Crockett City Council Moves Forward on CDB Grants

By Will Johnson

Messenger Reporter

CROCKETT – The Crockett City Council took steps towards improving the city’s infrastructure during a meeting held on Monday, Dec. 4.

Following the fire and police department reports, City Administrator John Angerstein said Crockett had been awarded a grant through the Texas Community Development Block Grant (TXCDBG) program.

“We received notice of the award, so this is soon to go out for completion of engineering bids for repairing manholes and some sewer lines in Crockett. These next three (agenda items) are basically documentation we need to have on hand if we are to receive this grant,” he said.

Angerstein explained the first agenda item pertaining to the grant “… basically allows the mayor (Joni Clonts) and myself to sign the documents so we can receive the grant.”

A motion was made, seconded and approved to authorize Clonts and Angerstein as signatories for contractual documents and documents for requesting funds pertaining to the TXCDBG program. The grant is a “no-match” grant for approximately $275,000.

The next agenda item concerned the approval of a resolution by the city to adopt the required CDBG civil rights policies.

GrantWorks Senior Project Manager Kelle Stubblefield – who was on hand for the meeting – explained the resolution.

“This is just a requirement as a recipient of the TXCDBG fund from the federal government that you have to file on civil rights. They are listed on this resolution and it states you are going to follow Section 109 of the Age Discrimination Act of 1975, you will have citizen participation and civil rights protections in place and you will follow Section Three of the Housing and Urban Development Act,” she said.

According to the Act, “Section 3 requires that to the greatest extent feasible opportunities for training and employment be given lower income residents of the project area and contracts for work in connection with the project to be awarded to business concerns which are located in, or owned in substantial part by persons residing in the area of the project.”    

Following the grant discussion, the state school property sale to Crockett ISD was discussed.

“We met with them last week and thought we would have all the documents to review and have both of our boards review,” Angerstein said. “What it looks like is they are having another meeting on Dec. 18. The hold-up was the lack of a deed for the bus barn. There was no deed on record so, they are having to do a title search. There are no issues because at one point it was recorded in their name. Right now, it’s just locating the documents.”

As he continued, the city administrator said the costs of the former state school facility were not budgeted and he would like to have the council’s approval “… to cover the expenses and until when.”

Following several minutes of discussion, the council authorized Angerstein to continue paying the expenses until Dec. 18. 

In other matters brought before the council:

• Crockett Police Lt. Clayton Smith reported the police department received 388 calls for service during the month of November which resulted in 54 arrests. There were 86 traffic citations issued and 85 police reports filed.

• Crockett Fire Chief Jason Frizzell reported the fire department responded to 32 calls during the month of November with three structure fires. Twenty-one calls were in the city limits while 11 were in the county. One structure fire was inside the city limits while the other two were outside the city limits. The fire chief also appealed to the council to help in finding more volunteers for the fire department.   

• The minutes of previous meetings were approved.

• The month of April was designated as Fair Housing Month.

• A specific use permit was granted to Rosemary Lane for the intended use of placing a mobile home at 1021 S. Fifth St.

Will Johnson may be contacted via e-mail at [email protected].

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