Episode 32 – Council Meeting Disrupted! What Happened October 8?

You guys ready?

>> Yeah, I mean as ready as I guess.

>> Yeah, let's do it.

>> Hey everybody, welcome to another

episode of the Local Winds Lawrenceville

unfiltered. My name is Louis Campbell

and you sir

>> Dwayne Bman

>> and you sir

>> Keith Bellinger

>> Gavin's brother. [clears throat]

>> I knew that.

>> Yes. And uh we're in a different

location if you guys notice this

evening. Um we're joined by a live

studio audience. Let's hear it. Come on.

Okay, [laughter]

we just uh finished a cookout with some

friends and decided to record a podcast

out here. So, all right. So, we're going

to do a recap of the most recent city

council u meeting that happened on

October the 8th and we're going to be

discussing uh some of the aftermath and

some things that have happened on social

media since then. There's been a lot of

um well, it's it's it's appropriate

we're going to be talking about uh

Republic Services on here because we're

going be talking about a lot of garbage

that's been going on.

>> Yes.

>> So,

>> um meeting starts as normal. Um prayer,

pledge of allegiance, roll call, um

recognition of visitors. We had nine

people that addressed the council. And

I'm just going to write them down here

real quick. Um

so, so I don't forget. Um

and uh

okay

so nine people which is quite a bit more

than they're they're used to

>> and we're going to go through these nine

people. Um but before that um they

[clears throat] had of course uh to

approve the minutes of the regular

regular council meeting on September

10th as well as the special council

meeting that occurred on September 24th.

That's where they discussed the the ITP

grant um and uh the application to uh

apply to the for the grant for the

sidewalks, the ADA compliant sidewalks.

Um you want to talk a little bit about

that? Dwayne, you were at the meeting. I

was not present for that meeting.

>> No,

>> we just voted on um we approved a motion

for

uh the engineering company to apply for

the grant.

And um if we uh if we score

a little bit higher than we did last

year on the application, we stand to

qualify for 100%

>> um

financing or not financing but 100%

grant back.

>> And we're asking for 5 million. Correct.

>> Uh yeah. Um

but if we uh if it's not approved for

100%

um it could be as much as 20%.

>> Of a cost cost sharing.

>> Yeah. Cost sharing. And at that time um

we'll revisit it and see if we want to

spend that kind of money.

>> Yeah. Because on a $5 million project

that would mean that the city of

Lawrence would have to um cough up a

million dollars

>> for that. So

>> yeah. Yeah.

>> At a time where the city of

Lawrenceville has been hemorrhaging

money

>> um to fix um [clears throat] some uh

issues that have been caused due to

negligence in our sewer department. So

>> yes

>> um okay

>> which I brought up at the meeting uh the

special meeting are are we prepared to

uh as a council prepared to revisit that

then? I just wanted to hear everyone's

opinion. really didn't have any any it

didn't have anything to do with the vote

we were taking that day which was to

give the engineering firm the go-ahhead

to put in for the grant. Um and it was

uh kind of like pulling teeth to get

everyone's opinion. Um, at one at one

point, uh, somebody council said, "Well,

[snorts] you know, by the time this

comes through, which will be next spring

sometime, that there may be different

council members here."

>> And I said, "I just want to know what

the feeling is here. If we're going to

have to pay 20% of this, are we are are

we as a group, everyone that's here now,

willing to commit to revisiting this?"

And and they said they would, so we'll

see what happens.

>> Okay. Um, so [clears throat] the uh

before we get into the public comment,

we had uh the city treasurer gave his

report. He talked about a couple of

>> CDs that um we're going to be maturing

in the next several months and such. So

there wasn't a whole lot of information

there because there's not a lot of

things occurring there. Yeah.

>> Um, but you [snorts] had asked a

question about the cemetery perpetual

fund and I want to dig into that because

it's really important that people

understand why, you know, we're asking

these questions, why you're asking these

questions because a perpetual fund um

has an amount that you referred to as

the principal amount um that the initial

deposit uh so if Keith, you know, you

live in Lawrenville, you pass away, your

family donates a fortune.

>> Yeah.

>> Or even $500, for example, to the city

of Lawrenville

>> to the perpetual fund,

>> that $500 can never be touched.

>> Never.

>> Okay. But every penny of interest that

is earned from that $500 can be used to

offset cost for the city cemetery, um

equipment, labor, upkeep, all that.

Okay. Um, but there are no records that

we've been able to identify yet

>> to know how much is the original.

>> Well, not even know how know how much

the original is, but we can't we have

not seen the records to indicate that it

ever was actually designated a perpetual

fund.

>> Yeah. Um, and the city attorney even um

suggested during his comments on it that

maybe it was designated a perpetual fund

for accounting purposes or investment

purposes, but it may not have been

perpetual fund.

>> May not been uh you know um established

as a perpetual fund in which case that

money

>> can be used can be used. Okay. But even

another important thing is what if

there's currently what $600,000 roughly

in the perpetual fund, the so-called

perpetual fund?

>> Yeah. 627

>> $627,000.

Okay. So, what if $625,000

of it

>> is perpetual

>> and then we spend $3,000? We've broken

the law.

>> We've broken the law.

>> Y we need to know where that

>> it seems to me that

myself and John W are the only two that

that are interested, right?

>> I was going to say understand, but they

understand. we're the only two

interested in getting this straightened

out. And it it it it seems like that

that's just a reoccurring theme. We

could talk briefly about the uh uh

ordinance uh where uh the mayor was

asking for and it was in the ordinance

for addresses of public people against

the right

>> public there

>> at the meetings. and um the mayor

acknowledged that that was the ordinance

was wrong and illegal, but they were

just going to leave it.

>> They weren't going to change it. Yeah.

>> So, it's it's the same kind of thing

here. It's it's it's a reoccurring

thing. You identify a problem and you