BINNIE IS TRINIDAD'S NEW MAYOR

Stan Binnie is Trinidad's new mayor.

The council voted unanimously Wednesday to appoint Binnie as mayor.
At the same time, the council chose Kathy Bhardwaj as the mayor
pro-tem and bid farewell to long-time councilman and Mayor Chi-Wei
Lin.

Although newly elected City Councilman Mike Morgan had stated his
interest in serving as the city's mayor on his recently launched
blog, he did not put his name forward at the meeting, according to
City Clerk Gabriel Adams.

The council also took the opportunity to honor outgoing councilman
and Mayor Chi-Wei Lin with both a resolution and refreshments.

Although the council discussed the process for making committee and
commission assignments, Adams said that won't actually happen until
the council meets again in January. That same meeting should see
appointment of planning commissioners.

Adams said the mayor will make the appointments to the three vacant
seats on the planning commission and the council will uphold or
reject those suggestions.

The council also discussed a report from Police Chief Ken Thrailkill
on the existence of marijuana-growing operations within the city
limits this year. A total of six search warrants were issued for
locations in the city this year and the cases of those arrested were
forwarded to the District Attorney's Office for prosecution, the
police chief said.

Thrailkill outlined how marijuana cultivation impacts the city, from
having fewer homes for families and increasing the threat of home
invasion robberies to prompting more drug trafficking.

Most such operations occur in rental homes, the chief's report
stated, an action that can put those properties at risk of forfeiture.

Many of the growing operations come with significant alterations to
rental properties, the chief said. Restoring the homes to their
original state can run into thousands of dollars.

The police chief also pointed out the lack of city ordinances dealing
with marijuana dispensaries and the fact that no city regulation is
in place to deal with the use of homes to grow medical marijuana
beyond the legal limit.

Thrailkill recommended that the city manager and the City Council
review existing ordinances and possibly create new regulations for
dealing with the issues surrounding marijuana cultivation.

The council, Adams said, considered some of the chief's
recommendations and will discuss them further in the future.