By Leigh C. Merrifield
Shinnston City Council met for its regular meeting on Tuesday, October 13 at the Woman’s Club clubhouse. With no petitions from citizens wishing to speak, Minutes from September meetings and work sessions were approved.
Mayor Kovalck participated via phone with Vice-Mayor Rodney Strait leading the meeting. Following executive reports, the meeting proceeded to project updates, and it was announced that the Dog Park should be finalized in November.
New business included:
*The First Reading of the municipal service fee which will bring a slight increase in the police fee and street maintenance fee that will amount to a total rise of $7. No one spoke against it and Council members were all in agreement that this was needed. However, a Public Hearing on this ordinance to amend and restate Article 753.02 of the Codified Ordinances of the City of Shinnston will be held at Council’s next meeting on November 9 and later followed by a second reading.
* Council also discussed dates and times for trick-or-treating. This will be permitted in Shinnston on Saturday, Oct. 31 from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.
* The next business item was to discuss collection of unpaid Police Department citations, which comes to a sizeable amount – just over $100,000. A collection agency has been selected to handle this. Mayor Kovalck stated that this problem has been brought up at several Mayors’ meetings, and that every municipality appears to be dealing with the same issue. “The total of just our unpaid citations is a lot of money, so imagine what this figure is like statewide! The State does not intercede and take action on this with license suspensions or anything, so unpaid citations just keep mounting,” he said. “It has to be stopped.”
The City Manager was given permission to sign an agreement with a collection agency to collect these delinquent citations.
*The final discussion item was to review the update on the Power Plant water supply. The City finally received a reply from them, which did not answer any of the questions the City Attorney had asked in a previous letter to them. The Power Plant instead requested a face-to-face meeting with Council and the City is in the process of setting that up.
Vice-Mayor Rodney Strait announced that three buildings on lower Bridge Street across from the Fire Department have been sold. Two are uninhabited properties, and the third is the Woman’s Club clubhouse. The local buyer has a plan but as yet, those plans have not been announced.
Strait also said that a vote count on Fall Fest’s hay bale competition had gathered 500 votes so far, and voting will continue until the end of October. Council is also considering having another Christmas light decorating project in December which will be further discussed at the next work session meeting.
With no need for executive session, the meeting was adjourned.
