City of West Frankfort City Council met Aug. 11.
Here is the minutes provided by the council:
1. Mayor Jordan Called The Meeting To Order At 6:00 P.M. Requesting A Roll Call. Commissioners Harkins, Simpson And Warren Were In Attendance, Along With The City Attorney And City Clerk, Commissioner Chambers Was Absent.
2. Mayor Jordan Asked For Approval Of The Minutes From The July 28, 2020 Council Meeting. Commissioner Harkins Made A Motion To Approve, Seconded By Commissioner Warren. Roll Call Vote: All Commissioners And Mayor Jordan Voted To Approve. Motion Carried.
3. Mayor Jordan Next Asked For Approval To Pay City Bills And Payroll In The Amount Of $198,623.56. Commissioner Simpson Made A Motion To Approve, Seconded By Commissioner Warren. Roll Call Vote: All Commissioners And Mayor Jordan Voted To Approve. Motion Carried.
4. The Next Item Was Approval To Accept A Letter Of Resignation From Commissioner Chambers And Deem The Position Vacant. The Mayor Stated That Commissioner Chambers Has Moved Outside The City Limits And Our Ordinances Require That If You Are Going To Be On The West Frankfort City Council, You Have To Live In The City Limits. The City Council Has Received Her Letter Of Resignation That We Are Going To Act On. The Mayor Continued Stating Tara Has Been Here Since 2011 And Was A Great Part Of This Council And What We Are Going To Do Is, Next Council Meeting, We Will Install A New Commissioner And, At That Time, We Will Recognize Tara. The Motion We Have Before The Council Is To Approve Her Letter Of Resignation Due To The Fact That She Does Not Live In The City Limits Any Longer And Declare The Position Of Street Commissioner Open. Commissioner Simpson Made A Motion For Approval, Seconded By Commissioner Harkins. Roll Call Vote: All Commissioners And Mayor Jordan Voted To Approve. Motion Carried.
5. The Next Item Was Approval To Accept Offers For Purchase Of Lots Deemed As Surplus Property. The Mayor Stated That There Is An Offer To Buy The Lot At 214 N. Washington Boulevard, James Ragan, He Lives At 212 N. Washington. Their Bid Is $250.00. He Says I Have Lived Next Door For 30 Years And Would Like To Turn The Lot Into A Safe Place For Neighborhood Kids. I Am Planning On Getting A Nice Swingset, A Gazebo And A Few Apple Trees. The Mayor Stated It Was His Recommendation That The City Try And Get A Little Bit More Money Out Of These Lots. It Was Probably More Than $3,000.00 To Tear Down The House On This Lot, So I Would Like To Get A Little More Than $250.00 From The Sale Of The Lot. Commissioner Harkins Made A Motion To Reject The Bid, Seconded By Commissioner Simpson. Roll Call Vote: All Commissioners And Mayor Jordan Voted To Approve. Motion Carried.
6. The Next Item Was Discussion, With Possible Action, Regarding A Quotation From Drp Construction Regarding The Emergency Installation Of Hand Rails At The Entrance To The West Frankfort Mall. The Mayor Stated We Are In Full Compliance With The Ada As Far As Ramps And Striping, But For Some Reason The Wheelchair Ramps, Instead Of Going Down The Ramp They Walk Off The Side And We Have Had A Couple Of People Fall. So What We Are Going To Do To Make It Safer Is Put Up Some Hand Rails Out There. Two Sets, 34” High On The West Side. To Make It More Apparent That There Is A Drop Off There, We Are Going To Put Up Two Sets Of Rails For A Pric Of $3,200.00. Commissioner Simpson Made A Motion To Approve, Seconded By Commissioner Warren. Roll Call Vote: All Commissioners And Mayor Jordan Voted To Approve. Motion Carried.
7. The Next Item Was Discussion, With Possible Action, Regarding An Estimate From 4siwi, Llc In The Amount Of $1,673.90 To Add Additional Cameras At The West Frankfort Mall. The Mayor Stated That There Is A Need For Additional Cameras. One Of The Things We Are Trying To Address Is We Are Allowing Sct To Have A Drop Off For Their Bus In The Front Portion Of The Mall And We Need To Have Some Visibility Out There. There Are Also A Couple Of Places At The Mall That Need A Little Different Angle For The Cameras. The Price Would Be For Two Individual Air Cams, 50 Foot Of Cable And A New Recorder. Commissioner Simpson Made A Motion To Approve, Seconded By Commissioner Harkins. Roll Call Vote: All Commissioners And Mayor Jordan Voted To Approve. Motion Carried.
8. The Next Item Was Discussion, With Possible Action, Regarding An Estimate From 4siwi, Llc. In The Amount Of $8,232.14 For A New Server To Be Installed At City Hall. The Mayor Stated At The Last Meeting We Voted To Replace And Buy New Software For Our Billing Department And Water Utility. To Have That Installed, We Need Additional Server Space And This Is An Estimate For That. Commissioner Simpson Made A Motion To Approve, Seconded By Commissioner Warren. Roll Call Vote: All Commissioners And Mayor Jordan Voted To Approve. Motion Carried.
9. The Next Item Was Approval To Pay An Invoice From Brown & Roberts, Inc. In The Amount Of $10,350.00 For Il Rt 149, Ken Gray Blvd & Bob Burton Way Preliminary Engineering. Commissioner Simpson Asked Engineer Mike Roberts If This Project Was Now 65% Complete Regarding The Engineering Portion. Mike Roberts Stated That Was Correct. Commissioner Simpson Made A Motion To Approve, Seconded By Commissioner Harkins. Roll Call Vote: All Commissioners And Mayor Jordan Voted To Approve. Motion Carried.
10.The Next Item Was Approval To Pay An Invoice From Stotlar’s In The Amount Of $2,373.05 For Installation Of Fire Doors For The Downtown Property #222. The Mayor Stated The City Has A Gentleman Who Is Planning On Leasing This Building And Our Agreement With Him Is That The City Pays For His Materials For The Upgrades And We Add It On To The Price Of The Property And At The End Of His Lease Agreement, He Will Purchase The Property And These Materials Will Be Added To The Purchase Price. Commissioner Harkins Made A Motion To Approve, Seconded By Commissioner Simpson. Roll Call Vote: All Commissioners And Mayor Jordan Voted To Approve. Motion Carried.
11.The Next Item Was Approval To Pay An Invoice From Banner Fire Equipment, Inc. In The Amount Of $6,213.26 For Pump Testing For The Fire Department. The Fire Chief, Jody Allen, Stated There Were A Couple Of Engines That Had Quite A Bit Of Repairs That Had To Be Done. They Pump Tested Them And We Had Some That They Couldn’t Test Them And They Would Pull A Vacuum And We Got Them All Pump Tested And Done. Commissioner Harkins Made A Motion To Approve, Seconded By Commissioner Warren. Roll Call Vote: All Commissioners And Mayor Jordan Voted To Approve. Motion Carried.
12.The Next Item Was Approval To Transfer Lake Lot #19c From Leonard Williams To Arthur L. Williams And Colleen M. Williams, As Joint Tenants. Commissioner Warren Made A Motion To Approve, Seconded By Commissioner Harkins. Roll Call Vote: All Commissioners And Mayor Jordan Voted To Approve. Motion Carried.
13.The Next Item Was Approval To Transfer Lake Lot #105 From Paul Miller To Kevin And Paula Westerberg, As Joint Tentants. Commissioner Warren Made A Motion To Approve, Seconded By Commissioner Harkins. Roll Call Vote: All Commissioners And Mayor Jordan Voted To Approve. Motion Carried.
14.Officer Reports:
Chief Allen Read The Fire Department’s Report.
Chief Prudent Read The Police Department’s Report.
15.Building And Sign Permits: None
16.Mayors Comments: The Mayor Stated That He Would Like To Let Everyone Know What My Intentions Would Be As Far As The Commissioner’s Position For The Street Department. If You Will Remember The Election Last Year, Roger Stanley Took Out A Petition And Had Signatures On It And Was Planning On Filing To Run For Commissioner. He Made A Decision That He Would Withdraw That. He Had An Interest To Run And He Wanted To Be A Commissioner, But He Decided That He Would Withdraw That And I Think It Would Only Be Fair That As Mayor I Would Ask Him If He Would Step In And Fill This Position That Tara Has Left In The Street Department. There Is No Better Qualified Person In This Community Than Roger Because He Has Been The Superintendent There Since 2012. Roger Will Step Down If He Decides To Take This Position And, At This Moment, That Is What My Intentions Are Is To Ask Him To Be Commissioner. He Will Retire From The Street Department And He Will Step Into That Role At The Next Council Meeting As Our Commissioner. We Have Had Some Discussions With This And I Am Talking To The Guys Now. A Man’s Life Is His Job, That’s Who You Are So Roger Is Going To Step Out Of His Job And Retire, But He Is Going To Step Into A Higher Position Where He Will Be In Charge Of That. I Want To Thank Roger For Considering To Do This And, Again, Officially At The Council Meeting In Two Weeks We Will Ask Roger To Be Our Street Commissioner. There Is Nobody Tht I Feel Would Be More Qualified Than Roger. We Will Take Action On This At The Next Council Meeting.
17.Commissioner Comments:
Commissioner Harkins Stated The Police Department Is Doing Fine, But I Can’t Say That About The Fire Department They Have Some Problems With This Covid-19. We Have People That Have It And, Of Course, They Are In Quarantine And Our Chief Is Doing The Best Job He Can Do Right Now. We Will Get Through It. The Mayor Stated That He Thinks It Is Important That The Community Know We Have The Cdc Guidelines That We Are Following And We Have Followed These In All Our Departments. This Information That We Are Talking About, We Will Acknowledge That We Have Some Cases In Our Ranks And We Are Working With Those. Jody Has Done An Excellent Job In Addressing The Issues. We Have Had A Meeting With John And Talked About It. I Think If We Are NaïVe Enough To Say We Are Not Going To Get The Virus, It Is A Big Mistake. We Are Doing What We Need To Do As Far As Following The Regulations From Public Health. Keep Us In Your Prayers.
Commissioner Simpson Stated He Knows Jody And John Are Doing A Good Job, Not Only In Addressing The Problem, But In Keeping Our First Responders Doing Their Job. Our Ambulance Is Still Running, We Are Still Addressing The Fires And Our Police Protection Is What It Should Be.
Commissioner Warren Stated She Wanted To Say That Everything Is Going Well Except Some People Haven’t Received Their Water Bills Yet And That Would Be Just A Little Glitch. They Are Out There, They Were Mailed On The 4th And All You Have To Do Is Come Up Here If You Don’t Have It, Ask Them And They Will Tell You How Much Your Water Bill Is And We Are Not Charging Late Fees And It Is Just Unfortunate They Haven’t Gotten To Some People Yet. We Are Accomodating People As Much As We Can By Not Charging A Late Fee.
The Mayor Stated, We Always Brag On The Fire And Police, But The Water Department, Sewer Department And Street Department, We Couldn’t Run Without Them Either. They Are Out There Everyday In The Community.
18.Audience Questions Or Comments:
Tim Hastings Stated For The Council Always Operating In A Christian Manner And Praying To The Lord Jesus Christ. Read A Passage From The Bible.
Bob Maragni Stated That Since Roger Might Be Taking Tara’s Place At The Next Meeting, He Is Now Going To Have To Brag On Himself.
The Mayor Stated That The Lot Where Coleman Rhodes Used To Be Looks Really Nice.
19.Approval To Go Into Executive Session To Discuss Contract Negotiations, Personnel, And/Or Pending Litigation, With Possible Action. Commissioner Harkins Made A Motion To Go Into Executive Session, Seconded By Commissioner Simpson. Roll Call Vote: All Commissioners And Mayor Jordan Voted To Go Into Executive Session At 6:31 P.M.
20.Approval To Return To Open Session Where No Action Was Taken. Commissioner Harkins Made The Motion To Return, Seconded By Commissioner Simpson. Roll Call Vote: All Commissioners And Mayor Jordan Voted To Return To Open Session At 7:19 P.M.
21.With No Further Business To Be Discussed, The Meeting Was Adjourned On A Motion By Commissioner Harkins At 7:19 P.M
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