Board of Works and Public Safety - Regular Meeting

Let's stop all the fun having now. Let's get to the serious matter of this Board of Works meeting. Will you please stand and join me for the Pledge of Allegiance?

I pledge allegiance 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.

All right, can we do the roll call?

Mayor Bonta?

Here.

Member Newell? Member Lewis? Here. Member Farkas? Here. Member Mileta?

Here.

Did everybody have a chance to take a look at the minutes for both the 24th and the 14th? And is there motions on those minutes or any other comments?

I'll make a motion. We approve the minutes from 3-24-26 and 4-14-26.

I'll second that motion.

So we have a motion and a second. All in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. All right, that gets us to new business. Recommendation of award, the 2026 Street Paving and Repair.

An award letter was sent to the clerk's office. I didn't see it in the drop box, but the department would recommend award of our paving project to Reith Riley Construction in the amount of $1,285,242. They were just under milestones $1,294,973.10. So they're responsive, they're responsible, they're the low bidder. We would recommend that the board award to Ruth Riley.

I'll make a motion. We approve the award for the 2026 Street Paving and Repair to Reith Riley in the amount of $1,285,242 based on staff recommendation.

I'll second that.

So we have a motion and a second. All in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Thank you. Thank you. We have employee restoration of vacation time due to work comp. Mr. Reeder.

Aye.

Yes, this is one of the street department employees. Just with reference, we're going to keep the name kind of private here, but you should have that name in front of you. This particular employee got hurt back in 2025. The majority of the year was a very serious injury underneath workman's comp claim, and he was not able to use... any of his vacation personal or sick time during that month. But the sick time didn't carry over. We're just talking about his vacation. There's about five weeks that he was unable to do. Out of 2025, he was on workman's comp for about 10 months. He was not able to use any of that time and carry over in 2026. With this unique situation we're asking the board to forward those five weeks into 2026 for this employee underneath these circumstances.

Randy, I know that this is a unique circumstance, but my understanding is this is consistent with some past practice that we've done before, or is there some precedent with this? Maybe not the same timeframe, but it's the same concept. Is that fair to say?

Yeah, we actually talked about this together, and yes, this is common practice. It is my recommendation legally that the board consider this and approve it. Thank you.

I'll make a motion that we approve the forwarding of the five weeks vacation to 2026. Second.

We have a motion and a second. All in favor please signify by saying aye. Aye. Thank you. Thank you. Then we have the sidewalk waiver for 2220 Locust Street.

Here, storage is wanting to develop a couple vacant lots on Locust and Clem, and they have requested a waiver from installing sidewalks. I believe there are already curbs in that area, so they won't have to install that, but they want to pay for the waiver rather than install the sidewalks.

This is Locust. This is like the northwest section, northwest of Dombey, right?

There's no sidewalks in that area.

There's some across the street. But not on that. Correct.

And this is for us to prove them paying for the waiver.

Correct. Their amount of the waiver, they had 527 feet of frontage. Their waiver amount would be $13,177.50. Are those other buildings around? Are those homes on the other side of the street? They are businesses. I'm not sure who's over there at the point, but just south of them is an existing storage facility.

Sure. Just want to make sure that it was consistent with what's also on the street. That makes some sense. If it was like a neighborhood, like with homes on all sides, I'd feel a whole lot differently about making sure that it's consistent.

Plus, they're paying the waiver, so we could always decide we want sidewalks. Exactly.

I'll make a motion we approve the sidewalk waiver for 2220 Locust Street.

Second.

So we have a motion and a second. All in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. That gets us to sidewalk waiver for Robins road in Brookside subdivision.

So the, the sidewalk waiver for Robins road is actually, it exists. There's a curb. There's an existing curb and sidewalk waiver for Robins road in the Brookside subdivision. Um, it was approved by the board of works, uh, in April of 2021, but in lieu of payments for those waivers that were approved, The board wanted the developer to install a bridge over part of Robin's Ditch. They said they would do that, exactly. So it's five years later and they no longer want to install this bridge. Therefore, they would like to come back and pay for those waivers that they received five years ago.

And I'm just gonna ask, those waivers plus the inflation of those five years, correct?

We haven't increased our fees for curbs or sidewalks since then.

We need to revisit that.

Do we have the option, Dan, to deny this waiver and say we need you to build the bridge as promised?

There's no expiration date on them building a bridge. I mean, the fact of the matter is they're out of compliance with their promise.

I mean, I would have to, I'd have to look into that. I mean, so if you want to make a decision, you know, today, but I mean, I could research that and come back to you with information if you want to table it. But I mean, I don't, you know, I'd have to look into that.

As somebody who was here when we did all this, I do remember this because it's quite contentious that we filled in everything but that one stretch of ditch. And I understand there was restrictions because it's different jurisdictions.

It was all due to the permitting, the burning process. They could only permit so much. And honestly, I mean, it is the City of Portage's goal at some point to fill in the rest of the ditch and install a proper curb and sidewalk. I just don't know when that's going to take place.

I think, but it's because I remember that meeting. I wasn't on this board, but my father was on the storm board at the time, and I... he takes credit for it. I don't know if it was entirely his idea, but he had a big role in pushing for that being the at least temporary solution there. I mean, I would put it this way. If they're here saying, hey, we haven't done the bridge yet, we want to not do the bridge, are they asking that they just pay? Is that what they're trying to do?

Correct. So their current waivers are the curb waiver on Robins is a total of $22,500, and their sidewalk waiver on Robins is $36,000. So they would rather pay the $58,500.

How much is the, not that I'm expecting you to know, but how much is the bridge?

I believe back in 2021, it was estimated it would be about 50 grand.

I mean, I'm very comfortable. I mean, it's a, I mean, I'm not the only member here and I'm kind of be cautious as the chair, but I mean, the city stipulated that they do this. They agreed to it. Quite frankly, I mean, I don't know if we should have been on them sooner, like code enforcement wise in the last five years to get the bridge built, but yeah, I mean, I don't feel particularly comfortable letting them get away with not building the bridge, like Promise.

So they are a large developer, and we still have subdivision bonds. So we have letters of credit in place which cover any infrastructure that hasn't been installed or that is failing. So we've managed to hold onto those bonds because of this situation.

I see. So we do have the ability to force them to do what they said they do and build the bridge. I just think that that's safer for the community. I'd love to see that ditch get filled, you know, in the future. But until it's filled, I think a bridge is better than nothing, you know?

Well, I guess that's my question.

What would it cost us to put in? Is that enough money to cover? Well, I mean...

I guess what you're asking is, is it enough money for us to build the bridge if they pay it and then we do it? Yeah.

So they already received, seems really loud, they already received a curb waiver for the undeveloped section of Airport Road. they paid for that because they knew that that would be a project that the city of Portage would have to undertake. But on the next slide item on the agenda, they're here asking for a sidewalk waiver for that undeveloped portion of Airport Road. Obviously, if you want them to build the bridge, we would have to deny that waiver because we wouldn't want the sidewalk to connect.

Yeah, we don't want to have a bridge.

So what is the staff's recommendation we do with this? You guys are more intently involved.

So, I mean, our dream would be to fill the ditch and build it appropriately. I just don't know the time frame, you know. Ultimately, we don't want this bridge. We definitely don't want the maintenance of this bridge. We have enough of our own maintenance issues. So yeah, it would be nice. I just don't know how long it would take for us to fulfill our dreams.

I don't mind if you guys want to table it, just to keep talking on that, because it sounds like the enforcement side, we've got it. I think the question is just, is that the solution or another one? Because ultimately... Yeah, I didn't know about the bond still being out.

We've got a lot of information floating out there to use for enforcement if we want to, but it sounds like we've got...

lot of other conversations so I that's what I'm hearing from you know from the speaking aloud the best thing in the world would be to fill the ditch and then build a sidewalk over it you know but filling the ditch is more expensive than building the bridge but at the same time if we build a bridge and then later get the ditch filled you know I think a little bit more time would be beneficial knowing that we do have some enforcement mechanism already it's not just as simple as you know

Something else to consider too is that there haven't been sidewalks there in forever. Kids know to use the west side of the road because there is a continuous sidewalk. We haven't gotten any complaints about it going in. We've had a lot of complaints about the ditches going to

take in a car but nothing about the sidewalk in the event because it's funny i've asked the police chief how often in the past you know five years has anybody driven into that ditch zero and i say that i'm always cautious about saying it because the second i say that out loud you know it'll be it'll be me only takes one did the bridge have a safety component to it? Like if the bridge is built as they proposed over the ditch, is that safer from the perspective of a car or would there still be room for a car to have an accident?

So there is the ditch that runs parallel with airport road. That ditch takes a 90 degree turn to go east towards Robins Road. The bridge is just to go over that eastern, the east-west portion. So the ditch parallel with the road is going to stay. There's nothing gonna change there.

Yeah, I think you'll go ahead, yeah, yeah. I make a motion that we table the sidewalk waiver for Robins and Airport Road for further discussion.

One sec.

We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. That'll get us to the Board of Works claims. So first, letter A-4-29-26.

I'll make a motion we approve the Board of Work claims dated 4-29-26 in the amount of $720,715.37. I'll second.

We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. That'll get us to payroll claims. We have pension payroll February 2026.

Make a motion we approve the pension payroll for February 26, the amount of $206,047.62. I'll second that.

We have a motion and a second. All in favor please signify by saying aye. Aye. That gets us to pension payroll for March of 2026.

Make a motion we approve the pension payroll for March 26 in the amount of $206,047.62. I'll second that.

We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. We have the C, payroll for 32026.

Make a motion to approve the payroll for 326.26, the amount of $2,080,863.36.

I'll second. We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. And then, if I'm keeping track, we still have payroll for 4-2-26.

Make a motion we approve the payroll for 4-2 of 26 in the amount of $2,436,255.10. Second. So we have a motion and a second.

All in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Thank you. That'll get us to bulk appeals. 50-30, independents.

yes mayor and members i was able to communicate by using the email on that form that was submitted so i did communicate the changes of this this meeting to them so i did not get a response back to it but if you wanted to if you feel comfortable proceeding with this we can was the resident saying that they wanted to come No, there was no indication on that.

Because if somebody wanted to be in person, I think we can wait for them. But if that wasn't indicated, you know.

So I'm asking that, I don't know, 50-30 independence, anyone? 50-30 independence? No one here? So I'm asking the board to uphold the $40 charge on this particular situation.

I'll make a motion we uphold the $40 charge for 50-30 independence.

I'll second. So we have a motion and a second. All in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye.

The next one is 6686 Federal. This one changed from the agenda from Tuesday, and this one was added. So I was not able to make any contact with this individual. So I was not aware that this one was going to be on there. I'm asking the board to possibly table this to the next board of works if they feel comfortable with that.

I'll make a motion we table the bulk appeal for 6686 Federal Avenue.

I'll second that.

We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye.

And I'll reach out to this individual that the next scheduled Board of Works.

Thank you. All right. Any other matters before the board, or is there a motion to adjourn?

Motion to adjourn.

I'll second.

All in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Thank you.