OROVILLE – Ed Naillon, an Oroville High School teacher, was sworn in as Oroville’s newest city council member at the ruling body’s Aug. 18 meeting.
Naillon, a Career and Technical Education teacher, applied for the position after Jason Blotsky announced his resignation because he and his family were relocating to North Dakota.
After being unanimously approved by the sitting council members Naillon recited his oath of office and was seated on the board. The new council member is a former commissioner on the Oroville Planning Commission.
In other business, Rod Noel, Superintendent of Public Works, informed the council the city had been selected for a Pavement Preservation Grant from the state Transportation Improvement Board (TIB).
The city was approved for 91,980 square feet of pavement preservation and will contract with Basin Asphalt at a cost of 82 cents a square foot.
“The bid was approximately 30 percent higher than our grant,” said Supt. Noel. “We got approval to proceed at the higher cost… the state will make up the difference and we don’t have to pare back our project.”
Councilwoman Neysa Rolley made a motion to accept the grant. There was a second by Councilman Tony Keopke and the motion was approved.
The TIB Pavement Preservation grant may only be used to preserve existing pavement with a one inch overlay and not to pave unpaved city streets, according to Noel. The TIB rated the city’s streets earlier in the year.
The project funds will be used to put overlays on 14th St., from Golden St. to the eastern city limits; 18th Ave., from Deerpath to Juniper St.; Fifth St., from Main to Highway 97; Seventh St., from Main to Fir and Eighth St., from Juniper to Ironwood, said Noel.
Clerk Jones informed the council that there was a renter at the city’s Dorothy Scott International Airport who was delinquent on their hanger lease payments.
“He has not paid any rent for the year 2008. We’ve sent him notices by registered letters to Canada,” said Jones.
Mayor Chuck Spieth said the city should proceed with eviction of the delinquent tenant.
“If there is no response then we need to proceed with eviction, just like anyone else,” said the mayor.
In other airport news, John Zosel made an offer to pay for repairs to the hanger he leases in lieu of three months rent. Among other problems the hanger doors are very hard to open due to structural damage.
Jones said it would be better to decline Zosel’s offer and have the public works crew affect the repairs instead.
“It makes for a much cleaner state audit,” said Jones.
Work has started on construction of the new helipad at the airport.
“That’s quite a project,” said Steven Johnston, the city’s airport services manager.
The helipad project is part of an FFA grant that also is paying for perimeter fencing around the airport.
The council was updated on the status of new Emergency Medical Technicians awaiting their EMT cards. It was reported that the state had a new data system and there were backlogs of 60 days on all licneses.
The new EMTs cannot be added to the payroll until the cards have been issued, according to City Clerk Kathy Jones.
The delay has frustrated both the council and the EMTs who have completed their training, but can’t go on calls until they have their cards.
