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MIN CC 04/07/1992WWMICIL MEETING OF APRIL 7, 1992 BOOK "R" 38 MINUTES OF THE HUNTSVIL.LE CITY COUNCIL MEETING HELD ON THE 7Th DAY OF APRIL, 1992 IN TIIE CITY ' HALL COUNCIL CHAMBERS, LOCATED AT 1212 AVENUE M IN THE CITY OF IIUNTSVILLE, COUNTY OF WALKER, TEXAS AT 5:30 P.M. The Council met in a regular session with the following members present: W. H. Hodges, Mayor Officers: Gary Bell William H. Knotts, Jr. Gene Pipes, City Manager Ila G. Gaines Ronald L Lange Scott Bounds, City Attorney William B. Green Dan S. Davis Melba Byers, City Secretary James L Carter ABSENT: Charles Robinson CITIZENSIINPUT INQUIRY Mayor Hodges called the meeting to order and asked if anyone would like to make any comments in this portion of the meeting. There were no comments. REGULAR SESSION - CALL TO ORDER There was no citizen inputlinquiry, therefore, Mayor Hodges called the regular session to order. Invocation by Rev. David M. Decker, Pastor of the University Heights Baptist Church CONSIDER MINUTES OF MARCH 31, 1992 Councilmember Green made a motion to approve the minutes of March 31 1992 and Councilmember Lange seconded the motion All were in favor and the motion passed unanimously. NOTE: Councilmember Robinson was absent. ' ATTENDING CITIZENS Ms. Melissa Becker and Ms. Rhonda Lunsford, members of the Week of the Young Child Committee, were present with numerous children. Mayor (lodges read and presented Proclamation No. 92A which proclaimed celebration for the "Week of the Young Child' members. CONSIDER RESOLUTION 92.4.7.1 Approving a substantial draft of a resolution proposed for adoption by the T.R.A. Board of Directors authorizing issuance of TRAP of Texas Contract Revenue Refunding Bonds, Series 1992 for the City of Huntsville Sewer Project. Councilmember Green made a motion to proceed with this resolution with a second by Councilmember Lange. All were in favor and the motion passed unanimously. CONSIDER ORDINANCE 92 -4 -7.2 Authorizing the issuance of City of Huntsville, Texas Waterworks and Sanitary Sewer System Revenue Refunding Bonds, Series 1992. Councilmember Green stated this is an advanced refunding. These bonds mature in 1994. Councilmember Green made a motion to approve this ordinance with a second by Councilmember Gaines. All were in favor and the motion passed unanimously. Consider authorization for Sam Houston State University Softball Program. Marty Blowers, Coach for the Sam Houston Ladykats, is requesting authorization to make improvements to the Josey Street Softball Field at T.H. Ball Park. City Manager Pipes stated it is beneficial that they coordinate their construction work with the Parks Department and improvements are long overdue and would be greatly appreciated. Councilmember Carter made a motion to approve this authorization request with a second by Councilmember Lange. All were in favor and the motion passed unanimously. Councilmember Davis asked if there were any liability problems with SHSU doing the work. City Manager Pipes said, "NB', because T.H. Ball Park is a joint ownership facility among SHSU, the City of Huntsville and the Josey Foundation. CITY COUNCIL MEETING OF APRIL 7 1992 BOOK "R" 39 CONSIDER ORDINANCE 92 -4 -7.1 Amending Chapter 8, Fire Prevention and Protection of the Code of Ordinances adopting by reference the 1991 Edition of the Standard Fire Prevention Code. City Manager Pipes stated this is a routine update and recommended for Council's consideration. Councilmember Gaines made a motion to approve this ordinance with a second by Councilmember Davis. All were in approval and the motion passed unanimously. Consider a professional services proposal for construction review work by Mr. Kim A. Williams. City Manager Pipes stated this is a proposal to work on the King's Candy Building for a cost not to exceed $2,280 which is a part of the Downtown Project. This is the Facade work on the front of the building and the restoration work. Councilmember Gaines made a motion to approve this proposal with a second by Councilmember Bell. Councilmember Carter voted "against" with the remainder of Councilmembers voting 'for ". The motion passed 7 to 1. NOTE: Councilmember Robinson was absent. Councilmember Carter stated he did not understand why we needed an architect to oversee what seems to be a relatively minor repair at this east. Review the final report to the Meadows Foundation for Phase I of the Downtown Revitalization Program. City Manager Pipes explained that staff had made the final report and staff has plans to request another grant for Phase H. This report is for Council's information and does not require Council action. Request for letters of support for the Downtown Revitalization Proiect, Phase II. City Manager Pipes stated, these letters would accompany the subsequent grant application for Phase II. Melba and I will assist in writing these letters. Councilmember Knotts raised a question regarding matching funds. City Manager Pipes stated, "this is a no match grant ". Councilmember Carter raised the question regarding using City letterhead to write these letters. Mayor Hodges stated "yes" in this situation. Mayor Hodges ICI, stated, using the City stationery does not necessarily state the City's position, purpose or intent. This is for Councilmembers information and does not require any action. CITY MANAGER'S REPORT Consider a request for adiustment to the per call reimbursement compensation policy for the Huntsville Fire Department part -time volunteers. City Manager Pipes discussed the policy that has been in operation for several years. He discussed the request from Captain Robert D. Coker and other individuals in the fire department to amend or modify our current operation policy by stipulating that all calls will be paid. Various situations such as immediate response, delayed response and cancellations to calls were discussed by City Manager Pipes. A letter from Fire Chief, Joe French, was brought to the Council's attention also. City Manager stated if the City's policy were changed, payment would be on a "stand -by" status mid he didn't believe that was ever intended. Therefore, he concurs with the Chief's recommendation that the policy stay as it is. Councilmember Knotts made a motion to reinforce the policy in place with a second by Councilmember Gaines. All were in favor and the motion passed unanimously. Consider G F O.A. Distinguished Budget Presentation Award announcement. This is recognition of fine work done by City Staff, and is for Council's information, no action required by Councilmembers. Consider Status of Taxicab Ordinance. City Manager Pipes stated when the ordinance was passed, Council and City Staff knew that some adjustments may need to be made. The Railroad Commission has indicated a response to our ordinance. City Attorney Bounds stated that he would bring back to Council a proposed ordinance that would permit the loading of all the vans in what',. we designate as our loading area. Also, we might suggest that alternate locations be considered for loading areas. MAYOR'S ACTIVITY REPORT Mayor Iledges stated he would like to congratulate Patricia Allen and her department for the numerous years of awards signifying a gob well done. We appreciate it. Mayor Hodges stated that Councilmember Robinson had called him and passed on a concern about 10th Street right -of -ways. He CITY COUNCIL MEETING OF APRIL 7, 1992 BOOK "R" 40 indicated that with the tremendous amount of rain we have had that we might want to look at our policy again. Mayor Hodges requested City Manager Pipes to bring this policy back to the Council in the next meeting for discussion. Councilmember Carter stated he did not see the need to bring it back up, obviously. However, due to the requests regarding the City's policy, Councilmember Green made a motion to bring this policy back to Council with a second by Councilmember Gaines. The motion passed unanimously. COUNCILMEMBER ACTION Councilmember Carter. I find it amazing that we are going to re -visit the mowing policy and I rind it amazing that obviously the tendency is to resend that policy. I can't imagine a city that would take this approach but I guess I'm alone in that so I guess IT accept whatever the majority wants to do as I have no choice. Councilmember Davis. He reported to Council that he had attended his first official meeting of the Huntsville- Walker County EMS Board together with Gene Pipes. Just for your information, the EMS Board did approve the new telephone system for the EMS organization which we all think will improve their efficiency of operation and ability to communicate. Councilmember Green. The Finance Committee had received notification from Southwestern Bell of termination of their franchise agreement with the City. They have presented us with a proposal as to an alternative agreement that they have suggested we adopt. In the Finance Committee meeting this afternoon, it was decided that maybe the best thing for us to do would be to have a work session so the entire Council has the opportunity to look at this proposal. It will alter revenues if we adopt their suggested proposal. I suggest we might want to look at that in terms of our overall budget process and overall revenues not as a separate item. We are not prepared to make a recommendation at this point. This item will be included on the April 28th City Council Meeting. ' Councilmember Bell. Ile raised the question of the possibility of establishing water billings on fixed cycles. Patricia Allen requested she have time to look at this and report back to Council He asked City Manager Pipes if he understood correctly that there will be a signal light put in by the Highway Department at the corner of 19th and Sam Ilouston. City Manager Pipes stated that is correct. Councilmember Bell stated that he had numerous citizens asking about this and he wanted to be sure that this was in fact what was going to happen. Ile stated when he first came on Council, he was driven around town to visit sites and see what the City is involved in, being taken) .' by homes, especially the poor, where roofs and bathrooms were being put into these homes where they currently didn't exist and were being put in under the terms of a federal grant. I understand that there has a tremendous philosophical shift in the past eight years on the part of the federal government. I believe that program was beneficial and I would like to return to that program with the City taking up the slack where the federal government left off as I believe we should take care of our own and would ask that this be put on the agenda, preferably on April 28, 1992. City Manager Pipes stated the information would be provided. He stated, Councilmember Green and I spent some time interviewing various management consultants who would like to do a management study for the City of Huntsville. We talked to three different entities, and I contacted a fourth one. I have tried to summarize my reactions to these meetings in a handout that you have before you. The first thing we need to do tonight is to determine: shall we have a management study due to the price tag of no less than $35,000 and maybe as high as $50,000, and, if we want a management study, what specific group do we want to undertake. The two major groups that we consulted were the Ralph Anderson group led by David Eisenlohr out of Dallas and the MGT Management Group that is located in Florida, Tulsa, Oklahoma and Austin, Texas. To clear up the lesser contender, I did contact the Sam Houston State University Department of Marketing Management. Their response was, we would love to do something like this and probably could if we had enough lead time given the sophistication and given the depth that you seemingly want. We have not the time necessary to deal with this within anything less than twelve and perhaps eighteen months. So the Sam Houston group, with their consent, has essentially factored themselves out of consideration. CITY COUNCIL MEEFING OF APRIL 7, 1992 BOOK "R" 41 'There were five submissions. Two seemed to stand head and shoulders above the rest for our purposes. He pointed out that ;Councilmember Knotts was also in attendance at these discussions. He felt both groups had both strengths and weaknesses and 'both were going to cost in the neighborhood, in the case of Ralph Anderson $35 to $40 thousand dollars. The second group, :MGT, is a little higher, $48,000 which is a fixed cost -- no expenses after that. The Ralph Anderson group is a little more flexible ?since his basic package is $35,000 and expenses will be added which could run from 15 -20%. Both groups seem to be quite competent, have expressed concern about employee morale, they are sensitive to the kinds of anxiety the employees of the City ;might experience, and seem to have done a number of similar studies in the past. Councilmember Green and I agreed that we !might recommend the MGT Group as being the one better prepared. !Councilmember Green stated he was probably a little stronger in his feeling toward MGT. He felt they were clearly superior for ';the kind of study that the City desires. MGT seems to have a better staff with greater background and more specialization. 'Councilmember Bell stated they came exceptionally well prepared up to and including analyzing us enough and having done '•enough research on us to be able to make some rather surprising comments about the City doing a lot of things in the City that :typically counties do. One thing Y did not like about the group is they plan to be on site about five days. They will issue (questionnaires to employees which will be collected by mail and there will be no follow -up interviews. Ralph Anderson Group '.seemed willing to commit to more than five days on site. A major point is they have absolutely no expertise in the architectural or engineering areas. Councilmember Green felt that maybe Councilmember Bell had gotten architectural/engineering confused. - Councilmember Green stated he understood that they would not analyze our buildings. Councilmember Knotts stated he ..understood they had no architectural or engineering expertise. Mayor Hodges stated he supported the management /efficiency study that we have been talking about for some time and he feels it will be cost efficient in the long run for the City. 'Councilmember Gaines stated $48,000 is a great deal of money to spend at this particular time in our economic climate for that ;type of expense. From a business standpoint, you don't spend that kind of money unless you hope to recover it in some way. That's just good business sense. You don't put that kind of money into a project unless somehow you can see a return on it. Are we hoping to recover from this study the money that we are putting into it? Or we committed to the point of doing what this management study recommends regardless of what it might be? What are we looking for in this study? Councilmember Green. I am not trying to sell you on the project, but I would hope that if we spent $48,000, that at least over some period of time, it wouldn't be worth our while doing it unless there was some expectation. But, I wouldn't expect it to occur in one year. If, in fact, you could save $5,000, $7,000 or $8,000 a year it would still be worthwhile and could save at least what the project cost. I would hope that they would make recommendations that would save even more than that. The other aspect as to what they might recommend -- Their philosophy is they will focus on things that they feel will become a consensus of the Council and would make recommendations that we probably could put into action. Councilmember Lange. First of all, I have been in favor of the management study since its inception. I do not like the name 'management study ". I see it more as a "management audit ". I think it has been some time since we have looked at our largest resource that this City has and that is management of our City government -- the people that work for us every day. I would like to caution each of you that we do not have our own private agendas in this. I want to have a totally objective study. We are not after any department or employee. I want to emphasize, this is not a hatchet job. I think it is going to take a lot on the City Council, City Manager and Department Heads to help us to improve the City of Huntsville's operation. Councilmember Knotts. I feel that we need this study and feel like it should be handled very objectively with information given on request We don't want to set their pattern. I felt that we would be put into a computer and stereotyped and then come out with graphics with MGT. I don't feel we could get the depth of the operation with their length of time on site, which included a week end. I felt Ralph Anderson was going to do a custom procedure for Huntsville. I am anxious that we have gotten this far and I don't want to lose what we have because I certainly want us to go through, in depth, and get the things we really need. I think there are places that a lot of money can be saved. CITY COUNCIL MEETING OF APRIL 7, 1992 BOOK 'R" 42 Mayor Hodges stated we do need to make a decision on who we are going to hire due to a timing situation. ' n Councilmember Davis asked, "have we done any checking of references or talked to other cities that have used either of these two groups and found out if they are or are not delighted with them'? There was a consensus of Councilmembers to schedule another meeting. At this point, Councilmember Bell made a motion that we conduct a management audit at a figure not to exceed $48,000 with a second by Councilmember Knotts. The motion passed unanimously. There was a consensus of Councilmembers to schedule a meeting on Tuesday, April 14, 1992 at 5:30 P.M. to look for a recommendation from the committee. Councilmember Knotts. On the letter we got from the Telecable about Channel 9. He talked to Randy Ellisor and he based his decision on deleting Channel 9 from tailing with a few citizens at the Rotary meeting. He stated several citizens had called him about this and would like to keep this channel since it carries programs that other channels don't carry. Mayor Bodges asked City Attorney Scott Bounds to talk with Randy Ellisor and report back to Council since it seemed to be the consensus of the Council to keep Channel 9. Also, as a reminder, you have your list of child centers to visit tomorrow. MEDIA INQUIRIES Question. Could we have a copy of the material regarding the managementlefficiency study? Mayor IIodges stated, "yes ". Mayor Hodges recessed to an Executive Session. ADJOURNMENT ' Mel a Byers City Secretary L