County Thanked by City of Crockett

World Champion Fiddlers’ Festival gets HOT

By Will Johnson
Messenger Reporter

HOUSTON COUNTY – During a meeting of the Houston County Commissioners Court, held on Tuesday, July 22, the city of Crockett formally thanked the county for their assistance in repairing Edmiston Drive earlier this month.

Once the meeting was called to order by Precinct Two Commissioner Willie Kitchen, the commissioner turned the floor over to Crockett City Administrator John Angerstein. County Judge Jim Lovell had a prior commitment and was unable to facilitate the meeting.

“I wanted to let you guys know that we really appreciated your willingness to work with the city on getting Edmiston Drive repaired. We are probably about 95 percent through. We got called off on some FEMA roads we are trying to get completed, but we will be on Edmiston. We have a little bit towards the loop (Loop 304) to finish and the driveway going up into the civic center and then just touching everything up,” Angerstein said.

“I just wanted everyone to know we’re not completely finished on it, but we do appreciate you guys working with us on it,” he added.

The city administrator further said the city was hoping to finished with preparations for opening up a citizen’s collection station “… on the tail end of Waste Connections closing theirs during the last few Saturdays. We are trying to give our citizens another option for their waste disposal so it doesn’t up in our creeks. We should be open the first day of August and tentatively, we will be open five days a week.”

As the meeting continued, Paul Stringer, Board Chairman of the World Championship Fiddler’s Festival, addressed the court about possibly receiving funds from the Hotel Occupancy Tax (HOT).

“This will be number 83 coming up. It will be the fourth Saturday in September which will be the 28. We will have it at the Porth Ag Arena,” he said.

Since the current board took over organization of the event, Stringer said of the five or six events he had helped plan, three of those had been rained out. He added the board didn’t want to fight it anymore and said last year they had to make changes the night before and wound up in the Ag Arena.

Stringer requested $4,000 for the event but because of county regulations, the court only agreed to provide $2,000 in HOT funding.

In other matters brought before the court:

The commissioners approved the minutes from previous meetings.
The payment of bills and expenses incurred by the county were approved.
The Houston County Treasurer’s and Compensatory Reports were received as information by the commissioners, well as the ESD #1 audit.
Salaries for new and/or transfer employees were approved.
An agenda item to consider a contract renewal with Blue Cross and Blue Shield was tabled for further consideration.
An agenda item to consider the termination of the contract for the Home Delivered Meals program through Cigna, United Healthcare and HealthSpring Star Plus due to ineligibility under Medicare provider requirements was tabled for further consideration.
Three pickup trucks were designated as surplus by the county and approval was given to contract with Auctioneer Express for their dispersal.

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