Poplar Bluff may pay $2 million of loan to utility

POPLAR BLUFF, Mo. -- The city may repay $2 million of a loan owed to the city utility company.

City officials also denied they have approached Ozark Border in an attempt to sell the city electric company.

City manager Heath Kaplan told the Municipal Utility Advisory Board last week he believes the city can repay $2 million of a $4.5 million loan owed to the utility. The money was used for the city cable division, which was sold in 2014 for about $8 million in profit.

The $2 million will be in addition to the purchase of $2.3 million in automatic meters and should settle the debt, Kaplan said.

The city decided in 2014 to purchase automatic meters for the utility. The purchase was not discussed with the advisory board, but the meters had been listed in previous capital improvement plans.

Automatic meters will make the department more efficient, Kaplan said. The utility's 2014 financial statements show it spent about $113,000 for meter reading during the year. That will be eliminated with the $2.3 million purchase, which will be paid out over 10 years.

Resident Joan Wessel of Barron Road asked at last week's city council meeting whether the city was attempting to sell the electric department.

"I think that to have your own municipal utility is a plus, a real plus, and it reflects really highly on our city," she said.

Kaplan said he called the director of Ozark Border, Stan Estes, on speaker phone while city finance director Mark Massingham was in the room.

Kaplan asked Massingham to address the allegations, which appeared in a Speak Out in the Daily American Republic, allegedly from a city employee.

Massingham said Estes was as surprised to see that in the newspaper as the city was.

"There was no discussion there at Ozark Border about selling Municipal Utilities," Massingham said, adding Estes said he had only met Kaplan once before.

City council member Peter Tinsley said the Speak Out was false and he did not know why the newspaper would print it without an explanation.

"I don't see how they can get a complete pass on something that is completely false," he said.