Lindsay City Council approves nearly $2M in road work at Tuesday’s meeting

Lindsay’s City Council approved nearly 2 million dollars in road work for the upcoming year at Tuesday evening’s meeting.

The project list presented to the Council by the Director of City Services, Mike Camarena, included nine different street projects that the city would benefit from upon completion.

The nine projects on the list included Tulare Street, Hermosa Street,

downtown streets, Orange Avenue, Harvard Avenue, Maple Avenue, another

section of Hermosa Street, Mirage Avenue and Sequoia Avenue. These streets had been selected as priority projects for the city at a previous City Council meeting.

Upon looking at the list, Council Members decided it was best to leave the prioritizing of each project to Camarena as he is the person in direct communications with the companies who will be doing the street labor.

Of the nine projects, six of them are cape seals and the remaining three are total street rehabilitation projects.

Public comment opened and closed with no one coming forward to address the Council. After the closing of public comment, it was time for the routine reports to be given from each individual Council Member.

The first to report was Council Member Velasquez who gave a brief update about his attendance at the Health Fair which occurred on October 20. “We had quite a few people participating,” said Velasquez. “It was a lot of fun.” He also spoke about his participation

in the recent Lindsay City Council candidate forum.

Council Member Watson provided an update on the groundwater board meeting he attended and said it was very informational and that he learned a lot about the expenses that come with water projects.

Council Member Cortes spoke about the El Quinto Sol de America quinceanera.

“It was lots of fun and it was nice to see how the passion and commitment of one person evolved, and all the support of other organizations have helped,” stated Cortes.

Council Member Salinas expressed his gratitude to the city staff for keeping the palm trees around town looking tidy and clean.

“I'd just like to commend our staff on cleaning up the palm trees starting out downtown,” said Salinas. “It's like night and day. As soon as they get done it's like the best thing you have ever seen.”

Mayor Kimball updated the Council on the TCAG meeting she attended last Monday and informed that transit studies had been approved.

“TCAG did approve the transit station studies for both Strathmore and Lindsay and they committed to help our cities find funding,” stated Kimball.

She also said that a Dia De Los Muertos celebration will be taking place at the Lindsay Museum on Sunday from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m.

Ireland Mccall, the Lindsay High School (LHS) student representative, was next to give her update. She informed the Council that this week is Bell Game Week at LHS as the rival game against Strathmore is approaching this weekend. She ran through a list of dress up that the

school is holding to keep students in spirit for the big football game.

Mccall also stated that Army recruiters were on campus this week to

talk to and inform students about entering in to the military.

Wrapping up the routine reports was City Manager, Bill Zigler. Zigler listed some of the upcoming events for the Council, including a harvest-festival at Mcdermont X, the rib cook-off, the seafood boil and the employee luncheon.

Zigler also gave Council the results of the fall clean up event that took place around town.

“We had a total of 218 loads delivered to the collection site, 14 tires collected for an extra charge and we had 63 mattresses collected,” informed Zigler.

Before ending his report, Zigler announced that he had a surprise for the Council and unraveled a banner for the new fire truck stating “Measure O Dollars at Work.” Zigler said the banner shows Lindsay residents that the city is using the money from Measure O in the areas that it wasdesigned for.

At the conclusion of all the reports, the consent calendar was passed with a vote of 5-0.

The Council also considered continuation of the public hearing to enter into two energy services with Climatec. Director of Finance Bret Harmon suggested that the Council postpone entering any agreements for now.

“I'm really concerned about dedicating space for financing to these projects not knowing what's going to happen with major projects down the road,” stated Harmon.

The Council agreed to postpone the agreements and tabled them for a later meeting. Lisa Davis, the wellness, aquatics and recreation supervisor at the Lindsay Wellness Center, presented Council with a plan for advertising around the pool. The reason for the advertising proposal is to help ease some expenses in running such a large pool.

Davis presented two different banner sizes that could be hung inside or outside of the

pool area. Davis stated that there are 92 available spots for advertising inside the pool and a total of 60 spots available outside of the pool.

The Council thought that the idea was great and unanimously agreed to move forward to finalizing the advertising project in the future.

The Lindsay Sports Complex Dedication ad hoc committee gave an update on the ribbon cutting ceremony plans. Ad hoc committee members Cortes and Salinas informed the remaining members of the Council that the ceremony is planned for December 8 from 8 a.m. to 12 p.m.

Cortes added that a free soccer clinic may be available at the ribbon cutting so the soccer fields could get used that day.

Salinas requested that a flag be hung from the new fire truck at the ceremony so locals could see the truck while enjoying the new park.

The next Lindsay City Council meeting is scheduled for November 13 at 6 p.m. inside the City Hall located at 251 E. Honolulu Street.