WEED AND SEED BOARD CONTINUES WITH REORGANIZATION

SIKESTON -- Southeast Missouri Weed and Seed continued the process of reorganizing itself Thursday by adding and subtracting board members and electing new leadership.

The changes are part of the suggestions made after an audit of the board by the executive Weed and Seed office last fall.

Southeast Missouri Weed and Seed is part of a U.S. Justice Department program to weed out crime while planting seeds of change in targeted communities that suffer from crime. The communities are neighborhoods in Cape Girardeau, Caurthersville, Charleston, Poplar Bluff and Sikeston.

Caurthersville Mayor Diane Sayre was chosen to be the new board president, replacing Poplar Bluff Police Chief Bill Adams.

The board's vice-president, Cape Girardeau Police Chief Rick Hetzel, also stepped down in favor of businessman and former Cape Girardeau city council member J.J. Williamson.

This is in tune with guidelines adopted by the board last month to have two representatives from each city's steering committee on the Southeast Missouri regional board.

At least one of the two members from each steering committee must be a resident of the targeted neighborhood in their city, the board's new rules say.

"We can have a greater impact by getting more people on the board who are living in and listening to the community," Williamson said. "This can only enhance the work of the board."

Prior to last month, the board did not have these formal organizational guidelines in place.

Board members also discussed how to replace former administrative assistant Alaina Shroyer, who has taken a position with the Southeast Missouri Drug Task Force.

At the same time that the board was interviewing for a new executive director in October, it was discussing the possibility of contracting a firm to handle administrative details in order to alleviate the executive director's workload, said Ron Scaggs, a board member who works for the U.S. Attorney's office in St. Louis.

A bid had been received by the Bootheel Regional Planning Commission in Poplar Bluff, Scaggs said.

However, Weed and Seed's Washington, D.C., office made it clear this week that a person, not a firm, should be hired to handle administration, Williamson said.

If the Southeast Missouri board failed to hire an individual person for the role of administrative assistant, funding would not be released.

"They said the planning commission would be just another piece of bureaucracy," Williamson said.

But before a new administrative assistant is hired, a job description is needed, said John Wade, a board member and head of the criminal justice department at Southeast Missouri State University.

"Alena did everything for a few months, but she didn't have a job description," Wade said.

New U.S. Attorney Audrey Fleissig, attending her first Weed and Seed meeting, stressed the need to carefully find a qualified candidate.

"We're responsible that a whole boatload of money is spent properly," Fleissig said.

Funding for Southeast Missouri Weed and Seed had been stopped for almost two months last fall when officials in their Washington, D.C., office expressed dissatisfaction with the board's reports and the presence of a federal employee as interim executive director.

Fleissig, who has not yet been officially sworn in as federal attorney for the eastern district of Missouri, told board members that in spite of past problems, they have made some significant achievements.

She credited 84 federal indictments resulting in over 8,000 months of prison sentences as a result of Weed and Seed's work.

"You've got to look at where you've come from," Fleissig said. "It's a pretty impressive program that you're running here."