9/14/11
During Monday's council meeting (see: http://windowsmedia.alphameetings.com/LMCCShorewood/091211shorewood.wmv at the 19:45 point) the Mayor introduced the "need" for a new Joint Powers Agreement covering AIS and Christmas Lake. Such an agreement had never been discussed by the council yet, the City Attorney had prepared a draft of its contents and it was clear that the Mayor had the votes to ram it through council.
The Insider notes that no council members other than Woodruff had any questions about the draft or its purpose. See: http://weblink.ci.shorewood.mn.us/weblink8/0/doc/155573/Page1.aspx and page 45 for the first page of the draft.
Woodruff asked about the purpose, questioned if a simple contract between the Watershed, DNR and Shorewood would suffice, asked for explanations as to meaning of some of the contents and questioned if the MCWD could actually enter into such an agreement since they do not have AIS management in their 509 Plan and need to do a plan amendment to get it added.
Readers of this blog really need to watch the responses from the City Attorney who, by the way, has a history of crafting JPA's for the City that, years later, come back to bite the City in the posterior.
It's also fascinating to listen to Zerby respond to questions about the meaning of the draft, defending ambiguous language and the Attorney's work, the fuzzy logic and mentioning that the "emergency legislation" gives the MCWD authority over AIS. The Insider has checked and there is no legislation or 509 plan amendment for the MCWD. Maybe Zerby meant the State legislation which was passed this spring that gave the DNR additional tools to manage AIS? If so, this legislation does nothing for the MCWD. Seems this is another of Zerby's obfuscations.
The conclusion was to have the Attorney complete drafting the agreement and to send it to the MCWD and DNR for their review (and approval?) by the end of this week. No direction to send it to council members, no direction to bring the completed draft back for a council review before sending it to the other groups. The Insider assumes that the Mayor feels council approval of the agreement is not necessary prior to sending it to the other groups. She probably already knows she has the votes to get it approved so is not bothering with the formality of actually having a vote.
Oh, by the way, the Christmas Lake Association which was supposed to be a party to the boat ramp gate system and its ongoing management isn't even a party to the agreement. Wonder why?
Happy reading!
The Insider
Let's see -- Lizee and company rehired the current city attorney who draft the Police JPA which ended up in court and lost to arbitration, plus the Coop Agreement for the Center which is meaningless - how's all that working? So we're to trust a new JPA which does not define voting privileges amongst the DNR, Watershed or City and eliminate the HOA who brought the issue forward;or any dollar amounts as Shrwd being fiscal agent? Siakel and Hotvet you were elected to be leaders not followers of Lizee and Zerby-- do your job!!
ReplyDelete