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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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SIMPSONVILLE CITY COUNCIL MINUTES BUSINESS SESSION September 11, 2007 6:30 P.M.
CALL TO ORDER: Mayor: Call the September meeting of Simpsonville City Council to order. I’d like to welcome you all here tonight. Ms. Bodkins would you call the roll please.
ROLL CALL: Ms. Bodkins: Yes sir: Councilmember Bridges: Here Councilmember Garrett: Here Councilmember Lawrence: Here Councilmember Bagwell: Here Councilmember Zitricki: Here Councilmember Larson: Here Mayor Waldrop: Here
Mayor: Thank you Ms. Bodkins.
INVOCATION Mayor: Is there anyone here tonight who would like to ask blessings upon this meeting in your own way. All right, Council Member Garrett would you ask blessings upon this meeting in your own personal way please.
Mr. Garrett: If we could let’s observe a moment of silence to remember the lives lost on this date 9/11/2001.
Mayor: I think this is probably the most appropriate time for me to mention that you need to all remember and remember the family of Carolyn Todd. A very valuable member of our community who has been involved in the City for many, many years. Served on many Boards and Commissions and even when she wasn’t serving on a Board or Commission she was happy to extend her opinion about how things were going and she will be missed. And if you will just keep her family in your prayers. Go by and visit and keep them in your site.
PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE Mayor: Join us now in the Pledge of Allegiance to our Flag.
APPROVAL OF MINUTES OF 08/14/07 AND 08/28/07 Mayor: Okay council members you have in your packets the minutes of the August 14 th and August 28 th meetings. I’m sure you’ve all carefully reviewed those. So I’ll entertain a motion in that regard. Ms. Lawrence.
Ms. Lawrence: Mr. Mayor I make a motion we approve the Council Minutes of August 14 th and August 28.
Mayor: Thank you Ms. Lawrence do I hear a second
Ms. Bagwell: Second
Mayor: Thank you Ms. Bagwell. Any discussions, corrections, additions, questions. All right. Hearing none, I’ll call for the vote. All those in favor signify by saying Aye (AYE) opposed No. Aye’s have it it’s unanimous. The minutes are approved.
REVIEW OF MONTHLY REPORTS Mayor: You have your monthly reports from all the Department Heads down in your office and I’m sure I have a copy of mine somewhere and we’ve all reviewed those. I want to thank the Department Heads for preparing those for us and kind of keeping us in the loop on what’s going on and you’re all doing a great job. And just keep up the good work and thank you very much.
PRESENTATION OF MUNICIPAL ACHIEVEMENT AWARD by Howard Duval Mayor: All right, occasionally we have a very special guest here. And we even have people who come here and they leave Greenville County and they go down to Columbia . They fill themselves with knowledge and they come back and share with us and we all go huh? But tonight we actually have someone who comes from Columbia to come and visit with us and we’re actually proud to have him here tonight. Howard Duvall is the Executive Director of the Municipal Association of South Carolina. They try to keep us all in line and keep us going down the path to getting better and better. And Howard we’re honored and proud to have you here tonight so if you’d like to approach the podium and heap praises upon us you’re welcome to do so.
Mr. Duvall: Well Mayor I do appreciate the opportunity to speak to the Council of Simpsonville and I do want to heap praises on you tonight. The City of Simpsonville was the winner of the population 10,000-20,000 category for the Municipal Achievement Awards. This year the Achievement Awards had 35 entrants, which is the most we’ve ever had since the 1987 when the awards were begun. And we were very impressed with the City of Simpsonville Heritage Park. When I saw the rough cut of the video that you have in your possession now, I remarked to the people that had come to Simpsonville to do the video – I said well they got a lot more time than the other cities on the video. And they said well they had so much more to show than the other cities on the video. So the Mayor was there to receive the award but we wanted to come out and talk to the whole council, because not all of the council were able to attend the meeting and to congratulate you on a project well done. This is exactly the type of community project that we think is innovative and that you put together the program using different sources of funding. You worked at it for a number of years. It is successful in that you have gotten enumerable people to use your field. It’s going to be a draw for the Simpsonville area for generations. So I am just here to congratulate you. To bring you an additional sign that you can display with the trophy. You get to keep the trophy for one year and then bring it back to us. I’m sure the Mayor’s going to have a hard time giving it up but in a year’s time we will have that trophy back and will be awarding it again to somebody else. Those of you that have come to the Municipal Association’s Annual Meeting over the years know that the City of Aiken has got a tradition of winning these things something like 13 times in a row. So I’m hoping that this is the beginning of a lot of good things in Simpsonville. I got here a little early tonight and I rode around the town and I saw several things that I think would be very innovative award entrants for next year. So Russ you’ve got the job now of picking out the best project that Simpsonville’s going to do during the next year to present to the Municipal Association next year and hopefully I can come back up here for at least one more time and present you with the achievement award for your category. Congratulations and if there’s anything that the Association can do for you please give us a call.
Mayor: Well thank you. Thank you and thank you for coming and thanks to the Municipal Association for everything they do for not only Simpsonville but all the municipalities in the State and if you don’t think we’ve been crowing and bragging about that thing you don’t know us very well. We take it every where we go. We take it to the bathroom and we take it to meetings in Greenville and everywhere else so we’re very proud of that and will continue to brag about it. But thank you very much for coming up. It’s real special when you make the drive and come up and visit with us. We hope you’ll come back again some time with or without an award, but we always like that so thank you.
CITIZEN COMMENTS Mayor: All right, Citizen Comments. This is the portion of our meeting where we invite folks to come speak to us about whatever you have on your mind and I won’t review the rules until we find out who we’ve got here. But we had three people call and ask to be placed on the Agenda and we give them a little more time than we do those who just signed up outside. So, let me call those and you can approach the podium and speak. First is Ronda Downey – Ronda Downey is not here. Alice Porter – Alice Porter is not here. And Jeff Collins. Is Jeff Collins here. Jeff Collins is not here. So apparently we answered all their questions before they got here. But they’ll be welcome to come back and speak any time. We did have one person sign up to speak tonight. Ms. Frances Hamby and Ms. Hamby if you’ll approach the podium we’ll give you two minutes. And if you’ll just state your address for the record please ma’am you may begin.
• Mary Frances Hamby – 116 Banbury Circle , Simpsonville , SC Ms. Hamby: My purpose for coming tonight is to say thank you to the council and the town for the assistance that they have given us with a nuisance that we had been dealing with for a while. Mr. Ron Bridges and Mr. Roger Berkner got right on it yesterday morning and I heard the power saws. And they cleaned out all the brush and low hanging tree limbs that were hanging over our white fences and messing them up and I just wanted to say thank you for the efficiency and promptness that this was taken care of. I would like to say also commend the Manager of CVS. He was very, very helpful and I appreciate the quickness that he responded and has cleaned it all out and it looks wonderful. So I wanted to say thank you.
Mayor: Well thank you but did I understand you to say that Ron Bridges got up early in the morning with a chain saw.
Ms. Hamby: He called me twice on the telephone for and Roger was there early Monday morning.
Mayor: Wow – thank you for reporting that. Thank you very much. Thank you Ron for getting up.
Mr. Bridges: I’m always up early. Not with a chain saw though.
CITY ADMINISTRATOR’S REPORT Mayor: Next item on the Agenda is the City Administrator’s Report. Mr. Hawes this is your time to heap praises on us also.
Mr. Hawes: Yes sir, Mayor and Council, first of all I wanted to give you an update on the ShoutFest that is coming to our new amphitheater. This is going to be the first stand alone event that the City has worked with a promoter on. It’s basically an event just for the amphitheater. So this can be a real good event for the City. We have executed a contract with the ShoutFest organizers and we look forward to hosting this Christian Music Festival at the Heritage Park Amphitheater. This is a touring festival with multiple bands that will fit well with the Amphitheater and it will be held on October 21 st . So everything’s moving forward real well on that.
W. Georgia Road and Main Street Corridors – staff met with the representatives from Duke Energy regarding the Gateway Corridor project and it’s integration with the downtown Streetscape project. And I want to welcome Randy Britton who is here right now. He participated in that meeting last week and Duke Power was very helpful and I think that we have a real good plan going forward to get this installed as quickly as possible. The decorative lighting will stretch from the Fairview and W. Georgia Road bridges into town. Installation will follow the installation of the downtown decorative lights. The representatives from Duke Energy indicated that they will coordinate with us as we complete the placement of conduit underground along Main and Curtis Streets and reverse services to individual affected properties.
We are developing two grant applications that will result in landscaping assistance in the amphitheater if approved. And also rather than the Harrison Bridge Road interchange which is written here we’re looking at possibilities with the W. Georgia Road interchange right now or possibly downtown on the second. We were considering Harrison Bridge Road originally but there are some aspects of that that are just not going to work out with regard to the partnering with the City of Ft . Inn so basically we’re going to have to redirect our focus there. This would still be in conjunction with Trees of Greenville and also the Palmetto Pride Grant process. And I’ll report further on that as well. That would be a 100% grant for new tress.
Transportation issues. I’ve been meeting with the Board and staff from the Greenville Transit Authority to determine if Simpsonville could benefit from a demonstration project of fixed route mass transit. This would involve leveraging State and Federal funding sources including the urban area transit funding through GPATS. I will keep you apprised of the progress. Right now we’re looking at a number of innovative scenarios whereby some monies could be transferred from one funding entity for another purpose that are within Federal requirements. In other words we might be able to get some funds through FTA that would help us do sidewalks along Main Street but would ultimately serve the transit. And I know we’ve talked about sidewalks all the way down to Heritage Park for a while. So this may be a way to get that done. Part and parcel to that is actually getting a demonstration of fixed route mass transit up and running. The form that that would take is really up in the air right now but we’re working in that direction to see if that’s feasible.
Upcoming Events – the next meeting of City Council is our Workshop Meeting on the 25 th . Schmooney Day at Heritage Park is September 22 nd from 10:00 am to 2:00 pm and I know you all don’t want to miss that because the Schmooney will be there in all its glory. I would say his glory but we’re really not sure if it’s a him or a her – it’s never been established. So – Touch a Truck is set for September 26 th and that’s a great event for the small children – at Heritage Park at 10:00 am until noon.
I’ll be glad to take any questions or you can save those for council comments and I can address them there.
COUNCIL COMMENTS Mayor: Well that’s an excellent idea because that’s what we’re going to do. Next on the Agenda is Council Comments and if any of you have comments you can make those and if you have questions for Mr. Hawes be sure and do that also. So Mr. Larson.
Mr. Larson: I was going to ask you Russell if at the ShoutFest is the City going to be running any of the concessions. Is the grill going to be open.
Mr. Hawes: The City will always have the use of its own concession facility but the concessions that will be set up by the organizers in the amphitheater will be kept to the organizers.
Mayor: Okay – anyone else. Mr. Zitricki
Mr. Zitricki: Thank you. Mr. Hawes there’s a couple issues that I’ve been made aware of. The first area is from the Foxwood Entrance on Davenport to the Hunters Woods entrance. There are a lot of potholes there and they’re becoming a hazard and we need to get those addressed quickly. I know the road is scheduled to be repaved this spring. We need to take care of these before the repaving.
Mr. Hawes: We’ll have those taken care of.
Mr. Zitricki: Thank you. Another area is on Yorktown in Powderhorn in the cul-de-sac there’s about a 3 foot round pothole. It’s trying to swallow small cars and we don’t want that to happen.
Mr. Hawes: All right. I appreciate your letting me know about that and we’ll address that one as well.
Mr. Zitricki: There’s also a tree at the corner of Rainwood and Powderhorn Drive . This tree is leaning about 30 degrees off center into the intersection and all the branches on the side towards the intersection – it’s all one sided. It’s posing a hazard from any heavy rains we may get. Hopefully we’ll get some rain – and any snow that may accumulate. We had a lot of trees this last – two years ago that came down in Powderhorn on Powderhorn Road that we had to clean up. This tree didn’t fall but I’m not sure how the root structure is. Those trees are pretty shallow rooted. You may want to look at that and talk to the homeowner or I don’t know if we give assistance with taking some of the tree down because it is posing a hazard in the intersection and people are stopping there you know when they stop at the stop sign – a three way stop. So they spend more of an inordinate amount of time in the intersection. And we just don’t want to see anybody get hurt.
Mr. Hawes: No absolutely not. We’ll take a look at that situation and determine if the City can do anything to assist that property owner. As I understand it’s on private property.
Mr. Zitricki: Okay. The trees not marked but I’m sure you’ll recognize it.
Mr. Hawes: If it’s leaning 30 degrees we’ll find it.
Mr. Zitricki: One more
Mayor: Go ahead
Mr. Zitricki: A-frame signs. I’ve noticed a lot of A-frame signs out on Fairview Road , Main Street . Left out overnight – on the weekends – when we don’t have our Codes Enforcement Officer going around and picking these things up. What can we do about enforcing the ordinance at nights and weekends.
Mr. Hawes: That’s something that is in the ordinance but the Codes Enforcement Officer is not on the streets 24 hours a day. If we know specific instances of where I guess there would be repeat offenders or something, we can certainly get with those folks or the Code Enforcement Officer can visit with those folks and let them know that they are in violation of the ordinance and that they really need to stop that. That would be step number 1 is trying to work with the folks.
Mr. Zitricki: How do we get that list compiled.
Mr. Hawes: The best way I would say if anybody observes what appears to be a violation of any Code they should get it to me.
Mr. Zitricki: Okay – I’ll make a list up for you but I think we need somebody else to generate some more people getting the information to you and don’t rely on one person.
Mr. Hawes: Oh no, no, no – I’m saying anybody – I’m saying any city employee, typically police will report violations they observe. Public Works employees, so
Mr. Zitricki: But Public Works is off on the weekends also and nights – they’re not working so they can’t help either.
Mr. Hawes: That is true. That is true, but they are at work at 6:30 in the morning – which if there is an A-frame sitting there at 6:30 before the business opened it’s probably a good bet that it was out overnight. So –
Mr. Zitricki: Could you make the recommendation and let Mr. Carter know that to have his people on the look-out. Thank you.
Mr. Hawes: Certainly.
Mr. Zitricki: That’s all.
Mayor: Okay. Well let me since it’s timely here – Mr. Holmes you’re getting by to easy we’re going to put you on the spot again. Just for the benefit of this conversation an to refresh our collective memories. Talk to us about – and because I’ve had some calls recently about tree limbs overhanging streets and that sort of thing. Sort of refresh our memory on what the City’s position is on removing overhanging tree limbs, things that seem to be some obstruction to traffic but are not located in the street. Go.
Mr. Holmes: Well if the City Public Works officials find a tree that’s a danger to the people traversing the streets they can do what they need to do by cutting the limb down and removing the debris. The issue sometimes comes up though that the tree itself is not in the City right-of-way – it’s on somebody’s property. And I think it would depend on the circumstances – I normally recommend the city staff not go on private property and remove the problem but to the extent that branches, limbs or a tree is in the street they need to remove that to protect the safety of those traveling the roadways.
Mayor: More specifically I wanted you to talk about people who call in and say I have this dead tree in my yard and it’s going to fall in the street.
Mr. Holmes: We don’t do that.
Mayor: And explain to us why we don’t.
Mr. Holmes: Well because it’s private property. I mean the City does not take care of
Mayor: I just want to get it all out.
Mr. Holmes: I understand. I mean we have routinely – we don’t fix broken water mains, we don’t fix easements that developers may have put on properties for drainage issues that are not part of City facilities. Same thing would be true about trees, bushes, shrubs, or for that matter power lines that are not affecting the safety and well-fare of those using the roadway or actually in the City streets or rights of way.
Mayor: Thank you – sometimes we just need to be refreshed – you know kind of like you do your computer – you defrag it and refresh it or whatever. All right anyone else. Ms. Bagwell
Ms. Bagwell: On that tree limb same type issue Mr. Hawes – could you just let me know – I haven’t been by there – but did they get the tree limb cut back on Curtis Street across from the – coming out of Poinsettia.
Mr. Hawes: They did that within one hour of your request Ms. Bagwell.
Ms. Bagwell: I figured they had but like I said I hadn’t been back over there. And I wanted to say thank you to you and to the Public Works Department for the excellent job done on the drainage culvert over on Woodcliff Court . The citizens were very happy with the way it was done. They felt like that was the best solution.
Mr. Hawes: Excellent.
Ms. Bagwell: So thank you.
Mr. Hawes: I appreciate that.
Mayor: Okay, anyone else. Wow that’s kind of one-sided tonight isn’t it – everybody on the left. All right well thank you council.
NEW BUSINESS • Resignation of Election Commission Member Mayor: All right, next item on the Agenda is brand New Business and Ms. Bodkins is going to tell us about the resignation of a Commission Member
Ms. Bodkins: Yes sir, you all received a letter I believe from Todd Kincannon who has been the Chairman of our Election Commission for the past several years. He has turned in his resignation – he’s taken the bar and a position with a law firm in Columbia and will be moving permanently to Columbia . So I will begin advertising tomorrow morning on the PEG Channel for a new Election Commission person, as soon as you accept his resignation tonight.
Mayor: Okay – so tonight we need to accept – or not – the resignation of the Election Commission member. So I’ll entertain a motion in that regard. Ms. Lawrence.
Ms. Lawrence: Yes Mr. Mayor, I make a motion we accept Todd Kincannon’s resignation from the Election Commission.
Mayor: Thank you Ms. Lawrence do I hear a second.
Mr. Garrett: Second
Mayor: Mr. Brown seconds- or Mr. Garrett seconds – you’ve got to turn that sign around. Any discussion. All right hearing none I’ll call for the vote. All in favor signify by saying Aye (AYE) opposed No. Aye’s have it and we regretfully accept the resignation of Mr. Todd Kincannon so we will – Ms. Bodkins you look like you want to talk again.
Ms. Bodkins: I just wanted to tell you that the appointment for this position will be the unexpired term of Mr. Kincannon which expires December 31, 2008.
Mayor: Okay
Ms. Bodkins: So it will be a short term.
Mayor: What a heck of a time to get a new member – within a month of an election.
Ms. Bodkins: Yeah – we need to advertise and hopefully present recommendations next time and vote in October to get a new person in there.
Mayor: That would be the October Business Meeting – 2 nd Tuesday in October – so all of you keep that in mind.
Ms. Bodkins: Yes sir.
Mayor: All right, thank you Ms. Bodkins.
RESOLUTIONS • Sewer Rate Adjustment – High Volume Users Mayor: All right, next item is Mr. Hawes you want to adjust some rates again. That always makes me nervous when you’re wanting to adjust rates.
Mr. Hawes: Yes sir, Mayor and Council, it’s not necessarily a matter of wanting to adjust rates – more a matter of an evaluation where in order to achieve equity and fairness for all a higher volume discharge, particularly industrial sewer users, inside and outside of the City, we needed to reconsider the rate structure. And what you have before you is a recommendation for the adoption of a new rate structure that leaves the rates the same for everyone who uses less than 500,000 gallons of flow – affluent flow into our sewers per year or per month. And only adjusting basically – basically creating a volume based rate for those who use more than 500,000 gallons of affluent flow into the sewer system per month. That rate is as attached and that would be for those over 500,000 gallons with a flat rate by meter size inside the City for the first 0-500,000 gallons and then 25 cents per 1,000 gallons thereafter. For those outside the City the rate would be $3.50 per 1,000 gallons for the first 500,000 gallons of monthly volume, with the rate in a declining rate structure basically dropping to $1.00 per 1,000 gallons for every – for usage over 500,000 gallons on a monthly basis. This does achieve equity and fairness. It’s also a reasonable and prudent approach to what we’re looking at right now. So I would recommend to City Council to approve this rate change for high volume users inside and outside the City limits of Simpsonville for the use of our sewer system.
Mayor: Okay, thank you Mr. Hawes. I’ll entertain a motion in that regard so that we can discuss it.
Mr. Larson: I’ll make a motion that we approve the request for the sewer rate adjustment.
Mayor: Thank you Mr. Larson do I hear a second.
Ms. Bagwell: Second
Mayor: Ms. Bagwell seconds. Thank you. Discussion. Ms. Lawrence
Ms. Lawrence: Yes, Mr. Hawes what was it previously
Mr. Hawes: Previously high volume users were treated the same as low volume users inside the City. And outside the City the usage rate was a continuous $3.50 per 1,000 gallons. With the declining rate we feel that may be more appropriate or is more appropriate and also inside the City we needed to adjust for the high-volume user inside the City whereby we did not previously have a volume charge.
Ms. Lawrence: Okay – thank you.
Mayor: Okay anyone else. Well now let’s be what’s that guy say that’s campaigning – let’s do some straight talk here. This is really going to be more attractive to industrial folks who may want to come to Simpsonville and bless us with some industry – is that correct.
Mr. Hawes: Certainly – as opposed to outside the City that’s true.
Mayor: I just wanted to make that point. This will make our sewer rates more attractive to those people who might bring us jobs and wealth and that sort of thing. And also this will not – correct me if I’m wrong – but I think I’m right – this will not affect probably – will it affect anyone in the City right now – it certainly won’t affect homeowners and – I mean unless they’re using 500,000 gallons.
Mr. Hawes: There are no users currently within the City who meet these requirements for the usage rates inside the City.
Mayor: And highly unlikely to be any – certainly won’t be any homeowners and small business and that sort of thing – unless they’re using 500,000 gallons
Mr. Hawes: These are only high volume users
Mayor: They’re doing some big time showering or something. Well I was trying to pull that out of you to say this is not going to affect
Mr. Hawes: The volumes that we’re talking about would be industrial only.
Mayor: Thank you so much. All right, anyone else have any thoughts that don’t seem to be clear. I guess I was the only one. All right, hearing no further discussion I’ll call for the vote. This only requires one vote. So this is it. All in favor signify by saying Aye (AYE) opposed no. Aye’s have it. Thank you Mr. Hawes. Wow are we at the end of our Agenda. We – something’s wrong here – somebody needs to complain about something.
EXECUTIVE SESSION • Contractual Matter – Administration Mayor: We do have a need for an Executive Session to discuss a contractual matter regarding administration – so I’ll entertain a motion. Ms. Lawrence
Ms. Lawrence: Mr. Mayor I make a motion that we go into Executive Session to discuss a contractual matter in administration.
Mayor: Thank you Ms. Lawrence do I hear a second.
Mr. Bridges: Second
Mayor: Mr. Bridges seconds. Thank you Mr. Bridges. All in favor signify by saying Aye (AYE) opposed No. Aye’s have it it’s unanimous. We shall adjourn into Executive Session.
Mayor: Came out of Executive Session at 7:10 – no action was taken. Ms. Lawrence. I wanted to say something and that was the reason for turning the recorder on so we could record all these wonderful things. Had a lady come in today that wanted to talk with me about some problems she’s having not with the City but with a neighbor regarding a sewer line that was run across the neighbors lot, but the neighbor passed away, the family sold the property to someone else and this fellow’s not quite as agreeable. I’m just giving you that to give you a little background. She has been working with Joe and Jay and several people down at Public Works and she said she wanted to tell me that those were the nicest most helpful government people that she had ever worked with in her life. That they were extremely helpful to her and she came up to City Hall and all the ladies down there were very helpful to her and kind and courteous and she just didn’t expect to get that kind of treatment even though she’s lived in this town most of her life and she wanted to let me know that. And she wanted me to let those people know that so I felt that I should let all of you know that and if you’ll pass that along to Public Works and I will to when I see them. But if you’ll pass that along to Public Works folks and the ladies downstairs. She didn’t say anything about the gentlemen downstairs she mentioned the ladies downstairs. But I told her that that was very special and I appreciated her saying that so that’s what I wanted to throw out there.
There was something about a tree falling over but I can’t remember what it was. Mr. Larson
Mr. Larson: You prompted my memory. I had a local business owner that was interested in relocating his business down on South Main Street in one of the little houses down there and there were some issues about the house meeting his requirements and Mr. Dyrhaug and Mr. Hawes both got involved and met with him down there and I was across the street and walked across and stuck my nose in on it and the gentleman was very appreciative of both of our administrators for what they did. Helped him get the business up and he’s working with Al Spain now to get the final permits and hopefully he’ll be open in a few days or a week. Pass that along to Mr. Dyrhaug to.
Mr. Garrett: You know Russ have we ever gotten a final report on Freedom Weekend as far as the financial end of it.
Mr. Hawes: On the finances – I believe the Mayor has seen that.
Mayor: Yeah – you won’t get a report on that because what we did is leased our facility to Freedom Weekend Aloft – Freedom Weekend Aloft is a private entity so all of that is internal. I’ll let you know sometime if you want to know but we won’t be releasing that to the public.
Mr. Garrett: I didn’t know how it worked – I knew we leased it to them and that was the bottom line.
Mayor: Now are you asking about the benefit to the City is there anything you can report as –
Mr. Garrett: I mean I assume we made money off those vending people.
Mr. Hawes: We certainly did – we had business license revenue, we had certainly the revenue that comes through all the restaurants – the hotels were entirely booked up over that particular weekend and we had our own vending and train concessions. The train had it’s biggest week ever and that was in four days it had I believe and I’m going from memory here but I believe it had about $12,000 in revenue on those 4 days
Mayor: And it didn’t break down.
Mr. Hawes: So certainly there were very tenable benefits to the City from that point.
Mayor: And just so you won’t think I was giving you a smart aleck answer the – I can tell you that revenues were up significantly over the last few years when they were in another town and that by every gauge that you use to judge the success of an event like that it was a successful event and all the folks of Freedom Weekend Aloft and all the participants – I’m not talking about just the Board and the ladies who actually do all the work but the participants – everybody to a man was just thrilled – people are anxious to come back next year – so I expect it will be bigger and better next year if the weather will hold we’ll probably have bigger crowds.
Mr. Larson: I know something a lot of people don’t know or overlook is that they’re a non-profit – they’re not really out there to see how much money they can put in their pockets – what they do make they try to distribute out to charities.
Mr. Hawes: That’s correct.
Mayor: The City benefited in many ways other than the money. Ms. Bagwell
Ms. Bagwell: Is there any way – how can we find out what charities they support.
Mr. Hawes: We can get a list of those from the Executive Director I believe.
Mayor: They’ll support your charity if you would like them to because they way they support charities – rather than just write them a check is they give you the opportunity and he’ll give you the list of who participated – but for instance if your church or your scout troup or whatever want to participate you can come and do certain things – help with the event – or have a booth and sell certain things and the money that you make is yours.
Mr. Hawes: I know right off the top of my head the Kiwanis was involved, I know for instance Westside Baptist Church
Mayor: They did very well from what I understand – Yeah, I’m not sure – they weren’t really collecting money or anything – I’m not sure I don’t think we paid them for changing diapers I think they just volunteered that but that’s kind of the way that works and hopefully some day we’ll make enough money that we can write checks to charities but then you get to that next thing – how do you pick and choose – who do you eliminate and cut out. The Mayor’s Retirement home is going to be the name or the greater beneficiary next year.
Mr. Larson: We already had the hospice there
ADJOURNMENT Mayor: All right now Ms. Lawrence do you have anything you’d like to say.
Ms. Lawrence: Yes Mr. Mayor I make a motion we adjourn
Mayor: Do I hear a second
Ms. Bagwell: Second
Mayor: I Thank you Ms. Bagwell the motion has been seconded. All in favor signify by saying Aye (AYE) opposed No. Aye’s have it we are adjourned.
Respectfully submitted,
PAMELA J. BODKINS City Clerk
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