By Lucky Kidd
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — Scott Meggers was sworn in as a member of the Hutchinson City Council Tuesday morning. Meggers won the Northeast District seat in the November general election over Stuart Conklin who had been appointed to the council last year to fill the remainder of the term Jade Piros de Carvalho resigned from. Also sworn in for new terms were at-large member Stacy Goss and Southeast district member Steven Garza, both of whom were unopposed in November. Fast was elected by the council to serve as Mayor for 2024, succeeding Jon Richardson. Stacy Goss was elected Vice Mayor, the position which Fast held last year.
The Council took a number of steps related to inventorying the number of lead and copper lines in the city’s water distribution system. The EPA has mandated all water systems nationwide to conduct this inventory in the wake of widespread lead issues in Flint, Michigan. For Hutchinson this involved an assessment of nearly 16,000 service lines, and this has to be done by Oct. 16.
Last May the Council held a hearing on borrowing $350,000 from the Kansas Public Water Supply Loan Fund administered by the Kansas Department of Health and Environment. The Council approved the loan documents, along with a contract with HDR of Kansas City to conduct that inventory.
The Council approved a pedestrian access agreement over a drainage ditch that cuts through the property where Trinity Catholic Junior-Senior High School is located. The Catholic Diocese of Wichita granted a storm drainage easement across their property to the city in the late 1970s, after which the city constructed an open drainage ditch that in effect separated two tracts that make up the Trinity Campus. The Diocese subsequently built a permanent pedestrian crossing over that ditch, and this agreement makes what has been there official.
Following a public hearing, the Council vacated a platted but never opened alley on the property of Hutch Metal Recycling on North Superior. The business owns the property on both sides of the alley in question, and it’s their intent to combine the two properties into one.
Two new members were appointed, and three others reappointed to the Hutchinson Housing Commission, Suz McIver and Nicole Waggoner were appointed to their first full three-year terms, with Steve Dechant appointed to his second term and Frances Conklin and Bud Conklin, who were appointed earlier to fill unexpired terms, appointed to their first full term. Dechant will time limit off the Housing Commission after this term while the other four will be eligible for a second full term.
