It was great to be meeting back in person in Council Chambers! It was great to see the first of many improvements made in Chambers, including new ceiling, new flooring, and most importantly our new microphone and speaker system. There are still more improvements to come, including new cameras to stream meetings, new paint, and new chairs. The meeting tonight was not able to be streamed live because of added pieces of the video system that need to be installed still, however, the audio portion of the meeting was recorded, and our IS Department is reviewing to see if it can be uploaded and shared via the City YouTube Channel.
Council also approved the City to go out for Bid on the replacement of SKiP Playground. This has been a long coming project and discussion. The SKiP Playground replacement is being funded primarily by donations, which as of this meeting, the update was that $475,000 has been pledged, and roughly another $100,000 could also potentially be confirmed in the next several weeks. The estimate for the new playground is roughly $600,000. According to Mr. Wren, the Chief of Staff/Service Director, going out to bid now will allow for ground preparation work to take place this fall and give time for the equipment that currently has long lead times to arrive by next year. I look forward to seeing the bids and final plans that the Parks and Recreation Board and Administration decide to bring to Council.
In 2020 Council passed Resolution 2020-84 to promote equality in the City, and a part of that encouraged training for employees related to such. The City did find a consultant that offers this type of training and will look to begin this in the next month or so once the final details and scheduling is worked out.
Council has talked for the last several meetings about updating Council Rules as they relate to the legislative flow through Council and Committees, and the order of business at Council meetings. These changes so far are updates to 3 sections from 1986 and the creation of a new section. A Summary is as follows:
- 123.07—Legislative Agenda Section
- This section was updated to be named Legislation and Legislative Agenda.
- Now includes when legislation should be drafted so that there is a basic level of support from Council before legislation is drafted. Now legislation will be drafted:
- If requested by the administration
- If requested/approved by a standing committee
- If requested/approved by a majority of Council under new business at a Council Meeting.
- Once legislation is drafted, it must first go through committee and have a recommendation by that committee before it is officially considered before Council
- 123.10—Order of Business
- Updated language regarding committees to require oral reports (which is what Council has been doing for several years since the meetings are now on the same evenings)
- Updated about public comment and legislative items to reference they will be done in accordance with the applicable code sections that address those areas.
- Removed an item that just simply has the clerk say communication has been distributed.
- 123.23—Standing Committees
- Removed items from the standing committee section that really were more about legislative agenda and legislation flow.
- Updated language that said each council member may only chair one committee.
- Stated that councilmembers can request discussion items be added to an agenda by a written request.
- 123.26—Failed Legislation
- If legislation is failed, postponed, or withdrawn, Council will have to approve with a motion to renew to again consider the item back before Council.
- This new way of handling things is following the same mindset of a motion to reconsider and simply gives Council a say in whether items should come back up prior to them automatically appearing on the agenda again.
There are also two charter amendments that passed and will be prepared for the November 2, 2021 ballot. Both of these amendments related to Council meetings and the purpose is to give some flexibility about meeting location and the potential for special meetings and notices related to them.
- Under 4.08, Council would be able to meet anywhere in Stow and instead of just in Council Chambers. As mentioned earlier, Council has been able to make some significant changes and improvement to Chambers during the period when we were meeting remotely, however, if we had not been remote, such things like re-drywalling the ceiling could be very difficult to accomplish and would take a lot more time and labor to get it done. We also learned with COVID that there are times buildings and locations could be shut down and not open to the public because of a pandemic or other related crisis. This would give us flexibility in an extreme circumstance to be able to meet elsewhere. It also moved our organization meeting each year from 8 PM to 7 PM which aligns to our normal Council start time.
- Under 4.09, the limitation to 6 special meetings would be removed and the notices served for special meetings could be by e-mail messages vs. serving notice in person. This adjustment does not change the limited scope of what type of items can be considered in special meetings. These restrictions as to what can be handled in a special meeting seem to limit the abuse of the number of meetings, however, based on our experiences during COVID, did remind us that we should allow for some flexibility in unique circumstances.
I look forward to our next meeting in Chambers on July 22nd and hope to have the video streaming part of the new AV system up and running by then!