Highlights of the Fort Smith Board of Directors Meeting 2/22/22

A Fort Smith Board of Directors Special Meeting was held 2-22-22. Directors Dawson and Good both attended remotely. The Board received quotes from the City’s current insurance provider Arkansas Municipal League and from Travelers Insurance that provided the City’s insurance for 19 years prior to AML. Travelers Insurance only provided a quote on the city’s property and buildings, but not the vehicle fleet as they only are interested in covering the property and not the vehicles. The Board heard presentations from Procurement Manager Ahlie Bahsoon, insurance consultant Phillip Merry, and John Wells from AML. Merry praised the blanket coverage for full replacement cost of damaged buildings offered by Travelers. He called the type of plan offered by Travelers “what you would use if you were a large corporate entity”. A major drawback noted by Director Settle with Travelers versus AML is that the deductible for Travelers is $100,000 per occurrence where the deductible with AML is 10,000 per occurrence. A difference in the coverages pointed out by John Wells was that the Travelers policy does not offer any coverage at all in Flood Zone A, an area including the Port that has experienced flooding damage in the recent past, but AML’s plan covers that area. Bahsoon and Merry recommended that the coverage from AML be renewed for the vehicles and the coverage for property be purchased through Travelers.

Director Settle passionately expressed frustration with the Board having just been handed the quotes one minute before the meeting, and being expected to make a decision with so little time to consider the information. Bahsoon explained that the time crunch was caused by the need to have a decision by March 1st and having to make cost cutting changes to the coverage and wait for the quotes.

Director Settle disagreed with Merry and Bahsoon’s recommendations and preferred staying with AML saying “ I don’t want to take a risk with the people’s money”. Of Bahsoon and Merry, Mayor McGill said “ I lean on their expertise in these matters…I support their recommendations”. Director Good also expressed his feeling that the Board should “trust the professionals”.

The Board voted with all in favor but Settle and Martin to renew insurance coverage for the vehicles with AML and to purchase coverage from Travelers for the property.

Bahsoon requested that the City hire a full-time insurance specialist. Good agreed with the suggestion.

Merry praised the work of city employee Randy Swaim whose work on property upkeep Merry credits with keeping the properties in good condition enough to attract the interest of Travelers and Lloyds of London in insuring the properties.

The Board voted to put two items on the May 24th election ballot for the voters to vote on, an 8 year renewal of the existing .25% sales tax to be divided evenly between the Fire Department and the Parks Department (for use for capital improvement projects) , and an 8 year renewal of the existing .75% sales tax to be divided with 16.7% to the Police Department and 83.3% going towards sewer repairs required by the Consent Decree.

Fort Smith resident Joey McCutcheon addressed the board on behalf of Citizens Against Unfair Taxation, Western Arkansas Transparency in Government Group, and City Elders of Fort Smith. He expressed his support for an 8 year term for the renewals (not the 10 year term that was called for when the items were initially to be put on the ballot before the Board rescinded them and postponed the election to allow for giving more information to and receiving more feedback from the public including a series of public meetings on the issue). He stated there would be “ no organized opposition” to an 8 year term. Of a 10 year term, he stated “I assure you we’re going to fight hard to defeat it”. He supported the rate freeze on sewer rates and the creation of a citizen commission on the taxes that were proposed at the previous night’s study session. He noted that the Board has not been receiving the monthly reports that they are supposed to be from the Street Tax committee recently. He pointed to the Board pulling back the original ballot items and postponing the election and listening to the public as evidence of the city being “committed to transparency and accountability”. He stated that the “city is at a crossroads. We have got to have money to fund the consent decree.” He expressed the preference for the Parks, Fire, Police, and Consent Decree repairs to all be voted on as separate taxes instead of two bundles.

Director Martin supported the 8 year term saying he was “not a fan of taxes” but that 8 years would take steps to get us closer to the end of the consent decree. Director Settle also chimed in with support for the 8 year term. Director Morton supported the 8 year term mentioning the “trust deficit” for city leadership and “need to restore that trust” and his feeling that taking the suggestion that was proposed through citizen feedback of 8 years would be a step forward on that. Morton also mentioned that if the tax passes by a heavy margin it will send a strong message to outsiders that the citizens are serious about satisfying the consent decree requirements.

Director Good favored the 10 year term saying he “can’t appreciate being somewhat bullied or pressured into changing or even trying to compromise what the board had in place on the length of this” and that the majority of people he’s heard from have not had issues with the tax or the term. He did, however, add that “If 8 is gonna get the tax passed, I can understand that.” Director Rego supported the 10 year term pointing out that an 8 year renewal term provides 2 fewer years of guaranteed sewer rate freezes.

Mayor McGill chimed in that “I have issue with the idea of not trusting this Board of Directors…The citizens elected these people…I wish someone would have the courage to call the Mayor’s office and tell me who you do not trust.”.

The creation of 7 member citizen committee to watch and report on the money coming in from and being spent from the taxes and the ordinances that would create the 3 year sewer rate freeze if the tax renewal passes and the 3.5% cap on increases for the remainder of the 8 year tax term cannot by law be included on the sales tax ballot but instead must be put effect by the Board via Ordinance. They will be presented the Board for a vote at the 3-1-22 meeting.

Following the voting business portion of the meeting, the Board held the study session discussion part of the meeting. This kicked off with discussion concerning Planning Commission procedures for notification of nearby property owners on zoning change applications. Planning Director Maggie Rice presented on the topic. State Law requires that a notice be published in the newspaper for 15 days before a Planning Commission meeting on a property application (like for a zoning change or conditional use permit). Currently, in addition to that, Fort Smith also puts signs on the property, mails letters to the property owners within 300 feet of the property, and holds a neighborhood meeting prior to the Planning Commission meeting (at a date,time, and location set by the applicant) and sends invitations to that meeting to property owners within 300 feet of the property.Rice mentioned that the 300 ft notification radius is the largest of any city of AR. She also mentioned that of the 110 neighborhood meetings held in the year before the pandemic caused suspension of neighborhood meetings 55% had no adjacent property owners in attendance.

Director Settle inquired if there were any way to improve signage posted on the properties to be rezoned and suggested that it could be bigger and more colorful. Director Martin suggested a bigger font size. Director Morton suggested the word “rezone” and the date in big letters. Administrator Geffken said that the street department could make metal signs that were more highly visible and easy to read driving by.

Director Rego expressed his desire to “infuse other activities with the same spirit” as the rezoning notification including digging for streets and pipes and utilities that might affect nearby neighbors. He stated interest in adding a requirement for notification for those things, too. Legal council for the city said that for city contractors, that could be done easily, for some utilities via franchise agreements it would be possible, and seemed doubtful about adding the requirement for other private companies.

The Board then discussed the idea proposed at a recent Board meeting that Planning appeals be sent automatically to a study session meeting first rather than just sent to a regular meeting to be voted on. The idea of sending them to a study session is to reduce zoning appeals being tabled at the regular meetings. Rice stated that that change would add a month before the applicant could have a final resolution to their request.In lieu of sending appeals to a study session, she suggested that the Planning staff could instead disseminate information earlier allowing for more time for the Board to consider the appeals.

Director Settle said the “study session allows for different ideas to flow” and the Board to “listen to ideas, come back, and make a good decision based on what we hear”. Martin voiced his support for the change. Morton also supported the change adding that the process taking “a little longer is acceptable” since the applicant appealing is asking the Board to overturn a decision already made by the Planning Commission.

To make the change, an Amendment to the Unified Development Ordinance will be brought to a future Board meeting for a vote.

Streets Director Matt Meeker presented that per the Fort Smith Municipal Code, property owners are responsible for mowing their property including rights of ways and drainage easements. However, in practice, for the last 40 years the City has been driving all 510 miles of city streets and mowing all of the rights of way and easements in the city that need it regardless of who owns them. Streets Director Matt Meeker states that discontinuing this practice and instead holding property owners responsible for mowing on their property would eliminate the need for 3 tractors and 4 seasonal workers (that have been especially hard to attract and retain during this recent labor shortage) saving the city $120,000 annually. The Board agreed that the practice needs to be discontinued and a notification process via the Neighborhood Services Department needs to be established. A Resolution to enforce the law and hold property owners responsible for their own mowing will be brought to the Board for a vote at the 3-15-22 meeting.

Meeker also presented an update on the sidewalks program. He talked about how previously the Street Department had focused their sidewalk efforts on repairs of existing sidewalks but at the request of the Board in 2020 started to include more new construction. Director Martin stated “New sidewalk construction is something sorely needed in Fort Smith”. Director Morton called the sidewalk construction program a “very popular program”. Director Good thanked the city staff for their response to and prioritization of citizen requests.

Director Settle asked if the developers of new developments are still allowed to opt out of sidewalks in their plans. When Geffken answered that they could Settle suggested that that option be dropped . Rice clarified that it was not an opt-out program but rather a pay-in-lieu-of program that would allow developers to pay the fair market cost of construction of sidewalks instead of building them. The benefit to the option would be that the money would be able to be used to construct sidewalks where they would be useful for practical connectivity instead of there being a disconnected bit of useless sidewalk built. She mentioned that all new development of residential subdivisions is required to include sidewalks on one side in most of the city and on both sides in Chaffee.