June's council meeting marked out first full meeting with our newly elected members. Our work session began with briefings from Joshua F.D. Chief Baker regarding the future of our ambulance service. It has become an expensive redundancy and later in the regular session we voted to sell our ambulance to the City of Keene for $35,000 (roughly what the city had invested in it many years ago). With Care Flight operating under contract in the county with a base of operations just outside out southern border it makes more sense to let them do what they do very well. The possibility exists that when construction of our new fire station is complete Care Flight may actually base it's ambulance in our station. That would be a win-win for the city.
In other fire department news we're on the hunt for a new fire truck at a reasonable cost after having to remove from service our newest truck that has been riddled with issues for several years. Our backup apparatus are fortunately performing well. My hope is that through our upcoming budget process we'll begin carving out a savings program for future big tickets items like this. I'm confident though that God will provide the wisdom and means for us to acquire what we need in the short term.
After a recent incident where a contractor for EOG dumped drill mud inside the city limits the council reviewed the first draft of our new mud farm ordinance. It's relatively simple and should be effective at prohibiting such acts in the future. I offered a minor change to the general definition and we should see it on our July agenda for consideration.
Mayor Hollarn discussed with the council his suggestion for making the council members more accountable for attracting and retaining commission and board members such our economic development boards. I think this is a good idea and agree with his logic that the voters elected us to manage the city so functioning boards that lead up to council decisions should be more closely managed by the council. I believe a big part of our responsibilities as council members is to be out in the community meeting people and working with our residents so should therefore be good resources for recruiting talent to serve withing the city.
In our regular session several board members were reseated to there positions and we welcomed in a few new ones too. Mayor Pro-Tem Walden was elected again to serve in that capacity for his remaining year on the council and I was honored to be appointed to the Joshua Library board, a cooperative effort between the city and the school district. I'm really proud of our library and I'm looking forward to doing what I can to promote it and expand it's use in the community.
My only disappointment in the meeting was losing a fight for a tree. Our new north entry sign is finally going to be erected on a terrific site, but a large cottonwood tree stood in the way. I would have preferred a change to the layout or size of the sign, but I was outvoted and 12 hours later the tree was no more. You can't win them all, but real failure comes from not trying.
A.J.
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