News : City Council: Drainage, Ditches and Oopsies, Wrong Aggregate

At Thursday night's Council meeting(s) the council heard a couple of requests during their work session. One was to purchase a tiny sliver of land that the city inherited as part of the Braille School acquisition. The city will probably make plans to put that up for sale.

During the work session a seven foot ditch that provides storm water drainage located in the right of way at 1605 2nd Avenue was addressed. The homeowner Doug Martens addressed the work session asking if the council would consider adding a culvert to the ditch as it is so deep and he fears someone being injured in the ditch because of its depth. The council will request the city engineer to check into what can be done.

An alley in the 700 block between B and C Ave. was discussed and possible seal coating of the alley.

During the regular council session, the council approved a bridge inspection report which included the need for replacement of the 13th St. Bridge and structural repairs are needed to the 4th St. Bridge.

During Citizen's input, there was an apology from Craig Streeter considering a misunderstanding between the city and the Legion. Miscommunication was at fault for the misunderstanding.

Dakoda Sellers also addressed the council sharing his concern about the Work session last Thursday. He explained that he felt the session was directed toward him and didn't feel that it was fair that the sign code issue was being blamed on him. Stating that the ordinance hadn't been enforced until this year and felt that it needed to be looked into.

The council also approved a survey conducted on Parcel C of Lots 1 and 2 of Anderson Creek Estates First Addition.

Airport Runway 9/27 will be under repair with a grant from the FAA making it the second grant toward this project. Moisture below the runway has been causing issues. There will be no fiscal impact on the city as it was already budget for at a cost of $26,988.86, with the FAA covering $242,899.75.

The council set a date for a public hearing for CDBG 2nd story housing grant for November 9 at 7:00 p.m. Schwan reported that the Visioning Committee that worked with Trees Forever is completed. There will be a final report given to the council at 6:00 p.m.

Monday, November 27, 6:00 p.m. will be a work session to discuss water and sewer rates with the city's financial advisor.

The discussion on signage was postponed until the city's attorney can be present.

CDBG Housing grant recovery application for disaster recovery on November 6, both Melissa Schwan and Chris Ward will be attending a League of Cifies workshop on November 2.

A request has been placed by Vinton-Shellburg for no parking areas around Tilford Elementary during construction from the east driveway to the corner so that busses have more room, and also requesting no parking in areas of the cross walks.

The city also obtained a section of land along K Ave. and 8th St. next to Koop's along with the deeding of the IBSSS property. Originally the state owned that section back in the 1940s. The estimate width of the section is less than 12 feet wide. The city will consider selling it.

The First Street West project ran into a bit of a snag. With the first 3/4 of the project it was discovered that the aggregate used inside the concrete by the company was inferior and hadn't yet been tested by the DOT. Preliminary testing says that it's not close to passing, however, there will be additional testing that will be done. Any cost to replace it will NOT fall on the city. It will be up to the city to decide how to proceed once the results are in. Probably, that section will be redone next spring. Fortunately, the city engineer caught the error.