Transportation & General Legislation Committee
II-A Mandates & Local Authority
Metro Cities opposes statutory changes that erode local control and authority or create additional mandated tasks requiring new or added local costs without a corresponding state appropriation or funding mechanism. New unfunded mandates potentially result in increased property taxes, impeding cities’ ability to fund traditional service needs.
II-B City Enterprise Activities
Metro Cities supports cities having the authority to establish city enterprise operations in response to community needs, local preferences, state mandates or to ensure residents’ quality of life. Creation of an enterprise operation allows a city to provide a desired service while maintaining financial and management control. The state should refrain from infringing on this ability to provide and control services for the benefit of community residents.
II-C Firearms on City Property
Cities should be allowed to prohibit handguns in city-owned buildings, facilities and parks. This would allow locally elected officials to determine whether to allow permit-holders to bring guns into municipal buildings, liquor stores, city council chambers and city sponsored youth activities. It is not Metro Cities’ intention for cities to have the authority to prohibit legal weapons in parking lots, on city streets or city sidewalks.
Public safety answering points (PSAPs) must be able to continue to rely on state 911 revenues to pay for upgrades and modifications to local 911 systems, maintenance and operational support, and dispatcher training. State funding should also support the technology and training needed to provide the number and location of wireless and voice over internet protocol (VoIP) calls to 911 on computer screens and transmit that data to police, fire and first responders.
Metro Cities supports the work of the Metropolitan Emergency Services Board (previously the Metropolitan Radio Board) in implementing and maintaining the 800 MHz radio system, as long as cities are not forced to modify their current systems or become a part of the 800 MHz Radio System until they choose. Metro Cities further urges the Legislature to provide cities with the financial means to obtain required infrastructure and subscriber equipment (portable and mobile radios) as well as provide funding for operating costs, since the prime purpose of this system is to allow public safety agencies and other units of government the ability to communicate effectively.
In spite of the serious downturn in the construction economy, thousands of new housing units have been constructed annually in the metro area, and when the economy rebounds, building will resume. Structural and water intrusion problems have surfaced in many houses and commercial buildings built in the last 20 years. These problems have resulted in dissatisfied homeowners and conflicts between the state, builders and cities.
Metro Cities supports an equitable distribution of fees from the newly created Construction Code Fund, with proportional distribution based on the area of enforcement where the fees were received. Metro Cities further supports a joint effort by the state, cities and builders to collectively identify appropriate uses for the fund, including education, analysis of new materials and construction techniques, building code updating, building inspector training, and the development of performance standards and identification of construction “best practices.” Metro Cities does not support legislative solutions that fail to recognize the interrelationships between builders, state building codes and cities.
Traditional methods of citation, enforcement and prosecution have met with increasing costs to local units of government. The use of administrative fines is a tool to moderate those costs. Metro Cities supports the use of administrative fines for local traffic offenses. Metro Cities will continue to support cities’ authority to use administrative fines for regulatory ordinances, such as building codes, zoning codes, health codes , and public safety and nuisance ordinances. Metro Cities supports the use of city administrative fines, at a minimum, for regulatory matters that are not duplicative of misdemeanor or higher level state traffic and criminal offenses. Metro Cities also endorses a fair hearing process before a disinterested third party.
II-H Residential Care Facilities
Sufficient funding and oversight is needed to ensure that residents living in residential care facilities have appropriate care and supervision, and that neighborhoods are not disproportionately impacted by high concentrations of residential care facilities. Under current law, operators of certain residential care facilities are not required to notify cities when they intend to purchase single-family housing for this purpose. Cities do not have the authority to regulate the locations of group homes and residential care facilities. Cities have reasonable concerns about high concentrations of these facilities in residential neighborhoods, and additional traffic and service deliveries surrounding these facilities when they are grouped closely together. Municipalities recognize and support the services residential care facilities provide. However, cities also have an interest in preserving balance between group homes and other uses in residential neighborhoods.
Cities should have statutory authority to require licensed agencies and licensed providers that operate residential care facilities to notify the city of properties being operated as residential care facilities. The Legislature should also require the establishment of non-concentration standards for residential care facilities to prevent clustering and require the appropriate county agencies to enforce these rules.
The 2006 Legislature created the Municipal Boundary Adjustment Task Force to study and make recommendations on what, if any, changes should be made to laws governing municipal boundary adjustments. The task force was charged with developing recommendations regarding best practices annexation training for city and township officials to better communicate and jointly plan potential annexations.
Metro Cities supports substantive changes to the state's annexation laws that will lead to better land-use planning, energy conservation, greater environmental protection, fairer tax bases, and fewer conflicts between townships and cities. Metro Cities also supports technical annexation changes that have been agreed to by cities and townships.