By Crystal McGough
PINSON – The Pinson City Council passed a resolution Thursday night, Oct. 7, that has been on the agenda nearly every meeting since Aug. 5, 2021. Resolution 21-23 authorized $36,500 from Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds to grant premium pay to the city’s full-time, permanent part-time and seasonal employees. The funds will be divided among 28 city employees as follows:
- Full-time employees will receive $1,500 each
- Permanent part-time employees will receive $1,000 each
- Seasonal employees will receive $500 each
“I know it says ‘premium’ and I know that’s the technical term we have to use, but the funds are going to come from the federal funds that we’ve been provided,” Councilor Robbie Roberts said. “We withheld any pay increases to the city employees as Covid began, some of which just had their reviews done days before Covid hit. In an effort to be very conservative with our funding, the council at that time elected to forgo any pay increases. … We later learned our revenues were very good, but these employees still were not (given raises) during that time period. So, it works out to be about the amount of money that these folks would have received had they gotten their pay increases the many, many months before. In light of that, I feel very good about … making this back up to these folks.”
Roberts added that the mayor and council will not receive or benefit in any way from the “premium pay” funds.
The council also passed Ordinance 2021-25, providing the city with a taxable general obligation line of credit warrant for an amount up to $500,000. The mayor and council said that the line of credit is in case of emergencies and natural disasters.
“This is, indeed, what we had unanimously said a few weeks ago, let’s go ahead and get that in place in case you ever need it,” Mayor Joe Cochran said. “You never know what catastrophic event may happen. We saw what happened in Fultondale recently – they still have trees they can’t get up. So, you never know.”
In other city business, the council approved the following:
- Motion to approve payment of $6,000 to Jefferson County Sheriff’s Reserves
- Ordinance 2021-26, changing the zoning classification of real estate at 8391 Hwy 75 & 8478 N. Road from Jefferson County A1 to City of Pinson District AG
- Resolution 21-33, declaring a public nuisance related to overgrown grass and weeds at 4135 Powell Ave.
The Pinson City Council will be holding a special-called meeting on Oct. 14, 2021, at 7 p.m., to consider the adoption of city building and technical codes, as well as hold a related public hearing.
The next regular meeting of the council will be Thursday, Oct. 21, 2021, at Pinson City Hall. The meeting will begin at 7 p.m., following a pre-council meeting at 6:15 p.m.
