Greenfield Board discusses clear well rehab, comp time and beer permit

Story by Shannon Taylor, Senior Investigative Reporter

The Greenfield Beer Board met prior to the regularly scheduled board meeting and Mayor Cindy McAdams said the beer license application for Cox’s Oil, which was sold to Tri-Star Energy out of Nashville, was to be discussed. City Attorney Beau Pemberton said that he looked at the application and everything was in order, and he recommended approval by the board, which they approved unanimously. At the regularly scheduled board meeting, the motion was approved unanimously 7-0.

During citizens input a resident came forward to ask why the senior citizens couldn’t get a notice of their monthly potluck posted on the city sign on the highway. McAdams said, “I was told yesterday by Jerica to do that, and I do it once a week. I need to know in a week’s advance because I’m the only one who does it.”  The resident said that the issue had been discussed many times over the last four years. McAdams told him that all he had to do was call her. He said, “I’ll hold you to it.”

McAdams said that sales tax was $39,545.32, which was up by a little over $4,000 from last month. The state sales tax was $23,394.13, which was up by over $3,000 from the previous month. “That’s awesome! We’re moving ahead.”

Chief Dudley from the Fire Department said that they’d like to create a checking account for fire prevention funds with City Recorder Jerica Spikes in charge of it. This was unanimously approved by the board.

Director of water and sewer, Robert Rodriguez, said that a resolution needed to be passed for the bid on the clear well to drain it and bypass it so they can get an inspection on it. The clear well has to be inspected every five years and issues were noticed at the last inspection and it has to be physically drained so that they can look inside to see if it needs more rehab. The board unanimously approved the resolution.

Police Chief Danny Smith said that back in January they applied for the violent crime intervention fund grant and received a tentative agreement that they were going further on it. Smith said they also received the Tennessee Highway Safety Office grant for $5,000. “Normally we know about that in December. They were late letting us know this time, so I’m just letting the board know.” Smith said they are also two officers short and have been interviewing the past couple of weeks and he thinks they have a couple of candidates to move forward with and have started the background checks on those applicants and should know something within the next couple of weeks.

Pemberton spoke on the comp time resolution. “I received a call from Ms. Spikes and met with her regarding her use of comp time and she has asked that I prepare a resolution with the board to consider amending the comp time policy. Apparently there has been some issue with city employees using their accumulated comp time within 90 days in which they accumulated. Ms. Spikes has recommended that we amend that out to 180 days to allow them more flexibility, particularly given the small staff size.”

The resolution deals with both non-exempt employees, hourly employees and non-exempt public safety employees. “This would uniformly address the concerns to allow them to have up to six months to flex off and use the comp time.”

Alderwoman Kelly Keylon asked why anything over 40 hours couldn’t just be paid out to make it easier to keep up with. Pemberton said that anything was feasible. Alderman James Pope asked Spikes if it was a problem keeping up with the comp time and she said that they all have a pretty good system for keeping up with it. A motion was made to move forward with the resolution as Pemberton stated it for 180 days. The motion was passed 6-0 with 1 abstaining.

McAdams said that the budget meeting would be held Thursday, March 16 at 4:15 p.m. at the city hall.

The community wide Easter egg hunt will be held on Friday, April 7 from 10-1. The rain date is set for Saturday, April 8 from 10-1.

Yard of the month will start in May and end in October.

The next board meeting will be held Tuesday, April 11 at 5:30 pm.