The Allen City Council met for their regular meeting on Monday, August 5, all members were present: Dianna Brannan, Charlie Henthorn, Rhonda Skelton, Melinda Haney and Joshua Marshall. Also present were Kala Stephens, City Clerk, Calem Woodward, City Manager, Darrell Armstrong, Police Chief, guest Phil Burke, Kelly Bohannon and James and Kara Tiger.

The minutes and the claims were read and approved. Guest Phil Burke expressed that although he was very happy about the new roads, he was not pleased that the excess gravel was swept into his ditch, after a discussion no suitable solution was agreed upon and he stated he would look deeper into the matter.

James Tiger came requesting the sale of water to Magellan so that they could conduct some testing on their tanks. In the past the town was able to supply the company with the water which was normally 75,000 gallon and this time they were needing 2.5 million gallons to perform the test. City Manager Calem Woodard was concerned that our pumps probably couldn’t satisfy their request without a lot of strain on our system. The discussion was held on purchasing bigger pumps to help provide that amount of water to sell. It was agreed that Woodward would study the situation and get back to the company. In the days following the meeting looked and in the months of August the citizens of Allen use about 2.5 million gallons usually in August and that is with the pumps going almost non-stop and constant monitoring from him and water Superintendent Ty Gragert. He met with Mr. Tiger and expressed that we could not provide that amount of water in their allotted time frame but perhaps we could get them around a million gallons. Mr. Tiger was going to get with his company and see what they wanted to do.

Kelly Bohannon talked about the amount of vandalism going on in his neighborhood. He stated that when he called 911 the call went to Hughes County (the county in which he lives) and they never responded and didn’t notify Chief Armstrong. He wanted to form a neighborhood watch to help with the problem. His first meeting will be September 7th at the Allen Park Pavilion to organize a group. The fire department had a fire tax request for Fire Gear from Casco and some hoses and valves for their trucks.

Chief Armstrong’s police report stated it had been a busy month with calls ranging from loose dogs, domestic violence, suspicious people, burglaries, vandalism, assaults and harassment calls. There were also calls on civil matters that turned violent. He wanted to remind people that the town ordinance allows only burning of small piles of leaves and limbs and not furniture and household items. He also wants people to call when they see something instead of relying on Facebook to report the problem.

There have been some problems with the police cars. The wiring is overheating the vehicles and draining the batters. Also, there are some mechanical problems with one of the cars that may not be worth the expense of fixing. However, we have gotten some money from the insurance when the big hailstorm came through that we can use to maybe pick up a good used vehicle. Armstrong listed 6 incidents in July 2 burglaries, 1 wire fraud, stolen vehicle theft, impound and other non-traffic offenses. Plus brought in $500 in tickets for speeding.

Woodward was very pleased with the mile of roads that the county with the help of Bill Spray, Bill Spray Consulting and his company SWH put down for us. With the town buying the oil and gravel County District 1 and Commissioner Gary Starns provided the transport. The work and transportation alone was probably worth $45,000 that they donated to the town. The Allen employees also worked very hard getting the roads ready for the repair work. New park lights were installed at the park with the help of some TSET money we have. They will continue working on ditches and cleaning tin horns as they have time. In the water meeting it was decided to finish purchasing the rest of the electronic water meters. We lack around 110 from our first purchase and we spend some of American Rescue money to purchase the rest. Woodward will also look at purchasing some new well pumps and repair tools with that grant money as well.