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4 <br /> <br /> Mr. Schilling said he would prefer not to be in that position. Mr. Schilling asked <br />if the City is required by deed to maintain ownership of the Wayland House adjacent to <br />Pen Park. <br /> <br />Mr. Svetz said he has asked the City Attorney for an opinion about this. <br /> <br /> Mr. Schilling said there are high maintenance costs for this building given the low <br />rent charged. <br /> <br /> Mr. Lynch said that Pen Park Road might be a viable route for an eastern <br />connector and he cautioned giving up that land. Regarding the H & R Block building, he <br />said he would like to start the development process knowing that we do not have all the <br />property. He said we should signal we are ready to sell with the understanding that a <br />developer would have to deal with private ownership of some of the property. <br /> <br /> Mr. Lynch expressed concern that the cost of the mobile data computers seems <br />high. <br /> <br />Mr. O'Connell said they are rugged computers. <br /> <br /> Mr. Watts said they cost $10,000 each with modification required to put into <br />vehicles. <br /> <br /> Mr. O'Connell said the idea is to buy as many mobile data computers as we can <br />with the money available. <br /> <br /> Responding to a question from Mr. Schilling about energy saving initiatives, Ms. <br />Leslie Beauregard, Budget Manager, said they were cut out of the budget. <br /> <br /> Mr. Lynch asked if we can have traffic signals on West Main Street synchronized <br />by the end of the year, and Mr. O'Connell said he will provide a report on the schedule. <br /> <br />Mr. Caravati asked if the GIS system upgrades are perpetual, and Mr. Watts said <br /> <br />yes. <br /> <br />Mr. Caravati asked for the balance of the contingency funding from this year. <br /> <br />Agencies <br /> <br /> Dr. Brown said he would like to start by looking at the agency review team <br />recommendations. He said his personal opinion is that we have a process in place that <br />has asked for the team's recommendations, and to tinker with them undercuts the process. <br />He said if we want to talk about this process and make changes to it, we should do it after <br />the budget. <br /> <br /> Ms. Hamilton noted that Councilors created a list of agencies to think about <br />changing the funding at the last meeting, but she now lines up with Dr. Brown and is not <br />comfortable tinkering with the recommendations of the budget review team. In light of <br />that, she said she will take the request for additional funding for the African-American <br />Festival off the table as she is comfortable funds can come from the special projects fund. <br /> <br /> Mr. Lynch said he agrees that there is some value in having a process where <br />programs are evaluated, but he said Council has not really set parameters. He said the <br />original premise is that agencies would get a 3% overall increase, but the total increase is <br />$1.5%. He said if an outside agency got a rating of excellent and if it is consistent with <br />Council objectives, he thinks they should at least be funded to the average increase of the <br />City budget. <br /> <br />Mr. Caravati agreed with Mr. Lynch. <br /> <br /> Dr. Brown expressed concern that this does not take into account whether <br />agencies have matches and mandates. He noted that some of the City increases are <br /> <br /> <br />