Columbia City Council convened about 9 am Wednesday, February 17. All council members were present: Kirkman Finlay III, Tameika Isaac Devine, E. W. Cromartie II, Mayor Bob Coble, Sam Davis, Daniel Rickenmann, and Belinda Gergel.

Funding

Judge Mildred McDuffie reported her Community Promotions Advisory Committee had recently approved funding for the OMAN Foundation’s Youth Mentor Program in the amount of $1,500.

Allen University

Dr. Charles E. Young, president of Allen University, asked council to help fund an upcoming gathering of the World Council of Churches, expecting 10,000 people to visit Columbia. Cromartie noted city council has been helping the World Council of Churches for the past 15 years and wondered what was the problem this year. Rickenmann pointed out this was the first notice, and the event is about a week away. Rickenmann added he wanted to be fair to everybody appearing before council, such as the two previous appeals ahead of Young, the Palmetto Open Source Software Conference and the Veterans of the Battle of the Bulge. Cromartie worried the group might go to Charleston or to Raleigh instead if council didn’t pony up. Gergel suggested council look at a larger context, and council agreed to put Young’s request on the agenda of the next council meeting.

Business spotlight

Angelo McBride, a city business administrator, recognized four previous 2009 Business Spotlight honorees in commemoration of the Municipal Association’s “Cities Mean Business” month. The four honorees: J Thomas Salon, Granger Owings, Finklin Pharmacy, and Argand Energy Solutions.

Tennis

Gergel and Allison Baker, assistant city manager, brought council up to date on the renovation of the Columbia Tennis Center courts in Wheeler Hill. Baker’s history went back to the $2.5 million committed by council in 2000. But council redirected the money due to the decision to build a larger tennis complex, Southeast Park, off Garners Ferry Road. Of the original $2.5 million, $2.1 million was spent on the land for Southeast Park, leaving $400,000 for parking improvements at CTC but no court improvements. Then the city spent millions more for the courts and landscape at Southeast and nothing more at CTC. Now it surfaces that $1 million is still in the bank to improve the courts at CTC. Gergel said her ad hoc committee recommended an all hardcourt complex, just about what’s already there at CTC, but a $1,000,000 upgrade across the site. Baker and Gergel asked John Temple Ligon to come forward.

Ligon’s speech

Ligon recalled his personal tennis history in Columbia. Then he reviewed the recent phenomenon of rising demand for clay courts. While the construction cost of clay courts can be surprisingly a little less than the hardcourts, the maintenance cost of clay is higher, but Ligon said the Bitsy Grant Tennis Center in Atlanta (13 clay courts and 10 hardcourts) charged each person $3/hour for the hardcourts and $6/hour for the clay courts, easily closing the gap in maintenance. Ligon cited the boomer generation and its demand for clay courts, and he also cited the style factor, the cache, which can really mean something in attracting tournaments and accommodating tourists. In closing, Ligon said he hated to see his hometown borrow from the

movie, On the Waterfront,

and its Marlon Brando character if Columbia failed to see the favorable edge in clay courts: “I coulda been somebody. I coulda had class. I coulda been a contender.”

Efficiency

Allison Baker, assistant city manager, introduced members of the consulting firm EquaTerra, whom the city paid $150,000 to study the city’s budget and recommend savings and hidden revenues. The consultants suggested Columbians could pay an extra $60 a year for garbage pickup, raising $2.1 million. All told, the consultants offered 42 items that would result in a $5.3 million gain for the city. Finlay asked about the city’s 2006 budget, which was when the city spent $21 million more than its revenues. Rickenmann referred to the $21 million overrun as “unauthorized.” Coble kept quiet.

Midlands Housing Alliance update

Cathy Novinger, chair, introduced Larry Arney, the MHA’s new executive director. Arney took his former position with Atlanta’s Habitat for Humanity from an annual budget of $600,000 to $6,000,000. She also introduced Virginia Hall, the second of two full–time executives at MHA. Arney walked council through the new homeless shelter to be built on the Salvation Army property at the corner of Main and Elmwood. Arney showed a 51,000 sq. ft. building, quoting a budget of about $8 million. The MHA has raised $11.3 million. Novinger reminded council the proposed second homeless shelter across the street by Jimmy Jones would not duplicate services, according to conversations between Novinger and Jones. Davis worried that instead of Charleston’s Four Corners of Law, Columbia’s intersection of Main and Elmwood would come to be know as the Four Corners of Homeless.

Second reading

Later in the day, after this reporter’s departure, council approved two new tax increment financing (TIF) districts, Innovista and North Columbia, for $193.9 million together.

Next meeting

Council meets again on March 3 in City Hall, corner of Laurel and Main.