Friday, September 21, 2001
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Friday, September 21, 2001 |
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Cripple council looks to new year By JOHN
THOMPSON
Senoia's City Council is on life support, and probably won't have a full recovery until January. Curious spectators at Monday night's council meeting noticed that only three seats were occupied; Mayor Joan Trammell, Councilman Dianne Cleveland and Councilman Robert Hannah. Councilman Darren Ratajski's seat was empty. He resigned and his seat will be decided by a special election Nov. 6. The other empty seat used to be occupied by Councilman Pam Youngblood. But Youngblood was sitting in the audience, which left many residents wondering what had happened. Halfway through the meeting, Trammell announced the city had learned that if a councilman chooses to run for mayor, he or she must resign from the council. Since Cleveland's term expires this year, the rule does not apparently apply to her. Trammell called for a motion to declare a special election to fill Youngblood's seat Nov. 6. The measure passed unanimously. But for now, the council has only three members, which constitutes a quorum. Trammell announced that she will be missing the two meetings in October, because of a governmental meeting and personal matter. Trammell's absence will effectively shut the city's government down for October, since only two council members would be present to conduct business. Cleveland said she would be gone the first two weeks of November, so the Nov. 5 meeting will also have to be cancelled. The council did approve a called meeting for Oct. 30 to stage a public hearing on the second phase design of the sewer system, but after that it's not clear when they will meet again. Before they adjourned the meeting, the short-staffed council did agree to extend the city's moratorium on R-20 green space development for another six months until a full council could decide it.
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