Sheldon, Iowa — The Sheldon City Council met in regular session on Wednesday afternoon.
The consent agenda was approved, but they did remove Police Chief Scott Burtch’s resignation out of the consent agenda to be voted on separately.
The council voted to approve a resolution authorizing advancement of costs for an urban renewal project and certification of expenses incurred by the City for payment. This is in regard to the former Bethel Church site. The resolution passed with council member Brad Hindt voting no.
The council also voted to accept the resignation of Police Chief Scott Burtch. Hindt voted no on that as well. He says he wishes they had been able to work out the issues before it came to this.
Hindt says he thinks the Police Chief needs to report to the mayor and council again like it used to be instead of to the City Manager like it was changed to. He says “there’s a difference between an administrative chief and a working chief.”
Councilman Tom Eggers says the same kind of problems could exist under a mayor and council-type position too, just due to personality differences or management structure.
The council decided to wait two weeks before making any decision as to what steps to take next to find and hire a new chief.
The council set September 4th as the date for a public hearing on an appeal of code enforcement action at an address on 10th Street in regard to a car in the front yard.
In reports, Public Works Director Todd Uhl says crews are finishing up the chip sealing project. He says they’re also getting closer to finishing permanent repairs to the water line under the Floyd River that was damaged in the flood. He says he’s not sure whether this or other projects will end up getting FEMA help.
He says flood damage cleanup and repair continue.
Uhl gives us a new water tower update.
He also announced at the meeting that they hope to take the old tower offline to be painted, which will probably take place in the spring or summer of 2025.
