Tag: Mike Rouker

Bloomington council votes down proposed law against camping, storing property in right-of-way

Bloomington city council (Sept. 13, 2023)
Josh Montagne
Kemal Perdana (Help Ourselves)
Soha Vora (Help Ourselves)
Sydney Zulich, Democratic Party nominee District 6 city ouncil
Abhinav Kotaru (Help Ourselves)
Nick Angelos (Help Ourselves)
Christopher Emge (Greater Bloomington Chamber of Commerc)
Pauly Tarricone
Tim Dwyer
Mike Rouker, Bloomington city attorney

Voted down on Wednesday by Bloomington’s city council, with just two votes in favor, was an ordinance that would have explicitly prohibited camping, storing personal property, or blocking the public right-of-way, among other things.

Supporting the ordinance were Sue Sgambelluri and Susan Sandberg. Abstaining was Dave Rollo. The other five councilmembers who were present all voted against it. Ron Smith was absent.

Rollo said he was inclined to bring a motion to table the ordinance. Councilmember Jim Sims said he was inclined to put off a vote, but if it came down to a vote that night, he would vote no.

A basic concern for those who opposed the ordinance was that it punishes the unhoused population, without offering a solution for storing their belongings in a place other than the public right-of-way.

Councilmember Matt Flaherty’s sentiments reflected the views of others, when he said that crafting a better ordinance “will take months of community engagement and outreach and collaboration between the executive and legislative branch and the whole community to arrive at a solution.”

Flaherty added, “So I don’t think this is honestly well suited for just tabling or postponing and bringing back with a few clarifications, in a few weeks time.” Rollo said it was clear that there would not be majority support for tabling, so he did not make that motion. Continue reading “Bloomington council votes down proposed law against camping, storing property in right-of-way” →

Bloomington concedes: Simple tickets can’t be given to scooter companies for bad parking by their users

A part-time temp worker documents an improperly parked scooter at 6th & Walnut streets Oct. 11, 2022
North Walnut Street Feb. 21, 2023 (This scooter was reported to the city and moved out of the ADA ramp by The B Square.
North Walnut Street Feb. 23, 2023. These scooters were reported to the city and moved out of the sidewalk by The B Square.

In late 2021, The B Square reported that no citations had been issued to scooter companies for violating the parking regulations laid out in a local ordinance, which was approved by the city council in July 2019.

When no ordinary parking tickets were issued to scooter companies, that came as a surprise to some residents—given the number of scooters they routinely encountered blocking ADA ramps and sidewalks in the downtown area, or in their residential neighborhoods.

The lack of any citations was especially unexpected, in light of the assurance given by city attorney Mike Rouker on July 31, 2019— the night the city council enacted the scooter ordinance. Rouker said that if scooter parking became a problem, parking fines would be imposed on scooter companies whenever the city saw a parking problem.

In August 2022, The B Square raised a question to Bloomington’s corporation counsel, Beth Cate, about the enforceability of the city’s ordinance that regulates shared electric scooter parking. That email went unanswered.

But last week, six months later, Bloomington’s director of economic and sustainable development, Alex Crowley, wrote in response to an emailed question from The B Square: “[T]he language in the ordinance needs to be tightened up, to give us the flexibility to impose fines on [scooter company] without having to impound.” Continue reading “Bloomington concedes: Simple tickets can’t be given to scooter companies for bad parking by their users” →

Cataloging scooter parking violations: Bloomington to use temp agency for initial staffing of 2 positions

Scooter blocking a sidewalk along 7th Street (Sept. 19, 2022)
Scooters staged in all the bicycle hoops at Miller-Showers Park (Sept. 16, 2022)
Scooter blocking an ADA ramp at Walnut Street and College Avenue. (Sept. 24, 2022)

Shared electric scooters that are parked so they block ADA ramps and sidewalks in Bloomington will soon be systematically documented and moved out of the way by two temporary workers.

In action taken on Tuesday, the city’s three-member board of public works approved a contract with Express Employment Services that is supposed to pay two workers $15.75 an hour for around 25 hours a week. The total cost of the city’s payments to Express can’t be more than $15,500.

The parking services division, within the department of public works, will administer the pilot program, which is supposed to be evaluated at the end of the year.

A temp agency is being used just to get the new workers on the job as quickly as possible, with an eye towards bringing the same people on board as temporary city employees soon after that.

The jobs are posted on the city’s own job board.

The program to document blockage of ADA ramp and sidewalk access, and move the scooters out of the path is being launched more than three years after the city council enacted its scooter ordinance.

Bloomington’s local law allows shared use electric scooter companies to use the public right-of-way for their operations, in exchange for a licensing fee of $10,000 a year, and a payment to the city of 15 cents per ride.

Currently licensed to do business in Bloomington are Bird, Lime, and VeoRide.

Continue reading “Cataloging scooter parking violations: Bloomington to use temp agency for initial staffing of 2 positions” →

Denied by Bloomington: Request to vacate two strips of right-of-way where parts of buildings stand

Indicated in red are the two strips that Lowenstein asked the city council to vacate. Green is the proposed easement.
Solomon Lowenstein’s attorney, David Ferguson, addresses the Bloomington city council (Sept. 21, 2022)

If a property owner asks the city of Bloomington to give up some public-right-of-way, the city’s default answer is no.

On Wednesday, Bloomington’s city council hewed to that basic standard, when eight of nine councilmembers voted against Solomon Lowenstein’s request for vacation of two strips of land.

The property is in the northeast part of the city, just south of 11th Street near the B-Line Trail.

The proposal got just one vote of support, from Ron Smith.

The historical background goes back around 100 years. More recently, in 2014, the city council considered, but ultimately denied ,a package of vacation requests, that also included Lowenstein’s. The vote eight years ago was 3–4, with two councilmembers absent—Steve Volan and Dave Rollo.

Why did Lowenstein, then as now, want the city to give up some land that is owned by the public? Continue reading “Denied by Bloomington: Request to vacate two strips of right-of-way where parts of buildings stand” →

Column: Judge rules Bloomington plan commission violated Open Door Law, second lawsuit now filed

In a ruling issued on June 1, Monroe County circuit court judge Catherine Stafford found that Bloomington’s plan commission violated Indiana’s Open Door Law (ODL) with its March 14, 2022 meeting.

Photo of plan commission in-person meeting with numbers 1 to 4 labeling the members who are physically present
This photo shows the plan commissioners who were physically present at the March 14, 2022 gathering. The graphics for the numbers have been added.

The allegation that the meeting violated the electronic meetings section of the ODL was made in a lawsuit that I filed a week after it took place.

The electronic meetings section of the ODL requires that at least 50 percent of the plan commissioners have to be physically present at the meeting. That works out to at least five of nine plan commissioners.

At the March 14 meeting, six of nine attended, but just four plan commissioners were physically present. The other two participated remotely.

Bloomington’s city attorney Mike Rouker tried to argue that the 50-percent is supposed to be calculated based on the number of plan commissioners present at the meeting, not the number of seated plan commissioners. Rouker’s attempted argument was counter to the widely disseminated guidance on the relatively new section of the ODL, which was provided last year by Indiana’s public access counselor.

However, the judge stopped short of granting all of the requested relief—which was to void the decisions made at the March 14 meeting. That would have forced the plan commission to reconsider all of the business that it transacted at the meeting.

Still, the plan commission has now reconsidered one of the votes that was taken at the March 14 meeting. Continue reading “Column: Judge rules Bloomington plan commission violated Open Door Law, second lawsuit now filed” →

Police contract with 13% initial raise OK’d by Bloomington city council

Bloomington city council president Susan Sandberg.
Bloomington city attorney Mike Rouker.
President of FOP Lodge 88 Paul Post.

On a unanimous vote, Bloomington’s city council has approved a new labor agreement with its police union, which has been unsigned since it was ratified in early March by a vote of the FOP Lodge 88.

The council’s action came at its regular meeting on Wednesday.

The highlight of the new four-year deal, which starts in 2023, is more pay for police officers. In the first year of the agreement, the contract calls for a base salary increase of around 13 percent, which works out to around $7,800 a year. Increases in each subsequent year are around 3 percent.

On Wednesday, it was city attorney Mike Rouker who reviewed for city councilmembers the legal and political nuts and bolts of the deal.

Among the political points was the fact that Bloomington’s mayor John Hamilton made the new labor deal contingent on the city council’s recent approval of an increase in the local income tax.

Rouker pegged the direct fiscal impact of the new agreement over four years at $4,917,000. Rouker called it “a truly unprecedented investment in public safety and in our police officers.”

The significant increase in pay is meant to help Bloomington’s police department contend with challenges in recruitment and retention. Continue reading “Police contract with 13% initial raise OK’d by Bloomington city council” →

Opinion: Bloomington’s plan commission violated Indiana’s Open Door Law, so I filed a lawsuit

This is scan of the filed lawsuit.
This photo shows the plan commissioners who were physically present at the March 14, 2022 gathering. The numbers have been added.

The B Square’s report on the plan commission’s meeting last week was headlined with a question: Did Bloomington plan commission meeting follow state law on electronic meetings?

After talking to a half dozen different experts on Indiana’s Open Door Law, I think the answer to the headline’s question is: No.

That is, Bloomington’s plan commission violated the Open Door Law with its March 14, 2022 gathering, which was conducted on a hybrid in-person-electronic platform. Four plan commissioners were physically present. Two participated through a Zoom video-conference interface. And three were absent. Continue reading “Opinion: Bloomington’s plan commission violated Indiana’s Open Door Law, so I filed a lawsuit” →

13% pay increase for Bloomington police in first year of new labor agreement

Members of FOP Lodge 88, Bloomington’s police union, voted last week to accept the city’s proposal for a new four-year labor deal starting in 2023, according to FOP president Paul Post.

B Square file photo of Paul Post, president of the Fraternal Order of Police, Don Owens Memorial Lodge 88

The current agreement between Bloomington and its police union expires at the end of 2022.

In the first year of the agreement, the contract calls for a base salary increase of around 13 percent, which works out to around $7,800 a year. Increases in each subsequent year are around 3 percent.

City attorney Mike Rouker gave a caveat on the agreement in an email to The B Square: “The contract is contingent on the city identifying a revenue source adequate to fund the salary adjustment.”

Bloomington’s city council will still need to approve the contract.

In Bloomington mayor John Hamilton’s state of the city address, delivered on Feb. 24, he put the money question like this: “We need major investments in public safety, ongoing revenue for adequate police salaries as city council directed last year, and as our proposed four-year labor agreement has included.”

B Square file photo of Mike Rouker, city attorney, addressing Bloomington’s city council in December 2019.

That “ongoing revenue” is likely to be sought in the form of a local income tax increase, which could be enacted by Bloomington’s city council for all of Monroe County.

In an emailed statement to The B Square, Post wrote: “The FOP is pleased that an agreement has been reached between the BPD [Bloomington Police Department] bargaining unit and the city.”

The statement from Post continued, “This contract provides significant increases to salary amounts and longevity payments, with the hope of both recruiting new officers to fill our large officer shortage, and hopefully retaining our well trained existing officers.”

The statement from Post concluded: “While the amounts could certainly have gone a bit further, this will be a good ‘first step’ toward correcting the staffing crisis at BPD.” Continue reading “13% pay increase for Bloomington police in first year of new labor agreement” →