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Have you noticed that our street crews have been working on potholes? This has been a bad year for potholes and the weather has not allowed them to do much during the winter. A survey was first done to determine where the worst potholes were and set some priorities for attacking them. If you are like me you still see potholes that need repaired. In fairness to the crews doing the work I think each of us forgets about the potholes that were there once we no longer see them! So we forget the ones that have been done and we keep being annoyed by the ones still remaining. By the beginning of April the crews had used 10 tons of pea gravel/chips in damaged areas and used 750 gallons of asphalt. They haven't quit and will be continuing work on the remaining potholes. The much welcomes moisture does delay their progress because they have to have the holes dried out before repair. Third grade students will be doing a field trip with the city council and mayor on May 13th from 9:00 to 11:30 a.m. I suspect the teachers of your children would be happy to have parents attending with their children. That will also help teach your children that you think city government is important to be involved in. May 19-21st I will be attending a National Main Street Conference in Des Moines, IA. The highlight will be a two day trip to various towns around Iowa to experience what they have done to rejuvenate their downtown areas. A scholarship from Wyoming Main Street will provide up to $1500 for transportation to Des Moines and hotel costs. I will have to provide my own food, or go on a diet! (That just might be beneficial) I will be making a report to Wyoming Main Street Advisory Board and a presentation to the city council after the event. Watch for a notice about the presentation so you can attend! Budget time is coming up. We are finding that some of our Enterprise Funds that are supposed to "pay their own way", haven't been doing that. They have been subsidized from the General Fund which is not what should happen. It seems we find more and more of what was done in the past is going to cost us more now. Most of us know that doing it correctly the first time is the best way to go! We are finding that sometimes council members were not given the information they should have been given. Withholding information makes it difficult to make good decisions! The city council is determined and dedicated to keep correcting mistakes from the past and to do our best to make good decisions. I'm sure we will make mistakes also; hopefully we get them corrected as soon as they are discovered. We have leadership now that believes in doing business the way it is supposed to be and he believes in being up front with us. Just because we have "always done it this way" does not make it right. Just because it is a "complicated answer" does not mean we don't need to know. Our city administrator, Steve Henning, is great at getting us answers we need and a whole lot of answers we didn't even know we needed! Hopefully we will find areas to reduce the budget that will help offset areas that we are going to have to increase. If you have ideas that you think would help increase the city's income and decrease expenses we encourage you to share them with us Personnel problems have come to our attention as you know. This is not something we enjoy dealing with, however it comes with the position. We will continue to gather the best information we can and make decisions that we believe are the best for Douglas and the citizens of Douglas. We hope you understand that "being a good person or a likable person" is only part of the story. We must also consider mistakes made and effectiveness in job performance. It is not fair for the people of Douglas, or other employees, if we keep an employee on the payroll that is not being effective in their position. Other employees, and the public, are affected by an employee in a position that is not a "good fit" for them, or a "good fit" for the city. Many of us in the past likely found ourselves in a work situation that was not a good fit and we know that after the upset of changing jobs we were better off in the end. We will continue to help an employee improve in their job performance before termination is considered. Termination is a choice we must make when other reasonable efforts have been exhausted. Termination is a time of sadness for everyone involved.