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2017 07 13 WS MinutesMINUTES OF THE REGULAR WORK SESSION OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF BAYTOWN JULY 13 2017 The City Council of the City of Baytown, Texas met in a Regular Work Session on Thursday, July 13, 2017 at 5.36 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 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 July 13 2017 City Council Regular Work Session with a quorum present at 5 36 P M., all members were present with the exception of Council Member Johnson who arrived at 5:44 P M., and Council Member McCartney who was absent DISCUSSIONS Discuss the City of Baytown FY 2017 18 budget Finance Director Wade Nickerson presented the agenda item and stated that there were two main points to discuss with the Council as it relates to the FY 2017 18 Municipal budget one relates to the FEMA and the other to the leasing of certain police vehicles Mr Nickerson stated that after Hurricane Ike, the City received funding from FEMA in the first instance the City was over funded and in the second instance the City was overpaid which resulted in the City having to pay FEMA back $3.6 million dollars Mr Nickerson stated that his predecessors knowing that the City would have to refund some monies back to FEMA had already set aside about $2.8 million however, in the last FEMA audit an additional $849 000 was identified for reimbursement which will be included in the FY 2017 18 budget Mr Nickerson further stated that the refunds were due prmanly to debris removal, and the City is looking into potential recourses to recover about $500,000 from the debris removal monitor, but because this can be lengthy process, the City needs to pay what is owed in order to argue that it has overpaid Assistant City Manager Troller noted that it is a credit to staff that the City has been able to maintain pristine records for Hurricane Ike and while there's no statute of limitation on FEMA auditing and recovering monies, this payment puts the City closer to final closing out Hurricane Ike City Council Regular Work Session Minutes July 13 2017 Page 2 of 6 During further discussion Mr Nickerson stated that the second item discussion was regarding the leasing of unmarked police vehicles primarily those of the detectives and the task force. He stated that it soon became apparent that it was not a feasible way to get all of the police vehicles as there was a capital component and debt capacity for recurring yearly leases that impacted the budget He noted that some of the police vehicles that are used for the task force can be rented similar to the program that Hams County currently uses Mr Nickerson stated that this program is truly a rental. which allows the City to rent a vehicle use it for three (3) months or until it gets burned (recognized as police vehicle) tum it back in and replace it quickly He stated that there are ten (10) of these vehicles, of which four (4) being rentals this year three (3) being rentals next year and three (3) being rentals in the following year; thus allowing the City to replace these ten (10) vehicles with rentals in the next three (3) years Mr Nickerson noted that instead of leasing the unmarked vehicles the City will be purchasing vehicles as it has done in the past, four (4) per year Additionally, Mr Nickerson stated that the program being recommended was logistically and fiscally better than the leasing option and recommended moving forward with the presented plan Council discussed the item briefly and was in support of the presented budget items b Receive and discuss an update from the Health Department regarding code enforcement efforts and related metrics Health Department Director, Mike Lester presented the agenda item and stated that the City Manager asked the health department to present a report about their code enforcement efforts about once a quarter He stated the items presented were the third quarter statistics for the neighborhood protection code enforcement and community service programs He noted that he d provide Council with the comparisons between the second and third quarters. Mr Lester stated that the Neighborhood Protection Division 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 the mowing of abandoned rail lines based on citizen and/or staff complaints and tax foreclosed properties He noted that they mow abandoned railroad lines, because it helps staff and citizens, being that the railroad commission is not responsive to mowing request He further noted that they do not mow pipeline easements because there tends to be more of a response and mow of the areas once notified of an issue by staff Mr Lester stated that the City is separated out into five (5) neighborhood protection sub -zones 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 Thursday and Friday staff conducts inspections throughout different areas of the City He noted that the neighborhood protection officers cover the entire City every five (5) days Mr Lester stated that complaints received from the City Manager's Office unless it's an emergency are placed within the inspectors weekly routines in order to keep these within the inspector's weekly follow-up schedules He stated that complaints that are highly visible or an emergency he or a division supervisor handles directly to get them taken care of as soon as possible City Council Regular Work Session Minutes July 13 2017 Page 3 of 6 Mr Lester provided the Council a map of the improved and unimproved alleyways throughout the City 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 dedicated alleyways with no Improvements that are mowed by contractors Mr Lester noted that currently the alleyways are being well maintained In order to get the mosquito control truck through them as they're being used more by the public to park and navigate In response to a question from Council Member Presley regarding what the cost efficiencies of mowing unimproved alleyways versus paving them would be Mr Lester stated that he didn t have those figures at the time, but would look Into it and report back Mr Lester noted that staff maintains the alleyways every 6 8 weeks, to prevent grass from overgrowing Mr Lester stated that the inactive railways are the ones that receive the most complaints, and in response they mow those areas within the Health Department's designated monies. He stated that this work has provided significant relief to the citizens especially in the 5 6 and 7 categories that tend to get a lot of wildlife in their areas Mr Lester presented an overview of the total neighborhood protection numbers from the current quarter to the second quarter as listed below 2017 Apra May June TOTALS January February I Much TOTALS Total Cases Created 419 628 1018 2,065 From Bu 350 84% 546 87% 924 91% 1,820 External Co Imre 87 18% 82 13% 94 9% 243 Unfounded Co airda 23 36 36 95 0 1 225 174 170 569 Yard Pa,kig Yroatbns 67 100 159 328 Yard Pkig Abated 69 74 142 288 F. Vbatlone 36 1 5 42 Vblalions Abated C 70 36 214 320 Vblalbru Abated Owner 233 326 638 1187 Court Co Ws Fled 39 129 156 326 03 Apra May June TOTALS 589 575 746 1,910 494 84% 501 87% 638 86% i,fi33 95 16% 74 16% 108 14% 277 35 27 36 96 39 76 98 213 26 63 86 176 1 1 0 0 1 225 174 170 569 304 345 359 1,008 63 59 100 222 Mr Lester stated that some of the decreases shown on the chart were results of seasonal issues that have to be dealt with i.e mosquito control and mowing high grass, and/or the Inspectors have dealt with the main offenders on the mainthigh visibility areas He stated that In the fall time frame, there would probably be an uptake in fence issues and other nuisances as the grass won't be growing as fast and the mosquito season would have decreased He further noted that a very positive trend identified was violation abatements by property owners Mr Lester stated that they completed a Community Cleanup in May 2017, and considering that it was put together In a short period it came together well He stated that the City had three (3) locations Bergeron Park, Lakewood and N Main with the latter two being new sites this year He noted that 156 people participating in the event and they received lots of heavy debris as well as tires He further noted that the numbers were a little lower than in the past. which could be a City Council Regular Work Session Minutes July 13 2017 Page 4 of 6 result of the two new sites and the extreme heat Additionally, he noted that they received 122 vehicles, filled five (5) roll -offs and that event was successful During further discussion, Mr Lester stated that the Community Service Division consisted of court appointed volunteers with two (2) full time employees overseeing the program, but noted that they both spend time out in the field Shawn the Division Coordinator and Chad, the Field Supervisor He stated that two (2) community service crews cover the City seven (7) days a week and each crew handles 3 10 people, which could results in 20 people working on any given day if both crews were out at full capacity Mr Lester noted that during the summer months it's common that the number of volunteers decreases He reminded the Council that this division handles routine hot spots checks litter sweeps survey work call response to litter dropped on the street, as well as, assist other departments for special projects and facility maintenance such as keeping certain areas cleaned and mowed Mr Lester further stated that the community service groups are great for physical labor, such as, moving boxes, furniture, litter cleanups, etc and are kept very busy Additionally he stated that the groups also mows the City's 66 foreclosed properties every 6 8 weeks help with the animal control facility cleanups and move boxes as needed Mr Lester went over the Community Service statistics chart, as noted M17 G2 G3 Jan FW I aYr ilnorrJaslit VAY June TOTALS 3bvAn 6 6 '/ 13 2] 12 32 T1 of Later 1032 839 866 2719 M 567 461 I'M TM 93 160 43 238 26 63 45 134 Total clean U Zai 211 190 827 190 156 176 524 Total aSNn CNNrM 196 156 123 14]5 11] 104 100 321 Commercial corri0an Garth' N Nuc Garth' N A . Garth N Akac Gersh N ANa. Garth' N Alex Garth' N A R 4 5 4 4 1 2 30 4 4 3 4 5 3 23 of Liar ]4 71 66 65 16 43 156 73 162 59 86 206 53 1 336 Galli of axBelu requre a ca r Me work hay an wi;l y b creee Council Member Hoskins inquired if staff ever presented businesses with the amount of trash they collected from their property and asked them for help in litter abatement Mr Lester noted that they're gearing back up to deal with the business owners with regards to the cleanliness of their properties, as well as, the litter blowing off of their parking lots City Manager Davis noted that the City has been experimenting with some temporary trash fencing on Garth and Cedar Bayou Lynchburg to capture the litter that comes from a business Council Member Hoskins further inquired about the possibility of a plastic bag ban City Attorney Ignacio Ramirez, noted that there're still pending lawsuits against cities in Texas that have an ordinance banning plastic bags, in addition to some bills that were filed in the last legislative session that prohibited cities from enacting bag bans Mr Lester noted that the City of Brownsville was able to successfully defend their plastic bag ban, but because they had specific environmental issues they were dealing with which the court ruled they could do, but only because of the very specific issue they were trying to mitigate City Council Regular Work Session Minutes July 13 2017 Page 5 of Mr Lester noted that the City is 36 square miles of which the hot spots or main roadways are checked on a weekly basis, which include Evergreen Road Tn City Beach, Hartman Bridge U tum and Gateway, SH 146 at Missouri Street thru N Main Spur 330 and SH 146 Interchange, Spur 330 frontage W Baker at Spur 330 (Bayway), Spur 330 at Slap Out Gully 1 10 Corridor overpasses the storm ditch at SH 146 and McKinney and Beaumont Road from Ward to Knowlton Street He provided to Council a map that identified the areas being swept on a regular basis and noted 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 sweeping the main road, all of the intersections are also cleaned, as well as, the road areas surrounding the intersections one (1) 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 Mr Lester identified the litter fence that has been placed next to the Home Depot property that has done a great job in collecting Inver and kept it out of the ditch He stated that this is being done as a demonstration to the business to show them that the problem of litter blowing across their parking lot is still an issue that needs to be remedied He noted that these fences will be used in conjunction with increased enforcement and that a litter fence has been added the property line between the Raceway and the Burlington properties for the same reason Mr Lester stated that in the month of June twelve (12) bags of trash were collected from the Home Depot litter fence, eight (8) bags were collected by the IHOP Aaron's rental litter fence and nineteen (19) bags were collected at the Raceway/Burlington litter fence He further stated that this is an estimated 2600 linear feet of screen that has been put up, which has already made a huge impact on litter Council Member Sam requested that staff look into placing a litter fence over on the Joe V's parking lot with Taco Bell Mayor DonCarlos asked who was responsible for cleaning up SH 146 Mr [ester stated that the Park's Department has a contract in place to mow these areas and noted that because it is a state highway and there are some safety issues, they were not able to use the community service volunteers to clean the litter on the highways Mr Lester further noted that the community service volunteers can be used on the frontage areas, but not on the highway themselves Mr Lester stated that in the budget there's an addition of another community service team that will be of great assistance to the current two (2) crews which will greatly enhance their productivity City Manager Davis noted the Health Department is doing a lot of work and has increased its statistics exponentially from the last few years in which the numbers can be brought forward to Council in the future, if interested Mr Lester stated that this year the City has two (2) very good mowing contractors in place which has helped to mitigate a lot of the high grass nuisances throughout the city He further noted that the Junked Vehicle Ordinance needs to be updated to deal with wrecked vehicles that do not tmhmcally meet the code's description of a junked vehicle He stated that they don't want City Council Regular Work Session Minutes July 13 2017 Page 6 of 6 to take it, but do want to encourage them with the potential of citations to move the vehicle off of the driveway to an area that is out of site c Receive and discuss an update regarding the animal control ordinance and procedures City Manager Davis stated that this item would be presented at the August 10, 2017, Work Session d Discuss any or all of the agenda items on the City Council Regular Meeting Agenda for July 13, 2017, which is attached below This item was not discussed. ADJOURN With there being no further business to discuss, Mayor DonCarlos adjourned the July 13 2017 City Council Regular Work Session at 6:24 P M ,