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    • COMMUNITY

    CITY OF ST. MARKS HIKES UTILITIES 75% ON RESIDENTS

    By LEGION TAYLOR Reporter

    The St. Marks City Commission discussed the increase in utility rates by 75% at their meeting on Thursday, Aug. 10, although it was made clear that the price to connect a home to utilities would not be increased.
    The fee increase is not for garbage collection, only on city water and sewer.
    Due to some recent problems with building permits, the City Commission has decided to get their newly hired attorney, Bill Garner, who was introduced at the meeting, to draft a letter or agreement that structures cannot be built on a vacant residential lot, as some building permits were issued that allowed this, though city ordinances strictly forbid it.  It was also made clear that until the construction of a house was underway, campers or RVs cannot be stored on what are called “Vacant Residential Lots,” which is any piece of residential land with no house on it.
    There is still some concern about grinder pumps, which the city returned to the ownership of the citizens a few months ago.  Some citizens are upset that the city isn’t paying costs to maintain, repair of replace grinder pumps. Dan Albers responded to this by saying that anyone who was having a problem with the grinder pumps should contact the city and ask them to come take a look at it, but that they didn’t have the resources to repair them all.
    The boat ramp’s manager Joe Crusoe has asked that the trash cans be replaced with a dumpster so that garbage won’t spill out everywhere if someone hits it with their truck or boat. The city isn’t totally in favor of this idea, with Commissioner Steve Remke worried that people might stack garbage there as if it were a place to dump oversized trash, and would like to look for other solutions. No decision was made on that.
    The state has unfortunately run out of grant money for now and as such the St. Marks River Park will not be getting its parking lot paved anytime soon, City Manager Zoe Mansfield announced.
    The city got new signs for the recreational public areas such as the river parks and the boat ramp.
    Some properties by the highway have been flooding due to heavy rainfall and lack of drainage, and have cited the sidewalk the city had put in as the cause, as it filled in the ditch that would have normally kept the water at bay. The city commission did not feel like they needed to take responsibility, though Ryder Rudd, the owner of the property which floods the most as a result did, and after some discussion it was determined that the city would evaluate the situation and decide what would be done about it at a later date.