Pickerington Area Taxpayers Alliance

----- Original Message -----
From: Barb Slaven
To: Ted Hackworth ; O'BRIEN, MITCH ; Mitch O'Brien ; Heidi Riggs ; Brian Wisniewski;
Cc: Judy Gilleland
Sent: Tuesday, January 04, 2005 8:15 PM
Subject: January column

Before the holidays I requested your idea's & thoughts for columns for 2005.

I have thought that possibly doing State of the City would be good for January. If this is agreeable with all of you I need your input. As Chairs of your various committee's could you send me what your goals are for 2005?

For instance Heidi on Finance...Judy has retained the services of a Financial Advisor...who is he? how will this benefit the City? Possibly speak on the budget. Are we in better shape?

Ted, 2004 was used for evaluation & studies. It seems to me 2005 should be implementation of these.

Brian..I know hiring a Police Officer is extremely important..what else?

Mitch what do you want to do with Rules?

These are only suggestions...I do so much better if your responses could be in E-mail form. In October Brian introduced a quarterly column on Council updates...this is a continuation. Anyway, if possible can I get this info by Monday January 10th? Of course if I can get it sooner that would be most helpful.

In addition, please send me any other ideas you may have. We are somewhat off schedule now..but to get back on track advise me what you want to do for February. In order to meet deadline for publication I will need no later than February 4th the topic, documentation & your position to meet the necessary deadlines of writing, review, submission & publication.

Barb

My reply

From: Ted Hackworth
To: Barb Slaven ; O'BRIEN, MITCH ; Mitch O'Brien ; Heidi Riggs ; Brian Wisniewski
Cc: Judy Gilleland
Sent: Wednesday, January 05, 2005 2:12 PM
Subject: Re: January column

Barb

I believe the issues and projects that are going to be considered this coming year of 2005 on Service will be:

1. Utilities rate commission will make recommendations to Council to increase at the very least our water and sewer tap fees. We will be getting a final presentation from Doug Punkett this month, I believe. In addition we will consider rate increases in other areas such as user fees but may put them off a few months or even a year because of an election.

2. Growth Management Plan. Those studies should be completed by now and they will be very close to being presented to the Service Committee and then to council for adoption. It is premature to state what this rate of growth might be or exactly how we might approach the issue. Clearly no matter what we do it MUST be backed up with study data from our consultants.

3. Impact fee study and implementation. Clearly Mr. Tischler is either done or very close to completing his study and his recommendations. I am not sure if this is a service issue or a safety issue. In any event it will need to get the full council approval. I think the big ticket items in these fee increases will be our streets, the police department, parks and recreation.

4. Tied to the growth management plan will be the Sewer Plant Stress Test data from R.D. Zande (preliminary report of 12/31/04) and tying to get our NPDES permit modified with the Ohio EPA to allow the city to be able to continue to use the current sewer plant WITHOUT EXPANSION for sanitary flow from the current 1.2 MGD up to 1.6 MGD. This would allow us an additional 1100 residential sewer taps before needing to consider a plant expansion. The sewer plant expansion plan that this council inherited last January would have required us to force growth of around 5% per year just to pay the debt on that expansion. Currently there are around 1100 residential building lots plated that would be serviced by our current Pickerington sewer plant. The other 500 or so lots will use the Canal Winchester Plant or the County facilities.

Now if we tie the growth management plan with the sewer tap fee increases together we will be able to pay a huge amount of the current sewer debt down before we need to expand.

5. We are currently working on the progression of the traffic signals on route 256. Hopefully we will begin the process of replacing some of the older traffic signal controllers that are aging and get new ones that have more artificial intelligent to count cars and adjust light timings as the traffic demands change. I believe a complete traffic signal and traffic count study will be conducted either this year or next to help us with our traffic issues.

6. We are currently working on the Transportation Improvement Plan. I believe we may be months away from completing that update. Currently we are scheduled to be looking at the downtown traffic and how we can deal with that. We also must consider the effects of ODOT placing an interchange at Pickerington Road instead of Allen Road.

7. Access plans. For years we have allowed businesses and other developers to make curb cuts into route 256. I believe there will be an effort this coming year to start the consideration on closing some of those access points. As I write this, I can target at least 6 access points along 256 that could close tomorrow and have no affect on the businesses they serve. I will want to look at this once the Transportation Improvement Plan is completed. These are slow and painful processes.

My reply continued


8. I also believe we must pursue the Courtright Road extension and make that section from 256 over to Stemen Road a minor artilary road (5 LANES). We must do it now prior to allowing buildings along that section. We also must restrict the number of access points to allow traffic to flow and not be impeded by slowing traffic and traffic entering the road.

9. Obviously I have left the Diley Road widening for last. Clearly we must continue this project. I know there will be a decision soon from the Finance Director on the validity of the recent referendum petition. I have not changed my position on this project I feel it must continue. To date I have not heard one reasonable alternative to this expansion. Nor have I heard how the Pickerington citizens will finance this project if we lose Federal Funding. ODOT has firmly stated they will not finance a three lane version of this project.

Barb, I hope I have hit the high points.

Ted Hackworth

From the Dispatch

Pickerington Council at odds over e-mail
3 out of electronic loop say they are cut off from discussions

Monday, September 26, 2005

Kirk D . Richards

THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH


Three Pickerington City Council members say their four colleagues are using e-mail messages to cut them out of policy discussions with the administration of Mayor David Shaver.

In one case, Councilman Ted Hackworth sent an e-mail that discussed waiting on sewer and water-rate hikes until after the Nov. 8 election.
Members of the council majority ?— Hackworth, Mitch O?’Brien, Brian Wisniewski and council President Heidi Riggs ?— say the objections are being raised by political rivals desperate to sway voters.

But the three council members on the outside ?— Doug Parker, Michael Sabatino and William Wright ?— say their colleagues are using e-mail to exclude them from discussions.

O?’Brien, Wright and Sabatino are running for re-election.

''There does appear to be some politics as to what information goes to whom,'' Wright said. ''It does concern me.''

The e-mails came to light after Sabatino submitted a public-information request and received more than 200 exchanges involving city officials.

Wright and Sabatino said they both asked to be placed on the distribution list but were rebuffed. City Manager Judy Gilleland said she did not recall receiving any such request.

Parker said, ''It?’s one of those things that you knew was happening, but the only way you can find things out is to do a public-information request like Mike did.''

The Ohio 1 st District Court of Appeals in Cincinnati ruled in July that government leaders do not violate the state?’s openmeeting law when they discuss issues via e-mail. ''Ohio?’s Sunshine Law does not cover emails,'' the judges said, because legislators did not include e-mail in a 2002 revision of the law.

Nothing about the e-mails would seem to violate ethics law, said Jennifer Hardin, chief advisory attorney for the Ohio Ethics Commission.

The e-mails were meant to solicit ideas from the leaders of council committees, Shaver said. Riggs is the finance chairwoman; O?’Brien is the rules chairman; Wisniewski is the safety chairman; and Hackworth is the service chairman.

Hackworth said the committee chairmen must work with the administration on an agenda.

But Wright said the system cuts out those who don?’t lead a committee.

''It?’s a situation where they truly want to control what?’s going on,'' Wright said. ''When you exclude people, you don?’t always get the best solutions.''

Former Councilman Brian Fox, a Shaver opponent, has reviewed some of the e-mails.
Fox focused on one e-mail that Hackworth sent in January to Gilleland, public-information consultant Barb Slaven and his three council allies.

In that message, Hackworth wrote that he expected the council to consider increases in user fees for water and sewer ''but may put them off a few months or even a year because of an election.''
''This memo raises a lot of red flags,'' Fox said at a recent council meeting. ''Why wait until after the election, Mr. Hackworth?''

After the meeting, Hackworth said he was making a prediction and not suggesting that his colleagues sit on a potentially controversial idea.

To Fox, a bigger concern is that the council majority could be using e-mail to discuss policy behind the scenes. Even if the courts say it?’s legal, he said, the practice violates the spirit of Ohio?’s Sunshine Law.

krichards@dispatch.com