– Waynesboro City Council meeting agenda
– Staunton City Council meeting agenda
– Supreme Court to hear UVa. Law School case
Edited by Chris Graham
[email protected]
Waynesboro City Council meeting agenda: Waynesboro City Council will hold a business meeting Monday at 7 p.m. at the Charles T. Yancey Municipal Building, 503 W. Main St., Waynesboro.
The agenda for the meeting includes:
1. Call to Order/Pledge of Allegiance.
2. Consent Agenda (any item placed on the consent agenda shall be removed and considered as a separate matter, if so requested by any member of Council, otherwise all items will be voted on with one (1) motion).
a) Consider approving the minutes from the December 16, 209 Work Session and the January 25, 2010 Regular Business Meeting, and dispense with the reading of the minutes.
b) Consider authorizing the Commissioner of the Revenue to issue partial refunds of real estate tax paid by two property owners in the amount of $146.30 and $17.50, respectively, due to an erroneous assessment.
c) Second consideration/adoption of an ordinance granting Ms. Cynthia Wade Obenschain, owner, a conditional use permit to allow the operation of a day care center in an existing dwelling in the RB-3 High Density Dwelling District at 405 Arch Avenue, Tax Map # 55-1-19-39, Waynesboro, Virginia.
d) Second consideration/adoption of an ordinance appropriating $400,000 from the General Fund and Fire Board Funds to the Special Projects Fund for the purchase and installation of traffic control pre-emption equipment at signalized intersections in the City of Waynesboro for the Fiscal Year ending June 30, 2010.
e) Second consideration/adoption of an ordinance appropriating the final installment of a grant from the Baseball Tomorrow Fund in the amount of $62,347 to the Special Projects Fund for renovations to the North Park Ball Field for the Fiscal Year ending June 30, 2010.
f) Second consideration/adoption of an ordinance appropriating a Title II Part A Grant in the amount of $3,843 to the Elementary Central Office Fund for the Fiscal Year ending June 30, 2010.
g) Second consideration/adoption of an ordinance appropriating a donation to the Waynesboro Library in the amount of $2,000 to the General Fund for the purchase of books and audio visual materials for the Fiscal Year ending June 30, 2010.
h) Second consideration/adoption of an ordinance appropriating a Title III Grant in the amount of $136 to the Elementary Central Office Fund for the Fiscal Year ending June 30, 2010.
3. Hold a public hearing to receive public comment on amending City Code Section 22-71, Division 2 Classified Business and Occupations Tax, changing the yearly “estimate-reconciliation” process for local contractors to “actual gross receipts expenditures”.
4. Hold a public hearing to receive public comment and consider introducing an ordinance regarding a request from Ms. Rebecca C. Henkel (aka Rebecca H. Johnson) to close and vacate a portion of a 10-foot alley located behind Lots 21, 22 and Lot 1, Block 47, Waynesboro Company plat, known by street address of 1105 West 12th Street, Waynesboro, VA, to correct title to property.
5. Receive a report from Ms. Tonia Flores Speir, CEO of C.A.S.E. Solutions, Inc. regarding her firm’s advertising and marketing efforts on behalf of the Greater Augusta Regional Tourism Board.
6. Receive the 2009 Office on Youth Annual Report from Ms. Carol Blair, Director of Office on Youth.
7. Consider setting a public hearing of Monday, February 22, 2010 to receive public comment on an ordinance amending certain sections of Chapter 94, Vehicles for Hire, of the Code of the City of Waynesboro, Virginia.
8. Consider approving the following applications:
a) Consider approving an application from Waynesboro Downtown Development Inc. for amplified music from 1:00 p.m. until 5:00 p.m., alcohol sales, and specified street closures on Saturday, May 15, 2010 from 10:30 a.m. until 5:30 p.m. for the 5th Annual Main Street Muscle Car Show.
b) Consider a request from Mr. Joe Kaminski, Blue Ridge Soap Box Classic Derby President, to close a portion of Main Street and adjacent streets, and place necessary barricading on Saturday, May 22, 2010, from 5:30 a.m. until 5:00 p.m., for the purposes of holding the annual Blue Ridge Soap Box Derby.
c) A request by Waynesboro Downtown Development, Inc. to reserve Constitution Park and the City parking lot at Arch and Main, and to serve alcohol on City property, for the Waynesboro Chili Blues & Brews Cook-off, on Saturday, September 18, 2010 from 7:00 a.m. until 7:30 p.m.
d) From Waynesboro Downtown Development Inc. to hold the Third Annual River City Wine Festival on Saturday, October 9, 2010, from 7:00 a.m. until 9:30 p.m. in the Constitution Park Pavilion area.
9. Consider introducing the following ordinances:
a) Appropriating $124,491 for the Water Enterprise for a “Water Action Plan” and associated water model.
b) Appropriating $299,486 from a General Fund Reserve consisting of unspent locally appropriated FY09 funds for the Waynesboro City Schools to the School Operating Fund for transfer to a Reserve Account for the Fiscal Year ending June 30, 2010.
c) Appropriating $158,130 for Downtown Mall Wall Improvements and designating $14,600 as a contingency Reserve for said improvements in the Special Projects Fund for the Fiscal Year ending June 30, 2010.
d) Appropriating a $6,000 grant from the Augusta Health Community Foundation that was placed in a General Fund Designated Reserve in FY09, $39,775 in Aid from the Waynesboro Fire Board, and a $10,555 transfer from the Capital Projects Reserve in the Projects Fund, to the Special Projects Fund for the purchase and installation of traffic pre-emption emitters for the Fiscal Year ending June 30, 2010.
|e) Appropriating $3,500 of Aid to Localities State Funding to the Fire Board Fund for the purchase of a replacement DTMF Decoder for the Fiscal Year ending June 30, 2010.
f) Appropriating a $924 reimbursement from the Commonwealth of Virginia Supreme Court to the General Fund for expenditures related to prisoner extradition for the Fiscal year ending June 30, 2010.
10. Citizen Comment Period.
11. Communication, Correspondence and Calendar.
12. Closed Meeting
13. Adjourn.
Staunton City Council meeting agenda: Staunton City Council will hold a business meeting Monday at 7 p.m. at City Hall, 116 W.Beverley St., Staunton.
The agenda for the meeting includes:
1. Call to Order/Invocation & Pledge of Allegiance
2. Mayor’s Report
3. Additional Items by Members of Council
4. Approval of Minutes
5. Work Session and Regular Meeting of January 28, 2010
6. Annual Update from Blue Ridge Community College
7. Introduction and consideration of adoption of an ordinance amending the Staunton City Code by adding new Section 3.05.090, Administrative Fees and Collection Fees on Delinquent Accounts, to Chapter 3, In General, of Title 3, Revenue and Finance.
8. Matters from the City Manager
9. Matters from the Public
10. Adjournment
Supreme Court to hear UVa. Law School case: The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case of a man represented by the University of Virginia Law School’s Supreme Court Litigation Clinic. It will be the fifth of the clinic’s cases heard by the Supreme Court in the past four years.
The case, Kevin Abbott v. United States of America, centers on federal firearms laws that allow additional charges with mandatory minimum prison sentences for certain crimes involving guns.
“The students are incredibly excited and have already started to prepare,” law professor Dan Ortiz said . “They’re seeing a real cutting-edge issue before the Supreme Court, because the lower courts have gone both ways.”
The case centers on language in the Armed Career Criminal Act, which provides sentence enhancements of five years or more for some crimes involving firearms. At issue is a part of the law known as the “except clause,” which says the additional prison terms for the firearms crimes do not apply if “a greater minimum sentence is provided by any other provision of law.”
The clinic’s client, Kevin Abbott, was arrested and convicted on two federal drug charges, and was also charged with two firearms violations: the possession of a firearm for drug trafficking purposes and possession of a firearm by a felon. He was convicted on all counts, and the two firearms charges added a total of 20 years in prison to his sentence.
The clinic’s position is that the “except clause” dictates that additional sentences for firearms charges should not apply if the original charges carry a minimum sentence greater than the subsequent firearms charges.
“We’re arguing that ‘any other provision of law’ means what it says and thus includes predicate offenses,” Ortiz said.
Secondly, the clinic is arguing that even if the term does not include all crimes, the “except clause” certainly applies to other firearm charges relating to the same offense.
Appeals courts have varied greatly in how to interpret the clause, which helped make the case a good candidate for Supreme Court review, Ortiz said.
“Depending on which questions you’re talking about,” the lower courts “have very different opinions and very different rationales,” clinic student Casey Lee said. “It’s interesting to look at what the scope of the opinions is and also at why they disagree.”
The case will be argued in front of the Supreme Court in October or November by clinic instructor David Goldberg, Ortiz said.
Until then, students will work to prepare a brief on the merits of the case. Clinic student Lanora Pettit said it was gratifying to learn that the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case, and that the clinic offers a rare opportunity for law students.
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