Tacoma City Council Meeting - May 8, 2012

The Mayor and Council had to rush off to the City of Destiny Awards ceremony immediately after tonight’s meeting, so things moved along at a pretty good clip, but they still managed to get in a few good questions on a couple items on tonight’s agenda.

CONSENT AGENDA

PROCLAMATIONS, RECOGNITIONS, PRESENTATIONS, AND ANNOUNCEMENTS
None tonight.

PUBLIC COMMENT
Only a few commenters spoke, with the main focus being on Resolution No. 38483 pertaining to the Mental Health and Chemical Dependency Program Implementation Plan. Two representatives of early childhood programs thanked Council for implementing the mental health tax, and encouraged them to consider including infant and toddler mental healthcare services in the programs funded.

REGULAR AGENDA

RESOLUTIONS

Purchase Resolution No. 38481 Awards contracts to:

 
1. Western Systems LLC, on its bid of $78,300.00, plus sales tax, budgeted from the Solid Waste Fund, for 300-gallon plastic solid waste containers, for an initial one-year term, with the option to renew for four additional one-year terms, for a projected contract amount of $391,500.00 – Specification No. PW12-0017F [Gary Kato, Acting Solid Waste Management Division Manager; Dick McKinley, Director, Public Works]; and

 
2. Ceccanti, Inc., on its bid of $10,229,311.42, plus a 5 percent contingency, for a cumulative amount of $10,740,776.99, including sales tax, budgeted from grants, the Streets Special Revenue Fund, various utility funds, and the Capital Projects REET Fund, for the geotechnical stabilization and reconstruction of Stadium Way from South 9th Street to Tacoma Avenue South, including Commerce Street, North E Street, North 1st Street, and Division Avenue to Broadway, as part of the Stadium Way Arterial Improvement Project – Specification No. PW12-0083F [Chris Larson, Engineering Division Manager; Dick McKinley, Director, Public Works].

Item one went un-remarked, but we got a fair amount of conversation on item two, regarding the Stadium Way Arterial Improvement Project. The project to stabilize Stadium Way and adjoining streets to deal with settling and seismic upgrades has been awarded, after some changes to clarify bidder requirements, and reduce some associated costs. Work on the project is scheduled to coincide with summer vacation so as to minimize disruption to Stadium High School. Phase one of the two-phase project will fully close down the street in front of Stadium while upgrades are made that will include a softening of the turn and grade at that point. During that time, Commerce Street will also be under construction, and will be down to one lane southbound. Once those sections are complete, the main stretch of Stadium Way will be fully closed to allow the contractor to complete the geotechnical stabilization and reconstruction of the road in one go. There is no schedule yet for Schuster Parkway work, but we can expect to see closures there as well.

Resolution No. 38482 Authorizes the execution of a purchase and sale agreement with Robert White, in the amount of $161,600, budgeted from the Solid Waste Fund, for the acquisition of a 9,100-square-foot parcel, including a single-family residence, located east of the landfill near the intersection of South 36th Street and Mason Avenue, to allow for the future expansion of landfill storm water holding ponds. [Rich Price, Senior Real Estate Officer; Dick McKinley, Director, Public Works]

This resolution authorizes the purchase of a single family residence and property, budgeted from the Public Works Solid Waste Fund, not impacting the General Fund.

Resolution No. 38483 Adopts the Mental Health and Chemical Dependency Program Implementation Plan directing the use of tax revenues collected from the sales tax increase of one-tenth of one percent for mental health services. [Linda Villegas Bremer, Director, Human Rights and Human Services]

The funds derived from this tax will not be huge in comparison to the number of programs that offer the services covered, so the emphasis at this point seems to be heavily on the needs assessment and gap analysis that will help the advisory committee decide which programs can best help close existing gaps in available services. Other questions raised by Council include the balance between prevention and intervention, taking into consideration public comment around early childhood services, and the broad definition of mental illness used. Staff comment was that the definition was intentionally broad so as to address problems of narrow points of access to services. Again, in response to the prevention/intervention question, staff preferred to wait for the gap analysis, rather than making taking a position at this time.

FINAL READING OF ORDINANCES

Ordinance No. 28070 Amends Chapters 13.05 and 13.11 of the Municipal Code, relating to Land Use Permit Procedures and Critical Areas Preservation, to modify regulations pertaining to the preservation and restoration of public and private natural areas within the city, as recommended by the Planning Commission. [Stephen Atkinson, Associate Planner; Ryan Petty, Director, Community and Economic Development]

Passed without comment.

FIRST READING OF ORDINANCES

Ordinance No. 28071 Revising and ratifying rates charged for wholesale transmission and ancillary services provided pursuant to Tacoma Power’s Open Access Transmission Tariff. [Travis Metcalfe, Senior Power Analyst; Ted Coates, Superintendent, Tacoma Power]

The OATT rates are rates Tacoma Power charges to its wholesale transmission customers for the use of Tacoma Power’s transmission systems. The proposed OATT rates are based on recent financial and operations data, which TPU says are more closely aligned with our current costs for providing the services. Tacoma Power estimates the increased annual revenues associated with the revised OATT transmission service rates and the revised ancillary service rates at approximately $2 million and $1 million, respectively. These rates were last adjusted in 2000.

UNFINISHED BUSINESS
None.

REPORTS BY THE CITY MANAGER
City Manager Broadnax had two items to share with Council:

 
• The city received word this morning that the Center for Urban Waters has received LEED Platinum certification.

 
• Mr. Broadnax formally introduced his new assistant to the City Manager, Nadia Chandler, who comes from San Antonio where she was executive assistant in the city manager’s office. She has an MPA from Texas A&M and BA in political science. Welcome to Tacoma Ms. Chandler.

COMMENTS AND COMMITTEE REPORTS OF THE CITY COUNCIL

Councilmember Boe reminded us that it is Bike Month and you can all be tracking your bike commute like he is. Mr. Boe pledged to do 60% of his commutes in May by bike, and he’s close – at 57.4%. We’re guessing that he’ll be above 60% in no time. Councilmember Boe also announced several upcoming events:

 
• A Bicycling Basics Workshop – if you missed it last night, catch it next Tuesday, May 15

 
• Bike Maintenance for Women and Girls next Monday, May 14

 
• Bike to Work Week next week, May 14 through 18

 
• Bike to Work Day, next Friday, May 18
  For those of you not riding your bike to work, or wherever you go, look out for bicyclists on the road. For more on these and other Bike Month happenings, visit www.piercetrips.com.

Councilmember Ibsen shared a couple events:

 
• Share the Harvest this Thursday at the Titlow lodge for urban agricutlrue enthusiasts interested in sharing harvest w/ food banks.

 
• A breakfast forum on foreclosure prevention with a panel of experts presented by South Sound Outreach at St. Mark’s Church in Tacoma

Councilmember Lonergan reminded us that Tacoma’s community cleanups continue, this coming weekend, Saturday, May 12 from 10:00 a.m. to 1:45 p.m. at St. Anne’s Catholic Church.

ADJOURNMENT

And with that, Mayor and Council, and we’re sure all of you, were off to the City of Destiny Awards. We didn’t make it to the ceremony, but we’d like once more to thank all the award recipients for their work to make Tacoma a better place.

P.S. In case you missed it, two more of Tacoma’s senior staff will be leaving City employment; Bob Biles and Ryan Petty will leave the City later this month.