City Council - Regular Meeting

Yeah, right.

Please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance.

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.

Roll call, please.

Breidenauer?

Here.

Osborne?

Here.

Latari? Not present. Jones? Here. Euler?

Here.

Thank you.

Approval of city council minutes. Motion to approve city council budget retreat minutes dated July 9th, 2026. Regular meeting city council minutes dated July 13th, 2026. And city council budget retreat minutes dated July 14th, 2026. Move to approve as presented.

Breidenauer? Yes. Osborne? Yes. Jones? Yes. Euler?

Yes. Item four, adoption of agenda.

Motion to approve agenda as presented. Breidenauer?

Yes.

Osborne?

Yes.

Jones? Yes. Euler?

Yes. Thank you. We're going right through this fast. Item five, second reading ordinance. An ordinance amending Chapter 27 of the Code of Ordinances of the City of Warrensburg, Missouri, establishing the McGuire Street corridor overlay project presented by Barbara Carroll, AICP Director of Community Development.

Thank you, Mayor and City Council. At your meeting two weeks ago, I think it was three weeks ago, you had a first reading to public comment and had a first reading of this ordinance creating the mcguire street corridor overlay district in since then after that meeting staff has not received any additional public comment regarding the ordinance and so we have placed it on your agenda for a second reading this evening the majority of the information concerning the overlay district is in the council packet from your previous meeting. We did put the ordinance, the Planning and Zoning Commission's recommendation for approval, and a copy of the map of the affected properties in tonight's packet. There's no additional questions. Staff would recommend approval of the ordinance as presented.

Any questions? Move to approve the ordinance as presented. Okay.

Bridenhour?

Yes.

Osborne? Yes. Jones? Yes. Mueller?

Yes.

Thank you.

Thank you. 5.2, second reading, an ordinance authorizing the city manager and city clerk to execute a professional service agreement with Burns & McDonnell Company, Inc. for Phase 2 Construction Administration Observation Services for the Rethink McGuire Project, presented by Joe Clifford, Public Works Project Manager.

Thank you, Mr. Councilman. Back when we had the first reading, we needed more information on the area and the process of it. I believe you got that packet. You don't have any more questions?

No. Thank you very much for including the clarification that it covers. the emerging contaminants grant. And that's what phase two is. So thank you very much.

If I may, one clarification, I think for the city attorney's benefit, but all those changes just added context to the scope as it was originally presented, but it certainly does kind of add additional detail for the record. Yes.

Thank you. I did appreciate the plans that you had in there. Is it possible to also get the plans for the rest of the corridor too? And what work was done along that corridor?

Yeah. They're actually, wow, some are pretty large. I can probably get them set up for you, send it to you.

I'd just be interested. On the website as well. At some point, it was out there. We can bring things in. Let's post it. Okay. Sounds great.

Thank you. No, but I want to say thanks for the work to get us through one and three. And Peyton back there, appreciate it. You were here for months and months, and Aaron was here the whole time too. part of it. But anyway, it's still great. We appreciate the good work we had. Yeah.

Motion to approve. Bridenhour?

Yes.

Osborne?

Yes.

Jones? Yes. Euler?

Yes.

Thank you.

Thank you. Item 6.1, first and second reading ordinance. An ordinance adding Section 2-546, directing that certain charitable trust funds be utilized to the maximum benefit for their intended purpose to Chapter 2 administration. Article 6, Finance, Division 3, Trust Fund of the Code of Ordinances, presented by Jody L. Schneider, City Clerk.

Thank you, Mayor and City Council. This ordinance, this proposed ordinance is being brought to you this evening. In addition to it, it is proposed to add the Chrissy and Brown trust funds into a recently adopted Stevenson fund grant policy with a grant application period and grant awards by council in a collaborative amount. Each fund would be separate, but would be a part of a collaborative amount for awards. Each fund is noted there in the background, has separate restrictions that go along with it. And what we have discovered under our issue portion of it is, first of all, there's a resolution for the Brown and Chrissy Trust that was adopted that sets limits on the amount of awards that can be given out. And so we would need to adhere to those. There is some flexibility built into that for Council to decide, but they definitely wanted each of those funds, the identity of those funds to remain separate. So as we were looking and reviewing this proposed ordinance, we looked at the economic impact. And if you notice on your city council letter, there is a graph that actually denotes each trust fund separately. The minimum balance is listed, the current balance, and then the estimated annual proceeds. Those amounts were calculated based on our interpretation of how the trust fund was originally set out. And you'll note that these funds have been budgeted in the past at higher amounts. These, of course, are estimates, but we're not looking at a lot of dollars there to be handed out to the community. So we wanted to present this to you. I think City Manager Scrag has more to add to that.

Yeah, thank you. So this has kind of turned into like peeling an onion. The more we dig into this, the more we find. But in the past, we found ourselves in a situation where we were having to speculate about interest earnings and what might be yielded for the different funds. So the ordinance that's before you goes into maybe more detail than it needs to, but it tries to clarify that we're going to finish a contract fiscal year. We're going to get the audited financial statements for the fiscal year. We'll know what our earnings were for that year. That'll be the basis of budgeting for the upcoming. So it'll create a year's lag in there, but we'll be getting our audited financial statements. We'll realize what our earnings were. We'll be able to administer each one of these grants as it's stipulated. And then we can take that amount and put it into the budget for the upcoming year. That creates a process that's predictable and a little bit more consistent. But what's left to be done then is we still need to look at these balances in excess of their minimums and figure out what we want to do with those. What I really would like the opportunity to do or the time to do is we need to go back and take a look at kind of our financial history. I don't expect we're going to have our financial history back to when some of these wills were invoked. But I think we can kind of decipher how it is we got to the balances that we have compared to the minimums. Partly what was happening, the Stevenson Trust, as an example, has language in it that 10% of the earnings are supposed to go back to the principal. The remainder is available for grant funds. It has a provision in it that unspent proceeds are to be set aside, essentially. I think they've been rolled back into that same account, and they've been picked up as if they were principal to be protected. One of two things needs to happen. We either need to just give awards in the full amount that is available annually. So we don't get caught into this cycle or we need to do more in the way of accounting for them separately. So after this action, after kind of setting this process going forward, staff will go back and take a deeper dive into the finances and see if we can isolate some funds available at Once we do, I think my recommendation is going to be for the simplicity of it all, let's identify that amount and let's see if we can't find some charitable purposes to get them out the door for eligible uses. And then we're kind of on a more regular approach from that point forward.

So do you think there's more money in the Stevenson fund than the $22,417 that's unrestricted?

I think there's at least that $22,000 that rather than saying we have $450 to work with, we might be able to say we have $22,000. Is there an eligible use when you want to use it for? And if we can get to where we feel like the balance is truly that principal amount that's supposed to be the endowment and we're distributing the rest, then we eliminate some of this confusion. Same way for the Brown Trust, the $29,000 balance compared to the $20,000 minimum that was identified in the $24,000 in Chrissy Trust compared to the $15,000 minimum. If we can confirm those numbers and we can make a one-time distribution of those, then I think we're kind of on autopilot after that.

So what's the plan after we spend it down to the minimum balance? Because we're only making, we're making less than 500 bucks a year on all this.

Fair question from staff's perspective. It's unfortunate that that's what it is, but. Frankly, staff would like this to not be so confusing and complicated and just get in a rhythm where we know what the trust the fund generates and we find a way to distribute it. We're not caught having to do all this accounting year after year.

Are we saying like Stevenson Fund, once we spend that down to minimum balance, we're making $452 estimated annually, we're just going to give out a $452 grant to somebody or a couple people?

For an eligible purpose and just stay on track at that point and

And you did say lagging one year behind so that we know exactly what we're dealing with.

The way the ordinance is written, it'll be based off of audited returns and we just distribute it accordingly.

So these small amounts could continue for many years to come.

Yeah, if we maintain that minimum balance, we'll continue to have small distributions.

And is there any leeway in the trust wording that the minimum required balance can be changed by the councilor so that it can be spent that way.

That's where I turned to the city attorney and I haven't done that yet, but I don't think that there is. In fact, I stumbled across some statutory language that we're answerable to the court and the attorney general to do what the trust provides. Oh, no.

I knew it would be either yes or no. That's right.

But if we spend these down still, I mean, we'll be receiving less money, too, on all this. I mean, that's $10,000 from just the Chrissy Fund.

There's nothing that prevents you as a governing body saying, well, we have 150, let's contribute enough to make it 500 to round up. We just need to follow the trust. And then if you want to supplement that with a little bit of general funds, you could.

I wouldn't want to get into the habit of supplementing that with general funds. I think these are standalone funds.

That's a policy decision for another day, so I don't mean to confuse it.

Appreciate the work on this.

It will process a real great intentions and commendable dollar amounts, but when you're just working on the interest.

Final question I had, as far as the timeline goes, are we, obviously this one, we would do the audit for FY27, FY28, those funds would become available, or we just plan on spending these down to minimum balance over the next fiscal year, and then from then on proceed with this?

Once we get through these numbers, if you need to make a budget amendment, we could, but we can identify what it would take to spend down to the minimum, and we can either do it within the coming fiscal year, or we budget into the next.

Thank you. No questions. Thank you. Motion can move to second by title.

Right now.

Yes.

Osborne? Yes. Jones? Yes. Mueller?

Yes.

An ordinance adding Section 2-546 directing that certain charitable trust funds be utilized to the maximum benefit for their intended purpose to Chapter 2 Administration, Article 6 Finance, Division 3 Trust Fund of the Code of Ordinances. This is for adoption or rejection. Ridenour?

Yes.

Osborne?

Yes.

Jones? Yes. Euler? Yes. Thank you. Thank you.

Item 6.2, an ordinance authorizing the city manager and city clerk to execute a contractor services agreement with SAK SAC Construction LLC for the 2026 Sanitary Sewer Main Lining Project in the city of Warrensburg, Missouri. Welcome, Jason McCarty. Haven't seen you for a while. Public Works Project. Rand, you've been busy.

Good evening, Mayor and Councilmember. Yeah, with Bill on vacation, you get both of us project managers tonight. A little history on this. In the process of getting this project put together and getting ready to bid it, Mr. Nick James back there with SAK got in contact with me and informed me that they did have a cooperative purchasing agreement through Onya Parkers. Doing a little research on that, we found out that through our finance procedure manual that we are authorized to do that in lieu of the traditional bidding process. SENDING THOSE NUMBERS UP THAT WE'VE GOTTEN FROM S.A.K. THE CITY MANAGER WANTED ME TO DO A LITTLE MORE DUE DILIGENCE AND WE GOT WITH A SECOND VENDOR WHOSE NUMBERS CAME IN A LITTLE BIT HIGHER THAN S.A.K. SO HERE WE ARE TODAY BEFORE YOU ASKING TO MOVE THIS FORWARD AND LET US ROLL ON THIS PROJECT FOR 2026 AS PRESENTED IN THE COUNCIL PACKAGE.

IF YOU ALL HAVE ANY QUESTIONS FOR MYSELF

we can answer those for you.

The question I had was about the process. So you didn't have to go through the normal bidding process. You said you were looking at a manual, like just internal financial policy?

Our financial policy listed in your council letter there authorizes us to use cooperative purchasing agreements instead of putting it out for a formal bid and then taking the 30 days and getting the bid packets in and we're doing them that way. We just use a cooperative purchasing agreement through stuff that's already been executed statewide.

So we do have a procurement policy, and the premise behind cooperative purchasing is it's already been through a competitive bid process, and you're able to take advantage of that. Sometimes you get better pricing because of quantity.

One of the other days you can execute through the cooperative purchasing agreement that's already been

So are we just going in on a contract with other municipalities then is kind of the idea?

The pricing is identified as part of the cooperative purchasing and then there's an individual contract between us and them.

That packages an agreement between the city of Warrenburg and SAK for that particular project using those pricings through their cooperative purchasing agreement. Gotcha. All right.

Thank you.

Appreciate you accepting including a map. of where all this is going to happen like that.

Any other questions for Jason or SAK? No? Thank you.

Motion to move to second reading by title.

Thanks, Jamie.

Bridenhour?

Yes.

Osborne?

Yes.

Jones? Yes. Bueller?

Yes.

An ordinance authorizing the city manager and city clerk to execute a contractor services agreement with SAK Construction LLC for the 2026 sanitary sewer mainlining project in the city of Lawrenceburg, Missouri. This is for adoption or rejection. Ridenour?

Yes.

Osborne?

Yes.

Jones? Yes. Mueller?

Yes.

Thank you.

Thank you. Item 6.3, an ordinance authorizing the mayor to execute an agreement of sale and related conveyance documents for certain city-owned real property located on East Yonge Street, presented by Michael D. Scragg, city manager.

Thank you, Mayor and Council. You may recall when we did our driving tour of the community, we tried to inventory all the properties that the city owned, those that were in use and those that were surplus or not in use. And on East Yonge Street, there was a location that used to be a sewer lift station. You may also recall we looked at sewer lift stations, and it's very much an oversimplification, but think of a sump pump for sewage. We had a sewer lift station location there on East Yonge Street, The sewer lift station was removed, taken out of service. We don't have a current or a foreseeable use for that property. And so we had interest from Scott Rasa with Earthworks, who is grading and preparing the site that he owns in that vicinity, connects to this particular piece of property. And he has kind of a vision for site work. His property actually goes from Young to Russell and kind of wraps around. So he's got an opportunity now. to do something that's more inclusive of this property and his. He approached us, and so based on that interest, I commissioned an appraisal. Didn't expect that that property was going to appraise for very much value. given its location next to the creek, the topography, the difficulty, the small size of it, and it came back at $10,000. So the agreement that you have before you reflects that appraised value. The one added benefit, I think, to us as the city and as the community is it does include provision in it that the buyer agrees to complete improvements to the right-of-way and to the area simultaneous with their development of the property. It provides that the buyer will install right-of-way improvements, street widening, curb and gutter, and sidewalk online to match the surrounding 505 East Yonge, which is the property east of this site. I've spoken with Mr. Rassa. All those terms are agreeable to him. He had questions about the timing of it all because it doesn't have a hard deadline, and We talked about just coordination with his project. It does have a reacquisition right. If he should fail to meet those conditions, we could choose to take the property back. We'd have to pay him what he paid us. That's essentially the proposed agreement. With respect to our strategic plan and why we might want to do this, I think it's not so much about the money as a higher and better use of the property. So we have in our strategic plan a goal of allocating resources efficiently to maintain existing infrastructure. And within that goal is an objective of connection and maintaining city sidewalks and trails. This is an opportunity to get a sidewalk and a road widening in an area that uh would be a little challenging for us and probably wouldn't be a high priority and amongst all of our other challenges we also have a goal in the strategic plan of providing quality services to the community that preserves and stimulates economic prosperity with an objective of identifying promoting projects that enhance quality of life in warnsburg there's also a goal of continued development to make our community attractive with an objective of encouraging residential commercial industrial growth I think this does all that in terms of maximizing development of this property in conjunction with his intended redevelopment nearby. So we would have the $10,000 cash receipt, and then we would have the benefits that I described. So it's staff's recommendation that you authorize entering into the agreement, and Mr. Ross has seen the agreement and indicated it's acceptable to him.

I did have two quick questions. $10,000 just goes in the general fund.

Yeah, miscellaneous revenue.

And then the second one, as far as the improvements, I know that we can... reacquire that property, what kind of timeline is he working on? I couldn't find it within the agreement itself.

I don't want to speak for him, but he's actively doing grading work on the north side, on the Russell side. And I think he's working on aggregating some more ground and he's actively doing that. So our intent is to stay in communication at the point that that site starts to look like he's getting ready for development. He needs to be working on this as well. So I assured him, let's just stay in communication and we'll try to synchronize this with his project.

But those improvements are not part of the leveling of that ground. It's with the development of a new building or something.

The way that we worded it is simultaneous with improvement of the adjoining property. So I don't know that it's development in terms of a site and a business prospect, but just the improvement of the rest of that site.

And that was the discussion on the going through the draft, you know, is I actually had some very explicit timetable language. And when you went back, I'm like, he's literally doing the development right now. And so we're not so much worried that he's not going to do development. It's more just tying into, okay, we're doing this development. We'll tie it to that development. And it's all happening at the same time.

Yeah. And honestly, I was trying to avoid imposing some arbitrary timeline and giving him the opportunity to just meld it into his project.

Motion to move to second reading by Kettle.

Bridenhour?

Yes.

Osborne?

Yes.

Jones? Yes. Euler?

Yes.

An ordinance authorizing the mayor to execute an agreement of sale and related conveyance documents for certain city-owned real property located on East Yonge Street. This is for adoption or rejection. Ridenour?

Yes.

Osborne?

Yes.

Jones? Yes. Mueller?

Yes.

Thank you.

Keith. 7.1, public comment policy discussion.

But you, Mayor and Council, so this is following up on your recent strategic planning discussions about our approach to public comment. And we left that conversation. I want to preface this with this is just a draft. I want to get your feedback. I feel pretty good that I haven't stepped on free speech, but I need to run that by the city councilor as well. But... Coming out of that conversation, it seemed like you had some consensus around kind of three forms of public comment, one being that formal public comment related to a public hearing, another being public comment on something that's on your agenda and a recognition that really needed to create that opportunity before you discuss and consider an agenda item. And then the last item was just public comment in general. And we had a little bit of conversation about, you know, that could be at the end of the agenda, but that seems to get a little confusing when you're splitting it up. So this policy was drafted with your feedback in mind. The other thing that I would tell you, I don't know if you've noticed recently, but there's a lot of public comment going on as it relates to data centers and it just underscores some confusion about the First Amendment and free speech and public meetings and and the nature of public comment at a local government, whether it's council, planning commission level. So I tried to be firm in clarifying those items as well as spelling out that you are open to receiving public comment within certain rules that are content neutral. It's based on time, place, and manner, not topic or opinion. There's kind of a preamble there, and I won't read all this to you, but it spells out that these are business meetings of you as a governing body. They are open to the public to be observed. The point there is, while public comment is not required, you are receptive to and want to allow for public comment within expectations of decorum. And it spells out those three items that I talked about, scheduled public hearings, comments regarding an agenda item, comments regarding matters that are not on the agenda, And then it spells out the process on which they should sign up. Typically they have three minutes to address the city council, tried to address as well. It came up in some of your conversations about what other things that come up, handing out information, signs, you know, reactions, whether that's audible or not when they're not speaking at the podium and tried to give you as the governing body sufficient latitude to, be open to the comment, but if the quorum is a problem, exercise your discretion or your authority. With that, I'd be happy to answer any questions, take any feedback you might have about edits. One other thing that's somewhat related, so some of the public comment that I referred to earlier has really gotten high profile in the media, news media, social media. So another thing that I've done is just drafted a script that the person presiding could have on hand if we really lose decorum. And it's essentially recess the meeting, revisit. This is a public meeting. You're open to the public, but it's not. You're clarifying their understanding of First Amendment, free speech, and public meetings to try to reset decorum if it comes to that, rather than have it kind of spin out of control like you might have seen a and other communities. No guarantees that'll work when things are dicey, but just trying to have that prepared in advance as well. So be happy to answer any questions.

I like the direction we're headed on this concern I have. we're going to have three different categories and then potentially multiple public hearings within the same meeting. It's a lot of signup sheets over there. So I think just having some sort of streamlined process would be beneficial too, just because it is confusing right now to some people, there's multiple things to speak on.

Agreed. In fact, I kind of was envisioning and Jody and I haven't talked and I haven't fleshed this out, but the signup sheet is going to be important and the more we can give them the opportunity to indicate which agenda item they're speaking, they're here to speak on. and make that as straightforward as possible. It'll help them and it'll help us. And it'll help the mayor group speakers by agenda item as well.

I think we also need to define in here when people need to be here. Does signups end right at 7? Is it whenever we call? That type of stuff. If everything's going to be on one sheet, Mary would get that in the beginning now. So how would people sign up after if they show up at 7 or 1 or something, for example? Um, the only other comment I had on it, I would love to just see a, like a draft agenda and just kind of what it would actually look like if we were to have a normal meeting. Um, but otherwise I think this looks great.

Yeah. So following this, it will take a look at the ordinance and what it says about the agenda and see if we need to amend that, but we can certainly get you a draft agenda.

Okay. Thank you. Any other comments, questions?

No, I like the idea. Yep.

Me too. Speaking of that. Thank you, Jessica. Appearances to the council not listed on the agenda. We have two. And the first one is Jamie DeBacker. If you come up and state your name and your address, please.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council members. Tonight, I would just like to take a few moments to share what your investment in Warchief Main Street has made possible so far this year. Normally, I have the opportunity to provide a more detailed report as we begin our budgeting process, but I understand there's a new process being developed and we fully support that. As those discussions move forward, I simply want to remind the Council that Warchief Main Street has a unique partnership with the City, While we are a nonprofit organization, our role extends far beyond that. Every day, we help extend the city's capacity by supporting economic development, recruiting businesses, preserving our historic downtown, organizing community events, managing downtown properties, and bringing visitors to Warrenburg. Our goal has never been to replace the city's work, but to be a trusted partner that leverages volunteers, private investment, grant funding, and community partnerships to accomplish more together than we could do alone. Your investment in Warrensburg Main Street directly benefits the city and helps accomplish the goals that might otherwise require city resources. I'm joined this evening by several of our volunteer board members. They, along with dozens of committee members and volunteers, have made countless hours each year because they believe in downtown Warrensburg and the work that we are doing. Although the city is nearing the end of its fiscal year, we are celebrating reaching a halfway point in Warrensburg Main Street. In just six months alone, we hosted 31 event days and promotion days, welcomed more than 10,000 visitors to the Warrensburg Farmers Market, recorded 2,400 volunteer hours valued at $80,000, and generated $825,000 in private investment in downtown Warrensburg. We've also welcomed four new businesses in downtown Warrensburg. Our downtown vacancy rate currently sits at 17%, about 4% higher than this time last year. While that number may stand out, for many of those vacancies, they exist because businesses have expanded, relocated, or property owners are actively renovating spaces to prepare for new tenants. I'm incredibly proud of those accomplishments, but I want to be pretty transparent. Today, Warnsburg Main Street is operating with a two-person staff, doing the work that is much often done by much larger organizations. In addition to hosting events, recruiting businesses, managing properties, administering grants, coordinating volunteers, supporting downtown businesses, preserving historic districts, and partnering with organizations across our community. None of that would be possible without the dedicated volunteers, but also the support from the city. The success you're seeing in downtown didn't happen overnight, and it didn't happen by accident. It happened because over 30 years ago, this community chose to invest in downtown Warrensburg through Warrensburg Main Street. Your investment doesn't just fund Warrensburg Main Street, it supports businesses generating local sales tax, the preservation of our historic downtown, and the events that bring people together, and the continued growth of our community and the people are proud to call it home. As you begin your budget discussions, I ask that you continue to view Warrensburg Main Street as an investment, not an expense. The momentum you're seeing today is a result of the decades of partnerships between the city and Warrensburg Main Street. Continued investment allows for us to leverage volunteers, attract private investment, recruit businesses, preserve our historic downtown, and create experiences that people can choose downtown Warrensburg. We are proud to partner in this work and remain committed to making downtown Warrensburg a place where people want to invest, open businesses, gather as friends and family, and call home. Together, we can continue building a downtown that reflects the pride that we all have in our community. Thank you.

Thank you, Jane. Randy, I didn't see you back there. So you're next. Randy, sure, if you want to come up and.

I put my name on there just in case I wanted to say something. Okay.

Okay. Just give us your name and address if you want to speak.

My name is Randy. So she talked about mainstream. And I came just because I heard that there was a new budgeting something. I don't understand it. So I wanted to be able to say it. Jamie represents the now i'm one of the 30 year people. In street started a long time ago and the difference in Warren for the just the downtown from the 1990 to today is. You can't even describe the difference that it is. And it's not all because of Main Street, but that was the catalyst. That was the, and it has been, it has been the engine. So if you're going to, at some point in time, not want to fund them, I think that's a bad decision. I'm not saying that you are. I don't know where it's coming from. I just heard about it. So I was like, that doesn't make any sense. So yeah. I just wanted to remind you that it is a, I forgot that it was 30, I forgot that it was that old, but it was a struggle. And the difference in the downtown, just in the downtown itself, is unexplainable. But what it does outside of the downtown is also something that should be looked at. The farmer's market. Debbie Irwin was one of the original board members of Main Street. She had this and that, which was in where I think it was on the corner where the real estate, the next door real estate is now. And then she moved to where the library is. But just before they moved, she said on a Saturday, she stuck her head out the door and she said it was like tumbleweed blowing down Holden Street. Because there was just nobody. There was no cars, there were no people, there was nothing. And she's like, what are we doing? Why are we thinking about getting bigger and moving? Saturdays are not that way anymore in downtown Orangeburg. So that didn't occur for any reason other than Main Street bringing the farmer's market or bringing that to life. So I agree with Jamie, as far as done, I don't think you can ever look at it as a, as an expense. I think it's part of what you just need to have. It's it's you're feeding, you're helping to feed that. I don't want to call it a monster, but that organization and that, that, that engine that, that, that gives the fact once we're in a whole lot more, and I think it ever gets credit for it. Thank you, Randy.

Appreciate it. Miscellaneous matters from the mayor and or city council. Nope. Okay. I didn't know.

I've got something in my head, but I'm not going to say it.

Oh, we might like to hear it. We will at some point. Yeah. Moving right along here, then we've got city staff updates, city manager.

Believe it or not, I really don't have anything. We're just keeping on keeping on, budget-wise, street-wise, and staff's got some things for you, but I won't belabor the point. Thank you.

Administrative Services Department. City Clerk.

I had nothing to report this evening.

Community Development. I have an update.

Sorry to break the streak there. The county released the... tax sale list of properties last week. And on that list was 303 Mean Street. And so you might wonder how that impacts the city's ongoing receivership process. We continue on that path, the Lawrenceburg Property Rehabilitation Corporation that was established a couple years ago. We'll have their meeting this Wednesday at 2.30 here in this room. And our legal counsel has filed a motion to issue the deed with the court now that the two-year waiting period has passed. We are hopeful that at a hearing on August 6th that ends the circuit court, that at that time, they will issue a judicial deed transferring title to the Warrensburg Property Rehabilitation Corporation. If that occurs, as we hope and expect, then the corporation, the city, will need to go pay the taxes that is set at $1,792.34, we would go satisfy the taxes in advance of the August 24th tax sale. And that way it would not be sold on that date. And we would not have another interested party enter the equation. So if all of that would transpire in that sequence of events, then we are still on the same timeline for abatement of that property, demolition of that property late this fall, early this winter. There are additional steps to take if the city, if the Warrensburg Property Rehabilitation Corporation receives that property. We'll have to take additional steps for eviction. We'll need to bid the property the demolition, bid out that demolition contract, and then we could move forward with that work.

How confident are we that we're going to get the deed?

Yeah, so the process under Chapter 441 allows for what has happened so far, and then the next statute in the process says that there has to be good cause shown that it was not abated. So it's on us to come in and provide some evidence to the court. I think that a picture of the roof, which is missing 10% of what should be there, is enough evidence all by itself. So it's just gonna be, this is fairly much a formality, is probably a fair way to describe it. We'll have Barb for testimony, we'll have pictures, we'll have everything there. And so I don't anticipate this being much of anything. It's set at an 8.30 hearing before 9.30, before a 9 o'clock docket. That typically is sort of things that are going to take 15 minutes. So it should be a fairly inconsequential issue. The judgment will get issued in judicial deed. It just means, of course, a judgment that says you own the property based on the judgment. So we'll get that in place. I've already talked with Ms. Taylor about on her end of things to make sure that she agrees with my interpretation. We can begin taking steps.

Two things of note. Barb and I talked, and we certainly within the budget can absorb the $1,700, $1,800 expense of the taxes. So we'll do that at a staff level, at administrative level. The other thing I think you may be aware of, but just want to reassure everyone, The mayor and I have done everything we know to do in terms of social and trying to reach out to the family, social services, agencies that might be able to be of some assistance to the tenant. So the family's aware, the family's been engaged. We've met with them three, four times to talk about this process.

For a fact, we tend to do that. That comes from many different angles and very different.

The structures to the point of this action is pretty much unavoidable. At this point, I feel like we need to go forward and try to do our best on the social service side, but I don't think we've made a lot of progress there.

Yeah, I'm just hoping that nothing causes the process of getting the deed on time so that we don't have another party come to try to do it.

Ironically, we had already the process because the figures was up and we were moving it forward and getting ready to file everything anyway. And then there was in the paper. So it was, we originally, our original hearing date was going to be August 21st. So I went up and asked pretty pleased that we please have an earlier hearing date. So.

Purely speculation on my part, but recognition of the process was in the works. Maybe why the taxes fell in.

Yeah. Yeah.

I'm trying to follow. I mean, I've been tracking this somewhat for a while, but it's been for several years. We have created a separate corporation. And then are we transferring, is the city transferring money out of our general fund to the corporation to do all this? Or I was, and then are we, is the city putting out to bid or is the corporation putting out to bid? I'm just trying to figure out where the governance stands on it.

Yeah, the best handling. The corporation exists. They do not have any money in their fund. They don't have funds. They do exist. They have incorporated with Secretary of State if their annual report is up to date. And the mayor and a council rep, Eddie, and city manager, Mike, are on that board.

They also have insurance.

They have insurance. the city's operating budget for fiscal year 27, so the one starting on 10-1, is the budget that will include the demolition money. I don't know if it will be in a fund of the... That's a fair question.

If we conclude that it needs to be initiated through the agency, we can... The funds are budgeted. We may have to transfer them to the agency to then execute the final contract.

So are we going to do a budget amendment for these tax payments?

We haven't adopted that budget yet.

I'm talking about the tax payments that we have to do in August.

Yeah, that's a small enough amount. I think we can absorb it in an existing line. Somewhere in the city budget.

Okay. We're not going to transfer for that, potentially.

Unless legal counsel tells me we need to to keep it in the correct corporation's name. But either way, there's sufficient funds in the city's budget to cover the expense.

And the number one concern has always been the safety of the tenant and the house. That house... could fall down any day. And we also appreciate the neighbors in this whole process with their understanding with the situation for the last many years. So anyway, I appreciate all the work that you guys are doing on this. And the family's very appreciative of the city trying to do everything we can to help the tenants. Anything else on that? Nope. Fire department. Parks department.

The additional.

Police department.

Amy Merritt, council. Here for you tonight, Max asked all two or three councilmen meetings before about the Blue Shield grant. We did receive that. They're going to be allocating Approximately $28,985 to us to each awarded city or county. So we're looking at doing eight SWAT vests. They're approximately $3,641 apiece. That would take us just $147.54 over what they'll pay in my interest. How much for each one? Each of the vests are $3,641. And this came in a short time ago, and we had to scramble and get bids, what we wanted to look at spending, allocating that money for. We had the idea of the swap vest, so we brought them in and was able to get the bid on that, and looked at a couple other things, but this best fit for this grant. Are they just more- They're heavier vests. They're rifle wraparounds and pistol rounds. Now our everyday vest, we upgraded them. They will stop a wraparound as well, but these have heavier plates on them and more user-friendly for the SWAT guys that are out in the field doing stuff.

You may recall last year's conversation about the Blue Shield grant was FLOC, and we said you gave direction not to proceed. And at that time, we said we'll revisit it when the Blue Shield grant comes out, or we wouldn't do anything without consulting you further. But given the Blue Shield grant amount, given the prior conversation, staff's not coming back to you with a recommendation for FLOC at this time.

Congratulations on the grant award. Thanks, Chief. Public Works Department.

I was going to put you on the spot a little bit. Just the emerging contaminants update. We received notice. There's still another step in the process, but we received confirmation of $4.6 million in grant funding with no local match.

I was going to wait until we got the letter. Yeah, sorry.

A quick question I have for Public Works. Update on the streets overlay.

Yeah, the last I knew, they told us the end of this month, so it is imminent.

They are running behind due to the weather. I'm not doing an update on what's going on with that, which Jason's here, but yeah, they are running a little bit behind. We should be getting close, though.

And one of the things that I committed to KOKO, among others, is once we have a date and a schedule, we'll certainly get that word out. Awesome. Thank you.

Okay. Warrensburg Convention and Visitors Bureau. All right. We're adjourned.