Practice put in place after change to council-manager form of government seen by some as time consuming and financially costly
By RYAN LANCASTER
Staff Reporter
Airway Heights City Council meetings could soon start a half hour earlier if the council passes an ordinance to do away with their scheduled pre-session agenda workshops.
At their April 18 meeting the council heard a first reading of an ordinance amending the city's municipal code to eliminate the agenda workshop and change the meeting time from 6 to 5:30 p.m.
The workshops were deemed necessary after the city changed from a mayor-council to a council-manager form of government in 2000, but Mayor Patrick Rushing said now they simply take up time and bring unnecessary costs to the city in the form of extra pay to the city attorney and staff.
“If we have issues that we feel need to be investigated further or discussed further we can either come back into a workshop or table that issue immediately and bring it back through committee,” he said. “We're really not getting that much out of the half an hour.”
Councilman Matthew Pederson disagreed that the workshops are a waste of time and said he would not support an ordinance to do away with them. “This is the only opportunity that we have to meet as a whole body to discuss the various issues as they come out of committee,” he said, adding that they allow questions to develop that have often led to better legislation.
The ordinance will travel back through committees before coming before council for a second reading May 2.
Also last week, the council set a public hearing for May 16 to gather input on a planned realignment of Sprague Avenue. The Kalispel Tribe requested permission to vacate and relocate a portion of that road to benefit future property development just south of Northern Quest Casino. The tribe will spend more than $2 million on the project, about $1.2 million of which comes from federal grants. The city will also spend about $400,000 to bring reclaimed water infrastructure to the area.
City Manager Albert Tripp briefly discussed the reconstruction of Lawson Street from Highway 2 to 21st Avenue. He said contractors will be ready to move forward soon although an asphalt plant must open for the season before work begins. The city secured more than $1 million in grants to rebuild the roadway and will use the opportunity to install sewer mains on Lawson from 18th to 21st avenues.
Council authorized submittal of a grant application to the U.S. Interior Department for the WaterSMART Advanced Water Treatment Pilot and Demonstration Project, which aims to improve water conservation and water use policy. Tripp said the city is aiming for a $1 million award and would be responsible for a 50 percent match, which he said would come from the city's water/sewer capital development fund.
Other agenda items:
•Council awarded a bid to Bowen Brothers Construction to connect municipal wells 1 and 4 to the McFarlane Road Reservoir project for $103,440. The city engineer's estimate for the project was $165,368.
•Council approved a cooperation agreement with Spokane County allowing Airway Heights to remain a member of the Community Development Block Grant consortium and to continue to apply for related funds.
•Council approved a resolution supporting the Community Covenant Program. The initiative was created by the United States Army in 2008 as a way to encourage cities and towns to formally commit support to service members of all branches and their families.
•Council approved an updated job description for part-time permit technician, including that the position will report to the building inspector and will perform building inspections on an as needed basis.
Ryan Lancaster can be reached at [email protected].
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