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Council members want some changes in 2017




BUCKEYE LAKE- Monday night, Buckeye Lake Village Council members were not ready to approve an ordinance to renew an agreement with Licking County for floodplain administration. The regulations themselves are fairly straight forward, but there were some changes beginning this year and council members didn’t feel they had enough time to review the changes and the regulations themselves to call for a vote.

Buckeye Lake Planning Commission chair Karen Cookston said the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA, created the floodplain regulations, to which the village must closely adhere. Licking County administrates FEMA’s regulations locally. Cookston said Licking County wants municipalities to sign up for the service on an annual basis beginning in January of each year; traditionally, Buckeye Lake has passed an ordinance to renew its commitment to the floodplain regulations every other year, beginning in February. “So, we’re a little behind the 8-ball,” Cookston said. She said Licking County would prefer council members to vote this month on an ordinance that would allow Mayor Clay Carroll to renew the county’s services.

Currently, the village has 97 insurance policies through FEMA, translating to about $14 million worth of insurance. The village has had seven claims totaling roughly $43,000. If FEMA’s regulations aren’t “followed to a T,” Cookston said, “FEMA can and will put us on suspension.”

Cookston explained all fees associated with floodplain regulations go to the county, not the village. However, the village does not pay for the county’s services. She said the fees collected would never be enough pay for a village employee to administrate the regulations.

Council member Peggy Wells asked if council members should expedite a vote on something council members did not have an opportunity to review adequately before Monday night’s meeting.

“I’m not voting on this,” said council member Tim Ryan, solely because he had no opportunity to review the information.

Council member Bob Masone said the regulations themselves have not changed. “It’s pretty standard stuff,” he said.

Cookston said the county didn’t provide the information until after council’s final 2016 meeting.

Wells asked why the village has a six-page floodplain regulation form for developers to complete if Licking County manages the regulations.

“That’s actually Licking county’s form,” Cookston said. “It goes right to Licking County.”

Ryan reiterated that council members need to have material to be voted upon provided to them well ahead of the next council meeting. “I’ve said that in the past and I’m sticking to it,” he said.

Council Clerk Valerie Hans said council could simply have a first reading of the ordinance Monday night and vote on it later, or waive the three-reading rule, approving it Monday night but it would’t go into effect for 30 days, giving time for the public to review it, if they so desired.

Council member Arletta Ruton asked what the ramifications would be for the village if council didn’t pass an ordinance immediately.

Cookston said the existing ordinance with Licking County is in effect until February, although Licking County officials are asking that the new ordinance be approved in January. But, Licking County didn’t distribute information about the regulations until late in the year. “I don’t know,” she said.

Council treated the ordinance as a first reading.

“I don’t think this should be on the agenda because we didn’t have the information ahead of time, nobody had a chance to read this ahead of time, and this is ridiculous,” Ryan said. “This can’t go on.” Council members need materials well ahead of meetings, no matter which reading, he said.

In other council news:

Council member Doug Poorman said he believes an old house next to the former LEADS building could be torn down at no cost to the village through the Licking County Land Bank. The village recently approved a lease agreement with the T.J. Evans Foundation to take over operation of the former LEADS building.

The lease payment is nominal but the village is responsible for all maintenance and operating expenses. The village may break the lease at anytime if the building becomes a financial liability. The plan is to use the building as a community center.

Zwissler said the community center has recently been pledged an additional $1,000 in donations.

Carroll read an email from village solicitor Mark Gardner stating in Gardner’s legal opinion a group email Wells sent to council members and the mayor was a violation of the Ohio Open Meetings Act. “The recent Ohio Supreme Court case of White vs. King determined that emails by public bodies, like village council, are governed by the Open Meetings statute,” he said. Gardner said a “meeting” is defined as a prearranged gathering of a majority of the members of a public body for the purpose of discussing public business. A meeting is prearranged when the majority of the public body is involved in discussing an issue from the public body, in person, or like in a group text/email. The case law notes that individual emails or one on one meetings or discussion by members of the public body are not considered prearranged and, therefore, not a violation.

Wells disagreed any violation took place. She said she was forwarding new information about different versions of the International Property Maintenance Code and explaining a procedural process. Wells said there were no deliberations and never any attempt to persuade anyone. “My intent was to inform by simply forwarding information and no different than our clerk sending out the council minutes,” Wells said. “I did not ask for comments or discussion.” Within the same email, she forwarded an invitation to attend a meeting of Licking County’s Council of Small Villages. Council had just adopted the latest edition of the Property Maintenance Code and days later Wells read a Beacon article quoting the Baltimore zoning inspector favoring a different edition. She wanted to inform council in case they wanted to reconsider a different edition of the manual before all the new manuals were unwrapped. Wells said, “The intent was to preserve village funds IF council changed their minds – the emphasis is on the IF,” she said. “I apologize to council and the public if I did anything inappropriate.” But, Wells didn’t believe the email involved any sort of intentional deliberation or attempt to influence village business on council’s part and disagreed there was any sort of violation.

Zwissler agreed as did Ryan and Masone. Zwissler said, “I don’t see any pre-arrangement.” Masone said, “I don’t think a violation occurred. There was no discussion. It wasn’t pre-arranged. There was simply the forwarding of information. Just having people’s names arranged in the email and pushing a send button does not constitute pre-arrangement.” Masone said, “I don’t think Peggy constituted a violation.” Masone and Ryan both agreed, “I think we just move on,” Masone added he didn’t agree the White vs. King case was closely related to the group email question, anyway. “I just finished reading White vs. King and there’s very little similarity to what Peggy did.”

Resident Noel Joyce said he was disappointed to see council members having “petty” disagreements going into the new year. He hoped council members could put the disagreements behind them. “Can’t you guys get it together?”he said.

“I thought I might make it through a council meeting without being reprimanded, spoken to like a child, and labeled dysfunctional, although that actual word wasn’t used. I’m tired of it,” Masone said. In previous meetings Masone has said this particular administration has accomplished plenty. He said all council members are capable people and he’s disappointed with the public “berating” the council during every citizens’ comment period. “That may be left over from a previous council that was dysfunctional,” Masone said. “People still think it’s dysfunctional. Why don’t they stop it?”

For example, Masone said he was offended at people criticizing council over the bathrooms at Ryan/ Braden Park when his wife and Zwissler volunteered their time and personal effort into the cleaning the bathrooms before they were professionally cleaned.

“We have to get a lecture on the bathrooms at Ryan Park,” Masone said. “I would just ask for nothing special, maybe common decency and respect. We get berated every meeting, twice a meeting…or more.”

Wells said she’s discouraged. “I’m discouraged from sharing information with other people especially the mayor and that’s unfortunate.”

“Her work in 2016 alone has been fantastic,” Masone said. He said he appreciated the time she spent sifting through the planning commission’s minutes and finding gaps as well as researching the zoning issue. “She’s been a total asset to this body,” Masone said.

“These people elect us and we need to listen to them,” Ruton said. “There are times when we don’t listen to them.”

Ryan said he does listen to the public and disagreed with her use of “we.”

“We are a council,” Ruton said.

“Not a piñata,” Masone said.

“I think we need to start listening to the public and I think we need to start listening to each other,” Ruton said. She said the email situation is a “wake up call” that council members could use training in the Sunshine Law so there are no more similar incidents. Wells responded, “I have 40 hours of Municipal League training and I promise that you and the mayor will not have to worry about receiving future emails from me.” She also asked the mayor to bring the solicitor’s invoice to the next meeting because the mayor was wasting tax dollars on a frivolous issue.

Ryan said he’d like for the planning commission and the council to work together more and he would like to see more reports from the planning commission. He said he gets along fine with the mayor but would like to see more communication and earlier communication other than the meetings. “I enjoy very much being on this council and I think it’s the best council we’ve had in a long, long time,” he said.

Zwissler said she would like for the mayor to create some sort of commendation for employees who succeed and go above and beyond what’s expected of them so these success are publicized.



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