Deena Winter: City Hall notebook

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The city might want to clean its own house before it goes about ordering others to clean theirs. That was the implication, anyway, by Councilman Ken Svoboda as the City Council debated a proposed graffiti ordinance on Monday.

The ordinance would establish mandatory minimum fines, starting at $200 for the first graffiti offense, and require property owners to remove graffiti within 15 days of receiving a notice from the city.

Currently the city removes graffiti if it’s on public property, but Svoboda noted the city doesn’t always get to everything either: An abandoned gas station owned by the city has had a big red graffiti tag on it for weeks, he said. A Journal Star reader claims it’s been there for months.

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Where is it? 48th and O, one of the city’s busiest intersections.

Eschliman suggests disbanding RTSD

City Councilwoman Robin Eschliman has only been to one meeting since being appointed to the Railroad Transportation Safety District’s board of directors.

But she’s already concluded it may be time to disband the entity.

The RTSD is a political subdivision authorized by state lawmakers in 1971 to deal with a rash of fatalities involving trains. Statewide, 28 counties and 32 Nebraska cities are eligible to set up RTSDs, but only Lincoln/Lancaster County has one.

The number of deaths has dropped precipitously since the 1970s, but the RTSD continues to fund railroad safety projects through a Lancaster County property tax levy. The owner of a $150,000 home pays about $40 annually for the RTSD. The tax generates about $4 million annually.

During a recent “commons” meeting of the City Council, mayor and County Board, Eschliman suggested that while the RTSD has been “tremendously successful” in preventing deaths and improving safety, perhaps it’s time has come to evaporate.

“It seems to me… that this is a committee that has done its job,” she said. “I think we should declare it a success.”

In light of the city’s recent “budget massacre,” she suggested perhaps the RTSD bank account be emptied, its funds split between the city and county and spent on more important needs, such as roads.

However, RTSD Executive Director Roger Figard said the funds must be used for railroad safety, not “fixing potholes.” And he said the funds are tied up for the next six years in projects such as Antelope Valley and the coming reconstruction of Harris Overpass.

Eschliman was unable to muster any votes from the City Council, County Board or mayor to ask the Legislature for the authority to at least expand the RTSD’s role.

Svoboda wants to restructure public works

During a recent interview, Councilman Ken Svoboda revealed one of the planks people can expect to see in his platform when he runs for mayor.

He wants to restructure the public works department, separating the transportation and utilities divisions and establishing an administrative board to oversee the utilities division. The board would help make decisions about rate changes, similar to an LES board.

“It’s too large,” he said of the public works department. “It’s extremely difficult to find a director who has the ability to understand water, wastewater, StarTran and roads.”

That’s not a novel idea, however. Other council members have also expressed interest in restructuring the department.

Site standards

Lincoln’s law limiting the height of plantings between sidewalks and curbs has a way of making vigilantes out of people.

City ordinance limits the height of plants in the right-of-way to 30 inches, but city officials only take action if they receive a complaint.

They investigate complaints and if the plantings are obstructing drivers’ vision, they send letters telling property owners to cut the plants down. If the owner doesn’t comply, the city can do the work and send the owner a bill.

Problem is, every so often someone gets so incensed after getting reported they decide to report a bunch of other properties out of spite.

A man recently sent in a list of about 100 addresses he said were in violation. The city must investigate them all, even though most are not turning out to be violations.

“He was going down the street and writing address after address if they had plants in the right-of-way,” said Scott Opfer, manager for traffic engineering operations.

That many complaints would quickly overwhelm the workers responsible for enforcing the law, so they’re checking out each address as time permits, Opfer said.

Councilman Jonathan Cook wants to tweak the ordinance, which he thinks is too strict in some cases and not enough in others.

“It’s sort of a one-size-does-not-fit-all type of ordinance,” he said.

The city’s plant standards are tied to national traffic sight-distance standards. And if the city doesn’t enforce the code, Opfer said it could be held liable for an accident caused by sight obstruction.

Sales tax collections improve

The city ended its fiscal year better than expected, with net sales tax collections for the last two months coming in almost 6 percent higher than last year.

That was a welcome departure from prior months, when collections were flat or even down from the prior year, and helped the city end the year collecting nearly 1 percent more than last year.

However, that’s still nothing to cheer about. The increase in city’s gross sales tax collections was the smallest the city has seen since the 1980s.

“That’s not very good,” said city Budget Officer Steve Hubka.

But he’s hoping the last two months’ rebound will continue.

What can you do to help? Go out and buy a car. And don’t shop on the Internet.

The amount of money the city took in from sales taxes on motor vehicles dropped noticeably, from $4.8 million last year to $4.4 million this fiscal year.

Normally the city rakes in about $5 million annually from that tax, and that extra half-million would have bumped up total collections for the year about 1 percent.

Hubka said it appears Lincoln is experiencing a nationwide trend toward buying smaller, cheaper vehicles that get better gas mileage.

Quote of the week

“I can only afford one foot at a time on M class pay.” — Assistant City Attorney Steve Huggenberger, after City Council members asked him why he was only wearing one shoe (his other foot was in a brace). He is a member of the so-called “M class,” a group of management employees whose salaries have been studied and re-studied for more than a year.

Reach Deena Winter at 473-2642 or dwinter@journalstar.com.