Archive for 2023

A standing room only crowd overflowed onto the sidewalk outside the City of Salem’s Council Chambers at Thursday nights’ meeting of the Board of Adjustment’s public hearing. Over 25 Dent County citizens spoke in support of granting a variance to Dewayne and Angela Arthur so they could rebuild their business, Dewayne’s Tire Services LLC at 800 South MacArthur. No one spoke in opposition to allowing the Arthur’s to rebuild their shop. After over an hour of public comments, the hearing was closed, and the public meeting was held. The Board of Adjustment then voted unanimously to allow the variance with certain conditions including the requiring of adequate off-street parking of one parking space for every 500 square foot of gross area of the building, requiring exterior tire storage to be screened by an 8 foot visual barrier, and requiring 6 foot visual barriers between parking/driveway areas and any adjoining residential district or use. The vote clears the way for the Arthur’s to begin the reconstruction of the business.

The Dent County Commission met Thursday morning for their regular meeting at the Dent County Courthouse. In the road report, District One Commissioner Wes Mobray said grading was going to be done on Dent County Roads 5590, 6020 and 6380 while brush was going to be cut on county road 6090. He went on to say two men would be out patching various roads with the Ultimate Paving Material. District Two Commissioner Gary Polk reported materials would be added and grading done on Dent County Road 4040 while only grading would be done on county roads 2520, 2530 and 4330. Polk went on to say brush would be cut on county road 3290. Presiding Commission Gary Larson reported he attended the Ozark Rivers Solid Waste Management District Board meeting where they reviewed applications for grant funding for recycling or reusing waste products. The district had $160,244.26 available for grants and Larson said ten applications were submitted that totaled more than $278,127.22. He said all the applications were funded, but most of them received less than their original request. Larson said he also attended an MRPC Dues structure meeting on Wednesday to discuss determining dues for member cities and counties next year. The MRPC would like to hire an additional grant writer full time, but can’t afford to do that and will look for a part timer. Larson said many more grants look like they will become available next year and the dues will increase next year to accommodate the demand for the services. With the MRPC dues paid by member cities and counties, they receive hours from the MRPC staff that can be used for help in preparing grant applications. Those member cities and counties can also allocate those hours to another entity if they are not going to use them. Larson will be attending the South Central County Commissioner Association meeting today in Houston. Commissioner Mobray reported the new John Deere graders have arrived. They were inspected Wednesday and then the road and bridge crew received training on the graders. Mobray said they are already out on the roads. Commissioner Larson also wanted to let people know that Octoberfest will be held October 28th from 1:00 until 7:00 around the courthouse square. At the last meeting, Engineer Corky Stack brought in a contract change order on the courthouse exterior repairs to replace 300 linear feet of rotten or broken wood to match the existing wood at an additional cost of $8,700. The commission approved the change order. Payment #8 was submitted from the contractor, Alexander Construction, LLC, and a payment due was submitted from Corky Stack, AEA Design. The next meeting of the commission will be Monday morning at 9:00 at the courthouse and the meeting will be open to the public.

The City of Salem Board of Adjustments will be holding a public hearing tonight at 6:00 at the City Hall Council Chambers to recognize anyone who wishes to speak on a request for an exception to the current city codes that would allow for the reconstruction of a structure for a non-conforming use in a commercial zone at 800 South MacArthur on property owned by Dewayne and Angela Arthur. After the public hearing is completed, a public meeting will be held by the board to accept or reject the request for the exception by Dewayne and Angela Arthur The location was occupied by Dewayne’s Tire before it was destroyed by fire. The hearing and the meeting is open to the public.

The Salem R-80 Board of Education will be holding a special meeting this afternoon at 12:30 via Zoom. After approval of the agenda, the board will moved into closed session to discuss personnel and real estate before moving back into open session and adjourning.

The Salem Utility Committee met Wednesday evening at the Salem Community Center @The Armory. At the meeting, City of Salem Finance Director Stacey Houston reported on the utility usage and revenues for the first three months of the fiscal year. Electric revenues through September 30th were just over two million dollars comprising 28% of the anticipated budgeted revenues while the water sales revenue came in $214,301 and sewer revenues were $281,052, and both of those figures made up 24% of the budgeted amounts. So far for the 1st quarter of the fiscal year, Electric Fund revenues exceed expenses by $673,570, the Water Fund revenues exceeding expenses by $46,868, and the Sewer Fund revenues exceed expenses by $107,566. A question was asked by Chairman Kyle Williams on the status of the emergency reserve funds for each utility which is supposed to come to 25% of the previous years expenditures. That information will be brought to the next meeting. The city is still paying a demand cost of 13.900 which was set last December. If nothing changes in the next two months, that demand amount would go down to 12.700. City Administrator Sally Burbridge said there was an initial scheduling problem with Encode to test sending e-mail bills. That testing is now scheduled for the week starting October 23rd. She also said the city is having issues with Exceleron when credit card numbers have to be entered manually. These error issues have to be resolved before the city can begin accepting credit cards over the phone through a dedicated line. She said rate studies are to be done on electric and sewer rates. The alderman will have to create an ordinance to calculate the sewer rate using engineering calculations on discharge, city debt and ability to repay the bond amount from income generated by the rate. This needs to be done due to the grant received by the city. The electric rate will be determined based on the latest audited numbers which the city is waiting on. They would like to kick off that study in January and it should take three to four months to complete. Burbridge also mentioned the city needs a policy on providing city utilities to people living outside the city limits. She provided information for the committee to review to help create the policy at an upcoming meeting. Burbridge talked about the MPUA meeting she attended where discussion of the grid situation occurred, and the issues of transmission lines reaching higher populated areas from rural areas using solar farms and wind farms. She said there was discussion on changing to a “time of use” electric rate rather than a consumption rate. She said possibly in the future, energy providers may be able to control your thermostats or electric usage in times of high demand. Chairman Williams told the committee he will be working on establishing committee by-laws and hopes to have them at the next meeting. After questions from the committee and public, the meeting was adjourned.