It has taken one year, three months and five days, but it seems as though the city of Indianola may soon have a new city clerk.
After exiting its executive session on Monday night, the Indianola Board of Aldermen voted unanimously to hire Kaneilia Williams as the city's new municipal clerk.
Mayor Steve Rosenthal introduced Williams as his choice to fill the position that was vacated by the resignation of former clerk Lashanda Moore in December 2019.
During previous meetings, Rosenthal—without mentioning any specific name—had stated that he was in negotiation with a potential new hire and touted that person as a qualified, certified city clerk. According to information on the Mississippi Municipal Clerks and Collectors Association web page, Williams is currently the municipal clerk for Yazoo City.
She was hired at a reported salary of $64,000.
In addition to the decision regarding the hiring of a city clerk, the lawmakers voted yes on a request to hire three non-certified police officers at $12 per hour pending the outcome of their physical and psychological evaluation.
They also voted 4-1 to hire one person at $9.50 per hour in the trash division. Alderman Sam Brock cast the lone no vote.
In other business,
A request by Municipal Court Clerk Teresa Nolden for a pay increase for her and her deputy clerks was moved to executive session after Alderman Darrell Simpson asked if the matter should be discussed openly.
That question prompted Attorney Kim Merchant to question whether he had a specific work performance concern regarding whether or not to give the increase.
It was determined that the members should go into a closed assembly to determine if the matter warranted going into executive session. "They have a right to go into closed session to hear what the issue is before they decide whether to go into executive session," Merchant said.
The closed session reportedly revealed the need for an executive session. At the end of that session, the lawmakers voted 3-2 to raise the clerks' pay by $1 per hour starting immediately and to revisit the matter at budget time to discuss adding an additional dollar.
The vote was taken on a subsidiary motion made by Simpson after Alderman Marvin Elder made the initial motion to raise the clerks’ pay by $2 per hour. Elder and Brock voted no on Simpson’s suggestion.
Nolden said she had queried other municipalities on what their clerks were being paid to provide a comparison on how much of an increase she should request. Parks and Recreation Director Carolyn O'Neal questioned whether or not any other department heads had been provided with the same opportunity.
“Because I don’t remember that,” she said.
Rosenthal said a comparison did occur.
O’Neal then asked if the individual in those cases conducted the surveys or someone else. “I looked at it. You don’t ask the person that’s doing it to look at it,” Rosenthal said. O'Neal then noted that Nolden had done her own. “Well, she may have, but that wasn’t what we presented,” said Rosenthal.
Additionally, the lawmakers approved a request by O'Neal to make application for the 2021 Land and Water Conservation Fund grant after she presented them with a detailed cost estimate of what she plans to do. The endowment requires a 50% match from the city.
Rosenthal said some of the city's financial obligation can be in the form of in-kind work and that City Engineer Ron Cassada has agreed to waive his fees, which will decrease the amount.
O'Neal said she is also asking the public works department to disassemble an old fence at one of the park sites so that a new one can be erected. Rosenthal said that too should serve to reduce the amount of the city's payout. "You could probably look at taking $8,000 to $10,000 off of our share by doing some in-kind work," he said.
Based on complaints by some of the residents of excessive speeding, the aldermen also agreed to begin a study on the necessity for speed humps on the portion of B.B. King Road beginning at Wiggins Road heading east to U.S. 49 South.
In other matters, Brock asked the members to revisit the city's policy on smoking and vaping during work hours, again. He questioned what was being done to enforce the policy.
Rosenthal said that any smoking or vaping is done during the employees' break time while they're not on the time clock, which prompted Brock to ask if it was being done on premise or off of the city's property. "Because on our appearance up here last week, I saw vaping," Brock said.
Rosenthal asserted that he was unaware of that, but invited Brock to come in and talk with him about who he saw breaking the rules. Brock said, "We have done this several times and I do think that we need to go on and make some necessary corrections."
In a discussion about choked up ditches and drains, Alderman Gary Fratesi mentioned several streets with drainage issues and when queried about those, Public Works Director Robert Spurlock said he had started earlier that day making a list of streets with issues and that he would submit a plan by the next meeting.
However, Brock insisted that the flooding problems have been ongoing issues that he has addressed with Spurlock before. He mentioned certain houses on city streets that recently had water settled underneath the homes because of inadequate drainage. "It's time for us to stop beating these dead horses. Public Works know about these problems," Brock said.
He insisted that Public Works should already have a solution to the problem, to which Spurlock re-asserted that he was going to bring them a plan.
Doggedly, Brock stayed on course, insisting that a plan should not take as long as it has. Spurlock retorted, "I am doing what I can do with what I have."
Rosenthal then intervened and mentioned the possibility of acquiring a $250,000 to $400,000 grant and said that if the grant was awarded the funds could be used to make the repairs Brock mentioned instead of using it for other street repair.
He agreed with Brock that one of the streets he mentioned was something that had been repaired before and should be looked at again. "But those other three, that's a board decision. That is not something public works can do, that is something the board is going to have to budget that money," Rosenthal said.
He added that the city has the money, but it has been allotted to overlay the streets.
