Village Council - Regular Meeting

It's all Thank you for being here tonight. February council meeting. Please stand for thanks for its residents, it staff that supports the community and [snorts] and everybody who's part of this um community, great community we live in. We ask you to be with those that are sick right now and then bless them, guide them, be with their families through these times and just uh just be with them through their trials. We thank you for you what all you do and we ask you to guide our decision making through the council and the staff of this community. Um please bless this community and watch over us. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. [clears throat] Thank you.

Sit next to me. We have a special guest with here with us tonight, Erica from the Defiance County Economic Development giving us an update on current happenings in the county. Thank you, Eric.

Well, hello I I know most of you, but I know that there are some that haven't met before. I did read the nice article in the Crescent News. It was nice to see Hicksville on the front page there. So, um, a little bit about myself. I've been in this position for five years. Um I come from a media background to um then transitioning into being a chamber director and then I got recruited by utility company where I learned a lot of things about infrastructure which then ultimately led me to this position. So um I work with the mayor on a regular basis. Um he sits on our board. We are half public half private and um every day is an adventure. I'm sure you guys feel the same way. So, as far as like the different things that we have happening in Hicksville, I'm going to start off by talking about Saber Industries. We have been working with them. They have have a request to ramp up the hiring of new welders. They are looking anywhere from 100 to 150 new welders. And um that when we first heard that, it kind of took us a little bit like how are we going to do that? Uh so we uh we called in um a lot of help uh Northwest um state community college for county career center. We even reached out to our partners in Pauling County um their economic developer along with Vantage Career Center. Um we've been meeting regularly to put together um really creating a talent pipeline for them that's an apprentice program. Um so so that's happening. Um, we're working on that um regularly and u I'll be excited to give you an update when I see you guys next on that. Um, but exciting stuff at Saber. Um, on top of that, and

if you know anybody that is looking for a position, um, they they will take people that have no experience and have them go through this training program. Um the starting wage there is the $1920 an hour wage, but then as you get your certifications it gets higher. So there's that. Um the Hicksville Spec Building, it is a project we've been working on, I want to say four years. Um so I want to give you some good news tonight. First off, I think we're at the last point. Mayor, would you agree with this? I say that about every council meeting, don't we? Uh then I come back with the next meeting and say

I really do feel like this is the last there's like one more signature item that they're willing to sign off on if they get the answers to. Um we've Aver's already provided them what the answer is. We're just waiting on a timeline to get that done. It's so close that um I've been working with Keller Logistics and we have been working on the OIP application. OEIP stands for Ohio Speculatory Inventory Program. And what that is, it's a jobs Ohio program where if you build a spec building, you can apply for low interest loans or grants to help with getting that that built. So, uh, we had our first review um with Matt Davis at RGP said the application looked good. Um, we're just tweaking a few other things. I think we have a couple questions that are out there that we have to get with Corey on. Um, but all in all, I think I'm very I think it looks very promising that we'll get a a um get something there from the state and then once we get that okay, then we can start marketing this. Um there's been a lot of missed opportunities there. We've had um one of the ones that I I I kick myself about most is we had a a medical instrument manufacturer that was really interested in in sighting there, but because we didn't have this all cleared, they couldn't come here. but it wasn't meant to be. Something else better will come along at once we get this all cleared up. Um I'm also working with three different companies in Hicksville currently. I cannot disclose their names. Um working on expansions that are very nice size with some new job numbers. Um the other thing that um I spent most of January working on was um what's called uh it's the it's called the RED grant. It's for residential housing. Um, and I don't know if you guys are all all are

aware, but in 2025, Defiance County landed the biggest singular investment of our history in the mega site, which is outside of Defiance, 13 around 1300 acres. And because of that, and it's a a tissue plant, um, toilet paper. I cannot tell you how many people have said, "Oh, human tissue." I'm like, "No, it's toilet paper." Not like, [laughter] but but I guess you have to be very clear. Um, First Quality is the name of that company if you want to do any research on they're a top-notch company. We're very excited to have them and they'll be bringing in 407 new jobs of which um they're they haven't started recruitment yet. that'll happen more in 2028, but they have started um with some of their executives and some some o some other um hires. Some of those have been doing tours of Defiance County and they have been looking in Hicksville. So, that's really cool. And they've all had really positive things to say about Hicksville. But because we um landed this mega site, we are one of few of the few communities that are eligible for this housing grant program. And um you have to be within 20 miles as the crow flies of the site. So we have a developer um Jefferson South Holdings. Am I getting that router or is it South Jefferson Holdings, which is the first

is it Jefferson South Holdings? and they were um in the process of doing a project in defiance and then uh we were getting Hicksville queued up to be one of the next projects that they tackled. So, originally we were going to put all of those we were going to put that application together because it was 125 um new houses, new housing units in the Defiance location along Arisville Avenue. And then they were, and again, keep in mind these are all phased approaches. So, it's not like you're going to see 125 houses. It'll be phased there. And they were also looking at Labar Drive, which is what the the village of Hicksville owns. and again phased approach where they would eventually build up to 90. We were looking at originally putting that application together. But as we started looking at some of uh the requirements of the grant, um we went a different [clears throat] direction. Uh we asked the developer if we put we went for the full um grant amount in defiance if they'd still be willing to um to commit to Hicksville. They agreed. The reason we couldn't include Hicksville is because some of the uh your zoning um and some of the zoning and there's a comp plan that isn't within a two-year period. I know you guys have have those things in place, but the way the state is looking at this is they want all of those up to date. Fortunately enough, Defiance had theirs updated two years ago. So, that is something that the mayor, Corey, and I are going to be like talking about and and seeing how we can get those reviewed because maybe it will we can be positioned for some other grants in the future if we start looking at that. So, that's another conversation for another day. But the strategy there was telling the developer, hey, if we go all in on this one in defiance, are you

still willing to commit to the one in Hicksville? And they were indeed. and they I believe that they presented a letter of intent and you guys have so you're in the loop on that. Um so that's that. Um the other thing that I wanted to mention to you guys is that our office thanks to West Banko, we offer a grant to small businesses. It's a $500 grant and it can be for anything. So I'm telling you this to kind of get the word out to, you know, various small businesses here in Hicksville and the surrounding areas. Uh, you do have to meet with our small business coach, Lisa Beecher, with the small with the SBA. She does that for us. Well, it's not the SBA. I think a small business development center. Sorry about that. And um and then once you meet with her and she she's she'll either help you walk through a glo a growth plan or a an actual business plan. And then once she signs off, we submit that to our committee for approval and it's $500. Hicksville Chamber. They recently just announced that they're going to start doing $500 grants for chamber members in Hicksville. I want to make sure you guys are all aware that we can stack those. So, if there's a Hicksville um chamber member that's going after the $500, tell them about our program, too, because those can be stacked so they can get $1,000 for marketing or whatever. I think one of the the one of my favorite stories is there was a a veteran, he um didn't he didn't want to do a a normal 9-to-five job. It was hard on him to stand long hours. So, um he started doing his own honey business. And um with this grant, he was able to order all sorts of inventory and supplies and marketing materials so that he could get out into some different stores. and he did just that with the help of Lisa Beecher. So, um it we're very excited

about that. We would love to do more of those here in Hicksville. So, overall um since 2020, we our office along with all the community uh leaders that we work with on a day-to-day basis, we've we've recruited 1,550 new highpaying positions. Now we are at 950 of those positions that still need filled. Keep in mind first quality is like 47 of those and between now and three four five years we have that time period to ramp up those 950. That is why housing so critical. That does not include the 150 count that I gave you for SA Saber. that does not include the other three expansions that I've I mentioned here in Hicksville or the other um companies that we're talking with in other parts of the county. So overall, I really feel like Defiance County has a great um a great lookout ahead and so does Hicksville. Um I I love coming to Hicksville and and visiting the different businesses. I think if the one thing that I want to make sure you guys are aware of if you do find a business um is having some needs, we um we would love to meet with them or if you talk with a business that is struggling, bring us in because there are resources that we can offer. Um but I will tell you all all in all the the different businesses that we visit on a regular basis are all going strong here. There's a strong community in Hicksville when it comes to the industry. Um, and it's really excite an an exciting time. So, if we can just get that housing piece, um, I think that we would, um, would be doing great. It sounds like we're on the way there. Close. Do you guys have any questions for me?

I got just one. The first quality, do they have a time frame of Yeah, ramp up time. So, they're um, they are supposed to they want to be in operation in 2028. uh they are they're working with a a firm that's supposed to create a website so that they can start doing them the the hiring. I'm anticipating that's going to be in 2027 um if not late 2020 this year. So um but that's what they're saying. That's their goal. Um and they have started work out there. Yes. But between that time we had discussed how many contractors will be coming through. That's a whole that's a whole other

opportunity for the county and the area is over a thousand contractors will be coming on their sites looking for Airbnbs. Yes. Rental properties, campgrounds. I mean, some of these crews come in and they bring campers in and set up um because it's, you know, they want to go home maybe on the weekends or they're here for three or four months um and and bring a car and stuff with them. So, you know, we've we've kind of had a little committee formed about showing where the restaurants are, what special activities, the festivals are, things like that within the county, uh working with the uh the chambers, you know, wanting to get out with them and and telling these people as they're moving in,

uh working um relocating and things like that that uh we want them to shop, eat, socialize, all everything here in the county if we can help them. So

we we're we we're calling that our ambassador program and we do have links of all the different that we did think about originally just having a one site that had it all but then everybody's got their own own organization. We feared that it would be hard to um keep up with a new website. So, um, we have created on our website and we've encouraged the others to make sure you have updated information on your on your restaurants. So, there was a another neighboring county um that had a chamber that didn't have any of that information and we were like, get it on there because so it's not just a defiance county thing. This is a regional approach. Um, I'm not even quite sure what a thousand contractors is going to look like. I do know that some of our local um restaurants that have food trucks are um positioning themselves. Some of them are buying some food trucks. Um but there's a lot of like you said, a lot of opportunity and um I'm excited to see where where it's going to go. Um I don't know. I'm sure there's going to be something that comes up that I'm not quite sure immediately how to deal with it, but we'll we'll figure it out like we always do. I want to say something about Erica and her staff over there. Anytime I've ever called her, Cara is another big part of your new Cara, but uh she is on top of everything. You give her a lead, you have a question, she gets back to you immediately and then follows up with things. You know, I've had some leads, she's had some leads. um uh she's an amazing lady that that takes heart in the county but also heart in each community within the county. Um you know today when I say where you going to be at today she goes I'm actually coming to Hicksville to meet with some people and she's not you know doesn't have to be specific. I'm just glad she's meeting

with our companies. She knows so many people within the realms of the fund financing uh the government entities that can help directional uh for these companies for um growth and movement. Um she's got a lot of good connections and she works well with everybody. She has been it's been rough year last year with this factory and the size it was. Yeah. Uh for for Erica and her staff to land this company and she was such a huge intrical part. This is big for Defiance County, a factory this size. And it it it took note through the state because the governor even got Yeah. the governor was involved in it. I mean, there was so many different people that played a critical role in bringing this.

But I can't thank you enough for what you do for the county and the residents and the communities as a whole.

Well, I will tell you there was many years ago, uh, 2008, both my husband and I lost our jobs in the same week. We had little kids and that was horrible at the time, but I'm glad it happened because uh it's made me this is why why I'm here. Like I'm fighting to bring higher paying jobs. Uh I've talked to a lot of companies that pay minimum wage and I'm like, well, how would you like to to to work that? Because I took some of those kinds of jobs when I was just trying to scrape by during that year and it was really hard. So, we want to try to bring in higher paying positions. [clears throat] When we talk to companies, we make sure that like if they're talking to us and they say, um, you know, we're [clears throat] going to offer X and if it's not above a certain threshold, we say, "Okay, you can come here, but we're we're not incentivizing that." So, um,

Erica, you've worked with so many comp. You don't care what size the company is. I mean, big, small, you know, self-employed people out there. She will help anybody at any time. You I've seen you do it. Yeah. I I I love working with the people and and trying to create new opportunities. So, that's what what I enjoy doing. So, you do a great job. Yeah. Thank you. Well, if you guys need anything, um I'm here if you need uh to refer anybody. Again, um the mayor has my contact. You can send it out. I'm accessible with my email and my cell phone. Thank you, Erica. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you, J.

All right. Um, we got the approval of the January 20th regular council meeting minutes. Make a motion to approve as written. I second. Roll call. Yes. Gonwick, yes. Basset, yes. Zed, yes. Miller, yes. Valena, yes. You have the uh payment list bills in your packet. Any questions on those? West Bank one just description says miscellaneous bank fees $115.

Oh, that's because it's uh the once a year when I have to do Office 365 and mailware bites and all of that came in. That's a lot of bank fees, but that explains it. Okay. Uh the mule did I know you guys were buying for the park. Did what do you guys do with the old uh ranger or whatever that was? The landm is still sitting down in the park building. We'll probably go yell it.

Make motion pay the bills. Second. Roll call. Elena, yes. Miller, yes. Donwick, yes. Basset, yes. Sedike, yes. Yes. Good. Thank you. Uh, we didn't have any boards or commissions that met. We do have some committee reports. Um, ordinance committee report in here. Oh,

um, sure. I'll go over it real quick. Uh, I wish Avery was here because she was there at that meeting with us. Um, and she's going to be writing up the uh the new ordinance. Um, but we had uh Jessica Garrison came and spoke to the committee. Um, she's the chicken expert of the village. It seems like we learned more about chickens than we cared to learn, I think, didn't we? Uh, gave us a lot of input of of what they like to do as far as raising chickens and, uh, how they take care of them. Uh Brian Demlin met with her at her house and kind of got an idea of, you know, this is this would be a good way um uh to zone it and take care of it with Brian doing the inspections and whatnot if if the ordinance goes through. Um we made a decision kind of 12 to be the number of chickens um having a permit in place to make it uh if they want to have those. That just gives us a way to um keep track of who has chickens in the village. Um to trying to help keep them up, you know, keep it clean because we all know how chickens can become um make sure people aren't going over that. It's just a way to uh I hate to say regulate it, but um it is a village in town. We we can't have a farm of chickens in town. So, we need some kind of uh ordinance to go along with that. So, um, Avery should be on the February 17th meeting having a first reading of the ordinance. So, we will see. That's why one reason I wish he was here to verify that, but Oh,

do you know, um, Brian, initially when they were talking about this, it was 12 animals. Is that still the verbiage or is it 12 chickens in addition to My understanding was 12 chickens. And correct me if I'm wrong, Ken or both, but 12 chickens and dogs and cats were separate. That's how the that's how the last year's proposal was written up. That's how because I know there's discussion of like if you [clears throat] had um rabbits, six Yes. six chickens and six rabbits, but cats and dogs aren't a part of it anyways. Dogs fall under Right. Right. So, okay. Okay.

So, is there a maximum number of animals that you guys are proposing with this ordinance? Not that I know. It was just a 12 chicken. Chickens is basically all we really talked about. Okay. Curious how Avery is going to write that up then [clears throat] because it's a it's animals at a dwelling, right? Not chickens at a dwelling. We had goats and animals, chickens and rabbits and well chickens was all we discussed even having in this ordinance. So there was no other So that like you said dogs and cats are excluded. Yeah. So 12 would be in my in my interpretation 12 chickens.

They have a limitation on cats. It's like how many cats somebody can have.

Yeah, there's there's actually discussion on cats, too. Um in a way that maybe we can start limiting how many cats we have in a village, but that's another discussion. Um but yeah, any questions? Um the people that were the the residents that were here with us. I think there was three or four families that all had chickens. They were they seem to be on board [clears throat] with what we were doing. Um they appreciated that we listened to them and again and uh Jessica would like to come next meeting to speak to the council if she could. I told her I pass minutes. Any other questions for the ordinance committee?

All right. Well, thank you for looking into that. I know it's been a lot of discussions and it sounds like we're getting to a conclusion. Uh, next we have administrator's report. Uh, the only thing I have to add to to this report is I have been working with Wesler Engineering for the paper drive lift station. So, if this project on Labar Drive takes off, currently the way that lift station sets, a good comfortable number is 18 to 20 more homes on that station. Uh, they just have a couple three horse pumps on there. Um, we can upsize to five horse pumps and there's some water infiltration that we're getting a lot from from Hap Drive, a lot of clear water into that. So, we're going to have to work on trying to get that out of the system. But just upgrading the pumps. Uh they were comfortable with anywhere from 90 to 100 more homes just simply upgrading the size of the pumps cuz the other ones don't they don't draw down quick enough. But we're going to be working on it in the spring. Um doing more uh cameraing out there and seeing where all this extra water is coming.

Yes, this clear water is coming from. I have a suspicion it's all coming from the field side and in the sanitary other nets on thanks to you and your crew for all our snow removal. Some people have no idea how much time and lack lack of sleep you get and lack of home time you get when you're gone all night and all weekend long. Thanks. Serious lot top to clean. I mean there's sometimes there's never an end in sight either. 26 26 miles 23 miles of roads now and then parking lots and everything else. Well, thank you to you.

Y same. Thank you. And with salt, too. I know I talked to one of your staff today. Um did salt increase? I heard uh because of all the snow in Ohio here and Yeah, have a limited supply. Yeah, I mean it was just like last year they had a salt shortage and it went from, you know, 80 bucks a ton to 200 250 and I know farther east you get it's like $650 a ton. I mean we're we're setting fine on our soul. Good. But yeah, thank you for all that. Um, solicitor Cheryl. Oh,

two of these were will show up on the 17th because they're not finished yet. Um, we have the first reading of resolution 20262 by caption only to enter into an agreement with Nationwide First Responder Grants LLC to manage the FEMA grant EMW 2024 FG0436 and declaring an emergency. When I sent this over to you, I also sent the actual contract and that's with Mickey Smith who did um our other firetruck before and now that we have been awarded the FEMA grant, he manages it for us because paperwork is horrendous and he does that. He did it before and it was wonderful. And um when the auditors come, we have to have a single audit because it's um federal money.

So I need um I make a motion to suspend the rules. How much do you plan on putting down on this? Um he is going to come and talk to the fire department about that. Okay. I was going to say this is just the him managing it, right? This is not Okay. I have additional questions about that. I say just double check cuz last meeting we asked about have you looked at you go I'm just finding out I just got the numbers have a chance to look at the budget so okay I had the same thought I'll second her okay roll call Sike yes Basset yes yes Miller yes yes Igley yes

okay second and final reading of resolution 202602 by caption only to enter into an agreement with Nationwide First responder grants LLC to manage a FEMA grant EMW 2024 FG0436 and declaring an emergency. So move set. Roll call. Miller. Yes. Valena, yes. Basset, yes. Gonwick, yes. Egley, yes. Sedike, yes.

Okay. And the next one was letter of intent um which we don't have any legislation for that yet. Um first reading of resolution 202604 by caption only to enter a contract with choice one engineering to provide professional services for the Columbia Hatterie water main replacement project and declaring an emergency. I'll make a motion to suspend the rules. Second roll call. Sedite. Yes. Egggley, yes. Donwick, yes. Basset, yes. Valena, yes. Miller, yes.

Second and final reading of resolution 20264 by caption only to enter a contract with Choice One Engineering to provide professional services for the Columbia Hatterie water main replacement project and declaring an emergency. So move. Second one, two. Roll call. Sedike. Yes. Yes. Basset. Yes. Gonewick. Yes. Elena. Yes. Miller. Yes.

All right. Thank everybody. I think that's all. Like I said, we have to get with Avery on the other two and one of them for the letter of intents. Um, so that can't be done tonight, Erica, with with that housing and then the other items. So, with that, we'll move along to we have police chief.

Uh, you should have cases and calls for service numbers for the month of January. Any questions about those? I gave your your committee the letter that you're at. Okay. My next and then uh which committee? Police fire. Okay. Well, see I'm on finance and police fire. So, so that's Mike today.

Yeah, it has it has your letter about hiring practices if we've done it before. Yeah, that went to the committee. Okay. So, do I need to go into executive session to talk about that? If you want to. I don't think there's anything that is um because I really didn't know who to present it to if it was personnel or police and fire. I thought, well, if I just do an executive session, that way it would just Yeah.

So, got so um so there's two on there uh to talk about uh for executive session on hiring. So, the one is is all new to me and I'm not sure if the village has ever done it before. So, but so that we will meet up. Uh Chief Silkai, I don't got Chief and Chief. I'm getting both of them. Whoever wants to go first.

You're either one. Uh so you guys I sent out a list of how many runs that we did last uh last year. You should have got that at the last council meeting. Um for the month of January uh we had 71 runs. Um which yeah, some of you are like whoa that's kind of a lot. That's like a lot.

Uh no I honestly at some point I feel like we're head trending up. You know, I've said that for a couple years now. And, you know, to come out right out of the gate with 71, that's, you know, kind of uh kind of where I'm leaning that we should see well over that 700 this year. Uh last Thursday, our new uh power load and uh was put into 511 and that's operational. last Monday night in case uh there were people listening to the scanner, we had to have Sherwood come up because uh we had three calls all at the same time.

Um so that's that's becoming quite popular a lot here lately where we're getting a lot of the backto-back calls again. So that's becoming quite popular. So you'll see us out. Um, so again, if anybody's got any questions, they can they can come over and ask talk to me. Um, ask me questions, call me, whatever. So,

have you worked at all with scheduling, getting people I know with your numbers increase and different things? And you got training still going on too with that. Are you getting that squared away? So the the uh basic class that is in session right now um will not be done until March which that's only next month. So uh they'll be done in March and then um we'll have plenty plenty of opport you know plenty of people at that point. Um by the end of this year I should have uh probably five to six new paramedics here. Um which would be quite awesome I think for the village. Uh I I keep seeing the the whole situation on on Facebook about the hospital and everything and I'm here to tell you that we're here. You know, we are here and we'll get you to the hospital. um even even during the major snowstorms. Um so, but uh other than that, that's all I've got. Question for Bruce.

What's a what's a high count like last year per month?

Uh so, in uh March of last year, we had I think close to 75 I think we had 75 um calls. And at that time, you know, I had kind of projected that we'd be well over 800. I mean, it kind it fell off obviously. Um, we we averaged from April to October, we averaged 60 60 to 65 runs uh per month. So, um, and I I was joking with somebody the other day that there were there were you there were time there was a time that, um, you didn't have 70 runs in three months. So, um, to have 70 runs in in one month is quite phenomenal. But, uh, yeah, I and I think just as the population gets older are you're going to see the the run volume increase. So, Thank you, Bruce. Good. Chief Derek,

hello guys. It's been a while since I've been here and unfortunately some new faces. Hi, I'm Derek. Um, I'm the head guy over at the fire department. Um, today I'm just present just to introduce myself as far as with the new people. kind of touch base with what's been going on. There's not a lot of new besides we just got our uh our uniform stuff uh together. The only thing we're waiting on is the coats. So, three4s of our uniforms are all in as far as class A's. So, we're uh that's coming to a head. That's great. Um that's that shipping's come quite well. Um nothing else is new. uh training are we have five six fire one guys who will be done next week I mean next month as far as fire one training which will make 93% of our department will be firefighter uh one or higher which is great considering compared to some of the other joining communities. Um, and that that makes it really nice because I don't have to worry about somebody not being able to go in and fight fire or someone doing this. We all will have our main primary job as far as that goes. Um, so that's great to see that as far as the majority of our department being firefighter certification level, which mean that [snorts] they're operational to fight fire and not just do duties or chores on the fire ground. So, that's a big that's a big thing in the fire service. Um, as far as this new fire truck goes, uh, the committee, the specs committee was here a couple last meeting. They

presented um the truck or our visit to Columbus. Uh, and I'm just here to kind of clear up today is a terrible reference, but I'm going to pass this around. This just gives you a reference of um of the type of fire truck or what the fire truck will look like. I'll start here. April, June, and August are all examples of what the fire truck is going to look like. Um June, uh we actually went and we're in Columbus. We actually went and seen that fire truck, was able to get inside of it, look around, uh that sort of thing. um due to just certain specs. I I just want to reiterate that we took our time trying to find this fire truck and the right fire truck for the time that we need it because they kept saying we need this truck for 25 to 30 years. No, all the bells and whistles are not on these trucks. We just need what we need for the community and who we serve. So, what we got on this truck is exactly what we're going to need for for this truck to last us. Um, we were pleased with uh with the gentleman who presented this truck to us, which is from Suffin. Um, it's a family-owned business. He knew he knew the truck without even resourcing anything. He just was able to rattle off everything about the truck. The facilities was beautiful. We actually was able to see a couple of the trucks be made from various other departments. Um, so I'm here to just kind of either answer or try to answer questions that didn't get answered from the spec

committee uh when they presented. Um, and that's and what you see there is as an example of what uh what we're looking at. So again, that's April, June, and uh August. Uh it's a SL 100. That's 100 foot ladder. Um we decide on that versus some of the other competitors that we that we uh met up with. We had a total of three uh people come and see us. They all presented their trucks and different things like that. Um cost was uh was a question that came up from my understanding. Uh, as far as cost goes, just keep it at 100. If we stay, if the truck, if the truck was to be less than a 1.3 million, we're asking for a truck to come in here and not be equipped with what we need. If it comes in here and it's not equipped, we're still going to be looking to dress this truck out as we call which is equipped truck which is going to be another anywhere from $200 to $400,000. Okay. Um so bare minimum the truck that we need or the truck that we would that we think best suits the community will is right at where we were like 1.8 1.7 1.8 Um, we thought we thought we took a lot off of it like compared to other places. Even the guy said he this is nothing. He said we got guys that are dressing their trucks up paying up to 2.6 2.8,000 or million just for a firet truck.

[clears throat]

And in comparison, like Columbus has got larger money than us, but they buy seven new brand new trucks every year. Seven new ones. Um, so that just gives you a reference of however it is. Just as far as just I wanted to give y'all a visual of what the truck would look like once it comes into that bay. Uh, the goal is to once that truck shows up, it's ready to go in service. not wait around and say, "Oh, well, we gotta order this and send it somewhere to get something else put on it. [clears throat] We want that truck to come parked in that bay, ready to go out on the next run if it had to." So, that was the goal and the objective. So, is there any questions for me regarding the truck, not the truck, because I've been missing any past questions? I was wondering with a FEMA grant like this because we get what 800 some around there thousand dollars. Do you have to have specific things on the truck that the FEMA grant requires?

FEMA grant contract has has certain perimeters or specifications on it um that you may go by. Um, some of them are has wiggle room as far as that goes, but you don't have to follow the specs exactly to the very tea, but the specs have to be right there. Yes. You know, so like if it had 20 line items, you at least got to have probably 15 of them that match the contract as far as um the things that you get on the truck or the specifications for it. Yeah.

And I know when the committee was talking, um, we didn't have a lot of discussion after they presented, right? Um, and I know there's more probably more discussion, but when you look at what we need for Hicksville, were you looking at I know one thing was a tank size increase, the volume of tank, right? Does that make sense? And or the ladder portion of it? Um, of course, we need big bigger tanks, right? You the structure has to be more [snorts] solid, you know, things of that nature. So, yeah. As far as the tank goes, the reason why I say that we needed a bigger tank was [clears throat] because the original the original proposal or truck that we were looking at only had 300 gallons on it. If we get out at a fire, 300 gallons lasts less than 5 minutes.

Right.

Okay. 600 gallons will give us at least 10 minutes or enough time to be able to tap into a fire hydrant or another truck that's coming to keep water flowing. Uh the other thing is even though it's a ways out, 504 has been giving us some issues periodically. So my mindset was if 504 ever goes down, we need to make this new truck the primary. And 504 has just as the same size, if not bigger tank than what we're requesting. So 504 has been very successful out on the scene being able to get water on the fire and enough time for us to um tap in from a hydrant or another truck to get more water flowing. Is that a tanker? Is that what the truck is?

Well, the tanker the tanker will be following. It's 300 this three uh it's 3,000 gallons. I couldn't remember how big the tankers were. So, if the tanker follows us with this new truck, we wouldn't have a water issue, but that situation wouldn't always be there. But as far as primary goes, so more than nothing else, the the the upage in gallons is more just to buy us time if we need it because 300 gallons will go boom just like that. So it kick out water really fast. Yes, absolutely. So what is the height of our current ladder uh over there right now? 100.

So this this ladder is 10 10 foot. Well, the truck height was 10 foot. Sorry. Okay. Now you're asking the truck. No, you're talking about the ladder.

The ladder over there is is 100 foot. Um I wanted to uh be at the same and not go lower just due to like the grain uh bin over here. It will reach up there. Um some of these buildings it has more than enough height. Another reason of the 100 foot is some of these country roads off of 49 or however some of these roads sit off the off the road a little bit and if we need to get to someone or extend a ladder to someone, we're a lot closer versus like like our ladder could raise up and be able to hit a fire without getting the truck closer to the house where it's not possible and be able to extinguish the fire from the ladder portion of just raising it up and shooting it from a master stream and uh getting a fire that way.

Right. Now, a fire like that you would call for backup anyways, right? It's automatically anything that tones out a structure fire. Yeah. We're automatically getting sherwood and so would a like even if it was a shorter ladder, it would at least get you started knowing that a larger ladder would be coming. We don't have a larger ladder. We would be that lad. There's no mutual aid. Mutual a don't have a ladder. Not a single one. No, you're not in defiance. Defiance is defiance is way out of our rim. Defiance would be like [clears throat]

if we if we had a what you call three alarm, you have a second alarm, a third alarm. But first alarm is Hicksville, Sherwood, Farmer. None of those guys have a ladder truck. All of them have engines or small tanker trucks. in the in the 25 years that I've been on I think on how many times the fines been here. So the closest the closest truck will be the fines. I think my question about prices when we had originally as a committee sat down and talked with Mickey he quoted us at between one and $1.1 million. So when you guys showed up with a $1.8 million truck that's why I was taken back. And he even said get three quotes

and he said add three to seven percent on that based on that inflation even right but I'm just saying like that's not so when you guys showed up with 1.0 Now, that's the push back was because we had worked with Mickey all along in the pricing and that's what he said it was. Now, that could have changed, right? But that's what I'm that's initially he called and I I get that. I understand that. But I talked to him and uh when I gave him the price, he goes, "Well," he goes, "That sounds about right." But if he told y'all something different. Yeah. I mean, I have it in my notes.

No, no, no. I'm not saying that you're, you know, not telling the truth. I'm just saying he asked me some of the same questions as far as, hey, what did y'all go with, you know, what manufacturer, all that sort of thing. He asked me those questions just last week. Now, the three quotes that you got, were they all about that same price?

Um, the the the less price, the lower price was 1.7. So, we went with a company called E1, and they were 1.7, but it was a truck that was already made for another fire department that was already it was already dressed out somewhat um through the making stages of it. And he really couldn't go back and make the adjustments that we needed for the truck. So, basically, the truck was going to get built. It was going to be available in October of this year, and we were going to get that truck. So, the size was off, the cabin space was off, it was a lot smaller cab than what we have now, the tankage was off, all that sort of thing. So, we end up not going with that truck. Um, but he quoted us 1.7 for that truck. Pierce very high company, right along with Suffin. Can't go wrong. They offered us a one point I mean they offer us a 105 foot, which is a little longer than that one, and it was at the same price. Um, suffen was 1.9 to 1.8 to 1.9 almost 1.9. Pierce said that it was maybe less than $1,000, $2,000 cheaper. It wasn't like a large amount cheaper as far as pricing goes. So, Sen and uh Pierce both were around the same price. Now, I even I even asked about the 75 foot, okay, just to see if it was lower. And both companies, them and Pier said, their cheapest uh was 1.6 for the 75 foot. And that's just and that's not adding the things that it needs on it. So we would ended up almost somewhat with the same pricing. So we went larger as far as the ladder goes and got less things versus a 75 foot and adding more and it being the same price.

So that's that's how we came to that because I did look at the 75 foot even though I didn't want to do 75 because I have a 100 and I didn't want to go lower than the one I already have in my bay. So is the truck comparable in length the old one?

Yes. So the June truck we actually went and seen that truck. We went to the fire station where it was they let us walk through a look at it. It's going to buy us some more space in the bay. It's a lot shorter base as well. Um, it's a little shorter than that one that's sitting over there. Um, it was nice. Even another company, they let us get in a fire truck and ride around. Let us lift the ladder. It was really a great time uh visiting there. Um, so spacewise, uh, Suffen offered us the largest cabin space, and that's something that's something that we need. I mean, I know some of us ain't all in perfect shape, but six people in that cab over there is tight, and it's a small it's a smaller cab. They offer a bigger cab. So now when these guys get in these trucks, uh, we got a little bit more leg room. we got a little bit more to dress inside the cab if we need to make adjustments instead of air by being packed in like sardines. So, that's one of the reasons why also why we chose something because they offer a decent um cab space and that's very valuable when it comes to getting on and off the truck.

Any questions for Chief? Thank you, Chief. Appreciate it. But Hitchfield girls, uh, middle school girls just won the championship. Oh, cool. I watch. Oh, they Yeah, you can tell them. So, now we're just They're going to do a little pray for them through town here. They just called. Yeah. Seventh grade girls, right? Won their championship. Yeah. Seventh grade. Yep. Yep. So, they're going to parade them through town. 37 to 11 they won. Oh, all right. That's cool. folks. Well, the fire department's going to pick them up and have a nice parade for them to celebrate their victory and cruise them through town. So, enjoy it.

We go cruising from the end of town over to the school. Awesome. And have a little celebratory. Absolutely. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. That's neat. Yep. Appreciate it. [clears throat] All right. Uh fiscal officer reports.

Okay. We have the fund status report for the first month of the year and the cash summary by fund. And if you notice in the first month we spent $516,000 off to a wonderful start. Um you also have the January income tax and utility collections reports. Um, you have the media count which is the EMS billing. Um, I put December in because it's also um, year end. If you look down where the blue line is has what we did for the 2025. Um, you have the media confranchise fee report for the fourth quarter and the January general standard that is put out now by the um, state auditor. And I think that's all I have except to if either of you want to have a copy of this. This is the award, the FEMA award. I didn't put this in everybody's emails because it's really long.

Thank you. And this is a proposal for the firetruck and the current proposal. And that is all I have unless you have questions. Anyone hiring anyone or No,

the two that had applied. No, I don't want it. So, right now I'm April is she's it this year. It's too late to get somebody in here for the tax season. So, she's going to do it um this and I gave her the opportunity. I told her when tech season's over, she can quit and go back to being my assistant, which is what she wants to do. But we'll see when tech season's over. And she's really out. In the meantime, I'm trying to hire someone part-time. Please, if you know anybody, [snorts] send them here. But April's really stepped up. Um, she's on top of things getting going through all the the records and making

backtracking on some stuff. So, she finds things. So, yep. How many different jobs has she done? She's always jumped in and just she does. She's a hard worker. She does tomorrow. Yeah. Yes, she does. So, thank you. Mayor report. I don't have anything except for executive session. We got some executive sessions. I just want everybody to be safe. Thank you for everybody that's shoveling and and being safe out there on the roads. Um we haven't had a winter like this in a while. So,

um just stay safe and warm. And people have talked about the warming shelters when it got super cold and there's there's several places to um uh go if anybody knows there's some connections with the police department calling after hours to get them to a place for shelter and stuff like that. So um yeah just be safe out there. So at this time I will call for executive. I guess based on what the mayor said we need one for certain personnel matters. Don't ask me what that is. purchase or sale of property pending or imminent court. Exactly. imminent court action. Not imminent. I intimate. Yes.

I don't want to. All right. I'll second that. Roll call. Sed. Yes. Yep. Melena. Yep. Mueller. Yes. Yes. Downward. Yes. All right. Thank you everybody. Be safe out there. Thanks for coming in.