Cloverdale council makes some major improvements

Friday, March 15, 2013

CLOVERDALE -- The Cloverdale Town Council got down to business during its monthly meeting Tuesday night, taking care of several utility issues and even getting some good news.

Utility manager Rich Saucerman received the OK from the council to go ahead and make some major, but much needed, purchases. Each year, it is recommended that a portion of the water meters be replaced.

Due to lack of financing last year new meters were never purchased. Tuesday, however, the council agreed to go along with Saucerman's recommendation to replace 10 percent of the meters, 144.

"These meters will have recorders on them," Saucerman said. "At anytime you have a question on a reading we could just go out and download that information."

The town will purchase 12 radio meters per month at a cost of $212.14 per meter or $2,545.68 per month. The meter replacement will have a total cost of $30,548.16.

Saucerman also approached the council to discuss the high service pumps. The town currently has two with one that is currently broken and is unable to pump enough water.

The council was provided with two quotes to rebuild the pump from Bastin and Logan for $2,967.20 and Quality Repair for $4,551. The council chose to go with Bastin and Logan after a recommendation from Saucerman.

Well cleaning is also an issue that will need to be address in the near future. It was suggested that it be done every one to two years. The council was presented with a quote on the cleaning totaling $7,000. The council, however, decided to table the cleaning until Saucerman collects more quotes.

However, Saucerman would like to focus on well No. 2 pump, which is 13 years old.

To repair the pump it could range from $2,000-$2,500. To replace the entire pump it would cost $3,000-$3,500.

The town approved Saucerman to purchase a new well pump, as it is only a $1,000 difference.

The town also decided to address the issue of the flow meters, which are also in desperate need of repair.

"Three out of the five meters need to be fixed. Two of them are beyond repair," Saucerman said.

The repair cost of the meters and an upgrade on the computer system is a total of $4,015. This also includes the installation into the manholes and training on the new system.

"The new upgrade will give us a lot better information," Saucerman said. "We'll need that because they're newer meters."

Clerk-Treasurer Cheryl Galloway gave the council some great news as the town has recently received $33,786. The money comes from outstanding and unpaid checks, which have now been canceled due to exceeding a period of two years.

The money is broken down into separate funds, $4,293.18 in payroll, $5,050.59 in water, $1,633.64 in wastewater and $22,809.39 in the general fund.

"This was a long time coming," Galloway said.

Galloway is also declaring the week of April 1 as spring-cleaning week for the town. Galloway hopes to have the help of several volunteers to clean up around town and around the town hall.

Also, with the nicer weather the hours will be back for the utility office. The office will now be open Monday and Tuesday from 8 a.m.-4:30 p.m., closed Wednesday, Thursday and Friday 8 a.m.-4:30 p.m.

Galloway also presented the council with the official deed for the Branneman property, which something the town has struggled with for several years. The deed has now been filed at the Putnam County Courthouse.

Building Inspector Mark Cassida along with the Interim Town Marshal Charlie Hallam recently took a closer look at the Morrison properties, which has an overflow of items on the lots.

Cassida came before the council to inform them that the 207 N. Main and the 63-64 W. Long St. properties do in fact have several infractions.

"Most of the stuff is on the town's property on those particular two lots (Long Street properties)," Cassida said.

The council chose not to make a decision on the next move during the meeting. It is expected that Cassida will present more information during next month's meeting.

Don Gedert of the Redevelopment Commission came before the council to inform them of some good news regarding the Food and Beverage Tax.

The bill passed in the Indiana House of Representatives with a vote of 65. The State Senate held a hearing also voted in favor of the bill.

"We have two more hurdles to get over," explained Gedert. "We have gained the momentum to get this through. It's moving along."

Gedert said the bill could become law by July. However, Town Attorney Alan Yackey was more cautious, stating that although there are a lot of great things happening, one can never be too sure.

"Some very positive things happened. With every positive there is a silver lining. With every positive there is a potential land mine involved," Yackey said.

On the positive end, the bill was passed. However, the town of Fishers was added to the bill, which could be a double-edged sword. The bill gained more support with that move, but it is no longer the bill that originally passed in the House.

"Sometimes you get a lot of superficial support because someone is about to stab you in the back," Yackey said. "The significance of that is that as soon as this bill passes through the Senate, it will be a different bill than the one that passed through the House. That means it will have to go to conference committee. Conference committee is where things could be sent to die."

Yackey did say that things were looking good. However, the town should not get too ahead of itself, he cautioned.

Ending the meeting, council president Don Sublett issued an executive order stating that there will no longer be overtime allowed for town employees. That is due to a previous council, which took $100,000 out of the general fund to pay for wastewater treatment plant bond.

"The wastewater treatment plant money was very short at that time," Sublett said. "It's got to be paid back. We have projected the overtime charges that we have been spending in 2013. The way it's going, it is project that we are going to have over $50,000 in overtime charges. That's half of what we need."

Effective immediately there will be no more overtime in hopes of making up the money needed for this violation.

"Sometimes they need it," council member Dennis Padgett said. "I think you're going to create some problems there. Snow removal requires overtime. I don't know how we're going to work through all this."

It was apparent that there will be a lot of kinks to work out in the comings weeks, as some of the town's employees do not have a set schedule. The council however moved to approve the executive order.

The Cloverdale Town Council will hold a special meeting with all town employees at 7 p.m. Thursday, March 21.

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  • Regarding the $4,293.18 in outstanding payroll checks - I believe the escheat (unclaimed property) laws in Indiana state that these monies must be turned over to the State of Indiana. Clerk-Treasurer Galloway should check with the State of Indiana regarding this matter.

    -- Posted by Lookout on Fri, Mar 15, 2013, at 12:44 PM
  • Lookout, you are so correct! You would think they would know this.

    -- Posted by grant104 on Fri, Apr 5, 2013, at 8:08 PM
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