City commission considers ordinance for city service fees to be amendable by resolution

Jan. 5—For three agenda items, the Abilene City Commission met for the first time in 2023 for a study session.

During the public comments, Ross Taplin, general manager for Holm Automotive, spoke on the City Inspection Department truck bid agenda item from last week's city meeting. Taplin said Holm Automotive thought city staff approached them for budgeting purposes, not for a bid. Taplin said Holm never received an official bid letter. As such, Holm did not give numbers for a bid, but for the city's budgeting. When the city gave Holm the opportunity for a second bid, Holm gave a price for the bid.

"I didn't want anyone to think we were trying to pull something over on someone or anything like that. We really just thought we were assisting with budget numbers, not an official bid," Taplin said in summary of his comments.

Ron Marsh, city manager, said city staff did miscommunicate with Holm about the bid and will fix what they need to and speak with staff about the miscommunication.

For their first item, the commission considered the reappointments for various city committees. The commission considers reappointments the first week of January each year. Marsh said city staff will present more appointments as the year progresses. Andrew Pankratz and Barry Arp are considered for the Heritage Commission. Planning Commission: Bill Marshall and Rod Boyd are considered for the Planning Commission. Audrey Corbett and Andrea Taylor are considered for Sister City. Kimmy Phillips, Mukul Ghosh Hajra, Elizabeth Weese and Sarah Anderson are considered for the Convention and Visitors Bureau. Hayley Whitehair, Steven Flynn and Drew Snitker are considered for the Tree Board. The Heirtage, Planning and Sister City commissions each have one appointment spot open.

The next item the commissioners considered was on the rebuild on one of the four Wastewater Treatment Plant's influent pumps. Lon Schrader, Public Works Department director, said the commission took the same action in May 2022 for another pump, and now the commission will vote on the rebuild of a second pump. The rebuild cost has increased by 6.25% from last year. The city budgeted $50,000 for the rebuild, which Schrader said should be enough despite teh increase in price.

Lastly, the commission considered an ordinance to change how prices in the city's fee schedule can be amended. Marsh said staff reviewed the fees and rates for 2023, and came to the conclusion that some of them have not been increased in, a long time."

"In order to keep up with increased costs and to stay viable, we need to make some changes of those rates," Marsh said.

In practice, the city has to create and approve an ordinance for each fee they want to change, Marsh said. About 42 of the fees are set by ordinance. A main difference between an ordinance and a resolution is that ordinances require publishing in the local newspaper and on the city website, while resolutions do not have those requirements, said City Attorney Aaron Martin. By allowing the commission to approve the fees by resolution, fees can be changed in a single resolution, as opposed to several ordinances that each require organizing and publishing public notices for each ordinance with legal fees.

The proposed ordinance will not include sewer and water rates, meaning those rates would still need to be changed by ordinance. Marsh said staff does not anticipate they will ask the commission to raise those rates this year.

After the commission votes on this ordinance next week, city staff will present a resolution to commission on the 2023 fee schedule.

After the agenda items, Marsh then said public works will be taking down Christmas Tree Lane beginning Jan. 9. Community members with those trees should remove their ornaments from the trees before their tree is removed.

Mayor Dee Marshall then commented that she appreciates all the positive comments about the new city's new Christmas decorations on the city's Facebook page.

The Abilene City Commission will next meet Jan. 9 at 4 p.m. for a regular meeting.