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By William Browning
Reporter
The official adoption was Tuesday at 10 a.m. in City Hall, but the Board of Alderman passed the final proposal to the 2006-2007 budget during the “first Tuesday” aldermen meeting.
The only change to the budget came when Alderman Lance Clement made a motion to transfer $20,000 from personnel services of the cemeteries and parks to the contractor services of the street department.
“I think we’ll be serving our community better by doing so,” Clement noted before Alderman Tommy Swearengen seconded the motion. The motion passed 4-0. (Alderman Charlie Harris was absent from the meeting.)
Currently the cemeteries and parks division has four part-time positions. Mayor Bill Norris noted before his call for votes that those four part-time positions would be cut back to two. The city will advertise and hire an independent company to cut its streets.
Other business conducted at the meeting:
• “At one time, I know we had stopped [buying back vacation time], because it opened up a big old can of worms,” Alderman Fred White said when the board was presented with city employee Ray White’s request to sell back his week’s worth of vacation time. “And I think we’re fixing to open up another can.”
R. White has worked with the city’s cemetery department since August 2005. After a year’s worth of work, an employee is entitled to a week’s paid vacation. The city’s handbook states that an employee can sell back such time, but “at the discretion of the board.”
“I think that if we’re going to do it, we better be willing to do it every time,” Alderman Clement said. “And if we’re not going to do it, we better be willing to not do it every time.” (Clement went on to ask, “Is this something that is done regularly?” To which city clerk Vivian Snider responded, “I think I’ve done [the work] on something like this once.”)
During the discussion, Alderwoman Sherry Johnson voiced concern over the amount of work available for R. White to do if he did not take a vacation.
“Are they caught up?” she asked.
“There is plenty of work to be done,” Mayor Norris said.
“Well I guess that at times something like this can be beneficial to the city,” said Johnson.
The motion passed with a 4-0 vote.
(Present at the meeting – for supposed unrelated reasons – was city employee Robert Turner. At one point during the discussion Turner, both an opportunist and employee of the city’s street department, raised his hand declaring, “I have two weeks of [vacation] time. Will y'all buy it back?” The board informed Turner that his request would be tabled until the next meeting.)
• The board heard from the street department’s Michael Scroggins. He informed the board that the department was short three full-time employees. (“We lost one to death and two to other employment.”) Scroggins urged the board to consider advertising for qualified help immediately.
“There are only two other workers besides myself who can [operate] the heavy machinery,” Scroggins said. “I constantly have to stop myself at a job I am at to go take care of something else.”
Alderman White asked Scroggins what specific positions the city needed.
“Well one of them is a backhoe operator, and another is a machine operator. We’ve got some part-time workers, but we’re paying them minimum wage. And there is no experience there,” Scroggins said.
He continued, noting that some qualified individuals had inquired about the jobs, but, Scroggins said, “some of these folks laugh at you. We underpay everyone [in Water Valley].”
“I think we need to advertise for [the positions],” Alderman Clement said. “And see what happens.”
“We’ve got nothing to lose,” noted Alderman Swearengen.
The board then voted to advertise for three full-time positions.
• The board approved City Attorney David Burns’ bill of $3,153.80. The bill, Burns remarked, “basically covers the last two months.”
• The board was informed that that city will receive $60,000 in grant money from the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks. The money is to be used on the renovation of the pavilion in Railroad Park.
Bob Tyler, representing the MDWFP, congratulated the board on the grant, which is a 50-50 matching grant. (Jessie Gurner and Betty Ruth Swearengen, both of a local garden club, were “instrumental” in raising the city’s money, Tyler said. He added that Mayor Norris’ recent letter to the MDWFP helped in getting the grant revived. The grant was originally requested three years ago.)
• The board approved a bid – the only one received – from Robert McCuan to purchase condemned property on Wagner Street. The bid was for $400.
“How big is the property?” Alderwoman Johnson asked her fellow board members before a vote was taken.
Mayor Norris then directed the question to McCuan, who was present at the meeting.
“I don’t have the drawings with me, but it’s not even a tenth-of-an-acre,” McCuan said.
The board then took a 4-0 vote.
• The board heard from Scroggins again, this time in regards to a growing problem at the municipal airport.
“The city needs to look into putting a fence around the airport,” Scroggins said. “We’ve still got folks trespassing and vandalizing out there. You can see skid marks and everything where they’ve been drag racing. This is a liability for the city.”
Scroggins said $950 would supply the city – which would do its own work – with materials needed to build a six-foot fence with wire on top.
Another solution discussed was the possibility of constructing a gate at the main entrance of the airport.
“That won’t stop a four-wheeler,” Alderman Swearengen said. (The water department’s Morris Surrette described the four-wheelers as “a tribe.”)
“Or a pickup truck,” Surrette added.
After Swearengen stated that the gate would “be a waste of money,” Alderman Clement agreed, saying, “Yeah, let’s wait on something like that.”
The board – absent Alderman White who had stepped into the hallway to answer a cell phone call – voted 3-0 to approve the $950 for a fence.
(Upon coming back into the meeting and hearing another matter being discussed, White asked, “What’d we do about the airport?” Mayor Norris told him the money for the fence had been approved. “Well. You could have waited on me.”)
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