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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2010-06-29 Government Operations Committee Minutes Government Operations Committee June 29, 2010 Minutes Councilor Attendance: Wheeler, Hawes Staff Attendance: Nicklas, Wellington, Yardley Others: Bangor Water District: Kathy Moriarty, Ralph Foss, Daniel Lawson Committee Chair Wheeler opened the meeting at 5:00 p.m. 1. Bangor Water District Moriarty began by summarizing the disinfection byproduct monitoring that was done last year. With the drinking water that is highly regulated, there were two new regulations brought about to improve public health protection for drinking water. The Water District needs to comply with these new regulations by the end of 2013. Moriarty spoke about the risks of adding these disinfectants and referred to graphs handed out to the Committee. She concluded that after the necessary testing from the stage two disinfection byproduct, the District will continue to meet the requirements for the new regulations and will not have to change the disinfection treatment. Moriarty updated the Committee with the Essex Street Concrete Tank. She referred to pictures of the different stages of construction. The District hopes to have this tank on- line in August. Moriarty spoke about the leak that was found on the Hammond Street Standpipe. She showed pictures of the different steps that the District took to fix the problem such as draining the tank, cleaning and inspecting and locating the problem. Although the leak is fixed, Moriarty says there needs to be more planning on this tank. It will require some improvements, and will need to be painted on the outside and inside, etc. The plan for the future of this tank is to consult an engineering firm and have the tank evaluated. The District will need to decide after the evaluation if the tank needs to be repaired or replaced. Moriarty talked about the work that is being done by the City of Bangor and the District’s engineering department. The purpose is to have better communication and work together on projects that will benefit both. Moriarty spoke about the GIS system that both the City and the District are implementing and the goal is to work together. Moriarty ended with an open invitation to City Council and City Staff to tour water supply and treatment facilities. Wheeler asked Moriarty if she thought the same information and updates could be given quarterly, three times a year or bi-yearly. Moriarty feels that this communication is very valuable. She is open to looking at other ways of communication. 2. Resolve Supporting Paper Trade Daniel Lawson, the field Coordinator for New England of the Alliance for American Manufacturing, would like the Council to pass a resolve supporting the paper industry. He was asked by the International Union to come out of his mill and work on this project, which is basically about China and Indonesia illegally dumping paper into the Country. Throughout the Country there have been three mills targeted that would vastly suffer if something is not done. Two of those mills are in Maine. One is the Rumford Mill and the other is the Sappy Mill in Skowhegan. Combined, the two mills employ about 2,000 people. He said that when a plant closes, such as the one in Brewer when Eastern Fine went down, the numbers of people that are affected by not being able to service that mill are the wood cutters, the people that supply them, the vendors, railroads, truck drivers, etc. The University of Maine did a study and came up with a number between 4.8 to 7.2 jobs that are created for each job in a paper mill. This would calculate to about 10,000 jobs on the low end. Lawson said that China became a member of the World Trade Order and is building paper machines left and right. In the past 10 years, between China and Indonesia, they put in 175 – 200 new paper machines. In the U.S., during the same time frame, only one paper machine was opened in Lincoln, Maine. China and Indonesia have newer equipment and because they peg their currency to the U.S., they get a 40% discount to ship. They give new businesses low interest loans or no interest loans that do not have to be paid back. They control the electric and water rights and have no DEP or EPA and have not regulations to follow. They are striping the rain forest to get their pulp to make their paper. The International Trade Suit, which has won the first two parts, will make the final th determination on September 16. Lawson’s group is asking the government not to give any handouts or tax breaks, but to uphold the laws that are on the books. Lawson says that if the Government provided a level playing field, the U.S. can compete against anyone in the world. Both Maine’s Senators and Congressmen are on board with this and the State Legislature, the House and the Senate both passed this Resolution that was submitted unanimously in the last week of the session. Lawson’s group is trying to prove damages and prove that there is support. He states that they have approximately 50 towns and cities that have signed on to this Resolution. Lawson pointed out that when the mill in Rumford took a paper machine out and the mill was reevaluated and the property tax went up 23% in one year. Wheeler listed many other Senators that have signed this Resolution and spoke about losing ground with other countries. Hawes made a motion to move this to the full Council. With no negative votes, this received has passage to move to full Council. Lawson spoke in general of a press release that he has, but that it was dated for the next day and was not able to share the specifics with the Committee. Wheeler asked if he would make it available tomorrow by sending it to the City Manager’s office in order to share it with the Committee and Lawson agreed. 3. Grant for Overdose Prevention Program Yardley stated that this is a renewal of a grant that was awarded to the City three years ago. Statistics are showing that a significant number of people are dying of drug overdose, both prescriptions and illicit drugs in the State. The Maine Department of Health and Human Services identified three areas of the State to lead the efforts on the ground to try to deal with the problem. The City of Bangor is the recipient of that funding, and along with a couple different grants, the City is able to employ someone full time. This person works with jails, homeless shelters and others to try to communicate to active addicts the dangers and to try and decrease the number of accidental overdoses that are occurring in this community. Responding to Hawes, Yardley said that there are no hard fast numbers of incidents or drug types that are the most prominent for drug overdoses. He knows that the State is working with the medical examiner’s office to try to capture that information. Wheeler asked if there is reliable statistics pertaining to how many of these overdoses are truly accidental or a result of uncontrollable addiction. Yardley said those two scenarios are like splitting hairs. Unless it is an attempted suicide situation, any drug overdose would be classified as accidental. He said that the goal is to teach that target group the dangers of mixing drugs and knowing what to do if someone finds themselves with someone that has overdosed. Responding to Wheeler, Yardley said that alcohol is not included in this grant but is often co-occurring with what is being dealt with. A motion was moved and seconded to forward this Council Resolve back to Council with recommendation for approval for accepting and appropriating the $50,000 grant for the Overdose Prevention Program. 4. Grant for Penquis District Public Health Coordinating Council Yardley began by saying that the State approached the City asking if it would be willing to provide administrative support to the new District Coordinating Council. The District Coordinating Council serves all of the Penquis District, which is all of Penobscot and Piscataquis County, and the funding the City will receive allows one of Yardley’s support staff to help arrange meetings, secure meeting space, take minutes and send out emails and do the kind of support for the District Coordinating Council, which is basically healthcare professionals and social service folks that come together to try and begin to put a form to the local public house system that the state is trying to create. Responding to Hawes, Yardley said that the $7,000 grant covers the cost of what the staff would be doing for this District Council. One of the challenges with any grants that are received for the Public Health Department is that it is usually a fixed amount and as costs go up, the capacity to do the same work within that cost is difficult. This additional money takes a little of that pressure off. He said this is a great fit and he is appreciative that the State sends the money in his direction. A motion was made to move this on to full Council with recommendation to allow the application for an acceptance of $7,000 from the Maine Department of Health and Human Services. Chair seconded the motion and it has passage. 5. Grant for Lead Poisoning Prevention Activities Yardley said that in this one case, the City outsources a great deal of that funding to Penquis which has a better abatement program. Staff works very closely with them around the deliverable. Again, he pointed out, the City is serving the region, but in this case the vast majority of identified lead issues have been concentrated in the Bangor Housing. This is really an opportunity for Bangor to help support work that Penquis is already doing. Bangor benefits from it in that it helps to underwrite some of the Health and Human Services admin costs. It also offers an opportunity for Penquis and the City to look at other collaborative opportunities around air quality, asthma, and a number of other areas. A motion was made and seconded for the grant of $37,250 to move to full Council for approval and acceptance. 6. Grant for Colorectal Cancer Prevention Activities Yardley said that this is specific to Maine and is the goal of the State Health Plan and Maine CDVC to empower local communities to work on chronic disease management. This helps to fund a staff position that is doing work in the community. The work is done with hospitals, other health care providers and in a more population base way of getting information out to the public through media, and newsletters to try to impact the rates of disease, particularly in colorectal cancer. Responding to Hawes, Yardley said that this grant is more for just the management of and education of the disease and not so much for the diagnosis of the disease. This is population based health approach and not in competition with the medical facilities and will hopefully provide awareness that gets people to both do the preventive steps and also to be aware of early warning signs. A motion was made and seconded to send this to full Council with a recommendation for approval to accept the $16,000 grant for the implementation of colorectal cancer prevention activities. 7. MMA Legislative Policy Committee Election Nicklas began by saying that Bangor has one full seat on the MMA Legislative Policy Committee to which it appoints a person and one seat that it has typically shared with Hermon. Bangor nominated Councilor Richard Bronson at an earlier Government Operations meeting and Hermon nominated Clint Deshane, City Manager for Hermon. This seat usually gets split. For one of the two year terms, one nominee will be the representative and for the second year the other will be the representative. When not acting as a representative, one will act as an alternate vote for that seat. Nicklas said that the recommendation is that the City vote for Council Bronson. Responding to Hawes, Nicklas said that alternates can attend all meetings. Nicklas added that in the past the vote was done at the Committee level. It occurred to him that because there are only two tonight and 3 typically, it would make sense to forward this on to full Council. A motion was made and seconded to send this ballot from the MMA Legislative Policy Committee forward to full Council with a recommendation that Council cast a ballot for Council Richard Bronson. Meeting adjourned at 6:00 p.m.