A number of citizens attended Monday night’s meeting of the Cordell City Council, following up on last month’s agenda item discussion on city code enforcement.
Monday’s meeting agenda contained a potential voting item for taking action on a code enforcement policy, but City Manager Vickie Hagerman informed the Council that the current code is out-of-date and doesn’t align with current state statutes, so it needs to be updated and brought back to the council for consideration at a later time.
In a related agenda item, the council was asked to consider a budget amendment to fund code enforcement, either with a salaried employee or money allocated to complete abatements if necessary. Council members voted unanimously to proceed by asking the city’s accountants to recommend where dollars could be reassigned for enforcing code.
During the ‘public remarks’ portion of the meeting, a concerned citizen spoke up about what he considers a lack of transparency within our city government. He questioned why the minutes of council meetings are not readily accessible to the public, either on their website or in the newspaper, and why the city’s website is not actively updated. He also questioned why city employee salaries are not published like county employee salaries. He ended by saying he had emailed the city office three times and had yet to receive a response. His remarks were not commented upon by council or officials because it was not listed on the agenda for discussion.
Hagerman reported that the city is still seeking someone to fill the position of City Attorney following the resignation of Shane Regier at August’s meeting.
Townsend Wildlife Control, the service contracted by the city to mitigate pigeon populations, was approved to continue the work of trapping and removing the birds. Owner Travys Townsend reported that around 6,000 pigeons have been removed thus far.
Next month’s regularly scheduled council meeting will be on November 16th at 6:00 p.m. The public is encouraged to attend. If you wish to be placed on the agenda for a specific concern, you must apply at City Hall. Only agenda items can be discussed, although you may comment on any agenda item during the ‘public remarks’ portion of the meeting, with a three minute time limit.