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Town Board Meeting

Monday, 7 April 2008 

While not a model of harmony, the April meeting of the Bethel Springs town board was somewhat less rancorous than recent meetings, and it wasn't until near the end that the hostility Alderman Bob Graham had displayed for Mayor Norma Smith at the March meeting broke out again, with repeated utterances of "Foolish" and "You're wrong."  Still, there were no demands that the mayor perform her daily duties while submerged in a vat of chicken fat, or that she stand on one foot throughout the duration of the town board meeting, so it could have been worse.

The meeting began with the unanimous approval, with minor corrections, of the minutes of the March meeting, on a motion by Graham, seconded by Alderman Shirley Williams.

The department reports were then approved, also unanimously, on a motion by Graham, seconded by Gray.  One item in the water report received special attention.  Pointing out that the water loss for the previous month had been 45%, Mayor Smith observed, "One thing we might want to consider in the long term, when we’re getting ready to address the budget for the upcoming year, is maybe making some improvements to the water system that we have.”

Alderman Vernon Hickman asked, "Do we know where we're losing the water?"

No, Mayor Smith replied.  “I think it’s a combination of old water meters, and if we have a leak it’s not usually found immediately.  It takes a while for the water to come to the surface.  And right now we’ve had so much rain we don’t know what water is from the rain.  The water system was put in in 1964.” 

The water and police reports were then unanimously approved, as was the financial report, on motions by Graham, seconded by Alderman Bobby Gray.

The second reading of an ordinance establishing a purchasing policy for the town of Bethel Springs was then unanimously approved, on a motion by Graham, seconded by Hickman.

Turning to the next agenda item, Mayor Smith said "we did get a notice on the first of April from the state comptroller’s office.  It’s an additional notice regarding the three-year audit and the results.  Overall, ‘It is the responsibility of the locally elected officials to manage and safeguard ... and ... comply with [the] statutory requirements....  However, for the past three consecutive years (2004, 2005 and 2006) [our] auditors were only able to perform compilations in order to comply with their own professional standards.  This was due to the extra work the audit firm was required to perform because the city did not have adequate accounting controls and financial records....  Further, qualified opinions were issued on the city’s financial statements for 2003 and 2003.’  According to the state comptroller, ‘Municipal officials should treat this situation very seriously, taking whatever action is necessary to ensure that independent audits are conducted in the future which [will] result in unqualified opinions.  Steps should be taken ... immediately [to] implement procedures and internal controls that would allow for the proper accountability and accounting of all transactions....  The water system has reported a negative change in net assets for two consecutive years.  Should the system incur a negative change in net assets for three consecutive years, it will meet one of the criteria … defining a financially distressed system.'  The state comptroller's 'office is required by state law to refer financially distressed systems to the Water and Wastewater Financing Board.'  The state comptroller's office has directed the mayor and board of aldermen to notify them in writing within ninety days 'as to [the] actions taken to address the issues.'  We've got ninety days.  Any questions or comments on that?" 

"Well," Gray observed, "that's pretty bad, isn't it?"

Mayor Smith then described several things the town had already done to meet the state's concerns, adding, "Unless y'all have some objection, I'll draft something up before the meeting with Melissa [Town Attorney Melissa Stewart-Leitschuh] and present it to the board."  Summing up, she said, "Probably the biggest thing the town has to do, is we have to give the state the assurance that we're taking some form of correction, and then also putting something in place so that it don't happen again."

The board then unanimously approved, on a motion by Graham, seconded by Hickman, a mowing bid by Randy Russell.  "He's submitted an increase for his rates from $45 an hour to $55 an hour," Mayor Smith said.  "It normally takes about twenty-five hours to mow all the streets, and this is the first price increase in two years."

Moving on to the next agenda item, Smith said "Ms Shirley's been doing some work to revise the policies and procedures in the employees' handbook.  And Ms Shirley, I know that you've given us a lot of different things."

Williams reported that a committee of three had met the previous Thursday and had come up with some recommendations.  There then was considerable discussion of procedures, and Graham made a motion to adopt the recommendations, which Hickman seconded, but before the vote was taken the mayor suggested that the recommendations be tabled until the next meeting to give the board members time to study the recommendations of the committee.  Williams then moved to table the matter, Graham seconded her motion, and it passed unanimously.

Moving on, Mayor Smith said "The next item that we have on the agenda is, Ms Williams would like to request that city employees report to the mayor and board of aldermen in person with a written report at Thursday working sessions at least once each quarter or sooner if the employee deems it necessary." Smith asked if this was something that could be added to the employees' handbook, and when Williams agreed that it could the mayor asked for a vote to that effect.  Graham made the motion, which Williams seconded, and it passed unanimously.

The next two agenda items—"Request that the Mayor and Board review contract with the accounting firm," and "Request that the contract with the accounting firm be for one year only"—were both approved unanimously, on a motion by Williams, seconded by Graham.

The next agenda item was "Promotion of a city wide clean up day."  Williams emphasized the need to get the community behind the project.  Mayor Smith pointed out that the town already has "a town beautification committee.  What we could do is, someone could head up the committee and beat the bushes and get the committee to come up with the date and the who and the how, and the board support it." 

"Here's the thing," Smith added. "There's a lot of things in the town that need to be done, in addition to cleaning up.  And the best way to get that done is, the more people you get involved, the more that you can get done."

Williams agreed that more community involvement was needed.  "We started off last year hoping we would have community involvement, and that didn't materialize."  Even so, she continued, "I know that the town needs to have a clean up day.  Because it's in bad shape.  And, so, you drive down the streets and there's garbage on each side of the street and it’s a problem.  I know it's this board's responsibility to initiate that."

Williams enquired about the possibility of using inmates, but Mayor Smith said that the town had tried that before, but that it took most of the town's workforce just to supervise the inmates so it was not practical.   Town Attorney Stewart-Leitschuh observed that an alternative to using inmates would be to use people who had been ordered by the courts to perform community service.

Finally, Williams said, "I move that we use the beautification committee to design and implement a clean up day for the town of, spring clean up day for the town of Bethel Springs."  Hickman seconded the motion, which passed unanimously.

"The next item," Williams continued "is a formal adoption of a monthly list of bills to be prepared by the town recorder and presented at each meeting of the board for review and vote for approval.  I'll put that in the form of a motion."  Hickman seconded the motion, which passed on a three-two vote, with Mayor Smith and Bobby Gray voting no.

The next agenda item engendered more discussion.  Mayor Smith said that "Ms Shirley would like to request that the mayor and the board of aldermen review the various ordinances and provide enforcement of said ordinances.  In accordance—this is for the information to the board—in accordance to the oath that each of us took, we did take the oath to observe the provisions of the charter and the ordinances, and faithfully discharge those duties of the office that we were elected to.  So all board members should review the ordinances, and then the board as a whole, it's our responsibility to ensure that they're enforced, to the best that the town can." She then asked Williams, "Are you wanting to make a motion to make sure everybody reviews them, those ordinances?" 

"Yes," Williams replied, "because I think we have not been, well, I know that they are not being enforced.  You know, last meeting we even had a citizen to come in and remind us that the clean up, that the slum ordinance is not being, you know, enforced.  So, there again, I'm about that just like I was about the clean up day.  You know, we talk about things, but it never gets done, so I thought if it goes into the minutes, that we would talk about it, we would vote something, some kind of solution.  And I'm not saying that we can come up with that solution tonight, but I know it is something that needs to be addressed.  So if it takes a motion to do that, you know, I'll be glad to do that motion."

"I don't think it takes a motion," Smith responded.  "Perhaps it takes a reminder to the board members that we're obligated to be aware of the ordinances, and that the board as a whole we have to enforce them, with the means that the town has."

"Here's the thing," Smith continued.  "There's so many things that the town needs to do, and we have so many limited resources.  We have to prioritize what we do.  Anything we do is going to cost some form of money.  Time is money.  Supplies are money.  Enforcing an ordinance takes money.  So we have to come up with a good, long-range plan to enforce, and provide all the services that the town is supposed to be providing to the taxpayers.  But we can't clean up and do everything all at once.  We have to have some priorities of what we do and when, and we have to make sure that we're fair and impartial in providing all the [unintelligible word] services."

"Maybe," Smith suggested, "we can all agree to at least review the ordinances so that we're aware of what they are, and then that way when we're getting some ideas for the budget we can focus on where we want to spend the money for this particular fiscal year."

"That's why I wanted to get this in," Williams replied, "because I know budget time is coming up, and we need someone who is going to—  Again, we talked about that, about having someone that would be a codes administrator.  And that hasn't never really happened, and it was given to an employee who already had responsibilities, and so—  I just think that we can do better than we're doing."

Williams restated this concern a few moments later.  "I am so aware that none of this stuff can be solved overnight.  But if you don't start addressing it, you know, it's not going to ever be solved.  And you know that for the last sixteen months we have not been able to do some things that I felt like we should, could do.  And it concerns me." 

After some discussion about the need to have money in the budget for the enforcement of any ordinances that the town board passes, Mayor Smith suggested that "maybe a good idea would be, if every board member has something that they would like to focus on, if you could put that on a piece of paper, we're going to have to be putting the numbers together for the budget.  Unless I know what you want to focus on, I don't know where to suggest where to put the money.  If you want it on the streets, you know, there's a limited amount of everything.  But the good thing is, we'll have an increase in sales tax revenues, that we can forecast that.  But you don't want to put all the eggs in one basket." 

The next two agenda items—"Street Repair (potholes)," and "Get Cold Mix, 20 Tons, $65.00 per ton"—were discussed together.  "Ms Shirley and Bob Graham have kind of associated with each other about potholes and that kind of stuff," Mayor Smith began.  "And once again, there are many potholes, and I don't know if anybody has taken the liberty to drive around when it's raining, but that's a good way to find the source of the problem with the potholes, because water is what washes the potholes….  How many outstanding work orders have we got on the street for potholes?"

"We've got plenty," Town Recorder Nancy McClain replied.

"It was in the newsletter," Smith said, "I think it was in November, you know, we did tell the public. 'Help us help you.'  You're going to have to call so that we can do a work order, and we can prioritize the resources as we get them, and we can do that."  As a practical matter, though, Smith said "It doesn't make sense to say we need to fix every road in Bethel, because every road in Bethel needs to have some sort of work on it, because we don't have the resources."

Graham said, "I just think we need to have just the cold mix to have on hand, where we can fix these potholes."

Mayor Smith voiced some concerns about purchasing a large amount of cold mix, including the lack of a secure place to store it and the lack of any money in the budget to pay for it.  "We've already exceeded our street budget by almost a thousand dollars," she pointed out.

Graham angrily swept those objections aside.  "Well, could, some of this could come out of water.  We just need some on hand."

Mayor Smith suggested purchasing one ton at a time, as it was needed, and Graham became increasingly agitated as she again explained that there wasn't money in the budget.

"Let me ask you something," Graham said, angrily.  "Why can't this come out of water, because water causes a lot of it where we're digging up the holes?"

"Well, technically," Smith replied, "we wouldn't be able to use it except for the part that we messed up the water with."

"No, that's wrong.  You're wrong," Graham repeated, dismissively.  "Well, I make a motion we purchase twenty tons of cold mix.  We need to fix these streets." 

"What do you want to take the money out of?" Smith asked.

"You've got general funds," Graham replied.  "Can't you take it out of general funds?  That's what streets comes under."

"I'm not saying we're not going to spend any money on it, Bob," Smith began, but Graham just raised his voice and talked over her. 

"It's foolish to go there and buy a bag of cold mix when we're paying way too much money for that," he said. "That is foolish."

"Yeah," Smith said, in mock agreement, which engendered a loud "Well it is!" from Graham.

In the end, Williams seconded Graham's motion to "purchase 20 tons of cold mix out of the water ... or general funds," and the motion passed unanimously.

The remainder of the meeting proceeded more smoothly.

"The next item on the agenda," Mayor Smith read, "MTAS elected officials academy, wait until the next election, presented to us by Bob Graham."

"I just think that, me and Bobby is up for election," Graham explained, and there's no point in the town paying $150 to send them through the academy if they aren't going to be around after the election.  Gray seconded the motion, which passed unanimously. 

The board also agreed to consider a raise for town employee Rodney Steen in the upcoming budget, and agreed also that the mayor had the authority to hire temporary help for Steen for up to thirty days.

The meeting was finally adjourned on a motion by Hickman, seconded by Williams. 

Monday, 10 March 2008 

The March meeting of the Bethel Springs Town Board began with an invocation by Police Chief "Pee Wee" Sowell and the reading, by Mayor Norma Smith, of a statement on the purpose of public meetings:

 "For the general public," she read, "the meetings are to allow the public to OBSERVE public policy and public business decision making process.  The mayor serves as the Chairman of the Board and presiding officer of the board, in accordance with the town charter.  Public observers and/or board members who conduct themselves in a disorderly fashion may and will be charged with a minimum of disorderly conduct, harassment, and disturbance of a public meeting.  Should disorder become so great that business cannot be transacted, and the chairman cannot enforce order, as a last resort the chairman can declare the assembly adjourned."

 As the mayor concluded, Alderman Bob Graham spoke up abruptly. "Mayor, I think we need to discuss that.  Make a motion to suspend the rules."

 "Well," Mayor Smith observed, "we had the working session, there wasn't any discussion or comment whatsoever—"

 "Well," said Graham, "this is a public meeting—"

 "Yes, it is," Smith agreed.

 "And the people have got the right to say what they want to say, and so we were elected by the town, and they've got a right to speak their piece in an orderly fashion."

 "In an orderly fashion," Smith agreed again.

 "Right," Graham said, becoming more agitated.  "And nobody since I've been here has done a disorderly fashion."

 "We had to have somebody removed just this last month," Mayor Smith pointed out, referring to the ejection of former mayor Kay Cox from the 11 Feburary meeting after Cox had repeatedly interrupted the proceedings.

 "Because you would not answer her question, that was all," Graham said.  "Well, you know, you're the mayor.  You're, and if you would answer her question—"

 "I am the mayor and the chairman of the board," Smith said.  "If you want to be the chairman of the board you can run—"

 "No, I don't," Graham said, before turning to condescension, "but I'd like for you to settle down a little bit.  You know, I don't see what your problem is.  We all try to work together here, [Honest, he actually said that!] but you, you know you come in here like you're the ruler, or the queen, or something."

 "Yeah," Smith said.

 Graham continued with his rant. "You can set there and 'Yeah, yeah,' all you want to.  I'm telling you the truth.  You know, I, I've been to many board meetings, and I never have seen that on top of the board, where a number two item tells, if Pee Wee opens his mouth, or Terry opens his mouth, he's going to be throwed out, if Larry opens his mouth, you going to throw him out too? You know."

 "That just refers to disorderly conduct," Smith observed.

 "Well, that's just what I was talking about," Graham said, even though it wasn't.  "Why, why do you keep bringing this up every meeting?  This is the third time that this has been brought up."

 "Some people just need reminding," Smith said.

 Graham muttered something unintelligible, then the mayor proceeded to detail some corrections to the minutes, which were approved unanimously as amended on a motion by Bobby Gray, seconded by Bob Graham.

 "The next item on the agenda," the mayor continued, "we've got the department reports, the water and police reports.  And then one thing to note.  It's on the water report.  We've always identified the water used by the city, and it's actually on the agenda.  It's mainly, you know, information, the town, you know, in accordance with the law, is supposed to be paying its water bills.  It hasn't been paying its own water bills, so we have to start paying the water bill for that.  And then you have the police reports."

 Gray made a motion to accept water and police reports, which was seconded by Williams and passed unanimously.

* * *

 The next agenda item was "Financial Statements," copies of which had been distributed at the 6 March working session.  Since Vernon Hickman evidently has better things to do with his time than attend the working sessions which are held to provide the aldermen with an opportunity to go over and question documents and reports before the regular town board meeting, Hickman spent several minutes at the Monday meeting questioning various expenditures, and then, as Mayor Smith was calling for a vote on Bobby Gray's motion to accept the financial statements, he interrupted to say "I thought that we were going to have the bills, a copy of the bills—"

 "You can review the bills any time you want to, Vernon," Mayor Smith said.

 "I mean," Hickman replied, setting off a prolonged discussion of the town's bill-paying practices, "I thought that was a motion at the last meeting, that we have them.  I'm not complaining, I'm just—"

 [In fact, Hickman misrepresented what had happened at the February meeting, which the following extract from the full report shows conclusively: "Gray made the motion, which Williams seconded with a request. 'I believe that the board needs to have a list of bills, and I know we talked about this before, but it's continuing on, and if we are going to vote on paying bills I think—  I know you said we could come into the office and look at it, but it wouldn't hurt to have it in front of us.  So, if we could put that to a motion.  So we can have that, in the future we can have that in our packet then we'll know what we're voting on to be passed.'  The motion then passed by a unanimous roll call vote."  The motion which was made and passed was that the board be provided with "a list of bills," and such a list was in fact provided to the board at the 8 March working session—a session which Vernon Hickman did not attend.

 [What is more, the official minutes of the February meeting, which Hickman and Williams had just voted to approve, included the sentence, "Alderman Shirley Williams seconded the motion with a discussion to have a list of the bills being paid to be available at the next meeting."]

 The mayor having complied with her February request to be provided with a list of bills, Shirley Williams then changed her request to support Hickman's claim. "I do request that we have the bills to be paid," she said, before adding, "Maybe next month we can straighten that out."

 "Well," Mayor Smith said, "what you're asking, you want to see the bills to be paid—"

 "Yeah," Williams replied, "because, actually we're voting on these bills, but they've already been paid, so—"

 "Well," Smith clarified, "you're voting to accept this financial report."

 "Right, exactly," Williams replied.  "And then as far as bills to be paid, we're accepting those as well, and they have already been paid.  But we as a board—"

 "We have to pay bills more frequently than once a month," Mayor Smith pointed out.

 "Right," William said.  "I'm aware of that.  That could still be incorporated, you know, if something is paid between the meetings.  I guess I'm just saying that it would be good, that was my request at the last meeting, that because the bills that are to be paid and, because once they're paid [laughs], there's really no need for us to vote on them.  Is that fair enough?"

 "Well," Smith said, "you're not voting to approve these.  These are here, you wanted a list of the bills."

 "Yeah, right," Williams acknowledged.  "And you provided that.  But I'm still asking is it not fair to ask whether or not the bills, the board should have the right to see the bills before they are paid?  And I know you said there is a list in the office that we can come and see."

 "Well, the office is open Monday through Friday," Smith pointed out.  "You can go in and look at the bills at any time."

 "Right," Williams said.  "But if we had them, if we had them in our folders at the business, at the sessions, then we could look at them and see what is coming up.  That was what my request was.  I mean, if it's asking too much, then we need to talk about it, but that was my request."

 "The town is not going to be able to only pay bills once a month," Smith said.

 "Well," Williams persisted, "I think that whatever is paid in between, from the time we vote on the bills to be paid, and if there are bills to be paid after that time, then they would show up on this list."

 "Okay," Smith said, "So you just want—"

 Williams interrupted. "I'm not trying to make this [UNINTELLIGIBLE WORD].  I'm just trying to see where we are.  I think it's only fair that all board members, you know, have [UNINTELLIGIBLE WORDS], and we have voted to accept it, and we're not voting on them but we are voting to accept them, are we not?  Are we voting to accept—"

 "You are voting to accept the financial statement" Smith repeated patiently.

 "Just the financial statement?" Williams asked.

 "Yes," Smith replied, "the financial statement."

 "We're not voting on this at all?" Hickman joined in.  "We're not voting on bills at all?"

 "You asked for this extra last month—" Smith began.

 "Right," Williams interjected, reflexively.

 "—and then you want to go back and—" Smith continued, only to be interrupted by an abrupt "No" from Hickman.

 "Well, actually that was my question," Williams said.  "Last month, Mayor, was that we have a list of bills to be paid.  And to look at them, vote on them….  If something comes up about what's here now, like if you just asking questions about something, it's really to late to do anything about it, because they've already been paid."

 "Right," Hickman said, predictably.

 "And maybe it's our fault," Williams acknowledged, "because we didn't come in the office and look at these before they were paid.  But—"

 Mayor Smith interrupted with a practical question.  "Well, how are you going to manage the bills that get paid in between?  That have to be paid in between?"

 "Well," Williams replied, "don't we have a limit on how much money can be spent without it being approved by the board?  If it's a bill that's in the budget, then it's just fine." 

Smith persisted. "What I'm saying is, bills come in daily, and not each bill that comes in has the same, you have to pay it by this date.  So if we only pay bills once a month, we're going to have extra charges because they're not paid on time.  That's what I'm asking.  How are we going to manage—"

 "Well," Williams said, "maybe that's something that we need to sit down and look and see.  If you say they all are coming in and they have different times of the month to be paid, uh, but if they are in front of us tonight, and you have bills that have to be paid the 15th of this month, we're going to be [UNINTELLIGIBLE WORDS] be paid then.  You know, any bills that's got to be paid from now until the next meeting should be on this.  Is that asking too much?"  [Laughs]

 "No," Smith said.

 "Okay," Williams said.  "All right."

 "What you're wanting, then," Smith attempted to sum up, "you're wanting any bills that are unpaid as of the—"

 "Bills that need paid—" Williams interrupted.

 "—you want a list of those," Smith continued, "so you know what they are?"

 Williams replied, "For example, tonight, we have bills to be paid for the month of March."

 "Okay," Smith agreed.  "As of today."

 "Well," Williams said, "as of today, or our working meeting time, whenever we get our paperwork for the upcoming meeting, then bills to be paid for the month of March.  Whatever date that they're due on doesn't really matter, as long as they are on a list, you know, that we have read, reviewed, and said 'Yes,' as a board we've voted that these should be paid, regardless of the date, it wouldn't really make a lot of difference, I don't think."

 "All right," Smith said, "let's say that we give you all the bills that have to be paid—"

 "Just like this one, for the coming month," Williams said.

 "And where should they be sent?" Smith asked.

 At this point Hickman got back in the game.  "Aren't they all supposed to be paid by the tenth of the month—"

"No," Smith replied.

"—of the following tenth of the month?" Hickman amended, unhelpfully.

 "No, no," Smith replied.  "That's what I'm trying to get at—"

 "Any of them that had to be paid—" Hickman interrupted.

Mayor Smith tried again. "We're going to have some that are not going to be—"

 Hickman interrupted, "—to be paid—"

 "—that are going to be due the month of March," Smith continued, "so if they are wanting to do the month of March, today is only the tenth.  So we're going to get, we might get a bill tomorrow, but it's due in the month of March.  You see what I'm saying?"

"I haven't reviewed the bills," Williams admitted.  "I'm just—"

 "Well, they've always been there, Smith said.  "Nothing is—"

 "Yeah," Williams interrupted, "I know that, I know that.  I'm not saying that anybody is—  You know, that's something else that we need to talk about.  Every time that somebody askes a question doesn't mean that they're trying to change anything or cause trouble, it's just an understanding.  We as a board, there will be some pieces in the work that we do here, we're all going to have to communicate, and we're all going to have to understand exactly what's going on, and maybe I might be a little slower than somebody else, or vice versa, whatever the case is, we're all in this thing together.  The citizens elected us, and we've got to carry it out as best that we can.  But we have to keep the lines of communication open, among all of us, at all times.  And make it as easy on all of us as we possibly can, what we're supposed to do.  That's my only objective," she added sanctimoniously.  "Has been from the very beginning."

 Mayor Smith tried to get the meeting back on track. "I'll entertain a motion to accept the financial statement as it is.  And then, between now and the next work— or the next meeting, y'all can come up with what you want and how you want it, so that we know to give it to you, at the monthly meeting.  But you're going to have to come up with something to do that, and make sure we don't pay the bills late—"

 "Right," Williams said.  "Exactly.  No one's asking for that to happen."

 Smith continued.  "That was one of the first things I had to clean up, was paying bills late, and we were being charged, taxpayers deserve better than that with their money."

 "Yes," Williams predictably agreed, "of course they do."

 And the financial statements were finally accepted by a unanimous vote.

* * * 

Mayor Smith resumed with the agenda. "And for the next item that we have on there, we're getting into the section where we had a meeting to go over all these tabled motions that we had from the last meeting.  That first one on outsourcing the accounting and controller things.  If y'all don't mind, it's kind of late to put it closer to the bottom.  The auditor, Mr. Hewitt, he's going to be here—"

 "I'm here," Michael Hewitt said, from the audience.

 "Oh, he is?  Okay" Mayor Smith said, then she attempted to proceed with that item, only to be interrupted by a procedural question (the irony of which would be made blatantly clear with the next agenda item).

"Do you not need a motion to admit those to the table?" Williams asked.  "I mean, we need a motion to admit those to the table, they all were tabled, they were separately tabled last month."

 "They were tabled," Mayor Smith acknowledged.  "We tabled them until this month."

 "But, still, a motion I think would be in order to admit them," Williams persisted, and was joined by that other expert in parliamentary procedure, Vernon Hickman.

"We need a motion to, uh—" Hickman began.

Williams finished for him, "—take them off of the table."

Graham provided the motion, "I make a motion to take them off of the table."

Hickman seconded the motion, which passed unanimously.

"Anyway," Mayor Smith continued, after that hurtle was cleared, "we got the result of the three year audit, and there were several deficiencies that were identified, and overall, one of the things that could correct and prevent these deficiencies from happening in the future and also give the board more accurate financial statements so that we can make better decisions would be to outsource the accounting and controller services.  Alexander, Thompson and Arnold provided us with a proposal that outlines, they would take care of our bookkeeping pretty much, give us the financial statements that we need, and then their fee for those services would be $1,300 a month.  For professional-type services, taking bids for those type of services are prohibited, and then if I'm not mistaken, I think, yeah, Tennessee Code, I think it's competitive bidding or proposals for professional services are not required.  Well it's based on this mainly their competence and integrity.  So whenever we look at bidding services that fall into the line of professional services, the bidding and the proposal process is a lot different than if it was bidding, say, constructing a bridge.  But anyway, after the last month's meeting, it was suggested that we try to get alternative proposals.  We got a negative reply from one, and we didn't get any response from another.  So, it's not anything that we had to do, but we did.  Overall, the town would probably best be served if we outsourced those particular services."

Gray began, "I make a motion that we—"

Mayor finished for him, when he hesitated: "—accept Alexander, Thompson, and Arnold?"

"Yeah," Gray said. 

"Is there a second?" Mayor Smith asked. 

"I second it," Graham said.  "I've just got one thing I need to ask.  Do we need to do this on like a yearly basis, or—"

"We can do it yearly, or semi-yearly," Smith replied.   "You can do a multi-yearly—" 

"Before we make our budget up," Graham continued, "that's the only thing I was—"

Hewitt joined in: "Yeah, if we were, request at least an annual agreement—" 

"Okay," Graham said. 

"—for us to start doing this," Hewitt continued.  "We're going to invest quite a bit of time in it, and we would be greatly disappointed if you cancelled the contract."  [Laughter.] 

"Mike, we were discussing the bills a while ago," Graham continued.  "When we come to a, and I guess it needs to be like a, maybe a cap on a bill.  As far as, like, we paid $3,750 because Askew Hargraves, even though they are our engineer as far as our sewer project.  So I guess, what I'm looking at, shouldn't that come before the board, or should we set a—" 

"Well," Hewitt replied, "it depends on what your charter says, and I don't think your charter requires this board to approve the bills." 

"No," Graham replied, "it don't." 

"Now, you know," Hewitt continued, "we do work for probably thirty towns besides Bethel Springs.  Some of them do approve the bills.  It slows things down." 

"Right," Graham agreed. 

"You know," Hewitt said, "what we usually suggest is that you all get a policy of what you feel comfortable letting the chief administrative officer handle it—" 

"Right," Graham agreed, again. 

"—and then," Hewitt continued, "then you all approve every, I mean, you know, do you really want to spend your time approving a bill for changing a tire on a police car?" 

"Right," Graham interjected.  "I agree with that."

Hewitt resumed. "Now, if you get a bill for $10,000?  Yeah, that's probably something that the board ought to look at before you pay it.  And just design a policy that makes some sense, so that you, instead of spending your time at the meetings, you know, working through a stack of a hundred bills—" 

"Right," Graham interjected. 

"—that only a handful of them may have any suggestion for the real, for the budget.  You know, spend some time looking at those, as opposed to running a bill everyday thing.  But, theoretically, when you all approve a budget, you're authorizing anything that fits within that budget.  You're actually authorizing it for approval right then, unless your charter, or an ordinance, or a policy that you adopt requires something otherwise.  But the practice is not uncommon.  A lot of smaller towns do that." 

"Okay," Graham said. 

"We've had some larger municipalities do it," Hewitt said.  "I get a little nervous when I see them do it, because they'll approve 300 invoices in about 45 seconds." 

"Right," Graham said yet again. 

Mayor Smith then asked, "So what type of timeline are you looking at to transition—" 

"Well," Hewitt replied, "we're knee-deep in tax work right now, but probably, I would say, by the end of April we'll try to have you caught up.  The one thing that's got to be done, is we've got, you're over seven years ago, got a lot of problems with and that's got to be cleaned up first, and then start on this current year.  And we will, if we're doing this, we'll no longer be able to do your audit.