City Council - Regular Meeting

Please obviously you know just going on

how are you buddy? came down. Thank you. [Music] to order the regular city council meeting for Tuesday, August 26, 2025, 5:30 p.m. If you would, if you'd like to join me in invocation, please do so and stand. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this day, Lord, and we ask that you guide us and direct us in your path. This council to take all the considerations they have this evening going forward for the best for the citizens in this city. We ask that you help them, protect them, and protect the people that leave here today. Lord, we ask that you guide us and give us the discernment. We thank you, Lord, for all your blessings. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.

Amen. Pledge of the United States of America. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the for it stands one indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Honor the Texas flag. Honor the Texas flag. I aliance to the Texas. Thank you. Roll call. Council members. Council member Mates here. Council member Schultz present. Pro pro mayor. Pro Tim man

present. Council member Freeze present. Council member Brenn. All right, we have a quorum. All right, visitor comments. People that will be speaking at the podium podium. I ask that you address the city council in an orderly, respectful manner. Attempt to address any issues, concerns, or suggestions in the public comment section of the meeting. Public comments outside of this section will all be limited. All speakers shall approach the podium. Provide your name and address for the record. The comments from the public during both the agenda items for the public hearings agenda items for individual consideration will be limited to three minutes per person. Each person will be allowed to speak once and your time cannot be allotted or shared by anyone else. Ask everyone silence your cell phone and please let's all offer undivided attention to all the speakers presenters and uh if you have any questions please raise your hand and if if appropriate we'll call on you. All right, let's start with the agenda. Number one, individual items for consideration. Discussion, consideration, and possible action regarding ordinances, vacating and/or abandoning, closing, and sale of alley in blocks 15, 16, 25, and 26 JJ Far East in edition. Okay, we have a speaker for this item, Mr. Loper.

Yes, thank you, Mayor BS. Yes. Thank you, Mayor BS. Well, it's not enough to attend. You got to also watch it on your computer. Your time may be up before you get it set up there. So on that point, how much time do I have? Uh first, if you'll give your name and address, please.

Okay. Thomas Loper, local address, 107 Peluxy. Mailing address for me, 301 Stone Hollow Court, Prosper, Texas 7507A. Thank you.

Welcome. So today we have members of men's family. Mr. and Mrs. men are are not able to attend tonight due to health issues. And this property is also on my side jointly owned by my sister who lives in Pennsylvania and she comes down a number of weeks a year to visit. So she's available as well if we need to talk to her. So let me just give you a quick history here. So if you look at these properties, this is kind of a I got a stick figure. So here's the original alleys in question. They date back at least a hundred years. So this property right here is actually these two smaller rectangles, those are owned by my sister and myself. This property right here has been owned by the Mims family for 20 something years. Interesting thing about this property, just real quick, it was three funeral home owners. Okay, it was Martin Funeral Home, then it was Reynolds funeral home. I'm sorry, no, no, it was Carter Funeral Home. Reynolds funeral home, market funeral home, and then in 2004, their mom did the unimaginable in my opinion and converted it to a place people would actually live, you know. So, it's kind of creepy to me, but she's done a great job, you know, and it's paid taxes all these years. In terms of our property, my great grandparents owned this property right here, these two lots right here, if you can see my mouse. Yeah, these two lots, uh, our family's own that for 117 years. Little trivia, it's the longest contiguously owned property by one family in the history of Glenn House. No, no one family's own the property longer. So, we're not going anywhere because, you know, so anyway, so these are the things. So, there's two alleys. They don't This town runs along Peluxy River in case you haven't noticed. So, north nothing's laid out north, southeast, west. So anyway, these alleys run

northwest, southeast, and northeast, southwest two outs and they've been maintained and in my family, they've been maintained for over a hundred years. The city has really never done anything to maintain these alleys. So the men's family and our family have kept them up for the last two decades. So that's that's the property. So where are we from here then? So we had surveys done and if you look back and I have the minutes if if you want copies of them from 1999 when this whole area it was called Wolf City. So if you've been for here long Wolf City was like anything technically it's southeast of the bridge. You most people call it south of the bridge but if you cross over the bridge that's all Wolf City that whole they didn't have utilities until after World War II even though it was in the city limits etc. And so in 1999 they realized that it's not really a very good situation the way it's set up and with the alleys. The alleys weren't really being used it seemed. And so there was a proclamation made by the city council then that if you would do us if the homeowner would do a survey property owner would do a survey and a quick claim deed then basically the alley would be you know awarded transferred by deed.

Thank you Mr. over. Okay, I'm kidding. Let me get a couple more minutes if you like, but try to stay short as you can.

Yeah. So, but guys, it kind of all matters. So, in 2001, in 2001, this this piece of the alley that those of you that know the late Johnny Martin and Marvel Martin, their parents actually owned this before then. And uh in in 2001, they closed a bunch of alleys. They said basically if you'll get a survey you can close the alley and there's a long list of them back in the 2001 minutes I can give you the minutes if you want but this these additions that were referenced are also referenced as part of that mass closure if you do a quick claim and so forth. So in 2006, two years after Miss M bought this property right here, then uh she and my mother, Billy Loper came to the council and had this portion closed under that 1999 2001 type ruling. All right. So along the way, this property right here now says Mims. You'll notice the colors change. this little section of alley here. When this alley was closed in 2001, this became an alley between our properties. It became an alley to nowhere. There's no access to it. No through access. When this alley closed, you still have through access, right? You could do a 90 degree turn. So, there was still an active alley right here. But Miss Mims didn't own this property. So, the only reason all these alleys weren't closed in 2006 is because she didn't own this property. So, how did she come to own this property? Right? So, she came to own this property because it was owned by a lady from it used to be Harvey Jackson's auto place and he would always leave cars in the alley and it was a mess. I won't get into that, but anyway, a lady from out of state bought it. I don't know how she came up on it. My understanding is she actually donated it as a tax write off to the city of Glenrose and then the city of Glenrose in 2021 sold it to Miss Mims. But once

again, if Miss Mims had owned this in 2006, my mother, it would have been all four corners and they would have just closed all the alleys in 2006. But they didn't have that option because this person was out of state. Went interesting closing these alleys. So they couldn't be closed. So what are we asking for tonight? So we're asking to abandon these remaining alleys here. These are incribes. These are the ones that are really still active. Technically, this is an unclosed alley here, but it's inactive because you can't get in and out of it, right? So, the the details here, the sizes are mentioned. The surveys are actually to clean up the whole thing. So, there's a survey that covers this piece for Miss BMS. It's a survey that we did because this is a joint alley. It's 20 feet wide. So, we ch like 10 feet of that. These are 15 foot alleys, but we own the property on both sides. So it makes like a kind of a weird looking T on the surveys. But since these were already closed then they were removed in terms of you know what's actually being discussed tonight in terms of square. So if you go back three years in 2022 I think Mr. Freeze was the only council member then. But in 2022, uh, somebody came forward and gave a proposition for closure of an alley in third and fourth streets. And they did it based on the July 1999 and 2001 where it lists out all these additions of which our additions are included in those additions. Right? And the idea there was you just do a quick plane D and a survey and that was it. Uh, I have that information here if anybody wants to look at it. It's on my laptop. I pulled it up from the city's website. So, what we're asking is we understand that there's been some changes in how alleys are being closed, but if you look at the history of our alleys, right? I

mean, in essence, they should have all been closed in 06 in a sense, but this lady was not available, not agreeable. and 01. Miss B Mims got it, but it was a busy time and she didn't consider it, I guess, at the time. So, anyway, here we are. Because of their health, they're considering selling this property. So, it's it's really in the best interest. They've been great neighbors for the Lopers. I mean, we couldn't have asked for better neighbors than the Ms. And that's why I'm here speaking tonight. you know, we got along, everything's great, but now time evolves and it's it's time to clean this up because it's it's kind of a mess for the city, too, cuz technically uh you know, you have responsibility for this, but it's been not not really anything done with it. So, anyway, we thank you for your time. That's our proposal. not fully in alignment with what's in the ordinance written. And so we're requesting the ordinances be changed to grandfather in the way Wool City's been handled for the last 25 years for island closures.

Thank you, Mr. Any questions? Thank you very much. Hold on. Hold on, Tom. I got a question. Nobody has a question. Um you say that in 20ou in 1999 there was an ordinance

in 1999 actually what they did was they were like all there's no surveys anywhere in W city it's a mess. So property owners will do these surveys then you know we'll we'll consider what happens with property sales. Then in 2001, there was this long grocery list when the actual ordinance happened of all these we'll see properties that could be closed under these quick claim deeds. And a quick claim deed, if you're not familiar with it, a quick claim deed basically is like, hey, we're good friends here. You can have a property. We don't really need it anymore. That kind of thing. It's usually relatives and stuff like that. Uh surveys, you know, it's a good idea to have a survey, right? to know what you're really getting. So, that was a really good plan. I mean, my legal counsel, which I' I've had, you know, on this topic, said basically, it's a whole other game if you're having to pay for an alley, right? Because usually, you know, we have our realtor here. He can correct me if I'm wrong, but usually the seller has to pay for the survey, right? Not the not the recipient, the seller of the property. So, if the city's selling the property, we're a little confused on why we're paying for a survey. And also, if you're selling a property, will you have to have a warranty deed, which means you'd have to go through, you know, a warranty deed basically guarantees it's clear title, right? So, you have to go to a title company and pay them money and and so the whole thing is kind of cumbersome when it's in a sale versus if it's quick claim. We take on the risk that if someday somebody comes said, "Hey, this is really my alley." The city cla agreed to a quick claim de. So, it's pretty straightforward actually for alleys to do it that way. So, I see why the, you know, the council years ago decided to do that. And up until January 2022, I hadn't looked since then, but I do find

the one for the between Elm and Bailey and and was it El Bailey? But between third and fourth and something and one was closed for the divorce act or something and that was 2002. January of no January 2022. No, no, no. The the when the when the whole laundry list of 2001 that was July one I have the minutes here. Look at I have copies too if you guys want copies of

I'd like a copy. Yeah, just quick copies. Think I got four copies. Somebody might have to look. So this first set is going to be the 1999. So here's some 1999 minutes. Here's the 2001 for the grocery list of, you know, which included the bar edition. Here's the 06 where Miss Mims and my mother closed that alley that we talked about that's halfway closed. And then here's the one that's really kind of interesting where this is just the minutes, but I have actually pulled up the agenda and the ordinance and all kind of stuff. July.

So Tom, yeah, the there was a transaction in 2006, but there was not a quick claim deed filed in 20. So they agreed to close the alley. The alley was closed, but paperwork was never followed up on. But here we are today. And that is one of these properties that has been surveyed or one of these alleys. It's a piece of Yeah. If we look right here, see this piece? Man, quit showing my screen. What happened here? Check device. Not sure what happened. Unplug and replug. Maybe you'll get a new signal.

Yeah, I was going to show you that alley drawing again. There's actually 22. Try that. Anyway, I think I have a copy of that alley. I actually have a copy of the presentation. I didn't make a bunch of Well, you've done a great presentation, sir.

Thank you. So, yeah. So, here's the Asheville alley. So, if you look, this is the loper alley. Makes like a tea. This was a piece already closed. This is the alley to nowhere I talked about because the Martin alley behind is closed. And then here's the Mim's alley. This is their half of that alley that was closed in 06. And here's the remaining, you know, loop through. I think we have that in our packet here. Yeah, you should have the surveys. Yeah, there's a survey. There's the two surveys.

549. Well, it looks like that's not coming back. But anyway, you you've seen the the essence of it. The 2022 was interesting because it there was a lot of documentation in the ordinance and all, you know, you see a lot of these things free, so you wouldn't remember it, but you were here and it was interesting and it was amazing. It was all online. I mean, it was all on the city website. I pulled it up. So, that's where we're at. So anyway, I think other than just to clarify what happened in 2022,

there was a So let me open up so I get you the exact information, right? You won't be able to see it because I can't get back on, but I'll tell you what what it was. That was in between Elm and Clay. This is that's when they came and closed a bunch down that was in Wolf City, right? So you can Yeah. So you can imagine third, you know, all the streets run first, second, third, fourth, and then Elm's over here on the side that goes up the hill and then Clay's here. So this was an alley that ran parallel to third and fourth between Clay and M. So literally it's two blocks away from these alleys we're talking about. It's like literally just two blocks away. What they did is what they're want to do.

Yeah, it's I mean it's well spelled out in the ordinance from then just January 11th, 2022. I I have it. It's online. I can give you the link on just can't seem to get my laptop to come back with you.

So, your contention is y'all are going to provide us a quick claim deed. Yes, we already have them. We have them here with us tonight. We have the quick claim deeds prepared by our attorney and all they have to do you guys sign them and there's a minimum on a quick claim deed of $10. I can hand you 20 tonight and call it even I can go run and get my check $10 another good valuable consideration.

It's a that's a state law. You can't have a quick claim deed with less than $10. I Yeah. So that's kind of interesting. And that's what the one from 2022 was also. So basically I copied the one from 2022 but my attorney actually like so he tweaked it up and improved on a little so he's got so anyway come back. That's weird. If we did it in 2022, then we did. Yeah, we did. We did in the project based on the 1999 information that had been provided

and you know the 2001 list when they went through the whole laundry list of properties in Wolf City that were proposed. Yeah. So that council acted of course I can't get it up for you guys but here here you can see here's the agenda right from 2022 I trust and then we got all and then here's the actual ordinance so you can look at the it was 111 2022 ordinance and so it goes in great detail so we're just basically asking the same

I mean I I don't know what y'all's contention is and what y'all are thinking and and I know we've we bounced around on how to dispose of alleyways. And we've done some in trades, we've done some in uh, you know, outright sales. We've done some in in kind trades to to clear up other property lines. But, you know, this one, you know, kind of fall, in my estimation, kind of falls where we were, you know, council 25 years ago, took an action to declare those properties as as surplus, those alleys not needed on those with a clear way to handle it. You know, with a quick claim deed and and a filing,

you know, we made allowances on on the couple of the cases we've had recently. We've made allowances. who worked with them. George, you're the only one old enough to know what went on, man. So, someone wants to make a motion, I'm open to it. I'll make a motion to execute the quick claim deed to uh transfer the alleyways for the men's property and the subject loafer property. I need to abandon abandon first and then do that. Okay. I'll make a motion to abandon the men's lots and the I mean the alleyways.

Well, what's the real description? Make a motion to abandon the alleys in the block in the blocks 15, 16, 25, and 26 of the JJ Far East End edition and then do the and then you want to do the quick claim in in one transaction. Okay. and then execute quick claim deeds transferring the subject properties that have been presented here tonight for the Loper family and the men's family by quick claim.

I'll second by Mayor Pro Tim man. All in favor, do you hear all that? You got a vote? I came in late so I'm going to abstain. I just barely heard the last maybe two minutes of the entire conversation. So I don't feel comfortable voting since I didn't hear um all the particulars. Okay. Thank you. We had four four one abstension. It passes and all this paper you wasted. Well, it'll recycle. Yeah.

So I don't want to labor the time here. So the mechanics of this could we get you a quick clean later? You guys file it for us. Why don't you do it tomorrow or bring it into Veronica, our city secretary and actually won't be here tomorrow. Well, you can leave it with her tonight, but I'll just leave it tonight and I'll leave you. Yeah, we can run that up to the That wasn't included in the motion. Well, it's in the quick. Okay, it's written into the quick. That's fine.

All right. Item number two, discussion, consideration, and possible action regarding creating a policy procedure that all department heads or their design shall have a draft budget expenditure for the department for the next fiscal year turned in before July 15th of each current calendar year. Rich, can you hear me? Yep.

Yeah. Uh so I brought this forward because I I was uh a little concerned that that um we don't have draft budgets brought forward before we start our budget meetings. uh you know even if I feel like we should have something in hand uh from the department managers the department heads uh at least something so that we can as council can review and uh those expenditures that are question we can get answers to and basically have a a good uh uh you know it's obviously it won't be a final uh budget on July 15th but I feel like if we're going to start our budget meetings you know in July we need to have something at hand in order to hold those meetings. So, uh, so I brought this forward for council to to consider and think about and, um, and we'll go from there.

Yeah. The only thing I would say to it is that it's going to be real slim. I mean, Jim, you go through it as a department head. It's very difficult to make a lot of assessment at that point. But the point is we are starting budget meetings. So either we move a budget meeting out a month or we get something to look at. I think it's a fair request from council to to bring something forward. And quite frankly, I mean we sat here and kind of struggled over the last short period trying to get everything in. So I don't think there's a problem requiring it in my view. Do you have any comments towards that? No, I totally agree. We we typically start that process like in May.

Yes. This year we were just kind of dragging our feet. So yeah. Any council member have a question or a motion or an emotion? Well, well, since I brought it forward, I'll gladly make the motion that all department heads will just have a draft budget of some format uh submitted in through their chain of command either to the city administrator or city secretary or the mayor, whichever is the proper chain for that by July 15th of said calendar year for the next fiscal year. Uh so that council can start reviewing these documents. Okay, we have a motion.

I'll second. Who was second by council member Mes. All in favor? 50 passes. All right, we're going to move into our budget workshop portion of the meeting and uh we're going to start with a discussion regarding the public works budget. And if you have something specific, you have something you have a question over either the working budget or the the slim down version of Veronica included, um, address it directly, but otherwise Jim, if you just want to kind of give a cursory.

Okay. Yeah. So, um started with the with the streets. We um we separated the streets and parks. I don't know if that's how y'all want want to do it, but in the past, we've had those together. We didn't really have many parks, so it wasn't that important. Now that we have Heritage Park and the soccer park, I think it would be wise to to separate those two. And so that's that's kind of what we did. So going over the the streets first. Um there there weren't a lot of changes. Um, but there were some some significant ones on the paving. So, I put 529,000 in there. That was actually three separate projects. Um, one being Mesa Drive, which is a a newer subdivision with a really old street that's in bad shape. The developer, we were we were trying to get that subdivision accepted so that someone could actually build homes there. And so we had an inferior street that we accepted. We did get a a maintenance bond on it when the street started failing pretty bad. We we cashed in the maintenance bond and so that's

about 130,000 or so. Is that right?

Yeah. 134, I believe, which won't cover the the total, but I feel like we should spend that money on that street since that's what we cashed it in for. So, I put that one in there. Um, and then there was 150 or paving. I'm I'm hoping to do a co-op with the county if we can pull that off. Um, I'd like to to redo the parking area in the street that's going into the soccer park. I put 150 in there, 150,000 for that. Um, which will more than cover it, but if we can pull off a a project with the county, then we can we can add to that, maybe do part of Texas Drive or something. Um the other little portion was Cedar Street. Just a little section there between uh in on the river and Bernard Street. So that's that's the paving project. Um the other significant one,

what was that last road you just said? Cedar Cedar Street. It's just one block there. down here on this side of the north.

The other significant change was the service fees went from 75,000 down to 20. So that's because we were separating parks from streets. Those service fees usually cover mowing, tree trimming, that kind of thing. So, we still will have some mowing and tree trimming um in the street budget, but I basically essentially I moved a portion of that into the new parks budget. So, that's that's really the main changes on the streets. Do y'all have any questions on on that one?

So Jim, I just kind of spit balled some members and I think taking on the parks had an additional excluding even the the the No, taking into account the grant match. No, excluding the grant match, it looks like around $130,000 additional give or take in expenses that you estimate between supplies.

Yeah, a lot of that I I separated out. So, so last year going into that it was kind of an unknown. And so this year when we started it, I was increasing based on what we've spent looking in the next year. Then we talked about separating those two budgets. So I just went in there and kind of divided those. But yeah, so overall it's an increase to account for the parks cost.

Yes. And the paving you want to do that's the chip seal in the park. Um it's currently chip seal that can go towards our inind match that we talked about. Um, and there's there's some other areas around town that have we have a chip seal street that really um I think it would be in our best interest to to just do a chip overlay. [Music] I think the last time we worked with the county, it's been probably 10 years ago, and we did Texas Drive for for $80,000. That's like 60 ft wide by 1.7 miles.

Yeah. So, couldn't do 10 ft, right?

Any other questions? So, we'll move on to the to the um parks budget that we created. So, the the previous administrator and I were talking about a a proposed wage for personnel to be overseeing the parks and recreation. Um, so there was an additional salary there. I realize y'all would have to approve that position, but that's that's what that salary is there for.

And that's not this person is not going to do manual labor out there. We might do some depends on what you write the job description for.

Well, I mean, I'm I'm not gonna Never mind. Yeah, I think the intent was to kind of to to help with any big projects, obviously the grant. I think we have a good shot of getting that grant and then, you know, helping to coordinate any tournaments or events, any construction projects. Um, I know if we ever have any events over at Heritage Park, maybe they would have some obligations there, too.

But it is somewhat of an overseeing position, making sure everything gets done, the mowing. If it's not done, who knows what he may end up doing, but it's really an administrative making sure everything happens. So, we didn't we didn't really um insert anything into the the benefits package there. Um we'll still have to go back and work on that. The rest the rest of those numbers are are basically some amounts that I've just split out of this when it was streets and parks. just separating that out. Um, we put a substantial amount in there for park development just for, you know, any kind of maintenance on playground equipment, fences, picnic tables, all all the stuff. That's

That would have irrigation in there, too, wouldn't it? Yeah, it does. It's then there's there's also um substantial amount of money in there for for fertilizer and pest control and that type of stuff. I gave an estimate. We've actually already done a little bit of that this year. The fields you can really

solid significantly better looks much better. So, we we wanted to do like an annual program where they go in every every one or two months, they go in there and apply some sort of chemical to help get those fields back in condition. Jim, remind me what's the match if we get the grant. What's the match that the 1 million? So 750 is what we asked for. Our match required is 750. Okay.

We we said we would overmatch up to a million. Yeah. Okay. We said we'd over match to a million and that that is awarded is 26 or 27. Um I believe January 26. Oh, okay. Well, that's that's when they announce. I'm not sure when the I think it is 27 when the funds get I think but everything now even though it's

even though we haven't won it can go towards that match. Yes. Or do you are any funds we spend now on the park even though we haven't been awarded that grant goes towards that matching that we have or do we have to wait till we're awarded it before we get we can count those funds? I ask Jake about that. I'm not sure. I don't think they allow you to look back until you've been awarded. Once you're awarded, then I think you get to count your income going forward, but I don't think you get to look back. So, like the paving, you would wait till 26. Yes. January 26th.

Yeah. I mean, that that particular application has to be done in the the hot part of the year. Okay. usually in the summer. So big projects she would look to doing it after. Fingers crossed we get Yeah. Yeah. get awarded the grant. Okay. I know when the county had them I think they subbed out the mowing there. Are guys doing the mowing over there? No. No. We have a contractor. No, we set that out and that's in in service fees is where that would be 55,000.

Did we accept their person just walk right into their contract or did we No, we did not.

Okay. We don't we don't really have a contract. Um he he just charges as he moves. We looked at a contract and he said, "Man, I don't I don't like doing those. I feel like the the u customers kind of get the raw end of the deal because in those contracts, they're built to where they mow so many times a year." And he said, "I'm not going to do that because, you know, certain times of the year I won't I probably won't mow at all." So, you're just you're just charging somebody for something they're not even doing. He charges us each month based on how many times he mows. So I I have running toll for this for this budget year so far for Big Rocks the park beside the dam riverw walker park and Heritage Park we've spent 28,760 on on m So there's there's a a little bit of fluff in there for mowing, but I I feel like um like right now he's mowing those fields, just the fields on Fridays or Thursdays, so they can mark the fields on Friday. Well, he's mowing those once a week now. So, it's it's hard to know right now what we're going to spend by the end of the budget, but

probably come in a little under that, but I've also had him helping out doing some other stuff. He does like common areas, too. Yeah. Around street sides and things. So, can I ask a question? As you said in part of your budget, you've added the pesticides and that kind of thing. Is there anything that we can start working towards trying to get rid of all the stickers up and down Heritage Park Riverwalk? Um,

I know it's a nightmare. I know I fight in my yard all the time, but um, you know, they're they're bad. Yeah. In some places just it starts at the entrance and goes all the way through. It really does. But stickers are hard to get rid of without injuring the grass and what you have developed. It's just hard. Yeah, we can look into that for sure. When they I've never paid attention when they mow. Are they catching the clippings? No.

Well, that's part of the problem. If they at least on that stretch, if you catch the clippings and all those stick because when you don't catch them, the stickers are just going back into the ground and making more stickers. Yeah. So, um that would be either that or or you know mow it so it looks like a putting green so that the sticker never Yeah. makes a sticker. Yeah, I'll check into anything else. All right. Oh, I do have one more question. Not about parks.

Okay.

So, all of the sidewalks are are I know what they still have some handles to do on a couple of those. I think those bars are the sidewalks done with what we we've done and is there any plans for doing sidewalk repairs like going down Bernard Street? Those are some of them are pretty bad. Um, we need to I I think that's pretty much done. I mean, we we do have the handrails, but yeah, that and clean up stuff, but I think that's pretty much finished. And then the sidewalks through town and around the highway, that that project's substantially complete, too. But there's no more sidewalk projects scheduled this year. I mean, we we could pick out some areas and

Okay. and m do some maintenance. And who who does the mowing along 67 where those sidew blocks are? Well, text does it twice a year. Okay. But um the property owners are technically supposed to mow all the way out to the pavement. Okay. So that's just an enforcement issue.

But we we do a little bit if it like down here between uh the traffic light and Dairy Queen. It got out of control. It was like this tall. We just have our guys go do that, but technically property owners are supposed to. Okay. I've just noticed there's been like um where Dollar General is all that's now starting to grow over and yeah, it's just and I was wondering. So, they should be finished with the sidewalks and the walls there pretty quick. You know, it might be hard to get mowers up there until that, but it does look bad.

Yeah. Grumps has done a great job. Yeah, they have. Excellent. All right. Anything else? Public works.

Um, so moving on to utilities to to the water department. Um, most of that stayed the same. We we added a little little bit of money in in meters. Um, so we have AMR meters, which you you drive down the street with a laptop, there's a transmitter on the meter, it sends a signal. Those battery those battery spins are like 20 years. Well, they're starting to go dead on us now.

A little premature. I think they're about 15 years old. So, there's a warranty. Long story short, you got to ship them to Wisconsin. By the time you get your check, there's not really it's not worth fooling with is what I'm being told. So, we need to start planning to replace a bunch of meters. So, the original ones we put in um there's about 800 of them. So, like everything else, they just keep going up in price. One one meter is about $256. So when I did the math, it was like we need about $156,000 to do the ones that are going to start failing. So we currently have 200 that we're having to manually read, which is hard when you only have two people at work. So, this money would would at least replace those those 200 that are currently we're having to manually read them. So, um the other thing was in capital improvements. That's $540,000. That's a project that we've already um contracted with an engineer. They've designed it. They've sent the plans to TCQ. We're waiting on comments back, but hopefully we'll be going out for bid on

that one within the next 3 months or so. So, construction next year.

What What project is that? It's so the the whale yard right across the bridge um on Elm Street. We want to we want to alternate between that well and the one at the top of Brian Street. We want to alternate filling the stand pipe using two wells instead of one. So what that does, it just gives you redundancy. If if the well at the top of Brian Street goes out, we can still fill the stand pipe with the well at the bottom on Elm Street.

Okay. So we we have another similar setup like that and it works great. You take the tank down for maintenance, you can still fill the stand pipe. So okay, it's basically just gives us a little more redundancy. And that's that's the two significant changes in the water department. Um, did y'all have any questions about any of the other items?

What was included is you talked about the meters. What's the service fees? service fees is um so we have the the fire hydrant flow testing done once a year and uh where they come in and they they basically test each and every fire hydrant. Okay. So we get a flow test, you know, gallons per minute, pressures, all that. That's that's $10,000. And then we have an impact fee study which is 51,600.

And so that's another project that we're kind of in the middle of um to try to come up with a plan for implementing impact fees. Okay. We're currently in a contract on that one. We're just needing some volunteers, I think. We need we need to create we need stakeholders and that type of stuff. So we haven't had a good response.

Any other questions on the water? Jim, how many how many full-time employees is in that kind of in this water and wastewater group? Um, well, I think between the streets and the water and the sewer, we want six guys. And then I think a third of the supervisor comes out of each of those.

Are we up or down on FTES? Are you posting for one? we we don't get a lot of um candidates, so we've been using the the tent agency in Granberry. Um but yeah, tough. So, right now, currently, we have um four four guys. We're looking for two more. Two of those are through the 10th agency. I think Rich has a question.

Rich, you have a question. Go ahead.

All right. Two questions. One I want to back up on, Jim. I was trying to get an answer to. Uh, has anybody has yourself had any communication yet with any county commissioners in reference to the uh, asphalt and utilization of roads uh, utilization of the roads department to to to has there been any conversations yet with anybody? No, sir.

Okay. All right. And then the other thing on on meters, you just were talking about meters as far as um, number one um, time line for replacements for some of the the ones that are currently installed, but also the need for some residences to get up to date with new meters. I'm just confirming those are two different things. And if if that is the case, is there a plan in place to have some extra meters on hand when you have to replace a meter that needs to be sent out for warranty, either repair or replacement?

Yeah. So we we usually have a small uh amount for for new homes or meter replacement. So we have a small inventory on hand, but um this this has just recently started to get out of control with with the batteries going out. And so I mean we can still read meters, we just have to do it manually. So, it's time consuming, especially if we're short staffed, but we're managing. I mean, we we just we split up and we go in different directions and get them knocked out, but but yeah, we we're going to need to to start planning because it's a huge expense. We're actually

that's kind of what that's that's what I was kind of consider thinking about is whether or not we need to um plan I mean I know you said you have a small amount on hand but if they're we're having an abundance of them starting to go out you know do we need to have more on hand additional or you know or or you know my concern is obviously of a non not a quick turnaround because we know what it takes for a lot of the businesses to to when we send something out for it to get it back and I don't want us to be uh short-handed,

right? Yeah. So, so I was just talking to the sales rep today trying to come up with solid numbers and and a plan moving forward. So, um but this amount that I put in there will will get us will get us started for sure. So, is that something we bid or no? That's tough because it it's like anything else once you're already you're already committed. So, it's like to that style,

they don't interchange with other meter companies uh that I know of. Now there there may be something out there, but I think they're probably all going to be um you know, it's just ongoing thing. We have we we get new technology and then within a few months they're telling us, man, you need to upgrade and I'm just like buying a computer. You leave the store with it. It's old.

And I know you said these numbers. Um how many do you project that we'll need to replace in the short term like two to three one to three years? Right now um there's already like 220. Okay. That we need to replace and then but what you're projecting in the budget is to purchase how many this next year? Th those 200 the full amount. Those 220 will cost almost 60 grand. Okay. So there there's a little more money than that in there and I think that would help get the inventory that okay that Rich is asking about.

Okay. Um, but I I'll know more in the next few days after revisiting the sales team and and with pizza. So, I like that we're doing this because it it gives us freedom to scale, you know? I mean, we have so many people moving in and, you know, lack of personnel. So, it just gives us that ability to scale. Any other questions on water? No. So, moving on the sewer. Um, so in the sewer department, um, I put $18,000 in the capital improvements that was we've been trying to So, we have a SCA system that'll alarm us of of certain problems that go on after hours or or at night time or whatever if Sure. Live station is going to hit a high level and overflow. We want to know about it before it overflows. So, I try to pick one out and and add that to the SCADA system annually. And so, all of our newer lift stations have have that already. So, this is just going back to the older ones and retrofitting with the skated technology. So that's that's what we have for capital improvements this year in SER and

we had service fees the utilities Which one? The utilities. Yes. Make the double 20.20.5400 20,000. Yeah, that's for the live stations. Um, we've just had a we just had the wrong number in prior years.

I I want to say we had a mix of and do you remember Veronica? We we had That's fine. Doesn't matter. we had something going on because I I brought it up to you and you you you went and found whatever the problem was, but I don't know if it was being coded wrong or what, but one one department was was catching all the electricity and so we had to kind of get that straightened out.

All right, any questions? Anything else? Not too much change there. The expansion grant that wastewater treatment plant. Yeah.

Yeah. So, we recently um began that project. I guess um going back, we we had the big grant. I think there was a million dollars. you know, it came in a million under budget and that was grant funds. And so, uh, Michael Lemons, he he fought with the water development board and they they didn't want us to be able to spend that money. I said, "No, you're not getting it." He said, "No, it was it was granted to us. We can find other ways to spend it." And so we had to go back to the wastewater plant specifically. We couldn't spend it anywhere else. And so we identified ways um to utilize those funds. This is just the match for that million dollars. Any other questions on wastewater treatment?

It's how you can find projects that you need to work on when you have extra grant money. That's wonderful. All right, I think we're good there. Nice development services. Let me take just a quick break here for a second. Folks, I don't think you came to listen to this budget stuff.

And John, if you fall asleep one more time, you're going to fall out of that chair. Please feel free to exit. It won't disrupt us. And uh we understand. Thank you. You bet. Thank you very if you want to leave those transfers with Veronica and we'll just

Tom. Good to see you. Thank you, sir. Good to see you, too. Y'all go way back. We go way back. about you write your email for me and I probably four or five years younger than my brother I think maybe somewhere in there

77 I was getting I was thinking I was trying to level them then burning and then I do my [Music] dad and stuff too. We've got some good activity. I'm sure you had a hard time getting All right, let's get back here.

We're going to go to the development services budget.

All right. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, members of council. So, um, Veronica has up on the screen the development services budget. Um, I came kind of came into the budget process a little late. It was already kind of started. So, I just kind of worked some magic on it to bring those budget numbers down and keep them a little closer to what we had this year. Uh, there was um a reduction in wages because we deleted a position. Um, I have used a portion of that deleted wages money towards we increased our postage budget. Uh, this will cover planning and zoning mailings for those uh new district overlay noticing that that was quite expensive to send that out. So, I budgeted for four of those just in case. Um, we had a little increase in uniform budget. We I budgeted for Jod and I to both have like matching polos, a jacket in the winter, sweaters, some boots for the inspector, that sort of thing. Um, just increase that by $300 this year. Uh, we do have a large increase in office supplies. That is to purchase a uh large format printer and scanner. Uh, currently right now, the city does not have a large format printer or scanner. So right now I cannot print plans, scan plans. I can't scan plats, any of that. So we have no digital files of our hard copies. My goal is to get all of our hard copies scanned and move to digital storage rather than paper storage on all of our archives. So that was uh $5,700 for the purchase and maintenance of a lease return large format printer. Uh I increased the budget for instruments and tools a little bit. I just kind of gave some line items. Uh, a smart level for measuring slopes for handicap ramps and that sort of thing. Um, a ladder. We don't often use a ladder in inspections. Generally, the contractors are required to provide that, but when you go into a little old lady's house, sometimes I need a ladder to help her out and get the inspection

in the attic done. So, I got a ladder in the budget for that. Um, disaster supply kit. This is something that I've done in every jurisdiction I've worked in. I have an onhand supply of disaster relief items um for inspection purposes. So, I have clipboards and pens and pencils and water bottles and granola bars, all the things that you need in an emergency that if you don't have it set aside in a tub, then you're scrambling when you're in the middle of a disaster. So, some disaster kits there. Um let's see. Contract labor. There is um we left the $40,000 for contract labor services that was previously in the budget and added $16,000 in there. These are items that the previous city manager worked with Bureau of Veraritoss to provide us with some bids on. Uh these are um a fee schedule analysis to go over our building department fee schedule and any other fees um that we feel that need to be reviewed and maybe get an understanding of what the fees are, why they're charged, and and a good idea of what we should be charging. A zoning ordinance review that would review our current zoning ordinance. Go back through all of our past and adopted ordinances and make sure that what we have published online matches all of that. and then some suggestions for corrections, revisions, conformance with state law. And then same thing on a subdivision ordinance review. Um, so those are in there as separate line items. Uh, we can remove them, approve them as needed.

Uh, fire marshall services. I'm sorry. Sorry. Go ahead. I didn't mean to interrupt. So you said contract labor that that's the 56,000 and that's specifically with Veraritoss to look at B schedule analysis zoning ordinance review and what was the 16,000 of that is for those is for the zoning ordinance for the subdivision ordinance and for the fee schedule. Okay, gotcha. Um

yeah, so what's the other 40? The other 40 is for um if we're short staffed and we need contract help. So if I have a large project I need to send out to BV for review or for inspections. Um right now we're using um Dennis McKenzie as our plumbing inspector while I'm working to get my state plumbing inspector license. So it's stuff like that where we need a little back fill until we can handle it. Next item. Um fire marshall services. We did you pull out fire marshall services as a separate Oh, that was actually one of the top guy who just got one down.

Oh, no. Okay. So, I have $18,000 in here for fire marshall services, which is a bump of $3,000. But um there was discussions that I I wasn't a party to totally revamp the fire marshall budget and the fire marshall contract. And that's going to be pulled out and made a whole separate budget account. That's that's what you'd rather do. That's what Alison says she'd rather do instead of just leaving one line item that says fire marshall services. Yeah. I I feel with the added services from the fire marshall, we should have its own separate budget and own light items so that we can track that better instead of just having a one fire marshall budget.

Yeah, I like that. So, I'll need to create a like a sub budget for uh that area. But that's not they're not requesting all that from us, but they are requesting whatever it is the truck. They're just requesting the bottom piece of it. Yes. This. No. Lower. Yeah. This one. This one. Yes. This one. Yes. This one. Yes.

All that. And one of those iPads we've already provided them. So, one of those will remove from the list. And then that right there include their uh current services. I don't remember those being in there, but this was what was given to me. This was the updated list. So, we just need direction as to what they kind of have their own radios. As far as I thought, I thought the 84,000 was it. Am I crazy? Don't I think that warrants a whole another discussion with fire? Yeah. Okay. Alison,

they were asking for the truck. I mean they what what I got out of it was whatever you could do would be but they dropped the whole thing down. That's what I got out of the conversation.

I see. So, and and that kind of goes back to, you know, I think we also need to have a good understanding of, you know, who's providing the insurance, who's going to use it, you know, all of the things that kind of go with buying another piece of equipment and then giving it to another third party entity or another entity that we don't have responsibility for. So, we got to kind of get that lined up, too. But we should include it in the in the budget. Doesn't mean we're not spending. So would you all like to see the fire marshall services as a separate adjustment? I think that makes sense.

Okay. Uh moving on through most everything is very minor adjustments the rest of the rest of the way through development services animal control budget. Um the construction the capital improvements project will drop off. Um Chrissy has asked to add $10,000 for a spay and neuter program. Um she feels it's very important and I agree to have all animals spayed and neutered as they leave the facility rather than giving vouchers to the adopting adoptive parents because they don't always have time to go back and take the pet in for those services. So, if we just send them out spayed and neutered, it's much better for everybody. And the 10,000 will cover that.

Yeah. Okay. Yeah. She said 10,000 would be perfect. Okay. I think they're $20 each or something like that.

And Alison, that's not something that could be included in the grant that she was awarded. So, the grant that she was awarded, we don't have all of the information on that grant yet, but she does not believe that that grant will cover the spay and neuter of animals that are in the shelter animals. She it it it's something different. She said she still needs extra money for spay and neuter. And then um capital improvements. Although we were dropping off the new construction project, we did throw $10,000 in there for a sign. Um there is no signage currently at the facility and you'll miss it driving by if you don't know what you're looking for.

Um so we there was talks about putting a sign on the fence, putting a sign on the building, maybe building a nice monument sign. We're not really sure what direction we want to go. Previous city administrator had had some lofty ideas. Um maybe we don't need as lofty of a idea. So, we just threw $10,000 in there as a placeholder for some signage. We don't anticipate we'll use all of that $10,000 for signage, though. Can I throw something in there from

Absolutely. So, a friend of mine in 20 she thinks 2015 um the school did a big huge thing with helping the the the pound thing. They they I don't know what all they did, but it was quite a bit. And when they did, they came to the city council meeting

and we think it was in 2015. And the city council at that time voted to change the name. I'm not sure if it was Glenrose Care and Control or Glenrose Glenrose Animal Care and Control or Glenrose Control and Care, but care was in there. And so I was hoping maybe we could go back and find the minutes for that. Absolutely. So before the sign is made because th those group of kids came and presented and she reminded me of that because now I'm on city council. Yeah

and I said well we're making new sign so I will find out. So if we could maybe figure out because I just don't know what order and she thinks it was in 2020 2015 and it probably would have been um in the spring because that was a year-long project that her class did so it probably would have been in the spring. Okay. Yeah. We'll absolutely look into that and get that name solidified before we order any signs. Okay, that would be awesome. And I can't wait to tell her. Absolutely.

Okay. Uh moving on to historic preservation. Um there was a little bit of change in historic preservation. Uh their budget's fairly small anyways. So they they added a couple of items in there. A little more money for promotional items. Um they're going to print some his a historic walking map. and uh they need to hold meetings with the building owners uh once they get the facade grant program up and running and the tax grant program. They they want to hold meetings with the building owners on those. So there's a little bit of money for that. Where is that at? It's 10.96 I think. There we go.

And then the only other change was um the they had asked in m in miscellaneous expenses for some grant writing funds and some seed money for the facade grant program. Um originally they asked for $5,000 in grant writing funds and $20,000 in seed money for the facade grant. Uh the previous city administrator asked to reduce those two items. So, those have been reduced to $3,000 for the grant writer and 17,000 for the facade grant. Um, I think that both of those are things that historic preservation will absolutely need. I think the three and the 17,000 is will work for them, but if we wanted to increase that to what their original ask was, I think that would be even better for them. But that's your decision if you want to go with the 3 and 17 or the 5 and 20. And that's all the changes for historic. Any questions about any of that? I know I flew through it, but

No, thank you. Those are uh it's under 1096 5801 under miscellaneous. We have zero in our reg zero zero. So it should be what amount? Um 3,000 3,000 for grant writing funds and 17,000 for seed money for the PAL grant program. Three for what? Three for grant writing funds for

17 for facade. And there was already $10,000 in the miscellaneous expenses. And the original quest request was five and 20. Was five and 20. Have we ever done it? I don't think we've ever No, these are two new things. Two new things.

I think the three and 17 would absolutely be sufficient for them. Uh they had just asked for the five and 20. questions.

Yeah, Rich has a question. Go ahead, Rich.

Yeah, I was uh off for just a brief minute, so I missed a little bit. You may have covered it. Um, two years ago, our fire marshall budget was $30,000. I know we didn't reach that. And then for some reason this last year, and I had some uh conversation with our previous city administrator about why it went down to 15,000, and he made the comment that they moved 15,000 of it into the um contracted employee fund. Um, so number one, I'm just a little concerned. I see we raised it just a tad bit, but I'm concerned because I believe they're going to bring on a third person to do it every single day a week. So whether or not that uh 18,000 that's I believe it was that's in the current budget is going to be suffice. Um I'd rather um play it safe than sorry I think I don't know why we dropped it. U but uh um I think it's just something that needs to be looked at.

Yeah. So, the I don't know what previous budgets were. I know that this year there was $15,000 in the fire marshall budget. I know that we are going to just slightly exceed that $15,000 with their monthly invoices this this fiscal year. So, I bumped it up to $18,000 for next year. Um direction of previous city administrator was to keep that as tight as possible. Um, I am very open to if they need more hours in the fire marshall budget. They are a vital asset to our safety of our structures for our residents. I I would absolutely offer to bump that up if we can, but for right now, the $18,000 will cover what they are going to invoice us for their hourly rates for this year and next year should be very similar.

Okay. Like I said, I'm just a little concerned that next year it won't be if they bring on the third body to to do it a third day. But that's my I'd rather have more in that budget and not utilize it versus the opposite. And I think we discussed unfortunately while you were offline that there was a whole slew of other items proposed for a fire marshall budget. And uh Veronica and I talked about breaking out the fire marshall budget into a completely separate budget item um so that we can break out all of those individual costs separately. And we have all agreed that we need to have further discussion about that fire marshall budget. Perfect. Thank you. You're welcome.

Any other questions? Thank you, Alison. Thank you. Hey bud. Yes, sir.

Say it's not mine. Say that didn't look right. All right. Awesome. Thank you. Thank you.

Okay. Uh most of my my items went up. Uh that's to include another patrol officer. uh including anything from uniforms to supplies. Uh vehicles I added in there 20,000. A used vehicle is going to be anywhere from 10 to 20,000 depending on it's going to be stripped down. You're going to have to add equipment to it which is around 28 29,000 uh to pivots about five or six. Um, and I talked to previous administrator about also about leasing a new vehicle with a fiveyear you pay like 27 30,000 a year for four or five years depending on what plan you go with. That's an option as well. That's what the sheriff's department does. They lease out and then you have $1 buyout at the end of that five years.

So that's an option. But have you got a break out of those numbers somewhere of a quote? Not now, but I do in followup. Yes, I've got I got a print out when I got that originally. May have seen it, but I'd like to I don't have it anymore. Uh took postage down to like 100 instead of 400. I think we're going to take most out of events to to deliver it. They don't want it deliver uh sent by mail anymore. So that I put that down to 100.

How much of this budget did you spend or have you spent from last year? How much of the budget does on all line items or I mean like how are you tracking right now from last year's budget? Just out of curiosity. Uh just what do you mean how am I tracking it by in my Are you on target? Are you on target? Uh no I was actually I was over because I in fact I had to get a couple of them from different line items to to cover it. Oh that's cool.

I I don't want you to think there's no judgment. I was just curious. And so I saw, you know, we had 70 budgeted for vehicle repair. Was that completed? How much? 70 70,000 for vehicle repair last year. Oh, that was that was a that included a vehicle. They included that line items. No, it wasn't all just for vehicle repairs.

They had put that in there last year as a vehicle repairs. I don't know why they included that price at 53,000 that we purchased. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Gotcha. Crown V. The Crown Vicks in bad shape, but not that bad shape. I know. I was like, okay, we were for 70 purchased for 20 in this. Yes.

I don't see it in there. Yes, I should have covered with another two different officers helping us cover that because he can only do Tuesdays and Thursdays. So, okay. Any other questions for law enforcement? So, your proposal is to add an FTE.

Yes. Am I remembering from the workshop that if that third one comes then we would have um police support longer into the night, right? Yes. What was the current hours and what would the hours be?

Uh we work anywhere from 10 to 11:00 p.m. uh during the week. During the weekend, it's a little bit later. So that would we keep keep one until 1 or two in the morning till it really slows down to get that covered. Have one as a power shift in between days and evenings. Have the evening guy work later. Okay. [Music]

So the one line item the repair and maintenance equipment you may have already answered that. What is that? What is that increase that last year we had 3500 this year we have 39,000. That includes that's for the uh the if we go with the the used vehicle that's the equipment that goes in it. Like let's say if we spend the 10 15,000 that's in a different line item and then that's that includes the uh the equipment to put in it. Radio monitor radio live sirene you know out it from bumper to bumper cameras if it doesn't already have a if you buy a used one. that don't already have it.

No, they strip them out. They strip them out. Yeah, they might have the partition. Some of them you may look at where they keep that in there. But most of them is going to be stripped out. What is the life of of a a new vehicle? I mean, will it last three years, four years? What's What is I mean? Just I mean, I've had the Crown V since 09 because it's just me driving it and the city limits what four square miles. We're not using and we're not you know big departments are using them you know there's another officer running the next shift so it helps them the life is longer span I think in small departments you get longer

until yeah that makes sense anything else is that other the other vehicle to be ready next next mid September Okay. Or a purchase. It was purchase. Yeah.

Looks good. Kind of depends on what y'all going to spend the 10, 15, 20 or spend the, you know, 25,000 on a new one and lease it out till you buy it. How's the vehicle Kobe's driving? It's a 2019. It's got 30 something thousand. Still still in good shape. All right. Anything else?

So, wait. So, if we get this vehicle, this would be your vehicle and then the Crown Vic would pass down to the new employee. Uh, we're trying to phase it out because, you know, it's getting some definitely got some bad spots. It's still running good, but I'm still having to take it in to get service. So, we need a new vehicle if Would we need a new vehicle if he came on or if she came on? Not I mean, we don't have that one. So, I'm saying we could get that used one and you know, okay, I've seen some that are 2015 2017 that cost 15,000 may have 96,000 miles on it. Okay. You know, one bad thing about police cars, they got a lot of island time on it.

So, I mean, I have a lot of miles, but they have a lot of island. They're sitting there on traffic stops, crashes. Yeah. Calls because we get leave it running for the lights. So, I'm not saying that be a good one. We could get But yeah, be be newer than the 09. Either either way we go. Yeah. I've got my money worked out of 09. I'm not asking. [Music] Sorry, Rich. Couldn't see you over here. Fire away.

I just had one and I think you said it. I just didn't catch it. Uh the increase in uh uniform budget or actually equipment budget up to $39,000 from $3,500. What is that covering? Uh for the equipment for the vehicle, whether it's it's the new or the or the used one for the cameras, the watch guard system, the Okay. That's not for the one that's due in September. That's for those that we go. Correct. Correct. Okay. Thank you. That was that was one big question. Yes, sir. George don't have anything from Stuart.

Anything? Candace? No. Thank you. So, I think we're done, Buck. Thank you. I will tell you, thank you so much for this weekend. There was excellent coverage everywhere. We had a lot of help. We did. Yeah, it was impressive. Harford wasn't covered that well. That's an understatement.

I'm gonna put a big sign up. We need citizens on patrol. I want to be I want it back. We need We need We need a cop program. Okay, we're going over to the administration. Me, baby. I got my nine. I'm ready. Stop. I just want to be dev so I can drive traffic so I don't have to go drive the school bus. Um, okay. Well, let's start. We're not having that. We are

10:05. We increased the wages to match what um voted in a while back. Uh, and then election expense, I didn't increase that budget. We were under that this year. Um, so I feel pretty good about staying at 15 for the next election cycle. Um, we recycled some laptops this time around. Um, so I'll leave that 1,600 in there just in case somebody needs needs a replacement. And then I we could possibly decrease travel, but I did increase training. Um, just to make sure we cover everybody plus TML just in case all five want to go. Any questions on that?

Yes. Mayor and council pay. That is quite the jump. How did we get it? Was this is not that 245 is not reflective of y'all's current that was the old numbers like carried the old numbers. So it never it was not changed last year. So we're over Yeah, we're over budget this this time. So I just adjusted it. So it'll be correct break even. Okay. Okay. Okay. Uh any any other questions on

how's problem? Well, still not enough to spoke 26 of them. The only I had uh was wages for administration. This 415 includes an administrative services manager. So, we could take those wages out and decrease that line item if you guys want to do that. I don't think we're going to fill that, are we? I I don't think we're going to build 250. What? Where

this administrative salary? This has an administrative assistant built in it. Service administrative services. This number was Yes. Is there a breakout? Well, I could know because then that would be Yeah. I mean, we could let everybody know what everybody makes. So, so what you're saying is out of this 415 number, take out admin services. Okay. And it would decrease the full budget. Okay. Yes. Overall, um, and there wasn't really any other

significant increases. I health insurance increases. Uh, work comp insurance. This is just more accurate reflection of what we pay. Um, so just increased it slightly. It's all pretty much. But we have an intern program that's going to be for 30 days. Well, that's the thing. We need to create a program. We don't have a program. We Okay. We can talk later. But I did increase that slightly just because you don't intend to

I'm I have the ad out um and then uh on the handshake website for Charlton. Um, I've gotten maybe one or two bites, but the intern we did have was a reference from uh Ann. And um, you know, we didn't really have a program like a set program. So, is that just a summer intern?

Uh, it doesn't have to be. So yeah, we just have to create, like I said, we just have to create I'm in the middle of creating the program kind of with the outline to be able to present to y'all. Um, but I have not completed that yet, but that's come up coming. So be able to Does it have to be somebody in college? No.

Anything else in there? It's really

event coordination. We kept that the same. Okay, here's 1060. 1060. Is there any question on 1060? I think he push He must been pushing something. [Laughter] What about software? What about

this one um includes our fun view um currently and we may have to pay um to get out of our contract with code. Um, is that a contract that uh Cassandra's been working on getting out of? Yes. So, okay. I think we'll be able to do it without any expense to us. Um, but I'm not 100% sure. I'm hoping. I'm hoping so. We've been working on it. Working on it. Yeah. I mean, I just know because I one day she was talking about it and I'm like,

"Yes, they ever since we said it, they've been very So, we'll see. So, this could possibly not get that high. Are you Are you switching to another? No, you're just going to do your own.

We do. We like Fund View. The all four of us um are very happy with Fun View. We're happy with customer service. Uh the price um is well worth it. Um, and we've discussed moving to encode, but there's been several people who have said that that encode 10 has caused issues with their city. So, we we're just hesitant because we're, you know, we were all very new and we'd spent a lot of money on training for Fun View and it seemed like a waste for us just to move over to Enco. Um, that's 100 grand. So

a very system. We don't know it either. We just did not want we wanted to make sure that we just kept continuity for now. Um and I feel like now that we were all kind of digging into fun were helping the process become easier.

And that's across all four of us because all four of us use different modules in Fundu. Um, and we're all very right now very comfortable with them. So, any issues that come up, we can usually squash. Any other questions on 1060? 1065 is non departmental. Is there any questions on that one? Oh, wait. Can we go back to 1060 event coordination?

Yes, that was a line item that the say I didn't think I was not say the previous administrator put in there. I was like I'm not gonna say that word. Was that was that like the Christmas budget? Yes. And music and the Yes, sir. Yes, sir. So, I left that number the same. Um, I don't know with the I don't know what everybody wants to do this next year. I'm not sure we're going to have Christmas Town, but So, if you want to increase it or decrease it, just give me direction on that and I will.

My opinion is to leave it where it's at and see if we can't come under it so it's already there. I think we can save some money in some of the events that we did doing it a little different way. Well, that's just my opinion. I'd like to have it there to cushion so we know we have those events, but I would like to come in cheaper than what we have there.

Yeah. I I can just say if you want to look at the split Christmas, we kind of talked about about a $25,000 increase in decorations because we did a lot last year and then the other two are the the music events and we you know I think we'll come in lower than we did for sure mainly because of band expense. my idea. It's not Y'all will get presented the numbers along the way, but I like the 125.

Any questions in 1065? Oh, I the um laser fish increase was the just foya that I uh presented to you all at the workshop. Um, so that's that cost in there to start implementing that which I would be so grateful for. And then really there's no other really big we did decrease the CPA. Oh, Richard has a question. We did decrease the

Sorry, we can wait.

Okay. uh budget from 63 to five and we probably will not get that high. That's Brenda. Um the lady who comes in, she was doing all of our uh bank wrecks for us, but uh Cassandra is now taking that over. So that'll allow for less um hours for Brenda. Brenda's going to come in and do spot checking on us. um kind of we're holding her retainer wise just so we can make sure we have her to bounce questions off of ask for any sort of advice um and then any procedural things that we need to make sure that we're doing for audit time. So um that's why there's a decrease slightly in that because her hours are going to decrease significantly because those bank wrecks were time consuming. All right. I got a question.

Go ahead, Rich. On the m It's on the cleaning and utilities. Uh obviously we will have the additional buildings. I know at some point we'll we'll probably uh maybe sell the other two buildings, but uh being that the budget's remaining the same, I know there's going to be a time lapse where we're going to have an additional building with utilities and cleaning needs and things like that. itself. I'm just a little concerned that that that the budget remains exactly the same and doesn't have a slight increase to topset that cost. Okay. I can add um additional into Do you want it in 1065 or uh for utilities?

Well, it looks to me like 65 is where everything's at. But if you have it in a different category, maybe that explains it. Like I say, I just want to make sure We were budgeted enough to to cover all the utilities and the cleaning of the new building. Okay, I will let me make a note of that and we don't have anything

cleaning and utilities. I will add that in. I'd rather put that because a lot of times the cleaning will split between departments since multiple departments are in the city hall. Um and then utilities will get split too between departments. So, I'll probably keep utilities and and 60. That's where you'll see that money go in. Do you think that's enough money for furnishing the new building? Which which line item was it? Um, it was the

1065 587. There is oh 25,000 last.

No. Now is is it enough for administration? [Music] Yes. With 1065 with the if I don't know where CBB is going. We just have to figure out who's going where and then we can budget appropriately for each department to or we can all put it all in non-EP departmental. It just it depends on

Let's go over the numbers and look at because Jim and I talked a bit about that today and some of the things in there. I mean, we've got the conference center side, too, but that doesn't have to happen right away. Um, let's just look at some some pricing and then put a number in there. It does need to be increased or placed in there.

Any other uh Yeah. So 10655241 amend zoning and subdivision subdivision ordinance. Is that different from what is budgeted in developmental services when she talked about Veraritoss B schedule analysis zoning ordinance review subvision ordinance? I never even touched that uh line item. So I don't know that I don't even know that we've ever spent money out of it from this year um or why it's in that non-EP departmental. But we can I can I can zero that out or move that to her.

Yeah, that's probably what she did. Move it to her. I just really think it was in from what I understood how she elaborated on what her her 40 I think it was 40 was was to do that. Yeah, the 40 plus plus 16 was the size. Yeah, I don't think you could strike that. So, I don't know that we even need to move that up there other than we just zero it out. We say $31,000. Yay. Hey, I covered my salary. 500 goes to the company. Covered all of our salary. Good job.

Then I assume the communications plan. How often is that updated? It was just I don't think we've ever done it, have we? I don't think we have. No, we still need to It was adopted last year. Yeah, we still need to engage CDL or whatever their name is now. Abra CDA. See the PDC something like that. Yeah. Any other go to a party? We better do something.

What's the commercial umbrella policy for country woods? Yeah. What is that, Jim? What is that, Jim? Um so Helen Kerwin owns um the portion of property there from from the dam back to the ri the I guess the the kind of the area that's behind the split rail fence. Yeah. Mhm. So, so she gave us an easement to to run that sidewalk down to tie into the dam. In return,

we we have to have a long list of things. One of them being an insurance policy. Okay. And that was stipulated as a condition of the easement. What kind of insurance? I mean like what what does it cover? Just to protect her of something. Commercial liability. Oh, like if somebody got hurt in that part. I see. Okay. It's what we're going to do though. If they get hurt, we're going to drag them down to the other area.

That's right. drag them into the river and it floods and stuff and and that fence gets messed up on her property. Is that her responsibility or it's our we there's a lot of things trashing.

Okay. Uh the building fund is that not under a capital project line item or what is I mean what is that? I think um we we discussed this today. We don't we don't know what the renovations are going to look like for this building, but I think that's what that was for. It is. And I can assure you it's going to be a lot less than that if not totally wiped out. The first time I saw it 45 looked at it 450. I'm like

but I looked at the plan today. You know we talked about that. That's a great question because I don't think we need what's in that plan totally for sure. Anyway, it's a great question. It won't be that. I think it all kind of comes back around to who's going where. Yeah. And what property is is needed, what properly is not needed, and what do we do with the final disposition of it? Yeah. Yeah, that that's true. And when is that discussed?

Well, as we get closer to this building, which is going ahead of schedule. Jim met with him this morning. Uh, I mean, it's it's going to move pretty quick. So those discussions are going to have to start happening and and uh probably between Jim and Veronica for the most to just look and say I mean the overall plan right now I think is to everyone be within this building or the lane building police department and the CVB eventually gone but that won't happen right away but that's kind of the plan. So most of the plans are to put a certain departments over here and then and we kind of have a conversation going. We haven't decided and we'll take input from everyone. But but anyway, it's got to start pretty quick.

When's it supposed to be done? Get the update. We're going to have a meeting tomorrow. We'll get an update. But originally they projected eight months. So they're on that number, are they? March. I'm gonna say she'll be ready in February. Rich.

Yeah. Rich. Oh, I just wanted to mention to to council that something that you and I discussed and and it's a recommendation of putting together some type of a working group with, you know, Jim, Veronica, um the police chief and uh probably Allison and then maybe one or two council members or or or something to to sit there and figure out whose offices are where and kind of more importantly decide um what what and the plans are for the current building, the current city hall and how lay it out.

Yeah. Yeah. Exactly right. And I think we will do that. Let Jim and Rona for the short term kind of decide how they want to put it together, who they want to talk to, and structure a committee and bring Chick-fil-A and see what happens. Shop local mayor. Oh, you didn't hear. Breaking news. What? Rumors. Oh, agenda. So bad. line. Yeah, Rich, that's a great point. Great point on the 450,000. Wow, that's a lot. And then 1065 5841 represents the change um that was voted on by all of you.

Yep. A couple, but they were also going to give us some audited financials as well, right? They are, but there's not a condition to it. Yes, it was. I don't believe so. You had to look back at the Veronica. I believe it was. You did? I don't think so, but look it up. I don't think so. You think it was? Yeah, I think it was that you because they wanted more than 38 and I think George they had to provide just

well if there something going ary there we'll just jug it out. [Music] Okay. And then the one last budget for me court. Is there any questions on um court budget? You might as well explain attorney fees. What happened there?

Yes. Um we have increased attorney fees this year. U it was budgeted for that 2900. Uh, we blew that out of the water um by $15,000. Wow. The attorney that we had contracted with with Stan's group um her fees were $2500 each time she came down here. Um so now we were with the same firm but we have a different lawyer, junior lawyer, a lot less a lot faster. Um, and the his fee has been significantly less. So, I did budget for $10,000 this time around. Um, and we were looking for a lawyer to just pay 500 flat fee or $600 flat fee. Um, but we had a couple people interested, but no fights.

All right. Anything else? Anybody, where do you capture your FOYA request? Um, time slashcost that was in um 65 laser fish is 5231. Okay. Thank you. Yes. Any questions on the court budget? I think we're good. That's all for administration.

All right, CBB folks break. Yeah. Hey, I'm going to take a 3 minute 50 second break so George can go to the restroom. Thanks. Put it Put that in the recording. to go to, but I don't want to go with him. So, how long you think your presentation's going to be, sir? Well, you got three minutes. I said it at the beginning of this. You have any questions?

Okay. No, it's pretty basic.

When do you guys start charging before? Uh, we charge whenever they it's appropriate. It just depends on the amount of time it takes, copies it takes. If it's a video recording, we charge for that. Yeah. The previous city secretary charged for records. That's a standard letter I sent out. Yeah. No, it wasn't for that. It's just I didn't

I know that I guess have not requested enough stuff that it's cost for payment. So that's I was curious like I don't know a lot of people pay for records. So I was like I know it is standard and next door they charge either next door.

All right let's reconvene break it over. The main thing we did since we're starting from scratch essentially um we consolidated a lot of these ancillary things under flat five marketing which had already been doing the statistical analysis for Glenrose. And we had uh Darren Dreitz with Flat Five uh put together our tourism some of our tourism promotion and social media content um and the website uh building and management. So it's all going to be under one company which makes it easier to manage. He knows us. he knows all the you know we work well together. So we're consolidating that. So we moved some things around. Uh we broke out some instead of everything being under advertising and tourism just two uh line items. We broke it broke that out and into the what was we were already contracted for billboards. We were already contracted for radio. So I'm fulfilling that and continuing that. But I'm changing up the copy and our message, you know, as as we're moving toward refining our branding. And uh we're we're going to add an influencer. It doesn't mean that uh Tracy and I are not going to be doing uh our own social media stuff, but we'll have somebody who can crank it out on a regular basis. Um the other uh the other major thing that we changed

um I redu because you see that uh 5210 advertising went from 60,000 to 40,000. It's because we it we didn't drop down in the advertising. We just had those other line items. So that's going to be the Texas tour guide which Glenn Rose has always done. and uh the Texas Highways magazine ad. And what we're adding is the Texas Society of Association executives. And this is going to be a banner ad which is going to specifically go to the associations and agencies and commission people that her charge is to try to get these conferences and meetings here on a regular basis. and these weekday meetings that'll help fill our our hotels and with that state rate which is real important to keep our occupancy up. Um, we are added some to the travel because we're going to be making some trips to some of uh other like cities and see what they're doing, right? And see how we compare and doing a little bit of outreach for some cooperative marketing programs. Um, I had a question about 5700. I I talked to the mayor. we were going to talk some more about the hot approved projects. You know, if if um if that's able to go up, it would be nice for us to be able to um help support some of the new events and activities that are going on here. Of course, by law, hot tax has to be used for marketing those events, but we want to be able to support upand cominging events and get them uh on the road to

success. Uh we reduced significantly 5763, which was the music content and jingles, and we moved that around into other areas. uh we reduced the miscellaneous expenses because I didn't see that that was being used in miscellaneous and uh we added uh the software we added constant contact so that we can utilize that function to uh for our tourism and travel partners you know get getting the word out. We we just completed two days of a very successful hospitality training uh workshops at the expo center and I think those

text how many people attended that? Well, we were expecting 15 yesterday and 32 32 showed up and today we had a couple of extra come in it. We knew this one was going to be a smaller attendance day but I think it was about 12 10 or 12 15

15 And it was a good it was a good representative sample of the you know hospitality industry here accommodations, restaurants and and uh attractions. And we got the the state park rep. So, you know, it was and and today the Zoom call was with Pierre who was out of town, but uh he's with the Dinosaur World and he even spoke a little bit. And on the events, the last one 5877 I, you know, I reduced that a little bit, but I don't have the history here of what the CBB did for that. So if we

Yeah, the problem was we were mixing some CVB with our big events and some of that money was crossing over. So it's going to be less than because we've got that 125.

Well, overall um you know last year uh we came in at from what I saw was 447 660 and this year we're 461. So, we're just three 3% some change over, but we're doing a whole lot more and I think it's going to be a whole lot more effective. And of course, we are creating a entirely new website. I've just finished going through 3,000 photos that were taken and selecting about 155 of those that will be used on the website and print materials and went through 450 drone shots and have chosen some of those that are going to open up and and be filtered throughout the the website. And it's there's Stuart got to see a couple of them that I've got. They hadn't been edited down yet, but they're they're spectacular. They're really going to show off the town a lot.

So, working hard getting that done. Any questions on the budget? Um, let me see. Okay, you answered advertising, tourism promotion. What doubled in tourism promotion? Just how are you classifi like what are you classifying in there? Well, the the Texas tour guide, okay, the uh Texas Highways magazine, the Texas Society of Association executives. Um, so that just, of course, we have we have no print materials out there whatsoever right now. Okay.

So, we've got to do rat cards. We've got to do brochures. Uh, I meet with Sam Houston tomorrow to find out what what's the deal with our ad that we bought in the travel guide that we Glanberry and they haven't performed yet. Yeah. So, I'm gonna I'm not just going to say, "Hey, we won our ad or we're gonna, you know, file suit." I'm going to say, "Here's what I'm thinking we can do. Maybe you could print us something that would suit us better than a

people carrying around a magazine." People are on their phones these days. We need something in racks as many places as we can get. So they see that then that'll direct them to the website. So that's what I think is going to be more effective. Have you used constant contact in the past? Not well yes but of course not here but we haven't had it here. But that was Tracy's uh suggestion that we we get that signed up. So what is constant contact? Is it like a CRM? It's a database that allows you to just import uh emails and you can just constantly contact your your database like newsletters. Yeah, exactly.

Oh, okay. But it you kind of slice and dice them too. Yeah. So, it allows you we can we can send different messages to different parts of it. So we can we can stay in touch with our hospitality uh population here, hotels and restaurants and and then and then we can also have uh all the people the tourists that are interested and it's an optin application volunteers when we have events. We always need to go to the volunteers and find volunteers and we're always starting scratch every event that we have.

That's a good idea. Have a constant contact list that includes volunteers too. And and the thing that we've found out from the workshop, but we went into it uh proposing that we work more closely with the uh chamber and all the events because nobody knows what the other ones are doing. And then of course there's been the I think butting heads is the best way to put it with the county and city from what I've heard in the past. So we're getting past that. We're meeting with county people and we all want to work together. So, I'm going to be the Rodney King of tourism here. You know, can't we all just get along? So,

So, have you worked much with the schools? Because like I don't know if y'all noticed how many buses were parked at hotels this weekend because of the volleyball tournament. So, is there any collaboration going on with the school district knowing when big tournaments? There's going to be because I've got a secret weapon. Yeah, you got a secret weapon in here. When that b those basketball tournaments come, those are huge. And at the workshop, she used her teacher voice, too. So, that was I I have a I have a question. Hang on, everybody.

What was hot the hot fun grants? And then what was that? I believe it's the funds that we have that we set aside so that if there's an event that comes up, somebody says, "Hey, I want to do a little wine festival thing and we could use some help for this startup." And it was a it was a three-year program, a funded program for the first year, second year, third year reducing

and we used it a little bit, but George, when's the last time we used it? I don't remember. It was when my mom was still against me to use that for startup events like mine festival got it. The bluegrass festival got it and each year like it decreased into we haven't used it. Nobody's used it which it would be really cool because we have more events. Well, if someone steps forward we might consider it again but for now we haven't used it. So, and by law, the the funds are supposed to be used for marketing at the event, not like bricks and mortar parts of it, but or buying a band, you know, but but that's what one of the major expenses of an event is getting the word out. So, yeah.

Any other questions? Everybody good?

Thank you, text. Thank you. Okay, we're going to recess from regular session here, regular meeting and go into executive session accordance with the provisions of the Texas Open Meetings Law Subchapter D Government Code Vernon Texas Codes annotated in accordance with section 551.074 pertaining to interim city administrator and section 551.071 071 consultation with attorney on interlocal agreements and again 551074 regarding the city administrator. So, we will recess from regular session at 7:40 p.m. [Music]

I was like, "No, you don't." When we talk about the capital project here that has all the casual I was prepared to talked about that. But man, that looks good. I like that hotel, too. It looks like a holiday. Is that an old holiday in there today?

Because because I was budgeting in streets and Troy was budgeting. So, computer we've accomplished some that we could take out of there. So, And then it's really nice having this.

He's not gonna stay in that rod. [Music] [Music] You never know.

Okay.

[Music] Oh,

I can't

But I wasn't ever going to say anything. No, it it went down exactly like I said. Let me buy the number six here. I haven't eaten at all today. I ate salad at 10 melt yesterday. All right, we go back into regular session now. City Council meeting at

8 p.m. action taken on items discussed in the executive session. Item number 11 regarding interim city administrator would direct HR to work with um Scooby-Doo with interim city administrator to agree to terms of uh his interim nature. Sounds good.

That's what we're doing. We're we're working out his interrum nature. Uh item 12, discussion consideration regarding interlocal agreement directing u our attorney to move forward and adjust the interlocal agreement for presentation to the county. Item 13, discussion, consideration, possible action regarding matters for city administrator. We will direct HR to conduct and continue conducting a search for a permanent fill and inform council as she sees fit with viable candidates.

Anybody have any comments before we adjourn and adjourn whatever time it is? 837. Yeah, we're gonna go uh we're gonna go hike around. The Chisos Basin is still open. They haven't closed it yet. We're going to go to the Hot Springs on the river. That's nice. Be sure you go to the vault to eat at the vault. The vault? The vault in Martha or Oh, I thought you were going to Hot Springs. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Hot Springs. Yes. And we're going to the Hot Springs in Big Ben. Oh gosh, that is nice. Yeah,

I love Big Ben cell phone hard work.