TUESDAY JAN 29TH BELOIT CITY COUNCIL

Beloit City Council

Tuesday, January 19, 2016

By Terry Bailey

The Beloit City Council held their regularly scheduled bi-weekly meeting Tuesday evening, January 19 to oversee the affairs of the City. All Councilors were present as well as the Mayor Tom Naasz, City Administrator Glenn Rodden, City Attorney Katie Schroeder, and City Clerk Amanda Lomax.

In the time reserved for comments by the Councilors all extended their thanks to the departing City Administrator Glenn Rodden and wished him well in his new endeavors. Additionally Councilor Bob Petterson announced that last Sunday, the VFW members served breakfast to a crowd of 433 people at the Post Home.

City Attorney, Katie Schroeder, thanked Rodden for all of his help as she adjusted to her job as the City Attorney. Schroeder also told the Councilors that the Codification of the City’s codes and ordinances had been completed by the company hired to do so. She plans to have the Council discuss and vote on the new document at the next meeting. Four of the Councilors expressed interest in having a hard copy of the new ordinance book to study beforehand. The other Councilors believed they could access the new ordinance book on-line.

Rodden displayed a plaque that had been awarded to the City of Beloit. Each year the Kansas Ready Mix Association selects one City that has performed an outstanding use of ready-mix concrete. Beloit was chosen by virtue of the cement work done on the streets at the North Campus.

The Governor’s State of the State address last week contained several issues that may or may not seriously affect the city of Beloit. Like much in the political world, it is a wait-and-see affair to see what action, if any, the legislature takes on his proposals.

Finally, Rodden said he was working with John Devine to locate an interim city administrator to fill the void until a new administrator is selected. Devine thought he had located a good candidate, but that person decided Beloit was too far west in the state.

In the Public Comment segment of the meeting, Garret McBlair and Rebecca Kats, representing the Beloit High School FCCLA club, addressed the Council regarding the needs of the local Food Pantry. The motto of the National organization for the current school year is Feed the Hungry.

They have discussed the needs of the Food Pantry with the director Bev James. Their research revealed these facts:

In 2015, the Food Pantry served 135 families totaling 897 people. This represents 13.3% of the population of Mitchell County.

1 in 10 of the people in Mitchell County benefitted from the Food Pantry.

Each week the Pantry serves 3 to 7 families.

The largest contributor to the Food Pantry is the Beloit High Student Council with their annual Food Drive.

The Dollar General Store and Catlin’s Apple Market have donation boxes.

Cunningham Telephone and Cable conducts a program each year in November and December which allows customers to receive a deduction on their bill for food donated.

Tipton High School and Wilson Telephone Company have a program where Wilson Phone Co donates $1 for each food item the school collects.

KVSV’s annual Joke Contest has proved to be a project that yields strong contributions.

In spite of all these very successful community efforts to supply the Food Bank to help those in need, there are times when the shelves are bare. According to James, challenging times occur during the New Year holiday, the months of April and May, and over the Christmas season. She estimated that at least one-third of the year the Food Pantry faces very lean times.

The Beloit High FCCLA offered a proposal for the Council to consider. It is one that has been conducted in other places with good results.

McBlair and Katts proposed that citizens of Beloit be allowed to voluntarily add one dollar to their utility bill each month to be earmarked for the Food Pantry. Their research showed that each month, the City of Beloit issues 2,200 utility bills. If everyone took advantage of this method to help those less fortunate, this would yield $2, 200 each month.

They were very much aware that 100% participation is not possible. They have done the math on other possibilities. A five percent participation would equal contributions of $1,320 per year. A fifteen percent of participation would bring in $3,960 each year. They both believe this would be a good way to help collect funds on an on-going basis to help those less fortunate.

Mayor Naasz thanked them for their presentation and that the Council would consider it.

Next up was a Public Hearing regarding the Community Downtown Block Grant project. North Central Kansas Regional Planning Commission Director Doug McKinney reviewed the successes of the project and how the work has improved the appearance of the downtown area.

City Attorney Schroeder reviewed Charter Ordinance #14 for the Council. It clarified the governance structure of the city and the composition of the City Council. The Ordinance was unanimously accepted.

The Council approved the spending of $13,905.76 for the purchase of four inch and six inch water pipe to be used on water main replacement projects.

An expenditure of $50,390 was approved for the purchase of Circuit Protection Relays.

The proposal for the purchase of a new pickup for the Water/Wastewater department gave rise to questions abot the necessity of the purchase. Department director James Bentz had solicited bids for a replacement vehicle for a 2001 Dodge that has been in service for 15 years. However, it has a relatively low mileage of 74,000.

The pickup Bentz proposed to replace the Dodge was a 2016 GMC series 1500, four-wheel drive, crew cab pickup at a cost of $28,704.

Councilor Bob Richards asked Bentz, “Does it have to be a four wheel drive vehicle?”

Bentz said, “There are a number of times where we get into places where a four wheel drive is very handy. The extra cost between a two wheel drive to a four wheel drive is only $2,000 which seemed worth the difference.”

Next Richards asked, “Do you need a crew cab? How often do you have that many people in the vehicle?”

Bentz said that many people in his department have to attend trainings and workshops and they would need the extra space.”

Richard then asked Rodden, “Isn’t that what we have the Yukon for? Can’t they take that to out of town meetings?”

Councilor Bob Petterson made a motion to table the consideration of the vehicle until the next meeting. His motion was seconded by Councilor Rick Brown. The motion passed and the action was delayed until the next meeting.

The last item on the agenda was the consideration of a Line Truck to replace the 1977 model currently in service. The Council approved the expenditure of $303,169 for the purchase of a fully equipped truck from Altec. They also approved a proposal to finance the purchase with a sixty month loan from the Guaranty State Bank at a 2.237 percent interest rate.

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Beloit, KS 67420, USA