Board of Alderman - Regular Meeting

Good evening everyone. I call this meeting of the Horn Lake mayor and board of alderman to order this February 3rd at 6 PM at Horn Lake City Hall. We have a court present tonight. So we can proceed with our agenda. All right. We have inv uh we have an invocation by Alder Alderwoman Johnson and pledge of alle allegiance by Alderman McKenna.

Let us bow. Heavenly Father, we come this evening to say thank you Lord God. God, we thank you for all the many blessings that you've bestowed upon us, Lord God. Thank you for allowing us to be here another night. Lord, we thank you for letting us get through the storms. Lord God, we count it joy. Lord God, we ask that you just bless those who are still experiencing a difficult time. Lord God, let them have food. Lord God, electricity, heat, and warmth, Lord God. Lord God, there may be some who are missing their treatments and medications and not being able to get to their doctor's appointments. Lord God, we pray for them right now.

Lord God, all of our medical professionals, Lord God, our emergency personnel, Lord God, we pray for all of those who have braved the storm here in Dotto County and all those who are still doing what they need to do to bring their communities back to life. Lord, as we as we meet on tonight, help us to make decisions that are wise. Lord God, help us to be more about your business. These things I pray in Jesus name. Amen. Amen. Let's rise for the pledge of allegiance.

I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands, one nation under God, indivisible with all.

All right. Now, we'll have a roll call by Miss Carter. Alderman McKenna here. Alderman Bledo here. Alderwoman Armstrong here. Alderman Smith here. Alderwoman Johnson here. Alderman Langston here. Alderman Boston here.

All right. All right. Now we'll move on. Uh I entertain a motion to accept the municipal docket. Mayor, I'll make that motion to approve the municipal docket. We have a motion by Alderman Bostik. Do we have a second? Second. Second by Alman Bleso. We have any discussion. All right. Roll call, please. Miss Carter. Alderman McKenna. I. Alderman Bledo. I. Alderwoman Armstrong. I. Alderman Smith. I. Alderwoman Johnson. I Alderman Langston. I alderman Bostic.

I motion passes unanimously. All right. I entertain a motion to approve the consent consent agenda. Mayor, Alman Bosik, make a motion to approve the consent agenda on items A through F. All right. Items A through F have been motioned by Alderman Bosik. Do we have a second? I second. Mayor. Second by Alderwoman Armstrong. Any discussion? Roll call, please. Miss C. Alderman Bostic. Hi. Alderman Langston. Hi. Alderwoman Johnson. I. Alderman Smith. I. Alderwoman Armstrong. I. Alderman Bledsoe. I.

Alderman McKenna. I. Motion passes unanimously. I entertain a motion to approve the claims docket. Mayor. Alman Johnson. I'd like to motion to approve the claims docket. General fund $330,85912. Library fund $12,3816. Utility fund $14,457.65 65 for a total docket of $357,354.93 cents. Do we have a second?

Second. All right, we have a second by Alderman McKenna. Any discussion? Roll call, please. Miss Carter. Alderman McKenna. I. Alderman Bledsoe. Hi. Alderwoman Armstrong. I. Alderman Smith. Hi. Alderwoman Johnson. Hi. Alderman Langston. Hi. Alderman Bostic. Hey.

All right. Uh we have six PAS and one name. All right. Uh we have a presentation special guest today. Uh uh CBDG grant engineer Daryl Dixon with North Delta Planning and Development. Come on up, Mr. Dixon. talking program for households. Applicificifications for engineering services to draft preliminary work. You all received proposals in response to that request for qualifications. Those proposals were due January 7th. So here at the mid, you all uh rated those proposals. You had four proposals and I do have a copy for the procurement record. So I've tabulated the results of the rating for those uh four proposals that were received and I do have your results based on those ratings. Uh Van Lissic Enterprise LLC received total cumulative number of points 338 points. Cornerstone engineering received total 559 points. Elliot and Britt Engineering received a total 641 points. And then Neil Schaefer, engineer received total 670 points. Based on the tabulation that I have on the rating

sheets that uh have for your consideration so that you can include them in your minutes and the procurement record based on that tabulation, Neil Schaefer is the highest rated proposer. All right. All right. Thank you, Mr. Dixon, for your hard work. uh just give a hand for bringing uh infrastructure improvements uh to home lake especially in low income areas. We so thank you. So we need a motion to stand. Right. That's right. If you I recommend you make a motion to acknowledge uh Neil Schaefer is the highest rated proposer and then from there we will prepare preliminary work for an application back for your approval. All right. So we need a uh a motion to recommend recommendations.

I'll make that motion, mayor. All right, we have a motion by Alman Post. Second. All right, we got a second by Alman Besso. All right, any discussion? All right, roll call, please. Miss Carter, Alderman Bostic, I. Alderman Langston, I. Alderwoman Johnson, I. Alderman Smith, I. Alderwoman Armstrong, I. Alderman Bledo, hi. Alderman McKenna.

I motion passed unanimously. Thank you so much uh Darl Dixon and North Delta and also to the board uh for voting to make sure we get uh some good service. Amen. All right. Uh next we have I got Okay, we don't have anything under this citizen remark. We do have citizen remarks. We have uh Mr. Kevin Freeman, 1398 Aub Drive here at Horn Lake. Come on up, Mr. Calvin Freeman. I gave you your address so you ain't got to worry about all that. Good afternoon.

Uh, thank you for allowing me to come in here. I know went a challenge week and I'd like to thank you for what y'all did, especially Chief Pulling and um and Deputy Chief. Yeah, cuz we had a house fire in our area and um

the lady doing okay. And other than that, I can say that uh I didn't take this thing like what y'all did today, this weekend. I saw, you know, I saw people druming and all that. They don't understand what it takes what y'all did. Like I came from a natural disaster from New Orleans, been in the war, but y it was great. It was great what y'all did. Y kept your paws and all. I want to acknowledge and thank you to Paul M, you know, for the decision y'all made during during the storm. If it were worth it, y'all would have been y'all still came through because uh y'all look y'all very supportive up here working as a team. I just want to share that

and I will go back to the American Legion trying to pull up some pans over there. Um we see we can do better on that in there, you know, for warming center or whatever where we got to get people to step up and do what they got to do. I just want to say that and thank you mayor and all for allowing me to come this appreciate your service.

Thank you Mr. Freeman, we thank you for those king cakes over there. We still haven't found that baby yet. All right. Uh we don't have anybody else on here. Uh so we're going to continue on with uh mayor and alderman correspondent. So I'll go first. Um, I would like to just take this moment to thank all the agencies and uh our agencies and the agencies that uh outside of Horn Lake and the people also who participated all this week uh during this ice storm. This ice storm was six and seven inches of ice. This is not a normal uh storm. Uh but it took a lot of fight and collaboration uh in order us for us. We're not out of it yet. We still working out of it. As long as ice still in the ground, we still working. But, uh, we thank God that God brought the sun out to to help us clean up a lot of this. Uh, but I want to thank all our our responders and, uh, essential workers, Horn Lake Police Department, Chief Pulling and, uh, Assistant Chief Hoya. Give them a hand. And I I'm going to make sure we stop between these because these are our own. Horn Lake uh Fire Department, Chief Lynville and Deputy Chief White and the department. Give them a hand. Horn Lake Telecommunicators, Jenny Black, and the crew. Give them a hand. Horn Lake Public Works on call workers, Wayne, and specifically uh Wayne, Dale, Steve, and the crew. These guys came out. Wayne and Dale was out. Uh Wayne got his first day off on uh was it when was Wayne? Sunday. Sunday. Dale. Dale got his first day off. You still fighting for yours?

All right. So Dale to get this to Wayne. Uh we going to get him off sometime this week. Uh and then I'm going go with Wayne. Uh anyway, uh but we just uh Horn Lake public works department. We thank them. Uh and we planned together before the storm was uh came. Uh we thank all our merch work. we did come together and plan uh for this storm and even uh make sure we had the things how we could use what we had uh at the moment. And we also worked together during this storm and I'll give you a few examples from uh picking picking up others to be here. Uh you had police officers going to pick up telecommunicators. Wayne went up to pick up telecommunicators. At this point, it didn't matter what department you work in. We just make sure uh that we made it happen, right? Uh also u reporting crucial areas. We thank our police department and fire department uh we in 301 got so bad that we was worried about station 3 and we was and waiting on the county to come through just to break the ice so to make sure our fire truck get out. Uh the next day after calling several times they finally came. Um but the county was also trying to help with the expressway crisis. Uh but we also had a fire uh crisis that could happen on the fire department could have uh also know it's just we we made a move. You know, them could only be so many places with one salt dog. One salt second salt dog. Uh it was fixed by the new mechanic, but it went out a couple days later, the motor. So, we was down to one salt dog. And that can only take salt, no gravel, no nothing else. It's called Salt Dog. So, uh we we with that one Salt Dog, we worked that bad boy all week long. And uh we had every department put salt in their cars uh to help out. You know, if you can salt area and salt it if it's bad. Uh but other agencies that we had working with us was Dotto County uh EMS emergency service under Chris Olsen and Josh Harper. We thank them uh for leading and orchestrating everything and making sure we all collaborate uh together. We want

to thank the solo county supervisor especi especially Ray Dennison uh for making sure that what we needed from the county uh that we got it as soon as possible. Um, of course, everybody's on the list as a city waiting, but until then, we have to continue to try to salt all the roads, not just the city roads, just to make sure uh that trucks can come through, loads can come through for supplies because with supplies not there, there really ain't no need of getting out the neighborhood. So, so we're just glad that we and our emergency services can also get around. So, we thank Supervisor Ray Dennis. We also thank Dodto County Street Management under Rob Chase who uh we collaborated with to uh hit the critical uh streets first, the ones that we didn't have uh ice breakers for. We have a snow plow, not an icebreaker. And it's important that we we still use it to our best of our ability uh to salt roads and remove the mush once it became so we can salt on top of that to hopefully keep shrinking uh the ice. So we did everything we could on on that behalf. We also thank uh Energy with Robert Johnson uh who was on standby just in case we had any power outages uh who checked on us every day to say is there anything going on? Uh we thank Robert Johnson and his team. Uh but once we pretty much made it through the majority of course uh everybody started heading to Oxford and other places. Uh Southern Baptist uh emergency response team under John Hampton. he was here checking on us and uh him and I popped up at uh South Haven CH uh warming center just to check on it as we collaborated with them. Also, uh we also had Red Cross Linda Sloan who was on standby if needed if we had a mass uh major disaster. We also had the county schools in partnership. If we had to open up a secondary warming uh uh center, uh we would have been ready. We actually have a storm uh center at Horn Lake uh elementary. We didn't announce it because we didn't want folks just popping up there when South Haven has a building that we're

partnering with that can fit thousands. So uh or at least a few hundred uh in that one building. Uh so uh we we're thankful to do the count I mean uh uh city of South Haven Mayor Muscle White and us collaborating and also Mike Upurch who was there every day who's a citizen of Horn Lake working in South Haven public works. Uh so we just parks and we just thank them. Uh the most they had was 20 people on the first few days. Most of them was homeless. They had six. Uh then it got went up to about 20 at some point. Uh MDOT, Mississippi Department of Transportation, Brian Charles and John Codwell. We appreciate them. We know they had a big crisis on the expressways. Uh but they still fought to get uh help here for uh uh 302, which is Goodman Road. And once they really hit Goodman Road, it was on us to manage it and keep salting it from there. So, a lot of salt that we used uh was not just used on our roads, but they got to remember we have to manage and continue to manage after that. Uh we want to thank the citizens on the ATVs. I know a lot of people call saying they everywhere, but those ATVs was actually getting out the neighborhoods and helping people get food uh get things they need. They was helping uh I believe they even pulled out a police car. I don't know. I don't think it was Horn Lake. I ain't going to say it was Horn Lake. I just don't believe it was u but uh they helped pull a police car out. So sometimes uh um you know we believe in law and order but there's a time when we also understand what a crisis does and we want to make sure we make uh rational decision decisions with wisdom and grace. Uh it's not always about law at the moment but it's about every community member helping. So we also want to thank every citizen who got out their car and and couldn't go buy a car and help push it uh out uh out of this ice. So we just thank everyone. uh dream center, Gina Khan, who was ready um if needed to adjust to being uh woman's senate if we needed one, especially during the time before we learned about the uh elementary school having a storm shelter. Uh Heartland Hands, Miss

Cunning was on standby because a storm shelter don't have normally don't have food. They're built for just a few hours during a storm. Uh so what we did was we did contact H Heartland Hands to make sure that uh if we needed food they said mayor whatever we need we can get it there. We have families waiting there because we figured that this uh because of the weather it would go on for weeks. Um also agencies were sent from other states who were here into leaving for other areas uh needing help such as Oxford and I know some more areas. Uh we want to thank DRC and Christy uh futes uh for being on standby right here in the stood county if needed. I I want to personally shout out my boy my partner alderman Kelly Smith. Give him a hand uh for giving me a break on Sunday but a couple of days he came out with us and uh uh helped out load the salt dog. Uh we uh rode behind it to let them know when it was out of salt and then we had to go fill it up, come back out and and on Sunday he said, "Mayor, you just need to uh take a break. Chill, go chill, be with your family." I said, "Well, I'll cook out for y'all then come to my house." And then I I really I went home, went to sleep. I didn't wake up to six o'clock after church. So that was how but I thank uh Alder Kelly Smith for just coming out and just spending a whole day on Sunday and continuing to fight to get those neighborhoods salted on the list that we created. Um hope I didn't forget anyone. If so, I apologize. I want to thank this board. Uh I did communicate with the board uh as much as possible, especially things specific for the awards and I want to just thank you all for uh helping to communicate as much as you can uh to the citizens. We tried to make sure we communicate um uh what was going on, update on what we're doing and all that. But I just want to thank this board for all you've done over the uh past week uh and being supportive. Uh but if I if I miss anyone, I promise you it's not because I tried on this list. Uh so

anybody listening, we just thank you every citizen number one, the whole Horn Lake. Thank you for caring for each other. Thank you for loving each other. And thank you for being one Horn Lake. All right. busted. Good. Langston,

yeah, I'm going to heap on the praise a little bit more for you guys. Thank y'all so very much. Especially all the essentials that you know, a few of us were able to stay inside, stay off the street, and and follow the the state ordinances. And some of y'all didn't have a choice. You had to be out there. So, thank you'all very much. which I am going to give a special shout out because it it wasn't directly mentioned, but the Horn Lake animal shelter taking care of those dogs and the cats and all the animals that are over there. Um, that's not something that a lot of people think about uh as far as as an essential worker. People had to be out there to feed those dogs and take care of them and make sure they're out and walk and everything else. And there were some really cool pictures of of dogs walking on the ice just trying to figure out where they can set themselves. So, thank you for uh for your parts and in all that and taking care of the ones that really cannot take care uh of themselves in in that regard. I'm also going to take a moment real quick to say in about two weeks uh on our net sport main and unfortunately I'm not going to be able to be here for that. I'm going to be down in South Haven uh at this public meeting about the uh the uh the MZ uh permits that are trying to get through the EPA. I'm going to make sure that Horn Lake and War One's voice is uh heard on that because noise and air and water pollution does not stop at a city line. And they need to know that uh Horn Lake does not need uh any more pollution or sound coming from that monstrosity up the road there. Uh it's not just a South Haven problem. It is a Horn Lake problem and I will be there to make sure that they hear from Horn Lake on that as well. So that's all I had. Thank you. Thank you, Alderman. Uh, and thank you from adding the animal shelf, too, because they are essential workers also. Thank you, uh, honorable John.

Yes, sir. Let's continue to pray for our neighboring cities and counties that are still experiencing difficulty with electricity and having heat and the things that they need. And so many times we seem that we're ungrateful. Uh we've heard and seen lots of people just griping even our trash. When are they going to pick up our trash when there are people who still don't have what they need? So let's just be grateful and continue to pray for those others who are still having a hard time. Amen. Aman Swift, is your mic on? hard work.

I'd like to thank everybody for their hard work and um just be safe out there. That's all I got to say. Thank you, Alman Smith Armstrong. I don't have anything, Mayor. Thank you. All right, Alderman Bless. Oh, yeah. Like all the workers that worked all through this bad weather that we have. And I really want to thank the mayor for riding around and uh he was he was the food wagon. He'd go to Chick-fil-A or wherever and get people food and and help them out. And I really appreciate that being the head man. You out there working just just like they are. Yes.

You know, I really appreciate that's all I got. Thank y'all and bless. So Wayne, I'm ate up all my money. So I had to feed them every day. All right. Al member Kenny.

Yes. I would just like to just piggy back off everyone else. This we had a like a not common storm situation. Wasn't just snow. It was like pure ice. So, you know, in order to, you know, for the mayor to say, "Hey, we're going to use what we have to do what we can and and organize it and to get the streets as clear as it's been and all that stuff is really a huge deal." um A+ in my book, but I know a lot of people couldn't go out or whatever, but I didn't have a choice. My father-in-law lives in South Haven, so my wife and I had to go back and forth. But every time we went back and forth, the streets were clear and clearer each day, so you can see the improvement if you had to go out there. I know, you know, it was a bias not to go, but some people had to go. But I did notice that and it was like you can see something happening. So it wasn't that we didn't know what to do or didn't have a plan or whatever. It was there. It was executed. Um kudos to everybody department heads. You're uh just to see the workers. Wonderful job. That's all I've got to say. Wonderful job. Amen. Give your board a hand. All right. Right. Now we have department head correspondents, Chief Pulling.

No, sir. Mayor, thank you. Thank you. And thank you for all what you and the police department uh did throughout this week. And uh everything was awesome. All right. What was that? Belinda, you got moved. Wayne, you have anything? At least nobody could. Belinda, your name went out there this week. Seemed like it. All right. I should be back by next board meeting. All right. All right. Wayne, may I want to thank you and Alderman Smith for coming out to help us. And Chief uh Pulling, I want to thank the officers coming out helping us, too. Thank you.

And I know Boston and I talked about this, but we're going to have to find something for ICE so we can be a little bit faster. So, we'll be working on that. I think the board probably agrees that we need to look at upgrading some equipment, too. All right. and everything else I had to say. You already said it. Thank you. Oh, okay. You're welcome, Wayne. Yes. You owe me some money. I'm just playing. Uh, Chief White, Mr. Mayor, I don't have any. And thank you all in the fire department. And I I seen a fire truck with a ice plow on it, too. So, uh, you better look out. All right. All right. Drew. Thank you, mayor. Thank you, board. I don't have anything tonight, sir.

All right. And they working hard to clean the park. And unfortunately uh in the midst of this people still going out vandalizing uh stuff during the time. I know we had some vandalizing in the um what is it Drew? Uh yes sir at the football field restrooms. So a lot of lot of days we've been dealing with that with the parks for a while. So we just ask some people to just watch out for the stuff that we do have and uh we we know you going to always have a few u but we want to take care of what we have and uh we'll just keep on doing what we got to do to protect it. Uh, Phillip.

Evening board, mayor. Um, I do have one item. U based off our meeting earlier today. Um, I'd like to suggest or propo propose a possible motion um to give authority to advertise for the Dunarton drainage improvement project. And just a nutshell what that project is. It's a behind the um Shadow Oaks Elementary School. From Shadow Oaks up to that line to the northern it's probably 1300 ft. We're going to upsize a storm drainage pipe to a 60inch pipe and improve three inlets on uh storm drainage inlets on Shadow Oaks to improve drainage for the people who live in that area.

And this is you all most of you all already know about this come out to ARPA funds and that funds do have to be used by a certain time. So we need to get the ball rolling on on this fund. So this motion is to approve what? to approve uh give authority to advertise the Dun Barton drainage improvements project. All right, which we use the last bit of our our B. All right, everything you just said. We have a motion. I made that motion. All right. Motion by Joshua uh Langston, Mr. Alderman Langston. Excuse me. Alderman Langston. All right. Second. Second by Alderman Smith. Any discussion? All right. Roll call. Miss Carter. Alderman McKenna.

Hi. Alderman Bledsoe. Hi. Alderwoman Armstrong. I. Alderman Smith. Alderwoman Johnson. Hi. Alderman Langston. Hi. Alderman Bostic. Hi.

Motion passed unanimously. So, we'll be getting that ball rolling. Getting it getting some bids and let's get that drain. I'm just praying that the water don't hit it tonight. All right. All right. And Phil, did you have anything else? All right. Alexis, good evening. Uh just have uh reports that we'll have five pets transporting Friday to New Hampshire going to New Hampshire and then next Friday we'll have another transport going to Minnesota,

right? And let's remember that animal shelter is essential. Also, they picked up some dogs this past week uh and they picked up some dogs this week uh due to stranded dogs out in the cold. So, uh, I'm sure that Alexis's hard work. He know how to Yeah. move them up north. All right, Andrew. No, sir. Nothing tonight. All right. Anything from the board? Any questions from the board to any directors? All right. We're going to move on to city attorney correspondent.

Um, good evening everyone. I don't have anything this evening. Are there any questions for me? All right, there will be no executive session and we are five minutes over but let me uh let me see. All right, I'll entertain a motion to adjurnn. I'll make a motion. We had a motion by Alderman Bleo. Second, second Langston. All right, any discussion? All right. Roll call, please. Miss Carter. Alderman Bostic. I. Alderman Langston. Hi. Alderwoman Johnson.

I. Alderman Smith. I. Alderwoman Armstrong. I. Alderman Bledo. Hi. Alderman McKenna. I. Motion passes unanimously. You are now adjourned. I've been trying to calm down.