Local News – Monday, March 18th, 2024

This past Saturday night near 7:30, the Dent County Sheriff’s Office received a 911 call reporting a domestic disturbance at a residence located on Denty County Road 2520. The female caller reported that during this domestic disturbance, she had shot her husband, who was now deceased and located inside the residence. When officers arrived on the scene, they located a male, identified as 40-year-old Travis Lee Bailey, deceased inside the residence. The Dent County Sheriff’s Office requested the assistance of the Missouri State Highway Patrol’s Division of Drug and Crime Control with the investigation into Bailey’s death. The investigation is currently on-going. Any future developments will be released as soon as they are received by law enforcement.

The team of Brandon Semenuk and Keaton Williams took 1st place at the 2024 100-acre Rally in the Woods in their Subaru WRX ARA24 with a time of 1:30:38.6, again beating the team of Barry McKenna and Leon Jordan in their 2019 Ford Fiesta who finished with a time of 1:32:27.1, falling short by about 1:50 seconds. Finishing in 3rd place was the team of Travis Pastrana and Rhianon Gelsomino in the their Subaru WRX ARA24 as they finished with a time of 1:33:19.1. The ARA wants to thank everyone attending the Parc Expose and those at the spectator points for attending.

The Dent County Fire Protection District board of directors met Tuesday evening. After the roll call and approval of the consent agenda and approval of the minutes from the February meeting, the financial report was presented showing an ending balance of 202,313.63 as of February 29th. Bills, payments, and statements were reviewed and approved, followed by the review and approval of the 2024 budget as presented. During the calendar review, it was noted on March 30th the department will be holding a vehicle firefighting class. It is an open invitation so that other departments can attend. Also, April 2nd will be the general election voting at the department. The monthly reimbursement report showed a total of 32 calls for the month of February bringing the total calls year to date to 72. Of those calls, 16 were for fires, five were responding to alarms, three were agency assist calls, two calls each responding to accidents, HazMat calls, and two listed as other. The department also had one each public service and utility call. In old business Feld Fire Service brought Scotts air bottles into the department on February 15th to demonstrate and have the firefighters try out and test. The SCBA bottles for both MSA and Scotts were tried out at training later that night. The bid given for the Scotts bottles was 97,053.66. To get the same as MSA the total would be 129,372.66 for the Scotts Air packs. The MSA bid was for 118,036.20. The Chief reported that the department had tried both and their recommendation was the MSA as they had a better warranty and repair time and were easier to put on and operate. Both were about 60 days out to receive shipment. The lawn care service was tabled until the next meeting awaiting pricing. The tower lease was tabled until the next meeting due to no contact with the company. The damaged water line has been repaired and capped. Bids are being obtained for the repair of the walls and will be presented at the next meeting. The board also requested that the treasurer order an audit to be completed due to the loss of an employee. Documents are being compiled for the audit and made available to the auditor. The audit will cost around 3,000 depending on the time required. The exact date of the audit completion has not yet been set. The pricing of a new truck has been obtained at approximately 250,000.00 and the board will check with financial institutions for financing to see if the department can obtain a new pumper truck. The truck is necessary to both keep the ISO ratings down for Dent County and to have enough trucks to help in mutual aid to neighboring departments for safety. In new business, there was a policy change for the approval of Executive Session Minutes. Secretary Dave Wells will investigate a bylaw for approval of executive minutes and will present it at the next meeting. In closed session, an interview was held with Andrew Baker and upon returning to open session, the board approved adding Baker to the department as a probationary firefighter. Chief Floyd then gave his report and said that the department is growing and coming together, and that money is the issue to get everything that is needed for the department. The date of the next meeting was then set for Tuesday, April 9th at 6:00 and the meeting will be open to the public.