MINUTES
STATE
OF NORTH CAROLINA BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
COUNTY
OF HENDERSON AUGUST 7, 2000
The Henderson County
Board of Commissioners met for a regularly scheduled meeting at 5:30 p.m. in the
Commissioners= Conference Room of the
Henderson County Office Building at 100 North King Street, Hendersonville,
North Carolina.
Those present were: Chairman Grady Hawkins, Vice-Chair Bill
Moyer, Commissioner Renee Kumor, Commissioner Don Ward, Commissioner Marilyn
Gordon, County Manager David E. Nicholson, County Attorney Angela S. Beeker,
and Clerk to the Board Elizabeth W. Corn.
Also present were:
Finance Director J. Carey McLelland, Budget Analyst Selena Coffey, Public
Information Officer Chris S. Coulson, Assistant County Attorney Jennifer O.
Jackson, Planning Director Karen C. Smith, and County Engineer Gary Tweed.
CALL TO ORDER/WELCOME
Chairman Hawkins called
the meeting to order and welcomed those in
attendance.
PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE
Commissioner Ward led
the Pledge of Allegiance to the American Flag.
INVOCATION
David Nicholson gave the
invocation.
DISCUSSION/ADJUSTMENT OF
AGENDA
The Clerk mentioned one
typographical error under Nominations, #5 should read Community Child
Protection Team instead of Community Child Prevention Team.
There were no other
adjustments.
CONSENT AGENDA
Chairman Hawkins made
the motion to approve the Consent Agenda.
All voted in favor and the motion carried. The CONSENT AGENDA consisted of the following:
Tax Collectors= Report
The Tax Collector=s Report was presented
to the Board dated through August 7, 2000.
Road Petition (for
addition to the State Maintenance System)
The County had received
a road petition to add Chanter Drive to the state Maintenance System.
It has been the practice
of this Board to accept road petitions and forward them to NC DOT for their
consideration.
Resolution - honoring Al
Calli
A resolution honoring Al
Calli for his outstanding service to Henderson County was presented for the Board=s
consideration/adoption. The resolution
is attached as part of these minutes.
Commissioner Gordon
asked that the Resolution honoring Mr. Cali be pulled and read. Mr. Cali was present at the meeting. Commissioner Kumor read the Resolution:
Resolution
Whereas, Al Calli
started the Volunteer Mounted Patrol in 1995 and has donated over 4,000
volunteer hours to this program; and,
Whereas, While serving
as the Director of the Mounted Patrol, the following awards were received:
$
NACo
Achievement Award for the Mounted V.I.P. in 1996;
$
NACo
Achievement Award for the Sheriff=s Mounted Cadets Program
in
1998;
$
Safety
awards from the American Horseman=s Association in 1996,
1997,
1998, and 1999;
$
Outstanding
Volunteer Service from the Henderson County Volunteer
Association;
$
NC
State Fair Outstanding Volunteer Service Award for 1997, 1998, and
1999;
$
NC
Agriculture award for 1998; and,
Whereas, Mr. Calli
assisted three other counties with a Mounted Patrol Program; and,
Whereas, Mr. Calli
started the Mounted Security Program at all Henderson County football games,
Jackson Park, and Mountain State Fair; and,
Whereas, Mr. Calli
helped with the D.A.R.E. camp for the last three years; and,
Whereas, Mr. Calli
helped the flood victims for a week in Pitt County, N.C.
Now Therefore Be It
Resolved, the Henderson County Board of Commissioners commends Mr. Al Calli for
his dedicated service to Henderson County and its citizens. The Commissioners extend to Mr. Calli best
wishes in his future endeavors.
Adopted this 7th
day of August, 2000.
Mr. Calli came forward
and stated that he has the privilege of serving now as the C.E.O. of the Blue
Ridge Community Health Service. He
stated that this is one of the gems of Henderson County. His early responsibility
will be to see that every citizen is aware of the high level of health service
provided at this community facility. The Board wished him the best.
NOMINATIONS
Notification of
Vacancies
The Board was notified
of the following vacancies which will appear on the next agenda under
Nominations:
1. Land-of-Sky Regional
Council Advisory Council on Aging - 1 vac.
Nominations
Chairman Hawkins
reminded the Board of the following vacancies and opened the floor to
nominations:
1. Nursing/Adult Care
Home Community Advisory Committee - 2 vac.
Commissioner Moyer
nominated Margo Nagel to position #10.
Chairman Hawkins made the motion to suspend the rules and appoint Ms.
Nagel. All voted in favor and the
motion carried.
2. Juvenile Crime
Prevention Council - 1 vac.
There were no nominations
at this time so this item was rolled to the next meeting.
3. Mountain Area
Workforce Development Board - 1 vac.
There were no
nominations at this time so this item was rolled to the next meeting.
4. Child Fatality
Prevention Team - 1 vac.
There were no
nominations at this time so this item was rolled. Commissioner Kumor asked if this seat had to be filled by someone
from Juvenile Probation. Staff was
asked to research this.
5. Community Child
Protection Team - 1 vac.
Commissioner Gordon nominated
Karyn Joyner. Commissioner Kumor made
the motion to suspend the rules and appoint Ms. Joyner. All voted in favor and the motion carried.
6. Recreation Advisory
Board - 1 vac.
Commissioner Moyer
nominated Gary Eblen. Commissioner Ward
nominated Roy Huntley. A vote will be
taken at the next meeting.
PARDEE HOSPITAL BUDGET
A draft of the Hospital=s FY00-01 budget had
been supplied for the Board=s review. The Board
of Directors of the Hospital Corporation is expected to approve this budget in
August or September.
Mrs. Sandy Smith
reviewed the Hospital Budget with the Board as required by the Lease
Agreement. The Hospital is required to
present to the Board of Commissioners a summary of their intended budget before
the Board of Directors actually approves it.
The gross patient
service revenue is expected to be in excess of $150,000 related strictly to
service increases, activity increases and additional billable units of
service. They proposed a 4% rate
increase in the budget, attempting to overcome some of the effects of the
Balanced Budget Act. They expect the
Balanced Budget Act to have an impact of about $1.6 million in reduced revenues
for the hospital over the coming year.
The Balanced Budget Relief Act helped somewhat. They are adding a number of services through
the course of the up-coming year. The
new Adult Day Health Service will open hopefully at the end of this month and
be fully operational for the next budget year. They have just opened a practice
in Fletcher to provide some occupational medicine services to that part of the
county. The Pardee Care Center
continues to increase their census and to raise the level of staffing to be
able to deal with that capacity census.
They=ve added some additional
services and staff in the emergency department.
Ms. Smith stated that
utility costs have gone up. They have
incorporated into the budget plan a debt service payment for the anticipated
revenue bonds. The gross margin for the
2000 budget for the hospital is projected to be about 3%. The budget this year was projected at
3.2%.
She briefly reviewed
their five year cash flow projection.
JAIL CHANGE ORDER
REQUEST
The Board was asked to
consider the approval of a change order in the amount of $9,036 for the new
Detention Center. This change order was
to install an additional camera in two of the exercise areas. Visual supervision of these areas from the
Housing Control Room was judged by the Jail Staff not to be sufficient. These
additional two cameras will assist the personnel in the Control Room with an
improved view of any inmates in the exercise areas. The monies would come out
of the project=s contingencies.
David Nicholson and Bill
Byrnes showed this change on a map/drawing.
Following some
discussion, Commissioner Ward made the motion to approve the request. All voted in favor and the motion
carried.
COUNTY SERVICE BUILDING
- SELECTION OF AN ARCHITECT
The County Service
Building Project Team (Commissioner Kumor,
David Nicholson, Gary Tweed, Bill Byrnes, and Bill Blalock) interviewed
the three selected architectural firms for the County Service Building Project
on Friday, August 4, 2000. The Team
made its recommendation to the Board regarding selection of an architect. Commissioner
Kumor, on behalf of the Team, recommended the firm of Harley Ellis of
Asheville, NC.
Commissioner Kumor made
the motion to adopt the Resolution to hire the firm of Harley Ellis of
Asheville.
The Board should
authorize the County Attorney and the County Manager to immediately initiate
contract negotiations with the firm.
The intent is to present an architectural contract for approval at the
August 16 Commissioners= meeting. The firm was formerly the Architect Six
Associates in Asheville. This firm has 28 people on staff here and have a
parent firm elsewhere, Commissioner Kumor thought it was in Michigan.
Commissioner Kumor
explained that the Team was specifically looking for firms that had some
renovation and rehabilitation work. The
three finalists had a lot of that. They
looked at their capabilities, whether they would have to hire outside support
or do most of their work in-house and the kind of resources they had in-house
to draw upon, as well as their abilities to work with a large number of people
in the design phase.
Chairman Hawkins
reminded the Board that there is a motion on the floor to authorize the County
Attorney and County Manager to proceed in negotiations on the architect
contract [as authorized by the resolution].
All voted in favor and the motion carried.
ABANDONMENT PETITION -
BRIDGE #42 ON STEPP MILL ROAD (SR#1734)
The County had received
an Abandonment Petition requesting that Bridge #42 located on Stepp Mill Road
(SR#1734) be abandoned and removed from the State=s Maintenance System.
Angela Beeker informed
the Board that this petition is asking the Board to ask NC DOT to abandon
Bridge #42 from the State=s Maintenance
System. Ms. Beeker distributed a map
she had prepared of the area. In order
for the Board to make such a request, they must find that the public interest
would be served thereby. Typically when
the Board receives a request to abandon a portion of a road or a road (Ms.
Beeker stated that she believed that a bridge would be considered a portion of
a road) the Board holds a public input session and request the emergency
service providers to comment. That is
an option for the Board on this matter also.
Ms. Beeker stated that the NC DOT was proposing to realign the road and
build a new bridge, the folks in the area decided they would rather have it
abandoned.
It was the consensus of
the Board for staff to advertise for August 16 for a public input session on
this item and to solicit response from our emergency service providers and
planning staff.
IMPORTANT DATES
Chairman Hawkins stated
that the Sept. 11 meeting the Board hoped to have jointly with the DSS Board
would have to be rescheduled as the Chairman of the DSS Board cannot make that
meeting. Chairman Hawkins will contact Chairman Lapsley to reschedule the
meeting.
Chairman Hawkins has a
Hospital Board meeting on August 23 and therefore will be unable to make the
Organizational Workshop scheduled for that day. Following discussion, it was decided that staff would try to put
some of that on the Sept. 16 meeting (the mid-month meeting).
Angela Beeker informed
the Board of the need to cancel the scheduled Public Hearing concerning the
appeal of Kenneth Swing, DDS. She asked
for a motion to cancel. Flat Rock and
Rick Merrell have filed a law suit asking the court to tell us what the proper
procedure should be for this appeal. It
is a declaratory action, they are not seeking damages. They just want to know what the proper
procedure for the Board to follow in this appeal.
Angela Beeker=s recommendation would
be to stay this appeal until the litigation is resolved.
Commissioner Kumor made
the motion to stay this appeal until the litigation is resolved. All voted in favor and the motion carried.
Commissioners Moyer and Ward refrained from voting on this issue.
Chairman Hawkins
explained that the declaratory judgement will give this Board directions on the
proper procedure to follow when they hear the appeal, hopefully that will
prevent the Board from having to hear it twice.
Ms. Beeker explained
that it is meant to be friendly law suit.
David Nicholson informed
the Board of the need to set a public hearing on a rezoning request by Mr. Leon
Allison (#R-01-00). Staff suggested the
Board adopt a special order setting the public hearing for September 5 at 7:00
p.m.
Commissioner Kumor made
the motion to adopt a special order setting a public hearing on a rezoning
application for Mr. Leon Allison for September 5 at 7:00 p.m. All voted in favor and the motion carried.
David Nicholson informed
the Board of the need to adopt a special order setting a public hearing for
economic development incentives for Manual Woodworkers & Weavers, Inc. Scott Hamilton, from the Committee of 100
was present and addressed the Board.
Scott Hamilton,
Vice-Chairman of the Committee of 100, stated that this request for economic
incentives is for a proposed expansion of their facility.
Commissioner Kumor made
the motion to adopt a special order setting a public hearing for economic
development incentives for Manual Woodworkers and Weavers, Inc. for September 5
at 7:00 p.m. All voted in favor and the
motion carried.
David Nicholson informed
the Board of the need to adopt a special order setting a public hearing
concerning a proposed amendment to the Fire Prevention Ordinance.
The Fire Marshal has
been working with the Fire Chiefs in Henderson County in order to arrive at an
acceptance procedure for fire investigations in the County.
Jennifer Jackson stated
that the Fire Chiefs have indicated that the fire departments would like the
responsibility of performing the investigation to determine the origin, cause
and circumstances of fires occurring in their fire district. Under this arrangement the Fire Marshal will
remain available to perform investigations when a fire involves injury or loss of
life to any person, when arson is suspected, when any fire department requests
assistance with an investigation, or when circumstances otherwise warrant such
involvement.
An amendment to the Fire
Prevention Ordinance (Chapter 97 of the Code) is necessary to clarify those
roles and accomplish the requested amendment.
The Board was therefore
asked to consider an amendment to Section 97-12.
The Fire Chiefs have
been actively involved in this discussion but the Board should consider setting
a public hearing in order to allow all of the fire departments and the citizens
to offer their comments on the proposed amendment. Staff recommended the public hearing be set for September 5.
Commissioner Moyer made
the motion to set the public hearing for September 5 at 7:00 p.m. All voted in favor and the motion carried.
Announcement
Commissioner Kumor
announced that our t.v. schedule is changing.
She stated that we are on Cable TV Channel #11. We are changing our
Thursday time to 7:00 p.m. and we are still at 4:00 p.m. on Sunday and 9:00
a.m. on Monday so there are a lot of opportunities to tune in to this gavel to
gavel coverage.
INFORMAL PUBLIC COMMENTS
There were none signed
up to speak.
One gentleman came
forward, wishing to speak about the Bridge abandonment.
1.Roy Murray - Mr. Murray asked about
the date the Board had set for the public input meeting regarding Bridge #42
abandonment request.
Chairman Hawkins
informed him that it is scheduled for August 16 at 11:00 a.m.
Mr. Nicholson informed
the Board that Mr. Noel Watts from SSEACO was present and wished to address the
Board.
2. Noel Watts- Mr. Watts is President
of SSEACO (Something Special Enterprises and Career Opportunities, Inc.) He thanked the Board for their most generous
support again this year, on behalf of the 110 persons with a disability who
attend SSEACO each weekday, the Board of Directors, and Staff.
In the past six years,
since moving into their new facilities, SSEACO has grown from 22 employees to
125 and of this number 44 are persons with a disability.
During fiscal year
1999-2000, 66 persons received vocational training that led to employment and
of this number 60 were persons with disabilities and 6 were from our community=s welfare system.
NC BIG SWEEP
Ken Weitzen, Chair of
the Environmental Advisory Committee (EAC) informed the Board of a Resolution
asking the Board to declare September 16 as AHenderson County Big Sweep Day@.
The EAC had been asked
to study the VWIN program. Their first
charge from the Board was to address litter in the county. At the request of the Mud Creek Restoration
Project Council Co-Chair, Renee Kumor, the EAC was updated at their July 12
meeting about the Mud Creek Restoration Project. The Mud Creek Demonstration Trail is the first leg of the
Greenways system in the county and runs along Mud Creek.
Clean NC 2000 is
collaborating with NC Big Sweep this year.
Because there are several current projects which involve Mud Creek and
because they are charged with addressing litter in the county, the EAC voted to
participate in NC Big Sweep this year and to focus the clean-up on Mud Creek.
Chairman Hawkins made
the motion to adopt the prepared Resolution.
All voted in favor and the motion carried.
MUD CREEK RESTORATION
PROJECT
Andrea Leslie, Western
Region Watershed Coordinator with the NC Division of Water Quality presented
this update. She stated that
Commissioner Kumor is the co-chair of the Mud Creek Watershed Council and had
requested this presentation to update the Board on this project. The Council has representation from local
government, state and federal agency staff and others. The goal of the Council is to educate the
public about water quality in the Mud Creek and to participate in the formation
of a watershed strategy to facilitate its restoration.
The Watershed Assessment
and Restoration Project (WARP) is a two-year project initiated by the NC
Division of Water Quality to investigate biologically impaired (unhealthy)
streams. The Mud Creek Watershed is one
of eleven watersheds across North Carolina, which was targeted to be studied.
This project has a
number of goals: the first goal is to look at the status of water quality or
stream status throughout the watershed as well as take a look at more areas
within those creeks; the second goal is to look at causes of stream impairment
and to look at the sources of those problems; the third and final goal is to
come up with a watershed strategy which will recommend what needs to be done to
improve quality. They will be
performing stream walks and will be going onto private property to access
stream conditions and will be taking biological samples and basic water
samples. She answered several questions from the Board.
Ms. Leslie has made a
presentation to the Environmental Advisory Committee and participated in three
public meetings throughout the county the week of August 1.
This was presented for
information only, no action was required.
Chairman Hawkins called
a 15 minute recess.
Transportation
Commissioner Moyer
mentioned that activity is going on with respect to the thoroughfare plan. There is a man, Bill Coffey, from NC DOT who
is in the county for three months doing what they call data collection. Traffic counters will be placed in strategic
points throughout the county to check on traffic volumes. If there are any places you would
particularly like for counters to be put to count traffic, they say they are
flexible and will try to accommodate those.
If you will let Mr. Nicholson know about those, he will pass that along
to Mr. Coffey. The staff doing this
data collection will be in white cars, primarily Chryslers with yellow state
tags. Commissioner Moyer said that the
State thus far has done a good job of keeping us informed of the various steps,
we have a timetable and as far as he can tell they are on the timetable.
Commissioner Moyer also
mentioned that the TIP (transportation improvement program) draft is just
beginning to be circulated. The
Transportation Advisory Committee (TAC) has discussed this issue but has not
decided what to do with it as yet. It
is on the agenda for the next TAC meeting.
PUBLIC HEARING -
Rezoning Application #R-02-00 (R-20 to C-4)
Mr. Dewey Putnam,
Applicant
Chairman Hawkins made
the motion for the Board to go into public hearing. All voted in favor and the motion carried.
Karen Smith reminded the
Board that the Board of Commissioners had scheduled for this date a public
hearing on an application by Mr. Dewey Putnam for a proposed amendment to the
Official Zoning Map of Henderson County.
Mr. Putnam had requested that the County rezone a 0.65 acre parcel that
he owns on Spartanburg Highway (US 176) from an R-20 Low Density Residential
district to a C-4 Highway Commercial district.
The Henderson County
Planning Board reviewed the application at its meeting on June 27, 2000 and
voted unanimously (8-0) to send the Board of Commissioners a favorable recommendation
on Mr. Putnam=s request as submitted.
In accordance with
Section 200-76 of the Henderson County Zoning Ordinance and State law,
notices of the public hearing were published in the July 25, 2000 and August 1,
2000 editions of the Times-News. The Planning Department sent notices of
the hearing via first class mail to the applicant and the owners of property
adjacent to the subject property on July 21, 2000. On July 25, 2000, Planning
Staff posted signs advertising the hearing on the subject property.
The Planning Department
sent notices of the hearing to the newspaper and property owners on July 18 and
19, 2000, respectively, however such notices contained an incorrect hearing
date. On July 21, 2000, Planning Staff
delivered a corrected notice to the newspaper and mailed corrected notice to
property owners. The Planning
Department met all required notification deadlines with the corrected notices.
Public Input
There was none.
Commissioner Ward made
the motion for the Board to go out of public hearing. All voted in favor and the motion carried.
Commissioner Moyer made
the motion to approve the request. All
voted in favor and the motion carried.
CLOSED SESSION
Commissioner Kumor made
the motion that the Board go into Closed Session as allowed pursuant to NCGS
143-318.11 for the following reasons:
1.(a)(3) To
consult with an attorney employed or retained by the public body in order
to
preserve the attorney-client privilege between the attorney and the public
body,
which privilege is hereby acknowledged.
To consult with an attorney
employed
or retained by the public body in order to consider and give instructions to
the attorney with respect to the following action:
Holmes
v. Henderson County (Henderson Co. File No. 99-CVS-829)
All voted in favor and
the motion carried.
Chairman Hawkins made
the motion for the Board to go out of Closed Session. All voted in favor and the motion carried.
There being no further
business, the meeting was adjourned at approx. 8:00 p.m.
Attest:
Grady Hawkins, Chairman