City Council - Regular Meeting

Everybody, it's 5:30. Uh, Russ West from Houston Church is going to open us with a word of prayer and then we'll have flag sleep and carry on with their business.

Let us pray. Lord, we ask that your blessings come down upon this place during this assembly this evening. God, would you unify our hearts towards the flourishing of this community for for our good and your glory? Lord, we ask that your goodness, your righteousness, and your justice be what govern this time and overflow into El Reno. Lord, we long to see our families thrive, our businesses thrive, and our schools. Lord, we pray for our schools as they begin a new school year this week. God, would you encourage teachers and administrators, provide for them, strengthen them, and may may we be an important part of that. Lord, we pray for the kids, for the students. Lord, would you guard and grow their their hearts and minds and raise them up to be impact makers as citizens? Lord, we pray for the leaders and decision makers this evening. God, would you guide them and may they lead with wisdom. We pray all this unto you. Amen.

Join with me in the flag salute. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

All right, it is 5:32. We call the Alino Airport Park Authority regular meeting to order this Tuesday, August 12th. Uh starting with roll call vote here. Vice Chairman Jensen here. Trusty Sterson here. Trusty Nether here. Chairman Schaffeer here. Item C, consent agenda. The following items are considered to be routine by the Elino Air Park Authority. Sorry, my mic was on mute. Can you hear me? Um it'll be enacted with one motion. Should discussion be desired in any item, the item be removed from the consent agenda and considered separately? Items one through four. Move to approve items one through four. Second.

Made and seconded. Start. Have a roll call vote starting. Trusty Black. Yes. Vice Chairman Jensen. Yes. Trusty Stappder. Yes. Trusty Nether. Yes. Chairman Chaer. Yes. Um nothing pulled. So move to motion made. All those and second. All those in favor. Call the Elno Recreational Authority regular meeting to order. Uh we'll have a roll call starting with Trusty Nether here. Trusty Jensen here. Vice Chairman Black here. Trusty Schaer here. Chairman Sterson

here. authority and will be enacted with one motion. Should discussion be desired on any item, that item will be removed from the consent agenda and considered separately? Move to approve item one through three. Second. Motion made and seconded. All those in favor? Oh, roll call. I'm sorry. Trusty Ny. Yes. Trusty Jensen. Yes. Vice Chairman Black. Yes. Trusty Schaer. Yes. Chairman Sterson. Yes. Move to adjurnn. Second. Uh motion made and seconded. All those in favor say I. I.

It's now 5:34 and I call the municipal authority meeting regular meeting of Tuesday, August 12th to order. Roll call starting with Trusty Nether here. Trusty Stappderman here. Vice Chairman Black here. Trusty Schaer here. Chairman Jensen here. Uh consent agenda. Following items are considered to be routine by the own municipal authority will be enacted with one motion. Should discussion be desired on any item that item be removed from consent agenda and considered separately. And we have items 1 through seven. Move to approve one through seven. Second. Motion made and seconded. Roll calls with trusty Schaer. Yes. Vice Chairman Black. Yes. Trusty Stan. Yes. Trusty N. Yes. Chairman Jensen.

Yes.

Nothing was pulled. brings us to discussion items. Item eight, discussion, consideration, action and/or possible amendments to award project P-26 Boon storm water sewer replacement and allow chairman mayor to sign all documents associated there too. So we have a 48 in storm sewer that's uh been failing. It's been in between Wade and Watts on on Boon and this is the proposed replacement of that. Uh the the u there's also another alternate that was bid out that's closer to Caraut there on Boon. There's a sinkhole um associated with that drainage ditch, the drainage channel that goes through there uh right adjacent to uh Boon Street. Um the lowest uh and best bid combined bid for the alternate and the base bid uh was from Grade Work Construction for a total of $231,51. And that would be the staff recommendation. Move forward with that. Make a motion to approve project uh P26 in the amount of $231,51 to Great Work Construction. Second motion seconded the roll call. Trustee Schaefer.

Yes. Black. Yes. Trusty Sappson. Yes. Trusty Nut. Yes. Yes. Move to adjourn. Second. Motion made second to adjurnn. All those in favor say I. I. Journ. It's now 5:36. I call the El Reno City Council regular meeting of Tuesday, August 12th, 2025 to order. Roll call start with Councilwoman Nether here. Councilman Stuffin here. Vice Mayor Black here. Councilman Schaer here. Mayor Jensen

here. Brings us to item D. Consent agenda. Following items are considered to be routine by the Arnold City Council will be enacted with one motion. And should discussion be desired on any item, that item will be removed from consider considered separately. And we have items one through 18. Move to approve items 1 through 18. Second. Men seconded. Roll call starting with Councilwoman Nether. Yes. Councilman Sterson. Yes. Vice Mayor Black. Yes. Councilman Schaer. Yes. Mayor Jensen. Yes.

Nothing was pulled. Brings us to item F, audience participation. And anyone having an item of business to present to city council that does not appear on the agenda, please come to the podium at this time. State your name. You request to limit your presentation to three minutes. Any item being presented must pertain to the city of El Reno business. Oklahoma Open Meetings Act prohibits the city council from taking official action on request made during this portion of the agenda unless otherwise noted on the agenda. Mr. kind of grinding stone here. What are we going to do about city sparks? It's been going on 14 months. I was promised a year ago they'd be done within a year. I asked y'all to let it dry. Look at any of ours.

Yeah, I looked at them. I've seen a lot of bright shiny red ones different colors out pink ones and everything else. No, these are brand new painted. Ones I saw were brand new painted. I've seen some older ones. Yeah, but I've seen

You had been looking that hard. You seen a few. Every place you go see down almost everywhere. The only ones they painted was right in front of the fire station. That's the only one they ever painted. And it just seems like I was told the fire chief was given a year to get a paint. That was 14 months ago. Haven't been touched. Are we going to do anything about it or just say we're going to be town?

I'll buy a brush.

I read the about our 7 or 66 station. That's great. I love it. It's beautiful. But people come to town and see all this ugly take care of the town and go across the street here. That's like a rug board. That's true. We got to start cleaning up this town. Can't just go out and do all this other stuff. But you got to be if you want to keep this town looking decent, you got to clean it up. I don't know. I know Peter Plaza that got built with voluntary help. I spent many night down there 10 11:00 every weekend. I told Miss Peter one time, I've got marks on my back where my wife need me to get down. Anyway, it's in clean this town up. Can you do it or can you get businessmen and their women and everything down there working all your people are m cleaning up the town also can they be pulled off after season that we get these things those are good questions I don't know what else to say need to be done. It's just that simple. Nobody care. I'm not care.

We've got color in town and some of them got color baited out. And it's tomorrow. Just drive around the town.

Thank you. Anyone else? Any comments? Okay. brings us to item G, discussion items uh 19A, to conduct a public hearing in consideration of amending chapter 35, article 1, section 1 through six of the code of El Reno, redefining ward boundaries for the purpose of conducting municipal elections in the city of El Reno. I now declare public hearing open. So, with the adjustments to our city limits and the addition of areas on the east side of town, we needed to adjust our ward boundaries. Um, and really every ward boundary needed to be adjusted to account for the additional uh population that was added to the town. So, um, P, I know you don't have a slide, but is it it's on the website,

can you pull that up real quick for us? Um, just so we can take a look at it. Um, basically what the what the um the new boundaries will will square up and enlarges some of, you know, each of the four wards. Um, we try to use natural brakes, um, geographic boundaries, uh, section line roads, and honestly try to clean up, um, the previous W map and and make some of that may make, uh, more sense with the natural breaks as far as the section line roads. So, um, while they pull that up on the the the map, we can take a look at that. But population in each of the boundaries is balanced as close as possible. pretty well

as close as possible. One of the things that we had to do, we utilized the 2020 census, but the 2020 census didn't account for some of the new home growth that we've experienced over the last 5 years. Um, so we counted up all the new new homes that were were built and and um did an estimate for the population within within those areas. And so uh we also had to account for some of the expected growth. So, a lot of that is for Ward 4 in some of the newer uh neighborhoods, Crimson Lake Estates, Settlers Crossing over in that area where we have platted lots but no homes yet. Uh we expect those lots to be filled within the next few years. And so, we had to account for that as well. So, that um it may not be exactly even, but it will be pretty close across all four wards.

Any questions? on the screens of that that map was a proposed what the boundaries will change to looks like I appreciate city staff working on that looks like um there's some slight modifications to different you know different ward areas but I think it lays out takes in new area that ran extended but also takes that into account the current areas and leaves not major changes to to the wards that balances the population out and takes in account future growth that we've had and future growth. The newly annexed areas would be split between W two and W three.

Any other questions? I just like to point out as long as you stay on the fairway in hole 17, that's that's in W two or four. If you lose your ball off the fairway, that's Pete's problem. I have a I have a bushel basket of balls. Yeah, right down the fairway. Move to approve ordinance 938. Sorry. Sorry. Any other comments? I now declare public hearing closed. Move to approve ordinance 9382. Second. Motion made second to approve ordinance 9382. Roll call starting with Councilwoman Nether. Yes. Councilman Sappson. Yes. Vice Mayor Black. Yes. Councilman Schaer.

Yes. Mayor Jensen. Yes. Move to declare ordinance 9382. An emergency. Second. Motion made in second to declare emergency. Council. Roll call. Start. Council member. Yes. Councilman Ster. Yes. Vice Mayor Black. Yes. Councilman Chambers. Yes. Mayor Jensen. Yes.

Brings us to item 20. discussions, consideration, action, and/or possible amendments regarding resolution number 26-006, resolution authorizing the calling of and holding of a general election in the city of El Reynold for the purpose of electing one elected elected official as council member for W 2 and one elected official as mayor, setting forth certain facts as required by the state law and directing that this resolution be delivered by the city clerk andor designate to the secretary of Canadian County Election Board for the purpose of giving such official notice of said election. Let's call in for this year's election uh scheduled for November 18th, 2025. And the reason why it's November 18th is because the second Tuesday is Veterans Day. Make a motion to approve election resolution 26-00006.

Second. Motion made second. Roll call. Start with Dr. Sha. Yes. Vice Mayor Black. Yes. Council status. Yes. Council. Yes. Mayor Gent. Yes. Brings us to item 21. Discussion, consideration, action, andor possible amendments to approve resolution 26-012. resolution renewing the downtown and Route 66 revitalization program.

This is a continuation of the downtown revitalization program, but we're adding in um some new areas along Route 66. Um this is uh if you'll recall, we've had two different rounds of funding on this. Um it's basically grants for businesses uh in the downtown area for the first two rounds, but we've added 66 from Alphadel all the way all the way to Reformatory. So businesses, property owners can apply for funding um it's a 6040 grant program up to $5,000. So the amount for this um continuation is $20,000. It's been very popular and successful um with the first two rounds.

Move to approve resolution 26012. Okay. Motion made in second to approve resolution 26012. Roll call. Starting with Councilwoman. Yes. Councilman. Yes. Vice Mayor. Yes. Council. Yes. Mayor D.

Yes. Passes. Reports. Um I don't have a lot. two or three things. Um, smoke on the water. We had a great uh weather was great. It was hot. Lake looked great. Just special thank you to all the parks staff, city staff, police, fire that helped put that on. It was a successful event. They added barbecue competition this year. I know they had uh I think 21 rib teams came in from multiple states to to cook in their rib competition and 17 wings teams and people that helped with the barbecue competition thought that that could be even bigger next year. There was another barbecue competition going on in Kansas City. Um so they thought that split some of the out of state people from coming in but they really liked the ones that were here really like being here. have to help judge, you know, that lot of taste. A lot of it was really good. Also with that, we just a special thank you you to Elno um EMS for helping keep the races going as a um ambulance provider. I know Elno whenever the smoke on the water was set up, Elena was not in the ambulance business and I know there was maybe some confusion on who was to provide those services but uh that provider didn't show up so stepped in and was able to keep the races going. I know there was some information out on the internet, but you can't always believe what you read on the internet. But uh but anyway, it was just a special thank you to the EMS department and just uh pleasure to see him out there to see and just provide the services that we

need. Um other thing school's almost over. School starting this week, so be careful with kids crossing the sidewalk. I know talk a little more about a lot of roads under construction, a lot of future roads going to be under construction. So, we need to be careful of that. But one one uh uh highway 81 and Jensen Road, you know, the roundabouts kind of they've got that area about, you know, it's open. It's not finished, but but they're starting construction on the south part of Highway 81 going underneath the interstate concrete all the way Jensen Road. But I mean, I was nearly in a a really bad accident down there today. I was going south on um you know, they've rerouted traffic and and you've got uh north and southbound traffic on the east side of the highway, but I just got down to Jensen Road. was going to naturally turn right, but what I didn't realize and it's not marked and and needs to be marked in contact with public transportation, but the old two southbound lanes on 81 are still open. That loop coming off the interstate, there was a guy coming 70 plus mile coming south had a wreck right there 81. I know my brother just in the last 24 hours, my brother was almost in a wreck there, my nephew. And so, it's very dangerous. Be careful. We're going to talk to him to see if we can't get somehow that sloped down. And uh one one lane they're using for construction traffic, but the other is just a natural southbound lane coming off I40 going south and speed limit's not marked. There's no construction marking and so people need to be be pay attention. And then if you're trying to if you're headed east on Jensen Road, get back on the highway, you've got three lanes of traffic coming south at you and one lane coming north. So it's kind of like, you know, playing

Frogger in there or something. I don't know. I mean, it's it's kind of tough deal. I told my told my young son, John David, who's now driving, I said, just just avoid it. you know, told my wife to report it, too, because, you know, I was I was there this afternoon and there's people that are making a U-turn so they can get back on the interstate going east. So, they just need to be there's some work to be done, but I mean that the road road will be fixed and it'll be nice and new and all that, but uh but just be careful around some of that construction stuff.

And that's what I just assumed those lanes were closed and I'm used to, you know, not stopping now. the roundabouts there. You just get up there and roll on through. And I and this guy, I thought, man, he's driving awful fast. And then I realized he's not stopping. And I I turned and he he jumped off in the ditch and was sliding sideways. He you know, it's a wonder he didn't roll over, but he didn't. And uh I just thought, "Oh my goodness, it's be careful out there." Um that's all I've got. Just echo what Steve said. School starts Thursday, so watch the school zones and kids who are not necessarily using the crosswalks. A lot more walkers out starting Thursday and they'll probably be on their cell phones because they can't have it during the school day. So, they got to get all that texting in, make their lunch plans before school starts.

I about hit a couple of kids walking across the street. I had a green light near sauntering across the street and looked at me like, "What are you what are you doing? Lights are green. I hit the brakes. This was just coming up here." So, yeah, got to be careful. But I I wanted to echo also the sentiments about EMS. Um getting some of those metrics in one month in and things look good. Um it's better than what we've had for some time and and uh doing a great job. Good word on the street and so it's good good to see, right? It's what we wanted and so far so good. Um and and just um just a a shout out again to what's going on at the filling station. I know it it may seem frivolous on some in some regards, but I I don't think unless you go down there and and catch the people coming from all over the world, literally um it's hard to understand the impact that's having. It it really is fantastic. It's mindblowing to see people from Italy and Australia and Bulgaria and France and all 50 states. They're right here. They're just a block over and they're coming through town and they're stopping. And we get that parking lot built. Maybe they'll stop and stay longer. So, it's good. It's good stuff. It's good news. Okay. I actually do have some stats on our new ambulance service. So, I want to talk about that. U sorry,

very briefly. No, that's okay. Yeah.

Um, so far we're one month in, but this these are the stats for the month of July. Total EMS calls 315 and total transports were 201. So, we had a very busy month with our two ambulance uh trucks running. Um, that's where we're working to get a third ambulance in service um as as soon as we can. It looks like it's probably going to be later August, early September before it's up up in operation. Um, go to the next slide. Um, so average priority one call time is about 5 and a half minutes, 5 minutes and 35 seconds, which is a a very good time. And then for priority two calls, it is 9 minutes and 46 seconds. So, it's very important. I think those are those are impressive times. Those are those are what we're looking for. And then when we get the third truck up, I think that it's going to um provide even that much more support. So, okay. Um, other than that, we have, uh, we've talked about construction on roadways. August 25th, we have the overlay coming through town on Rock Island. Um, turning on Wade and then going north on Chalkaw all the way to Kado and then it's going to go west on Sunset from Chalkaw to Haden. That's going to be a major overlay construction project that uh we have a great partnership with ODOT. It's it's their project. Um we are very excited to see that completed. It's it's been needed for a while. August 25th, so school will be in session. Um but it's going to be a huge win for the community. It's going to be visually beautiful, right? But also it's going to be smooth. because I know that we we get a lot of complaints through town on Rock Island. We get a lot of complaints on Sunset. Um it's not going to be the whole stretch of Sunset, but it's going to be to Haden where it transitions from

asphalt to back to concrete panels. So that's a that's a big deal for for our community. Um street sweeper has been out running. Uh that was part of the DEQ grant. Um Amy and street department's been doing a good job running the street sweeper. So, we'll have fresh asphalt that we can come back over with street sweeper and keep it looking good and clean. So, big wins for the community and um that's all I have. Okay, I'll try to get us out here by six. Uh field control show on the financial report. We'll do the broadband report first. Yeah, on broadband goodness is we are up to 564 customers now. We have the Lake View edition live and the Crimson Lake areas is a new area that's under build. Uh you can see that we're continuing to go up with the number of subscribers. Next slide. Uh here's showing the lake view edition that's now live right there. So if you live in this area, sign up for service. We're ready to serve you. Uh here you can see the areas underneath construction. U the blue area which is where most people are living is being about to go live here very soon. Next slide. Uh on financials, um the sales tax numbers for the month of August were not where we're hoping they would be. They came at $966,8361.18, which is missing our monthly budget of $1,78,000. However, um July and August are still relatively down months for so for the first two months for compared to the same months last year, we're actually still up by 2.3%. on use tax brought in $170,952.16 and this again is missing our monthly budget of $215,000 but again we usually see a little dip in

the July August time frame right there on hotel miltail tax we $42,38461 and this is above our monthly budget of 36,500 and year to date that puts us about 7.8%. Well, um no executive session tonight brings us to Jake. Move to journ. Okay. Mot second to journ. All those in favor say I. I.