CITY OF EUREKA SPRINGS
COUNCIL
MEETING MINUTES
The
March 2, 2000 meeting was called to order at 7:10 p.m. by Mayor Beau Satori.
It
was held in the courtroom of the Western District Courthouse.
PRESENT: Mayor
Satori, and Alderpersons Jeffrey, Schrader, Stoppel, Freeland and Sumpter. Alderwoman Taylor was absent.
ALSO
PRESENT: Susan Lourne, Ed Leswig,
Georgia Rubley, Glenna Booth, Virginia Voiers, Royal Alcott, Glen and Carol
Strange, James DeVito, Ruby Alexander, L. J. Smole, Bill Earngey, Bruce Levine,
Davie White,Cynthia Hudson, Karen Brawley, Phyllis Shimaka, Bob McVey, Diane
Murphy, Kirby Murray, Earl Hyatt, Don
Matt, Kim Dickens, Tom Laub, and Clerk Lee.
PLEDGE OF
ALLEGIANCE: Ms. Dickens led in the
Pledge of Allegiance.
APPROVAL OF
THE AGENDA:
Ms. Dickens
announced that the approval of the Minutes of February 17th, 2000,
is postponed until the March 17th
City Council Meeting.
It was
suggested by Ms. Dickens to move item 1, under New Business, to the beginning
so that Mr. Murray could leave at a reasonable time. The Mayor suggested that it be put under Commission, Committee,
and Authority reports and vacancies. The
motion was made and seconded to approve the agenda as amended. All were in favor, 6/0/0.
Members of the
Preservation Society, Georgia Rubley, Virginia Voiers, Glenna Booth, and Royal
Alcott came to present the Mayor and the City of Eureka Springs with a replica
of an 1880 Flag which was in existence at the time Eureka Springs was born.
APPROVAL OF
THE MINUTES:
The minutes
were postponed until the March 2nd, 2000 Council Meeting.
COMMISSION,
COMMITTEE AND AUTHORITY REPORTS AND VACANCIES:
DEPARTMENT
HEAD COMMENTS:
Mary Springer
had been nominated by the Mayor at the last meeting for Position No. 5 on the
Historic District Commission. The motion
was made and seconded to approve. All
were in favor to approve, 5/0/0.
The Mayor
nominated Calvin Cotton for Position No. 1 on the CAPC.
Kelley Simon
had been nominated by the Mayor for Position No. 5 on the Parks and Recreation
Commission. The motion was made and
seconded to approve. All were in favor,
5/0/0.
Mayor Satori
nominated Dr. Jim Fain for Position No. 3 on the Hospital Commission.
The motion was
made and seconded to approve, and the vote was 5/0/0.
The Mayor
reported that Bennie Clark had agreed to serve another term in Position No. 2
on the Cemetery Commission. The motion
was made and seconded to approve, 5/0/0.
UNFINISHED
BUSINESS:
Discussion regarding burying the power
lines under Planer Hill, (Kirby Murray);
Mr. Murray
said he is in favor of burying the power lines.
He is concerned about the expense.
He has bought the conduit and casing from the Street Fund. He knows that the expenses can be brought
against the grant money if it comes. He
said conduit has to be laid by an electrician .
He also said that four crossings were necessary, to go under the
road. He wanted the Council to know that
he had not budgeted for this expense and that an adjustment would have to be
made mid-year.
Mayor Satori
said that back in October, he had applied for a $500,000 T-21 grant to be used
for burying power lines from the top of Planer Hill to Spring Street. The grant awarded is $175,000 and it is an
80%-20% grant, which means the City will have to come with $35,000. This amount is not in the budget. The Mayor said the State has not instructed
him specifically as to how the money can be used. He directed Mr. Murray to lay down sections
of casing, to go under the street, to hold the conduit, which will have to be installed
by an electrician. The total cost so far
is $5802, excluding the cost to have the electrician lay conduit. The cost to drill under the street later
would be very expensive.
Mr. Murray
said that the next project is the Planer Hill Sidewalk project. It would seem that burying the casing and
conduit would seem to be the sensible thing to do, before the sidewalk is laid
down. Just the cost of the conduit is
$18,106 ($8.23 per square foot times
2,200 feet). That does not
include the cost of the electrician, and elbows, junction boxes and anything
else that might be needed.
Diane Murphy,
Finance Director, said that the $35,000 for the matching grant has not been
budgeted for and an adjustment will have to be made mid-year. She had been trying to reach the Auditor to
find out if the expense for burying itilities can come out of Street
Funds. It will certainly come out of the
grant money when we are able to use it.
Mr. Murray
said the plans for burying the utility lines will have to be drawn up and
submitted, he believed, by June 1st.
The Highway Department delayed the Planer Hill Sidewalk being built, so
they gave us an extension as to when the money must begin to be spent.
Mr. Murray
said that Grand Avenue has been started and is due to be finished this year.
Alderman
Jeffrey said that the Mayor applied for the grant without a budget amendment
and without approval from the Council, and from a financial standpoint it
should come out of the Mayor’s budget.
DEPARTMENT
HEAD COMMENTS:
There were no
department head comments.
CITY
ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT’S REPORT:
Ms. Dickens
announced that Monday, March 20th, 2000, is Arbor Day. At that point the City Clerk asked for ideas
for the celebration from the community.
Mayor Satori suggested that Parks and Recreation help. 1999 is the eighteenth year to receive the
Tree City Award, and that will be awarded at the celebration by the Forestry
Department for Carroll County.
UNFINISHED
BUSINESS:
Ordinance No. 1829, Amending Title
Eleven of the Municipal Code:
The motion was
made and seconded to suspend the rules and place Ordinance No. 1829 on its
third and final reading by title only.
The role call vote was 4/1/0, with Alderman Schrader voting no.
Ms. Dickens
read the ordinance by title only.
The motion was
made and seconded to approve.
Alderman
Schrader stated that he wanted the ordinance to include a list of things
homeowners can do inside their homes without asking permission.
Ms. Dickens
said that she had understood that the handout she had staff working on had been
okayed by Alderman Schrader. It was
going to give the information needed in cases of people who are working on
their own homes.
Alderman
Freeland said his concern was with how many projects are done in the City
without qualified people doing them. He
agrees with the spirit intended for public relations, but he would not like to
tamper with the ordinance.
The motion was
made and seconded to amend the ordinance by inserting a new clause,
11.04.02(a).1, Owners may work on the interiors of their buildings without
permission or inspection from the City, except for those operations which the
ordinance specifically states require permission from the City and are subject
to follow up inspections He also said
that it be renumbered one and two to two and three. Alderman Freeland seconded for discussion
sake. The vote was Schrader andJeffrey,
yes, and, Sumpter, Freeland, and Stoppel, no, 2/3/0.
The vote on
the original motion was 4/1/0, with Alderman Schrader voting no.
Discussion regarding the legal opinion
of the Great Passion Play collecting CAPC Tax:
The Smith
Foundation is listed as a 501 C 3 organization and the legal opinion of the
State is that they cannot collect the CAPC tax for the City.
James DeVito
said that the State tax for attractions can be collected. The attractions in the City cannot be taxed.
Alderman
Jeffrey said there is a distinction about the line of business CAPC tax can be
collected from. It cannot be collected
on the attraction ticket sales. The
Passion Play businesses that were going to collect the tax were the gift shop
and the restaurant. He said that he had
a copy of a bill that was passed in the 1999 regular session. It said if a charitable organization sold new
tangible personal property, it would be subject to gross receipts tax if the
sales competed with for-profit businesses.
The gift shop and the restaurant were the only two businesses at the
Passion Play that were to collect the tax, and they definitely are in competition
to shops and restaurants in town. It
seems that the State has passed legislation that is in direct conflict with
itself. He said the City should follow
up on this with a letter asking the directors of the Passion Play what they
would like to do in this situation.
Alderman
Schrader read a long law that said basically that if the IRS exempts them from
being taxed, they may not collect CAPC tax.
Alderman
Freeland asked Ms. Dickens to contact the Passion Play and find out, based on
what the findings are, if they still want to pursue collecting the tax for
Eureka Springs. He asked that if they do
want to pursue it, the subject go on the
March 16th, 2000 meeting agenda.
NEW BUSINESS:
The motion was
made and seconded to move item no. 3, creation of a Parks and Recreation
Department to item no. 1 under new business.
All were in favor, 5/0/0.
Discussion regarding the creation of a
Parks and Recreation Department, (Dave Jeffrey):
Alderman
Jeffrey said that three years ago the suggestion was made to create a Parks and
Recreation Department. The idea was
brought up because of the added responsibility of Lake Leatherwood Park. The budget was about $100,000 and now it is
$400,000 annually. He has received many
calls, most of them negative, about the actions of the new commission. He said that none of the commissioners have
any management experience. The only
person who did have was Nikki Cherry, who is no longer there.
Alderman
Schrader said it would be a terrible burden on the City.
Alderman
Freeland said he could understand peoples’ concerns because it is a big
management issue. He also said he has
the same concerns and they are for all of the City’s commissions. He said the City should be helping commissioners
and not criticizing them.
Several people
spoke and some said they thought there should be Council representation on the
commission like there is on the CAPC. Ed
Leswig and Glen Strange were two who thought that Council representation is
important. Jack Byrne wanted to know
what a department can do that a commission can’t do.
Alderman
Freeland said the Council should have a work session with commission chairmen,
to discuss some of the issues that face them, and ask if the council can help
in any way.
Alderman
Sumpter said he has read and heard a great deal about what Parks is doing but
he really didn’t know which idea was best.
Mayor Satori
said in past years he had favored it becoming a department, because it seemed
to have so little support from the City Council. He felt that if it were a department, it
would get more recognition and funding from the council. This is a much stronger commission than the
City has ever had and has addressed and solved many of the commission’s
problems. He said the Council can create
a department, hire a director, and hope it works out, or have an advisory board
who really has no power except to advise.
Otherwise the director would be bringing every problem to the Council to
vote on.
He said he
fully supports the efforts of the commission.
Alderman
Schrader mentioned the new system for accounting that the Administration
Department is going to be implementing.
When the system is in place the City will take over the accounting for
the commissions.
Karen Brawley,
Parks commissioner, said she wanted to let the community know that the Parks
Commission is not running amuck! She
said they are sincerely dedicated to getting things done to the best of their
ability and they were working very hard.
She was sincerely concerned about what would happen to the land if the
Parks Commission did not have custody of it.
Glenn Strange
took exception to the present Parks Commission taking credit for things that
were decided on before the new people came in.
He was outraged at many of the comments, and offered documentation to
any Council Member who would be interested in seeing what the last
commissioners carried out.
Jack Byrne
said the Council needs to take a closer hand at working with
commissioners. He said when he was on a
commission, he felt that the City really didn’t consider the commission part of
City government, and that continuity can only be maintained by the
commissioners and the council working together to a common goal. One of the most important things is for the
City to let people know where their perimeters are and how to make judgments
according to the laws of the City.
After much
discussion, Alderman Jeffrey said that he had been asked by many people to
bring the idea to the table. He said it
was evident to him that the idea had insufficient support.
He felt that
many good ideas have come from the discussion.
Commission
Chairman Bill Earngey spoke. He said
Nikki Cherry wasn’t fired; she resigned.
He said they cut the budget from $400,000 by 52 %, so that they can do
more bricks and mortor projects. He is
proud of the work that has been done.
Phyllis
Shimaka spoke as a county citizen on why she thought a department should be
formed. Her concern is that the Mayor
and the City Administrator do not oversee the commission and that there are no
professionals serving on the commission.
Chairman
Earngey listed the professionals that they have and that they will be hiring.
The motion was
made and seconded to have a short recess.
All were in favor, 5/0/0. The
meeting recessed at 9:10 and reconvened at 9:25 p.m.
Commissioner
Levine invited anyone who was interested to attend a meeting on Friday, March
17th, at one o’clock at Harmon Park.
It is an informal meeting with the grants supervisor. He also said he would support the idea of
someone from the Council being on the commission.
Alderman
Freeland said that there should be a work session with all of the Commission
Chairmen.
Discussion regarding Special Election
issues:
Ms. Dickens
said a date has already been set for a special election on June 6th. She is sure the City’s issues could be
included.
Alderman
Schrader told the Council that a petition was circulated against the bond issue
for the police building and all of the banks and the bond company said they
would withdraw if there was a petition.
He said the Council might just as well rescind the ordinance and start
over. There was no support from the rest
of the Council to do so.
He said that a
bond might be necessary to improve Lake Leatherwood Dam.
Mayor Satori said it might be good to get
public opinion on the building of a new Tourism Headquarters. Also, annexation issues may go on there. Until help is available to do the work on the
dam, the City may have to entertain borrowing some of the funds.
The motion was
made and seconded to approve June 6th, 2000, as the date for a
special election. The vote was 4/1/0,
with Alderman Schrader voting no.
Alderman
Jeffrey is still of the opinion that the City should challenge the State on
their findings on the dam. He thinks the
City should get a second opinion. He
cannot really agree with the findings.
He said we should not assume that it really should be done.
Discussion regarding Ordinance No.
1835, adopting new code for the City of Eureka Springs, (Kim Dickens):
Ms. Dickens
had given the ordinance to the council for them to look over. She then passed out the codification to take
home and study. There are five sections
that are waiting for the new ordinances to be put in. The sections that are missing are Title 11,
which was finished tonght, Landscaping, Trees, Zoning, and Signs. The ordinances are sent to the codifier who
send the pages back for our code books.
There will be an updated CD rom so that the book can be put in the
computor and also on the web.
The books are
very expensive. They are numbered and
anyone going out of office is responsible for turning in the books in the
condition they are in now. Don’t deface
the books or take pages out of them.
The last time
there was a codification was in 1978.
The Council decided to start working on the code book at the March 17th,
000, meeting.
The City has a
plan to put a computor on a desk in the
front lobby for citizens to look things up on.
Discussion regarding Title 14, Zoning,
video arcades and wedding chapels:
There was
comment that this was not proper to be on the agenda now, with the new zoning
ordinance so close to being brought to the council.
Ms. Dickens
said that there was a great deal of pressure brought to bear, from members of
the community to bring this to the council table. She would have no problem with the council
giving it back to the Planning Commission and the people would have to wait for
the new ordinance. That is a decision
the council can make.
L.J. Smole
said there is no instrument within the City Code to instruct her how to proceed
with this. She asked the council to make
the decision.
Mayor Satori
said that Ms. Smole cannot issue a business license to people as the ordinance
stands now. The new ordinance covers the
issues.
Alderman
Schrader asked two members of the Planning Commission if this subject had come
up and they told him that it has not.
Ed Leswig,
Chairman of the Planning Commission said that there is only one section of the
zoning ordinance that is not yet agreed upon.
It will be agreed upon at the next meeting.
City Attorney
said if we are that close to a new ordinance we should wait.
Mr. Leswig
said “close” is relative. It will take
about ninety days to pass the ordinance.
The Council’s
options were limited to waiting for the Planning Commission.
The Approval of the Rotary Banner for
April 27, 28, 29, 2000 which will say “Welcome Rotarians”:
The motion was
made and seconded to approve. All were
in favor, 5/0/0.
Approval of the Victorian Classic Run,
April 1, 2000:
The motion was
made and seconded to approve. All were
in favor, 5/0/0.
COUNCIL
COMMENTS:
Alderman
Sumpter asked about the regulations on United States flags. He has seen some pretty raggedy ones around
town. It was mentioned that the American
Legion is usually the watchdog for
flags.
Alderman Stoppel
asked that the Council have a workshop on the Lake Leatherwood Dam. He thinks
the City should invite people to explain why it needs to be pinned and give the
Council the facts. Ms. Dickens said she would set it up with McClelland, and
someone from Arkansas Soil and Water, etc.
Alderman
Schrader said he would like an engineer to be there. He has heard that there is a proposal of
lowering the height of the dam three feet, bringing in the perimeter of the
lake drawing the dam out from under the state law.
Ms. Dickens
said that many ideas have come up and have been addressed and were not
workable.
Alderman
Stoppel asked that the subject about speed bumps needs to be put back on the
agenda. He asked that it go on the March
16, 2000 agenda. His suggestions were to
put three-way stop signs at the end of Flint, Echols and Cross.
Alderman
Schrader asked if Parks can spend money on lands out side the City limits. He said if they don’t build ball fields at
Leatherwood, are there any level fields on other City land.
MAYOR’S
COMMENTS:
Mayor Satori
said the North Main Business Association had approached him with their concerns
about the work that will be done on North Main St. and how it will affect their
businesses. They asked if their was a
way to work with the City and the State Highway Department so that people could
get to their businesses. Mayor Satori
said that it looks like some re-scheduling can be done so that it will work
better for all that are concerned.
The motion was
made and seconded to adjourn. All were
in favor, 5/0/0. The meeting was
adjourned at 10:25 p.m.
This is the signature sheet for the March 2nd, 2000 City Council Meeting Minutes.
APPROVED:
______________________
Beau
Zar Satori, Mayor
ATTEST:
____________________________
Mary
Ann Lee, City Clerk-Treasurer