Residents concerned about a proposed "high density" development on the hillside between Stadium Boulevard and Creek Trail Drive - just west of the JCMG complex - expect to meet with the developer at 5 :45 p.m. today in City Hall.
So the Jefferson City council Monday night delayed taking any action on a bill that would approve developer Twehous Excavating's rezoning requests for the nearly 70 acres of land.
A vote on the proposed changes, and the required public hearing about them, now are to be held Dec. 15.
But the council on Monday passed a resolution approving the Convention and Visitors Bureau's $801,309 budget for 2015.
The council has the final authority to review and approve that budget, because the CVB is funded mainly through a voter-approved 3 percent lodgings tax.
Some council members questioned the agency's 5.16 percent increase in salaries and wages but, ultimately, approved the resolution 9-1.
Kevin Zumwalt, the CVB board's chairman, told the council the board began looking at salary improvements "about three years ago ... after we had had some turnover within our ranks."
Comparing the local salaries with other CVBs around the state and nation, and with general manager and sales director jobs in the hotel industry, Zumwalt said: "We found that the pay structure for our employees was sub-par."
What looks like "exorbitant pay raises" for the agency's six full-time employees and one part-timer, he said, really is "what we consider a performance level where we can keep our good employees, instead of them going someplace else."
Glen Costales, 4th Ward, cast the only vote against the resolution, telling colleagues he was willing to support only a 1 percent raise for the CVB employees.
"With the city employees getting zero percent last year and 2 percent this year, and the same for the county, and state employees getting zero," Costales explained, "I think a 5.16 percent (raise) on top of 1 percent (last year) is exorbitant and sends the wrong message to all city employees."
Council members spent 30 minutes discussing an updated report on abandoned buildings in the city, but took no action.
Janice McMillan, the city's Planning and Protective Services director, reported that "140 buildings have been on the abandoned properties list at one time or another over the past two years - and the city is getting a good level of compliance from property owners" who are working to improve their properties or, at least, secure them from vandalism."
And Councilman Ralph Bray announced plans to resign his 5th Ward seat on Dec. 31, so he can move into the Cole County Recorder of Deeds job on Jan. 1.
The City Council would choose Bray's temporary successor in January or February, with the voters electing a new councilman in April.