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DeLeon Police Chief Gary Morphew
announced Thursday night, during the regularly scheduled City Council
meeting, Thursday, April 27, his intention to retire, effective
immediately.
The announcement came immediately
following a more than two hour executive session by the council.
“Based on current circumstances and
actions, and requirements and things we’ve been discussing,” Morphew
said, “I wish to go ahead and retire from the police department...my
duties being stopped after this meeting. I would ask that you’d make
my official final last day, the end of the pay period.”
Councilman Howard Gifford made a motion
to “accept Chief Morphew’s retirement” with a second by John Holdridge.
The motion was approved unanimously.
When reached by telephone Monday, Mayor
Jim Adams said the City had “already started advertising for a Police
Chief” in various papers, but that no acting chief had been appointed.
Morphew issued a statement that appears
elsewhere in the paper.
In other business, council members:
• Tabled a request by Chastity Lopez to
manage the city pool for 2006 because there had been an additional
bid, and the bid deadline is May 5.
• Approved a street light placement
between 1164 and 1208 N. McKinney Street, for safety reasons. The
request for the light was placed on the agenda by Ronald Hammon, who
provided the names of several other like-minded McKinney Street
residents.
• Approved a six months variance, for
Mayor Jim Adams, on ordinance # 013-04. “What this pertains to,” Mayor
Adams said, “is that I’ve sold my house. We’re tearing down the house
on the corner of Bell and Reynosa. We’re going to need to live in our
travel trailer. I’ve put six months...but I hope it doesn’t take that
long.” The ordinance in question allows such arrangements for only
three months. Gayle Stroud made a motion to approve the variance, with
a second by Howard Gifford, with the Mayor abstaining.
• Voted to “take no action” on the 2005
Grip filing for Atmos Energy, in reference to customer rates. It was
noted by several Council members that to approve, deny, or take no
action, would produce the same result. “It’s going to be done anyway,”
Mayor Adams said.
• Decided on the color for the metal
buildings and roofs at the Festival Park Grounds.
“The first thing the engineer asked,”
said Jamie Welch, Assistant City Secretary, is, “is there a green, and
is there a red?” because those are your classics, and would look the
nicest. He said that when you see old rec centers they’re beige, and
didn’t think that’s what we wanted. He thought we wanted to use
something that when you come over that hill (from the east) it just
‘pops’ out at you.”
Councilman Gifford inquired about the
cost.
“Is there no difference in the bid price
doing these buildings with colored metal?” Gifford asked.
“Yes, there is,” Welch said. “The bid
price was just steel. When you add colored steel, you’re looking at up
to a maximum of $2,000.00 (for all the steel.)”
After a brief discussion, council members
decided on “rustic red and shell white.”
In the staff report section of the
meeting, Mayor Adams noted that the meters had been ordered for the
new decorative lights downtown, and that they’d soon be hooked up. He
also said that the traffic lights downtown would be flashing for about
10 days, in part, “so that people could get used to seeing something
up there again.”
Council member Gayle Stroud gave a
progress report on the “Welcome to DeLeon” signs, noting that Blanton
Jones was making one sign for them to look at, in case there were any
changes, and that she believed the signs would be black, with white
letters.
Howard Gifford asked what the Council
needed to do in regards to the speed limit sign on N. McKinney Street,
which had been requested by Warren Mitcham at an earlier meeting. He
was informed that the sign had already been installed. |
