During its Aug. 20 meeting, the Seward City Council:
• approved a request to display small American flags at the Parade of Flags to recognize victims of the Sept. 11 attacks.
Angela Bell from Concorida University explained how the flags will be set up by volunteers the morning of Sept. 11 and then taken down the same night.
• approved a Special Designated Liquor License for Tall Tree Tastings LLC in Beatrice for an event in Harvest Hall on Nov. 9.
• acknowledged a receipt of Airport Authority resolution requesting levy authority for the 2019-2020 fiscal year.
• awarded bid to IES Commercial for the KV industrial substation construction project. City Engineer Jake Vasa asked the council to table this approval at the last meeting because of contract issues. Vasa explained they will continue with the original contract because talks of changing wording in the contract had not gone anywhere.
City Attorney Kelly Hoffschneider said the contract as written does not typically get modified.
“We were concerned that if we were going to make modifications to that contract, then we’d have to let other bidders do that as well,” he said.
• awarded a bid for culvert improvements to ME Collins Contracting.
Vasa explained this project is on a farm levee south of the Big Blue River. He said the city has worked with the company before.
Council member John Singleton was concerned about putting money into the project if there was not going to be any upkeep in the area.
The council decided to approve the bid and make another agenda item for the next meeting to discuss regular maintenance to the area.
• approved a task order for JEO Consulting Group to prepare a right-of-way dedication plat and declaration of use documents for the Karol Kay Boulevard and Bader to Hillcrest project.
Vasa said the Nebraska Department of Transportation needed declaration of use before considering the right of way. But he said based off what he has heard, bidding could start soon on the project.
• accepted a water study by Olsson. City Administrator Greg Butcher said the last time a study was done was around 2010. Since 2010 the study found the per capita demand has gone down, but the study notes that is normal with newer houses being more efficient and older houses being retrofitted with new equipment.
Butcher also said the study pointed out that water mains should be at least 6 inches in diameter. Butcher said 85% of Seward’s system is currently up to the 6-inch standard and the remaining 15% is smaller.
A big element, Butcher said, was the city’s ability to provided adequate elevated storage.
“That’s if the water treatment plant would go offline, we would be able to pump water back into (the plant). You want to have so much of a level of water within those systems elevated to provide water and also have correct pressure,” he said.
The study listed recommendations for the city to consider. Butcher said the first recommendation was the city should consider demolishing the downtown water tower and replacing it with a larger tank elsewhere.
Other recommendations are adding fire hydrants to fill in gaps between existing ones, budget to have the north tower sand-blasted and re-coated on the exterior. Butcher said that is a long-term project so the city should start looking at that now to keep the quality of the north tower; and to work on updating water mains less than 6 inches in diameter.
The city will receive a budget soon with some of the recommendations implemented over a couple years.
