Meeting Notes
Tuesday, April 4, 2006
Regular Council Meeting
Tonight's meeting began early, at 5:30pm in order to accommodate a study session on the CDBG housing rehabilitation program guidelines. The full Council was in attendance along with Chief of Police Graham Hill, Accounting Supervisor Gordon Eton and City Attorney David Martinek. The CDBG presentation was delivered by Ken Terrill of Redwood Community Action Agency (RCAA) and was designed to cover major revisions of the CDBG guidelines that regulate the housing rehabilitation program in Rio Dell and other communities. The presentation covered approximately half of the needed material and will resume, most likely, at the next Council meeting. Copies of the regulations would be available upon request from City Hall. The HUD money is granted to the City of Rio Dell specifically for the rehabilitation of homes in the city and is then administered by RCAA, as has been the case for a number of years (see 2004-05 Grand Jury Report). Changes to the Self-Help component will be covered in the second half of this presentation. (*on a personal note, a number of the HUD guidelines for the program, that have been in effect for a number of years, were systemically ignored and circumvented by RCAA with the full knowledge of the city) Terrill ended his presentation with a recommendation that the City eliminate its' Paint/Fix-up grant program entirely and direct people to take out the CDBG loan's, administered by RCAA. Terrill stated that the City shouldn't hand out money that would never get repaid, as in a grant, but that people who own their home should have to take out a loan in order to do the paint/fix-up work. The $2,000 maximum grants available to Rio Dell residents, through City Hall, are designed to assist people that couldn't otherwise afford it an opportunity to fix-up their home thereby benefiting not just the homeowner but the entire community. There are a number of households that either can not or will not incur more debt for what is essentially cosmetic work but would fix-up their home if the grant was available to them. This grant program is a community wide benefit and should be preserved as is.
The Council proceeded on to the Consent Calendar, which Mayor Bud Leonard read aloud. The items included the standard extension of the local water emergency through April 18,2006. The entire Consent Calendar can be found on the Agenda. Next came the Special Call Items with two pay requests. First was the eighth pay request from John N. Petersen in the amount of $35,541.00 for the raw water intake project. Secondly was the ninth request from SJ&B Group in the amount of $118,271.18 for the water infrastructure rehabilitation project. Both requests were passed unanimously.
Public presentations were next on the agenda. Steve Harris spoke first and addressed the question of why more people don't attend the Council meetings. He stated that this was possibly due to how the citizens are treated both in the meetings when they address the Council as well as in the public. Mr. Harris went on to state that on March 17th, he and his wife were at Mingo's, here in Rio Dell, when they were approached by Mayor Bud Leonard. Leonard asked them questions surrounding "who turned the City in to the Grand Jury?" Leonard went on to state that the Grand Jury was notified about some emergency repairs on Belleview and Ogle and that City Manager Jay Parrish was called in to testify. Leonard stated that he and Parrish had discussed the investigation and said it had to have been either Mr. Harris or one other resident who contacted the Grand Jury and that it mustn't have been Mr. Harris because he was on vacation at that time. Mr. Harris stated that the Grand Jury investigation process was confidential and not to be discussed, let alone discussed out in public at a local pub. Mr. Harris then said that if this was the type of respect the Mayor and the City Manager had for the law then he was calling for them both to step down. Mayor Leonard then stated to "back off, he didn't say a g** d*** word (*expletives deleted)" and went on to say that we know what went on up there and nothing was secret in Rio Dell. Mr. Harris disagreed with that statement and said that the Grand Jury process is secret and called again for Leonard and Parrish to step down. Leonard said to "get off it!" Voices were raised and at this point Council member Julie Woodall stepped in to try and calm things down. She stated that she knew emotions were high but we needed to calm it down a little. Harris then stated he was "appalled by the lack of respect the Mayor and the City Manager have for the law" and asked for a public apology and again that they step down. He finished by stating he wanted this to be part of the public record, Leonard said to City Clerk Karen Dunham to make sure it was in the record. Harris then said that if anyone had any questions they could call him, thanked the Council and began to walk away from the podium. Leonard muttered something under his breath to which Harris asked him to speak up. Leonard stated "I can tell you from here right now." Harris asked him what did he want to tell him? Leonard said, "I don't think I can say in public. There are a whole bunch of people intent on destroying this town, are you one of them?" Harris responded, "no, I don't want to destroy this town Bud. Do you?" Leonard then said, "No I don't." Harris responded, "then why do you bring this to me in a public place?" Voices were raised and at this point Chief Hill stepped in and said to move on. Harris said to Leonard, "let's call a hearing. I'll bring my witnesses, like you said." Leonard then said, "I asked you something, I did not jump on you like I have been accused of by a certain organization." Harris stated "these are the facts as they happened Bud." Leonard disagreed, "no, those aren't the facts." Harris said "ok, let's take it to a hearing and we'll see." Leonard responded, "I think it probably will be." Harris said, "ok, let me know." To which Leonard said, "they will let you know." Harris asked, "pardon me?" Leonard restated, "they will let you know." Harris then asked, "whose they?" Leonard responded, "you know what I'm talking about." Chief Hill stepped in again and asked that we move on from this. Harris asked Leonard again, "who's going to let me know Bud?" Leonard reiterated, "you know what I'm talking about." Harris asked, "what are you talking about?" Voices were raised again and Council members Woodall and Melissa Marks both spoke up and tried to calm the situation. Harris then said to Leonard, "you're making accusations here..." Hill said again that we needed to move on, to which Harris said "ok, I've said my peace. Thank you very much." Leonard then again muttered under his breath and Harris asked him, "pardon me?" Leonard continued to mutter and clearly stated "what an a**h*** (*expletive deleted)." Harris loudly stated, "let's say for the record that the Mayor just called a citizen of Rio Dell an a**h*** (*expletive deleted)." Leonard started up again with "do you vote even?" Harris responded, "do I vote? You bet I vote." Both Woodall and Marks stepped in to try and stop Leonard from continuing. Harris finished with "Thank you for your time" before leaving the chambers. Marks responded with "Thank you" to Steve Harris. (Listen to the audio clip) This was the most unbelievable performance I have ever witnessed by an elected Official from the podium. I have been the recipient of Mayor Leonard's inappropriate behavior in past Council meetings (also available at the audio clips page) and commend Steve Harris for keeping his composure and not lowering himself to the level of the Mayor.
Mayor Leonard then went on to the Staff reports but the public presentations weren't finished. I addressed the Council regarding the CDBG program guidelines and a recommendation I had been wanting to make for quite awhile. It was not quite as exciting as the prior exchange but since the Council was reviewing the guidelines, I felt it was a good time for a suggestion. I recommended a simple method of record keeping to verify to the loan committee that the recipients had been given all needed paperwork and guidelines (as was not done in our case). A simple checklist of all documents, listed by document number and title, in the loan file and given to the recipients could prevent a number of problems for both the City and the recipients. Similar checklists are used by mortgage brokers, realtors and such to great success and serve as a reminder to everyone of what documents are required. Council members Mike Dunker and Julie Woodall thanked me for the suggestion (which I appreciated).
John Coleman was next to address the Council. He first stated that the microphones in the Chambers are too far away from the speakers to pick up the voices and it was difficult to hear everything. He asked that the microphones be moved closer to the speaker. He commended the Council and the City staff for the "good job" they are doing and stated that there was too much negativity in the Council meetings. He asked that citizens keep the negativity out of the meetings and stated that sometimes he also gets upset with the Council or staff for various reasons but he speaks to them outside of the Council meetings.
Staff reports were next. Chief Hill spoke for City Manager Parrish, who was absent, as well as Public Works Director Jim Hale, who was at another engagement, and said that there was nothing to report from either of their departments nor from the Police department. Accounting Supervisor Eton next spoke of the 15 various projects they are working on and the 14 more that are coming up. Needless to say, his department is very busy. Patrick Talbott from Housing and Community Development is planning on being back in the area in May for another review of the City's CDBG program and compliance. There is to be a budget workshop scheduled as we are approaching the '06-'07 fiscal year. He stated that the major operating funds for the city were doing well at this point. Council member Woodall asked about the budget workshop since the City is operating on a roll-over budget from the prior year. (For background, when Chief Hill was the acting City Manager he had stated in a Council meeting that since we did not have an official City Manager, the city would be using the previous budget and would work on the new budget once there was a new Manager) Woodall expressed her concern that we are spending money on things that are not budgeted for. Eton stated that we are making budget decisions based on "need." Council member Mike Dunker also expressed his concern of not having a budget that included the many projects the City is working on. Before Woodall had left for her vacation, she had submitted a written request to Parrish to set up a budget workshop to address these issues and get an accurate budget done. She had been under the impression that this workshop would be scheduled for tonight's meeting and had returned early from Italy and made a special effort to return in time for tonight's meeting. Eton stated that he had only been told by Parrish to hold a budget workshop with no information as to what that workshop should cover or any other guidelines for the workshop. (It would be futile to hold a meeting without having some guidelines as to what the meeting was to accomplish or what information should be covered) A budget workshop should be scheduled in the near future. We will post the information as soon as we know date and time.
The Council then recessed into the closed door session. Items to be discussed in this closed session are listed in the agenda.
I spoke with Mike Dunker the day after this meeting and he apologized on behalf of the City for the very inappropriate behavior of the Mayor at the meeting and stated that an apology was extended to Mr. Harris. While I greatly appreciate the apology, as I am sure Mr. Harris did, it is not Dunker or any of the other Council members that should be apologizing. The apology needs to come from the offending person, Mayor Bud Leonard, and be in public. This apology however would not alter the fact that a Grand Jury investigation has been compromised by Leonard and Parrish. When a person testifies before the Grand Jury they are sworn to secrecy and admonished to not disclose anything of what was asked or said at the hearing.
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