03/08/2000 Meeting Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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Council Minutes of 3/8/2000 would probably not be done until 2002. However, he plans to send the street sweeper `~' down to take the debris off the street. Also, the service crews will take care of patching F the holes which should allow the street to last for another year or so. AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION Dennis Lambert, 25057 Carey Lane, asked if Councilman O'Grady would be attending a National League of Cities conference and if he would be reimbursed for the trip. Mr. O'Grady replied that he was attending the conference in Washington D. C. from Sunday through Tuesday of next week and the city will pay for the trip. He is a member of the policy committee of the National League of Cities. This committee sets policy on issues that affect municipalities throughout the United States, and he will represent the interests of the City of North Olmsted and the State of Ohio. Mr. Lambert said he felt that, when a Council member goes on a trip, it should be a recommendation of the committee as a matter of protocol. Also, he felt there should be a resolution to reimburse with some discussion as to the cost that is expended. He believes this should be done even though the funds have been appropriated. He suggested Mr. O'Grady give his thoughts some consideration just to appear to be above-board. President Saringer noted that, when the notices regarding these meetings are received, she does bring it up before Council to find out if there is anyone interested in going--it is discussed. Mr. O'Grady took exception to Mr. Lambert's comment that he should do something to "appear" to be above-board. Those choice of words are disappointing to him. As a point of honor, as a point of integrity and as a point of honesty, he always does everything to the utmost of his ability to be completely open and honest and above-board. Mr. O'Grady asked the Law Director to comment on whether Council is doing something improperly in the way they conduct business. Law Director G-areau did not agree with Mr. Lambert's suggestion to set aside the fact that Council has appropriated money for these types of expenditures. If there is sufficient money appropriated, then by acquiescence the members of Council agree that a person should attend. He doesn't see anything wrong with that--all departments have line items for organization and travel. The funds have been appropriated and can be expended if it's appropriately expended by virtue of it being expended for a municipal purpose. Obviously, what Mr. O'Grady is doing is for a municipal purpose. Jim Burns, 3978 Dover Center Road, the former Finance Director, said he wanted to follow up on comments made by Mr. McKay. It is true that a huge amount of infrastructure work was compressed into a shorter period of time than originally scheduled. As a result, the outstanding debt of the city was substantially increased. Apparently, the residents of Chapel Hill and Sanders wish the city had borrowed some more money. When the street program was started, the streets were broken down into basically three categories: (1) good streets that were worth saving but had some problems; (2) good streets that were on their way to falling apart; (3) streets that already had fallen apart. The priority was given to the first and third categories in order to fix the streets that weren't working and to keep the streets that were in good shape from becoming streets that weren't working. Unfortunately, streets like Sanders and Chapel Hill fell in that middle category and had to wait. At a point in time, the city got to the point where more money could not be borrowed without jeopardizing the financial 6