HomeMy WebLinkAbout2003 07-22 Pre
Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting July 22, 2003
The Pre-Council Meeting of the Meridian City Council was called to order at 6:00
P.M. on Tuesday, July 22, 2003, by Mayor Robert D. Corrie.
Members Present: Mayor Robert Corrie, Tammy de Weerd, Cherie McCandless,
and Bill Nary.
Members Absent: Keith Bird
Others Present: Bill Nichols, Gary Smith, Kenny Bowers, Terry Paternoster, and
Will Berg.
Item 1. Roll-call Attendance:
X Tammy de Weerd X Bill Nary
X Cherie McCandless O Keith Bird
X Mayor Robert Corrie
Corrie: I would like to call the City Council Meeting to order on July 22, 2003 at
6:02 P.M. at the City Council Chambers. At this time, I would like to have the
City Clerk have roll call attendance. We have three Council people present and
one absent. At the present time, we do have a quorum.
Item 2. Adoption of the Agenda:
Corrie: Item Number 2 on the agenda is the adoption of the agenda.
Nary: Mr. Mayor.
Corrie: Mr. Nary.
Nary: I would move that we adopt the agenda as presented.
McCandless: Second.
Corrie: Okay motion has been made and seconded to adopt the agenda as
published. Any further discussion. All those in favor of the motion say aye.
Opposed no. All ayes motion carried.
MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES, ONE ABSENT
Item 3. Discussion with Greg Bennett regarding water bill:
Corrie: Since Greg Bennett doesn’t seem to be here tonight and we want to
discuss this Locust Grove Overpass Right of Way Reimbursement I would like to
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July 22, 2003
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hold off and maybe Keith could be here. He was the one that would like to hear
that.
Item 4. Discussion of Locust Grove Overpass Right-of-Way
Reimbursement:
Corrie: We can have the discussion of the Finance Report.
Nary: Mr. Mayor.
Corrie: Yes.
Nary: Before we do that thought I know Mr. Mills is here and I wandered if – all I
was going to ask him a question was is there a particular person from ACHD that
might want to be here for that discussion about the right of way. We’ll set it over
to next – well two weeks. Yourself is fine but if you think there is someone else
more appropriate would you –
Mills: We certainly can I’m not exactly sure what the questions are. Certainly if I
knew what those were I could either answer them or take them back.
Nary: Maybe take them back because what we’ll do is we’ll probably set it over
like I said for a couple of weeks. We had asked at our Joint Meeting for
information as to which pieces of property have already been purchased with the
money that was set aside for that project from the city.
Mills: Okay and –
Nary: And we had some questions about some of the properties. Basically, how
do they fit in the criteria that we had set up for that? Is that a fair statement?
De Weerd: Yes.
Nary: So I don’t know if there is a particular person from ACHD that’s – I
remember the gentleman knows the project manager that sort of stood up while
we were there and I don’t remember his name. I don’t know if he should be here
to have that conversation with.
Mills: It’s possible. My limited knowledge is that there are three different projects
between Franklin and Overland and that you’re being charged right of way for all
three of those projects, which includes the Overland Locust Grove Intersection.
Then the project that would be from Overland up to 500 feet north up near
Bentley I guess that would include the overpass then one from Bentley onto
Franklin. My understanding is you’re being charged for right of way purchased
on all three of those projects. From what I – I have a copy of the agreement and
it’s a bit nebulas in whatever the word is. I guess it says that it’s between
Franklin Road to Overland Road parenthesis and I-84 Overpass. Is there a
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July 22, 2003
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question about that about whether you should be being charged for something
other than the overpass project itself or that’s really, what the question is?
Nary: Yes, the document that we received had identified some properties that at
least one particularly I think was on Franklin Road I can’t recall.
De Weerd: Probably both.
Nary: Yes but it was really fronting Overland and not part of the Locust Grove
project.
Mills: It wasn’t fronting Locust Grove it was just on Overland. It wasn’t on a
corner or something like that?
Nary: Right.
Mills: Okay.
Corrie: One of them was the purchasing fronts Overland Road which could be
part of the intersection improvement. That was still (inaudible) about that.
Mills: Okay.
De Weerd: Mr. Mayor.
Corrie: Mrs. de Weerd.
De Weerd: I guess it was my impression first that our 1.8 million dollars would be
used for the Locust Grove Overpass not the intersections but the overpass. We
just want some clarity on that and I believe our Public Work’s Director had also
brought in question a couple of properties that were being asked for
reimbursement. I totally agree with him.
Mills: Well now I understand what your questions are. Probably it would be
better if I bring someone along that can explain it or at least get all the answers
for you or bring that to you or send it in a letter form. That’s my understanding.
You’re more concentrated on the overpass not necessarily the other.
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Corrie: And we can have that continued to August the 5. Would that give you
enough time to –
Mills: Sure or even a week is fine.
Corrie: We won’t be here.
Mills: You won’t be meeting next week anyway so that’s fine.
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July 22, 2003
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Corrie: He won’t be here then and I won’t be here the 5 but I don’t count
anyway.
De Weerd: Where are you, you haven’t asked for permission.
Corrie: Yes I did she said okay.
De Weerd: Oh, your wife.
Mills: Well I’ll get the answers for you.
De Weerd: Oh sorry the higher authority.
Corrie: Okay thank you. Anything further Mr. Nary?
Nary: No I just thought we would get that taken care of this week.
Item 5. Discussion of Finance Report:
Corrie: Stacy do you want to go and then put him last?
Kilchenmann: I think we’ve discussed numbers enough in the last few days so I
don’t have too much to add to the revenue discussion we already have. I went
through all the expenses and it looks like we’re going to come in fine. With the
hold back we did, we should be in good shape expense wise. I did look to see if
we could restore the hold back for the city hall and I think we can. We will have
savings in prosecution expense of 54,000 dollars and we have a line item in
other government called advertising and promotional that we haven’t used which
we could probably also use that for volunteers to do something. Will and I talked
about doing something for the volunteers out of that. Then you have about
28,000 dollars left in the Council professional services budget so you would be
okay to go with that. I printed out for everyone the email I sent you with this
summary from the budget workshop just in case you don’t have a printer handy
or whatever.
De Weerd: I think (inaudible).
Kilchenmann: Are there any questions?
Corrie: I don’t have any right now.
De Weerd: I certainly appreciate you looking into that for the update.
Kilchenmann: If there aren’t any more questions then we’ll let Terry take over.
Item 6. Web Page Demonstration by IT Department:
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July 22, 2003
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Corrie: Okay Terry.
De Weerd: Terry you’ve got a lot of time.
Paternoster: What do we have about 45?
Corrie: You’ve got 15 minutes.
Paternoster: 15 minutes that should be more than adequate.
Corrie: Take your time.
Paternoster: I just wanted to show you guys some of the recent changes we’ve
made to the website. I’m not sure if you’ve been recently out to the website but
we hired a programmer to come in and make some changes for us and I think
that overall there has been some good improvements. As you can see that, the
overall navigation has changed so that we have drop down buttons. We’re in
total control of this unlike the buttons that we had before which were hard coated
on to the actual image. We can actually at will come in and change the name of
the buttons, add departments and change the names of departments whatever
we want. One of the other nice features that we did is over on the side here
there’s actually this side frame lets you navigate through the different
departments so that if someone comes to our website and they’re trying to
wonder how did I get where I’m at they can always see where they’ve traversed
to. They can see that well I’m in departments I’m in finance and I’m in
employees so it’s kind of nice because it gives them some additional navigational
function that wasn’t previously there. Some of the other changes to briefly cover
with you that were made is we’ve made it so that individual departments can add
their own web pages. Previously when the website had been originally done they
were limited to the default menus that were given to them as far as employees,
links, news everybody has the identical menu choices and there wasn’t any way
for them to really add their own web pages. One of the interests of the Police
Department was they said they would like to get a lot more community
information out on the website. By making this change, it’s going to enable them
to come and create their own navigational substructure so that they can get to
where they want to go. Something else as you’ll notice is the City Council has a
nice little button on the top, which takes you to your picture. Not only that, under
the departments you also notice there’s a City Council so that you guys have the
same availability to put in employee files, facts or whatever type of information
that you might want to add. Yes.
De Weerd: Did you notice I put in a question?
Paternoster: Where under facts?
De Weerd: Yes under frequently asked questions.
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Paternoster: Oh I see an A.
De Weerd: I didn’t look to see if it’s still there but it was earlier. I guess it didn’t.
Paternoster: I guess I’m not – apparently, it didn’t get saved.
De Weerd: I just asked you know how often does City Council meet and so that
the Mayor and City Council meet every Tuesday. It’s the only question I could
think of.
Paternoster: I’m sure that there will be a lot of questions that could come up in
the future. I think that probably another advantage of this change that’s going to
be to the city is that if we do get some sort of intern in to help out we could have
them upload pages. Actually, do some of that modification for us so that we have
someone taking care of some of the content for the Council and other
departments that need some assistance.
Corrie: What have you got under calendar? Mine won’t work is it my computer
or have we determined that?
Paternoster: Well one of the changes that was actually updated was there was a
lot of problems with some of the overall functionality of the previous website.
There were some broken links. There were problems when you would try to add
items. It would error out on users. If you didn’t have, certain placeholders like an
NN and NA like under your files it would error out if someone tried to go to that
site. Those have all been corrected to the best of my knowledge. The calendar
does work and items can be added to the calendar. There still are a couple of
just – it’s not perfect. Basically we didn’t really contract in this particular update
with the programmer to modify the calendar to make it completely functional but
basically they fixed it so that it works as originally intended which means that –
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that’s fireworks because it’s the 4 of July. If items are added to the calendar
you can come and look and they will show up over on the side. Currently we
don’t have any items listed in the calendar but if items are put, there they will
show up. Some of the weird things with the calendar is like if an event traverses
stst
between July 31 and August 1 it won’t show up in August but it will show up in
July so you would have to additionally go add it into the August calendar to get it
to show up on that date. Overall, I think it is much better than what it was
previously.
Corrie: Yes I agree.
Paternoster: No, nobody has put anything on the calendar. Yes, we could put
the Salmon Barbeque on there.
De Weerd: Well and the Centennial Celebration too. Terry when I clicked on –
you know when you sent me that link the other day it took forever. I don’t even
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July 22, 2003
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think I’ve waited – well maybe I didn’t have enough patience but I couldn’t get the
Mayor’s message.
Paternoster: Were you on a dial-up?
De Weerd: Yes.
Paternoster: It could take a long time to access some things on our site through
a dial-up because it basically has to download that to your machine and stream it
to you like the Mayor’s message. I’m pretty sure that if I was to go to let me see
what happens if I try to go there.
Corrie: We’re about in the process of changing that too.
Paternoster: Absolutely. I think that would be an awesome change.
De Weerd: See how you can condense that file so it loads faster.
Paternoster: So if I come in here –
De Weerd: I guess you can always say hi then –
Corrie: So long.
Paternoster: See it goes pretty fast for me here. Obviously, it’s not going very
well on the screen. I can see it on my screen just fine and it’s running. I think
that it’s probably just because you have dial-up connection that it’s not running so
optimally for you is what I’m guessing. What we were going to do is we were
going to add something to the calendar. Let me see. General and calendar
items the date would be August 1, 2003 with an end date August 1, 2003. Event
annual Salmon Barbeque what do you call it Kenny.
De Weerd: Isn’t it the Firefighters Association? How many years have they held
it?
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Paternoster: Isn’t this the 24 year?
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Bowers: 24.
De Weerd: Yes, you can put that.
Paternoster: And where is it located at?
Corrie: The speedway dairy barns.
Paternoster: Meridian Speedway.
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De Weerd: Make sure Terry you put 24 annual.
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Paternoster: Okay good idea. 24 Annual Salmon Barbeque. Even fees.
Bowers: (Inaudible).
Paternoster: Eleven dollars adults and five dollars for kids six to 12.
De Weerd: Just put call the department.
Paternoster: Contact name Kenny. Contact address 540 East Franklin Meridian
Idaho. Contact phone number.
Corrie: 888-1234.
Paternoster: Contact email address is merfire?
Nary: Shouldn’t we put Greta as the contact person?
Paternoster: Let’s see if this works. Well what happened here.
De Weerd: It probably went to the same place as my FAQ.
Nary: Good demo Terry it’s out there in space somewhere.
Paternoster: It obviously does not like something and I’m not sure what its not
liking at the moment.
De Weerd: What a nice looking back row we have here. We don’t often get nice
looking back row people. I’m talking about your friends.
Corrie: I figured she was going to stick her foot in.
Paternoster: I am completely baffled on why that’s not working. That’s not a
very good demonstration. It will the barbeque will be up by tomorrow.
Corrie: Either that or we cancel it?
De Weerd: Will you put in my frequently asked question too?
Paternoster: Let’s see so you want to go to City Council. I’m pretty sure that this
one would work your facts. The question is how often does the City Council
meet. What’s the answer? Every Tuesday.
Corrie: Every Tuesday.
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Berg: 1 through 4.
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July 22, 2003
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Paternoster: So if there’s five Tuesdays in a month you don’t meet?
De Weerd: Well it depends.
Corrie: Special Meeting.
Berg: At 7:00 P.M.
Paternoster: Okay so now if we go over here and we go into departments, City
Council I think you’ll have a fact. How often does the City Council meet?
Technically, I think that (inaudible). Just to give you an example of a couple of
the other things that were added real quick just so we can check it out. One of
the features that was added was each individual department has the – let me go
here and log out and log in as an individual user. When they log in it takes them
to their department but basically, what they can come in and do is they can come
in and they can add users. They can give them permissions on what they want
the user name to be, the password, whether or not they want them to be able to
add web pages, edit web pages, delete web pages or just edit the calendar.
Previously there had been one log in for each department now there is multiple
log ins so people can get on and do all sorts of neat stuff. I think that that
probably about wraps it up. Are there any questions?
Nichols: Terry. I would recommend you change your password now since it’s
been on display and on there for everybody to see.
Paternoster: This was just my temp I actually have a master password. Besides,
you would just ruin the Technology Departments page.
De Weerd: What was the password?
Paternoster: It’s zip disc.
McCandless: I don’t even know what mine is because I don’t use it.
Corrie: That’s why your darn computer doesn’t work.
Paternoster: Look it, I can delete my user.
Nary: Mr. Mayor.
Corrie: Mr. Nary.
Nary: Terry just so with the intent being each of the departments would have
some designated web person this isn’t something anybody can log into that.
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Paternoster: It is. It’s so each individual department can assign somebody at
their department or different people to take care of different content. I think for
the most departments there’s probably only going to be one person who’s going
to maintain the information at their web page. For somebody as large as the
Police Department they might assign multiple people to do certain aspects of it.
It enables that functionality. Something else that allows is it also allows them to
change the header so that they can have like a picture of the Police Department
or the Public Works Building instead of having city hall while still maintaining the
overall fill of our website so it maintains a consistency for the users.
Nary: Is there a way on all the pages to have some incorporation of the logos so
that they can maybe put the police building but still have the city logo on the
pages so that way there’s still some connection between all those different links?
Paternoster: Yes and I think that some of the discussion had been that we
thought that maybe we’d replace like the clock tower or put the city logo on so
that that way there was consistency there.
Nary: Replace that you mean?
Paternoster: Yes that little clock.
Corrie: That’s a lot of space.
Nary: No, you can’t see the detail or the sign there.
De Weerd: That’s a (inaudible).
Paternoster: Any other questions?
Corrie: Good job Terry.
Paternoster: Thank you.
Corrie: I’ve got some things to add that I will be talking to you about next week or
so.
Paternoster: Great that sounds awesome. Thanks.
Corrie: You’re welcome. By the possibility, is Greg Bennett here tonight yet?
Item 4. Discussion of Locust Grove Overpass Right-of-Way
Reimbursement:
Corrie: Bruce I’m sorry come up here.
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July 22, 2003
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Mills: Mr. Mayor I was just looking through the agreement that we were talking
about earlier on Locust Grove. I just wanted to point out that Section 1.4 says
the project shall mean the ACHD minor arterial construction from Overland to
Franklin with a freeway overpass over I-84 including intersections. I just wanted
to let you know that that language is in there in the agreement. I also looked at
the maps and I do see that it appears that certainly on Overland Road that we
purchased and have charged you for some parcels that are not at the
intersection of Overland and Locust Grove. They are west of the – so in any
event I’ll get additional information to you but I wanted to point that out that I saw
that in the contract.
Corrie: Okay thank you. We can adjourn if you want to stay close around.
Nary: Mr. Mayor I would suggest maybe if we wanted we could adjourn and if
Mr. Bennett does show we can either take that up or put him on the end of the
other agenda.
De Weerd: Mr. Mayor.
Corrie: Mrs. de Weerd.
De Weerd: Or we could look at going into Executive Session and ask the City
Attorney to give us an update on the memo he sent out earlier.
McCandless: That would be a good idea.
Corrie: Okay I will entertain a motion to do such thing.
De Weerd: Mr. Mayor would it fall under c?
Corrie: Personnel, which one are you doing?
Nary: Probably we’re talking about – yes b and f.
De Weerd: Okay. Mr. Mayor.
Corrie: Mrs. de Weerd.
De Weerd: I move that we adjourn into Executive Session per State Code 67-
2345(1)(b)(f).
Nary: Second.
Corrie: Okay motion has been made and second any further discussion?
Hearing none roll call vote Mr. Berg.
Roll Call: Bird, absent; Nary, aye; de Weerd, aye; McCandless, aye.
Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting
July 22, 2003
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Corrie: We’ll go into Executive Session and let us know if anyone comes in.
(Enter into Executive Session at 6:30 P.M.)
(Come out at 6:45 P.M.)
Corrie: I would entertain a motion to come out of the Executive Session.
McCandless: So moved.
Corrie: Motion has been made and second to come out of the Executive
Session. Any further discussion. All those in favor say aye. All ayes motion
carried. Let it show there were no decisions made in the Executive Session.
MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES, ONE ABSENT
Item 3. Discussion with Greg Bennett regarding water bill:
Corrie: We didn’t adjourn but we have still on the Pre-Council Meeting Agenda
and I believe Greg Bennett is here this evening. Greg discussion of Greg
Bennett regarding the water bill. You’re up.
Bennett: My concern is the procedure for establishing open water accounts for
our rental properties in Meridian. I own properties in Meridian and I talked with
you three or four years ago about a procedure because I was told then that I had
to come into city hall and fill out a renters form to get water service from one
tenant to the succeeding tenant. I complied with that and within a matter of a
couple of weeks the brand new tenant his water service was shut off. It was the
reason given was because the prior tenant hadn’t paid the closing bill. As I
explained to you, the reason for water being shut off for the prior tenant is no
reason to turn off service for another tenant who had nothing to do with the fact
that the closing bill wasn’t paid. I suggested to you that a solution to that might
be if in fact a landlord must come in and fill out a renter’s form that that would be
the time to make the landlord pay the closing bill for the water account and
therefore there would be no outstanding account. There would be no reason to
go and shut water off at somebody’s house when they had done nothing wrong
to begin with. A few months later the procedure was changed to, I believe it was
changed so that the billing would be Greg Bennett care of the tenant at the
residence where the water was being consumed. That wasn’t really a solution to
me but it had seemed to be working for a few years. Now just recently another
one of my rental properties turned over and that tenant came in to try and get
water service established and she found out that she couldn’t put a water
account in her name that it had to be in my name. When she told me that I called
the Water Department and they informed that September, October last year that
the billing procedure had changed again and that now a water account in a rental
property in Meridian is billed straight to the owner of the property and sent to the
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July 22, 2003
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address of the rental property where the water is consumed. I asked the woman
who I was talking to where – I’m ultimately liable for the water bill at the property
and I have no problem with that but how am I ever going to know that those
people haven’t paid a water bill. She said well we think that the postal service is
going to forward it to you at your residence. I said wait the postal service is going
to forward mail to me when there is no forwarding address on file with the postal
service to do that. She said they are just following the procedure the City Council
had set up through the ordinances. It just didn’t make any sense to me because
I have – I was dumbfounded. I don’t see how the postal service would even
know that that’s not my house that I don’t live there and I would never get the bill.
I had the lady check my other rentals and she said oh here’s one we’re going to
turn the water off today. That very day they shut the water off. Well me being
liable for that water bill somehow the city had let that water bill get to almost 200
dollars. In all my years of owning rental properties in Meridian, I have never once
been notified by the Water Billing Department that a bill has gone unpaid. The
City of Meridian is making me liable for 200 dollars worth of water that I had no
knowledge was even there that had been unpaid yet I’m still liable for it. Well my
question would be where is the notification process because years ago when I
had to come in and fill out the forms that said renter’s forms I checked a little box
that said notify for non-payment I would assume that I would have been notified
that there was in a rears on the account. It was going to be shut of imminently or
that I owed money for an unpaid water bill. I have never ever been notified by
the City Water Billing Department. It’s just surprising to me that the city can’t sell
water to a renter directly and collect money from a renter. I would say that Idaho
Power does it seven days a week 365 days a year. They collect money from
renter’s all the time for utilities. Intermountain Gas does, Direct TV does, Qwest
does they all do and it’s just surprising to me that a municipality that sells a water
service it’s an essential service can’t also do that too. Also, what’s on that bill is
garbage services and then effect as landlords we’re being asked to pay for
people’s garbage to be hauled away and for the water they’re using. In my
opinion, it’s kind of the same as power. It’s the same as gas it’s an essential
service that goes to a property. If the utility companies can do it, I don’t
understand why the city can’t do it. I don’t know where I would stand from here.
I can’t make motions or can I?
Corrie: No.
Bennett: All I can do is tell you my story?
Corrie: Right.
Bennett: That’s kind of it I just don’t see the logic in it. Somebody at one point
had told me that there are hundreds of unpaid accounts in the Water
Department, which must equate to thousands of dollars worth of uncollected
revenue. That to me that’s got to be unacceptable to somebody in the City
Government because there’s money that isn’t being collected that could be use
to put more parks on line or to pay more people to go turn off more water or
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July 22, 2003
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something. Either the problem seems to me to be in the management of the
water billing or I don’t understand how the City Council makes that ordinance
such that me as a landlord would be liable for a property and then fail to notify
me when the bill gets so high. If I had been notified the first month when it hadn’t
been paid it might have been 65 or 75 dollars. Yet, here it gets to 200 dollars
and the only way that I’m notified is if I have to call in and find this out. Now
somewhere the procedure must be in place to notify the person that they’re liable
for water bills rather than just wait until the tenants out and somebody tries to
establish a new account. By that time there could be four or 500 dollars worth of
water. I have no idea I don’t know how long the city will let it go. I know I had
one that was at 200 dollars almost before they shut the water off. That seems
unnecessary. Somewhere I mean it used to be that renter’s form seemed to be
to cover the whole thing. When I suggested to you the way to solve that problem
might be to just make the landlord still fill out a renter’s form and yet pay the
closing bill for the prior tenant before establishing service for a new tenant.
Because any landlord would typically have the deposit and they would take the
closing bill and deduct from the tenants deposit return. It seemed like a really
good solution to me and three years later we seem to be further and further away
from a good solution to something that just isn’t working. It doesn’t seem to
make any sense. That’s my case.
Corrie: Okay it sounds like you have three or four different issues there. One
being that the renter’s are not paying their bill, then they leave and you come in
with a new renter and they’re not catching the bill at that time. That’s one of
them I understand is that right? You’ve got a property and let’s say it has a 200-
dollar bill and they’ve walked away from it. Then you have a new tenant come in
and you get them their water the department does not notify you that there’s a
200 dollar bill on that account is that correct?
Bennett: Well I don’t think I should have to wait until it’s 200 dollars. I think I
should be notified when it’s 30 days. I don’t think that was 30 days I think it was
like 100 days worth of water service that the man hadn’t paid for. If there is a
notification procedure then I should be notified in 30 days so it doesn’t get to 200
dollars. I have a lot better chance of getting the tenant to pay the 65 dollars after
one month then I do after three months worth of accruing. I still am liable for it.
In a spirit of cooperation I would think that I would be notified early enough so
that I could do something about it for the city’s sake to get them their money plus
be able to get it turned off. To get it stopped to get the problem resolved earlier
then all of a sudden now Greg owes 200 dollars. That’s one then there’s the
notification process yes. That to me is a big problem.
Nary: Mr. Mayor.
Corrie: Mr. Nary.
Nary: Mr. Bennett I mean many of the things are things we already knew the
problems. Don’t get me wrong I think what you’re saying has some real validity
Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting
July 22, 2003
Page 15 of 18
to it. Some of it which is beyond what has impacted you is that this whole
process has been re-looked at about three times in the last year partly driven by
the Public Works Department initially also then changed by us changed again at
the Public Works Department request. Some of these bugs that you’re talking
about I think we have been attempting to work. Now, and you may have seen
this in the paper awhile back but the Utility Billing Department is now part of our
Finance Department. Hopefully some of these problems can get worked out.
That doesn’t necessarily affect you today but that is something we’re trying to get
a handle on for the same reasons and concerns you’ve raised. You also sound
you’ve got some really poor information because I don’t think this Council ever
said that we hope the post office can figure out whether or not to forward a piece
of mail to somebody. We never said anything like that and that was never the
intention of the group here. Who gave you that information or why they said that
is beyond me because that was not something we’ve ever talked about. I don’t
know what we as a group can tell you today other than what you probably do
need to do is – we can help spur it along but you also really need to talk to our
Finance Director about what your concerns are. They do need to evaluate the
policies and practice of utility billing to get these types of issues taken care of on
the front end. You’re absolutely right we don’t want to have a lot of unpaid water
bills. We don’t want to have to go through this hassle with landlords or tenants
on getting these paid and paid timely and all of those things. We both want the
same things and for us to achieve it with the volume of users requires some real
strict policies and inherent to them. Those are things we’re trying to work on
constantly to make better. The best that you can do is what you have done is
come here, talk to the Mayor, talk to us. We’ll certainly spur the Finance
Department to get those policies in place to make that happen like what you’re
suggesting. If you want to talk to them directly, you certainly have the power to
do that as well.
Bennett: What is the procedure then and was that tenant correct there is no
account in the name of a renter?
Nary: What was decided at one point was that the landlords with the property
owners would be responsible. We’re not going to be billing the tenant because
we were having a lot of difficulty or the Water Department claimed they were
having a lot of difficulty collecting those back from tenants. They move, move out
of the area, they moved to Boise they moved to Nampa the cost of collection
sometimes can be very expensive the cost prohibited. Since the landlord is also
responsible for their property that was what was decided at one point. After that
they were – my memory is not real good. My recollection is we had a discussion
about that and there were issues like you’ve raised that landlords are saying we
need something that’s sort of in between that because we’ve got these properties
that we’ve got tenants and some landlords don’t even live in the local area so
that makes it very cumbersome to try to get these paid. Some of the timing
issues like you’re talking about. We told them that we would be willing to look at
something else some alternatives. I don’t remember the specific alternatives that
we talked about but we did say that was fine we would go with the alternatives to
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July 22, 2003
Page 16 of 18
allow some flexibility for tenants as well as landlords to – again ultimately, we all
want the same thing we want them paid. That was the last I recall our discussion
was that.
Nichols: Mr. Mayor.
Corrie: Mr. Nichols.
Nichols: Mr. Mayor, Members of the Council, Mr. Bennett. We have been
working on revising the ordinance again. We’ve been looking at other issues
besides just the landlord tenant question. Things like instead of all of the
accounts being billed at the same time every month splitting that up and doing
some things to try to even out the workflow within the office to make it more
customer friendly and more efficient. We also looked at of coming up I think in
context with the revised ordinance a different kind of form for landlords so there
is some stuff working behind the scenes to try to get this fixed but it hasn’t been
fixed yet.
Bennett: Well my question I don’t think was answered. Is the tenant going to
have their name on a water bill or is that not the case?
Corrie: Do you want them to have it?
Bennett: Pardon me.
Corrie: That’s fine yes but it’s up to the landlord if you want to have the tenants
on the water bill. The ultimate is still the owner’s property. If you want to have
the tenants on the water bill that can be done.
Nichols: Mr. Mayor.
Bennett: See that wasn’t my understanding.
Nichols: Mr. Mayor, Members of the Council I think we’re confusing the issue a
little bit. A bill an account just in the name of the tenant that goes to the property
address is not what I think we were left with by the Council. Your name in care of
the tenant at that address may have been something that was contemplated that
could be done.
Bennett: That’s what’s being done now. I have other rentals that that is what’s
being done now. It’s Greg Bennett care of the tenant at the address where the
water is being consumed.
Nichols: But I think one of the issues that we also encountered was how was the
Utility Billing Department going to convert over the last policy change was. They
weren’t going to just – I don’t think they were going to wholesale send out letters
to the landlords that says you have to come in and redo this. Those longer-term
Meridian City Pre-Council Meeting
July 22, 2003
Page 17 of 18
tenants that you have those accounts may have continued to be the same as
they have been in the past so the situation you’re encountering now is one that’s
come up since that change. That’s why there’s a difference.
Bennett: So the latest policy is that the bill goes to Greg Bennett at the address
where the water is being consumed.
Nichols: No I believe that the last policy was the bill goes to you at the address
you designate which I think was contemplated by the Council would be your
address which is why we have this problem with out of town landlords and those
kinds of things. It’s like you try to fix this over here, it creates a problem here,
and we’re trying to find the right balance.
Bennett: Confusing isn’t it?
Nichols: It’s not the best situation sir.
Bennett: Okay Finance is that who l need to talk to.
Nary: Yes I don’t know that they’re here right now. (Inaudible) Finance
Department.
De Weerd: Mr. Mayor.
Corrie: Mrs. de Weerd.
De Weerd: We can certainly share the record so you don’t have to share your
story all over again to the Finance Director. Maybe you can contact her after she
has a chance to review the minutes and see what your issues are and check with
the most current policy that’s being formulated. See if some of those policies
answer your question and have some dialogue after she’s had a chance to kind
of review it.
Bennett: And she being?
De Weerd: Her name is Stacy Kilchenmann.
Corrie: We’ve changed it over who is responsible. It goes to the Finance
Department now. There may be some confusion in there. If you call in and ask
for Stacy she will be the one Kilchenmann, you don’t have to remember that last
name. It’s Swedish but just say Stacy and it will go to her. Give her about a
week to go through these records and see what we’re talking about and what the
account is doing. I think we can probably clear up some of this. I don’t think
we’re going to clear it all up, because we still have some ordinance we’re working
on up here. We know your problem and I know they know it over there but it
went back to finance now rather than the Water Department which we thought
was the best thing but it isn’t. Financing is done by finance now and that’s where
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July 22, 2003
Page 18 of 18
it should be. If you want to give it about another week, call in or I’ll – what is your
phone number?
Bennett: My phone number is 322-1948.
Corrie: Okay. In about another week I’ll give you a call if you don’t call in and
get to her. I’ll see if I can’t follow up for you. That’s the best we can do right. We
have to look at those ordinances again to see where we are and about the
billings. Then I’ve got about four questions here that you have asked and then I’ll
ask her and see where we are. You’re living with a question mark I know but I
think we can straighten it out for you. I hope we can we have Jed I can see that
but maybe we can.
Bennett: Fair enough.
De Weerd: Mr. Mayor.
Corrie: Mrs. de Weerd.
De Weerd: I move we adjourn our Pre-Council Meeting.
Nary: Second.
Corrie: Okay motion been made and second to adjourn the Pre-Council Meeting.
All those in favor say aye. All ayes motion carried.
MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES, ONE ABSENT
MEETING ADJOURNED AT 7:08 P.M.
(TAPE ON FILE OF THESE PROCEEDINGS)
APPROVED:
/ /
ROBERT D. CORRIE, MAYOR DATE
ATTESTED:
WILLIAM G. BERG, JR., CITY CLERK