Meeting of the Southaven, Mississippi Mayor and Board of Aldermen - January 3, 2023

[0:06:07] welcome everyone I'm now calling this meeting to order Happy New Year to everyone we'll get started with our first meeting of 2023 please stand I will be led in prayer this evening by Alderman Gallagher after that please remain standing for the pledge of allegiance that will be led to alternate large George Payne Heavenly Father Lord we love you and we thank you for the opportunity to be here tonight Lord Lord we thank you for the new season and all that it represents Lord Lord we pray that you would uh be with us Lord and help us to become better leaders and better people Lord that lead others towards you in your name we pray amen I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for our own first on the agenda this evening is the approval of minutes for the December 20 2022 meeting second you have a motion Alderman Hoots second Alderman Payne is there any discussion hearing none roll call yes Alderman Kelly yes yes that motion carries next on the agenda is travel approval for the Mississippi Municipal League midwinter conference and the Washington D.C Congressional briefing trip Mr may I move we approved travel for the mayor and the board to attend the MML convention next week in Jackson and for the allowable members to attend attend the D.C Congressional briefing term as well second we have a motion Alderman pain second Waterman Kelly is there any discussion again just a reminder if everyone with a DC trip if you'll let Christy Faulkner know if you would like to attend that

[0:08:12] trip and we'll try to formalize they've allocated spots for three of our board members to go what was the date Christy that they deadline they needed to know that okay as soon as we can okay so if we can just sometime you know the next couple weeks if if y'all will please do that then we'll go ahead and reach out to The Economic Development Council and let them know how many people from South Haven will be go Mary what are the dates on that again I'm sorry it's May the 3rd through uh uh it's like it always is like a Wednesday through a Friday so it's May 3 through 5. in the hotel the hotel has changed names I think it's the Washington Hilton now but it's the same hotel that the group has always stayed in the Washington it used to be the old Washington Court Hotel which has a great location it's right by the hill of the Capitol so it's so anyway if anyone asks it's if you see a different name it's the same Hotel okay if there is there any other discussion hearing non-roll call please yes yes yes that motion carries next on the agenda's approval of contract for a printer with the RJ young company it's uh the city is currently upgrading the munis and the current check printer uh is not in the clerk's office is not compatible so this is requiring a new maintenance agreement for a new printer uh in the amount of 2 593.35 so just need authorization for Andrew Mullen the city park to sign this contract with RJ Young so move a second motion bottom and Gallagher second of alderman Hoots is there any discussion hearing none all in favor say aye aye any opposed say no I just haven't

[0:10:14] motion carries next on the agenda is the resolution for City Utilities rates yeah it's been discussed in the past uh the Horn Lake Creek Interceptor sewer district is obviously the entity that provides its infrastructure for the sewer treatment for South Haven for the vast majority of South Haven sewer treatment has is increasing its rates it's charging to the city because what's half the city of Memphis where the water or the Wastewater is treated by that is sent from the district is increased their rates to this Memphis increases rates of the district which has had a triple down effect and that rate is being increased to the city of South Haven from the district so it is required by law we must have our rates be sufficient to fund a utility system so the rates uh tonight under this resolution if we're passed by the board will increase for for 289 per unit to 444 per unit on its residential and then um 385 I'm sorry 289 per unit to 296 per unit for residential and in 385 per unit to 444 per unit for commercial um that's will take into the account the increase in rate that's being charged by the district to the city of South Haven which is caused by the increase to the city of Memphis to the district these rate increases don't have anything to do with the current suit between the two entities it's just based on the maintenance that the city of Memphis is having to do in its own facility which just need to be upgraded and that is causing Memphis to incur more costs so pursuant to our contract or pursue it to the district's contract with the city of Memphis those calls were passed along to the district which as noted before increased those rates to the city of South Haven so this resolution will increase those rates as noted before and in the resolution and if you have any questions happy to try to answer those or any Talk Amongst the board you can obviously says with the mayor as well

[0:12:20] so and one thing I was going to this probably this will probably be uh I know not I don't want to say ongoing but this will this will be more frequent than it's been in the past due to the maintenance upgrades that are being required either by the city of Memphis um or if there's another option for the city of South Haven the district long term um based on experimenting factors of the lawsuit as well but this is uh not just be blocked probably not the end of the rates that will be increasing of the next couple of years I'll make that motion second uh we have a motion Alderman Flores I think we've had a most a second first Alderman wheeler is there any discussion and we we have to pass this increase along we this is not something this can absorb right my understanding is the seed does not have the funds to absorb this increase that that that um you you won't have the amount sufficient to keep to keep a reserve that's required and needed for future repairs infrastructure along with keeping your calls that are needed to just operate your system so you need to do this in order to be able to to accomplish what's needed to be done for your sewer infrastructure and water infrastructure yes I'm not sure we would be addressing this if we didn't have to go down matter of fact I know we wouldn't be any other discussion one quick question will see and how Memphis you know there I know there's a lawsuit Memphis is wanting to get us in Horn Lake the Horn Lake Interceptor District off of there water Water and Sewer Supply if they're having to make upgrades it looks like they're needing more money at the moment does this have anything to do with the lawsuit going forward I know I know the rate increase doesn't have anything to do with the lawsuit but the maintenance that they're having to do will um I think I can't I don't know the specifics between the district and the City of Memphis as far as the talks they've had regarding that um I I do

[0:14:23] know the district um has made you know has offered to try to help with future upgrades um through uh extra money um I don't know if that's been um how the city of Memphis and the district have actually handled that issue and negotiations that I don't know but um these I think these repairs are just being done simply based on what's needed now and what's not obviously the long term I think we could probably get into more details and specifics uh with the district maybe in a strategy and executive session type talk but uh I don't know if you can do that this this would be helpful to um as an answer to your question alderman the um the city of Memphis has had the right per a long-term agreement from 1972 to adjust these rates since 2012. and for whatever reason they've not done that that we find that strange don't know why they have it but how that relates to you know the lawsuit even though it's not directly involved with that they've had the ability per contract to adjust the rates but they're being receiving pressure and requirements now by the Tennessee Department of Environmental Quality to make adjustments to address capacity needs for the treatment center so that has been prompted by T by the pressure that's being put on them but as Nick just said when they they've had their ability to adjust these rates and when they do that it it is a trickle-down effect when they adjust the cost that's going to the district the two biggest users of the district are the city of Horn Lake in the city of South Haven with the city of South Haven being the biggest and so that's just passed straight onto the city South Haven so when these costs are adjusted it's going to have a direct impact to the city of South Lake and the unfortunate fact is there's still a lot of unknowns as to what the future costs are going to

[0:16:26] be for the City of Memphis and you know again which will you know trickle down to us so but this is the resp to be financially responsible to adjust our rates for enough to cover that cost it's being passed on to us this is where we need to be at this point and then as Nick said this is a volatile situation so it's not going to be like it has been the past where we don't look at this for and not look at it we don't take make adjustments you know every five or six years or whatever it's been averaged in the past this will be something with all the volatility going on that probably will be before this board every year at this point because it's it's that Dynamic that many moving parts to it does that make sense it makes perfect sense I just want to make sure everybody you know that we're not shocked by you know as as we know the lawsuit is going to be something that um you know in 2023 we should know a lot more um but then the future is going to it is going to be volatile they're going to be some changes coming our way any other discussion questions hearing none roll call yes the motion carries there's no planning agenda this evening we had a busy agenda in the two meetings in December uh the next meeting in January you should see that resume but due to the holidays a lot of things uh slowed down so there's nothing for the planning agenda tonight next on the agenda is the mayor's report I just want to update you about a couple of things the the main thing was the weather since I've seen all of you we had some serious challenges in the city with the weather it was dangerous weather as you all know it's it we had extreme temperatures some very extreme

[0:18:30] situations we used our community safe room we did have um yeah it was less than 10 people but we did have some people that use the safe room you know when the temperatures were so cold so that was very beneficial to some of our people and so we kept that thing open as long as the temperature was below 32 degrees it was open and it served a very good purpose for us during this event unfortunately uh as we knew when temperatures get to that level water pipes are going to freeze and a lot of the old copper pipes when they freeze they swell and then they break and so we were not it was nothing new we had some bad bad luck with that we had a lot of people throughout the city in private residences and businesses that had pipes that were bursting we also had damage to some of our city facilities that I want you to know about we had damage to the Snowden house the Forever Young Cafe room which is towards the west side of the that section of the building we've had some problems with the training range police training range and the The Chiller at City Hall due to freezing bad news looks like uh we have a insurance deductible of ten thousand dollars so it looks like some of these will be under deductible but we do have a pretty significant loss at the Snowden house it is important that that you all know that with some of these weather events uh it's like a lot of crazy things with the weather you some things are hard to predict like the the loss that we had the Forever Young facility the plumbing was in the perfect place it was well insulated the pipes were wrapped you know we we did everything we could do and it just it it's just weather sometimes they do sometimes they don't and so we feel like that we couldn't avoid most of these losses we did have a strange situation at the Snowden house with it being an old building somewhere along the line of the past someone had added some plumbing

[0:20:33] and maybe did some questionable made a questionable decision on where they ran the pipe and that pipe is the one that did freeze um we we've cut the water off and most of these facilities and tried to be as cautious as we could but some of the water was still in the pipes and so we did have significant damage to the Snowden house we got about forty thousand dollars damage to the snow now so anyway I'm going to meet with Dylan tomorrow and we'll look and um and uh and get with Melanie as well Melanie is our liaison with our property Casualty Insurance and so we'll look at that and make a decision if if it's something that we want to you know make an insurance claim you know we've done a good job in in trying to keep our record as clean as we could you know if it's a loss that you know is barely above your deductible it's always smart not to have the claim frequency on your policy for future ability to buy insurance at a competitive price for our taxpayers so we'll make a good decision on that it looks like you know the Snowden house may be one that we do use insurance so I'll report that after we review the details of that I'll report that back to you but anyway that's the bad news that you know that we did have uh have some water damage throughout the city again as always uh we had our utilities Crews obviously firing police and public works you know that we're working overtime they were working their tails off trying to keep the streets good keep people safe respond to calls that were weather related and obviously when you have cold weather like that you have fires because people try to do unusual things to stay warm and so we had that happen as well utilities crews are you know being called out to homes for you know pipes bursting and then also our own infrastructure in certain places so anyway just um I want to say thank you to our team you know for the extra effort during the during the extreme weather event and that's really all that I have tonight like I said coming off

[0:22:36] the holidays you know we have pretty much a short agenda but at the second meeting in January that will be ramped up it will be back to full statement that time next on our agenda is our Personnel docket Mr Mayor move we approved the Personnel docket as presented on this date we have a motion bottoman pain second Waterman Hoots is there any discussion hearing none roll call that motion carries next on our agendas our city attorney's legal update just one quick item that doesn't require any action but just noting it's being entered into the minutes uh that the demolition department has recently been changed to make some clarifications as far as requiring the slab to be removed as well um so day-to-day function but just entering this into the minute so there is a record of it that was changed for the demolition permit but no actions required and just want to make a note thank you okay next on the agenda is our utilities billing leak adjustment docket approve the utility bill leak adjustment we have a motion Alderman pain second Waterman Jerome is there any discussion hearing none roll call them yes yes yes yes that motion carries next on our agenda is one claims docket Mr Mayor move we approved the claims docket and the amount of one million seven hundred and including demand checks second we have a

[0:24:38] motion of alderman Payne second Alderman Flores is there any discussion hearing none roll call yes yes yes that motion carries next on our agenda is the purpose of determining the need for executive session I'll make that motion we have a motion Baltimore Gallagher second of alderman Kelly Oliver say aye aye any opposed say no the need this evening the needs our claims and litigation involving the city economic development in the city and interdepartmental personnel with no action is there a motion to declare executive session so move second we have a motion ottoman Gallagher second bottoman wheeler all in favor say aye aye all opposed say no I just have it motion carries the mayor and board will announce our executive session

Captured 2026-07-26 · source: youtube.com/watch?v=jFX8nJo8-q8