[This transcript was generated automatically from audio using AI and hasn't been reviewed by a person -- it can contain mistakes, including plausible-sounding sentences that were never actually said. Treat it as a starting point, not a verbatim record.]

[6:20] Please come to order. Members will please rise while Councilwoman Berka leads us in prayer
[6:25] this morning.
[6:27] Good morning. Thank you for being with us today and guiding us all here safely. This is a special
[6:32] week for our city and we just pray that you will watch over it and keep us all safe, help
[6:38] everyone make good decisions while they're out there having fun. And just bless us in
[6:43] this meeting as we meet every other week, Lord, to make decisions for the city and
[6:50] for the people of and I pray you'll give us wisdom and guidance and help us do
[6:54] what's best for everyone and help us to know what that is just watch over
[6:59] everyone today keep them safe as we leave here and as everyone runs around
[7:03] the city and bring those people who are coming in safe and as everyone goes
[7:07] home keep them safe as well just watch over it and let it be a good safe
[7:10] time in Jesus name I pray amen thank you so much council member over
[7:16] We're sure you would please let us in the pledge.
[7:19] To the flag of the United States of America
[7:22] and to the Republic for which it stands
[7:30] to take.
[7:32] Nikki, will you please call the roll?
[7:38] Annie.
[7:39] Berka.
[7:41] Burton.
[7:44] Separately excused.
[7:45] Cook.
[7:46] Begrie.
[7:48] Feral.
[7:51] Giannola excused.
[7:53] Haas.
[7:55] Hoover excused.
[7:56] Jenkins.
[7:56] John's. Kerns excused King.
[8:02] Minority. More. Overstreet.
[8:06] Pepper. Bar. Robinson. Rubio
[8:11] excused. Selango.
[8:25] Excused
[8:27] Clerk, please read the journal, Mr. Chairman.
[8:31] I request unanimous consent that the reading of the journal be dispensed with.
[8:34] It's been a motion on floor dispensed with the reading of the journal. Hearing and seeing no objections, the reading of the journal is now dispensed with.
[8:39] We have one public speaker this morning, Rachel Rubin. Rachel?
[8:48] Is there a time limit that I need to respect?
[8:54] I think just two or three minutes, if that's okay with you, Rachel.
[8:57] Be great.
[8:57] Yes ma'am, thank you so much.
[8:59] Hi, y'all. I'm Rachel Rubin. I'm a tenant. I've lived in Charleston for three years. I've been in West Virginia for six.
[9:05] I work at the Chicanoa County Public Defender's Office. This is now the second year in a row that, in order to have its big party,
[9:12] that the city has undertaken an entire effort to disappear anyone that they don't want to see ahead of their gata.
[9:20] Over 25 people were booked at South Central on Thursday.
[9:24] Over the course of the last couple of days, 16 people have been charged for sleeping in a public park.
[9:29] Eleven are being held on nothing else.
[9:31] So that means it's coming out of the city's jail bill in order to incarcerate these people for six days.
[9:37] Let me go over that.
[9:40] The city's discretion was used in order to sweep people out of public parks, go on an entire war and sweep.
[9:46] There are 11 people who are being held for nothing else but being in a public park after hours
[9:51] That's 1425 for the finance boys in the room
[9:56] 4825 per day per person
[9:58] So that's excess of $4500 strictly for the city's jail bill
[10:02] In order to disappear people that the city did not want to be part of the regatta
[10:07] I wonder what that line item is going to be for next year's regatta
[10:10] How you will describe how you are spending that money in order to disappear
[10:14] here, my friends and my neighbors.
[10:17] For the technocrats in the room,
[10:19] whom I think the legal procedures work itself out,
[10:22] two things.
[10:22] People are technically entitled to a PR bond
[10:25] for nonviolent charges and violation of city ordinances.
[10:29] And city judge Matt Smith canceled court on Wednesday.
[10:32] I can promise you the public defenders
[10:34] filed bond motions for every single one of those folks
[10:37] that were arrested and the latest of those
[10:38] was filed before 3 p.m. on Friday.
[10:41] So it is the city judge's discretion
[10:43] to not have ruled on those bond motions.
[10:45] Those people don't have a prayer
[10:46] of getting out of jail before Thursday.
[10:50] Corporal Cooper and Corporal Harper
[10:52] have been the foot soldiers of this operation,
[10:54] but I want y'all to know
[10:55] that they're carrying out your wishes.
[10:57] You have the control and the discretion to direct CPD.
[11:01] I guess the last thing I'll say
[11:02] is that I'm a young person
[11:04] who's raised in another state.
[11:06] I went to college in another state.
[11:07] I decided to move here.
[11:09] I brought friends of mine here.
[11:11] And what the city has decided to do
[11:12] in my name just disappear an entire generation of people who they don't care about is embarrassing.
[11:17] For
[11:22] your comments this morning, that will be it for our public speakers.
[11:26] The clerk will now please read the claims against the city.
[11:29] A claim of Terry Natsen alleges damage to property.
[11:32] A claim of Nikki D. Robinson alleges personal injury.
[11:35] A claim of Patricia Thacker alleges loss of property.
[11:38] Thank you. Please refer to the city's solicitor.
[11:40] The clerk will now please read the committee report in resolution 841-23.
[11:43] 3. Your committee on finance has had under consideration resolution number 841-23, authorizing
[11:49] the mayor as city manager to purchase 2023 Ford police interceptor SUVs from Thorne Hill
[11:56] Ford Lincoln in the amount of $848,980 or the purchase price was determined through
[12:02] a competitively sourced statewide contract and reports seem to cancel with the recommendation
[12:06] that the committee report be adopted. Mr. Chairman.
[12:08] Thank you Madam Mayor. Recently in the past couple of years, essentially beginning with
[12:14] the pandemic, there's been a shortage and a delay on obtaining from Ford the police
[12:19] interceptor SUVs. Through happenstance, Thornhill Ford Lincoln had ordered about 50 or so of
[12:27] these for the state police but they came in the wrong color and so the state police
[12:31] declined to take delivery, thus making many of these SUVs available for purchase
[12:38] from other law enforcement agencies. We are able to purchase 20 of these, which is great
[12:44] because we recently purchased 16, and we may not even get all those, and they're still delayed.
[12:51] Possibly only get seven of those, and so the replacement schedule for CPD, particularly
[12:59] the patrol cars, is behind schedule. And so, therefore, your finance committee recommends
[13:04] the approval of this purchase.
[13:07] Thank you. The floor is up for discussion on the resolution. The question is the adoption
[13:11] of the resolution on favor of vote aye. Opposed vote nay. I declare resolution 841-23 as adopted.
[13:19] Before we close out, just want to say a couple quick things. First of all, we have a very
[13:22] special guest in the room, Nora Wood is here with us today. Nora, we are so happy
[13:28] to have you here at Council, honey. She's been very helpful earlier this morning. Thank
[13:33] Thank you to Chairman Jenkins for bringing coffee and donuts for those of us who slept
[13:37] two hours and those of us who just like donuts, so we appreciate you very, very much.
[13:42] Let me also just say thanks to council members who have volunteered or showed up to haul
[13:50] ice or water or sit at one of the booths and work, but especially to our refuse streets,
[13:57] traffic, police, fire, EMS, they're doing a wonderful job.
[14:01] Last night we had a little burst of weather that popped up pretty quickly when it's when
[14:07] you're working in event with a meteorologist you get those things in real time so the winds
[14:11] picked up to about a burst of 40 49 miles per hour and one small burst so it felt like
[14:19] it I'll say that it felt like it Matthew Sutton grabbed a tent from out of the air
[14:25] So it was amazing, but thanks.
[14:29] You know, we take for granted sometimes when we have those things in town and our streets,
[14:36] especially our refuse department, they work really hard.
[14:39] It's been really hot and they work extremely hard.
[14:42] It's a running joke now we see them.
[14:44] The first folks we get up in the morning and the last folks we see at night.
[14:48] Our streets and our refuse department are doing such an amazing job.
[14:52] So I do want to give a big shout out and say thanks to them before we close out
[14:56] Are there any remarks by any members of council this morning?
[15:01] Councilmember Solomon, do you have any announcements or remarks?
[15:10] Thank you, Mayor. I just want to comment on what Ms. Rubin said. We had 16 people charged with parks after dark or parks after hours.
[15:25] years, and we had,
[15:31] I mean, there's only five of those people had warrants, so we're sweeping
[15:35] two additional people for every warrant served, and before June 29th, only, that charge was
[15:41] only used seven times in the last seven years, and it was, it's kind of a, like, what, just,
[15:46] why did we just reinvent a prosecutable offense that is going to put people in jail for
[15:52] six days?
[15:53] I think I've asked questions I've not received answers and we can debate that but it's it's
[16:01] something that we're there we're hearing a lot from folks that are concerned about it and it's
[16:07] just not looking good it's not a good no not good optics when we have 25 people arrested on one
[16:14] day, the day before Regatta starts. It's primarily on house folks and it's just not a good look
[16:28] for the city. Thank you.
[16:35] Thank you Mayor Goodwin. I would echo the speaker's concerns and questions
[16:42] questions, as well as Councilmember Steelehammer's concerns and questions.
[16:48] I spent some time with others visiting parks and the monomial parking lot on Saturday,
[16:58] a regatta day, and just listening and trying to learn more about what was going on.
[17:02] And one person told me, I overheard one person share, either all my friends just
[17:10] died or they've been swept away to jail. And I don't think they all just died. And that
[17:17] just really, really resonated. I think the numbers are also so far. We're trying to learn
[17:25] more. We're the of concern. But one area where it seems like we could reduce the harm
[17:33] of the arrests that have been made since court has been closed since last Thursday
[17:38] is to ask Judge Smith to return to the bench before Thursday, today, Tuesday, Wednesday,
[17:48] and help clear out some of these cases. I don't really know how to do that, but if anyone
[17:54] has any advice or suggestions or relationships with Judge Smith to ask if he might return
[17:59] to the bench, that would be much appreciated. I'm happy to work with you on that. Thank
[18:04] you.
[18:04] Yes sir thank you council thank you councilmember Solomon councilmember King
[18:10] and I'll think I see any other hands yes sir I just like to that say thank you to
[18:15] our law enforcement agency for doing their jobs all year round not just right
[18:20] before we got it thank you any other comments where we close out tonight
[18:25] Mr. I'm gonna call you the ice man now since you've been doing ice is that
[18:30] okay with you slinger slinger hey there a couple of us have been out there
[18:36] each morning slinging ice and helping the vendors and the mayor mentioned some
[18:41] things about all the hard workers of the regatta but I want to recognize the
[18:46] administration these the individuals sitting up front are here at daylight
[18:53] they're here till dark they're here till two in the morning they're jumping in
[18:59] they're doing everything starting from Jane Bostic to the regatta commission
[19:03] to Mayor Goodwin, to Matt Sutton, and I'ma miss the people. Tina, all of them. Andrew, you know,
[19:11] they're all out there riding in carts. They're all out there slinging ice, taking the vendors,
[19:19] making sure the vendors orders are taken care of, making sure all the behind the scenes,
[19:25] means I listen to the radios. They won't give me a radio by the way. But there's a lot that
[19:36] goes into this regatta. And until I started working with Bruce and riding around the
[19:43] cart with Matt, I didn't recognize what goes into an event like this. I put on a lot of
[19:50] myself but nothing to this that stage- but it there's a lot of people doing a
[19:58] lot of things behind the scenes and they should deserve the credit they deserve
[20:02] so I just want to recognize those people sitting up front and those that are
[20:06] not here and out there working now the refuse and the fire the police that
[20:10] I mean they're out there we did get to see the new officers the officers
[20:15] new shorts this weekend so they were pretty sure that so I just want to
[20:19] make that recognition. Thank you councilmember Robinson we appreciate it
[20:25] and it's not just during regatta we care about our work all the time we care
[20:29] about our work and we care about every single person that lives in this city
[20:33] every single person if you own a business if you live here if you work
[20:38] here if you are just here we care about you we have amazing teams plural
[20:44] not just in the in the mayor's office or the city manager's office we have
[20:48] lots of different departments that were here before we got here, and departments that we
[20:53] created to make sure that we're doing the best that we can for the most that we, for
[21:00] all, for everyone. So we don't always get it, we don't always get it right, but our
[21:06] heads and our hearts are certainly in the, certainly in the right place. Thank you
[21:09] so much. The clerk will now please call the roll.
[21:11] Annie, Berka, Burton, Seferly, Cook,
[21:18] Bagree, Barrel, Giannola, Haas,
[21:26] Hoover,
[21:27] Jenkins, Jones, Kearns, King,
[21:33] Minority, Moore, Overstreet, Pepper,
[21:39] Farr, Robinson, Rubio, Solango,
[21:49] I am here. Thank you so much. Mr. Chairman, most adjourned until Monday July 17th at 7 p.m. There's a motion to adjourn until July 17th. Thanks everybody.