Board of County Commissioners: A routine weekly meeting was held Monday morning, during which the Board approved using ACCO deductible funds to pay for $21,230 of damages to a Sheriff’s vehicle due to a deputy rear-ending a pickup truck at an intersection on October 31st of this year. If the costs exceed that amount, the Sheriff must use his own funds to cover the gap. District #2 Commissioner Leon Warner asked the Sheriff if would be able to salvage any emergency equipment from the unit, and Sheriff Bowling said that yes, he thought he would.
Warner spoke on the ongoing discussion over ARPA funds and how to best disburse them, due to Assistant District Attorney Andrew Goforth’s absence. He said that the Board has received $24M in requests and that the Board will be able to allocate $1.5M to those. He said that Barbara Albritton, of INCOG, has recommended that the Board focus on one project per requesting entity, for now. The Board agreed to review the data it has for a week and to discuss it at next week’s meeting on the 13th.
Sapulpa City Council: Two spots on the Board of Adjustment, recently vacated by John Mark Young and Hunter Edwards, are to be filled by Chuck McKinney and Jude Terrones, respectively. At Monday evening’s regular City Council meeting, Mayor Henderson said that McKinney owns his own insurance company here in town and that Terrones is in Human Resources at American Heritage Bank. Both gentlemen came highly recommended, said Henderson, and the appointments were unanimously approved.
An application for a Specific Use Permit to allow a church in a Commercial Shopping zone at 1011 East Taft, on the corner of Taft and Division, was heard. Seeds of Legacy Church would like to occupy a vacant tenant space in the building, east of an existing urgent care office. The application was unanimously recommended for approval to the Council by the Sapulpa Planning Commission on November 16th and was also unanimously approved by the Council.
A change order adding $7,961 to the contract with Crossland Heavy Contractors for the Regional Wastewater Treatment Plant Improvements Project was approved. It was originally estimated that the second digester had 6 holes to be patched when the digester was pumped out, but ultimately, 37 patches were required.
In a lighthearted recap of last Saturday’s annual Christmas parade, Mayor Henderson said that, according to numerous social media posts he saw, it was “the worst parade in history.” He said the two biggest complaints were that the Big Blue Marching Band was absent (they were competing in All State, as were other local bands who typically could have filled in) and that the firefighters did not perform their usual acrobatic feats on the firetruck ladder.
Chief Dave Taylor conceded, “That’s on me,” saying he recently attended a Chief’s convention where the dangers of those kinds of activities were emphasized. “I just hate to see one of our guys get hurt. I didn’t want to do it last year, but the guys wanted to and they talked me into it.”
Councilor Brian Stephens said that, on the bright side, the Councilors “threw 10,000 pieces of candy” and that they had a good time participating.
Two citizens spoke during the time for public comments, the first, Mr. James Williams, with concerns over Taco Bell drive-thru traffic blocking access to the Cambridge Court Apartments to the south of the restaurant and concerns over not being able to hear tornado sirens while inside the aforementioned apartments.
Henderson assured the speaker that Riley would speak to the Police Department about enforcing the traffic issue and Police Chief Mike Reed addressed the tornado siren issue, explaining that they are meant to alert people outdoors that a tornado is coming. People indoors have access to other sources, such as television and radio. Several people suggested that Williams purchase a dedicated weather radio or to request a free one from the weather service.
The second speaker is a familiar face at City Council meetings. Mr. Ken Ayres, a resident of the Lakes at Cross Timbers housing addition east of town off Highway 117, spoke about his issue with the lack of information on berms on the engineering criteria for the neighborhood’s final plat and about concerns with neighbors’ pool water draining into the pond near his house rather than into the sewer system.
Henderson said that the Council will continue to work with City staff to get Mr. Ayres’s issues resolved and apologized for how long it’s taking.
Creek County Emergency Ambulance: The new workers compensation plan approved by the Board at last month’s regular meeting went into effect on December 1st, it was reported at this month’s meeting on Thursday evening.
In November, income was $355,337, there were 678 billable calls, and 1,040 total runs.
