Wanted: Ward 3 Council member

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Local News

November 27, 2018 - 11:10 AM

Residents in Iola’s Ward 3 — anywhere south of Breckenridge and west of Cottonwood streets — have until Dec. 4 to express their desire to be the next member of the Iola City Council.

So far, there have been no takers.

Iola City Administrator Sid Fleming and Mayor Jon Wells made another appeal Monday for somebody to replace Michael Middleton, who resigned his seat earlier this month because he is moving outside the Third Ward.

Wells noted Middleton’s replacement would be on the Council for one year. The seat is up for re-election in November 2019.

He’s asking for applicants to reach out to him or City Hall by Dec. 4 so he can appoint a replacement by the Council’s Dec. 10 meeting.

In a related matter, Fleming said he would provide information to Council members in January about factors they’d need to consider and the protocol involved if they choose to drop the Council to a five-member governing body.

Such a maneuver would require a charter ordinance, Fleming said, which then would be subject to protest approval by Iola’s voters.

 

IN AN otherwise abbreviated meeting —12 minutes in all— Council members approved, 6-0, a hearing to discuss budget amendments for the city’s library, tourism and capital projects funds.

The most significant of the amendments is to the capital projects budget authority, Fleming explained.

That’s because Council members agreed earlier this year to use capital projects monies to make the city’s annual $670,000 water plant payment instead of using water utility funds. To cover that payment, the capital project expenditures went from $780,000 to $1,549,824, an increase of $769,824.

Other funds should be sustainable through the end of the year, Fleming said, although he is monitoring the stores fund to ensure it will not require an amendment.

The budget hearing will be at  the Dec. 10 Council meeting for final approval. Council member Chase Martin was absent.

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