BELLE — Belle aldermen on March 9 voted to allow Mayor Daryl White, Jr., to write a performance letter for the Belle Police Department before going into closed session to discuss a school resource officer (SRO) contract.

White posted the March 9 special meeting at 12:48 p.m. on March 8 at City Hall under “work session.” City Clerk Frankie Horstman said just before the meeting that she did not have an agenda and was not sure what it was going to be about.

“This is a working meeting,” White said after calling the meeting to order. “What I want to do is update you on some of the stuff we have been working on this week and I didn’t want to do it outside of a quorum. Some of the stuff that we have been asked to do or promised to do.”

White began by addressing all four aldermen present about several items he had looked into on the city’s behalf. The most notable item was an assessment of the city’s police department and his wish for the Maries R-2 School District to have an SRO officer from the Belle PD.

Police Department Update

“I don’t know if it was last September, October, November — we went by ourself in December — we promised the community to explain our plan, what we was doin’ and a review of the marshal department and stuff,” White said. “This is the time for it. Basically, we have next week to hit the paper before it is too close to election time. That is what we need to work on. That is what I asked you guys here for. It is a letter we want to write for the paper, it is a paid ad. Is this something you want to work through together or my office to draft a letter? Do you want to work through this together. Or do you guys want to add or subtract things in your own words? Do you want to write five different ones?”

Padgett suggested White draft a letter of what he wants to say and allow the board to review it before it is sent to the newspaper.”

“What is the purpose?” Struemph asked.

“Rebutal,” Padgett said.

“We promised the public in a public meeting and the paper that before the election we would update the status of the marshal’s department or how the police department is going, the police officers’ and the marshal’s performance was,” White said. “I think it should include our present police officers — I am not looking to write a letter about the formal marshal or a former employee. It is a letter — moving forward.”

White said at some point the board does need to address the accusations made against them.

“I am not saying we need to rebut all of them or any of them but I did give the public my word that we would have some kind of a — as a council — an assessment of what has been going on from the time we started the police department up to election time,” White said.

Struemph asked for clarification if that includes where they were and where they are now. White said yes, and why they took the steps they did.

“I know it is something we have addressed several times, but we’ve still got issues to work through,” White said. “But for the most part, I am very happy about where we are and what we’ve got. We started off saying it is going to be hard to get started, and bare bones and stuff, but we’ve come a long way. We’re doin’ good.”

Howarth made a motion for White to “draft the form and the board correct or change anything. She reworded the motion that say the letter is drafted.

“If you guys have any suggestions for how the letter is worded, you can email me or call me,” White added.

The board voted 4-0 to draft a letter for an advertisement about the status of the police department.

School Resource Officer (SRO)

“I’ve been talking to the school alot, we’ve done some brainstorming,” White began. “I told them we have talked about it a few times in passing but never formally. They would like to talk about an SRO officer for the next school year.”

White said the city is invited to the March board meeting to discuss it.

“I have been, spent a lot of time thinking about that, researching requirements, what I would like to see, what the school needs,” White said. “It’s quite a project, but it’s quite a project, in my opinion, is well-needed and needs to be investigated.”

White said he worked at the school for several years and thinks about how to make it a better, safer place and how to benefit the police department.

He said he spoke with Maries County R-2 Superintendent Dr. Lenice Basham about the issue and with Belle High School (BHS) Principal Garrett Haslag, who plans to attend a board meeting in the near future to discuss creating a city ordinance against vaping.

“We are going to help him in ordinance form get a control on vaping problems and stuff that they have at school,” White said. “Some other towns are adopting some different ways and different ordinances to handle it.”

The board is 100 percent on board with trying to put control of the drug issue for our young people.

“That is why we moved towards getting a new K-9; we are making great strides, and hate to stop now.”

White said he wants to put together a proposal for the school district to provide them with an SRO.

“As far as a proposal, I have some ideals about numbers and stuff to present to the school which needs to be in closes session when it comes to that, to come up with the right figures and stuff,” White said. “That is something we need to be thinking about and talking about.”

White said the SRO bill was what he wanted to discuss to see if the board had an interest in moving forward. Alderman Jeanette Struemph asked White if they were going to meet with Basham prior to the next board meeting.

“I know we have talked about it several times, but I didn’t want to present you guys with a proposition and you not know it was comin’,” White said.

Alderman Barb Howarth said the previous agreement was the school district paid for half and the city paid for half. White said he has some numbers in mind

“I have told her what I would like to see us offer as a city, and my thoughts is we need a full-time SRO officer at school, we need ‘em to be Belle PD, we need to be able to — we’re six blocks from the school and need a real SRO officer,” White said. “We need somebody that has administrative duties and can work through a curriculum on D.A.R.E or some kind of drug program. We need somebody that has a relationship with the students that they can talk to.”

White said he doesn’t want to put a guy in the school with a tactical vest that will scare everyone.

“I want the right person,” White said. “Obviously we don’t need — we have to be really careful about who we hire. We have to be careful about hiring the wrong person right out of the academy because they would be two years older than the high school students. We don’t need somebody that can’t handle theirself in an emergency.”

White said whoever they hire needs to be an SRO only, at the school no matter what, every day.

“Not a part-time, come and go as I please,” White said. “If they are sick, Jerry (Coborn, police chief) needs to send a substitute.  We don’t need them leavin’.”

He added that while the school doesn’t use the SRO during the summer, the city could use them to cover vacation gaps and events during that season.

“It would give us a back-up officer when school is not in session,” White said. “But when it is, the officer needs to be there and be seen. Needs to be there for the right reason in Belle and Bland, it would be a school thing.”

White said he has put a lot of thought into it and has researched it.

“There is so many things that is important to me and the community, we would like to think nothin’ is ever going to happen in our small town,” he said. “But we have had some close calls and we have had some close calls recently.”

White said he didn’t want to air bad laundry, but they have had serious calls in the last few weeks.

“It has really been upsetting to me,” White continued. “I feel that it is our duty as a police department and act on it to move forward. I know that it is tricky to grow our department now, but, you know, the generation we have in school is our future. There have been threats against the school and drug issues in the school. It is really disheartening because when I say we have issues at the school it is not just high school kids, it is middle and elementary school.”

White continued that part of the decision to purchase the K-9 was to “have more tools in their toolbox to combat the problem.”

“I think this is really worth the time talking about,” White continued. “I think I read in the paper this week that Vienna is going to fine the kids and the parents who get caught vaping a hundred bucks. I think the only way we can get the kids’ attention is at some point include the parents.”

White said he wants to explore what the city and police department can do to help the school (with the drug situation).

White said the school may have the potential for two SRO deputies if they have one from the county and one from the city.

Aldermen Adam Padgett said it is a good idea to speak with the school and create a proposal.

“I think when you guys see the numbers and stuff it will make more sense to you,” White said. “This is a working meeting, I am not asking for a motion or a decision or anything. I don’t like split decisions or last-minute stuff. This is something to think about.”

White said he was done talking and had a few closed items to talk about. When asked what the closed session items were he only mentioned the potential school resource officer contract.

According to the meeting announcement, no items were listed for the closed session.

Other items discussed during the meeting were:

MRPC Strategic Planning Meeting on March 31

— White told all four aldermen present to expect an invitation from Meramec Regional Planning Commission (MRPC) to attend an all-day March 31 strategic planning meeting for the city of Belle.

“It is an opportunity to get a direction,” White said. “We sat down with (MRPC) and Mark McClane and went through every organization in Belle and tried to get someone from every organization that had an interest in Belle.”

He said he would try to get a representative to come to the all-day meeting.

“It’s for everything, where we would like to see Belle go, what we would like to correct in Belle,” White said. “We need to get a plan for water and sewer, a combination of houses, we want to see growth in Belle — a 150-house subdivision.”

The items will be ranked by importance and MRPC staff will assist in finding grants to get the city where it wants to be.

Rep. Bennie Cook on city water issues

“I met with Bennie Cook this morning, and he wants to help us figure out how to fix our water and sewer problem,” White said. “There are a lot of opportunities out there and he wants to help us research ‘em. Whether that is a grant or what it is.”

White related to the board that Cook believes there is state and federal funding available for a water/sewer project update and brought the ideas to Rep. Bruce Sassmann, Ben Brown and Justin Brown.

“Everybody that can help us, that is interested and represents us, they are all on board,” White said. “They are working diligently fast, trying to get it out. This year’s budget is about in, next year’s budget is still out. We are trying to find some options before we go to a bond issue or increase.”

White told the board that their representatives may be reaching out.

Meet the Candidate Forum

White said they have had a lot of questions about the future of Belle with the election coming up.

“Another reason that I have talked to a lot of you all individually, questions and stuff, that needs to be answered that we want to answer,” White said, adding that a Meet the Candidate Forum moderated by the newspaper, will be held at the Belle High School on March 22. “Anything that we can do to get the community together.”

Padgett and Struemph said they like the idea of a candidate forum because it gives the community a chance to speak and ask questions.