City Council - Regular Meeting

We got 6 o'clock. We'll call this regular meeting of April 13, 2026 at 6:00 to order. Uh Ty, you want to give a prayer? Yes, sir. Father God, we just come to you and we thank you for this day, Lord God. We just thank you for the moisture we had. Lord, we just pray for this city uh those who are hurting and have lost. Uh we just pray that you be with them. Lord God, we just lift up our first responders as they continue to answer the call. It's in your name we pray. Amen.

Amen. To the United States of America, indivisibley and justice for all. flag one and indivisible.

We'll move on to the consent agenda. Approval of the minutes from March 23rd, 26. Make a motion that we approve the consent agenda. Second. Motion. Two seconds. All in favor? I. Any opposed? There are. We'll move on to a regular agenda for public comment. Uh I have a couple things. Chase has a couple things. Um first thing, uh EDC is doing trash clean up this weekend. So, uh I think I've got quite a few people. We do. We've got a sign or as always will.

Yeah. Um, and the new trailers that we bought for trash are going to be around town to help with that, facilitating clean up so they can run them straight out to the dump afterwards. Um, are we making available like our little gators and all that stuff for cleanup? All that anything I can possibly think of trying to get out there.

Um, somebody asked me about uh golf cart new TV permits. first week, actually first days, we've had 10 get uh their inspection done and registered. So, we have 10 permitted side by sides and golf carts around town. And um this is just kind of FYI, whoever's listening out in the crowd, uh the pool, we have five lifeguard applications right now. So, and we need 13. There's a chance that we will not have a pool if we don't get more lifeguards. So, anybody out there knows anybody tell them to come apply.

We find a manager. Not 100% yet. We're talking somebody right now that may be interested in doing it. I know one might. Okay. Oh, you do? doesn't send them our way. Training starts this weekend. Yes, this weekend and next week and lifeguard training is this weekend and weekend. So,

we've flyers to all the schools in the area. Um mentioned on the radio, put it on Facebook. She hadn't announced at the school this morning. Like I say, we used to I used to have Gilbert go to the school and do a you know recruitment. Yeah, we used to we could get 19 20 kids for that easy job. We struggled last year. We were really struggling this year. So

JJ and mayor, if I could say also on that uh cleanup on Saturday, we've got five zones and this is a partnership between the chamber and the EDC to do this.

Mr. Mayor, council members, uh good evening. I just wanted to bring our two newest uh graduates of the police academy to you. Uh I wanted I think it's a good opportunity for them to get to know you and for you to get to know them. So I'm just going to give them a little bit a brief moment to introduce themselves and just talk to you guys from Afternoon everybody. Uh my name is Caesar Enriquez. I'm 21 years old. I'm originally from Herford, Texas. Moved down here. Got the opportunity to go to the police academy. Uh, thank you Jace and thank you our chief Hughes. I'm very excited to serve this community and be a part of it. Thank you'all. Good to have you.

Cody May, 24 years old, originally from Vega, Texas. Um, got the same opportunity that Caesar was given. Very, very grateful for it. I'd like to thank you, council members, for allowing this to happen, mayor and city manager. Thank you guys. So, what I'll say is they they've officially they had their first week last week. Uh they started their official FTO program being on the streets on Friday. I know after talking to them both they had a very interesting weekend. Uh things are warming up. So, so they've been getting pretty busy. So, uh I will say that we have been sending them to the Texoma Regional Police Academy out of Sherman. Uh and we've had a lot of really good luck. I'm I'm very appreciative of that program. But I just want to reiterate what uh what they said. Thank you to to the city manager for uh the homegrown program to to Mr. Mayor and to the council members. Uh they're not beating down the door like they used to when I first got into this business. Uh people are applying 35 people deep for one position and they're not beating down the door. So the opportunity to go get to recruit and get to build them up and and they start them in our program. They're not coming in with any bad habits, anything like that. Uh so we're appreciative of that and we're appreciative of the support. So, we only have one opening uh left. Uh we've got some applications on that and so hopefully we'll be uh we'll be at full strength very soon. That's that's our hope and our desire.

Welcome aboard, guys. Yep. Thank you. Glad to have you.

And then I have one more thing for you. Uh I wanted to let the council know that we have a new website. The police department does. It's uh separate from the from the city's website. It's dowhartpd.com. So, this is something that Chief Hughes has been working on for about the last six months, uh, trying to get it up and off the ground. I think it is a very good website. We have put a lot of information and a lot of work into this website. Uh, some of the things that I want to highlight for you all and especially the citizens that are here tonight and some of the citizens that are watching are just some of the the the information that we have on the program. So under our services tab there, one of the biggest things is our vacation and vacant house watch. If you'll open that up, please. So this is an opportunity for the citizens if they're going to be out of town uh and they're going to be gone for an extended per not even an exper extended period of time. If they're going up to Red River for the weekend, we encourage them to fill out this. It lets us know and it sends us an an email directly letting us know that somebody's going to be out of town. it has the opportunity to let us know if somebody's supposed to be in their house feeding cats, dogs, whatever, so on so forth. Uh, but it's that's one of the highlights of our pro of of our website. There's a lot of different information on there. Another thing on there is our our recruitment. Uh, there's a tab in there for our recruitment. So, folks can go on there specifically for like the homegrown program uh and where they can go in there, get information, they know about the job, they learn about uh the department itself. And so it's it's it's something that we just want to make sure we're going to push it out. We've pushed it out on our Facebook. I know some of the media stations out of Amarillo have helped us to share that information, but it is very informative. I just I encourage everybody, all of our citizens, our council members, please go through there, help us spread the word because there's a lot that can be done through this program or if you have a compliment on an officer, if you have a complaint on an officer, all of that can be done through our website.

Is there a place like you give tips? So we we are starting a you're talking about like a tip for a crime crime. Yeah. Yes. So we are monetary.

We've been having Oh, I can tell you this to it's kind of a two-part question. I'll answer. Number one is the Doward area crimes stoppers program was run by the sheriff's office uh at one point. They have made a decision that they are no longer going to be doing that. uh Chief Hughes and I back in probably November were having conversations with board members that are still currently on that board because this is a program they want to continue. So we have identified somebody within our office who will be the crimes stoppers coordinator that's required by the state. Uh we're going to get licensed. We're going to do all that. We're going to run that outside out of the police department. Uh and so there is a link to the Dowhart Crimestoppers right there. When we get that program up and running, I've been talking to Dean Graham who's going to be on that board. When that program gets off of the ground, we will we will add the link to that and you will be able to go directly to their website to submit the anonymous tips.

Thank you. All right. Thank you guys so much for everything you do for our our department. We appreciate it a lot. Thank you.

We'll move on to item two. discuss act upon scheduling a public hearing for April 27th, 2026 at 6 PM for the second reading of ordinance 20264 authorizing the issuance of a special use permit allowing manufactured home be located 8 Milbour subdivisions section 20 of section 31 block 48 HTNC RRO city of Delhard Harley County Texas from from R3 residential special use.

Okay. Yeah, that's all we're doing on number two is voting on setting the public hearing and then number three will actually be the first reading of that. We kind of do things backwards just how timing falls and to make it work better. Make a motion we schedule public hearing for April 27th, 2026 at 6 p.m. on the second reading ordinance 2026-04. Second motion and second. All in favor?

Any opposed? Adam three. Discuss or act upon ordinance 20264 first reading. Ordinance of city of Delhart, Texas authorizing issuance of special use permit allowing a manufactured home to be located lot 8 Milbourne substance subdivision subdivision 20 section 31 block 48 HTNC railroad uh city of Dart Harley County Texas from R3 to resident or special use. So, this is going to be a brand new manufactured home that's come in. Um, we did have this one presented to planning and zoning once before, but we had to wait it out. It ended up being changed um due to the application phase. Someone else, the person who attempted ended up moving. So, the remaining person decided to continue on with the process. It was a a relationship situation. Uh, the remaining person decided to continue on and to keep moving forward with the procedure. So, um, we did have some changes in the plat. The whole property that's set there needed to be replplatted and separated in order for us to reszone this to special use. Um, we we will be reszoning just the east side of this property. I'm not sure if you guys were able to see the the land survey. Um, by the way, everything's been approved through planning and zoning to be pushed through you guys. So, everything is ready to go. Setbacks are met and um, this will be a brand new one. So coming off of 13th Street.

Have any questions? I'll entertain a motion. Motion that we approve the first reading of ordinance 2026-04. Second. Motion second. All in favor? Any opposed? All right. On to item four. Discuss or act upon adopting resolution 202608 resolution of city council Dart of Texas approving a strategic plan Dart Texas 2026 to 2031 providing for an effective date.

Good evening mayor and councel. Um we've been working on the strategic plan with the board in economic development and a strategic planning um group uh volunteers that uh help finalize it um and uh kind of curate it. This is a long range road map for the growth investment and service priorities of Dowart. We've also identified uh strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats um in five priority categories within the strategic plan. Um this strategic plan is different from a comprehensive plan. So comprehensive plan is uh is focused more broadly on long-term growth, housing infrastructure development, so forth, while this plan is centered on implementation and priority setting. Um, I'm going to assume that you guys have had opportunities to kind of peruse through it and I'll answer any questions you may have.

It looks good. It's clear road map. Okay. Motion. Yes. Make a motion that we adopt resolution 2026-08. Second. Motion second. No further discussion. All in favor? I I

Any opposed? All right. Move on to item five. Discuss or act upon resolution 202609, a resolution of the city of Delhard, Texas, responding to the application of Atmas Energy Corporation, West Texas division to increase rates under the gas reliability infrastructure program suspending the effective date of this rate application for 45 days determining at the meeting in which resolution was adopted complied with the Texas Open Meetings Act. making such other findings provision related subject and declaring an effective date. Uh yes sir. This is just another grip flying of Atlas Energy and all we are saying tonight is that we want to suspend their rates for another 45 days while they work through um their what what's the word I'm looking for this study in Austin where they have to go through every five five or so years with a PU. I'm drawing a blank.

Public utility commission. Yeah. But they they call it something and I can't remember. I'm sorry. Where they go through every rate increase that they're proposing to make sure it's fair and just. Um this is another thing that we're part of that of that steering committee. And you know, as you're part of these steering committees, you go in with love, Amarillo, and these bigger cities. So you're not set out on an island alone where they can really harm you. So, yeah. And they split the legal fees. Yes. Yeah. Are we still using Herrera? Okay. Oh my god. Make a motion that we adopt resolution 2026-09.

Second. Have a motion, a second. Any further discussion? All in favor? Any opposed? All right. Move on to item six. Discuss or act upon ordinance 20 2605 first reading ordinance city of Delhart, Texas. Amending chapter 8 buildings and structures by adding a new article uh vacant building registration regulating vacant buildings within the city limits. providing a penalty clause, repealing all conflicts ordinance, providing a severability clause, providing a severability for publication, and providing for an effective date.

Good evening, mayor and council. This vacant building registry uh ordinance. Um it's designed to regulate vacant buildings uh by reducing blight, safety risk, nuisent nuisance conditions, and criminal activity within these these buildings. Um what this does basically is it requires the owners of the vacant buildings to register annually with the city submitting detailed ownership and property information providing proof of tax payment and insurance and maintaining a current registration certificate. Uh the registration fee is set on a per square foot basis and um there's also penalties if they're not actively marketing the the building. Um just preliminary preliminarily going through the community. Uh we've identified 41 um vacant homes. Uh one of which is being marketed for sale, but it's not listed on MLS list listings. And then 18 commercial buildings, two of which are are um being actively marketed out of those 18 vacant uh buildings. Um, I'll answer any questions that you may have.

This I thought this was just for commercial buildings. I believe it's for commercial and revenue. Inspect building.

Yeah. Which should cover It should cover boats. Need to table this until wording is correct. I mean, uh, I was just under the impression that this was for for commercial only. Is that kind of going into number seven? This for the homes.

Yeah, it just says vacant buildings in it. There's buildings and structures. Will you go back and revisit the language on that? Make a motion that we table this. Second. Have a motion. a second to table this. Any further discussion? I let's add one thing to it. If we're doing this, we're really going to have to look at budget because if you're talking about

commercial is a wholly different animal than and we're talking demolition, we're going to have to really as it costs a lot of money to tear things down. Yes.

Okay. Motion to second. All in favor? I. Any oppose? All right. Now, we'll move on to item seven. Discuss or act upon ordinance 2026 06 first reading ordinance of city of Dart, Texas, repealing and replacing chapter 8 building and structures. Dangerous buildings and structures. Hereby adopting a new chapter 8 buildings and structures. Dangerous building and structures section 8 71 through 890. Just said code regulating substandard buildings and other structures. Establishing standards for all buildings and structures. Providing for declaration of substandard buildings structures. Public nuisances. Providing notice to property owners, occupants, mortgages, lean holders. Substandard buildings structured. Providing for public hearing on the substandard billing for structure. Providing for abatement of nuisances. Providing recovery of costs. Providing a penalty clause. Providing for judicial review. providing for contamination of law matters, providing a severability clause, providing for publication and caption hereof, and providing for an effective date. That's a mouthful. No,

to say sum all that up is um we've heard from the community um that we have some dilapidated this is this is focused really on residential structures that kind of falls under the health and safety codes stuff like that that we are deeming that they're in an unlivable state no matter what you do. Um Lyanna can help me with this, but it was really there's a very convoluted path in the old ordinance to get a hold of these structures and basically tear them down because the the structures that we are we are really focusing on are the structures that are beyond the point of repair. and with this process that that uh she's worked with the city attorney, city of canyons using uh a form of this and the city of Pampa are using a form of this and have a have had a lot of success in this. Um Lyanna kind of came up with a on the first page before the actual ordinance itself of kind of how all this is going to work. She's going to kind of walk us through and kind of I think she has an example of a home that we're working on that we've been working on the last nine months that we just can't get taken care of because our current route requires us going in front of a district judge and that kind of stuff. Whereas if we can streamline the process, have some public hearings comes before y'all, we can make the decision as then remove the structure

for that example that he just gave. I'm going to give you all kind of the example of what I've been working on and you know you guys are going to see exactly what we're talking about. Thank you. Okay.

So, so with this one here, I've been working on this one as of June 7th of 2024. What got me into this one here was going to be an issue um that the police department had to work with. Um there was stolen items that were placed inside um that they detected inside which got them the warrant to enter. When they entered I was able to come in is when Chief Hughes called me in to start doing my investigation per code which was electrical was not on. Um water utilities haven't been on since April of 2023. And per our ordinance, it does state running water, electrical, in order for somebody to reside there has to have those things per our ordinance. They can't live without it. Becomes a nuisance when they're using the bathroom or preferably in this situation, they were using the bathroom in the back of the home. So, um, we did end up going in. I went in and did my thorough investigation. It was hard for me to get through. I do have plenty of pictures I'd love to show y'all, but, um, it was quite a bit. Um, we ended up uh telling them that they could not enter unless it was up to code, brought up to code of what we had for our 2015 codes at that moment. Um, I did do in my own little investigations and my inspections, I was keeping up with at the time Ben Brick. Turns out he was deceased. Um, after he passed, the person who was living there um, ended up I have to go through the whole process again once it changes ownership. So, we started over. um we were not getting any compliance. Um I worked with her all up until November of 2025. So I gave her plenty of time to kind of get situated where we could at least go in and kind

of gave her some kind of a routine that she could probably try to help herself to to help us get her into compliance with code. Um it was unsuccessful. Um, we then started getting a lot more issues where it was becoming a nuisance around the neighbor, surrounding neighbors. People were calling in, people were coming in riding bikes late at night, people were just a lot of traffic. Um, we have had a drive by shooting there. Um, windows were right before the inspection was complete for me to do, windows were shot out. So, it just set her back for the most part. I gave her some more time for her to situate those. Um, so that's just kind of a little run down with this one. Normally, we gain compliance with property owners, but they'll either sell the property or they'll get it up into compliance with code. This one is an example that we're probably going to end up having to um place a lean on the property if we end up demoing. Um, the plumbing has been ripped up. The roof, as you see, has been I'm not sure if they tried to separate. It was a duplex at one time. I believe they tried to separate to try to utilize one part as a homestead, which in the state of Texas, a homestead, you could do whatever you want. But in this situation, it's considered a duplex. So therefore, you have to get a contractor to do any type of work inside uh a duplex, multif family, whichever the case is, as long a rental property. Um so yeah um this is going to be kind of where this ordinance takes in. This ordinance is going to allow us to not only stray away from going through the district court. It gives us to present it to you guys where you guys make that decision as in yes I we we deem this is going to be a dilapidated unsafe structure for for human you know habitation for people to live in. Um,

we're not I I know that there was a a time that they tried to say city was trying to come in and take my home. That's not what I'm trying to do. That's not what I've I've tried to give her solutions and kind of give her guidance and tried to help her get where she needs to to get this house into compliance, but it's just not working. The funding for her is not there. Um, it it's she's had a few people wanting to buy, but I don't think the the issues with the home is just too much. So, if we were to adopt this, that would just help us go through the process a little bit more easier where we're removing the district courts. We present it to council um and we still have to go through the whole process with you guys where we present inspections, sorts of that. So, Pampa utilizes this. They've had quite a few dilapidated homes that have been removed. And um I do speak with somebody that's that works there who has said it's just the easiest way to go when uh when it's presented to council. Um our city attorney is very familiar with this. So the legal process is going to be more of we issue warrants. We still have to do the proper procedures to enter obviously um issu is issuing the warrants and making sure we take a complete investigation before we do any of these demos. So it's just more of us presenting to you. police department. I mean, they're familiar with usually the houses that come before, you know, in these situations and stuff like that. I mean, I think it's a good way for these two to get together and identify some of these houses that we need to take care of. And u you ever get your money back? Probably not. But it does help the communities that these houses are in. So, and we're just looking for a more streamlined way of getting this done because like you said, we only been working on that one

out since 20124 and we just can't get anywhere.

I did suggest um it's a instead of contracting out for demo, I mean, for example, we're going to use 10 $10,000 for example to contract G&G to come and demo a house. If we utilize city personnel, we would be eliminating some of that budget for the most part. I mean, for the hourly pay, we still get our money back if we do that 10% lean along with what we already pay our city employees to demo that. So, I mean, we would be saving along the lines of that, maybe accumulating some sort of revenue for code along the way. Um, plus that 10% interest. I mean, it's kind of a talk that maybe we could do. just suggestions. I think it's a good idea, but if we have the contract out, like the mayor had mentioned, it's the budgeting that's going to get us. So,

we have the equipment for doing that kind of stuff. Oh, yeah. for the most part most time the houses that you see that fall into this and L kind of and I kind of talked about that if it say if it's a big old two-story house yeah we'd probably have to figure that out but most structures I've seen over my time yeah city crews can handle it and I mean if we had to go rent an excavator we don't run an excavator but other than that we have equip it for the most part I mean you can do it with a a see them done with just a a loader in the back because usually once you pull one board it kind of falls per

it's still going to be a long drawn out process no matter what. Yes. Just if it just helps them get along the way. How many left the houses actually have people living there? Um this one here we've kind of got rid of one on the north end. We had um 419 uh or Omaha, Mr. or Miss Pacheo's home. That's gone. Um I feel like the ones that are becoming an issue were that one and then this one here. And we do have one on the north end that's becoming an issue now, which is the school. Um

which echoes is one of the one of the ones you got taken care of now. We not the city. So they ended up selling um and someone else brought bought the property and then demoed it. So um the neighbor to Pacheco's property is the one who bought that. So again, this comes back where we start hitting these properties and they end up wanting to sell because it's easier for them to sell, take a little bit of money from what they're given and they go on about their way and then someone else comes in and takes care of the problem.

So this ordinance would currently affect three homes. This one, well, one's already gone. So, this one right here will affect this one, plus our burnt homes here. We've had so many burnt homes here and areas where this will also take care of that because I've worked on two so far of the burnt homes and I'm not even getting an answer back. So, the one on chestnut that we just cleaned up, you had to work on that one to get Yep.

You had to get that one done and he ended up having an insurance issue was what kind of kept him from pushing forward on that one. insurance was kind of involved with that one. So, we had to wait for that one, but finally they got the insurance paid out. Um, they contracted G&G and they got it removed. So, we've been getting a lot of compliance. I feel there's just a couple that I'm not getting any compliance at all. So, is there any push back to this ordinance? I don't think for the most part you're going to have push back from the property owners themselves, but the people within that neighborhood. I don't I don't think so at all just because most of the time they're the ones calling us going,

"Hey, you got to do something about this." I see new faces in here. I just know somebody's in here opposing this. Most of the citizens are in favor of getting I think it's a very slippery slope. like you have to have checks and balances through this whole processes. Like I know we're supposed to have public hearings, then y'all go do your thing, then you bring it to council. But I think it's a very slippery slope whenever you start almost claiming imminent domain and start taking away properties. I think that as a council that is a very big long drawn out takes a process. That's a checklist. I believe we submitted with you guys. There's a checklist that we think as accountants it's a slippery slope when you start taking away homes. Yes, but I understand it's needed. It is.

I get that. I just It's one of those and technically the city still doesn't own the property itself. The the property owners do, but but I know you're saying property rights. Yeah, don't get me wrong. Yeah, it's it's an abatement of a nuisance. Do you have some ma'am?

I do. The house next door to me on the east was empty for years and years and years until somebody was giving them a hard time. I mean, Eric and I tried to buy it. I mean, it and it just for years and years and years sat there empty. Um, as you well know, events happened in those in houses and until the city started giving them a hard time that property was just going to stay. So, I think you're going to see that your citizens are going to support the land owners are going to push back because it's costing them money. But I think this is a good thing that I would like to see. I would support this

if I may. the if we leave too many of these houses, especially dilapitated ones that we go into the winter and things like that, that's when we start finding open doors at night and things like that. Find people inside these houses. It's not uncommon for us to go in these houses, drug personality thrown out throughout the home. Uh it's not uncommon for us there to be stolen property, things like that. So, I will tell you from the police department standpoint is we're we're pretty acutely aware of these homes that are that are nuisances. It's not folks that are taking care of their property, things like they're compliant with homes that are vacant, things like that. They fall apart and people unfortunately crooks are they're pretty they're not smart all the time, but they they do have a bright moment every now and then and they'll notice these houses been vacant and they're dilapitated. they start setting up shop and then what that creates is as we start getting into the colder months naturally they start lighting a fire to try to stay warm and things like that just it it it's a compounding problem over and over again. So police department standpoint we certainly are in favor of trying to eliminate or at least reduce uh the probability of that happening. Any further questions? Not. I'll entertain a motion.

Motion. Would we accept ordinance 2026-06? Second. Motion and second to approve first reading. All in favor? Any opposed?

Motion. Second. Motion. Second. All in favor? We are in Benny.