Newcastle News
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Council approves purchase of maintenance equipment, before state grant expires By Christina Corrales-Toy With just a few months before a state Department of Ecology grant expires, the Newcastle City Council authorized the Public Works Department to use the funds to purchase a $100,000 piece of equipment that will benefit the city’s storm water management. The trailer-mounted hydro-excavator will be used for quick response to spills and storm pipe cleaning, though Public Works Director Mark Rigos admitted he was not sure how often the city would use it. “Honestly, I look at this as kind of a nice-tohave, not a requirement,” he said. “I do have some concerns on how much, honestly, we’re going to use this equipment. If this was solely coming out of Newcastle coffers, I would not bring this to you.” Rigos said the equipment would allow for quick responses to hazardous spills, such as paint spills, and help keep the catch basins around the city clean. He estimated the city would use the hydro-excavator two or three times a year for spills and about 10 to 15 times a year to jet wash catch basins. In 2010, the city received a Department of Ecology grant for more than $96,000. In 2012, the
city was awarded an additional $50,000. The grant is set to expire at the end of June. City Manager Rob Wyman warned the council that failure to use it would limit the city’s ability to secure future awards. “We applied for the grant to acquire equipment to help us with our storm water program,” he said. “For us to go back to Ecology and say ‘We don’t need the money,’ we do damage our credibility in future applications for grants.” Questions about the extent of the equipment’s usage, and the fact that there was little time to consider alternatives before the grant expired, concerned some of the council members. “This one is really troublesome to me,” Councilman Bill Erxleben said. “We’re coming up to a deadline date to spend some money, and so the maintenance folks have come up with a toy that they think would be helpful.” Erxleben and Councilman Gordon Bisset suggested the city partner with the Coal Creek Utility District to perform some of the same duties the new equipment is expected to perform. The district is not sufficiently staffed, however, to manage the city’s 2,000 catch basins, Wyman said. The City Council ulti-
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City secures sponsor for Fourth of July event Traffic, safety concerns still need to be addressed By Christina Corrales-Toy The city of Newcastle’s Fourth of July fireworks celebration will go on as planned, despite initial funding concerns and worries about public safety. Mayor Rich Crispo brought the discussion of city events to the council’s April 16 meeting to seek input about the feasibility of the Fourth of July event. Crispo’s main concern was public safety after last year’s event attracted between 3,500 and 5,000 people. “It was wall-to-wall people,” he said. “There was no place to put a blanket, a chair, anything … We had two policemen there. They weren’t really enough. There weren’t enough facilities there for people to use. The lines out of the bathroom were long. In my opinion, there were safety issues.” Councilman Steve Buri said he has attended the event with his family, but has never felt uncomfortable. “I’ve never felt unsafe over there. It’s a great amenity for our residents,” he said “It’s a service we should provide.” The larger impediment, however, was funding for the event. The Fourth of July celebration is expected to cost about $3,000
more than last year due to the increased cost of the fireworks display and the procurement of more police officers. The point became moot moments later when Councilman John Dulcich announced that he had secured a $10,000 commitment from Continental Properties, the developer of Lake Boren Townhomes, to sponsor the event. “We are sponsoring as a thank you to the community for helping us make Lake Boren Townhomes a great success,” Claudio Guincher, of Continental Properties, wrote in an email. “We have really enjoyed working in the Newcastle community, and hope that we have provided a positive addition to the community.” Securing a sponsor does not make the public safety concerns go away, though, and Councilman Bill Erxleben suggested the staff look into them before the event. “We’ve got concerns about traffic, we’ve got concerns about safety. They need to be addressed responsibly,” he said. “Let’s toss the ball back to the staff to do that.” With a sponsor secured, Councilwoman Carol Simpson said she saw no reason to cease offering the event.
“If we have a sponsor, I think we should step up and do this event, and continue to seek more sponsorships and more donations to offset some of our costs, and some volunteers to direct traffic,” she said. Finding volunteers is becoming an increasing problem, though, as the city continues to see a decline in residents willing to lend a hand, Crispo said. “We have not been doing very well on volunteers so far this year. Last year, we did have about 125 volunteers that worked within the city of Newcastle,” he said. “But, it has been difficult at the beginning of this year to find volunteers for events, to find volunteers even for the Community Activities Commission.” Last year, the city of Bellevue had more than 6,000 volunteers, Erxleben said, adding that Newcastle should seek guidance from its neighbor to attract more residents to get involved in the community. “We talk about volunteerism in the city of Newcastle being one of our strengths, but we’re having problems with it recently,” he said. “Maybe it’s a combined problem of volunteerism falling off a little bit … but, it’s also the marketing.”
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mately approved the purchase, 4-3, at the April 15 meeting, but members were generally dissatisfied with how the grant money was handled. Council members Carol Simpson, Bisset and Erxleben dissented. “It’s not an ideal model of efficiency in government, but I appreciate the risk of not taking and using the grant money,” Deputy Mayor Lisa Jensen said. “I think once we have equipment like that in-house, you will probably find more uses for it.” Wyman acknowledged that the grant money could have been managed better. “We have backed you into a corner a little bit here by bringing this to you so late and not having other options,” he said. Mayor Rich Crispo supported the purchase, but noted that it was more of a vote of confidence for Rigos than anything. “I’m also going to support this, but I don’t like the way this was done,” he said. “If he tells me that he checked this out and he believes this is of value, I accept that position.” Bisset questioned the initial logic of securing the grant without a firm plan for its dispersal. “The question is why did we ask for the grant in the first place if we weren’t darn sure what the heck we were going to use it for?” he asked.
MAY 3, 2013
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