Ernie Moore, Executive Director of the Eastern Oklahoma Development District (EODD), spoke during Monday’s county commissioner meeting to address matters related to the City of Beggs water issue.

“It’s no doubt the City of Beggs has a serious water issue,” Moore said. “After reading an article in the Okmulgee Times and on some comments people made, I found it necessary to clear the air on some of the issues.” Moore stated the City of Beggs received a CDBG Grant from EODD through the Oklahoma Department of Commerce for funds to replace a water line. He added that EODD serves as grant administrator and there are certain criteria that must be met, including having public hearings and awarding contracts under the Competitive Bid Act.

“But the City of Beggs, as the grant recipient of that, they have total control in what they do,” Moore said. “One of the issues that came up was the issue with the line being installed incorrectly. Per the engineer that designed this, it should have worked without any issues. There were some issues with air lock in the lines, so air relief valves were put in the line.”

Moore stated there was an issue with the routing of the line.

“The contract and the law says you have to keep the line within the easement that was there,” he said. “The surveyor surveyed it and the line was placed in the easement by the contractor as it was supposed to.

“Now the City of Beggs is working with an antiquated water system and has been that way for years, and we knew when we started in this project, it was going to be a multiple year thing, because the City of Beggs doesn’t have a large income base, enough to just go in and replace the whole system, so we knew we were going to have to do this over a period of years,” Moore said. “We will continue to work with the City of Beggs.”

Moore stated there is another CDBG grant that EODD will apply for this year for the city, “but again it will be engineers who will determine what we need, but ultimately the City of Beggs will decide on the project. We are just basically the grant administrators in this.” The director stated that when the project first started, a list of engineers was provided to city officials, but the decision on who to use was left up to them.

“There has been much talk about how to alleviate this current issue,” Moore said. “One of these is to put a pump up at the water plant to push water through the line and then there are also issues with the pump inside of the pumping station itself and keeping those running.

“Most water systems have redundant pumps built into them so if one goes down, the other keeps going. I know that it is going to take some time to get these things worked out, but we’ll be working with the City of Beggs and we will continue to support them with the REAP grant and CDBG grant we’ll be applying for them.

“In the short term, they are deciding whether they want to re-hook up to the old line to go around the mountain, or to put a pump up at the station. But again, that will be up to the City of Beggs to decide and some engineer probably should look at this again, so we make sure we do the right thing, instead of putting good money after bad. The initial line was put in ‘per spec’ and it’s been functioning, but anytime they have issues is when something happens to the water plant or up at the pump station, or in this last case, when OGE had a substation go down.

“But I just wanted to clear up some of the issues and one of the things we do not do is respond to the Facebook quotes on there or engineers on Facebook, I do not get into those things,” Moore said.

“I know the mayor has been really frustrated and he has been working hard - the mayor and the council at Beggs - have really worked hard on this and they are concerned with this also.”

Moore stated that over the years, the City of Beggs has been awarded REAP grants for projects that have been beneficial to the citizens.

“In REAP year ‘17, ‘18 and ‘19, we put $81,000 into Beggs which they chose to install electronic meters with,” Moore said. “We’ve been here, we’ve been helping Beggs and we will continue to help them. We will be applying for another REAP/CDBG grant when the cycle comes around and that will be in March. It will be the City of Beggs that ultimately decides what their project will be.”

Okmulgee Fire Chief Dewayne Hurt, who is also secretary for the Okmulgee County Fire Department Board, presented two proposals to the county commissioners, which were approved.

The first was a request to pay East Central Electric the monthly fee for Ecolink internet service at the Preston tower site, which allows a hardline to ensure all towers are able to communicate.

“This allows us to know if a radio system goes down, prior to us going to an emergency scene and trying to key it up and don’t have communication,” Hurt said. “It allows for a notification if the system goes down at some time.”

The second item was a request to repay the county $1,245 bill that was used to pay for immediate repairs on the radio system.

Agenda items approved were:

• Minutes from Nov. 14 meeting.

• Blanket Purchase Orders: District 1 to Cintas for uniforms as needed for $800.

• Employee Forms: Donna Chronister, Treasurer’s Office, fulltime effective Nov. 21; Wilbur Ross, District 2, employment ceased; Michael Thomas, District 1, employment ceased.

• Resolution to designate property for the Sheriff ’s Office. Property (20 acres) located in a commercial zone south of Okmulgee would be designated as a training area. Sheriff Eddy Rice added that the proposal for an ultralight airport in the area was no longer being considered.

• Resolution to disburse COVID Relief and Aid Fund. This money was already earmarked for the sheriff ’s department to be used for overtime pay.

• Plat for Arbor Ridge #1 in District 1. The new housing addition will be located at North 205 and Creager Road.

• Resolution for Disposing Equipment (vehicle) from Okmulgee County Sheriff ’s Office.

• Three lease purchases for the OC Sheriff ’s Office through Welch Bank.

• Payment of Claims: $900 for FY 21-22 and $376,637.04 for FY 22-23.

• Monthly Appropriations.

The board tabled awarding Bid #4 for road materials for a six-month period to allow time to look over the submitted bids.

Under New Business, a Transfer of Appropriations from Anna McBride M/O to Drug Court Personal Services for $4,000 was approved.