What's going on at the City Commission meeting? - 5/6

Here is the agenda for tomorrow night's meeting. I have highlighted the items that are of special interest to me. There may be others that interest you. If so, click here and it will take you directly to the agenda posted on the City's website. You can click on any item there and the back-up will load into your Adobe Reader.






Item D on the consent agenda is finalization of the interlocal agreement with Palm Beach County related to the Snook Islands project - demolition of the old bridge (west side of Intracoastal), boat parking and one-way southbound transition for North Golfview Road and applying for the Florida Inland Navigation District grant funds for the project. This is the item that County Commissioner Kanjian wrote his letter about that was featured earlier in this blog. I guess someone picked up the phone and communicated with the County what the City's intentions were. One hopes, at least. Anyway, we are finally doing the right thing here, not pointing fingers and getting on with a worthwhile project. It will help open up the Lake Worth Lagoon as more of an active recreation area which is something the City should embrace. And the County is agreeing to take down the old bridge at their cost - no small benefit.

Item G on the consent agenda (not highlighted above) authorizes the spending of nearly $50,000 for engineering related services for the Latona Streetscape project. I won't offer editorial comment here, other than directing you to a previous post that has a slideshow of the street and the conditions there. This happens to be about a block away from the Lake Worth Community Development Corporation offices.

Item H on the consent agenda is a contract for Matrix Services for management consulting services related to our utility department for about $50,000. Matrix Services was discussed recently during a non-Lake Worth meeting that I attended recently. It seems that this firm is also engaged, or about to be engaged, in doing a similar study/recommendations for the City of West Palm Beach related to their Building Department. Nothing positive or negative about the firm or their work, but they are tackling another local government department that has more than its share of customer service issues and problems. Sometime I will tell you about my experience with the hurricanes and re-establishing my electric service. Suffice to say, there were inefficiencies.

Item O on the consent agenda relates to a pilot project for Wi-Fi internet transmissions from our public safety communications tower. The Palm Beach County Education Commission is attempting to bridge the technology divide and teach computer/Internet skills to the Guatemalan community. It's important to train and provide access to the Internet for many groups in the City - I would hope that there are other efforts that could be coupled with this to address the needs of other communities. And, what is the prospect for this happening in other areas of the city for the general population - perhaps we will learn more about that under the presentation concerning Wi-Fi, earlier in the agenda.

Item T concerns an item that came up during the City Commission retreat. They felt that it was important to have a City newsletter come out twice a year with needed information for City residents. The cost for this is $50,000. I think they are missing the point here. If we are concerned about waste generation and scarcity of resources, then we should be concerned about how this is going to contribute to the waste stream. This will be mailed, as well, which adds a significant portion to the overall cost. Instead of this, which will be redundant with the City Bits newsletter that already comes in utility bills (or does it? My latest bill didn't have one.) I say we use that money to insure we have timely and accurate press releases that deal with current items. These could be put on the City's website and posted in all City buildings. Every now and then, there will be local news organization that is hungry for news that will pick up on a story. Key staff people would be identified that could answer questions on the material. This is standard operating procedure of nearly any municipality of any size around the nation - why is it such a difficult concept to grasp here? Open government is a good thing.

And before we leave this part of the agenda (consent), it's another opportunity to talk about how the Commission is handling public comment in this part of the meeting - it's wrong! Right now, if something is pulled off of the consent agenda, you can offer your comments about that topic. But if you want to say something or have objections about an item on the consent agenda that is not pulled by one of the Commissioners, then you can't comment on it. That is just plain not fair. But our Mayor doesn't see the value in public comment, has made all of his decisions ahead of time and is not interested in what the public has to say. Remember that come election time.

The Public Hearing item is about an ordinance to limit sales of alcoholic beverages for those establishments that sell off-premises (not bars) to stop at 10 p.m. instead of 2 a.m. This is being pushed, supposedly, by the Police Department (however, the word on the street is that it is being pushed by no other than Commissioner Jennings). There are a lot of responsible businesses that would be hurt by this ordinance and what would the public benefit be? If we do have a severe problem with public drunkenness, then enforce the existing laws already on the books. And if the problem is so severe that we think this measure is appropriate, then try it out for testing period - some limited period of time - and see if it makes a difference. And don't cut things off during this period at 10 p.m. How about 12 a.m. as a compromise? That would seem reasonable. The ordinance as written is not reasonable.

Next up, we will be getting an update on the negotiations with the PBC Sheriff's Department regarding the take-over of our police department. Let's hope that we have provided the information and have a basis upon which we can make a decision. I would hate to see our municipal police to disappear and become an extension of County government, but the reality may be such that there is no option. That's why it is important to have the best information possible in order to make an informed decision.

Then under item D under New Business (which is really Old Business) is the continuing saga of the dismissal of Wayne Marcinkoski from the CRA Board. Expect a full showing by the cabal on this one, as he is one of their own. I predict a 3-2 vote.

And, under the City Manager's report we have a proposal to have a grand opening for the pool, now that it is renovated. What can I say, we should celebrate all of our successes as a community.

I will probably arrive late to the meeting as I have a professional engagement at Jog and Okeechobee around 5:30 p.m., but should be able to take in most of the later part of the meeting.