GRANTS, NM - The City of Grants held a special city council meeting on May 30 at 6 p.m. During this meeting two individuals were appointed to boards, Ty Detmer Day was proclaimed, budgets were discussed, the Grants Police Department and Grants Fire & Rescue received funding, as well as other discussions.
The meeting began with approval of minutes for the regular city council meetings that were held on March 29 and April 26. Christine E. Garcia and Sally Zamora were appointed to the Senior Advisory Board for two-year terms. During the meeting it was stated that, “We need to work on this ordinance because it’s very old… We just haven’t been able to fill seats.” Anyone in Cibola County can apply to be appointed to the Senior Advisory Board.
Public safety was then discussed, the council stated that public safety has been a discussion for eight or nine months. Mayor Eric Garcia stated, “I think we’re making good headways.” There was also a discussion about code enforcement, and getting updates once a month concerning specific districts and problem areas.
Chief of Police Maxine Monte and Fire Chief Robert Hays both came before the council to give updates on their departments. Monte stated, “Our calls for service are still increasing… we’re working and we’re fighting hard to recruit more officers and continue to patrol and answer calls the best of our ability within the city of Grants.” Hays then went before the board and stated, “ We are cruising as well as we can go.” Overall both departments are running smoothly, Eric Garcia stated, “I’m a very proud mayor.”
Executive Director of Grants MainStreet Project Inc. William Yarborough came before the council to discuss the great blocks grant they received from NWNMCOG (Northwest New Mexico Council of Governments). The grant is a capital outlay grant given from New Mexico’s legislature to the New Mexico Mainstreet who then disperses that funding to its 30 New Mexico Mainstreet communities. Yarborough stated, “It's a $120,000 grant that will be used for planning and designing a three-block area in our downtown area. The area chosen is from fifth street to copper.” Yarborough also spoke about the importance of businesses and jobs in the Mainstreet area, “What Mainstreet is very involved with is job creation, business creation… it’s a real honor to be awarded this.”
The discussion on the Wilson Project update was moved with a motion to table, since the party didn’t show up. The next discussion was regarding the Ty Detmer Day proclamation. The discussion began with an explanation of who Ty Detmer is and his importance to the community. The discussion ended with a reading of a plaque and Saturday June 3, 2023 being proclaimed as Ty Detmer Day.
The next discussions were budget discussions. The seventh adjustment of the budget was approved by the council. The FY24 Interim budget was presented to the council. There are two dates in which the budget is required to be submitted. For the interim budget the due date is June 1 by midnight and for the final budget the due date is July 31. If the city of Grants submits their interim budget it allows them to continue operations, past the ending of the fiscal year which is June 30. One of the priorities included in the interim budget is raises for all city of Grants employees not including the police officers. In the budget all city employees would receive a 7.5% raise by July 1. If approved all city employees would be receiving a total of a 9.5% raise due to the fact that earlier in May city employees received a 2% raise. The city managers gave two options for budgets with option B however, it also includes $513,000 extra for improvements in purchasing vehicles, park improvements, building improvements, additional concrete work, additional machinery, and other projects. The council ended up approving the option B budget.
The next discussion was on the annual approval of the credit card acceptance and processing policy. The policy is required to be submitted with the budget by the DFA. The major change of the policy is that at all city businesses if an individual uses a credit card, they will be required to pay a 3% fee, for the merchant services fees, so the city doesn’t have to pay it. It was stated, “Everything else, all the state recommended policies and procedures are in place as it relates to security of cardholder data, our monitoring of the merchant services providers, and being fiscally responsible regarding the assessment of merchant services fees.” The council approved the new credit card acceptance and processing policy.
The next discussions included approval of emergency expenditure for the repair of a sewer line on Santa Fe Ave., approval of city of Grants memorial for fire, police and veterans, task order in the amount of $25,558.40 excluding NMGRT to Horrocks engineers, approval of city of Grants police department body camera contract in the amount of $113,446.09, and Approval of Grants Fire & Rescue Zoll Monitor/ Defibrillators in the Amount of $55,186.98. All of these were approved by the council.
The special city council adjourned the meeting at 7:36 p.m. If you are interested in attending any other board meetings you can find the schedule for June on the city of Grants website: cityofgrants.net The regular city council meeting will meet at 6 p.m. on June 28, in the city hall council chambers, 600 W. Santa Fe Ave, Grants, New Mexico. Agendas will be available on June 23, at city hall or on the city of Grants website.