City Council - Regular Meeting

But we used to do Okay. We used to do team outings to ball games were different. So we were out of town. It's like I've been to I've been to a bunch of the stadium. Sorry, I'm really bad about answering people these days. And of course, the price was right when the company's picking. Well, yeah, it's always right when picking it up. We're gonna give Brent a few more minutes. He said he would be a little late. Brent, I can't imagine that. Is there a fire threat in here tonight?

I feel safe though. Thanks, guys. Hello, Jerry. We all color coordinated from head to toe. shoes match that shirt perfect. Oh, here. Do you want to talk about this and see if anybody wants to read? I just now started it, but I think my time was off because of where they started this 41 and still So, this guy's from here, right? Oh, no. No, he actually lives in Duncan.

Okay. But his parents got married here and he's, you know, they come to a lot and he wrote a book about the last I know that's really I mean it kind of catches you from the first page.

Good for you. Yes, he is. Hey, he beat my record. Mine was 604. Don't worry. 602. You good? Can I still sit here? I asked that same question. Your leg. Apologies. All right. Uh, please silence your phones if you have one and let's start this meeting so Brent can get back out to the ballpark. Um, Chief Page, would you offer our invocation tonight?

Heavenly Father God, Lord, we come to you. We give you praise and glory and honor God for giving this wonderful weather to us, the recent rains. God, we ask you continue to watch over our citizens of our town. Keep them safe tonight as they make decisions affecting our city that they be in your desire. Just lift these things up in Jesus name. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Please join me in the pledge. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. All right, we have a couple of things um on the items for in uh community interest. Thank you for bringing this to our attention. Um got them glasses back on so I can read it. We had a state a doubles team conference 3A state winner from Buoie. Their names are Heidi and Willow Sebert. I understand they're sisters and they've been playing together for a while. and and Doug made me aware of a parade that will be for them and their celebration tomorrow, right?

A victory lap. A victory lap. Okay, that's a good idea. Um, so tomorrow at what time? Five o'clock. So if you sit somewhere down here, you probably should be able to see it. And then somebody from Duncan, Oklahoma, I've just started it. Sy's apparently gotten through more of it than I have. Barbara says a lot of people like it. um wrote a book about the last Mustang, which as you know was prejack rabbit days uh about this I don't know I haven't gotten far enough into it but it's about buoy and the last Mustang you know more about it than I do. It's about a football team that made it to the state playoffs but they didn't get to because um the war happened and so Pearl Harbor Pearl Harbor

they went off to fight in the war. Um, so I've got two copies up here if anybody like to take it and read it. Bring it back or share it with somebody. Well, Mark got one. I got one copy up here if anybody wants to read it and take it back. Bring it back when you're finished. All right. So, we have a proclamation this week for the emergency medical services. And we have a couple of our favorite people here to share it with us. Hello sir.

All rightclamation from the office of the mayor. Whereas each excuse me each year residents and visitors may require emergency medical care for traumatic injuries and other emergencies. And whereas EMS is ready to provide saving care to those 24 hours 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Whereas access to quality emergency care dramatically improves the survival and recovery rate to those who experience sudden illness or injury. citizens of our community benefit the knowledge, skills and dedications of these EMS specialists as they ensure appropriate treatment at the scene and on the way to the hospital and in the emergency room. It is appropriate to rec this year's theme is improving outcomes together. I encourage our community to observe the week and celebrating our local emergency medical services personnel. Therefore, I us

Thank you guys. Thank you. Thank you. All right, we're going to move forward to the city manager report. This has been an eventful week, so I've added a bunch to it. So, you'll know uh today I type this that's old. It's over one page long now.

Yeah. Uh Tony Lawrence, Jay Edmons, and I met with Blaine Boswell, our engineer with Corvic Boy, who is doing the engineering on Rock and Pillar Street drainage project. The plans are 90% complete, uh which should be ready to bid out the project in June. We made some minor changes to the design so that the electric department can get their bucket trucks behind the houses on Pavle Street to do service work if and when necessary without the alternatives. base cost will be about 1.5 million and with the two alternatives it could be as high as 2 million. One of the alternative is rep wrapping the creek uh downstream of the bridge and the other is working on the bridge at Miller and Greenwood streets which has some wear and tear and damage on the bridge that needs to be fixed. Uh we finally decided on the project for the Texas Water Development Board grant application. Since the raw water pump project is under orders from TCQ, we feel that this project had the best chance of being funded. The original cost was between 1.2 and 1.5 million. But since we are applying for a grant, we thought that we would add items to the project that would enhance it to the point of making it a more modern, safer, and resolant pump station. items such as a new skater system for the new and old pumps, new electrical uh additional lighting for the area, actuators for the raw water intake, new electrical poles for the transmission line. Last but not least, paving the road to the pump station off 11 FM 1125. With all these additions, we're probably looking at two and a half to three million. But we can uh bring the new water pump station into the 21st century by making it a great facility. Hopefully, we'll be successful with this grant application. I've been working on the grant paper paperwork, finding

forms, getting information together. The application was due by July the 30th. So, we've got quite a bit of time. The main thing I need to tell you is now is I found out I had people tell me that we couldn't apply for more than one project in the in the grant application. Well, I found out that we can apply for more if they're related. So, we're going to apply also for the engineering design for the reused water project and also uh the engineering for the uh uh addition onto the water purification plant. And as I said, it's 100% grant. So, we need to take every opportunity that we can to get all the money we can to get a lot of things done with that. Uh it that was late news that came in last week. I sat through a uh a webinar that put on by a private company, but it was people that really knew what they were talking about. So, I've informed the engineers that we're going to go for those things, too. Uh, as you might know by now, Pamela Woods is no longer our finance director. Uh, in my search for and Pam was going to retire. and my search for a competent finance director, we constantly came up with uh without good applications or applicants that had issues that would not have been good for the city of Buouie. I made a two-step decision while thinking about the near future and the distant future. For the near future, I have hired a third party consultant contractor who will be doing our monthly and year-end processes, working with our staff to ensure compliance with the city's financial policies and procedures, coordinating and developing quarterly and annual financial reports, and compliance with governmental accounting, auditing, and financial reporting requirements. Coordinating the annual audit, assist with preparing the city's operating budget, preparing and reviewing journal entries, preparing monthly bank

reconciliations, performing and assisting uh with payroll accounts payable transactions, and performing any related work required. He was available will be available on for on-site visits, but only mostly it's going to be virtual where we'll be using Zoom meetings or telephone calls or whatever. He's pretty close by. He lives on this side of Fort Worth, so uh he's somebody that can be uh be here. He he will be attending council meetings, uh doing monthly check-ins with city staff, and any other meetings on site as we need him. Uh his name is Austin Henderson. He's a CPA and with a company called Advising. Uh he has vast experience working with multiple cities in Texas doing audit work and does has done quite a bit of troubleshooting work with some cities that have needed help. He's got a list of about 25 or 30 cities in Texas that he's done work for. I I was really impressed with his uh abilities and stuff and he's done a lot of helping cities get out of trouble trouble but he's also done a lot of uh audit work. So when we present our accounting uh to the auditor it should be audit audit ready without any problems or question. I've also hired a local person Mr. Robert Johnson who lives here in Buouie. I've known Robert for over 20 years and he he has a degree in accounting from MSU. Robert has done financial reporting, uh, documentation, payroll and accounting system, regulatory compliance, recordkeeping, policy development, administration, employee relation, operation support, incident investigation, uh, and reporting. He he worked here in Buoie for Showya Petroleum which sold

out and when they sold out he lost his position there. He's also worked at CVS pharmacy for Chris Lemon CPA and has done volunteer income tax assistant for the BER program. Uh Robert will be our future finance director in a few years as he becomes familiar with governmental accounting. Robert will begin work next Tuesday and Austin Henry Henderson will also be here next Tuesday. So anyway, got any questions about anything? What's the timeline on the TECQ grant process?

U we'll we have to have the grant in by July the 30th and and by fall we should know something. Okay. And then that one's 100% as well. Uh yeah, the yeah the water development board project is 100% grant. All right. And we I guess as far as what the the other acronyms been asking of us, hey, you need to do this, you need to do that. We still within their timeline? Yeah. Okay. I' I've talked to TCU.

That's who you're referring to. And I've told them that uh and I'm sure that there's a lot of entities in the state that are under order some tq that are doing the same thing we're doing. You know, give us a little time on this stuff. We've done the engineering on it already. We're ready to go, but we want to see if we can get the Texas Water Development Board to pay for it. And they're at total understanding. They couldn't give me any promises, but I said, "Well, I stick my neck out." So, that's where we're at. And then who's going to be in charge of the day-to-day on the finance department as of right now? Robert. Robert will be personnel and all that. Yeah.

Who's going to be handling HR? Because I know Pamela was handling HR. Who's going to handle HR? Robert has done HR before. Uh but I'm looking at some other alternatives because that's kind of been a hit and miss proposition. No privacy. Employ that are afraid to go see HR and things like that. And and for them, I want to and I've already started doing work on on outside HR people that'll build us by, you know, on consulted basis. That's a great idea. Yeah, we've been talking about that for a couple of months probably. So anyway, I'll know something about that. But okay.

Yeah, it just the employees did have not felt like they had anybody they could talk to and when they did they were inside a building with an office with a closed door that nobody could hear talking what they were saying. So we need to fix that. I agree. Good deal. Everybody okay? Yep. If y'all want to know any more about the the two people, feel free to come to office. I'll give you the reason for my decision that Okay. Are they going to be in in town on Tuesday? Can we meet then? Yeah, we could meet.

Yeah. In fact, Robert's official start date is not Tuesday, but I said if you'll hang around and you poke around in the office and you look at the file cabinets and you do all that sort of stuff. Whatever hours you spend, I'll give you off later.

Uh because I want to familiarize yourself. But the Tuesday is uh the first day of our next pay period. So that's his official start date. But he he was here today. He did his physical today. He already done drug testing and everything. So we got him going. So and and uh Austin Henderson will be here Tuesday also. So and I'm sure we'll be hanging around over there mostly, but y'all are welcome to come over there, too. All right, everybody move on. Yep. Good. Sandy and I are fighting a nap over here. So that's what you see now.

Um thought you going I was

um So the next item on the agenda is public comments. As you notice, we have moved the public comments. It's a new thing that the state thinks that we should do. One more thing, they won't tell us how to conduct our meetings now. So we'll move it to the front. I don't think we have anybody here for com do we do we have anybody here for public comments? Okay. So again a state also allows for the public to ask questions when we are on an item. So we really haven't restricted anything. So next item on the agenda is the consent agenda items. The meeting minutes are in there but we we didn't have one end of April. This is so this is all the way back to 14 the April the 14th. and then the right offs are there. So if you have read and you do approve, I would entertain a motion.

So Oh, wait a minute. We got to add a financial statement. You all have your financial statement. Well, as you can look out in the audience and see we don't have anybody here to do financials tonight, but Bert's available if you have some questions. Well, let me just say it this way. I thought we were going to have a finance director here tonight, but she's chosen to leave early. So I I have been through the financial statement. We're doing okay, but I haven't gone through and picked out highlights what thing. So if you can't read it, come say me a moment. But yeah, we're doing good.

Okay. Again, I I will ask for a motion to accept um all four items as presented. Thank you, Shaw. Do I have a second? Second. Sprouls. Hi, Holstone. Hi, Shaw. Hi, and Mcuan. Hi.

Right. All right. The next item we have on the agenda is a young lady named Britney Barnes is wanting to join the community development board. So, um, Cindy has presented her for us to vote on her, um, joining that board. So, I would entertain a motion to allow Britney to join the board. And it's a what, three-year term? Three-ear term. Yeah. So, moved. Wasn't there a song component to the application? I think so. Thank good

second before she gets out of here. And Brent does a second. So Holstein I Sprouls I Mchuan I and Shaw hi. Thank you very much. Thank you Britney. Now you're Thank you. All right. We have a resolution. The Texas Water Development Board says I need to ask y'all permission to ask for free money. Ask for money. Ask for money. I agree. Free money.

And we have to This is It's crazy deal because we have to record the vote if there's any no votes or anything like that. And I thought, guys, you went overboard on this one. You can't imagine how many forms that I've got. I'm I'm building a file, okay, in my on my desktop where I put all the forms that they're required. So it's amazing, but it's going to be worth the effort if we get the grant. So So you can see the document in your um packet. It's not necessary, I think, that we read it out loud. So I would entertain a motion to accept the resolution as presented. So move. Boy, do I have a second? Second,

DJ Shaw. Oh, that was Shaw. Who made it? Second. You made it. Who does it? I'm sorry. I thought TJ did. I thought it was TJ. All right. Shaw. Hi, Holstein. Hi, Sprouls. Hi. And Muin. Absolutely. All right. Great. All right. So,

Katie is with us tonight for us to approve the master parks plan. Um, she's been ill, so let her get up, do her spill, and get her out of here. I won't do too much of a spill um unless y'all absolutely want one. I know Sandy has shared with y'all the parks master plan as part of y'all's packet previously. This has been going through the parks and recreation board for probably the last eight months now. Um the idea is that we want to get this passed and approved tonight so it can be a part of a Texas Parks and Wildlife approval process which has to be submitted by May 31st. Um, overall this is just a guiding document to help tell the city what we need to do with our park system that the city currently has in place, how we need to maintain it, capital and non- capital improvement projects over the next 10 years, so on and so forth. I can go detailed page by page if y'all would like me to. However, I doubt y'all would like that much detail. Um, so please let me know if y'all have any questions regarding this document. I'd be happy to answer them. Has there been any major changes to it since the first iteration?

Uh, the first iteration that I brought to y'all, the biggest change is going to be the tables at the very end of the plan that actually show the capital and non- capital improvement projects that we are suggesting the city start working towards. Other than that, no sir. Goals, objectives, analysis has all remained the same since the last time y'all reviewed this document. And so when we look at these, we're laying this out of things that we have in mind or want to do. Are we obligated to follow to the letter here?

No, sir. None of this is obligation to the letter. All of this is just best practice recommendations from a planning perspective on what the city chooses to either a spend money on or b spend our time on over the coming years. The idea is that this would be used as a guiding document. So when your parks board gets together or say city council or Bert whenever he looks at the budget for the next fiscal year, he's able to sit down and say, "Okay, these are the projects we've been suggested. Do we think we have the funds to go after any of these or do we want to try to go after any grant funding for any of these?" Um, none of this is a the city has to do any of this. However, it is the city understanding that they are making the initiative to have a plan in place to try to continue to improve the park system

and without this there's no grants. Yeah. So, we have to have So, this does have bearing on the grants that we may apply for. That was very

So, the way this works is for Texas Parks and Wildlife specifically for small community grants, which is a maximum of $300,000, you're able to apply without a parks master plan. However, if you want to be eligible for any upwards funding of that, you have to have a parks master plan in place to be able to score well to open that avenue of funding. Of course, it is still very competitive. This does not mean that we will get the funding, but it means that it puts us much higher than a lot of our competitors would be that do not have this document. And then, additionally, this is also a component of the comprehensive planning grant that y'all currently have. We are just checking it off a little prematurely compared to the rest of the document that's still in the writing process currently.

Great. So, so we have to approve this tonight. Um, trying to get back to the beginning of it. So, we I'm going to ask for a an approval from the council for the parks master plan from public management, which we all know we need this in place if we're going to go after that park grant. I'd entertain a motion. I'll make that motion to approve. Do I have a second? Second. Is that TJ? Yes, ma'am. Shaw. I Holstein I

Sprouls I Muan Hi. Thank you so much council. Thank you for all the work that you've done. I know you've done a ton. And I also want to just keep in mind if there is anything that we over time we are still working on the comprehensive plan element. So over time, if there's anything that we're like, "Oh, we would like to see this added or we've heard this or this is something we didn't, you know, think about, we have until we adopt that full comp plan to make edits and amendments and then we can readopt it come that point." We appreciate that. Thank you. Thank you everyone. All right. If the council has nothing else, I'm going to adjourn the meeting at what? 624. 6:24. Thank you. Bravo.

Yes. Absolutely. Next. What's the next planning meeting? Can't do them all. We still need it by the end. What's the next thing on the agenda?