10/04/2018 Special

[0:00:02] welcome everyone i'm not calling this meeting to order please stand with us i will be led in prayer for audrey gallagher uh please remain standing after that for the pledge of allegiance that will be led by alderman payne heavenly father we love you and we thank you for the opportunity to meet today today lord i pray that uh you would just be with our country as we go through a tough time with judge cavanaugh lord lord we pray that your will be done not ours but yours lord we know that you control everything and lord we just pray your will back to you in your name we pray i pledge amen to the divide 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 okay first on the agenda this morning is approval of minutes for the september 18 meeting mr mayor will be approved for minutes of the regular meeting of september 18 2018 with any additions deletions or corrections second we have a motion baller in pain a second balarama yes okay that motion carries next on the agenda is a discussion about the de-annexation of democracy at starlanding road west there's no action but do we need a willingness to just discuss okay there's no action i just want to update the board on this basically desoto county approached me recently about some property on the farm it's in the far southwest corner of our city

[0:02:04] limits it's near the railroad bridge on star landing road west of uh highway 51 and that piece of property there's really been nothing it was part of an annexation done i think it was part of the was it part of the sump whitney the summerwood and all that that'd be like separate from that one but it was it was right before that annexation okay but it's been recent you know within the last 10 15 years it was one of the most recent annexations by the city i'll just leave it there i'm not really sure why that piece of property was ever annexed it's kind of uh kind of sticks out it's kind of like a tail and i don't really know but it was i'll leave it like that you see my eyebrows but anyway it's in our city uh but really we don't have much of a purpose for it it's just there's nothing there's is producing um i mean some it's pretty there is a convenience store on the corner on the northwest corner of 51 and star landing in the mobile home bar but other than that there's really nothing that brings any economic value there and the county suggested an accident because the y'all probably heard that there's going to be a new national guard armory building that's built there that will be in the city of south haven right now but they just suggested that since they're going to be building that building or overseeing that it may be easier for them to handle all the permits and then handle the road maintenance there in the whole deal so they suggested that they passed a resolution asking the city to de-annex it since i received that i've asked a lot of questions talked to nick about it there are some concerns there's some negatives to it we just worry that with our comprehensive plan that we're working on now that it could be viewed in a negative way if the city ever needs to annex additional property and it's my understanding that judges a lot of times when you de-annex something they view that that you don't have the

[0:04:06] capability to provide municipal resources to that area and so sometimes they will consider that if you ever go to them again and ask for to annex additional property so we certainly we don't have immediate plans to annex anything but with our comprehensive plan it is going to make sense that we are going to annex some other properties in the future and it just it worries me a little bit i have some concern it's something i think we should you know slow down just a little bit uh be deliberate in our thinking and make sure that we don't uh harm ourselves for future annexation uh and then nick is there if anybody has any questions about that i nick can explain that better than i can but it it's just bottom line is judges do view a de-annexation in a negative way if you have plans to do a future annexation so for that reason i have a little bit of concern about it uh but as far as um you know on the surface it makes sense because we're not you know like i said we don't have a whole lot of economic value there county requested it it's kind of a tale when you look at it geographically but i just worry about it hurting us in the future but anyway that's just the update any questions for me or nick has anybody talked to the owner of the mobile home park there and how they feel about it or uh no not yet that would be something a de-annexation process is kind of lengthy and so there would be plenty of time for any effective property owners to speak their piece but we've not gotten that far down the road this is in its baby stages the discussion first started in a council of governments our county city meeting you know about two weeks ago are there other cities surrounding all the other sides or like do they go all the way down hernando is on the southern border like hernando goes up to uh star landing right there in that area and then [Music] south havens on the north side and obviously the west i mean the east side and then it turns into county so it's such a small area because horn lake goes up

[0:06:07] more lake is on the north that's what i'm saying it's kind of like a like a tail uh hanging off because the north of that is foreign lake then there's a little section where it juts out and it's in the south haven south of there's fernando and then west of aries in the county i don't i don't i think i remember it being in the paper that that the property owners requested annexation there i mean i was on the board and i remember i remember doing it and we were told that uh that they had requested that we annex and it was just you know there wasn't a it wasn't a big deal to do it or not do it and i don't think it really hurt anything it's just there's really it's provided no economic value and there's been one other thing i didn't really get into there has been some discussion about um there was a drainage culvert in that area that um i was approached by the county uh to do some work on we did that we did the part that was city the road is ours so we we can work on the road but there's a major erosion issue on the south side of the road there in that area and the property owner is having a difficult time understanding why i said no i'm doing work on if it's private property you can't do that and then i think it's my understanding hernando also said no county felt like it was related to the culvert and we should be working on it but after doing an engineering analysis it's it's not it's just it's a private property issue i don't know if that's something that maybe they didn't like our answer i i don't know but uh i know that they didn't like their answer so i don't know if it would be easier for them if it's in the county maybe it's easier for them to kind of manage everything maybe but outside of the legal issue in the future i'm trying to figure out why the county

[0:08:09] wants it so bad well what they told me is basically the armory building is a big it's going to be a big deal that's that's huge and uh and they when they build the armory they felt like uh it would be easier for them with it being in the county they're not involving another governmental entity with the permitting process and all that they can just kind of move forward in-house since it would be done through the county uh whereas right now they would go through our building department is there any advantages to the armory building bidding in the city of southeast it's attack and correct me if i say something wrong nick but it's not a taxable building since it's a government facility so there's really no i mean other than obviously we'd be proud to have a you know our national guard in the city and have a nice building but as far as from a financial standpoint i'm not aware of any benefit from a perception standpoint there is though don't you could be yeah i yeah i agree i think it's yeah i do think it would be nice to have a brand new national guard farming facility in the city and this is the piece of property that hernando annexed up to like 10 feet before the road right correct well i thought we would be responsible for all the roads correct and we are responsible for the roads and we have done you know the star landing project that we did last year uh did include a large park or most of that it just seems like a really big undertaking for paperwork reasons like just to save that time on doing the well they don't want to be held to our stand they don't want to be held to our building standards which whitney would hope to i think that's part of it yeah there's something else there yeah i don't know what it is well my biggest thing after talking to nick and some other people too is y'all know this in the last five years we have been so busy with so many things the last thing i know while i speak for myself the last thing on my mind is annexation i'm trying to fix problems in

[0:10:11] the past yeah the property that we have i definitely have not tried to buy you know buy any more real estate but looking at the comprehensive plan long term the city is going to need to annex some additional property in the future and we don't want to put ourselves you know any type of disadvantage you know with a judge uh if they even though this is not they're obviously not the reason we certainly don't have a problem uh providing the you know resources to the area but we don't want it to be viewed that way but that's all we know no action today i just wanted to know the county did officially request that my recommendation to the board is that we sleep on it think about it a little bit and then we'll come back later and give them a formal answer that's okay with you any other discussion questions okay okay moving on uh next on the agenda is the health insurance renewal chris wilson will come up chris and i have spent a large amount of time working on the city health insurance i do want to say before chris speaks that i know sometimes serious things that affect our employees our view that we just kind of shoot from the hip and you know we look at it one day and we make a quick decision it's over this is not something that's done like that we know that financially health insurance is one of the biggest expenditures for a household and for our employees it's also one of our biggest expenditures as a city it's a very serious thing we spent a lot of time doing it uh with that being said uh there's one thing i can tell you that i know other people don't look at their health insurance every day but i can tell you right now it's one of the biggest challenges in america right now for companies and organizations to be able to provide health insurance many private companies that used to provide all the benefits have gone to not providing those anymore for their employees or at least doing a co-op you know to trim expenses but it's one of the most challenging things we do we take it very seriously we want all our employees to have great

[0:12:14] coverage and uh we went to a lot of links to do that so chris will um explain the summary and how we've gotten to where we are now so i emailed out the chart uh last week leading up to this um basically what we're looking at um we're currently with cigna sigma offered a renewal of across the board 19.9 increase again against uh one thousand deductible two thousand dollars well three thousand doctor against employee spouse family child um humana offered um a tiered increase which amount to about 23 increase on all tiers blue cross blue shield came in at two percent lower on employee only and then up to 48 percent higher on family humana did revise theirs to come in lower than cigna but we had to play around with the deductible on pharmacy and the medical tiers on that so like i said at this point we're basically looking at the best decision out of bad options as far as cost increases go no matter what we do we're going to see a cost increase it's about mitigating that increase to the benefit of our employees by far so again what we've proposed is to remain with cigna the city absorbs a 19 increase on behalf of the employee portion that the city pays which will benefit by far the most employees obviously we have more employees on the employee-only 2000 plan than any other tier that's just to say again that you're you're faced with the best alternative out of you know a cost increase which we knew going in we've talked to our brokers talking to the individuals quoting this we've had a really unlucky bad year as it goes our loss ratios are extremely high and that's what the insurance is for cigna does offer and those checks will be going out this week they do participate in the aca rebate program so some thirty four thousand 000 are being

[0:14:16] rebated back to current uh enrollees on the plan so that also mitigates somewhat against this potential increase but as for that the signal plan stays the same no deductibles change no nothing changed with the plan so the those rebates actually straight to the employee yes based on proportion to share the more you paid in for the higher plan the more you'll get back yes i think the highest rebate is three hundred five dollars and that's if you participated in the family one thousand dollar w plan and the employees who are participating in the employee only plan or yeah they get our name okay didn't pay anything in i can get rebates and just to add to that put it in perspective we're a large account for health insurance carriers i mean when two major carriers say no thank you that tells you what how you lost right now is a good point we had some major major carriers couldn't even get it couldn't even present a bid that was around 20 increase of where we were one other discussion that will come up you all know when we switched to sigma a few years ago uh it removed the baptist hospital from the network and we didn't we hated that we didn't want that to happen that has nothing to do with us that's strictly a business arrangement between the facility and the insurance carrier we hate that because baptist is obviously a you know a great corporate citizen for us they serve our people it's a great hospital and so we have a lot of heartburn about that we hate that but it's important to note that blue cross did submit a quote that was equally as high but then the reason that we didn't entertain that any further the cost for dependents was much higher so it was going to excuse me it was going to cause our families even though the cost of the city was about the same as cigna it was going to cause a significant increase for our dependents our families right thank you so good question about that i want you to know that blue cross submitted a

[0:16:19] two 2.1 decrease for employee only but as high as 50.8 percent on demand coverage increase approximately how many employees would that affect chris on which on the uh dependent increase 28 as well 30 46 57. well i mean on just not that's just on we have 146 out of the 401 146 just take the 2 000 and leave it at that you're talking about the actual number of dependents yeah yeah well the the number of employees who are also insuring their families okay not the number of people right correct and the way to know um the net after the um aca rebate works out uh 246 thousand dollar increase in the city our partner we pay and we believe that we can absorb that throughout the year in 2019 that's our plan so we don't plan to do any budget change premiums would go into effect beginning in january and this gives them memorable time to make any changes they need from their and again you know you've seen it everywhere some employer some employers don't even offer spouse or family coverage anymore they're being priced out or some organizations if insurance is available to your spouse and they don't take it there's a premium charge added on top of that to be on the plan we are not proposing any of that now i'll be honest we have to look at everything just cause containment at this point okay and then we'll want to we'll board action to accept to bring out today we're waiting to start open enrollment

[0:18:22] as soon as possible yes okay i'll make that motion second okay we have motion florist to accept cygnum as the health insurance renewal and we've got a second album wheeler is there any other discussion here kelly yes yes do we get significant calls from like people going to the emergency room of course they're going to baptise because they're trying to go anywhere okay next on the agenda's authorization to execute the jag grant award that's just the board authorizing you we've been awarded that jack graham like we have every other year we just swapped out a branch i do administer this this year it's already here so we all need to um the question is to authorize the mayor to sign the documentation sent back to department of justice i believe it's 29 thousand dollars which we split olive branch about the sixteen thousand for us and thirteen thousand for olive branch i'll make that motion for the mayor to authorize the document second promotion volunteer plurals second volatility is there any discussion everything has been approved by the ag cancer clerk and secretary of state any other discussion hearing none roll callie yes yes okay that motion carries next on the agenda is the snowden grove field of dreams playground and to accept the task force at 15. mr mayor ambu we approved task 415 by urban architecture as a president today exactly i'll start discussion just quickly um

[0:20:27] this is as you all know as part of our uh board approved parks expansion and enhancement plan this will add a special needs playground at snow grove park in the area of field of dreams we did the initial estimates on it just to update you we put the raw numbers together we were thinking about 300 000 we realized that to do it right it is going to be about 450. so um since we did not approve the splash park part of that um overall financial picture included 300 grand from the splash mark so we had 300 000 to you know wiggle run so that's where the other 150 will come from so we do have the money to do it any other discussion and this will uh this is something that can be built during the winter months so we'll start this will be done very quickly any other discussion appearing on royal call yes okay that motion carries next on the agenda's the um copy contracts for rj young sister nick manley two separate contracts and one for dispatch and one for the uh police department that allow for contractor rj young that are trying to get those done as soon as possible so authorization for chris shelton's on both contracts and it's uh one uh mexican replacement copiers in the west bridge one's for the west precinct winner dispatch i'll make that motion mayor second we have a motion pain second dollar and kelly is there any discussion looking at this it doesn't look like we have an allowance for like certain copies before they start kicking in the right thing i think it starts when you can't do any other discussion

[0:22:33] hearing none roll call caller kelly yes yes okay that motion carries next on the agenda is the resolution of liens uh to assessments yeah the last thing you recall we transferred the links that we found in the unlocks to the assessments we had a couple more that came up since that last meeting uh so need to authorize these links if you followed the assessments pursuant to mystic code 21 1911. somebody second we have a motion by kelly's second bottom and gallagher is there any discussion hearing none roll call kelly yes okay now motion carries next on the agenda is authorization for thanksgiving this is our yearly bank bid or every two year bank bid advertising we have to go to bids a repository institution that will award in january i think we'll advertise in november so just need an authorization to go to get bids and then chris will come back to you at the december meeting probably with uh or no emergency meeting with recommendations for the positive institution or 2019 each one i will say there is there is going to be maybe hopefully a push for some legislation this next year to extend that to four years as opposed to doing every two years because uh when you do have to switch every two years and if you just have to switch banks based on interest rates it becomes a my channel it's a more deal than i can imagine clear i mean just yeah i could have your own personal bank account or i can only imagine what it is for a city so that's just authorization to go to get good bids for now i'll make that motion second

[0:24:36] we have a motion monitor gallagher second ballroom wheeler is there any discussion and just quickly what as nick said we have compiled a list this year of legislative issues that are affecting the city of south haven and this is on that list so we hope to sometime before the end of the year meet with some of our legislators to try to get that on their agenda for the next session to get something done about it this is a major problem like nick said you know what a pain of the tail it is to change your own bank accounts in your household when you're changing accounts for a 70 million operation i mean for everybody it's a big pain in the tail a lot of times it's not the net net best for us either even though the interest rate may be better other fees and other costs may not be so it makes no sense that we do it this way so hopefully we can get some legislative change any other discussion hearing none roll call mckelly yes yes okay that motion carries right next on the agenda is authorization for uh sahaja yoga police department bids for uniforms same thing just allowing us i think the police fought they're going to get bids for the uniforms and they'll be working with andrea on that and allow them to go get bids and use central bidding as the if required use central bidding as the entity to deduct reverse options mr mayor i'll make that motion thank you we have a motion by paying second monitoring wheeler yes okay that motion carries next on the agenda is the resolution for unmarked

[0:26:39] vehicles this is the resolution required by the state now that we'll send in the clerk's office will send in that will allow or that will note the vehicles that are unmarked by the police department mr mayor i'll make that question a second we have a motion holder in maine second arm and boots is there any discussion depending on roll call yes okay that motion carries next on the agenda is a resolution to clean private property mr mayor move we adopt a resolution granting authority to clean private property is presented on the state sector renovation kelly is there any discussion on the board being known as is there anyone in the audience that has an interest in the property any other properties we have planning agenda in the items whitney no i have no items for the planning agenda uh mayor's reports updates about i've got two things to tell you about the um first of all uh talking about city hall renovation you know we've been working on this for a long time um as i informed all of you just to prep for the meeting you know our plan was not to affect our budget we didn't want to pull any dollars away from our departments to do renovations to this building so we've not done that our plan was to use the proceeds from city real estate two pieces of property one of them 385 state line

[0:28:43] the old walmart building on state line that's for sale and also the the city property vacant city property on get well north of the fire station that is also for sale we do have still have legitimate buyers for both of them but as you all know we turned down some offers that we didn't feel like would be best for our city from a planning and development standpoint but as we've you know been through this i know all of you i've updated all of you on the prospects and what was potentially going to be located there we do have some other hoops to go through that make it challenging to sell to get well property because there's a deed restriction from the snoke family so that's a negative for potential buyers they don't that some of them simply will not be involved in that because the deed restriction is in place until 2024 so for that reason it makes it a little tougher to sell both of the properties and so making the whole improvements here to this building contingent upon that could be an indefinite time frame and there's some things about this building that need to be done immediately and i don't want us to be rushed to sell the other properties that could maybe not be the best thing for the city in the long run so it's after a lot of re-evaluation and sitting down with architects again i think that we could do this in phases and i know that alderman payne i think it was either last year the year before you asked a question in a public meeting about doing it phasing it and we were concerned about that a little bit just because of economies of scale you know when you bid something if you keep piecing it together sometimes you duplicate cost and it can end up being significantly more so we don't want to break for that reason we don't want to break it into a lot of phases but i think we could break it into just an initial phase that takes care of the areas that are most heavily traveled that the public sees more uh that you know is seen from the exterior and also addresses some urgent things with the building

[0:30:44] i know we don't talk about this a lot but i'll just go ahead and tell you the truth the reflex and and one thing i know from my career in insurance my roof leaks it's always going to leak i mean you can keep patching it and you can do this and that you may as well go ahead and face it you're going to replace the roof so anyway what i think we should do is again not press to sell the real estate let's let that come in as it comes in i think we should take some money out of surplus we have a plan that we can address uh some of the biggest issues for about 700 750 000 and uh and we can you know make a big impact on that from a safety standpoint another thing i'm not going to get into a lot of detail but this is not the safest building so anyway that's all i'm going to say about that but let me get into as i mentioned some of the what the plan is the plan would be first of all to address the exterior i told you we have a and you'll see the picture on here this is the finished product okay the the architect designed this can y'all believe this is the same build we're sitting in uh that would be the finished product you can see it has a more modern design uh the front of it knocks the porch out and extends it out to have a lobby a very nice reception area my suggestion and one of my plans was to make that area a tribute home for former city employees or former residents of south haven that made a big impact on our city and and have something consistent there like have a you know bronze bronze plaque that you can put on the wall you know that would um you know kind of list their achievements and what they did for the city you know kind of like a hall of fame kind of thing i think that would be really nice rather than trying to name streets and buildings after people um you know we can honor people that way the other thing is as you all know when you walk in the city in the city building you have a little small reception area our reception area

[0:32:46] in the city is something that's probably conducive to a 1500 square foot office you know you when you walk into a large building like this it's you need a bigger area for people to congregate to get out of the weather you know come in you know before they you know actually move on to what their purpose for being at the building is for but this is a finished product you'll notice that the there's a couple of limestone areas between the windows these two sections right there all of this the gray area would be covered with like paneling that would go over the top of the building but these two areas are actually the surface exterior surfaces there now so so one of the things would be to go ahead and paint the outside of the building you know you wouldn't be putting all the paneling on yet uh but you would paint the building the building is nasty okay there's things growing on it i don't know what i mean we could do a science experiment with all the things that were growing on it but it would be to paint the building so then we wouldn't be duplicating expenses later on we can come back and put the panels on you notice the windows look black all that is the windows are actually have a dark tint to them now all you're doing to achieve that look is just painting the panels in between the windows so that's something that you know could also be done later it wouldn't affect the overall cost of the total renovation but again back to get to the getting the list this is the finished product but what we would start with would be taking the roof off and replacing the roof the architect's recommendation is to go back like the building was initially built with a flat roof take the green roof off then we would have to put i always forget the term what's the term with you when they apparent all right it goes where the roof line graded down a parapet is built up on the

[0:34:50] top where my finger is there and that's just to hide the equipment on the roof like the hvac system and things like that that are unsightly so that would be done [Music] like i mentioned paint the building there's some landscaping changes that need to happen around the building we have some trees and other growth that are so close to the building that they're actually growing into the building so we need a little bit of money to clean that out parking lot needs to be repaved i don't have to explain that to you it's in horrific condition we have drainage problems in the parking lot we can fix all that for about 110k then you get into on the inside this boardroom right here i mean you can make a lot of difference with just some cosmetic changes you all know that we took down all the 1970s pictures that were in here christy good job christy we took all that down we can all come back and add some things maybe in some modern frames but uh the um you know if you look at the wallpaper on the wall right there uh that needs to go what is it congrats on that it would fit there but anyway we can do some things that can make a lot of bang in this room for a small amount of money just by repainting i think that we need to be more professional we have temporary seating here my recommendation would be to go something like a courtroom seating or you know church pew kind of thing to make some permanent seating here it'll look much nicer the maroon carpet needs to go and then some of the wood paneling could eventually be done it's kind of old to kind of dress it up but doing that basically would make it look tremendously better and then there's some ada problems that we have now i don't even know if all of you know about that all this but

[0:36:52] on the north entrance to the building where you come in to pay your water bill now there was a grade there that's um it it's been you know kind of chiseled down to make it as safe as possible but it needs to be reworked we had someone that tripped there the other day busted their head open it needs to be cleaned up and redone on the north end of the building also from the annex area to the main building in the main hallway when you go down there actually is some kind of contraption to come down it just is very strange people get hung up and caught in it that needs to be reworked there so this first phase would include making the building more ada compliant so we would do that the other thing is the porch out front i don't have to get into you know all the ugly details but when you pull a vehicle up to the front door of a building there's nothing safe about that okay that needs to stop the building of the porch is rotten my recommendation is to remove the entire porch knock out the drive-through and side that with a sidewalk make it nicer in the front and we can put a temporary awning there until we eventually add the tribute home you know lobby to the front but i think it's i think it's a lot we could do to make the building look tremendously nicer for about 700 750 000 and again the total project to renovate the whole building would be about four and a half million so we could start phase one i recommend that we do that immediately and pull that money from surplus just for those out there that can have asked i just want to make sure everybody understands some have asked me before hey why would you go and spend money that much money on a building that was built in 1969 why would you just knock this thing down and build a new building and it just comes down to money if you um if you build this building again it's 50 000 square feet if you build it new the cost of construction would be about 10 million dollars and then you would have to have a temporary place to do business until then or if you're going to rebuild it next door you have to buy the real estate

[0:38:54] next door which is about a million and a half and then the cost of demo the building is about another 500 000 so you're getting into about a 12 million dollar project if you build a new building as opposed to four and a half billion so i think it's a very good move you know from a city standpoint for being efficient with taxpayer dollars um let me look at my notes real quick i want to make sure i oh i want i want to get in the financials a little bit with you i praise this board for joining me in making our city more financially stable that's at the top of my priority list also we've come a long way in 2012 the unassigned fund balance in the city was 2.7 million dollars at the end of fy17 it was um 7.7 we got all the way to 7.7 million dollars uh in five years and then this year obviously we're not audited yet but um our preliminary reports indicate we're gonna have another surplus of about eight hundred thousand dollars again that's not guaranteed you know we can't quote that but it is a proposed estimate so we definitely have the money to do this so that's my my recommendation i'm going to move on to the one other thing but before i do that just so we stay on topic is there any discussion about this building that uh in that 770 the roof's in there too right correct now we eventually in the long term plan there are some wiring changes that need to be done but again talking to architects that's not something you'd want to do all at one time because we're going to be in the building we're living here so we can't do all of it at one time anyway so we think it's smart to do like electrical changes uh and some hvac changes we can do all that while we're building in stages one thing i don't see i don't want to sing or not uh versus like southam city hall or something like that are you going to have a nice sign can we get that done first yes sir that's first yeah thanks for reminding me about that and if i may i'm gonna stand up and just talk louder but everyone hear me

[0:40:58] yeah um so like alderman hoots uh questions we're gonna have some temporary signage there obviously we take out the canopy now we'll put a temporary sign on there that says south heavy city hall something like that now and then eventually we'll come back it's hard to see in the picture but on the tribute hall roof it does say city hall there so eventually there will be a permanent sign on the front it's right there not one that's hammered up and tacked in like geppetto [Music] and then eventually on the back of the building if we can see the big picture again please on the back of the building it faces interstate 55. you all know we've run into major issues we're finding a good location to put a city entrance sign on i-55 we think we can scrap that and save money by just putting a sign on our building i mean when you come south on 55 the most visible thing you see is city hall and uh so we we thought it would be a good idea just to put mount a sign on the roof of the annexed area and kind of tilt that and face it to the southbound traffic on i-55 so we can kind of kill two birds of one stone by putting an entrance sign on our roof on the backside too there is i know that some people won't like this but i'll go ahead and get this out there there is a tree maybe too they're going to be knocked down we don't want to kill trees in the city we love big old trees but you have two trees one of them that's growing almost up to the building eventually it's going to have to come down anyway it's too close to the building then you have another tree that's a little further out it's a beautiful tree but it's going to have to come down if we're going to build a tribute home but that neither of those will well maybe this the first tree may have to be removed but the second tree probably not have to be moved until we move on to another phase don't cry wouldn't you project the next phase um the next phase would be the real

[0:43:00] estate after the real estate proceeds like the two uh properties that i mentioned the appraisal of the 385 state line building is uh those 1 billion 885 000 so if it sells for that you got almost 1.9 there the real estate at um get well including the park shop property i was going to be about 2.2 million so you add those you have plenty of money to complete the renovation after that the total renovation the 700 000 gets us safe all the things i mentioned today i believe and i talked to the architect about it there could be some variation don't hold me to the penny with that but basically we believe we can do it for seven seven fifty somewhere in that area to do all these things i talked about today and it bothers me i'm not i'm gonna be very straightforward with you it bothers me we have an obligation from a security standpoint there's some changes that i've never been comfortable with that you know in 2018 some of these things need to be changed 88 and we we need to fix those things if we have people falling down our building and busting their head and we need to fix that the other thing is i know how dangerous our illegal rape is i mean it's just an own goal it's it's paying yourself right anyway i'm excited about it i hope y'all are uh we have the money to do it the other thing i want to and i try not to give too much credibility to the uh the people that like to circulate false information in the community but it does get back to me people point it out to me they photo what do you call it snap shot or whatever and send it sent me pictures of comments from time to time i did see some comments like that someone said that we were going to burn the city's rainy day fund and this and that we're not burning any rainy day fund the 12 percent that we have you all know that we adopted a policy on this board to be financially safe and that we always maintain at least 12 of our general fund in reserve what i'm talking about for this change and the next thing i'm going to talk

[0:45:02] about is with surplus reserves it's not the rainy day fund or things that we need to be safe from a bond rating standpoint we're still going to maintain that 12 percent and just to go through the numbers our general fund budget and fy19 i know that it's 46 million 180 000 i don't bring my glasses hang with me so if you do 12 percent of that which is our policy to make sure that we maintain our plan you have to maintain at least 5 million by 541 000 reserve so the numbers i've given you with the surplus of 7.7 million and then the obviously the projected for this year that gives you plenty even even let's just exclude that let's don't talk about fy18 surplus let's just talk about audited numbers which is 7.7 million so you have enough money to do this because all you have to do is maintain five million five hundred forty one thousand still be complying with your twelve percent cost so it's not touching rainy day money excess surplus okay any other discussion about city hall and uh we'll put this on the next agenda to do a budget amendment to move that money uh between now and then if anyone has questions or wants to know any more details about um all that would be done at the total prices or anything else just let me know please the next thing the next thing i want to tell you about is stems from you know obviously one of the most fantastic developments in the history of the city silos square as you know is under construction now it's a 200 million dollar project that's being built on getwell nearby between may boulevard and nail as we we know that silo is going to be one of the first truly walkable communities in our city's history uh and

[0:47:05] and that the developer brian hill will be the first to tell you that the reason he wants to build silos square there is it's the ideal location he said there's nowhere else in the city that he could build that development it makes sense to be where it is next to snowdrop park but with it being walkable it's going to have a 10-foot multi-use trail eventually that expands from get well all the way west to oklahoma you all know that we've got two other pedestrian plans that are in place one that will connect central park and stoked park that will also connect that area we also have an mpo project that will be under construction next year that has another 10 foot multi-use trail throughout stone grove park so we've done a great job in a short amount of time trying to make our city more pedestrian friendly well since we've done all that to snowden and then we have another pedestrian friendly project right across getwell it makes sense that we've got to connect it to and when we first started talking about that whitney and i talked to dan and even bounce some things off mdot you know how do you slow traffic i mean it's no secret that get well is one of our most heavily traveled areas how do you let people safely cross over from silo square to snow grove park if somebody's at a restaurant on the square at silo and they want to go see a concert at the amphitheater if they don't want to get in their vehicle they can just walk there which is what that's what the whole plan is to make it walkable so i don't know about you but the more i thought about i've heard all the options like you can put you know markers uh rumble strips you can you know do all kinds of markers on get well to slow the traffic but you're not going to catch me walking across get well i'll go ahead i'm not gonna i'm not going to do that and i really don't feel safe with our citizens doing it either so the more we thought about it and talk about it is build wall bridge you know build a bridge over get well and then it gives connectivity to silos square snow grid park and not only that but if you've seen and i didn't i was in a hurry i didn't get a chance to get pictures

[0:49:06] um you know to rit department but um but it adds a grand entrance if you look at some of these you can google it i look at vanderbilt's bridge you can look at others around the country it just is a grand entrance to a location so we think it would do you know provide tremendous benefits from an aesthetic standpoint as well so basically what you're doing is you're adding a walk bridge it's going to come down at maybelline is right there or where the fire station is on getwell it's the main entrance to snow grove mark when you go across getwell that's going to be the main entrance to silo square so they're going to have walking trails to there so what we would do propose is to build a walk bridge that'll come down have steps that go down on both sides to connect to the sidewalks and then our sidewalks at snowden the steps on the snow side will come down and connect to those walks so it connects the two to do this it's expensive i mean you know when we first started talking about that i have no clue what a walk bridge cost we went back and um and dan cordell did some work for us i went back and researched the vanderbilt bridge and the cost of bill is about 1.5 billion we budgeted last year or in this budget year to have new mast arms built at that same location because we know we've got to have traffic control there so we've already allocated 250 000 to that so and there's some other little minor things we believe we can do in-house we believe we can do some of the sound work ourselves connecting where the bridge comes down on may to where it connects to the other sidewalks in snowden but we believe that the net cost is going to be about 1 million 250 so 1.3 million um to do that so um my proposal again we have the money and excess surplus to build a bridge i think it speaks loudly of our commitment to being something different in south haven you don't any other walk bridges are in the subaccount just it's just it just would be a grand entrance on getwell and it would improve the safety of people like i said

[0:51:08] connecting walkability from silo and snow will we still need to put a signal there well what will happen yes i mean dan uh and again i'm a pretty good engineer but dan's better um you still are going to need like this will help some because you can it is you kind of do it all in one yeah but you are still going to have some arms there so there is some cost but this 1.5 this the numbers i just get includes everything okay so it's not on top of the 250 we've already budgeted mary you said something about the steps is it going to be a ramp for handicap accessibility well there's there's uh we're going to follow ada rules but it does get extremely expensive if you put like a ramp coming totally down the bridge so there will be some steps so it will not be completely where um well there's some steps but that is dan would you speak to that there are there are going to be some steps there because it is extremely more expensive to do a ramp uh but we are going to be ada compliant or we would be ada compliant well the preliminary plan would be to have the steps like he like the mayor's talking about we would evaluate like vandy has the ramps that go when they cycle in i mean they they uh zigzag into the location our plan for ada would be to allow pedestrian crossing at grade so you would still have your crossing locations but for more regular loot use you would have your pedestrian crossing with the bridge so ada would be handled through at grade crossing with a bridge for the more prevalent uh crossings of your bikes and that kind of thing so the handicapped people would cross the street correct you'd have pedestrian crossings at the we would signalize it so you would have at the boulevard location a ada crossing how much more would it cost us to make it well the vandy bridge in total was about 1.9

[0:53:11] in 2004 so till we get a better look at what the silo square layout's going to be it's hard to assess what that ramp would be but yes we're keeping it in the back of the our mind of a second phase or a possible ad if we can make it possible but we just don't know that right now and that leads to another question i mean that's something that could be amended later after this bill yes yes all and this is not a it's a prefab crossing so when you look if if you do a contact or like you said search uh vandas bridge you'll see a lot of different scenarios and concepts on how to get the ramps up to uh the bridge crossing um and it would change the layout song but it is possible i i'm really concerned that we you know that we i think we need to look at making it handicap accessible from the beginning if we're going to do it because to say a handicapped person used to roll across you know right yes get well the non-agile people got to walk across the street so you know i mean i think do we have the money to do that uh yeah we have the money yeah we do have the money but and again this is just preliminary we just wanted to kind of get the discussion inform you about it but yeah we can make adjustments to it and as dan said we're still looking at it and considering all that with the pricing uh we're still this was the initial estimate but we're going to do some more research on the pricing as well yeah the mayor's already had me trying to cut at some and we brought up ada access in the ramps and and that's why we felt that number has some room in it for ada rams but it depends on how elaborate they become uh and so until we get more information on layout and everybody's wants you didn't want to put too much into it and i'm sure you've already thought of this but what about just an elevator yes that's another alternative and then if you have the uh of course then you get into safety issues about enclosures and

[0:55:14] how you monitor them you light them those kind of things so there's there's still some now at the 1-5 week in elevator but you have different thoughts needs out there at that point of how you secure it so we got to work through those issues as we get further along how high is the bricks gonna be off the road i don't have the exact footage but there's a standard four uh federal highway that mandates the clear space and if i may thank you for reminding me i did want to speak to that you just reminded me of something that's very important um we always we all see the nightmares and there was a bridge that collapsed out of university florida in florida in florida and i asked the same question i said hey look we want to make sure we do something like this obviously we don't run into a situation that's dangerous like that and some of those bridges that are built um you know on college campuses are done with different standards this is going to follow a standard as a federal approved standard so it's it's a proven uh type of construction elevation is going to be something that's been tested and proven throughout the united states many times over would you is that yeah we're not going to try to do different construction methods then a lot of those like at universities in florida that failed that it was a design build concept a lot of it was on the contractor to actually provide it was new methodology so none of that's in the book for what we're looking at okay i got this just popped in my head uh you know once we build this bridge we're gonna have to build one for the walking trails over goodman yeah we've talked to mdot about that uh whitney now talk to mdot at length about that because it would be uh same thing going uh going across goodman because the the multi-use trail connecting the two parks we'll come out of um central park on tula home and go southland tula home

[0:57:16] across goodman right there same thing i agree 100 that's one of the first things about the project that i asked him diet and we'd like to see a walk bridge right here you may have a match yeah yeah that would be ideal but again you're getting into mdot's money by doing that so mdot is not just going to flip that out so that would be something that probably eventually would be on us too but yeah there's no doubt about it i don't i feel just as uncomfortable about the goodman road crossing as i would get well but to follow up on what the mayor said we've had discussions with them is you're just in a lot better position once the bike trail the multi-use trail is there to get assistance from them for phase two at that cross and then you are at this point if we did it at this point it would be on us to do it so once we have the trail there we'll be in a better position to get assistance from leverage correct yeah so we would definitely like to do that the reason this one will be discussed now is it is under our authority it's not it's not good on the road it's not um you know an mdi um you know managed uh road and the other thing is a silent square because you've got so many people right there but it makes sense to connect it to you but we are it's been something that we've worked on for five years whitney knows this dan knows it um [Music] we've had these projects going on i still read like i said people send me stuff that the city doesn't care about pedestrian work you know we're not with the times all that that's false we're behind there's no doubt he's waiting i don't know why in the past we didn't do some of these type projects but we're trying to catch up we've got several projects that we've been working on for five years that are about to happen they're finally about to happen right then yes sir and um in 2019 they're going to be under construction so you're going to pass this you're about to see stuff on the ground happening with multi-use trails mr mayor i love the idea and i think it would definitely be a monument to you know what we want to be an entertainment area district for the

[0:59:19] city i just i don't i don't know that i'm sold on the need to spend that kind of money on across the street that there's already going to be a stoplight it's not like we're crossing an interstate where there's no you know there's nowhere to stop i'm just not sure on that my uh my 11 year old daughter crosses it every day she's right yeah we have a policeman there too at a concert but he said a lot of money but yeah i mean it just becomes it'll just become a decision you know do you how much do you like it you know i i think it and that's your opinion i respect that to me um i'm the same thing before i would flip out 1.3 million dollars it's got to be something that uh i think is worthy and just just as a reminder before i ever bring something to this board um i spent many many many hours thinking about it asking a lot of questions lose a lot of sleep at night i think about a lot of things so again not to you know i i don't expect everyone to agree with me all the time but before i ever say something to you before you ever get an email to me there have been months and many many hours of thought about it and i think it's um not just from a safety that's not the only thing not just from a safety standpoint i think it's uh just the grand entrance it just i agree i agree with that yeah it just makes us different and that's that's been one of my goals as mayor is to to make southaven different to make this stand out because i love south haven's a great city but there's a lot of things that we've done in the past that we've done in a boring way like we just said you know we could spend the money and really make this awesome let's let's let's just do it the cheap way and i've always tried to do things that are going to provide value for the long term and there's no doubt in my mind uh this will excite many people and it will make a grand interest to the city uh you'll just as i told you to google

[1:01:21] bridges around the country vanderbilt uh people will be googling our bridge all over the united states if it happens it's a big deal i think it's worth it is this something that perhaps we can get the stylus square developer to partner with this song because it's going to benefit and yes there's been a discussion uh that would go back and amend the tip and try to build it that way that could be done uh the only thing that i don't like about that is then you're allowing a private developer to build something what do you think it's input well not only input but he if he's the one building it he builds it he's making the decisions on how safe it is and uh and no offense against brian hill brian hill built everything first class but i just don't i don't think that's the best way because i want to have i think the city needs to be the one direct to that to make sure it's done you know to the utmost safety standards but long way to answer your question that's an option it could be a he did suggest a min in the tip and he'll build it and then work that into the tip but um i don't think it's the best thing again for the reason i think it's since it's public safety i think it's something the city should have our hands all over how soon are you talking about what is to start happening uh well he's he's he's doing his interest like that was done this week where he started working on his entrance on may boulevard i talked to him about that when he's going to have streets in right there that's something that he's going to be doing immediately he'll have streets on may boulevard connecting to the square area probably by the end of the year so it's something that i think should be under construction you know when the weather gets better next year my proposal would be that that we build it and start construction in april 2019. and that way all the timing will be along with east when he starts putting his trails in and then the timing is good for us too because the project we have

[1:03:22] is scheduled to start putting our trails at snowden park in 2019. how long of construction how long i don't know dan how long would it be six months so it goes right through baseball season and unfortunately most of the construction is on each end because they come and sit at the crossing in a couple of days what's he going to have built over there in a year from now yeah he's uh i got an update for him actually last week from him he's he's trying to build everything yesterday i mean he's so unlike um other people no offense but he's so unlike so many people that i've dealt with in the last five years that that love to um y'all after my term kick tires but you understand people love to say uh how about this have an idea let's discuss an idea but there you know there are a few people that really want to take immediate action he's one of those guys that he's ready he wasn't built yesterday but his update is that he is actually going to be building two commercial buildings on the square that will be under construction uh early early 19. i mean he's like you said he's got to put the road in first but as soon as he gets the road in the buildings are going to be under construction so yeah you'll see buildings being built within the next four or five months you'll see buildings and phil i know he's moving i can't take the they're the designer being a site and both those buildings are in my office to come in front of the board uh next month and one of them is one of them it's a big building this is when i talk about small stories yeah but that's again that's the purpose of the discussion if y'all don't feel like you know i respect all of your pain you know and when y'all say things i also take that home and i'll i'll i you know stay awake some more nights thinking about what you said but but i do i've had the same thoughts

[1:05:25] you did like i said dang it well what'd i say dan when you when dan first gave me the thing i said 1.5 million times he went through items so anyway i have the same concerns you do i just i look at things and again my philosophy and when i'm gone i hope that y'all remember this i like to do things right the first time i don't disagree with that at all i when i first saw it and i was looking at because there's going to be a stop light there where bay boulevard goes across my first thought was people walking across i i see the majority of the people if there's a way to walk across the street right there instead of going up the stairs they're just going to wait and walk across the street i mean i've seen it in other places i just imagine that's what i would probably do well and again like wheeler said like his daughter walking across the street when you get further south on get walk by the school it just it has a just everything around it has a calming effect like you start getting into more small offices you know residential areas so people naturally when they see that they know a school's there sure they're naturally going to say oh i got to slow down a little bit this is school crossing this is a totally different ballgame where this is this is further north this is right going to be right in the middle of all the traffic where people are coming out of silos square stone grove farm people go look go sit on the side of the road and watch how fast people drive right there i mean it just to me they're different like we're honoring wheelers daughters across the road and where this is to me are two different things i just think it's riskier crossing the road right there i mean maybe nothing ever happens but i'm just saying there's some people that are not paying attention you know i think it's a matter of time if we don't build a bridge until somebody gets hit over there crossing but that's not that wouldn't stop the fact that somebody's going to try to run across the street there anyway i mean some signs or something that say you know can't cross the street at street level you've got to go over the bridge or do

[1:07:27] something to force people you can't do that with ada you've already got parents decided to play strollers across across the street there anyway so i guess really we need to figure the price tag with that with the ram yeah and again that's one of the first things i stand to you know so yeah we can definitely uh you know crush the numbers and look at it that way too and again to all of the things point you you can't control what everybody does but you can provide them a safe way if they choose to be unsafe that's on them i i i would and and i'm not saying we have to build the 1.8 million but uh how much is one person's life worth if we could save one person's life well there's the i mean that's the probability i mean you have to take the probability into consideration i guarantee you the university in florida is probably wishing they had done it right and not cut corners at this point and i want to correct you that was at the university of florida i didn't say i said that oh yeah yeah it's okay we know you're a gator fan we'll excuse that sin but that's okay see y'all brought this up is there any way we can improve the lighting down there so the center for that crosswalk because at nighttime it's pretty dark i just had somebody tell me last night they were coming through there a kid coming home late from school after dark and if the light hadn't been read she would have never saw him so i mean i think we need to improve that writing down there around there sure i've never noticed it being a problem yeah we can certainly do that we'll take a look at it light it up a little bit more so you can see those numbers but anyway just want to to update everyone um again my recommendation would be to go ahead and start the process looking at ways exploring the ways maybe we can do it you know with some changes with ada um get to get a price tag and bring it back to you but uh it's something i'd like to put on the agenda and for everyone to think about um in the upcoming upcoming weeks is

[1:09:30] there anything that you that you think is relevant dan that should be okay thank you dan okay next on the agenda is our citizens agenda we didn't have anyone sign up is anyone in the audience would like to speak seeing none hearing none we'll move on next one is jenna's personal document mr mayor move we approve the personnel documents presented on the state yes okay that motion carries next on the agenda the city attorney's legal update he has nothing to do next on the agenda's claims docket uh docket number one in the amount of one million seven hundred and twelve thousand eight hundred eighty seven dollars and one cent including demand checks second the promotion of alderman payne second water and flores is there any discussion on docket one hearing none welcome kelly yes mr mayor will be approved docket number two in the amount of forty six thousand eight hundred and forty dollars and seventy four cents a second we have a motion about automating second volume and flores is there any discussion we're going to get a reimbursement check for signal for this right that's what i thought we're just the fiduciary at this point chris that's correct

[1:11:34] thank you any discussion on two fear none roll call kelly yes yes okay that motion carries next on the agenda is to determine the need for executive session i'll make that mention a second motion ballerina pain second monitor gallagher all in favor say aye all right can your poster say no eyes have it carries the need uh today as personnel marks claims against the city and our public works department and economic development with potential industry and business locating to our city now is our motion to declare executive sessions one section we got a motion by army kelly second on the pain all embarrassing hi all right folks say no i just have it bless you carry some airport now in our executive session oh yeah

Captured 2026-07-26 · source: youtube.com/watch?v=ayENH9BH7mk