The January 28th Council meeting was cancelled after temps dipped, once again, below zero.
Unlike the last weather-related cancellation, this one was reflected on the city's online calendar and on the Council Meeting Agenda & Minutes webpage.
Glad the message got through.
The best way to communicate with residents is to use all the tools at the city's disposal.
ONE INTRIGUING AGENDA ITEM
The January 28th Agenda, posted online, contains this intriguing item:
Motion to adjourn into Executive Session to discuss employee compensation.Why is this intriguing?
Last year Council approved union contracts and pay ordinances, which set salaries and benefits for every city employee for the next several years.
Council also changed Jean Buchak, the Clerk of Council, from an hourly to a salaried worker.
So what "employee compensation" is left to discuss? And for whom?
Residents will have to keep their eyes and ears open on this one.
An executive session means that it will be a behind-closed-doors discussion.
The results of that session, if any, will appear as an action item on an upcoming agenda.
WE FEEL ABANDONED. YOU HAVE LET US DOWN
Residents Jack and Victoria Thomas addressed Council at the January 14th Council meeting.
The Thomases live in a lovely model house, sitting at the corner of Highland Road and St. Charles Place.
Next to their home is an abandoned "pump house" that was built when the Glen Eden subdivision was developed.
Behind the pump house is the Glen Eden water detention basin---a large, non-buildable area that collects and holds rainwater and storm runoff from the Glen Eden neighborhood.
Mr. Thomas told Council,
"When we bought the house we were told that when the (Highland Road) sewers came though that the pump house would be ..torn down and the land reclaimed.When Thomas finished, Council President Cathy Murphy turned to Law Director Tim Paluf and asked him to comment on the pump house situation.
No action was taken about the pump house.
We patiently would ask. We heard many messages from Council and from this administration. ...
We feel abandoned. That you have let us down.
In good faith we've been patient, and with so many promises we felt we had to come to you and tell you that we feel you really haven't represented us. We've lost any hope of you following up at this point.
Trucks are coming in after midnight dropping off roofing materials, and the banging going on---if you lived next door to it you would have done something about it.
I do feel I don't have a representative among you that is willing to represent us."
Paluf said:
"We had (an eminent domain) hearing more that a year ago. I still havent' heard from the judge..I'm not normally inclined to push a judge or magistrate but I'll do what I can."The Thomases are right to be frustrated.
I first wrote about the pump house and water detention basin in a February 5th 2010 blog posting.
It turns out that the Glen Eden developers never applied for a tax exemption for the pump house and water detention basin.
Taxes were assessed, but never paid. They went into foreclosure.
A woman bought them for $400 at a tax foreclosure sale, then promptly erected a "for sale" sign.
According to a news report, a realty ad described the property as "1.2 acres wooded with ravine. Stable house on land."
What a ridiculous ad.
The Glen Eden Homeowners Association offered to take care of the basin if the city bought the property.
Council debated purchasing the pump house and detention basin from the woman----for far less than her $5,000 asking price. Councilman Ed Hargate opposed the idea of the city taking ownership of the property.
While Council dithered, the woman sold the pump house and basin, at a profit, to several investors, one of whom turned out to be former Mayfield Heights Councilman Howard Sonnenstein.
The new owners tried to cut a deal with the Glen Eden homeowners' association---offering to maintain the detention basin for a fee----and when that deal fell through they threatened to fill the basin in and sell the land as building lots.
I heard that the feds---namely the Army Corps of Engineers---eventually got involved and notified the new owners that they couldn't fill the basin---a dedicated flood control area--- in.
The owners' next gambit was to rent out the pump house---which is where all the truck noise comes in.
Years after it gave up the opportunity to purchase the property for a song, the city finally bit the bullet and began costly proceedings to acquire the property by eminent domain.
The new owners demanded a lot of money, claiming that the pump house and basin are commercially viable.
Hence the hearing before the magistrate over a year ago.
It's not just Jack and Victoria Thomas who are frustrated.
Residents should be frustrated, too, by the city's failure to address the situation early on, when it would have cost taxpayers hundreds, rather than tens of thousands, of dollars to resolve.
Here's a link to a news story describing the early stage of this sad tale
http://blog.cleveland.com/sunmessenger/2010/02/homeowners_association_wants_h.html
