Mayor Dee Grimm

Councilmen Dwayne Padalecki Francisco Arevalo Susann Baker David Rakowitz Walter Wyrwich

City Secretary Barbara Pawelek Minutes of the Regular Council Meeting

April 2, 2015

1. CALL MEETING TO ORDER

Mayor Dee Grimm called the meeting to order at 7:30 pm.

2. ROLL CALL AND ESTABLISH A QUORUM

Roll call was taken. Members present were Councilman Frank Arevalo, Councilman David Rakowitz, Councilman Walter Wyrwich, Councilwoman Susann Baker, and Councilman Dwayne Padalecki. A quorum was established. Kathy Palmer filled in for the City Secretary.

3. READING AND APPROVAL OF MINUTES

The minutes to approve were from the March 5, 2015 city council meeting. Councilman Frank Arevalo moved to accept the minutes as written. Councilman David Rakowitz seconded the motion. All were in favor; the minutes were approved.

4. REPORT FROM ST. HEDWIG FIRE DEPARTMENT

Fire Chief Larry Padalecki gave the report for the St. Hedwig Fire Department. In March, there were a total of 27 calls. 16 of those were in the City, and 11 were in the County. He handed out a report to city council.

Chief Padalecki said there is good news for citizens. Starting on May 1st, homeowners insurance rates should start going down due to the classification for St. Hedwig. The rating got lowered since the last state inspection. If you are living 1,000 ft from a fire hydrant or within 5 miles from the fire station, you get a ‘6’ rating, compared to a previous 8 or 9, which will lower your homeowner’s insurance.

1 Fire Chief Padalecki met with the new Bexar County Fire Marshall, and they will be turning over the ETJ to St. Hedwig Fire Department for first responders. They will attend the next ESD meeting, and will have more information.

5. REPORT FROM CODE COMPLIANCE

Kathy Palmer went over the code compliance report. Carol Sullivan will be building a new home, submitted a building permit but still needs the plot plan and then will be sending it off for review.

There was an update on the letter we had sent for the zoning ordinance violations on Adkins-St. Hedwig Road. The travel trailer and the side trailer which they said will be for sale by March 27th; are now for sale. The back trailer will be demolished by May 15th, and then the property will be back in compliance. The owner is Randall Zaiontz.

We did receive a Certificate of Occupancy application for a new business called Texas Nuganiks, which will be a general store and organic garden center located next to the Rodeo Tex Mex building downtown St. Hedwig.

Mrs. Palmer visited with Ellen Swetman on 2210 E FM 1518 S. She had concerns of a manufactured home and a construction of a new residence on the same property. She was concerned because there were several electrical poles installed on the same property. Mrs. Palmer said the owners had the manufactured home there temporarily while they build their site built home. Then it will be removed.

Mayor Grimm questioned the acreage for sale on Abbott Road. Mrs. Palmer said yes she was contacted by Bexar County because some of the individuals put in driveways without getting permits from Bexar County, and since it is a Bexar County Road, it must meet their requirements. This acreage is in our ETJ.

7. CITIZENS TO BE HEARD

There were no citizens to be heard.

8. OLD BUSINESS

A. ROADS

Councilman David Rakowitz gave the road report. Mr. Mills has done the majority of the spraying along the roadways. He hopes to finish up early next week along Kusmierz, Felix, Town Lane, and the stretch of St. Hedwig Road starting at the ball diamond.

2 Mr. Valerio from Texas Road Repair has repaired the potholes throughout St. Hedwig and is doing shoulder work as needed. Next up is crack fill, which will be prioritized, based on traffic patterns.

A citizen called with concerns about drainage on the Sullivan Property on CR 345 around the corner from the cabinet ship. There is a culvert there to divert water across the street, but the water initially collects over a large percentage of the low-lying property after a significant rain event before it can fully drain off. Councilman Rakowitz took some pictures and video at the scene after such a rain event and will study this further to determine possible courses of action and by whom.

Mr. Respondek has worked on the following: a) Putting up a few more signs around St. Hedwig. b) A Stop sign needs to be fixed or replaced at Felix and FM 1346. He questioned whether that was the city’s responsibility or the state’s. c) He has not been able to reach Mr. Hopkins about the Neighborhood Watch signs for Kusmierz Road. d) Placing traffic counters on Graytown Road along the part bordered by FM 1518 and Abbott Roads. He also did the stretch of E. Lupon Road between Graytown and Gable Roads.

Mr. Ruvacabas has contacted Mayor Grimm and hopes to start right away on sweeping the excess material off the resurfaced roads and doing repair work now that the weather is warming up.

Mayor Grimm said she will speak to the engineer regarding the Sullivan property, and he will give us a report to assess the drainage and what can be done. Councilwoman Baker felt it was a good idea to have a third party come in and assess it. The drainage problem has been there for 20 plus years.

Mayor Grimm said that she has spoken with Ruvalcabas who will be doing the repair work. Once it is completed, she will have the engineers come out and make sure it is done correctly and until we are satisfied with the work, then we will release the retainage on the project.

Councilman Arevalo handed out a copy of the old interlocal agreement with Bexar County for council to look at. He said he was able to reach the Commissioner’s office and set up a meeting to discuss our interlocal agreement. They want us to make any changes to the agreement. What Councilman Arevalo would like to do is set it up, as Bexar County does, on a 6 year rotation.

This previous interlocal agreement was from 2004. Back then we were paying $9,000 per mile for Bexar County to seal coat the road. Councilman Arevalo hopes that he can negotiate at least no more than $12,000 per mile. That is with the City buying the materials as before.

3 Councilman Padalecki felt like most of the roads will need a double seal coat, not a single one like before since its been so long since the roads had been done and the traffic has doubled and tripled since then.

Mayor Grimm asked Councilman Arevalo to explain what the 6 year rotation is? He said they do a different set of roads each year until they are completed, which takes 6 years, and then they start over.

Councilwoman Baker questioned what is the Interlocal Agreement? It is basically assistance from Bexar County to maintain our roads. We supply the materials and they do the labor. Its when they are out here working any way; they have the personnel and the equipment to do the work. Councilman Padalecki added that they do a good job.

Councilman Arevalo said from his discussions with Bexar County, they are willing, able, and ready to revive the agreement.

Councilman Arevalo moved to revive our interlocal agreement with Bexar County to include the changes and to specify which roads, what type of work, and negotiate the cost, and timeframe and performance. Councilwoman Susann Baker seconded the motion. All were in favor; motion was approved.

Councilman Dwayne Padalecki went over the counts on the traffic counters:

Graytown West, by Adrian Way was 5,787 Pittman Rd South, by LaVernia and Pittman, was 3,883 Graytown East, by the t intersection, was 3,832 Pittman Rd North, by the church, was 2,588 LaVernia Rd, at 1346, was 2,009 LaVernia Rd, at Pittman, was 2,583 LaVernia Rd at Rakowitz was 1,473 LaVernia Rd at Mt. Olive was 1,409

Councilman Padalecki said there is lots of traffic on Graytown and Pittman Rd. These counts are for a 2 week period.

The counters are currently at Lupon at Graytown, Lupon at Gable, Graytown at 1518, and Graytown at Abbott. Then we will move to Old St. Hedwig Road and North Lupon.

Mayor Grimm said she had a citizen that seen 3 teenagers defacing one of our signs, and the citizen did get the license number of the car, which will be turned in to the sheriff’s office.

B. CITY PARK

Chris will start fertilizing and spraying some weed killer in the park.

4 Councilwoman Baker said the new bench is installed on one of the new pads that was poured.

C. MONTHLY CRIME STAT REPORT

Councilwoman Susann Baker gave the crime stat report. It was for the period February 26th thru March 30th. There were a total of 2 crimes in the City. One was on LaVernia Road and the other on Adkins-St. Hedwig Road, both thefts.

D. CHURCHVIEW STREET LIGHTS-Discuss and Take Action

At the last city council meeting, it was brought up about the citizens paying for the street lights in Churchview by Wanda Polasek, who was in attendance at tonight’s meeting. Mrs. Polasek asked if the City would consider paying those bills since they are city streets.

Councilwoman Baker, was not in attendance at the last meeting, and questioned where are the street lights located? Are they on city or private property? Mrs. Polasek said she was not sure if they were in the city right of way or on private property but the lights shine on the city streets. Councilwoman Baker said her only concern is what we are currently paying for now on our electric bill. Are we paying for other street lights? She also mentioned that the money is not in our current budget. Councilwoman Baker said she would like to contact CPS and find out if we’re paying for other street lights.

Councilwoman Susann Baker moved to defer the street lights in Churchview until she gets more information from CPS. Councilman Frank Arevalo seconded the motion. All were in favor; the motion passed.

E. FIRE INSPECTIONS –DISCUSS AND TAKE POSSIBLE ACTION

Mayor Grimm explained that it was asked by a citizen if we do fire inspections for commercial buildings, other than the initial inspection that is done when a business opens. We discussed it at the last city council meeting. Mayor Grimm said we basically say we have 3 options: have an agreement or interlocal agreement with Bexar County to do the inspections, however, the fee may supercede the amount of inspections if we only have a couple of businesses, this way may not be feasible. The second option is to hire someone and have a fee for his service, and the third is to have one of our higher trained firemen attend the building inspector course, which runs about $1,000. Mayor Grimm said these are our options but she would like to defer this until she is able to talk to the new fire inspector for Bexar County next week when he attends the ESD meeting and find out if there is a charge for this.

5 8. NEW BUSINESS

A. Scenic City Certification Program

Mayor Grimm explained to the council members who were out last meeting about the program called the Scenic City Certification Program. The certification standards are not terrible difficult things but things that come naturally. There are certain things the city has to do to qualify such as keeping trash off the roadways and planting local plants, etc. She said LaVernia is certified as a Scenic City. It would probably require a couple of ordinances being passed. She gave an example of one of the items for lighting standards, is outdoor lighting programs that decrease light pollution effects and preserves a nighttime visual environment. She would like council to go online and look at it and get more information. You can go to www.sceniccitycertification.org.

Mayor Grimm said this is just informational but if council would like to pursue this, she would be more than happy to start looking into it.

9. ANNOUNCEMENTS

 Thank you to MD Systems for Spring Cleanup Day! Mayor Grimm said it was very successful and went very well.  Happy Easter to all!  Annunciation Parish Festival on April 26th.

Councilman Padalecki thanked the couple of people who were involved in expediting the potholes. He wanted to thank them because he is getting a lot less phone calls. He said he knows there are a lot of things involved in expediting the process but he hopes we could get a little quicker this next go round, he would really appreciate it. Councilwoman Baker questioned if they fixed LaVernia Rd? Mayor Grimm said they did complete the pothole work on LaVernia Rd.

10. AGENDA FOR NEXT REGULAR COUNCIL MEETING May 7, 2015 at 7:30 PM

1. Call Meeting to Order 1. Roll call & Establish a Quorum 2. Reading and Approval of Minutes 3. Approval of Financial Summary 4. Report from VFD 5. Report from Planning & Zoning Commission 6. Report from Code Compliance 7. Citizens to be Heard 8. Old Business a. Roads b. City Park

6 c. Crime Stats d. Street Lights in Church View 9. New Business 10. Announcements 11. Determine Agenda for next meeting 12. Adjournment

11. ADJOURNMENT

Councilman Walter Wyrwich moved to adjourn the meeting. Councilman David Rakowitz seconded the motion. All were in favor; the meeting was adjourned at 8:40 pm. Mayor Dee Grimm thanked everyone for coming.

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