01/17/2023 Meeting Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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Council Minutes of 01-17-2022 Charter Amendment is a very laborious process and is sometimes not met with approval. However, if it is it something important to Council, based on the suggestion and the process, it may be something to be considered through the ordinance process. Mr. Alejandro Chock 24677 Randall Drive North Olmsted, OH 44070 Mr. Chock wanted to echo Mr. Sturgeon's comments with regard to Council's appointment process. He stated that in 2009 and 2013 there is record in local media that can be found of Council's active solicitation of applications from the public for the open council seats, in 2023 there was nothing. That leaves the residents with candidates that were directly informed by Members of Council, or who happen to be on the City's website during the countdown to the new year, or as Council Member Hemann suggested they were not even able to see that before the arbitrary deadline that was set. Mr. Chock continued on to say that he was there to encourage an affirmative ballot on Resolution 2023-6. Mr. Chock stated he served as the primary co-author of a study for that legislation, noting it will improve safety at the Maple Ridge Road intersection with Clague Road, the recommendations were identical to those brought forward in Resolution 2022-111. At that time, Councilman Glassburn led the effort to kill 2022-111 in Committee and Mr. Chock continued to state that Councilman Glassburn accused him of stealing the money spent on the study for his personal gain and conspiring with the former Mayor to deny the City a larger project. Mr. Chock stated that Resolution 2023-6 admits the fault and failure to pass 2022-111. Council is very fortunate that the people who work in his industry are committed to making projects happen and keeping projects alive. The 27 crashes that occurred on this stretch of Clague Road including one serious and four minor injuries since the failure of 2022-111, are the real-world injuries of the decisions Council makes on a daily basis. Mr. Chock continued on to applaud Mayor Jones for seeing the value in this study. He said that he was not colluding with the Mayor, but ended with "great minds think alike". Mr. Chock again urged Council to make a better decision than they had in 2022 and to place safety before politics. Councilman Glassburn asked for the floor to ask the Mayor if anyone in the Administration could speak to the development of 2023-6. To which Director Upton was asked to address Council and attendees. Director Upton provided a brief overview. He stated that they used the report to which Mr. Chock referenced, and engaged the County of Public Works Directory to conduct a peer review of the report. In the peer review provided to the City, they generally reached some consensus but noted some of the short -comings in the report itself, stating it is in limited valuation and that the report could have benefited from a more rigorous and consistent comparison. The report also indicated a lack of contemplating other alternatives and poor cost estimations, but generally speaking it reached concurrence with the slip turn lane as it goes into Maple Ridge