Common Council - Regular Meeting

All right. Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to the first meeting of 2026 for the Charles Town City Council. It's January 5th, 6:30 p.m. Glad to see everybody out tonight. We'll begin our meeting as usual with our pledge of allegiance. Please join me to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you so much. Our invocation tonight will be by Reverend Joel Waters from the Living Waters House of Prayer. last name. Anyway, thank you for the opportunity to be here. Our heavenly father, Lord, we thank you for this day. Thank you, God, for watching over us and keeping us and giving us another year. We ask you, Lord, that you'd lead us and guide us in a direction that you want us to go for another year down the road that we may be able. We ask you Lord that you bless each and every home that's gathered the earth. Lead us and guide us there. Let us be like a city that's set upon a hill. Lord give us the opportunity to serve one another. Be with one another. Serve our friends in our community. We ask you Lord that you help us each and every one. I ask this in Jesus name and amen. Amen.

Amen. Thank you. And I apologize for the typo your name. Sometimes things happen. report. All right, we'll have our roll call. Let the let the record show the meeting is being live streamed by Under Production Multimedia. And we'll have our roll call. Bo Bertram here, Ronnie Ble here, Shannon Elder here, Brian Hester, Jack here. Let the record show Mayis is present as well as deputy clerk treasure Deborah Miles. And we have our attorney Michael Wilder for council and sending in for Perry McCall Tyler Miller. An agenda has been provided. We need a motion to approve. Make a motion.

Motion made by Ronnie Levens. Second. Second by Shannon Elder. Any edits? Hearing none. All in favor say I. Any opposed? That's unanimous. We have our standing business which includes our meeting minutes approval from our meeting in December. December 1st our current claims and our payroll allowance docket from November 24th to December 28th. Entertain a motion to approve. Make a motion. Motion by Shannon Hillary. Second. Second by Ronnie Bleven. Any questions or edits? Hearing none. All in favor say I. Any opposed? That's unanimous.

Is there anyone signed up for public comments tonight? Come forward and state your name and address. Debbie Smith 8824 sat. I have two things. The first one is it possible to get a sign put up in front of the kettle where it's handicapped because that paint unless you look at the curve the paint where the wheelchair supposed to represent it handicap is worn. You can't really see anything and people just some people know to work there other people don't. And where the ramp is that kind of goes up people park in it and go pick up orders. So, I was just wondering if there's a way. We'll look at if we can't get a sign, we'll restart the curve.

Well, I notic there's a sign out here and there eight new signs down here where H&R block it. Shouldn't be a problem. We can get Okay. And then where lifespans is, and I know it's public parking, you can park anywhere you want. But is there a way that somebody could talk to them about having their employees park over on the other side of the building instead of parking right in front of it, which when people go to the kettle at lunchtime, there's no parking spaces. They have to go down to Grayson's funeral home and park over there if there's not a funeral. Um, and people think they're so busy they don't even they just keep on going and they don't come in to eat. I mean, I can email Beth Keen and ask her to park.

I've been up there in the mornings and I've watched people just swipe their bags, go in the same door, and park their car. At least three or four of them. It is public parking, so I can't I can't make them do that. But Bess is very good to work with and so I'll just send her an email and she she can mention that too. I just wonder because on the other side there's hardly anybody parked over there. Sure. Yep. I can email her and ask her. Okay. That's all I had. Just those two. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Those are pretty easy things to solve. All right. Our legislative youth adviser is with us tonight.

Hi. Happy New Year. Happy New Year. All right. During winter break, our CHS athletics have been extremely active. To kick us off, we would like to give a shout out to Chesnney Jackson and Alexis Finchum for being MVP and Alexis for being all tournament team for the Lauren Hill Classic champs for varsity as well as JV for their win for the Lauren Hill JV tournament which was 30 to 27 over in Union County. and for MVP Evie Howard and alternate team Kayla Bryant. Next, uh the boys basketball team participated in the Phil Hawks Memorial Tournament, beating Mville in the final game 63 to 55 in overtime with Anthony Fresh leading all scores with 36. We also would like to congratulate Boomer Hester for finishing at third and Jackson Brody in eighth on the Spartan Classic podium. Our congratulations also go out to all four Lady Pirate wrestlers who advanced to regionals. Sabrina Arabi took fourth, Madison Liscoco took fourth, Caitlyn Brown took fourth, and Ellis Shaw took first place, becoming a backto-back sectional champion. And lastly, we would like to congratulate the CHS swim team for bringing home first place for the boys and second place for the girls against North Bern last night.

Wonderful. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you

for mayor's comments. I have two things to address. One, we are at the at the end of the development of the comprehensive plan process. Um, thank you everybody for their feedback and the survey and the steering committee work. Um, the public hearing on that is scheduled for next Monday the 12th during the plan commission meeting that's been advertised. Once the planning commission hears it, they will make or not make a recommendation for it to come before the council for final approval. So that will be on your agenda for your February meeting. So I encourage you to attend or watch the plan commission meeting. Um Tony when he sends out the packet will send out the link to that draft plan and you'll be included in that so that you have plenty of time to look over it before receiving the plan commission's response and feedback from the public hearing at your February meeting. So that's one thing. Um I saw the draft. I was a little surprised by some of the statistics. Um I think you will be too in a good way and I think you will be too. You see our updated demographic analysis. So Charles Town is doing some very good things. Um the second thing I wanted to issue a formal invitation as well as I can knowing that you are a body that's governed by open door laws and I can't have more than three of you in one place at a time or more than two of you in one place at a time. Starting on January 29th, I'm going to be leading a what we're calling develop Charles Town civics engagement workshop at the library for six weeks on Thursday nights from 6:00 to 8:30. And I just wanted to offer the opportunity. We'll be covering things like how municipal government works, how we get our finances, what pools of money that can go into projects that we can solve together. It's open from middle school all the way up, limited to 20 participants for the first run. It's free for people just to come and learn about their government, participate in a

problem solving exercise. And I have invited um Don Kuber to come if she wants to talk about municipal finance. And I want to issue that invitation to you as well. If you're interested in coming, I just ask that you let me know one of those dates so that we don't have more than two of you on the same date just to be square with all of our open doors. Um but if you want to particip at any point for an evening and introduce yourselves and talk about your role as a council member and what you see happening in the city. I'll be happy to have you there too. Just let me know if you know how to find me. Again, that's the 29th of January for six weeks Thursday night. All right, open it up for council comments.

Uh great job city workers for the Christmas display they did. It was an amazing job. They did a great job here on the building uh activity spark. Sorry. Uh great job. Just want to say great job and the work you're doing fabulous job. We had amazing feedback this year by the way. Great job. Very good feedback. Anything else? Ditto. Can't say it any better. I mean a word for consis.

I mean we I did send an email and I try to get across to everybody. I think you for But I mean, it it it takes an army. I've said it a couple times. It takes an army. And I I've heard nothing but positive feedback everywhere from everybody that's come around. So, a lot of good things. A lot of people like the trolley. So, that was a pretty big hit. I know we're we just got it and a couple little buzz to work through, but I think next year it'll be an even bigger hit. So, there's at least one night where it sold out before it went down. um it sold out and um everybody that wrote it had great feedback about the experience. I just think it's a great addition. I mean, especially what we got going on. So, I think a lot of a lot of good things, a lot of forward thinking. So,

and to be clear, I want to make sure that everybody understands the reason it went down isn't anything hugely. It's just some trash in the fuel line because it sat for so long. It was one of because Chuck called me. He said, "What's wrong with the truck?" I said, "It's fine. It's the easy fix. It's just that the day that it went down, we had two garbage trucks, a dump truck, and a forklift go down at the same time. And our mechanic who works on those things was leaving the next day for two weeks. And so when I had to choose between trash trucks and trolley, we went with trash trucks. So, well, I think a lot of forward thinking, I mean, it gets better and better every year. So, again, big deal. Anything else?

Okay, we'll move on through. No public hearings or old business, straight into new business. First up on your agenda is you need to elect your council president for Nominate Brian Hester. We have a nomination of Brian Hester. Are there any other nominations? Since there are no other nominations, by default, it goes to Brian Tester. But if you want to make a motion, though, you certainly I'll make a motion. Make sure it sticks. Chuck makes the motion. Shannon Elderain. I think even if you abain, you're still there, sir.

All in favor say I. Any opposed? Don't do it. All right. So, Brian will serve continue to serve as council president for 2026. And then, uh, the ordinance that you have before you tonight for first reading is on the parking update. So, for about what, three years now, Tony?

Yeah. Um, I asked Tony about three years ago to start working on a list of streets and figure out a way to help with traffic because we were having a problem with certain streets where people park on both sides of the road with not only regular commuter traffic getting through, but also snow plows, garbage trucks, and fire engines. We originally hoped it would be as simple as saying don't park on the side of the street with fire hydrants, but unfortunately that's not how our fire hydrants work. and some of them are zigzagging across the street and that makes that difficult. So for three years, Tony and Tubby have driven all 50 miles of the city during peak parking times to try to identify roads that need to be restricted to one side or cold sacks that need no street parking when small cold sacks. So that's what this ordinance does. It's an it's actually it takes the other parking restrictions we had such as parking on hard pan surfaces, not your grass, not not parking their fire hydrants, not parking their crosswalks, all of that as well. But the biggest substantial change is this exhibit A that you have a hard copy of here that lists the streets and which way to park.

Uh it should be in your in your pack in your back. Yes. So my recommendation would be for you to consider this on first reading only tonight so that you can take this exhibit A and look it over and if there is a street that doesn't work in some way that you need to recommend amend or if we have left a road or a street or closed back off by accident that you think should be included based on your knowledge of your districts. We need to put it on the table first before we talk about

yes I just need a motion I'll just ask a question. So social media is not the fix for anything. I believe that wholeheartedly but it does get the word out. and we post this to the Charleston social media site where it gets the word out from the city and I'm not saying we're not going to have arguments about it and if people want to be harsh about it we just delete the comment. I mean sorry about it but we can't delete comments.

Well, we just stop we're not talking about it. We don't need to be about it but I'll just say I live on Burst Drive. It's a dead end street. Pine drive breaks off of us and it's got a little toack where you can actually turn around. So that one's not so hard. But when you got a dead end street and there's some places out there that do that we're not we may miss or we may not think about or something like that and in the cold it's easy may be easier to turn around. So I may say hey don't park on my street if you live on a dead street. She may say and it may not be the right thing but at least we can have a discussion. Well, they can evaluate it if if

right at least we get the word out and Tony and Tubby, they could all see that and we can we at least talk about it. So, my recommendation would be rather than using Facebook as a form to gather that data, we can publish it there so that people are aware of it. But Ryan can easily create a jot form. That's where where people can provide feedback or he can link them to the existing jot forms we have like our road hazard jot form that's out where people can report that and although that won't keep people from commenting what we can say is your Facebook comments will not be considered a part of any consideration in order to have your voice heard you must click on I'd rather take it to where you can compile it and have it all in one spreadsheet

we can do that in J form with the spreadsheet rather than trying to use social media is just there for social media. Yeah. So, if we could do it that way, I think that would help everybody. Uh, and if we could have maybe access to that when he gets that, put a deadline on it be well before our next meeting. Sure. That way, if it's in I mean, I cover the whole city. So, I would like to go out and see him, but if it's in Ronny's or Shannon, Brian, both Yep. we can go anywhere. So, what I will have Brian do then is publish the proposed list now with this ordinance. Yep. and ask that people review the ordinance in the list and any additional feedback can be sent to the job form. I think it' be great.

Once we get that um we'll set a date for it. Once we get that back, Brian can disseminate that to the council in advance of your next Yeah. And if that job form has got ways we can get a hold of people, I'd actually call and talk to them and look at it too. Can't guarantee they'll put in their contact. I I get that, but at least we give them the opportunity. So, okay. Can I tell you how I come up with that list? just come forward so we can hear. Yeah.

Yeah. When we we considered these streets, a lot of like said the fire hydrants was number one thing. That's when we found out we don't have enough fire hydrants. We they're mismatched all all over the place. So, we had to take that in consideration. Then we took the size of the street, how you know how much traffic's on them. Then when you get places, some of the places you think, okay, well, why are these people parking on street? Well, you look only like half of them have driveways. So we had to take that in consideration, you know, and then of course businesses we take consideration. So but people come when you're talking to people, you need to ask them, do you have a driveway? Does your neighbor have a driveway? You know, or is there a firefighter?

For expediency, I would So my fear is that if we have five council members communicating individually with different people, we don't know who Chuck talked to. Chuck doesn't know if that person also talked to Shannon or Ronnie or Brian or Bo. So my advice here would be to collect the data on the job form and then we can have our staff follow up with them and check out the road because that way it's centrally located with Tony and Tubby who have already done this list and then he can reach out to one of us and if you hear something that needs to be evaluated you can let them know as well but I'd rather that come through one central office rather than have it scattered.

My only my only thought is on the whole process and I again I'm not going to say I got the right way to do it. I just want to make sure that we give everybody an opportunity. Yep. Yeah. To put their stuff out there. When we did this, we we took that against like I was telling them, you know, we knew there was going to be streets that we seen, but you guys see them different like Birch, you know, we went through there. I just don't for some reason in my head we did. You drive it once. He drives it every day. I just want to make sure everybody Yeah, they have a chance. Yep. Here's your chance. So we can collect the data and then Brian can sort it and give it to Tom and Tubby and have re-evaluate and we'll provide for you at the next meeting a summary of

and the reason the reason we're doing all this is because when we started this Paris look here's your old problem. We've had like 37 different ordinances for streets. Yep. You know over the years that's just what happens when you forget we parking on that street and sign take it down. Perry. So, well, if you do it this way, you can add and subtract and keep it in the same organs, right? Part of the agenda. I think it's a great idea. I mean, I really do. I just give a chance. Yeah. I've been I've been approached a couple times about certain streets. Actually, went to the chief and asked him about looking at those streets.

All right. So, I'll have Ryan post that um once you guys get this, if you want to table it tonight and do it on first reading next time, you can. But, um if you want to pass it on first reading, we can collect the data and you can look at it for a second and finally read it at your next meeting. I make a motion we pass on the first reading. Okay. So, I have a motion from Chuck. Second. Second from Brian Tester. Any other questions on that? All in favor of passing on first reading say I. Any opposed? That's unanimous. So, we will get that information out, collect the data, give it back to Tony and Tubby, and let them um re-evaluate and follow back up with you in advance of the next meeting. Tony, thank you for getting this together. Took longer. No, thank you for doing it.

Ma'am, I see your question. We don't normally take outside of the but I mean, if the council has no issues, I'm happy to hear what it is that you have to say. Question. Yeah. I'm just wondering once it's all done, which I don't have a problem with doing all this, but once it's done, will it be enforced if somebody parks Yes, ma'am. The ordinance the ordinance has um fines and penalties for people who fail to to go on. That's part of the ordinance and that's what some of the problem is. If you talk to the police department, they can't enforce. That's why I was wondering people parked in front of people's mailboxes and I was just that's why I was asking.

All right. So, we have that passed on screening. That's our final business for tonight. I'll get Ryan to get that posted on our website for feedback on the job form. Tony and Tubby will evaluate the ones that come in and provide a summary for anything that was added in advance of your next council meeting and follow up with you guys. And if you obviously have Yeah, happy to. Um, if there's no other item of business for tonight, I just need a motion to adjurnn. I'll make a motion. Motion by Chuck De. Second by Shannber. All in favor say I. I. Any oppos? That's unanimous. Don't forget to sign the claims.