 We'll call the third regular meeting in the Common Council to order. Pat, would you call the roll, please? Bowman, Berg, Boonee, Doyle, Groff, Manny, Montemayor, Moody, Perez, Rinflaich, Steffen, Van Akron, Vanderwil, Wongamon, Warner, Weninger, 14 present, Corms present. Alderman, Groff. Your Honor, I would move that we dispense with the reading of the Common Council meeting from April 21st and the same stand approved as entered on the record. Moved in second that we approved the minutes of the previous council meeting under discussion. Hearing none, all in favor? Opposed? Motion carried. Alderman, Rinflaich, would you lead us in the pledge, please? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. Okay, we have two hearings this evening. I'll read them both and then if you would like to be heard, please step up to the microphone and give us your name, address. The first one is rezoning property located at 706 North 9th Street, and the second one is rezoning property located at 406 Pennsylvania Avenue. Any interested persons wishing to be heard? Any interest persons wishing to be heard? The staff person will be coming later. We are with Lutheran Social Services and we were requesting a zoning change for that property so that we can move our offices into that building. Lutheran Social Services has been located in Sheboygan for over 25 years. We provide quality counseling and case management services to improve the quality of people's lives, working to strengthen and support families and individuals and children and youth. We serve all people regardless of national origin, religion, race, socioeconomic status, and I believe that we're a contributor to the improvement of this community. So we were asking for that zoning change. The entire east side of 9th Street is already commercial and three of the six structures between Wisconsin Avenue and Pennsylvania are already zone commercial. We believe that the area is experiencing a change and that it's becoming more commercial and it would be compatible with the way that it is developing now. Thank you. I live and grow up. Mr. Mayor, was she speaking on hearing number two, correct? Number one. She was speaking on one. North Main Street? May I ask her a question? There was a concern expressed to me, is there supposed to be a coffee house opening up in that building? Oh gosh, no. No, no coffee houses. Oh my gosh, no, no coffee houses. What's out there and there was concern about rezoning this for that purpose? No, it's an office space, no coffee houses, no, no products being sold, no, no, yeah. I'm glad you asked. Lutheran Social Services, yes. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else wishing to be heard on it, on either hearing? Hold on a minute, Ben. Hang on, he's going to speak one more and then you all. Oh, sorry. Okay, go ahead. My name is Jonathan Ross. I live at N7377 IWCJ in Plymouth and I'm here to speak my wife and I are here to speak representing a company, a little company that we formed called North Star Properties and we would like to request a zoning change from urban residential to central commercial on the corner of 4th and Pennsylvania. For those who may or may not be familiar with it, it's going to be hard to see from where you are but essentially it's the here's 4th Street, Pennsylvania, the Harbor Lights Tavern is a one end of this little triangular block Pennsylvania 4th and Franklin and the armory bar is at the other end so it's bookended right now by commercial properties. These are legal non-conforming properties. The parcel in question here is actually made up of 16,000-foot parcel that was made up of four pre-existing lots. There's only one small house that has about a 500-square-foot footprint on it and it's really right along the commercial corridor of Pennsylvania Avenue and it's also within what's called the riverfront district on the city's master plan. So this riverfront district angles right up on Franklin Avenue and goes across and this is the end of Pennsylvania so the property in question is right right within the heart of this riverfront district and that zoning or the riverfront district in the master plan calls for offices, residential and retail development within that structure. So it's calling for mixed commercial and residential and so therefore our plans are to create some office some professional office space potentially mixed with maybe residential as well but the right now the building would be far smaller than the 16,000 square feet of property involved. Probably have less than a 5,000-square-foot footprint possibly only about 2,500 to 3,000-square-foot so we would also have a residential feel to the architecture of the building. We have not talked to an architect as yet but the plans would be to make it a welcoming and a structure that would be compatible with both the residential and the marina district and provide I think a considerable improvement to the property value and to the neighborhood. Any questions? I might answer. Thank you for your consideration. That has not been determined. There's a fairly ample on-street parking in that area and there's also the parking lot in the current armory though. Sir, they hate to stop you but you can't ask questions. Alderman can ask but gallery. Thank you. Anyone else wishing to be heard? Anyone else wishing to be heard? Alderman Benachron. I'd ask that question where your parking is going to be with 16,000 square feet on the property. Could you please use the microphone? With 16,000 square feet on the property and the plans would not call for a building that would be anywhere near that large there's a strong likelihood that we will be able to provide some off-street parking and quite frankly I was going to approach the city to see if we could arrange some kind of a parking arrangement with the armory parking lot which is vacant about 99.9% of the time and this would be space that would only be required to be used during typical office business hours not evenings or weekends when it would be likely that any armory parking would be needed. Thank you. Steve, did you want to address that please? Mr. Mayor, Council, just a couple things that this holds true for both of the rezoning that we're dealing with tonight they're both being rezoned from urban residential to central commercial. Right now we're just dealing with the land use designation just from residential to commercial not specifically the use at this point in time. Both issues would be required to do either a site plan or a conditional use permit that would be required to go before the plan commission before any type of operation would occur so some of the parking issues things like that would have to come and be submitted to show staff where exactly the parking is going to be what the use is going to be things like that so these are all issues that well need to be addressed to the plan commission before any type of operation can take place at either of these sites and so at such time as say for example the an application is made the parking and the issues like that members from the public are free to come to the plan commission and make sure or ask questions and we can address those then and the app and probably hearing some of these is going to be aware of them as well so. Thank you. Anyone else wishing to be heard? Anyone else wishing to be heard? Alderman Van Eyre. I moved to be closed. Moved to second at the hearing to be closed under discussion. Hearing none, all in favor? Opposed? Motion carried. Public forum. Yes. Robert Brown. Robert Brown. I guess he's not here. Renee Susha. Remember Renee, it's five minutes. Renee Susha and I reside at 303 St. Clair Avenue and that is in Sheboygan. I would like to welcome the new Alderman to the council and take this opportunity to explain to you some of the problems and opportunities that you currently face relating to room tax. The three problem areas lie with the way the city is currently spending the room tax money, the contract between the city and the chamber and also the proposed contract between the city and Great Lakes. Tonight I'll focus primarily on the historical data for your benefit. In front of you you all should have received a rainbow colored handout from me. I'm going to do my best to get through it. My name and phone number on the front page please feel free to call me because I know I'll probably run out of time. If you look at the green sheet that's a copy of the room tax statute. Basically room tax was developed to help cities promote and develop tourism. According to the statute with an 8% room tax the city can keep 20% and the remainder must be spent on promoting and developing tourism. However if there is a city-owned convention center some of the room tax money can be used to pay for the debt of the building. Now the city can either spend the money directly by having a department of tourism that would take out the ads in the magazines and go to the trade shows or the money can be forwarded to a commission who can enter into a contract with the tourism entity which is defined as a non-profit organization such as the Chamber of Commerce or the CVB. Now if a commission would be formed it would consist of four to six members chosen by the mayor and approved by this council. This is not another layer of government these are non-paid positions but the catch is that at least one person has to be from the lodging industry. Now when the city entered into a room tax contract with the chamber you created a situation of taxation without representation and that's the majority of the beef that we have from the lodging group with the city is a taxation without the representation. Now if you look at the gold sheets that is a copy of the contract between the city and the chamber and this is where some of the problems begin. First of all the city entered the agreement without creating the commission secondly the city is keeping the first hundred and fifty thousand dollars of room tax right off the top whereas the statute gives you a percentage you're entitled to twenty percent last year by taking a hundred and fifty thousand off the top you took fifty percent that's a little bit more than you're entitled to by law. You also have in there some interesting phrases you plan to use room tax money for related public improvements other than the convention center. I question can you use room tax money to pay for a two point four million dollar promenade I'm not sure. You also have in there that room tax higher than eight percent shall remain the cities and not part of this particular agreement. Now if there is a convention center you can raise the room tax above eight percent but nowhere does it say that you can keep it. If you look at the blue sheet that will give you some background in regards to where the two thousand and two expenses went for tours and promotion by the city. A lot of it was spent on the parades and also band concerts and I want to bring your particular attention to the patrol division. Last year when I was part of the room tax committee we spent a lot of time meeting with the city to talk about the patrol division and why that accounted for roughly ten percent of the total room tax money brought in and on the April 14th meeting the city attorney said quote could a judge say the use of room tax to pay police overtime for the fourth of July parade is stretching the bounds could be that's a possibility I could concede. We spent hours discussing this so for your background information I've also included on the white pages some information from the special operation detective agency in the past they manned the barricades on the fourth of July whereas now apparently the city feels you must have an armed police officer manning those barricades I just want to remind you we don't live in Baghdad you probably could get by a lot cheaper if you utilize the special operation detective agency a little bit more please look at their prices carefully when considering this issue. Lastly the peach colored documents is a copy of the notice of claim believe it or not this notice of claim does give you the opportunity to make the room tax issue a winning situation for everybody first of all if you form a commission the lodging group would be happy because we have input into the way room tax money is dispersed secondly we would make sure that the city took your fair share I just got done giving you an example where you're taking 50 percent under the current situation when blue harbor is up and running there's going to be so much more money in the pool that the commission would force the city to take your 20 percent your 20 percent that you'd be forced to take is a lot more than the hundred and fifty thousand you're currently swiping from the existing lodging group so it's really a winning situation and it's foolish that we have to serve you papers in the form of a lawsuit to force you to take the money you're entitled to and also we would make sure that the cvb got more money that they're entitled to so they'd be in a winning situation as well as you know last year they had about 15 000 inquiries and the first quarter of this year they had 15 000 inquiries how can that be the answer is they had more money first quarter this year due to a carryover left over from last year to actually promote the city denny moyer went to four trade shows in the first quarter that's why they had 15 000 inquiries in one quarter Renee well please call me thanks dolce johnson good evening mayors ram council members if you will give me nine point two million dollars i will guarantee you a return on your investment of one dollar a year for 99 years good deal if you can get it and as i understand that that is the deal that the city of sheboygan has made with great lakes to build and operate a conference center as part of the blue harbour south pier project but there's more according to a saturday press story part of the nine point two million dollars will also be used for a restaurant now i keep hoping that that press reporter got that wrong but i have this sinking feeling knowing the way this project is going that it's probably right so is the city now going into the restaurant business too what's next where will it all end perhaps the city will also end up owning the hotel and the water park what happened to private development along the way none of the several alderman i spoke with over the last few days had any idea what they were going to be asked to vote on tonight vis-a-vis the blue harbour deal evidently there's a lot of secrecy involved in the plans for this project to say nothing of the haste to finalize an expenditure of a mere twenty one million dollars ironically the day after this huge project was approved the mayor announced the need for city layoffs and cuts in services i think of this project as our second marina you remember the marina that project which no private developer would touch but which the city plunged into ignoring the wishes of the citizens for a referendum on the project that project that someone we were told was going to pay the city a million dollars to operate for us that project that marina that was going to be so full of boats in two years that we would have to build 200 more slips in no time at all well it's now several years later the marina is not full never has been we're still paying skipper bud thousands of dollars to manage the facility and the taxpayers are still subsidizing it to the tune last year of eighty five thousand dollars i've been told and now the city has been presented with another yet another too good to be too project and you know what they say if it sounds too good to be true it probably is one would think that if sheboygan was such a prime place for a conference center that private developers would be all over town vying for the opportunity to build it and with their own money i am told that when great lakes first made their proposal there was no mention of a conference center and suddenly without explanation the project just wasn't going to be feasible without a conference center which great lakes of course will not finance so what happened the alderman i've talked to don't know so evidently it wasn't even in disgust in a closed session but obviously somebody got through to great lakes i congratulate alderman wongerman on his courage and casting a common sense no vote on this proposal in face of great pressure i am sure from the mayor the chamber of commerce and the friends of sheboygan some of you may know that i served eight years on the council and i cast a lot of no votes but i was living in the real world representing real people people who worked hard to support their families people without jobs people on fixed incomes people who can't afford a big boat people who can't afford to subsidize a conference center and now possibly a restaurant for the city there was a letter in the sheboygan press a few weeks ago by former mayor susha suggesting that we all look for the money tree that the city seems to have well i was astounded to learn from alderman van akker and that my taxes are not going to go up as a result of the blue harbour south pier project so evidently the city does have a money tree but i don't think so mayor susha knows that he and i and all of the tax paying homeowner citizens of this city are the money tree there seems to be no end to multi-million dollar pie in the sky projects for this city i am not against progress but is this progress or folly risky you bet responsible no thank you thank you okay alderman thank you your honor the consent agenda yes i would move that our our that all our o's be accepted and adopted that all our c's be accepted and placed on no the other way if that's okay everyone our o's be accepted and placed on file all our c's be accepted and adopted and that the resolutions be put upon their passage we do the second i'm sorry okay it's been moved in a second and all our o's be accepted and it in file all our c's be accepted and adopted and resolutions be put upon their passage and that's three one through three twenty two under discussion hearing none would you call the roll please berg bonnet Doyle graph i manny montemire moody keres rinflage benachron van der wheel wongerman weninger bauman 14 i's motion carried 323 through 328 to be referred 329 we will hold for 349 330 through 348 to be referred 349 along with 329 by alderman bauman authorizing entry into a contract for building demolition alderman bauman your honor i'd like to ask for the very first suspension of rules of this council year it's moved and seconded for suspension are there any objections hearing none proceed i would then move that the report of officer be accepted and filed and that the resolution shouldn't be put upon its passage moving is seconded at the resolution be put upon its passage under discussion thank you your honor this would be the resolution authorizing the purchasing agent to enter into contract for building demolition this would be the buildings of course along self-business drive that have already been purchased all the money already is in place and the demolition is scheduled to begin on may 12 this also was the reason that we did discuss this in a short committee meeting on the first of may and the rest of committee was in full agreement but we couldn't report out because of the times that was available so then again i did make the motion to have it taken care of thank you is there any other discussion hearing none would you call the roll please bonnet doil graph mani montey mayor moody peres runeflash van akron van der wheel wangenman wininger bowman berg 14 eyes motion carried 350 by alderman don van akron wangenman wininger and peres authorizing the hiring of two new police officers immediately alderman van akron i like to add uh make a motion to make motion then we'll amend it make a motion that the resolution be put upon this passage move to second resolution be put upon this passage okay alderman okay i'd like to make amendment on this one on the bottom i'd rather put uh be further resolved that two more officers will be hired in june 2003 it's been moved in second that the amendments say that in june two more officers would be put upon up to you okay is there any objections we don't need a roll on amendment right just a vote all in favor opposed motion carried now alderman van akron as amended i moved that resolution as amended be put upon this passage second moved in second at the resolution be put upon this passage under discussion alderman doil yes sir your honor i just a little bit of a digression but this is a new council so i'll take the liberty of just protesting as usual the way that we go about cutting the budget i agree that we need to cut spending but i don't believe freezing department budgets and freezing hiring is the best way to do it when i go to the internet and check out government websites i find that city governments are laying off workers by the thousands newspapers report that businesses are also laying off employees and some manufacturing companies are moving plants overseas to reduce costs a major cause of the problem is skyrocketing health costs everyone including employees and retirees want the best health services but they want employers or government to pay the cost just unrestrained demand for free medical services and prescription drugs is driving health cost skyward to pay our rising city employee health costs we have frozen budgets frozen hiring raised taxes and raised fees but to no avail new revenue is quickly gobbled up by the next round of higher health costs we don't have enough money to pay for basics like rebuilding streets and solving flooding problems to make matters worse the state is threatening big cuts and shared revenue and our departments have been forewarned to prepare for seven percent cut and we've already heard how me library may have to close several days a week there may be fewer police patrols on the street and there may be cutbacks and other key services the reason for the freezes in the seven percent cut is because we don't want to lay off employees we have chosen to eliminate jobs through attrition while this is a compassionate plan it's wrong we should base our budget decisions on what the citizens want not what is best for city employees the best way to save money is to cut health costs by cutting services at this point in my three years on the common council we have done very little to solve the budget problem we have passed the responsibility on to the mayor and the department heads we were elected to make hard decisions and it's time we accepted that responsibility i proposed that the strategic fiscal planning committee begin by bringing last year's survey of possible cuts back to the common council the committee of the whole should schedule meetings to create a prioritized list of at least two million dollars in possible cuts that list should be published so the public can have input with every cut there will be unhappy people but the money we save will allow us to adequately fund high priority services if you read the paper the school board has already made over a million dollars in cuts and they have a plan to meet their budget crisis we should do the same thank you thank you is there any other discussion hearing none will you call it all please doil graff manning i mounty mayor moody perez rindflash benagren bander wheel wongamon weninger bowman burg bonnet 14 eyes motion carry 351 through 360 to be referred 361 will go to plan commission 11 ro by city plan commission recommending rezoning property located at 706 north 9th street all of them doil thank you your honor i move that we accept and file the ro and put the general ordinance upon its passage would you like to take second one also yes sir it's moved in second that we accept the filed ro's and put the general ordinance upon their passage on one one one two read what one two is one two are all by city plan commission recommending rezoning property located at 406 Pennsylvania avenue hearing no discussion would you call the roll please graff manning mounty mayor moody perez rindflash benagren vander wheel wongamon weninger bowman burg bonnet doil 14 eyes motion carried 362 will go to industrial development commission 363 that's the new development agreement that will go to committee of the whole steve did you want to address that i just i'm just briefly you've received on your desks a black line version um in the lower left hand corner it indicates it's got some letters and then some numbers and there's a dot that says 12 uh that version 12 of the document the the document you passed on uh april 14th was version nine what this document is in front of you is shows the black line changes between version nine and this version so it incorporates uh several drafts in between but because you acted on version nine felt it was best to show you what's been changed from uh what you acted on uh much of this has to do with the issues that stem from the resort proposed resort lender um looking at the document after it was passed and and requesting changes be addressed um there's also a number of changes that relate to restructuring the the 12.2 million that rather than a redevelopment authority alone for 12 to you'll see that it's broken out into a loan of four million dollars and a 8.2 million going towards the construction equipping and and furnishing of the convention center slant restaurant for the for the project i would ask that you all look at this between now and committee the whole i understand that's going to be next monday most likely i'll ask alderman warner if he can schedule that when he gets back for next monday evening we got questions on the document and they relate to the language or whatever feel free to call me if they're financial i'm sure rich gaphart would be happy to receive calls any any concerns or any questions uh raise them or raise them at the committee the whole uh be time to i'll spend more time at the committee the whole and go over more specifics of the changes and for the newly elected alderman the uh some of the basics of the agreement that are still in place as they as they previously were if anybody has questions now that wants to ask them feel free i'll run for us thank you i just decided to have a question is this revised uh development agreement going to be made available to the public if they want to look at it too as we did the last time we could i don't know that we're going to have a lot of people run it over here to get a copy but in case somebody is interested i'd like the public to know that one can be made available to us thank you and just so you know this is one reason we wanted to go to committee a whole next monday night to give every alderman opportunity to read it over and get their questions answered before you vote on it so everyone's comfortable with it so we are not voting on it this evening in that regard mayor your honor if i may we have some new alderman who had absolutely no input and the original document here they're going to be asked to to make a very very important decision that involves a lot of money i don't know if it would be appropriate to have perhaps steve or richard rich meet with them for an hour or so and give a briefing uh as to the background and so forth i don't even know if they would like that but i would make that suggestion if that's uh their wish thank you if they like to they're more than welcome to set up a meeting with us anytime you come on up and we'll do that if you'd like to steve other matters three dash 64 is an aro by the city clerk submitting a communication from roi ramos of tejanos mexican american restaurant requesting a two-hour parking limit in the 1200 block of north 13th street from the corner of north 13th in michigan to approximately the mid-block alley entrance that will go to public protection of safety 365 is an aro by the city clerk submitting a communication from william kotler of davil engineering being a plat affidavit of correction of still meadows township oigan fine commissions 366 is an aro by the city clerk submitting a communication from eugene weeden submitting a list of issues which should be addressed by our public servants relative to the state pension fund when looking for ways to solve our budget problems strategic fiscal plan 367 is a resolution authorizing the extension of the city's underground locating services contract and that will go to public works move to secondary adjourn under discussion hearing none all in favor