Scottsboro City Council Regular Session December 28,2015

(photo by G. Morgan)

 Scottsboro City Council President Patrick Stewart formed four Committees to examine the issue of the Mayor's Capital expenditure plan which involved $3 million dollars in funding for four projects. The one item on the Scottboro City Council agenda died due to a lack of a motion - Mayor's Capital Expense Projects

The Capital Expense projects would be funded via a bond issue or local bank financing thus increasing City Debt. The city council sent a clear message to Mayor Potter about his plan to continue the increase in city debt. Blog articles on city bond debt, 2009-2014 -  http://arklite.blogspot.com/search/label/Scottsboro%20Bond%20Issues

Committees: 1) Renovation of Veterans Field, $1 million; committee members - Councilman Gary Stewart, Mayor Potter, Mark Pepper. 2) Renovation of Swimming Pool, $1 million, committee members: Councilman Brent Miller, Mayor and one other. 3) Renovation of Fire Station #3, $500K; Councilman Tony Wallingsford, Mayor Potter, Fire Chief Nichols.4) Heritage Center Addition/Renovation, $500K, Councilman Keith Smith, Mayor Potter, Center Director Judy Weaver.

The committees are required to announce the date, time and meeting place of their committee meeting as required by the Revised Open Meetings Act. Council President Steward stated the committees would file their reports with the council by Feb. 1, 2016. 

VIDEO

UPDATE: JAN. 2, 2015 - NOTE TO THE SCOTTSBORO CITY COUNCIL - If you are going to serve the people, do your job professionally and to the best of your abilities, the citizen tax-payers of Scottsboro deserve nothing less.

Would it be possible to post a link to the City Council Rules of Order on the City's web site or on this Face Book site? (Note: This message was posted to the City of Scottsboro's Face Book site at https://www.facebook.com/City-of-Scottsboro-Alabama-166218866760540/?fref=ts  )

Posting of the Scottsboro City Council's rules of order are necessary since the City Council President did not make a formal statement regarding the dead issue of the Capital Projects, the issue died due to a lack of a motion. Unfortunately, the lack of a motion was not formally declared. Mr. Stewart immediately moved into the naming of committees to study and report to the council on the various projects of the Capital Projects Issue, but it was a dead issue due to a lack of a motion. A point of order should have been called by a member of the city council, this was not accomplished, the silence was deafening! Mr. Smith did question the dead issue, but even so, Mr. Stewart continued unchallenged,

There were also indications during the meeting and after the meeting that the issue had been pre-planned and a discussion had occurred prior to the council meeting about the course of action of the meeting which may be a violation of the open meetings act.

I thought the Council President’s conduct to be highly unusual and not within the normal meeting course of conduct and probably violated the rules of order, particularly since the issue died due to a lack of a motion. It would seem the proper course of action would have been to bring this issue forward at the next council work session for a discussion, then place the committee issue on the agenda at the next voting council meeting.