June 28, 2005
The Board of Commissioners of the City of Lawrence met in regular session at 6:35 p.m., in the City Commission Chambers in City Hall with Mayor Highberger presiding and members Amyx, Hack, Rundle, and Schauner present.
RECOGNITION/PROCLAMATION/PRESENTATION:
Mayor Highberger recognized the 150th Anniversary of the First Baptist Church.
CONSENT AGENDA
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to approve the City Commission meeting minutes of June 14, 2005. Motion carried unanimously.
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to receive the Historic Resources Commission Action Summary of May 19, 2005; the Lawrence Memorial Hospital Board meeting minutes of May 18, 2005; and the Traffic Safety Commission meeting minutes of June 6, 2005. Motion carried unanimously.
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to approve claims to 332 vendors in the amount of $1,529,215.72 and payroll from June 12, 2005 to June 25, 2005, in the amount of $1,516,115.52. Motion carried unanimously.
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to approve the Drinking Establishment Licenses for Panda Garden, 1500 West 6th Street; and Kokoro, 601 Kasold, Ste: D102 & 103. Motion carried unanimously.
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to concur with the recommendation of the Mayor and reappoint Karen Christilles to the Convention & Visitors Bureau Advisory Board, to a second term which will expire July 1, 2007; and reappoint Truman “Bud” Waugh to the Douglas County Emergency Management Board to an additional term which will expire July 1, 2006. Motion carried unanimously.
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to set a bid date of July 26, 2005 for Street, Storm Sewer, and Waterline Improvements for Monterey Way, Stetson Road to Grand Vista Drive, and Peterson Road, Kasold Drive to Monterey Way. Motion carried unanimously. (1)
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to set a bid date of July 12, 2005, for the 6th Street and Indiana Street Sanitary Sewer Improvement Project; and authorize the City Manager to enter into an agreement for a shared sanitary sewer service line for the properties at 545 – 547 Indiana and 710 – 712 West 6th Street for the Sanitary Sewer Improvement Project. Motion carried unanimously. (2)
The City Commission reviewed the bids for painting the micro sand pump room, for the Utilities Department. The bids were:
BIDDER BID AMOUNT Ammon Painting Co. $19,700
JF McGivern $21,250
Hardister Painting & Redecorating $28,950
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to award the bid to Ammon Painting Co., in the amount of $19,700. Motion carried unanimously.
(3)
The City Commission reviewed the bid for 2005 Concrete Repair Program, Phase 1, for the Public Works Department. The bid was:
BIDDER BID AMOUNT
Engineer’s Estimate $336,148
Paver’s Inc. $384,989
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to award the bid to Paver’s Inc., in the amount of $384,989. Motion carried unanimously. (4)
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to approve the sale of surplus vehicle through e-bay. Motion carried unanimously. (5)
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to place on first reading Ordinance No. 7875, annexing approximately 13.366 acres, generally located north of Clinton Parkway, east of K-10 which was authorized by the City Commission on March 29, 2005, conditioned upon execution of an agreement not-to-protest a benefit district for road improvements to County Road North 920. Motion carried unanimously. (6)
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to place on first reading Ordinance No. 7897, establishing “no parking” along the east side of Eldridge Street between Seele Way and Trail Road. Motion carried unanimously. (7)
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to place on first reading Ordinance No. 7898, establishing a “stop sign” on Field Stone Drive at Grand Vista Drive. Motion carried unanimously (8)
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to approve the sidewalk dining license for Free State Brewing Company. Motion carried unanimously. (9)
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to place on first reading Ordinance No. 7874, allowing the possession and consumption of alcoholic beverages in the Free State Brewing Company sidewalk dining area. Motion carried unanimously. (10)
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to concur with the Traffic Safety Commission’s recommendation to construct a speed hump at approximately 3112 Riverridge Road near the bottom of the Hill. Motion carried unanimously.
(11)
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to concur with the Traffic Safety Commission’s recommendation to install a “stop sign” on Field Stone Drive at Grand Vista Drive. Motion carried unanimously. (12)
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to concur with the Traffic Safety Commission’s recommendation to establish “no parking” along the east side of Eldridge Street, between Seele Way and Trail Road. Motion carried unanimously. (13)
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to concur with the Traffic Safety Commission’s recommendation to deny the request for an “all-way stop” at 7th and Alabama Streets. Motion carried unanimously. (14)
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to authorize the Administrative Services Department to: bind the package coverage offered by Emergency Services Insurance Program (ESIP) for emergency vehicles, general liability, management liability, and portable equipment for the Fire/Medical Department for the period July 1, 2005 to July 1, 2006 for an estimated premium of $65,988; bind the package coverage offered by Affiliated FM for the City’s building/property coverage for the period of July 1, 2005 to July 1, 2006 for an estimated annual premium of $118,500. Motion carried unanimously. (15)
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to authorize the Mayor to sign a Subordination Agreement for Ruth Townsend, 1061 Home Circle. Motion carried unanimously. (16)
As part of the consent agenda, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to adopt Resolution 6600, authorizing the transfer of property as part of the 1993 industrial revenue bond issuance for E&E Specialties. Motion carried unanimously. (17)
Alan Black, representative of the League of Women Voters, pulled from the consent agenda for separate discussion the Planning Commission meeting minutes of May 23 and May 25, 2005. He said the League submitted letters to the Planning Commission at almost all of its meetings and often made oral presentations at the meetings as well. Sometimes those letters and oral presentations would get into the minutes of those meetings and sometimes they would not. He said they were particularly concerned about what happened with the May meetings because they thought it was particularly important to consider the revision of the two chapters of Horizon 2020 Comprehensive Plan, chapter 8 having to do with transportation, and chapter 9 having to do with parks, recreation, and open space. He said he could see that the League’s comments were often very lengthy and detailed and in those cases of those 2 chapters, they had submitted CD’s, which he thought included every single page of the chapters with their questions, comments, and suggestions for changes.
He said there was a one page summary of comments on chapter 8, and a two page summary of their views on chapter 9, and those summaries did not get into the minutes of the Planning Commission meeting. Instead, there was a reference that those comments were on file. He said there were few people who had the time to go looking in the file to look at those comments and what the views of the League of Women Voters were. This had been a continuing concern of the League, and they would like to find some way to make sure that the major arguments that they had would get conveyed to the City Commission.
Mayor Highberger asked staff to respond.
Sandra Day, Planner, said she apologized, but she had not been aware of that particular issue. She said she knew staff made every effort to get communications in those packets to the City Commission. There was a new staff person who had been taking over some of those duties. She said she did not know if there was anything that was going on in that when staff received communications, those communications were scanned and placed into the agenda, but staff certainly could make every effort to address that issue in the future.
Commissioner Rundle said as a matter of course, he would like to see all the correspondence either acknowledged in the minutes or as a link. He said receiving correspondence the day of the meeting was not as good as having that information well in advance.
Mayor Highberger said he understood that the League would like to have a brief summary of their comments on chapter 9 included in the minutes from the meeting.
Black said correct, Chapters 8 and 9.
Mayor Highberger asked if chapter 8 had been corrected to Black’s satisfaction.
Black said he believed so.
Mayor Highberger suggested that staff have someone look at the League’s recommended changes of chapter 9 and bring those minutes back to the City Commission next week.
Day said she would see that that happened. (18)
Commissioner Schauner pulled from the consent agenda, the site plan (SP-03-27-05) for Long John Silver’s. He said in looking at the 23rd Street Corridor Access Plan issues he noticed in the staff report that the comment that the consultant had met with the property owners regarding their plans for development with concerns for traffic and safety and willingness to participate in improvements. He asked where they were in that process and were they going to improve access on 23rd Street with this redevelopment project. He said he did not want to approve this site plan without knowing that they were going to make some progress on this site. It was sort of a fleeting opportunity to make some concrete progress on the access plan, and he was curious as to where that was. He said he could not tell from the staff report whether agreements had been reached or if information had been given to the consultant.
Day said this had been a very unique project to work on because there were so many things in process. The 23rd Street Corridor Study, the first step of that, was to contact property owners and to assess their willingness to participate. Another phase of that was for HNTB to come back with specific recommendations of what they would recommend for that specific segment of the corridor that they had been working on.
This particular project had come at a time before all those grant monies and all those specific recommendations were in place, and staff recognized the opportunity to do something very dynamic to have a demonstration of both public and private partnership in the approval. The first step that the applicant had done was to replat the property and through that they dedicated willingly, a cross access easement, all the way across their property.
The second step was to review the site plan and its ability to redevelop the site. The applicant had one curb cut to their property and there were no new curb cuts and no additional curb cuts proposed to their property through this project. Staff had worked with the applicant to shift their curb cut to the west to be shared with Mongolian Barbecue which was certainly an improvement because they would be reducing one curb cut in this segment. They also had established cross access and the ability to have that cross access continued over to the property to the east, to Party America.
There were several other steps that still needed to take place to fully implement all of the things that staff identified through the development process. Planning staff was available to sit in the meetings with the adjacent property owners and received their ideas and concerns about cross access.
The applicant was on a very tight timeline, but the applicant willingly slowed down so that the other meetings could be conducted with the property owners to get their input and that information had been shared with representatives from Long John Silver’s.
There was a possibility that staff might not be able to fully execute the access easement to the east as timely as they would like to. Staff would still need to get agreements in place from the adjacent property owners, but the location of the curb cut to this western side seemed to be the most immediately feasible, it did not have any grade issues, therefore, it could go very quickly. The applicant would be waiting for agreements to be executed offsite with the Mongolian Barbecue. Staff also needed to clarify some things from Public Works on the actual construction activities that would take place and staff had provided both this site plan and the existing site plan for the Mongolian Barbecue property over to HNTB, so they would work up a blow up of that area so staff knew exactly what the contractor had to do offsite as part of this project.
Commissioner Schauner said in looking at the staff recommendations, he could not tell whether the cross access easements with the adjoining property owners were part and parcel of the conditions to which this site plan would be subjected.
Day said the cross access easement with the adjoining property owners were not part and parcel of the conditions because staff could not hold this property owner to do something off site like that. That was an agreement that staff had to work out for them.
Commissioner Schauner said “if” and “when”, the City Commission approved that site plan, he asked about Day’s expectation about being able to get more improvements at that location other than just a common curb cut for those two properties. He asked it there would be any other corridor improvements such as cross access easements.
Day said the cross access easements were already established. They had gotten the cross access on the Long John Silver’s property, but they needed to get another 30x30 piece on the west and the east sides. Then there would be the closure of the center curb cut that existed today, so those improvements, theoretically, were all going to be made in a timely fashion.
Vice Mayor Amyx said there was an elevation grade that would need to be addressed on the proposed access to the east of the Long John Silver’s property. He asked who would pay for those improvements on that site.
Day said Public Works staff had some discussions with KDOT and the cost of that construction would be set back against their grant for the improvements. The grade was really not as bad at the very northern end of those properties as it was further into the property. Staff asked that the building be set back far enough that so that if the grade needed to be adjusted there would be room for that adjustment.
Vice Mayor Amyx asked if there was any concern from Mongolian Barbecue about taking short cuts through that property going all the way to Naismith Drive.
Day said on the west side of Mongolian Barbecue there was actually another retaining wall so that full maneuver could not quite be made.
Vice Mayor Amyx asked if a person could go east in front of the Long John Silver’s property and in front of the Party America, back into Naismith. He asked if there would be any conflicts that could be caused by that type of maneuvering.
Day said she was sure there was something that staff had not foreseen yet, but she believed staff was trying to have some contact with the Burger King property owners to look at doing some of those other things as well.
Mayor Highberger called for public comment.
After receiving no public comment, Commissioner Schauner asked about the grant money.
Mike Wildgen, City Manager, said the engineering firm was working on that design at this time. He said the grant was available any time the Commission decided what projects they wanted to bid. The city match had been approved.
Moved by Rundle, seconded by Amyx, to approve the site plan (SP-03-27-05) for Long John Silver’s, a site plan for the demolition and reconstruction of a restaurant located at 1501 West 23rd Street, subject to the following conditions:
1. Execution of a site plan performance agreement;
2. Provision of public improvement plan per City Engineer’s approval;
3. Recording of the Final Plat with the Register of Deeds Office prior to release of the site plan for issuance of a building permit.
Motion carried unanimously. (19)
CITY MANAGER’S REPORT:
During the City Manager’s Report, Mike Wildgen said staff had received notice today that the St. Luke AME Church, located at 900 New York, was going to be added to the National Historic Register and would be eligible for grant money and other incentives. (20)
REGULAR AGENDA ITEMS:
Receive public comments from Price Banks and others concerning proposed improvements to Kasold Drive from Bob Billings Parkway to 22nd Street. A public meeting on the proposed improvements was conducted June 20, 2005. The Public Works Department and the consulting engineering firm of Bartlett & West plan a presentation at the July 19, 2005 City Commission meeting concerning the draft plans for the improvement.
Tom Raney, Lawrence, said as he was on the way to the First Baptist Church on Sunday he took time to look over that proposed project on Kasold and he had several concerns. The first concern was the massive amount of traffic on Kasold. He said David Woosley, Traffic Engineer took a traffic count on that stretch of the road between Bob Billings Parkway and 22nd Street, and the average daily traffic count was 20,000 vehicles. He said in his opinion there were a couple of issues that needed to be addressed
The first issue was if it was being proposed to close the entire section of Kasold between Bob Billings Pkwy and 22nd Street, he asked where those 20,000 vehicles would go. The way he understood was that those vehicles would be diverted a mile to the east and a mile to the west which would be a nightmare. One of the problems was St. Andrew’s Drive, which was just short of Bob Billings Parkway, went directly down the hill, it had 5 blind hills and 4 corners and it went right through his neighborhood, which was Alvamar Estates. He said Quail Creek was once a closed road in front of Pachamama’s and they opened up that road. He said that road was deeded over to the City, and their neighborhood when it was built by Bob Billings in the 70’s was designed to accommodate the traffic for that neighborhood all the streets were dead ends. Since that street had been opened up they had gone from an average of 45-50 cars a day that cut through the neighborhood to approximately 600. As a result, there had been several animals killed, along with near misses with children. He said there were no sidewalks on any of those streets.
He said if Kasold was going to be closed all together they would need to close St. Andrew’s Street at 15th Street and Quail Creek, and close the neighborhood to everything but local traffic or else it would be absolute gridlock and a nightmare through the neighborhood.
The second issue that needed to be addressed was the ripping out of all of the landscaping, retaining walls, and all of the work entailed by placing that bike path on the west side of Kasold. He said as he started at Bob Billings Parkway and went south there were approximately 14-15 houses that were going to be affected on the west side, and on the east side, there was nothing but a field.
This bike path would be sent down an 11 degree grade which would run into Hy-Vee’s parking lot. He said he did not see the purpose of putting a bike path at that location, but if it had to be at that location, he suggested integrating it with the bike path that already existed on the east side, have it run through what he considered to be scenic landscape, without adversely affecting houses and tie those bike paths in on the east side. He said by doing that property would not be damaged and bicyclists would have a beautiful scenic route, rather than running the cyclist along the side of Kasold Drive.
He said unequivocally, the issue of where 20,000 cars a day were going to go needed to be addressed. He said detouring vehicles a mile to the east or a mile to the west was not a viable detour. He said he spoke to the Fire Department about this issue, but they did not have enough information. He asked where the fire trucks would go because there were a lot of fire trucks that go up and down that stretch of Kasold. He also asked what would happen to people who had medical emergencies, to Prompt Care and LMH at 23rd and Clinton Parkway. He said there were some major issues that needed to be addressed. He said the most logical thing to do was to bite the bullet and do this project one side at a time and keep the roads open.
Commissioner Rundle asked if there was an existing bike trail.
Raney said yes, right behind the Clinton Parkway Assembly of God. He said there was a nice scenic route and he suggested that the route continue through that endowment association property.
George Catt, property owner in the area, said he had a number of concerns. He said the building of the bike path would eliminate approximately 20 spirea that had been at that location for over 30 years and also, might eliminate some evergreens. He presented pictures of the proposed area to the City Commission. He said putting a bike path at the proposed location did not seem to be a very good planning strategy.
He said he was not arguing about the need to have that street fixed. That street was constructed by someone who had never put in a street before, but happened to be the low bidder, and now money was being spent to fix something that should have been done right in the first place. He said that issue was not the present City Commission’s fault because they were not there at that time, but the Commission could make a difference on that bike path. He said there was currently a bike path along a waterway in the area and because it was a waterway, it was usually more meandering and followed the topography instead of an abrupt jump over the hill. He said the proposed bike path should be hooked into the current bike path instead of spending a lot of money and damaging a nice neighborhood.
He said the neighborhood had spent thousands of dollars on plantings, trees, rock walls, all barriers to try and screen out the intense sounds coming from Kasold and the sounds would get much worse for him when all of his coverings were ripped out
Also, there would be some serious safety issues, and he did not want to be the one that said “I told you so” because he did not want anyone to get hurt. He said there was a potential for some type of a real tragedy because of the grade of that hill.
He asked the City Commission to reconsider the bike path on the west side, and seriously consider the fact that there was already a bike path in the area that was not dangerous. He also suggested working with the University on this issue.
He said they were told at a meeting that was held by the consulting engineer that on the west side there was quite a drop off in several places, from the street. When questioned, the consultant said the bike path would be at the grade of the street, so the people who were on the west side of the frontage roads were going to be looking up at this wall and the sidewalk with a railing which sounded like a loading dock, and would destroy the ambiance of living in a nice neighborhood. He suggested that the City Commission reconsider this issue and he hoped that the Commission would give the neighborhood consideration in this matter.
Commissioner Schauner asked what Catt thought about closing the streets altogether versus closing the streets in phases.
Catt said a straw vote was taken the other day concerning suggestions about the bike path and he suggested that the project not be done at all. He said at first, he was in favor of closing the whole street and getting the project over with, but given the impact that this project would have on through traffic in the neighborhood, it might make good sense in keeping one lane open.
Jack Rose, neighbor in the original part of Alvamar, said fortunately they did not have any problems with landscaping because they were not very close to the street. The concern he had was closing Kasold for such a long period of time. He was not aware of any time that a major arterial street had been closed for any length of time and there being such a large segment of street closed. That street was approximately 7/8 of a mile from Bob Billings Parkway to Clinton Parkway which was a long stretch or road to be taken out of service. He said he understood that the daily traffic on that stretch of road was in the neighborhood of 20,000 vehicles a day. The first thing that did was caused those 20,000 people to find another way to get to where they were going and that would impact a large part of the City. The traffic would be going over to Iowa Street or to Wakarusa Street which was a large imposition to make on people who travel that route on a regular basis.
He said he was very familiar with Kasold because he drove on Kasold every day and two open lanes would come close to servicing the number of vehicles that drove that route. He said if traffic was diverted into other areas, in fact, they would be taking a problem that should be solved on Kasold Drive and putting parts of it on other streets which caused stress on them. He thought there was a lot to be said for keeping one of the two lane highways fully operable until such time as the other two lanes were operable and then they could switch and do the other part of that project.
Price Banks, Attorney, presented photographs of the area of discussion to the City Commission. He said the plans that were presented at a meeting showed virtually no change to the east side of the street, but on the west side it would be paved to the property line, tall retaining walls would be erected because of the grade on Kasold Street was being cut down which would require even taller retaining walls. Fences and vegetation would be obliterated in those areas, and there would be established an 8 foot recreation bike path. If that area was retaining walls, fences, and then an 8 foot bike path, he bicycled occasionally and needed a little bit more than 4 feet of path to get by when he was riding his bicycle. He said he was not going to be within a foot of a retaining wall or a fence because that was inviting disaster, so he would be on the outside passing and meeting other bicycles and there would be a tendency to fall off into that curb with traffic speeding through that area over 40 mph. He said as Catt indicated, they were looking at some potential disaster at that location. He asked the Commission to look outside the box.
He asked the City Commission if they had ever seen the current bike path in the area which was scenic and pretty, and the path was less than a quarter mile east of Kasold, but the only problem with that bike path was that it did not go anywhere. Years ago, the City had worked with the University about getting a recreational path all the way through that endowment property along the creek. He said he did not know if that proposal simply stalled or was not followed up, but if the intent was to get bicycle and pedestrian traffic somewhere then there was a great opportunity to get that bicycle and pedestrian traffic both on a safe and scenic route and the 11% grade would be eliminated. He said one of the folks in the public meeting had indicated when they coasted down that grade on Kasold Drive, their bicycle reached 32 mph which was a pretty fast speed on a bicycle.
He said the streetscape on Kasold had improved since he lived in the area for 22 years. Backyard trees and shrubbery had matured and people had begun to take more care about plantings, and there were many plantings on the right-of-way, some of which were going to be lost. If retaining walls were being constructed and fences taken out, everything in the right-of-way would be taken out and would probably be losing some substantial trees and plantings in back yards. He said the area would lose half of its streetscape and it would be replaced with something that was not appealing. With the retaining wall and the eight foot path, the City would be creating a hazard and he urged the Commission to rethink this issue and urged the Commission to investigate the possibility of placing the bike path to extend the existing path north up to Bob Billings Parkway.
Alan Black, resident of the Heatherwood Subdivision, said in a one mile stretch of Kasold there was only one traffic signal, but it was in the wrong place. The traffic signal was at the access point to the Hy-Vee and opposite was a cul-de-sac with almost zero traffic. He said he assumed the signal was put at that location because Hy-Vee paid for it, but he did not really know. He said the traffic signal should be a block north at 22nd Street. The intersection of 22nd and Kasold, which he went through every day, was a rather dangerous intersection and clearly, should have a traffic signal. He said this was just another idea for the City Commission to think about since major work was being done at that location. This was an opportunity when this mistake could be corrected. It would require redesigning the access to the Hy-Vee and the other stores in the area, but if that did not happen he thought someday there was going to be two traffic signals in that area instead of one traffic signal.
John Olson, Hy-Vee Store director at Clinton Parkway, said he had a concern about the project schedule for Kasold Road along with the other concerns that had been already been spoken about. In their particular business, access was key. Their business was driven on people being able to get to the store two or three times per week, just the way the nature of their business was. He said when they saw one of the options was to close Kasold for 8 months, it was a concern. Those 20,000 cars were their life blood. That was what their business was built upon was that traffic.
He said he looked at their business from north of 15th Street, north of Bob Billings Parkway, and it ran somewhere in the neighborhood of a 15% reduction of traffic they would get from north of Bob Billings Parkway and he assumed that other shops in that strip mall were similar. A 15% reduction in volume or revenue for their business would be pretty tough to swallow. He said it would be devastating to some of those businesses in that strip mall. One of the reasons for thinking about closing Kasold Drive for 8 months was cost savings. He said a 15% reduction in their volume over 8 months would be a lot more than a $300,000 savings or whatever that amount might be that the City might be saving. That reduction in revenue means potentially lost jobs, lost income for taxes and other things.
He had spoken to other business in the area of their concerns in closing that road for that period of time. Certainly they all agreed that those 20,000 cars would go somewhere and the nature of people was to find the shortest access to where they wanted to go. To put that traffic a mile east or a mile and a half west, that traffic would find an alternative route, whether it be through residential neighborhoods, through Inverness or Crossgate, but they would find an alternative route and that would place a lot of unnecessary traffic onto residential areas that would not be good for anyone.
He said it was his understanding that it was unprecedented to close a major arterial road of that nature for that length of time and would certainly place undue stress on their business as well as other businesses that were in that shopping area. He said they wanted to be good neighbors and they had asked their trucks to not use Kasold certainly during the period of time that the road would be under construction, if it was kept open, they would ask their trucks to stay off that road to help mitigate the heavy traffic flow. In a meeting with the neighbors, they had asked them to look into getting their trucks off the road as much as possible. He understood the road was a truck route, but they were going to try and be good neighbors and keep those trucks off that road.
He said the only other thought he had when looking at the project scheduling was if the road was going to be kept open during the 15 months, or so, that the project would be under construction, the cars would be moved to the west side, going north and south, as the waterline was moved out of the center of the road, over to the east side and along the Endowment property. Then when that area was completed, then cars would be moved over to the east side and redo the whole west side with a retaining wall and other proposed improvements. He said it did not make much sense to go from one side to the other side, and back and forth. He said why not once the traffic was moved one direction, leave the traffic there until the whole project was done on the opposite side, and then move it the other direction. He said he was not an engineer, but it certainly seemed like there was an additional amount of time spent moving traffic back and forth, and there was probably some good reason for it, but it certainly seemed like an extra amount of shifting of traffic.
Carrie Lindsey said she also lived off of Kasold, and she expressed concern that this road would be closed for 8 months because that seemed an excessive burden to those who used that road to move about town. She said if they did place a bike path in that area, although she did not believe that was a good location for a bike path, that it would not have the pothole problems that Kasold had. She said while she was in favor of taking care of Kasold, because those potholes were awful, she would not like to see the road closed for 8 months.
Randy Dyke said he had worked on a lot of highway construction, and the comment of shifting traffic from one side to the other side needed to be done because once a section of highway was poured, it had to set for so long before traffic could travel on that section of highway. He said concrete could not be poured one day and be driven on the next. He said the project would take 8 months to complete.
Chuck Soules, Public Works Director, said staff had intended on bringing this issue back to the Commission regarding everything that was presented to the public on July 5th, but because people would be out of town due to the holiday, staff would like to bring this issue back to the Commission to address all those issues on July 19th. He said staff would like to be able to answer their questions fully and thoroughly so that staff could give the Commission better answers and information.
Commissioner Rundle said when the Commission was looking at all of the alternatives and trying to address multiple modes of transportation, this plan, and the construction schedule, seemed like the best idea. He said the original proposal was pulled back from the 5 lane thoroughfare without the dividing median. He said that did not make sense with the City trend toward traffic calming and managing traffic. It seemed every time you expanded the capacity, the volume quickly rose to fill it and went beyond. One of the more subtle traffic calming techniques was to use vegetation to present a visually narrower street and the existing vegetation might not be the best example, but moving all that vegetation really sent a visual signal that this was a high volume and high speed trafficway. He suggested investigating the alternative bike path because it could possibly present some savings, if it could be worked out with the University.
Commissioner Hack said she would like to see what the potential was for a bike path through the KU endowment land.
Mike Wildgen, City Manager, said when the City received a KDOT grant a number of years ago, bike paths were constructed around the Lied Center, past Pioneer Cemetery, down to 23rd Street; and up to Peppertree Townhomes. He said he personally talked with the Endowment at that time and they did no want to extend the bike path up that valley to 15th Street. He said they might have changed their mind by now, which would be a good alternative. He said staff could meet with K.U. Endowment to discuss that issue.
Commissioner Hack said the cost benefit to the City and also to the businesses in that area should be looked at in terms of the total closure of those streets versus partial closure. She said this project was going to be a huge disruption whatever was done, but those streets would be done right this time.
Commissioner Schauner asked if it was possible to find a way to make those interior streets west of Kasold available to only local traffic. That was one of the issues that he would like to discuss when staff came back to the City Commission on July 19th.
Soules said some of those issues were brought up at the meeting and staff had been discussing those issues with a consulting firm. He said he would like to discuss those issues further with the consulting firm and bring those issues back to the Commission.
Commissioner Schauner said it seemed whether those streets were closed all at once or in sections, neighborhood traffic was going to increase unless there was some way to shuffle that traffic in a different place and/or make it so unattractive so that people would not go through the neighborhood, at least in great numbers.
One of the big concerns that had been previously discussed was the traffic count on that street by 2035 was going to be about 35,000 cars a day. He said whatever was going to be done now he would like to have discussions about how that noise could be buffered because the noise was only going to get worse. One of the problems with buffering with just green material was that it took a long time for that material to grow and if buffering with hard scape, unless it was done right, he suspected it would amplify the noise. He said he would look forward to staff’s report on July 19th.
Commissioner Amyx asked if the engineering work being performed at this time, would allow construction on two lanes if the Commission decided to only have work done on two lanes at a time and keep two lanes open.
Soules said the purpose of their meeting was to present two options and no decision had been made, but staff was planning on bringing those options to the Commission. He said 90% of those plans were completed, but the portion not completed was how this should be built. That issue was what staff wanted to bring to the neighbors for discussion and then, those options would be presented to the City Commission for further discussion.
Mayor Highberger said the discussion was on two different tracks. They had been through the design issues, but the construction sequencing was a new issue which was the reason for public comment. He said he was willing to wait for a staff report to make a final decision. He said it would be great to explore a different route for the bike path. He asked if the Bicycle Advisory Committee would be meeting prior to the July 19th.
Wildgen said he did not know.
Mayor Highberger said this matter would be discussion at the July 19th City Commission meeting. (21)
Receive Business Retention Task Force report.
Commissioner Hack said a City survey was conducted regarding whether this City was business friendly, the efforts made to retain and acquire businesses in Lawrence, the planning and permitting process, and whether or not the City was efficient and fair. The Chamber of Commerce had also conducted 3 or 4 surveys as well and as a result of that work, they decided it was important to form a group to discuss the results of those surveys and to see what improvements that could be made. As a result, another survey was conducted to look at those companies or individuals who had had contact with the City either through planning or permitting through Neighborhood Resources within the last 24 months. The people that were surveyed were a targeted group of people that were asked specific questions about the types of projects and staff’s response. When looking through those surveys it was important to distinguish the difference between business retention and business acquisition.
She said staff from the Chamber of Commerce had been working with existing businesses to make sure that those businesses knew how much they were appreciated and if those businesses decided to expand, there were ways to help with that expansion.
The other part of the survey concerned business acquisition and when new businesses or development came to town how they could make that a smooth transaction. It was important to keep in mind that any business coming to town or any business wanting to expand could not disregard any of the City’s policies just to get the job done faster.
She said City staff was asked to look through some of their policies and procedures to see how the planning and permitting process could run smoother, fairer, and more efficiently. She said as a result, there were several things that staff could do such as making the process clearer to developers, and that staff knew where projects were within the process which was addressed in those policies.
The second issue that was brought up consistently was the issue of a moving target. She said the responsibility of the Commission was to set policy and then the policies had to be followed fairly, consistently and efficiently, and that the planning and permitting process could not ever be a moving target, that once those steps were addressed and the policy had been followed, then the plan should then go to a logical conclusion of approval.
Mike Wildgen, City Manager, said there was a second group that dealt with some of those same issues. He said the second memo also addressed a number of those same issues. He said they had spent most of the time on the development process, but the summary was that they wanted to develop and enhance a culture of continuous improvement through all the city staff departments. That meant openness in communication, professionalism, and a confidence in the development process, that people could get through the process in a comfortable way and understand the decisions and the different policies. He said they wanted to define that development policy and process to ensure that there were few mixed messages as possible and consistent policy definitions.
He said the Business Taskforce Retention Report would be a business link to major developers, people new in town, the small business person, and citizens that had never been in City Hall, on how the approval process worked.
Again, one of the things staff had done internally was to develop a customer service emphasis. There was an on-going staff committee that was working on that process for enhancement.
The City was also in the process of hiring a training specialist who would concentrate on customer service and City employees’ processing of requests and complaints.
He said staff had audited a number of the City’s processes and one item found concerned temporary utility easements, which staff found that that paperwork was redundant and was not recordable and staff would try to eliminate those types of situations.
He said a one stop permitting process was being looked at and there were functions that could be combined in the future
Heather Ackerly, Lawrence Chamber of Commerce, thanked and congratulated staff on the development of the matrix. The matrix was efficient and would make for a more transparent process, which she thought would be good for all parties involved. She said the business retention survey that the Chamber administered, there had been comment that companies did not necessarily think the process was unfriendly, it was simply not understood. She said those steps would do a lot to make those processes more defined, efficient on the user end, particularly the business link. She said they had all the tools necessary to make the process friendly and staff had put together a plan to make it more efficient.
The Elected Officials Visitation Program would be started in July and would consist of teams with members form the City Commission, Douglas County Commission, and USD 497 School Board, and they would be paying visitations to some of the larger employers in the community to encourage communications between all parties and making sure that everybody’s needs were being understood and being met.
There was also the Customized Assistance Program, which was a program that was offered to companies that needed more individualized assistance, and those teams and plans were put together on a case by case basis, and they would certainly use all the tools that were needed to meet that particular company’s needs, whether it be City or County. Again, that business link would be beneficial to show all the resources that were out there to help companies succeed.
The last program was the Kansas Department of Commerce International Resources, and they were being a bit more aggressive at the Chamber to make sure the companies know about the various international resources that were available at a state level when it came to marketing, and market research for importing and exporting goods and services.
Mayor Highberger said he appreciated all the hard work from the Task Force and staff. He said they had made some progress and it seemed that they would make more.
Commissioner Schauner said Commissioner Hack did a nice job of leading the Business Retention Task Force, and the work of the work group continued. He said this was an on-going process of continually refining how they would handle customers and clients.
He said business friendly and unfriendly were terms that he did not like, but he liked doing business in a way that was understandable and that was efficient which made a lot of sense. He said the Commission represented a constituency and those businesses represented their own interests. It should be an efficient and understandable process, and if they could accomplish that he thought they would have done a lot in making it a better system.
Commissioner Hack said the term friendly or unfriendly did not come up in their discussions. She said people were concerned about efficiency, transparent, and fairness which were issues that people had continued to come up with.
She thanked staff because when staff was empowered to come up with creative solutions, they did, and it was going to be a great opportunity for communication among the 3 departments which were Neighborhood Resources, Public Works, and Planning. She said those departments were on the front line in all of those retention and acquisition issues. She said it was a great step forward, and obviously it would be a work in progress.
Commissioner Rundle said he wanted to acknowledge that the Commission had in their 2006 proposed budget, funding for assistance with this process. He said one of the models that was considered was reviewed by staff and the Planning Commission reviewed that model at American Planning Association Conference. He also gave a brief outline of that model to the Business Retention Task Force which was a two year long development process which was underway.
He said he would like to see someone go to Yakima, Washington, perhaps Commissioner Schauner and a couple of the planning staff, when that process was underway. It was a 5 year process that they were involved in right now. By seeing someone who was a step ahead, staff would be prepared once they were able to look at spending that money that might be allocated in the 2006 Budget.
Commissioner Amyx thanked Commissioner Hack and everyone involved in this issue. One of the questions he was asked over and over again was the difference between being at City Hall now, versus 20 years ago. He said City Hall was a very big business and having everyone working together to recognizing the City’s positive strengths and weaknesses and constantly try to serve the customer better was on-going. (22)
Consider authorizing negotiations with Black & Veatch for a contract to complete the Siting Study for the Wakarusa Water Reclamation Facility
Dave Wagner, Assistant Utilities Director, Wastewater, said staff was asking the City Commission to authorize staff to enter into contract negotiations with Black & Veatch for a new facility that they projected to be built on the Wakarusa River for sanitary sewer services. That facility was outlined in the 2003 Master Plan and this was the first step in getting that project underway in trying to find a suitable location to place that facility. He said staff recognized that process was going to require a significant amount of public input, involvement and consideration of what their points of view were in all aspects.
He said the sewer plants of 50 years ago were different today and staff anticipated that that facility could benefit by looking at options with alternative and innovative treatments, as well as potentially serving other functions. There were a lot of other facilities around now that provided recreational opportunities or educational opportunities as well. He said those were some of the charges that staff identified in their Request for Proposals.
He said they received four proposals from various teams of engineering and consulting firms and a panel reviewed those proposals over the last several weeks, and came up with a recommendation that Black & Veatch was probably the best firm, out of the group, to perform that work.
Commissioner Schauner asked about the dollar figure range among the bidders.
Wildgen said staff did not ask for bids, but some of those bidders had estimates. He said contract negotiations would determine the actual contract amount and would depend on the services that staff wanted from this firm. He said those firms did not like to give bids on this type of process.
Commissioner Schauner asked if the City had a number in its pocket that staff thought was reasonable for those services, and if the firm could not meet that number, then staff would look elsewhere.
Wildgen said that was correct. It really depended on what professional services staff wanted.
Mayor Highberger called for public comment.
After receiving no public comment, Commissioner Schauner said he appreciated the bid solicitation including looking at alternative sources as they had conversation last week about Clinton siltation and other issues. He said anything that staff could do to get to gray water through a less mechanical process, using more natural processes and anyway they could use that gray water in a way that eliminated the reliance on treated water from the City’s Water Plants would be terrific.
Commissioner Rundle said he wanted to make sure that the assessment of the site needed to be looked at through two perspectives, one was technical like where should the plant be located for technical reasons and the other perspective was where should that facility be located to support the City’s long term plans for growth. The drainage studies that had been done indicated that at the eastern ends of possible locations there was a greater opportunity for drainage by gravity. He said for him personally that was a compelling reason to direct growth to take full advantage of that potential. He suggested that maybe the Commission needed to be communicating their consensus on where they wanted to see growth go so that was factored into the site.
Commissioner Schauner said gravity was a terrific point. The more that gravity could move that wastewater, the less that wastewater would not need to be pumped. A location consistent with that idea would make sense.
Commissioner Hack said she wanted to preface her comments in that her comments were in no way a criticism to Black and Veatch, but this was the largest project that she would ever be a part of as a City Commissioner and this was the first step. She asked to what extent did the City look at local firms and was there going to be local participation in this project as opposed to participation from people from Kansas City.
Wildgen said he had asked that question with an emphasis on local firms. He said there were some local people such as appraisers, survey work, evaluation of sites, and other things could be done locally. There was some design work that would be done outside of Kansas City, but Bartlett & West, was the engineering firm and they at least had an office presence in Lawrence.
Commissioner Hack said this project was going to be using a lot of the City’s tax dollars and she wanted to be sure those dollars would be revolving back through the community.
Vice Mayor Amyx said he understood Black & Veatch’s experience in this type of project, but he asked staff if they had used anyone other than Black & Veatch when it came to the City’s systems.
Wildgen said yes. He said both the Water and Sewer Plants generally Black & Veatch had been the lead designer for those systems. Most of the transmission lines and pump systems, a variety of engineering firms had been used there over time, and continued to be used.
Vice Mayor Amyx said the construction amount for this project was $76,000,000 and he could not imagine another project that would exceed that amount. He said he wanted to make sure, as a member of this Commission, that the recommendation that staff had made and the decision that Commission made was absolutely the right decision.
Wildgen said this was the Siting Study and not the design work yet. He said on the 8th Street project they used approximately 37 local firms. He said Huxtable was a major subcontractor even though there was a big general firm from out of town. He said staff used local firms to do that work. Penny’s Construction was involved in a lot of the concrete work and other local firms and he expected the same thing would happen on this project. He said there were going to be a number of area Douglas County contractors in the ultimate project.
Vice Mayor Amyx asked if staff’s recommendation was being made just because Black and Veatch had always done that type of work for the City.
Wildgen said no, Black and Veatch had to interview just like everyone else and they were not going to be just handed this project.
Commissioner Schauner asked if local firms interviewed.
Wildgen said there were a number of teams that interviewed and they teamed up with a number of local firms, some of them had local architects and some of them had local appraisers. The names that were heard were national firms that interviewed, but they came into town and brought in their own teams.
Commissioner Rundle said he shared a general concern about the City’s engineering. He said he had brought up the idea of trying to do more projects in house. He said this was not the type of project that would be considered in house, neither were many of the KDOT projects, but the City had spent over $3.5 million on engineering last year and that was a substantial amount of money. He said he would like to see the City performing some type of assessment of just engineering in general as a Commission down the road.
Mayor Highberger said he shared most of his fellow Commissioner’s concerns.
Moved by Rundle, seconded by Schauner, to authorize negotiations with Black & Veatch for a contract to complete siting for the Wakarusa Water Reclamation Facility. Motion carried unanimously. (23)
Receive staff report concerning 2005 Senate Bill 298, concerning Sunday sales of alcohol and cereal malt beverages.
David Corliss, Assistant City Manager/Legal Services Director, said the issue of Sunday sales concerning packaged liquor was visited by this Commission a couple of years ago and the City Commission adopted a charter ordinance that exempted the city from the relevant state law governing retail package sales and allowed for Sunday sales and modified slightly the holiday prohibitions as well.
That Charter Ordinance concept was challenged in the Kansas Courts, and the Kansas Supreme Court upheld the ability of cities to enact Charter Ordinances exempting themselves from that type of legislation. The 2005 Kansas Legislature had responded to the Charter Ordinances. There were approximately a couple of dozen cities that enacted Charter Ordinances similar to Lawrence’s Charter Ordinance.
In response to the issue of the state liquor laws being non-uniform with Senate Bill 298, he wanted to simplify that bill as much as possible. This Senate Bill, which was now law would be effective on July 1st, made Charter Ordinances similar to Lawrence’s, ineffective, and invalid, as of November 15th of this year. The state law took effect July 1st, the Charter Ordinance was not effective after November 15th. The bill established an opt in provision if a community wanted to allow Sunday sales for packaged liquor, in Lawrence’s case, continued to allow packaged liquor sales after November the 15th. It also addressed a couple of minor items.
He said currently state law did not allow for retail cereal malt beverage (CMB) license sales on Sunday. A person was not allowed to buy CMB at those types of stores. Those stores were prohibited from packaged liquor, in Kansas packaged liquor was only allowed in packaged liquor stores. This new state law indicated that if a City was going to opt in for packaged liquor, the City would also need to opt in for packaged CMB sales. That would allow for CMB sales on Sundays for those establishments as well.
There was also a provision in the law that would allow the Commission to adopt an ordinance that would prohibit packaged liquor sales. He said he did not present that as an option because he did not have any Commission direction to do so. He said when there was discussion about Sunday sales, theoretically, there were a lot of things that could be changed in the retail liquor statutes, but the City did not pursue that idea.
The City Commission’s options were, essentially, to adopt an ordinance that would allow for Sunday sales of packaged liquor and packaged CMB or not. He said his suggestion, since there was a little bit of time before November 15th, that staff solicited the input of the establishments that would be effected by that bill. He said he had a few contacts with the retail package stores. He said he had seen some newspaper articles that had discussed the impact of allowing Sunday sales. He said he did not know if there was a view point that the Commission wanted to reflect upon as they considered the ordinance. He said staff would send out a questionnaire out to those affected business owners and then staff would give the Commission the results of that questionnaire and then the Commission could make a decision whether or not to adopt an ordinance.
The ordinance was subject to a protest petition under the state law, and the memorandum that was provided, gave the Commission the indication of a protest petition. He said if there was a successful protest petition, there would need to be a special election. Unless they were voting on a constitutional amendment that they could tag along on, but staff was not sure of that idea.
He said he had not solicited the input of the establishments tonight because he indicated that that might be something the Commission might want to do as they considered this ordinance, but staff wanted to get this issue out in early enough fashion so that the protest period could be met if that was the Commission’s choice.
Commissioner Schauner said if the City opted in to continue to permit Sunday liquor sales in package stores, he asked if they would also be required to opt in to CMB sales on Sunday and did that translate to grocery stores and convenience stores.
Corliss said correct.
Commissioner Schauner said did that mean 3.2 or does that mean strong beer.
Corliss said that only meant 3.2, it did not change what CMB retailers could sell, they could only sell CMB. The only change would be whether or not they would be able to sell on Sundays and the holiday’s that were indicated.
Vice Mayor Amyx asked if staff would contact liquor stores and grocery stores to see if they wanted to pursue Sunday sales.
Corliss said he was asking the Commission whether or not the Commission wanted that input in any kind of formal sense.
Vice Mayor Amyx said the input would be very helpful. He asked about the deadline for that information to be received.
Corliss said his memo stated that staff would place that back on the City Commission agenda on July 26th.
Commissioner Rundle suggested that a link be created on the website that would show the relevant information. He asked if the City had to opt into both.
Corliss said yes.
Commissioner Rundle said anyone that was concerned about that idea would also be aware and not surprised.
Corliss said that was a good idea.
Commissioner Schauner said the City now had several months of experience with Sunday sales. He was curious to see what the range of experience had been in terms of impact on business at liquor stores which was the mom and pops versus the larger stores. He said there was a lot of debate and discussion and concern about when did a mom and pop ever receive a day off if the City went to seven day sales. He said he would be very interested in hearing whatever feed back those businesses wanted to provide the Commission.
Mayor Highberger called for public comment.
Spencer Duncan, owner of World Wine, & Beer, said a couple of issues that he would like to stress was first, expediency on the issue. It seemed like they had a lot of months because November seemed far away, but for those retailers who were going to have to adapt, the sooner the Commission could get to this issue, the better because which ever way the Commission decided to go would effect their business practices and they needed to start to prepare for that, so the July 26th date was great.
The other change in the law, which was very minor, is it would alter the hours from 12-8 as opposed to 11-7. He said that was one of those legislatures tinkering for the sake of tinkering items.
The last thing was regarding surveying folks like him because he did encourage that idea. He said there were 19 individual retail liquor stores and what the Commission might find was that they would be split right down the middle. Maybe it was going to lean one way versus the other, and from the 33 grocery stores and convenience stores, they would be 33-0 in favor because it was a whole new thing that they had not been able to do, ever in the history in Kansas.
What he really encouraged the Commission to do, because he knew where those businesses were going to fall, was to talk to the people of Lawrence who had now had this option for the last two years, because what he thought they would find was that those were the people who were going to give the best feedback as opposed to the retail stores. He said they could certainly provide the Commission with what their sales were like and how it impacted them in terms of staffing and the 6 days versus 7 days, and they would be happy to provide all that information, but at the end of the day, the Commission’s best feedback would be from talking to the citizens of Lawrence who were either going to tell the Commission that it was a great thing for them or that they did not care either way.
Commissioner Hack said it seemed the logical thing to do was to proceed as staff had indicated with Corliss’ suggestion of getting information from the existing retailers and to the extent that they could get some public comment that might be where the link on the website might come in.
Moved by Hack, seconded by Amyx, to direct staff to place the item on the July 26th City Commission meeting agenda and further direct staff to solicit feedback from existing retail liquor stores on the Sunday sales issues. Motion carried unanimously. (24)
Receive report concerning plans for Fire Station #4 on Wakarusa Drive.
Dan Sabatini, Sabatini Architect, said they had completed the design and construction documents and were ready to go out to bid, which was why they were before the Commission. He said by the end of the month they would receive the bids from the bidders. It was an open bid process where they would put out a public notice, but also, they had a collection of local and regional firms that they would put a notice out to so they would get good bids on the project.
Mike Wildgen, City Manager, said this project would not be partially funded by the County. He said the County did not have any responsibility on this project.
Commissioner Schauner asked if Sabatini felt comfortable with a total project cost $2,585,000.
Sabatini said yes his firm felt good about that amount. If noticing the construction number was $2,322,000, they felt very good that their bids would fall within that amount.
He said the design was taking the prototype that was developed on Fire Station No. 2 and the intent was that that prototype would be used in future suburban fire stations.
Commissioner Schauner asked if Station No. 4 would be the same square footage as Station No. 2.
Sabatini said those stations were going to be essentially the same, but Station No. 4 would be an additional 10 square feet.
Commissioner Schauner asked if Sabatini remembered what the construction cost on Fire Station No. 2 was.
Sabatini said $1,550,000 was the end result.
Commission Schauner asked if the City had to buy ground.
Wildgen said yes.
Commissioner Schauner asked if that amount of $1,550,000 included the land.
Wildgen said no.
Sabatini said that $1,550,000 was purely construction without the 10% contingency. If adding the 10% contingency it would have been approximately $1,650,000.
Commissioner Schauner asked when Station No. 2 was built.
Sabatini said 2001.
Commissioner Schauner said in 4 or 5 years, there had been an $800,000 increase.
Sabatini said yes, that was approximately right. He said oil prices had gone up, steel prices had doubled or even tripled in many cases, so construction materials had gone through a lot of inflation.
Commissioner Schauner asked about the square footage for the proposed Station No. 4 compared with the existing Station No. 4 on Stonebarn Terrace.
Sabatini said he did not know the square footage of that’s station.
Mayor Highberger called for public comment.
After receiving no public comment, it was moved by Hack, seconded by Schauner, to receive the report concerning plans for Fire Station No. 4 on Wakarusa Drive and approved plans, authorize the establishment of bid date, and direct the preparation of debt resolution. Motion carried unanimously. (25)
Commissioner Schauner said he had an interest in discussing the Stonebarn Terrace future use. He said one of the things that the City did not have much of was meeting places for various community groups and he would like to at least have some discussion about putting together a group to look at the reuse of that facility and involve the neighbors.
Wildgen said there would be two facilities freed up by those series of fire station construction. He said Station No. 5 on Massachusetts was the other facility that would be freed up.
Commissioner Hack said there had been some discussion on Station No. 5 because of its connection with the Underground Railroad and the use of it as a museum. She said she would like to give that station a strong consideration of some historical commemoration at that facility.
Commissioner Rundle asked if the station on Haskell Avenue would continue to be a training station and whatever else that building was used for. He asked if that station was under utilized.
Mark Bradford, Deputy Director, Fire/Medical Department, said the facility on Haskell served two purposes. One purpose was a training facility both interior and external and it also housed their vehicle maintenance division. All of the apparatus bays that would normally be used for that purpose were used for maintenance of their fleet.
PUBLIC COMMENT:
Randy Dyke addressed the issue of panhandling downtown. He said he did not agree with someone being ordered to give money. As far as camping, that was a big issue that needed to be addressed. There were probably close to 5,000-6,000 homeless people and no place that they could go. He said a lot of the homeless go down by the river to camp and try not to cause any problems. He said he did not agree with someone camping on someone’s roof. Also, the homeless did not need to build a fire in a dumpster to keep warm. If nothing else, he suggested giving the homeless a controlled camping area.
He said there were places like Manhattan and Ottawa that buy bus tickets to send the homeless to Lawrence to get rid of them.
He said he had a crew of guys that had a slab down at the river and they kept their area clean, controlled, and they were not there to cause trouble.
He said the Salvation Army was getting ready to kick out 90% of their clientele because they would not take the required classes to stay at the Salvation Army. He said those self help classes were not worth taking. He said most people know how to use good hygiene and most people knew what they were doing. He said the mentally ill homeless people were the people that needed help and he believed the Homeless Task Force addressed that issue and they appreciated that.
Eddie Ottwell said he did not choose to live the way he did. He said his wife died and her income disappeared and he had been homeless for the last four years. As far as the camping situation at the river, some people keep the area clean others did not. He suggested that the City send someone down by the river to inspect the area once a week.
He said the people who came to cause trouble they would make them leave because they were like a family. He said he needed to figure out what he was going to do, with the meager income he had which was less that $600.00 a month.
Raleigh Worthington said living on the river was just simply a place that he could call home. He said he actually chose to be homeless because he liked the lifestyle and he liked the simplicity of being homeless which gave him a feeling of freedom, relaxation, and having their own place was a feeling of security. He said they had the freedom of making their own decisions, creating their own rules, not rules that overruled the rules of society or the nature of the situation they were in, just a place to relax, where they could go instead of having to go into the Salvation Army or the Lawrence Open Shelter having to live under tyranny to a degree. He said he really liked living on the river because of the freedom.
Mayor Highberger said the Commission had not made any final decisions on any of the civility ordinances that were being referred to. He asked if there was a date for that discussion.
Corliss said the discussions would take place next week. He said Scott Miler, Staff Attorney, had an opportunity to look at some of those issues that were last discussed concerning those civility ordinances.
COMMISSION ITEMS:
Commissioner Rundle said it seemed that the Homeless Taskforce was willing, to the extent that the Commission thought it would be helpful, to stay together and help with any implementation. Some of the people on the Taskforce had funding ideas that they would like to see the plan handed off to, if there was going to be a committee appointed to make that smooth transition. There was also talk of wanting another study session with the City Commission later in the summer.
Mayor Highberger said that seemed like a great idea. If those recommendations were going to be implemented, somebody needed to take the lead and until there was a new committee or board to take over that role, it made sense to have that happen. That would be my preference unless there was an objection from any Commission members.
Commissioner Hack said she did not have any objections at all to that idea and the fact that the Taskforce was willing to continue was remarkable, when the Taskforce had put in two years. The only suggestion was if they considered the addition of a downtown business person to that taskforce, someone representing that interest.
Commissioner Rundle said he would put that idea on the internet.
Commissioner Hack suggested Maria Martin because Martin was the Director of the Downtown Lawrence Incorporated. She asked the Commission to consider that idea.
Commissioner Schauner said he was impressed hearing from those gentlemen. He said sometimes he thought people wanted to do the right thing, and did not bother to ask the people to whom or for whom they were trying to do the right thing, and he just wondered what kind of input they had received from the stakeholders from whom they heard tonight on this homeless issue. He said he certainly did not know what was really right for anybody except for himself and he would very much like to see that they had some formalized way to get input from a stakeholder group that he suspected was under represented in this process. He said he would definitely like to have some more discussion and thought about it whether via the internet or otherwise.
Commissioner Rundle said both times that they did have stakeholder meetings, they tried to set up those meetings at locations that would be convenient for the homeless to attend and they had gotten the word out to individuals that were homeless. He said the whole reason to have stakeholder meetings was that they recognized that even the diverse group they had assembled could by no means think of everything and know everything that needed to be considered.
Moved by Schauner, seconded by Amyx, to adjourn at 8:45p.m. Motion carried unanimously.
APPROVED:
_____________________________
Dennis Highberger, Mayor
ATTEST:
___________________________________
Frank S. Reeb, City Clerk
1. Bid Date Set – Street, Storm Sewer, & Waterline for Monterey Way on July 26, 2005.
2. Bid Date Set – 6th & Indiana Sanitary Sewer Improvements on July 12, 2005.
3. Bid – Painting & Micro sand pump room for Utilities to Ammon Painting for $19,700.
4. Bid – 2005 Concrete Repair Program, Phase 1.
5. Sale – Surplus vehicle through e-bay.
6. Ordinance No. 7875 – 1st Read, annex 13.366 acres, N of Clinton Pkwy, E of K-10.
7. Ordinance No. 7897 – “No parking” E side of Eldridge between Seele Way & Trail.
8. Ordinance No. 7898 – “Stop Sign” Field Stone Dr. at Grand Vista.
9. Side Walk Dining License – Free State Brewing.
10. Ordinance No. 7874 – 1st Read, allow alcoholic beverages, Free State Co., sidewalk dining are.
11. TSC – “Seed hump” at 3112 Riverridge near bottom of hill.
12. TSC – “Stop Sign” Field Stone Dr. at Grand Vista Dr.
13. TSC – “No Parking” E side of Eldridge between Seele Way & Trail.
14. TSC – “All-way Stop” 7th & Alabama.
15. Emergency Services Insurance Program – Emergency vehicles.
16. Subordination Agreement – Ruth Townsend, 1061 Home Circle.
17. Resolution 6600, authorizing the transfer of property as part of the 1993 industrial revenue bond issuance for E&E Specialties
18. Planning Commission meeting minutes discussion.
19. Site Plan – (SP-03-27-05) Long John’s Silvers, 1501 W 23rd.
20. City Manager’s Report.
21. Public Hearing – Kasold from Bob Billings Pkwy to 22nd.
22. Report – Business Retention Task Force.
23. Siting Study – Wakarusa Water Reclamation Facility with Black & Veatch.
24. Sunday sale of alcohol & CMB – 2005 Senate Bill 298.
25. Plans – Fire Station No. 4.