Gahan and Coffey Together Forever, Part 3: What The F@#* Opie? Ya Ain't Seen Nothun Yet! (16 January 2009).

LAST: Gahan and Coffey Together Forever, Part 2: Ulrich out, Robison in as city council attorney (15 January 2009).

The second council meeting of 2009 was when the Democratic Party fix hit the fan, as Dan Coffey tactlessly shouted down a speaker during public input time ... but the Wizard was just warming up for the main event to come at the now defunct Studio's.

I missed it all. It was the time of intense build-out for Bank Street Brewhouse, which debuted in March, so Friday coverage of the Thursday evening meeting was provided by the late Lloyd "Highwayman" Wimp.

Lloyd had considerable potential as a writer; he wasn't trained in any respect, but harbored excellent instincts when it came to a juicy story. Unlike so many purported reporters, there wasn't a question Lloyd wouldn't ask.

We miss him.

---

What The F@#* Opie? Ya Ain't Seen Nothun Yet!

16 January 2009

Here it is, the middle of the week, the predicted coldest night in recent memory, there’s nothing of consequence on TV, and y’all still elected to be couch potatoes when you could have attended one of the most entertaining New Albany Common Council meetings to date.

It started out harmless enough. Our resident mail carrier took to the podium to say he felt the Council had better things to do with its time than deal with a Resolution in support of HR676 (a US House bill concerning universal health care).

After all, the city of New Albany has no influence on the Beltway Boys so why waste the time.

At this point a non-agenda item was raised in the form of a council committee report from the housing/code enforcement threesome. (make that a twosome as CM Price abstained from officially signing the recommendation.)

Steve's reasoning was that he disagreed with a sentence that seems to hold rentals to a higher standard than us lowly homeowners as it pertained to enforcement.

As a side note, Pat Harrison & her entourage of landlords presented CM & Committee Chair John Gonder with a copy of said recommendation prior to the meeting. The mystery of that is according to Gonder himself, he had not presented said report to any Council Members prior to tonight’s meeting. Strange indeed!

Then in the Communications from City Officials slot an employee from the City Controllers office took a stand against A-09-01 which would give a raise in pay to two Non Bargaining Unit employees who work in the Utility Billing Department.

It seems they have inherited the billing duties from EMC as it pertains to Storm Water, Trash, & Sewer bills as those has now been brought back into the Cities venue.

She was followed by one of the two affected employees who pled their case for the increase after which the fun began in earnest.

Carl then stood in the absent Mayor’s stead and proceeded with a detailed explanation of England’s surgery, (good thing I didn’t eat before), recovery, therapy, and remorse for not being at tonight’s gathering.

He was going to elaborate even further but Council President Coffey took the floor and exclaimed that while the Council and the audience were concerned about the Mayor’s well being, it was not necessary to give a blow by blow report at each & every gathering.

He went on to request that if the Deputy Mayor had any further official city business to discuss to get on with it.

I went blank for a few seconds but as I recall Carl offered a report about the insurance monies received for the Tabernacle Building, the FEMA funds forthcoming from Ike, the city’s resolve to address code enforcement based in part on the committees recommendations, and his assurance that Mayor England would give his State of the City address at the next meeting.

With that we moved into “the meat of the meeting” per President Coffey.

Resolution (R-09-01) to support the aforementioned HR676 passed with a vote of 7 for & 1 abstention (CM Gahan).

Ordinance A-09-01 amending Salaries for Non Bargaining Unit employees garnered a 4 to 4 vote. At this point Pres. Dan conferred with Council Attorney Stan Robison (oh! Did I forget to mention we have a new attorney?) who ruled that a tie vote on first reading amounted to a failure to pass.

Next came Z-09-02 to amend the Zoning Classification in a portion of the West End of our fair city. Upon a recommendation from Zoning and Planning it passed with an 8-0 count on first reading.

There were two more ordinances on the agenda but one got tabled (again) and the other I blanked out on (again). Even more evidence that attending one of these events stone cold sober is hazardous to ones health!

Then came the first round of the Headliner of the evening ie; Non-Agenda Items! Our good friend and comrade-at arms Mark Cassidy took the podium to ask this council to consider the US Constitutionally mandated redistricting of New Albany’s voting districts.

If you’ll recall, the previous Council’s prime objection was that action had been initiated without having first requested that they (the Council) do their duty. Mr. Cassidy was merely attempting to abide by the Council’s wishes by bringing it forward again.

However President Coffey was going to have none of it. He cut Mark off in mid sentence explaining that in these dire times there were much more important issues facing New Albany.

He furthered that the previous Council had indeed passed a redistricting plan that met the State statute and that was the end of it.

Not one to be ignored, Mark respectfully asked if he could at least finish his remarks. Coffey nodded in the affirmative and Mr. Cassidy began again.

At this point the new Council Attorney began to dress down Mark about events concerning this subject that occurred back in 1999. Apparently Mr. Robison had been sitting in as a substitute for then Council Attorney Henderson on the evening that this subject was broached and afterwards had been berated in the media and elsewhere for his action/inactions during that event. So tonight opened up an old wound and he came out like a wounded pit bull.

To his credit he later in the evening apologized to Mark for his outburst and seemed genuinely remorseful for his actions.

President Coffey took over where Stan left off and began to look like the Dan we’ve all come to know over the years. Mark tried several times to finish his statement but in the end he was gaveled down and the meeting was adjourned.

We all took a deep breath of WHEW! Damned glad that’s over without bloodshed!

But is was not to be for Round Two was just over the horizon!

I hurriedly guided Mark out the door to the elevator and into the cold night air. We proceeded to Studio’s for our regularly scheduled Council Meeting Afterglow. We ordered a coupler of beers and were pleasantly surprised to see our very own Bluegill and his compatriot Roy stroll in.

We began to impart a report of the gathering to them and who walks in but Coffey, Gonder, Robison, & Carl Malysz!

Dan apparently hadn’t had enough and the discussion began anew with gusto!

It wasn’t long until Bluegill got involved and he & Coffey got nose to nose. The volume rose, the faces got red, threats got hurled and then slowly something close to a tone of reason began to return.

Almost all present exchanged their views on the subject and although no agreement was reached there was no broken glassware, no blood on the carpet, and no 911 calls.

Dan left, Stan again expressed his remorse to Mark, we ordered another round and collectively discussed the variety of still unresolved issues before us.

In the end it was a toss up somewhere between definite lines being drawn in the sand and a no harm/no foul street ball game.

Sure does make one wonder what the future holds though. So grab a season ticket and enjoy the festivities.

Hell they’re FREE!

---

NEXT: Gahan and Coffey Together Forever, Part 4: The new conjoined councilmen: Coffey and Gahan (17 January 2009).

If you say it really fast, TG Missouri almost sounds homespun.

When the story about the proposed subsidization of TG Missouri was published, some small details were left out.

TG Missouri is owned by Toyoda Gosei Co., LTD (Japan).

According to their 2009 annual report (PDF):

They have 25,792 employees.

Capital Investments (2009) [like air conditioning!]: $682,818,091.00

NET Assets (2009): $6,411,685,341.00

Average NET Income per year (2005-2009): $168,475,391.00

According to 1Si, the England Administration, and the Daniels Administration:

Toyoda Gosei can't justify what for them is an infinitesimal expansion without public assistance. (A potential $3 million investment represents .004% of their capital investment for 2009.)

The England administration thinks a $150,000 deal is a make it or break it proposition when they make location decisions.

The Daniels administration thinks giving them a tax break is the way to go, even though they depreciated and amortized $419,994,000 in assets last year alone.

I'm guessing 1Si's Kathleen Crowley didn't exactly highlight any of that during her advocacy because, you know, 1Si is the voice of Southern Indiana's small businesses-- especially if they're a multi-billion dollar Japanese multinational corporation with a really Midwestern sounding name.

"Because people are just laughing at us..."

This video, shot during the mayoral campaign in 2007, highlights a portion of Mayor England's proposed solution for rampant slumlordism in the city. Apologies for the audio being slightly out of sync with the images. It's a copy of a copy of a copy. It's also strangely apropos, owing to the fact that what was said still doesn't match what we see.

Pre-election, the mayor promoted the idea that while a full-time city attorney wasn't necessary, irresponsible landlords would never take the city seriously until they started getting hauled into court. This occurred in addition to multiple promises at other times to make public examples of the most egregious offenders with no concern for what the slumlord population might think.



Two and a half years into the mayor's return to office, we have a full-time city attorney and to my knowledge no one has faced a judge to be held accountable for the condition of their rental property(s). If I'm wrong about that, please correct me. It certainly hasn't made the news or been otherwise communicated. If I'm not, should we assume they're still laughing?

Downtown in the news. Good news.

Fox 41 News, with some input from Mayor England and NABC's David Pierce, recently gave notice to what a lot of us have known for some time: Downtown New Albany is happening- now.

The recognition is great. What's being recognized is even greater.

Thanks to those who've helped make such reporting possible. There's undoubtedly more to come.


Transcript:

New Albany wants to attract people to live downtown


Despite the recession, plans are moving forward on a major project in downtown New Albany. And it's just one of several developments being planned.

Developers want to build a $40 million project across from the Parthenon Building, a downtown landmark. The block would be transformed into a mixture of shops and housing, shops on the ground floor, and a mix of condos and apartments with a view of the Ohio River on the upper floors.

New Albany Mayor Doug England says the idea is to, "Remember when people was younger, people lived downtown, then we went through this period of everything had to go to the suburbs, now it's coming back."

This week the city and the developers, New Albany Horizons, reached an agreement that allows the project to proceed. Mayor England says, "It's very important, every project like this that brings shops, that brings people living, most imporant thing we have to have the shops downtown to generate money. But they can't generate money if they don't have people going in there, I think with people living downtown it will make it viable."

It's just the latest bit of good news for downtown New Albany. The YMCA opened last fall. Two Louisville restaurant companies, Wicks Pizza and Toast, which specializes in breakfast service, have announced plans to open restaurants there.

And the New Albanian Brew Pub just moved in this spring. Brewmaster David Pierce says, "It's fun to see it after all these years, because I grew up here and it was pretty dismal the last fifteen to twenty years. And to see it revitalized with Toast on market and, of course, us coming in and some of the other places opening up, it's very heartening."

Construction is also underway on a permanent canopy over the stage at the city's amphitheater along the riverfront. Its a $700,000 project that's designed to attract major entertainers.

Pierce says, "We're close enough to Louisville, so we're big city, but we're small enough so you don't lose that small town feeling."

The mayor says renovation of the amphitheater should be compete in time for a July 3rd celebration. And he says developers of the project along Main Street hope to begin construction by late summer.

Here's a link to the FOX 41 video: New Albany Downtown Development

Open thread: Mayor says sell Baptist Tabernacle and Shrader Stable.

New Albany Mayor Doug England wants to sell church, stable sites, by Daniel Suddeath (The Tribune).

Mayor Doug England is asking the New Albany Redevelopment Commission to make the Baptist Tabernacle building available to private ownership interests today...

England is also requesting the historic Shrader Stable property — finished in 1875 — along Main Street be sold. The administration would like to develop stringent guidelines as to who can purchase the Tabernacle and Stable sites.

What's the best outcome? Tightly controlled development that seeks to protect the historic integrity and prime locations of the sites or undefined rehab and fixing the Tabernacle roof as Dan Coffey suggests? Or should the City sell them now at all?

Correction---the Trucks Do Have Brakes!!

On Tuesday last I posted on this blog a handful of pictures of yard waste collections that had lain dormant for some time. The issue was these had all been reported to the Street Department personnel on a repeated basis to no avail.

This morning I’m happy to report that as of dark thirty last evening, a full 75% of those posted are now gone. Additionally in checking back with folks in the neighborhoods I learned that many others were disposed of by the city’s Grapple Truck crew over the weekend as well.

So to Mayor England, Street Superintendant Mickey Thompson, and especially the guys on the trucks we send out a heartfelt THANK YOU!!! We the people really do appreciate your efforts.

We also want to thank all of the aforementioned as well as Board of Works President Matt Denison for coordinating the dumpster drop this weekend for the cleanup efforts of the SEJ Neighborhood Association.

Kudos as well to Padgett Inc. for manufacturing such fine looking dumpsters for these events. The red lettering on the bright white paint looks sharp!

Albeit I’m quite sure not all of the contents came from the SEJ area, we none the less managed to fill all five of them to overflowing. So as of this writing our fair city is minus two extremely large loads of yard waste, two of household trash, and one of old tires. Our sincere thanks once again to all who participated in this affair.

Speaking of tires, one gentleman who concentrated solely on them noted that a large number of them had been cut in the fashion that a repair shop might in order to discourage one from trying to salvage them for reuse. So it begs the question--- do we have some unscrupulous souls in our midst who are dumping their rejects in our neighborhoods to avoid the business costs of disposing of them properly??

If so would it not be a coup if we could catch them in the act on camera?? Sounds much like a Block Watch project to me.

And just to show that we at NAC believe in equal opportunity press, did anyone note the participation of anyone from the new “Landlord’s Association” in this weekends cleanup attempts?

If so another round of THANKS for helping!! If not, WHY?? It was advertised well in advance after all.

♪ ♪ How Many Times Must the Trucks Drive By??

I arose earlier than I normally do this morning so that I might shave, shower, etc, before heading downtown to the Board of Works meeting.

As I pulled out of my garage I noted again that my ever growing collection of yard waste was still present.

So just for giggles I took a quick tour of the neighborhoods to see how many others were still present and unacccounted for.

The images that follow are but a few that I took in the process. I did so in order that I might show them to our Street Department Superintendent at the aforementioned meeting.

I was also going to inquire of him the route schedule for the pickup of such in the four quadrants of the city as proposed/promised some months ago.

But alas he was not present as he was shepherding his crew through the process of repainting school crossings around the city. From what was said I came away with the impression that all hands were on such duty as per Mayor England.

I can't however, verify that to be the case as I'm running low on gas so I passed on the temptation to do so.

What I can say with certainty though is that many of the examples cited below have been brought to the street departments attention weeks hence and the remainder are in very plain sight! Assuming anyone has their eyes open that is!



The above is from our very own Spring cleaning /storm damage cleanup efforts. I alerted the proper entities of its existence at least two weeks ago.



This one in the 1900 Block of spring Street (Division Street) has survived at least three garbage day/recycling truck/various other city vehicle drive by's!




The two directly above are from the 700 Block of Market Street and are the remains of trees located on city rights of way which if I'm not mistaken makes them the cities responsiblity.

Oh, and note that obstructing the sidewalk appears not to be a safety concern after all.

Then this one on the 600 Block of Main Street was according to the owner phoned in and put on the to do list on March 6 of this year and the pile keeps growing!

Now to give the devil his due we all understand that the city is shorthanded, there have been a series of storms of late, we have budget woes, and on and on and on.

However, unless my ears deceived me Thursday last, the Mayor did say at the Common Council meeting that ours streets were clean.

Somehow I fear he has been misinformed as the items referenced above for the most part are not new though they may be growing.

So tell us Mr. Mayor, what else do we as citizens need to do?

We volunteer for weekend cleanups several times a year to rid our city of that which has accumulated only to watch it accumulate again. Thanks by the way Mickey for furnishing the dumpsters for such events!

We encourage our neighborhoods to police their own as much as possible.

We have offered on many occassions to haul our own to the dumpsters at the 4th Street location only to be turned away as we're informed that one can't put bagged yard waste in said dumpsters. And this after we've been told by the selfsame officials to bag it, leave it at curbside & it will be picked up!

We have followed the street department's grapple truck down many a road to watch it drive by pile after pile some of which it had to swing out & go around to keep from hitting them enroute to who knows where!

We have raked loose leaves to the curside as instructed only to see them either blow back into our yards or get washed down the storm water drains all the while being told WE the Public are responsible for said drains in close proximity to our property.

So PLEASE help us help you!!

Raise wages, raise taxes, raise rates, or fire 'em all and start over!

Park a dumpster on every street corner!

Petition the Council for more stringent legilation!

Request the Governor send in the National Guard complete with dump trucks to assist the Street Department!

Or like us buy a pair of gloves & blue jeans & jump in.

But quit with the same ole, same ole!

Storms past, economic disasters pending, and lack of property tax revenue aside I'm unaware of a city employee that has gone without a paycheck as of yet. Albeit some may not have been as big as they would have liked!

We just need to see some effort at getting our money's worth! And more often than once or twice a year via an insert in the councilmen's packet that never sees the light of day I might add!

So again how do we accomplish this feat? Outside the box ideas anyone?

By the way, isn't our thirty days about up??

What The F@#* Opie? Ya Ain't Seen Nothun Yet!

Here it is, the middle of the week, the predicted coldest night in recent memory, there’s nothing of consequence on TV, and y’all still elected to be couch potatoes when you could have attended one of the most entertaining New Albany Common Council meetings to date.

It started out harmless enough. Our resident mail carrier took to the podium to say he felt the Council had better things to do with its time than deal with a Resolution in support of HR676 (a US House bill concerning universal health care).

After all, the city of New Albany has no influence on the Beltway Boys so why waste the time.

At this point a non-agenda item was raised in the form of a council committee report from the housing/code enforcement threesome. (make that a twosome as CM Price abstained from officially signing the recommendation.)

Steve's reasoning was that he disagreed with a sentence that seems to hold rentals to a higher standard than us lowly homeowners as it pertained to enforcement.

As a side note, Pat Harrison & her entourage of landlords presented CM & Committee Chair John Gonder with a copy of said recommendation prior to the meeting. The mystery of that is according to Gonder himself, he had not presented said report to any Council Members prior to tonight’s meeting. Strange indeed!

Then in the Communications from City Officials slot an employee from the City Controllers office took a stand against A-09-01 which would give a raise in pay to two Non Bargaining Unit employees who work in the Utility Billing Department.

It seems they have inherited the billing duties from EMC as it pertains to Storm Water, Trash, & Sewer bills as those has now been brought back into the Cities venue.

She was followed by one of the two affected employees who pled their case for the increase after which the fun began in earnest.

Carl then stood in the absent Mayor’s stead and proceeded with a detailed explanation of England’s surgery, (good thing I didn’t eat before), recovery, therapy, and remorse for not being at tonight’s gathering.

He was going to elaborate even further but Council President Coffey took the floor and exclaimed that while the Council and the audience were concerned about the Mayor’s well being, it was not necessary to give a blow by blow report at each & every gathering.

He went on to request that if the Deputy Mayor had any further official city business to discuss to get on with it.

I went blank for a few seconds but as I recall Carl offered a report about the insurance monies received for the Tabernacle Building, the FEMA funds forthcoming from Ike, the city’s resolve to address code enforcement based in part on the committees recommendations, and his assurance that Mayor England would give his State of the City address at the next meeting.

With that we moved into “the meat of the meeting” per President Coffey.

Resolution (R-09-01) to support the aforementioned HR676 passed with a vote of 7 for & 1 abstention (CM Gahan).

Ordinance A-09-01 amending Salaries for Non Bargaining Unit employees garnered a 4 to 4 vote. At this point Pres. Dan conferred with Council Attorney Stan Robison (oh! Did I forget to mention we have a new attorney?) who ruled that a tie vote on first reading amounted to a failure to pass.

Next came Z-09-02 to amend the Zoning Classification in a portion of the West End of our fair city. Upon a recommendation from Zoning and Planning it passed with an 8-0 count on first reading.

There were two more ordinances on the agenda but one got tabled (again) and the other I blanked out on (again). Even more evidence that attending one of these events stone cold sober is hazardous to ones health!

Then came the first round of the Headliner of the evening ie; Non-Agenda Items! Our good friend and comrade-at arms Mark Cassidy took the podium to ask this council to consider the US Constitutionally mandated redistricting of New Albany’s voting districts.

If you’ll recall, the previous Council’s prime objection was that action had been initiated without having first requested that they (the Council) do their duty. Mr. Cassidy was merely attempting to abide by the Council’s wishes by bringing it forward again.

However President Coffey was going to have none of it. He cut Mark off in mid sentence explaining that in these dire times there were much more important issues facing New Albany.

He furthered that the previous Council had indeed passed a redistricting plan that met the State statute and that was the end of it.

Not one to be ignored, Mark respectfully asked if he could at least finish his remarks. Coffey nodded in the affirmative and Mr. Cassidy began again.

At this point the new Council Attorney began to dress down Mark about events concerning this subject that occurred back in 1999. Apparently Mr. Robison had been sitting in as a substitute for then Council Attorney Henderson on the evening that this subject was broached and afterwards had been berated in the media and elsewhere for his action/inactions during that event. So tonight opened up an old wound and he came out like a wounded pit bull.

To his credit he later in the evening apologized to Mark for his outburst and seemed genuinely remorseful for his actions.

President Coffey took over where Stan left off and began to look like the Dan we’ve all come to know over the years. Mark tried several times to finish his statement but in the end he was gaveled down and the meeting was adjourned.

We all took a deep breath of WHEW! Damned glad that’s over without bloodshed!

But is was not to be for Round Two was just over the horizon!

I hurriedly guided Mark out the door to the elevator and into the cold night air. We proceeded to Studio’s for our regularly scheduled Council Meeting Afterglow. We ordered a coupler of beers and were pleasantly surprised to see our very own Bluegill and his compatriot Roy stroll in.

We began to impart a report of the gathering to them and who walks in but Coffey, Gonder, Robison, & Carl Malysz!

Dan apparently hadn’t had enough and the discussion began anew with gusto!

It wasn’t long until Bluegill got involved and he & Coffey got nose to nose. The volume rose, the faces got red, threats got hurled and then slowly something close to a tone of reason began to return.

Almost all present exchanged their views on the subject and although no agreement was reached there was no broken glassware, no blood on the carpet, and no 911 calls.

Dan left, Stan again expressed his remorse to Mark, we ordered another round and collectively discussed the variety of still unresolved issues before us.

In the end it was a toss up somewhere between definite lines being drawn in the sand and a no harm/no foul street ball game.

Sure does make one wonder what the future holds though. So grab a season ticket and enjoy the festivities.

Hell they’re FREE!

Mayor Doug England: "The entire local community should repudiate this type of ignorance and intolerance."

This just in from Mayor England:

----

“David Ward’s reported statement (Chicago Tribune, Oct. 18, 2008) that he is voting for Presidential candidate John McCain ‘mainly because he’s not black,’ is both regrettable and embarrassing. It speaks to latent racism that still permeates certain elements of American society. Through our actions as well as our words, the entire local community should repudiate this type of ignorance and intolerance,” Mayor Doug England said today.

Randy, Doug, & Dan!

This report was originally posted by Lloyd Wimp on his "View From the Highway " site.

Last evening’s New Albany Common Council meeting was unique in a number of ways.

For one, Doug England was present from beginning to end. For another, Carl Malysz was nowhere to be found.

Then there was Mr. Randy Smith who rose to the podium to remind the Council of their historic unwillingness to raise taxes & services rates regardless of the need to do so. He also suggested the budget be frozen at 2007 levels and let the chips fall where they may.

To his credit he managed to not be removed from the room although he did get gaveled out of order by President Gahan later in the evening.

And for the second meeting in a row CM Coffey remained calm, cool & collected. Well for the most part anyway. He voice did raise an octave or two when an employee of the New Albany Housing Authority dared to disagree with him about his memory of the origin and distribution of monies within that entity when he was on their board. (circa the1990’s)

The Mayor (that’d be Doug ‘cause Carl weren’t there) came to the podium to inform the Council that the storm cleanup, although expensive, was for all practical purposes done. That was the good news.

The bad news was that your man Mitch (he sure as hell ain’t mine) has yet to declare our fair county/city a disaster area. Further more, there have been no clear indicators of either when or if he will.

Which brings me to a burning question. Where are the Floyd County Executives (i.e. the Commissioners) in this conversation? Oh wait! Floyd County doesn’t have any infrastructure worth selling off to the highest bidder to further pad the State coiffures does it.

But I’m getting off task here. As a result of the untimely storm, the Governors inaction, and the States tardiness in handling our local budget issues we are in fact up the creek without a paddle.

All that being said the Mayor’s position is that he will work within the legal constraints of the budget monies available. If that means cuts in jobs & reduced services to the public, so be it!

He once again reminded all present that we in New Albany have one of the lowest property tax rates in the State. If I heard correctly our rate is $0.80 per $100.00 of assessed value.

Mayor England went on the say that he would balance this budget because he is legally required to and that his administration would work closely with this Council to formulate a 2009 budget that all can agree to. However at the current tax rate and unless someone can wave a magic wand, freezing the 2009 budget at 2007 levels will result in even more reductions in public services. The dollars just aren’t there.

CM Price of course put forward the same ole same ole of parking take home cars, cutting overtime, restricting cell phone use, etc, etc,……….

The remainder of the evening was spent on first readings of various ordinances pertaining to the 2009 budget.

The most telling of which was R-08-43, a Resolution to Reduce 2009 City Budget to offset State Shortfall. This is basically requiring all city departments (except of course Police, Fire, & Safety Services) to trim yet another 10% from the operating costs.

In the case of the aforementioned Safety Services, that cut was a minimum 12 to 15%. A “Good Luck doing that” sigh was felt across the room.

The mayor stated the if necessary we could expect to see Police administration officials on street patrol duty.

Following my 3rd District Councilman’s lead I suggested to the fire chief that he could save thousands if he were to remove the inside dual tire on all of the fire engines and use PVC couplers & radiator hose clamps to repair damaged fire hoses.

Or better yet, let the houses burn completely to the ground thus saving the Building Commission the costs of demolition after the fact. Hauling off a dump truck load of ashes has to be cheaper and quicker than demolishing a half burnt building.

I know, I know, that ain’t funny. But it is about as realistic as a citizenry demanding $3.00 worth of services while only putting .50 cents in the kitty. Cats & rabbits breed fast enough to replenish themselves but I’ve yet to see even pennies, nickles & dimes do so to the scale we are talking about.

At any rate with the exception of A-08-14, which authorized the spending of a federal grant for a new radio system in the Fire Department and R 08-42 which amounted to a 5 year tax abatement for Rite-Way Industries, the other menu items were in one way or another centered around the budget.

There is a Council work session scheduled for Thursday October 23rd @ 6 PM to discuss the budget (again). The Council requested that city department heads attend this workshop to assist in trimming the fat.

As per Kay Garry, the Council has two more meetings in November to get the details hammered out & agreed to. The drop dead date is December 1st.

Happy New Year New Albany!