Board of Aldermen meeting recap

by Cole Arndorfer


​The Grain Valley Board of Aldermen met briefly for their second August meeting on Monday, August 28. This short meeting included a proclamation for National Service Dog Month, approval of a liquor license for Valley Moments, a public hearing on the property tax levy, two resolutions, and five ordinances.
 
Mayor Todd and the board of aldermen presented a proclamation to recognize September 2023 as National Service Dog Month. Todd said that the need for service dogs is growing and the city is continuing to work toward becoming an inclusive community, in which all citizens and their service dogs are embraced. Deborah Morrison and her service dog, Mango, accepted the proclamation from Mayor Todd.
 
Under previous business, the board heard the second presentation for a liquor license for Valley Moments. As the business owner, Sadie Gibson, has a state license in hand and the police department has signed off on the application, the board approved the liquor license for the business.
 
The board then moved on to a public hearing for the property tax levy. General fund, debt service fund, parks and recreation, and public health are all the pieces that make up the total tax levy. Going through the current levy, the general fund currently makes up $0.4685, the debt service fund is at $0.8362, parks and recreation comes in at $0.1035, and public health rounds out to $0.0412. This makes the current total tax levy $1.4494. With regards to the increase in assed property valuation seen in the past year, the following changes to the levy have been proposed: general fund would be brought down to $0.3907, the debt service fund would drop to $0.5427, parks and recreation would come out to $0.0863, and public health would be decreased to $0.0344, bringing the proposed total for the tax levy to $1.0541.
 
City Finance Director, Steven Craig explains, “since this is an odd year, Jackson County has been appraising the properties and we saw about a 26.8% increase in the assessed valuation compared to last year. The state law does require that the levies be rolled back to be revenue neutral… and ours did roll back approximately 40 cents as a result of that.”
 
City Administrator Ken Murphy said that these are the numbers that the city has at this time and that they should be receiving a more solid round of numbers by the next board meeting in order for the board to take action on the issue. He also pointed out that the city has to have these numbers sent back in to the county by the end of September, noting that this is later in the process.
The board then discussed possible problems that changing the levy may cause as there are still citizens in the appeals process with the county regarding their property assessments. Craig said that there is a statute in Missouri state law that would allow the board to take action to adjust the levy if, for whatever reason, the assessments were to be held at the 2022 rate. After no members of the public stepped forward to talk on the matter, the public hearing was closed. The issue will come back for the next board meeting.
 
Under resolutions, the board discussed and took action on two resolutions.
 
The first resolution was to establish the need to amend the 2023 budget in order to fund the all-inclusive playground project at Armstrong Park. The board approved this resolution unanimously.
 
The second resolution was related to the first. This resolution entered the city into a contract with Cunningham Recreation to build the all-inclusive playground at Armstrong Park. The new playground would be installed by the end of the year and will take the place of the two existing playgrounds at Armstrong Park. The two existing playground sets have the capability to be moved to some of the other, smaller, parks in the city once they are removed. The board approved this resolution unanimously.
 
Under ordinances, the board heard five bills, four for their second reads and one for its first and second read.
 
The first bill approved the vacating of the platted cul-de-sac on the east and west side of NW Jefferson Court as discussed in the previous meeting. This was approved 6-0.
 
The next bill approved amending chapter 415 of the Code of Ordinances relating to Flood Hazard Prevention in order to adopt a new countywide flood insurance study. This item was also discussed in the previous board meeting. It was approved 6-0.
 
The third bill was approved to allow the city to create an ordinance that outlines the procedure for disclosing potential conflicts of interest and substantial interests for certain officials. This item was discussed previously in the last meeting. It was approved 6-0.
 
The fourth bill was approved to allowed the city to add Chapter 255, Article I, Section 255.010 to the City Code in order to allow bow hunting for deer within city limits. This item was discussed at length in the previous meeting. This was approved 5-1 with Alderman Arnold being the sole “no” vote.
 
The final bill discussed went with the first resolution discussed previously in the meeting. This bill was approved to allow Mr. Murphy to amend the 2023 budget in order to fund the all-inclusive playground project at Armstrong Park. The first read was approved and it was read again, by title only, where it was approved again 6-0.
 
Next on the agenda was city administrator and staff reports.
 
City Administrator Ken Murphy had just one item for his report: he said that the city is making progress on the construction of the new police station and that officials should be on the lookout for upcoming dates to walk the site in September.
 
For his mayor’s report, Mayor Todd spoke on the upcoming fair and parade taking place in the city September 8-9. He stated that the parade start time was moved up to 10 am this year in hopes to draw more attendance for that. He also said that there are well over 120 vendor spots, which is the most the city has ever had and the first time he can remember having to put together a waitlist for the event.
 
The next board of aldermen meeting will be held on September 11 at City Hall, starting at 7 pm.