This Meeting was recorded for Accuracy
Present: Amy Lickenfelt, Art Sisitki, Ron Betts, Dan Short, JR, Sue Bartow, Solicitor Jeff Miller, Mayor Tom Pickup, Ron Robson USDA Grant Engineer.
Public Attendance: Adrian Cameron, Joe St Clair, Pam St Clair, Lois Salyards, Veronica Rager, Wanda Clawson, Greg Hughes, Gladine McMaster, Melissa Miller, Arch Dodson, Newspaper reporter, Ligonier Echo, Hans Hoel, Janet Hoel, Caitlyn McMaster, Susie Lamantia, Mark Scribe, Sondra Boring, Billy Shank, Pat Shank, Jean Pahach, and Bill Sisitki.
Amy Called meeting to order 7:00 PM. All council reviewed meeting minutes from February. Correction to be made on page 4 (2nd) paragraph where Amy says Ron can purchase what he needs to fix the windows. Should read the additional statement. Everyone on council agreed. No other corrections to be made.
Ron Betts made motioned to approve minutes, Sue Bartow 2nd. All approved.
Treasurer Report: All council reviewed. Ron Betts questioned what he thought was a mistake on Cd # 2 which showed a balance of $0.00. Treasurer responded by explaining that CD was cashed out on its maturity date so a better CD could be purchased. This CD was replaced with CD #5. Explanation was accepted. Motion was made by Art Sisitki to approve Treasurer Report, 2nd by Dan Short. All approved.
Solicitor report: Jeffery Miller states have nothing at this time.
Public Comment: Adrian Cameron, stated she came to special meeting this past week to discuss the new storage facility. She wanted to review some documents on the building and could not. Wanted to know why the original grant documents were not kept at borough building when it is public knowledge and public property? The Treasurer is required to keep her documents at the building why aren’t the grant documents kept here also. Amy stated, as she explained this past week’s special meeting she could not answer that question and referred to Mr. Arch Dodson for an explanation. Mr. Dodson stated he left everything here and has no idea where they went to. He gave them to Kelly to file. He also said he only has copies and he is not hiding anything. Amy stated no documents were found in the files, only several letters that were sent to the last Bidder group that was rejected. Question # 2 from Adrian: She said she read somewhere that the storage facility was to be used only for the Borough and not for Parks and Rec to store their items. Is that true? Art Sisitki stated that was correct. Parks and Recreation has their own storage area. The only thing in the current Quonset hut is the trash cans used in the park and some lumber.
Joe St Clair, next public comment. He stated after talking to other townspeople he was not in favor in putting the new storage unit at Burkey Park. He said "it is for children and families and we should keep equipment for borough together." He is in favor of putting storage facility next to the current building at Lower Park. If you cannot keep equipment with the salt during summer because of high decay then put the salt elsewhere. He cannot see having truck at top of hill, going to bottom of hill to load up and then back to top of hill again to start plowing and salting. It doesn’t make sense to me. He is not here to address gas being stolen in the past from lower area, he is here to address his opinion on the new location of facility.
Next Public comment: Pam St Clair wanted to reiterate what she said this past week at public meeting. Borough should maintain a maintenance system to keep equipment from being destroyed. When items have been brought up the council at the time says no to the maintenance needs to be addressed and needs to be taken care of rather than putting off.
Next Public comment: Lois Salyards: She wanted to know why we were keeping the police cruiser when we do not have a police officer in town. Mayor, Tom Pickup commented "it will be over my dead body before the car goes". Lois still not satisfied and wanted to know more. Mayor said because we want a police officer here for protection of residents. Just as soon as we can get an officer to apply. He stated he has advertised for one, however no one has applied to work the hours we need them here. Mayor stated it is even tougher to get someone to apply since Officer Reed got shot. Group discussion within the public commenting on running stop signs, taking classes for a public official to get certified, and who in town could possibly take a class to issue citations or drive the cruiser around town.
Next Public Comment: Veronica Rager, Wanda Clawson nothing to say.
Next public comment: Hans Hoel, stated he was at meeting this past Saturday, he understood the new location for storage unit was almost shut down and recommending the location of the Quonset hut. The statement was made when the council was looking into purchase of old funeral home it was not feasible at that time to purchase it or to keep the Quonset hut location. It would be a shame to cancel the new location and look into the Quonset hut repairs and he guarantees that by this winter we will be in the same boat as we were this past winter. He feels we should act on this project now. He also wanted to comment it seems there is hostility currently among council members and needs to be stopped. Need to bury the hatchet, smoke a peace pipe and think what’s best for the community. As you all are aware, we already lost our paramedic service, high school, and darn near lost our medical center. If we keep stalling we are going to lose this money also. The Mayor stated he does not remember ever seeing a cost estimate of repairs for the current Quonset hut. Mayor wants to see proof that it would be costlier to have the Quonset hut repaired. Mayor suggested to ask current council why a cost estimate for repairs was not done on Quonset hut and to also ask Mr. Dodson. Council Pres, Amy Lickenfelt had to stop dispute with Mayor, Mr. Dodson and Mr. Hoel speaking.
Next public person: Gladine McMaster. Here to reiterate her stand on the current new location and wants to check into repairs on current Quonset hut or placement of new garage beside the existing one. She also stated her other issue she has is she wants to give the Borough back the Bolivar Cemetery. Amy suggested to add it to agenda for next month since it could get lengthy. Gladine also wanted the street commissioner to talk to Boro worker about plowing all the snow right in front of her driveway instead of just below it. She is aware she is on the no parking side and commented that because no one is on the other side, why the blade can’t be turned away from her driveway area. The plow driver takes the snow from the upper street, drags across SR259 and dumps it in front of her driveway. Snow was up to Glenn’s hips the pile was so tall and hard. Could he just take it down and dump into Sam’s empty lot. He would not mind. Gladine said Glenn talked to plow driver and it just got worse.
Next public comment: Greg Hughes. He stated everyone wants to see a police officer in town but for the right reasons. What he means, we have a serious drug problem in this town. He knows first had because his son is part of it. He doesn’t want an officer coming in here and arresting someone for easing through a stop sign. A tax payer paying a fine when they should be out there getting the drugs. Amy stated we have to get to that part first. Greg said we had one and nothing was done about the drugs. Amy agrees with Greg. She says she saw it every-day. Caitlyn McMaster commented: "You cannot pick and choose what to enforce." Then Greg Hughes complained about running stop signs.
Pam St Clair spoke up and asked whether the public can see the blue prints of layout of garage. No one commented.
Lois Salyards spoke about drug problem - and asked what the State Police did about it. Amy commented that she could not answer that question.
Bid Openings: Amy handed bids over to Ron Betts, and Rob Robson, Architect who also reviewed with Solicitor, Jeffery Miller.
Sue asked question what the alternates were and how they affect the bid totals. Bid alternate explanations are as follows.
Bid Alternates explanation:
Alternate #1 Preparation grade. (6) six inch thick gravel yard – rough grading and draining, prep site to do building grading.
Alternate #2 installing trenching and back fill of (1- 1/4) one and one quarter inch gas line
Alternate #3 Delete gas heating system controls, piping and electric work, provide scaled down space heater
Alternate #4 installing (3) three inch conduit and (200) two hundred amp electric service box to building.
Bid #1 Roger Suter and Sons INC – Connellsville PA
Bid Amount $82,725.00 Alt #1 -$5100 Alt #2 +$2432.00 Alt #3 +$2391.00
Alt #4 +$28387 . PI – Yes. Bid complies.
Bid #2 Swede Construction Corp – Elizabeth PA
Bid amount $128,900.00 Alt #1 -$2800.00 Alt #2 -$1300.00 Alt #3 -$2200.00
Alt #4 --$3500.00 PI – yes. Bid complies.
Bid #3 MJ Construction LLC – New Florence PA
Bid Amount: $72,762.00 Alt #1 -$4000.00 Alt #2 -$500.00 Alt #3 -$1500.00
Alt #4 -$313.45 PI Yes Bid complies
Bid #4 Don Huey- Indiana PA.
Bid Amount $76,785.00 Alt #1 -$4480.00 Alt #2 -$945.00 Alt #3 -$100.00
Alt #4 -$975.00 PI yes Bid complies.
Bid #5 JDP Construction INC - Indiana PA
Bid Amount $ 97,000.00 Alt #1 -$6982.00 Alt #2 -$1900.00 Alt #3 -$3403.00
Alt #4 -$1944.00 PI yes – Bid complies
Bid #6 Blair Construction – Emlenton PA
Bid Amount $74,050.00 Alt #1 -$14,500.00 Alt #2 -$1200.00 Alt #3 -$250.00
Alt #4 -$3000.00 PI Yes Bid complies
Bid #7 Mid-State Construction INC – Altoona PA
Bid Amount $117,977.00 Alt #1 -$11,330.00 Alt #2 -$2266.00 Alt #3 -$5253.00
Alt #4 -$2652.00 PI Yes Bid complies.
Mr. Robson, stated there will be (7) seven different inspections done during the construction and completion of project.
Tom Pickup, asked if there would be any additional fees that would have to be incurred for this project? Ron Robson, stated the building permits were already taken care of. The only other additional fees would be if changes were made from the original plans. A change order would be initiated and everyone would have to agree to the change. Rob Betts asked the question concerning the price. "If the project ended up being cheaper would we pay the cheaper price?"
Ron Robson, said, "No we would still pay the same price." If this was a private project and submitted as time and materials then you could do that. This is not the parameters we have to work with. At this time the only thing to do is accept one of the base bids, one of the alternates or reject all the bids again.
Amy opinion back in October asked Arch to find more funds, and he came back and said USDA would not give more in a grant but as a loan. Amy said we are still more than $24,000 over and she is sticking to her original decision. If we are going to borrow that kind of money we should do what the majority of the people want and she thinks it can be done. "That is a think, because no-one GOT AN ESTIMATE, so I am going to stick to my original decision.
Sue questioned Arch about the grant money. She said Arch stated the funds would still be available as long as we stayed in touch with USDA. Sue questioned: "Could the money be used to refurbish the existing Quonset hut?" Arch commented it could not. That would require a whole new application and approval process, with new site plan, new USDA industry project approval, new blue prints, new engineer costs, get the county approval again, get state preservation approval again. Federal gov't requirement, and if they find anything they will do an archeological dig.
Sue also questioned the funds collected for the (7) seven bids that came in. Wanted to know whether that was Ron Robson's to keep? He explained the AIA documents required to be included in the bid were over $25.00 per set plus the printing costs, plus his wife's time to put the projects together is where those funds came from. Sue also questioned if there would be additional funds to him. Mr. Robson stated there was a little over $300.00 left in observation phase and I did spend extra time in making changes so there will be a little more but not very much. Sue stated, "Are we looking at Thousands of Dollars?" Mr. Robson specifically stated "NO".
Amy said we have (5) council members, last year it was Arch and I, this year it is Sue and I making opinions. I want to know what the rest of your opinions are on this. Speak this is your chance. No one would say anything.
Amy made motion to reject all bids, and Sue 2nd. Dan Short, Ron Betts, Art Sisitki opposed the rejection of bids. Amy wanted to know why?
Art said he still thinks there will be a problem for the new bldg at the Quonset hut location, and going through everything again is not an option. The decision has to be done tonight.
Boone, said he wanted to see a garage. Every winter time truck has to sit outside and has to warm up for about an hour.
Ron said he wanted to see a garage. He doesn't care where it goes. When he was street commissioner and wanted to move salt out of Quonset hut he was told no. Amy cut him off and said again: Am I allowed to make another motion? Jeffery said you can make motions all night if you want.
Amy motioned again to reject all bids. Sue 2nd motion. Again, Ron, Art, and Dan opposed the rejection of bids.
Art said we need the garage. Jeffery spoke up and said you already have the votes so someone needs to make the motion. Again Art said he really wants to see the garage and it is not in the way of Parks and Rec. He said it will not be an eyesore, however he could not guarantee 10 years from now with another council what it would look like but hopes the council then would also keep it up. Jeffery said, the public needs to stay out of the conversation and let council discuss this among themselves. Art said putting the bldg down at the old Quonset hut location means we would have to move the bldg. Years ago when we wanted to put the trailer in on the side of the alley the railroad made us move it because it was too close to their property line. This new bldg will not fit.
Amy motioned again to reject all bids, Sue 2nd. Ron, Art and Boone opposed.
Art decided to make the motion to accept Mike James bid, MJ Construction at whatever his bid is $72762 base bid. 2nd by Ron Betts. All in favor, Ron, Boone, Art. Sue and Amy opposed. Motion passed. Sue wanted to ask a question and Amy said no more questions, we are moving on!
Grants: Ron, What's going on with grants? Ron turned over to Arch. Ron said he was resigning from working with grants. Sue commented Arch did not want to work with her. Jeffery spoke up and said we got approved for a CDBG grant for $91,000.00 Jeffery turned over to Arch. This covers storm drains on Walnut Street , (1) one on 7th Street & McKinley by Hoels home, (1) one by Salyards home on 7th Street & Lincoln Street and paving all of Walnut street. Last part of project was reconstruction from McKinley ST to Crabapple Lane. Our allocation for this year was $27,000 was submitted in (4) four phases. Arch met with Mr. Antonacci, and was told Bolivar has not used money in the past that was allocated to them so they came back with approval for the whole project. This goes before the Commissioners on March 10th for their approval then, off to HUD to get their approval. HUD's approval will not be finalized until late May early June. We already have McCormick Taylor, engineers on this. They were also used on the last project we did on the streets.
Next item on Agenda was Consulting firm. (DCED). This council has had more than ample time to make a decision on this. The cost was already budgeted for it. Amy made motion to accept, Sue 2nd. All in favor, motion carried. Amending motion for Tom to meet with them and be spokesperson.
Next item. Street lights: Penelec started to put LED lights in, we started with 24. Pat talked to Janet in charge of lights we can do the rest of them. Amy signing documents. All lights are going to be changed. Whole town to be done at no cost. Ron motions to accept contract with Penelec to change all lights to LED’s. Art 2nds motion. Everyone approved.
Next Agenda item: Reposting Sunshine notice. Take off till next year.
Next item: Boro windows, Ron said it has cost less than $35.00 so far. Only have front windows left to do.
New business: Sue has a window grant she wants to talk about. Sue was listed as an alternate. She has been in contact with a gentleman who will do replacement windows. She is meeting with him this upcoming week. Sue stated Jeffery said to leave windows inside and outside as they are and to see how much grant money we can get for them. Since Sue was already approved as an alternate council does not need to make a motion to approve for her to check into a grant.
Next item: All grant documents to be kept at borough building. Jeffery said all documents needs to be kept at Borough bldg, Copies can be kept at home. Arch said he has the documents and will bring them in. Arch can have copies of any of them. Arch says as long as he can get a hold of them, he doesn't mind copies. Amy said Pat can make whatever copies you want or need.
Next item: Westmoreland County Outreach Program for Veterans. Wanted to know if Borough is interested in them coming out to talk to all vets and their families on what benefits are available, what kind of aide and care is available for them. Joe St Clair said he would be interested. They will come to either the Legion or Borough bldg and talk to the Vets on what is available. Amy said to call.
Next Item: Next meeting April 7th 7:00 PM
Next item: Items found during cleaning. Move to next meeting.
Next item: Destructing of records. Move also to next meeting.
Next item: Getting A/C fixed before the season. Pat commented the a/c quit working this past year and no one came to fix it. Amy said she called and no-one came. Boone says get fixed, Sue says table till next month. Ron says it needs fixed. Art says go ahead and get fixed. Amy said she called last summer to get fixed and no one came. She says go ahead and get fixed. Art says we need to have it serviced every year. Pat is to call and get unit serviced and running.
Next item: Catch basin at fire hall. Water has actually going along behind the curb and was undermining. So what the BORO worker did was to put 2 1/2 bags of cement in the hole as a temporary fix for right now. Will need to get engineer to look at it to see what needs to be done.
Next item. Lights around the borough bldg. Ron said they haven't work in years. Put it on next month agenda. We have been without them this long already.
Next item: FEMA flood plan update. Pat gave documents to Tom. He said he spent over a year back in 2010 to get the documents in order, got the maps, got the ordinance in place, and recommendation plan. He has no idea who gave Arch the authority to do this, but now FEMA is saying our records have not been updated since the 1988 and nothing on site in the vault. Why did this happen? Why did council give anyone authority to do this, to act as the Flood plan authority. The council said no-one authorized Arch to do this. Amy said the letter said Arch told them no documents were in existence. Arch told them we have no Flood Plan in existence.
Arch said, he did not say we had no flood plan. The document says otherwise. Tom said since council took it over then he recommends council fix the problem. Pat spoke up and said Tom has always been the coordinator for this project. Amy said the only thing Arch was supposed to do was go to a meeting. NO one gave him the authority for anything else. Tom said he will continue to do it but he was not taking the heat for this. Tom said he will straighten it out but he does not like getting the finger pointed at him for something he did not do.
Letters: PSAB update for everyone. Peoples gas wanted us to choose a long term gas alternative company for cost on gas bill. No one interested. Letter about going to a banquet April 29 in Greensburg. Anyone interested? Payment of liquid fuels was issued March 1st in amount of $18,646.27. Pat said we got it and it takes Liquid fuels account up to almost $28,000.00
Sewage Committee: Ron said next meeting this upcoming week. Nothing to report at this time.
Street commissioner report: Co-stars wants us to submit bid for salt for upcoming year. Needs to be done by March 15. Art feels we have enough salt for upcoming year because of the mild winter we have had. Next time to order will not be until March of 2017. We have still time to call it in if you want. Everyone agreed not to order for this year.
Sue commented to Street commissioner on the borough workers being called back April 1st. She feels we should wait until next council meeting to decide if and when we are to call them back. The letter that Jim has does not say "Jims is guaranteed to be called back on April 1st. The letter Jim has is for unemployment only so he could collect unemployment during the winter, it does not guarantee he will be called back April 1st. The letter says "plans to be called back April 1st", it doesn't say, "We will"
Mayors report. Tom said he actually spoke to a gentleman about becoming a police officer. He is a retired officer and basically gave him the finger salute. He still thinks we need to look into a contract for coverage if we are going to do it.
Parks & Rec. We have a large tree to take down. Cost is estimated to be $550.00. Parks and Rec is looking into another estimate. Tom commented the Borough needs to step up and help out Parks. Art commented, the Parks and Rec committee already said "NO"
Jeffery commented to council at the next meeting council needs to decide to take action on the difference in funds, whether to borrow or to make up the difference out of the General Fund. The plans needs to be approved next month. A resolution also needs to be done, needs to go to bank and make out application. Consider that and be ready to act next month.
Amy ask for a motion to adjourn. Sue made motion to adjourn, Art and Ron 2nd. All in favor. All agreed.
Respectfully,
Patricia Betts
Secretary/Treasurer