WEBSTER COUNTY, KY (11/21/12) – Clay City Council held their regular monthly meeting Tuesday night in the Clay Council Chambers.

Fire Chief Jeremy Moore presented the council with the First Responders Report. For the month of October Clay Rescue had responded to eight calls, while the Fire Department made two runs. Clay Fire Department also presented fire prevention courses at Webb Memorial Preschool and at Clay Elementary School.

Bob Burrow, the Morganfield Team Leader for Kentucky utilities was on hand to present the City of Clay with an offer for a renewed franchise.

“The current franchise with Kentucky Utilities for the City of Clay expires in May of 2013,” Burrow said. “We would like to offer you a new franchise with KU. It's a three percent, twenty year franchise.”

The expiring franchise paid the city 2.7 percent, so the new franchise would earn the city a little more than they make on the current deal.

City Attorney Ben Leonard read the contract for the council, and it was recorded in the minutes as the first of three readings.

Next on the agenda was the proposed name change for Hearin Street.

“We’ve been trying forever to get a monument for the veterans,” Mayor Rick Householder said when he presented the idea last month. “We have tried unsuccessfully since 1999. We haven’t got any money and haven’t found any money. But we could possibly change a street name.”

This month he said that he had spoken to all of the property owners on Hearin Street, and all of them were fine with the change.

Some of the names being discussed were Veterans Avenue, Veterans Memorial Boulevard and Veterans Boulevard.

Ben Leonard told the council that they just needed to get the owners to sign a form verifying that they were in support of the change.

“We talked about redoing the road at the end of Nall by the Methodist Church,” Householder said. “Then we decided that we were going to do something else and not blacktop until after that. Then we decided that we wouldn’t be able to get to that job for a long time.”

He told the council that there has been a suggestion made to turn the section of Nall leading into the park into a one way. Traffic exiting the park could travel down Taylor Street to Hall Street.

“To do that thing at the end of the road is going to be a major ordeal,” Householder said.

A motion was made and passed to proceed with this idea. The change will not go into effect until January 1, 2013.

The next big issue on the agenda was the city’s health care.

“We go through this at this time every year,” Mayor Rick Householder said. “This year is not good.”

Currently the city pays $8,540 per month for insurance on six city employees. The new proposal from the insurance company is for $10,184 per month, an increase of $1,644 a month. That’s $19,728 more a year.

“That’s a 19.2 percent increase,” said the mayor. Last year the increase was only 2 percent.

The next plan down would only save the city around $200. Any lower plans severely cut the benefits.

“I think we need to continue the way we are, and start shopping now for insurance for 2014,” Householder told the council.

“I think our employees deserve every bit of it,” Councilwoman Patty Dennis added.

The council voted to proceed with the current insurance, picking up the 19.2 percent increase.

After a brief discussion of personnel, the council adjourned.

Matt Hughes
J-E News Editor

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