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| The following summary minutes have not been approved by Simpsonville City Council. An official copy of the minutes will be available after adopted by City Council at City Hall 118 NE Main St. Simpsonville. Pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act, notice of this meeting date, time, place and Agenda was posted on the bulletin board at City Hall and faxed to the newspapers, radio stations, television stations and any concerned citizens. |
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CITY OF SIMPSONVILLE SIMPSONVILLE CITY COUNCIL STRATEGIC PLANNING RETREAT ACTIVITY AND SENIOR CENTER February 17, 2007 – 9:00 a.m.
Mr. Hawes welcomed everybody to the Retreat. He explained that we had three retreats previously with Mr. Hawes facilitating. Decided to shake it up a bit and bring in an outside facilitator. Want to move the City towards what City Council wants to see.
Mr. Edwin Thomas, Director of the Government Research and Public Service Institute at University of South Carolina was introduced as the facilitator for this meeting. Their mission is to provide training and technical assistance services, predominantly training.
Mr. Thomas laid some ground rules for the meeting. Agenda was based around what Mr. Thomas and Mr. Hawes spoke about. Start out with a visioning exercise, trying to figure out what everyone sees as the vision for the future. Goal is not to create a vision or mission statement but will get out of the group the elements of what should be in there. Will have each person jot dot brief description of their vision for the future. Will look for common themes. Will identify and prioritize issues that make Simpsonville. Will then talk about each issue in turn. Goal is to try to move towards actionable items.
Ground Rules were set out – would like everybody to participate; wants people to be non-judgmental; have everybody talking and participating one at a time; hard to keep up if everyone is talking at once. Finally, may disagree without being disagreeable.
First discussion was on what Simpsonville would look like five years from now. Looking for themes, concepts and ideas. Vision statement should be compelling and satisfying; clearly stated challenges; have a guide for budget decisions; requires substantial implementing capacity; honors the past; and should be brief and inspiring.
Ms. Lawrence stated she was concerned with marketing but needed to do some tree-lined medians on Fairview etc to make it marketable. Need to move commercial sewer and have an on-call engineer to make sure DHEC drainage regulations are followed to be paid for by the developer. Impact fees for developers. Planning and Zoning Administrator who would be on call and active in the marketing of the City. And continued partnership with the Kitten Action Team.
Mr. Zitricki’s main vision was when someone drives through it they say I like this place, I want to live here – this feels like home. Also discussed sewer, trash pick-up, police and fire protection that were very important. Feels that sometimes that gets pushed to a back burner. Downtown revitalization – bringing in businesses and keeping them there. Fairview Road corridor – should be tree-lined – traffic is way too fast – need to slow it down to get more people out there. More pedestrian friendly both downtown and Fairview Road .
Mr. Larson stated he thinks we should try to make Simpsonville a destination with festivals and the Cultural Center and concerts. Music at the Clock-Tower and the amphitheater. Streetscape expanded both sides of Curtis Street and further down Main Street . Also wanted to get Fairview Road merchants more involved in the City. Landscape committee and crosswalks to slow traffic down and make it more pedestrian friendly.
Mr. Gecy stated most of the things he thought of dealt with promotion. He wants them to do a better job with promotion. Wants to get involved in promoting the elections and putting out information about who’s serving where etc. Need to get more people out to vote. Want to promote the departments more – letting people know what we do. Get maps and calendars out in the library and other places where people have easier access to them. Council business needs to be shared with the citizens. Wants to have an in-house inspection department – and in-house or on-call engineer. Also concerned about the debt of the City. Feels we’re going more and more in debt.
Mayor Waldrop – five years from now he would like to see an atmosphere that promotes healthy families spending time together in a clean, safe, well-managed town with facilities and infrastructure that supports that.
Mr. Bridges stated he would like to see the Commercial Park completed and sold out. Would like to see a lot of new business out there. Finalize Heritage Park . And would like to see Georgia Road completed and they need to work a little harder to see that it doesn’t develop as Fairview Road did. Make it more friendly.
Mr. Garrett would like to see us have a history museum/art museum in the old Library or somewhere. Also would like to see the old school completed and the auditorium where they can bring things in. Major retail growth downtown – love to see restaurants like Justin’s with seating outside where people can have dinner downtown. Feels Greenville has done a great job with its downtown. Big thing is downtown growth – doesn’t want to see downtown become a dead downtown.
Mr. Thomas stated many of these ideas were very specific and others were visionary. Heard common themes on revitalized downtown and everything that goes into that; pedestrian friendly; somewhere that feels like home. A Destination, where people come not just because they live here or shop here but because we have things going on. Wanted additional civic participation. Heard a lot of interesting ideas.
Ms. Lawrence stated she heard a lot of them were concerned about marketing and family oriented. Downtown particularly she thinks they need to try to get the businesses to stay open after 6:00 p.m.
Two things don’t look like part of the vision – working towards being debt free and impact fees and other revenue. Impact fees would help to pay for the cost of growth rather than property taxes. Impact fees would help take the burden off the city for sewer and roads. General Fund money could then be used for the things they want to do to make Simpsonville a neat place to live.
Discussion on whether impact fees were good idea or not. Several didn’t feel that even though the developer did put the road in and put their sewer in it was still having an adverse impact on existing sewer and roads.
Mr. Thomas said they needed to think about vision and the outcome – impact fees etc are a means to that end.
Common Themes – revitalization of downtown and growth of downtown area. Georgia Road area – hopes we can control it in a different way than Fairview Road . Mr. Garrett stated he felt they all had a vision that they wanted to see the City better itself and thrive. Don’t want to see it end up like some other places.
Need to get it all down to a statement like the one the Mayor made earlier. Need to have a town with infrastructure that supports the growth. Mr. Gecy mentioned signage – envisions getting off a plane and seeing multi-colored signs that tell you where the parks are and public parking and a big sign to City Hall. His vision has beautiful rock entry signs. Goal to enhance the landscaping of our bridges and entryways. There are some state funds available for that. First they need is a plan for what they want to do then find some money source for it. Might be able to get landscaping intern from one of the colleges to design an entranceway for us. Ms. Lawrence would like to see the Chamber out of where they are and up by the Fairview Road turn-off or at least a welcome center with picnic tables.
Mr. Harrison stated that they had “x” amount of money to get through the year. Needs to find a way he can produce funds that would enable them to do what they want to do. Have to match grants etc.
Discussed Strategic Issues: issue with infrastructure – planned growth – planning update – complete overlay district ordinance – traffic – growth and annexation – marketing – financing – financial stability – downtown vitalization. Several big issues planning and growth and a second issue of traffic and a third issue of marketing and fourth issue of infrastructure and fifth of finance.
Finance is number 1 issue – can’t do anything without money. Mr. Zitricki stated infrastructure and planning are the two most important things. You’ll find money somewhere to deal with it. Finance should be at least 3 rd . You can’t talk about finance until you know what you want to do.
Assigned points to each category. Infrastructure 28 Planning and growth 31 Finance 15 Traffic 12 Marketing 13
PLANNING AND GROWTH – first Simpsonville is high growth area – if you don’t have some plan in place it happens willy-nilly. You’ve got to have a plan – years ago developed a Strategies for the Future but it needs updating from time to time because of things changing. Areas of town develop in different ways. If you don’t plan ahead growth will overwhelm you. If you have a plan in place you have something to compare to in the future. Mayor stated we had an opportunity to get ahead of the W. Georgia Rd corridor. It will be the next Fairview Road . The advantage we have is we’re ahead of it. The disadvantage with Fairview Road is the development happened before the annexation happened. Need to stay ahead of it on W. Georgia Road and Harrison Bridge Road and impose our standards before the development happens.
Mr. Holmes stated he has always said the City needs a vision and what is it. The growth we plan on Georgia Road or Fairview or to enhance downtown would all go to enhance that vision of family. Fairview Road is uncontrolled growth with horrible traffic. Planning Commission is working on overlay districts. Have good ordinances in place to control growth. The new sign ordinance will apply to the new growth area on Georgia Road . The new CVS on Main St was held to the standard of the ordinances with the type of building, windows, bricks etc. This is the type of building we want. Have some visionaries on the Planning Commission now. Bridges were done with decorative lights etc per council’s request. Need to get gateways (on bridges) done to the downtown area so that people passing through realize that we have a downtown. Have a plan with tools in place to control growth. Feel the overlay districts are a key to the entire process. Overlays are being written now and hopefully will be presented to council within the next two months.
Ms. Lawrence felt the biggest thing they needed to do was hire a Planning/Zoning Administrator. Greenville County does a lot of that work but their vision is not always Simpsonville’s vision. Mr. Hawes stated that the County Planning Commission staff will now fall under County Council. Mr. Hawes recommended a proposal for a new Planning/Zoning Administrator for Simpsonville. There is a planner up there now that would be good for Simpsonville. Would basically take the aspects of Al Spain’s job which are non-inspection oriented and place them under this new position. Has spoken with Craven and Associates and they’ve indicated they are willing to lower their take on their agreement with the City from 50% to 35% and that would fund this position. It would create $40,0000. Would be a neutral fiscal impact. Craven and Associates would then only do inspections which is their expertise. This person would be a jack of all trades but not a building inspector. Discussed having their own inspection department – was a possibility eventually. Inspections are a very specialized trade and do answer to the City directly. Planning aspect is something that was thrust upon Craven and Associates – but that’s not their specialty. They serve well in the capacity of inspections. Everyone was in agreement with that. Council has never provided written policies or instructions that expressed their desires.
Zoning Administrator would be a kind of policeman for interpretation of the zoning ordinance and enforcement.
Updating Plan – Strategies for the Future and Comprehensive Plan. Needs to be updated every 10 years. Have a course of action identifying how the comprehensive plan is underway to be updated and is going to be shaped by the Planning Commission and input from City Council members. Will be a number of meetings. Greenville County Planning Staff will be putting it together and shepherding the process but the process would be dictated by the Planning Commission and community of Simpsonville.
Strategies for the Future looks at mostly downtown and downtown overlay and how to revitalize the downtown corridor. That plan is still in effect. The Dickens project and the Burdette building both fit that overlay for Strategies for the Future. Tripp Muldrow gave them an update on that plan just in the past year or so. Three major projects getting ready to start. Within a quarter of a mile there are three major projects going into the downtown area.
Council needs to develop a vision statement. From that everything else emanates. Mentioned Industrial Park because of the revenue it would bring. Constantly hears council and Planning Commission talking about Simpsonville being a place where people come to live and raise a family. They drive other places where they work. Mr. Holmes stated he noticed people will say I live in Simpsonville – that’s a good place to live and they’ll say the City has 7 square miles and about 16,000 residents. There are 30,000 to 40,000 residents that believe they are residents of Simpsonville, who live immediately around the City – it would seem before you do a lot of this stuff – that we want to be the best place to live and raise a family and that type of thing and from that start to develop other policies. Wants to see Council develop that statement. Strategies for the Future was an attempt to do that. But council as a whole has never written that down and said this is what we want to do. Never had a target to shoot at.
That vision needs to align all the efforts of this community. By sharing that with all the departments and commissions then they all know what the direction is and vision and things they propose ought to be consistent with that.
Planning Commission is looking at degrees of zoning classification C-2. Need to watch degrees of commercial development. As we publicize and promote we need to promote to our neighbors, not just ourselves. We need to consider the people who live in the neighboring areas, not just for annexation but to consider those people because it will affect those folks who live in Simpsonville but not the corporate limits. We need to continuously try to sell our plan not just to citizens but to people who are affected by it.
Development on Georgia Road both west and east is the key. Those folks can come into downtown. The downtown cannot be magically developed – Stores have got to come in and they’ve got to make money. There’s got to be more people going downtown than there are right now. Mr. Gecy is anxious to see how Ft. Inn develops their downtown. We need an influx of a major store in the downtown area. CVS is just on the outskirts. When the Karate place moves out of downtown it will be real quiet. Need to find something to go in that spot.
Goals are: Vision Statement Merchant Association Hirer a Planner Keep pace with growth – fire dept; police dept; sanitation etc. Services have to be able to keep up with the growth. Need financing to have sewer, sidewalks, paving etc to grow and plan Impact Fees should pay for a trash truck – one truck picks up about 650 homes a day; Annexation Policy from City Council – clarity or concensus from council regarding annexation – right now we don’t chase it but in certain cases we try like commercial growth but there are other cases where larger subdivisions on the periphery may or may not be beneficial but they could get us farther out and allow the city to grow and build a higher revenue stream – those are the types we need input from council; they give input when they vote but need like a 5 minute discussion regarding annexation and where we should be looking etc.
Mauldin is currently paying people to come into the City right now. Thinks council just reviews who they want in. They’ve had committees at different times but it hasn’t been very effective. Mr. Hawes would like an updated discussion or clarity on annexation proposals. Ms. Lawrence is not against high quality annexation – thinks it should be high quality because we are Simpsonville – is against some low quality stuff that we take in. Feels we should do better with our building codes. Need to do better than the minimal standards of the code. Need higher standards – increase or enhanced standards. Our roads are at a higher standard than is required. Sometimes you have to take the lower quality or standard homes to get to the higher end homes that are beyond them. Need to see a map and say this is where we want high quality homes. Have liasons with the County to have them help. Encourage certain types of development in certain areas to carry forth the vision which will help with annexations. Low quality is the stuff that people can’t maintain and has different issues that come along later that council has to get involved with. What we take in needs to be quality. Ms. Lawrence believes that coming into the City is a selling point for subdivisions. When we annex we take in the roads and sidewalks or lack thereof. Then Public Works Department has problems with inferior roads and curbs and sidewalks if they are there at all.
Should look at the environs and territorial jurisdictional scenario and work with the county and identify strategic areas that we are looking at and have them consider our input in those as they may some day come into the city. Now Greenville County compares everything in a vacuum. They don’t consider what’s beyond the line of the City – they plan in a rural way. Need to have some input into the types of things that go on outside the city with the planners that work outside the city. Next step is getting workshops together and letting City Council identify the corridors. We have fulfilled the goals on Harrison Bridge Road and Fairview . That triangle is all now in the City after just two years. Many good decisions in regards to investment for infrastructure. It will come back and pay for itself. The Givens Property is also going well – with the park being put in. Do we need to go further up 14. Do we need to go to Woodruff Road .
Mauldin is trying to annex all of Holly Tree. They’re contiguous down Bethel Road and they’re trying to annex it right now. Ms. Lawrence doesn’t feel we need to go Hwy 14. Need to concentrate in the W. Georgia area. Need to start annexing further out past the Blooms or we’ll get standard County development. Mr. Hawes stated if we want to protect the image and character of the City to get out as far as we can so we don’t get blocked in by a parcel.
Mr. Holmes stated they needed to develop a policy. The City needs the following as it’s policy for annexation. Council may want to be provided with the following information for annexations – what is the condition of the streets, the infrastructure in the subdivision; what is the average tax value; what’s the condition of the sewers; those types of things; are there any inner-connectivity issues; write a short statement to justify this annexation into the City; then council can access points – if it gets 6 it gets annexed if it’s less it’s not. Mr. Hawes said a policy would help him know where he needs to spend his time working on an annexation or not.
It is beneficial to the county the more that we annex. We start caring for the roads and police calls etc. Mr. Harrison said we should take the roads if the county gives us X number of dollars to fix the roads – Ms. Lawrence said the county doesn’t repair roads. You can never get the county to pay money for us to annex – there is now way – they don’t see it as us taking a liability off of them.
Want to enhance building standards – Planning Commission has nothing to do with building standards – that’s City Council. Planner can work with the building inspectors and identifying areas where there may be deficiencies that can be strengthened to have higher qualities. Has to be through ordinances.
Need to adhere to the policy once it’s established. Need to do quarterly reviews. One workshop per quarter devoted to where you are.
Have a priority list of roads that need to be paved – about $750,000 – and we are behind on paving. C-Funds are derived from gas tax and you have to go to that committee to get your gas tax monies and they require a match – we have to match monies that are rightfully ours that were derived in the city for gas taxes – so you have to pay them twice. And then you have to pay them to manage it. There’s a 17% cut off the top to manage a paving contract which we could manage in-house. Legislature appoints all the members to the committee. The committee is supposed to decide which projects have the best merit. Needs to be divided up on a per capita basis and hand that money over to the Cities and then the City Council decide what to do with it. They don’t do that. They sit on it and cut a million off the top and give to the School District automatically. We get nothing automatically. We still owe it to our tax payers to pay from our money and pave the roads. If we don’t get a match we don’t get a match but we have to take the money and do paving. We did have some lobbying done and did get some money from the state but some of that money went to five lane Harrison Bridge Road . That didn’t help our neighborhoods but did help our future developments. That was C-Fund money.
We’ve reached the critical level where we need to address the issue of road paving. The Committee is not the way to address it. Need to get on top of the curve. Will never catch up if we do 8 roads a year. We’ve got 48 roads on the list right now. There was a proposal earlier to use some of the general fund balance to attack this problem. Mr. Hawes proposed the possibility of using our credit rating to our advantage, rather than deteriorating the rating by using the fund balance – use the rating to our advantage and do a single GO Bond that would get us back on top. It would issue approximately $750,000 worth of money for paving and would address a couple of the paving issues at our fire stations that are on the needs list. We could do that and not deplete the fund balance. To be paid out over a number of years. Would be a low interest rate environment. About 4% or less. Spread payments out for up to 15 years and then on top of that budget not only the payment but another $100,000 a year to go into keeping the roads up. Need to do this and get caught up with the bond issuance and then commit to doing $100,000 each year as a match with the legislative delegation. Payment would be about $75,000 per year. If we get the GO Bond we need to spend it when we get it and get the roads paved. Ear marked for paving only. Need a plan in place – who the contractor will be – how bids would work and get it in the streets as soon as the money comes in. Do not have the power to levy a gas tax.
Cities can charge impact fees and user fees.
Sewer System – need to spend the money currently on hand that is allocated to that and start upgrading the sewer system. Need plan for implementation of sewer upgrades within the next two weeks – can’t just wait for a grant. Should have money in the sewer fund for doing some of these repairs. Have fund for maintenance of existing sewers, and for identifying future issues and capacity. Expended monies on a GPS System. Money is not all spent. Spent a lot of money getting out from under the Consent Order. Did the Frazier study which identified priority basins for capacity and inflow and infiltration. Undertook a study involving smoke testing and checking manhole areas for permeability. That’s underway now and cost about $60,000. The plan identifies the first 5 years. We are where we should be on the study. Buying a new camera truck in the near future at $135,000 from the sewer fund. Will have digital imagery and software. Will allow us better to prioritize the basins that have been identified by the study and show what we need to do to rehab them. Mr. Hawes will put together a time line with what’s being done and how much it will cost. Did some pipe lining downtown with a grant.
In the process of studying the Hedge Street sewer problem. A developer can come in and do what he wants to do. We’ve got a good idea of what needs to be done. The Burdette property owners may be contributing to the cost of that. Mr. Harrison said he had money that was sitting for sewers and money that was coming in for sewers. He will produce a time line that says he has this much money available now so they get an idea what we’ve got. The money that’s available changes all the time. Sewer Fund is an asset in the fund balance. Sewer fund is broken out from the general fund.
Ms. Lawrence was concerned that the capital improvements that should have been made have not been made and we are three years behind. Mr. Hawes stated the plan didn’t start until the SSES was begun which was just in the past year or so. The money has been collected since the 4 th quarter of 2004. Should be able to have a report ready for them by next meeting – not sure it will be a full report.
Mr. Gecy stated we couldn’t let sidewalks and curbs go. If we’re not getting matching money we still owe it to our citizens to pay for sidewalks and curbs where necessary.
Finance issue is the City can’t do all the other things they need to do if they don’t have the money said Mr. Harrison. Millage rate is at least 15% below the next lowest community and half of what the larger communities are. The state has whittled away at the revenue we get from automobiles – it’s gone from 10 ½% to 6%. Revenue’s maybe not gone down but it hasn’t gone up either. We fight a battle for every day. We’ve done a lot with a little. We don’t get a benefit by urbanization and the cities should receive a benefit for that.
Need to look at better management of services and also where else to look for revenue. We don’t have control over aid to subdivisions or the CTC. Have to determine what the citizen is willing to pay for. In order to accomplish the vision set out it wouldn’t hurt to find more money. You’ve got to make an investment to accomplish what they want to do. Mr. Gecy feels citizens will get concerned if they hear the City is borrowing money to pay for paving. They’ll be asking what’s happened to their tax money. Mr. Hawes says it’s still their tax money – there’s no change in where the funding comes from – because we’re borrowing vs paying it out in one lump. The cost of borrowing the money to do the paving now is far less than the cost of deferring the work. Mr. Harrison stated that after coming to the meeting where they voted on the tax increase the knowledge and understanding of city taxes by the average interested citizen who came to the meeting was almost a perfect zero. Ms. Lawrence agreed.
Goals have to be set at what they want to do – where do they start and how does it pan out from there. Mayor stated that it was important that they understand that every good idea they have and good project they have cost money and they’ve got to decide whether it’s worth the expenditure and if it’s saleable to the public. He feels it’s a great thing that they play it tight and close to the vest. He feels that’s what government should do. We take money from the public to provide services they want – not to make a profit. You’ve got to have just enough money – shouldn’t have tax payer money laying around in a savings account. Mayor feels we’re doing very well.
Need to figure out what the vision is first and then start prioritizing from that point. Mr. Harrison said they wanted to do things as economically as possible but not so cheap that it costs more money in the long-run.
We face inflationary issues every year. Faced the fact that our employees were pretty severely underpaid a couple of years ago and tried to bring that up. Employees are the number one cost we have along with employee related cost such as health insurance. The Cost of Katrina as it relates to how our insurance is layered and what is re-insured. Katrina was such a major hit that it funneled down to everyone. Retirement is going to go up again this year. These are the big expenses. Ms. Lawrence stated they needed to rate the programs and needs according to what meant most to the citizens. Major elements in budget are going up faster than the revenue is.
MARKETING – Marketing brings business. Ms. Lawrence feels the Chamber has a place in that – doesn’t know if they’re out selling Simpsonville or not. We aren’t getting any bigger businesses that haven’t been brought in by council. Mr. Hawes stated the Chamber coordinates efforts among existing businesses; they bring people from outside of town with the events they do. Probably don’t do a huge amount of recruiting businesses. They do events fairly well and meetings. They try to get the businesses talking with each other – those that are already here. There is some benefit in that.
Mr. Holmes stated at the Chamber Retreat he was on the economic development committee and the city folks told the Chamber marketing was their job. A recommendation of that committee was that the Chamber consider hiring a professional marketing type person for economic development. That’s one of the things they ought to be doing. They don’t have the money to hire anyone.
Mayor stated he was thinking more of branding – feels it’s councils duty to project an image of their community. Want the rest of the world to know Simpsonville is whatever they choose it to be. Try to project an image of small town USA , great town to raise a family; progressive community that’s always looking forward. That is the marketing he’s talking about today. Imaging is a better term to use than marketing.
Businesses that come to Simpsonville come because of all the growth in this area in residential here and beyond our borders. Now that we’re adding things such as Heritage Park and events down there we’re making Simpsonville a destination so people want to come here and then the businesses will want to come here.
Mr. Zitricki stated if they didn’t think they were getting the help they needed from the Chamber then Council needed to market it themselves to bring businesses in where they see future availability. Feels they need to be pro-active to try to get something in when they know there’s going to be an opening. Need to draw the good businesses here. Discussed at the Chamber Retreat that they needed to have an inventory of available properties on the web site so when people are looking to come here they can see what we’ve got available.
Buxton Company does a demographic analysis for cities; then they approach the retailers you want them to approach. They go to the trade conventions and shows and put your city in front of the retail analyst or the real estate analyst for the retailers and tell them this matches with your criteria. They keep a huge data base. It’s not cheap and it costs about $68,000 to do it. Mr. Bridges says there is a Greenville County development corporation with Jerry Howard as the head – thinks we need to get him working for them. Mr. Hawes stated they do not go outside the industrial realm – they don’t get into retail. Mr. Hawes always talks with Mr. Howard about industrial businesses. He sees Simpsonville more as a Commercial/Retail over all.
Creating a branding and imaging identity that they are doing now will be a great, huge step. If council wanted to consider something along the lines of Buxton or another company that does demographic analysis we can consider that but need to find money to do it.
Mayor said we could spend $68,000 to do that or take $68,000 and fix curbs and sidewalks. Mr. Gecy said he would spend the money on neighborhoods first and then see if there was anything left. Mr. Gecy wanted to know who talks to all of these folks that want to come in here and bring there business to Simpsonville. Mayor stated that by the time we generally got calls from a business wanting to come in they had already done their demographic studies and made their decision to come – it’s down to needing a site. It’s all about timing and cash flow.
Mayor stated for every one call that turns out to be a business moving in he probably gets 6-7 calls that don’t turn out to be anything. Hasn’t had any calls lately with the exception of a hotel investment firm.
Web Site – Ms. Lawrence is not happy with the web site. Need to spend money on getting the web site dressed up. It needs to be jazzed up. Mr. Garrett suggested we speak with Bob Schumaker about web sites. Also need to upgrade the site with functionality not necessarily pretty. We’ve got a video on there – the codes will be searchable in the next month or so. The Chamber is supposed to be putting vacant buildings on their web site. Mr. Holmes stated the Chamber told him some of the real estate people are fighting that they don’t want that information made available on the Chamber web site.
Two actionable things to pursue – branding and imaging and part of that is what the web site looks like. Have a study underway currently that will create a logo and identify marketing and positioning for the City. It will do background research to get ideas what the City should be to help develop; and develop a motto.
Need to pretty up the web site. Needs more pictures and statements about what the City is all about. Needs to identify the character of the town – needs some sense of place. Walterboro has all the council pictures on their site and it lists “why am I on council”. Need to look at other web sites and see what they have that we would like to have on our web site. Ms. Lawrence suggested they go to the high school and ask them if they would be interested in doing the web site as web master and carry it on as a project.
Mr. Hawes said it would cost between $15,000 and $30,000 to get a good web site. Need to decide what’s more important to do on projects. Web site needs to convey a sense of what Simpsonville is. Mr. Zitricki wants to see in-house marketing. Wants staff to contact some of the outside businesses and solicit them to come into the City. Mr. Hawes says a new planner might have some ability for that purpose. Council could also approach businesses about coming into the City. The people you need to contact is the franchiser not the business itself. Recreation Dept is still marketing Heritage Park . Freedom Weekend Aloft and the amphitheater will bring a lot of people in.
TRAFFIC: Simpsonville was recently ranked number two for speeding tickets. Council felt in general this was good because it tells people that we want them to be safe and we won’t allow people speeding and running red lights. Mayor is concerned about traffic safety – especially when the high school gets out. There has been a great influx of traffic in the last 5-6 years. Mr. Garrett thinks the Police Department is doing a great job in making traffic stops and trying to keep traffic calmed down and at the speed limit they are supposed to be driving. Traffic tickets are not necessarily revenue generating. 107% of the fine collected goes to the State. Mr. Harrison stated we bring in 15-20% more than what it costs to run the Court Division.
Mr. Gecy brought up speed bumps. He said we’d talked about it for years and he thinks it’s time we experimented with it and put some out there and see what the public thinks once they’re out on the streets for a while. There are areas that have asked for speed bumps and once they have them they might not want them but he feels that we should experiment with it. He thinks it may calm the traffic in some residential neighborhoods.
Mr. Hawes stated they had a list but they didn’t have a policy. The policy involves the money and right now we don’t have an allocation of money for speed bumps. GO Bond could be increased to include speed bumps. Might want to try temporary ones that you can put down and if they don’t work they can be pulled up and moved to another location. He’d rather try those than extending the GO Bond for additional monies. Ms. Lawrence said that she had an old policy about speed humps and would get it to Mr. Hawes.
Department Head Retreat was held January 12 th . Focused on needs assessment. What needs they had now and in 3 years and 5 years etc. Gave council a synopsis prioritized by the Department Heads. Mr. Hawes sees these as real needs – some are needed more than others at this time.
Fire Department – number 1 priority was personnel. Need another firefighter per shift and a deputy fire marshal. They’ve asked for a deputy fire marshal for two years now. Ms. Lawrence feels deputy fire marshal could be done by some of the firefighters they have now in the evenings. Three firefighters were identified in the projections presented to Greenville County when the City renewed the Fire District Contract. Based on a 10 year plan 2005-2014. This year per the contract we’re supposed to have a 3 mil increase in the Fire District. County Council will have to approve that increase. Need 9 votes to enact a tax increase. Don’t know if we can get that but if we get it that money will be used to pay for 3 new firefighters. A mil in the fire district is approximately $72,000.
Reroofing station 2 may be done in this fiscal year. There are leakage issues over there and we can do it for about $4,700.
Surface Bay floors – slippage and safety issue. Need to address that. Will identify a way to get that done at the end of this fiscal year with contingency or in next year’s budget.
Dive rescue equipment and training – he feels that’s a luxury item. Greenville County has a dive team – Very unlikely we would need one – we only have back yard ponds in the fire district that are not major bodies of water.
Paving stations 1 and 2 would be done through the GO Bond of paving. Paving rear of station 3 would be the same way.
Acquiring land for station 5. Not in the offing in any time in the near future. They’re talking about land costs going up. Chief feels they should buy the land and sit on it and when we need station 5 to be built we’ll have it. It’s not practical in our current fiscal scenario.
Fitness Room – we’ve got the equipment through a grant. Right now they work out in the fire department bay. In a good situation they’d have their own room to work out in. May be able to work with that because Public Works could build that room – just going to have to see if there’s a way to work that with materials and Public Works labor. It’s not a high priority. Not sure it will be addressed this year. Mr. Gecy thought the firefighters might have the time to devote to building on a room for work out equipment.
Police Department – has 8 vehicles over 100,000 that need replacing. Mr. Hawes has identified a vehicle replacement policy based on actual maintenance costs, age of vehicle, use of vehicle, number of miles per year, assigned or pool vehicle – all of this would be analyzed to objectively identify cars that need replacing. 8 cars over 100,000 miles does not mean to him that there are 8 cars that need replacing. Chief is very adamant that once they reach 100,000 they need replacing. Working on an analysis now – hope to have it ready for the first council workshop. Mr. Garrett says he’s concerned because he sees a lot of officers leaving a stop sign or light and they floor board the car. He doesn’t feel there’s any need for that. Mr. Hawes said that we have mostly assigned vehicles to officers and they tend to take better care of their vehicles. There are only 3 pool cars now. Helps keep the mileage lower on the vehicles. Extends the life of a number of the vehicles.
Also an issue of take home vehicles – Chief Reece is adamant that he has lost people because they can’t take their vehicles home. Mr. Hawes would be in support of allowing a take home vehicle on the Chief’s discretion rather than just within the City limits. Some are outside the limits and they are good officers but they get an offer from somewhere else that allows them take home vehicles and they jump at it. Ms. Lawrence said she had suggested 10 miles a few years ago. Mr. Hawes supports the discretionary authority of the Police Chief or himself. There would have to be some criteria identified – longevity of employee – distance from the station. Ms. Lawrence said longevity is reasonable. Typical police car that’s assigned will last 8-9 years. They drive them 10,000-15,000 a year. Mayor suggested that they let the Chief give them a take home car but they were going to have that car for 9 years. Ms. Lawrence doesn’t feel they leave because they don’t have take home cars – she stated they follow the money – they’ll leave for $10-$15 more a week. Mr. Hawes stated if council would look at a policy such as they’ve discussed here at the discretion of the Chief with some agreement that all the cars would have to last a certain amount of time. Mr. Hawes will draft up a policy.
Number 2 priority was an investigator. Working on a grant for that – have put in for grant two years. Doesn’t believe they’ll get it this year. Ms. Lawrence asked if we got it what would we do when the Grant ran out. Just as the other grants it becomes part of what you have to budget for. Ms. Lawrence stated that was her problem with it you became stuck with a person you wouldn’t have had. Mr. Hawes stated it was similar to the fire-marshal he needed to get some clarification as to why it was absolutely needed at this time. The grant helps you ease into the additional officer. If you need the person it helps make that transition easier. Council questioned why the investigator was necessary. The Chief feels he would like to have an investigator per shift. He feels he is getting stretched at this point. It’s questionable whether 4 new officers are needed at this time. We have new developments with homes coming on line but the types of homes they are are not generally the types of homes that generate police calls. We do not have a high crime city. If he can work them into the budget he probably would – but he’s not sure if he can work them in – he’s going to need them at some point. The reality is it’s difficult to do it. Money has to be prioritized to where council wants to put it and where it needs to be placed. If you add officers you have to add vehicles. Looking at build out scenarios as to how quickly homes are coming on line – it’s slower than expected. Distances are considered. They do patrol the neighborhoods. We can measure how many times they go through a neighborhood in a day or week or month. Police Dept’s actual measure of effectiveness has not dropped. Calls are steady at about 2,000 plus a month.
Fire Trucks are seen around town at a restaurant or grocery store because they must have their truck with them if they need to respond even if they are eating or picking up groceries.
Mr. Gecy suggested Mr. Hawes get with the Chief and work out a policy that states they don’t want to see police cars just sitting and parked talking with each other. There are 5-8 cars on the road at any one time. Mr. Hawes to investigate whether there is really a need to add 4 more officers.
Requested to have a dispatch person and station – another desk. There are two on a shift now. Mr. Hawes will investigate to see if the need is really there.
Records Management System – Mr. Hawes is in full support of and will try to work it into the budget – will improve efficiency of both the Police Department and the Court System. It will take us off Greenville County ’s proprietary court management system. Will enter tickets at the site one time and don’t have to be re-entered at the Court and automatically creates a docket when the ticket is entered. Mayor stated we just spent a lot of money 5 years or so ago to coordinate with the County. Ms. Lawrence concerned about how they would know if there were outstanding warrants somewhere else.
Computer hardware software and recorder of DVD for dispatch, records every voice communication with dispatch. It’s a necessary system – one they have is very outmoded and NT based and have had to use patches to get it to work.
Public Works is requesting 4 employees – two drivers, a concrete person and a service tech; Joe believes he can get a driver and a concrete person all in one. Definitely needs another CDL driver and service technician would be helpful with increased demands we have with amphitheater and football/soccer fields coming on line. This would be a grass mower type person. Needs part-time employee for assistance on projects. Mr. Hawes supports this if he can get it in the budget. We’ve taken on a lot of new projects.
PW needs another brush grabber; have found a used vehicle that we can get for $6,500; this will allow purchase of a brush grabber that can be mounted on the back. Will allow old brush grabber that doesn’t work off the back of the existing truck and use that truck to create a second recycling truck. There is a leaf truck as well to see if we can get a leaf trailer. Feels the employees are a real need and will do everything possible within the revenue structure we have. Garbage Truck is the 4 th request – don’t feel it’s necessary this year. Will revisit next year.
Generator request may be split between departments.
Recreation Department – do we want to light the soccer football fields at Heritage Park . Ms. Lawrence feels there are plenty of other fields that are capable of handling football and we don’t even have a soccer program. Mayor would like to see those not called football and soccer fields – just recreation fields. Thinks they need to think about things they can do in the future with that field. Festivals, circus etc. They don’t think they should do lights down there. The fields already have irrigation. Mayor doesn’t think we should put in any lighting or grandstands or anything that would interfere with the meadow. Mr. Hawes says the fields make perfect parking for the amphitheater. Decided to leave irrigation in but not top dress the two bottom fields. If you top dress a field you really don’t want to be parking cars on it. They want to park cars so they won’t top dress it.
’92 Mini Van is worn out at Rec Department. They need a new pick-up and will try to work that out for $10,000 at the State Contract price.
Floor Scrubber is needed badly. Will try to get that in the budget.
Portable Movie Screen goes hand in hand with amphitheater. They are envisioning a movie night in the park. Is inflatable and costs $6,000. It’s size is 12 x 20. Pretty large. Folks could come out and watch a movie and bring a picnic. Mr. Hawes stated they would look for larger screens and price those. Discussed possibility of building their own screen.
Have issues with oil switches at Woodside Park, College Park and City Park which would cost about $12,000 – will budget that in the Rec Department budget. These are the switches that turn the lights on and off.
Administration – discussed personnel at City Hall – if we add a planner that will be an addition to staff at City Hall. Envisioning putting that person in the back conference room. Really don’t need two conference rooms. Staffing at City Hall otherwise is the same as it has been for the past year. It is quite functional. Not looking at adding anybody. One recommendation of the audit was to have someone assist with bookkeeping and we’ve got a person doing that. That’s a good positive situation. Discussed streamlining a position at City Hall. The position as it is is functional for the purposes of City Hall. Was decided that this matter would be discussed in Executive Session at the next meeting.
Mr. Zitricki would like to use the Mayor’s statement as a template for the vision statement and move forward. Should receive template from facilitator some time next week.
Mr. Gecy wanted to consider the impact of the MID they had previously discussed in meetings. He would like property owners to pay a specific tax to help enhance that area. Mr. Hawes said they were still looking at that. The consultant is examining now how to work medians into Fairview Road . There are some issues with DOT that they will have to overcome. They require the approval of every property owner who would be impacted by a median before they would allow a median to be placed on the road.
Ms. Lawrence feels Fairview Road is not the frontage road for the businesses – there is road that goes from Ray Talley Court to Harrison Bridge . That’s the road they should use. Have got to continue to bring the downtown philosophy across the bridge. Bring the lights down and over the bridge, especially as the corner develops. Also up and down Curtis Street .
At this point they adjourned the retreat.
Respectfully submitted
PAMELA J. BODKINS City Clerk |
| 118 N E Main Street, Simpsonville, SC 29681 |
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