WESTFIELD – The City Council will vote tonight on the appointment of City Treasurer Meghan Kane as the acting city treasurer and will consider two revenue-generating taxes as it prepares for the annual six-week summer recess. The next scheduled City Council meeting will be Aug. 20, 2015.
Mayor Daniel M. Knapik submitted Kane’s name for the acting position at the council’s special meeting Tuesday, but the council did not vote on the appointment because City Charter gives the appointing authority specifically to the City Council.
The city is currently seeking a consulting firm to review the operations, standard procedures and staffing of the Collector’s office and to determine if changes are needed in that department. The city posted a request for bids for that service which are due by July 9, 2015.
The city is also assessing the consolidation of the Collector’s Office with the Treasurer’s Office. The two offices were under a single department head until they were separated more than a decade ago.
The council will also decide if the city will act upon a local option meals tax of three-quarters of a percent (.75) and a local option room occupancy excise tax of 6 percent. Knapik used the revenue from those two taxes, estimated at $300,000, in the 2016 Fiscal Year Budget.
The council voted in January to reject both taxes and would have to suspend the City Council Rules to reconsider adoption of the two taxes.
The council’s Personnel Action Committee will bring out three candidates for appointment tonight and Knapik has submitted seven reappointments on tonight’s agenda.
The Pac will bring the nominations of Barbara K. Taylor as a member of the Council on Aging; Sofia Bitzas Williams as a member of the Zoning Board of Appeals; and the reappointment of Amanda Goodheart Parks to the Historical Commission.
Knapik is seeking the reappointment of Sara Unger as the Ward 1 member of the Parks & Recreation Commission; Dawn Sienkiewicz RN as the ward 2 member of that commission; and Renee Wroth as the ward 6 parks & recreation Commission member;
Knapik is seeking the reappointment of Christopher Mowatt to the License Commission; Carlo Bonavita to the Fire Commission, Robert Goyette Jr., to the Airport Commission and Dr. David Doe to the Conservation Commission.
The council will also consider approval tonight of an inter-municipal agreement with the City of Easthampton for animal control services and will take action to amend a $10 million bond to include reconstruction of the intersection of North Elm and Notre Dame streets. The bond was approved several years ago for improvements to the Routes 10 and 202 corridor, which includes that intersection.
The city has hired a contractor but ran into a problem when attempting to sell a portion of that bond to finance the $4.4 million North Elm Street improvement because it was not specifically included in the language of the bond approved by the council. Bonding agencies balked at selling the bond because the North Elm Street and Notre Dame Street improvements were not included in the language of $10 million bond approved by the City Council last year. The city used $1.8 million of that bond to finance the improvements to Arch Road.
