Both the Belle and Bland boards of aldermen decided to further discuss a joint venture to share a public works department after the April 5 elections during an April 1 meeting at the Chambers Building in Belle.

Belle Mayor Josh Seaver said the meeting was to explore options and see what both boards thought of the idea. 

Belle has been advertising to hire a full-time public works employee without success. The city of Bland currently has no public works employees as the former director Jason Lewis and his helper Dave Hefflin both resigned from their positions in March.

“Looking toward the future success of both communities, a total merge could be discussed,” Seaver said after the meeting. “There is a precedent for such in the state of Missouri, and it would be something I would be willing to explore.” 

The discussion began with Seaver stating the purpose of the meeting.

“We need to decide where we want to go as far as this contract deal goes,” Seaver told board members. “We all feel it’s gonna be a win-win for both communities. We don’t want to see you guys fail. It doesn’t do Belle any good for you guys to fail and obviously doesn’t do you guys any good for the city of Bland to fail either.”

Bland Interium Mayor Mark Ferran asked Seaver to explain what he is thinking, as he has only been in charge for about three-and-a-half weeks since former mayor Lee Medlock stepped down.

“If you can go over what you are thinking, it would be very beneficial because other than the initial idea, we haven’t had a lot of conversations yet about the specifics of what this could actually look like,” Ferran said.

Seaver asked Belle Public Works Director Tony Baretich to explain.

Baretich is also Bland’s backup operator and spoke as a liaison between both boards.

“The situation that Bland is in and what I have seen the past couple of weeks, just to keep it going, is you have one person,” Baretich said. “I understand that two people is pretty much out of the question on the public works side.”

He said the idea of looking at putting the two public works departments together came when Lewis still headed the department. Since Lewis left, it took on a different form.

“There’s all kinds of options for this as far as going on a full-in venture, eventually we bill together, do everything public works-wise together or we kind of talked a little bit, you guys take care of your end — bills — and contract the agreed-upon price for manhours to take care of the wells and lagoons, work on projects, shut-offs, meter readings, water main breaks — just that type of general stuff,” Baretich said. “The options are wide open and being four miles apart doesn’t mean we can’t do things together.”

Baretich said the city of Belle has been battling to find a public works employee.

“It’s hard to get someone to come work with sewer water for the same amount they would make at McDonald’s,” he said. “If we combine resources and get a four-man crew, we can get stuff done — like curbing.”

Baretich said Belle ends up with some funds leftover, but not enough to do a lot and Bland does the same. Together, they could start getting things done.

“How can we do more with what we already have,” Baretich said. “I don’t think it’s going to be easy, but when we look at the big picture, I think working together would benefit both communities, both towns.”

The city of Belle currently has a public works director, one full-time employee, and one part-time employee. Bland usually has one public works director and a part-time employee and is hiring for both positions.

“I’m not saying we have the 100 percent answer,” Baretich said in regards to merging the departments. “All these small towns, we’re focused on money, we’ve got to be able to survive, make improvements, pay our people and we want to do all this without putting too much a burden on the people in our community. Just the stuff we double up on in both communities with only four miles in between, I really think we could mitigate some cost down the road by working together.”

After Baretich suggested working together to accomplish larger goals, Tony Kottwitz, owner of K&M Store in Bland, was present to help discuss Bland’s public water project and reminded board members about a potential candidate they were scheduled to interview later that same afternoon.

“I know they have an applicant for closed meeting this afternoon,” Kottwitz said. “I know this guy, he’s a worker. He can do anything, he can fix anything. So keep that in mind before you do anything. And he lives there in town.”

The board did not hire the applicant they interviewed that afternoon. However, they hired John Dean of Bland following an April 4 interview. Dean is scheduled to start on April 18 and is planning to take classes to be certified.

Baretich said the April 1meeting was obviously preliminary.

“I guess what we need to figure out is do we want to jump off into this venture or do we just want to be friends. When things get really bad, we just help each other out as needed and keep it like it’s been the last 40, 50, 100 years?”

Kottwitz said that would be a good starting spot.

Ferran spoke on Bland’s behalf.

“We definitely appreciate all you guys have done at this point,” Ferran said. “If we didn’t, the last few weeks, have conversations with Josh and Tony we would be in a very bad space right now in terms of DNR testing. We appreciate how neighborly you guys have been.”

Ferran said that he is new to the community and appreciates how everyone talks about how all the neighbors used to help each other years ago and he appreciates how Belle has modeled that example.

“I’m going to repeat what I heard you say, a couple of different options. One could be if the city completely contracted with the city of Belle, and the other, if we had our own city employee, but we still work out some type of contract agreement where we can work together. I agree that one of the biggest problems is that one person cannot do the public works job all by themselves.”

Ferran said they want their streets, curbing and water main breaks to be fixed.

“I think it would be prudent to figure out how we can work together in terms of us sharing — if we hired someone and us being able to partner with you guys or you guys being able to partner with us,” Ferran said.

Bland Alderman Diana Mayfield suggested a memorandum of understanding between the two cities.

“It outlines what each entity is going to do for the others,” Mayfield said. “I’m thinking that might be more in line with what we are trying to do here than saying, ok, Belle is going to have our public works. That scares me as a citizen of Bland and as a representative of the city.”

Mayfield asked if anyone had contacted Missouri Municipal League (MML) about a possible contract. Ferran said he had.

“They said the usual ways municipalities have done this in the past has been with police departments, but it’s definitely possible or doable for any type of municipal agreement,” Ferran said. “It’s nailing down all of the concrete stuff upfront with the lawyers and getting it in a contract.”

Baretich asked Mayfield what her fear would be.

Mayfield said her fear would be that they don’t have that person to call on, to do their streets immediately, to be there for the citizens of Bland.

“If we don’t have anybody hired in our city to represent our city, then they won’t be there,” Mayfield said. “Now if Belle hires everybody and says ok, you’re going to do this, we still don’t have nobody.”

“And you need one,” Kottwitz said.

Mayfield agreed.

“We need somebody so the clerk will be able to say ‘we need you to go shut these off now.’ Not two days from now,” Mayfield said. “That is my concern. You will be so busy with Belle stuff that the little stuff with Bland gets lost.”

Baretich said it is a valid concern. He is blessed with a board that allows him to manage the public works department and prioritize what needs to be done.

“As far as having that person, I don’t know what would be any different if the clerk calls and says ‘I need these shut off’ and I drove to Bland and shut the water off,” Baretich said. “Or if I am in Bland running a chlorine test and the Belle clerk calls and says, ‘hey, these people are moving out and I need them shut off.’”

Mayfield said if they have someone in Bland, they don’t have to turn around and come back from anywhere.

“I understand where you are at on that,” Baretich said. “But my thoughts, there is no reason for me to prioritize one town over the other. My goal will be to be equal. An emergency in Bland will be dealt with. An emergency here will be dealt with. Every day starts with ‘is the water safe, are the towers full, are the lagoons functioning properly, are we within DNR requirements?”

Baretich said he understands where they are at, but to him, it is a very mitigated issue.

Mayfield said they are working on the water project and the American Rescue Program Act (ARPA) funds are coming in. Those funds cannot be used for a salary for Baretich.

“My concern is that we have so much going on right now that Bland is responsible for,” Mayfield said. “This is what it sounds like to me, ‘you are wanting to take over the public works department’ and where does that leave us in Bland?”

Baretich said it leaves them with a much more diverse group of people to come in and work on projects, versus just one person to do whatever he can get done in a day’s time.

“A memorandum of understanding would say we are gonna help each other out,” Mayfield said.

Belle Alderman Ken Stanfield asked Baretich how many public works employees they would have if they merged the towns.

“We are pushing towards three full-time guys and they have one full-time guy already,” Baretich said. “We are really just looking for the half guy at the moment who could eventually be a fifth full-time guy.”

Baretich said he is looking at the workloads on what they have going in both towns.

“To me, the gap is negligible between us,” Baretich said. “We are both two rural Missouri towns trying to survive in rough times. We’ve been working together for years.”

Mayfield asked if each town would hire or if Belle would hire all employees. Baretich said he thought it would be better for them to be under the same entity for insurance, payroll and tax purposes.

“I know that’s hard to hear because I have caught kickback once this all hit the paper. I have also heard positive once this all hit the paper,” Baretich said. “I’ve really found the strife goes back to the ‘80s when the schools combined.”

Baretich said he reminds everyone that the communities came together to build the Belle-Bland Community Center in 1994.

Ferran reiterated that the big picture is either Bland completely contracting with Belle or Bland still having an employee that will figure out how to work as a team with Belle’s group.

“I think the least palatable to the community will be, if it says in the paper, that Bland contracts everything,” Ferran said. “But in the future, that might be very beneficial. What if we just began to head in the direction of working together, if we do move towards Bland having an employee and figuring out terms together. Maybe even if we hired someone, but Tony (Baretich) would be the overseer of them. He would be a part of Tony’s crew, but still works for our city. A trial run, more than a trial because there would be a contract. We would have all of the specifics figured out. A way that we could move in this direction.”

Ferran said he agrees with the communities working together.

“I would love to see us come together as a team and community and do it in a way that our communities will be okay with it without shaking up the beehive too much,” Ferran said. “If we get someone and Tony helps oversee them, we are going to be in a place where we need someone trained and we don’t have the skills and capacity to do that and you guys do. We could be better working together, but we need to do it in a way that our communities need to be okay with it.”

Ferran asked Baretich what he thought. Baretich said he works for both boards and will do what the people need, but he has already said what he thinks.

“You made the comment that it is not very palatable if the paper reads on the front page that the city of Bland contracts with the city of Belle for public works,” Baretich said. “But the only less palatable thing is that the city of Bland or city of Belle sells their public water district to a private company because we can no longer sustain and that is happening all over the country.” 

Once a city loses its water and sewer department, they no longer have a way to maintain its streets, because the water and sewer department is the main source of income.

“The first one may be unpalatable, but the worst one is the second,” Baretich said. “If we do this, it isn’t going to be easy, I don’t want to pretend it’s going to be smooth. It will definitely be coloring outside the lines of what we have done in two communities for a long, long, long time. But what if in five years we see street improvements and in 10 years things are looking better? So we can say what is only depends on what we are willing to put into it.

“Anything for me, outside of success for both of us, is a failure. And if we really want to be honest, if the paper wasn’t here writing everything down — if we really want to talk about ‘are we successful?’ at this current moment, and you could be real and truthful about it, I don’t know that the answer is ‘yes.’ There is a difference between surviving and thriving.”

Bareitch pointed out that the Ozark Central Ambulance District (OCAD) just did a similar contract to survive and is doing better than it has in a long time.

“How can we do better, be better, have more?” Baretich said. “This isn’t Belle taking over Bland. When you pull the lawyers and insurance companies together, it has to fall under something.”

Both cities are paying liability insurance and that could be cost-effective if they merge it together.

Ferran said he can’t imagine that anyone in Bland could truly understand the situation the city is in.

“I can’t imagine that they would be upset about us working together, more if we didn’t have someone,” Ferran said. 

Seaver said none of them will put their names to something that they are not going to do 100 percent and make sure it’s done right.

The city of Bland will be under new leadership after the April 5 election. There is also a contested aldermen race in both Belle and Bland. Ferran will be going off of the Bland board. 

Ferran asked what it would mean to move together into the future and get a contract involved.

“If we begin to work out the specifics and see that this is the most cost-effective, the most feasible way forward, so we can begin addressing our needs right now and figure out the specifics of this could look like,” Ferran said.

Seaver said if that is a direction everyone wants to go then everyone needs to sit down together and get an outside attorney to do the contract so no one feels like they are getting an upper hand from using their attorney for the contract.

“Just having a conversation about which direction we need to go,” Seaver said.

Ferran said he invited Baretich to come because he knows what questions to ask and they will be dependent on him for at least another year to help with training.

Baretich said per license, travel time and food, along with classes, it doesn’t take long to have $5,000 to $10,000 into the process of certifying a public works director.

Belle Alderman Fred Bethmann said his take is that by combining both budgets they could have more manpower to service both towns, better than they are being served now.

Bland Alderman Jane Vandegriffe asked if they would still have the city hall and board of aldermen. Ferran explained that they would still have all of those things. Only the public works department is being contracted.

“It doesn’t cause me any anxiety to say we could contract completely and I would be ok with it,” Ferran said. “I just know that it will cause other people anxiety and no matter what happens, I want us to move forward. We are one community, we are neighbors, I want us to be able to work together.”

Ferran said in terms of figuring out details, they would need to have town meetings to share specifics and figure out needs before contacting a lawyer. Seaver said the town hall meeting would allow citizens to come in and ask questions about the potential contract. They agreed separate town hall meetings in each city would be a good place to start. Belle Alderman Jeanette Struemph said both boards need to be unanimous moving forward.

The boards agreed to discuss the matter and contact each other about how they want to move forward after the April 5 elections.