Thursday, May 15, 2014

• City Council Meeting May 14, 2014

The meeting started with a moment of silence for two people. Edy Roadarme and DJ Kisner. Edy published an ebook about Wildomar Cemetery History that I'd started reading last year.

—^—

There were a couple of awards handed out tonight. One to the city for its budget (I guess a person needs to be part of the city to get it... sorry, I don't get it, but I'll take your word for it that it's cool).

The other was for our city clerk Debbie Lee. She coincidentally marked her fifth year with Wildomar, and was our city's first employee. She was presented with a city clerk award for excellence in her field. 
Congrats Debbie! 

— • —

City Attorney Thomas Jex gave a brief rundown of Item 3 on the closed session agenda, "the city council voted unanimously to defend the cases, with no more reportable action on those matters."

You may be asking,"What is Item 3?"
You probably know that we keep getting sued by the same group of people.
It's broken into two parts, A and B.

A. Alliance for Intelligent Planning v. City of Wildomar and CV
Communities – Case Number MCC 1400546
B. Martha Bridges and John Burkett v. City of Wildomar and CV
Communities – Case Number MCC 1400557

Wildomar's self appointed, sue happy "community activists" [cough],
better known as "The Unelecteds" (and in one case "The Diselected")
doing what they do best —beating their chests and begging people to
pay attention to them. They need to go back to picking their own
nits and leaving the rest of the citizens of Wildomar alone.

Thank you self appointed, unelected, self glossed "community activists"...


Thanks for nothing that is.
------------

As for the rest of the meeting, I found there to be several items that were very interesting that deserve more individual attention. Among them were issues Council Member Bob Cashman wanted to discuss from the Consent Calendar Items:
  • 1.5   — Library Development Impact Fee
  • 1.6   — Animal Control Services Agreement
  • 1.11 — Sycamore Academy CMFA JPA Agreement
General Business Items of interest were:
  • 3.2 — Cooperative Agreement with Riverside County Flood Control -
    Wildomar Master Drainage Plan Lateral C-1 (aka Billie Ann Storm
    Drain)
  • 3.4 — Animal Shelter Credits and Marketing Program
  • 3.5 — City Hall Facilities


In brief:
1.5 is about a pool of money that has long ago been collected for libraries, but is just sitting there.

1.6 is about Animal Friends of the Valleys. Something that has long been a sticking point for Wildomar since the terms simply aren't distributed fairly among the member cities.  (I'm going to blog about this topic soon.)

1.11 is about the bonds for Sycamore Academy, and the concern was whether or not Wildomar would be on the hook for payment if Sycamore failed to pay them. It was emphatically stated, by City Manager Gary Nordquist, that Wildomar is "not on the hook for that, the city has nothing to do [with that], it's not a liability for the city, there's no need for a surety bond because we don't have any criteria or association with that debt."


3.2 Has to do with an area that constantly floods (during those rare rains). If you know where Plow Boys is on Palomar near Arnold, this project will help that area.

3.4 This wasn't clear. It has to do with matching funds at Animal Friends of the Valleys. We had a surplus, of $18k and the options were to put it back into the general fund or to apply it to animal related programs, like altering and ID chips... or in the words of Council Member Tim Walker Clip n' Chip.

AFV is offering an incentive to the participating cities of matching up to $12,500. Due to the wording involving "Marketing Program" the council wants that clarified before entering into such agreements. I can just see it now... a large portion of the "matching funds" going into the marketing arm... I agree with the council that the program is a good one but the "marketing" angle needs to be hammered out first.

3.5 The lease was extended for two more years, and the city council chambers will be moving down the hall.

o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o


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6 comments:

  1. Only in Wildomar can we borrow 100K from the JPA to pay part of the service debt and then have the audacity to think about how to use an 18K surplus.
    Kenny Mayes

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You speak of things I haven't heard before. I'm not in the business of making the other side's arguments, especially when I don't even have the facts one way or the other. Yet I'm thinking that an inquiry to the City Manager would provide prompt answers as to the details. That is if you really want the details.

      Delete
  2. sorry but the "only in wildomar" line is tiresome AND inaccurate AND a misleading crack against the city and the people who live, work, and participate in events here. Too often those making those comments(or writing critical blogs) remind me of either Jon Stewart or Rush(pick your poison) they only present their view of events. I recommend people actually speak with the city manager and staff to understand how cities and more specifically how Wildomar works and how decisions are made and what they mean. sheila

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Carefully worded response that did not deny that the City of Wildomar for 2 years running has borrowed 50K each year from the JPA to cover the cities share of cost leaving the city 100K further in debt. Spin it anyway you want these numbers are all in black and white in city financial documents.

      Delete
    2. "carefully worded response" hardly! Please be more specific. Are you saying that the city manager lied at the meeting this week with regards to the $18,000? Are you saying that the city is doing something illegal or untoward with regards to the city financials? Or not in keeping with standard practice of accounting for cities? If you are going to bring up the issue of the arrangements with AFV please give a better solution than one that leaves us with the debt and no services locally and subject to lawsuits. Perhaps one the city councilman that spoke out against it at the recent meeting could use his magic to persuade the other cities to agree to changes! We would all love that! sheila

      Delete
  3. I would like to offer a big congrats to Debbie who has to deal with so much and is dedicated to making Wildomar a successful city! sheila

    ReplyDelete

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