Centerville Tidbits
Skate Park Replacements
The Centerville City Council has approved spending part of a recent $17,383.12 windfall from the now-defunct District Memorial Hospital Board to replace damaged skate park equipment at Laurie LaMotte Memorial Park.
According to a January 4 City Hall memo, two quarterpipes at the skate park - purchased in 200 - have been removed after becoming a safety hazard due to high usage.
Replacements are expected to cost "a minimum" of $15,000, but there is no money in the city's maintenance fund to cover new equipment, the memo notes.
Meanwhile, when hospital board chair Michael Perreault presented the city with the check December 18 to cover accumulated tax revenue donated by Centerville to the hospital district in the past, he recommended that the money be used for "health-related purposes."
That recommendation, in turn, prompted the city Parks and Recreation Board to unanimously favor spending the money on replacing the skate park equipment. The City Council followed suit by unanimous voice vote at its January 10 meeting.
New Meeting-Minutes Contract
The council also unanimously approved a 2007 contract renewal with the secretarial firm that provides official City Hall meeting minutes.
Under the contract with the Madison Lake-based TimeSaver Off-Site Secretarial, the city will pay the firm a base rate of $119 for each meeting's first hour, and $29.35 for each additional 30 minutes of meeting time.
The city may also choose another payment option under which TimeSaver clerical professionals would be paid $26 per hour for each meeting, subject to a 90-minute minimum, plus $11.60 for each page of official minutes prepared from shorthand or machine notes.
According to a December 4 memo from TimeSaver to Centerville City Clerk Teresa Bender, the new rates represent a 3 percent increase over 2006. The new contract will expire on December 31.
Horse-Drawn Hayrides Coming
Winter lovers will be treated to city-sponsored horse-drawn hayrides at Bunker Stables sometime soon after action by the City Council January 10.
In the past, the city Parks and Recreation Committee has sponsored such rides and a bonfire - typically costing the city around $560 - as part of Centerville's annual Frozen Fête des Lacs festival, but that event no longer exists.
In an effort to keep the tradition alive, however, the committee on January 4 recommended that the hayrides be scheduled for sometime this winter, ideally a Friday night in February, depending on the stables' availability.
The council unanimously followed the Parks and Recreation Committee's recommendation at its January 10 meeting and authorized up to $600 in city funds for the event.
No date had been set as of last week's press deadlines.
City Hall Spam Control
Also unanimously approved by the council was a new contract with a Delaware-based internet security firm aimed at preventing computer viruses, spam and other problems at Centerville City Hall.
Under a January 3 agreement with the city, the company, MessageLabs will be paid a total of $980 for a variety of security services, including $720 for virus and spam control, image and content control, and URL filtering.
The 2007 MessageLabs contract also includes $260 for City Hall website domain set-up and internet provider set-up, according to the agreement.