Mayor's Report

Hello Everyone,

Tuesday evenings Council Meeting was a good one, though it lasted until 12:40 am! It was a real example of open government, with much citizen participation, lots of deliberation back and forth between council members, and many good decisions.

When I say citizen participation, just look at the variety of folks that I was able to give proclamations to this time: Recognition was made to the volunteers who picked up Hurricane Ike trash from the Dr. Ned and Fay Dudney Clear Creek Nature Park for 12 hours resulting in 2 tons of trash. The proclamation was made to Vaness Dudney Hamilton and Mike Mize, for organizing the pick-up.

Rex Ward was honored for his continuing work as the head of Clear Creek Environmental for the annual Clear Creek Cleanup. Since its inception, Rex and more than 6000 volunteers have removed from the Creek 4296 tires, 500 freezers, 5 pickup trucks, 1 semi, and more. Thanks to their efforts, our Creek is clean and beautiful, and we should all be very proud!

April 26, 2009, was proclaimed as "American Legion Post #554 Day" in recognition of their hosting the district 9th Annual Conference here. Their organization helps sponsor both Girls State and Boys State, and Hope Village.

Catharin Lewis, curator of the League City Historical Society's One Room School House, gave a short informational presentation about the school located on Kansas and Second Streets, telling the history of the West Bay Common School. The schoolhouse was opened to tours in October, 1993, and since then more than 83,000 adults and children have passed through their doors, 83% from outside League City. The School and Barn Museum are open to visitors most weekdays.

The history of the Ghirardi House was given by Chien Wei, our Parks Director, who sited how the Italian home came to be resting in Heritage Park in the care of the City. He was assisted by Rita Ghirardi, donor of the home, and Dorothy Ludwig, a descendant of one of the 12 Italian families who settled in League City in the early 1900's.

A special presentation was made to Ronnie and Nancy Richards of Butlers Courtyard who are tenants of the Butler Building on Second Street at Michigan Avenue. The Butler building is 100 years old this year, the only remaining commercial building from that era, having been constructed of bricks actually made in League City. A birthday celebration is being planned for later in the year.

In the Public Hearings section of the agenda, no citizen spoke up against issuing a Special Use Permit to T-Mobile for co-locate on an existing cell tower, and Council passed the item 6-1, Paulissen no.

In the other public hearing item, Council voted 4-3 to rezone 13.4 acres on 270 between Main and Hwy 96 from RSF-20 to Office Commercial, which means that it will not be strip centers but offices or an office building. Dissenting votes were Barber, Paulissen, and Sanborn.

We heard several more citizens in the Request for Hearing Before Council. Four from Clear Creek Shores spoke against a Palomino Road bridge across the Creek. Another spoke against the Ghirardi House, and one offered to help organize a Friends of Ghirardi House.

Various and sundry announcements from Council members: the April 18th City Open House at Heritage Park from 11-3 may have to be postponed because of weather. If so, citizens will be notified by phone if they have registered with the City's notification service. There will also be a Seniors 5 K Walk in connection with this Open House. Check the City website for details of this walk. The traffic light at Walker and Hwy 96 is now fully operational-hooray! The next step for the folks who are interested in a Farmers Market will be a bus tour of Houston area Farmers Markets, which has been scheduled for May 30th Everyone who has indicated an interest will receive an email with details.

Under New Business, The April 21st Council Workshop will be held at Butlers Courtyard. The vote was 5-2, with Paulissen and Sanborn dissenting.

Regarding the proposal to spend $68,000 for renovation of the Ghirardi House, there was much back and forth discussion including questions about some Master Plan issues. Although everyone in the room wanted to honor our Italian heritage, the proposal failed with a 3-for, 4-against vote. Generally the feeling was that we need to define a plan for the development of the House before we start working on it, since it is dried in against the weather at this time. For going ahead now-Cones, Baron, Nelson; against-Barber, Paulissen, Sanborn, and Samuelson.

A proposal was passed for a FM 518 Pilot Traffic Program for IH 45 at Main and at Hobbs Road. A uniformed police officer will be stationed at both of these intersections for two hours of prime traffic time morning and afternoon for four days to see if this would help the traffic move through the intersections. Chief Jez said that this experiment will cost the City about $1000 a day, and that he will make the arrangements to do this. Vote was 7-0, so keep your eyes open for this experiment and let us know what you think, if it involves you.

Council voted to temporarily suspend the $25.00 application fee for business registration permits from April 18-24, in an effort to encourage businesses that are operating without permits to either acquire them or renew expired permits. so, if you are one of those, please take advantage of the grace period.

A proposal to set a Public Hearing for April 23rd to discuss long term traffic improvements impacting FM 518 west of IH 45, including the extension of Palomino or another north/south alternative passed 7-0.

The Closed Session item regarding the City Administrators Performance Evaluation passed with no action taken.

Again, this Council meeting was a good meeting with lots of citizen involvement! Thank you for coming!

Remember that Early Voting starts on the 27th, so get to know your candidates and how they feel about the issues. Your vote gives you a say in how our City heads into the future with all of its new issues to tackle.

I invite you to email me with your comments, problems, suggestions. I want to hear what you think and promise to answer you, too.

Though it is a privilege to have you on my email list, if you choose not to receive the Mayors Report, just ask to be removed.

Mayor Toni Randall