Nazareth Borough Council Meeting 12-4-06

Unfortunately, I was unable to attend the Council meeting again this week (sorry, and hopefully someone who was there can give us some additional detail regarding what happened).

According to Arlene Martinez of the Morning Call, who had to have been busy as she was credited with covering the School Board meeting as well, the Nazareth Council approved the 2007 Budget, voted to make meetings open, and contested a bill from architect Robert Furst (read the article here).

Since I wasn't there and don't have notes to provide, I'll share some commentary on these developments:

The 2007 Budget - there were some items that were questioned at previous meetings, but they were not authorized to be spent, only included as able to be spent if authorized. There were also some questions in regard to the cost to transition to the new building, which I would assume the committee led by Councilman Bowers has now been able to answer. The budget had no increase in taxes.

Open Meetings - Councilman Herbst of the Law Committee made a motion that was long overdue - to as a matter of procedure hold open meetings. This results in Committee Chairpersons no longer having the choice to open them or not (which is a violation of the PA State Sunshine Law). The only person to vote against this motion was Councilman Bowers, who recently closed the meetings of the transition committee and who served on the committee that met privately during the summer leading to the architect bills now being contested. Interestingly, Bowers was appointed to his position in a manner that led to the new process utilized two months ago to have candidates interviewed instead of simply selected.

Architect Bill - This one is interesting as there are two aspects - first, is the bill itself 'fair', and second, who authorized the architect to do the work. If the bill is fair and valid, Council ought to pay the architect for the work that was done. He could not have known he would be asked to do work and not be paid for it. The authorization is an internal matter and really only impacts the architect in terms of who asked you to do the work? I have not compared the previous plans to the ones drawn up this summer, so I can't say whether or not significant work was done, but others have told me what Council President Dan Chiavaroli is quoted as stating (and I summarize) that there didn't seem to be much difference (between the plans shown this summer and those made to Council in prior years).

From the NewsOverCoffee archives I've found the following related to the process, specifically who asked the architect to do the work:

• April Workshop Meeting - One of the first I wrote included a note that Rev. Matz of finance would be putting a motion forward to authorize the development of an architectural draft for a new police station/borough building, possibly where the yard (recycling) currently exists.
  
• April Council Business Meeting - States: "A motion was approved to authorize the Administrative Office Project Committee and the Police Facility Committee to proceed with architectural planning so that it can present Council with their recommendations on how to proceed with Phase 2 of the Capital Projects Initiative."
• June Workshop Meeting - States: "The primary focus of Thursday's Workshop Session was the building proposal calling for a 2.8-2.9 million dollar facility containing both the Borough Offices and Police Station and comprising some 12,000 square feet on the corner of East Center and Church Streets. Two options were presented by the Committee based on Furst Architecture in Bethlehem."
• July Workshop Meeting - States: "Councilman Davis noted that the committee making the building proposal met and considered the public comment and has agreed to ask the architect and engineer to reduce the space in the current plan."
• Sunshine Law Violation - States: "During the Public Comment period of the 7-10-06 Business Meeting I asked some questions following Councilman Davis' explanation of the process. His explanation was that two committees were formed based on the strategic plan, one to address the police and one to address the administrative building needs. Each had two committee members. The two committees soon realized they were doing the same work and formed one committee and in compliance with the Sunshine Law they did not have a Council quorum. My question was first how could two independently assigned committees decide to form one committee - under what authority was this done, and second if the committee held meetings were they publicly announced. I knew that the Committee had met at least twice following the May 25 public meeting, because at the last two workshops Councilman Davis, who chairs the committee, noted that his committee met and discussed the public comments and issues raised.
• The Revised Government Center Proposal - States: He [Davis] noted that 10 other proposals were considered, numerous meetings were held, 100s of volunteer hours made. He thanked his fellow committee members Councilmen Bowers, Samus, and Stoudt.

So where does this leave us? I don't claim for these notes to be authoritative or exhaustive it is what I heard and recorded as it happened, but it does seem that something was approved in April and that the committee directed the architect to make the revisions to the plans.