COUNCIL PROCEEDINGS OF THE CITY OF SHREVEPORT, LOUISIANA

FEBRUARY 24, 2004

The Regular Meeting of the City Council of the City of Shreveport, State of Louisiana, was called to order by Chairman Thomas Carmody at 3:00 p.m., Tuesday, February 24, 2004, in the Government Chambers in Government Plaza (505 Travis Street).

Invocation was given by Councilman Walford.

On Roll Call, the following members were Present: Councilmen Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Absent: None.

Approve Minutes. Motion by Councilman Green, seconded by Councilman Lester to approve the Administrative Conference Summary Minutes of February 9, 2004 and the Council Meeting Minutes of February 10, 2004. Motion approved by the following vote: Councilmen Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

Awards, Recognition of Distinguished Guests, and Communications of the Mayor which are required by law.

Distinguished Guest: Res. 183 of 2003: To name Evangel Christian Academy’s Evangel Eagles as an official Goodwill Ambassador for the city of Shreveport. (G/Jackson) [No Action Taken]

Distinguished Guest: Res. 23 of 2004: To recognize Alvin Mims for his public service to the City of Shreveport and this community. (B/Walford) [See Resolutions on Second Reading and Final Passage]

Distinguished Guest: Res. 40 of 2004: Al Kessler, Chair of the Shreveport Chamber of Commerce's I-49 North Coalition. (D/Gibson) [See Resolutions on Second Reading and Final Passage]

Distinguished Guest: Patricia Hewitt and the Board Members, from the West Caperton Concerned Citizens Homeowners Association.

Councilman Jackson: I think I’m half ready so- - - Mr. Chairman and to the City Councilman, I’d like to at this time, like to ask if Ms. Patricia Hewitt and the Board Members who are here from the West Caperton Concerned Citizens Homeowners Association of District G, if they would to come now.

Thank you and to my colleagues and others who are here, to introduce to you all and also to take this moment as a moment of commendation, if you will, for this group who all reside in Queensborough and more specifically on several blocks of West Caperton in Queensborough. But it also encompasses more than West Caperton, but it was the men and women from this area, Ms. Bobbie Henderson and others, Mr. Jonas Gibbs Kelly, Mr. Brown and Mrs Hewitt who are here today. Ms. Hewitt is serving currently as the president. Had a chance to meet with them on Saturday morning at a breakfast that they do annually and recognize many of the people throughout their community for doing great work.

And I wanted to say to the Chief and to others that I think these are the kinds of efforts that keep even the neighborhoods that have ostensibly, I guess that’s had history of being crime ridden, you see that the numbers decrease when the people care about where they live and take pride in their streets.

I wanted to commend them because they work together and they also recognize individuals throughout their community who are part of their homeowners association, who keep their yards up and they have a "Yard of the Month" and they do several things. And I just wanted them to come so that we could recognize them publicly for the good works that they do. So often, we talk about a lot of the negative things that may go on, not only in Queensborough, but in different parts of our City. But I wanted you to know that amidst all of what’s going on, many people have said and I’ve said before that there is a fallacy that darkness is the opposite of light. Truthfully, darkness is not the opposite of light, darkness is the absence of light. And what happens in many of our communities amounts to darkness because there is not light there.

But I want to commend this group because even in situations around them that may seem like dark situations, they continue to hold the light of neighborhood, they hold the light of fellowship, the light of friendship (inaudible) in the midst of what seems to be darkness. And I just believe that, that’s contagious and I wanted to commend them. I want to ask Ms. Hewitt or Ms. Henderson or whoever is here, whoever would like to, if you’ll just make a comment, I want to ask my colleagues to join me in commending this organization for the work that they are doing and we certainly believe that there is still a lot of good work yet to be done and that the best is still yet to come, so congratulations on the work that you’re doing.

Ms. Hewitt: Good afternoon. (Inaudible) that you all have us here this afternoon to recognize us for the work that we do in our homeowners association which was founded by Ms. Bobbie Henderson and I’ve been president this past year and Chairperson, Mr. Gibbs. We do different things in our community. We read to the school kids in our neighborhood schools and we plant flowers on different days or whatever, we give to the community, the elderly, whatever needs to be done, we try to do. And we try to think positive, like you said, it is not that much that people do, in this day and time, particularly like you said in the Queensborough area, but we try to do our best, and we’ve been doing pretty good. We have little gatherings at Thanksgiving and Christmas time and stuff and we just get together as a community, as a people and you know, we try to serve (inaudible).

Councilman Jackson: Thank ya’ll so much and (inaudible) the work that you are doing.

  Councilman Jackson: Alright. Can you hear me now? I’d like to Mr. Chairman, recognize three other distinguished guests who are with us today. One who is no stranger to these Chambers, Mr. Fire Chief, Kelvin Cochran. Would you come, and also Ms. Sarah Carey and Ms. Markey Washington.

I figure since today is Mardi Gras and I didn’t know if anybody else would invite anybody else, so I thought I’d invite people who are members of my Krewe, the Krewe of Harambe, our King, Mr. Kelvin Cochran, our Queen Ms. Sarah Carey and our Captain, Ms. Markey Washington. They have done a great job this Mardi Gras season along with all the other Krewes in Shreveport.

I couldn’t get everybody here from all those other Krewes, but just on behalf of myself and I’m sure of my colleagues for all of those people who are out there who are involved in Mardi Gras celebrations in one shape or form or another, just wanted to commend you for the work that you’ve done and that you’re doing and certainly want to commend you on a wonderful production on Saturday, this Krewe who is a historic Krewe, I just wanted to say thank you for the doing the work that you do and tell you to keep up the good work.

Chief Cochran: Mr. Chairman and Council Members, on behalf of the Krewe of Harambe, and all other Krewes of Northwest Louisiana, it’s been a great Mardi Gras season and personally, I’ve experience Mardi Gras in a way that I’ve never experienced it before. To have a whole new level of appreciation of the wholesomeness of the Mardi Gras season.

The Krewe of Harambe. Harambe is a term, a Swahili term that means let’s all work together and the Krewe of Harambe has a community testimony that envisions, that speaks to our community coming together and working together for the good of Shreveport, LA. So on behalf of our lovely Queen and Captain, thank you for recognizing us today Councilman Jackson and everybody have a wonderful last day of celebration on this Fat Tuesday.

Councilman Green: I gotta say before you all go to congratulate you all in serving, I certainly see my member as being Captain and my number is 635-7118, if you all looking for a King next year.

Ms. Washington: Yes sir, we’ll take that thoroughly under consideration.

Councilman Jackson: Well, he wore his Mardi Gras clothes yesterday, you should’ve been here. He has his Mardi Gras tie on today.

Convention Center and Convention Center Hotel Project Report:

Mr. Antee: Each of y’all should have received- - - we handed out today, what we have spent to date on Convention Center construction and we will do that once a month at the last meeting of the month.

As for as the Convention Center Hotel report, I did meet yesterday with the design professionals as well as the developer and we have some preliminary numbers- - - construction costs of approximately $26 million which is down somewhat from what the original budget estimate was. They are still working on the various financing options to come up with information from Citigroup or Solomon Smith and looking at other options, it may make better sense to lower the interest rate and so once we get that in a position to where we can fully update you on what all the options are, then we will present it back to the Council as well as the Hotel Trust.

Councilman Jackson: Mr. Antee, obviously I don’t know if I’m talking about the right numbers and I may be wrong, but at the risk of being wrong, at one point, did we talk about somewhere in the $40 million dollars and $48 million dollars or something like that, was that the same number that’s applicable to this $26(million)?

Mr. Antee: No, that’s the entire project.

Councilman Jackson: Okay.

Mr. Antee: The hard construction costs - - -

Councilman Jackson: Oh, we’re just talking about the hard costs.

Mr. Antee: It’s just the hard costs based on the very preliminary estimates from Hunt Construction, who is doing our design review and construct-ability cost analysis along the way.

Councilman Jackson: What was the hard cost in that $48 (million) originally?

Mr. Antee: I think at one point, it was $28 million, then the latest budget was an estimate because after a couple of years ago, of about $30 million and now that they’ve done the conceptual design or they’re in the schematic design portion of it, they did a cost break down and its’ somewhere around $26 million for 300 rooms.

Councilman Jackson: So, anywhere from $2-4million is the difference in the real hard cost.

Mr. Antee: And that’s gonna continue to change hopefully, the less ones that are more than the unknowns in terms of what systems they are going in, right now, they’d have a pretty big contingency in there because the construction documents have not been completed to put out for hard bid. But that’s - - - they’ll price it at four different stages throughout this project, so that we don’t get to the end and see that the cost of the building would be a lot more and then have to go into some value engineering, we want to do that along the way that’s why we’ve got a construction doing the construct-ability and the cost estimate.

Councilman Jackson: Okay, what about the number of rooms in this hotel?

Mr. Antee: Right now, we’re looking at 300 rooms, give or take a few. They’ve also got an option in there for less rooms, 250 rooms but we’re looking at 300 rooms.

Councilman Jackson: Is that, and I don’t know- - - I apologize, I don’t know of any of those studies or anything that may have preceded this whole project, but is 300 the number, I mean the right number - - - I mean compatible number this size convention center and for the type of conventions that we intend to attract? And I’m assuming, 300 obviously is not, but I’m assuming when you mix in what else in the market to speak to the capacity, I don’t know, maybe just downtown, is 300 rooms adequate or is that just what we can afford to pay for? How did we arrive at 300?

Mr. Antee: There are several factors, primarily money is the first factor and that is what will the occupancy rate versus the room rate work out to where you can afford to build the hotel, and that number is there in the 300 rooms.

The other issue is for our local hotel owners and operators. If you have a convention that needs a thousand rooms or that there’s a thousand people and you got 300 rooms, well then that’s gonna afford the opportunity for all the other area hotels to share in providing rooms for those conventions. And so, that’s one of the things we want to have a huge economic impact and in doing that, we spread it around.

If you build a hotel and then kept all the conventioneers in that hotel, then the rest of the community and the rest of the local hotel owners do not get to participate as much in the spill off effect; so, that comes into play too. So when you put all those things in, what we’ve been told from day one, is anywhere from 275 to 325 rooms is the magic number to where it increases the economic impact for as many people as possible and it still gives us the hotel that we need to go after and be competitive in the convention market.

Councilman Gibson: Mr. Antee, you’ve used Hunt Construction. Have we signed a contract with Hunt for construction management services?

Mr. Antee: We have the proposed contract, but no, we have not signed a contract.

Councilman Gibson: So, they’re just working just to help us out on this thing?

Mr. Antee: No, they’ve been selected and we agreed to the terms and their proposed contract’s sitting on my desk. We just haven’t finalized it well, the Hotel Trust hasn’t signed it yet, but they were selected through a process by the Hotel Trust Board.

Councilman Gibson: And you’re saying that the Trust is comfortable with the- - - piggy backing off my colleagues comments, that based on the size of the hotel and the size of the Convention Center, that we will be able to attract the kind of conventions to make that Convention Center work?

I guess in my recollection in a consulting report, there were some stipulations in there about the size of the hotel in order to make that size of convention center work. I understand the philosophy of spreading the economic wealth around the community but at the same time, I guess we have some data to back up the fact that this Convention Center, the size that it is, over 300,000 square feet total within the confines of this box, that a 300 room hotel will be able to qualify us for some of the conventions that are out there in the market place?

Mr. Antee: If all we had was 300 room hotel or 300 rooms available for a convention, no it would not. But we’re not building a hotel that will accommodate 100% of all the conventions that we go after and that’s what I just explained. Councilman Gibson: I understand.

Mr. Antee: But we do have the information from PKF as well as discussions with SMG, who is in the convention business, that what we need to be competitive to go out and seek these conventions, a 300 room hotel is sufficient especially with the additional hotel rooms and the agreements with the single hotels and the other downtown hotels.

Councilman Gibson: Let me piggy back off that one comment on the casino/hotels. I recall, in sitting in on a meeting in 1998, in fact I think Anthony Sanflippo was the General Manager of Harrah’s at the time and the other casino who was represented and their hotel was on the drawing board, but they - - - is it still a commitment of the hotels and the casinos or the casino/hotels that they only wanted to be able to provide the City of Shreveport with a 5% overflow of support?

Mr. Antee: I’m not sure where you’re coming from with 5%. In the lease of the two casinos, there is language for hotel rooms based on 18 months out, 12 months out, 6 months out, that they have to provide a certain number of rooms.

Councilman Gibson: Let me clarify. When I was on the task force, we were meeting at that time in Mayor Williams’ office where the casinos were there and they specifically said to the City at that time, maybe they’ve changed since then, but I remember underlining my notes on it, that they were not there in terms of - - - they wanted their clientele to visit their hotel. But at that time, it was stated that they were in a position for 5% to be provided for if a convention center was built and the convention center hotel. Now, if they’re giving us more, I’m glad that the Administration has negotiated that, but that stuck in my mind that they wanted to make sure the public understood that these multi-story hotels that they were building were not so much for the convention business, but for their specific clientele and at that time in 1998, it was at 5%. Now again, if we’ve got something that increases that, I think that’s only better for the entire marketplace and I’m glad to see that the Administration is working with them to give us more capacity over there at those hotels.

I don’t want the public to take it or to misunderstand that because they see those high rises, that, that’s going to be our fall back position for hotel space in this area, because as I understood it, at that time, and that may have changed since then, that we had limited availability in the casino hotels.

Mr. Antee: Well, obviously, I’m not aware of the meeting you were at with the prior Mayor. But at that time, there was no hotel at Harrah’s and it wasn’t until Mayor Hightower got elected and went and met with them and stated that he would not support their renewal unless they built a hotel.

When that was done, we entered into the lease with Harrah’s or re-negotiated the lease with Harrah’s, and built in there percentages of rooms and it depends on how far out in advance and we can get that to you, but it starts out at a minimum of 25% of their winnings.

Councilman Gibson: Well, I’d like to see that information, because I think that’s great and again, I knew that the Mayor was on top of things in terms of negotiating with them. But again that was a concern of mine back then, yes, those hotels weren’t in place, but they were coming on line at the time that those plans were in place with both Hollywood and Harrah’s and I’m glad that we were able to turn their attention to helping us out on that, because again, you’re exactly right. It’s going to take all those hotel spaces to make that convention center work. So, if I could ask on behalf of my colleagues that all of us get that information, that would be helpful.

Councilman Hogan: Mr. Antee, I just wanted to ask you, of the work that’s been done so far, some $2.3million, this is mainly as I appreciate it for pilings for the foundation. Is that correct?

Mr. Antee: That’s, of the actual work being done, that is, yes. But in addition to that, there are several set up costs that were included in that as well as bonding costs. So there’s more than just the piles in that $2.3 million.

Councilman Hogan: Do we have someone assigned to inspect the work?

Mr. Antee: Yes.

Councilman Hogan: Is that- - - who would that be? Someone from Engineering?

Mr. Antee: Mike, do you know the - - -?

Councilman Carmody: I believe it is the architect, Mr. Antee.

Mr. Strong: (inaudible)

Mr. Antee: Yeah, but we also got our Buildings and Permit Inspectors out there and that’s where I was trying to get. Thought you were wanting a name of who that is.

Councilman Hogan: No, well, I’m sure for a project that size, it would probably be more than one person that does inspections. My point is I just hope we can keep things inspected and make sure that the work is done up to code and to specifications before the people get paid in order to avoid what happened recently - - - the 12 Mile Bayou work.

Mr. Antee: Well, we’ll definitely make sure that we can have the proper inspectors out there. However, somebody - - - it is.

Councilman Hogan: Okay, thank you.

Chairman Carmody: Mr. Antee, yesterday at our Work Session, I had asked about the scheduling of the Convention Center Hotel Trust Authority. Do we have a time for that meeting?

Mr. Antee: Well, we haven’t set it up yet, but.

Councilman Carmody: Okay. I believe that we had asked about a month ago to schedule a meeting so that we could have HRI as well as those other parties that were going to be involved, PKF come to meet, the Trust Authority.

Mr. Antee: I wasn’t aware that we were going to have somebody from PKF or that we had budgeted to have them come over. But we can get with you and set up a meeting with HRI. I’ll e-mail them prior to the close of this meeting today and see when they can be available to come up.

Councilman Carmody: Excellent Sir, I appreciate it. And along the lines of I guess two weeks ago, I know that we had asked Mr. Lafitte for an opinion regarding the Legislative Auditor’s recommendations to seek a refund. Is Mr. Lafitte in the Chamber? Welcome Sir, how are you?

Mr. Lafitte: Hello, how you doing this afternoon?

Councilman Carmody: Pretty well, thank you.

Mr. Lafitte: Yes, I did make contact with the Auditors Office and requested the information that Councilman Gibson spoke about two weeks ago and they are compiling that information. I updated Councilman Gibson yesterday in connection with that. They are compiling that information and giving it to us.

Councilman Carmody: And the opinion then would be forthcoming after you receive that information?

Mr. Lafitte: After I receive that information. In fact, I spoke with one of the auditors who actually assisted in compiling the audit itself and I spoke with him as late as today.

Councilman Carmody: Can we anticipate at our next.

Mr. Lafitte: And I am hopeful that I will get the information before the week is out according to him.

Property Standards Program.

Councilman Carmody: Yesterday, we received our Property Standards information. I have not seen Mr. Bowie unless he is there in back of the Chamber.

Councilman Lester: They don’t have to approach. I just want to tell them I appreciate what they are doing. I had an opportunity to be in Shreveport City Court on yesterday afternoon and one of serial property standards violators in the MLK area who occupies the space on Jackie Robinson, happened to be there and he was summoned by Property Standards Committee and the people at Code Enforcement.

So, I can report that they are still doing the job and are very vigilant. I have not gotten a report from the Court as to the disposition of the case, but I was very happy to see–well, lets put it like this. I was happy to see that they were doing the job. I was disappointed that the serial violator was there, but I was as not as disappointed to see him as he was disappointed to see me.

Councilman Gibson: Ms. Moore, I appreciate the letter you sent to me on February 18 regarding 452 East 75^th Street. We’ve got, that is Mr. Renter’s house, Harold Renter. The owner was cited for having a substandard structure.

Could I ask that you and Mr. Bowie and myself arrange for a meeting with Mr. Renter because and the reason why I am asking you this is because this issue has come up. In the past, I think ya’ll have a file on this particular residence out in Cedar Grove and Mr. Renter has some serious concerns about the safety regarding this unsecured structure and I’d like to contact you tomorrow that we could arrange maybe the three of us to go out to either–I’d like to visit with Mr. Renter to see what we can do. I don’t know who the owner of this structure is, but I’d like to see what you have in your file also to see what we can do to expedite this process because of his concerns and some of his neighbors around him because it has become an issue affecting life safety because of this house being used by some people that are using it for other purposes.

Ms. Moore: We will be more than glad to accommodate that.

Councilman Walford: Ms. Moore, if I may, do you know where we stand on the towing contract now?

Ms. Moore: We have actually consummated that contract and the towing company started work today.

Councilman Walford: That is probably the best news we are going to have at this Council meeting.

Councilman Hogan: Ms. Moore, one more quick question. I was just curious to know, I had not heard anything about the name that I submitted to you of the company from Logansport that was willing to, that has made an offer for us on the towing.

Ms. Moore: Because of his location, it was literally impossible for us to work with him, but we appreciate the offer.

Councilman Hogan: Are you able to disclose who the contract is with and their address?

Ms. Moore: I’ll be glad to get that to you.

Councilman Lester: Ms. Moore, I just want to again, thank you for what you have done in terms of helping to facilitate neighborhood investment program.

Just to let the Council members know, we had meeting today with members of the Risk Management Committee and I want to thank Mr. Antee and the Administration for moving forward with an amendment to some of the issues relative to insurance requirements. One of the concerns that we had was in this program, which I think is going to be a good one having these small neighborhood groups having to pay an exorbitant amount of insurance to the point where it would basically eaten up all of their funds. But we were able to prevail on the Risk Committee to make some exceptions for this program. So I just wanted to let you know we appreciate you bringing that to our attention and we thank the Administration and members of the Committee for their support on that issue.

Councilman Gibson: Ms. Moore, the deadline for applications?

Ms. Moore: February 27. We have received over 100 applications. We’ve been overwhelmed with the response coming in.

Councilman Gibson: Just to reemphasis, February 27, 5 p.m., close of business. So, those non-profits that are in the process of being non-profits, step up to the plate, this is the time to do it.

Legislative Agenda.

Mr. Wainwright: Before I begin my formal comments there is a report before you but there is a report on Mr. Gibson’s lead and pay some kudos to one of my fellow lobbyist down there and that is Lindy Broderick.

It is going to come as a surprise to ya’ll but that legislative body unlike this one, occasionally lets personalities and things get in the way of some of their agenda. And while last year we were able to successful get passed the Legislature a bill that forgave a debt that the City had relative to the warehouse or the construction refurbishings facilities out at the airport, and it meant $300,000+ per year for the City of Shreveport. And it took some clever legislation that coming in ran the process and we were able to be successful.

But early in that process for reasons I won’t get into, there are some personalities having got cross-wise. And frankly if that had not been resolved, we would have never had a chance to have that bill heard before the Committee. I want to personally acknowledge Lindy Broderick who went tho those personalities and got things settled down and everybody working together on the same page again. And because of that, we are realizing that amount of money is here, I think, for the next 10-years and I want to acknowledge that and thank her on behalf of the City and she certainly made my job a lot of easier in that instance. She and I work well together down there and I appreciate her assistance when I’m down there. Lindy, I appreciate you staying and letting me say that up front.

The 2004 Regular Session will convene on March 29 and it will be in session and must adjourn on or before 6 p.m. on June 21.

Unlike in past year the pre-filed bills seem to be coming in slower than usually. We only have 36 pre-filed bills that have been posted on the internet as of this afternoon and we can expect that number to reach somewhere around 3,000 before the session ends, before the bill filings deadline ends. Last year 13,023 bills became enacted into law, about one-third of those that were filed.

One of the reason, there are several reasons why I think they are being slow filed this year. 1. The Special Session which is going to being on March 7 is the best information that we have as of right now, although the official call has not been issued and there is a lot of focus on that as well as on the upcoming Regular Session and 2. This is a new legislative body and that probably approximately on-third of both bodies are new members and we have a new Governor of course for the first time in eight years.

That special session is being required because two years ago the public adopted a Constitutional Amendment that flip-flopped the years of fiscal sessions and regular sessions which you are required to have two Regular Sessions in a row in order to get the order get in the correct way and that meant these two year tax renewals that have been enacted over and over in each fiscal session suddenly were coming due on a non-fiscal year and so those matters can’t be taken up in a regular session and thus we are having to have a special session.

The Governor has indicated that she is also going to add to that agenda some items addressing the repeal of the inventory tax as well as the tax on debt. That is of interest to us in local government because we don’t necessarily want the state repealing the inventory taxes that local governments are collecting. I don’t have the figures for Shreveport, I need to get those from Tom, but I know in Baton Rouge they had worked up the figures and it was almost $3 million dollars that it would impact them if that tax was repealed for them by the Legislature.

Instead we have people from the LMA and local governments have been meeting with the Governor and proposing a situation where local governments will have the option of waiving those taxes or exempting those taxes for businesses in there communities and they felt like that economic development tool was of benefit to them or they would have the option of leaving the local taxes in place if they felt like that those dollars were more important to the economic development aspect of having those repealing. And those far we are encouraged. It looks like the Governor’s call will be in such a way that we will be able to put that in front of the Legislators.

When the Special Session begins, we really don’t have a very ambitious agenda from Shreveport in terms of local bills and things this year, which I’m grateful for because with a lot of new Legislators down there and new Governor, it is probably not the year to go down with a lot ambitious plans.

You will recall two years we were able to pass a bill that was offered by Senator Malone to allow and authorize us to seek a quarter cents sales tax which was going to be dedicated and was dedicated to Police and Fire. We were able to get that passed. In order to get unanimity along the Local Delegation a lot of compromise and things had to be done and one of those one that the bill contained a four year sunset which meant that we had to go back to the Legislature and get re-authorizing in order to go back to the people to get them to reapprove or renew this tax in future years. And because of that, we are going to try that this year to get that authorization either permanently in place or put in place for an extended period of time because we don’t want to wait until the year before the sunset kicks in and then somebody hit a mis-step or something down there and end up without the authority to allow the voters to impose a quarter cents sales tax on them even if they want to. So, I’ll be working with Jamie Tussek with the Firemen’s Union and the Police Union down there and think that we will be able to work out something among our delegates to enable to extend out that period for some period of time.

Councilman Carmody: Under that issue of fire and police pay, if we are successful in our efforts to lobby the Legislature, how soon would we be looking to put it in front of the voters?

Mr. Wainwright: As I appreciate it, the tax the voters approved was for a four year period. We have to go back to the voters within four years of its imposition, for renewal, so that would not be changed.

What would be changed is once we would go ahead and get the authority to do that whenever the renewal came up and I understand also we are going to be seeking to extend that four year renewal period to some longer period. Most taxes are for 10 year period and something of that nature where you don’t have to go back every four years. And so, I think the legislation we are seeking is going to allow us 1. to seek that re-authorization and 2. to seek it for a renewal period of longer than a four year period.

Councilman Gibson: Does that expire in terms of the (inaudible), isn’t it 2007.

Mr. Wainwright: That is correct.

Councilman Gibson: It would be December 31, 2007?

Mr. Wainwright: It is four years from the time whenever the effective date of it when we enacted the last time and it somewhere very close to that.

Councilman Gibson: Last year it was passed. When was that?

Councilman Lester: End of 2002.

Councilman Gibson: End of 2006.

Mr. Wainwright: December 2006.

Councilman Gibson: I thought that this was, we authorized in 2002. The Legislature authorized it but it was actually voted on before the voters.

Mr. Wainwright: That is what I am saying. I think it was four years from the time that it was adopted by the voters.

Councilman Gibson: Right. I believe this Council if I’m not mistaken approved to put it on the referendum.

Mr. Wainwright: It was the same time as ya’lls election.

Councilman Gibson: So that was in, what, the Fall of 2002 or the Summer of 2002? Worse case scenario, we are looking at 2006.

Mr. Wainwright: Correct.

Councilman Lester: Has it been any conversation from any sector in terms of including the municipal workers on any sales tax increase or at least to authorize a ballot initiative to see whether or not the citizens want to include the municipal-the rest of the municipal employees?

Mr. Wainwright: I have not been a part of any such discussions but I do know at the time that this original bill was passed in 2002 that, that was very much one of the issues among our local legislative delegation that was of concern and whether or not some of those same individuals will have those concerns at that time, may well still have that as part of the (inaudible) if you will because as you know, local bills have to unanimously agreed to and those individuals may or may nor require that additional authorization.

Councilman Lester; But if we want to have a ballot initiative, this would be the time for that conversation to be had.

Mr. Wainwright: It certainly would be germane to this discussion.

Councilman Hogan: You had mentioned that about Governor Blanco, who has indicated that she is going to repeal the business tax, the tax on debt and inventory tax.

Mr. Wainwright: In a phase out.

Councilman Hogan: Okay, that was my question. Was it going to be cut out all at once or phased out in 02?

Mr. Wainwright: As much as I think the Governor would like to do that and as much she believes it would be an economic inducement to bringing in and expanding existing industry, I don’t believe that she feels that our current situation will allow it to be all at once and I’ve heard anything from 10 to 20 year phase in on actually putting this in place completely.

Councilman Hogan: There is also talk about the corporate income tax and lowering or repealing that completely. Have you heard anything on that?

Mr. Wainwright: I have not heard that being an item on this particular special call agenda and whether or not, once again, the Governor decides what gets debated in that Special Session and what is germane and not germane and I have not heard anyone from the Governor’s Office indicate that that is going to be one of the items on this Call.

Councilman Hogan: I would certainly be interested to know if you can give us an update once you see the Session comes in and (inaudible)

Mr. Wainwright: The Call should be issued at any time, I think the call is like 10 days before. I think you have to put out I think the Call has to be something like 10 days before so we are really very close by the time when she has to issue that call setting forth the agenda.

Councilman Hogan: And the information you said a moment ago about the inventory tax, about possibly leaving that up to local municipalities, where does that come. . .

Mr. Wainwright: The local tax component of it.

Councilman Hogan: Whose idea was that?

Mr. Wainwright: The Municipal Association advanced that as well as the Conference of Mayors, we had the Conference of Mayors on behalf of local municipalities and parish governments because of the impact it will have on their budgets.

Councilman Jackson: Mr. Wainwright, on yesterday I had the conversation with the Administration and with the Chairman, and I suggested to them that I think one of the things that would be effective, certainly not saying that this exchange is not effective, but I thought that one of the things that would be effective is if we could have a collective meeting with your local delegation and this City Council and the Administration, as well, to be facilitated prior to the legislative session.

Obviously perhaps in the interval between the Special Session and the Regular Session and we talked about on yesterday and everybody understands that it is difficult to get everybody together, but obviously they represent us and I think to represent us well, one of the things that we would like to be able to do is to talk about what those concerns are. And again, that is to cast no aspersions on the Mayor’s Office or your work of deciding those things that become priority or important to the City. But I think we have, some degree an incumbent responsibility to be able to work through you and our local delegation to espouse those things that we think are important and significant as priorities as well.

And I was just saying that I thought that if we couldn’t facilitate ourselves, that maybe you could act as a liaison and pull that local delegation together and maybe orchestrate a breakfast or a luncheon or something that we can do it. And I know as a lobbyist, you are accustomed to paying for that kind of stuff; so, if you will take care of that for us, I certainly would appreciate it.

Mr. Wainwright: If I could have my budget increased to what some of my fellow lobbyist are accustomed to paying for those kinds of things are, I certain would accommodate that, but I’d be glad to try to facilitate such a meeting.

Councilman Jackson: My recommendation was on the contingency that it would not decrease.

Mr. Wainwright: One of the ways we avoid those personality conflicts I alluded to earlier, is having the kind of communication between all of the parties so everybody knows and nobody gets surprised, because surprise it not a welcome thing down there.

And, so I would welcome that chance. I know that you Councilman Jackson are in Baton Rouge during the sessions, I’ve seen you, visited with you down there a number of times; that is always a welcome thing. It always makes my job easier when they see that there is enough interest in the local government to be down there and taking part in the process and that is certainly an open invitation that if you are down there, I’d be glad to put you to work helping me do the work of the City down there and would welcome any of you to be down there as much possible.

Councilman Jackson: You can get us a room too, won’t you?

Mr. Wainwright: I can get you a reservation. The next item that we are trying to address is on the Convention Hotel that Mr. Antee has already given you a report on the Convention Hotel but one of the things that we are trying to do is borrow from the lead that has been taken by New Orleans, Baton Rouge and Alexandria in that they’ve established these special taxing districts in each one of those communities regarding a hotel operations in those areas.

And what that would permit us to do is take that occupancy tax that is already being collected and already being imposed for guests who stay in hotels and dedicating the tax that is generated by that facility, to be utilized in going toward the debt retirement on that facility and like I said, it is not an original idea but it is one that was passed in 2002, Act 47 for those other communities and we want to try and duplicate that and take advantage of it to help with the funding on this project.

Councilman Lester: On this item what we would be seeking would be the permission from the Legislature for this body to actually create the district, is that correct or would it be created in Baton Rouge?

Mr. Wainwright: The Legislature itself would actually create this district and designate how it would be constituted, what would be on it and then that district would have the authority to receive and dedicate the funds from this tax toward the retirement of the bond.

Councilman Lester: So, that would be different than the Red River Entertainment District that was created as I appreciate it, by this body?

Mr. Wainwright: I’m going to defer to Mr. Antee if he.

Mr. Antee: Now, any TIF District has to be created in the Legislature, but I think what the Shreveport City Council did was pass a resolution in favor of it that was submitted to the Legislative Delegation in Baton Rouge.

Now, there may have been some additional action required, but I know that was part of what was done and that is what we planned on doing at the proper time is bringing a resolution to this Councilman and asking them to support, so that we can send down to the Legislature to show that we support it.

Councilman Lester: I was just trying to get procedurally where we were, which comes first–the cart or the horse.

Councilman Gibson: In terms of and I don’t know if this is directed at you or the Administration. Financing this particular endeavor is going to be dependent on its success in turns of turning around the success we take and pay down the debt service. What happens, God forbid, if this endeavor finds itself in financial straits? What happens to the debt service, I guess, bottom line, what is the underlying if the Legislature passes this thing, if something goes south for example, bankruptcy occur as we just went through something I think on that with the Entertainment District–who is responsible on this particular item in terms of picking up the pieces. Is the City? Is this Council, the Administration?

Mr. Antee: That’s all what will be worked out in the financing plan of the hotel, but let me back up on something. The Entertainment District has not filed bankruptcy, that is the TIF that Councilman Lester was referring to, as the Entertainment District TIF.

That TIF was put in place before Performa ever received the first go ahead to perform any work down there that has been foreclosed on. There has been no bankruptcy of Performa. That district includes the whole riverfront area with the exception of the casinos and that money that is created not only by the entities in the Red River Entertainment District/Performa but also the other entities down there that are the Blind Tiger, Chicago, all the other businesses that were not part of the Red River Entertainment District. Those increased tax revenues go to do infrastructure within the whole riverfront area.

Councilman Gibson: So this is not the Entertainment District. Lets go back to the Hotel.

Mr. Antee: To the hotel. The first series of bonds will be guaranteed by the revenue and by the hotel property. Those bondholders if it went belly-up and no payments were ever made, those bondholders could only look to those two things to collect. Twelve Million Dollars ($12,000,000) in Capital Outlay, that’s a grant from the state and the gap in between is what we stated all along would be the portion that the City guaranteed and we won’t know until we actually take it to the bond market as to what that actual gap will be. But prior to taking it to them, we will bring that to the Council because obviously the Council has to take action and it has got to go to the Bonding Commission, the State Bond Commission.

Councilman Gibson: Just to go back, the revenues derived from this endeavor if for some reason something happens–foreclosure, whatever, the property owner and the hotel is the two parties that people would come after? Did I hear you say that? Who would they go after, I guess my question.

Mr. Antee: The revenues of the hotel as well as the facility.

Councilman Gibson: Okay.

Mr. Antee: Is what’s guarantee that first level of bonds.

Councilman Gibson: Okay.

Mr. Antee: So in other words, the bond purchasers aren’t going to issue the bonds unless they got a 2.0 debt coverage and pretty well guaranteed that they are going to be able to get their monies back. Now, we are looking at all kinds of different–not all kinds of different, we are looking at different options to lower the interest rate, lower the risk so that the bondholders will be comfortable in issuing more bonds and all of that to lower the gap that the City will end up–that the City may have to end up having to guaranteeing.

Councilman Gibson: At the time, I guess when you finally get to that point, you are going to explain to this Council, what kind of risk we are taking about with that gap, right?

Mr. Antee: Correct.

Mayor Hightower: I think to help clear some of that up, Councilman, what we are trying to do with the TIF is reduce the gap. So if the gap was 8, we hope that we can reduce it to 6 or whatever that number may be. There will still be a gap that we will have to come to the City Council for at some time to say, the City has to guarantee. So, at some point to build a hotel, the City will be on the hook for a portion of the total cost of the $50 million dollar structure.

Councilman Gibson: And I just want to make sure that–‘cause this is some things that some times get out of our particular expertise. When you say, gap, we are just basically talking, we are trying to reduce our risk. The gap is basically a risk.

Mayor Hightower: Exactly.

Councilman Gibson: And I just want to make sure that we are on the same page because some people may be saying ‘gap’, but gap is basically ya’ll are trying as an Administration, provide the most minimum risk before it comes before this body for a vote in order to minimize that risk for the City of Shreveport.

Mayor Hightower: Right. And our task to being able to do that is to sell as many bonds as we can. And to sell more bonds, we have more than just the hotel site itself and the income stream, but we also now have a TIF on top of it. We are likely to be able to finance $17 million in bonds instead of $15 million in bonds or whatever the number may be, so that is what we are working to do at this point but at some point, we have said all along, there will be a gap. There will be a time when the City Council needs to make a decision and step up and say, we have to have a hotel to make this Convention Center work and it is worth us standing behind it for however many million that is.

And I go back, if you remember several months ago when we talked about the buckets and how they were dumping and we had reserves to help back up and guarantee every risk pool. Those will still be in place. We think our risk will be minimal, but if bankruptcy did occur that, at the hotel, it doesn’t mean that the Convention Center is going away, we still need a hotel and for a $5 million dollar risk or an $8 million dollar risk or a $20 million dollar risk as far as that is concerned, we’ve got a $50 million dollar hotel sitting there that ensures that the Convention Center is going to do what it is suppose to do for the citizens of this community.

Mr. Antee: What the bondholders are looking for is how much revenue is coming in and that will dictate how much they will be willing to issue in the first tier bonds. And what we are trying to do is put as much revenue in that stream as possible and by creating the TIF we can take a percentage of the taxes and dedicate it to those bonds that will go in addition to the room revenue, the food and beverage revenue, the telephone revenue, and every other revenue that a hotel brings in and you put all of that into a pot and they tell you, ‘okay, based on this amount of revenue, we will give you this number of millions in bonds.’

Once we have that number we add to it the $12 million, the difference between the $48 to $50 million dollars for the project and that number, is the gap we are talking about.

Councilman Lester: One last question, in terms of obviously at some point, you have to run some numbers in terms of what you believe the taxes that will be generated from the hotel. Have we come to the point where we have run some projections? I know that we should have some hard numbers as it relates to the riverfront and the Entertainment District down there, in terms of what that TIF was able to generate, but do we have any projections in terms of the hotel?

Mr. Antee: Well, based on the percentage that we are able to capture in the TIF. For the record in the TIF we are not asking for the .25 for the fire and police.

Councilman Lester: Right.

Mr. Antee: We are not asking for the .75% that goes to Bossier that was part of the Convention Center Stadium issue and we are not asking for the 2. (whatever percent) that goes to the School Board.

Councilman Lester: Okay.

Mr. Antee: So we have met with Stacy Brown with the Convention and Tourist Bureau. She is setting up a meeting with their executive committee so that we can met with them. I have met with Loy Walker to let them know that we are not going after that .75 that goes to them and I’ve got a request in to meet with some of the local hotel owners so that they can hear first hand what it is we are actually trying to do, why we are trying to do it, and what the reasoning behind it is that will help rise all of the hotels in the area.

Councilman Lester: So now the Convention Center Hotel, the funds and taxes or what have you, generated, they are not going to be paying into the hotel /motel tax, is that correct?

Mr. Antee: Well right now, the way the tax structure works on the hotel room, is you’ve got the sales tax which comprises of state and local, then you’ve got 3% occupancy tax that goes to the Convention and Tourist Bureau and then we have the 1.5% tax which half comes to the City of Shreveport for the Stadium and Convention Center and half of that goes to Bossier.

So of that total amount we are trying to capture approximately, I think it is, 10.5%. And if we capture the 10.5% based on the numbers of the occupancy, the rate and the room rate, you know it can range anywhere to an additional 5 to 8 million dollars in additional bond revenues.

Councilman Lester: At some point when you reduce that to writing, I’d like to take a look at that.

Mr. Wainwright: The Airport has requested that we seek legislation that will permit or carve out an exception on the public bid law for the leasing of facilities at the Airports. And what is happening is, it is really not a, you have an individual who is anxious to locate a facility out at the Airport and they are confronted with, when they go to the Airport and say, I want to put a facility out here, they have to do this public bid so that everybody else in the world that might want to put a facility out there at that time, have the opportunity to bid on putting on a facility at that particular place, and it is not practical. And, what happens is, it is just generally private enterprise and just say that they will go somewhere else. If they got an option to go somewhere else or it just drives the cost up and everything else.

The airports around the state, they are all seeking this legislation. There will be a state bill introduced that will try to get this in place that actually was a bill or an amendment to a bill last year, but unfortunately that bill got stuck in the House Calendar in the last days of the Legislature and by the time it got to the floor, it was too late to add the amendment and get it back across the Senate for concurrence; so, they left the amendment off. So they are going to try this year with a fresh bill. This is simply, we are going to have a local bill back up in case the state wide bill hits a glitch that we could move forward with a local bill and try to do the same thing.

Councilman Carmody: Mr. Wainwright, the 250 square feet of course is a very small area. When you say, locate facilities, are these vendors that are wanting to lease space inside the terminal?

Mr. Wainwright: Primarily hanger space.

Councilman Carmody: That is what I want to make sure of.

Mr. Wainwright: Hanger space out on the, and so that is the (inaudible) where you hit the 250. Almost all of them are bigger than that, but once you get to that size then you are going to start–if xyz company wants to buy an airplane and construct a hanger out there, all of sudden they’ve got to go through this whole additional process when practically speaking anybody else that wants to do that is going to approach the Airport, they are not going to wait until they see an advertised bid to go do it.

Councilman Carmody: Right.

Mr. Wainwright: It is just, it doesn’t fit with the law. I mean, it makes it at first blush, it sounds like they ought to go through it, but when you understand how the actually mechanics of it works, as long as they are doing market rate rentals out there then there ought to be adequate protections for the public.

Those are the only legislative matters, I see bills on. The fiscal matters of course are capital outlay process that we are all familiar with and we have some of the same projects that we’ve had in there from year to year, and have presented those.

We have also added recently the Right to Play playground at A. C. Steere. There was a request made to add that to the Capital Outlay request and I’ve also had recent conversations with Mr. Miller out at the Airport on the possibility of adding a capital outlay request for some cargo handling facilities out at the Regional and I think that, that is something that they are in discussions with the Administration on how that would be handled.

The last item I want to highlight, is that Southern University currently has a program that has about 25 students in it on each semester, each class that is trying to do these airplane refurbishings. And it is a tremendously successfully program and the terms when those graduates walk of the stage with a diploma they walk straight into a job at Continental Express facility out there and they are waiting on them and they have got the job openings for them. And, unfortunately because of the funding crisis with higher education, that program is in jeopardy and needs some additional funds and we have been approached about trying to help them get this in the Appropriations Bill as some kind of line item in order to keep that program there, so these jobs with I think the starting pay is $40,000+, we don’t lose the generator of those jobs for lack of funds in the program. So, with that I’ll be lad to answer any additional questions and look forward to working with ya’ll during the Session.

Councilman Gibson: I just want to, again, thank you for your due diligence on the report and also good luck in the upcoming Session. We’ve got some great delegation with our representatives up here in Northwest Louisiana that are obviously your friends, but obviously we’ve got a lot of others around the state that you’ve got relationships with and are building relationships and I know that your professional expertise will come through again in a clutch and I appreciate that because every session, like I tell Ms. Broderick, they have to invest in some roller skates and you where those roller skates out pretty quick moving around the House and Senate Floors, so I do appreciate that.

Councilman Hogan: One last question, under Item No. 1 on local municipality, local government issues. It says encouraging legislation for local economic development authority. Have you seen or is this one of the bills that has been introduced or filed already?

Mr. Wainwright: No, Sir and these are more conceptual. Basically that list, is. . .

Councilman Hogan: This is just an idea that they’ve come up with.

Mr. Wainwright: . . . are conceptual agendas that when the LMA and the Council of Mayors Directors went and met with the Governor’s Office, they wen through this list in a concept only. It was not specific legislation, it was these are things that we are concerned about, this is what we want to avoid and this is what we want to try attract and that is going to provide (inaudible) kind of their overall.

Councilman Hogan: It is just an idea right now?

Mr. Wainwright: That is right.

. Councilman Hogan: Who is crafting this legislation or who would it come from?

Mr. Wainwright: It will be a variety of people but the LMA of course is generating some of the stuff. The Municipal Association, Ginger Adams is one of the lobbyist down there and Tom Ben McQue was the Mayor of Baton Rouge for years and years then he’s got the Police Jury, Rusty (last name escapes me right now) but anyway he is working on it and then there will be various other economic, the Chambers of course having their input. We also have Mr. Sam Jones who was the Mayor of Deridder, I think it was Deridder, down in the Governor Blanco’s area and she was a close personal friend of his and he was Mayor in that city for like the last 25 years. He recently resigned his Mayor’s job in order to become the Governor’s Liaison to local government and we have already met with him what I call the Metro Group, which is my counterparts from around the state, met with him about three weeks ago to discuss opening lines of communication and keeping everybody posted on what’s going on and having our input on matters that do touch local government. So, I’m encouraged because of the fact he was (inaudible) Mayor for 25 years, he’s been there and done that in a situation we are not having to educate him about local government problems. He comes already know them.

Councilman Hogan: I’d be interested to know when they have any type of meetings coming up about that, I’d love to attend. If it is not too much trouble would you keep me informed on that.

Mr. Wainwright: Certainly. And I’ve provide you my e-mail address and cell phone number if you have got any questions to come up or need anything, those are where you can get me.

Councilman Lester: Two quick questions: 1. Of particular concern to us in North Shreveport, obviously beside I-49 is Shreveport Blanchard Highway and the widening and possible four-laning of Shreveport-Blanchard Highway as a way to revitalize the North Shreveport Industrial Park. Have you heard anything as it relates to that and I know Capital Outlay is like, throwing money in the air and whatever stays up, you get to keep.

Mr. Wainwright: I hear a lot about it. I heard about it since the first day I took this job and started working with it and I know that Representative Glover has talked a lot about it in the Capital Outlay process.

And I’m sure you are aware at the time Kansas City Southern agreed to come and locate their headquarters there, then Governor Edwards promised them that in exchange for that, they would do the widening and four-laning of that road that you are talking about.

Unfortunately, hat promise did not get acted on at the time and it was, at one time a high priority in the Capital Outlay Budget for some reason it didn’t get funded and I mean, we are talking years and years and once it slip, fell there, it has never been able to rise back up to the top again. And the cost of that road per mile is so tremendously high because of the heavy volume and the heavy weights of the truck that it has been a long saga in which no one has provided any happy endings yet.

It comes up every year and the case is made ever year and the Department of Transportation every year, the local regional guy would have said, it is too expensive, we can’t put it in the Priority Fund so we have not, we haven’t solved the problem yet, but everybody is highly aware of it.

Councilman Lester: We might have to hire Mr. Kessler on that.

Mr. Wainwright: That might work.

Councilman Lester: Because he is moving that 49 thing, too. The other question I have is, the police review board bill that was passed out of the House by Representative Glover have you heard any conversation on that being re-introduced in the general session?

Mr. Wainwright: I have not, but I have not had an opportunity to sit with Mr. Glover and talk about what his planned agenda is or what bills he’s got to offer that he may be coming to us for a position on or assistance on but I do anticipate. I think what is happening is because of the Special Session is coming up March 7. I think most of us are just kind of waiting until we are all down there and frankly, it is going to be when most of it is tax measure. The first several days of that session all of the action is in the Ways and Means Committee and everybody else is sitting there waiting for them to finish and I think that is where everybody is kind of looking at this will be the time we all get face to face and talk about those agendas and those items; so, I anticipate having that those conversation.

Councilman Carmody: Mr. Wainwright, I appreciate you taking the time, Sir. I think it was very productive. It is nice to hear from you on the front end to see what we are looking to try and accomplish. We are now looking forward to is the return to hear the report of how successful we were.

Mr. Wainwright: There is going to be a scorecard at the end.

Mayor Hightower: What I would like to inform the Council of, shortly before Council convened this afternoon, we’ve had our crew of attorneys lead by Dannye Malone with the help of Mike Strong and Company has been working behind the scenes with Wicker. And that is the group if you watch the news that was involved in the demolition of a utility bridge over 12 Mile Bayou that subsequently the piers were found underneath the water.

We’ve been working to try to settle this case. If you’ll remember back when the investigation took place, the State found the piers under the water and authorized $100,000 roughly in expenses to clean that up to make way for construction of the 12 Mile Bayou vehicular bridge. At the time, it had to come so we authorized doing that and had paid the State.

One thing that happened and there was an article in the paper this morning about it and one thing that was left out in that article, via the legislative audit, was that when the City inspectors were on that job on Friday, those piers were still standing. When they returned on Monday, they were gone and the City Inspectors Office had no knowledge that any work would happen over the weekend. So, finger pointing at the City Inspectors, I think, was little out of line and we pointed that out in the audit and it is in the response if anyone would care to read that.

But the good news that happened a couple of hours ago is that Wicker (Yor-Wic) actually was the contractor has agreed to reimburse the City in full for those monies that were expended by the City to the State. So, hopefully this Chapter at least of this particular contract is coming to an end and coming to an end that we obviously had hoped for when we authorized the clean up by the State and again. I’m glad to report today that we are at least back to net zero from the City’s standpoint on that job.

Councilman Gibson: If I can just underscore, I know that the minutes are being taken on this thing, can we underscore that it is Yor-Wic and not Wicker Construction.

Mayor Hightower: Absolutely.

Councilman Gibson: So, if we could make a note of that. Because they are two distinct separate companies.

Mayor Hightower: The Principal in Yor-Wic is David Wicker. But it is Yor-Wic Construction Company.

Councilman Hogan: Mr. Mayor, I did read the paper this morning about this article and it I did peak of my interest. It came as a total surprise to me and I was just curious to know if there are other state legislative audits being conducted, to your knowledge?

Mayor Hightower: No, not that I am aware of it.

Councilman Hogan: And also, I’m assuming that we plan to implement these recommendations. How do you feel about the recommendations from the legislative audit, these four that are in the paper today?

Mayor Hightower: We certainly don’t have any problems with those, some that are not in place will be in place so we concur.

Councilman Carmody: Mr. Mayor that is good news. I am sure that the taxpayers of the City of Shreveport are pleased to see the progress that the Administration has made in getting the money back.

Public Hearing: None.

Confirmations and/or Appointments, Adding Legislation to the Agenda and Public Comments.

Confirmations and/or Appointments: None.

Adding Legislation to the Agenda. Motion by Councilman Gibson, seconded by Councilman Lester to add the following to the agenda:

1. Resolution 39 of 2004: A resolution authorizing the employment of Special Legal Counsel to represent the City of Shreveport and to otherwise provide with respect thereto.

2. Resolution No. 41 of 2004: A resolution authorizing the execution of an agreement with Shreveport Redevelopment Agency and Shreveport Urban Renaissance Corporation, Inc., and to otherwise provide with respect thereto.

3. Ordinance No. 21 of 2004: An ordinance amending Chapter 106 of the Code of Ordinances, the City of Shreveport Zoning Ordinance, by rezoning property located on David Raines Road at its intersection with Round Grove, Shreveport, Caddo Parish, Louisiana, from B-3, Community Business District to R-3, Urban, Multiple-Family Residence District, and to otherwise provide with respect.

4. Ordinance No. 22 of 2004: An ordinance amending Chapter 106 of the Code of Ordinances, the City of Shreveport Zoning Ordinance, by rezoning property located on southwest corner of Dalton and Forbing, Shreveport, Caddo Parish, Louisiana, from R-1, Urban, One-Family Residence District to B-2A, Business Park District, and to otherwise provide with respect.

5. Ordinance No. 23 of 2004: An ordinance amending Chapter 106 of the Code of Ordinances, the City of Shreveport Zoning Ordinance, by rezoning property located on the west side of E. Bert Kouns 150 feet north of Brook Hollow, Shreveport, Caddo Parish, Louisiana, from B-3, Community Business District to B-3-E, Community Business Extended Use District limited to "an animal hospital with seven indoor/outdoor kennel spaces" only and to otherwise provide with respect.

6. Ordinance No. 24 of 2004: An ordinance amending Chapter 106 of the Code of Ordinances, the City of Shreveport Zoning Ordinance, by rezoning property located on the west side of Kingston Road, 350 feet south of Francais Drive, Shreveport, Caddo Parish, Louisiana, from B-2, Neighborhood Business District to B-2-E, Neighborhood Business Extended Use District "limited to a plumbing shop" only and to otherwise provide with respect.

Motion approved by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

Public Comments (Agenda Items to be Adopted). Kenneth Kreft (157 Archer): I thought maybe it would be at the end, it s really 11C on the last page of your agenda and it concerns a patio cover a woman had a contractor put up on Adger at 129, unaware of the setback requirement and with your permission, Mr. Chairman, I’d like for a 6 month variance, give her time to pay.

I mean these laws are there for a reason on a larger scale, citywide. I think the city and the MPC might want look at disabled citizens and a change in the laws that are closer to the ordinary setback could be done to allow somebody to put up at least, 8 or 10 or 12 feet of a cover so that disabled people would have dry surface during a rain or sleet or snow event. This particular woman has severe arthritis and I got to meet with her and she really just got snookered by a contractor from Bossier City, I might add, Cover All is the name of the company. And. . .

Councilman Carmody: Mr. Kreft you probably don’t want to say something bad about a contractor. I’ll give you that bit of advise.

Mr. Kreft: Okay, Then I’ll say something good about them then. And that is about it. When ya’ll get to this, I just want you to give her some time. Because she is on a fixed income and probably would save a little every month. I don’t know what the cost to remove it. It is not a safety hazard. It just violates the setback. I mean it doesn’t obscure any sight lines or anything.

And could I have 10 seconds for a brief PSA in my 3 minutes. Just anybody in District A, we have a forum tonight at 7:00 for School Board District 8 if you want to come ask those three candidates questions, at Broadmoor Presbyterian at 7o’clock.

CONSENT AGENDA LEGISLATION.

INTRODUCTION OF RESOLUTIONS: None.

INTRODUCTION OF ORDINANCES: None.

TO ADOPT RESOLUTIONS AND ORDINANCES:

Motion by Councilman Green, seconded by Councilman Gibson to adopt Resolution Nos. 32 and 33 of 2004. Motion approved by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

RESOLUTIONS:

RESOLUTION NO. 32 OF 2004

A RESOLUTION ACCEPTING DEDICATION FOR GRAND OAKS DRIVE IN THE HIDDEN TRACE UNIT NO. 6, AND TO OTHERWISE PROVIDE WITH RESPECT THERETO.

BE IT RESOLVED by the City Council of the City of Shreveport, in due, legal, and regular session convened, that the dedication for Grand Oaks Drive in the Hidden Trace Unit No. 6 in Section 28 (T16N-R13W), Caddo Parish, Louisiana, and as shown on the plats attached hereto and made a part hereof, be and the same is hereby accepted as dedicated to the public for public use in the City of Shreveport.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the original plat reflecting the dedication for Grand Oaks Drive be and recorded in the official records of the District Court for Caddo Parish, Louisiana.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that if any provision or item of this resolution or the application thereof is held invalid, such invalidity shall not affect other provisions, items or applications of this ordinance which can be given effect without the invalid provisions, items or applications and to this end the provisions of this ordinance are hereby declared severable.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that all ordinances or resolutions or parts thereof in conflict herewith are hereby repealed.

RESOLUTION NO. 33 OF 2004

A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING KEVIN JAMES CLINE & DEBRA ANN PADDIE CLINE, LOCATED AT 1315 FOREST CREEK DR., TO CONNECT TO THE WATER SYSTEM OF THE CITY OF SHREVEPORT AND OTHERWISE PROVIDING WITH RESPECT THERETO.

WHEREAS, Kevin James Cline & Debra Ann Paddie Cline have agreed to secure all permits and inspections required by the Shreveport Comprehensive Building Code. Said party having submitted a petition for annexation to the City of Shreveport, and having agreed to fully comply with the regulations of the City of Shreveport in connection with said property, all as set forth in Section 94-1, et. Seq., of the Shreveport City Code. Said request and petition are attached hereto.

BE IT RESOLVED by the City Council of the City of Shreveport in due, regular and legal session convened, that Kevin James Cline & Debra Ann Paddie Cline, be authorized to connect the building located at 1315 Forest Creek Dr., to the water system of the City of Shreveport.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that if any provisions or items of this resolution or the application thereof are held invalid, such invalidity shall not affect other provisions, items or applications of this resolution which can be given effect without the invalid provisions, items or applications, and to this end, the provisions of this resolution are hereby declared severable.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that resolutions or parts thereof in conflict herewith are hereby repealed.

ORDINANCES: None.

REGULAR AGENDA LEGISLATION:

RESOLUTION NO. 23 OF 2004

A RESOLUTION TO RECOGNIZE ALVIN MIMS FOR HIS PUBLIC SERVICE TO THE CITY OF SHREVEPORT AND THIS COMMUNITY AND TO OTHERWISE PROVIDE WITH RESPECT THERETO

By: Councilman Walford

WHEREAS, Alvin Mims was born in Shreveport, Louisiana and graduated from Booker T. Washington in 1953, and

WHEREAS, Alvin Mims obtained a Bachelors of Science degree from Wiley College with a Master Degree in Supervision from Prairie View A & M University and received 30 plus hours in guidance counseling from Centenary College and Northwestern University; and

WHEREAS, Alvin Mims taught at several schools throughout Shreveport and was a part-time band instrument repairman for Swicegood Music Company; and

WHEREAS, Mr. Mims retired from the Caddo Parish School System as a Counselor at Northwood High School, and

WHEREAS, Alvin Mims was appointed to the Metropolitan Shreveport Zoning Board of Appeals in April, 1993 and served on this board until his death on December 20, 2003; and

WHEREAS, Alvin Mims made significant contributions to the citizens of Shreveport by serving on the board of directors of many organizations including: Kappa Psi Fraternity, Inc., South Shreveport Voters League, Cedar Grove Community Action League, Montessori School of Shreveport, Eden Gardens Needy Fund for Needy Children, Socialization Services, Inc., Eden Gardens Neighborhood Assoc., and the Black & White Communications Task Force; and

WHEREAS, Alvin Mims used his talents to improve the quality of life for the citizens of this community and this City. This philanthropic service includes: Substance Abuse and Prevention Organization (S.A.P.E.), Southwest Mental Health Association, Task Force for Integration of Caddo Parish Schools, Boys State, and Louisiana Black Culture Commission; and

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, by the City Council of the City of Shreveport in due, regular and legal session convened, that it publicly recognizes and thanks Mr. Mims for his service to the City of Shreveport by servicing on the Metropolitan Shreveport Board of Appeals for over 10 years and for his many other contributions which made the City and this community a better place to live.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that this resolution shall be executed in duplicate originals with one original presented to Mrs. Petrolia Mims and the Alvin Mims family and the other filed in perpetuity in the office of the Clerk of Council for the City of Shreveport.

Councilman Walford: Mr. Chairman, it was my pleasure to serve with Mr. Mims for over six years, almost seven on the Zoning Board of Appeals. Mr. Mims cared about Shreveport, cared about the people of Shreveport and its really a pleasure. And with your permission, I would like to go down and present this to the family.

Read by title and as read motion Councilman Jackson, seconded by Councilman Lester passed by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

Councilman Walford: Mr. Mayor, would you join me in presenting this to the Mims’ family?

Mayor Hightower: Yes sir.

Mrs. Mims: Our family, the Mims’ family really appreciates your thoughts, your kindness and your memories of our loved one. We do thank you and we will forever cherish this.

Mayor Hightower: I do have a couple of things that I’d like to say before we leave the Mims’ family tribute, I would like to make a comment. I’m sure there are several other Council Members would like to as well.

Certainly, I think you did a great job putting the resolution together and it talked a whole lot about what the man did in his public service and how he really did believe in children and that they were future of this City and he dedicated his entire life to it either in the classroom or on the School Board, even in the neighborhood.

And I know that he was also something else that will be missed in the Cedar Grove neighborhood and that was a great cook. He loved to cook and loved to have people come by and taste his food and make ‘em eat more and all those things that your grandmother used to make you do is what Alvin Mims did even though he was never a grandmother actually. But he was a great guy. He was a humanitarian and he was a person that all of us and those that never even knew him will come to know him and miss in our City. There is someone in the family and I know Mrs. Mims is certainly a hard worker as well and has a strong family around her to hopefully continue the tradition, continue to give back to the City; so, we appreciate it.

Councilman Jackson: To Mrs. Mims, as I said to you on last week (Inaudible). I had an opportunity I guess to know him at another level. He was my fraternity brother and got a chance to know him in very private ways since 1989 was probably the first time and (inaudible) Mr. Mims was a very special person, because he cared as we said about young people, but (inaudible) when I thought that he wouldn’t have the energy and the enthusiasm to do it. Out of all the other people who could have, he was always responsible for undergraduate chapters and working with young men who were in college. So, I want to just say to you all as I said to his wife privately, to his family, if there is anything that I can do, certainly I’m just a phone call away to not only you and Reginald, but certainly your daughter and your other daughter who is out of town as well. So, we will certainly continue to bid you a Godspeed. And just want to say keep the faith and you know, God always needs more than he takes; so, we appreciate you being here today. Thank you so much.

Councilman Lester: I have had an opportunity to know Mr. Mims under personal private way, literally all of my life. He is a person who made a difference in the lives of not only his children, but the children and particularly, the young men of our neighborhood.

I hear stories - - - you know when you talk about different areas, different neighborhoods, different subdivisions, there are always one or two men or women that are literally the pillars of the neighborhood and without a doubt, Mr. Mims was one of those people. From walking us across the street as we went to the elementary school to taking his daughters and my sister to Girl Scout events, he is a person who certainly comes along once in a lifetime.

And he will sorely be missed, but more important than that, his contribution lives on, not only in the lives of his family, his son, his daughters, his wife, his grandkids, his legacy of service and commitment to his neighborhood lives in many of us who he touched on a very personal level and I count myself as blessed to be one of those people.

So, I just wanted to say quite obviously to the family, I mean words cannot describe the esteem that I hold Mr. Mims and that family in, but we just love you and we’re praying for you and we just thank you that you shared him with us, because he meant as much to us as he meant to you.

Councilman Gibson: Mrs. Mims, great leaders always continue to bless our presence. Just a few weeks ago, we had one of your neighbors right across the street, Eden Gardens here recognizing the talents of those young boys and girls who obviously Mr. Mims touched on a daily basis. And this Council was very please to have about 60 or 70 of those students here and I know he was looking down on the accomplishments that school has been able to do with the leadership of your husband.

I always considered him a friend. He showed me some things in getting involved in the community when I came back here in 1996 that I will always keep with me in guiding principles for the future. His heart and soul is out there, not just in Cedar Grove, but specifically in Eden Gardens. Everywhere you look through Eden Gardens, you see Mr. Mims’ fingerprints. And I’m proud to have called him my friend and a mentor. Again, he’s there looking down on this Chamber and there’ll probably be other times where there’s other opportunities that this Council will be recognizing achievements that Mr. Mims will have a part in.

The memorial that was held not too long ago at y’all’s church was very, very inspiring and touched a lot of people. The strength that your family has is obviously a testament, not to just him, but yourself and I echo my colleague Councilman Jackson, that this Councilman who represents you in the district can ever do anything for you and your family, please call me. It’d be an honor to help you in any way; thank you very much.

The Deputy Clerk read the resolution by title: Resolution No. 25 of 2004: A resolution expressing support for the proposed state legislation which would facilitate the conversion of the McNeill Street Pumping Station into a museum operated under the State Museum System, and otherwise providing with respect thereto.

Read by title and as read motion Councilman Lester, seconded by Councilman Gibson to postpone the resolution until the March 9, 2004 meeting. Motion passed by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

RESOLUTION NO. 26 OF 2004

A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING THE MAYOR TO EXECUTE A COOPERATIVE ENDEAVOR AGREEMENT WITH THE STATE OF LOUISIANA FOR THE ARTSPACE AT THE WEST EDGE CAPITAL PROJECT AND OTHERWISE PROVIDING WITH RESPECT THERETO.

WHEREAS, the City of Shreveport and the Shreveport Regional Arts Council are working to develop a community arts center in downtown Shreveport known as ArtSpace at the West Edge; and

WHEREAS, the State of Louisiana has agreed to provide State Capital Outlay funds of $825,000 in support of this project; and

WHEREAS, the State has prepared a Cooperative Endeavor Agreement for this project which must be executed by the Mayor before funding can be provided.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the City Council of the City of Shreveport, in legal session convened, that the Mayor, Keith Hightower, be and is hereby authorized on behalf of the City of Shreveport to execute this Cooperative Endeavor Agreement, a copy of which was provided to the Clerk of Council on February 9, 2004, with the original copy of this resolution and that he is granted the authority to act on behalf of the City in all matters pertaining to this project, as required by the State.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that if any provision or item of this resolution or the application thereof is held invalid, such invalidity shall not affect other provisions, items or applications of this resolution which can be given effect without the invalid provisions, items or applications; and, to this end, the provisions of this resolution are hereby declared severable.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that all resolutions in conflict herewith are hereby repealed.

Read by title and as read motion Councilman Walford, seconded by Councilman Gibson passed by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

The Deputy Clerk read the resolution by title: Resolution No. 27 of 2004: A resolution authorizing the City to obtain approval of the State Bond Commission and to purchase land immediately adjacent to the City Landfill located on the Woolworth Road and to approve and authorize the Mayor to execute an agreement for the purchase of said property and otherwise to provide with respect thereto.

Read by title and as read motion Councilman Carmody, seconded by Councilman Walford to withdraw the resolution. Motion passed by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

Councilman Carmody: Mr. Mayor, if I might ask are we as a City going to pursue additional properties to expand our landfill?

Mayor Hightower: Absolutely. I think it is incumbent upon us to look to the future. Costs are not going down, they are going up; so, we are going to continue to do what we can to find some property that will work that is not only cost effective on the frontend, but backend as well as far as operation and maintenance goes.

RESOLUTION NO. 28 OF 2004

RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING THE FILING OF A SECTION 9 (5307) APPLICATION WITH THE DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, FOR A GRANT UNDER THE URBAN MASS TRANSPORTATION ACT OF 1964, AS AMENDED.

WHEREAS, the Secretary of Transportation is authorized to make grants for a mass transportation program of projects;

WHEREAS, the contract for financial assistance will impose certain obligations upon applicant, including the provision by it of the local share of the project costs in the program;

WHEREAS, it is required by the U.S. Department of Transportation, in accord with the provisions of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, that in connection with the filing of an application for assistance under the Urban Mass Transportation Act of 1964, as amended, the applicant gives assurance that it will comply with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the U.S. Department of Transportation requirements thereunder; and

WHEREAS, it is the goal of the applicant that minority business enterprise be utilized to the fullest extent possible in connection with these projects, and that definitive procedures shall be established and administered to ensure that minority businesses shall have the maximum feasible opportunity to compete for contracts when procuring construction contracts, supplies, equipment contracts, or consultant and other services.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the City Council of the City of Shreveport, in due, legal and regular session convened:

1. That Keith Hightower, Mayor, is authorized to execute and file an application on behalf of the City of Shreveport with the U.S. Department of Transportation, to aid in the financing of capital projects pursuant to Section 3 of the Urban Mass Transportation Act of 1964 and the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA) of 1991, as amended.

2. That Keith Hightower, Mayor, is authorized to execute and file with such applications an assurance or any other document required by the U.S. Department of Transportation effectuating the purpose of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

3. That Keith Hightower, Mayor, is authorized to furnish such additional information as the U.S. Department of Transportation may require in connection with the application for the program of projects and budget.

4. That Keith Hightower, Mayor, is authorized to set forth and execute affirmative minority business policies in connection with the program of projects and budget procurement needs.

5. That Keith Hightower, Mayor, is authorized to executive grant agreements on behalf of the City of Shreveport with the U.S. Department of Transportation for aid in the financing of the planning, capital and operating assistance program of projects and budget.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that if any provision or item of this resolution or the application thereof is held invalid, such invalidity shall not affect other provisions, items or applications of the resolution which can be given effect without the invalid provisions, items or applications and to this and the provision of this resolution are hereby declared severable.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that all resolutions or parts thereof in conflict herewith are hereby repealed.

Read by title and as read motion Councilman Lester, seconded by Councilman Walford passed by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

RESOLUTION NO. 29 OF 2004

RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING THE FILING OF A SECTION 3 (5309) APPLICATION WITH THE DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, FOR A GRANT UNDER THE URBAN MASS TRANSPORTATION ACT OF 1964, AS AMENDED.

WHEREAS, the Secretary of Transportation is authorized to make grants for a mass transportation program of projects;

WHEREAS, the contract for financial assistance will impose certain obligations upon applicant, including the provision by it of the local share of the project costs in the program;

WHEREAS, it is required by the U.S. Department of Transportation, in accord with the provisions of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, that in connection with the filing of an application for assistance under the Urban Mass Transportation Act of 1964, as amended, the applicant gives assurance that it will comply with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the U.S. Department of Transportation requirements thereunder; and

WHEREAS, it is the goal of the applicant that minority business enterprise be utilized to the fullest extent possible in connection with these projects, and that definitive procedures shall be established and administered to ensure that minority businesses shall have the maximum feasible opportunity to compete for contracts when procuring construction contracts, supplies, equipment contracts, or consultant and other services.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the City Council of the City of Shreveport, in due, legal and regular session convened:

1. That Keith Hightower, Mayor, is authorized to execute and file an application on behalf of the City of Shreveport with the U.S. Department of Transportation, to aid in the financing of capital projects pursuant to Section 3 of the Urban Mass Transportation Act of 1964 and the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA) of 1991, as amended.

2. That Keith Hightower, Mayor, is authorized to execute and file with such applications an assurance or any other document required by the U.S. Department of Transportation effectuating the purpose of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

3. That Keith Hightower, Mayor, is authorized to furnish such additional information as the U.S. Department of Transportation may require in connection with the application for the program of projects and budget.

4. That Keith Hightower, Mayor, is authorized to set forth and execute affirmative minority business policies in connection with the program of projects and budget procurement needs.

5. That Keith Hightower, Mayor, is authorized to executive grant agreements on behalf of the City of Shreveport with the U.S. Department of Transportation for aid in the financing of the planning, capital and operating assistance program of projects and budget.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that if any provision or item of this resolution or the application thereof is held invalid, such invalidity shall not affect other provisions, items or applications of the resolution which can be given effect without the invalid provisions, items or applications and to this and the provision of this resolution are hereby declared severable.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that all resolutions or parts thereof in conflict herewith are hereby repealed.

Read by title and as read motion Councilman Lester, seconded by Councilman Walford passed by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

RESOLUTION NO. 34 OF 2004

A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING THE INSTITUTION OF EXPROPRIATION PROCEEDINGS AGAINST CERTAIN DESCRIBED PROPERTY WITHIN THE CITY OF SHREVEPORT IN CONNECTION WITH THE TURN LANE @ FAIRFIELD AND PIERREMONT PROJECT, PROJECT NO. 01C022, PARCEL NO: R-8, AND OTHERWISE PROVIDING WITH RESPECT THERETO.

WHEREAS, the City of Shreveport has developed the Turn Lane @ Fairfield and Pierremont Project, Project No. 01C022; and

WHEREAS, the property rights described in the legal description, and more fully shown on the plat map marked as Exhibit "A" attached hereto, is situated in said development; and

WHEREAS, all attempts to amicably acquire fee title to the property comprising Parcel No: R-8 have failed; and

WHEREAS, public necessity dictates that these property rights be owned by and subject to the use by the City of Shreveport.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the City Council of the City of Shreveport in due, regular and legal session convened, that the expropriation of this property is necessary for the public interest; therefore, the City Attorney be and he is hereby authorized to institute expropriation proceedings against the owners of record, as they might appear at the time of filing suit, of the property described in Exhibit "A" attached hereto as Parcel No: R-8, to be acquired in fee title.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that if any provision or item of this resolution or the application thereof is held invalid, such invalidity shall not affect other provisions, items or applications of this resolution which can be given effect without the invalid provisions, items or applications and to this end, the provisions of this resolution are hereby declared severable.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that all resolutions or parts thereof in conflict herewith are hereby repealed.

Read by title and as read motion Councilman Carmody, seconded by Councilman Walford passed by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

RESOLUTION NO. 35 OF 2004

A RESOLUTION SUSPENDING THE EFFECTS OF CERTAIN PROVISIONS OF CHAPTER 10 AND CHAPTER 106 OF THE CITY OF SHREVEPORT CODE OF ORDINANCES ON APRIL 16, 2004 FOR THE LOUISIANA STATE UNIVERSITY-SHREVEPORT "SPRING FLING" AND TO OTHERWISE PROVIDE WITH RESPECT THERETO.

BY: COUNCILMAN MIKE GIBSON

WHEREAS, Louisiana State University-Shreveport ("LSU-S") will sponsor its annual "Spring Fling" on April 15-16, 2004 on the campus of the university; and

WHEREAS, LSU-S maintains a permit for the sale of low alcoholic content beverages (beer) on the campus;

WHEREAS, the permit does not authorize alcoholic beverages to be sold, dispensed, or consumed outside of the licensed premises;

WHEREAS, Section 106-130(6) provides that unless otherwise excepted, all uses shall be operated entirely within a completely enclosed structure; and

WHEREAS, Section 10-80(a) provides that it shall be unlawful for any person to sell, barter, exchange or otherwise dispense of alcoholic beverages, except within those sections of the city wherein such sale is permitted by the applicable zoning ordinance; and

WHEREAS, LSU-S desires to dispense, and allow the sale and consumption of low alcoholic content beverages (beer) on the grounds of the university outside of the licensed premises between the hours of 9:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. on April 16, 2004 in conjunction with the Spring Fling event.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the City Council of the City of Shreveport in due, legal and regular session convened Section 106-130 (6) and 10-80(a) are hereby suspended on April 16, 2004, from 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. to permit the sale of low alcoholic content beverages (beer) on the grounds of Louisiana State University-Shreveport outside of the licensed premises during the Spring Fling event.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that all other applicable provisions of the City of Shreveport Code of Ordinances shall remain in full force and effect.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that if any provision or item of this resolution or the application thereof is held invalid, such invalidity shall not affect other provisions, items or applications of this resolution which can be given effect without the invalid provisions, items or application, and to this end, the provisions of this resolution are hereby declared severable.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that all resolutions or parts thereof in conflict herewith are hereby repealed.

Read by title and as read motion Councilman Gibson, seconded by Councilman Walford passed by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

RESOLUTION NO. 37 OF 2004

A RESOLUTION SUSPENDING THE EFFECTS OF CERTAIN PROVISIONS OF CHAPTER 10 AND CHAPTER 106 OF THE CITY OF SHREVEPORT CODE OF ORDINANCES ON MARCH 13, 2004 FOR THE LOUISIANA STATE UNIVERSITY-SHREVEPORT LAGNIAPPE MUSIC FESTIVAL AND TO OTHERWISE PROVIDE WITH RESPECT THERETO.

BY: COUNCILMAN MIKE GIBSON

WHEREAS, Louisiana State University-Shreveport ("LSU-S") will sponsor its LSUS Lagniappe Music Festival on March 13, 2004 on the campus of the university; and

WHEREAS, LSU-S maintains a permit for the sale of low alcoholic content beverages (beer) on the campus; and

WHEREAS, the permit does not authorize alcoholic beverages to be sold, dispensed, or consumed outside of the licensed premises; and

WHEREAS, Section 106-130(6) provides that unless otherwise excepted, all uses shall be operated entirely within a completely enclosed structure; and

WHEREAS, Section 10-80(a) provides that it shall be unlawful for any person to sell, barter, exchange or otherwise dispense of alcoholic beverages, except within those sections of the city wherein such sale is permitted by the applicable zoning ordinance; and

WHEREAS, LSU-S desires to dispense, and allow the sale and consumption of low alcoholic content beverages (beer) on the grounds of the university outside of the licensed premises on March 13, 2004 in conjunction with the LSUS Lagniappe Music Festival event.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the City Council of the City of Shreveport in due, legal and regular session convened Section 106-130 (6) and 10-80(a) are hereby suspended on March 13, 2004 to permit the sale of low alcoholic content beverages (beer) on the grounds of Louisiana State University-Shreveport outside of the licensed premises during the LSUS Lagniappe Music Festival event.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that all other applicable provisions of the City of Shreveport Code of Ordinances shall remain in full force and effect.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that if any provision or item of this resolution or the application thereof is held invalid, such invalidity shall not affect other provisions, items or applications of this resolution which can be given effect without the invalid provisions, items or application, and to this end, the provisions of this resolution are hereby declared severable.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that all resolutions or parts thereof in conflict herewith are hereby repealed.

Read by title and as read motion Councilman Gibson, seconded by Councilman Walford passed by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

RESOLUTION NO. 38 OF 2004

A RESOLUTION SUSPENDING THE EFFECTS OF CERTAIN PROVISIONS OF CHAPTER 10 RELATIVE TO ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES ON APRIL 1, 2, AND 3, 2004 RELATIVE TO DISPENSING, SALE AND CONSUMPTION OF ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES AT 805 BROOK HOLLOW DRIVE AND TO OTHERWISE PROVIDE WITH RESPECT THERETO.

BY: COUNCILMAN GIBSON

WHEREAS, the River Cities Chapter, Inc. intends to sponsor a fund raising activity on April 1, 2, and 3, 2004 between the hours of 9:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m. at the Shreveport Harley-Davidson dealership on 805 Brook Hollow Drive; and

WHEREAS, the River Cities Chapter, Inc. intends to dispense and allow the sale and consumption of alcoholic beverages at this event; and

WHEREAS, the proceeds of the event will benefit River Cities Chapter, Inc., a non-profit organization; and

WHEREAS, Section 10-80(a) makes it unlawful for any person to dispense alcoholic beverages except within those sections of the city wherein such sale is permitted by the applicable zoning ordinance; and

WHEREAS, Section 10-190(a) prohibits consumption of alcoholic beverages on the parking lot of a business or on other property of a business where said property is open to the public; and

WHEREAS, Section 106-130(6) provides that unless otherwise excepted, all uses shall be operated entirely within a completely enclosed structure; and

WHEREAS, Section 10-81 provides that Section 10-41 (requiring a retail dealer’s permit) shall not apply to a bona fide nonprofit event meeting the requirements of this section, only when it is held within the confines of an enclosed building.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the City Council of the City of Shreveport in due, legal and regular session convened Sections 10-41, 10-80(a), 10-190(a) and 106-130(6) are hereby suspended on April 1, 2, and 3, 2004 between the hours of 9:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m. to the extent necessary to allow the sale, dispensing and consumption of alcoholic beverages at the above described fund raising event by the River Cities Chapter, Inc. at the Shreveport Harley-Davidson dealership on 805 Brook Hollow Drive

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that all other applicable provisions of the City of Shreveport Code of Ordinances shall remain in full force and effect.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that if any provision or item of this resolution or the application thereof is held invalid, such invalidity shall not affect other provisions, items or applications of this resolution which can be given effect without the invalid provisions, items or application, and to this end, the provisions of this resolution are hereby declared severable.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that all resolutions or parts thereof in conflict herewith are hereby repealed.

Read by title and as read motion Councilman Gibson, seconded by Councilman Carmody for passage.

Councilman Lester: Mr. Gibson, I think you are answering a question. Where is it. . . .

Councilman Gibson: It is Harley-Davidson is having an event.

Resolution passed by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

RESOLUTION NO. 40 OF 2004

A RESOLUTION TO RECOGNIZE AL KESSLER FOR HIS WORK AND COMMITMENT TO THE 1-49 PROJECT AND THIS COMMUNITY AND TO OTHERWISE PROVIDE WITH RESPECT THERETO

By: Councilman Gibson

WHEREAS, Al Kessler has been a leader in the business and civic community for several decades; and

WHEREAS, Al Kessler has served on many boards including, but not limited to, the Greater Shreveport Chamber of Commerce, Downtown Rotary Club, I-49 North and many other notable organizations; and

WHEREAS, Mr. Kessler is widely known in the community as "Mr. I-49 North" by volunteering to chair the I-49 North Coalition; and

WHEREAS, Al Kessler has provided leadership to raise $276,566 in a three-year period to finance the legislative lobbying efforts in Washington, D.C., Baton Rouge, and Northwest Louisiana in order to educate the elected officials on the importance of I-49 North; and

WHEREAS, Mr. Kessler has traveled thousands of miles from Washington, D.C. to Kansas City to New Orleans promoting this critical "Gateway to Louisiana’s Economic Future".

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, by the City Council of the City of Shreveport in due, regular and legal session convened, that the City of Shreveport and all its citizens publicly recognizes and thanks Al Kessler all his exerted effort and commitment in making the I-49 project a reality.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that this resolution shall be executed in duplicate originals with one original presented to Al Kessler and the other filed in perpetuity in the office of the Clerk of Council for the City of Shreveport.

Councilman Gibson: If I could have the representatives from Chamber of Commerce, Al Kessler and Dick Bremer and Lindy Broderick, would you come forward please?

Read by title and as read motion Councilman Gibson, seconded by Councilman Jackson passed by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

Councilman Gibson: Mr. Kessler, the floor is yours.

Mr. Kessler: Ladies and gentlemen, I’m shocked. I had four things I’d like to say. 1. is that the I-49 up to Kansas City and first of all to Texarkana will provide the keystone to the economic recovery of Louisiana. 2. Thank you. 3. Thank you. 4. Thank you.

Councilman Gibson: I do have a couple of comments though. Ms. Broderick, could I ask you to come forward for a second. Behind every good leader, there is somebody that is always the coordinator and the glue that holds things together. Gentlemen, what you have before you is someone that keeps this I-49 North engine going in Lindy Broderick. She is the Legislative Affairs Representative, she handles a lot of things for the Greater Shreveport Chamber of Commerce. Dick Bremer, her boss, is a modest individual sitting back there, but obviously he is another key component, but this lady will be extremely modest just like Mr. Kessler.

But if you indulge me for just a second, since the inception of I-49 North, there’s been some many keystone accomplishments of which without Ms. Broderick’s help and her professional guidance, we would not be standing here today looking very closely to seeing I-49 North become reality in terms of meeting the Arkansas portion of the project.

In 2001, she was instrumental in keeping this area focused working with DOTD and the Federal Highway Administration to get a record of decision for I-49 North that triggered all the wheels in motion.

The Chamber of Commerce also with her guidance, formed the I-49 North coalition and then also working with Mr. Kessler was able to coordinate and with the funding that was raised by Mr. Kessler was able to hire, I believe the first time the Chamber has ever had a full-time lobbyist in Washington D. C. with J. Bennet Johnston, our former Senator in Washington, D. C.

Working real closely with Congressman McCrery, has constantly stayed on top of the funding mechanisms that take place. They’ve also been able to have a major writing campaign to a variety of Congressional delegations, not just in Louisiana, but a lot of our partnering states. They also in February, 2003 was able to through a bi-partisan I-49 congressional caucus was formed that consists of Congress who have a portion of I-49 in the Congressional Districts. A three-state alliance between Louisiana, Arkansas and Missouri Departments of Transportation was created.

I know that both Lindy and Mr. Kessler worked tireless efforts to be able to get all those players together. If you think it’s tough to get Louisiana together, you ought to try to get Arkansas and Missouri together in the same mix. All of that is created. What we have before us, the foundation to start this house of which we all know is I-49 North which in the resolution stated clearly that it is the gateway to Louisiana’s economic future.

But Lindy on behalf of the Council, I want to thank you for your tireless effort and your professionalism in terms of helping the volunteers that make up the Chamber of Commerce to take on a huge, huge economic engine for this community’s future. Thank you very much.

If I could ask the Mayor to present this. Mr. Kessler, could I ask you to come forward? Thank you Mr. Kessler, again Mr. 49 North.

Councilman Carmody: Mr. Kessler, I’m sure that there might be some other comments from Council Members, but just a personal note. Years ago, you had given words of encouragement to me regarding the fact that a lot of times, getting started is a lot like a diesel train. Where to get it rolling, it’s inperceivable that’s it’s actually beginning to move, but once that it starts to gain momentum, that it’s a very difficult thing to break and stop. And it’s obvious to me that your diesel train is still running full steam and I want to applaud you for that. And I believe that you have done a tremendous amount of work to get I-49 North a reality and I’m looking forward to the day that we all get a chance to ride on it, Sir, but again, I applaud you. Thank you.

Councilman Jackson: Just wanted to say to Mr. Kessler, I had the privilege of working with (inaudible) and Al was retired already I believe and came back to be the best. And (inaudible) keep up the good work.

INTRODUCTION OF RESOLUTIONS:

1. Resolution No. 36 of 2004: A resolution authorizing the transfer of $14,719 from the City of Shreveport to the Red River Zooport Agency Endowment Fund of the Community Foundation of Shreveport-Bossier and to otherwise provide with respect thereto.

Read by title and as read motion Councilman Lester, seconded by Councilman Jackson to withdraw the resolution.

Councilman Carmody: Mr. Dark you had mentioned that yesterday. You said that this resolution was not ready, or are you totally withdrawing it?

Mr. Dark: We thought that we were ready to go with this one and we are not; so, we are asking that it be withdrawn.

Councilman Hogan: Do you plan to re-introduce it?

Mr. Dark: No, not right now.

Councilman Hogan: I’d be interested to know--this $14,000 almost $15,000 where is that money actually, right now?

Mayor Hightower: It is in the City’s General Fund and that was money—you’ve heard the stories that was collected from school kids before I was a school kid, I think, to be dedicated for a zoo.

So, we do want to move that into the furtherance of a zoo in the City however, I think it is incumbent upon us to be sure that when we decide to move that money in that it actually goes to a zoo and not to some—to administration or something other than the actual zoo itself. There is more than one group out there interested in a zoo and that is the reason we pulled it from the agenda.

Councilman Hogan: So this $15,000 has been out there for some 40 or 50 years no, is that correct, in the General Fund.

Councilman Jackson: Is that how long since you were a school kid?

Mayor Hightower: I said, before I was. . . .

Councilman Walford: While I was a school kid.

Councilman Carmody: While Mr. Walford was a mere child.

Councilman Hogan: Well, I would encourage us to do something with that as quickly as possible because you could only imagine if it were only 4% interest, you know that money would have at least doubled by now. So, I hope that we can move somewhat quickly on that and maybe within the next few months reach a decision.

And I’ve expressed some interest so far in having a zoo and I’ve got a place in my district that I’d like to put it. And so, anyway, we’ve got a lot of animals out in my district—nay, I was just kidding. If there is a meeting on that or if you make a decision on it, I’d like to be informed and I would hope that we can get it into some type of vehicle that is earning interest on it as soon as we can.

Mayor Hightower: We tried to use that money on the purchase of this building but were unsuccessful doing that.

Councilman Carmody: Mr. Hogan, I would remind you that we are not a bank, so we don’t’ pay interest on the money that we retain.

Councilman Hogan: Excuse me.

Councilman Carmody: We are not a bank. We don’t pay interest on the money that we are holding.

Councilman Hogan: That is correct.

Councilman Carmody: I just wanted to make sure that you understood that.

Councilman Hogan: Oh, I understand that perfectly. We want to put that money that is not earning interest, if it is going to sit there, into something that does earn interest.

Councilman Carmody: And I understand that.

Councilman Lester: I’d like to just commend Mr. Dark for his diligence in finding $14,000 in a several hundred million dollar budget for 40 years.

Mr. Dark: The good news is that the Finance Department holds onto that and puts it in a special place where I can’t touch it.

Councilman Lester; He is good, he is real good.

Motion passed by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

2. Resolution 39 of 2004: A resolution authorizing the employment of Special Legal Counsel to represent the City of Shreveport and to otherwise provide with respect thereto.

3. Resolution No. 41 of 2004: A resolution authorizing the execution of an agreement with Shreveport Redevelopment Agency and Shreveport Urban Renaissance Corporation, Inc., and to otherwise provide with respect thereto.

INTRODUCTION OF ORDINANCES:

1. Ordinance No. 16 of 2004: An ordinance declaring certain adjudicated properties to be surplus and to authorize the Mayor of the city of Shreveport to sell the city of Shreveport’s tax interest in certain surplus adjudicated properties, and to otherwise provide with respect thereto.

Motion by Councilman Gibson, seconded by Councilman Jackson to Introduce Ordinance No. 16 only at this time.

Mayor Hightower: We would like to have some discussion on some of these, if we could.

Councilman Walford: I would like to offer a substitute motion. Lets introduce 16 only at this time.

Motion by Councilman Walford, seconded by Councilman Hogan to Introduce Ordinance No. 16 to lay over until the March 9, 2004 meeting. Motion passed by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

2. Ordinance No. 17 of 2004 by Councilman Gibson: An ordinance amending the 2004 General Fund Budget and otherwise providing with respect thereto.Motion by Councilman Gibson, seconded by Councilman Jackson to Introduce Ordinance No. 17 to lay over until the March 9, 2004 meeting.

Councilman Walford: I guess I would ask the author if he could give us a little information on it.

Councilman Gibson: A little information?

Councilman Walford: Well, I been reading the newspaper and the Faxnet. I thought maybe we could get it from, I won’t say, from the horse’s mouth since we are talking about zoo, but could you give us exactly what is proposed.

Councilman Gibson: What is proposed is putting more money in the Police Department, $750,000 dollars to be exact and if you read the specific amendment to the budget, it specifically addresses the manpower shortage.

Councilman Walford: Is this something that, what I am reading is that this is not necessarily what the Police Department wants. Is this something that this Council is trying to push on the Police Department that is not wanted by them or where are we?

Councilman Gibson: Well, okay lets just get to the heart of the matter. This Council, I think has an obligation, at least this Councilman does. We all got the crime reports here in 2003, we are 3% up on crime. In December 2003 versus 2002 we were up 30% on violent crime and we were up 10% overall.

I think we heard a presentation during the budget process last time that we had a manpower shortage and we approved a budget based on thinking that that was not going to be that much of a deterrent and now the statistics look that the manpower equating to a problem with increased crime. In my district, my constituents are extremely upset about it. I think you are the only district Councilman Walford who has benefited in having crime stay down, but everything else is up.

In addition, we have a police force which is doing some create service to the citizens of Shreveport, but at the same time being 50 police officers short and it could even rise higher that that is going to continue to put us behind the 8 ball in terms of crime.

To say that the Police Department does not want this, I think, as a Council that we have an obligation to provide more resources to put more police offices out either in the form of overtime or any other recommendation that this Police Chief has.

And then to read just as you did that there is a 2 year, a consultant that has been working on for the last 2 years of a plan to address manpower that was news to me just as it is probably news to you. I wasn’t aware of any consultant that was out there working on a manpower issue, but the fact is, I don’t see those numbers increasing.

I appreciate the Mayor’s due diligence to put a couple training academies in place for this particular fiscal year, but I think it is in agreement that those training academies are not going to solve the problems not only short term, but long term. It is going to take several training academies to get us up to speed knowing that we’ve got retirement coming with our police force and in addition, the overseas call up.

Gentlemen, 30 police officers at any 8-hour interval on the street for a total of 90 patrol officers for 24-hour period is unacceptable in my estimation and that is what we are dealing with here.

You might get two less, you might two more than 30 on a street at any 8-hour given of time, but I think that the manpower shortage is something that we’ve got to deal with. And I’ve got a proposal to take $250,000 out of Riverfront and $500,000 out of Retained Risk. I know this Mayor has said repeatedly that and I agree with him that we shouldn’t be putting monies in banks that when we have a need, this Administration has already demonstrated an ability to step forward and take action. But, looking at the December 2003 compared to December 2002 and then the overall for 2003, is scary to say the least in terms of what we are dealing with here.

And to say that the Police Department is not in favor of it, then my question is and I’ll be more than happy to hear the Chief’s plan for manpower to deal with the manpower issue, but 30 police officers on the street gentlemen, is a sad commentary, a very sad commentary and that is not a reflection on Chief Campbell or Mayor Hightower. That’s all of our problems down here to deal with.

And we passed and we just talked about earlier, a quarter cents sales tax that the citizens paid for and then to come back with crime statistics of this nature. I think with what is being proposed in Baton Rouge, to have that as permanent deal, we’ve got to step up to the plate and do something and work with this Administration to come up with it; that is one of my plans. To throw that money out there to say, Chief here is some money to hire back police officers on the street.

I met with the Chief a couple of weeks ago. He gave me some information that made a lot of sense to me. I felt like I bring it to you. We’ve got two weeks to discuss amongst ourselves, plus I’d like to see the Chief come forward in two weeks with a plan of action of how we are going to deal with manpower shortage because if we compromise personal safety and property infringement we are going to effect our future economic development, we are going to effect our population staying in Shreveport, we are going to effect a lot of other things.

And I kind of take exception with you Councilman Walford by saying that,

‘the Police Department may not be in favor of it.’ I’ve heard the Chief say, ‘he needs all the resources he can get.’ I’ve also heard. . . .

Councilman Walford: Okay Mr. Gibson, you’ve answered my question. Let me keep the floor and then you’ll get your turn on this if that is acceptable to the Chair. I’m reading, the Police Department has devised a plan to increase the number of patrol officers on the street and I’m reading that they shelved the plan and that they want to wait on the (without digging into the article to find the exact wording) they want to wait on the results of a manpower study before implementing anything. So, I ask the question because I’m getting conflicting information and perhaps it would be best if the Chief addresses it for us, but that was my reason for asking the question, I certainly don’t question that we have a problem. That we would like to have more police on the street. Questioning what I’m reading as the proposal that we are putting up to vote on (Councilman Gibson: In two weeks.) in two weeks and what I’m reading in the media and I’m wondering if we are going about it in the best way possible; that is my reason for the question.

Mayor Hightower; We would and the Chief I believe is prepared to address the situation to the Council if you would permit a few minutes to do so.

Councilman Lester: My concern is this, when I spoke with Councilman Gibson concerning this particular piece of legislation, I shared with him my concern about our increase in our crime statistics. And I also indicated to him that apparently and I quite obviously, I am at a disadvantage because I have not had an opportunity to sit with Chief Campbell to hear what his plan is.

But I would think that it would be germane for us to hear from the Chief in terms of what he believes is necessary and required. I agree that something needs to be done and I applaud Councilman Gibson for that. I think that is being very pro-active. And at the same time I don’t think that we are putting ourselves in a negative situation by just simply introducing this.

If this is a point where, if there is a jumping off point where we discuss the issue. Because I definitely have some concerns and questions myself in terms of manpower, in terms of a allotment from different departments and I know for a fact that I have a host of questions that I would like to ask the Chief, but I think it would be prudent at least to hear from the Chief before we decide to spend any money. So, I don’t know if the Chief is here, but I would be kind of interested to see what the Chief has to say but I don’t think that we should necessarily slam Councilman Gibson for coming up with the idea.

Councilman Green: I would like to commend Councilman Gibson for the idea, but on the same token, I think we ought to give the Chief the opportunity to be the Chief. I think that we’ve selected/elected him to be the Chief and I just think that we ought to give him that opportunity because basically even if we put 50 officers on the street, even if we put them on there today, it is not going to solve crime, as to how we think it will.

I think that this program that Councilman Lester has about investing in our neighborhoods, it is going to take people to take care of neighborhoods and to say that we are not going to tolerate whatever is going on in the neighborhood and I think people will have to work hand-in-hand with the Police Department but I just think that before we take this money and we’ll say we’ll just put it over there, and Chief if you ask for it, then he may not need it. I just think that with his ability there is some plans that he is going to initiate that is going to really make us proud. So, I just think that we ought to give him an opportunity.

And when you talk about crime going up, I guess in the rest of these districts it has just become an emergency but I’ve had crime in my district so long until it just really, make my body just numb. Councilman Gibson asked me about crime in my district. I told him mine went down because I hadn’t had no killings, lately. It has moved to somebody else district and I guess crime is only emergency if it is in your district, but I been dealing with crime for years and years.

So, I just think that we need to just hold this idea and I don’t think we ought to put the Chief on the spot today. I think we ought to hold this idea, give him an opportunity to let his study come back. If he is going to tell us then we need to fire the folks that is doing the study and save that money and put it with whatever money. I don’t think we ought to put him on the spot. I don’t think that we ought to have him come up here and stand before us and say, ‘okay, Chief tell us if you want it and then his boss is over there. And then you say, ‘how you going to make all eight of us happy?’ When basically this is not the problem.

So just think that we ought to give the Chief a chance to be the Chief, wait on the study and then go from there. Anything else we do because I wouldn’t want the Chief to try to come up and run this legislative body; so, therefore, in fact I am going to, in fact, Chief since you’ve been Chief, I’ve slowed down, I don’t drive fast like I used to because I don’t know how you stand on giving out tickets; so, I don’t want no trouble.

But I just think we ought to let everybody handle their own business and this is good, but it is not yet and that is basically what I wanted to say, Mr. Chairman.

Councilman Jackson: I would like to ask if there are some questions that we may have. However, I think it appropriate and in the brief history of this Council together, obviously these kind of issues have come up before in this procedural, in this manner and it has generally been this Council’s mode of operation to suggest that maybe we ought not to discuss it today that if it is on the agenda, that in two weeks, whether we are for it or against it we could just begin to vote it up or down and it is in that vein that I call for the question. [Councilman Jackson called for the Question, seconded by Councilman Green. Motion passed by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 6. Nays: Councilman Walford. 1.]

Motion to Introduce Ordinance No. 17 approved by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 6. Nays: Councilman Walford. 1.

Motion by Councilman Jackson, seconded by Councilman Green to reconsider Ordinance No. 17 of 2004. Motion approved by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 6. Nays: Councilman Gibson. 1. [Later in the meeting.]

Motion by Councilman Jackson, seconded by Councilman Green to remove Ordinance No. 17 of 2004 from the agenda. Motion approved by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 6. Nays: Councilman Gibson. 1.

Councilman Jackson: It is in that, because all of these are connected, it is in that same spirit that I would like to move to add 18 through 20 as well.

Motion by Councilman Jackson seconded by Councilman Gibson to add Ordinances 18, 19 and 20.

Mayor Hightower: We’d again, I don’t have a problem with the Introduction of the legislation but I would like to have discussion and have the Chief come forward to talk about this legislation.

And the reason that I think that it is imperative to do that, this week instead of waiting two weeks is I don’t think that the story should continue to be spread that the sky is falling and I think the Chief wants to talk about that and talk about what the stats say. Statistics obviously can be what you want them to be and bottom line is crime up, it is up, but I think we need to look at the numbers and what’s inside the numbers as to the reason crime is up. And I don’t think that we should take whatever opportunity this may be to stir up something that probably doesn’t need to be stirred up when you start talking about how it impacts the perception, if nothing else of our City, the economic development opportunities. I think that the proof is in the pudding and if that I f the Chief could come forward today and talk to you a little bit about what the numbers are, where they are headed, what his plans are, can show you that he is not operating out of his hip pocket, that he is a professional that has plan. I think the entire community would benefit from his presentation today.

Councilman Green: Chief, before you get to that , send me an e-mail on how your stand is on speeding.

Chief Campbell: I just got a brief presentation and again, I do as well want to clear the air on several things.

First of all, it would be the easiest thing I the world and come up in here and say, ‘show me the money.’ I know that there are several other department heads within the city that would love to do the same thing. And I do appreciate the concern and the efforts, but I think that before we make decisions, and that is one thing about me, I am a very systematic person and I like the things—in the end, I’m going to be held responsible for the results and I think that it is very important that we look at it in that manner.

I would just like to say a couple of things about my commitment to this City and this Police Department’s commitment to this City. And I think if we look as we look at the charts in just a few minutes, you are going to see what that commitment is. My commitment to this City: In June of last year, I took this job. I knew there was going to be issues,. I knew there were going to be problems. I knew we were going to have issues with manpower and I knew that we were going to have some increases in crime and I think there are several things that we need to look at.

And I also made a commitment to his City to move here. And I think that is a very significant commitment especially at my age to do that. In particular that my house would have been paid for in 4 years and I would have been perfectly happy to live there. If I had some concerns about the future of this City, I certainly wouldn’t have done that. And I can tell you if I had a financial planner, they would fire me as a client, I can assure you.

And again, I think there is some mis-communication. I did have a meeting with Councilman Gibson in regards to the statistics and obviously there was some mis-information because we talked about that. We talked about the 12-hour shift, we talked about some of the things that we had considered and we decide to shelve that study because it wasn’t cost effective and that was the understanding that I thought that we had.

And there was a follow-up conversation with my Assistant with Mr. Gibson, offering another plan. And I am not telling you, I don’t need money. I think everybody in city government needs money, but I think we have to be very careful about how we approach that.

Let me just tell you a little bit about statistics so that you can make an informed decision. Crime is up slightly this year, 3% overall in 2003 and that is particularly in property crimes. It was up 4% in 2002, so we’ve actually, while we have had an increase it wasn’t as much as it was in 2002. The violent crime index has remained steady at 0% during that same time period, 2 years. However, I think it is important that you look at the statistics carefully and in the total context to get an accurate picture of what is going on.

If you look at the first chart: Part 1 Crime for Shreveport 10-Year Comparison: If you look at the 10 year comparison starting in 1994, you see where we were: Total Part Crime Index is 24619. Now we are now is about 16945. I think there are some very significant things that we can look at and I think that I can show you that they are more than just police officers involved, more factors than just the number of police officers involved in crime statistics. If you look here in 1994, there was slight peak in 1996 and I am going to have to a little research on that, but generally speaking, you have a downward fall until 2001.

And if you will, just think back of what has occurred in our City during that time period–jobs, casino, money, opportunity–and I think that has a direct impact and I think it shows what we have done here.

If you also look in 2001 and you see it start picking back up, a slight rise. I think that is different from a surge. And some of the things I read in the last couple of days, I am not sure where all this information is coming from, but I think it is important that we get out important information especially when we are trying to attract additional and new jobs to our City. And again, in 2001, you see a slight increase.

What happened in 2001? What happened to our economy in 2001 and I think it is very clear, the results of the September 11, 2001 impacted not only our community but impacted this great nation in regards to our economy. And at the same time, we have had some issues in our own budget, locally. Unfortunately, we are not like the federal government. We don’t print our own money.

The next chart: Part 1 Crime by District: And I think there is certain things here and I been explaining on the phone, been quite busy on the phone explaining issues when we go bannering about statistics without looking at them in a total aspect of what those may mean.

If you look in the City, we’ve got a 31% increase as reported in the paper in our Ellerbe Woods neighborhood. If you would take a look at the chart under District 17, that is 134 Part 1 Crimes total, that is a Part 1 Crime about every 3 days. The majority of them being property crimes.

On the other hand if you will take a look at our Cedar Grove neighborhood which is our highest crime district, there is 1625 Part 1 Crimes in 2003. For an incident rate of about 4 per day. A big difference there. And one of the things that you have to be careful with statistics, when you compare small numbers to small numbers you get big increases. I think, I am obviously concerned. One crime is too many, but I can tell you we been around a long time and we are going to have peaks and valleys in our crime statistics and manpower is, granted, one of the factors. It is not the total factor.

If you’ll look by district and as you look across, there is certain areas and what we have done is identified some of the major crimes for those things. District 1, primarily the problem is resident burglary. District 2 Residence Burglary. District 3 Residence Burglary; 4 and 5 (same thing (Residence Burglary) and those things are things that we can work on, that we can apply resources to and have some effect on and we do that on a daily basis.

District 6, 7 and 8 primary increase there is Shoplifting. That comes with a territory. When you have a lot of businesses, you are going to have shoplifting, without a doubt. District 9 is residence burglaries. District 10, Residence Burglary. District 11, 12 and 13 are Theft General.

And those generally when you are talking about theft, you are talking crimes of opportunity. You are talking about leaving your garage door open and somebody coming by and grabbing your lawn mower and there is things that we can do and we’ve worked in several of these neighborhoods helping citizens (inaudible) their residences and that is what we need to do when we are talking about crimes of opportunity.

Districts 14, 15 and 16 again, shoplifting is the big number and it deals with the businesses that are located in those districts. District 17 again, theft in general and downtown in District 18 is auto burglary.

If you’ll flip to the next page, I think that you can see in District 9 Crime Comparison. Where we were in 1994, where we are today nearly 50% decrease there and there is a lot of work going on there and a lot of work continuing to go on there.

If you go to the next slide, District 17 crime 10-Year Comparison. You can see in 1994 we had a 178 Part 1 Crime there. We are at 102 today. I think there is some other things you need to look at when you do that comparison, 134 for 2003.

But when you look at it, look at what is happening in that particular district. Does anybody got any ideas? There is a population explosion there a lot of building going on. A lot of increase residences in that area. When you have increased people, what does that do? It increases opportunity for crime. Look at it at the same time there is a lot of construction going on there, there is a lot of transient people in and out of the neighborhoods that wouldn’t normally be there and so it lead to crimes of opportunity.

And just finally, the last couple of sheets I want to show you a comparison with Little Rock and this is a little bit earlier and it is kind of interesting. We got on the internet trying to find statistics from cities. Found that several, several cities don’t really even report theirs and I guess that is pretty good when you can get away with that, that is no accountability there.

But it is a little bit early in the year, generally speaking. Those numbers those who participated in the Part 1 statistics are out about March. We will get the federal numbers in about June. And if you compare us to Little Rock, a little bit smaller city but you compare the Part 1 crimes there, we are 25% below Little Rock. And also we did a comparison with Jackson. They track their numbers a little bit differently than we do and we show a 1% difference being less of a crime rate than Jackson Mississippi.

So, we do we have crime splurge? I don’t think so. I can tell you about a crime splurge. I lost two good friends in a crime splurge in the late to early ‘90s and it is quite a bit different now. I am concerned, certainly I’m concerned. The manpower that we have does affect our ability to do a lot of proactive things, but also at the same time, the economy plays a pretty significant role as well. If the economy improves this year, I think we are still going to have a crime increase. I don’t think it is going to be a great crime increase. But if it does not improve, then I think that if it going to be more significant than what we are seeing now. It is my professional opinion from being in this business some 30-years.

And then finally, we’ve got on the back there, the selected criminal offenses by district of January through December of 2003, when you can compare from those. When you talk about statistics, it is very important that you look at them in a holistic fashion. A couple of things that I’d like to get cleaned up in regarding to some of the articles that have been written. The Times article on Sunday, this past Sunday talks about the fact that we cancelled two academy classes last year, that is not true. We cancelled one. We looked at another thing we got on the Faxnet Update today, and I would like to know where some of these figures comes as well.

Councilman Jackson: Chief, don’t look for news in there.

Chief Campbell: Well, I am just concerned with the numbers and I think it affects and I . . .

Councilman Jackson: It is F-A-X not F-A-C-T-S.

Chief Campbell: I’m sorry?

Councilman Jackson: I learned that it was F-A-X not F-A-C-T-S.

Chief Campbell: Talking about potential shortages for the end of this year, that we are going to be 125 officers short. I have no idea where that figure came from and I certainly don’t think that we’ll approach anywhere near that.

And as we talk, I would like to talk just a second about what we are doing short term. Presently as everybody is aware we are hiring a class of 30 officers beginning March 1^st. That brings our numbers up from roughly 476 up to-correction, if you take into account the military people, we are going to bring us back up to about 496 officers. Obviously they are not going to be street ready. They going to be available to us down the road, but it is the plan that we do have in place. We currently have in budget and have another class in September of this year. We are also looking at hiring 4 officers back who has decided to come back to work for us and so we will have that done March 15 which will further increase our numbers.

In the meantime, you can look at the statistics or the worksheets and you can look at the officers that are on the street and generally it does, depending on the day of the week, the shift, there is anywhere to 30 to high as 40 officers out there on the shift, but that not all of the officers that are available in the City of Shreveport.

We have roughly about $500,000 dollars in federal overtime monies that we direct toward certain projects that are (inaudible) which is a drug related grant that we use for overtime to go out there and do that to enforce the drug laws. We have several other narcotics-related grants. We have a property crime grant that we work that pays for overtime. It puts additional officers out there. While they may not be assigned specifically to Patrol at that moment, there are officers out there on the street and I think they are doing a wonderful job, by the way.

Also in regards, in particularly, our grant coming on line dealing with District 9 and 10 specifically, looking at violent crime. And I think it is a very good program and I think that we are going to see some remarkable results from it as we get this thing up and running.

Some of the other things that we are doing short term is, we are allowing our Supervisors to assist on help calls to get out and make those things, to keep them from stacking up on us. So, there is several things that we are doing short term and we’ll continue to do short term until our resources some on line. And yes, may be back here asking you for money, but I’d rather do it with a plan in place knowing the exact numbers and then we get into the long term plans.

We should have a little information from Dr. Bellmeow, this week, just some preliminary numbers that we can address that we can start looking at those thing and we may want to do that. I don’t know if that is going to cost $50,000. I don’t know if that is gong to cost $100. I don’t know if it is going to cost $750 and we are going to wait for the results that he comes in and I think it is prudent that we do that in regards to taxpayer money.

Also, we are in the process this year of completing a 5-year Strategic Plan that is going to tell you what our needs are as a Police Department over the next 5-years. And also in looking at that, try to identify sources that we can use. One of the things that I forgot to talk about when we were talking about federal grants, federal funds, if you look at the legislation at the national level, there is several bills afoot to reduce those monies significantly and those would have a crippling, if they did that, if they follow through, they would have a crippling effect on our ability to do a lot of the things that we do.

Again, the 5-Year Strategic Plan. We have a lot of issues, we have a lot of things that we could put money towards and we are concerned. I am not making light of this in any form or fashion. I would love for crime to go away. Unfortunately, I’ve been in this business 30-years and that is not going to happen. But I think there are several things we can do smarter, we can do smarter as Police Department, we can do smarter in planning the things that we do. One of the things that I think over the years that we have neglected to do is when we take a look at these annexations, we need to appropriate that money when we annex. I would think that would be a way that we could address some of these issues over time.

Also, and I would like to entertain the possibility of putting a committee together with members of the Council, some economic development professionals, representatives of the U. S. Attorney’s Office, the Caddo Parish District Attorney’s Office and the Shreveport Police Department to come up with a holistic plan to address crime in our community, not just by the numbers of officers but also through economic development.

If you want to help me, bring me another GM, bring me another Western Electric, that will help, big time and if there is any questions, I’ll answer those..

Councilman Carmody: Chief, and I ask this hesitantly, but I am going to ask it anyway. At given time, there are 30 officers on patrol within the city limits of the city of Shreveport? And again, I’m asking that in the form of a question but asking also if that be true, are we down from a number that at one time we had more officers on patrol during the shifts?

Chief Campbell: That would be a low number, that number would fluctuate. Again, based on calls for service, days of the week. That would be a low number per shift would be around 30, we have been there. We’ve also been up around 40. And again, it depends on the calls for service, the number of calls we are getting and days of the week and those type of things. The different shifts, obviously we are going to have more people working evenings, because that is when you primarily get your calls for service.

Councilman Carmody: And as far as your available police force, we are impacted by the military call-ups. at this point.

Chief Campbell: That is correct.

Councilman Carmody: And your comment was that we will have 30 officers coming out of this class which will bring our current level to 496 officers in the city of Shreveport?

Chief Campbell: That is correct.

Councilman Carmody: That is taking out those that are activated and on military duty which are not here.

Chief Campbell: No sir that would not. That would basically 9 of those which would not be here which we have right now.

Councilman Walford: Mine is not a question, Chief. I guess I started this fire storm by asking a question about what we were doing because of the conflicting information and I want to make it clear to you and the public and I want to address it to Mr. Gibson that, I certainly support what you are doing. My question was, was it the right thing to do? Was it consistent with what you needed, because I saw conflicting information in the media and in the legislation that was proposed.

So, I want you to know that this Councilman is here to support you and I certainly want your input though, not us try to tell you. I think that you are the professional and I will always refer to you.

And, I want Mr. Gibson to know that I certainly was not questioning his motives or anything or the need, merely that we have very conflicting information and that was the reason I asked for a clarification on it; so, for you and him both, I want you to know that I am supporting, believe me.

Councilman Green: Chief, I would just like to first of all again say, congratulation, keep up the good work and I want you to know and I want it to go on record by saying, that I support whatever plans you have to make our City safe. You can count on my support.

Chief Campbell: Thank you.

Councilman Lester: I’m looking at the last chart you gave us, Selected Criminal Offenses By district - Location of Districts - January -December 2003 and it says "Selected Offenses". Is this, the offenses, are there other offenses that we haven’t calculated or are the offenses that we have listed here, pretty much, I hate to say, run of the mill, I mean, in your professional expertise, these are the types of crimes that generally happened in neighborhoods.

Chief Campbell: Yes, Sir. These are the type of crimes that the FBI tracks throughout the country, Part 1 Crime statistics. There are some Part II crimes, generally they are very minor in nature. Generally what we look at is Part 1, that is generally accepted across the country as a from of measuring our crime statistics.

Councilman Lester: When you say, Part II Crimes just for the un-enitiated what kind of general speaking what kind of, are you talking about drug offenses or things of that nature?

Chief Campbell: Some of those yes, that would fall under that category.

Councilman Lester: So with the exception of drug offenses, these are the type statistics that when you nationally crime is up by 4% or crime is down by 10%, these are the numbers that the FBI that is generally accepted in the law enforcement community?

Chief Campbell: Yes, Sir that is correct.

Councilman Lester: I want to make that clear. I want to be clear about that because, I am not surprised but I think maybe some people in the City would be surprised to know that when you look at it in terms of the Part I Offenses, the total crimes that you have listed, I mean, quite obviously, the safest area and when I say ‘safest’ I am talking about the least amount of crime as reported as Part I was in fact District 17 which is Ellerbe Woods.

But as I appreciate it looking at this breakdown the No. 2 was District 13 which as I appreciate it is Western Hills and Yarborough Subdivision, then No. 3, Councilman Green is Mooretown. No. 4 in terms of least amount of crime is the Martin Luther King area. The No. 5 area is Cherokee Park, North Highland which is District 2, Cherokee Park, Freestate North Highlands and of particular interest to me is District 3 which is Lakeside and Allendale, and that ranked 9^th out of 18, so it is pretty much in the middle of the pack.

So, I just wanted to get that information out there for those that are reading and those that are watching so that the perception, I think the Mayor indicated that a lot of times perception sometimes becomes reality. You think that just because you are in a certain neighborhood, that neighborhood isn’t safe . So, looking at the statistics that you’ve given us Chief, that doesn’t necessarily always bear out.

So, I appreciate the work that you’ve done. This is obviously the result of a lot of diligence on not only your part, but the men and women that are working with the Police Department said and I will echo what Councilman Green said, that if there are anything that I can do to support your efforts because at the end of the day, your success is our success.

Councilman Carmody: Chief, just as a side note, I seem to recall in years past that there were crime such as driving off–stealing gasoline that were not included because they kind of skewed the overall statistics and they are not considered to be, I guess what you would call a selected criminal offense.

Chief Campbell: And I’ll have to actually get back with you. I think there was some controversy about taking those off, but I don’t think that you can legally do that and I would have to check with my Statistician Joe Barbosa to check for sure, but I think those are included.

Councilman Carmody: Well, as I say, robbery is a crime regardless of what is being stolen.

Councilman Gibson: Chief you had said, that you don’t consider it, I think, no crime splurge. But you also said that we are at 4% in 2002 in terms of crime being up and we are 3% and applaud that the Police Department going down 1%, but the fact is, it is still up in both years.

Chief Campbell: That is correct and I think I’ve stated that, Councilman.

Councilman Gibson: And I think this issue is not about micro-managing your department. There is no question about your commitment, your police officers commitment to the department in any form or fashion.

In the conversation between you and I two weeks ago and maybe we did have a mis-communication, I don’t recall and I apologize to you if I didn’t not hear that, but I didn’t hear that you were shelving a plan that you alluded to regarding a potential shift because my question to you was, what would it take in terms of dollars.

And No. 2, the other question that we talked about is overtime, that was a major component of what you are dealing with right now. I don’t know what the statistics are 5 years ago or 10 years ago in terms of where we are in manpower but I know in terms of the growth that this Mayor has brought to this City and I think we have given him major accolades for the growth in this City, but with growth as you just said on annexation, comes additional resources to go to the department.

I think we cut the budget 15% in December 2002, I think we cut the budget in Spring 2003. You stated there that you were in manpower shortage because of attrition because of overseas call-ups.

I frankly, don’t care about other cities in term of their statistics. I care about what goes on in Shreveport. I don’t care what goes on in Bossier, I care about what goes on in Shreveport. And you have the experience, your personnel have the experience and it is painfully obviously to me as a Councilman that we have a resource issue.

In that conversation with you two weeks ago and again, I will apologize for mis-understanding anything between us, I don’t remember once about a consultant in any form or fashion and I applaud the effort. I don’t know when the consultant was hired. I don’t know when it was budgeted, but again, consultants are there to help bring additional resources to compliment the professional experience that we have within the Police Department.

But when I look at the stretching of patrol officers on the street and the growth and I don’t care if it is my district or anywhere else, I think we see growth in a lot of different aspects, it equates to crime. We hadn’t even talked about the presence of police officers and I think hat anybody that walked their neighborhoods during their campaign a couple of years ago, heard on a regular basis, we got a fine department. But at the same time if you are stretched you don’t see them very often. And we’ve got speeding in the neighborhoods, probably more o at least according to my neighborhood association, then they ever recall, and we talked about that two weeks ago too.

Where is the priority? Priority is crime on people, crime on business and then we try to deal with the traffic issues and all the other little ancillary things that come with the business that you are in and it is a tough business, I understand that.

I for one, think that this is healthy discussion. It is not to point figures at anybody. It is not to say we can’t afford this negative publicity. What we can’t afford is to be caught short in terms of providing you with the resources that will hurt the long term image of this City. And I see your statistics up here, but I also see a consistency for the last 24months we have been at least 3% or more higher than we’ve had in the past. And personally, I believe it is in putting manpower on the street based on my conversation with you 2-wees ago.

And my last words to you were, I was going to go back to the table, draft some legislation for a budget amendment to bring to my colleagues for consideration and to mull over and maybe they might come up with some amendments and twist to it which I encourage very much so but it wasn’t to micro-manage this department.

I have too much respect for you, for Mayor Hightower, for Dwayne Huddleston and every one of your staff to try to meddle into it because it is not my expertise. My expertise is to take care of my district and right now the statistics show, my district is one of the ones that is being most effected. And, I appreciate that we have six police officers according to your statistics in 8 and 9 precincts (I call them precincts, I think you call them districts) six for a district with over 30,000 residents.

And I hope and pray that that consultant’s report and again, I am still taking back on the consultant a little bit, because again, I have all the confidence in our professional experience. You have 30-years experience, I believe, with our department. I think any other city would love to have your consulting abilities on this thing, but if that will help in the short term and the long term, I’m all in favor but at the same time it is still not going to address and I’ve talked with your own rank and file out there that told me first hand, 1, 2 training academies isn’t going to solve this problem.

Chief Campbell: No, Sir it is not.

Councilman Gibson: It is going to be a long term effort that some time we lost focus on and again, that is all of our fault up here at this point in time in terms of dealing with training academies which is the lifeblood of your department, the way I see it.

In crime of opportunity, sure and right now, I consider a couple of district being pretty good opportunities for people to come out to if they are not seeing very much police presence.

And in the short term, I hope that that consultant’s report is going to bring some things to the table. My interest was to bring resources to the table to compliment what I see immediately needed on the street in my district and I think in other districts too to put more patrol officers which takes more pressure off according to some of your personnel. They are stressed out right now. They are stressed out in a lot of different ways because of shortages in manpower. That is not your fault. You stepped into this issue. I don’t even consider it Chief Robert’s fault. It time progression.

Construction has got the same problem. Right now, we didn’t do a good job of training over the last 25 years, and as a result, we are behind the 8 ball and it has raised the bar in my opinion in a positive way. To compliment the efforts of Mayor Hightower in terms of bringing growth to this City and to bring additional resources to your department so we don’t get caught in a catastrophic problem to where we look up and see statistics going even higher over time and fortunately we do have employment fairly healthy right now in this community. But you know as well as I do and for 30-years on service, it is good to be prepared. And I think you are setting the stage for us to be prepared, but again, this is resources to help you do your job. And whether it be Plan A or Plan B, I heard two different things from you the other day. 1. Additional overtime and 2. a possibility of looking at, and I agree we mis-communicated on that. In fact, I think there was some mis-communication of some of the information on the street whether it be media or otherwise.

But the fact is, we come full circle. We can muddy this water all we want. There aren’t enough police officers on the street and we can debate that all day, but the stats are proving that. And I have to go by those stats because I can’t look at anything other than that and I also have to go by the feedback and my commitment in that same meeting, 2-weeks ago, is to get you more engaged in some of the neighborhood association so you can hear it not just from me, but from my constituents.

Councilman Green: Chief, when we hire the rest of these police, are we going to have enough tasers for them all?

Chief Campbell: We are working on.

Councilman Hogan: Thank you Chief Campbell for coming today and explaining all of that. I think you’ve done a good job of clarifying a lot of misunderstandings that, at least I had and I know a lot of other people here in the Council and in the community had.

I would just like to get some clarification on one thing that has been talked about that was printed in the paper also, about the 30 cars on patrol in the community and Councilman Gibson said, he has six in his area. Well that would be, if each had six that would be five districts and so I’ve been told that I’ve only had, most any given time, I have one car patrolling in my district. Can you just sort of clarify that?

Chief Campbell: If you don’t mind, let me bring the Patrol Commander up and he can kind of give you an idea and again, and I’ll be glad to sit down and explain and how we do, allocate our manpower. Mike can tell you exactly how person per shift.

[Unidentified] Patrol Commander: Mr. Hogan, we do just like the Chief said, we look at the crime throughout the City and that is how we and calls for services, determine how many cars ride in a certain area. Usually on a given time you may have one to two cars like District 15 and maybe one to two in 16, but just on the given days it may be one unit riding in District 15 and one riding District 16.

Councilman Hogan: Right. I can appreciate that you go where the crime is. You patrol where the crime is that is why it didn’t seem to make sense in one of the lowest crime rates in the district, in District D that you’d have that many people patrolling out there. Nonetheless, that answers my question and I appreciate it.

Chief, I had another comment for you. You mentioned about economic development, that we really want to help you go bring some companies in here and some job and really that makes sense; I agree with your approach. And I would encourage people on the Council here as well as other to participate in the Choose Shreveport campaign that we’ve launched.

You know, not too often do I mention something that happens in my church, but I do want to mention something that was brought up in my church this past Sunday. We have a ministry at our church, at Summer Grove Baptist Church, we have started recently where we send a group of men to minister to the inmates at Angola.

And this has not been just Summer Grove here in our area, but it has been a group of other churches throughout the state that have participated in this. And eight years ago the Warden Earl Cain he implemented this program where he is allowing churches to come in and they are encouraging Bible studies and things like that.

In 1995, the way I appreciate it, the way I understand it, Angola had some of the highest crime rates, within the prison there of any prison in the country. In the eight years that have past since they’ve implemented this program, for lack of a better term you could call it a faith-based program, they have wardens coming from around the country to look at what has happened there. The result has been astonishing. We are now at some of the lowest crime rate within the prison.

And personally, I would like to put you in touch with some of these people. Could there be a possibility of us putting in a program like this at the city jail, I don’t know. I would be willing to participate in that and even explore those possibilities. I think that that is very relevant an I’d just like to meet with you in the future on that, soon. If we can discuss that, I’d like to bring my Pastor and some of those men that are involved in that program.

Chief Campbell: Councilman, would love to. In fact we are working with the Justice Department now on several faith-based initiatives that we are trying to get up and running in our community and we’d love ya’ll to be a part of that as well.

Councilman Carmody: Chief, I want to thank you for coming and bringing the presentation before the Council, at this point.

Mayor Hightower: First of all, I appreciate the Council for letting the Chief come before you today and explain to you’re the numbers inside the stats.

Certainly, Mr. Gibson, I appreciate what you want to do, that you want to add more money to the police budget and I do to and the Police Chief wants more money and every officer wants more money.

Since I been the Mayor, we put an additional, almost an additional $10 million dollars into the police budget; so the proof is in the pudding of what we have done in the police budget with city funds to combat crime. I mean that has been our No. 1. priority when I was on the City Council, when I ran for Mayor. Councilman Carmody, I know you were the same way, is to reduce crime and do everything we could and threw the resource that we could, at that problem.

Even though the police budget was cut last year, it was not cut to the level that it was previous year. So, we’ve never funded the Police Department in any year less than we funded them in the prior year even through the budget cut process to get the budget in balance.

So, I think the whole crux of what we are trying to talk about today is, lets get the facts. Lets figure out how to prioritize where our money needs to go. We put a budget together you guys passed two months ago, that I think is a pretty good budget. We all understand the budget is flexible, we are going to have priorities, we are going to have focus, we are going to have other things that come up that we need to do. We know there are some coming down the road. We know that we are faced with $100,000 dollar bump in police retirement alone for this year, that was not figured on--same thing could happen to us with Fire a year ago, if you will recall, to a much larger extent than that. So, we know that we are going to have to come up with extra monies but we think that we have a budget that works.

And, I guess the point here is that we need to prioritize, we need to spend it right. I know over the past several months, I’ve heard we need better golf courses. I’ve heard we need more infrastructure because we are $200 million behind underground. We need better roads. We need more asphalt overlay, we need more police officers. We need tasers, you know, we need all of these things. But I think we have to be cognizant and go to the experts and say, ‘you know, Chief what is it you need?’. I don’t think we can just go throw numbers and I think the Chief hit the nail on the head. He is going to come back when the study comes back and he is going to say, I need whatever it might be.

But I do think today’s discussion as Councilman Gibson said, is healthy in that I think the general public needs to understand that the sky is not falling, there is a plan in place. There is money being spent in the Police Department, millions being spent in the Police Department, to control crime. It is the No. 1 priority and it will continue to be the No. 1 priority. But I think if there is one message that should go to the general public today, that the Chief said is the reason for the slight increase in crime over the past couple of years, is that it has been crimes of opportunity–mostly car theft, burglaries, shoplifting, the type of things that are going to happen with growth especially retail growth. And, I think that if Target were located in District B. Crime would be up in District B. And if car dealership were located in District A, crime would probably be up in District A.

Councilman Lester: We’ll take the dealership.

Councilman Walford: And we’ll take the Target.

Mayor Hightower: So, I do think that Councilman Gibson is going to be faced with a different animal perhaps than some of the rest of you may be faced with in that there is a tremendous amount of growth in that particular district, but it also remains the safest district in town. And, if we can convince the citizens to help do their part through neighborhood watches, through closing garage doors, locking cars, picking up bicycles and bring them inside at night, all of those little bitty things not only make your neighborhood safer and make the crime stats go down, but it also gives a whole lot more cities to talk about when we are out recruiting economic development-wise when we can say, wait a minute. We are a safer city than Jackson. We are safer than Little Rock. We are safer than Baton Rouge. We are safer than Longview. We are safer than all of the other things. We all, all 200,000 of us in this community can affect the statistics by just doing simple things. Cutting your bushes, lighting your house. I think the Police Chief, you can go through a number of those.

But again, I think the discussion is healthy. Councilman Gibson I appreciate the fact that you bring it up and I think it should be to light and bring to focus the fact that we all need to get involved and do what we can to prevent crime so that it does help us do the things the Chief says we need to bring, more General Motors and businesses to town.

Councilman Carmody: Chief, I know that I took advantage of the program that the Department offered to come to my residence and to critique what I could do as a property owner to make my property more safe and having enacted those recommendations. That is still available to the public, if I’m mistaken?

Chief Campbell: Yes, Sir that is correct.

Councilman Carmody: That ya’ll will come out. And a number of them were quite obvious thing that I had never thought about before. And again, having implemented those, I think it gives me peace of mind that at least I’m not making myself an attractive target.

Councilman Gibson: In terms of the consultant, your estimated time of getting that information back?

Chief Campbell: We are going to have a phone conference with him in the morning. I think that he has the information he needs it is a matter of getting him on a schedule. Once he comes here, this guy is well known across the country for studies just like this and once he presents and he can even come to the Council, if we request and make a presentation to you based on the calls for service. And there is a lot of things that figures into this, not only calls for service but how much, and they don’t call it discretionary time and that is where you can go out there and do pro-active policing while you are there instead of making call to call to call and we are not getting that discretionary time to do proactive things in the community.

But once he is finished, we have a software program, we have all of the statistics. And one of the other things that we are going to talk to him about tomorrow is coming up with some type of formula that we can use when we talk about annexing properties, what is the cost that goes along with that and I think that these things will help us do better in the future. I don’t want anything mistaken. I appreciate your efforts and I appreciate your concerns. It is going to be a tough year. It is just like I told you. We have some things working and we are going to work like we’ve worked for the past 10-years to try to do the best we can with what we have and I think with some of the things that we are doing in the communities as well.

And I think that what we have to look at it is not just the Police Department, it is not just the Council, it is all of us working together toward a common goal and I think that if we do that, I ‘m committed to Shreveport. I always have been, lived here all of my life except for the short brief period I was across the river with my wife and that is where she is from. But I’m committed and I certainly wouldn’t be here in this job if I didn’t think there was a better way and we couldn’t do better.

Councilman Gibson: If I could encourage the Administration, I personally would be interested in and I hope that my colleagues would be interested in hearing at the end of the day from that consultant in terms of their findings and if that could be brought before us either in written or oral presentation.

The other part, I definitely would like to, if you get that task force together, I would like to volunteer to serve in any capacity.

And I guess the last thing, as I said at the very beginning, this legislation as it is written has nothing to do with the integrity and the efforts of your police officers. That goes without saying, the effort and the time that they put in the dedication that they bring to the citizens of Shreveport and the pride that they bring with their professionalism for us to enjoy. They put their lives on the line every single day. And for that I’m grateful. For that, at the same time, no one was up here micro-managing or beating.

It was again to put information or resources on the table to solve some issues, that to me are trends and trends are something that are again are a concern both short term and long term and I think we’ve all covered all the different aspects of that. But again, I volunteer to help in that task force and look forward to hearing from the consultants as they move forward to that. But that was something—and I will apologize. I don’t remember that in our 2-weeks conversation ago in any form or fashion, about a consultant, but again, for that I will apologize to you.

Councilman Jackson: In light of all of the discussion that we’ve had over the last several minutes, I’d like to amend my previous motion to remove Ordinance 18 and 19 from the agenda. I had 18, 19 and 20 in my original motion. I would like to amend to remove 18 and 19 from the agenda.

Motion by Councilman Jackson, seconded by Councilman Green to remove Ordinances 18 and 19 of 2004 from the agenda. Motion approved by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 6. Nays: Councilman Gibson. 1.

Mr. Thompson: For the record, 18 and 19 was removed and that vote also added to the agenda, 20–is that correct?

Councilman Jackson: Yes, Sir. I also would like to move to reconsider Item 17.

3. Ordinance No.18 of 2004 by Councilman Gibson: An ordinance amending the 2004 budget for the Riverfront Development Special Revenue Fund and otherwise providing with respect thereto.

4. Ordinance No. 19 of 2004 by Councilman Gibson: An ordinance amending the 2004 budget for the Retained Risk Internal Service Fund and otherwise providing with respect thereto.

5. Ordinance No. 20 of 2004 by Councilman Gibson: An ordinance amending the 2004 budget for the Police Grants Special Revenue Fund and otherwise providing with respect thereto.

Councilman Carmody: Looking for a little direction here.

Mr. Thompson: I believe we did Item 20. Item 20 has been added to the agenda.

Councilman Walford: We ever vote on it?

Mr. Thompson: The original motion was to add 18, 19 and 20.

Councilman Carmody: Correct.

Mr. Thompson: The amended motion was to take off 18 and 19 and to leave 20, to add 20 and I asked for clarification and that is what the author said.

Councilman Carmody: Thank, you Sir.

Motion by Councilman Jackson, seconded by Councilman Green to Introduce Ordinance No. 20 to lay over until the March 9, 2004 meeting. Motion approved by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Hogan, Green and Jackson. 6. Nays: Councilman Gibson. 1.

[Clerk’s Note: Ordinance Nos. 21 through 24 were added to the Agenda previously in the meeting but not Introduced].

6. Ordinance No. 21 of 2004: An ordinance amending Chapter 106 of the Code of Ordinances, the City of Shreveport Zoning Ordinance, by rezoning property located on David Raines Road at its intersection with Round Grove, Shreveport, Caddo Parish, Louisiana, from B-3, Community Business District to R-3, Urban, Multiple-Family Residence District, and to otherwise provide with respect.

7. Ordinance No. 22 of 2004: An ordinance amending Chapter 106 of the Code of Ordinances, the City of Shreveport Zoning Ordinance, by rezoning property located on southwest corner of Dalton and Forbing, Shreveport, Caddo Parish, Louisiana, from R-1, Urban, One-Family Residence District to B-2A, Business Park District, and to otherwise provide with respect.

8. Ordinance No. 23 of 2004: An ordinance amending Chapter 106 of the Code of Ordinances, the City of Shreveport Zoning Ordinance, by rezoning property located on the west side of E. Bert Kouns 150 feet north of Brook Hollow, Shreveport, Caddo Parish, Louisiana, from B-3, Community Business District to B-3-E, Community Business Extended Use District limited to "an animal hospital with seven indoor/outdoor kennel spaces" only and to otherwise provide with respect.

8. Ordinance No. 24 of 2004: An ordinance amending Chapter 106 of the Code of Ordinances, the City of Shreveport Zoning Ordinance, by rezoning property located on the west side of Kingston Road, 350 feet south of Francais Drive, Shreveport, Caddo Parish, Louisiana, from B-2, Neighborhood Business District to B-2-E, Neighborhood Business Extended Use District "limited to a plumbing shop" only and to otherwise provide with respect.

ORDINANCES ON SECOND READING AND FINAL PASSAGE:

1. Ordinance No. 209 of 2003: An ordinance amending Chapter 106 of the Code of Ordinances, the City of Shreveport Zoning Ordinance, by rezoning property located on the north side of Kelsey Street 300 feet west of Russell Road and also on the south side of Martin Luther King Drive 300 feet west of Russell Road, Shreveport, Caddo Parish, Louisiana, from R-1H, Urban, One-Family Residence District, to R-3, Urban Multiple-Family Residence District, and to otherwise provide with respect thereto.

Having passed first reading on December 19, 2003 was read by title and on motion ordered passed to third reading. Read the third time in full and as read motion by Councilman Lester, seconded by Councilman Walford to postpone the ordinance until the March 9, 2004 meeting. Motion approved by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

2. Ordinance No. 14 of 2004 by Councilman Gibson: An ordinance amending Section 26-243 of the Code of Ordinances of the City of Shreveport relative to the architectural and engineering selection process and otherwise providing with respect thereto.

Having passed first reading on February 10, 2004 was read by title and on motion ordered passed to third reading. Read the third time in full and as read motion by Councilman Green, seconded by Councilman Gibson for passage. The Clerk read the following amendment:

Amend the ordinance as follows:

Amend Paragraph (16) c. to read as follows:

c. Produce a report for the council and to deliver to the clerk of council by April 1, July 1, October 1, and January 1 for the prior three months showing the names of the A/E firms selected during the previous three months, the dollar amount of each contract, and amendments to each contract, the names of the firms submitted to the mayor and not selected for each project and other information requested by the chairman of the council or the chairman of the audit and finance committee. This report shall also include the names of A/E firms selected during the previous three months for which the initial contract amount was less than $10,000.00, the initial dollar amounts of each contract and subsequent amendments to it and the purpose of the work. This report shall also include the total amount of fees awarded by the city for professional services within the past four years for each firm or individual design professional providing A/E professional services.

Motion by Councilman Hogan, seconded by Councilman Gibson for adoption of the amendment. Motion approved by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

Motion by Councilman Green, seconded by Councilman Jackson for adoption of the ordinance as amended. Motion approved by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

The adopted Ordinance, as amended, follow:

ORDINANCE NO. 40 OF 2003

AN ORDINANCE CHANGING THE NAME OF THE SHREVEPORT BLANCHARD ROAD FROM THE ROY ROAD TO NORTH HEARNE AVENUE TO HILRY HUCKABY III AVENUE, AND TO OTHERWISE PROVIDE WITH RESPECT THERETO

By: Councilman Lester

WHEREAS, Hilry Huckaby III was the lead attorney for the plaintiffs in the law suit Blacks United for Lasting Leadership (BULL) v. The City of Shreveport; and

WHEREAS, Hilry Huckaby III’s successful prosecution of BULL v. City of Shreveport resulted in the City of Shreveport adopting a new charter on May 13, 1978 which changed the form of government from a Commission form of government to a Mayor/Council form of government with seven council members elected from individual council districts; and

WHEREAS, the new Mayor/Council form of government provided more direct and effective representation for all citizens of Shreveport and provided the opportunity for African-Americans and women to service on the Shreveport City Council and to gain the experience needed to be elected to and to serve effectively in other political offices; and

WHEREAS, Hilry Huckaby III was elected to serve on the first city council under the Mayor/Council form of government representing District A, and he represented District A from November 28, 1978 to November 27, 1990 and again from November 24, 1998 to June 1, 2001; and

WHEREAS, Hilry Huckaby III was elected and served as a Judge, First Judicial District, Caddo Parish, Louisiana; and

WHEREAS, Hilry Huckaby III was a member of the City Council when he died on June 1, 2001, and wife Pearl Aaron Huckaby was initially appointed and then elected to succeed him on the city council; and

WHEREAS, because of his unique contributions and long and effective leadership and serve to the City of Shreveport and to Caddo Parish it is necessary, fitting and proper that a lasting and significant memorial be established for Hilry Huckaby III; and

WHEREAS, the Shreveport Blanchard Highway as described herein was located within the boundaries of District A when Hilry Huckaby III represented District A.

WHEREAS, in accordance with Section 78-452 of the Code of Ordinances the following historical information is provided about the existing name of the street to be renamed:

Shreveport Blanchard Highway is State Highway 173 that connects Shreveport and Blanchard, Louisiana.

NOW THEREFORE BE IT ORDAINED by the City Council of the City of Shreveport, in due, legal, and regular session convened, that the Shreveport Blanchard Road from the Roy Road to the North Hearne Avenue, in the NW/4 OF Section 35 (T18N-R14W), Caddo Parish, Louisiana, be and the same is hereby renamed and changed to Hilry Huckaby III Avenue, as shown and indicated on the plat attached hereto and made a part hereof.

BE IT FURTHER ORDAINED that in accordance with Section 78-452 of the Code of Ordinances this ordinance shall not be adopted prior to July 8, 2003 and during said 90 day period the tasks delineated in Section 78-452 shall be performed.

BE IT FURTHER ORDAINED that to comply with LSA R..S. 18:201, a certified copy of this resolution to be furnished to the Registrar of Voters for Caddo Parish, Louisiana.

BE IT FURTHER ORDAINED that a certified copy of this ordinance be filed and recorded in the official records of the District Court of Caddo Parish, Louisiana.

BE IT FURTHER ORDAINED that if any provision or item of this ordinance or application thereof is held invalid, such invalidity shall not affect other provisions, items, or applications of the ordinance which can be given effect without the invalid provisions, items, or applications and to this end the provisions of this ordinance are hereby declared severable.

BE IT FURTHER ORDAINED that all ordinances or resolutions or parts thereof in conflict herewith are hereby declared severable and repealed.

_____________________________

Thomas C. Carmody, Jr., Chairman

________________________________

Arthur G. Thompson, Clerk of Council

ORDINANCE NO. 14 OF 2004

AN ORDINANCE AMENDING SECTION 26-243 OF THE CODE OF ORDINANCES OF THE CITY OF SHREVEPORT RELATIVE TO THE ARCHITECTURAL AND ENGINEERING SELECTION PROCESS AND OTHERWISE PROVIDING WITH RESPECT THERETO.

By: Councilman Gibson

BE IT ORDAINED by the City Council of the City of Shreveport in due, regular and legal session convened that subsections (9) and (16) of Section 26-243(e) of the Code of Ordinances are hereby amended to read as follows:

Sec. 26-243. Architectural and engineering selection process.

* * *

(e) The competitive selection process for A/E professional services shall be conducted by a nine-member A/E selection committee.

* * *

(9) When it is determined that the city needs to obtain A/E services, the mayor shall require that the announcement for such services be published in the official journal, and mailed to each member of the City Council. This announcement shall invite all interested parties to submit within a specified time (minimum of 25 calendar days) letters of interest in being selected for this specific project, together with a Form SF 255 describing the firm or individual's experience related to the project and such other information as the announcement may specify. The notice shall contain a general description of the project and an estimated fee range for the contract, if known. These submittals shall include the relevant pages of the SF 255 form and any information which is deemed relevant by the A/E firm or which has been requested in the city's official notification. They should include a description of the firm's experience on similar projects, its current workload with the city, and (when known) the personnel who the firm intends to assign to the project.

* * *

(16) The mayor shall cause the A/E selection committee to:

a. Provide notice and an agenda of all meetings to each Council Member at the time committee members are notified;

b. Provide each Council Member with a copy of the minutes of each meeting which shall include all recommendations of the committee, and

c. Produce a report for the council and to deliver to the clerk of council by April 1, July 1, October 1, and January 1 for the prior three months showing the names of the A/E firms selected during the previous three months, the dollar amount of each contract, and amendments to each contract, the names of the firms submitted to the mayor and not selected for each project and other information requested by the chairman of the council or the chairman of the audit and finance committee. This report shall also include the names of A/E firms selected during the previous three months for which the initial contract amount was less than $10,000.00, the initial dollar amounts of each contract and subsequent amendments to it and the purpose of the work. This report shall also include the total amount of fees awarded by the city for professional services within the past four years for each firm or individual design professional providing A/E professional services

BE IT FURTHER ORDAINED that if any provision or item of this ordinance or the application thereof is held invalid, such invalidity shall not affect other provisions, items or applications of this ordinance which can be given effect without the invalid provisions, items or applications and to this end the provisions of this ordinance are hereby declared severable.

BE IT FURTHER ORDAINED that all ordinances or resolutions or parts thereof in conflict herewith are hereby repealed.

_____________________________

Thomas C. Carmody, Jr., Chairman

________________________________

Arthur G. Thompson, Clerk of Council

UNFINISHED BUSINESS:

1. Resolution No. 88 of 2003: Amending Sections 1.8 and 1.11 of the Rules of Procedure of the City Council (Public Comments). (A/Lester) (Tabled on June 24)

2. Ordinance No. 40 of 2003: Changing the names of the Shreveport Blanchard Road from the Roy Road to North Hearne Avenue, and of Ford Street from North Hearne Avenue to Pete Harris Drive, and of Caddo Street from Pete Harris Drive to the Clyde Fant Parkway to Hilry Huckaby III Avenue. (A/Lester) [Tabled *As Amended on July 8 - *Changing the name of the Shreveport Blanchard Road from the Roy Road to North Hearne to Hilry Huckaby III Avenue.]

Motion by Councilman Lester, seconded by Councilman Gibson to remove the ordinance from the agenda. Motion approved by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

Motion by Councilman Lester, seconded by Councilman Gibson to adopt the ordinance as amended. Motion approved by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Gibson, Green and Jackson. 4. Nays: Councilman Walford, Carmody, and Hogan. 3.

3. Ordinance No. 152 of 2003: Amending Chapter 26 of the Code of Ordinances of the City of Shreveport by adding Article VIII., Division 1 and Division 2 relative to disposal of public property and disposal of adjudicated property. (A/Lester) (Tabled on Nov. 11)

NEW BUSINESS:

1. Taxi Driver license: Terry Robison (Postponed until Feb. 23 and Denied)

2. BAC-7-04, Melissa Fussell, 346 Sadie Douglas Lane, Special Exception Use in an R-1D District, expanded home occupation (Creative memories parties, meetings, workshops) to 12 midnight. (D/Gibson)

Councilman Gibson: I am going to ask for a 2-week extension. I do have an agreement. All I’m looking for is two signatures from the person who appealed and the applicant and I will be getting that into Mr. Kirkland’s hands so two weeks from now we should be able to have an amended.

Motion by Councilman Gibson, seconded by Councilman Walford to postpone the application until the March 9, 2004 meeting. Motion approved by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan Green and Jackson. 6. Nays: None. Out of Chamber: Councilman Lester. 1.

3. BAC-5-04, Virginia K. Perego, 129 Adger, variance of 12 feet in the 30-foot front yard setback in an R-1D District; carport. (C/Carmody)

Councilman Carmody: Yesterday, Gentlemen I had apprised you based upon the recommendation of both Mr. Kirkland with the Metropolitan Planning Commission as well as the information that we received today from the citizen Kenneth Kreft.

Motion by Councilman Carmody seconded by Councilman Walford to reverse the decision of the Zoning Board of Appeals and temporarily grant the variance for a period of six months, with the stipulation that the carport cover be removed or brought into compliance by the end of the six month period.

Councilman Walford: I very seldom want to overturn Zoning I want to make it clear that this is done for the benefit of the person who built it and allowing it to be removed.

Councilman Carmody: Excellent.

Motion approved by the following vote: Ayes: Councilman Lester, Walford, Carmody, Gibson, Hogan Green and Jackson. 7. Nays: None.

REPORTS FROM OFFICERS, BOARDS, AND COMMITTEES. None.

CLERK’S REPORT: None.

THE COMMITTEE RISES AND REPORTS (reconvenes Regular Council Meeting).

ADJOURNMENT. There being no further business to come before the Council, the meeting adjourned at approximately 6:00 p.m.

_____________________________

Thomas C. Carmody, Jr., Chairman

________________________________

Arthur G. Thompson, Clerk of Council