Harrisburg City Council Work Session - October 1, 2024

the time is 5:35

p.m. I would like to call our work

session to

order Mr Parker could you please call

the

role yes Miss

Daniels

here Ms Davis

present Miss Green

present Mr Jones here M

rolls

present Mr Rodriguez present Miss

Bowers

present thank you H just a few comments

before we begin um the committee

business for the building and housing

committee uh the ARA program status

update was supposed to be delivered by

interim director of the department of

building and housing Miss Martin Roberts

she's unable to attend this evening so

we will go over that and the community

and economic development committee

business resolution 56 of

2024 uh the applicants uh have sought an

extension um so we will look to

um provide an overview and receive

resolution 56 along with um two other

items sometime in November so we will go

over that so to begin this evening uh we

will begin with the work of the budget

and finance committee I will defer to

our budget and finance committee chair

vice president green thank you president

Bowers good evening everyone uh for the

budget and finance committee we'll be

going over resolution 60 of

2024 uh I believe we have Mr McCutchen

here to go over that so if you wouldd

like to come up I read the resolution uh

resolution 60 of 2024 is a resolution

authorizing the city of Harrisburg to

amend its professional service agreement

with Meer duu PC for the purpose of

providing additional audit preparation

services to the city of

Harrisburg if you wouldn't mind just

giving us a brief overview and

introducing

yourself yes uh don't mind at all uh

good evening

everyone thank you vice president green

uh Brian McCutchen accy

manager um this resolution is aimed at

the request to expand the 2023 audit

preparation services to be provided by

Myer dusel um the idea is we're trying

to jumpstart or fast track our catchup

on our audit prep our audit work within

the city uh currently we're in the draft

we we do have a financial draft of the

audited financial statements for

2022 uh and our we're in the report

phase uh the pieces that go that will

accompany the uh comprehensive report to

be issued by our Auditors and provide it

to the city's audit committee um so the

timeline is that is for that is to occur

over the next several weeks and my goal

was to have that completed prior to the

end of uh this month of October but in

the meantime we've

also uh implemented our audit

preliminary audit early stages work for

the 2023 re audit which includes Meer

duel doing what they have already

contracted to do earlier this year

namely to uh provide audo preparation

services including the uh revenue and

receivables components of the

neighborhood services fund that's the

trash utility piece I I should say uh

and liabilities associated with uh

compensated

absences and the city's opep or post

post employment benefits

liability and also the assets and

liabilities associated with the pension

plans so this current resolution is an

an extra layer ask again to try to

expedite our uh performance of of the

2023 audit it includes three main areas

which are significant which will help me

concentrate on other areas to to uh

expedite uh

it's a

liability uh component of the city the

workers compensation

liability um also the the city's um real

estate Tax receivables and Revenue work

papers there's a receivable and a

deferred U section of of that part of

the audit and lastly the the city still

has in effect loans receivable that

relate back to uh both the prior mayor's

Economic Development economic

development program uh there's a

portfolio of loan balances that are

still outstanding and and and some

payments continue to uh materialize to

pay down those loans and then also on

the federal side uh building and housing

development through HUD funding we have

various U homeowner type loan

Improvement uh loans that involve both

the cdbg funds from HUD and the uh home

investment Partnerships uh program which

is also HUD funded so those are the

three main

areas uh Meer dussel's original contract

earlier this year the the total fee

proposed or accepted was for

$2,500 this particular request for these

three main are uh significant areas is

is to add an additional

$9,750 uh to the total audit prep

assistance fee that would bring the

total to

$3,250 for the 2023

audit uh audit audit

preparation that's those are the main uh

pieces to that all right thank you very

much uh so essentially we just be adding

adding more services for them to perform

in our audit preparation so that we can

um make for sure we're on track with our

2023 audit so that we can get it

expedited yes yes to catch up uh to

increase that that that process okay all

right um I don't really have any any

questions I know I discuss this with you

during the audit committee meeting so um

I'm definitely on board for this I feel

like us um getting this audit caught up

and and done in a timely fashion is

really important for the city to make

for sure that uh everything's on track

uh and everything's in order so I'm in

support of this I'm going to open it up

to my colleagues I'll start to my far

left with councilman

Jones Thank You vice president green uh

no

questions okay right thank you thank you

councilman Rodriguez thank you madam

chair no questions thank you councilman

Ros any questions good evening everyone

um no I don't have any questions thank

you president bers any questions no

questions thank you thank you councilman

Davis any questions thank you vice

president green no I uh trust your

judgment and operation with this so no

questions thank you and I meant to say

coun ccom Davis so excuse me and

councilwoman Daniels any

questions thank you um no further

questions from us thank you for the

presentation uh and look forward to

getting this audit completed so okay

thank you yes likewise thank you vice

president green and I appreciate the

consideration on this uh to all you cons

uh City Council Members thank you very

much thank you I'm going to recommend

this move to our next legislative

agenda and that that finishes the

business for the budget and finance

committee thank you vice president green

we will now move to the work of the

Public Works committee I will defer to

our Public Works committee chair

councilman Rodriguez thank you madam

president um today in the public works

committee we're discussing two

resolutions um Mr Parker do you mind

reading resolution 61- 2024 into the

record please

certainly resolution 61 of

2024 a resolution authorizing the

submission of a dolphin County local

share Municipal Grant application of up

to

$300,000 to fund the purchase and

installation of a new salt dome for the

public works facility all right thank

you for that and I see Mr John with us

today will you be speaking on there

thank

you Mr John please pull the mic close to

you when you speak it's great to see you

as always

if you want to give us a rundown of

resolution 61 please yes good evening

good evening president everyone um yeah

so we are in need of a new uh salt Dome

um the one that we have now um is too

small for the city of Harrisburg for our

application so after going through a few

storms uh realize that these the salt

Dome that we present we have will only

hold salt enough for uh possibly two

storms and as we uh went through the

storms that we went through last year

they were so close uh that sometimes

getting sought in from the delivery from

the uh contractors was a little scarce

because of the snow storms are hitting

all of the counties all at one time um

it's hard for them to deliver to us as

well so to purchase a new salt dment

would give us about four storms worth of

salt which in turn can keep us that

we're safe that we know we have enough

salt to cover the storms and I believe

this is why not I believe but this is

why we're asking with the Grant

application um for for the grant funds

and also uh we'll use our uh if we don't

get the full amount through the grant we

will use our liquid fuse dollars um

through the state to complete the

purchase all right thank you for that

and um also with everything going on

with the strike it's uncertain when you

know bad storm coming we'd be uncertain

so that would definitely be a good move

um I uh actually Mr Jackson sent over

some photos I shared with counil so

they're aware of like the current

condition yes um how how much of a

hazard or how hard does it make the salt

to work with when the salt gets

saturated or wet before so the Sal is

very hard um once it gets wet we

actually have to our uh heavy equipment

to break it up and then in turn once we

load that into our trucks there are

spreaders on the back of our trucks and

if there's chunks there it could cause

mechanical damage to our spreaders so

keeping it dry is and potentially to

someone's vehicle if it's absolutely

absolutely so it makes more work if not

handled correctly and stored okay well I

have no um further questions I think

it's a no-brainer and the uh Municipal

grant for the gaming funds it does cover

that infrastructure part okay awesome

awesome um I have none but I will start

on my um far end on the far right with

councilwoman uh

shame I don't have any questions thank

you all right thank you councilwoman

Davis no questions all right Madam vice

president I don't have any questions

thank you Madame President I don't have

any questions thank you councilwoman

r no I don't have any questions thank

you thank you councilman Jones so no

questions um I think it's a great idea

and I definitely move to put resolution

61 of 2024 on our next legislative

session um moving forward resolution 62

of 2024 Mr Parker can you please read

resolution 62 of 2024 into the record

please yes resolution 62 of

20124 a resolution ratifying a United

States Department of Transportation Safe

Streets and roads for all Grant

application and authorizing the city of

Harrisburg to execute any agreements

forms and documents related to the award

of

$955,000

to implement traffic signal timing in

the downtown area thank you for that

engineer thank you um can you please

shed a little bit of light on resolution

62 and just the components Within sure

thank you so this project came about as

part of our initial Vision zero

plan for the uh for the city of

Harrisburg um just to kind

of kind of rehash what the vision zero

plan was basically it's a data driven

program kind of looks at the high Injury

Network through the city and you could

start to see patterns and kind of

clusters of incidences that kind of

dictate where the projects come about

this project was one that we could kind

of

see a

large kind of cluster of incidents in

the downtown area as we kind of look

more into it it was a lot of pedestrian

incidents and it makes sense uh

downtown's pretty desirable for

pedestrians there's a lot of businesses

restaurants we have Riverfront Park and

some of these

pedestrian sign say like a Walnut Street

where um

both crosswalks activated at the same

time go down one block only one does it

at the

same at once and further on some of them

require a push button it's really

confusing part of this project would be

to kind of make everything

uniform for the pedestrians and then for

the signals

themselves uh some of them don't have

emergency vehicle preemption makes it

very difficult for emergency vehicles to

remember which signals have this prevent

uh preemption so they're expecting a it

to turn green and it stays red if could

cause an incident and there's

also room to improve our traffic signal

timing throughout this 25 intersection

cluster to kind

of improve the traffic flow which would

also

reduce any any further incidences with

the speeding in in

pedestrians thank you for that um Vision

zero uh mitigation or to minimize

pedestrian cyclist deaths um do you feel

just in your opinion there are perhaps

other parts of the uh City where there

are a bit more higher rates of vehicular

deaths taking place yes and that's one

of the reasons that we when we do do

this it's it's all data driven so it's

not like we we kind of pick and choose

what we want to do we take the highest

number of incidence

incidences try to attack that problem

first and then move further down the

line so I agree it it might not seem

like it's um I would say 15th and her

should have been like the first you know

places like that where it's so

traditionally happening right um is

there what were the metrics or data that

we were looking for when we thought of

just like the downtown area for this it

was based on the

um available traffic

data

just so this a gr see you hit your

button yeah I didn't think you were

going to say 15th and her I thought you

were going to say Cameron Street well

that's that's home by the state so

hopefully they'll chip in if that's the

case yeah they've actually declined us

doing a traffic study up on there which

has made it very frustrating very

coincident the uh um but I believe when

a pedestrian is struck by a vehicle or a

bicycle or another car each of those

involves a police accident report

requirement so the reported requirement

data would be published for not

specifics but the number of incidents

okay so that would be a driver of this

type of data okay okay I don't I don't

know how far behind they are when they

get to their report I don't know if it's

once a year I don't know how quickly

they get the data out okay how how far

of a radius will this near nearly

million dollars cover it would be a 25

intersection radius okay you know the

stretch from to it'

be if I can recall it's from

like see from 83 to almost forer then

front

s okay okay all right thank you um no

further questions for myself but I will

pass it along to my colleagues um

councilman Jones thank you um yeah that

was pretty much my question I think this

is like on the Front Street side of

things where you going to be making

those changes

correct it'll be within that whole area

yeah the whole

area 25 intersections have been

identified to receive

improvements yeah yeah I read it's

pretty simple to me but yeah thank you

Council woman

Ross no no questions thank you thank you

madam president

I don't have any questions thank you

madam vice president I don't have any

questions regarding this thank you

councilwoman Davis thank you councilman

Rodriguez I do have a couple

questions so it was uh determined that

the radius from Forester Street to I

mean from 83 to Forester and then from

front to

seventh oh from front to seventh okay

so these

lights need

to have this new technology attached to

them it could be some of the lights

might be able to be reused some don't

have the emergency vehicle preemption so

okay it require reinstall some of the

pedestrian push button signal or timing

that might have to be replaced as well

it it depends on which intersection

I would think that some of the

intersections on Cameron Street would

would be

considered because of the accidents on

Cameron Street over the years and the

people many people who have gotten

killed down there on Cameron Street

Cameron and Market Cameron and

Paxton um um I don't think those are

state roads but Cameron and

Cameron State Road it is the entire road

is a state Ro

okay um and then State

Street that's another one

okay okay well thank you very much no

other questions thank you councilwoman

Daniels Yeah so basically this is both

software and Hardware kind of upgrades

correct uh it be the hardware the lights

and signals themselves but then the the

software be the timing for pedestrians

we could even do like

something it was even stated in the

actual application that we could

lengthen the leading pedestrian interval

where they'll get the green walk before

the light turns green so we could even

lengthen that too to give pedestrians a

longer time to to

cross and then

um uh

will that require expense on like the

vehicle side in terms of making sure the

vehicles then match up to like the

emergency vehicles or police vehicles

match up to to be compatible with the

preemption no this this is something

they already have they already have it

okay um it's just we would make sure

that all 25 intersections are equipped

with that technology okay and could you

give us a sense um I know it's probably

not specific but if you had to give us

an idea of what year um our current

system would be aged or would be

state-of-the-art for versus what this

would be paying for like what how many

Improvement how much of an improvement

in years do you

see that that I'm not sure off hand I do

see some of them are very old if they

don't have the preemption they're quite

old I mean it it's it's even something

where

just because it's an older light we

could even we still have the ability to

adjust the

timings but to to get the actual

technology built into the signal itself

is is what would bring it up to date

okay okay that's it for me thank you

thank you and uh excuse me right how

many lights do you have a count of how

many there are total or

that I don't have offand I know it's 25

intersections you

might have maybe eight lights at each

intersection oh okay so each

intersection or each light is going to

so each intersection would have like um

if it's a two-way you would have maybe

two

lights on each cross right okay so

they're all going to get the same

technology so this price here9

5,184 is going to pretty much be spread

out over 25 lights 25 intersection 25

intersections okay thank you quick math

would be 200 lights plus plus pedestrian

improvements as well okay thank you

welcome thank you um does anyone have

anything further they' like to add

hearing none um I would like to add

resolution 62 of 2024 to our next

legislative session but also I'd like to

go on a record and say everything you

were saying as far as the safety and the

need I agree with but I also AG agree on

it being Citywide um because if we're

saying we're just improving one area

what is that signal or sign message

saying to the rest of the residents may

I just this is one part of vision zero

which encompasses oh absolutely in a

comprehensive plan it's mentioned a few

times pretty pretty wide and spread

we've heard about it for years but are

we saying these things sometimes to go

after grant funding for specific

projects or we could considering the

whole city oh we're considering the

whole city this

this this opportunity came after we

already had the vision zero in place so

was kind of this opportunity presented

itself we had a plan we could move

forward with it so this was not done

just for Grant well I'm not saying the

grant I'm saying for perhaps maybe one

section of the

city throughout time historically showed

that certain elements have just really

been concentrated to maybe Midtown

downtown there great families on the

hill great families out the south Great

families out town they also get dark

they also need great traffic lights they

also need the same technology um so

although I do agree what you're saying

and I do um motion to put this on our

next legislative session I just would

hope and I can help in any way to go

after more dollars for the whole city or

section by section or there's 22

communities in Harrisburg I think we

could do a lot for them true I age yep

and that concludes the business of

Public Works um Madam president back to

you thank you very much councilman

Rodriguez we will now move to public

comment just a few housekeeping notes

before we begin please state your name

and your address for the meeting record

if you don't feel comfortable sharing

your address please share the vicinity

in which you live within the city you

will have four minutes to share your

comments Mr Parker will serve as our

timekeeper I'll begin to my right is

there anyone that would like to offer

public comment seeing and hearing no one

anyone in the middle section

seeing and hearing no one anyone to my

left seeing and hearing no one the time

is 6 o' p.m. I will entertain a motion

to adjourn move is there a second second

thank you we stand

adjourn for