The December 5, 2016, meeting was called to order at 6:00 p.m. with Mayor Glas, Finance Officer Pat Jurrens and all council members present. Notable was the absence of City Attorney evidently ‘once again’ he was not invited to the ‘party’. Given the agenda item number 8, Executive session SDCL -1-25-2-4:

Preparing for contract negotiations or negotiating with employees or employee representatives;

One would think it would be advantageous to have an attorney present when our governing body none of whom to my knowledge have passed the bar and I don’t mean walking past the Alcester Bar or Hillbillies intend to call Executive session for negotiation with employees. H-m-m!

Agenda Item #7  I presented photographs of the classy job on Madam’s brick wall. Please note photos below. Initially Mayor Glas was willing to spend $8K to $10K to ‘parging’ or ‘back plaster’ to make Madam’s brick wall purty! Want to see the result of his ideer of ‘boo-ti-fi-cashun’? Look below! Now The Mayor wants BACK on the HRC WHY, is it because he knows so much about parging? Look below. A couple cans of foam polyurethane and gosh only know what the ‘grey matter’ finger painted on the wall is. FIY polyurethane foam has a drawback, it is not UV stable. Yup that old round thing in the sky that shines down on us and that brick wall will cause the Polyurethane piped in between the bricks to change to an cell block 10 orange color and break down causing it to fall out and litter the alley. Looking at the quasi-parge, it appears a pre-school class had a field trip to the alley behind the bar to practice their finger painting!

Agenda Item #9, B, ii; Sewer rate resolution. It has been determined it has been a spell since the sewer rates were raised. Imagine that discovery, just when the North 40 Industrial Park has broken ground. Amazing. Now folks what this means to those of us paying property taxes and sewer charges. Ol’ North 40 Industrial is going to need water and waste water utilities and wouldn’t you know that waste water needs to be ‘lifted up’ to go downhill to the sewer plant. All those Ward I folks who have paid, and paid again with the hope the infrastructure that serves their homes will be updated apparently have to wait and pay again. Let’s see, a street with no homes on it in Ward III budged in line and now it appears the North 40 Industrial Park is budging in line. Seems to me we are gonna have blue porta-potties a sittin’ along the curb in Ward I, next to those spiffy new garbage cans. I can see it now… some poor soul is a sittin’ in his blue thinkin’ cube when ol’ Loren Fischer comes by to pick up garbage and by mistake Ol’ Loren’s brand new magic garbage arm gloms onto the blue porta-potty by mistake and there goes poor Mr. Jones up in the air while he’s a takin’ care of pre-dawn business. The Alcester City Council read this resolution for the first time and I do mean for the very first time. It appears their information is handed out in packets and are waiting for them to arrive at 5:30 p.m. the night of the meeting they’re are to make decisions. Excellent timing Mayor Glas.

        Agenda Item #9, C, ii; Tim Peet Loan Agreement. Some time ago we had a young police officer named Tim Peet who took training at the police academy in Pierre. and a combination of poaching by Sheriff Limoges and allure of much higher wages Officer Peet left the city’s employ, March 16, 2015. At the time of Officer Peet’s resignation, Mayor Tom Glas, Alcester City Councilmen Lance Johnson and Mark Dykstra had a pre-council hissy fit and openly discussing their ideas of punishment, retribution cum get-even-plan for an Alcester City Employee with me sitting and taking notes of their discussion. So much for discretion in dealing with employee matters. December 5, 2016, in open session and once AGAIN Mayor Glas and Alcester City Councilman Lance Johnson did a re-run of their hissy fit of March 16, 2015, there had been a realistic monetary reimbursement agreement between Officer Peet and the Alcester City Council back in 2015.

Now keep in mind certain members of this council handed out a CDBG loan to Madam to cover her (very liquid asset) liquor inventory which I believe she is still paying on. Mayor Glas and Councilman Mark Dykstra brag Madam is ahead on payments. Really? How much of that original liquor inventory is still on the shelf? Inventory has been served, flushed, gone, and she is still paying on the loan. But golly dang, Mayor Glas boasts she is ahead on her payments. GEE whatever happened to Business Loan 101?

So now apparently there is a problem with the payback plan the city had with Officer Peet. Yup! I know this because Mayor Glas and Councilman Lance Johnson were discussing this in open session and in front of me. They talked of sending the Chief of Police after young Mr. Peet. There was a saying back in the day, LOOSE LIPS SINK SHIPS! Boys, your ship is in danger and ya’ll don’t have a life raft or a paddle. Although I could prolly round up a manufacturing second for ya’ll in the paddle department, it just might be yer ‘deliverance’!

Now on to the second part of the story. The Updating of the Volunteer Roster. Mayor Glas’ name was put on the list, I guess to protect the city for ‘oh, who knows’? So do the liability insurance people know what has been happening in the gym? HAZING? So if an employee is asked to do something by his supervisor or his City Council employer which is dangerous does he risk termination by saying NO? Who gets to pay the liability bill if a Tazing-Hazing goes wrong on Alcester City Property while he appears to be restrained? Is it still considered consensual when it is his employer is making the request and he doesn’t feel he can say no? Maybe you ol’ boys better consult the city attorney before pulling this stunt again. If the academy does it, it is their liability not the city of Alcester.  What do you think Councilman Dykstra?  H-m-m?

Facebook photo 07/28/2014