CHAFFEE SETS BID DATE TO FIX FIRE-RAVAGED CITY HALL

CHAFFEE - The bidding process has started for restoration work to Chaffee City Hall following last November's ambulance fire.

City Council members at their regular meeting Monday set July 8 as the deadline for bids on the work. Bids won't be taken after 5 p.m. that day.

"We need to get moving on it," Ward 1 Councilman Jerry Wolsey said of the repair work during the meeting. City Mayor Ron Moyers agreed.

Moyers said, "We do need to get moving on it because I'm tired of looking through a hole in the ceiling."

The Chaffee City Council chamber is missing ceiling tiles because of the fire.

The council set the deadline after City Attorney David Summers said he had received the prevailing wage for the work from the state. Summers said the city needed to have the information before bidding out the work.

The ambulance caught fire in the former North Scott County Ambulance District garage at City Hall on Nov. 15.

The ambulance and all of its equipment were destroyed in the blaze, as well as medical supplies and equipment in a storage area.

Council members Monday also approved the use of city workers to cut high grass at an abandoned house in the 300 block of Helen Street. Wolsey had asked that the workers be used for the job.

He said at a city council meeting in early May that residents in the area had complained about the house. Monday evening, Wolsey said the residents were still bothered about the situation. The owners of the house can't be found, city representatives say.

Chaffee Police Chief Ivan McLain said a similar house on Elliott would be cleaned up this week. McLain said he had found the house's owner and that the owner had said the site would be cleaned.

In other developments, an elderly woman identified only as Mrs. Keller complained to the council that a hole had been shot in the vase on her husband's grave at the city cemetery.

"I honestly believe it was a pump-up pellet gun because there is a hole in it and some (shots) didn't penetrate." As well, she said someone had knocked a vase off her son's grave.

Keller said the damage had upset her very much.

"If you don't think that upsets you, you (need to have) somebody you love somebody who has gone on to meet the Lord and you walk out there and see this."

Mowers have also scrapped monuments at the cemetery, Keller said.

Moyers said he would have Keller meet with the city's Cemetery Committee.

Following the start of Monday's meeting, City Clerk Diane Eftink read off minutes from a special council meeting last Tuesday.

She said the council had approved an arrangement where Union Electric would pay the city $100 a month to serve as a pay station for UE bills after the utility closes its Chaffee office. Four council members voted for the arrangement, one voted against it, and another abstained, said Eftink.

The office is scheduled to close June 28 as part of a UE plan to establish a centralized call-service center in Cape Girardeau. The bills in Chaffee will be handled by the city's collector and assistant city collector.

Ward 4 Councilman Tom Cunningham said at the council's last regular meeting that the two city employees would receive the money. Any bonding that is needed for the employees would come out of the money.

The council went into executive session Monday at the end of its open session. Cunningham said the session would be held for discussion pertaining to real estate.

Randy Dooley, of Ward 3, did not attend the meeting.