Council, PMUA Meet on Goals

Monday (June 28) was overloaded with events, as Mark Spivey noted in his Courier News report.

There was the 1 to 5 p.m. City Council retreat, the 6:30 p.m. rally at City Hall Library to confront gun violence, the 7 p.m. special City Council meeting and the special Board of Education meeting at 8 p.m.

Plaintalker arrived at City Hall in time to find a large crowd preventing entrance to the library and left coverage of the rally to Mark.

The council meeting began late at 7:38 p.m. in City Hall Library with a discussion of the Plainfield Municipal Utilities Authority’s actions since a joint meeting with the City Council about a year ago. For the last 15 years, the authority has provided solid waste and sewer services to the city through an interlocal services agreement. But last year, a citizen group challenged a number of the authority’s practices and the governing body has sought to call the authority to account for its perceived faults.

The first thing PMUA Commissioner and Chairman Harold Mitchell did Monday was to dramatically present City Administrator Bibi Taylor with a check for $1.5 million dollars, which Taylor said represented the Authority’s typical budget contribution for revenue sharing toward the end of the fiscal year.

PMUA attorney Leslie London then went into a lengthy account of the authority’s accomplishments over the past year, including several reductions in charges. But in addition, she noted many costs associated with the citizen litigation and the impact of having to provide services to apartment buildings owned by Connolly Properties without compensation while the landlord faced foreclosures, bankruptcy and property auctions. About $950,000 is still owed to PMUA, she said.

City Council President Annie McWilliams and others sought to receive factual updates on goals from last year, and found some lacking, specifically proof of the rationale for certain PMUA charges. But PMUA officials said outside experts had verified typical charges for trash pickup and disposal rates.

While many of the changes sought by the citizen group “Dump PMUA” were met, the authority claimed they were voluntary, such as rollbacks of fines for containers left out past a deadline or for lids left open. A judge had dismissed all of the Dump PMUA claims except for the issue of shared services, where ratepayers are assessed a charge for cleaning parks, municipal buildings and other places used by the general public. On that issue, Judge Karen M. Cassidy ruled in favor of the PMUA, London said.

But speakers Monday still probed the cost. In public comment, Philip Charles, leader of the Dump PMUA movement, asked why ratepayers are assessed $4 million for shared services and why the service cannot be let out for bids. On the latter, London said it is simply part of the city’s agreement with the authority and as for the cost, she said, it was borne out in an analysis by outside experts.

Even though strict new PMUA policies have reduced spending on travel, Charles still challenged bills for recent trips, flowers and meals, saying, “It’s like a piggy bank.”

Resident Bill Kruse called for reduction of PMUA commissioners from five to three to save money, but London said five commissioners are required by statute and the board can also have two alternates. At present, the PMUA board has four holdovers, another point of contention. McWilliams urged the administration to make appointments as soon as possible.

James Pivnichny, a former mayoral candidate now running for the Second & Third Ward at-large council seat, blasted the authority for, in his opinion, giving the same performance as a year ago, namely “a lot of excuses and no indication of positive results” in addressing concerns. Pivnichny said he was “outraged” and called for the authority to be abolished.

While PMUA Executive Director Eric Watson was less defensive than at the previous joint meeting with the governing body, he still lashed out after public comment.

“I can’t respond to rhetoric,” Watson said. “To set up and hear a lot of folks yell and scream - I can’t respond.”

But McWilliams summed up the outstanding issues raised by the council and public – including rolling some costs into tax bills, seeking outside municipal clients for solid waste services, naming a “point person” each for the city and authority to share information, increasing transparency on the authority’s web site – and called for a follow-up meeting in September.

Also on Monday’s agenda, the council approved 23 liquor licenses, but will require hearings on three and declined approval on several others.

End-of-year budget transfers were also on the agenda, but the council decided to let the resolution on transfers die in favor of proposing action on a revised resolution to be acted on at a July 1 special meeting. The administration has held that no changes are possible in the transfers, but the governing body wants revisions. There was some confusion Monday over procedure, with McWilliams saying the council had expected the administration to come back with changes Monday. Councilman Adrian Mapp, who had called for the proposed resolution to be tabled “indefinitely,” said he would entertain a modified version, but alleged the administration was “drawing a line in the sand.”

Corporation Counsel Dan Williamson countered by saying both sides had drawn a line in the sand.

The council and administration held a joint retreat Monday afternoon to increase collegiality in addressing city issues and will hold another one Wednesday.

--Bernice Paglia