Covington City Council questions Trailhead usage

Covington Councilman at large Trey Blackall put forth a proposal at Tuesday night’s Council meeting that would question the policy of after-hours use and rental of the Covington Trailhead’s bathrooms and electricity.

The use of the facility and the policy of locking the bathrooms and turning off the electricity that powers the outdoor fans were questioned by Covington businesswoman and resident Kay Morse. Morse had attended the Tea Party gathering April 15 at the facility and was appalled that the fans were not in operation and the bathrooms locked.

Covington Mayor Candace Watkins explained that the city does not rent out the facility and it is closed at its normal hour of 4:30 p.m.

“Our policy is not to rent the Trailhead for a private party... we cannot expend public funds to have someone there for any kind of political meeting,” said Watkins. She later said that she did not want to encourage people to be at the site at night unsupervised.

Morse said the party was not private, but open to whomever would like to attend, no matter what political belief or party affiliation.

“I myself am a Democrat,” said Morse.

She also said that the event was not political, but she had attended to get information regarding how tax revenue is being spent in Washington, D.C. She said that the Trailhead was built with taxpayer money, and the taxpayers should be allowed to use it.

She closed by asking, “Why can’t the policy be changed to accommodate the people?”

Watkins said the city couldn’t afford to have someone there to lock up after normal business hours.

“We need to examine what the policy will be at the Trailhead because it was built with public funds,” Blackall said.

He added that he had no problem with the bathrooms remaining open for gatherings after hours. “We (the Council) need to sit down with Pam (economic development director, Pam Keller) and the people at City Hall,” he said.

He also said that the Tea Party brought 700 people to downtown Covington, many of whom went out after the event to eat at local restaurants, thus having an economic impact on city businesses.

“There must be a monetary figure we can reach to provide for it,” Blackall said. “Any group should be able to use that facility, even if it’s not an economic development office event.”

Watkins said that when the facility was built, it was originally designed as an outdoor facility and as things progressed, it was changed to include a building with exhibit and office space, the maintenance of which were not in the original budget. She also said that at the time of the event, the city simply was not prepared.

Other concerns raised by Morse at the meeting included the intermittent telephone problems at City Hall. A real estate broker, Morse said that many times she needs to contact City Hall for information or questions a client may have. Sometimes she is put on hold and the call is dropped, and at other times she cannot get through at all.

Watkins agreed that there have been problems with the system, but since the offices are now in permanent locations, she hope to have the problems finally fixed.

In other business, an ordinance setting inspection fees for residences at $25 and for commercial and institutional buildings at $60 per inspection was approved unanimously.

The city’s building official, who hires the independent certified inspectors to examine each site, sets the number and type of inspections necessary. The average number of inspections for a residential building is five.

Watkins said that inspections are done only for a legitimate reason and to set a minimum or maximum number of inspections in the ordinance itself would unduly remove the discretion needed by the city’s building official.