June 13th, 2017 Council Minutes
Once approved, a link to the official council minutes will be at the bottom.
June 13, 2017
St. Clairsville City Council met in Council Chambers for a Special Meeting on Tuesday, June 13, 2017, with the following present:
Linda Jordan, Council –At-Large Terry Pugh, Mayor
Beth Oprisch, Council-At-Large Richard Myser, Law Director
Jake Olsavsky, Council, 1st Ward Tom Murphy, Planning & Zoning Administrator
Frank Sabatino, Council, 2nd Ward
John Tomlan, Council, 4th Ward
The meeting was called to order by Council President Pro-Tem Frank Sabatino.
Frank Sabatino: Council has been called for this special meeting. We will have the representatives of Gulfport introduce themselves in a short time. We are here to hear the information concerning a proposal from Gulfport. If approved Mr. Myser will write the Ordinance for next Monday’s meeting.
Gulfport Energy: Brent Marlow, Field Land Manager in Ohio, Randy Wheeler, Land Man, Bob Watkins, McDonald Land Services. Austin Shody, Intern with Gulfport.
Mayor Terry Pugh: Actually we have had a couple of meetings and what it is all about is Gulfport is requesting to put a portable water line above ground. It is going to end up going through our property the Newlan property that is 30 some acres behind Memorial Park and behind Cindy Drive. The second meeting came about last Thursday and Gulfport had requested it because there had been a change in their production schedule. Brent said we could sure use your help by letting us start to put our water line in on the 20th. We all said we don’t have a Council meeting until the 19th. It is important to keep in mind that one thing we will be asking for is an Ordinance that would be passed on emergency basis to permit them to start work. The number one plus in this is it is going to cut down the truck traffic on Route 40 and Barton Road. They won’t be hauling water in there like they have at other sites. They will be pumping the water in so that is the first major plus for the city. The second thing is they have offered to pay per foot and I think it worked out to be 1,400 feet long. They were going to pay us $3,000 which in the scheme of things is not really that much money. I asked if we could forgo the money and when you come to reclaim this would you be willing to put in a nature walking trail. They readily agreed to do that. I thought I was on a roll so I said could we expand this to also put a walking trail from this trail over to Memorial Park? They agreed to that. So we are going to end up hopefully with a nature trail which isn’t going to cost the city anything. Tom Murphy and I went to the Memorial Park Board meeting last night and presented this to them and they were completely behind it. The reason the Park would be involved is there is Park property we would cross to bring it to the road that passes the pool. Eric Costine thought it might be better to come out at the bottom of the road behind the pool. We are for it either way. That is what we are here about. Number one we wanted to inform all of you and give you a chance to ask questions. Richard Myser has gone over the contract with Gulfport and made some changes. Gulfport agreed to all the changes. I guess the key to it is that Gulfport is being a good steward to the city. To me it is giving us two valuable things. It is cutting down on heavy truck traffic and we are going to end up with a nature trail which a lot of people in St. Clairsville will get a lot of use out of.
Tom Murphy: This area used to be called three falls. We did walk the area with Randy and Bob and we found two of them. The idea would be to bring the trail through the park at the Northeast corner. It would go through the park property and onto the city property. All told it if you walk it and come back it will be about 1 mile. It would pass by the waterfall. Our hope is to make it a wooded trail. It is not going to be fancy. It is going to be mulched and we can look at developing it further as time goes by. As far as the agreement we did not want to see larger trees cut down and they did not want to do that either because that would be more costly for them. Originally the width for the right of way was 40 feet they knocked that down to 25 feet. They will have no pumps on the city portion of the property they will be on the other section of the property. Overall I think it is a win for them and a win for the city and the park.
Frank Sabatino: Are there any questions for Gulfport or the Mayor or Tom? Beth Oprisch: So there is nothing on the land now? Tom Murphy: Right, it is just wooded property. The exact route will be modified a little bit, we want to make sure it is safe for everybody. You kind of forget you are only a half mile from St. Clairsville when you are walking on this property. It is a pretty impressive piece of property. Jake Olsavsky: How wide is the trail? We actually agreed with Mr. Myser’s request for 6 feet to 8 feet width of mulched access through there. Richard Myser: Do you think you will have that done within one year? Bob Watkins: Yes Sir. Beth Oprisch: Is it possible to see this? Tom Murphy: Yes we can take you out there. Just let me know so I can dress appropriately. Terry Pugh: There is a little triangle of land between the park and the Cindy drive area. It belongs to the park and it is outside the city limits. I asked the Park Board would you be willing to annex that little triangle so we can annex our property. They said they would be more than willing to do so. Brent Marlow: From the agreement side it looks like we have everything we need to move forward. Randy Wheeler: We have the trail marked and you can look at it, we would be more than willing to go as well. Bob Watkins: We truly appreciate you all coming together to meet with us like this. I think with the good faith negotiations we have had through all of this I think that we would have further considerations on this property here down the road. Mayor Pugh has talked about maybe a Gulfport walking trail or something of that nature. We may partner with you down the road with some more things on the trail. Beth Oprisch: You want to start this on the 20th? Bob Watkins: We at least want to get our boots on the ground, start scheduling things. Brent Marlow: We have line agreements ready from either side of the park so we have that to work on until this is signed. The real hard deadline for us is the 20th so we would like to have this signed and ready to go so we can move forward. We will be physically laying pipe by the end of this month. Frank Sabatino: If there was as malfunction of any sort would any houses be affected. Bob Watkins: No we would be quite away from any houses. During our activity we do monitor our lines and our pumps just to make sure things are in order. Brent Marlow: When there is a release on those water lines they are quickly noticed. This is all fresh water. Frank Sabatino: This line would just lay on the ground: Brent Marlow: Yes. Frank Sabatino: With no further use Gulfport would just remove it? Bob Watkins: Anything we brought in would be removed from the property. Everything would be reclaimed and we would leave a mulched 6’ to 8’ walking path through there. Terry Pugh: Does anyone have a problem passing this on an emergency basis? Beth Oprisch: I want to read this, I can’t imagine that I would not vote for it. I can’t see how it is not a win-win. I can’t see a down side.
There being no further business to come before Council a motion to adjourn was made by John Tomlan and seconded by Jake Olsavsky.