The Public Service Committee voted to place on the consent agenda an ordinance authorizing the director of public service to publicly bid construction of lighting and security improvements at Grace Park on Perkins and declared an emergency.

Public Service Director Chris Ludlow said the park has experienced "numerous problems with vandalism and also, theft of our wire," and that staff designed a bid package to install 12 new poles with two LED fixtures on each, five floodlights to illuminate the park interior and overhead wiring to reduce theft. "So we are proposing to bid a project. We've done it in house. We've designed it where we would install 12 new poles around the park, and each 1 of those poles would have a, 2 LED lights, but all the wiring would be overhead," Ludlow said.

Councilman Lombardo asked whether the overhead-wiring approach would be applied to other parks; Ludlow said the city has used overhead wiring successfully at other locations and that upgrades would be done on an "as needed" basis, noting Prentice Park as the next candidate. The committee also discussed camera integration; Ludlow said the camera system is "tied into the same system the police uses so they can monitor the cameras and they can go back and look at them," but that the cameras are not tied into the city's fuse system.

The committee moved to suspend the rules and advance the item to the consent agenda; the chair recorded no opposition. The action authorizes bidding and design work; construction and equipment purchases will proceed only after the competitive procurement and subsequent approvals.