January City Council questions

Written questions submitted to the Comanche City Council at the Jan. 9 meeting with written responses from the city:

Questions for City Council Meeting on January 9,2024 with written city responses

1.  Any response from ODOT on city sidewalks since the last meeting? All of the blame was put on ODOT. 

- An inspection and walk through has been scheduled with Cole on Jan. 4, 2025

2. Are you going to apply for a grant to complete downtown city sidewalks? Last meeting you said there were several out there. 

- Grants periodically come available throughout the year for sidewalk and accessibility. The next grant we are aware of is the ODOT Transportation Alternatives Grant. The application period is May 1-May 31. We have everything in order to apply for the grant when it opens.

3. Any update on Cemetery investigation?

 Smokey ask what I wanted from this last month: 1.  I want a letter from the city saying they filed my police report as an insurance claim without my consent. 2. I want all info from ODIS concerning the investigation that the police department done. 3. If investigation was done on cemetery and what the city manager says was done, wouldn’t it be a conflict of interest for the police chief being that he is hired/fired by the city manager. It should be investigated by an uninterested party preferably a state law enforcement officer/agency. 

- Action will be taken to deny the claims as recommended by OMAG. Their independent investigation did not reveal any liability on the part f the city.

4. Question last month on city council members terms and filling vacancies. Question was unanswered of who decided Teresa was the person to fill seat and who asked her was unanswered. How do you come up with people in this district to fill a seat? There are a lot of people that live in this district that could fill this seat.  There was nothing put out that there was a vacancy and if anyone was interested in doing this to turn in info to the city hall? (This question has nothing to do with Teresa as a person. She is a great person. I think she will do a great job.) It seems a person was chosen and that was it. Who did the choosing/selecting? It was voted/approved by city council I know and that is great. 

- I was not involved in the selection process. I will defer to the May or to answer this question.

5.  Question from last month on money coming in from flower shop, flea market, field of dreams, you listed funds received from July 1st on each of these 3. I see the flower shop is monthly rent. The flea market venue, how do you tell how the money is coming in from this? Also the Field of Dreams? They are odd amounts of revenue. I know there are others/places  in town that the city is supposedly receiving revenue from? What are they? All of the businesses that have received RBEG loan for building and business improvement have are what businesses? You said last month there are sixteen businesses that have received this. Do they pay the city back directly for this monthly, quarterly or yearly? How? When the business is no more and they still have outstanding balances what happens then? 

- The Trading Post rooms are billed monthly and the outside spots are paid at city hall when the spot is reserved. The amount of revenue varies each month based on the number of rooms rented and the number of spaces used. The city received 35% of all gate revenues. This varies based on the number of events held and the number of attendees at each event. The Comanche Sports Group collects the gate fee and typicallyt makes a payment for the city’s portion at the end of each month. The school is currently not paying for use of the Field of Dreams or the water and electricity they use.

- Please be more specific in “others/places” the city is supposedly receiving money from.

- All businesses receiving the RBEG loan repay the loan monthly. At the time of loan the committee generally requires a form of collateral. If it is th buildilng we have the option to put a lien on the property but this is uncommon. In the event the business closes they can continue to make the repayment with no penalty. In the event of a default we contact USDA and follow their procedures.

6.   In December’s meeting there was nothing said about rate increases for electric or anything else. In September it was brought up about increasing cemetery rates and then again in December’s with no action taken.  Then it was brought up about possible electric increases in October and November with no actions taken. Then we get a notice with our city electric bill dated 1-1-2024 effect getting raise hikes across the board on everything. How can this happen when it wasn’t in the city council meeting? 

- On Feb. 11, 2014 the council passed ordinance 510-14 establishing an automatic rate increase of 3% every July 1 for all city services.

- On Nov. 9, 2021 the council passed ordinance 571-21 amending the automatic increase reducing it to 1.5% or CPI (consumer price index) whichever was less. Additionally the feeling of the council was that an increase in summer months (July 1) was inconvenient for residents so the same ordinance changed the date to Jan. 1 when bills are typically lower. The 2022 CPI was 6.5% so the automatic increase was based on teh standard increase which was lower.

7.  All city council meeting should be recorded. Making them freely accessible to the public. Why can’t this be done?

- State statute requires that we keep the minutes of each meeting and that those minutes be certified. They are available through an open records request. It does not require that meetings be audio or video recorded. Steve Bolton recorded every meeting and retained those records during his time at The Comanche Times. It is unclear if Todd has continued this practice.