| Culvert
not as bad as feared but still costly to fix
Jack Duman reported at the August meeting of the Cottonwood City Council Monday, August 14, that the Cottonwood Creek culvert, although bad, isn’t as bad as feared. He said a couple of Idaho Transportation Dept. engineers from their culvert and bridges inspection unit spent 4 hours going through the culvert and then provided the city with a detailed report and recommendations. One of them told Duman, “The sky isn’t falling, but it doesn’t look good.” The report provided by ITD will be a great help in securing grant money. Duman said he has contacted an engineering firm and CEDA will be working on some grant applications. Most of the grant funds available need to be applied for by the end of September. Duman said he would be scheduling a public meeting to inform the public. He also reported there is some sediment building up in the creek behind Gem Builders and is working on getting that taken care. He hopes to have both projects done before winter. A request from Ben Munger about water and sewer hookups to lots in the northeast part of town was discussed. It was felt that a full loop around the lots wasn’t necessary but they wanted to make things so that services could be provided to other lots in the future and provide sufficient sized pipe to be able to do so. A Police policy recommended by the city’s insurer was adopted by the Council. The Council also approved the tentative budget for Fiscal Year 2018, which begins Oct. 1. The budget hearing will be held Monday, August 28, at which time the budget would be formally adopted. Police Chief Terry Cochran said they are resubmitting a grant application for generator switching stations for both Cottonwood and Ferdinand. A request from the U.S. Census Bureau for some mapping assistance was discussed and refused. The request was for about 16 man-hours of work time with no compensation for it. The Council and the Idaho County Sheriff’s Office were provided with drafts of a couple of Memos of Understanding One is regarding ICSO patrols when Cottonwood doesn’t have one of their own officers available and the other would outline just what Jason Rambo is allowed to do outside the city limits. The Council hopes to be able to approve these at the August 28 budget hearing. In reports Pat Holthaus reported the city pumped nearly 8 million gallons of water in July with only 3% loss. Ron Grant said they have been approved for the sewer lagoon tests. Duman reported the sidewalk project is finished as is the chip sealing. He said they will be allowing parking on the sidewalk for the Fair along East Street but for cars only. If it gets abused it will revert back to a no parking area. Duman also wanted to give kudos to Pat Enneking who has been repainting all of the yellow no parking zones on the curbs. Ron Grant reported they were awarded a FEMA grant for new airpacks for the Fire Department. Funding would pay for 20 new airpacks with 2 air bottles each plus 25 facemasks. Cottonwood Fire Department was one of only 2 awarded in the area. He also reported they had 4 fire calls in the past month, all grass fires which were all put out without much trouble. The council meeting adjourned at about 8:30 p.m. Next regular meeting will be Monday, Sept. 12 at 7 p.m. with a special budget hearing meeting set for Monday, August 28 at 7 p.m. |
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