mr. Lockett: What is the size, how many bedrooms does this house have? Ms. Kingcannon: It has four bedrooms. Mr. Lockett: Four bedrooms, so are you going to have a couple of them are going to be sharing a bedroom? Ms. Kingcannon: Yes, sir, a larger, a large room would have two ladies in it. Mr. Lockett: And how many baths does it have? Ms. Kingcannon: Two. Mr. Lockett: Two baths. Ms. Kingcannon: Yes, sir. Mr. Lockett: Okay, now these ladies, would they be independent or would they have to rely on someone to take care of them? Ms. Kingcannon: Yes, well, they’ll be independent but it would still be a staff there. Mr. Lockett: Okay, they’ll be staff there. Would it be 24-hours staff or what? Ms. Kingcannon: Yes, sir. Mr. Lockett: Okay, now how about transportation? Will they be driving their own automobiles or do they have to --- Ms. Kingcannon: No, sir, they wouldn’t be driving an automobile. Mr. Lockett: Now will there be a van or something parked on the at the house or what? Ms. Kingcannon: It would be staff car yes. 16 Mr. Lockett: A staff car. Okay, thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Guilfoyle. Mr. Guilfoyle: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Ms. Kingcannon, who is John Crawford? Ms. Kingcannon: He is the owner of the home --- Mr. Guilfoyle: Okay. Ms. Kingcannon: --- John Crawford. Mr. Guilfoyle: And this recommended by staff? Ms. Wilson: Yes, Mr. Crawford signed the application which we required for submittal. Mr. Guilfoyle: Let me make a substitute motion to approve. Mr. Lockett: Second. Mr. Mayor: We have a motion that’s been made and a substitute motion that’s been made and properly seconded. Do we have any objectors here? Okay would you like to speak or? If you could come to the microphone, please, ma’am. Yes, ma’am, that would be. And if you could keep it to five minutes please, ma’am. Ms. Messer: Thank you. My name is Corrie Anne Messer. I live at 3308 Emerson Drive which is directly across the street from 3307 which is in question. The layout of our neighborhood and I’m sure the Planning and Zoning has checked that is a dead end street one way in one way out. We have young children next door to me. In the past emergency vehicles have had difficulty getting in and out of our neighborhood, fire trucks and things like that and of course with elderly people and that’s some of us also you do have that to contend with. It is a residential neighborhood and I feel like this is a business of profit and doesn’t belong in our neighborhood. I have no problems with Personal Care Homes but that is my objection to it. Mr. Mayor: Okay, thank you, ma’am. Mr. Johnson: Mr. Mayor? Mr. Mayor: Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. Mr. Johnson: Yes, may we get her back to, could you come back up, please, ma’am? I just wanted to ask just a few questions. I understand your concern. I think more importantly I just wanted to be clear that you all don’t feel like there’s any endangerment to you or any other neighbors in the community with them being there. Duly noted as Commissioner Jackson stated with the decrease of funding for this you know Gracewood and other medical facilities that deal with mental illness and others that need care. Of course a lot of these are coming up you know 17 in neighborhoods and of course it’s just what’s going on now. And I think the more we can educate the community about them that’ll prepare, they would be to I think to accept it if you will. But I just wanted to be clear that if you know you guys had any issues or any concerns as it relates to safety that’s the main concern here because I think this is a very difficult situation even for us as Commissioners. You know we look at the recommendation highly from the department director and if they don’t have any real issues with that typically we do move forward with it. But I would like to know even if this did pass today could you all and would you all be willing to just meet with them just to make sure everybody is amenable and I think you’re all on the same page. Because I think if you’re going to be there and they’re going to be there it would be good to be good neighbors as well as you move forward with their lives. So I just wanted you to know that but at the same time if you had any other concerns if you would please just you know state them now then we (unintelligible). Ms. Messer: Okay, I’m not concerned about safety. I did have a conversation about the patients or clients that would be living there, elderly ladies not gentlemen at this time, not planning to take anyone with known Alzheimer’s or anything like that that might be out wandering around the neighborhood. So that’s not as much of a concern as the other things that I brought up. Mr. Johnson: Okay, all right thank you for coning and we appreciate your comments. Ms. Messer: Thank you. Mr. Johnson: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Williams. Mr. Williams: Yeah, I’d like to add to that that it there won’t be any signage now. I don’t think it should be, it should be a residential area where there wouldn’t be a sign saying any particular service because it ought to look like a regular home and it ought to be a regular home. So if everybody’s in agreement I’ve got no problem supporting it as long as there’s not a sign and there’s a van out there stating this that and the other. If it’s just a regular home no one will really know what’s there as long as it maintained and kept properly. I mean because I know some scenes I rode over there by some of the neighbors I’ve got. I’ve got some music 24/7 and I done called the Sheriff’s Department I know at least ten times. I mean that’s just straight, that’s just straight. So I really have good seniors there and make sure there’s no signage for a business or anything like that I can support. But I just wanted to make that position known that it just be another residence and no one would really know who was there. As long as the participation is done right I think we wouldn’t have no problems. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Guilfoyle. Mr. Guilfoyle: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Just one question. Emerson Drive, is this a neighborhood? Ms. Kingcannon: It is. 18 Mr. Guilfoyle: All right. Is there a neighborhood association? Ms. Kingcannon: Not to my knowledge. Mr. Guilfoyle: Okay, the reason why I was asking that is because after listening to everything and getting the support of the staff I’m going to follow the staff. But anytime we’ve got a neighborhood association if people get together and put covenants to protect their neighborhoods. That’s how you fight certain issues. I’m not saying fight this issue I’m just saying fight other issues where people are trying to put businesses into their neighborhoods. But as far as, I’d rather have the ladies in there then a bunch of thugs. Thank you, ma’am. Mr. Mayor: Okay, we have a substitute motion to approve the request that’s been made and properly seconded. If there’s no further discussion Commissioners will now vote by the substitute sign of voting. Mr. Guilfoyle: Madam Clerk, can you call out the motion? The Clerk: Yes, sir. The substitute motion was to approve the concurrence with the Planning Commission to approve a petition by Mary Kingcannon requesting a Special Exception to establish a Family Personal Care Home on property located at 3307 Emerson Drive. Mr. Guilfoyle: Thank you, Madam Clerk. Mr. Mayor: Okay, we have a primary motion. Madam Clerk, for the sake of clarity if you could read that one back. Mr. Johnson, Mr. Mason, Mr. Guilfoyle, Mr. Williams and Mr. Lockett vote Yes. Ms. Davis, Mr. Jackson and Mr. G. Smith vote Yes. Motion Fails 5-3. Mr. Mayor: Madam Clerk, next agenda, or no, we have a primary motion on the floor if you could read that back for clarity. The Clerk: That motion is to deny the petition by Ms. Kingcannon requesting a Special Exception to establish a Personal Care Home on 3307 Emerson Drive. Mr. Mayor: Commissioners will now vote by the usual sign. Ms. Davis, Mr. Mason, Mr. Jackson and Mr. G. Smith vote Yes. Mr. Johnson, Mr. Lockett, Mr. Guilfoyle and Mr. Williams vote No. Motion Fails 4-4. Mr. Williams: So what happens to that item, Mr. Mayor? What do we do does it come back to the, what happens? 19 The Clerk: On request --- Mr. Williams: On request? The Clerk: --- from Mr. Williams. Mr. Williams: On request --- The Clerk: Are you requesting --- Mr. Mayor: Are you requesting it, Commissioner Williams? Mr. Williams: Yes, sir. The Clerk: Okay --- Mr. Mayor: Okay, thank you, sir. th The Clerk: --- we’ll put it back on the June 26 meeting. Mr. Mayor: Madam Clerk, next agenda item please. The Clerk: ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES 15. Discuss the Mercer Group Contract, lack of commission approval, state law and the procurement process. (Requested by Commissioner Marion Williams) Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Williams, this was yours. Mr. Williams: Yes, sir. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I asked the Procurement Director to give me and the Attorney in fact to give me some details that I had to call the ACCG to get some information on. First of all, this request to do this contract. If Ms. Sams could I guess come to the podium I need to ask her a couple of questions if she can. Mr. Mayor: Ms. Sams. Mr. Williams: Ms. Sams, you quoted me the code from 1-10-5. Can you tell me again did you say that this item went through the Procurement Department to be rebidded on? Ms. Sams: The code that I quoted I believe was 1-10-54(h) and you asked if it had gone through a proper procurement and my answer to that was yes. Mr. Williams: Ms. Bonner, can you put this, I had the minutes pulled. Can you put this on the screen for me? I guess what I asked for I wanted to. I want to know whether or not we went through the process and the code does say that anything over $5,000 dollars had to be 20 bidded on. But this particular part was supposed to go through the Procurement and not H.R. Is that right? Ms. Sams: The code that you are quoting is for small purchases. The code that I quoted was for Professional Services and I believe if we were to revisit the code it says that the user department and the Procurement office will work together in coming up with that contract performing the tasks of that contract. And let me just turn to it. Mr. Williams: While you’re turning to it the Attorney advised us that what was done was right because we were not a county. Is that right, Mr. Andrew? Mr. MacKenzie: That’s correct. Mr. Williams: Okay now under the Consolidation Bill and what was held here that we’re not a county than how counties are the only ones that can implement a SPLOST tax. How we were able to implement a SPLOST if we’re not a county? And if we are consolidated we are a city and a county and are we picking and choosing as to what we can do or what we can’t do? Mr. MacKenzie: To a certain extent the Consolidation Bill actually allows a consolidated government to utilize all the benefits of being a county as well as all the benefits of being a city. In this instance the prohibitive language is only applicable to counties only and we’re not a county only government. So that prohibitive language --- Mr. Williams: I don’t see that now. What I placed on the screen and, Ms. Bonner, do you have a copy of that? The Clerk: No, sir, but what is it you need? Mr. Williams: I need that section read out so everyone can really for it to go on the record so everyone can understand that the code does say that we are --- Mr. Mayor: I’ll give you another two minutes. Mr. Williams: --- thank you, Mr. Mayor, that --- The Clerk: Are you, okay now what you have on the screen now is regarding Section 1- 10-53 Competitive Section for Professional Services and Consultant Services. Then you have highlighted (A). The Procurement Director upon the request of recommendation of the using agency shall procure professional and consultant service in accordance with this section. That’s Section (A). Section (C) you have highlighted here, when requested by the using agency the Procurement Director shall issue public notice for request for proposal from professional and consultant offers as provided in Section 1-10-53. Mr. Williams: And I’ve got a copy here of the minutes that I thought I was passing down there and these are the minutes that I was referring to earlier that was answered on last week. And the H.R. Director was the person who administered that. And I just figure out how one 21 week we are and one week we’re not. Now we’re a consolidated government and I’ve always been told since we did merger since we did have the consolidation we were a county and a city. We’re both now one of three in Georgia that’s like that. That’s Athens/Clark, Columbus/Muskogee and Augusta/Richmond. But you can’t pick and chose one week you want to be a city or one week you want to be a county. And I’m just trying to figure out what rule are we using because I don’t think the Procurement went through the process that we’re supposed to go to because it also says that we ought to have it in the minutes and then the Mayor will sign off on it. Mr. Mayor: Ms. Sams. Ms. Sams: Mr. Mayor, Commissioners the contract itself and also the recommendation which came from the H.R. Director was in fact given to the Commission and the Mayor to my understanding via email by that office. We also must take into consideration your directive to the H.R. Director to work with a subcommittee that you all appointed. And through that subcommittee she worked to get the job description I think rewritten and some other things. But the contract itself went through the legal process. I’m not sure of Mr. Williams’ concern as it relates to whether or not it was written into record because --- Mr. Williams: Well, I --- Ms. Sams: --- that would be something that --- Mr. Williams: --- can help you out with that, Ms. Sams. I can help you out with that right quick. First of all we did approve to get a headhunter --- Ms. Sams: Yes, sir. Mr. Williams: --- but we did not approve the contractor that the headhunter was. That should’ve been, that never came back to this body. And then when it was approved it was sent to the Mayor for the Mayor to sign as if we had approved that. You did state that we have some emails and there’s some, I’ve got problems with emails because we can’t find the one that the Administrator had so emails, so we can’t rely on. That’s not the way this government handles business anyway. We can’t send you an email or get emails and say well we’re going to approve through an email. It has to be voted on in this room and this body. And that was not done and that was my whole argument that --- Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Williams, I’ll give you one more minute. Mr. Williams: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. That was my whole argument, Mr. Mayor, that the process was not done by the code. And I was told with this on the screen that it was and it was not. So the Procurement Office didn’t handle this. H.R. don’t have that authority. H.R. should’ve brought something to Procurement and maybe they should’ve handled it. But that wasn’t done and I think the process was flawed. That’s my whole point. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Lockett. 22 Mr. Lockett: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Ms. Sams --- Ms. Sams: Yes, sir. Mr. Lockett: --- was there any violation of policy or procedure in this particular item that my colleague was talking about. Was there anything that was done incorrectly or illegally? Ms. Sams: I have pulled all of the records and I could not find a violation, sir. Mr. Lockett: Thank you. Mr. Mayor: Okay, if there’s no further discussion can I get a motion to receive this as information? Mr. Lockett: So moved. Mr. Guilfoyle: Second. Mr. Mayor: We have a motion that’s been made and properly seconded. Commissioners will now vote by the usual sign. Mr. Williams: Madam Clerk, will you put that back on the agenda for next week? The Clerk: Yes, sir. Mr. Williams: Thank you. Mr. Williams votes No. Mr. Johnson, Mr. Fennoy and Mr. Donnie Smith out. Motion Passes 6-1. Mr. Mayor: Madam Clerk, next agenda item please. The Clerk: FINANCE 16. Receive final report from Finance Director relative to employees attending the June 2 – 7 SUNGARD Software Conference held in Anaheim, CA. (Requested by Commissioner Marion Williams. Mr. Mayor: Ms. Williams. Ms. Williams: This is the information that was requested by Commissioner Williams through Ms. Bonner the other day and was sent out on Friday of that week. This is a, the final 23 total after the employees had come back and turned in their receipts. And this is the total of our first event as requested. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Williams. Mr. Williams: Thank you. I requested this information and I didn’t get it until now and I’ve got some issues with that. But that’s par for the course. I was not against the travel but I more or less was upset about was the fact that we could’ve done a seminar here. We could’ve, the money we paid to go out there an annual thing where the software company sent in software could’ve been done right here and we could’ve trained a lot more people than the money we spent. We was talking about cutting the budget and talked about the Sheriff coming in and have his money but then we spend money like this. I get accused of a lot of things and I get questioned about, the media about the gas we are allotted and we’re supposed to use but then we do this we act like everything is fine. I’ve got some issues with it and I just wanted to get the numbers out there to see what that total was. And I thank Ms. Williams for finally getting it even though it’s late but it’s, I guess, better late than never. Ms. Williams: Excuse me --- Mr. Williams: Yes, ma’am. Ms. Williams: --- this information was sent to your email. It was also sent to the Clerk’s office by the date that it was promised that it was going to you. Sir, I sent it that’s all I could do to send it to you. Mr. Williams: Okay, well, I’m sorry. Ms. Williams: I cannot take it to your house. Mr. Williams: No, ma’am, I don’t need you to bring it to my home. Ms. Williams: If you can tell me another way to get it to you I’ll be happy to try to get it to you, sir, but I do the best I can sending it to you. Mr. Williams: I don’t want to get into a debate with you. This is not the first item now this is just one of many so I don’t want to get into a debate but this ain’t the first time that I requested information and didn’t get it. I just questioned something from the Interim Administrator. I got a call from her yesterday and I didn’t receive that call back. So this ain’t personal. Mr. Guilfoyle: Mr. Mayor, can we call for the question please? Mr. Mayor: There’s no question to call, well, Commissioner Lockett, did you? Mr. Lockett: Mr. Mayor, I probably shouldn’t say this but I got to say it. I’m quite sure Finance realizes that quite a few of us are going to be going to Savannah in a couple of days. 24 We’re going we don’t have to do anything when we get there. We can go and party all day all night. Mr. Williams: Speak for yourself. Mr. G. Smith: I want to go with you. Mr. Lockett: You know, we don’t have to do it but we do it, we go every year. We go other places. Some of us have even been to Hawaii so I don’t know why we’re making a big issue of this. I mean they didn’t have the option of saying I want to go to this software training in Thompson. They had to go where the training was being offered. And I think they’re giving a good explanation as to the diverse group that went. You know we spend so much time bickering about stuff that has no importance or relevancy. Let’s do the people’s business and quite nit picking with our employees. Mr. Williams: That’s a matter of opinion, Mr. Mayor. Mr. Lockett: Thank you. Mr. Williams: That’s one Commissioner’s --- Mr. Mayor: Thank you, Commissioner Lockett. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Williams. Mr. Williams: Yes, sir, Mr. Mayor, that’s a matter of opinion and that’s one Commissioner’s opinion. He’s entitled to that but I don’t director his commission job or tell him what to do or how to do it. He does it the way he thinks is fit and proper and do it the way I think. He’s not going to tell me how to do it either. Ms. Davis: I make a motion to approve. Mr. Lockett: Call for the question, Mr. Mayor. Mr. Mayor: Ms. Davis? Ms. Davis: Motion to receive as information. Mr. Lockett: Second. Mr. Mayor: We have a motion that’s been made and properly seconded. If there’s no further discussion Commissioners will now vote by the usual sign. Motion Passes 8-0. Mr. Mayor: Madam Clerk, on to the next agenda item please. 25 The Clerk: ENGINEERING SERVICES 18. Approve the reallocation of space for commissioners and the mayor in the commission chamber. The present set-up of the dais gives the appearance of three separate groups as opposed to one cohesive group. Provide the mayor with double the space of each commissioner and equally divide the remaining space. (Requested by Commissioner Bill Lockett) Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Lockett. Mr. Lockett: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. As you can see in the new commission chamber Commissioner Guilfoyle and I are sitting just as close to each other as (unintelligible). Now the Mayor I know he’s the Mayor and likes his space and independence but Lord have mercy can ya’ll just give us a little bit of space? I mean I don’t see any problem with him having two times as much space as a Commissioner because he’s a very important person. But for him to have that much space it looks like we’ve got one group down here, we’ve got another group down on the end and he’s all by himself. So I would hope that some kind of adjustment could be made so that we can have just a little more room over here and not crowd the Mayor out but just take a look at his face. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Mr. Mayor: After nine years of doing this you’ll excuse me if I’m a little claustrophobic from being under the microscope for that long. I’m fine, I’m lonely here, man. Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. Mr. Johnson: I was just sitting here expressing to my colleagues I could see Sylvia’s article on Sunday saying that the commissioners wanted to intrude on the Mayor’s space. Mr. Lockett: Yeah, that was someone (unintelligible). Mr. Mayor: Don’t be getting all up in my space. I’m fine if you want to move it down a little bit. I think that’s open for discussion. I’m going tell the Mayor Elect that we’re putting you shoulder to shoulder. Okay, I think it’s a valid request and something we can look into. Can I get a motion to receive this as information? Mr. Guilfoyle: So moved. Mr. Johnson: Second. Mr. Mayor: We have a motion that’s been made and properly seconded. Commissioners will now vote by the usual sign. Motion Passes 8-0. 26 Mr. Mayor: Some people call me the Space Cowboy. Madam Clerk, next agenda item please. The Clerk: Mr. Mayor could we, Mr. Lockett, would you like to do number 20 and then leave all the Environmental Services issues? Mr. Lockett: That will be fine. The Clerk: Okay. Mr. Mayor, can we do 20? Mr. Mayor: I’ll call agenda item number 20 at Mr. Lockett’s request. ENGINEERING SERVICES 20. Discuss the utilization of the downtown depot as a needed source of revenue. (Requested by Commissioner Bill Lockett) Mr. Lockett: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We are constantly Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Lockett. Mr. Lockett: --- thank you, Mr. Chairman. We are constantly talking about the lack of revenue. We have a money maker that’s sitting down on the river and to my knowledge it hasn’t been used in the four and a half years I’ve been on the Commission. And the only thing we’ve done is put a new roof on it. And I’m talking about the depot. I go Georgia Municipal Association meetings in Thompson on a regular basis and they have one and theirs is on the railroad tracks not on the river. And they are constantly booked and they’re making money. And we have a resource there and we’re doing anything with it. So I think that we should go on and put a couple of dollars in it and get the inside taken care of and make some money off of it. That’s what we need. Mr. Mayor: Thank you, sir. Do we have any? Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. Mr. Johnson: Thank you. I guess if we can Commissioner Lockett would you like to maybe task someone to look at a cost analysis of what we can, what it would take to get it in a presentable you know I guess condition to either rent for events or whatever the case may be. Because I’m assuming that Parks and REC would probably be the entity that manages overseas But I think we probably need to that facility as far as maintenance and things of that nature. get a cost analysis and maybe get themto bring it back to us with a recommendation of what we can do and maybe a couple proposals in the next I don’t know, Ms. Allen, I guess you would probably have to lead the charge on seeing what it would take, how long it would take to get that information back to the Commission. Mr. Lockett: Mr. Chairman, I’ll second his motion. Mr. Mayor: Are you putting that in the form of a motion, Mr. Johnson? 27 Mr. Johnson: I am, Mr. Chair. Mr. Mayor: Ms. Allen. Ms. Allen: If I could ask for 60 days --- Mr. Johnson: Okay. Ms. Allen: --- to bring a committee together and then actually go down there and do an assessment. Mr. Johnson: Okay, that’s fair enough. Would you, Commissioner Lockett? Mr. Lockett: That’s great. Mr. Johnson: I’ll task the Administrator that’s part of the motion to bring back the information to the commission in 60 days, within 60 days, in 60 days if you will. Mr. Mayor: Okay, we have a motion that’s been made and properly seconded. Commissioner Davis then Commissioner Guilfoyle. Ms. Davis: Thank you, Mr. Mayor, and I agree with Commissioner Lockett and Commission Johnson, Mayor Pro Tem Johnson. We do need to try to utilize that space. Is it being marketed? I mean who is, who does oversee that property and that building is it the Rec Department? Mr. Mayor: The city owns it. We’ve got a new roof on it. Ms. Davis: Did we try to market it for any kind of sale or I mean any kind of --- The Clerk: It was on the surplus property list but we had to take it off. Ms. Davis: So basically it has just been sitting and we just don’t know what we want to use it for. Mr. Mayor: But it is to the best of my knowledge dry. It does have a new roof on it so it’s not in deplorable shape. Ms. Davis: Would there be a better, also you know bring back a cost analysis or what, but we don’t know what we want to do with it. So is there any way we could get the right people to the table to figure out the best possible use for the city to bring people down there? Mr. Mayor: Well, I think and correct me if I’m wrong we go through and RFP process and do a Request for Proposals to see what interest there is out there. Ms. Davis: Thank you. 28 Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Guilfoyle. Mr. Guilfoyle: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Commissioner Lockett, I appreciate you bringing this up and we’ll be able to utilize that property. But if we look back at last year when we had the Utilities and the TAG office the developer actually did a build to suit for them two departments. They charge us on the average of $13.50 a square foot where average the office space is $7.00 to $10.00 a square foot. So what we could do is do build out if we have a tenant or if somebody actually rents the whole place we could actually build a suite and then add the square footage cost on to the rent. That way it doesn’t cost any money out of our pocket and they actually, the renter actually pays for it. That’s a consideration when we go to address this issue. Let’s look at that avenue as well. Thank you. Mr. Mayor: Okay, we’ve had a motion that’s been made and properly seconded. If there is no further discussion Commissioners will now vote by the usual sign. Motion Passes 8-0. Mr. Mayor: Madam Clerk, next agenda item please. The Clerk: Item 21 Environmental Services Department update of the Solid Waste Collection fees --- Mr. Mayor: Did we skip over nineteen or did we? Mr. Lockett: (inaudible) nineteen. The Clerk: ENGINEERING SERVICES 19. Discuss the ESD approach for tire collection in residential areas. (No recommendation from Engineering Services Committee May 27, 2014 and referred from the June 3, 2014 Commission meeting) Mr. Mayor: You’re up on 19 and 21 so. Mr. Johnson: I’ve got the rest. The --- Mr. Mayor: Mr. Johnson. Mr. Johnson: --- on scrap tires in this contract we took scrap tires out as they’re a very small percentage of the total contract. Running numbers back to 2010 you’re talking about .62% of 1%, .62 of 1% in total volume of what’s collected. That’s the reason we took it out. You have to collect them with a dedicated vehicle you have to run dedicated service because they can’t be mixed in with any other commodity. When we did that we went to scrap tire events trying to get people to bring those tires to us. But people were still putting them to the curb so 29 we tried several different pilot programs. In the winter months when we had some people who normally cut grass we put them in county vehicles picking them up. That was inconsistent. With an on call contractor we paid them to go through the entire county drive every road that was a very expensive onetime cost. So we found that tires are still being put to the curb. It is still and operational problem but we don’t see that driving up and down every street every week looking for tires is an appropriate or cost effective prudent solution. What we would recommend is putting out an RFP putting out a bid or an RFP for a contractor to go through once a month or potentially do a menu of service that says we’ll do it once a month we’ll do it once every two weeks bring those costs back to this body to say what level of service do we really want to offer our constituents, afford you guys the opportunity to pick a defined service level and have a cost associated with that program. The, some of the nuances that would be there is how many tires did we collect. In previous we did two tires per week. Nobody has two tires per week at a residential property unless you’re running a business. It’s not very logical. So we would be proposing a smaller number per month or even in the RFP do an unlimited number and look at the cost difference. So that way you would have once a month once every other week two tires or less per collection or unlimited tires per collection afford you guys the opportunity to look at that menu and move forward. We still like the idea of having the citizens have some level of responsibility. And that’s why we believe that the drop off and the citizen involvement and our department engagement is very important but at the same time we have parts of this community where that is not an effective path. They’re still ending up in a ditch, they’re still ending up on a vacant lot and we still need a solution to make those go away. Mr. Mayor: Okay. Commissioner Lockett then Commissioner Williams. Mr. Lockett: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Mr. Johnson, let’s get out of that box. You talked about the hardship the tires are presenting you’re talking about the cost it’s going to take us to collect them why don’t we do what many other states have been doing for at least ten or fifteen years and use those tires process those tires make sidewalks or streets out of those tires. You know we’re an Age Friendly City now. We have lots of seniors here and if nothing better than walking a sidewalk that’s made out of rubber they impact that it has on your ankles you back and so forth this can be done because it‘s been done a long time ago. And it’s a little more expensive to make sidewalks out of rubber or streets out of rubber than it is out of concrete but the life of the finished project is much longer with rubber than it is concrete. We’re the Garden City we take great pride in the trees and so forth that we have. But you know downtown in particular when you’ve got a tree and the roots are growing up under the sidewalk you know what happens. It may kill the tree or it’s definitely going to crack the sidewalk. But with the rubber you don’t have that problem. And I know ya’ll going to say we don’t have the facility to do it and so forth but this is something that we should consider. I don’t know if there’s any where in Georgia where you can do it. I know ya’ll been hiring, hauling the tires over to South Carolina or something but let’s think big let’s get out of the box. I mean this could be a way to put some money in our pockets. Mr. Mayor: Mr. Johnson. Mr. Johnson: Currently Ameresco which is the company we’re sending our tires to from the scrap tire is in the process of upgrading their facility to make the rubber chips in which 30 you’re talking about. We’ve talked to them about purchasing some of those chips but you’re looking at $600 to $800 dollars a ton. It’s a very expensive proposition and when you throw in the capital costs you may have noticed an article this week where Columbia County actually is pulling all of those rubber chips out of their playground because the kids were getting stabbed with the left over metal out of the steel belts. So it is doable but you have to really go to a high end process, manufacturing process to avoid those types of liabilities. And I’m with you. I will look outside the box and I will bring you back cost concepts but I wasn’t sure we were prepared to get into the manufacturing realm just yet. Mr. Lockett: Well, Mr. Mayor, if I may. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Lockett, I’ll give you your last minute. Mr. Lockett: If there’s something that’s going to produce a product that we need if it’s something that’s going to make a product that’s going to last much longer sometimes it’s better for you to pay a little more and get something that’s going to last and provide the services. Now I didn’t say put these in a park I said the sidewalks and the streets. And many, many states have been using it and there’s a manufacturer that does this with the radial tires and everything out in California and they’re having all kinds of good success. I’m not saying that’s it’s something that we do this year or next year. I’m not saying it’s something we’ll be able to do but I think this is a concept that it’s worth us taking a look at. Mr. Johnson: It’s a great idea. Mr. Lockett: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Williams then Commissioner Guilfoyle. Commissioner Williams: Mark, have you discussed any of this with the new owners of the tire place down on Sand Bar Ferry? They’ve got an in house situation that went through Planning and Zoning they got it approved. And for what every reason they haven’t been able to pick up the tires. Have you had any conversation with them to find out when they will start or why they haven’t started picking up tires? They got a facility on the old (unintelligible) downtown on Sand Bar Ferry Road. So has there been any conversation I guess is my first question. Mr. Johnson: The, I started with research in the beginning and --- Mr. Williams: Research, is that the paper we’re, I’m talking about? Mr. Johnson: --- it’s --- Mr. Williams: My question was have you had any conversation with the group who approved who got approved to pick up tires. They got a warehouse to put them in. They’re down on Sand Bar Ferry Road. They had not been able to pick up tires as of yet. So my question to you have you had any conversation with them? 31 Mr. Johnson: Well, sir, I don’t know who they’re approved through because as of March th 14 they’re not approved by the state to do it. Mr. Williams: Okay --- Mr. Johnson: So when you talk about have I talked to the approved people to do it, no because they don’t have permits through the state, they are not a scrap tire processor as of May of 2014. So there’s no point in reaching out to company who can’t --- Mr. Williams: But you are familiar though. You are familiar with the group I’m talking about. Mr. Johnson: I am not intimately knowledgeable of that group. Mr. Williams: I hope not. I hope not. I’m just asking, are you knowledgeable of that group that came through this body who got approved to pick up tires and store them inside through Melanie Wilson the Planning and Zoning Director. They came through this body and was approved to pick up scrap tires and store them inside of a building. And I don’t know what they’re doing with them but my question is, you say you had not contacted them right? Mr. Johnson: I have not contacted them. Mr. Williams: Okay, well, whether they’re approved by the state or not if they were to pick up tires, are we approved by the state to pick up tires? Mr. Johnson: Are we approved? Mr. Williams: Yeah, are we approved? I mean the contractor you’ve been subcontracting to --- Mr. Johnson: Yes. Mr. Williams: --- went out, okay so I need to find out because that’s going to help us I think. If they want the tires if they do something with them I deal with them every day in all of the districts so I need to get them off the street. If they can deal with the state and get by that’s a good deal. I just think we need to talk. Mr. Johnson: And I think what I would do is invite them to participate in a solicitation where they could pick up those tires. Mr. Williams: Okay, that’ll be our first step. I would appreciate that. They’ve already been approved through this body they got a warehouse to put them in and I think they’re waiting on something, I don’t know. That’s why she hasn’t had any conversation with them. So if you will get with them we might have a solution to get rid of these tires that --- 32 Mr. Mayor: I’ll give you another two? Mr. Williams: --- yes, sir, that we don’t have any use for and they may be able to help us out at no cost to us because they want the tires. Can you make that happen and at least let me know? Mr. Johnson: I can have that done by the end of this week. Mr. Williams: Okay. Thank you. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Guilfoyle then Commissioner Davis. Mr. Guilfoyle: Mark, you said the pickup throughout the city of Augusta is .067%? Mr. Johnson: We ran numbers that went by volume, tons and I ran 2010 through 2012 and it was .62 of a percent of total tons. You’ve got to be careful because you’re talking about all the trash that’s picked up at a residential level. Compared to the amount of tires it’s small in volume but it’s still a decent amount of tires. But it’s really a small amount when you look at the total contract. Mr. Guilfoyle: Well, Mark, my problem is as a taxpayer individually I shouldn’t have to pay for somebody else’s disrespect for this community just too cheap to have to pay for the tire to be recycled at the tire store. And then they take it with them and they’ll throw it out on the side of the road or there’s one right across the street from my house and to me that’s wrong of the people’s trash you’re picking those out of the trash. As far as these other cities other municipalities have you spoken to them because I know this is an ongoing issue that every city, county faces. Maybe we need to try to reach out. We already had spoken about this before is to reach out to these tire suppliers. Mr. Johnson: We’re working with Melanie’s group to, that’s kind of second phase is the first thing is how to figure out how to get them picked up off the road and get rid of the nuisance get rid of the mosquito traps get rid of these pieces. The second part of it is we’re revisiting ordinances in regards to secondary scrap tires, primary scrap tires and how we can hold the people accountable from jump street way up here at the start before they walk off and end up on a big plot. Mr. Guilfoyle: Right. Mr. Johnson: So that we’ve had those initial conversations. Rob Sherman and I have sat down along with License and Inspection and we’re doing our due diligence to go to other municipalities and figure out what other people are doing to put more teeth in it. That’s going to take more time and I want to at least get something moving to get these tires off the street. Mr. Guilfoyle: Well, reach out to your when you go to school with other municipalities because they do face the same issue. As far as I know this gentleman who put out a tire, two 33 tires for a couple weeks to see if ya’ll was going to pick it up and we don’t pick up tires anymore. Mr. Johnson: Finally got (unintelligible) Mr. Guilfoyle: (unintelligible). Mr. Johnson: But my only question is the concept that we presented we don’t like what we have now. We don’t like the scrap tire events because they’re not as effective. Are there any other things that we would like to see included in that RFP beyond what we presented today so that I can at least bring back the concept or the costs for you to approve or evaluate. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Davis. Ms. Davis: Mark, thank you, Mr. Mayor, I’m personally not in favor of adding any additional fee, I think you’ll have to come over here. I’m personally not in favor of adding any additional fees for tire collection. And I know you’re trying to move at a faster pace but I appreciate you working with Melanie Wilson to try to you know get more tires picked up or an ordinance that has more teeth in it. And I want ya’ll to continue to work in that fashion. Wasn’t, can you add more additional pickup or drop off places in the problems areas. You said there’s certain areas that it’s just not of course in the city that’s not working. You’re having too many tires that you’re not able to get. I mean what are some other options. I’m just I’m not personally in favor of right now adding any other fees. Mr. Johnson: Drop off locations in my opinion unstaffed, unmanned, unmanaged will just open Pandora’s Box. Everybody who changes tires in town would be dropping tires off in that location. So it would be more events it would be more community events more scrap tire events where it’s managed somewhere to what we do now. You’re a Richmond County resident you’re flat tires are less but the challenge there is the people who are throwing them in the ditch are not in my opinion a responsible party who’s going to bring them to an event. It’s reviewing with a social event rather than, I don’t know how to say it it’s not the same person who’s going to bring you the tire to an event it’s not typically the same person who threw it in the ditch. Mr. Mayor: They’re not very civic minded. Mr. Johnson: That’s a good way of putting it. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Lockett. Mr. Lockett: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. What if we put a dollar value on each of those tires? If someone could go out and collect those tires and bring them to you and get a couple two or three bucks you would eliminate the problem right there. And that all depends on how much it’s going to cost you to have somebody go out and pick them up and bring them back. Mr. Johnson: So like a bottle bill. I pay you a dollar a tire to go and collect them our behalf in lieu of hiring a contractor to do it. 34 Mr. Lockett: Yeah, I mean if there’s a dollar value if somebody sees those tires out there they know that they can take them to the landfill and get paid for them I guarantee you that would solve the problem real quick. I’d probably be out there in my car picking up a few. Mr. Johnson: That’s out of the box and that’s something we can look at. Mr. Lockett: Thank you. Mr. Mayor: Okay, if there’s no further questions can I get a motion to receive this as information? Mr. Lockett: So moved. Mr. Guilfoyle: Second. Mr. Mayor: We have a motion that’s been made and properly seconded. Commissioners will now vote by the usual sign. Motion Passes 8-0. Mr. Mayor: And because we still have some people waiting here on tire issues we’ve got a few more agenda items, Madam Clerk, I’d like to call agenda item 22 and 26 because I believe they’re companion items and can be combined. The Clerk: ENGINEERING SERVICES 22. Environmental Services Department Update on Solid Waste Collection fees for Vacant Lots. (No recommendation from Engineering Services Committee May 27, 2014 and referred from the June 3, 2014 Commission meeting. 26. Discuss the weekly garbage and yard waste pickup(s) associated with the Solid Waste Contract. (Requested by Commissioner Marion Williams and referred from the June 3, 2014 Commission meeting. Mr. Mayor: Mr. Johnson, it’s all about trash. Mr. Johnson: We’re starting with vacant lots? Mr. Mayor: What’s that? Mr. Johnson: Vacant lots? Mr. Mayor: Uh hmm. 35 Mr. Johnson: Vacant lots was designed on good intentions and horrible application. And basically the intent of the program was to get material picked up from all the vacant lots, getting homeowners to be, getting property owners to be responsible for their property but the way it was drafted went too far. And we identified some key problems and as soon the tax assessments went out we identified some key issues where it expanded well beyond residential and well beyond the scope of what our intention was. And it ended up with green space it ended up with industrial property and it ended up with some commercial property and we had a serious of unintended consequences. And that’s why we quickly drafted this agenda item. I talked to a couple of you but we quickly drafted this agenda item to make some changes. Our intent was to deal with dilapidated residential areas where they’re doing rehab the areas where they’re doing different things. And a lot of you have talked about exclusions, exemptions and I think the remedy to this is to change the policy associated with how we define an unoccupied structure meaning if you look at item three and unoccupied location means a vacant lot an unoccupied residential unit unapproved property on vacant lot and then it goes into A, B, C and D. I believe that A, B and C should be inclusive in our program where we’re dealing with uninhabitable due to fire, flood, other natural disasters and we’ve removed the (unintelligible) property that’s been in the mothball program or things that have been condemned. The challenge that we dealt with historically was dealing with the utilities. So if it had a basic residential structure and people were rehabbing it we ended up with a lot of debris by the road. Sometimes we did sometimes we didn’t do we charge them do we not charge them. We tied it to utilities. Well getting those verifications became very problematic for our department and that’s one of the reasons we went to this method. The challenge was item D, the property has no dwelling. That’s where we ended up with every piece of property in the city that had no dwelling. We ended up with undeveloped property, unintended consequences. And what I would propose as a solution is making that service optional so that if you own a vacant lot in the urban core and you want to send somebody by to cut it and put the material out to the road we have the option to pick it up for you and we have the availability to charge you for that service if you need it or if you want it. If you put a couch out to the curb if you’re the responsible person that’s looking for a low cost solution to get rid of the material you call us and you ask us for the service. But I think we should turn those fees off and let the citizens ask us for the service. If we do it through a form of exemption we leave the fees on and then they have to ask to be out of (inaudible). That burden should not be put on those citizens. That’s my approach to that. Mr. Guilfoyle: Thank you. Mr. Mayor: So you’re saying basically we go with an opt-in approach versus a opt-out approach. Mr. Johnson: I believe that if it has a residential structure you should be charged at some level to deal with the rehab to deal with the debris on the vacant lot to deal with all of those types of conditions. If you own a mothball property you’re supposed to be maintaining the property anyway. And it gives that an avenue to get rid of the yard waste and the bulk waste that would be associated with that property. If you own a structure that’s falling in ideally you’re getting rid of it a little at a time to make it go away. But again that’s a policy decision. If the body wants to do away with all four of those conditions that’s a policy decision that you would make. My recommendation is we strike deep. 36 Mr. Mayor: And I will say I’m in agreement with you. But what I was saying on ‘D’ if the property has no dwelling it’s you can opt in it’s not putting them in a situation where they would have to opt out. Mr. Johnson: They would have to request the service and we would make it available to them but it would not be a predefining fee that’s arbitrarily put on their bill. Mr. Mayor: Okay. Commissioner Williams and then Commissioner Guilfoyle. Mr. Williams: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The property owner should have to bear that no one’s going to opt in. I don’t know nobody that’s going to say I want to opt in to pay for you to pick up on a vacant lot because a sofa or the tires that end up there come from somebody else, they done dropped them off on their lot at midnight or before day in the morning. So you’re not going to get anybody to say I want to opt in because when they drop a sofa on my lot I want you to pick it up. They’re not going to put a sofa there and even if they do they’re not going to admit to putting a sofa there. So I don’t know how that option’s going to work. It’s bad when this was put on the backs of the taxpayer’s. We voted on that and didn’t know that was there. I see people here now who’s trying to figure out what we’re saying what we’re going to do with this. To opt out and certainly what we ought to do is to eliminate all three. I don’t understand how it got to Environmental Services out there where you are at the landfill when it comes to vacant lots anyway. I mean I don’t understand that. I mean picking up trash is one thing but then the lots is something else. A lot of cases we have not picked up trash on places we’re supposed to be picking it up on. I mean it’s been passed by. And we’ve got folks who’ve got acres of land which nobody goes on it. I talked to a young man first thing this morning who has some property there’s a pond around it. He said, you know, he’s been billed $155.00 dollars for that area. So I guess, Mr. Mayor, what I’m saying is we need to just to drop this or opt out of this all together and look at I guess another way and not where we’re charging people for that. We’re going to put so much on --- Mr. Mayor: I’ll give you another two. Mr. Williams: Yes, sir. We’re going to put so much on the backs of the taxpayer that we depend on they aren’t going to want to support anything we’re doing because we’re forcing stuff on them. So I hadn’t heard anything yet except to opt out of this thing or to redo this thing and take all of that charge away. I don’t know if anybody paid it, Mark. Can you answer if nobody’s paid it? Mr. Johnson: We have not actually sent out bills. We are required by state law to send out a tax assessment where those fees are on there. Bills do not go out until August. Mr. Williams: But the fee that we put on the tax bill we can’t enforce because it’s not a tax right? Mr. Johnson: It is a fee on a tax bill. 37 Mr. Williams: It’s a fee on go out with the tax bill. It’s not on the tax bill now. Mr. Johnson: It is on the tax bill. Mr. Williams: Well, okay, we’re going to hassle about words but it goes out with that but we can’t, can we enforce that? Mr. Attorney, I need you to help me. Mr. MacKenzie: Yes, that’s enforceable. Mr. Williams: It’s enforceable. In other words we can charge we can put a lien on your property if you don’t pay that bill. Mr. MacKenzie: Yes. Mr. Williams: I know for your tax now but I’m talking about for the garbage service. Mr. MacKenzie: Any debt owed to the government can (unintelligible). Mr. Williams: I’m sorry, say it again? Mr. MacKenzie: I said any debt owed to the government will (unintelligible) price on any property they own in Richmond County. Mr. Williams: You’re still making the rules up as you go but that’s all right. Mr. Mayor: Okay. Commissioner Guilfoyle. Mr. Guilfoyle: Thank you. I’m kind of surprised because 85% of all the money that we had spent on blighted houses was actually here downtown in District 1. When it comes to vacated houses, boarded up houses, houses set on fire, now it becomes the responsibility of the taxpayers which is us up here as well as the people in the chairs. It’s not a fair way of doing it. I hate to keep just throwing money away, good money at a bad thing. I think everybody that has a piece of property should and should be required to maintain it keep it up if not the city should take it over. But as far as the $150 dollars you know I’ve got a piece of property with an old building on it. But it’s you know I don’t have a problem doing it but my vacant lots as well as the developers as well as the gentlemen that came up here an spoke no we’re trying to charge for a service that would never be rendered. And what a lot of people don’t understand by using the word exempt when we actually exempt a lot of the residents out there in our areas as well the areas of Augusta on the trash service. They only way they was able to be exempt is by calling 311 sending an email giving us a lot of aggravation for the citizens by doing this as an optional it leaves the door open so let’s say if somebody buys a lot and they want to go ahead and get it cleaned up. Well the only thing they have to do is call 311 and they could continue to start using our service. So it leaves an open door for the future later. But right now using that word optional it saves the aggravation for the citizens not having to call and say hey I want to be exempt. Is that true? 38 Mr. Johnson: That is a fact. Mr. Guilfoyle: Thank you, Mark. Mr. Mayor: Okay, Commissioner Lockett. Mr. Lockett: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Mark, as you know I voted no on this contract but for you and all of the other department directors when you come before this body I realize that you indicated that there was some unforeseen circumstances that came about. But something that has the probability of causing so much of a disturbance within our population should be spelled out to the governing body because we don’t always read every sentence in a contract. So I would expect you and the other directors to say that I’m asking for your vote but however if you vote for this the rates are going to be increased by approximately this much. Put a dollar figure out there or something to let us know. I’m not saying we won’t support it but you know we’ll be fully aware of it so when we start getting telephone calls and so forth we won’t be shell shocked. Mr. Johnson: In fairness to the entire process this process started in 2010. I have Power Point presentations where we talked about vacant lots fees in 2010. We had Power Point presentations and lengthy discussions about the contracts where we talked it and then we included it in the contract. I may not have done a great job at articulating or ensuring that everybody saw it. I just want everybody to know that at some point we did talk about it whether it be in the budget process hearing the planning phases in 2010 but I will work better at insuring that the fine detail is more at the surface. Mr. Lockett: It’s kind of ironic that you say that because I was a new Commissioner in 2010 and the document that you are referencing I have them all here. And with the documents with the minutes I couldn’t find anything at all that came up with the dollar amount that you’re talking about or the approximate dollar amount you’re talking about. I couldn’t even find it in your budget proposal the money we’re talking about for vacant lots. Mr. Johnson: The, yeah, the one from 8-17-2010 talking concept. That’s what we built the contract from and it wasn’t until June of ’13 when the fees were actually set by this body. And that’s where that would’ve been in a spreadsheet. Mr. Lockett: Now the fees that were set by this body did you at that juncture say, Commissioners, this is my proposal let me make it perfectly clear to you. If you --- Mr. Johnson: I don’t recall --- Mr. Lockett: --- vote for this, no you didn’t because I have the minutes and I have --– Mr. Mayor: I’ll give you two more minutes. Mr. Lockett: --- yeah, thank you and I have everything else too so that didn’t happen. Don’t get me wrong you’ve already admitted there was a mistake made. So I’m not getting on 39 your case but I’m trying to say in the future make sure those things are highlighted. And sometimes you may even need to say it twice. Mr. Johnson: Yes, sir. Mr. Lockett: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Mayor: Mr. Johnson, I have a question for you. What can we, what action can this body take today to help alleviate the issue in moving forward? Mr. Johnson: The direction that I need and we’re going to need it fairly timely because the tax bills, I have to have the information to the Tax Commissioner for billing in very late July is I need you to set the policy of, I need you to define the unoccupied locations. Is it as I defined where it is uninhabitable due to fire, flood, natural disaster, property that’s under mothball or it’s been condemned and we’re pretty much talking about residential property. And we do away with item ‘D’ and make that an option. Or do you go as Mr. Williams recommended and you eliminate unoccupied locations altogether. That creates a contractual problem for us because that is specifically listed in our contract. It’s a service they will provide. So --- Mr. Mayor: It seems to me that the best remedy would be a motion to make Item 3D in the presentation before us, property that has no dwelling optional for the property owner to opt in to the service. Correct? Mr. Johnson: To that effect, yes, sir. Mr. Lockett: Mr. Mayor, I’d like to make substitute motion. Mr. Mayor: I didn’t make a motion. I was trying to set it up for somebody to make it. Mr. Lockett: I would like to make a motion that the Environmental Director get with the Law Department draft up what they feel is going to be in our best interests and bring it back to our next committee. And then the committee will approve it and go to full commission. Now will that give you that leeway that you need, to get with the Tax Commissioner? Mr. Johnson: The next commission meeting is --- th The Clerk: July the 7. The Mayor: We’re cutting it close. th Mr. Johnson: I’m not sure we can have the administrative work done between the 7 and th the 25. Mr. Lockett: But what I’m afraid of I’m afraid this is just something you just threw out there and we could conceivably be in the same predicament six months from now that we’re in 40 now. Now you may have had plenty of time to think about it but the ones that got to vote on it we haven’t, we just heard it. Mr. Johnson: I will be happy to draft something and bring it back. What I would be drafting is very similar to Item 3 with the last sentence amended. Mr. Lockett: Mr. Mayor, could we maybe have a Special Called Meeting or something prior to the committee meeting? Mr. Mayor: I’m fine with setting that up. Mr. Johnson: That will work. Mr. Mayor: Okay, I’ll have that --- Mr. Johnson: (inaudible). The Clerk: (inaudible). Mr. Mayor: --- what’s that? The Clerk: We’ll have the Legal Meeting at 12:00 noon. Mr. Mayor: Yeah, if we could --- The Clerk: (unintelligible) could go on that agenda. Mr. Mayor: Okay, why don’t we add it to that agenda? Mr. Lockett: Yes, that would be fine. That would be my motion if it’s in order. The Clerk: Okay, so you don’t want it to go to the next committee you want it brought back to (inaudible). Mr. Lockett: Because of time, yes. th The Clerk: Okay, to the July 7 Legal meeting. Mr. Lockett: Thank you. Mr. Mayor: And you made a motion to that effect. Do we have a second? Mr. Johnson: I’ll second it. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Williams. 41 Mr. Williams: Yes, I would go ahead and take that vote then I got a question I want to ask the Tax Assessor out there because I’m still confused on this whether or not there’s a lien on the building in the process and what we can do. Mr. Mayor: Commissioners will now vote by the usual sign. Motion Passes 8-0. Mr. Williams: Steven, I just wanted to know from and maybe some of the change about the building process and the going through your office as a lien or not. Now can you explain that to me? Mr. Kendrick: Sure, if a county has a solid waste facility in it Georgia code provides that counties can levy, Tax Commissioners can levy against garbage collection in the attempt to collect those fees. What is says more specifically is that any way in which a Tax Commissioner can collect those other taxes and fees it can use it to collect garbage as well. It’s a very unique situation that does not apply to all fees. For instance street lights is not a fee; we can levy against and so it’s a special part of the code that deals with garbage alone. Mr. Williams: Okay, now we’re a municipality now what’s the difference being a municipality and versus a county. Mr. Kendrick: Well, the code when it was written did not designate whether or not it was whether a municipality had different issues. However because the Tax Commissioners office is a part of a, is as state constitutional officer we’re considered county officers. And again this is just for me and my thought process is that we would be performing as county. The political subdivision that is Richmond County was created by the State of Georgia and that’s what gives me that authority. So I’m not a lawyer but that’s pretty much the way I read it. Mr. Williams: Okay, thank you. Mr. Kendrick: But you’re not the first person to have questions about the levy on garbage. It is indeed an issue from time to time that we have all the necessary documentation to prove that that can happen. It’s the other fees that sometimes cause (unintelligible). Mr. Williams: And with the urban and suburban that doesn’t play a role in all (unintelligible). Mr. Kendrick: Well, you mean the urban and suburban tax rates, no, because those are things that the governing body puts forth. I’m bound by law whatever those rates are and whatever the amounts that the body has asked me to collect I’m bound by law just to collect those in whatever manner. I just would like to comment and I mentioned this to Mark as well is about the timeline. That is indeed of importance. He mentioned late July at the time. Well we st have to start testing for digest submission about August 1 and so late July’s a little bit too late for us. We need that information from him usually a little earlier in July because we have to test the bills before they come out to make sure that they way that they send the information, I don’t 42 know if you guys remember you may not remember this but we got a heads up about this $155.00 dollars last year because mistakenly some of these charges went on last year’s bill and so if ya’ll remember that. And so that testing happens and that’s how we figured that kind of stuff out. So we need these numbers from him as soon as we can get them or we’ll have to delay the process to submit to the state. It doesn’t mean it’s not possible we submitted it later than st August 1 before but it doesn’t allow us to get the bills out early so the county and get the money in as earlier as they like to. Mr. Mayor: So you want me to do that Special Called Meeting as soon as possible. Mr. Kendrick: It could be tomorrow for me. Mr. Mayor: Okay just checking, Mr. Tax Commissioner. Okay, can I get a motion to receive? No, we’ve already had a motion that’s been made and properly seconded. The Clerk: We voted. Mr. Mayor: And we voted. The Clerk: We’re at 21 now. ENGINEERING SERVICES 21. Environmental Services Department Update on Solid Waste Collection fees for the Urban Services District. (No recommendation from Engineering Services Committee May 27, 2014 and referred from the June 3, 2014 Commission meeting) Mr. Johnson: Urban and Suburban. In consolidation we consolidated in 2001 the government decided that is was going to start providing trash service. It set a value at that point. The garbage service was going to be about $195.00 dollars a home. And the Old City had garbage collection in it and the old county did not. So as part of that when the garbage service went in to play the suburban area was charged a fee and the urban was charged millage. And over the course of time specifically in 2005 the garbage service was losing money up in 2004, 2005 and there was a fee increase to keep us from continuing to lose money. And what that did is it applied a fee plus a millage to the urban services and we just adjusted the fee in suburban. And that’s creates some conflict. One is just public perception. If you look at it today our suburban customers pay $310.00 and our urban customers pay $115.50 in fees. The urban pays $155.50 plus a percentage of their millage associated to solid waste. So you have several key issues one is public perception that there’s any quality. Two you issues where you’re providing a common service and an uncommon fee. Three it’s into the nuts and bolts of the pay as you throw program. In this program we tailored it around the more you throw away the more you pay the less you throw away the less you pay. We put in incentive based recycling we put in a variety of things and in a tax base system those can’t be adjusted. So there’s a lot pain points there. We proposed historically to go to all fee base system and we’ve continued to push and we believed that that was approved with the resolution and again with the budget. We put that out there but that is created some heartburn or some challenge and now we need to pick a path forward and define that. 43 Mr. Mayor: Okay. Commissioner Guilfoyle. Mr. Guilfoyle: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Donna, as far as making the trash service across the entire Richmond County the same (unintelligible) what does that do with the urban millage the secondary millage? Ms. Williams: That’s one of the pain points that Mark was talking about. When these assessment notices went out the way that the legislation is written it requires you to use last year’s mill rate. So in our continuing discussions and we had the urban/suburban subcommittee of which he had three commission members and then the entire commission was briefed at the retreat at Phinizy Swamp last year about the problems of urban/suburban and how there’s not a real easy fix and we need to maybe start pulling these pieces out one bid at a time. And one of the more easily identifiable pieces that is buried in the urban services millage rate is the cost of garbage collection. So when we started talking about that last year we went through a good many scenarios and it was it was always proposed that if a fee structure was implemented where the fee was the same for both urban and suburban that there would be a corresponding decrease in the urban service millage rate. That was always understood in the proposal. The problem with the assessment notices is that could not is that could not be reflective. If you’ll look at the highlighted the little pink highlighted thing. This is from our tax assessors web site some questions about the assessment to come on. Even if you had proposed to reduce the millage rate which has always been the train of thought in the urban service district, have if they went to a flat fee for both areas it could not have been shown on that notice that was sent out. So that was a problem. Now it will show obviously on the tax bill if that was implemented. But that kind of led to some more of the confusion is that these assessment notices you can’t make changes to what the previous year’s millage rate was on the new assessed valuation. And you, the tax assessor’s office they can express some of their frustration with the way this is. The bill was designed to give the taxpayer’s more information but by giving them more information but restricting the process by which it could be disseminated it kind of led to some additional confusion. So that’s where that’s where we are on this. Now the information that I’ve shown you, do you want me to keep going or you can tell me to hush --- Mr. Speaker: (unintelligible). Ms. Williams: --- okay. The first page of the information that I’ve given you and I realize there’s a lot of numbers on this sheet. But what I’ve done on this is I have converted what is being paid out of the urban service district, I’ve converted it to a corresponding millage rate. It is costing $2.5 million dollars to cover the garbage collection out of the millage rate that is in the urban service district. There are 12,842 parcels in the urban service district and I’ve you the digest to. So if you do that conversion the millage equivalent is 2.787 mills. So that would be a corresponding credit where the urban service millage rate would be reduced. And what you have here is some examples of what would happen to the various properties. The top part is residential properties. As we’ve all said before they are paying unequal amount for trash because it’s based on the hybrid system of a piece of the millage and then a flat fee. So this would be the effect on the value of residential property. Now down at the bottom it becomes rather obvious where a portion of the cost of paying for garbage service is coming from. These are your 44 commercial properties who pay the same millage rate as your residential customers. They would also receive the corresponding millage rate reduction because you can’t set one millage rate for residential property owners and another one for commercial property owners. That’s not legal. So those are some examples of the differences that the values of those properties would pay. This is a lot of information I apologize but we’ve had it ready and this discussion has gotten delayed a couple of times. But on the next page you’ll see something that is really similar to the information that I presented out at Phinizy Road. This shows the difference between what happened with the millage rate in the suburban district and in the urban service districts and their various house values on here. As you know everybody pays the county wide millage rate and that’s on both sides. In suburban districts you pay a separate millage rate for fire protection. In the urban service district that service was rolled into the one mill rate that the urban service district paid. It covered everything like the spaghetti sauce it’s all in that one mill rate. Mr. Guilfoyle: Would you let the people know the fire, the lights? Ms. Williams: Right, right, so you’ve got the two different ways and methodologies that our group of citizens pay for their services the last line on here of course being garbage. So you’ve got the urban service district person that has the fee of $115.50 but yet everyone in the suburban district pays $310.50. And because the remaining service is in that millage rate you can see that the two citizens do indeed pay different amounts for the same services and we’ve known that. We’ve struggled for years to attempt to fix this and met and met and met and everybody, the only thing that everybody can agree on is it’s very complicated and there’s going to be a whole bunch of people that aren’t going to be happy at the end of the day. On the next page you’ve got what would happen to the ‘C’ in both areas for garbage. And as you can see immediately the differences between the two services are a lot closer now than they were on your previous page when your suburban service district was still paying the $459.17. That’s doesn’t change. But your homeowner in the urban service district who was paying $266.79 is now paying $436.00 and yes that is an increase but it is still an amount that is somewhat less than the suburban district taxpayer. And those two numbers stay closer a lot further down the page than they did in the previous example. And the reason that they are still apart is because of the, there’s still the differences in the way that they pay those services if you’ve got street lights and fire protection and some other items that are covered by the millage rate that is still set in the urban service district pay for those services. It can’t just go away because it funds the services that are being provided by the government. So what the decision that needs to be made from this body and Mr. Kendrick spoke to you about the kind of timeframe that we’re under is we either continue with this hybrid methodology that we’re using or we take the first step in attempting to equalize the way that our entire body of citizens are paying for services that are offered by this government. And the recommendation of the Finance Department would be that you convert the garbage service to a fee based structure instead of the hybrid structure that you have. You can do it all at one time or you can phase it in. That was discussed at the subcommittee and there was some, that was bounced around a little bit. And Mr. Mason I’m sure remembers that also. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Guilfoyle, you still have the floor. Mr. Guilfoyle: Yes, sir. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I’d like to thank my colleague Mr. Mason. Last year and a half ago we was on the urban/suburban committee and people don’t 45 realize how difficult with all the obstacles every time we come up with a solution there’s another obstacle. The Tax Commissioner, Mark was there, the Attorney was there as well as you, Donna. But the main thing is people want it to be fair and equitable across the floor, across the board for the entire Richmond County. I looked at it today where Macon Bibb County they’re just a newly consolidated government. Guess what they’re facing the same challenges right now so whoever gets to the plate first and comes up with a solution maybe we can learn off of each other. But this is a great start as the probably the fairest and equitable way for every taxpayer in Augusta Richmond County because again we shouldn’t be subsidizing people for a service at the backs of the other taxpayers. So it’s a start and I know we still have a long road to hoe on this urban/suburban and if we could do a millage where it’s the same across the board for an entire county if we could get to that point and actually do the trash on a separate invoice I think the people would be more receptive to that. Mr. Mayor: We’ve been hoeing this road since I’ve been up here for nine years and I’ve bet it’s still going to be getting hoed when I leave office. No pun intended. Commissioner Lockett. Mr. Lockett: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank my colleague Commissioner Guilfoyle but I just want to tell him that that was Commissioner Jerry Brigham and Bill Lockett that had this project before you even came on this body. And it is complicated and I don’t know any consolidated government in the state of Georgia that has completely figured this thing out because I think Macon and Bibb was in much better shape than us because they just recently consolidated. But this is a problem and you’re going to make some people extremely unhappy and the others you’re going to make unhappy so this is a losing effort we’re ending up with. Thank you very much. Mr. Mayor: Thank you, sir. If there’s no further discussion --- Mr. Johnson: Mr. Mayor, I just want --- Mr. Mayor: Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. Mr. Johnson: --- to ask a question. Donna, I know this has already been, well, I’m not going to say implemented but it’s been primarily implemented. Have ya’ll, is there any way that the questions and the concerns I’ve had the people, well, I guess it was such a tremendous amount for them all at one time. And I don’t know whether there’s any way for us to maybe do it in a, you know, a phase, you know, I guess 2014 they pay a certain amount and then in 2015 they pay a certain amount until it eventually equals what it should be and what you’re proposing here. That’s been the biggest concern for a lot of people because it’s like they had no notice. And I had a guy call the other day and he’s just like I don’t know whether or not it’s going to be another increase next year. And I’m concerned about that so have ya’ll looked at possibly maybe phasing it in and in that they better, it’s a better understanding as how this because a lot of people, you know, honestly they just got, you know, got content with that and they didn’t think there was going to be any change. And they didn’t know the issues that we know of. So now they’re looking at it like okay you guys are upping my taxes and that’s not really what it is it’s 46 just you know it’s two different fees and so what is the plan in moving forward with that or have ya’ll? Ms. Williams: Yes, sir, it was, it was discussed in pretty much detail in the subcommittee and the consensus of the subcommittee and I might paraphrase this was pretty much we’ll do it at one time and get our butts kicked all at once. Is that pretty accurate? So --- Mr. Mayor: Let’s do that at the last meeting of this year. Ms. Williams: --- but I mean it could, the other it was proposed that it get phased in, you know, one half this year and one half the next. Obviously your mill rate credit would be less approximately probably about half --- Mr. Johnson: Right. Ms. Williams: --- and you split the difference between the increase from the $155.00 to the $310.00. And I can do the numbers if you’ll just --- Mr. Johnson: Tell you what to do. Ms. Williams: --- tell me which way you want to handle it. Mr. Johnson: All right, it seems like we’ll do it all in one shot so. Mr. Guilfoyle: So moved. The Clerk: That’s you, Mr. Guilfoyle? Mr. Guilfoyle: Yes, ma’am. The Clerk: Okay, let me make sure you’re receiving the recommendation of the Finance Director regarding the flat fee --- Mr. Guilfoyle: Yes, ma’am. The Clerk: --- with the mill rate credit model. Mr. Guilfoyle: Yes, ma’am. The Clerk: Is that right, Ms. Williams? Okay. Mr. Mayor: We have a motion. Do we have a second? Mr. Jackson: I’ll second it. 47 Mr. Mayor: We have a motion that’s been made and properly seconded. If there’s no further discussion Commissioners will now vote by the usual sign. Motion Passes 8-0. Mr. Mayor: Commissioner Lockett, I’d like to recognize you. Mr. Lockett: Mr. Mayor, I have two agenda items out here. I’d like to send them back to committee if I can figure out what two they are. The Clerk: 23 and 25, sir. ENGINEERING SERVICES 23. Consider assuming responsibility for a highway beautification project for Gordon Highway and Deans Bridge Road extending from Regency Mall to Fort Gordon’s Cyber Command Main Gate and Gate 5 respectively. Task Code Enforcement with ensuring that all properties in referenced areas are compliant with local policies. (Requested by Commissioner Bill Lockett) 25. Provide an assessment of any potential progress that has been made relative to the development of the Regency Mall Property. This unsightly property is located at the intersection of two of the most heavily traveled roads in the city. (Gordon Highway/Deans Bridge Road). The condition of this Mall has impeded economic growth in this area for many years. South Augusta development is as important as downtown development and must receive the same amount of attention that is devoted to the development of downtown Augusta. (Requested by Commissioner Bill Lockett) Mr. Lockett: Madam Clerk, thank you so much. I’d like to send those back to committee please. Mr. Mayor: Are you putting that in the form of a motion? Mr. Lockett: That was the motion, Mr. Mayor. Mr. Mason: Second. Mr. Mayor: We have a motion that’s been made and properly seconded. Commissioners will now vote by the usual sign. Motion Passes 8-0. Mr. Mayor: With no further business to come before the body we stand adjourned. [MEETING ADJOURNED] Lena Bonner Clerk of Commission 48 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 the Augusta Richmond County Commission held on June 17, 2014. ______________________________ Clerk of Commission 49 50