During a meeting that took all of 20 minutes to complete, The Iola City Council Monday night accepted a bid from Vance Brothers of Kansas City for the emulsion oil used on chip seal projects. Vance Brothers submitted the only bid of two solicited, at per gallon cost of three dollars, up 56 cents from last year.
This year, the city will be doing around 155 blocks of chip sealing in the area from US 54 to the Southview Addition between Cottonwood and Kentucky Streets. As part of this project city crews also perform ditch cleaning, crack sealing, grubbing and miscellaneous concrete work as needed.
Two event requests were approved, including waiver of rental fees and a waiver of curfew regulations for the Allen County Relay for Life Saturday, June 20th at Riverside Park. The event,which runs from noon to midnight, has for the past few years utilized the Recreation Community Building for their cancer survivor event.
Council members also approved use of the electric pedestals on the square at no cost for the 2026 Movies on the Square. These movies will be held on the last Friday of the month through September with the final movie to be shown on October 10th.
Approval was also given for a fireworks display July 2nd at Allen Community College in conjunction with an Iola American Legion baseball game.
The Council deferred action until their next meeting on a proposal to collaborate with Thrive Allen County on a potential housing grant opportunity. Thrive’s Jessica Thompson was not able to be at this meeting. This item was originally to have been taken up at their May 26th meeting which didn’t happen due to a lack of a quorum. There was only a bare quorum for this meeting with one member participating by phone.
During the meeting Mayor Steve French recapped a meeting a couple of weeks ago with representatives of the Health Forward Foundation, which has been involved in numerous projects in Allen County over the years. In that time the foundation has awarded six million dollars in grants in Iola, and some 11.7 million dollars in Allen County as a whole.
It was also reported the US 54 reconstruction project is off to a fast start, with a lot of the concrete removal already done on the north side Madison west of Buckeye Street, the first part of Phase I of the project.
