Thursday, August 11, 2011
Council members also talk about refinancing bonds, charter review during Monday's work session.
- GOVERNMENT
- Joe Scott
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Thursday, August 11, 2011
Florissant City Council members received good financial news and discussed reducing one a tax as a result. During a Monday work session, Finance Director Randy McDaniel told the council that projected for the rest of the year, Florissant would come about $760,000 ahead of its budgeted utility tax receipts. While putting together the 2011 budget, McDaniel projected the city would receive $5.7 million from the revenue. On Monday, he said Florissant likely would wind up with $6.4 million from utility taxes. Through July, tax collection is $600,000 ahead of projections due to utility rate hikes and higher bills, he said. The city raised the utility tax from 5 percent to 7 percent last year as the council struggled to balance its budget. “I …
Monday, June 6, 2011
Mayor Schneider believes the city should wait to address redistricting until a full council is seated.
Florissant, like other municipalities, will be required to realign its ward boundaries in keeping with the 2010 Census results. Florissant grew by 3 percent since 2000, but its population also shifted due to some annexations. Each council member will appoint a ward representative to the commission who would recommend boundary changes. Those changes could affect future elections. This round of realignments could bring some significant changes. “Because of the annexations since 2001, boundaries in every ward may change,” said Ward 7 Councilwoman Karen McKay. She’s said she’s not sure that’s happened before. Ward 7 was changed in 2000 to include an area near McCluer High School that had been part of Ward 5, she said. But due to annexations, …
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
Currently, it appears that three will vie for the vacant council seat on Aug. 2.
The No. 3 seems to be symbolic for the City of Florissant, as three people filed for the Ward 3 City Council seat at the close of filing on Tuesday evening. Mark Behlmann, Joseph Eagan and Elizabeth O’Fallon have turned in their nomination petition packets to the city clerk’s office to vie for the seat. Mayor Tom Schneider vacated the seat last month following his mayoral win. City Clerk Karen Goodwin said that all have submitted their filing paperwork, but they would not be official candidates until their petition packets have been certified. Once certified, the candidates will campaign for the Aug. 2 election where the seat would be filled. Also on the ballot will be the Ward 6 runoff race between Steve Purgahn and Pat Stinnett, who …
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
City Council reorganizes during Monday's meeting following April 5 election.
After more than 30 years, Tom Schneider entered the Florissant council chambers on Monday night as the Ward 3 Councilman and left as the new mayor. More than 30 people, including Florissant Police Chief William Karabas, Greater North County Chamber President Carolyn Marty and former mayoral opponents Mark Behlmann and Robert Garrett, looked on as elected city councilors and the mayor-elect took their oath of office. City Clerk Karen Goodwin swore in Wards 2, 4 and 8 city council members–John Grib, Keith English and Mark Schmidt, respectively--at the beginning of the meeting. Following immediately afterward, Mayor Robert Lowery read the oath to mayor-elect Schneider, which he quickly accepted. “I’m grateful for this honor,” Schneider said …
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Following Monday's swearing in ceremony, Schneider's council seat will be vacant until August.
When mayor-elect Tom Schneider is sworn into office on Monday, he leaves behind his Ward 3 City Council seat, which he’s held for 32 years. Florissant’s Ward 3 residents will select its new councilman on Aug. 2, which leaves three months in between with only eight councilors. City Clerk Karen Goodwin said that business would continue normally for the council, despite being short of a councilor. With the possibility of ties resulting from the council’s future vote, Goodwin said she believes that councilors would take that into consideration before voting. The Ward 3 section extends from Washington Street and Charbonier Road around Koch Park to the streets of Tahoe, Kostka and Montezuma. It consists of more than 1,900 households. Goodwin …
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Council votes on seven bills on Monday night's agenda.
Although the Florissant City Council had a number of presentations and celebrations last night, the group still had a number of bills on the agenda. Here’s what happened with agenda items at last night’s meeting:
Saturday, April 9, 2011
See what our readers have been clucking about this week.
We were tempted to make this week’s “Comments from Patchland” an homage to the recent election. But there were too many other good comments to pass up. You’d be a moron to miss these highlights (and, as you’ll find out, we know you’re not one). If you’re game, click the headlines to join in the conversation on some of these topics. Were the commissioners just…oh, what's another word for "scared"? Chickens Denied: Planning and Zoning Commissions Says No to Urban Chickens "'Urban Chickens' would make a great band name." — Bill Niehoff on St. Peters Patch "Too bad for this kid. Sounds like a good project for a kid and families with children wanting to have fresh eggs." — Ruthie B, also on St. Peters Patch For the record, we don't think Patch …
Thursday, April 7, 2011
Although the election is just about said and done, Florissant Patch's news coverage isn't.
This week, we saw a changing of the guard in a number of ways. Florissant elected its third mayor in more than 40 years, the Ferguson-Florissant Board of Education received three new faces and left out three familiar faces and the Florissant Valley Fire District received a new board member. Not to mention, we’re awaiting the official results of the Ward 6 City Councilman race. The election coverage hasn’t ended because Tuesday has come and gone, though. Although, we’ve filled our site with a number of results and winners' briefs, we’ve still got a lot of ground to cover, and Florissant Patch is getting ready to deliver those to you. There’s still a lot to sort out regarding the election, and we’re planning to be there for it all. Here’s …
Tuesday proved to be a long and busy day for candidates and their supporters.
Once polls opened at 6 a.m. on Tuesday, the final push for votes was on for candidates, and the anticipation of the night's winners was long. Florissant Patch captured it all from the day's supporters and voters heading into the polls to the night's watch parties and results coming in. We take a final look at what happened on a day that changed so much.
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Schneider's victory makes him the third mayor Florissant has had in the past decades decades.
After a campaign unlike any other for the City of Florissant, with no incumbent and six different candidates vying to be mayor, Tom Schneider has emerged on top. The longest serving member on the city council was elected Tuesday night as the third mayor of Florissant in the past 40 years, following James J. Eagan and Robert Lowery. “I started my campaign by asking people what was important to them,” Schneider said in a speech to his supporters on Tuesday night. “I thought that was a good place to start because it wasn’t about me. It was about Florissant and the surrounding community.” Schneider beat out an open field of five other candidates for the seat of mayor and won with 37 percent of the vote. Incumbent Mayor Robert Lowery announced …
RM
6:18 pm on Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Perhaps instead of "robbing peter to pay paul" so to speak, we should look back to the audit that was done on Florissant that listed many things that were being done that were not in the best interest of the citizens of Florissant but were technically not illegal because of the "strong mayor" form of government that we current have. Perhaps the city should ALWAYS operate in the best interest of … more ›