City Council Briefs

Olney Volunteer Fire Department

The Olney Volunteer Fire Department received an emergency grant through the Texas A&M Forestry Service, Fire Chief Clint Pulliam told the City Council at its Sept. 10 meeting. “We submitted somewhere between $8,000 to $8,500 in expenses that we do not have to pay for all those tires we used in that period [over the summer,” he said. “That will save the City a decent amount of money” on tires and radiators and other repairs to the equipment after a busy fire season, he said.

In August, the OVFD responded to 22 grass fires, three auto accidents, five false alarms, an oil spill and five transformers that caught on fire, he said. “Our call volume is way up” because of the hot and dry weather, he said, estimating that 15,000 acres near Olney have burned this year.

“We appreciate you guys,” Olney Mayor Rue Rogers told him. “Hopefully a little rain will go a long way. Especially for these grass fires.”

Police department

Crime has slowed down in August, most likely because temperatures were well into triple digits for much of the month, Olney Police Chief Dan Birbeck told the Council. The OPD had 129 calls for service, made 11 arrests, issued 87 warnings and 36 citations, and two detection deployments for K9 Bond. Police Cpl. Miranda Wright made “quite a few narcotics arrests” with and without Bond’s help, Chief Birbeck said. “She had a really good month,” he said. “Arrests were made in both [detection deployments] and a cache [of drugs] was seized.”

The OPD also handed out 10 code enforcement citations, left 14 door hangers for substandard structures, five grass violations, and one for accumulated debris, he said. Code enforcement officer Joe Logan tagged six cars, issued 12 building permits, received 36 calls for service, did 10 residential inspections, two commercial inspections, and 26 residential code enforcement inspections. He mailed 15 letters and posted three unlawful occupancy notices for three residents who connected back to the city’s water supply without notice.

Olney Animal Control was deployed on 18 calls and EMS had 88 calls for service, he said.

Public Works

Olney Public Works director Michael Jacoba said the City will show a large discrepancy in August between the amount of water pumped and the amount residents were billed for because of the fire department’s use of water to put out a large number of grass fires, including the 9,000-acre Campbell fire.

“We had 22 grass fires so it’s a little off but everything else is looking great,” he told the City Council on Sept. 11. The public works department repaired seven breaks to the six-inch water mains in August. “They just split right on top with the ground shifting,” he said.

Water treatment plant

The City is near the end of the bidding period for the new water treatment plant, City Administrator Arpegea Pagsuberon told the Council. The sealed bid will be opened at 2 p.m. on Oct. 17 at City Hall, she said. The City’s engineers, Corlett Probst & Boyd will present their recommendations at a City Council meeting on Oct. 23.

The City Council has proclaimed Oct. 5 as Teachers’ Day, and urges citizens to display a light blue ribbon outside their homes during that week as a symbol of support for our educators, Mayor Rue Rogers said. The proclamation also encourages people to personally express their appreciation for teachers on Oct. 5. “The city of Olney’s future growth depends on the quality of schools … and our teachers did great during the COVID-19 pandemic,” Mayor Rogers said. “We do appreciate our teachers and administrators and school board members and everything that the school district does and the school that we have.”