City Council - Regular Meeting

I'll get 6 o'clock. We'll call this meeting to order on June 22nd, 6 p.m. Terry, you want to lead us in prayer?

Let's pray. Father, we thank you for all your blessings. We thank you for the rain that we've received. That's for more rain. And ask you to just be with the families in Dallhart, Texas that are going through trials and sickness right now. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen.

Well, move on to the consent agenda.

Approval of the minutes from July 8th and approval of May financials and bills.

Uh, about three quarters of the way through the year and, uh, in the financial department. We're looking good. We're holding pace to where we need to be. Uh, budget is well on its way. Should be everything goes as planned. I'm hoping that first meeting in July, we'll kind of have a workshop. I kind of tell you where I think we're going to stay in next year and kind of what my ideas are for the budget. But we've already had two rounds of staff budget meetings with each department head and stuff like that. So a lot of it just depends on where evaluations and stuff shake out. So I'll work it out.

Make a motion we approve the consent agenda and the financials. Second.

I have a motion and a second. Any further discussion? Mayor Mrakas, All in favor. Mayor Mrakas, Any opposed. Mayor Mrakas, or. Mayor Mrakas, move on to. Mayor Mrakas, The. Mayor Mrakas, Public comment yeah a lot of public. Mayor Mrakas, Deeds I got a public comment.

Mayor Mrakas, Yes, sir, my seven year old granddaughter was eating with me the other day and said, are you on city council. said yeah why she goes I went to the splash pad last week and she hit the little thingy when she hits the thingy one of them works but the other thingy doesn't work I said why are you telling me she goes so you can get it fixed did you write that down there's a thingy that's the thingy works the other one doesn't so on the splash pad fix the thingy she's in my ward so

we got a direct call we were actually out there it was a tuesday when i was out there with tyler looking at that and there was and you didn't think four more kids and a mom out there and today she said you got a meeting today i said yeah she's gonna you're gonna deal with it and i said yes so you think this is no well it says you want you want to deal with it right there fix the thingy that's right check the thingy gilbert in the morning Okay, we'll move on to item two, public hearing. Conduct public hearing on ordinance 20-2607, authorizing an issuance of special use permit allowing a manufactured home to be located at lot 24, block 3, Kelly Hill Division, city of Dalham County, Texas, from R3 Residential Special Use.

Make a motion that we open the public hearing for ordinance 20-26-07. Second.

A motion a 2nd, all in favor. Okay. Now we're open. Okay.

Um, this is the 1 we talked about. Uh, last meeting and.

Nothing's changed right thing has changed on this 1. everything's still good. Setbacks are good. Um, it's going to be a new manufactured home coming in an empty lot. Um, so everything is good to go on this 1.

2026 model.

Move to close public hearing on ordinance 2026-07. Second.

I have a motion and a couple of seconds. Any further discussion? All in favor?

Aye.

All opposed? We are closed. One to item three. Discuss or act upon second reading ordinance 20-26-07 to rezone a lot 24 block 3, Kelly Hill Division, City of Delhart, Dowland County, Texas from R3 residential special use for the purpose of placing a manufactured home 109 Oceola Avenue. This is the one which said the public hearing on.

Make a motion that we accept the second reading ordinance 2026-07. Second.

Motion and second. Any further discussion? All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed? There are none. Okay. Item four. Public hearing. Conduct public hearing on ordinance 2026-08 authorizing instruments of special use. Permit allowing a manufactured home to be located on lot one, block 91, original downside, city of Delhart, Delham County, Texas, from R3 Residential Special Use.

Is there a motion? I make a motion that we open the public hearing for ordinance 2026.08. Second. Motion and second. Any further discussion?

All in favor? Any opposed? There aren't any. We are open.

So 202 Maple. Um, we didn't have any issues with this 1. this was 1 that we caught. As they had already set this 1 that they didn't know the procedures and the people who I believe this was Clayton homes. They had a brand new person who had come in that was helping these, these individuals who also didn't know the city ordinance on how we did for manufacturing homes to come into the city. So we were able to catch this 1 in time. And since then, they've been following the procedures. So that's where we're at here. They made sure everything was turned in and did everything the right way.

So. Is it also a new 1? And this is the 1 that I didn't make the call when Clayton discovered that they said they would remove it, but. Leave it, don't look anything up.

So we go through the process.

And it came motion.

Move that we close public hearing.

Motion second. Any further discussion? All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? There aren't any. We're closed. Move on to item five, discuss our act one. second reading of ordinance 20 2608 to rezone lot one block 91 original town set city of delhart elm county texas from r3 residential special use for the purpose of placing your manufactured home 202 maple make a motion we accept the second reading of ordinance 2026-08 second have a motion a second any further discussion all in favor all right Move on to item six, discuss Center Act Ordinance 202605, first reading ordinance of the City of Delaware, Texas, amending chapter eight, buildings and structures by adding a new article, a vacant commercial building registration, regulating vacant commercial buildings within the city, providing penalty clause, repealing all conflicting ordinances, providing a severability clause for publication, and providing for an effective date.

Good evening mayor and council. This is a ordinance that I brought to you a couple months ago that just had buildings instead of commercial buildings. So we've actually changed the ordinance to delineate commercial from residential structures for commercial only. This ordinance would require owners of vacant commercial buildings to register annually with the city. Submitting detailed ownership and property information, providing proof of tax payments and insurance and maintaining a current registration certificate. This is on vacant buildings, vacant commercial buildings anywhere within the city. It'll set a registration fee of a nickel 5 cents per square foot annually with limited refund provisions if registration ends early or no inspection occurs. It also requires owners to designate an emergency contact who can respond within 1 hour and to allow city inspections of the building. It also mandates a 1Million dollar liability insurance naming the city as an additional insured and requires ongoing proof of coverage. It also requires a vacant commercial building plan, covering maintenance, security code, compliance, monitoring and mitigation of neighborhood impacts with weekly owner inspections required. gives the building official authority to issue, deny, revoke, or reinstate registrations with limited appeal rights to the Board of Adjustments. It provides that violations are subject to daily penalties under the city's general penalty provisions, and the ordinance is set for first and final readings in April of 2026. In places like Dalhart, even with a few empty rundown buildings, they can stand out so we don't have the luxury of hiding blight like bigger cities do. And this can affect how the whole community looks and feels. A vacant building registry ordinance would also help to keep the city on track or keep the city Allow the city to keep track of these buildings and make sure owners take responsibility and address problems before they get worse while also protecting property values and supporting ongoing efforts to keep down hard attractive for residents businesses and future investments. I'll answer any questions that you may have.

Add a couple things to him. I mean, this kind of goes hand in hand with the one we did with residential structures where we can, it helps us. I mean. There's nothing that is more disheartening in a small town than you drive around and you see these. Older buildings that are just falling apart that nobody's going to do anything with. I mean, I hate to say that we're trying to force these owners hands, but in a way we kind of are. Keep your buildings up, get rid of them, do something with them instead of just deteriorating over time. I mean, we had one in my old city where it collapsed in the middle of the square and it's just not a good thing. And if we can put some things in place to kind of hold these owners accountable for upkeep and stuff, I mean, I don't think it's a horrible idea.

Well, it gives us, you know, I know three locations that we've had fires. They're all collapsed and they're sitting on the middle of the property, but nobody's cleaned them up. And that gives code enforcement the ability to do some more. Has our attorney reviewed this for the penalties?

Yes. He's the one who's actually drafted it.

That's all I wanted to know was to make sure that we have a number. Do we have a number of 15?

We've got quite a few in the city. Yes. I think when I retired, we still had 90.

And we're at some point needed something.

Does this include that 1 over there on the side that school part that burned down.

Would that include that it'll include any vacant building within the city?

Yeah.

Who owns that making commercial building?

I don't know. It's top of my head.

It's not vacant. People are limited.

they're looking because they're tearing down the part that bar no terry berg so just i thought the cafeteria looney got that did he not get that i have no idea yeah i think they're cleaning it up it's still pretty much a mess over there yes yeah but remind me these were together and then we and why did we kick this one down the road it didn't say commercial commercial and this it does go hand in hand with our residential but they're just some different I know it's mechanisms because residential is a little bit different. I don't, I don't ever want it to seem like we as the city are trying to go in and take somebody's home.

Yes, sir. Okay. Um, we accept ordinance 2026 national file.

Now a motion and a second to accept the first reading. Any further discussion? All in favor? Any opposed? There are.

OK, we'll move on to item 7.

Discuss and consider adoption of resolution 202616, resolution authorizing an application for financial assistance from the Texas Water Development Board.

Yes, sir. This is kind of a funding mechanism that goes through the state every year. We haven't applied in the last couple of years. The engineers and I have talked. This is the first step just to give permission that we are going to file an application. It doesn't say it doesn't hold us to any financial obligation whatsoever. On the resolution, it says seeking assistance not to exceed $10 million. And $10 million will help. our thought is it would be a major uh wastewater upgrade to our system along with some new water and sewer lines to go in uh place if we are accepted but we'll see a lot of that stuff is um correct me if i'm wrong mr mayor but when you get these it's kind of a matching deal it's almost that 10 million could turn into 30 million Uh, if you want to put up that much money, so we kind of went big, it can always be scaled back to to meet your needs. So. That's this is just the 1st step in it.

And it's a statewide revolving fund, so. It's a competitive statewide.

Make a motion that we adopt resolution 2026-16. A motion and a second.

Any further discussion? All in favor?

All right.

Any opposed? All right. Move on to item eight, discuss and act upon the formation of a multi-jurisdictional tech committee.

Yes, sirs. There was an issue. Well, for some of the, you don't know, uh, the city down in Hartley County do, uh, share some networks and there was an issue where possibly a network was corrupted. It wasn't, but it's okay. And we kind of kicked around the idea about anytime anybody wants to hook up, change any of the security parameters that are in place right now. This committee consisting of the city manager for the city, the county judge for Delham County, and the Hartley County judge all have to sign off on this before any security measures can be changed or anybody's allowed to hook up to this network. It's just an extra layer of security.

I think it mainly deals with the jail and law enforcement.

Yes.

Because they all have access to. Yes. I move that we form a multi-jurisdictional tech committee.

Second. I have a motion and a second. Any further discussion? All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed? Aye. I don't know. Discuss and act upon repairs at the wastewater treatment plant.

Um, yes, you know, this is something that we, uh, we did budget for some improvements in the wastewater plant. Uh, it is an aging facility. We are. I want to say stick a Band-Aid on something, but there's some things that need to be repaired, and this is just kind of the first step. I asked Daniel to kind of come help walk us through. The total amount for repairs that are going to be needed are $127,232. We did kind of wait until later in the year when we made sure we did have the funds to cover this repair.

Daniel, can you talk about the repair itself? It's going to be Kenneth's Health Farm. There's three rolls that need to be replaced. And also, we have one sludge pump right now. We've had only one pump for a very long time. When it was down, we couldn't press. I'd like to replace the old pump and have two running pumps in there.

And what?

The pressed one. OK. Sludge pumps.

Is it those long? The cylinder ones on the floor? Yeah. There was just two of them in there, weren't there? We only have one. We built one one time.

We have one functioning right now. And we need, it's designed for two. We need two. And the pump itself is $67,398. And the press parts, rollers, are another $56,334. we're helping with the labor we also got a quote from an in-town individual the labor itself is thirty thirty five hundred dollars this isn't a really want they have to need to to help extend the life of our plant i mean because i think i think a lot of you are going to be shocked because with that Grant, I don't want to call it a grant, but from the Texas Water Development Board, one of the things up in there, it goes, put me a new price for a brand new plant. And I think it's just, it's going to be shocking to a lot of people when they see that price tag. But if we can extend the life of our plant with some maintenance, it'll help.

It'll help. I think all of y'all took the tour out there. A lot of these are in that felt-fresh room.

Yeah. We're pressing right now.

Yeah, I mean, and they have a generally a 20 year lab and we're there, but you can extend the life of them and get a few more really good years out of them eventually. But we're looking in the next five, seven years that like we've talked about, we're going to build a new plant, or we're going to spend a few more million to retrofit and upgrade this one to only extend the life another 10 years of it.

Have you got both trickling workers working now? No. Still just got one. That's... One of the things you've got to be fixing.

Yeah, we've got to, yeah. We're trying to fix these as funds. When we come up and we were here, we rotated those. Yeah. So that you can maintain one. But one has been running for, the same one's been running for how long?

Did you all ever get that valve? Yeah, a couple years. Did you get that valve changed?

No, they need a new valve fixed at once.

It's real deep, ain't it? Yeah.

15 points it's only just it wants i think that there's these what is our capacity in there what can we add still 50 percent down here okay dennis has mentioned that once you reach like 65 70 percent you have to make plans for a new plant that will upgrade your but i guess we're okay the state will say you're licensed for 1.5 million but you're not users you can actually run you're still running about eight nine hundred thousand through it make a motion that we approve the repairs at the wastewater treatment plant second no motion the second for the discussion all in favor aye any opposed no right now Move on to item 10, discussion on Texas health benefit insurance coverage for the 2026-27 fiscal year.

Yes, it's that time of year that we have to sign off on next year's health coverage. We were lucky, and I don't want my colleagues out there that are listening. We were hit with zero price increase this year, and I think we're the only ones that I've heard of so far. Same plan, same coverage as we had with zero increase.

You want to talk more about that? So they did also add in some ancillary coverages for our employees that they're able to choose from. I mean, that's at the employee's cost, but they're now offering accident, hospital indemnity, volunteer critical illness, different coverages, kind of like what AFLAC used to do. which a couple of employees kind of switched from I-flat to different companies in the last year. We've had like three different companies come. So that's another additional that they're adding as an option for employees. They did say in their letter that health care costs across Texas and the nation were rising at levels never seen in our generation. So they've come up with different things for employees like green imaging, the lantern surgical care, which is another benefit for the employees. If they ever have surgery, they can call lantern, get it set up, and they actually can get money while they go have their surgery. It'll help pay for stays, travel, whatever. But we were lucky. um report that they pull we didn't have as many high chronic claims as what we've seen in the past so and we've had quite a few of those that have been here remember that every time you work here that had the the more chronic illnesses so we were very fortunate to not see anything increase so it's still the 90608 from point only and then dental and vision is the same uh general uh yeah and the vision is 1258. so we still offer that basic life and accidental that the dismemberment for each employee also there's one bit of good news that we've got reselling

Is that because we moved it up so much last year? That we covered so much last year that this year just caught up?

The rate increase is based off of your employees that you've got, their tenure, and then like your cost, your medical cost that is actually having to be paid for. So any major procedures.

Claims throughout the year.

Yeah. Yeah. Your claims is one of your biggest things that will determine whether you have an increase or not. A whole lot with the health insurance on employees, this year, and it was also explained to me to anybody who goes to the doctor and does like the glp one shots. Those are like really hard on our insurance, but we haven't had.

No, we like our people that we're good with it.

it's cheaper it's actually cheaper for them to go get.

yeah it is, and I mean it helps with their insurance costs to not go up to put it on your insurance.

I move that we accept Texas Health Benefits insurance coverage for the 2026-2027 year. Second.

Motion second. Any further discussion? All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed? All right. Presentation on the TxDOT right-of-way beautification program.

Yeah, Sean's going to kind of get with this. This is a EDC project that will kind of run in conjunction with the safe.

city kind of has to sign off on a few things on this uh sean took the presentation over it so tonight's just the presentation on the 13th i'll be bringing the resolution to be able to move forward with texdot um i want to talk about the texdot right-of-way project it's not just a landscaping project it's an actual economic development strategy Our highway corridors 87, 54 and 385 are the front doors to the city. This is the first impression that a lot of people get of the community. We're trying to get them to get off the corridors filter into the community. But if we can't get them off the corridors, because first impression is not not the best. Then that that affects everyday spending and as we've seen ourselves tax decrease year over year for the last few years. So, part of it is not because traffic counts have reduced traffic counts have actually increased over the years. It's getting people to that comfortable feeling of of wanting to stop and spend some money dive a little bit deeper into the community. and get off those corridors rather than just pass on through and go to the next community. Cleaner, more intentional corridor can support fuel stops, restaurants, hotels, retail, tourism, downtown activity, and visits to places like Rita Blanca Lake. It also matters for industry, retail, housing, and population growth companies, site, selectors, developers, and future residents notice whether a community looks organized, maintained and ready for growth. So we have to invest in ourselves before we can actually ask somebody to invest in us when they come into the community and they ask. What are you guys doing to try and improve and make your corridors look better and mitigate my risk? You're asking me to invest. What are you guys doing on that? So with that said, in front of you is a seven-year plan that I put forth to TxDOT. They like the plan. They like the layout. They like the areas that we're asking to beautify along the corridors. And so with this plan, since it's phased, it remains manageable, also spreads funding over time to be able to reach all seven phases between 2027 and 2032. And it allows us to also build a long-term improvement strategy. So these images are just for illustration only. So if you take a look, there's 87 South right there. And that's what it looks like today. Now, again, these images are just for illustration. This is by no means going to be the landscape layout. But picture that, driving through a community that has some landscape layouts along 87. There's 54 coming in from the Stratford side. We added a little bit of landscaping that dramatically improves it and improves people's attitudes. You know, we're not trying to change mindsets. We're trying to change environments because when we change environments, that changes their mindset. That makes them want to stop. This is 87 North, going out towards X line. Add a little bit of landscaping to it. you've made some dramatic improvements. Bottom line is this, we've got the traffic, we just need to capture those sales and get them off the roadway and feeling safe coming through Dalhart that they can actually stop and spend money here. So I'll answer any questions you may have. And I know 1 of the 1st, 1 is going to be, how is this going to be maintained? I plan on bringing an ordinance to you guys later on. There are several cities in the state of Texas that already has ordinances in place that puts it puts the onus on the budding property owners to maintain these landscape right of ways. So, I'll be bringing an ordinance and examples of those cities to you guys later on this year. And watering. Water same exact thing. It's going to be, it's going to be on the property owners to maintain those now normal wear and tear. We'll, we'll replace those, you know, because that's going to be funded throughout the, but as far as keeping it, the upkeep going, the ordinance is going to be very clear that that's going to be on the abutting property owners.

I like the idea, but I know that I went through this and they actually did away with there. Ordinance, they used to require 10% to be landscaped. They did away with it. Is that someone that's not. I want to make sure we talk about.

All the business owners and stuff that we're going to be impacting before we do this. And that's fine, but, you know, again, we've got to do something and we've got to be able to hold these business owners to accountability. You know, we, we can't continue to have corridors that look like they look and wonder why we're continuing to decline because we're not getting travelers off the streets. You know, shopping and spending money here. Or going into the downtown area. Okay, so I'll be bringing a resolution to you guys next month on the 13th. It'll detail basically what the next steps are is just working with TxDOT to get the needs and bounds of the locations that are listed in the packet. from street to street in that area, as well as work on some other paperwork with them to formalize an agreement between TxDOT and the City. So there will be several resolutions that will come after this. Wouldn't that work with the railroad? So that side, again, that's just for looks. Railroad is probably not going to be impacted. We're not going to probably do anything on the railroad side. It's simply going to be on the businesses side. So it's going to be sporadic landscaping throughout the community where the businesses versus the railroad being responsible for it.

That was just my point is because if we're going to put the onus on the business owners, they need to buy into it. They need to know this is coming.

We'll have a public hearing with that as well.

Far back. What's the distance that you're hoping for? Overall? Yeah, on each, like on this picture.

The width.

I'm looking at this one. No, I mean the length. Yeah, length.

I don't think anybody would participate. That's what you're looking for, Sean, is the city limit to city limit, right?

Yes. Yes. And it's not going to be every single area. So like, for instance, this one being 87 north, it's going to be all four corners of Denrock and 385 and all four corners of US 87 and 54. And then it'll run from Omaha Street to Tascosa Street on 87 North. So a pretty short distance. We're not going all the way out to Love's or anything like that, but we are keeping it kind of sporadic to where you're at least seeing some beautiful landscaping as you're coming through.

Not to dishearten you, Annie, but i know when we sent letters to all the property owners out of 54 and we wanted three feet every one of them said no we already own the right of ways this is this is their property we wanted to keep four lanes oh 54. instead of the the two instead of two internal yeah well and this would be on on the right of ways the text not already owned so i mean it's not

encroaching on their personal property. It's all property that TxDOT would already own.

Will this include where the underpass is? The little hills there?

Yes, there's four corners at 385 and Denrock on each side that it would have beautification out there as well.

Yeah, railroad, they're not going to do anything. But like I said, I still want to, because I talked to that one representative that gave us the grant for the flower beds at Malfunction Junction. He thinks that if we push textile, we can get them to concrete those areas along the highway. Because they're, I mean, they just erode. And we look, Sherry was on council one week, we're looking at some type of vegetation to cover it.

And just a roads, so.

I think we'll, I think we'll be pretty impressed to find out that this that the community wants that the community wants the corridors cleaned up. And so I'm not expecting a lot of pushback from businesses to be really honest with you when we talk about beautification and we talk about enhancing the community, because it is going to affect their bottom line in a much more positive manner than the negative manner that that we may be thinking.

I think I agree with it, but you're putting the burden on that business owners.

We need to make sure they're notified that they know what's coming to do a little bit of watering.

Watering and a little bit of, you know, like I said, you know, we had in our meeting talking about certain ones can do a good job of maintaining even a highway. What was it? Where the Texas T is. Oh, yeah, when it was that before they never took care of it now.

No, and that's the beauty of peer pressure takes care of there. That's the beauty of peer pressure. Nobody wants to be a kid on the block. So, when you've got Sonic and that's keeping up with their place. Well, it kind of, you know, you can kind of shame these business owners and say, hey, you want to know why your sales aren't doing so good because I see their sales. Well, this is part of it. Nobody, nobody feels, you know, nobody wants to give you business because they don't want to go into your place because it looks bad. It looks awful. You know, you create an inviting place that people want to go. Yeah, I see.

Make sure they're notified. I think we make a point of it. I'll do it myself too.

We'll put a public hearing notice in the paper.

How much damage is done in the wintertime by throwing salty stuff up in these flower areas.

The plants would have to be drought tolerant and so forth. Tolerant to the road soil. Yep.

Yeah, I mean, if we move forward, it would have to be, I mean, yeah, we would love that, but that vegetation is not conducive.

No, no. And that's why we've got pallets that have been identified working with several businesses on what's drought tolerant and what West Texas, you know, can support and so forth to be able to. And while we're at it. Minimal maintenance.

I wanted to, I know they don't get much recognition, but pedal pushers. Mm-hmm. They used to be beautiful. Amelia is her husband. All of those people that maintain those fire beds and stuff.

They look really, really good.

Even when I say manager. And I said, just give them whatever they want because.

I do think it looks really good. Or if you just change it to zero scape, rocks, cactus.

We could, I mean, in Arizona. Yeah, we could, you know, I mean, the thing is, this is just a rendering to kind of give you a visualization of what we could do. We'll be using water. And that's, and that's the thing is the pallets, the pallets that we're looking at are designed for West Texas, drought tolerant plants. So they're going to be minimal maintenance.

I wouldn't hurt to just go around and get their view on things too, just talk with them. Get their ideas.

We'll also post a public hearing as well, a paper, so that they'll have an opportunity to come and voice their opinion before the resolution to let them know.

Any other questions?

motion second all in favor