April 17 Council Meeting

Pretty quick meeting. It took about 25 minutes. Everybody was there except CM Balmer.

Heard a report that the swimming pool is scheduled to open on Memorial Day weekend. (As an aside, the city is now accepting applications for lifeguards).

The council accepted a proposal for asbestos checking in the old library building. The council also approved the go ahead to start the process of accepting the donation of the building just north of the library. The intent is to clean out the asbestos in both buildings, and tear them down. Then the plan is to construct a new City Hall on the location.

The council also approved the purchase of an aerial photo of the City of Roland. We have not had an official one since 2000. It hangs in City Hall. We've had some amount of change in Roland since then, mainly the new businesses and houses on the SW side of Roland.

And other than some minor administrative stuff, that was pretty much it.

Hydrant Flushing on Monday and Tuesday

City staff will be flushing hydrants on Monday and Tuesday during the day. This could lead to some temporary discoloration of water. The water would be safe to drink, it just tends to stir up sediment in the lines. So if you see water that isn't crystal clear, that is probably the deal. If you even notice, it should only be that way for an hour or so, until everything gets settled back down again.

So for the whitest whites, (I sound like a detergent ad!) do your laundry today, or in the evening on Monday or Tuesday.

KC Royals donate $5000 to new fields at Britson Park

Some people don't like Mondays, but I liked yesterday. Janet at City Hall sent me a note saying there was a $5000 check sitting in my inbox from the Kansas City Royals. That's a good Monday. I filled out a grant request for a program they have to help build new fields in the Midwest. And fortunately they found our grant request worthy to be filled. We will use that money for finishing off the infields.

I wrote the grant request, so that is pretty exciting to me personally. But due to the help of a lot of people, I was able to put together a solid request. The folks on our Britson Park Committee who organize our fund raisers, and volunteer in park construction, really make for a good base (no pun intended) to show that progress is being made, we are raising money, and this isn't some fantasy. Our city staff has been a big help as well, as they deal with stuff like our 5K run checks/registrations and the questions that go with it, and taking on extra responsibilities in the park--digging a hole here, or spreading some dirt there.

It is really fun seeing this come together, and have enjoyed our planning sessions with our volunteers at the Legion. I really would like to have our council meetings at the Legion. They would be more fun with a shared pitcher of beer.

In case you forgot, another grant request from the Minnesota Twins netted us $10,000 for fencing. It is nice to be almost exactly between two MLB clubs. Those two teams have really nice ballparks, and they are helping us have a nice ballyard too. I endorse supporting the Royals and Twins back. Load up the kids and head to their parks this summer. I kinda am partial to the White Sox, but the Royals and Twins are better trips to take in the AL Central.

Slow it down Danica!

As noted in my previous post, we've had some complaints about speeding on Industrial Drive. I know it is Roland's best drag strip. I drive on it. Wide open country, no cross streets (for most of it), and nothing but corn. However, on the north side, it does meet up with Progressive Drive, where Roland's largest employer resides, and other businesses that drive trucks and pull trailers.

We've gotten complaints about speed on that street--for traffic moving both North and South. Council Member Hill brought up putting a stop sign on Industrial to try to slow people down. I'm not in favor of that, but I'm not in favor of accidents either. The council has asked the Sheriff's Dept to patrol that area more. So be warned. You don't want a ticket, and depending on where you live, you probably don't want a stop sign there either. So just slow it down, Danica.

April 3 Council meeting

Been kinda busy lately, especially last weekend, so I didn't get to blogging about Mayor Stuff. So finally getting around to notes about the April 3 meeting. Had everybody there but CM Canny who was a bit under the weather.

Got an update on bids for a new backhoe tractor. I think the current one is 12 years old. Trading in our old one, we are getting a new Case for 39,000. That came in a couple thousand less than what we had budgeted, so that is good. Our current one has served us well. It digs our water and sewer lines, and moves snow out of the downtown area.

We heard a report about some digging work that will be done around the intersection of Poplar and Linn. We need some underground maintenance there, so that intersection will be closed for a few days. It will go best when it is drier, so no word yet on when that will happen.

City staff moved our speed signs, if you haven't noticed. Speaking of speed, we talked about putting a stop sign at Industrial and Progressive. CM Hill was interested in putting a stop sign there to protect truck traffic coming off Industrial. The other 3 Council Members and myself were not prepared to take that step, so we talked about getting the portable radar from the Sheriff's department on that street. I will talk more about this in another post.

The council agreed to talk to our city attorney about starting the process to acquire the property at 220 N Main. (building just north of the old library). The owners have offered to give it to the city. While this is no particular prize to us, it will save us a lot of hassle in trying to obtain it. It needs to be torn down. If we don't acquire it, it may sit there in it's current decrepit state. So we are starting the process.

We heard from RADC rep Jim Taylor about that group's effort to promote our industrial park on a state economic development website.

The city council agreed to join the Story City Greater Chamber Connection as an associate member. I think this is a good idea. Lacking a business type chamber in Roland, this will be an opportunity to get some more publicity of things in Roland in front of the larger Story City audience.

We also went forth in hiring a 2nd engineering firm to give a 2nd opinion on what to do with sewer and storm water issues in Roland. The council decided that with the potential expense, it would be good to get a 2nd opinion. So we are getting that input from Veenstra and Kimm out of West Des Moines. We've never worked with them, but the two Council Members who interviewed with them spoke highly of them during their meeting. So we shall see what they come up with.

We also found out that CM Balmer is continuing to work on coming up with ideas for a new city website, so then we can put out that request to various companies, to see what they might want to do. And finally, the City will be flushing hydrants on Monday and Tuesday the 15th and 16th.

Spring Training 5K Run

What a great day, and great turnout for our Britson Park 5K Spring Training 5K Fun Run/Walk. After weeks of substandard weather, we had a really nice day for the event. And people must have known it. We ended up with 198 entrants for the race. About 140 pre-registrations, and the rest were walkups.

All the runners got free pancakes as well, served by the Roland Kiwanis. We had another 50 some walkups for pancakes only as well. Then we sold a few memorial bricks for the park as well.

So this was a really nice fundraising event for Britson Park. Big thanks goes out to the Roland Kiwanis for supporting this event, and then also big thanks to our Britson Park committee.

We've had 3 races so far, with runners at around 125, 95, and then 198 for this, so that was a huge turnout for us. Most of the increase was in the number of kids running. Us old fuddy duddies complain about kids not getting off the couch and away from their video games. A bunch followed our wishes on Saturday.

The course was a little different this year. The runners reported it was a bit more challenging, as it went down a couple of Roland's "hilly" streets, the biggie was south bound on Main to the water tower, while running into the wind. We also got the runners out to Britson Park for the first time. We had to have one lane traffic on Maple to get them out there, but that went pretty well.

Here are the results

Garage Sale Days in Roland

The Garage Sales Days in Roland have been set, according to a little birdie. Friday, May 31 and Saturday, June 1 are going to be the dates. Sell, sell, sell!