Traffic pours into the Linn County Fairgrounds during the Sugar Mound Arts and Crafts Festival in October 2023. Use of county crews and resources to help with that event in 2024 was called into question during the county commission meeting on Monday, Sept. 10. (Journal file photo)
By Charlene Sims, info@linncountyjournal.com
MOUND CITY – On Monday, Sept. 9, when Public Works Director Shaun West reported that county public works employees would be doing some work at the fairgrounds to help set up traffic signage for the Sugar Mound Arts and Crafts Festival, Commission Chair Danny McCullough took issue with that.
“With all this other stuff happening, like the senior center and this, are we staying focused on the roads and ditches?” asked McCullough.
West said that this work would only take a half of day and no graders or people working on ditches will be pulled off their jobs.
“If we are going to continue to do this assistance then we should probably think about it,” McCullough said. “I mean, I thought at one time that we closed everything off, but we just continued to give assistance.
“I don’t think that’s fair to the cities that we’ve turned down with their assistance if we’re still out helping everybody else. I think that’s something we need to talk about and figure out.”
West said he could reach out to the boards that the county has helped in the past and ask them to come up with a plan to self-support.
“Did we not all agree that we weren’t going to be accepting any applications for assistance at all?” McCullough asked. “At one point that was an agreement.”
McCullough said that he had gotten an earful from a city that was turned down about doing some work on an eighth of a mile. He said he did not think that it was right to turn down one city and then help everybody else.
In February, the commissioners took no action on a request from Pleasanton asking the county to work on a gravel road for them. At that time, McCullough reminded the commissioners that they had decided to not accept application for assistance until the county road work was caught up.
In August, all three commissioners agreed for the county road crew to do work at the fairgrounds for the FFA program.
McCullough asked Commissioner Jason Hightower if he had any thoughts on this.
Hightower replied, “I think we should be continuing to help take care of the entire county.”
West said that some of these are just old agreements. Some of this is just living with what we’ve done in the past and expectations there.
Commissioner Jim Johnson was not at the meeting and had notified McCullough and Hightower that he would not be able to attend.
Commissioners also reviewed the August and year-to-date information for the Linn County Park .
The August 2024 receipts for the Linn County Park amounted to just over $34,900. These receipts come from marina sales, marina food sales, cabin rental, boat fees, KDWP fees, Airbnb rentals, and permit and user fees.
The August expenditures were slightly over $22,300 for a gain of about $12,600. Expenditures include personnel services, contractual, commodities and capital outlay.
The year-to-date receipts were $209,100 and the expenditures were over $187,300 showing a gain of more than $21,700.
In other business, the commissioners:
• Learned that Alison Hamilton had asked for a traffic study to be done at the Massacre Site Park because a lot of vandalism was occurring there. She wanted to present the numbers to the state so that they would either fund gates or staffing there.
West said that he was concerned with the safety of the equipment used for the traffic study if a lot of vandalism was occurring and he would check with the sheriff’s department about that concern.
• Discussed the availability of grants for roads and bridges and who was in charge of looking for grants. West said that was something that the county’s on-call engineering firm was doing.
• Approved moving more than $82,000 of federal funds into an exchanged with the state. The exchange rate for the funds will be nearly $73,900. The money will be put in a special roadway fund to help with matches for grants.
West pointed out that this exchange is done every year because the state opportunities for using this money are much broader than the federal opportunities.
• Made a motion to sign the request for revision to the functional classification system for the Kansas Department of Transportation for important segments of Tucker Road, 1000 Road and 1100 Road.
West explained that this classification allows these roads to be classified properly for availability for funding in the future.
• Hired Samantha Blanchett as receptionist, data clerk and WIC clerk for the health department at the rate of $18.10 per hour.
• Discussed the Devlin Road project. McCullough said, “We have all this hearsay about Miami County doing their part, but do we have an understanding with them that if we do our part they are going to do theirs?”
“We need to make sure that they are on board,” Hightower said.
West said he had not pulled public works off of their project last week to estimate the cost of preparation of Devlin Road because he knew that Johnson was going to be gone this week and it is in his district.
• Discussed a resolution that Pleasanton passed about speed limits changes and signs on 1200 Road and around the East Lake, West Lake and Stegge Lake. West will get more information about the locations.
• Discussed the proposed swimming area and new reservation service at the Linn County Park. McCullough said he wanted the park to sustain itself. He said that he was very concerned about the length of time it was taking to get these projects completed.
• Discussed the airport and required setbacks from the runway.
• Discussed the contracts with the cities for the compactor sites.
• Discussed training offered for grader operators.
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