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CHA 03/23/2009 TO: Charter Commission Members _ FROM: Deb Skogen, City Clerk and Staff Liaison Date: March 16, 2009 CITY OF Re: Charter Meeting of March 23, 2009 FRIDLEY The next Charter Commission meeting will be held on Monday, March 23, 2009 at 7:00 p.m. in Meeting Room 1 in the lower level of City Hall. In order to ensure a quorum, please contact me by 10 a.m. March 231-d at(763) 572-3523 or skogend @ci.fridlev.mn.us whether or not you will be attending the meeting. Those of you who did not attend the March 3rd Special Meeting received a packet of information and draft minutes of that meeting to allow you to have the same information as those present. Please find the agenda for the 23rd, which also includes the election of officers and two amendments to Chapter 7. n CITY OF FRIDLEY •-� CHARTER COMMISSION AGENDA MONDAY, MARCH 23, 2009 AT 7:00 P.M. LOCATION: Fridley Municipal Center Meeting Room 1, Lower Level 1. CALL TO ORDER: 2. ROLL CALL: 3. APPROVAL OF AGENDA: 4. APPROVAL OF MINUTES February 23,2009 March 3,2009 ^ 5. Administrative Matters A. Annual Election of Officers 6. Discussion of Proposed Amendment to Chapter 7 7. Discussion of Future Items 8. ADJOURNMENT Next Regular Meeting: Monday, April 27, 2009 at 7:00 p.m. in Meeting Room 1 in the Lower Level CITY OF FRIDLEY CHARTER COMMISSION MEETING February 23,2009 CALL TO ORDER: Vice-Chairperson Soule called the Charter Commission meeting to order at 8:10 p.m. ROLL CALL: Members Present: Braam;Hoiby; Holm;Plummer;Reynolds;Ryan; Shaw and Soule Members Absent: Borman; Findell;Jorgenson;Kirkwood;Kranz;Nelson;Scholzen Others Present: Deb Skogen,City Clerk/Staff Liaison OATH OF OFFICE Commissioners Plummer, Shaw and Plummer took their oath of office and signed their Acceptance of Appointment. APPROVAL OF AGENDA: Commissioner Braam MOVED and Commissioner Hoiby seconded a motion to approve the agenda. UPON A VOICE VOTE,ALL VOTING AYE,VICE-CHAIRPERSON SOULE DECLARED THE MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY. APPROVAL OF JANUARY 26,2009,CHARTER COMMISSION MINUTES: Commissioner Holm MOVED and Commissioner Shaw seconded a motion to approve the January 26,2009,Charter Commission Minutes. UPON A VOICE VOTE,ALL VOTING AYE,VICE-CHAIRPERSON SOULE DECLARED THE MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY. 1. ADMINISTRATIVE MATTERS A. Report of the Nominations Committee Committee Chair Holm reported that the Nominating Committee Recommended the following individuals unanimously be elected as officers for the 2009-10 Commission year: Chairperson,Cindy Soule;Vice- Chairperson,Rick Nelson;and Secretary Carol Hoiby. Commissioner Holm asked that the nominations report be provided to the commissioners who were absent prior to next months annual meeting. He said nominations from the floor can be made at the next meeting. B. Scheduling of Special meeting Deb Skogen said City Manager Burns and Finance Director Pribyl would like to meet with the Charter Commission at a special meeting and provided the dates of March 3 and March 5. The meeting is to discuss the restrictions of the Charter and the current budget situations. It was agreed the meeting should be scheduled on March Pat 6:30 p.m. Staff will send out the meeting notice so those individuals not in attendance know when the meeting is. DISCUSSION OF PROPOSED ORDINANCE FOR CHAPTERS 7 THROUGH 12 CHARTER COMMISSION MEETING OF JANUARY 26,2009 PAGE 2 The Commissioners reviewed the draft ordinance prepared by Skogen. All agreed it looked okay. Commissioner Braam MOVED and Commissioner Shaw seconded a motion recommending staff to prepare a memo and attach the draft ordinance to the City Council for their review prior to recommendation by the Charter Commission to formally make the recommendation. The amendments are not technical in nature. UPON A VOICE VOTE,ALL VOTING AYE,VICE-CHAIRPERSON SOULE DECLARED THE MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY. DISCUSSION OF FUTURE ITEMS Feed back from the City Council on the draft ordinance and information about elections. Skogen spent about 30 minutes discussing the elections process,the recount,and proposed legislation. She said that there are a lot of ideas being discussed but there is nothing formal at this time. She answered questions and said she would keep the Commissioners updated. ADJOURNMENT: Vice Chair Person Soule adjourn the meeting at 8:00 p.m... Respectfully submitted, Debra A. Skogen, Kathleen Linder,Secretary City Clerk/Staff Liaison CITY OF FRIDLEY SPECIAL CHARTER COMMISSION MEETING March 3,2009 CALL TO ORDER: Chairperson Borman called the Charter Commission meeting to order at 6:30 p.m. ROLL CALL: Members Present: Borman,Braam,Findell,Hoiby,Holm,Plummer,Reynolds, Scholzen,and Soule Members Absent: Jorgenson,Kirkwood,Kranz,Nelson,Ryan and Shaw Others Present: Deb Skogen,City Clerk/Staff Liaison Bill Burns,City Manager Rick Pribyl,Finance Director PRESENTATION BY CITY MANAGER AND FINANCE DIRECTOR ON 2009 AND 2010 BUDGETS City Manager Bill Burns thanked the Commissioners for allowing him to meet with them about the proposed budgets adjustments for 2009 and proposed budget for 2010. He met recently with the City's Department Heads and City Council to address the same issues. While the budget adjustments are temporary,the City is still looking at approximately a$1 million to$1.6 million deficit. His goal is to start planning ahead to avert a financial crisis from occuring in the City. If nothing changes,there could be drastic cuts to services or programs coming in the future. Mr. Burns reviewed his memo of February 26,2009(Attachment A)that was mailed to the Commissioners outlining some assumptions and the 2009 and 2010 revenue and expenditure adjustments he was recommending. Commissioner Holm asked if the City was transferring money from general fund reserves to balance the city's budget on an annual basis;and, if that was true,would the City be out of reserves by the year 2012? Mr.Burns said yes. He said the shortfall required the City to transfer$815,000 from general fund reserve,$500,000 annually from the liquor operation,and$250,000 from the closed bond fund. He said sales at the liquor store have been down and going forward,they may only be able to transfer$300,000. He said by the year 2012 the city would have a$15 to$16 million dollar cash balance and would not recommend using any additional reserve funds as the city requires$5 million for cash flow and working capitol and$2.5m is needed for annual street maintenance. In addition,the city has no CIP funds dedicated to the Municipal Center facility and a portion of the parking ramp needs replacement. Commissioner Reynolds asked why the city didn't budget for projects that were needed. Mr.Burns said money for maintenance is added to the general fund for such projects but it isn't in the CIP fund. Commissioner Reynolds reviewed Minnesota HF 979 pertaining to the levy and was wondering,if it were passed,if that would allow the city to levy up to 100%of lost LGA. Finance Director Rick Pribyl said there is currently a statewide levy limit that is currently more restrictive then our Charter language. Commissioner Holm wondered what the city could do with no charter restrictions or no state levy limits. Mr. Pribyl said if the language reverted back to the language in 1997,before the amendment was passed,the city council could hold a public hearing and adopt a resolution approving an additional levy. He said if the City Council SPECIAL CHARTER COMMISSION MEETING OF MARCH 3,2009 PAGE 2 were to adopt a resolution asking for an additional$1 million levy,it would cost approximately$50-60 annually for an average residential property or about$5 a month in additional property taxes. Mr.Burns said the city could institute a franchise fee on utility bills. He said there were currently 30 cities that did have franchise fees on their electric and gas utilities. Xcel Energy said it would cost the residential property owners about$.75/month and the commercial/industrial property owners about$1.25/month. If instituted at that level,the city would receive an additional$381,250 in revenue. All properties in the city,including tax-exempt and city facilities,would have to pay the tax. Mr.Pribyl said this would be a locally generated fee rather an a controlled fee set by the state. Mr.Burns said Centerpoint Energy felt it was a regressive tax and felt a usage tax was better than a flat tax. He said that this would be a small fee that would be paid monthly by utility users rather than paying the fee in one lump sum. Commissioner Soule said the last time the franchise fee was adopted, it started the mistrust and the charter amendment was created as a result. Commissioner Braam wondered if there were any other ideas for increasing revenue for providing services. Mr.Burns said the fees were already high pertaining to land use fees and other licenses have to be provided at the rate that it costs the city to provide the licensing. Commissioner Borman wondered if the city had any ideas to bring in substantial revenue to the city for instance raising taxes. Mr. Burns said they have thought about that. He said at some point the city may have to cut back services if they could not raise the revenue and felt they needed the help of the Charter Commission. He said currently the City Council could go to the voters for a special levy or a targeted levy,which would have to be spent for that purpose. He said the city would have to analyze the risk and availability of good people to campaign for this. Deb Skogen City Clerk provided the proposed charter amendment that would bring the charter back to the 1997 version and a timeline showing the process if the charter commission were to recommend an amendment by ordinance to the council. Commissioner Reynolds said the proposed ordinance takes all of the amendment language out. Ms. Skogen said it was a draft to return it to the original language prior to the 2000 amendment. She said the proposed ordinance was drafted for discussion by the Charter Commission. Commissioner Findell said he would prefer it be changed back to the original language as he did not think the electorate should be micro-managing the city's business. He felt more experienced people like the Finance Director, City Manager and City Council should be able to prepare and adopt a budget as they were appointed or elected for that purpose. Commissioner Soule said if people didn't like how the city was managed they had the option of recall or electing new individuals into office. Mr.Pribyl said the history of the city should provide a story of how the council has been fiscally responsible over the past thirty years,since he has been on staff. He said staff at various times in the past had recommended increasing taxes or fees,but the city council did not always agree. He said the city has been consistently lower then other communities with the utility rates or taxes. He said some changes were still needed at the state level. He was working with Gary Carlson at the League of MN Cities to try to remove levy limits,but the Governor appears to want to restrict city spending even more than he has in the past. Commissioner Holm asked if the proposed ordinance would be on their next agenda. Ms. Skogen said yes,that it would be placed on their agenda. SPECIAL CHARTER COMMISSION MEETING OF MARCH 3,2009 PAGE 3 n Commissioner Reynolds said it appeared the city was still limited in the proposed amendment and Mr.Pribyl said that was correct,but the 5%or whichever is least was removed. Commissioner Soule said the Council could not increase the taxes just to increase them but had to have a good reason for increasing them. Commissioner Borman played the"devil's advocate"and wondered what would happen if the council tried to go for a levy increase first,and if it failed,then try to amend the charter—similar to what was done with the amendment for the utility rates—but,he could also see the benefit of just amending the charter to remove the restrictions. Mr.Pribyl said it took about three years to educate the public before the utility rate amendment'was approved. He was not sure the city could wait three years for a tax levy increase. Commissioner Reynolds wondered if just the amendment to the tax levy should be done at this time because people would see all of the strikethroughs and wonder what was up. Commissioner Findell suggested changing Section 7.02.3 from voter approval to council approval;stating the council would still be required to hold a public hearing on any increase and adopt a resolution. It was agreed it might be a little easier if all of the language was not in the paper. Next Charter Commission meeting is scheduled for March 23,2009 and this will be placed on the agenda. ADJOURNMENT: Commissioner Findell MOVED and Commissioner Soule seconded a motion to adjourn the meeting. UPON A VOICE VOTE,ALL VOTING AYE,CHAIRPERSON BORMAN DECLARED THE MOTION CARRIED AND THE MEETING WAS ADJOURNED AT 8:08 P.M. Respectfully submitted, Debra A. Skogen, Carol Hoiby, Secretary City Clerk/Staff Liaison 1 TO: Charter Commission Members KJ FROM: Bill Holm, Chairman of Nominating Committee Date: February 24, 2009 CITY OF Re: Nominating Committee Report for 2009-10 Officers FRIDLEY The nominating committee has met and selected the following three names for nomination to serve as officers for the 2009-10 Commission year. Other names may be submitted during the March meeting; however, the Nominating Committee does recommend a unanimous vote for these three names. Chairperson—Cindy Soule Vice-Chairperson—Rick Nelson Secretary—Carol Hoiby �-. 4. The Charter Commission may recommend the council amend the charter by ordinance Upon recommendation of the charter commission, the city council may enact a charter amendment by ordinance. Public hearing must follow upon two weeks' published notice containing text of proposed amendment. Ordinance must be adopted unanimously and published in the legal newspaper. Ordinance shall not become effective until 90 days after passage and publication or at such later date as is fixed in the ordinance. Within 60 days after passage and publication of such ordinance, a referendum petition may be submitted, signed by 2% of the registered voters of the total votes cast at the last previous state general election, or 2,000, whichever is less. 5%of the registered voters (2/5/09- 15,486 registered voters)need 776 signatures If a referendum petition is submitted, the city clerk must certify its sufficiency within 10 days. If found to be insufficient,the referendum committee has an additional ten days to submit additional petition papers. If submitted,the city clerk then has 5 days to certify its sufficiency. If sufficiency is certified, the city clerk shall notify the city council to declare an election. 51% of votes cast in election shall be favorable-becomes effective 30 days from date of election or at such other time as fixed in the amendment. If no referendum petition received, ordinance becomes effective 90 days after publication, or at such other time as fixed in the amendment. Timeline: March 30, 2009 Commission to propose an amendment to the Charter April 13, 2009 Commission forwards amendment by ordinance and requests scheduling of public hearing for May 4, 2009 to City Council April 14, 2009 Notice of Public Hearing sent to Focus April 14, 2009 for publication on April 23 and 30, 2009. May 4, 2009 Public Hearing May 18, 2009 1St Reading June 8, 2009 2nd Reading June 9, 2009 Notice of Amendment to Focus for publication June 18, 2009 August 11, 2009 Deadline to submit charter amendment to county for November election August 17, 2009 60 days after publication-deadline to submit a petition September 15, 2009 90 days after publication- Ordinance becomes effective. If Referendum submitted and successful and to ensure placement on November 3rd Ballot, .-�. Amendment by ordinance continued Sufficient petition: July 27th Last day to submit petition to city clerk August 6, 2009 Petition found to be sufficient and certified by city clerk-resolution to City Council August 10, 2009 City Council adopts a resolution declaring an election August 11, 2009 City Clerk notifies Anoka County of election Insufficient petition July 10, 2009 Petition submitted to city clerk July 10,2009 City clerk to verify sufficiency of petition July 22, 2009 Petition found to be insufficient—notify petition committee July 22, 2009 Committee re-circulates petition and submit to city clerk for sufficiency August 1, 2009 City clerk verify sufficiency of petition August 6, 2009 Petition found to be sufficient—resolution to city council August 10, 2009 City Council adopt a resolution declaring an election August 11, 2009 City notify Anoka County of election