City Council Highlights, 1-25-2016

The City Council meeting on Monday evening opened with an invocation from the new minister of the First Presbyterian Church.

In the public comments, a member of the audience asked what was happening at the quarry. The response was what this blog reported a while back, that the owners were planning to demolish the house/office and mine the material under it. A regional manager from National Gypsum thanked the Council for the tax abatement they had granted at the last meeting. The Council expected an appearance from someone representing the soccer program but no one showed.

A few meetings back Councilman Watson noted a discrepancy between titles and pay for one city worker. At Monday's meeting the Council passed an ordinance to change the title to match the pay.

There was a short presentation by the city's financial advisor who said that the city has spent a lot of time and effort to meet the requirements of Rural Development agency that is funding the high water treatment plant planned for Lincoln Street. He said that there was the common sense way of doing things and the federal government way of doing things. I do not know exactly what changes had to be made, the city can refinance some old debt at a lower interest rate and will get a 40 year loan at a 1.8% interest rate. The signing of the financing is scheduled for today (Tuesday) and after that there will be some sort of meeting discussing construction. As the last step in the process, the city council passed a loan resolution to replace one of a year ago.

The city project manager spoke in favor of waiving the tap fee for businesses that will be served by the new water main to the I-65 intersection. The construction of the main has been finished but various sorts of testing remains. The line has to be flushed, pressure tested, and tested for bacteria count before it can start delivering water to customers.

The Council approved the city wide yard sale on April 30.

The fire station should be getting garage doors soon. The expected date of completion is still April 1. The city has been trying to get the state to fix some street lights on the east side of the I-65 overpass, apparently without much success. The city has a bicentennial committee. Councilman Barton would like to replace the iPads that the councilmen have with laptops. The iPads do not do what they want them to do. A committee was established to look into the matter. The Police Chief has sent a letter to INDOT asking them to look into the possibility of a light at the Grace-Melville intersection. The fire department has been unusually busy lately, averaging more than one call a day. The contractors should soon start a test water well on the SJC property that the city would like to lease for a third pump station.

All that in about 35 minutes.