ON THE AGENDA Here are a few...

ON THE AGENDA

Here are a few of the items the council will consider Tuesday.

CITY APPEALS PROCESS

The council will consider whether aspects of the city’s appeals

process need to be tweaked. First, it will consider the overall

appeals process, where residents or applicants who disagree with

decisions on development projects appeal them right to the council.

The council will explore alternatives, including eliminating the

waiver of the fee charged for appeals if a council member requests

the review for a resident, and reducing the cost of appeals, with the

city subsidizing a percentage of the fees.

The council will also consider the development appeals process,

where projects are appealed from a city planner to the zoning

administrator or from the zoning administrator to the Planning

Commission.

The council will explore options including requiring more than one

planning commissioner to appeal zoning administrator decisions and

limiting these kinds of appeals so they can only happen once.

WHAT TO EXPECT

A thorough discussion of the process.

CITY ATTORNEY’S OFFICE

The council will consider whether to keep its legal counsel

in-house or contract with an outside firm. The city interviewed 10

firms, with three outside firms being recommended if the city chooses

an outside route. The city attorney’s office also has submitted three

separate proposals presenting various plans for retaining a modified

in-house plan.

Based on current staffing levels, the proposed cost from each of

the top three outside law firms is more than double the cost for

in-house counsel if the same number of hours is required to perform

the same legal services. But if the legal services are contracted

out, it is expected that the number of hours of legal services billed

to the city will be reduced since attorneys will not be attending

many of the meetings now attended by in-house legal staff, according

to the staff report.

WHAT TO EXPECT

If the council decides to contract out, Councilman Chris Steel

does not want any vote taken Tuesday on which an outside law firm

should be hired, because he feels the issue is being rushed and the

appointment of a new legal firm should be a separate discussion at a

later date. He is concerned that a vote might be taken since a

meeting has been set up Tuesday afternoon before the council meeting

for he and Councilmen Allan Mansoor and Mike Scheafer to meet with a

representative of the outside law firm that was recommended most

highly from the interview process.

-- Compiled by Deirdre Newman