Mr. Kirchoff: Town Council for August 22nd is now in session.
PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE
Mr. Kirchoff: Would you stand with me for the Pledge of Allegiance.
CONSENT AGENDA
Mr. Kirchoff: Just for everyone's information, Mr. Brandgard is in London I believe as we speak, and Ms. Whicker has a daughter in the hospital who is recuperating from a ruptured appendix, so we are a little short handed tonight but we will get on with it, the consent agenda for tonight.
1. Approval of minutes of the regularly scheduled Town Council meeting of Monday August 8, 2011 and Minutes of the Executive Session of Monday, August 8, 2011.
2. Second Reading of Ordinance No. 10-2011: Plainfield Deadly Weapons Ordinance.
3. Approval to grant from the Town Center Façade Improvement Program the maximum 50% match of $2000.00 with a total project cost of $4,267.00 for limestone spray wash and painting for 201-203 West Main Street per the Planning and Zoning Director's report dated August 17, 2011.
4. Approval of the Town of Plainfield 2012 Holiday schedule per the HR Director's report dated August 22, 2011.
5. Approval of promoting Teresa McKinney to position of Staff Accountant/Office Supervisor for the Plainfield Clerk-Treasurer's Office at rate of $20.00 an hour effective Monday, September 5, 2011.
6. Approval of Town Engineer's, Director of Planning and Zoning, Parks and Recreation Director's reports dated August 19, 2011, IT Director's report dated August 20, 2011 and HR Director's report dated August 22, 2011.
7. Approval of July 2011 monthly reports for the Plainfield Police Department, Town Engineer, and Plainfield Fire Territory.
8. Approval of Amendment No. 1 to Engineering Agreement dated December 13, 2011 between the Town and Butler, Fairman and Seufert, Inc for work related to the Main Street Area Drainage project, increasing the cost for inspection services from $30,000 to $99,500 per the Town Engineer's report dated August 19, 2011.
9. Approval for a partial release of retainage in the amount of $120,000 to Bowen Engineering Corporation for work associated with the Swinford Water Plant project per the Town Engineer's report dated August 19, 2011.
10. Approval of Change Order #55 to the Gradex contract on US 40 Streetscape Project for the extension of the completion time to July 1, 2011 for the landscape planting per the Transportation Director's report dated August 19, 2011.
Are there any additions or corrections? I have one on the HR Director's report, there was a first name missing on one of the terminations, I believe it is D-E-V-O-N, Devon VanWanzeele is the only correction there, any others?
Mr. McPhail: I would move that we approve the consent agenda as amended.
Mr. Gaddie: Second.
Mr. Kirchoff: I have a motion and a second to approve the consent agenda as amended, roll call vote please.
Mr. Bennett: Mr. Gaddie- yes
Mr. McPhail- yes
Mr. Kirchoff- yes
Plainfield Town Council consent agenda for August 22, 2011 is adopted as amended.
Mr. Kirchoff: Thank you.
BUSINESS FROM THE FLOOR
Mr. Kirchoff: Business from the Floor, I see Edra is here tonight.
Ms. Waterman: Just like every place else in Plainfield the library is a change oriented institution, always looking to make things better, so we have some big things coming up I thought you would like to know about.
Mr. Bennett: Mrs. Waterman, I'm sorry to interrupt, could you state your name and position for the record please?
Ms. Waterman: Edra Waterman, Library Director, Plainfield-Guilford Township Public Library. The first thing I would like to talk about a little bit, how many of you have or heard of Amazon Kindles, Nooks, I-pads, and all of those things? Well one of the things the library is doing, is providing content for those devices that so many people have now, so if you have a Plainfield resident library card, you can download books for your nook, books for your I-pad, all from the library's website. All you have to have is that library card and a couple of clicks and you have it on your device. Ok, it is more than a couple of clicks, but we have a lot of people at the library who can help you out if you don't quite understand how to get that book from the website to the Nook, just stop by our reference desk and we can get it on there for you. Another really cool thing that we have is called Freegal, and what that is if you have an I-pod, or any other kind of listening device, you can every week with your Plainfield Library card, download three songs for free, it is completely legal, the library uses our resident tax dollars to purchase the subscription to Freegal which has the entire Sony catalog, everything from Britney Spears to Jazz to Classical, and you can get three songs a week that are yours to keep in your I-tunes library, with your Plainfield Library card. Another thing that is coming up January 1st of this coming year, we are making a couple of changes, one of those is that people that live outside of Guilford Township will have to purchase a P.L.A.C, which is a public library access card for $50.00 a year in order to continue to use the Plainfield Library, because all of our tax dollars come from Guilford Township, we just can't continue to provide that service for free, and people do value it, and we are glad that the PLAC card program is out there to allow them to keep using it. Another really neat thing we are doing is we are partnering with the Red Pride Booster Club at the high school and the library is going to be out there at tailgating, starting at homecoming we are going to have our own booth with our I-pads, with our computers, people will be able to see how Freegal works right there while they are waiting in line to get their hotdog or whatever from the tailgating booth. They will be able to see how to get an item onto their portable device, and they will be able to get a library card if they don't already have one, because now you don't have to even come into the library to get a library card, when we are out in the community we can issue a library card right there. The final thing that you guys need to know about is probably the biggest thing is that the library is closing for an entire week in September. We are closing from the 12th through the 18th because we are getting new carpet and we decided that since we were moving everything to get new carpet we were going to rearrange everything as well. About a year ago we did some focus groups with people all over the community and with that input plus the input from our staff, we decided that we wanted to rearrange things. So when we are putting in the new carpet we are also going to be moving around all the shelving that we have, we are going to be getting some new shelving that will have things front and center when you walk in, easier to grab them off of that display shelving and we are going to get a little bit of new furniture. Hopefully it will be pretty exciting, so we are going to have a grand re-opening on Saturday the 24th, and we are going to give away a Kindle, so if you don't already have one of those portable devices, you might stop by and see us on that day. The library will re-open on the 19th, but we are going to still be finishing up the project through that week of the 24th. Whatever we have done the 24th, that is what we are grand re-opening on. So are there any questions with any of that? I'm trying to keep it brief.
Mr. Kirchoff: How many people do you have trained on the Nook? Because when my wife got hers, there was one gal who was the expert and we were unable to connect with her.
Ms. Waterman: We have two people that are really good at it and then there is about three or four others who work that desk, myself included who are pretty good at saying ok, lets get our Nook and plug it in and drag it over here. But our goal is to get everybody trained and we've actually started, we have someone who is developing a training that has been approved by the State for Library Education Units, so our staff can take that and we will have t-shirts they will be wearing, so if you come in if you see someone that says “Ask me about E-books”, they will be trained to help you with that. So hopefully that won't happen again, but we are gearing up.
Mr. Kirchoff: Are you seeing a large volume of usage?
Ms. Waterman: Yes, yes, since Christmas which is really when this whole thing took off, our usage statistics have really sky rocketed, and we expect once, right now the Amazon Kindle doesn't work with library materials, but starting this fall, probably in September it is going too, so we expect it to double yet again once the Kindle comes on. The cool thing about the Kindle is, when you check it out from the library on the website and you click “I want it”, it is going to send it to your Kindle, there is not going to be any plugging in, dragging, and dropping like there is with the Nook. So it should be pretty neat.
Mr. Bennett: Edra was that again, was your grand re-opening September 24th?
Ms. Waterman: Yes, Saturday September 24th, I believe from 11:00 to 3:00.
Mr. McPhail: Could you explain again the library card for Guilford Township only?
Ms. Waterman: Sure, as you know the Plainfield Library is really the Guilford Township Library, we serve the vast majority of the Plainfield residents too, but our tax base is Guilford Township. For many years that we have pretty much let anyone with a card at any library in Hendricks County use any other library, but over the past several years, the use of the Plainfield Library has become greater than any other libraries, so our Guilford Township residents aren't seeing much benefit of using other libraries because they just don't use them, and we are getting a lot of use from folks that are outside of the Township, so by asking them to purchase a P.L.A.C. card for $50.00 a year, which is less than a dollar a week, we hope that will help pay for some of the library service.
Mr. Bennett: Is that the State wide card that you can use on a State wide basis?
Ms. Waterman: Yes.
Mr. McPhail: My Avon card no longer works.
Ms. Waterman: It will work until January 1st, and you know what makes a great Christmas present, a P.L.A.C. card, so keep that in mind.
Mr. Kirchoff: But you are in the Town so you won't need to do that.
Mr. McPhail: But I live in Washington Township.
Ms. Waterman: Part of Plainfield is in Liberty Township and part of Plainfield is in Washington Township.
Mr. McPhail: I pay taxes for the Avon Library; we've had a reciprocal for like 10 years or so?
Ms. Waterman: I think the current one is seven, it has been a while.
Mr. Kirchoff: So you are telling me if you live in Plainfield but not in Guilford Township you still have to buy a PLAC card?
Ms. Waterman: Starting January 1st, yes, because your tax dollars go to the Avon library.
Mr. Kirchoff: I thought it was Plainfield Guilford Township.
Ms. Waterman: That is true, but the Washington Township Library existed before Plainfield annexed into Washington Township, so the part of Plainfield that is annexed into the Town belongs to the Washington Township Library, because they were there first.
Mr. Bennett: Kent's Township taxes go to Washington Township.
Mr. McPhail: I pay Washington Township or Avon Library taxes.
Mr. Kirchoff: I didn't know that.
Mr. McPhail: I'm sure Liberty Township pays Clayton.
Ms. Waterman: They pay Clayton, yes. It is not a lot of people, but it is very confusing, and you guys deal with that at the Rec Center a lot, because I live on Lisa Lane, so I am in the Township but not the Town, but this is actually a little easier because you can say where do your kids go to school, and if they say Avon, then you know. Is there any other questions?
Mr. Kirchoff: Thank you very much.
Mr. McPhail: I guess we will still be able to rent printed materials
is that correct?
Ms. Waterman: You will be able to use anything you want at the library; you will just have to buy a card.
Mr. McPhail: Some of these old dogs are hard to learn new tricks.
Mr. Kirchoff: I guess I'd ask how the remote unit is going at the Rec Center.
Ms. Waterman: I think it is ok, it is kind of nice to have it out there, it is one of those things it is more of a novelty, but it is really cool that we have it, people can say “oh yeah, Plainfield's got it”, it doesn't get a lot of use, but it gets enough to warrant…
Mr. Kirchoff: Is it more books or tapes?
Ms. Waterman: It is probably DVD's at this point, but both of them circulate pretty well, considering we didn't have to pay for it.
Mr. Kirchoff: Thank you. Is there any other business from the floor? If not we will move to the Town Manager's report, Rich.
TOWN MANAGER'S REPORT
Mr. Carlucci: An item that I spent a little bit of time in my report to the Town Council has to do with County Road 550 South. County Road 550 South, if you were to take Reeves Road from 267 and head east, you will come up Reeves Road and Perry Road intersection, continue a little bit further to the east, and it is where the Chimney Sweeps are, and the substation is located, that is where County Road 550 South is located. At one time this road, you could go straight south to a frontage road along I-70, that would take you over to the Six Points Road overpass, but all of that is pretty much gone, there is still a road there being used now. The road several years ago the Town Duke Realty and Opus made improvements to that road because there are two warehouses on either side, actually three, but only two empty into this road. We came together and rebuilt part of this roadway so that it could be used by those industrial buildings and we shared the cost at that time. One of the main uses of that road is Fox Conn, which has a substantial number of employees there, they use that road and now we have S2F, which is part of BrightPoint, using that road and will be using that road and will be using it more, and my favorite is Sara Lee, although they don't let you go to the back door and get anything, so there is a lot of use in a small space there. What we are finding out, and this came up because Brightpoint purchased Touchstone Wireless and at the time that they were getting ready to get S2F going, which is the name of one of their companies, this came along and which really required some additional thinking about that roadway there. I'm going to let Don talk a minute about some of the other issues related to and the cost, but we are in kind of a situation where we have a couple of major employers there, we had finished the road from basically Reeves Road to a certain point and thickened up the asphalt so that we could use that road, and then we put what we call a headache bar over that roadway, and what those are, those are those big yellow things that come up like this and go across the road, that was the first one we ever put on a public road, but we didn't want the semi's going any further to the south and tearing up the road. Now there is a situation because of success of Fox Conn, basically just run cars up and down there, but with Sara Lee and S2F, and their Touchstone Wireless, that has kind of changed the whole approach out there in terms of that road. The section of roadway is not to a standard where we could let semi tractor trailers go on that road. I think there is an estimate of approximately $80,000.00 to finish that road and we will have, Don I'm sorry, I should stop now and I will let Don explain, but basically we have to cut part of that road down and rebuild it. Part of that is, for the Town wanting to do this, one is because it does bring jobs, we do have the money in the TIF district that is in that area there, and I will let Don talk about those numbers. We also have here tonight Chris Scott who is a Senior Vice President for Brightpoint, and he would like to explain the benefits of their new, when they took Touchstone Wireless, and what they anticipate happening, is compared to what they had agreed to do initially, so Chris if you want to step up.
Mr. Scott: Thank you for having me my name is Chris Scott, and as Rich mentioned, I am the Senior Vice President at Brightpoint, I've been with Brightpoint for fifteen years. I've had the opportunity to experience the growth of our company and was actually one of the pioneers when we moved to Plainfield, we had to get directions on where to get to the new site on Airtech, but we found it and I actually worked from a construction trailer there for several months while we were building a new facility and getting it ready, so my experience with the Town and especially with Brightpoint is fairly rich. I was also involved with respect to the S2F project so that was where Brightpoint made an attempt to go outside of our wireless centric business in with verticals that were different than wireless. We were really looking for a way to sustain our business outside of core, seeing that it is the consolidation amongst the wireless carriers, and things are going on the marketplace that could adverse the affect of us, so after six or eight months we attempted to make that business thrive, which was S2F, Rich was referring too, we elected to buy out the open remaining shares of that business and take it into Brightpoint. We had split that business essentially in a way that allowed us to qualify for MBE status, we still have control over granting the systems and the operational methodologies that we felt were core to the business to make it work. So towards the end of 2010, we became the sole owner of S2F and to this day we still maintain that company, but we are in the process of transferring over the liabilities into Brightpoint North America, the company I work for. So as we were making the decision to wind down the S2F project, we effectively finished the year in 2010 with no employees in that company and the investments that we had made and starting the IT info structure and the build out of that building, we were also doing deals with a company based in Bristol, TN, called Touchstone Wireless, and what we found, this was a part of the wireless industry that we were missing, they specialized in repair and refurbishment of phones and just by virtue of the market share that we enjoy as a fulfillment company should influence on the outbound, we miss it completely on the backside, which our phones that come back for a variety of reasons, for warranty, and out of warranty repairs and remorse and things that the carriers extend to their customers as part of the service. So regardless, we made the decision in December of 2010 to purchase Touchstone Wireless up until about a week before the transaction closed, we were going to go into a buy and hold mode, where there was a two year earn out associated with that company and we would continue to run operations in Bristol, TN and also in Fort Worth. By changing the type of transaction from a buy and hold to a buy and integrate, we were able to take immediate title to the company and also make decisions around where we were going to be able to run the company from and how we would utilize it across our portfolio versus waiting for two years and sort of a hands off approach. So as you are probably familiar and hopefully Rich has communicated, we made a decision shortly after that to kind of engage the folks in Bristol, with the folks in Fort Worth and also look at the prospects of moving the business here and after a series of difficult decisions, and some adverse information received from AT&T, relative to their plan to acquisition of T-Mobile, we made a fairly abrupt decision to close the operations in Bristol and divide it equally amongst the operations here in Plainfield and in Fort Worth, and those numbers have actually larger than the next skid at this point. In the last four months closed the Bristol operations and relocated a number of employees here and in Fort Worth as well, and we've taken the assets of that company and transferred them, not only the physical aspects of it, but also the systems and so forth. So at the end of 2010, we invested about 80 million dollars effective in a company that helped build out our portfolio and really set us up for an extended period of, I guess longevity or a security with our existing customers that we attempt to not lose that share. Up to this point that type of business repair and refurbish has largely been outsourced to off shore type of operations, where Central and South American operations, where the quality of work has been ok, but the lag time associated with transportation and just the risk of inventory obsolescence has really been a problem so our ability to maintain our operations here and service the full life cycle of product is incredibly important and then I also sustain a building for the company as well, which is all of our green initiatives, and also supporting those of our customers, so for sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon, and all the big carriers that we serve, we are actually able to help, not only ourselves satisfy in an environmental and economic and I guess green element to that business but also help our customers do that as well, so those are all the factors that led into our decision and also have largely executed on that as much we are in the process of winding down the Bristol operations, and we have moved about thirty employees total, that accepted our offer to relocate, we actually offered every employee in the Bristol location the opportunity to move, and we would fund not only their relocation, they would receive equal or better pay, and they would have the opportunity to do something outside of what they have been trained to do, so of the thirty people approximately that accepted that offer, twenty-eight picked Plainfield over Fort Worth, so if you are involved in supporting that I know that the Chamber and a few other folks helped us do tours and a variety of things to help people warm up to the location. So Rich if that is helpful in the way of background if there is anything else. There is two elements, one, the investment; our projected investment in the facility itself will be north of five million dollars by the end of this year, and things that will stay with the building, so we had to air condition it, develop systems to support the technical aspects of the business, typical tenant improvement and things in a new facility. Then we have also are tracking towards an employee head count number of 275 employees in the building of the end of this year, mid year of next year we will be looking at 425, and then based on estimates, upwards at 600 employees at the end of 2012. We do use a combination of fulltime Brightpoint employees and temporaries but that is pretty customary here in the local area. All of our temps are qualified through the same background check, drug screening process and skills tests, with the ability to flip over to full time employment, so we have that lever available to flip those employees over as a confidence in the business and so forth dictates. There is some seasonality's associated with the business, typically after the first of the year after the holiday rush occurs, what ever goes up must come down eventually a spike in that business in that first quarter of the year and then it tends to normalize the year kind of plays out. This is a new business for us, but I can tell you that the operations in Fort Worth today have 1,400 employees and the high water mark in Bristol, it was 900. We are trying to be conservative as possible, but also paint a picture that says that one; we are making investment, and two, that we have a pretty good handle on what the job count will be. Which I think overall it is not significantly higher, but it is higher than the estimated projections, and it is also real, I mean we are actually running the business there today, and actually facing some of the challenges that Rich described earlier.
Mr. Kirchoff: Thanks for coming in.
Mr. Scott: Thanks for having me.
Mr. Carlucci: Part of the issue with County Road 550 South, as I mentioned was that it cannot bare the weight of those semi tractor trailers and what is happening now is that the semi tractor trailers are going through the parking area where people are parking to get around the building. What we want them to do is to strengthen that road, continue to use headache bars and make them go to the very south end and go around and then into the site. I will go ahead and let Don talk about the aspect of what it will take to rebuild that road and what the cost will be.
Mr. McGillem: As Rich indicated, when 550 was constructed and as I put in my report, Opus did share with Duke the cost of creating the heavier pavement of Reeves Road down to where the current headache bar is, and that was set up with Opus so that the trucks can enter the warehouse distribution site in that north drive and utilize the building facility. What we got right now is most of the docking for Sara Lee and the docking for Brightpoint will be primarily on the east side and with the number of employees that they are going to have they are basically going to create the west side of the building for passenger vehicle parking, so essentially we won't want those trucks, and they don't want those trucks going through the passenger vehicle side. So essentially the solution that we have come up with in working with Opus is and working with Brightpoint is to take the trucks down to the far south drive where there is a drive that goes all the way around that building to the east side and that gets the trucks out of the passenger car parking. When the road was built from the current headache bar, south to Fox Conn, it was built as essentially a local street type section because all we were looking at was cars on that, so basically what we are going to do now is take the headache bar up from where it currently is and move it down to just the south drive, we are going to take and mill off the top surface area and then essentially build up to the industrial truck standard the pavement section in that area and then of course we will have to move a headache bar. The cost associated with that based on Opus last numbers for the contractor for that portion is $87,835.00 and so basically where Rich is coming from and what we are looking at is that would be beefing up our Town road, the public road there and that would be a portion of participation of the Town will be involved in on the roadway section.
Mr. Kirchoff: Do you have any idea of timing? Are you talking about getting it done this fall?
Mr. McGillem: Yes, in fact we have talked with Duke; we are probably only looking at about a week. Rich has had some conversation with Charlie Podell at Duke, they have agreed there is that connecting roadway from 550 that goes over to Perry Road and comes out there by Hitachi, which they gated off primarily for emergencies and so forth. They've agreed to open that up to where we can move the construction to avoid the traffic and by doing so, it holds down the cost and also like I say I think we can get in and once they get going and get it done in about a week's time. Basically I think, I know Brightpoint and it is my understanding that if they want jump on it and get it done just as quickly as possible.
Mr. Kirchoff: So Rich, what do you need from us tonight?
Mr. Carlucci: Just your approval to move forward with the reconstruction of the road.
Mr. Kirchoff: Does that have to go out to bid?
Mr. Carlucci: I don't know if it meets the requirement for a bid, but we've already got in place a common construction wage that will take us to the end of the year so we don't have to redo any of that, so we've already got the wage in place, because you can now when you go to these common construction wages, and we hold them at the Town Hall, now those wages can be good for three months, so if we have to bid out. We will have to look at the numbers. We will check on the amount just to make sure, if we have to bid it we can do a pretty quick bidding process.
Mr. McGillem: I think normally or what was anticipated with it would be essentially a part of Opus overall project, they've got much more work to do.
Mr. Kirchoff: So then we simply reimburse our portion.
Mr. McGillem: Right, so we were not looking at going to a contract ourselves.
Mr. Kirchoff: We are not going to have to do the project. I misunderstood.
Mr. McGillem: We will just be participating in the cost associated with the improvements.
Mr. McPhail: Don I'm trying to test my memory here, when we originally rebuilt 550 there, we had quite a bit of drainage work to do and that kind of thing, is that, will we have to redo any of that or is that just beefing up the base?
Mr. McGillem: We shouldn't have to do any of that the only thing that we will have is we are connecting that south drive so there will be a new drive and a new pipe that goes in, but nothing else that should be affected.
Mr. Carlucci: I think the estimate that I saw and the total cost for all of that's going to happen out there is a little over $3,000.00 of improvements.
Mr. Bennett: I'm sorry Rich we were funding that from the I-70 TIF, did we talk about that?
Mr. Kirchoff: Yes, that was mentioned.
Mr. McPhail: Do we need a motion?
Mr. Kirchoff: I think so, and should we just say not to exceed $90,000.00, and would that be the safe way to do that. Would someone want to suggest what we should say?
Mr. McPhail: Let me make an attempt and see, I would move that we authorize the expenditures not to exceed $90,000.00 to reimburse Opus for our part of the County Road improvements on their project for County Road 550 South.
Mr. Gaddie: Second.
Mr. Kirchoff: I have a motion and a second to authorize to proceed with Opus on the reconstruction of County Road 550 South, not to exceed $90,000.00. Everybody in favor indicate by saying aye, motion carried, we are good.
Mr. Carlucci: Thank you. The next item I have has to do with an item that had been brought up to the Council a couple of meetings ago. It is the Indianapolis Airport Authority Non-Binding Memorandum of Understanding. The optimum phrase is non-binding, this will allow us to continue on with the airports Airtropolis project and they will want to have the MOU signed, I talked to Mr. Kirchoff earlier and suggested we just go ahead and if the Council has the desire to approve that MOU, that we'd go ahead and approve it and then just have Robin sign it when he gets back.
Mr. McPhail: I don't have a problem with that.
Mr. Kirchoff: So I would entertain a motion that we would approve the Non-binding Memorandum of Understanding with the Indianapolis Airport Authority and authorize the President to sign it when he returns.
Mr. McPhail: So move.
Mr. Gaddie: Second.
Mr. Kirchoff: So we have a motion to approve the Non-binding MOU with the Indianapolis Airport Authority and have Mr. Brandgard sign that when he returns. If there is no further discussion, everybody in favor indicate by saying aye, opposed, thank you.
Mr. Carlucci: A couple of cheerful items, every year the Flyer puts out a contest where people can best places to live, best water park, and those types of things, best restaurant, well Plainfield is the 2011 winner for the best community in Hendricks County.
Mr. Kirchoff: Right on. Along that line, do you have more of these; this ought to be in the Rec Center and the Library. Ok, I was going to suggest we put them in a number of…
Mr. Bennett: I will find that out.
Mr. Kirchoff: Yes, I think we should, when you come in the front door at the Rec Center, the library, here, and other public places we ought to toot our horn. Excuse me.
Mr. Carlucci: The next one is a couple of months ago I got contacted by our representative from Money Magazine and they wanted information about the Town of Plainfield, and actually another Town manager that I had talked too says well when they call you, that means they are going to rank you somewhere. So Plainfield was ranked out of 100, our ranking was number 62 as small communities to live in.
Mr. Kirchoff: In the U.S.
Mr. Carlucci: In the U.S., that is very good for the Town of Plainfield, and I think it represents a lot of hard work by staff and the Town Council, because that is the first time we have been ranked for this kind of category, so I am pretty happy about it, and I think that is something we should all be proud of. Then I noticed just below that, that Hendricks County was ranked number 20 in the Country for where you can find jobs, we always kind of think of the eastside, but on the westside we have a pretty substantial steel plant that is still operating and then the businesses out there and so I think that is outstanding for Hendricks County. This came basically with the same day that these both came out, I don't know how the Federal Government works on creating jobs, I know is what is important to us is creating jobs and getting people to work, and I think Brightpoint is a part of that, not only do they have their main building on AirTech, you can find it now can't you Chris? Then they bought another building in Allpoints and they have that completely renovated and people working in it, then of course this project with Touchstone, they are a big employer and given with what is going on around the Country I'm glad we are able to create the jobs we are creating and getting people to work because there is nothing better than getting a paycheck. That is all I have tonight, thank you.
Mr. James: Good evening, I have one item that needs a motion from the Council tonight. In my report I spelled out that the new owner of 276 North Center Street has appealed the mowing expense for that property, we had it mowed on July 6th and then he took ownership of the property on July 7th, so it was not in his ownership when we got it mowed, so the motion would be to approve or deny his mowing expense appeal and also if you approve the appeal that we will not put a tax lien on the property.
Mr. Kirchoff: Will not.
Mr. James: Yes.
Mr. McPhail: It appears to me we'd spend a whole lot more than what that bill is if we tried to collect it from the lending institution which is what it really owes.
Mr. James: Yes, that is correct.
Mr. McPhail: I would move that we dismiss the…
Mr. Daniel: Tell me again Joe, I read that in the report and now I lost track. They have appealed the mowing so what the Town is basically doing is recognizing their appeal and cancelling the fees.
Mr. McPhail: What is the address?
Mr. Kirchoff: 276 N. Center Street.
Mr. McPhail: I would move that we waive the mowing fees for the new owner at 276 N. Center Street.
Mr. Gaddie: Second.
Mr. Kirchoff: We have a motion and a second to waive or cancel the mowing fees for 276 N. Center Street, any discussion? All those in favor indicate by saying aye, opposed, done.
Mr. James: Thank you.
Mr. Kirchoff: Bill? Clay?
Mr. Chafin: Good evening, in my report I wanted to bring to you tonight for your approval, the request to move forward with the Park Impact Fee, updating that ordinance and also combining that project with creating a departmental master plan, in the report it was recommended to go with the Pros Consulting in the amount of $44,915.00, we were going to fund that from two different accounts, $25,000.00 of that would be the Parks Non-reverting Fund and then remaining balance of $19,915.00 would come from the Park Impact Fees. We had two consultants provide us with proposals, they were very similar, one of the things that stood out to us from Pros Consulting was that their financial consultant was Umbaugh, and I know we use Umbaugh in the Town so we thought that particular relationship that might give us the advantage over the other institution and so we did do some reference checking with some of the other Parks and Recreation Departments around the Metropolitan area with Carmel, Brownsburg, Greenfield, they all gave this firm a very positive remarks and we were relieved with the results that they were able to put together. The reason I was asking for a master plan is that they have a lot of master plans for different parks, but we don't have one comprehensive document that we keep up to when we are doing budgeting or forecasting and say this is how we are going to attack the next two to five years or whatever it might be, I think that would be a very valuable asset for us to have. So with your approval whether it is a motion or consent, we can get that going.
Mr. Kirchoff: I had talked to Ms. Whicker today; she said she had talked to you about one part of that, which had to do with community surveys or something like that, have you had a chance to check into that?
Mr. Chafin: Yes, there was one line, they did a total proposal but then they added some different line items that would be like ala cart type of…
Mr. Kirchoff: So that is not in there?
Mr. Chafin: It is in there, there was $1,600.00 in there to do some additional community input surveys, but I think we can take that and reallocate that some place else that we may need that or if we decide, you know what this is basically gathering information that we already have, we can remove that from the total cost and finding out from the scope from then on out.
Mr. Daniel: I didn't get a chance to get through that contract this afternoon, but I will get to it right away.
Mr. Chafin: I will forward it to Mel and upon his…
Mr. Daniel: You sent that out in your report.
Mr. Chafin: Right.
Mr. Daniel: I've got it; I just didn't get a chance to get to it today.
Mr. Kirchoff: So we will need a motion to be continued upon your review.
Mr. McPhail: What was the amount?
Mr. Kirchoff: $44,915.00
Mr. McPhail: Mr. President I would move that we approve the contract with Pros Consultant LLC for a Park Impact Fee and master plan study, not to exceed $44,915.00 subject to the review of the documents by legal counsel.
Mr. Gaddie: Second.
Mr. Kirchoff: We have a motion and a second to approve the contract with Pros Consulting LLC in the amount of $44,915.00, subject to review by our Legal Counsel, any other discussion? If not, everybody in favor indicate by saying aye, motion carried.
Mr. Chaffin: The only other thing that the soccer invitational that we had at the Sports Complex, if you drove by there not this past weekend but the weekend before last, there was close to 3,000 people in Town, there was soccer, football, and it was a really well attended event, one of the representatives from Indiana Soccer just happened to do a pop in visit on the tournament, and she told Brent on our staff that it looked like we had been running tournaments for 20 years, and that was the first one that he had done out there with them, so Westside United has already contacted us and reserving a date again for next year.
Mr. Kirchoff: I have grandsons who play for FC Pride over at Lawrence, and their Soccer Coordinator was going to be here and I meant to get down that weekend and I was busy and I didn't get to until it was too late, but he had been over and seen the complex and very excited about coming over to the tournament.
Mr. Chafin: We had a lot of positive feedback and we were able to generate a little revenue and we are going to work with the Conventions and Visitor's Bureau to find out in their next report the impact they had in the hotels. That is all I have.
Mr. Kirchoff: Great. Why you are still there, I don't know if it was you or Rich had in one of your reports about the Swinford Park tennis courts.
Mr. Chafin: Rich put that in his report a couple of weeks ago; they were willing to remove those. I looked into resurfacing them or putting a tennis court surface on them, and it is a fairly expensive endeavor with now the middle school having five courts that are in really good shape and open to the public, it doesn't seem like it is a wise idea to do that. I am going to check into a couple of contractors to see what type of price they would give us to remove the fence, or to remove the asphalt. One our guys has contacted Milestone and I think they will take the asphalt and charge us, just a matter of maybe us getting it down to them, so we might be able to do that this fall as we slow down.
Mr. Kirchoff: So that isn't something you need action on right away?
Mr. Chafin: No, but if you are in favor of us taking that out and doing that we can probably start getting things lined up as the fall progresses.
Mr. Kirchoff: They have a lot of age on them.
Mr. Carlucci: Just to expand on that, not only do we have really good courts right next to us, we have courts up at Franklin Park, and we have courts there at the high school which are brand new, so we have plenty of courts, and what we are trying to, and of course there is also a sand volleyball courts there, which I have never seen anybody play there, and the reason is, there is two good sand volleyball courts right at the end of the bridge on the east side of the park that get a lot of use. So the idea was we are trying to protect our resources and the idea was to take those courts out plant them back in grass and something will pop up some day.
Mr. Kirchoff: Maybe Pros Consulting can tell us what to put in there.
Mr. Chafin: Yes, that would be a great idea, we will look at that.
Mr. Kirchoff: Thank you. Tim? Don?
Mr. McGillem: One additional item I forgot to put in my report, I even had a flag and I looked right over it and didn't get it in. I wanted to remind you all; I think we mentioned it earlier. The County is getting ready to do some work on the Clark's Creek bridge, Stafford Road, and that work will consist primarily of sidewalk replacement there is some of the pier rehabilitation for the piers on the east side of the bridge that they are going to be reconstructing. They are going to be putting in a new approach slab on the east side, most of the work will be done with restricted traffic, but when they put the approach slab in there, we will be about to be where Stafford Road really closed to through traffic that location, so that is coming up, we are looking at the end of September, first of October to get started. One of the things that are in review of the plans and discussing with the County is they need to give them plenty of time to routing school busses and so forth.
Mr. Kirchoff: Now will our Clark's Creek project be done by then?
Mr. McGillem: No.
Mr. Kirchoff: So that is going to diminish one of the options for getting around is it?
Mr. McGillem: No, our Clark's Creek project shouldn't be…
Mr. Kirchoff: Well it just comes down to Metropolis doesn't it?
Mr. McGillem: Yes, the big thing is the school busses, I'm not sure there is that much routing of the school busses through that end of Stafford Road. You've got the school busses to come around and they get to the elementary schools up on Elm Street, they come back and they get to the middle school and come back to the high school and make it around. We will try to get it done as quickly as possible. I just wanted to remind you all that is coming up and something that does need to be done; I guess there is some pretty bad scouring that has taken place on those piers on the side.
Mr. Kirchoff: Jason?
OLD BUSINESS
Mr. Kirchoff: Old business Kent?
Mr. McPhail: I just have a couple items. I just want to report that the Quaker Day Festival and parade plans continue to move forward and we look forward to having a good activity that weekend.
Mr. Kirchoff: What are those dates again?
Mr. McPhail: September 30th and October 1st, Friday and Saturday. They will have activities Friday evening and all day Saturday and Saturday evening, and we will have a special wrist band time on Thursday evening for the carnival for a short period of time. Then also the Chamber of Commerce has purchased new Christmas lights to go from Moon Road to Dan Jones Road on US 40, and we would like to try not to do anything on Quaker Boulevard until we get a lighting plan there. There are some funds still available and the Chamber has been accumulating funds for the last few years and you know I think once we have a new lighting plan along Quaker Boulevard someday, I think they will probably would be able to fund that lighting, but I think our committee felt like from Dan Jones to Moon Road is a section to make sense to us. Then one other thing, Chief Anderson and I had the opportunity this morning to welcome a new convention to the Town of Plainfield, the International Association of Arson Investigators, they have been meeting and having their annual conference for about fifteen years at Keystone at the Crossing at one of the hotels there, and a little over a year ago, Keith Hall, one of the local electricians who is also a fire investigator, called me and said “Kent, I think you can get that convention in Plainfield if you worked at it”, so working with the Convention and Visitors Bureau putting a package together with Primo's and one of the hotels, and we are really excited about it, it is a convention we think that will come back here after a year and broke the ice for those smaller conventions. We had a good time this morning. They had a really impressive opening ceremony for their conference. Rich wrote a letter of support from the Town. I just think that is a plus that we've actually got a convention going on in Plainfield.
Mr. Bennett: Just two comments real quickly, I'm doing some research for a report that I was writing, to kind of put you back on where Rich was saying about what is going on locally, through the 2010 U.S. census, Hendricks County is projected to be the 82nd County fastest growing County in the Nation, so that is some information you may or may not be able to use. The other comment I wanted to make was directed to Mr. Scott and Brightpoint, as someone who has been on both sides of the table of mergers and acquisitions and downsizing, I just want to express my personal appreciation to you and Brightpoints philosophy of offering those people jobs from Tennessee and bringing them up here or Fort Worth, you don't hear about that very often of acquisitions and people being offered jobs and offering of them being moved, and I really appreciate personally the philosophy that Brightpoint and you have taken in that regard and wanted to thank you on behalf of myself and the rest of the folks here today.
NEW BUSINESS
Mr. Daniel: Very short, I sent out a copy you will recall, we had a case pending on the Kroger gas pumps on a Kroger site out there, everybody here probably remembers that Kroger wanted to put gas pumps on the west side of the Kroger parking lot, the Plan Commission heard that, and thought it created serious problems for that site and public safety issues, and not only for the traffic in there but also for getting tank trucks in and out to fill those tanks and everything else, the Plan Commission denied it, they appealed that to the Trial Court which becomes an Impaled Court for the Plan Commission a Trial Court agreed with the Plan Commission and affirm the Plan Commissions denial and Kroger appealed that to the Indiana Court of Appeals last week we got a decision, the Court of Appeals had a different or reversed the Trial Court but in the process it remanded the case to the Trial Court with an order to remand it to the Plainfield Plan Commission for the Plan Commission to determine whether or not they could revise their findings to make them more definitive and satisfy what they felt or think is a greater standard as far as how much detail is required in those findings. Kroger has thirty days, they can petition the Indiana Supreme Court for transfer, they have thirty days to do that, if they don't do that then if we go through the first process and go down to the Trail Court and we will remand it back to the Plan Commission to take a look at those findings. On a petition to transfer that is up to the Supreme Court, they do not have to take that case, so if they petition to transfer, it will be up to the Supreme Court to rather or not they want to hear that case or not. So that is where we are, we are waiting to see rather they file a petition to transfer if not, it will be going back to the Trial Court and back to the Plan Commission.
Mr. Carlucci: I didn't want to mention that we had Westside United South out here, last weekend you could hardly move around Town there was so many people everywhere, on the trails, Plainfield is really just, they hold it in Swinford Park, it was just packed, you could see the busses the number of busses they had to bring out to bring those kids in. The skate park had a skate park tournament, and then there was a lot of activity, football, soccer, they were parked practically everywhere.
Mr. Kirchoff: Did we plan for enough parking down there?
Mr. Carlucci: We did, we just found people finding the easier ways to get over from the bridge across to White Lick Creek, but at this point we will probably talk to Clay, we've got some things that we need to resolve but it is not, we can wait.
Mr. Bennett: It is a good problem to have.
Mr. Kirchoff: It sure is.
Mr. Carlucci: The only reason we let it go is that it could rain two inches and it is not going to make the fields get muddy or anything. But just the fact that all of these people are out there all over the Town; I know it makes everyone feel pretty good that we are on the right track with the athletic programs.
COUNCIL COMMENTS
Mr. Kirchoff: If there is nothing else to come before the Council, I will remind us we have a special call meeting next Monday at 5:00, which is the hearing for the annexation, and Tim has an issue so it should be fairly brief. If nothing else to come before the Council I would entertain a motion to sign the documents as required and adjourn.
