City ups manager’s spending budget

Divided Choctaw City Council authorizes $25,000 purchases

Last week Choctaw City Council voted 4-3 to increase the city manager’s spending budget.

With the ordinaThe trio of council members agreed things had worked out fine.

However, Linley claimed taking requests before the council slows down potential progress of administrative staff.

“I’m trying to get the justification as to why we need to bump it up from $15,000 to $25,000. So far, I haven’t heard any justification,” said Williams. “It’s a blank check basically.”
Linley assured the council that city staff has strict policies in place, and will continue to document all work orders and transactions.

“Now a miscellaneous credit card charge on the spending report can be up to $25,000. You might have internal controls, but the public doesn’t see that,” said Williams.
Williams, Pendergraft and Morris voted in opposition, but Jeannie Abts, Steve Krieske, Rick Modisette and mayor Randy Ross all voted in favor to approve the ordinance changes.
With the same margin, the accompanying emergency clause failed, not meeting a supermajority required to declare the law change an emergency.

As a result, the full ordinance was published in the legal section of the community’s newspaper and the law change was delayed 30 days instead of going into effect immediately after passage.

“The following may be purchased without giving an opportunity for competitive bidding: Supplies, materials, equipment or contractual services whose cost does not exceed twenty-five thousand dollars ($25,000) in a single transaction; and public improvements whose cost does not exceed fifty thousand dollars ($50,000.00) in a single transaction,” reads the ordinance.

“The City Manager may contract for and purchase or issue purchase authorizations for: All supplies, materials and equipment for the offices, departments and agencies of the city government, and the city manager also may transfer to or between offices, departments and agencies or sell surplus or obsolete supplies, materials and equipment in an amount not to exceed twenty-five thousand dollars ($25,000); and all public construction contracts for the purpose of making any public improvements or constructing any public building or making repairs to the same in any amount not to exceed fifty thousand dollars ($50,000.00) without the prior approval of the city council, subject to any regulations which the council may prescribe.”

 

Follow us @ChoctawTimes on Facebook and Twitter