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City May Take On Cost to Fix Detention Pond
by Ashley Murphy

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Several local road concerns were addressed during Monday's City Council Meeting. Residents have concerns about parking on Robin Hood Drive. Cars will park along the roadway with half of the vehicle on the pavement and the other half on the grass. It was determined by city staff that there is sufficient room to navigate around these parked cars. The roadway width is 19 feet and a standard vehicle lane for moving traffic is 10-12 feet wide.

On Shenadoah Road, residents had concerns about cars speeding through the area. After city staff evaluated the area, they found the street to have adequate marking signs; a stop sign, a dead end sign and a speed limit sign displaying 30 MPH. It is possible for the city to place rumble strips along the roadway, however, staff wishes to get in touch with the citizens in order to explain noise concerns and the short success rate of these rumble strips.

One of the biggest concerns to citizens across the city and county is the intersection of Ocoee Street/Broad Street and 8th Street. Issues with space and congestion seem to be causing several problems at the intersection and city staff have conducted an evaluation of the intersection, which has been sent to the Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT). After contacting TDOT to discuss possible solutions, staff will update the Public Works Director and discuss the situation further.

A public hearing was held during the 4 p.m. regular session to give the public a chance to comment about a request by Dale Hughes to abandon a portion of a public right-of-way on Paul Huff Parkway at Frontage Road. Hughes was not in attendance and no comments were received by the public. It was stated that if this is approved, a compensation should be given back to the taxpayers since the State of Tennessee paid for the construction of Paul Huff Parkway. In addition to this compensation idea, the plot of land will be virtually useless and will not serve any purpose to the taxpayer. This will be discussed at the next meeting to give Hughes a chance to be present.

A resolution authorizing a contract with Consolidated Technologies, Inc. was pulled from the consent agenda for further discussion. The resolution would allow a contract with CTI for additional engineering services for the East Street detention pond at the cost of $16,700. CTI originally designed the pond over 2 years ago, but due to an excessive amount of rainfall over the past few weeks, the channel lining is deteriorating and causing problems with local wildlife. The Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation is requiring the city to fix the problem. City Manager Janice Casteel stated that the Council needed to quickly approve this and get it through as soon as possible saying TDEC is "breathing down our necks" about this.

However, a few council members had concerns and didn't want to hastily throw away the taxpayers money. Councilman David May stated that the contracted engineer should have to pay for all of the costs, and if not all, at least part of them. May went on to say that all involved government and engineering entities involved had signed off on the project, but now that there's a problem, the city is the one that is footing the bill.

Casteel went on to say that this shown amount, $16,700, does not include materials. These will be added as an additional cost, but that amount won't be known until engineering is completed. The materials are, however, expected to exceed $10,000.

The resolution was then voted to delay for two weeks, the council's next meeting date.

Another item on the regular agenda that all council members were not in complete agreement with was a Waterville Golf Course change order for the installation of a Pump Station. The change order will include the removal of trench rock. This has now increased the cost of the project by $28,826. The original contract was $162,902 and has now been jumped to $191,728. Council members Bambi Hines and George Poe, who opposed the project in the first place, were against the amount increase.

The Cleveland City Council will meet again on Monday, August 23, 2010 at 2 p.m. for a work session and 4 p.m. for a regular session in the Cleveland Municipal Building.