Over the past few months, there hasn’t been a lot to report from the Board of Supervisors meetings or the City of Quitman board meetings.
I have sat and listened to both approve for this bill to be paid or for this department to receive tires. Nothing out of the ordinary. Seems everyone is purchasing items in county and keeping a tight lip when I am in the room. I wonder why?
I spoke with someone who has many years of experience in my field about how I was waiting for several things in the City of Quitman board meeting that have been tabled to be resolved so I could report on them. He encouraged me to go ahead and inform everyone of what is being discussed no matter how small or if the issue is not resolved. So, here it goes.
There have been a few items discussed and tabled; two issues have not been resolved, but one has.
One issue is Main Street. The parking lines have recently been painted by city employees—a task that was way past due needing to be done. As someone who works on Main Street, I see the need to make sure the parking lines are visible. Some people parallel park, while others park diagonally. It can be a hot mess sometimes. It’s especially confusing for those who are from out of town coming to eat at our restaurants.
The board of aldermen had someone come to a meeting to discuss painting the lines correctly. The man gave his professional opinion and even provided the board with a quote.
The aldermen have run into some issues with going ahead and allowing the company to come in and do it correctly. One issue is all the existing lines from years past. The board considered changing the angle of the lines to make more room for the larger vehicles and freight trucks that frequently travel Main Street. This is a good idea but will add another set of lines on the street. If that happens, then it will be creating more issues in the long run.
One idea to help with the covering all the lines was paving Main Street. This idea was not a popular one. It would totally change the look of Main Street, and for some, lose the nostalgia of our Main Street.
So, until the aldermen can come up with the best solution on how to have the lines professionally done on Main Street, the city workers will have to continue to repaint lines when they get the chance.
Another issue that has been tabled is Historic Clarke County not paying their bill.
I was expecting to hear an update at the last board meeting about this issue, but the board was just given a report on a stand-alone museum for the boxcar.
Becky Watkins informed the board about the research about another city that has a depot that also has a caboose. Unfortunately, the caboose is not able to be used by the public as previously thought by the aldermen.
The aldermen are considering what to do with the boxcar if it is donated to the city. One idea that was mentioned at a previous board meeting was maybe to turn the boxcar into like a mini museum.
The issue right now is that the boxcar is considered by the Archives of History to be part of the Depot Historical Landmark. If the boxcar is moved, then that could affect a grant that is currently in the works to help restore the Depot.
The City of Quitman and Historic Clarke County need to resolve the issue of the boxcar sooner rather than later.
The question that pops into my head is why is there no other communication other than the city sending Historic Clarke County letters in the mail?
The last issue that was discussed for many weeks and tabled repeatedly was the transient vendor’s license. The City of Quitman was charging $250 for 90 days and a renewal fee of $25 for an additional 30 days.
The city is only allowed to change the amount for the first 90 days. The renewal fee is set and cannot be changed. Once the 120 days are up, the vendor must then repeat the process and purchase a new license.
The board discussed this heavily because they wanted to do what was best for the city. Their concern started with not wanting to take away sales from brick-and-mortar stores but also encouraging small vendors to be able to afford to set up.
The board finally came to a decision and approved the new transient vendor license. The new fee is $125 for 90 days and a renewal fee of $25 for an additional 30 days.
Now moving on to the Board of Supervisors. In the Board of Supervisors meetings, everyone turns in their work reports, requests tires, requests items be repaired in their departments, and tells of new hires for their departments.
This past board meeting EMA Director Toshia Evans reported to the board that they were scheduled for a special training on December 5 with William’s Pipeline on County Road 250 and 270 area. The county also planned to attend as well. Evans planned to also take the command center trailer with them and run drills.
Road Manager Brian Dace informed the board of several work orders of people wanting gravel or dirt.
Dace said, “One thing I would like to mention, we got several work orders for gravel and or dirt. Gentlemen, we don’t have gravel and dirt to give to people. I would think that y’all would know that as a whole. What we have comes up usually comes up one time a year when we clip the shoulders of the roads. Other than that, we don’t any.”
Supervisor Darrick Marshall said, “Don’t talk like that; we will end up back in court again. I’m just telling you, keep that to yourself. Write it to the individual.”
Dace replied, “Individual? Ok. We need to slow down on loads of dirt because we don’t have it.”
Marshall said, “They can get it off the, ugh, where we clean the ditches. We don’t want to get into the misunderstanding thinking that we are stealing dirt now. Let’s don’t get into that. That will be a problem again. We know what you are saying.”
Dace said, “Alright we don’t have it, period. Just that simple.”
The meeting continued with items that needed to be paid and ended with the board going into executive session to discuss a personnel issue and other topics.
I will continue to show up and report on what is going on in the public meetings of the City of Quitman and Board of Supervisors.
