Minutes from the Tuesday October 3, 2023 City of Jeanerette Public Works and Safety Committee Meeting

[City Clerk]

Minutes from the Tuesday October 3, 2023 City of Jeanerette Public Works and Safety Committee Meeting Present- Mayor Carol Bourgeois Jr., City Clerk Susan Colden, Treasurer Liz Verdun, Public Works Director Howard White, Supervisor Wade Tillman, and Fire Fighter Mitch Dubois, Police Chief Vallot and Barry Segura, Anderson Clay and Brandon from Statewide Electric. Mayor Carol Bourgeois Jr. lead the prayer. Mitch provided the report from the fire department. The department responded to 88 calls, of which in the city 40 were medical, 27 were canceled, 7 alarm investigations, 1 person violated burn ban, 1 power line down, 1 auto accident, 1 structure fire on Ira St.. The department gave auto aid for 2 medical, 2 auto accident, 2 structure fires, 3 investigations/ alarms, and 1 power line. They attended 2 trainings last month, Mitch conducted a medical class for the new volunteers, and there was a Search and Rescue class. The trucks are running well and the hydrant testing is complete. Chief Vallot reported for the month of September 137 calls, 4 arrests, 3 citations and 7 arrest warrants issued. For the French Bread Festival, the Fire Dept will have a tent set up for medical aid and Howard and Vallot will walk the road and discuss barricades. Wade reported for the month of September, 14, dottie markings, 28 areas had grass cut, 2 sewer back-ups were cleared 4 water leaks were repaired, Mayor Bourgeois Jr. asked about the repair of the manhole cover on 182, Howard said Kent is supposed to have a crew out there to repair. Public Works with aid from Catholic Charities and the Cowboy Church responded to help clear the tree that fell on the home of residents on Martin Luther King drive. Alderwoman Clay and Council Lady Brown also helped the residents with aid from the Red Cross and the Jeanerette Fire Department. Barry Segura reported at the sewer plant. they got the electric sludge pump working and the pump had an issue, it picked up a rubber flapper from the clarifier. Howard helped them clear it and the sludge pump has been working ever since, and has been removing sludge from clarifier 1 and putting it in the aeration basin. Then the by-pass pump was used to clear out the contact chamber to the drying bed and then cleared clarifier number 2, the City will eventually need to get another sludge pump for clarifier number 2 at a cost of around $14,000 and a cost to install of $10,000. There were two aerators running but one had to turned off because the brackets failed, Southern is going to come out and repair. Barry said that there is issues with the design and the City might need to go with a floating aerator, Barry invited the Mayor and Howard to go with Barry to look at a plant that has floating aerators. The Mayor asked about drying bed number 4, and Mr. Segura replied that it doesn’t have sand in it but it would be good to have since bed 1 doesn’t drain. The City will get the sand for the bed. Southern repaired the bearings on aerator 4, when the unit was turned on the shaft flew out the other side, the cost to repair the gear box is around $4,000, but the City might want to look at the floating aerators instead of constantly repairing the current ones. The building should be insulated in two weeks, and the furniture is in. The Bar screen is not working, they are raking by hand, and Barry is going to get an estimate to repair. The water plant is going good, there was an issue last week on the backwash on Plant 1. The contractor didn’t tighten the bolts on the big aluminum box for the splashguard but after a few emails it got fixed. Lemoine is going to install the bypass the softeners next week so Mr. Segura said they are going to fill all the water storage before and Lemoine should only need 4 hours to complete the work. The next City-wide flush should happen the week before Thanksgiving. The contractor is going to take water from well 9 to plant 1, well 10 will be reworked and well 11 will be reworked in November. The contractor wanted the rollup door in Plant 2 repaired so they can store the sand, which the City doesn’t need. With no other business to consider the meeting was adjourned.



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Carol Bourgeois Jr., Mayor
ATTEST:





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Susan Colden City Clerk