The Holts Summit Board of Aldermen named Hanna Lechner as the new city clerk and held a first reading on the appointment of Anji Gandhi as the assistant prosecuting attorney Thursday during its monthly meeting.
Lechner had served as the city's court clerk for the past several months, City Administrator Matt Harline said, and was picked from five applicants. When the previous city clerk resigned recently, Lechner had temporarily taken over the position's responsibilities until being officially named to the position Thursday.
The city is expecting to add a clerical technician soon, Harline added, which essentially does the work of a customer service representative.
Harline said Holts Summit has not had an assistant city prosecutor for around a year, but decided to start the process of appointing Gandhi to the position in case the city ever needed someone to fill in for Renee Godbee, the city prosecutor.
"I was talking to Renee, and I think she was able to make every court date this last year but maybe one and then (the court) discontinued for that one," Harline said. "But this give us that option in case she ever, you know, needs to go on vacation, gets ill, has a conflict, any of that stuff."
Harline told the aldermen the assistant city prosecutor should rarely be needed and would likely only cost the city a few hundred dollars per year - the salary is $100 per hour. Ghandi is from the law firm of Bandré Hunt & Snider, the same firm as City Attorney David Bandré.
Harline and Keith Edward, sewer department superintendent, told the aldermen the city has almost obtained all the easements necessary to begin work on a multi-million dollar project to link Holts Summit's entire system and send waste to Jefferson City.
"One (easement) may require us to pursue at least the suggestion that we look at condemnation," Harline said. "It's the last one; it's down outside the city limits but near where the sewer line, force main, would cross U.S. 54."
Harline said once all the easements are in place, the city will be able to pursue putting pipe in the ground for the project.
Mayor Landon Oxley brought up an issue with the city's compensation to himself and the aldermen, noting Holts Summit had accidentally paid them twice their monthly salary. Harline said it was an error that has been fixed, and the city will simply not pay the next two months' salaries to balance it out.
During the meeting, the aldermen held a first and second reading of an ordinance approving the 2018-19 liquor license applications in the city, established the city clerk position's salary as $47,500 after a probationary period, and passed a resolution for a chip and seal program to repair roads in the city for a cost of $73,902.
The aldermen held multiple first readings on new bills including an agreement for the smoke testing of sewer lines; an ordinance updating and re-adopting the procedure to disclose potential conflicts of interest for city officials; a granting of a special use permit for an event benefiting the Justice for Carl DeBrodie Foundation on Aug. 11; an ordinance allowing the mayor to sign an agreement with the Callaway County Commission for the STOP Violence Against Women Act; and an ordinance accepting the ownership of a sewer main in the Serenity Subdivision.