Council approves collective bargaining agreements with city employees

By James Grob, jgrob@charlescitypress.com

The Charles City Council approved individual tentative collective bargaining agreements for police, fire and public works employees at Monday’s meeting.

The council authorized Mayor Dean Andrews to sign the collective bargaining agreements. The council will work with Michael Galloway from Ahlers & Cooney and the Teamsters 238 to finalize the contracts.

“I think those are good agreements,” said Andrews. “Negotiations went well between the groups, and they came to a resolution pretty agreeably.”

City representatives met with union representatives and local stewards to negotiate and renew the collective bargaining agreements in early November. The council went into closed session Monday to discuss the agreements, then re-opened the meeting and approved them unanimously.

Employees and the city agreed to a contract that includes a 2.25% salary increase the first year. Public works employees agreed to a re-opening of wage discussions in years 2-5, while fire and police/dispatch employees will re-open wage negotiations in years 2-3. Dispatchers received a 3% raise.

The contract also allows certified officers to receive one-year vacation after six months, up from the previous 12 months.

In other business, the council received a clean audit report for fiscal year 2019-20 on Monday. Representatives from T.P. Anderson and Co. presented the audit report, and told the council that there were no instances of non-compliance and there were no questionable disbursements. Some funds that had negative balances at the end of the year will be corrected once reimbursement funds are received.

T.P Anderson and Co. audited financial statements of the governmental activities, the business-type activities, each major fund, and the aggregate remaining fund information of the city. According to the report, receipts of the city’s governmental activities increased 21%, or approximately $2,137,000, from fiscal year 2019 to fiscal year 2020. Bond proceeds increased approximately $2,190,000.

Disbursements in the city’s governmental activities increased 25%, or approximately $2,952,000, in fiscal 2020 from fiscal 2019. The major cause for the increase was due to purchase of 75 acres of land for the Avenue of the Saints Development Park.

The city’s total cash basis net position decreased approximately $5,011,000 from June 30, 2019 to June 30, 2020. Of this amount, the assets of the governmental activities decreased approximately $2,188,000 and the assets of the business-type activities decreased approximately $2,823,000.

The city’s cash balance for governmental activities decreased from a year ago, from $10.7 million to $8.5 million.

In other business, the council set Dec. 21 as the date for a public hearing on a proposal to enter into a general obligation bridge improvement loan not to exceed $1,550,000. The bonds will help fund the Charley Western Bridge replacement project.

Total costs for the project are expected to be $2,125,000, which includes the previous demolition of the old structure, engineering, construction of a new bridge, among other miscellaneous costs. Total secured revenue for the project from various funding grants comes to $654,000, leaving a shortfall of $1,471,000

The total bonds would be for up to $1,533,000, and if additional grant funding comes in the city can look to decrease this amount.

The council also went against staff recommendations and voted unanimously to draft an agreement with Tony Lessin to allow him to connect to city sewer service.

Lessin submitted a request for the city to provide sanitary sewer service to a proposed dwelling outside of the corporate limits. He is proposing to connect to the sanitary sewer that is located in the rear yard of 3026 Yorkshire.

At the last planning session, Lessin indicated he plans to extend a gravity sanitary sewer service line from this location to serve the first floor level of his new home but not the basement level. The basement will require a grinder pump to lift the sewage up to the gravity sewer service line.

The agreement will specify, among other things, construction and future maintenance requirements, acquisition of a private easement to access the sewer main, and a provision not to protest future annexation.

In other business Monday, the council:

— Denied a request by Charles Chandler, who is representing an unidentified government entity looking to relocate to a building in downtown Charles City. The government entity is requesting four reserved parking spaces, free of charge, as close as possible to a proposed building to be purchased on the 300 block of North Main St. The government entity would lease the building from the new owner.

The parking lot is located west of Wisconsin Street, south of Blunt Street, east of the row of stores on Main and north of the row of stores occupied by First Citizens Bank, H&R Block, Stitches, and State Farm Insurance. After lengthy discussion, the council voted no to setting the precedent of allowing reserved spaces in public lots, but said they would consider a different proposal should the government entity wish to submit one.

— Approved a request for waiver of subdivision requirements for Werner and Edna Pelz and Scott and Janit Heinz, who have been in negotiations to transfer a 10-acre parcel between the Pelz Trust and the Heinz family. This parcel is located immediately west of the Heinz’s 8-acre home site.

— Approved the purchase of a truck for the water department, which will be bought from Molstead Motors at a cost of $32,474.

— Passed an agreement with Floyd County regarding dispatching services.