Monday, November 23, 2015

Joplin city manager provides weekly update

(Joplin City Manager Sam Anselm provided the following update to Joplin City Council members Friday.)

Key Meetings 

-On Tuesday, Director Heatherly, Chief Furgerson, and I attended a Networking 101 event on the campus of MSSU sponsored by the Young Professionals Network, which helped students learn and practice the valuable skill of networking. Several representatives from area businesses and organizations were on hand as well, and they had a pretty good turnout for it.

-On Wednesday I attended the monthly Connect2Culture board meeting to get an update on their efforts with Memorial Hall and various arts initiatives. During the meeting, the board discussed the possibility of making a presentation to the City Council at our regular council meeting on December 7th, but once I get confirmation of their attendance I will let you know.

-Afterward, our parks department provided city employees with a lunch to say thank you for everyone’s hard work over the past year. I would like to recognize the efforts of our parks staff for the warm gesture on a cool Fall day, and I’d also like to thank those of you who were able to attend (and Councilman McCreary’s wife for providing some cookies, which I heard were delicious, because they went quickly!). I am very optimistic about the direction we are headed as an organization, as it is spontaneous, little events like this that make Joplin a great place to work.

Miscellaneous

-Attached is the update (the update is below this report at the link) provided by public works, along with a map of the snow routes for the upcoming winter season.

-Last week our parks and public works departments met to discuss options for fixing the sewer line at Memorial Hall. We were notified by the company that provided the temporary restroom trailers for past events that due to cold weather and unheated water lines, we cannot use the restrooms during winter months, especially January or February. So that may be an ideal time for us to make the sewer line repair, but we have every March weekend booked for events, so it will be important to make the repair before that time.

-Our finance department continues to work on the duplication of benefits and FEMA reimbursements. We have collected about 80% of the duplication of benefits proceeds, which I am told is a very good collection rate. And Director Haase is still on track to complete the FEMA reimbursements by the end of the calendar year, but that could be impacted by our regular yearly audit, so I will keep you posted as we get closer to December 31st. We actually have until May of 2016 to complete the reimbursements, but we should be finished well before that time.

 In the Pipeline

-On Monday, staff and I will be meeting with Councilman McCreary and Councilman Glaze to talk about our building permit process, at Councilman McCreary’s request. I’ll recap that meeting in next week’s report.

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