February 18, 2021 – City Council Meeting Minutes

Apr 20, 2021

Seymour City Council

Regular Meeting Minutes

February 18, 2021

A Regular City Council Meeting was held on Thursday, February 18, 2021 at 7:00 P.M. at the Portwood Art & Civic Center, 800 E. Morris Street, Seymour, TX 76380.

Call to Order/Roll Call/Pledge of Allegiance by Mayor Jon Hrncirik at 7:00 p.m.

Council present: Mayor Jon Hrncirik, MPT Monty Glass, Council Member Lan Winn, Council Member Brenda Miller, Council Member Brian Broome, Council Member Mary K. Fair.

Counsel present: City Attorney was not present at this meeting.

City Staff present: City Secretary Conchita Torrez, ED Director Lauren Bush, Water/Sewer/R.O. Plant Supervisor Robert Torrez, Emergency Management Coordinator John Hostas, Salt Fork Recreational Complex Supervisor Todd Hrncirik, Street Supervisor Shawn Sanchez, Street Employee John Lynch, Seymour Police Officer Paul Davis, Seymour Police Sergeant Bryce Sawyer.

Guest(s): Nancy Boone, Mark McCord, Rick Moorhouse, Sandra Moorhouse, Charlie Rose, and Heather Winn.

Mayor Announcements: Mayor Jon Hrncirik took this time to state “This past week we have all experienced a winter storm that most of us have not seen in our lifetime. Most of our neighbors have experienced rolling blackouts, frozen pipes, and busted water lines. We have been asked to conserve electricity, conserve water, and now we are asked to boil water for consumption. We have all been forced with some type of adversity during these past 8 days. One thing has stayed strong, our will to survive as Seymour, Baylor County, Texans, and Americans.

I would like to say “Thank You” to our city water, electric, street, RO, sewer, Salt Fork, Police Departments and to our First Responders.

Also, “Thank You” to Loy Studer and Tommy Holub, for your dedication to keeping the water flowing. Thanks to County Judge Rusty Stafford for supplying 2 generators that have been powering the water wells during our electric outages. To Darin Hays and his crew for doing what had to be done to get the generators running. To our churches First Baptist, Harvest Fellowship and Sacred Heart Catholic Church for opening their doors as warming centers.

Last but not least “Thank You” to our Emergency Management Coordinator John Hostas. John and I have been through a lifetime of issues in this past year. I could not think of anyone better to be called to duty with. Thanks John Hostas. I am sure I have missed some and I apologize for that. Thank you and God Bless !!

Mayor Jon Hrncirik at this time asked that City Secretary Torrez explain House Bill 2840 to the Council and citizens: (This was taken from TML Assistant General Counsel-July 2019) House Bill 2840 is effective as of September 1, 2019. This bill amends the Texas Open Meetings Act to provide that “a government body shall allow each member of the public who desires the body regarding an item an agenda for an open meeting of the body to address the body regarding the item at the meeting before or during the body’s consideration of the item.” Before the passage of the bill, the public had only the right to observe, rather than speak at, an open meeting of a governmental body.

City Secretary went on to say “Thank You” to Council Member Mary K. Fair for providing this House Bill for our information as it gave Mayor Hrncirik and I a chance to study it and I contacted my surrounding city secretaries to hear how they handle their meetings. Mayor Hrncirik and I had gone over it together to see what would best suit our city during our meetings.

The guidelines for this meeting will be the following:

1. Citizen questions and or comments may be made on a future agenda item or items they would like to see addressed the following month.

Mayor and Council may listen to citizens voice their concerns, but, by law may not go into discussion with them regarding any item that is not on the agenda. Citizens will have a total of 5 minutes to speak during this time.

2. For agenda items on the agenda Council will discuss the item at hand, and after they are finished addressing the agenda item, a citizen will be given the opportunity to speak on this item for a total of 4 (four) minutes. It will then go back to the council for a motion to pass or not.

This will hopefully bring more order to the meetings and it will not allow a citizen or citizens to speak constantly or burst out comments from the audience as we usually hear.

Citizen questions and or comments: At this time, Nancy Boone asked to address the Mayor and City Council.

Nancy Boone stated her name and had several questions to address with City Council.

Regarding the Gun Range the following questions were asked during her 5-minute allotted time:

1. What insurance does the City have for a public gun range?

2. Is this separate from the City?

3. Does the insurance company know about the gun range?

4. What happens when /if someone gets shot or killed on a neighboring property ?

5. Who pays the additional insurance?

6. Who made the decision to have a gun range?

7. Private parties at the gun range?

8. Gun range manager and paid by who ?

At this time Nancy was advised her 5 minutes were up.

She gave City Secretary the rest of the questions she wanted answered. By law, City Secretary or the appropriate party has 10 days to answer her questions from time of request ( February 28, 2021).

Note: The majority of the questions asked were questions that Mayor Hrncirik should answer. Therefore, City Secretary gave him the notes and he is to get with Suzanne and Mary Griffin for answers.

CONSENT AGENDA: (Items listed under the Consent Agenda are considered routine and are generally enacted in one motion. The exception to this rule is that a Council Member may request one or more items to be removed from the Consent Agenda for separate discussion and action.)

1. CONSIDER APPROVING THE CONSENT AGENDA AS FOLLOWS:

a.) Approve January 6, 2021, January 18, 2021, January 21, 2021, February 2, 2021, and February 8, 2021 City Council Meeting Minutes.

b.) Accept Reports

1. Employee List/SFRC Membership total

2. Administrative & Supervisor reports

End of Consent Agenda

Motion made by MPT Monty Glass, seconded by Council Member Lan Winn, to approve consent agenda, with changes as stated by Council Member Mary K. Fair. Motion carried 5/0.

At this time, Mayor Hrncirik stated that due to the weather, our Executive Session would be moved to Wednesday, February 24, 2021. Mayor Hrncirik moved on to agenda item #4.

Regular Meeting closes and Executive Session will begin

2. An Executive Session (closed to the public) and pursuant to Chapter 551 of the Texas Local Gov. Code, §551.071- Consultation with Attorney, Pending Litigation.

Executive Session closes and Regular Meeting resumes

3. Discuss and take action (if any) regarding deliberation from Executive Session.

PUBLIC HEARINGS BEGIN

4. The City of Seymour to hold Public Hearings regarding City of Seymour Ordinances for the following as presented by ED Director Lauren Bush:

1. General Provisions 2. Animal Control

3. Building & Construction 4. Business & Commerce

5. Fire Protection

ED Director Lauren Bush stated that she did not have any discussion on these ordinances, and they had been discussed in lengths at the last council meeting. Council Member Fair thanked her for placing these ordinances on the website so that citizens could review them.

No one spoke for or against these ordinances, therefore, public hearing closed.

5. The City of Seymour to hold their First Public Hearing regarding a re-zone request from Ryan Dwyer for location at 610 N. Browning Street, described as Lots 1-3, Block 14, McLain Addition.

This agenda item was regarding the Specific Use Permit that was requested by Ryan Dwyer for location as stated on the agenda item.

ED Director Bush stated that this was simply to accept the application as no decision could be made at this time, due to a second Public Hearing required. Council Member Fair asked if this was for one or two properties? ED Director stated that after he wrote that he realized that one of the properties could not be on the permit.

Mayor Hrncirik moved on to the next agenda item being that there were not comments or questions asked by anyone in the audience.

PUBLIC HEARINGS CLOSE AND REGULAR MEETING RESUMES

6. Discuss, consider, and take action to approve Ordinance No. 2021-04, City of Seymour Ordinance – General Provisions.

Motion made by MPT Glass, seconded by Council Member Winn, to approve Ordinance No. 2021-04, General Provisions. Motion carried 5/0.

No one in the audience had any comments or questions before the motion was made.

7. Discuss, consider, and take action to approve Ordinance No. 2021-05, City of Seymour Ordinance- Animal Control.

Motion made by MPT Glass, seconded by Council Member Broome, to approve Ordinance No. 2021-05, Animal Control. Motion carried 5/0. Also, Lauren Bush is to get with Samantha Hamilton, Animal Control Officer regarding the 10-day waiting period after animals have been placed in pound. Police Sergeant was going to check on some questions with Samantha Hamilton.

No one in the audience had any questions or comments before the motion was made.

8. Discuss, consider, and take action to approve Ordinance No. 2021-06, City of Seymour Ordinance – Building & Construction.

Council Member Fair stated she would like to see the City of Seymour enforce the permit requirements.

Motion made by MPT Glass, seconded by Council Member Broome, to approve Ordinance No. 2021-06, Building & Construction as reads.

Motion carried 4/1 with Council Member Fair opposing.

No one in the audience had any questions or comments before the motion was made.

9. Discuss, consider, and take action to approve Ordinance No. 2021-07, City of Seymour Ordinance – Business & Commerce.

Motion made by MPT Glass, seconded by Council Member Winn, to approve Ordinance No. 2021-07, Business & Commerce. Motion carried 5/0.

No one in the audience had any questions or comments before the motion was made.

10. Discuss, consider, and take action to approve Ordinance No. 2021-08, City of Seymour Ordinance -Fire Protection.

Motion made by MPT Glass, seconded by Council Member Broome, to approve Ordinance No. 2021-08, Fire Protection. Motion carried 5/0.

No one in the audience had any questions or comments before the motion was made.

11. Discuss, consider, and take action regarding and reviewing from Tiffany Varner for Specific Use Permit Extension Request.

At the beginning of this discussion, Nancy Boone stated that Ms. Varner, should have been contacted in writing as due diligence, because people tend to forget and as far as Ms. Varner is concerned, she may not even know this council meeting is taking place. ED Director Lauren Bush stated that she did not contact her because she had been notified 60 days prior and given the exact date. Ms. Boone stated that she should have sent her a written letter and notified her in writing. Council Member Fair stated that anytime someone is to be on the agenda, they should receive notice, because as before, Mr. Stallcup was not notified when he was to be on the agenda months before. ED Director stated that Ms. Varner had been given the extension which had already expired for her recreational vehicle and it was to be sanitary. Nothing had been done as of the night of the meeting. She did not have to remove the recreational vehicle, but she would not be able to live on it.

Council Member Fair felt that the City has an obligation to notify a citizen if they are going to be on the agenda.

Council Member Broome stated he wished she had been notified and that she would have attended the meeting, but that she also was notified in writing 60 days ago and she had attended the meeting.

Council Member Winn stated that if Ms. Varner had done what she was supposed to do, we would not be having this conversation.

Mayor Hrncirik asked for Charlie Rose to come up and make his comment known. Mr. Rose stated that he wanted to make a point of order at that time, and Mayor told him he would have to wait, until Council finished discussing this agenda item.

Council at this time finished their discussion and Charlie Rose was allowed to speak.

Mr. Rose stated that he could have saved us the whole discussion due to there was no extension to be discussed because she had not filed one. So, legally she had until the end of business day after the last extension and could file another one so there was really no action to be taken other than give Lauren direction.

MPT Glass made a motion to give Lauren direction to contact Ms. Varner and let her know that her 60-day extension was up. Seconded by Council Member Miller. Motion carried 5/0.

12. Discuss, consider, and take action to approve the City of Seymour A/P bills paid the month of January 2021, in the amount of $549,157.20.

Council Member Fair asked regarding the Atmos Bill for the Conference Room Upstairs, Seymour Police Dept. and Street Barn and why they were so high ? Lauren explained that the pipes upstairs are frozen due to the weather and Robert explained that due to their equipment being stored at the City Barn, they do not want to take the chance of the cold weather ruining their equipment.