CLEARLAKE, Calif. – The Clearlake City Council met for a regular meeting last Thursday, Aug. 14, at City Hall, taking up three items of business.
The council awarded a bid for a road restriping project, heard what its members can and cannot do in regards to election campaigns, and authorized its support of a marijuana-related resolution as requested by the League of California Cities.
City Engineer Bob Galusha said two bids were received for a citywide restriping and bike lane conversion project on Lakeshore and Olympic drives.
The bid was awarded to Chrisp Co. of Fremont in the amount of $307,335.
Galusha said the city has budgeted $321,200 to cover the construction and construction inspection of the project.
He said $289,000 is funded through a federal Highway Safety Improvement Program grant; $11,584 from a Lake County Area Planning Council bicycle and pedestrian grant; and the remaining $20,616 comes from the city's gas tax fund.
“This project includes the citywide restriping of some of our arterial and collector streets using thermo-plastic paint and reflective pavement markers,” Galusha said. “In addition, Lakeshore Drive from Old Highway 53 to Olympic Drive and Olympic Drive to Old Highway 53 will be restriped to provide for class II bike lanes on each side of those streets.”
Galusha said existing crosswalks on both Olympic Drive and Lakeshore Drive will be replaced with high visibility thermo-plastic, ladder-type, crosswalks.
Striping also will be applied in the area of Davis Avenue and Moss Street, Galusha said. That area was a recent topic of discussion brought to the council by an area homeowner concerned about safety.
Galusha received commendations from both the council as well as from members of the public for his consistency in securing funding for road improvement projects.
“A lot of these projects wouldn't have happened if it weren't for Bob (Galusha),” District 2 Supervisor Jeff Smith, who introduced himself as a “proud citizen of Clearlake,” said. “Thank you very much for everything you're doing for the city.”
In other business on Thursday, City Attorney Ryan Jones gave a presentation describing allowable activities for council members and city staff with regard to support for candidates for city office and Measure R – the city's half-cent sales tax initiative for citywide improvements that is to go to public vote in November.
Jones said council members are prohibited from advocating, for or against, while serving duties in their capacities as members of the city council.
They may, however, engage in such activities during their personal time.
Jones said “on-duty” time is any time in which the council members are attending to obligations of their elected position, including but not limited to presence at city hall for the purpose of city business.
While council members are prohibited from engaging in endorsements in representation of the city and/or the city council, Jones said they are allowed use of their title in providing personal endorsements.
City staff is prohibited from engaging in advocacy and endorsements in the same manner. Staff, however, may provide factual information to the public during work hours, he said.
Jones said public funds can only be used to provide the public with informational materials that are based on fact, not position.
Also on Thursday, the council authorized support of a resolution regarding illegal marijuana grows introduced to the League of California Cities by the Redwood Empire Division, of which the city is a member.
Specifically, City Manager Joan Phillipe said the resolution was originally introduced by the Fort Bragg City Council after Councilman Jere Melo was shot and killed in August 2011 while out on private timberland investigating a report of an illegal marijuana grow.
The resolution calls for action from the “governor and legislature to convene a summit to address the devastating environmental impacts of illegal marijuana grows on both private and public lands throughout California and the increasing problems to public safety related to these activities by working in partnership with the League of California Cities to develop responsive solutions and to secure adequate funding for cost-effective implementation strategies.”
Highlights of the resolution call attention to the following:
- Growing public concerns about damage to fish and wildlife habitat and degradation to the environment.
- Substantial public investment in support of the Clean Water Act, Porter-Cologne Water Quality Control Act and Endangered Species Act with efforts through those acts jeopardized by illegal grows.
- Illegal water diversion for cultivation of marijuana poses direct threat to endangered and threatened fish species.
- Unregulated use of fertilizers, pesticides, insecticides, soil amendments causing contamination to land and waters.
“This is definitely something we need to do to stop the devastation of our forests,” Councilwoman Joyce Overton said. “It's a starting point to get the state's attention.”
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