Next ‘Keep Paris Beautiful’ Trash-Off is April 21

 

 

Paris City Council will hear mayor’s request that building permit process be simplified

By CHARLES RICHARDS

eParisExtra.com

Mayor AJ Hashmi will recommend Monday night to the Paris City Council that it appoint a building permits “variance commissioner” authorized to override code regulations that are too severe for a city the size of Paris.

State and federal officials allow an occasional waiver of rules, but builders, contractors, owners of residential and business property, and small businessmen told him during two recent private meetings that the city staff makes no attempt to work with anyone.

“We need to have codes, but we need to adapt ourselves to knowing that we are a smaller city. We are not Dallas or New York City,” Hashmi said.

The city has a Zoning Board of Adjustments that hears complaints from citizens on zoning regulations and can grant an exception if it feels the argument is justified.

The mayor said something similar should be made available to people who want an exception from a building, plumbing, electrical or other code.

“It’s not a separate paid job. The person would make himself available and he will make the determination based upon what his experience has been,” Hashmi said.

“If it’s a small issue that can be helped, this variance commissioner would have the power to issue the building permit then and there if he feels it is justified,” the mayor added.

The item, midway through a 25-item agenda, is not an action item. The mayor said he’s throwing the idea out for the council’s consideration.

The council meeting will start at 5:30 p.m. Monday at the council chambers at 107 E. Kaufman St.

Also on the agenda:

• RESIDENT’S APPLICATION FOR DISANNEXATION – (Deliberate and provide direction to city staff) . City engineer Shawn Napier will update the council about the city’s inquiry over the past two weeks with the City of Reno regarding the possibility of Reno’s providing sewer service to residents living in on five acres in the southeast corner of Wildwood Lane and Smallwood Road. Primarily because the city has provided no sewer service, resident Terri Palmer of 4300 Smallwood Road has asked to be dis-annexed from the City of Paris. At the council’s March 26 meeting, Napier recommended that Palmer’s request be denied. Palmer said state law allows residents to apply for dis-annexation if they are not provided services. Napier argued that the city is not bound by that law because it went into effect after the city annexed the property. Mayor Hashmi said just because the law was passed after annexation is not a very good argument for not saying the services don’t have to be provided. People living in that area are city residents and tax payers and are deserving of services, the mayor said. The council asked the staff to talk to Reno officials after Palmer said City of Paris officials told her it would cost her about $25,000 for the city to run sewer lines, whereas Reno has service nearby and could do it relatively inexpensively.
• CITY MANAGER’S CONTRACT – (Action item). Adopt a resolution approving and authorizing  the execution of an employment agreement between the City of Paris and city manager-designee John Godwin. The 3-year agreement specifies a salary of $165,430 a year plus benefits (pension, insurance, car allowance, home computer, cell phone, association dues, etc.) amounting to about $44,000 a year.
• ERIC CLIFFORD VS. CITY OF PARIS – (Receive attorney’s advice only about pending or contemplated litigation; no action or deliberation). Eric Clifford – a former councilman and mayor and now judge of the 6th State District Court – has brought suit in County Court-at-Law in Lamar County regarding Cause No. 81385, concerning losses to Clifford’s plane from an accident caused by rocks on the runway at the city-owned Cox Field Airport.
• ALLOWING THE SALE OF WINE AT MARKET SQUARE – (Not an action item; deliberate and provide direction to city staff). Cheri Bedford, the city’s Main Street Coordinator, has asked that a city ordinance be amended to allow the sale of Texas wine at the Farmers Market in Market  Square on Saturdays from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. during the market season from May 1 through Oct. 31. This would allow Paris to join other Texas cities in allowing wineries across the state to sell wine at farmers’ markets. Wineries would be allowed to give a half-ounce sample to patrons (after checking for proper identification), which Bedford says has been found at other farmers’ markets to be essential to the sale of wine.
• BETTER SIDEWALKS – (Not an action item; discussion only). Christopher McGreal of Dallas, an attorney for Disability Rights Texas, will discuss a complaint by several disabled people in Paris about the lack of well-maintained sidewalks in the city. “I told them the whole city cannot be corrected with sidewalks; we don’t have the money to do it,” Hashmi said. “But if they can specifically identify those spots that they visit frequently – such as the hospital or some supermarket – then the city will try to help them out by specifically identifying those spots and make them disability-compatible.”
• DOOR-TO-DOOR SOLICITATIONS – (Not an action item; discussion only). The mayor said candidates for political office have recently become aware of a local ordinance that requires a permit before anyone can go door-to-door, handing out various paraphernalia, including election campaign material. “We don’t want criminals knocking on doors and soliciting this or that, which is the reason the city needs to keep track of who is going around doing whatever. So I want direction from the council as to whether they want a variance for people who are running for elections, for the sale of Girl Scout cookies, or other solicitations by civic clubs or whatever.”
• RENOVATION OF OLD CITY COUNCIL CHAMBERS – (Not an action item; discussion only). To date, the old council chambers on the second floor of City Hall, the drop ceiling removed, air/heat conduit relocated above the tin ceiling, and electrical boxes placed for new lighting. New historically accurate finished aluminum clad windows with energy efficient thermal window panes will be installed at a cost of approximately $25,000 plus $8,000 to install.
• REPLACEMENT CAMERAS FOR COUNCIL CHAMBERS – (Not an action item; discussion only.). Given the importance of videotaping and broadcasting meetings of the city council meetings, city staff is seeking permission to investigate the purchase the FDESKII camera system. Interim city manager Gene Anderson said he believes a lower price than the catalog price of $22,000 can be negotiated.
• MAYOR’S 20-YEAR REPORT ON THE PEDC – (Not an action item; discussion only.) Mayor Hashmi said: “I have a spreadsheet on the revenue and expenses for the PEDC from when it started in 1992 through 2011. There are certain things I will talk about, like the city leasing the depot to the Lamar County Chamber of Commerce for a dollar, and the chamber renting the building to the Paris Economic Development Corporation for $5,000 a month. I am going to make a suggestion that we make available to them the renovated space in the old city council chambers so we stop wasting money on nonsense.”
• CITY COUNCIL TASK FORCE ON SUBSTANDARD STRUCTURES – (Not an action item; discussion only). City councilman John Wright, chairman of the 11-member task force, will give a final report for the inquiry directed by the mayor into the collapse of a building in downtown Paris in mid-January and what steps should be taken to assure something similar doesn’t happen again.
• EVALUATION OF THE COUNCIL, BY THE COUNCIL – (Not an action item; deliberation only). Mayor Hashmi said he wants each council member, including himself, to discuss what the council – individually and collectively – has done, both good and bad, since the last election. “What did each of us campaign about, that we would do, and what are the things that we finished. And what are our goals for the next year?” Hashmi said. “We hold the city staff and city employees accountable, so we should also hold ourselves accountable. This is a self-evaluation that I would like to take place each year for all times to come. It would be helpful for council members, and for the citizens, to hear from the council members before the elections each May as to what they said they were going to do and whether they succeeded in doing it.”
• CITY CLEAN-UP AND MAINTENANCE PROJECTS – (Not an action item; discussion item only). The mayor said he put this item on the agenda because he has gotten no response to two requests of city officials to announce dates for when the city’s street sweeper will make its runs in residential areas. “Just like we have dates for weekly pickup of residential trash, there needs to be a schedule – time and date – for when the city sweeper will sweep each city street. I want to put them on the spot that this is the day they say they will clean streets, and I want to be sure it gets cleaned that day.”

—

send comments about this story to

extra@eParisTexas.com

 

Building and Standards Commission will review five “unsafe” downtown buildings on Monday

By CHARLES RICHARDS

eParisExtra.com

The city’s Building and Standards Commission will have a public hearing at 4 p.m. Monday to determine whether the owners of five downtown buildings have made the repairs ordered by the panel seven weeks ago.

Following the collapse of a building in mid-January two blocks east of the downtown Plaza, interim city manager Gene Anderson cordoned off 11 other properties that he determined to be unsafe or substandard.

On Monday, the commission will hear from code enforcement supervisor Robert Tally and from owners of the five buildings listed below, all of which during a Feb. 20 meeting were given 30 days to make their properties safe.

The six other properties are not at issue on Monday because of repairs either already completed or in satisfactory progress.

Failure to comply could subject an owner to civil penalties of up to $1,000 a day, although such a penalty has never been enforced in Paris. Commission chairman Don Wilson has asked the panel to consider levying civil penalties of $10 a day for the first month of non-compliance, to be increased to $20 a day thereafter.

260 S. MAIN ST. — Vacant apartment complex opposite the old Gibraltar Hotel, owned by Boomer Trends Magazine Inc. (Kenny Kammer). Given 30 days to get a structural engineer’s report to determine the safety and stability of the building and parapet. The roof has fallen in, and Kammer said his plan is to patch it up and sell the building. He said youths breaking into his building have contributed to the building’s deterioration.

347 BONHAM ST. — Owned by Tommy Adams. Given 30 days to bring back to the commission a plan to repair the roof and loose bricks, or to demolish the building. The roof is missing, and the front façade is deteriorated. The owner said half of the roof was gone when he bought it.

107 GRAND AVE. – Owned by Lavonne Poteet. Given 30 days to repair a deteriorated awning. The owner has died since the property originally came before the commission’s attention. The owner’s daughter has said she wants to sell the property.

134 SW FIRST ST. — Owned by Truby Family Revocable Trust. Given 30 days to repair and secure all windows and the back door. Talley said the awning was deteriorated and a window frame was hanging over the sidewalk. The person renting the building complied with Talley’s request to fix the awning and tuck it back into the frame, and to remove the falling window frame. Talley further asked that repairs be made to windows and to the back door.

37 CLARKSVILLE ST. — Owned by Ben Faber. Given 30 days to address safety issues; to remove or fix the awning, overhanging rock and cap stone; replace missing windows; and secure the roof. Talley reported in February that there was a hole by the front glass “that you can see into the basement.” He also reported: “The building is deteriorating, has water damage, the awning frame is broke, top of building concrete cracking and chipping, rock hanging size of baseball, roof is leaking, windows are missing, and building is not safe.”

  —

Send comments or questions about this article to

extra@eParisTexas.com

 

 

 

 

Repairs are completed on several downtown Paris structures that were under scrutiny

Don “Pinky” Wilson, chairman of Paris’ Building and Standards Commission, and member Wendell Moore are shown  at the exploratory meeting at which members of the city council’s Task Force on Substandard Structures were selected in early February. (eParisExtra.com photo by Charles Richards)

By CHARLES RICHARDS

eParisExtra.com

Repairs have been made a number of downtown structures that the City of Paris labeled unsafe in the aftermath of a building’s collapse.

Mayor AJ Hashmi created a special Task Force on Substandard Structures and ordered interim city manager Gene Anderson to investigate reports that the city’s code enforcement office ignored repeated warnings from members of the Building and Standards Commission about the building that collapsed on Jan. 16.

One of the mayor’s first directives was that the city should resume scheduling monthly meetings of the panel, which had last met in August of last year. He also ordered interim city manager Gene Anderson to come up with a list immediately of other buildings that the commission had considered unsafe.

Don “Pinky” Wilson – vice chairman of the task force and chairman of the city’s Building and Standards Commission –presided over a meeting on Feb. 20 in which owners of the structures were given 30 to 90 days to repair their buildings, under the threat of a civil penalty in the amount of $1,000 a day.

Since then:

• The west wall of a building at 365 Bonham St. where bricks had come loose and were falling has been repaired.
• A deteriorated awning in front of a building at 310 Grand Ave. has been taken down.
• A small building at 231 Grand Ave. whose roof had collapsed has been torn down and is now a parking lot.
• A garage (which had been crushed by a fallen tree) across from the southeast corner of Bywaters Park has been repaired.
• The store front and plate glass window at 37 Clarksville St., at the northwest corner of Clarksville and Southeast First Street has been secured and work is ongoing on the roof, awning and other issues.
• A concrete awning that was chipping has been re-poured on the south side of the old Vault Bar & Grill at 33 E. Plaza, and other work is in progress.

Still under scrutiny is the long-vacant apartment building at 260 S. Main St., across the street from the old Gibraltar Hotel building. The roof has fallen in, some of the windows are missing, and there is water damage. On Feb. 20, the owner was given 30 days to get a structural engineer’s report to determine the safety and stability.

The owner of a building at 270 Southwest First Street, next to Swaim Hardware and across the street north from the skateboard park in Market Square has a collapsed roof and some of the outside wall is compromised. The owner is finalizing a repair plan.

One of the major accomplishments of the mayor’s task force is the reinstatement of meetings of the Building and Standards Commission.

Although it is scheduled to meet on the third Monday of each month, the city government suspended the meetings last August, after a court ordered the City of Dallas to pay a the owner of a dilapidated house about $100,000 after tearing down the structure.

A series of 30-to-90 day demolition or repair orders that the commission had issued at its Aug. 25, 2011, fell through the cracks.

At its March meeting two weeks ago, the panel looked again at pictures taken by code enforcement of about a dozen dilapidated residential structures and re-instituted “you demolish them or we will” orders that had been instituted last August.

Wilson has urged that the commission be brought situations before they reach the hopeless state — situations in which the commission will be giving residents 30 days to repair — not 30 days to demolish.

“Everything that came before us was absolutely beyond repair,” Wilson said.

“You can look at the side of the homes, the blocking and floors are sagging, and what they would have to spend to fix them up, it makes it absolutely beyond repair.”

Downtown Paris – both residential and business – was destroyed by the Fire of 1916, and as a result Paris has the largest collection of nearly 100-year old structures of any city in the United States.

“Years ago, they said, ‘Oh, Bois D’Arc will last forever.’ And apparently it will last for about 100 years, because that’s what we’re into now. Especially, in the black land, houses are literally laying down,” he said.

“We’ve got a bunch of 96-year-old structures, and it’s gotten to where I don’t see how we’re going to maintain the core of our city without some real help,” Wilson said.

Wilson said Jean Schweers, who is on the substandard structures task force with him, reported a recent conversation with an acquaintance in Dallas who is an assistant city attorney.

Schweers said after she laid out everything that the Paris task force has been struggling with, the Dallas official told her, “You’re doing everything the City of Dallas does, and let me tell you something, we can’t fix our problems, and we have a lot more money available than you do. We cannot throw enough money to fix it.”

Wilson said he thinks the Building and Standards Commission is moving forward now that it has spent several weeks trying to make everything work the way it should.

“I think we’re moving forward. The staff is doing what we asked them to do, and we’re on line as far as getting all the I’s dotted and the T’s crossed,” Wilson says.

“And we’re following the rules and following the ordinances as described, with good minutes. I think we’re doing great right now,” he said.

One of Wilson’s concerns is more emphasis by code enforcement on homes before they reach the stage that the only solution is demolition.

“We have discussed with the (code enforcement) staff the need to start moving quicker on the holes in the roof, or whatever. It would be cheaper for the city to help with the roofing, if the people aren’t able to do it, possibly using grant money. We think if we attack the roof, we can keep these houses from deteriorating further,” he said.

Under new guidelines addressing the Dallas lawsuit, anyone who is given an order to demolish a building found to be substandard “or we’ll do it for you,” is informed he has up to 30 days to appeal such a ruling to district court in Lamar County.

Absent an appeal within the time period, the commission’s order “is final and binding.”

Serving with Wilson on the Building and Standards Commission are Vicki Ballard, Lee Ann Barbee,  Ryan Lassiter, Wendell Moore, Johnny Norris and Zack Saffle.

When Mayor Hashmi established the task force to investigate whether the city was properly attacking its substandard building problem, he said he would like the 11-member panel to wrap up its work in 30 days or so.

Now more than two months old, the panel has wrapped up its business, says its chairman, city councilman John Wright. He says he will give a final report to the city council next Monday.

 —

send comments or questions about this article to

extra@eParisTexas.com

Fireman’s Ball commemorates Paris’ spirited determination to rebuild after 1916 downtown fire

Auctioneer Frankie Norwood solicits bids midway through a live auction during Paris’ first annual Fireman’s Ball. (eParisExtra.com photos by Charles Richards)

By CHARLES RICHARDS

eParisExtra.com

Paris civic leaders gathered Saturday night at the Love Civic Center for a look-back at the 1916 fire that destroyed downtown Paris — particularly the efforts of the firefighters who battled the fire and the community’s determined effort over the following year to rebuild.

Proceeds for the $25-a-plate Firemen’s Ball – which included a meal and live and silent auction – are earmarked for an annual community-wide “Paris, Texas Fire Festival” — the first of which is planned for June 2013.

Auctioneer Frankie Norwood, who is also a member of the Paris Junior College board of regents, presided over the live auction.

The festival, according to City of Paris recreation director Sally Wright, “is to show our city’s resilience in how strong we came back after the devastating fire of 1916.”

Images and memorabilia from both the Paris Fire Department and the Fire of 1916 were on display at Saturday night’s ball. The live auction focused on memorabilia from the fire 96 years ago.

City councilman John Wright was the high bidder on a 9-week-old dalmatian puppy. As the bidding went up, he hesitated to bid again but with his granddaughter looking at him pleadingly, Wright persisted and won the auction.

Fire chief Ronnie Grooms was the high bidder for a table, built by firefighters, with the department logo emblazoned across the top.

City councilman Matt Frierson was the high bidder for an “Aggie fire hydrant” that was painted by another city councilman, Edwin Pickle. Both are Aggies.

John Fuston of Paris, who is a retired firefighter and fire historian, spoke for about 30 minutes, giving a first-person account of his experiences on Sept. 11, 2001, as a member of the Prince Georges County Fire Department in suburban Washington, D.C.

Fuston said he remembers everything about that day just as if it were yesterday.

After watching on television the coverage on the planes that flew into the Twin Towers in New York City, and then learning that another plane had flown into the Pentagon, the concern was that more planes would be flying into the White House or the Capitol in Washington, D.C., and Fuston’s department went on full alert, sending both firefighters and apparatus into the capital and to the Pentagon.

The Blackwater Woods Band provided music during the meal. The Billion Dollar Blues Band provided live music to dance to.

Crawford’s Hole in the Wall catered the event with a meal of chicken fried steak, potatoes, and green beans.

The Paris Police Department provided the four-member honor guard.

—

send questions or comments about this article to

extra@eParisTexas.com