Common Council MTG 06/10/08

Attending: Serasis, Brown, Sutton, Lindstrom, Bolden, Geake, Moccia, Bondi, Hiliard, Straniti, Conroy, , Bonnefant, Hempstead,

They discuss the missing words from the past meeting minutes. Krummel points out that there’s a missing bit that Corp Counsel said, and Lindstrom says her questions and Sheehan’s answers were missing. Lindstrom has the missing into on paper, what a novel concept. Brown corrects a sentence she stated. Straniti corrects a sentence she said that doesn’t make sense.

They vote unanimously to correct as mentioned.

Moccia recognizes the youngsters; James and ??? who saved a friend from drowning at the beach. They received a proclamation and pins of the seal of Norwalk. They also got to shake the hands of all the council members.

Rick McQuaid describes the camp program that they attended and what they did as well as said he’d make a recommendation for a Red Cross award.

Moccia goes over the ground rules, asks that the audience respect the three minute council rule and to try and keep the applause to a minimum.

Patti Genuario of Harborview, and reads from a statement. Asks that the council vote no on the transfer station issue and says that too many neighbours will be impacted. Mentions environmental injustice.

Helen Marshall of Harborview, reads from a statement, says that Alvord and Bondi claim that every topic will save the city a million dollars. Cites some examples that reflect traffic and health issues. Asks that they vote for the Crescent street option.

David Park of East Norwalk, supports Mike Mushak as a zoning appointment. Describes Mushak’s involvement to the Mill Hill historic park and historic commission.

Nelly Mann of South Norwalk, says that City Carting is bringing all this activity in the community. Says Meadow Gardens would be adversely affected by this and the children should be saved. Asks the council to vote no on Meadow street and that to vote for Crescent street. Ask for expanded recycling. Claims that CRRA will be expanding its recycling.

Diane Lauricella, of a post off box, speaking as a member of the secret open government group. Asks that council vote no on 3a and 3b, which is Meadow ST and that Crescent ST be voted for. Says that true facts have not been presented. Describes chart that Alvord provided as being apples and oranges. Claims that there is truth missing from environmental recourse. Is making claims about environmental issues concerning a phase 1 document that she does not distribute and claims that there is pollution at the site (duh) and that it will affect Norwalk. [For the record phase 1 is a DEP term about remediation and is part of the process of cleaning up a site]

Betsy Farnsworth of Harborview, says that they have 68 residents signed a petition against Meadow street. Says that traffic is a problem. CRRA is willing to renegotiate the terms and asks for independent verification of financials that Alvord has presented. Says that the rush to decisions is suspicious. Says vote should go back to committee and reiterates call for independent verification.

Jaqueline Lubelle, of Village Creek says that South Norwalk has changed over the years that there are problems on Meadow Street. Claims that Crescent street will be closed and the trucks will go in new development. Makes reference to Emperors New Clothes and a swindle involving a million dollars. The audience chuckles. They Mayor objects to the implied swindle term.

Gail Wall of North Norwalk, speaking as chair Democratic Town Committee. Reads resolution from that committee. They support environmental justice for Norwalk. They ask that the items for back to committee and was unanimously voted on by the Town Committee July 21.

Tim Butler, attorney representing Enviro Express. Claims that Norwalk is to become a regional trash center, and that the DEP has placed the permit for the Meadow St on hold. Greenwich has approved the RFP, 5 out 7 have left the RFP. That’s interesting because Alvord said earlier that New Canaan, and Wilton have signed contracts.

Yolanda Dancy, speaking for Meadow Gardens and asks that council votes no on Meadow street.

Bill Galasso, says to vote for the transfer station. It is not new the vote is merely who is going to operate the facility. Trash disposal is highly regulated and does meet environmental issues.

Appointments:

Chris Roman approved unanimously Brown is Not Present.

Michael Mushak to zoning.
Mike Geake speaks to the appointment. Knows Mushak through Golden Hill homes owners association.
Lindstrom seconds and speaks about experience of the Tree Advisory committee.

They vote unanimously except Bonnenfant abstains.

Tom Aikenhead to reappointment Oak Hills Authority.
Bondi speaks to reappointment.
They vote unanimously

Mary Geake to Fair Rent
Geake says he will abstain from the vote (since its his wife.)
Hillard speaks to the reappointment, so does Bolden then McQuaid who says she’s the brains behind Mike Geake, council chuckles, and
They vote unanimously but Geke abstains.

John Church for Fair Rent
Hempstead says this is the third generation of Church family which he knows
Bondi also speaks and knows family.
They vote unanimously but Sutton abstains.

Wendell Simms for Fair Rent
Hilliard speaks to appointment and says he’s a great person and great guy.
They vote unanimously but Sutton abstains.

Robert Keyes to zoning
Hempstead speaks to appointment, and says that its good to have an attorney on the commission.
They vote unanimously but Brown, Straniti and Bonnenfant abstains.

Robert Hard to zoning
They vote unanimously but Brown, Straniti and Bonnenfant abstains.

Moccia speaks briefly to the reappointments and they they work hard. Says that they wanted to put another woman on the golf authority. Says he knows

Moccia speaks to the process on the transfer issue, and that an engineering firm and attorney to review. Says that there is much discussion but says that Meadow street is not a viable option. The audience applauds. Says that City Carting should not be made the victim and that there is much misinformation that has been stated. But he also says the garbage can’t pile in the streets. Everybody on both sides of the aisle have reviewed many pieces of paper on this issue. Says although he thinks that Meadow street was the right way to go, but respects the voice of the people and that Crescent street and its improvements is the direction that they should go.

Bondi: Reminds that 6 out of 8 Democrats. McQuaid mumbles that Republicans are pissed, and Moccia remarks that he didn’t think it was that bad. Bondi says the agrees with the Mayor to move on and get the job done at Crescent street. Says the wasn’t happy with the accusation that he wasn’t thinking of the kids since he’s been working with kids for 35 years. Added the that the August 26 meeting will cancelled.

They take a 5 minute recess before they tackle the trash issue.

They come back and Krummel kicks things off.

Krummel says a year ago that the Council hired outside consultants to create an RFP on the basis of using Crescent street as a a transfer station. He says 3 bids came in, and the RFP invited responders to present alternates. City Carting presented an alternate that was at that time attractive. Malcom Pyrnie was the basic RFP proposal. Meadow street was an alternate.
Moves 3 A and B which is the Meadow st option.

Hempstead: No one can fault government for the process that got us here tonight. Says that all of the council is volunteers. Says this council did its job, did multiple public hearings. There was no cover up no attempt to hide anything. He says that people should get involved and participate. Says it doesn’t know who the citizens for open government. He knows who other groups are.

Conroy: Says that many emails were sent, and that he hasn’t been able to respond to them. He said that the 1200 tons issue was not really supported by him and that it isn’t like the council would have ignored all these types of issues. Also says that there are similar issues at Crescent that have been brought up as part of Meadow street.

Hilliard: Thanks the public and people who became involved and it is apparent that they listened to. Claims that no one who lives in South Norwalk supported this. Oops, he must’ve missed me. I’ll remind him.

Geake: Reads a quote about judging the quality of life of the less privileged. Geake says that low income housing was purposefully put in industrial areas and that he implies that this is a problem.

Bolden: Thanks constituents for voicing their concerns. The magnitude of traffic and zoning issues have now been brought to the fore and that they want to make south Norwalk a better place.

Lindstrom: Adds to other comments that appreciate the neighbours and public coming out. Neighbourhood involvement is very important. Mentions role on park issue on Meadow street. Says that the process is to listen to all sides of the issue and that process had confidential information until June. Says that it can happen again, and wants to remedy it. That all information should have been before them in committee. Says the process is convoluted and that the council should know all the information instead of her having to drive to Bridgeport to get more information.

Serasis: Thanks the public. Says he knows South Norwalk well from running many programs there. Suggests that trash causes cancer after citing a Besty Farnsworth statement concerning cancer station versus transfer station.

Stranitti: Grateful for all the residents who contacted them. Says that many issues that were brought up had nothing to do with the transfer station and they the council does something about those issues. Says if there was no transfer station there she’d never vote to put one there. She points out that the transfer station is there and that someone will be operating it with no city control. Thanks Alvord and his staff for answering questions. Thanks Alvord and his staff for answering questions. Says that there was over 10,000 pages of information and that people process information differently. She points out that Alvord answered all questions and invited people to review documents in his office.

Lauricella calls out and claims that wasn’t true and Al Ames interrupts and says Straniti is lying and then storms out.

Brown: Thanks the public and says she disagrees with the process and says that the pressure of the public made the council listen and that the council serves the public. Says she is elated that Meadow street is over but that the public needs to put the same pressure on Crescent st and that the public should understand what the issues are with Crescent street.

Sutton: Says that he doesn’t usually says a lot, jokes that he says he abstains, and agrees that the same public pressure be made on Crescent street.

Bonnenfant: Thanks the public. We do need to move on and have a place to put our trash.

McQuaid: Some people choose to make this political before they had a chance to hear all the information. At no time has he “talked trash” to a family member in the trash business. Says he was not on the “Meadow Street team.”

Krummel: Makes some observations. Says that some issue ignite a match onto the issues and that the grievances brought to light on Meadow street and that they did learn that there’s a problem that needs to be addressed. Heartned that the Mayor has started to work on some of those problems. A second observation about the Harboview, Harborshores and Village Creek are neighbours. Delighted that the neighbours came in to stand up for their other neighbours. The battle has just been started. On January 1st, he doesn’t know what will happen at Meadow street. What’s going to happen. The neighbourhood will be affected by what happens there after January 1.

Bondi: Asks that he withdraws his motion, after saying that he would not have supported Meadow street.

Finally Krummel calls the question on 3 A and 3 B

They vote unanimously against both Straniti abstains.

Motion fails on Meadow street.

Bondi makes motion to approve Crescent Street motion.
Krummel makes statement that it’s the committee chair that should make the motion. He then makes the statement about the RFP and the makes the motion.

Brown: Claims that there hasn’t been the same disclosure on Crescent street and that there haven’t been any public hearings. Says that they don’t have enough info. I will likely run out of battery power here, but Brown starts reading a list of items that were not met. Claims that tonnage rate is cheaper with CRRA at $75/to which Brown obtained from the president directly from CRRA. Which is an interesting statement considering the strict guidelines of the RFP process and City procurement. I suspect that Brown violated some process.

Moccia: Says that Brown went to solicit outside bids.

McQuaid: This information was outside the bid process. McQuaid reminds Brown who keeps interrupting McQuaid, and that the council is overstepping bounds as council members. That information should be sent to all 15 council members and that the requirement is to go with the lowest bid.

Lindstrom: Says that this is the type of information she was alluding to. Says that they should meet in committee and discuss and they are doing committee work on the council floor. Makes claim that the Mayor is making deals with department heads instead of the committee. She thinks that they should basically ignore the RFP process.

[battery dies about here]

So what happened next, Lindstrom went on to say that having trash go to Ohio wasn’t environmentally as good as having wheelabrator burn the trash and converting into energy.

Then Krummel makes a motion to vote on the issue, suggests after a long speech that they delay the vote by one meeting and then there’s confusion about what they are voting on.

Hempstead tries to clarify what the procedure on the vote is, and then says that the obligation to how the city should deal with the Crescent street issues that Krummel raised. He says that the traffic would be less because of the CRRA Waste Management secret deal. He says that most of the concerns go away. He says that it’s the obligation of the council to the taxpayer to get the least price for a contract. He doesn’t see that Council making a decision not to go to Crescent street and that the public was saying “go to Crescent street.”

Brown says that they didn’t do the due diligence. She brings up a gas issue that one proposer is getting city gas prices. She says that proposal is not comparing apples to apples.

Moccia calls Alvord to answer the allegation that Brown raised.

Alvord goes over the procurement guidelines enacted by the council. They had 3 proposals and CRRA did not make a proposal. That you would be in violation to accept a proposal that did not go through that bidding process.

Brown disagrees and says that according to the RFP that Hal could have conducted simultaneous negotiations with 2 or proposers.

Alvord says its at his discreation, and points out that 7 towns voted to overwhelmingly on the accepting City Carting as the preferred bidder. Earlier the lawyer for Envirotech sais that 5 towns dropped out, Alvord rebuts that by saying 3 towns had signed and 2 more were in process.

[My tape ran out here-- but there was more discussion]

They eventually vote on sending it the Crescent street option back to committee. That ends up failing because of a tie vote and the tie vote goes to a fail. The votes:

Bondi N
Brown Y
Geake N (Geake passed first)
Sutton Y
Bonnefant N
Serasis Y
Bolden Y
Krummel Y
Lindstrom Y
Hilliard Y
Hempstead N
Straniti N
Conroy N
McQuaid N

Then they vote on approving the Crescent Street propsosal.

Bondi N
Brown Y
Geake N (Geake passed first)
Sutton Y
Bonnefant N
Serasis Y
Bolden Y
Krummel Y
Lindstrom Y
Hilliard Y
Hempstead N
Straniti N
Conroy N
McQuaid N

They vote to adjourn
I. ROLL CALL

II. ACCEPTANCE OF MINUTES

Regular meeting – July 8, 2008

III. PUBLIC PARTICIPATION
IV. MAYOR
A. RESIGNATIONS AND APPOINTMENTS

Resignations:

Appointments: Chris Romano – Oak Hills Authority

Michael Mushak – Zoning Commission
Reappointment: Thomas Aikenhead – Oak Hills Authority

Mary Geake – Fair Rent Commission

John Church – Fair Rent Commission

Wendell Simms – Fair Rent Commission

Robert Keyes – Zoning Commission

Robert Hard – Zoning Commission

B. REMARKS

V. COUNCIL PRESIDENT
A. GENERAL COUNCIL BUSINESS

B. CONSENT CALENDAR:

VI. REPORTS: DEPARTMENTS, BOARD AND COMMISSIONS

COMMON COUNCIL AGENDA PAGE 2 JULY 22, 2008
VII. COMMON COUNCIL COMMITTEES
A. PUBLIC WORKS COMMITTEE
1. Authorize the Purchasing Agent to issue a Purchase Order to C.N. Wood of CT LLC for the purchase of a 2008 Elgin Pelican P street sweeper for a sum not to exceed $154,804.00. ?Account No. 09 07/08/09 4031 5777 C0313
2. Authorize the Purchasing Agent to issue a Purchase Order to Inter-state Ford Truck Sales, Inc. for the purchase of a 2009 ford F-750 truck with body and plow for a sum not to exceed $99,054.00. (Purchased from State/UCONN bid list) Account No. 09 07/08/09 4031 5777 C0313
EITHER
3a. Authorize the Mayor, Richard A. Moccia, to execute an agreement with City Carting, Inc. for the operation of the Meadow Street and Crescent Street transfer stations and the transport and disposal of solid waste for a term of ten years commencing on January 1, 2009. Terms in accordance with term sheet negotiated, May 23, 2008. Account No. 014042 5298.
3b. Authorize the Mayor, Richard A. Moccia, to execute a Lease Agreement with Meadow Street Partners, LLC for the lease of 8-18 Meadow Street/Lot 92A for a term of ten years commencing on January 1, 2009. Terms in accordance with term sheet negotiated May 23, 2008. Account No. 014042 5298??OR
4. Authorize the Mayor, Richard A. Moccia, to execute an agreement with City Carting, Inc. for the operation of the Crescent Street transfer station and the transportation and disposal of solid waste for a term of five years, commencing on January 1, 2009, and for a sum not to exceed $13,668,605 (based on an estimated 23,000 tons per year.). Account No. 014042 5298

B. LAND USE & BUILDING MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE
1. Authorize the Mayor, Richard A. Moccia, to execute an agreement with Kohler Ronan, LLC to provide engineering services for the design of the sprinkler and fire alarm systems at the Lockwood Mathews Mansion for a total not to exceed $41,500.00 (including $3,000 for reimbursable expenses). Acct. #09056310 5777 C0330.
2a. Authorize the Mayor, Richard A. Moccia, to execute an agreement with BKM Total Office for the supply and installation of carpeting in Norwalk City Hall for a total not to exceed $65,700.75 from the following capital accounts: 09034071 5777 C0268, 09074071 5777 C0268 & 09084071 5777 C0268.
2b. Authorize the Office of Building Management to issue change orders on contract for a total not to exceed $6,570.00.

COMMON COUNCIL AGENDA PAGE 3 JULY 22, 2008
VIII. RESOLUTIONS FROM COMMON COUNCIL
IX. MOTIONS POSTPONED TO A SPECIFIC DATE

Agenda item, VII.B1 Planning Committee, from the July 8, 2008 CC meeting.
1. Authorize the Agency to give all required State notification, and further authorize the Agency to go back to the Developer and demand they make a good faith effort to renegotiate with each outstanding property owner in the Waypointe and Wall Street Project.
X. SUSPENSION OF THE RULES

XI. ADJOURNMENT

COMMON COUNCIL AGENDA PAGE 4 JULY 22, 2008
APPOINTMENTS
OAK HILLS AUTHORITY M/C Nwlk Code 73-2
Kristrun Romano (Succeed J. Walters)

179 East Rocks Road Term expires – 6/24/11?Norwalk, CT 06851
ZONING COMMISSION M/C Nwlk Code 79
Michael Mushak (Succeed C. Weston)?50 Elmwood Avenue Term expires – 7/01/11?Norwalk, CT 06854

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REAPPOINTMENTS
FAIR RENT COMMISSION M/C Nwlk Code 39
Wendell Simms, Jr. (D) (Succeed McElveen)

10 Gibson Court Term expires – 7/01/11

Norwalk, CT 06854
John Church (I) (Alternate) (Succeed L. Blair)

1 Highview Avenue Term expires – 7/01/11

Norwalk, CT 06851
Mary Geake (D) (Alternate) (Succeed P. Genuario)

39 Elmwood Avenue Term expires – 7/01/11?Norwalk, CT 06850

OAK HILLS AUTHORITY M/C Nwlk Code 73-2
Thomas Aikenhead (D) (Succeed R. Bestercy)

82 Ledgebrook Drive Term expires – 6/24/11?Norwalk, CT 06850

COMMON COUNCIL AGENDA PAGE 5 JULY 22, 2008
REAPPOINTMENTS

ZONING COMMISION M/C Nwlk Code 79
Robert Keyes (D) (Succeed Wells)

3 May Drive Term expires – 7/01/11

Norwalk, CT 06850
Robert Hard (D) (Alternate) (Succeed A. Savvaides)

213 Wolfpit Avenue Term expires – 7/01/11

Norwalk, CT 06851