By Terry Schrimscher
IRONDALE — The Irondale City Council met for the first regular meeting of the month on Tuesday, April 2. All members were present as the Council and Mayor moved through the brief agenda.
The largest item on the regular agenda was Resolution 2024-R-45, accepting a bid for the construction of a new library in the city at 1032 Grants Mill Road. The Stewart/Perry Company submitted the construction bid in the amount of $8,544,000.
“I’m looking at our capital expenditures from January through March and I’m seeing that we’ve spent close to 10 million,” said District 3 council member Cindy Cuellar. “I’m seeing that we have about $15.7 million in reserve. We don’t have the funding, according to the calculations that I have. So, how can we approve this expenditure when we don’t have a budget?”
Cuellar suggested the Council should delay a vote until a budget for the fiscal year could be approved. The Council previously extended the 2023 budget forward until a new budget could be approved.
Mayor James D. Stewart Jr. offered the explanation that the city has not spent $10 million as claimed and asked Cuellar if she was discussing money already budgeted or money actually spent to date.
“We talked about using a public building authority to be able to borrow the money,” Stewart said. “The public building authority would then lease the property back to the city and then the city would add that to their regular expenses to be able to pay for it,” he added.
In the regular agenda session, Cuellar motioned to postpone a vote on the resolution but the motion failed. The Council approved the resolution accepting the bid in a 4-1 vote with Cuellar submitting the sole dissenting vote.
The Council also approved $68,945.04 to Southern Pipe and Supply Company for water infrastructure at the new library site. The item was moved from the regular agenda to the consent agenda.
A groundbreaking ceremony is scheduled for for 3 p.m. on April 10 at the construction site.
Returning to a discussion from last month’s meetings, the Council approved a policy for a procurement card program allowing for an independent contractor or contract employee, working for the city through the mayor’s office, to use a purchase card for city business.
Cuellar also motioned to postpone a vote on the resolution but the motion to postpone failed. The Council voted 4-1 to approve the resolution and agreed to continue to work on the policy.
In the consent agenda, the Council approved $2500 from the discretionary fund of Mayor Stewart to be allocated to Irondale Middle School. The funds are to be used exclusively for uniforms for the middle school band.
The next meeting of the Irondale City Council will be held at 6 p.m. on April 17 at Irondale City Hall. An agenda for the meeting can be found on the Irondale website prior to the meeting.