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Session 1943 MINUTES OF THE UNIVERSITY CITY COUNCIL December 11, 2004 At a study session of the City Council of University City second floor conference room, on November 17, 2004, Mayor Joseph Adams called the meeting to order at 10:15 a.m. In addition to Mayor Adams, the following members of Council were present: Ms. Cassandra Colquitt (arrived at 10:20 a.m.) Mr. Robert Wagner Ms. Francine Brungardt Ms. Stefany Brot Ms. Shelley Welsch Mr. Arthur Sharpe, Jr. (departed at 10:50 a.m.) Also present was the City Manager, Frank Ollendorff. The purpose of this meeting was to discuss the following issues: 1. Leaf Collection - Councilmember Wagner reported that regular collections were reduced from three to two at the recommendation of the City Manager and at the decision of the City Council. It has not been successful and there were big problems with trying to compress the schedule to two weeks. Those problems included: concern that all leaves are collected before a big snow storm hits, leaves still adhering to trees as late as the last week of November, complaints from all areas of the First Ward, and simply not enough time to complete the collection successfully and to the satisfaction of many citizens. He suggested that if there is not enough City staff, perhaps collection can be outsourced. Councilmember Brot received many of the same communications as Mr. Wagner and she quoted one which stated that the bulk of leaves do not drop until the month of December and that pick-up dates are too early. She suggested not collecting in October and collecting in December instead. Councilmember Welsch said that she wanted to discuss it in the future. Mayor Adams reminded the Council of the capricious nature of frosts and how they affect the dropping of leaves. Mr. Ollendorff said the basic problem is the amount of time needed to complete the collection and the loss of man hours due to the Thanksgiving holiday week; seven weeks are needed to cover the entire City twice. If collection begins at the beginning of November it cannot be completed until the third week of December, which is too late. He mentioned also some logistical problems. Mr. Wagner said out-sourcing would enable more than one area be experience collections at one time and Mayor Adams said that would be a budget item. Councilmember Brungardt asked about the length of time needed to convert trucks to snow plough and was advised that to do all of them requires about three days. Mr. Wagner suggested to Mr. Ollendorff that the problem could be solved by