Town of Woodland Board Minutes
Date: September 2 2021
7:00 PM

Board/Staff Present:

Randy Beale – Mayor
David Cooper – Commissioner
Brian Christison – Commissioner
Barbara Outland – Commissioner
Ricky Morris - Commissioner
Donielle McDermott – Town Clerk

Raymond Eaton and Chief Hoggard were absent.

Call to Order: Mayor Beale called the meeting to order at 7pm. The Pledge of Allegiance was recited followed by a moment of silent reflection.

Approval of Agenda: The first item of business was the approval or amendment of the agenda. Commissioner Cooper made a motion to amend the agenda to include 15a Closed Session to discuss personnel pursuant to NCGS 143-318.11(a)(6). Commissioner Morris seconded and the motion carried.

Approval of Minutes: The next item on the agenda was the approval or amendment of the minutes for the Closed Session Meeting dated August 5, 2021 and the Regular Board Meeting dated August 5, 2021. Commissioner Morris made a motion to approve the minutes as written for both meetings. Commissioner Christison seconded and the motion carried.

Consideration of Bills: Commissioner Cooper made a motion to pay all the current bills and to also pay all the regular bills that come in throughout the month. Commissioner Christison seconded and the motion carried.

Public Comments: Steve Newsome said he would like to keep the moratorium in place for the solar farm ordinance. This will be addressed in item 11.

Fire Department: Robbie Collier thanked the board for their help with the new building, most especially Commissioner Cooper for putting the line in. The electrical and plumbing are being done now. Revelle Builders is almost finished with their part of the job.

Mrs. McDermott asked what the change order was for in the Revelle Builders bill. Mr. Collier said that was to order gutters for the back and lining.

After the town pays the invoices for Pantego Doors and Revelle Builders, the amount left out of the proposed $200,000 the town put towards the new building will be $25,641.77. Mr. Collier said they may go over the $200,000 because they still need to put an apron on the front of the building. The fire department is prepared to take on anything above the $200,000.
The fire department would like to have an open house/cookout for the community when the building is complete.

Police Report: Chief Eddie Hoggard was absent, but Mayor Beale read the report which will be included in the Minute Book.

Clerk Report:

a. The current Xerox lease will be up in January of 2022. Document Systems, Inc. has given the town a quote for a new lease which can actually begin before the current lease is up and without penalties. This 60 month lease will include a new machine and allow a monthly base of 3,500 b/w pages. Colored pages will be $0.059 per page. The monthly base fee will be $222 which is only about $2 more than our current monthly base. Commissioner Christison made a motion to approve the new Xerox lease with Document Systems, Inc. Commissioner Outland seconded and the motion carried.

Maintenance Report: Raymond Eaton was absent so there was not maintenance report, however Mrs. McDermott relayed to the board a couple of questions from Cody Hurdle with the maintenance department. Mr. Hurdle would like to know of they can go and pick up the lawnmower from Thompson Nursery and try to fix it themselves since it has been in their shop for over six months. The board discussed this and agreed they need to check on the warranty of the mower and check on companies who can do warranty work because they do not want to void the warranty if there is still one.

Cody Hurdle told Mrs. McDermott that the stop relay at the water tower has no connection to the two wells. The maintenance guys are having to manually start and stop the pumps twice a day and have been for two weeks. Mr. Eaton told Mr. Hurdle that this should be under warranty. Mr. Hurdle called the company who installed the stop relay, Wilson Rhodes, to ask them to come fix it. A gentleman named William told Mr. Hurdle that this issue has happened several times in the past and he wants to install a precision digital pressure transducer. He is working on getting a quote to Mr. Hurdle. William said this should fix the problem, but it’s going to be costly. Mr. Hurdle asked if they could come look at the stop relay first before trying to redo it all, but they said they were too busy and were not able to come out right now. The board discussed this and decided we need to talk with Blaine Humphrey to see if it is in fact still under warranty.

Commissioner Cooper suggested checking on our backup O.R.C. to make sure we still have someone in place in case we need one due to Mr. Eaton being out for medical reasons. Our backup O.R.C. should be Chris Wheeler, but we will double check that.

Weeds, Grass, and Refuse Ordinance Chapter 84: Commissioner Christison said we have houses in town where the yards are awful. The process is long to get the grass cut. If fines are issued, some of these houses are not going to pay the fines. Commissioner Christison suggested talking to Atty. Luther Culpepper to see if we can get volunteers to clean up some of the yards. His hope is neighbors will pitch in. He stated he understands they will need to have permission from the homeowners. The overgrown yards are making the town look bad.

Commissioner Morris disagreed stating the town needs to go through the required process as soon as possible. This shows the town is doing something about the problem.

Commissioner Cooper asked what other towns are doing to resolve this issue. How do they handle it?

Solar Farm Moratorium: Commissioner Christison made a motion to repeal industrial solar energy generators as a permitted use in the Town’s Code of Ordinances. Commissioner Morris seconded and the motion carried.

CDBG: The Upper Coastal Plain Council of Governments’ monthly report for project #19-I-3116 will be included in the Minute Book.

Comments from the Mayor: No comments

Comments from the Commissioners: Commissioner Cooper said our golf cart ordinance specifies use on back streets, not main roads. Lately he has seen several carts on Main Street. Some have no lights. Eventually someone may end up in an accident.

Commissioner Cooper also stated we need to get back to checking on the street lights, especially since the days will be shorter soon.

Public Comments: Steve Newsome stated he has been helping the town cut the grass under the water tower for a couple years, but there is a leak under the tower, so he is unable to mow it. If it gets fixed, he will continue to help cut the grass. Commissioner Cooper said the leak is from the main valve of the water tower. To fix it, we may need to cut all town water off. The valve is as old as the tower is. We could possibly put a new valve in and connect to the county so the town will not be without water until it is fixed.

Commissioner Cooper said the Izuzu truck dump bed was overloaded and now does not sit flat. There is a place in Jamesville who does chassis work. He recommends we take it to them to get an estimate to fix it stating, “It’s too good of a truck to get rid of.” Commissioner Christison suggested purchasing a 14ft X 8ft battery operated dump trailer instead.

Chief Hoggard showed up towards the end of the meeting. He stated street light work orders were sent in. He got another equipment grant for $24,500. An update on Mrs. Handy, all charges besides the speeding ticket were dismissed, however she appealed to superior court.

Closed Session: Commissioner Cooper made a motion to leave open session and go into closed session to discuss personnel pursuant to NCGS 143-318.11(a)(6). Commissioner Morris seconded and the motion carried.