46  Work Session Meeting Minutes - August 10, 2023  City Council Chambers, City Building, 16 West Scribner Avenue, DuBois, Pennsylvania onl Thursday, August 10,2023 @4 4p.m; Council convened att their regular Work Session with Mayor Walshi in the Chair. Other Council Members present were: Pat Reasinger. Also present were: Acting City Manager/City Engineer/Public' Work Director, Chris Nasuti; Code Enforcement/Zoning: Officer, Zacl Lawhead; ITI Director, Absent: Councilman. Jim Aughenbaugh, Councilwoman Diane Bernardo, and Councilman Shane Dietz  Matt Johnson; andF Finance Officer, DeLean Shepherd.  August 14th Agendal Items  Mayor Walsht turned the meeting overt tol Interim City Manager Nasuti. #3. Resolution of Condolence- - Eugene Mabie Mr. Mabie worked! herei int the 60's and 70's priort to workingi for PennDOT.  #7. Downtown DuBois Parking Study Report - Downtown DuBois, Inc. - Julie Stewart Julie Stewart willl be here for a presentation on the downtown parking study that was recently #8 Request appointment of Molly O'Bryon-Welpott: to DuBois Housing Authority  completed.  She willl be taking thep place of Ms. Lieber. We will continue our discussion on Work Sessions. October 31st beginning at 4:30p.m. Annual Halloween Parade  #9 Work Session  #10 Request from Priority Mediai for West Long Avenue from N.F Franklin to Brady be closed  #11 Request for Intermunicipal Liquor License Transfer From ARC Restaurants, LLC Clearfield to Public House on. Jared, LLC, (Julio's). Jared ST, DuBois. We will bet turning that over to the Solicitor ands setting al hearing date. #12 Request from Becky McTavish to appoint. Julie Stewart to Library Board  #13 Tabulations & Recommendations  We willl have tabulations andr recommendations on three different projects: Coke Hill Water Line, Paving Project, Pricing on three different houses for demolition (21 S. Jared ST, 307S. Jared ST, 119 W. Weber Ave). We did get multiple contractor pricing on that.  #14. Authorization to advertise for Aggregates.  Thisi is an annual request. Sand/Stone fori trench backfill for utilities and our antiskid for winter #15 Request for use of stage from DuBois Area Youth Football for September 12th #16 Request for 2nd Public Hearing concerning 2023 Community Block Grant Program for Ibelieve. Joe mentioned this last time. We will have thel hearing prior tol him submittingt the application. We are still looking for projects if anyone has any recommendations. Therei isa a private water line, most of them have been turned over to the city butt there is still onel left on Oklahoma Salem Road, ith has six properties owners. They haves submitted a request for the city tot take the line over as we have done witht the others. Iwill present that information. We reviewed ita and all the facilities, and we willt turn that over to the Solicitor as  maintenance. Cheerleading Expo  Monday, September 11th at 5:45p.m. #17 Oklahoma Salem Waterline  well.    47  Work Session Meeting Minutes - August 10, 2023 (Cont'd.)  Thel last two items are a discussion on the Financial Director and the Manager's position. Mr. Gelfand asked how the city picks which houses are selected for demolition. Is there a signup sheet? Interim City Manager Nasuti directed the question to Code Enforcement/Zoning Officer Lawhead. Lawhead stated that thet three listed have probably been on thel list the longest andi in really rough shape. 21S.J Jared ST appears to be in dire need, iti is ready to collapse; it's got to go. Nasutis statedt thati if we can't findt the owners and get the ownerst to take care ofi ita and wet feeli it presents ap public safety hazard, that is when we decide to take them down. Otherwise, we pursue and tryt to gett the owner tot take care of it. Councilman Reasinger saidi it'sa a process to get thel house andg get itt torn down. You can't just tear down a Gelfand askedi if City Officials are going and looking at properties and making the decisions. Mayor Walsh said no that'sZac's job; he will let us know and we will go andl look at them and give our opinions afterward. Gelfand wanted to know when was the last time the city demolished a property. Walsh said ar month ago maybel longer. Reasinger asked Lawhead when thel last time was; Lawhead said two years ago thet firel house on East Park Avenue. Lawhead said wei facilitated that demolition. Nasuti asked ifi it was around seven kitchens? Lawhead confirmed. Reasinger said! he believes that Redevelopment bought that house and had itt torn down. Reasinger saidi it wasn't abandoned. Nasuti said the building on W. Long Avenue next tot the Wings of Grace Church, wel had to go in andt tear down that building. Kathleen Clement askedi if the Redevelopment bought thel house, then they owni the property. Reasinger confirmed they do own the property. Clement askedi ift they would sell that property. Reasinger said presentlyi iti is beingl leased to the neighbor for not al lot of money. We would sell that lot; iti is not a very valuable lot as it's small and not a great location. We were hoping it would be part of a development when thes seven! kitchens property sells, we would tryt to selli it tot themf for an entrance. That would be ar nice way to get into the property, butt that has not DuBois Sports. Nasutis said, what about DuBois Sports. Jackson said, let'st talk about it. So, Matt Checchio runs DuBois Sports. Nasuti confirmed. So, the money all these fields are getting, is DuBois Sports using the city'st taxes? Nasuti stated theyl have their own. Jackson asked ifv we get al breakdown of whatt they are making on thei fields, with each game, On Deck? Iknow the city gave ther moneyt to buy On Deck. Nasuti and Reasinger corrected her and stated that Redevelopment did. Jackson said, Redevelopment, got the money from the city. Reasinger stated he is not 100%s sure ont that; it could have been Redevelopment money. Iknow we talked about that, I'm not 100% sure on that. Jackson asked where do we stand, is it straight across the board? Idon't understand why the cityi is using somebody else to manage thei fields, we: should hire a parks andi recreation employee instead of using Matt Checchio. l've been going through the budgets for the past fewy years with thet fields and the cost and the new field. Ijust wantt to doal little bit of background work.I went through all the websites for DuBois Sports. On Deck, what they charge; didn'tsee al lot of that coming into the city. Isaw where Heindl gave $100,000 up front; ist that whati isi int that account to maintain? Ist that that special account wel have fori thep park? Nasuti said part oft thati isi in there. Nasuti said, M'llg go back to College World Series time, instead oft ther money going to Checchio and then Checchio paying the city, the city now collects the money; that is how we pay Matt. Jackson asked how do we know allt thei fields are being booked? Ihave an email that Matt Checchio sent out to somebody ont thet field anda at the end of the last paragraph it was a little strange. It said, "Please do not broadcast or openly discuss this discounted rate with other organizations. The public isn't aware ofa all our resources and operations yeta yeta....and our organization feels there ist too much chatter and gossip, (Ig guess I'm chattering right now) local discounts and special dispensations would cease." Thati isf from Matt Checchio. Councilman Reasinger asked what the date was on the email. Jackson said December of last year. Reasinger said that is before the city started..... Jackson: said yeah. Jacksons said shes still wanted everyone tol know what  Public Comments Elliot Gelfand -1S. Highland  house because itl looks bad.  started.  Jennifer. Jackson - 42 N. Brady ST    48  Work Session Meeting Minutes - August 10, 2023 (Cont'd.)  they are doing. Is there different rates? Ifwe are spending all this money on a ball field, which the budget partl willt talk about later, we need tor maintain it. These fields should be for local people andi ift they are getting charged astronomically locally to use these fields and getting bumped out for all oft these travelling teams; feel it defeats the purpose oft taking out al loan when we can'tr maintain what wel have now. Grants are great, but we need somewhere to get the money to maintain these down ther road. Ifl'm reading thel budget right, we willl be talking Monday, there are some issues int there. Idor not see why we are doing this when we can't maintain what we have now. We haven't raised taxes in how many years Eddie? Wel have had how manyr ratei increases in the past 10 years? Walsh said 25%. This Council has never voted fora ai taxi increase. It's scary. Nasuti askedi ifs shes said we can't maintain our fields. Jackson saidr no we're at 80% of thel budget this year and we're only at the end of July. It's August and we're already at 80% of our budget. Nasuti asked, for thet fields? Jackson said in general ini this city. Nasuti said he feels thati is al little misleading. Jackson said, asi in? Nasuti said lwant tos say therei is grant monies for capital improvement projects in there. Jackson said OK. We don't really! have al loti ins savings from the millions like the city usedt to. Our savings isn'tt there, andl don't wantt tot touch much ont thist today, because Iknow it is going tol be at topic on Monday. You: sayt there is all this moneyi int these funds, we still have al heck ofal lot of bills to payt through the end of they year. lunderstand they are capital projects, but from what the daily expense sheet says we're at 80%. Nasuti reiterated he doesn'tf feel that is correct; he will get her the numbers. Jackson said OK. Both Nasuti and. Jackson began tot talk at the same time. Nasuti said! based on ther revenue that wel have projected coming int this year and expenses we have projected this year... Someone asked what revenue? Nasuti saidt taxes. Jackson said, our taxes Michael Clement said you only take in about 2.5 million fromi taxes, property taxes. Nasuti said wel have water/sewer rents. Clement saidy yout transferred about 91 million dollars, I'mi rounding Chris, it's not exact. You transferred 9 million from the water/sewer fund; it would bet two different funds. So now you geta a 17 million budget. But, ifthis budget is correct, and we assume that iti is, because iti is thes same! budget, you're down like $300,000. Ithink their question isr really valid, wherei ist the money coming from. Ifthati is the budget as of today,! Jackson said there is at two-line item in here thati is al budget shortfall. Nasuti confirmed. Explain tor me, ab balanced budget to mei is ally your revenue and all ofy your expenses. Nasuti confirmed. Ifwel hada al budget shortfall to balance thel budget, why didn't we cut expenses. Nasuti saidt thel balance that they presented in. June had as surplus, correct? Jackson saidi no. Nasutis saidy yes. Reasinger said $26,000. Nasutis saidi it absolutely did. Jackson said $26,000 OK. Finance Officer Shepherd stated that wel have not adopted that, so that is not showing on our financial: system. That is where iti is off. What Ms.. Jackson isl looking at is out of the financial system which isn'tt the new budget that we came up with. Not spending money that would Nasuti clarified that they are not looking at the same budget. Shepherd confirmed they are not. Nasutis said what he looked att the end of. July, we were: stillf forecasted revenue VS expenses to Jackson asked, eveni ifv we've drawn out thet transferring 4.8 million oft thel lease and management payment; they don't bring int that kind of money. Shepherd saidt thati ist thel budget shortfall. That is counteracting that. allg going to come in, that's what thel budget shortfall is for.  barely cover the police budget.  think there probablyi is some sort of moneys shortage issue going on.  have been spenti in thep past. cover everything.  Jackson said OK. Shepherd when on, we were not expecting it all to come in, we knewi it wasn't Gelfand asked about the field money thati is collected, where does its show up? Doesi itgo through Matt Checchio or come here to the city? Nasuti reiterated it willl be paid to the city.    49  Work Session Meeting Minutes - August 10, 2023 (Cont'd.)  Reasinger stated that his grandkids were ata a kickball event last night at Heindl Field, we don't charge fors something like that do we? Nasuti said he doesn't believe SO. He doesn't know how that was scheduled. Mayor Walsh said there are sometimes the fields are open andy you can just go on it. That could be one of those instances. Reasinger saidt they said theyl hadt to quit because it was getting dark, andt they didn't have al keyt to the lights. Mayor Walsh said then they didr not have an agreement tol be ont there; otherwise, they would have hada al key. Reasinger said that's OK, he was hoping that they didn't have to paya as it was just al bunch of Asked what Matt receives to market and manage DuBois Sports. Nasuti said, don't have the exact numbers, but he does get a monthly payment anda a percentage of the advertising. Vida askedi ifv wel have a contract with! him. Nasuti confirmed we do. Vida wanted clarification that the cityi isr maintaining thei fields andr now all ther money coming from those tournaments or whatever is coming in through the city. Nasuti confirmed. Mayor Walsh saidi it nol longer goes Ithink iti is very important that the Council members and even you Chris, go on Spotlight and look at thet free panel on holding officials accountable in Pennsylvania. He said Greg Primm, former Manager in Falls Creek, was talking on one of the panels. Idon't knowi ify you have seen this or not, butl suggest thaty you watch it, because they talked about the sewer and water utilities and what's legal and what is not. Ireally question what we are doing here int the Cityof DuBoisi ifiti isr really legal or not. The manager on! here, they talked about him; theyl had three different people one from Chambersburg, one from Penn State, and Greg Primm. I'my very concerned about howy you havey your lease and management figure. The way they were explainingi it, it doesn't look good for the City of DuBois. So, lamj just saying on your partl Mayor Walsh said, we have been through two major lawsuits with Sandy Township and all these questions were asked, whaty you are bringing up now, andt they have never been. : Trzyna said when he watched it yesterday and Isaw especially what Greg said, it hit me,l thought the City of DuBois better watch out wheni it comes down to that. One othert thing, Iwish my best friend would have been here today: Toni. Int the last Council Meeting she made a statement that she did not write Herm Suplizio's contract. Idid tryt to make a call to Rich Miller because Iheard some things about Campbell, Durrant, and Beatty but he never got back to me. Toni andy you saidy you wish Gary Gilbert would have been here; well, you) were here and Diane; Aughenbaugh wasn't. Buti int the minutes of March 9, 2015, you want tor read the! highlighted area, whati it says. Because Iwould like to have Toni actually do a do over ont that. You can read it out loud. Its says, drawn by City Solicitor, given to Council and the Mayor. That is al little bit different than what shet told us at thel last Council Meeting. Or explained tor me att thel last Council Meeting. Imean, itisi ini the minutes and the only one that The minutes say, "the contract was drawn up by City Solicitor of the City of DuBois and given to the Mayor and Council for their review at the Work Session, Thursday, March 5, 2015." Wastewater Treatment Plant and the PennVEST loan, why didi itg go from $40,000,000 to $80,000,000. Mayor Walsh said COVID was the number one reason and prices just went through the roof. Clement asked ifiti was filingf for it or paperwork. lunderstand that Anthony Ditka was the Attorney on that. Walsh confirmed. Clement asked why wasn'tToni? Mayor Walsh stated that is his specialty, he does PennVEST loans. Clement went on, it wasn't that we added; from whatl lunderstand Ithink iti ist the Wastewater Treatment Plant Taj Mahal. Bunk room, washer dryers, locker room, it's pretty fancy for a wastewater treatment plant. Isit  kids.  Kristen Vida -929 Chestnut Avenue  through Checcio, that is one thing Chris did when he first came on board.  Ron Trzyna - 120S. Avenue  would take al look att that, it's about an! hour and al half long.  wasn'ti there was Aughenbaugh. You and Diane were.  Kathleen Clement -718 Chestnut Ave    50  Work Session Meeting Minutes - August 10, 2023 (Cont'd.)  necessary to have all oft thats stuff? Mayor Walsh confirmed iti is, Nasuti also confirmed and said they havet that now. No one wants tol leave..... Walsh said do you wanty your husband to come home from working there all day without as shower? It's what we have now. So, what caused itt to go from $40,000,000 to $80,000,000;1 that's the only reason, COVID. Nasuti said when they didt theiri feasibility study the engineers estimated itt to be around $40,000,000; they obviously didn't get the number right. It did go up because of COVID. We rebid it after, the first bid camei ina at $79,000,000 and we rebidi ita again it came in at $73,000,000 and then PennVEST gave us thel loan for that. We asked DEP if we could puti it off further, they would not give us any more timet to puti it off. They didn'tt think the prices would change either. Reasinger said some oft that $80,000,0001 is two waterlines, correct? Nasuti said yes, we have the north interceptor, south interceptor, the Coke Hill Water Lines, and the engineering andi inspections that is alli included ini it. That is not alla at the Sewer Plant. Ist that another PennVEST? Nasuti said not thati is alli in one loan. That ist the Wastewater Treatment Plant, right? Those are all wastewater projects. Everyone started talking at once. Someone said did we pay Tonit for any oft that, like legali fees? Nasuti confirmed we did. Someone said so she did work on ita and then Ditkat took over. Mayor Walsh saidr no they worked on it together, that is common practice. Kathleen Clement askedi if wel hadt to pay Anthony since we paid Toni. Nasuti confirmed we paid both. Clement thought maybe one ort the other didn'tg get paid. Mayor Walsh said they both get paid. Jennifer. Jackson asked ift they got paid the same amount. Nasutis said nott the exact same amount. The general consensus was ifh he was the expert he would get paid more. Someone asked why he wasn't calledi ini int thei first instead of letting Toni do it. Mayor Walsh said because there are certain aspects that had tol be done at the local level. Kristen Vida asked a question about the Forensic. Audit. She asked about the scope of work on that, such as, how many years are they looking at, when didt theys start. Ithink yous saidi itis going tol be donei in November. Nasuti confirmed. November ist they projected timeline. They have until May, butt the projected timeline is November. Thei initial documents they requested go back to: 2009. Thati is every account we have: Water/Sewer, General Fund, Fire Department. They are goingt tol look at loans as well. Nasuti confirmed. Vida said, have tol be honest with you Chris, youl know Icame in and ran DUFAST Transit after the Director and her Assistant embezzled money fromi it. We hadt tol have a Forensic Audit done; we only hadl like four accounts, andi itv was pretty cut and dry andt that took well over ay year. I'm shocked that this is moving sO quickly as convoluted as all of thisi isi int the city. Itjust amazes me. That was) just one auditor and an assistant, andi it took them well over a year for that tol be complete. Idon't know. iftheyl have at team oft two dozen people working ont this or what. Nasuti stated they do havea team, we went through DCED, we put out the request for proposals through public advertising, we did not hand select the auditors. The auditors just did the same thing in another community near Harrisburg, they are well recommended, and we checked their credentials. Ihave every faith that they will geti it done right. Vida askedi ift they are going tol look at monies that should havel been deposited intot the General Fund and wasn't. Nasuti said they are going to tell us everything; we didn't hold anything back from them. They have direct access to our accounting system SO we don't! have to give it to them, they can get into itt themselves. Vida askedi ift they are goingt to gol back through and look att the minutes of approvals and signatures and things liket that. Nasuti saidI Ican't telly you what they do, they have all thei information. Vida said because part of what came out with DuFAST is that minutes were forged; so, Ijust wonder how all oft this is going to play out. Nasuti said, lam leaving that up tol DCED andt the professionals. I don't want to guide them on howt to do theirj job. We gavet them the parameters. Linda London askedi ift they willl be interviewing Council members. Nasuti said he doesn't know about Council members. After they review this first one, they will give us al list of people they want to interview and thet files they want to come see. Ifyou can, Ihopet they meet individually with Council members about the things they approved and didn't approve. Nasuti said once again! am not going to address that with them. Mayor Walsh: saidi iti is being overseen by DCED. Jennifer. Jackson asked ift ther report willl be given to the public. Nasuti confirmed.  Kristen Vida - Chestnut Avenue    51  Work Session Meeting Minutes August 10, 2023 (Cont'd.) Kathleen Clements wanted tol know where everyone was. Mayor Walshs said Diane had surgery today, Jim's in Kentucky, and Shane's on vacation. It's just the perfect storm. Reasinger said,  everyone you're stuck with us.  ATTEST  APPROVED:  aik  Cpp    51  Work Session Meeting Minutes - August 10, 2023 (Cont'd.)  Kathleen Clements wanted tol know where everyone was. Mayor Walsh said Diane hads surgery today, Jim'si in Kentucky, and Shane's on vacation. It'sj just the perfect storm. Reasinger said,  everyone you're stuck with us.  ATTEST:  APPROVED:  Douk  Cpap