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HomeMy Public PortalAbout10-October 02, 2018 Special Commission Meeting CITY OF OPA-LOCKA "The Great City" CLERK'S ACTION SUMMARY MINUTES SPECIAL COMMISSION MEETING Tuesday, October 02, 2018 2:00 P.M. Sherbondy Village Auditorium 215 Perviz Avenue Opa-locka,FL 33054 1. CALL TO ORDER: Mayor Myra L. Taylor called the meeting to order at 2:00 p.m. on Tuesday, October 02, 2018 in the Auditorium at Sherbondy Village, 215 President Barack Obama (Perviz) Avenue, Opa-locka, Florida. 2. ROLL CALL: The following members of the City Commission were present: Mayor Myra L. Taylor, Vice Mayor Joseph L. Kelley, Commissioner Timothy Holmes, Commissioner John Riley and Commissioner Matthew Pigatt. Also in attendance were: Acting City Manager Newall Daughtrey, City Attorney Vincent Brown, and City Clerk Joanna Flores. 3. INVOCATION: The invocation was delivered by Mayor Myra L. Taylor. 4. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE: The Pledge of Allegiance was recited in unison. 5. PUBLIC INPUT: Agenda Items Only Eric Redmon, Villa Francine, Opa-locka, FL, said that he supports the termination of the city manager. Alvin Burke, 1240 Jann Avenue, Opa-locka, FL, said that he does not see why this is happening. This commission has two more meetings left and putting someone else in the seat isn't going to get anything done. How can the City move forward if it keeps getting rid of city managers? There is a reason behind this because it does not make sense. If the commission cared about the City, they would sit for the last thirty days, unless there is something they want done that the manager will not do. Steven Barrett said that the City has the worst reputation for getting rid of managers. The City needs to keep the manager it has and let the new commission come in and decide what they want to do. It is not good management of the City to continue to fire managers. He asked the commission to allow the manager to stay until the new commission arrives. Special Commission Meeting Minutes—10/02/2018 1 Natasha Ervin, 670 Dunad Avenue, Opa-locka, FL, said that she will not ask the commission not to terminate the manager because they are going to do what they want to do anyway; but it does not look good. It looks like there is an agenda and something in the milk is not clean. She thanked Mr. Daughtrey for his service. Brian Dennis, 821 NW 54th Street, Miami FL, said eight years ago, the City was not in financial trouble and now it is. He will not advocate for the manager because he already knows the outcome. He agreed with Ms. Ervin's statements and stated that he does not understand why this is happening when this commission is almost done. When the commission votes today it will show what they are about. He endorsed Commissioner Pigatt for mayor. 6. RESOLUTIONS: a) A RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COMMISSION OF THE CITY OF OPA- LOCKA, FLORIDA, TERMINATING ACTING CITY MANAGER NEWALL J. DAUGHTREY; PROVIDING FOR INCORPORATION OF RECITALS; PROVIDING FOR AN EFFECTIVE DATE.Sponsored by Commissioner Riley The above resolution was read by Attorney Brown. It was moved by Commissioner Holmes, seconded by Commissioner Riley for discussion. Vice Mayor Kelley asked the mayor why she sponsored this item. Mayor Taylor said she believes the manager has gone as far as he can and she does not think he can move the City forward. Vice Mayor Kelley said that there is potentially a whole new commission coming in and it is sad when the community knows more than him. The citizens already know what is going on and something is wrong with that. There are real issues going on and thirty days out this kind of decision is being made. He will be watching to see every dollar that is being spent because he does not see what the manager has done to warrant this. The City needs to hire a professional manager and give them a contract. If this is not done,the culture of the City will never change. Commissioner Pigatt asked the manager to speak as to why he should or should not be terminated. This portion of the minutes will be transcribed in verbatim format. Acting City Manager Daughtrey: The Charter states specifically that every matter that comes before the commission, the manager has the right to participate in the discussion, but he does not have a vote. And the reason for that is, supposedly in order to be a city manager; you have to have certain skills and abilities. You done have to have those same skills and abilities to get elected. That's why a board of directors, a commission, appoints a manager, they appoint an attorney, and appoints a clerk. I must say that I was surprised memo that there was a commission meeting today to terminate me without one person talking to me about quote "What the unreadiness is" or what they think I'm not doing according to the charter. Again, you have the right to hire and fire the manager. Under normal conditions, you do that based upon specifics. The City happens to be in a financial emergency, continuously and it still is. The manager's job and my job has been to put the City in a position where we can come out of the financial emergency. In addition to that, we have had major, major sewer problems. Because of those sewer problems, almost all of my attention has been focused on keeping the sewer off of the street. In discovered last week that in 2011, the City paid for and had all of the sewer systems televisions and we knew then in 2011 that we were having major sewer problems, but yet no budgeting was done to take care of these sewer problems. Of course,just recently, an attorney approached us to sue us to try to take over Special Commission Meeting Minutes—10/02/2018 2 the water and sewer system from us. And as a result of doing research, I discovered that in fact we did pay for 2011 televisioning of our sewer systems. It showed us where most of the infiltration was. Yet, we did not budget on dime to deal with the problem. So, i.e. the situation at Bahman happened. There are a lot of other Bahman's that are going to happen if we don't become proactive and deal with the sewer system. We have one hundred and forty four thousand linear feet of clay pipes on the ground that may burst at any moment. What we have to do is be rational and be reasonable and plan our work to solve these problems. We dealt with the Bahman Problem and when we did with the first part of it we discovered that of we didn't take care of the second piece, that it too was going to collapse. Thank God that we were able to deal with it. I think professionally I've done what any professional manager could possibly do here. I've made sure I communicated the seriousness of the problem. No one wants ten mills for a City, but you have not maintained your infrastructure, when you've not maintained your buildings. And we're in a situation where yes, we did thanks to Dr. Baker, was able to get the state to agree to loan us thirty eight million dollars ($38,000,000.00). And the first time we got the loan, we used for something else and not what we agreed to. Now in order to access the loan we have to pay for the work, prove that the contractor got paid, prove that a partial release of liens for labor and for materials took place, and then send it to the state and they will reimburse us in about ninety days. But the problem is, we didn't have the cash. Therefore the people on Cairo Lane walked off the job over a year because we hadn't paid them. We sent the state a copy of the check to say we had paid them, but when the contractor went to Tallahassee, he said, "I never saw the check and I never got it."So we did was total mismanagement. I'm surprised they didn't put somebody in jail; they should have. But never the less, we still have access to that state revolving loan. But only after we pay the contractor and prove that the contractor received his money. That is why I recommended going to ten mills because we need a working capital fund so that we can deal with all of these underground problems that are going to face the city unless we start dealing with it. Also to get out of the financial emergency, you have to prove that you can pay everybody within a five year period of time. I.e., I said ten percent(10%) of the ad valorem tax money needs to be set aside so that we can pay those old debts. Ten percent (10%) is be set aside so that we can have a working capital fund so we can fix these problems that are in our face; and then eighty percent (80%) of the ad valorem tax money can be used to run the day-to-day operations. We have consistently overspent our budget. We been spending (OPM) Other People's Money, Other People's Money. Money that we're holding as trustees, we're spending it; we have to stop that. Since I've been manager, I've stopped stealing the red light camera money, cause that's what we were doing, stealing the money. And I've sent them two hundred and thirty thousand dollars ($230,000.00) since I've been the manager. So been stealing their money from 2013 through June 30`" of this year when I made the first payment. My point is I've been a good manager. I'm not boasting. My job is to take care of the citizens of the City of Opa-locka; I work for you. You, in theory, work for the people. We are to provide safe roads, clean water, and safe sewer issues. My biggest paranoia for all of us is, we have sewer problems that is going to hurt us if we don't appropriate money to deal with those problems. I also passed out some information that I received from Public Works Director talking about the Bahman situation. Also the Cairo Lane situation. Cairo Lane people walked off cause we didn't pay'em. We have been successful two weeks ago to be able to get them to come back and do the work. They left because they weren't getting paid. You can't blame a man to stop work cause you won't pay him. We did pay him. We have been able to pay him all that we owe him and we have been able to get him to come back. The biggest hold up now is we started on 127th Street which is part of the project is FPL. We have to move those poles. It took us almost three years to get those easements. We should have had those easements before we issued any building permits on Cairo Lane. We allowed those people to build without putting in water lines in or sewer or proper road beds. Okay, we're here now. Guess what we did? We agreed to do Cairo Lane for those people for free. The correct way to have done it is what the state statute says, "whoever benefits, pay their ridership, but the commission voted to do it for them for free. So everybody in Opa-locka gone pay for Cairo Lane, alright. We have to finish it cause we are halfway through, but all these other projects we gotta follow the state statute and protect the citizens and not give away three million dollars ($3,000,000.00) that they have to pay back. Let me end by saying two more items. The old city hall (sighs), we have negotiated with that contractor, he's halfway through, but we could not agree to his last demand, that we take the money that we have in an account and put it in his attorney's trust fund; we can't do that. But it has been brought to my attention that we've made another offer to him that we can do a payment bond. If we can do a Special Commission Meeting Minutes—10/02/2018 3 payment bond, then they can go back to work. If not, we're going to either come back or we have to call their bond and go out for bid to the lowest bidder. He's been paid now, but he still has not come back to work because he was not paid and he's angry, and I understand that. My last item has to do with what I believe is why this vote is up today. Two weeks ago, I sent a memo out to the utility billing and Code Enforcement people stating that anybody who owes the City over ten thousand dollars ($10,000.00)for ninety (90) days, put a lien on their property. What's been going on in the past is they run up these bill then close the account without paying and we let them open a new account; that's whats been going on. I put in your package two million dollars ($2,000,000.00) worth of water bills that people owe us right now that's over ten thousand dollars ($10,000.00) and over ninety days. And I believe that because I did that, that was the genesis of this motion to terminate me. Whether it is true or not, the very fact that if I stay, we're going to follow through and asked the people that owe us over two and a half million dollars ($2,500,000.00) to pay. If they paid us we would have plenty cash, but they have been allowed, some haven't paid in six (6) years. I'm not even talking about the ones on Cairo Lane who hadn't been billed because their meters were not read in six (6)years. Those are the kinds of things that been going on and that is why we are in a financial emergency because we have run this City as if it were some kind of criminal enterprise. We have some employees who have participated and hopefully some are going to be arrested today; if not, hopefully they'll be arrested tomorrow. Whether I'm here or not, they guilty and we got'em by the whatever. We got the documentation and we gone arrested them. I cannot be involved in anything crooked or anything illegal or improper. I ain't taking no prisoners, anybody that does wrong on my watch and I know it, I'm gone put'em in jail. Madam Mayor and commission, thank you for allowing me to make my statement. I have enjoyed the twelve (12) hours a day that I have been working since I been here, no one made me do that, but my love of the City. So if you choose to vote to fire me, What did General McArthur say?I will return. Thank you. This completes the verbatim portion of the minutes. Commissioner Pigatt thanked the manager for the job he has done since being manager. He said it is a shame that this is happening and he is disappointed that thirty days out this is the kind of things that are going on. He agreed with the vice mayor that a professional manager should be hired and given a contract. What is going on is wrong and it should not take place. Commissioner Holmes said the manager has not performed his job efficiently and he wants to move forward. There being no further discussion, the motion on the resolution passed by a 3-2 vote. Vice Mayor Kelley No Commissioner Pigatt No Commissioner Riley Yes Commissioner Holmes Yes Mayor Taylor Yes b) A RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COMMISSION OF THE CITY OF OPA- LOCKA, FLORIDA, APPOINTING AN ACTING CITY MANAGER DUE TO THE DEPARTURE OF NEWALL J. DAUGHTREY AS ACTING CITY MANAGER; PROVIDING FOR INCORPORATION OF RECITALS; PROVIDING FOR AN EFFECTIVE DATE. Sponsored by Commissioner Riley The above resolution was read by Attorney Brown. It was moved by Commissioner Holmes, seconded by Commissioner Riley for discussion. A motion was made to nominate Yvette Harrell as acting manager. Special Commission Meeting Minutes—10/02/2018 4 It was moved by Commissioner Holmes, seconded by Mayor Taylor to appoint Yvette Harrell as acting manager. Vice Mayor Kelley asked why the commission would bring back Yvette Harrell. Commissioner Holmes said he thinks she can do the job. There being no further discussion,the motion on the nomination passed by a 3-2 vote. Vice Mayor Kelley No Commissioner Pigatt No Commissioner Riley Yes Commissioner Holmes Yes Mayor Taylor Yes There being no discussion,the motion on the resolution passed by a 3-2 vote. Vice Mayor Kelley No Commissioner Pigatt No Commissioner Riley Yes Commissioner Holmes Yes Mayor Taylor Yes c) A RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COMMISSION OF THE CITY OF OPA- LOCKA, FLORIDA, DELETING NEWALL J. DAUGHTREY AS SIGNATORY AND ADDING YVETTE HARRELL (ACTING CITY MANAGER) AND BRYAN HAMILTON (FINANCE DIRECTOR) AS SIGNATORIES FOR ALL CITY FINANCIAL INSTITUTION ACCOUNTS; PROVIDING FOR INCORPORATION OF RECITALS; PROVIDING FOR AN EFFECTIVE DATE.Sponsored by Commissioner Riley The above resolution was read by Attorney Brown. It was moved by Commissioner Holmes, seconded by Commissioner Riley for discussion. Commissioner Pigatt asked if the terms of Ms. Harrell's employment has been discussed with her because she already has a job. Mayor Taylor said she wants the vote called on the signatures at this time. There being no further discussion,the motion on the resolution passed by a 3-2 vote. Vice Mayor Kelley No Commissioner Pigatt No Commissioner Riley Yes Commissioner Holmes Yes Mayor Taylor Yes d) A RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COMMISSION OF THE CITY OF OPA- LOCKA, FLORIDA, ADOPTING RESOLUTION(S) PURSUANT TO SECTION 4.5(B) OF THE CITY OF OPA-LOCKA CODE OF ORDINANCES, DIRECTING THAT AMOUNTS APPROPRIATED FOR CURRENT OPERATIONS FOR THE CURRENT FISCAL YEAR (FY 2017-2018) BE DEEMED ADOPTED FOR THE ENSUING FISCAL YEAR (FY 2018-2019) FOR A PERIOD OF FIFTEEN(15)DAYS,WITH ALL ITEMS PRORATED ACCORDINGLY,UNTIL Special Commission Meeting Minutes—10/02/2018 5 SUCH TIME AS THE COMMISSION ADOPTS AN ANNUAL BUDGET FOR THE ENSUING FISCAL YEAR (FY 2018-2019); PROVIDING FOR INCORPORATION OF RECITALS; PROVIDING FOR AN EFFECTIVE DATE.Sponsored by City Manager The above resolution was read by Attorney Brown. It was moved by Commissioner Riley, seconded by Commissioner Holmes for discussion. City Attorney Brown said this is necessary because the state has to give final approval for the budget. There being no further discussion, the motion on the resolution passed by a 3-2 vote. Vice Mayor Kelley No Commissioner Pigatt No Commissioner Riley Yes Commissioner Holmes Yes Mayor Taylor Yes 7. ADJOURNMENT: There being no further business to come before the Commission, it was moved by Commissioner Riley, seconded by Vice Mayor Kelley to adjourn the meeting at 3:14 p.m. / "11‘ % MAYOR ATTEST: ,A ■ L/: II fCITY CLERK Special Commission Meeting Minutes—10/02/2018 6