City of Lakewood

City Manager's Weekly Info Bulletin 6/10/05

Details

Category: Weekly Info Bulletins

Published on Thursday, 09 June 2005 17:00

June 10, 2005

WEEKLY INFO  BULLETIN

To:       Mayor and Members of the Council

From:  Andrew Neiditz, City Manager

• Permit Activity for May, 2005:  Community Development issued 121 building permits. The total valuation for new construction was $6,007,885.

• Ft Steilacoom Park Playground  City employees and councilmembers joined hundreds of others this week as volunteers to help with the construction of the new Fort Steilacoom Park playground structure. Work on the project will continue through Sunday, June 12th.  Thousands of man hours have gone into this project! The playground will be a great addition to our community and a real asset to the park.

• SummerFest  Mark your calendars for the City’s official kick-off celebration for the Ft Steilacoom Park playground.  Next weekend a mini-SummerFest event is scheduled.  Plan to bring your families out to a free event featuring games, crafts, food, music and the movie “Racing Stripes” on Saturday, June 18th from 6:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. in Fort Steilacoom Park.  The event is free and all of the activities will focus on children and families.

• Urban Forest Survey  The Parks and Recreation Department has completed the City’s first urban forest survey focusing on trees located within the boundaries of city park property.  Grant funds were utilized to hire an arborist to conduct the survey which was designed to assess the condition of trees and identify remediation needs associated with the conditions.  The City now has baseline data regarding its park trees. 

• Judge’s Conference:  Judge Heller is attending the Washington State District and Municipal Court Judges Spring Conference this week in Blaine, Washington.   Topics include legal updates, ethics, mental health issues, vicarious trauma and commercial driving violations.  

• DSHS  The city manager met this week with the deputy secretary of the State Department of Social & Health Services (DSHS) to discuss the status of adult family home (group home) development, and other issues related to Western State Hospital.  The city was asked to take the lead among the five other cities which “host” DSHS institutions to support department-sponsored legislation to increase the impact funding paid to “host” cities.

• Disaster Preparedness Drill  Lakewood Police provided support to Western State Hospital on May 31st for a Disaster Preparedness Drill. This is the second event we have participated in to prepare WSH for disasters and emergencies.

City Manager's Weekly Info Bulletin 5/27/05

Details

Category: Weekly Info Bulletins

Published on Thursday, 26 May 2005 17:00

• Beyond Sexual Harassment Training The “Beyond Sexual Harassment” training program for staff is next scheduled on June 2nd and June 30th. All City employees are required to attend this training. This course is designed to stimulate discussion about all forms of harassment. The facilitator will provide management and employees alike with valuable tools to help eliminate the emotional and financial problems of harassment in the workplace. Upon completing this training session, participants will be able to identify behaviors that can be considered harassing, explain the effect that harassment has on people, and promote the concept that harassment of any type is a form of discrimination.

• Fishing Derby The 3rd annual Youth Fishing Event took place on May 21st at American Lake Park. Approximately 500 children had the opportunity to experience and learn more about the sport of fishing. Hosted by the City of Lakewood and Pierce County Parks and Recreation and presented by the Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife and C.A.S.T. for Kids Foundation, this program is aimed at getting more kids involved in fishing and building a base for the future stewards of this resource.

• Pacific Highway SW Project (Bridgeport Way to 108th St), Open House Public Works will be hosting an Open House for the Pacific Highway SW Project (Bridgeport Way to 108th St) on Thursday, June 2nd from 5 to 7 PM at Lakewood Fire Department headquarters. Attendees will be able to view the final design proposal and get questions answered regarding project schedule and construction impacts. This is an opportunity to meet with affected property owners to discuss specific ways to mitigate impacts to parking and access. Sound Transit staff will also be present. Please contact Desireé Brown with any questions.

• Short Lane Improvements (104th Street to Lake Steilacoom Dr) The contractor completed paving on Short Lane this past Monday. The striping and final clean-up work is scheduled to be completed later this week.

• Farwest Dr/116th St Project The City will advertise for the Farwest Drive/116th Street drainage improvement project beginning May 31st. Bids will be opened on June 14th. The premise of the project is to upgrade the existing storm drainage system to alleviate localized flooding. Other major work includes pavement restoration.

City Manager's Weekly Info Bulletin 6/03/05

Details

Category: Weekly Info Bulletins

Published on Thursday, 02 June 2005 17:00

From:  Andrew Neiditz, City Manager

• Sounder Station  The Sound Transit Board executive committee approved a motion this week to include structured parking on the west side of Pacific Highway, which is the same side as the Lakewood station, as a replacement for the previously-authorized surface parking on the east side of highway.  The action authorizes the preliminary engineering and environmental review process for the parking garage, and also revokes the outstanding offers to property owners on the other side of Pacific Highway.  A partnership has developed between the City and Sound Transit, whereby the City has offered to provide long-term operations and maintenance (O & M) responsibility for the facility, to include station security and routine maintenance, and Sound Transit would built the parking structure which has a cost of about $5-7 million over their $25 million budget. The plan is for 620 parking stalls in a garage adjacent to the station, and will provide for a safer and more convenient situation for riders. It will also free up valuable commercially-zoned property on the freeway-side of Pacific Highway.

• Pacific Highway SW Project (Bridgeport Way to 108th St), Open House  Public Works hosted an Open House on the Pacific Highway Project (Bridgeport Way to 108th St) on June 2nd  at the Lakewood Fire Department headquarters.  About 30 attendees were able to view the final design proposal and get questions answered regarding project schedule and construction impacts. 

• Lakewood University The first Lakewood University program went well this week with about 50 participants.  “Classes” included community policing, traffic engineering, budget & finance, and growth management.  The program continues next week.

• Gov’t Relations Director   Candice Bock was appointed this week as the City’s Government Relations Director, with responsibility for intergovernmental relations and communications.  She’s been in several administrative positions with the City since 1999, and was previously with the City of Richland and the City of Colorado Springs.

• Elk Grove CA   A 7-member team from the City of Elk Grove (pop 120,000) visited City Hall this week to review our transition to a new police department.  The Sacramento-area city’s group included their mayor, city manager, and police chief, and they are setting up a new police department there.

• Staff Teams  Two 10-person employee “staff teams” were invited by the city manager to participate in an organizational assessment to assist in identifying our strengths and weaknesses.  The group meetings will take place next week.  While some employees volunteered, others were randomly selected so that each department would be represented.

• Tillicum Association    About 55 people were in attendance this week at the Association meeting, and the agenda included review of the proposed sewer system as well as the skate park siting issue.

• Prostitution Emphasis The most recent “John” operation was a success.  The team arrested 32 total suspects, 7 prostitutes (4 female/3 male) and 25 “Johns”.  One John had meth, and one a dealer-quantity of weed and a $6,500.  We had one person drive his exempt plate car to his date.  We are fairly certain that this was the highest total of arrests we have ever had with a John Op. 

• Reserve Officers The first Lakewood Reserve Officers will graduate from the Reserve Academy on Saturday June 18th at 6:00pm. The ceremony will take place at Pacific Lutheran University.

• Homeland Security Award Lakewood Police Department recently was selected to receive an award from the Department of Homeland Security, Office of State and Local Government Coordination and Preparedness. The Commercial Equipment Direct Assistance Program (CEDP) will purchase a Search Camera Victim Locator System and pay for training an officer to use the equipment.

• LPD/LFD Basketball Game The First Annual Helmets versus Shields basketball game for American Cancer Society was a spectacular success.  Plans are being made to ensure this will become a tradition.  The Police team represented the Police Department very well.  Even though the Fire team had a (very) few more points on the board – there were no losers at this event.  The big winners are the victims of cancer.  The final money is still being tallied fully – but it looks like we may have raised over $4,000.

• Human Services Timeline Attached for Council’s information is the Human Services 2006 application process timeline.  Please note that Council action is scheduled in November 2005.