06/06/2006 Meeting Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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Council Minutes of 6/6/2006 2) Continues to work on the reorganization of the Law Dept. Hired two new law clerks, Erika Schindler, first year student at Cleveland State who is assisting on the civil side, and Heather Heberlien, a first year student at CSU who is assisting the city prosecutor. He will be conducting interviews this week for the new part-time Assistant Civil Law Director position, who will be responsible for 50% of the city's fair housing program and 50% real property maintenance. He is also receiving and evaluating proposals for outside counsel services in six different areas of the law to assist in specialized areas should the need arise. 3) Civil litigation: The case of Shelley v. City of North Olmsted, which is being handled by Assistant Law Director O'Malley, has been referred to mediation. Midwest Claims Service v. Andrew Cruxton, a case in which the city is an involuntary plaintiff on an insurance subrogation case, is set for a management conference for June 27. Case of Nancy Kovacic v. Cuyahoga County Dept. of Children has been set for a settlement conference on August 24. City prosecutions: in May, 271 cases handled and 6$% were traffic; 32% were general offense cases. Three cases were tried with three convictions. 4) Attended a meeting of the Charter Review Commission to support two of the proposals before the commission. The proposals represented a splitting of Issue 29-proposed amendment to Article VIII, Section 6 of the Charter dealing with competitive bidding. Perhaps the voters might appreciate looking at the issues separately. First, whether there should be an expressed emergency exception for competitive bidding. The language fashioned was real and present emergency that immediately affects the public health, safety and welfare. Second, the state purchase program. Charter Review Commission approved both proposals and is returning them to City Council far further review. 5) Spent last part of May updating knowledge on laws relating to competitive bidding to try to provide additional helpful advice to department heads so that the city can continue to improve its competitive bidding process and continue to improve the RFP process so the city can get more competition and better prices. 6) Attended directors' meetings May 30 and June 6; Board of Control meeting on May 3 l; swearing-in of new firef ghter on June 1; BZA meeting on June 1. Finance Director Copfer: 1) Along with Service Director, City Engineer, Superintendent and Assistant Superintendent of the Wastewater Treatment Plant have completed the interviews with the engineering firms who answered the RFP for the operational and rate study. A meeting will be held tomorrow to identify the top three and ready a presentation to the Board of Control. 2) Cleveland Port Authority financial group made a presentation to her, the Mayor and Planning Director discussing various financing opportunities that may be of assistance with several projects that might affect the city in the future. 3) Late last week and early this week the Finance Dept. properly disposed of old records in accordance with the records destruction authorization granted last year by the Ohio Historical Society. When complete, the department will be able to begin following the annual retention policy that was approved last year by the city records commission and the Ohio Historical Society. Thanks to Service Dept. who assisted in this task. 4) Month of April detailed financial reports were e-mailed to Council today; summary reports are in mailboxes. She would like to have time during the Finance Committee meeting for an update of revenues and expenditures for some of the significant funds. 4