Local News – Friday, December 22nd, 2017

Congratulations goes out to the three winners of the KSMO Radio Big Christmas Giveaway sponsored by Bottorff’s Southtown Furniture in Salem, the Fidelity Communications Salem office and Fairground Auto Plaza in Rolla. The three winners this year were Sandy Gibson, Leon Turnbough and Ron Ice. Thanks to everyone who participated in this years contest and have a very Merry Christmas from KSMO and YWT.

The Dent County Commission met for their regular meeting Thursday morning. In the road report, District One Commissioner Dennis Purcell said grading would be done on Dent County Roads 6080, 6210 and 6220 while chip and seal county roads 5015 and 5083 would receive some patch work. Purcell said he attended the South Central Missouri Community Action Agency meeting Tuesday and they have seven programs that are available to the public including the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, Weatherization program, a home repair program, Head Start and Early Head Start and others. There are some income guidelines that apply and to find out more information, contact Sara at 729-3500. District Two Commissioner Gary Larson indicated materials would be added and grading done on Dent County Road 3410, while materials only would be added to county road 3265, and only grading would be done on county road 4403. Larson also said some repair work needed to be done on brush cutter #6. Skiles updated the commission on the Rock Island Railroad Trail saying that currently there are 300 landowners that have deeds that stated once the railroad was abandoned, that property would go back to the original landowner. He felt it was wrong for the MRPC to offer to help support a project that denies private citizens their private property rights. Dent County Clerk Angie Curley said she continued to work on the budget and the courthouse would be closed on Monday and Tuesday for the Christmas holiday. Dent County Sheriff Bob Wells brought in bids to provide meals for the prisoners in 2018. Three bids were submitted and the lowest bid came from KFC/Taco Bell at $4.80 per meal. The Commissioners approved the low bid and wanted to thank the other restaurants for their bid submission. Sheriff Wells also recommended raising the jail board fee to $45 a day from the current $40 per day to house prisoners. The commission approved his request. The next meeting of the Dent County Commissioners will be Thursday, December 28th at 9:00 at the courthouse.

The City of Salem Board of Aldermen met Thursday night for their regular meeting. The board heard from auditor Kristen DeLuca about the audit for the last fiscal year ended June 30th, 2017. She gave an unmodified opinion of the financial statements which is the best that can be given as she said the financial statements are fairly stated. She showed increases in the net position for the city in their governmental operations of $382,951 and their commercial operations of $300,188. DeLuca told the board the audit went smooth with full cooperation of the city employees. Jeff Meadows from Archer Engineering presented the bids for the Ultraviolet Disinfection Equipment needed for the Salem Wastewater Treatment Facility. Meadows explained the process of equipment procurement as well as calculating operating costs and useful life in determining the best bid. He said the bid from Trojan Technologies for the horizontal bulb alignment of $114,740 with expected operating costs of $239,000 over 20 years was the best bid for the city. The board approved that bid. The board also approved the bid from Erb Equipment Company in Cuba of $10,287.47 to remove and rebuild the transmission of the Crawler for the Street Department. After the consent agenda was approved, City Administrator Ray Walden said he would bring information requested by Mayor Brad Nash on how many employees the CDL Policy and differential pay would affect to the next meeting. He will also bring to the January meeting definitive dates for the Visionary meetings with the Drury University Students about the old middle school property, and he will discuss with the Park Board about a proposed change in the baseball and softball league sponsors to raise additional funds by Parks and Rec. Director Tye Lydon before bringing the request back to the aldermen. The City Administrative offices will be closed today, Christmas Day and New Years Day. The board approved Bill #3352 that created an ordinance to annex into the city some property on Highway 32-72 West owned by the Inman Living Trust, Max and LaWanna Inman Trustees. They also approved Bill #3353 that allows the mayor to execute task order #4 pertaining to an agreement between the city and Archer Group to perform services on the project named the Highway J & 72 Water and Sewer Extension. The board approved the destruction of old police records prior to 2011 except for felony reports as permitted by state statute, and they approved the purchase of fuel for the airport in the amount of $13,853.19 from Naeger Oil from Springfield, Missouri. The board then went into closed session.