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	Grand Forks City Council Service/Safety Standby Committee Tuesday, August 10, 2010 - 5:30 p.m.____________________ The Service/Safety Standby Committee met on Tuesday, August 10, 2010 at 5:35 p.m. in the council chambers in City Hall with Council Member Bjerke presiding. Present at roll call were Bjerke, Grandstrand, Gershman (ex-officio). Others present included: Howard Swanson, Don Shields, Brad Gengler, Todd Feland, Dean Rau, Al Grasser, Chief O'Neill, Emily Fossen, Mark Walker, Tim Haak. Bjerke stated there was an additional informational item for the agenda from the Fire Dept. Gershman stated that he was considering having the matter of texting come to city council meeting on Monday, that his motion was tabled and wanted to bring that back for a vote, and would talk with the Mayor's Office. 1. Preliminary Engineering Services Agreement for Project No. 6621, Engineering Evaluation of the Columbia Road Overpass.______________________________ Dean Rau, asst. city engineer, reported this is to hire a consultant to help in investigation work on the bridge, the DOT does bridge inspections for us and this past spring they noticed some deck cracking that has occurred in several areas. The consultant would do an overall review of the bridge and repair options; after review is done, street maintenance crews would do temporary seal over the areas and next year do a permanent fix. He stated they wouldn't do a permanent fix this fall because with UND coming in would have to close portion of the street and hinder the movement through there. There is not a safety problem, purely cosmetic at this point. Bjerke and Grandstrand moved to send this to council; motion carried. 2. List of additional projects for 2009-2010 MPO Work Program. Rau reported that MPO was notified that there were additional monies, $300,000, that weren't used by other cities and that if there were extra projects some of this money was available, would help figure out traffic patterns in the city and help figure what projects we should be doing. One project that didn't make the list but will be on additional list in several months for the next two-year cycle is studying University Avenue through the University. Proposed projects listed in the staff report are areas concerned about and are work items. Est. costs listed were $70,000 for 3 projects and $130,000 for one project, and committee stated they seem rather high and if used the $300,000 to spend on road repair if that would be better spent. Rau stated the monies cannot be used for road repair but for MPO to do studies; and felt costs accurate. Motion by Bjerke and Grandstrand to move this item to city council; motion carried. 3. Bids for Project No. 6594 Police Building Addition for PSAP Expansion. Mark Walker, asst. city engineer, reported number of bids were opened for addition to the Police Department for PSAP and recommended work be awarded to low bidder for each category (general, mechanical, electrical), there were some alternates that were bid and only recommending award of one alternate. Bids came in higher than the engineer's estimate but architect is working with the bidders to identify some potential cost savings that they might take advantage of to reduce the project cost. Motion by Bjerke and Grandstrand to approve and moved forward to council; motion carried. 4. Bids for Project No. 6594.1, Low Voltage Cabling Infrastructure for PSAP Expansion._______________________________________________________ Walker reported this work involves doing the local bid work telephone communication cables, etc. at the PSAP addition and received 3 bids last week but one of the bids was not opened because it did not contain the bid bond envelope on the face of the envelope, customary for us to receive bids in that manner and our instructions for bidders would include that and in looking at the instructions to the bidders as well as State Statute that it became aware to us that neither State Statute nor the instructions to bidders required that the bid bond envelope be on the face of the bid envelope. The consultant is Elert & Associates out of Minneapolis wrote the instructions to follow State Statue which says that the bid bond and license be in a separate envelope and that accompany the bid - after some consultation with the city attorney's office, are recommending that the committee recommend to council that they waive any irregularities associated with the bid of Dell-Comm not putting the bid bond on the face of the bid envelope and suggested that they open the bid of Dell-Comm and if there is an envelope that was sealed and contains the contractor's license and the bid security that it be opened and if acceptable, consider the bid; and on the basis of low bid award the project. Gershman stated he would concur with Mr. Swanson's determination on it, that we have had some instances where this happens and need to get our procedure one way. Walker stated normally the consultants that work for us know the requirements and include that in their instructions for bidders, but in this case where have an out of state consultant and an out of state bidder - Gershman stated might see more of that because of the economy and companies in MN looking for work. Motion by Bjerke and Grandstrand to waive any irregularities and to authorize staff to open the bid of Dell-Comm and that if the bid meets requirement to consider the bid, and award the project based on the low bid received. Grandstrand stated that we need to figure out, seems to be common sense, should we open the envelope or not and should be question that comes to this level but does it make sense to open it up, yes or no. Howard Swanson, city attorney, stated bidding is very precise, do it correctly or you don't, and if don't do it correctly, generally we do not have the discretion to open that bid. Maybe nice to be able to say you should look at it and use common sense but the rules are very hard and fast, common sense may not enter into the equation, it is whether or not the bid instructions are followed - our problem is that the bid instructions weren't clear as they normally are - State Statute is not very clear, we control the bid to the extent that we can have more requirements than the State has. The responsibility is on the contractor to read the bid instructions and follow it but in this case we didn't give clear enough bid instructions. Upon call for the question, the motion carried. 5. Rescinding 2009 Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD) and adopt 2003 Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices with all revisions to be in conformance with the State of North Dakota.________________________________ Rau reported that earlier this year State adopted the new manual on MUTCD which was the 2009 version but several weeks ago they noticed some irregularities in language and are rescinding the adoption and going back to the 2003 version, this is conforming with the State. Motion by Bjerke and Grandstrand to move this to council; motion carried. 6. Bioterrorism Grant budget amendment, additional revenue H1N1 vaccinations. Don Shields, health department, reported this is cleanup budget amendment - that 3 grants were approved last November, some of the money was expended in last fiscal year, some expended this spring, the grants ended in June and in August, and puts the money back in the budget. Motion by Bjerke and Grandstrand to approve and move this to council; motion carried. 7. Discussion of smoking ordinance implementation and impacts - Information. Todd Feland, director of public works, stated their original intent was to include this as an informational item and to include the downtown discussion and maintenance as part of this discussion matter. He stated that Urban Development does downtown maintenance, do pocket parks, clear sidewalks of debris and do Town Square; Public Works does street cleaning, empty commercial containers and those on the sidewalks, both recycling and solid waste are picked up by sanitation crews on Mondays and Fridays when doing the greenway before and after weekends. Public Works agreed to do the community green from bridge to bridge and took over the maintenance of the greenway, community green, maintenance of the irrigation system - Public Works would do public works, streets and green areas. He stated feedback was that they were not meeting expectations of people and if nothing changes going to get constant disappointment of our policy makers because we are going to continue to maintain that level of performance. Don't have much weekend coverage - most people go to bars on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights and if something happens on an early Saturday morning unless there is a downtown business that going to police their area that is not going to get cleaned up until Monday and when have events at the Town Square, nobody to take care of that - that is the issue of where we stand with maintenance. . Brad Gengler, city planner, stated in addition to the downtown businesses the planning department has been working with establishments outside of the downtown, everyone is subject to the same rules but conditions are different so have to look at differently as far as the last minute amendments that were made to the original ordinance, whether it be the 15 ft. rule or other issues and at this point will continue working with the individual establishments, there are some areas that will be addressed but until get a good idea of different scenarios, wait to bring anything back for any changes that may or may not occur. An individual who works at Grand Forks Central High School, stated disappointed when going downtown for many things, has notebook and pinpointed what she wanted to bring up including photos. She also mentioned garbage, broken fixtures, broken benches, that she doesn't frequent the bars at night but she likes to come downtown to ride her bike, many beautiful places incl. courthouse, police department, City Hall, Central High School. Chamber of Commerce once was a beautiful place but not that anymore, need to take care of our downtown and hopes what she presents today will be talked about and asked what are the businesses doing, do we have expectations of our business owners and property owners. Feland will review notebook and photos. Gershman stated he has been disturbed about our beautification efforts downtown, spoke to Chamber of Commerce about that issue and have an issue as at night certain things happen in that park and they don't have any control, police department looking at that a little more closely at night. That City Hall and parking ramps and public property that the City owns should be an example of what beautification should be in maintenance. We dedicate one mill for beautification (over $100,000), have used it for Gateway Drive for painting of fences and helping to clean up auto wrecking places and in other areas of the city and perhaps time for council to consider and staff could put together a report that we focus back on an area that we have made significant investments in our downtown - that is public part of it. He suggested having the mayor send a letter to businesses, not only downtown, to have business owners/property owners be more aware of their place in the morning, sweep, and if everybody did that, be better - we can do a lot more - not much time left this year - and hope that staff would get together and look at the beautification money, at staffing, and having the mayor write a letter to businesses - a gentle nudge to the businesses in town might be worthwhile. Grandstrand stated this could be an opportunity for business owners and organizations downtown to show leadership and put together recommendations for how to use the beautification money downtown. Bjerke stated he agrees with Mr. Gershman - plan for next year. He stated that if looking for people to work weekends, why we don't have community service offenders, court could sentence them to do some of this work - have to realize that someone has to work weekends, can rotate. That he is concerned more about with smoking, taking large groups of people that were inside a building that couldn't hear and put them on patios where now will hear them, not sure how many are gong for patios and concern (need to go downtown at 1:30 at night - interesting experience) but our police can't be tied up on some of these things, don't want police to turn in their tazers and clocks for tape measures to keep people 15 ft. away from the door - concerned that have a large amount of cigarette butts starting Monday morning in the downtown - not sure if we are going to be involved in that and that if we do it and have to empty them; somebody needs to monitor the streets Feland stated that he talked to Mr. Hoover and he is planning to have over the next two weeks increased enforcement re. maintenance of the pocket parks, sidewalks and try to document what is happening - tonight Public Works is going to go down and clean all the sidewalks downtown -Urban Development is the lead in most part in picking up and described in who does what - we have supplements when they need assistance on getting things done and that the business owners see things first and would assume they would walk around their area and if unnecessary things on sidewalks would want to get that cleaned up because that would be in their best interest - there's a fence that the City is going to be there, the sidewalk is public, parking is public and everything is public and therefore spend a lot of time and effort, whether snow removal or cleaning - and as a public policy practice you want us to be all over the downtown to make sure it looks like Target, Inc. - difference is that we need City forces to make sure that it fits the City of Grand Forks' corporate image that we want downtown - right now we are not doing that to the highest degree, should take ownership and take downtown district is the city of Grand Forks district of which we shall maintain as though it was a Target type development where we manage everything for everybody and nobody has to worry about because we know the downtown businesses can't afford to pay too much more from what you hear - that if this committee is interested enough in coming back with a stepped up plan and going after the downtown and us becoming the caretaker of downtown and that is what it is going to require of Public Works and Urban Development getting together and ramping our services down here. Bjerke stated he doesn't want to do that - it is their business - that council needs to make a decision, either we are going to let the businesses know that this is their responsibility - don't power wash anybody else' sidewalks in town. Feland stated that this is a common street and take care of it for everybody -- Bjerke stated that if you do everything for them - they will be happy to let you do that. Gershman stated business owners and property owners have responsibility, not only to the City but also to their customers, to take care of their properties and believes that if going to do it all - then they won't do anything - that it is their front door and they should take care of it. He talked with a pastor from a large church and they are looking for projects to do to benefit the City, don't want to be paid and would have between 300 and 500 people that would be able to work on weekends and told them he would follow up - will give names to Mr. Feland, rather than giving publicly. Grandstrand stated that most of the businesses and organizations downtown are local, that we need to give them a little assistance in getting started and maintenance at some level. Bjerke suggested maybe go with a list of options ala carte menu - and then could pick and choose what you think would be appropriate. Feland stated they would define service and then come back with some options where committee could pick. Bjerke stated it would be real clear if started next year and know exactly what we do, what the businesses do, Park, etc. - that this is our plan, detailed and written out. Gershman stated he would also recommend that we need to solve the parking assessment issue because that is negative and until we get that issue solved for downtown businesses -need to engage them in the process and that if come forward with a plan that will relieve some of the pressure, they will be more interested in talking with us. Feland stated he would like to work under Urban Development, define and work out plan and ramp up in the meantime and come back with a plan, not only with maintenance, but long term capital, Hoover has plans for beautification money, and continue to maintain and he will send out what our plan of action and attach a copy of these pictures to city council - see what now and year from now. Howard Swanson, city attorney, stated the agenda was misleading, discussion had nothing to do with tobacco ordinance or smoking ordinance but had to do with maintenance of downtown, and thinks you have seen a lot of cooperation from bar owners, they are trying to comply with the new ordinance - that we will monitor and there are plans for enforcement where necessary. The law goes into effect, August 15, 2010 at 12:01 a.m., and some of the bar owners have said don't want to be in situation where have to stop activities in middle of the night and going to say Friday, the 13th is last day to permit you to smoke in their facility, and on Saturday, the 14th, will be first non-smoking day. Bjerke stated he was concerned with what is happening outside the bar; wants to know who is going to tell him what is going on downtown, just wants a name, somebody has to be in charge; wants to know re. 15 ft. rule and if no place to put cigarette butts and everyone going outside to smoke, those cigarette butts will go on the ground - and what's the plan. Swanson stated the issue is noise ordinance, have already identified that as a concern that exists even without the tobacco - don't panic but react to it, work with the bar owners - is sure there will be some issues and wait to see and let staff deal with it. He stated let's coordinate with the property owners and thinks they will take some responsibility - some may not, and asked Mr. Bjerke what he wants the City to do. Downtown is a difficult situation because of the distance and proximity of doors but the council adopted the ordinance, staff is in charge to enforce and implement it - if there are issues that come up, they will be addressed. Don't minimize the effect of the ordinance, this ordinance applies to all public places - focus has been on bars but the application of the most recent amendment is broader than just bars. Gershman stated that when he gets a complaint from somebody, or police or health, then respond to that particular complaint - agrees with Mr. Swanson and wait to see if there are issues with cleanliness, etc. address them that way. Mr. Swanson stated that the Public Information Center takes those calls and complaints all the time and they determine to various inquiries where it should go - that the departments that are involved have to take their own responsibility - if a violation of law and want to contact city attorney's office, they will look at it and if its not legal issue but a public works issue, he will forward it on and vise versa. Informational item. 8. Matter of wind turbine installation at Public Safety Center. Chief O'Neill presented Debra Pflughoeft-Hassett, who is Energy Sustainability Coordinator with the City, that a few months ago came before council and informed them that they were going to put in a wind turbine at the Public Safety Center - this is an update on that matter and if there are any concerns as they proceed with the project. Debra Pflughoeft-Hassett stated she wasn't involved in the beginning of the wind turbine project but reported: the proposed wind turbine is 5 kilowatts and installed at the Public Safety Center at 1220 South 52nd Street, are working on an agreement with EERC and they have a project with the Department of Energy to install that wind turbine and they will be responsible for all of the installation and upkeep; that agreement is in process. They have also made an application to Nodak Electric for an interconnection to their system because its going to be on our property and that is under review at Nodak, doesn't anticipate any difficulties with that being approved, and are expecting a site plan so the very specifics of the construction activity will be outlined by EERC; once have building permit and those small issues, should be ready to construct the turbine and get it hooked to the Nodak system and should be operational. EERC does have a deadline of December 31 to get it running and operational. Chief O'Neill reported that Mr. Swanson has looked at and approved the agreement, there is no City money involved with the project and should be recovering about 1/12th of the month's worth of electricity at the Public Safety Center. He noted they have located with the Defense Depart-ment and Air Force Base and different committees involved with that so no interference with any kind of radar, etc. Ms Hassett stated this is really a training facility for EERC and educational wind turbine so students can come out and learn how they operate and learn how to do maintenance on them, etc. Grand Forks Valley is not the best place to put a wind turbine because of the wind patterns in the state and that is the primary reason that they selected such a small one, and issues with the Air Force and Air Base if it were much larger we might have issues. Informational item. ADJOURN Motion by Bjerke and Grandstrand to adjourn; motion carried. Meeting adjourned at 6:45 p.m. Alice Fontaine City Clerk