City Council Minutes 2021 12 21 - Laserfiche WebLink

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City Council Meeting Minutes December 21, 2021 Page 4 of 12 Richard Morgan, 644 West Pine Street, stated he does not think this decision should be made by the 700 residents who signed the referendum petition but rather it should be put to all of the residents to decide. Sherry Sommer, 910 Palisade Court, urged the Council to repeal Ordinance No. 1811. She feels repealing the ordinance would allow for a better proposal to come forward and the City's limited resources should not be spent on a special election that would get very low voter turnout. Susan Loo, 1020 Willow Place, asked if newly elected Councilmember Most should recuse herself in this decision as she was not a participant in the original discussions on the ordinance. She stated there is a potential conflict for Councilmember Most and she is concerned it might open the City to a lawsuit. Councilmember Leh stated that at the last meeting he felt it would be less divisive and less expensive to repeal the ordinance and he voted to move the repeal forward. He stated that in the intervening two weeks he has spent a lot of time thinking about this. He noted it may be divisive, but the referendum process is important and it is a democratic process. It is a decision of whether the people or the Council should decide. He stated he supports the referendum process and the right of the people to decide this issue so he will not be support repealing the ordinance but will support sending the decision to the voters. Councilmember Brown stated he feels the best route is to repeal the ordinance; he feels the wrong decision was made in September. Motion: Councilmember Brown moved to approve Resolution 90, Series 2021 to set a special election on April 19, 2022; Councilmember Dickinson seconded the motion. Substitute Motion: Councilmember Brown made a substitute motion to approve Ordinance No. 1819, Series 2021; Councilmember Most seconded the motion. Councilmember Most stated she feels the fastest, least divisive path would be to repeal the ordinance. She feels sending it to the voters will increase the divisiveness in town and the vote will be to repeal in the end anyway. Going to a vote just prolongs the inevitable. Public Comments RJ Harrington, 457 East Raintree Court, stated the youth of the community have clearly voiced their support for repeal of the ordinance. He stated this community should send the application back to the drawing board with no new fossil fuel infrastructure.