Public Comment 2/3/11, Part 1

For your information, Public Comment is limited to 5 minutes per speaker and is confined to the Public Comment portion of the agenda--AFTER the business meeting and before paying the bills.

One of the agenda items was to open bids for electrical and plumbing work on the school.  Before the trustees could begin that, this comment was inserted:

Graham Harmon:  Could I ask a question?  Do you guys plan on going over these bids tonight?

Vic Grim:  It looks like we will.

GH:  Objected to having to sit and listen to all of the discussion of bids and deciding about bids in 15 minutes when people had probably spent hours putting them together.  "And you are going to spend 5 minutes passing them back and forth and deciding to give it to this company or that [this?] company?"

VG:  I think we should proceed with our meeting and look at this later.

Jason Carlton:  We are looking at paragraph style, bulleted proposals, trying to match everything.

Mark Hall:  Let's come back to this later.

The business meeting was conducted.
        Blogger to readers:  Keep in mind who objected to how the trustees were going to spend meeting time.

Public Comment:
Speakers and Topics:  Frank Horack, bid book,  videotaping meetings; Jim Aldrich, inquiries about the work done on the school;  Carole Pollard,  rule of law and trustees following it; Dawn Pechman, liability insurer, Internet account for township, format of minutes, change of use of school building, suggestion that bids not be opened tonight.  Blogger comment at end.

Frank Horack, 4586 Winchell Road.  I need to request a zoning book, the cost, and where I can get it.
     A:  John Vechery, 274-9663.  Cost:  $30.

FH:  Is it available now?

John Vechery:  Marie Stehli can get them for us.

Marie:  To Frank: as soon as I can get them run off and to John.

FH:  I was called by [someone?]  wanting to know if it would be all right  to have the residents of the township videotape the meetingand also record them [audio record?] , since they are not recorded now.
The resident wants to know if it is OK to bring a video camera with a recorder for the website.
     Blogger:  FYI, Brent Simon had set up the video camera at the beginning of the meeting (7:30) and recorded the proceedings..  Public Comment began at 8:35 with Frank.  

Mark Hall:  Video cameras are all right as long as they are not disruptive to the meeting.  Otherwise, I know of no issue with this.

VG:  Agreed.

FH:  Summary:  Spoke about many businesses/entities having a standardized bid form so that the bids are easier to evaluate.

Jim Aldrich, 12380 Chamberlin Road.  You haven't offered much up in the last 2-3 meetings about progress with the school.

MH:  We have just received bids for some interior work.  Some finish work has been going on on the doors in the basement.

VG:  Three other doors have been installed by Troy Construction.  Those would be in the corner on the north parking lot; the doors have been put in there.  New dooors at the west end of the hallway as you go out to the trailers and block work in there in both cases.

JA:  Asked about the basement classroom work.

MH:  We need to put in the metal stairs to go up and out the doors into the parking lot, the railing on the exterior for the entrance ways to the doors and we also got the door in where the old wooden door was on the north wall there and then, I believe, paint and carpet.  Is there anything else?

VG:  Just waiting on the final plumbing inspection also.

JA:  Do you have a probable completion date as such?

MH:  We want to have it done by the end of March.  JA:  Thank you.

       Jason:  The building permit runs from 4/1/10 to 4/1/11.

Carole Pollard, 5359 Allyn Road.  Until I started to come to trustees meetings a number of years ago, I was not too interested in politics or government, and as a result of attending these meetings I have developed a deep appreciation of how our system of government is structured.
 
You hear it every once in a while:  We are a nation governed by lasws, not by men.  When you look at the evening news for the last month or so, you can see what happens when governments are by men and individuals who also have their flunkies, toadies, sidekicks, and deputies, and those individuals hold power for its own sake and see their countries as their pocket books.

That sounds very philosophical and remote, but it is not.  It goes from top to bottom.  The philosophy of a nation of laws as opposed to a nation of men goes from the halls of Congress right to your  [the trustees' and fiscal officer's] table, and I appreciate the way you have conducted the township's business very much.  That's all for now.  I can come back to this topic at a later time.

Terri Vechery:  No comment

Faith Osborne:  No comment

Dawn Pechman, 3218  S.R. 82.  Asked to have various things repeated from the Fiscal Officer's report because she did not hear them.  Jason gave the ballpark figures.

DP asked who is the township's insurer for liability of various kinds.  Mark Hall gave the insurer and the agency through which the insurer works.
     Condensation:  There was a LOT of back and  forth about which agency was what, who, and wherefore.  A WHOLE lot.  If you want a clear answer without what --in my opinion--seem to be attempts somehow trip or trap the trustees, contact Marie Stehli.

DP:  [New question]:  How many employees does Mantua Township have?  There are two full time road people and summer help but how many employees does Mantua Township have, and who are they?  I am not talking about appointments.

A:  (either Vic or Marie):  7

Jason:  Are you considering the trustees?

DP:  No.  I am only talking about hiring.  [Mark and Marie reviewed the list of employees.]

Larry Lietzow interrupted:  Mark--you have 11 on the payroll.

Mark:  7.   (Trustees and Marie do not get checks signed by the trustees.)

DP:  Not all the employees get paid all the time.  So there are 7?

DP:  Last time we talked about the minutes program--what program do you [Marie] use?

Marie:  The UAN, provided by  the State.

DP:  And as far as computers you have for e-mail you said the state does [does not?] have e-mail.

Marie:  No, I said the township does not have an Internet account.

DP:  OK.  But the state computer -- is it capable for Internet use?    Marie:  Yes.
DP:  So if the minutes are prepared and if there is an Internet account, they could be e-mailed then?

Marie:  They go through the Word program and I have to number pages as I print them.

DP:  In Word, right?  Can that be saved to a Word document?

Marie:  They would have the same number from one page to 15 pages.  Mark:  So on each page you must make a manual change to put in the page number.

DP:  We need the page numbers so the big minutes book with all the pages on [in?] it-- do we need to have the big book like that?  The way minutes are all prepared before, they used to be in a binder.

MS:  They have been in a legal sized binder since the township has been taking minutes and I would like to keep them that way.

DP:  But if they were changed to another size would you be doing page numbers?

Marie:  I can not get it to print to letter size.

Mark Hall:  The question is do we need to maintain  page numbers on the minutes.
Marie:  I think it is easier.
Mark:  I would say yes, that we need to do that to keep track.

DP:  I am looking at it from the standpoint of people who want to see the minutes and to get the minutes and that would be something to check out and consider.

DP: The last question I have is April 1 is when you have to have an occupancy permit, am I right on that, for the Center School?

MH:  That is when the building permit is set to expire.

DP:  When would you go for the occupancy permit?

MH:  After the building permit is completed.  DP:  (partial interruption)  Expired?

MH:  After the building permit is completed or after the building portion is completed.

DP:  So my question is will you consider changing the classification of education  from something other than day care and have you talked about it, considered it, and where are you at?  I know this has been brought up before.

MH:  There has been no further discussion on that.

DP:  Will you please consider changing the classification to something other than preschool.  Yes or no.
MH:  We can [consider that].
DP:  I wish you would.

DP:  I'm sorry--as far as the opening of bids is concerned and doing it after the meeting*, we as people have a right to hear what the trustees are talking about and maybe you should make copies and then come  back and talk to us.  I am wondering if it would not be a better  idea if you guys got copies of that and came back and talked to us.
*The trustees never said "After the meeting," which would have either been illegal or would have required a separate, special meeting to be legal.

Blogger to readers:  The last statement would  delay the bid selection by two weeks, if I understood the intent.   MORE IMPORTANT:  IT WOULD CORRUPT THE BID PROCESS.  THE REASON FOR OPENING SEALED BIDS AND ACCEPTING THE BEST ONE IN A SINGLE MEETING IS TO KEEP THINGS HONEST.  A number of attempts have been made to convince the trustees to ignore the process required by the Ohio Revised Code.  This is just one of them, from what I can tell and in my view.
Vic and Mark have stood firm on the law, despite some heavy pressure.

Peggy Peck:  No comment.

End of Part 1 of Public Comment, 2/3/11.  (I warned you it could get tedious.)

Note:  The trustees went into Executive Session and upon its conclusion opened the bids and chose contractors.  The official minutes have that information.

     
  

About This Blog

The purpose of this blog is to give an accurate account of what is said during  Public Comment  at Mantua Township Trustees meetings. 

Trustees' decisions are in the official minutes, available on request from the Mantua Township Fiscal  Officer, Marie Stehli, 330-995-2640.  The Township charges 10 cents per page.

Other items of interest or the writer's opinions will be included from time to time, clearly identified .

 Finally, this is not a forum or a chat room, but a source of information, so it is closed to outside input.

Well, a final "finally":  I am really, really green at this blogging stuff and will do my best to make the pages attractive and easy to read.  For now, I am just very glad  even to  be getting text onto a page.