City Council - Special Meeting

a minute with the Muscogi cinemag Kendall Francis is in. Good morning. Hey, good morning, Ron. Are you done singing Jonie Msina songs? Cuz I heard you coming down the hallway singing bye bye bye. I am not. I am not. What a great show. Oh, phenomenal. Really was. Place was packed. The town was packed. We had people everywhere here in Muscogee and it was just phenomenal. And they showed up and showed out. That's the biggest thing. If you all keep showing up to these events, they're going to keep bringing big time talent. We are absolutely.

Also, over the weekend, I saw a lot of people out there wearing the vest. I kind of felt bad. Welcome to tonight's special call Muscogi City Council, April 22nd, 2026. If you will please rise for the PL flag salutes and invocation led by Deputy Mayor Derek Reed.

Shall we pray? Dear Lord, once again, we just come thanking you for the gift of another day. Thank you for all the blessings you bestowed upon us within this day. ask that you would come into the room tonight, look upon your city counselors, lead us and guide us in the direction that we will be doing the things that's pleasing in your sight. These and many other blessings we ask in Jesus name. Amen. Amen. Attention salute. Pledge 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. The Oklahoma salute.

I salute the flag of the state of Oklahoma. It symbols of peace unite all peoples. Roll call, please. Mayor Ryan Low here. Deputy Mayor Derek Reed here. Tracy H. Shirley Hilton Flannry. Melody Cranford here. Dan Hall here. Tom Martanddale here. Mike Broly here. Jeremy Schuler here. Item one. Item one, discuss and consider approval of resolution number 3087 declaring a local emergency under the Oklahoma Emergency Management Act of 2003 for the city of Muscogee or take other necessary action.

Thank you all for being here. This is my agenda item this evening. I'm going to read you a statement that I prepared. A week ago Tuesday night, during the late evening hours, a severe weather event impacted neighborhoods on the southeast side of our city. I was on scene within minutes and observed widespread damage, including significant destruction in the Grand View 7 neighborhood. I witnessed families standing in the rain, many still in their pajamas, looking at their damaged homes, vehicles, and property in shock at at what had just occurred. I spoke with many of them that night and assured them that they we were with there with them. The following day, War 2 council members and I returned to the affected areas to survey the damage and continue speaking directly with residents. Almost immediately, calls began pouring in, people asking for help, for answers, and most importantly asking where the city leadership was. This was not just another thunderstorm. The National Weather Service has since confirmed that this was an EF1 tornado. with winds exceeding 100 miles per hour. These are our friends, neighbors, and colleagues, but above all, they're hardworking taxpaying citizens who expect their leadership to show up in times of crisis. I understand that the city cannot solve every financial hardship, nor is that the role of government. However, doing nothing failing to act in a moment of clear need is simply unacceptable. Moving forward, I like I would like to work with my colleagues to establish an emergency fund to respond to events like this. We must ensure that we are prepared to act swiftly and effectively to support the very people who entrusted us with the responsibility to lead. Thank you for your consideration. I welcome your input and any questions you may have. We have two uh citizens that have signed up to speak. First one, Miss Cindy Dennis. if you would come up to the podium, state your name, and please uh lean into that mic a little bit. It's hard to hear

sometimes. And you'll have five minutes.

My name is Cindy Dennis, and I live in Graan View 7. Um I've lived there for I've lived in Muscogee since probably 98. Um grew up here, graduated. Uh my parents had a business which I took over and it's been in business for 50 years. We've paid many many years of taxes and we do point of sale taxes uh which also helps our city to be able to do things that they need to do. Um I've never been in a tornado before. Um, which this one, you know, at least for me, was pretty scary. Um, we had the alarm go off on our phones and so we knew something was could be happening. Um, so I was looking out, you know, the back window. All I saw was a blur. Um, my husband looked out the front. Um he noticed a pressure change in our house because our windows were busted out and screened run to the closet. Um our house lost most of quite a few of the shingles. Um so we're probably going to have to get a roof replaced. Um fences were down all around us. Um debris everywhere. um you know and we're a hardworking family and we're just an average family. Um but you know we also feel like um that when there are times of need and it's not just like you said it's not a regular thunderstorm. It's not like and

it's not like we're you know asking for you to fix our houses or whatever. It's just try and help when you can. Try and, you know, you would want that for each of y'all's families and each of your homes. Um, if somebody can carry off debris, then great. Um, that's, you know, just something that we should do to take care of our neighbors in their time of need. And, um, anyway, I, you know, that's just pretty much what I wanted to say. Um, I hope that you all consider this and I hope that each and every one of you all never have to go through a tornado. Um, it's the scariest thing that you could be in. Um, you know, having things ripped around you and um, fortunately nobody was hurt um, that we know of. Nobody was killed. Um, but you know, there is a lot of damage and I invite all y'all to come out and look at it if you, you know, can get out there like you said. Um, I think this needs to be passed. Um, and not only that, you know, the world is watching. If you want businesses to come here, um you want to grow this town, they need to see how you're going to react if you know their business gets damaged or, you know, if they need help. Um they need to see us as a community come together and help each other. And um that's I appreciate you all listening to me and I thank the mayor for coming by to talk to us. And um that's all I have to say.

Thank you, M. Thank you. Next citizen assigned up to speak, Jennifer Hollingsshed. Miss Hollingsshed, if you would step up to the podium there, state your name, and you will have five minutes.

Thank you. My name is Jennifer Hollings Head, and um we live at 509 Hillrest in Graan View 7. We've been there about 18 and a half years. Um my husband John and I, we um raised our family there. Um our kids are grown and gone now. Um but we um we woke up to our phones going off that night. Um John's a stormchaser, so we don't usually, you know, pay attention to things like that. She's like, "Ah, it'll be fine." But um he looked out the window. We ran to the closet. we um started hearing things hitting our home, hearing loud noises. Um and it was it was a very scary feeling not knowing what you're going to go outside to. Um once the storm passed, we went out, we checked out our house, um checked out our neighbors, and um then we went to check out my two businesses nearby on Peak Boulevard. Um they did not withstand damage, thank goodness. But um anyhow, so we we had a lot of debris in the neighborhood. Um so much debris that um Adam Pototts with Lawn Stars, he came that morning, the morning after the tornado hit and he was hauling out uh debris for everyone free of charge. He volunteered his time. I asked him today how much he hauled out of our neighborhood. that very first day he hauled out 15 um dump trailer loads of debris um on his own with his crew. Um that was just the first day. Uh we thought, well, the city's going to come by. They're going to send their big truck by. We've seen that happen um in other um with other cases like the flood. I believe it was in 2019. Um the grapple truck was out then. Um it

then we heard it's not going to happen. So um we got together and found some local businesses that would help us out. Um these businesses, they volunteered their time. Um they took the burden of what we feel like our city should have done for us. Um Mike Cordell with Cordell Tree Service, he hauled out five um very large loads. I'm not sure if his truck is as large as the city's arm truck, but he hauled out five huge loads on Monday. Um, he volunteered his time and the time of his crew. He paid them to work for us in our neighborhood. On Sunday, we had Dalton Clay with Fivear, believe it's FiveStar Demolition. Um, he was there. He hauled out um, five loads, five trailer loads, rolloff loads, and then he had one he said was a 30 yard load. um my understanding that's pretty big. So um he volunteered his time as well as his crew and Chad Carrier with American General Contracting did the same thing. They came out, they did physical labor for us. Um we weren't asking the city for physical labor. We were just asking for you guys to pick up debris. Um a lot of our brush and limbs were picked up by these local businesses. They took that burden for us. Um, we have storm debris. I took about maybe 15 photos this morning of what's still there. Um, and then I've talked to our neighbors and maybe about 10 or 12 people said that they will have a lot of debris after they are able to work this weekend. We're a workingclass neighborhood. A lot of our um neighbors, they work all day every day. Okay, we have a few elderly people mixed in that, you know, need our help as well as we're cleaning up our own homes. We're helping

out each other as well. So, what we would like for the city to do for us is pick up a load this week and come back next week and pick up a load after people have had an opportunity to work this weekend. Um, I'm not one to bash my city. I'm a nearly lifelong Muscogee citizen and I love this city. It it drives me insane when I see people on social media um bashing my city. Um I have two local businesses here, small businesses, and um I love Muscogi and um if you guys can do this for us, pick up our debris, we would greatly appreciate it. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Couple discussion. Any discussion? Uh yeah, I have a question I guess is so will this resolution provide us the capability in the future to enact services quicker, easier, or what would be the process at that point? or is this kind of a one-time thing for this and then we'll work on something else in the future or

this is this is specifically for this incident. So, it's a declaration of emergency for this incident. If the council would like to um do something in the future that streamlines a process, we'd have to take that up in another issue.

Okay. And that's kind of where I was looking at because I know when I called the mayor of Moore, Oklahoma and they talked about that when they have the big tornadoes, they have FEMA that takes over everything, but then they also have a a process and they have a policy set in place with a funding mechanism that kicks in on smaller tornadoes that would pick that would help these people pick up stuff. even if it was a uh a contractor that the city had contracts out that we could have contracted with and said, "Hey, here's this go. We got the money. Just go do it right now and it's already in place." And I would like to chase that chase that kind of a mechanism for uh emergencies like this in the future.

I actually um have gotten the um city of Moore's emergency services plan. It's about 300 pages long. haven't had a chance to go through it yet, but Tyler Evans and I do have a meeting um set up to look at what we already have in place as far as our emergency plan and protocol is and um whatever changes we think need to be made that we can um bring to Mr. Francis and then go from there as far as um what does council need to do and what decisions does council need to make. Okay. When I was talking to the mayor, he didn't say it was 300 pages when I told him to email it to you. I'm sorry.

Uh Mr. Brawling to to your point, I I believe uh in the future it would have to rise to the extent of of being an emergency, not just if we have a thunderstorm or or a wind event, we would have to decide if we want to declare an emergency at that time. And I think that would be the the difference. Sure. Yeah. I mean, I understand that. I just wanted to if there's a way we could streamline that whole process, you know, be quicker about it. Maybe after you all go through that, we can go in at that time and do something for future.

So to help them now, like she was wanting to go pick up stuff this weekend, what would that look like? What would we need to do to make that happen? Be I mean, if the council would like that to happen, we could make that happen. Now, I don't know. I'm going to have to defer to Mike whether that would be his crews or city crews I should say or or we're in a position where we'd have to contract that.

So with the driving out there and just doing the windshield assessment, what we have left is something that we could manage inhouse. We just have the one knuckle boom truck and it's only a 20 yard truck. It would still take several days to finish cleaning up, but we could finish it up. We would just have to have a mechanism to pay for it at the landfill. We don't have an account set up specific for that, but I'm sure we can get that worked out.

We can handle that. So, I I asked I I asked uh Kendall about waving those fees over the past weekend so that the loads that are actually being taken out there for this area, the fees would be waved so that we wouldn't have to I mean, if the if the contractors are going to volunteer to take the things out there, then as a city, we could wave the fees for those certain people that we know are taking it or even if the city is taking it, wave the fees for what you are doing instead of charging to get it done. So, councelor, let me make sure I'm clear. So, the brush and limb site we own, we manage and we burn out there and it is completely free, right?

The other debris, the the uh fence material and stuff like that would have to go to the landfill which is not owned and operated by the city. It's waste management. So, if the city could pay those fees, that was my question to him. if the city could pay those fees or somewhere they could be worked out so that they are not having to pay the fees to get the the debris out there. Yeah, we're on the same page. I just need an account set up and take it. Yeah. So, and we've had those conversations. I've had those conversations with some of the contractors. Um that the me it's a mechanism trying to figure out

are they responding for Grand View 7 or are they hauling in from other places? That's that was some of the issues. Um, as we move forward,

you know, and and like I said, we haven't reviewed Moore's policy, but there needs to be some sort of guidelines as to what qualifies and what doesn't. Typically, an emergency declaration um really is issued to help us bypass purchasing policies. If we know that um the expense is going to going to be beyond what our typical purchasing policy allows, then we issue an emergency declaration that helps us streamline that portion of things. um to simply say it's an emergency, there's got to be some parameters as to what qualifies for an emergency, right?

Um this is not going to this is and I could let Tyler Evans speak to this, but this is not going to rise to the level of a of a declared emergency because that um it's based on dollar amounts of damage and stuff. And while I'm empathetic for those people that were affected, um it it doesn't it just simply doesn't rise to that level. So, what what parameters would the council like to see in place for when the city steps in and provides assistance? Um does it the a tornado does that or is I mean hard straight line winds? I mean there are things um there's a lot of varying degrees that um I want to make sure that if we do for one we do for all in a in a in a well thoughtout strategic way.

Absolutely. So I Mr. Stewart, I spoke with state senator Avery Frics and they have went across the hall while they were in session and spoke with ODQ and they are waving the fees when it comes to hazardous materials at the landfill. So, that's a little bit of a a cost savings there. Um, you know, this is my first meeting here. Obviously, we want to do things the right way and we want to do things the lawful way. Um, we can talk about what the parameters are and um, you know, when when your neighborhood's been destroyed, uh, it's an emergency emergency to those folks and it' be an emergency to me. So, um, yeah, we need to we need to discuss it and decide, you know, when we're going to act, but in my opinion, it's our job to come to the aid of taxpaying citizens of Muscogee, Oklahoma when they need us the most. That's something that we'll have to figure out up here, but as simple as sending a truck out and picking up some debris, um, I don't think should be too political. And those are just my opinions.

And along those same lines, I agree with you on that, Ryan. We got to be citizens and good neighbors to the people that put us all in these offices. And sometimes it doesn't reach to what what FEMA classifies as an emergency. But we need to at least present something to our people that makes it where they can function back at their residence. like it. I don't think it would have hurt us too bad to go by and pick up all their limbs and stuff and get them out of the road so they can probably get back to somewhat normal life or putting things back together. I don't think they're wanting us to rebuild their house or do a FEMA size uh emergency management plan, but I do think that somewhere we need to be good citizens and good counselors to put something together that says when these happen to our neighborhoods, we're going to respond to make at least where they can get up and down their roads and so we can get them back to functioning or make it easier for them even if it's just debris cut off. mean carry all those things makes their life a little bit easier so they can get back to putting their life back together. And that's all I'm kind of asking for tonight. It doesn't have to be a massive uh disaster for us to be good citizens and good stewards to our citizens. Mrs.

I would like to I would like to shameless plug that we are a just serve city and if we could get on that just serve app and put in the volunteers that we need to finish up the cleanup and helping with that. I've talked to Donna and some of them over there. if we could get volunteers to just go back and finish up and kind of tighten up what they're needing help with and then have it all like you're saying carried off because it is doable and then figure out that I think that's where we need to really like just fine-tune this and then we can come back and and visit revisit and figure out what we need to do long term. But as for now, let's figure out how we can just get volunteers over there, get this finished up so that all this stuff can be hauled off. Figure out how to pay if those fees are being waved for the materials, what fees we would need to pay and where that's coming from from our budget and move forward instead of having like this whole long drawn out conversation. If it's got to be done, we've got to get it done. And thank you so much to the the local business owners that came out and spent their money and their time and brought their staff, especially on a on a Sunday afternoon. Uh we want to recognize those folks as well. Uh very much appreciated.

Mr. Stewart, I know last weekend uh there was a site where they could uh bring the debris. Is that going to be open this weekend? So it is right now currently open through this weekend through Sunday. Okay. All right. And um just out of curiosity, was there any response that the city took uh immediately after the storm? So, we were out moving trees all over town that night. Mhm.

And our process is to clean the streets and we push the tree limbs up on the curb, which is kind of confusing because the next day when we move them out of the street, we go pick them up, which makes people think we're picking up stuff at the residence, which we're not. We're just picking up what we moved that night. Uh we were doing that. We were chasing traffic lights and high water all at the same time. Uh and then we decided the very first thing Jason Green who sits sitting here with me. It is mine and his responsibility the next morning to do an assessment. Let the city manager know if there's enough damage that we need to open our limb site which we did and we so we opened it. We open that so people can dump for free. That's the very first move we make and then we just assess as we go to see how long we need to keep it open. Unfortunately, when we open it, it's very hard to close it back down because debris just keeps coming. One of the things I would like to make sure that we're very clear on is how we're going to handle the debris that we pick up. Is the city going to do all the picking up and hauling it out there or are we going to let the contractors do it? And the reason I asked is because I deal with Pete Schultz who's over uh waste management and he's concerned about just turning it open to contractors bringing debris in because he gets abused as well. And what he said was we'd have to have some kind of organized list, you know, something that tells them who's acceptable and who's not. And then also to put some kind of parameter around it where it does close down. That could always be extended, but at least it locks it into a time frame at first. and gives us, you know, that window could be large if it needed to be, but it does give us a time frame to shut down. That's another thing that we have a hard time in public works with is once we start doing this type debris removal is actually getting it shut down because it just keeps getting called in and called in. And we know that some of it is not storm debris and and I'm sure not

trying to shed a bad light on it, but that's just what happens to us. So, Miss Hollings said when she was speaking asked for two weeks. So, we know that we would need it for at least the two week time frame because that's their time frame that they're asking for sure. And then we could revisit maybe at that two week mark to see if it needs to be extended. But for sure, at least the two weeks they're asking for. So, right now, and I and I'll ask Jason to correct me if I'm wrong, but we're only getting one or two loads a day. We're we're thinking it's going to be again on Saturday, right, and Sunday when people actually have time to haul, right? So

we had a 10 loads today and very little. I mean there was only one truck that was pretty big size with a trailer. The rest of them was little, right? Kind of like she said though, they're workingass families. So they're working through the week. So these couple of weekends for them to be home and kind of get things navigated and lined out. I think the two weeks for sure and then we revisit. So counselor, we recognize that and that's why we're opening it through the weekend. So thank you for your point.

So um Kendall, you were talking about um the declaration uh that's before us tonight. So um is this going to be something that we can pass in its um current state or were you saying that it uh does it rise to this this level? And if that is the case, we still will respond, you know, with those other um things that we've been doing to try to help out.

Okay. So, to be clear, you can pass this as it is. It um it uh if it doesn't rise to the level of of a of the declaration, that's not that's not an issue.

Okay. Um, what this kind of does is kind of give us a little bit of parameters to say that an emergency was declared in this event and that's why the the city is intervening and and taking these steps. Um, now if it if it would have been to the point where it did rise to that level, then we'd be eligible for some of the reimbursement. you know, we'd be tracking our hours and doing some different different things to uh to make sure uh the city was properly reimbursed. Um but passing this resolution um we honestly we can we can do it with or without the resolution. So, uh, my final question, uh, how will we proceed with, uh, Mayor Law's request to, uh, set up a fund in the future for future storms?

Um, they want to do that after they read the mayor's Mo's, uh, 300page program. Yeah, I think we we're going to need more time as staff to to digest that and see how that could translate here. take what maybe it's copy and paste, maybe it's not, but um see if we can take their ideas and translate it here to to Muscogi and come to bring something back to the table that we think would be workable for future events.

So, and if we're going to send the city crew, our contractor out, they need to be aware that we're not going to come up into the yard to get stuff. We're going to pick it up at the curve. Now see now that is one thing that the emergency declaration um and actually did we did we it does the resolution does require that um the items be at the right of way for pickup and just for um a parliamentary procedure issue anything regarding a fund to be set up that's not part of the agenda tonight and so that's something that we'll have to take up at another day. Thank you. But we don't want to go into people's yards because they mentioned and stuff like that. But we will pick it up starting when do you think

if we're going to vote Do we need to vote on this to have them start picking it up tomorrow? The next day, we can start immediately. You tell us to start and we'll start. So, we really don't even need this to do any of that. Theoretically, no. Um but there is a I mean clear understanding that we're only going to pick up in the rightway. Um um just for the protection of So you want us to go ahead and vote on this tonight? Move for approval. You it's not it's not needed. I mean if you want to you can but it is not needed. Okay. Well, we're basically just want to make sure that something that we starting the ball getting stuff done.

We don't have to vote for this to be an emergency to go in and and give direction to pick up limbs at the curb the rightway. You know, I I think I would like some kind of some kind of time limit put around it. Um, and the reason I say so, so Saturday, um, or Friday night, it was like, I mean, we had some pretty heavy winds and there's a there's a lot of tree damage in the rest of the city from straight line winds. Um, and so I think that's part of the reason we're starting to continuing to see a need for the tree dump to be open. people are responding. But um

so our action tonight, an appropriate action would be to to author to authorize to authorize authorize me to direct staff to to um clean up debris, tree and limb debris. And do we we want all debris out of the rightway in do we say Grand View 7? I don't know if that's the correct. So we do have debris in other areas of town and if you limit it to Grand View 7 are going to blow up again. And that's what I'm I would say the tornado affected area. Okay.

Um I mean it's documented where that went through. I mean, that's just my opinion. So, even though the the storm went through that one particular area, we had trees down all over town. I don't think that the storm was as heavy in the other areas of town, but it caused damage throughout the town. Yeah. And and and candidly, that's that's what makes this so difficult, right? Um and and part of the reason that I chose not to send staff into into those areas because um I need to put a deadline of the date we're going to do this to. Well, that would be much appreciated.

I would say I would say two weeks would give plenty of time for folks to get their stuff out, especially with the contractor's help that we've had. uh just you know give a start date in two weeks from that date uh you know we'll be we'll be done. Agreed. So if we go through two weeks from today would be May 6th. That's um and that's two weekends and it will cover two weekends if they're looking for work. Sounds good. Yes.

So directly we can come and do this pickup in Grand View 7, but it's probably important to note that any debris across the the towns that that site is open that they can bring and dump. So you know all the muscoi won't feel left out. Yeah, we've opened it to the entire town. One of the other things I wish we'd make sure that is public is that it gets separated that the uh for example fence material is not in the brush pile. And if you got brush, separate it between that and debris because we're going to take one to the landfill and one to our burn site. And we can't separate it with that grapple when we're out there. It' be manpower we'd have to have. So

So what what is our verbiage that we needed? Direction to staff and then what that is. Yeah. till May 6th to pick up debris in the right house. All right. So, I move that we direct staff to uh clear these debris and with a time frame of opening up this this dump for them for the time frame until May 6th. Is that what I need to say? Placed in the right of way. Placed in the right of way. And are you determining separated? Are you determining an area? No. because he just said it's all over.

I will say 100% of the calls and messages that I received were the Grand View 7 area. I didn't have anybody else asking for help other than the Grand View 7 area. I had one lady mention Cobblestone, but she said we we've pretty much got all our stuff handled in that area. So, that's that's the the gist of who contacted me. Woodlands got hit pretty well, too. And then there was an area up by what I call Tower Hill which is seventh and Tamaro up in that area had quite a bit. So I think just making this motion we approve this and then at their discretion they can navigate like high priority and trickle to where they need to.

Yeah. I mean I would stress tornado affected area. I know it's a broad statement. uh and then the two week the twoe process and then just you know tell them what it has to be secondary separated. So that's my motion. I'll second it. I would like to add one last thing. We're not just going to use our knuckle boom. We'll probably have the street department out there with some front end loaders and dump trucks as well so we can get it up in that twoe time frame. Thank you, sir. Thank you. So I I'm still not clear on the motion that's that's at hand. So, are we saying that this this action is can only be used in the Grand View 7 the tornado area or tornado area?

No, I did not say tornado area in the city. He said city. Are you guys going to be able to handle that? So, we will probably have to stop some other projects that we're doing, but we'll put focus on it with environmental and street and we can probably get it done in that twoe time frame. Thank you. This is two weeks from Monday, by the way. Thank you. Have a motion. So, for clarity, I I think you're talking about two different days. You said two weeks from today. He said two weeks from Monday. I just want clarification on a date. We need two weeks from Monday.

Two weeks from Monday. This coming Monday. May 11th. The 11th. May 11th. Okay. You amend your amend your motion. Do you amend your second? Shirley, when will the pickup start? When will the pickup start from the city? We're going to start picking up tomorrow. Okay. And extend two weeks from Monday to May 11th. Yeah. Okay. Ready for roll? Are you ready for roll call? Roll call. Jeremy Schuler here. No. Yes. Mike Broly, yes. Tom Martin, yes. Dan Hall, yes. Melody Cranford, yes.

Shirley Hilton Flannry, yes. Deputy Mayor Jared Creed, yes. And Mayor Ryan Le, yes. Item passes. Thank you. The meeting is adjourned.