FREEBURG —  At their Aug. 5 meeting, Freeburg trustees considered ways to deal with lost revenue from Hilke’s Ice after the devastating fire in June of this year. One option was to look at ways to reduce expenses for the water department. Mayor Darryl Haller and Water Clerk Cindy Struemph contacted Utilities Services, which has a maintenance contract with the village of Freeburg to service the water towers. After explaining the situation, Utilities Services promised to reduce the cost of the contract they have with Freeburg for the upcoming year.

“They (Utilities Services) are going to help us out with their fees,” Haller said. “I’m just not sure by how much at this time.”

Haller and Struemph will reach out to Utilities Services and present exact numbers at the September meeting. Haller said that even with the reduction in expenses, the village would have to make some tough decisions if Hilke’s Ice is not able to find a suitable property to build a new facility within the Freeburg village limits.

“There are a lot of questions to answer, and there are going to be some tough decisions to make down the road,” Haller said.

In related business, Struemph estimated that firefighters used approximately 400,000 gallons of water from the village to fight the fire. That amount was billed to Hilke’s Ice, as well as an estimate for the water that Hilke’s Ice used during the first 19 days of the billing period.

“A chunk of that number was estimated because we couldn’t get back into the building to read the meter,” Struemph explained.

Hilke’s Ice owner, Laren Hilke, has not paid the entire bill yet because he does not like that the number of gallons was estimated.

“What (Laren) wants is for us to put on the bill that it is not estimated,” Haller explained. “He said his auditor won’t like that wording. It’s hard for me to say anything other than it’s not a guess when it is a guess.”

Struemph will bill Hilke’s Ice with the wording as is and wait for a response.

• Trustees approved Black Roads Group’s $55,159.15 estimate for street work, which includes surface sealing East Oliver Street, Chestnut Street to East Lewis Street, West Harrison Street to North Pine Street, East Harrison Street, Locust Street, West Walker Street, North Pine Street to West Lewis Street, South Chestnut Street, North Olive Street, East Gilbert Street, Dogwood Street, West Gilbert Street, Oak Street, and Ash Street for a total of 34,418 square yards at a cost of $1.20 per square yard.

The estimate also includes applying crack seal from West Harrison Street to North Pine Street, East Harrison Street, Locust Street, West Walker Street, North Pine Street to West Lewis Street, South Chestnut Street, North Olive Street, and East Gilbert Street for a total of 16,303 feet at $.85 per foot.

Trustees questioned Utilities Supervisor Doug Hamacher why more streets were not being repaired since they had approved $200,000 for street repairs in the budget for the 2024-25 fiscal year.

“How come we are not crack-sealing more streets?” Haller asked. “If there is a crack in the street, we should be sealing it. It only takes one bad winter to ruin a street.”

Haller called Black Roads Group during the meeting and confirmed that they would be able to do additional streets at the same rate. They will meet with Hamacher, measure additional streets, and submit a supplemental proposal to be discussed at the September meeting. Street repairs are scheduled to occur from mid-September to mid-October 2024.

• Trustees are concerned with the recent increase in vehicles burning tires on city streets. Haller noted that he has seen people post about it on Facebook, and trustees noted that residents have discussed their concerns about the incidents, including the damage to the streets and safety issues.

Haller said that one resident has clear pictures of the license plate of a vehicle burning off tires on the streets.

“I think people know they shouldn’t be doing it, and they know people are looking for them, so I hope it stops,” Haller said. “If it doesn’t stop and the person is caught, I have no problem prosecuting them and having them fix the streets. It ain’t going to be cheap.”

“I’m glad we are bringing this up because people are getting pretty angry,” Trustee Scott Knoll said.

“Well, it’s become excessive,” Trustee Glenn Haller added.

Haller said that the Missouri Highway Patrol and the Osage County Sheriff’s Office are aware of the problem, and he has spoken to several people connected to the individuals responsible for the incidents.

“I think people know we mean business,” Mayor Haller said. “The warnings are out. Take it out of town.”

• Trustees approved a five-year agreement with Radio Wire for $3,000 a year in rent to the village to have their equipment on the water tower. Haller said he was against raising the rent for Radio Wire because he felt that the cost would just be passed along to the customers in additional fees and rate increases. The terms of the agreement will remain the same as the contract from 2019.

• The lead service line project is on schedule to begin in September or early October, and is expected to take three weeks to complete. Residents may start seeing stakes in their yards this month in preparation for the project.

• The Holy Family School construction project is completed, and trustees are happy with how it turned out.

“Everything looks great,” said Trustee Jamie Kaesik.

• The board approved up to $500 for repairs to the backup lawnmower leaking oil.

“It’s pretty old, but it probably just has a seal out of it,” Haller said.

Brandon Holterman has agreed to look at the mower and make necessary repairs.

• Trustees approved Hamacher’s holiday to extend to Friday, July 5 this year, but in the future, they will not pay that day as a holiday.

“We kinda copy the state’s schedule, but that’s for the normal days,” Mayor Haller said. “If the governor gives additional days off, I don’t know that we want to do that.”

Haller said that in the future, Hamacher is welcome to take additional days off using comp time or vacation time.

Haller also expressed concern that Hamacher had a large amount of vacation days built up.

“The main reason is I get so much comp time when I plow snow in the winter, and naturally, I would use that time up first,” Hamacher explained.

Haller agreed with Hamacher’s reasoning but wanted to stay within the state’s guidelines for vacation carryover days.

Hamacher is still under the amount allowed at this time.

• Trustees plan to withhold $1,925 from Verslues Construction’s bill for the recent project to deal with stormwater on the Reinkemeyer property. The company told Haller it needed additional chat to backfill an area. Haller asked that Hamacher haul the chat for the project to reduce cost, but before Hamacher could do the work, the construction company had already hauled the material and completed the job.

“The problem is we didn’t have a change order,” Haller said.

Kaesik expressed some concern that there wasn’t more follow-up from Verslues Construction about the change to the project.

“I’m sure it’s okay, and we don’t want to piss them off if we need them for help with future projects, but I’d like some clarification,” Haller said.

The mayor will contact Verslues Construction for additional information and will delay paying that portion of the bill until next month.

Hamacher noted that he had completed seeding and strawing the Reinkemeyer lawn, which had been torn up during construction. Since there was no rain, he didn’t have a lot of faith that the grass would do well.

• Trustees approved the following outstanding bills: general ($34,957.77), sewer ($15,872.06), and water ($780.53). They also approved an additional $560 for Struemph to purchase five postage rolls.

• Freeburg had the following ending account balances: sewer checking ($10,092.64), general revenue checking ($21,348.59), sewer money market ($325,721.73), general revenue money market ($490,119.52), water ($21,373.86), water replacement ($657.26), water money market account ($872,242.81), and lead service line ($300,536.91).

• Water loss for the Village of Freeburg for June was only 2%. The village pumped a total of 2,218,796 gallons of water, with 1,716,000 gallons billed and an additional 477,896 gallons accounted for as being used to put out the fire at Hilke’s Ice.

• The next meeting is scheduled for Monday, Sept. 9, at 6:30 p.m.