HomeMy Public PortalAbout2012_tcmin0104COUNCIL SPECIAL MEETING January 4, 2012
Council Chambers, 25 West Market Street, 7:00 p.m. Mayor Umstattd presiding.
Council Members Present: David Butler, Thomas Dunn, II, Katie Sheldon Hammler,
Fernando "Marty" Martinez, Kevin Wright and Mayor Umstattd.
Council Members Absent: None.
Staff Present: Town Manager John Wells, Deputy Town Attorney Barbara Notar and
Clerk of Council Lee Ann Green
AGENDA ITEMS
1. CALL TO ORDER
2. ROLL CALL: Showing all Council Members present
3. RESOLUTIONS AND MOTIONS
a. Appointing a Council Member
Mayor: I want to thank everybody for coming out tonight. Our understanding is Tom
Dunn is in the parking garage and on his way up, so we may wait a couple of minutes
for him. Questions have been asked if only five members of Council were present for a
vote whether three members would constitute the necessary majority and the answer is
no. It requires at least four Council Members voting for one applicant to appoint
anybody. So, whether Tom were here or not, the same rules would apply. Robert's
Rules of Order does not envision applicant speeches, but I am going to take that up in a
little bit. It doesn't prohibit them, it just does not envision them. Robert's Rules
envisions the calling out of nominee's names by Council Members followed by a listing
of the nominees by the chair in the order in which the chair hears them called out and
immediately subsequent to that, a vote on each nominee in the order listed by the chair.
Although Robert's Rules does not envision nominating speeches being given by Council
Members who nominate applicants, Robert's Rules doesn't specifically prohibit Council
Members from giving brief nominating speeches. So, any Council Member who
nominates anyone will get a chance to make a brief statement of support. Since Tom is
here, I am going to call to order this January 4, 2012 special meeting of the Leesburg
Town Council. We do have all sitting members of the Council present. As you can see
there are only six of us. I am going to ask Council Members if they just want to give
brief greetings, but on behalf of myself and the rest of Council we are thrilled that we got
22 applicants for this vacancy. That is unprecedented in our experience to see this level
of interest and to see how well qualified the applicants are and unfortunately we can
only chose one, so as I have said to a friend, that means we get to make 21 people angry
at us and one person happy but we are just really impressed with all of you and thank
you so much for being this interested in serving the town. Robert's Rules does not
require a second to any nomination. If Council Members get really excited about some
applicant, you may hear seconds and thirds, but all it takes is a nomination by a Council
Member. There is no second required. It is not treated as a normal motion. Robert's
Rules also does not envision a debate among Council Members over each nominee. So,
once I have taken down the nominees in the order in which I hear them, I will call out
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COUNCIL SPECIAL MEETING January 4, 2012
the name of the first nominee. But before we vote on the first nominee, I will ask the
nominating Council Member if he or she wishes to make a brief statement of support for
the individual that he or she nominated. Then I will ask for the vote on that nominee. If
that nominee gets at least four votes, the voting ends immediately and that individual is
appointed to the vacancy. If that nominee does not get at least four votes, then I will call
out the second nominee's name, ask if the Council Member nominating the individual
has a brief statement of support and then go to the vote on the second nominee and so
on until a nominee has gotten at least four votes or we have run through the list of
nominees in the first round with no one getting at least four votes. At that point, if no
one nominee in round one got at least four votes, we will start round two and reopen the
nominations. Council Members can nominate the same person two times, three times,
four times, or they can nominate a new person in each subsequent round and they do
not have to nominate anybody. One council member may chose simply to support the
nominee of another Council member. Council members are not required to vote for
only one nominee in each round. Council members have the right to vote for multiple
nominees in each round of nominations. So, if for example I wanted to vote for
Nominee number one when her name came up and she only got three votes, then I
could also vote for nominee two and nominee three, and nominee four. That applies to
all members of Council. According to Robert's Rules, when one nominee gets four or
more votes that ends the entire process and there will be no more votes on any other
nominees. In other words, the first nominee to get at least four votes wins. It doesn't
matter whether someone else might have gotten five or six votes in a subsequent round.
So, this is basically how it is going to work. I am going to ask Council Members to
make nominations. Then, when I have written down that list of nominees, I will ask the
- -- first Council member who nominated to make a brief statement of support, if they want
to, then I will ask for the vote on that nominee and on. The first thing I am going to do;
however, is restate what Robert's Rules envisions and in relation to applicant speeches.
Robert's Rules does not envision applicant speeches or nominee speeches, so unless
someone wants to make a motion to entertain applicant speeches, we will go forward
without them. Is there any such motion?
I am now pen ready and anybody who wants to nominate any of our many fine
applicants, now is the chance.
Martinez: I would like to nominate Kelly Burk.
Wright: I would like to nominate Neely Law.
Dunn: I would like to nominate Bob Zoldos.
Hammler: I would like to nominate David Schmidt
Butler: I would like to nominate Tom Marshall.
Mayor: I will nominate Terry Titus. In keeping with Robert's Rules, we have a list of
six nominees so I am going to go to Marty to see if he has a brief statement of support
for Kelly Burk.
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COUNCIL SPECIAL MEETING January 4, 2012
Martinez: (Inaudible)
Wright: In the last town council race where we were vetting issues related to the town,
Neely was the next highest vote getter and has also continued to serve on Boards and
Commissions.
Dunn: Bob has served on Town Council before. I think he did a great job and he has
done great work for the town of Leesburg.
Hammler: First of all, I did want to echo the Mayor's comments. The number of very
qualified and passionate Leesburg citizens who came forward was humbling, so thank
you all very much for taking the time and effort to do that, for those of you who came
this evening. As you recall, Madam Mayor, we were in the same situation last time,
actually when Kelly Burk moved on to the Board of Supervisors. Dave Schmidt who
had served previously on Council was willing and able to serve a very short term on
Council in the same sort of time period in which we immediately went into a budget
session, so I appreciate the fact that he has previous Council experience and this is, in
fact, going to be a pretty tough budget year again. So, another decision making
parameter is ensuring that we can toe the line on the tax rate as well as not reintroduce
any major new capital projects given the debt ceiling. Given Dave's track record on his
votes in the past and his service to the town, I fully support his nomination.
Butler: First, a quick comment. I would like to remind everybody, especially folks in
the audience that aren't used to something like this, this is one of the most purely
political things that we do on Town Council, so I hope that no one is offended by a vote
for or against them. It is all ... there are plans within plans within plans, so it is just a
weird thing. But, Tom, like Neely, finished fourth in a town election right behind Ken
Reid, so I think that's important because the people have shown a preference there.
Tom also served very ably serving Leesburg on the County School Board over the past
four years.
Mayor: In support of Terry Titus, I would like to say that Terry is one of four of the
applicants who has actually been elected to Town Council in the past. Terry was on the
County planning commission for a number of years. He has remained active in town
issues, most recently serving on the utility rate advisory committee, where he has taken
the initiative to try to find a compromise position that would be amendable to the
Council as a whole as well as to the URAC. Terry is a long time resident of Leesburg.
Is very easy to work with, is a fiscal conservative. I am confident he would not support
bringing on board any major new expenditures that would threaten us with exceeding
our debt limit ceiling and I believe he would also vote to hold the tax rate and not
increase it. For that reason, I am very happy to nominate Terry Titus. We now have all
nominations. We have all nominating speeches and I am now going to go through the
list of nominees and ask for the votes aye or nay and depending on how well I hear this,
I may need to clarify.
The vote for Kelly Burk failed by the following vote:
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COUNCIL SPECIAL MEETING January 4, 2012
Aye: Umstattd, Martinez and Butler
Nay: Wright, Dunn and Hammler
Vote: 3 -3
The vote for Neely Law failed by the following vote:
Aye: Wright, Martinez, and Butler
Nay: Umstattd, Hammler and Dunn
Vote: 3 -3
The vote for Bob Zoldos failed by the following vote:
Aye: Dunn, Wright, and Hammler
Nay: Martinez, Umstattd and Butler
Vote: 3 -3
The vote for Dave Schmidt failed by the following vote:
Aye: Dunn, Wright and Hammler
Nay: Umstattd, Martinez, and Butler
Vote: 3 -3
The vote for Tom Marshall failed by the following vote:
Aye: Butler, Umstattd and Martinez
Nay: Hammler, Wright and Dunn
Vote: 3 -3
The vote for Terry Titus was approved by the following vote:
Aye: Umstattd, Hammler, Dunn and Martinez
Nay: Butler and Wright
Vote: 4 -2
Mayor: Terry Titus, welcome to the Town Council. Thank you all very much for being
here. We are sorry we couldn't select all of you. If Council Members want to say
anything...
Hammler: Nothing additional, but I do appreciate everybody else coming out this
evening.
Martinez: I just want to say thank you to all of you that did come out and I got a chance
to talk to. I agree with the Mayor and Katie that it is really great to see this many people
interested in this seat. We have a special election coming up and we have November
elections. I hope we get this much enthusiasm and participation in those. Truly, thank
you for coming out. It is not easy to go through this. It is pretty brutal for us to sit here
and try to make these decisions on who we want up here with u s. I would much rather
you guys go through an election than us having to choose you. Thank you for coming.
We really appreciate it.
Wright: I would echo Marty's comments. I would remind those of you who are
interested in running in either the special or the general, you can start circulating those
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COUNCIL SPECIAL MEETING January 4, 2012
petitions now and we would love to see a bunch of faces on those ballots. Don't all 22
of you run in the special. That might get a little weird, but we would definitely want to
see you guys out and running and it is great to see that many folks out and involved.
Really appreciate your involvement, although I will have to disagree with the mayor
when she said we will upset 21. I am pretty sure we have managed to upset more than
that through this process, but thank you all very much.
Dunn: Thank you again for showing your interest. Please, as others have said, show
your interest in the special election coming up and in November. I can speak for at least
this Council Member, maybe not for all of them, but we need a new bunch of people up
here. So, please get out there and run for election.
Mayor: Thank you very much.
On a motion by Council Member Martinez, seconded by Council Member Dunn, the
following was proposed.•
RESOLUTION 2012 -001
Making an Appointment to the Town Council
The motion was approved by the following vote:
Aye: Butler, Dunn, Hammler, Martinez, Wright and Mayor Umstattd
Nay: None
Vote: 6 -0
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On a motion by Council Member Martinez, seconded by Council Member
Wright, the meeting was adjourned at 7:19 p.m.
C. mstattd, Mayor
Town of Leesburg
Clerk of Co nc'
2012 tcmin0104
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