Local News – Thursday, July 7th, 2022
An accident happened in Texas County on Highway 63 about a mile north of Licking Tuesday evening around 7:11. According to the highway patrol report, a 2014 Chevy Captiva driven southbound by 37-year-old Dannie Wilson of Newburg, traveled into the left lane, overcorrected and the Chevy traveled off the right side of the roadway where it went airborne and impacted an embankment as well as several trees. Suffering serious injuries were two passengers in the vehicle: 29-year-old Megan Strain of Rolla who was taken by Air Ambulance to the University Hospital in Columbia; and 43-year-old Steven Stiner of St. Louis who was taken by Air Ambulance to Mercy Hospital in St. Louis. Neither were wearing seat restraints at the time of the accident. The Captiva was totaled and removed from the scene by Jay’s Automotive in Houston.
The City of Salem and the Missouri Public Utility Alliance remain under a PEAK POWER ALERT this afternoon from 2:00 through 6:00. Your help in reducing your electric consumption during this time would be greatly appreciated! For energy saving tips, visit salemmo.com and summer energy efficiency tips can be found on city’s portion of the website under news.
The Salem Board of Aldermen held a special meeting Wednesday evening at the Salem Community Center@The Armory. At the meeting, the board discussed a bid on the OPW Fuel Management Systems from Jason Hogan of Show Me Petroleum Equipment Company in Republic, Missouri. This system will allow for fuel to be purchased again at the Salem Airport and would accept all major credit cards including Visa, Mastercard, American Express and Discover through the EMV Terminal and swipe systems. The cost of the equipment is $11,809.11 which includes installation. There will be no shipping charges as Hogan would bring it with him when they come to install the system. Hogan said there is a warranty but wasn’t sure if it was 90 days or a year. The board voted unanimously to approve the bid before the meeting was adjourned.
The Salem Utility Committee held a special meeting Wednesday at the Salem Community Center@The Armory called by chairman Kyle Williams to discuss sewer rates in anticipation of applying for a $5 million grant for the second phase of improvements at the Wastewater Treatment Plant. It is required as of March of this year by the Department of Natural Resources to be able to measure the total maximum daily limits of contaminants going into Spring Creek. The Phase 1A and 1B parts are completed and those phases cost $4.4 million and this new phase is expected to cost $9.512 million. The need for the meeting was that the current sewer rate is not sufficient to cover the budget deficit and has not increased in some time. The utility committee discussed different options available that will help in the scoring of the grant application as the city would need to be charging their citizens. The first option was for a 7.1% increase in the rate of $5.65 per 1,000 gallons of wastewater that would increase the normal usage bill to near $7.46 per 1,000 gallons of wastewater. This increase would help the application by adding five points to the City of Salem application as it would bring the sewer rate in line with the standard for sewer systems of 1.5% of the median income level in the county. There was a motion increasing the usage rate over 100% that would also remove the service availability fee, but that recommendation fell for a lack of second. Another motion was made to leave the service availability rate at $6.00 per customer in place and raise the rate about 84% to $10.40 per 1,000 gallons of wastewater. One caveat to the motion was that if the city does not receive the $5 million grant, the increase would be repealed and then would be reviewed by the Utility Committee. This rate increase would remove the deficit in the sewer budget and provide them with a 2% sewer rate in line with the median income level in the county. This would also give the application an additional 10 scoring points and make it a much stronger candidate for the grant funding that if awarded, would NOT have to be paid back. The Utility Committee approved by a 5-0 vote to recommend to the Salem Board of Aldermen next Tuesday to increase the rate to $10.40 per 1,000 gallons of wastewater that continues to include the service availability fee and could be repealed if the grant is not awarded. The competitive grant application will need to submitted by July 16th. The meeting was then adjourned.
Salem and Dent County Economic Development Director Sally Burbridge has released figures from the Missouri Economic Research and Information Center on the updated anticipated average annual wages from July 1 of 2022 to June 30th of 2023. Dent County’s average annual wage has increased to $34,000 annually coming to about $16.35 per hour. This is the amount for people who have their jobs in Dent County. Counties in the area below Dent County are Shannon County with $29,465 and Texas County with $33,372. Counties in the area above Dent County include Crawford County at $41,711; Phelps County at $41,827; Iron County at $42,694 and Reynolds County at $43,561. The data from 2019 show that 59% of the available labor pool in Dent County work outside of the county. To break that down even further, 3,294 people living in Dent County work in other counties; 2,286 living in the county work in the county, and 1,761 people living outside the county work in Dent County. As of 2019, there were 4,047 persons employed in Dent County with 5,580 people employed in the area living in Dent County. This means that Dent County has an available work force for existing business or any potential new employer looking to move into the area.