Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

Emmet mayor, council get down to business, pass budget; also discuss fire department needs

After three months of bickering, Emmet's City Council managed to get some work done, including the adoption of a budget for 2004.

According to the budget, presented by Emmet Mayor Dale Booker, the anticipated revenue for the general fund is $102,185, with only 90 percent allocated, leaving $92,766.50 for the city to operate on.

The estimated revenue for the street department is $28,650, with the city to have $25,803 after deducting 10 percent from the top.

For the water and sewer budget, the amount expected to be received is $119,025, with $107,122 available for use.

By law city and county governments can only allocate 90 percent of their anticipated revenue for actual use. The remaining 10 percent is set aside as a contingency fund for unexpected emergency situations.

There was no discussion on the budget by the council, as councilman Dick Snell pointed out the proposed budget doesn't really mean much, as adjustments will likely have to be made during the year anyway.

He said this after Booker informed the council the 2003 budget had set $4,000 aside for repairs on the water system, but wound up spending about $11,000 because of problems with the city's sewer pumps.

"It's been a disastrous year," Booker said, "with the system. Practically every sewer pump in town had to be worked on."

In addition to the pump problems, the controller went out on the water system and had to be replaced recently. When the controller went out, Booker said, the pumps didn't know when to shut off, and wound up overfilling the water tanks. For a while the pumps were manually operated, but a new controller has been ordered.

Another problem with the water department, he said, is the computer system needs to be upgrades. This is because the computers being used are about 12 years old and the program used to send out past due notices isn't available any longer for these computers. What will have to happen is new computers will have to be bought, along with the new programming.

In the interim, he said, the past due notices are being written by hand, which is labor intensive.

Booker said there is also a problem with the heating and air conditioning system, as it can't be used to heat individual rooms at City Hall and something needs to be done about it so single rooms can be heated or cooled as needed without the rest of the building being affected.

He asked if the council thought it would be worthwhile to insulate the fire station, as there is none in the ceiling. Snell said as the station is seldom used, it wouldn't be cost effective to put in the insulation.

Booker had the gas turned off at the station during the warm months and plans on having it turned on in January to keep the equipment warm and usable for emergencies.

On the topic of the fire department, Booker asked the council to think about what can be done to improve its ISO rating. Currently the Emmet Volunteer Fire Department is a Class 8, but with new equipment, could see this classification possibly drop to a Class 7.

ISO ratings are used by insurance companies to help determine the cost of fire premiums. The lower the rating, the more homeowners can save on their insurance,

New regulations, Booker said, require 1,200 feet of 2 = inch hose for each truck. Emmet has two trucks, which would mean the department would have to have 2,400 feet of water hose. This hose costs about $2 per foot.

He suggested getting a list of equipment the department has and seeing what is needed to help lower the rating.

One of the things Booker wants to see done for the fire department in the future is add a repeater to a radio tower. At this time, he said, the firemen have hand-held radios without pager capability. The problem with the radios is they're only usable for short range communications.

Nevada County's Rural Fire Association (RFA), composed of 13 rural volunteer fire departments, wants the antennas turned toward the south. The RFA, he said, decide to take money received from a state grant an add another repeater to the existing tower. Departments in the RFA have been operating on the Arkansas State Police radio frequency, but the extreme northern and southern parts of the county are too far away for good radio coverage.

CenturyTel is willing to give the City of Prescott a tower, Booker said, and a repeater could be put on it to cover the northern part of the county. This would cost about $25,000, with the rest of the $50,000 grant from the state being split equally among the 13 RFA members.

The Emmet VFD, he said, could wind up with about $12,000, with its share of the state grant, Act 833 money from insurance companies and funds from a grant from Congressman Mike Ross. This money could be used to upgrade the department.

Additionally, he said, a fire department committee is in the process of putting a procedure manual together. The plan requires all equipment to be videotaped with narration explaining what each item is.

Booker said once the video is made it can be sent in for the plan to be written. This would cost $150, but the Emmet VFD would then get $1,500 from the state, and be eligible for other grants as well.

Emmet residents, he said, need to be trained to call 9-1-1 for fire emergencies, instead of calling the Emmet Fire Department. Currently, the EFD has an emergency phone costing the city about $200 a month. However, with most of the firemen working during the day, calls made to their homes with this system are meaningless.

This can be corrected, Booker said, by finding a way to buy pagers for the firemen. The pagers would cost about $300 per man, or about $5,000 total.

The final order of business was to change the meeting date from the third Wednesday of the month to the third Thursday. This is because City Secretary Frank Faulkner hasn't been able to attend Wednesday meetings due to church work. The meetings will start at 7 p.m.