2017 03 23 WS MinutesMINUTES OF THE REGULAR WORK SESSION OF THE
CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF BAYTOWN
MARCH 23. 2017
The City Council of the City of Baytown Texas met in a Regular Work Session on Thursday
Much 23, 2017, at 5:31 P M., in the Hullum Conference Room of the Baytown City Hall 2401
Market Street, Baytown, Texas with the following in attendance
Laura Alvarado
Council Member
Robert Hoskins
Council Member
Charles Johnson
Council Member
David McCartney
Council Member
Chris Presley
Council Member
Terry Sam
Council Member
Stephen DonCarlos Mayor
Rick Davis
City Manager
Ignacio Ramirez
City Attorney
Leticia Brysch
City Clerk
Keith Dougherty
Sergeant at Arms
Mayor DonCarlos convened the March 23. 2017 City Council Regular Work Session with a
quorum present at 5 31 P M., all members were present with the exception of Council Member
Alvarado that arrived at 6:21 P M
DISCUSSIONS
a Receive and discuss an update from the Health Department regarding code
enforcement efforts and related metrics
Mr Mike Lester, Health Director presented the agenda item and stated that the information
presented is towards the end of the second quarter, so as the numbers may seem a little odd, they
will paint a better picture regarding enforcement efforts when the third quarter report is presented
in July
Mr Lester presented information regarding the Neighborhood Protection Division which deals
with nuisance abatement, such as, high grass and weeds, rubbish, illegal dumpsites, open storage,
junked vehicles front yard parking and other maintenance issues related to alleyways,
abandoned rail lines and tax foreclosed properties He stated that the City is separated out into
five (5) neighborhood protection zones and the fifth zone was made possible through the addition
of the fifth neighborhood protection officer (NPO) in last year's budget He stated that each
Monday inspectors go out to identify and document issues within their respective zones Tuesday
is court administrative day, so no inspections are conducted on this day, and on Wednesday,
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March 23 2017
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Thursday and Friday staff conducts inspections throughout different areas of the City
Additionally, he noted that the neighborhood protection officers cover the entire City every five
(5) days
Mr Lester showed the Council a map of the improved and unimproved alleyways throughout the
City that are maintained by the Health Department He stated that the improved alleyways are
those with a concrete drive that the City has to weed eat along the edges and the unimproved
areas are those without any improvements that contractors mow in order to maintain grass level
Mr Lester stated that staff inspects these alleyways every 6-8 weeks to verify which areas need
the most attention He noted that the rail lines are done every 6 8weeks as they are hot topic
complaint areas and some areas are mowed more often if they backup to residential areas
because there are more complaints associated with them Council Member McCartney asked
why the railroad did not mow the areas along the railroads Mr Lester stated that in his
experience the railroad has no set timeline or schedule for this type of work and therefore, they
get to it when they get to it Deputy City Manager Bottoms stated that there s a new staff person
at the Railroad Commission that seems very receptive to comments and collaboration from the
City Mr Lester noted that staff works to keep high grass and weeds low because it helps with
wild animal issues littering, and other nuisance concerns
Mr Lester stated that the total neighborhood protection cases have increased from 2016 to 2017
the escalations in cases are due in part to the addition of the fifth NPO and have added the open
storage ordinance so the number is trending higher Specifically he noted that in February 2016,
there were 275 cases on file and 625 for the February 2017 He also noted that 86% of the NPO
cases on file are observed and initiated by staff, 8% me outside founded complaints, and 6% are
unfounded external complarnts, as these numbers are very much in line with Council's direction
to move from complaint driven code enforcement to pro -active code enforcement Mr Lester
reminded Council that the NPO's survey the entire city every five (5) days, which is how they
visually identify code violations and commented that the presented statistics show that the Health
Department is being very pro active in its code enforcement efforts
During further discussion Mr Lester presented information on yard parking code enforcement
efforts and noted that there is a significant increase in cases from 2016 to 2017, primarily
because Council directed staff to transition from complaint driven code enforcement of the yard
parking ordinance to pro active enforcement He noted that many are coming into compliance
however they're seeing a lot of repetition for yard puking violations Mr Lester also noted as it
relates to the fencing violations that they have no statistics to compare the case load to because
the fencing ordinance was lust added this year Mayor DonCarlos alerted Mr Lester of a fencing
issue in Garth Road around Harold Lane that needs to be inspected for compliance with the
Fence Ordinance. Mr Lester stated that staff would look into his concern
Mr Lester stated that the NPO's spend 2 3 hours a day in the field with the rest of the time
working in the office handling cases He stated that there s a follow up to every case that's
initiated, therefore, on any given day, half of the work load is resolving the follow ups from the
prior week or initiating new ones from the current week He stated that each NPO gets about 15
new cases per day which is in addition to the 15 cases from the previous week He further stated
that the NPO's have to conduct their own research and administrative work so they're working
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March 23 2017
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at capacity Council Member McCartney asked if it would be more efficient if the NPO's handed
their work over to an administrative person to handle the letters and mail -outs to allow them
more time out in the field Mr Lester in response to the question stated that it may seem that
this would be a more efficient process but noted that it's a hard learning curb to hand over to
someone that may not have the same knowledge base or experience with the issues at hand as
oppose to the NPO's who are more familiar with their areas, processes and cases Mr Lester
noted that staff tries to make the code enforcement process as easy and as efficient as possible
with the current resources He stated that he believe that the addition of an administrative
assistant to the group last year has help with some of the more minor duties such as work
orders, phone calls, filing, etc Mr Lester noted that the addition of the fifth NPO and the
administrative person will greatly assist the process and further noted that he'll be able to give
better statistics about the code enforcement efforts in the next quarterly report
Mr Lester presented information regarding court complaints and noted that from January
February 2016, there were 11 citations issued in comparison to the 167 citations issued in 2017
for the same time frame He again noted that the increase is mainly due to the new open storage
ordinance and pro -active enforcement of the yard parking ordinance He stated that staff sends
out a notice of the violation in order to give the individuals an opportunity to comply with the
ordinance He further stated that instead of sending a second notice of noncompliance, as was
done in the past staff now issues citations Mr Lester stated that if a person does not fix the
issue or contacts staff for more time to come into compliance the second notice is a court
summons and citation instead of the old second written notice for compliance which has been
eliminated He noted that the time frame between notices and citations has changed. from 14
days to seven (7) days to come into compliance after the first written notice
Mr Lester stated that the Community Service Division consisted of court appointed volunteers
with two (2) full time employees overseeing the program, Shawn, the Division Coordinator and
Chad, the Field Supervisor, but noted that they both spend time out in the field He stated that
two (2) community service crews cover the city seven (7) days a week and deal with a number of
items to include routine hot spots checks litter sweeps survey work call response to litter
dropped on the street assisting other departments for special projects and facility maintenance
such m keeping certain areas cleaned and mowed He stated that the community service groups
are great for physical labor, such as, moving boxes, furniture, litter cleanups, etc. and are kept
very busy He stated that this group also mows the City's foreclosed properties ranging from
about 60-80 properties at any given time which are mowed every 3 4 weeks and saves the City
enough money to cover the two (2) staff members for this program Mr Lester noted that the
City is 36 square miles, of which the hot spots or main roadways are checked on a weekly basis
He stated that the litter sweeps are done once a week specifically to Garth Road and Alexander
Drive He stated that Garth Road is cleaned on Thursday and when they sweep the main road
they also clean all the intersections as well as the road areas surrounding the intersections one
block down He noted that aside from the regularly scheduled road sweeps they also do call outs
for special items such as litter and debris in ditches, but further noted that these crews do not
clean litter on the feeders of SH 146 and SPUR 330
The Council briefly discussed the litter concerns along SH 146 SPUR 330 and the feeders of I
10, and whose responsibility it is to undertake said cleanups The Council directed staff to work
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March 23, 2017
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with these agencies to find ways to clean these areas of litter and mow more consistently Mr
Lester stated that the Parks Department has an agreement with TxDOT for them to mow SPUR
330 and they are doing a much better job in cleaning the litter before mowing the area
Additionally Mr Lester stated that community service hours total cleanup hours and bags of
trash are up from last year
City Manager Davis stated that the staff will continue to work diligently towards cleaning up our
city and reporting our endeavors back to the Council
The Council discussed the use of the clean team to assist in litter abatement the success of the
extended hours at the City's green center and the legislative and legal issues related to the
implementation of a city wide ban on plastic bags
Discuss potential revisions to the Food Truck Ordinance
City Manager Davis presented the item and stated that this item was being brought forward per
the Council's request to discuss two (2) main concerns presented to them at the last council
meeting related to (1) the distance from sanitary services location from a food truck and (2) the
allowed hours of operation at one location without having to move the food truck He further
noted that should Council request any changes to the food truck ordinance, they would be
brought forward for consideration at a future council meeting
Mr Lester stated that the 150 feet distance requirement was decided on after working with the
Planning Department and identifying the average lot size for commercial properties, as well as
what was a reasonable distance from one end of the shopping center to the other He noted that
the requested 300 feet was significantly larger being approximately the size of a football field
With regards to the hours of operation, he stated that the timing issues was set due to Council's
direction that they did not want the food trucks to compete with the brick and mortar restaurants
nor did they want them parked all over the city for extended periods of time because it was not
the image we wanted for the city He stated that the two (2) hour limit was set, except in the
A.C.E District because Council wanted them to navigate to this area and create target
destination for food trucks Additionally Mr Lester stated that these were the reasons for the
existing regulations
The Council briefly discussed the item and requested that the following changes to the food truck
ordinance be brought back for the Council's consideration at a future meeting
• Extending the time for the hours of operation without having to move the food truck from
two hours to six hours and
• Increasing the distance between the food truck and a bathroom facility from 150 feet to 300
feet
Mayor DonCarlos stated that if these amendments become an issue in the future, Council would
re -consider these options
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March 23 2017
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c Library Director will update Council regarding partnership with Lee College and
Project Grad to open a Caf€ College site inside Sterling Municipal Library
City Manager Davis stated that this agenda item was pushed to the next Work Session as it was
not ready for discussion
d Discuss current recycling and solid waste collection services and the upcoming
request for proposals for such services
City Manager Davis presented that item and stated that the City will soon be requesting bids for
its solid waste collection services and wanted input from the Council regarding what they wanted
to see in the next proposals or any cwncems they had with the current provider
Council Member McCartney stated he was comfortable with the current provider and felt they
were doing a pretty good lob Additionally he stated that any change would come down to cost
and making sure that the service was up to par without missing any streets in their route
Council Member Sam stated he did not have any big complaints about the service in his district
Council Member Hoskins stated that he's had a number of complaints and concerns related to
him by his constituents where the service provider has failed to pick up the trash, sometimes
until late in the evening or in other instances a few days He further noted that the recycling
being picked up in large bulk and anything that is put out on the curb being picked up should
maintain the same level of service
City Manager Davis stated that he had received comments of lacking service in the trash
collection from other areas in the city and there should be a reasonable window of time when
citizens can expect their trash/recycling to be collected Mayor DonCarlos requested that staff
include the pickup of heavy brush in their solid waste collection contract, i.e an integrated heavy
brush with the recycling every week He further stated that this option would help the community
look inter as our current once a month heavy brush pickup conducted by Public Works is not
enough Additionally, he stated that many time citizens cut down branches and leave them out all
month because they did not follow the monthly service calendar
City Manager Davis thanked the Council for their comments and stated that staff would report
back on the bid process soon
e Discuss any or all of the agenda items on the City Council Regular Meeting Agenda
for March 23 2017, which is attached below
City Manager Davis notified the Council that item 2.c related to the recognition of Officer Clint
Holden has been rescheduled for the next Council meeting due to a scheduling conflict
2 ADJOURN
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March 23 2017
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With there being no further business to discuss Mayor DonCarlos adjourned the March 23
2017 CI*V Council Regular Work Session at 6:21 P M
Leticia Brysch City Clerk
City of Baytown
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