Slayton City Council held their regular meeting on July 1, 2024 with all council members present. The agenda was approved with 2 additions. The minutes were approved as written and the claims were reviewed and approved.
Many extremely generous donations have been given to date toward the playground project. These were “read for the record”: Murray County Health Alliance - $2000, Hadley Lions Club - $1,000, Slayton Fire Relief Alliance - $2,000, Slayton Area Chamber of Commerce - $1,000, Pork Producers of Murray County - $250, Shred-it event - $155, Kiwanis - $1,252.35, Murray County Medical Center Foundation - $2,000, Women of Today $1,000. More donations are expected to come in.
July 10, 2024 there is a legislative recap meeting being held in Worthington. City Administrator and Councilwoman Kate Harmsen will attend.
The first item of business was to report that there has been no response yet from Xcel Energy. They have 30 days to replay back which will be on July 12.
In regard to flooding, City Administrator Josh Malchow reported that the city did bypass pumping from late Friday night/early Saturday morning until Monday or Tuesday. “We are not pumping anymore. We fared pretty well. Depending on what part of town you are in, we got 10-12 inches of rain in 2-3 days.” The Federal Declaration window starts on June 16 with the end date left open. Murray County is included in it. There will be some FEMA State “stuff”. Public Works Director Weston Mahon is on top of it. He called the Duty Officer immediately and kept good records of what we were doing.
Kate Jacobson, CPA reviewed the City of Slayton Annual Financial Report for the year end Dec. 31, 2023, noting where and explaining why the city was either over or under the budget in each area. There was discussion about changing the amount for capitalizing items. Presently, some insignificant supplies are falling into this category. This will be addressed going forward.
The discussion also included the two street improvements, 28th St. and 34th St. These are being capitalized, so some of that money will be coming back. When finished, they will be depreciated out. The 34th St. project already has a separate account for this. The 28th St. project will be set up in a separate account also. Bottom line for the General Fund was a positive variance for the year of $237,158.00.
The most unpleasant part of the review came with the Water Fund. What is being brought in, is not enough to cover new assets and improvements. There has been a loss for the last three years. Some of the reasons this year were, that supplies increased in price due to inflation, as well as needing to do waste water testing and a treatment study. When net changes in the negative occur year after year, the writing is pretty much on the wall. The council will need to be discussing increases to the water bills. Presently, Slayton City water bills are lower than area cities. Except for the recent $1 added to the sewer bill, it has been 20 years since they have been reviewed and adjusted. Knowing there is an infrastructure project coming up, it is wise for the council to be thinking ahead.
Following the Financial report, the council moved and approved to transfer $37,550 from the General Fund to the Capital Outlay Fund. They next approved a motion to increase the capitalization policy to $2,500, beginning with the fiscal year 2024. This has become necessary as things without a long life-expectancy become more and more expensive. Next, they approved a motion to accept the Annual Financial Report as presented.
Moving on, the council approved a motion to pay Duininck, Inc. for the Bituminous Surfacing Improvements in the amount of $496,767.50, retaining $26,145.66 (5%) until the remaining work list is completed. Lastly, they had a request from James and Sandy Gertsema to sell a piece of their property to James and Carla Goedtke. This was also approved. Meeting adjourned.
