Minutes - Council Work Session - 05/29/2012

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Chief Way stated the Judge says if you can see it from the road, you do not need a complaint or a warrant. Mayor Ramsey stated he would say only look for stuff that was complained about. Councilmember Tossey stated he appreciates that — but — you cannot do that. You could change the ordinance so only the complaint item is enforceable but he did not know how you could tell an officer to ignore a violation. Maybe you change the ordinance so it is only complaint based. Councilmember Strommen stated that the difficulty here is to take one example and make another. You need to take more into consideration. I would not be in favor of changing it to set one example. Maybe just make it more enforced when the complaint is — that puts more burden on the neighbor. She felt you create unintended consequences. Either you have to give staff and the officers tools to enforce it our abandon it. Mayor Ramsey stated it's the principle of asking officers to turn their back on clear violations. He did not want to ask officers to do that. He added he would not "mess with" the ordinance. Councilmember McGlone stated he remembers the conversation. In the discretion part is where he would like to have a conversation somewhere. There are things we could talk about here but we cannot reflect on a particular case. Mayor Ramsey stated that the majority of this Council's concern is in the discretion. He did not want to necessarily change this either. Chief Way stated that we had a case about two and a half years ago — a complaint — we went out and looked. The only way you could see this is if you went in their back yard. He got written up for that. Look at discretion — if the only way you can see it is from the yard — or back yard — say it's tucked in a corner. . . Councilmember Tossey stated he did not agree that officer's discretion should go to the personnel committee. It should come to the Chief. Councilmember McGlone stated he would withhold his statements. Consensus was to recess the work session and reconvene the Special City Council meeting. The work session was recessed at 8:10 p.m. to reconvene the Special City Council meeting. The work session was reconvened at 9:03 p.m. 2.3 Continue Discussion of 2013 Budget City Administrator Ulrich stated that staff has set up a budget exercise using the "clickers ". Councilmember Strommen inquired what the nature of the questions are. City Council Work Session / May 29, 2012 Page 5of12