City Administrator’s Report
January 7/ 2019
Mild Winter
Here we are in January and we still have not had to plow the streets. With the mild
winter the street crews.have been working on projects that normally get done in the
spring or summer.
Some crew members are painting the shop and cleaning up areas long neglected
due to not having the opportunity to get to these projects. At City Hall, we are
putting in a new storage area upstairs to store court records.
The Judge has 6-7 file cabinets with records needing long term storage. Her office
has no room for more file cabinets, so the crew build a secure area upstairs to keep
the file cabinets, opening up space in her office.
We are fortunate to have an employee very skilled at building frames. With some
old lumber down at the shop he built frames for some old mill photos, a map and
an old aerial photo of the City. These photos make a nice addition to City Hall and
preserve the history of Libby.
Another project getting done is rebuilding the pump on the sewer jet truck. The
pump has needed repair for a long time, but we never had a chance to take it apart
and deliver it to Spokane. The last time any major work was done on the pump was
in 2007.
The alley between Spruce and Larch is on the list for getting completed this winter
along with the sewer line to the new restroom at Fireman’s Park. As long as the
weather is mild there are other projects that may get completed.
Water Treatment Plant
Since the water treatment plant was built in 1996, the meter measuring flows to the
Cabinet Heights subdivision has never worked. The Cabinet Heights area
has a separate system of pumps and a hydrostatic tank that supplies water to those
residents, not part of the City’s gravity feed system.
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The operators have been looking into a new meter for the area so we can record
usage in the subdivision. Currently the only means of measuring usage is from the
billing statements.
Looking into the meter for a replacement, it was found that the reason the meter
never worked is that it was not designed for the low flow amounts this area has.
The meter is for high flows and will not work because the flows never reach the
minimum for the meter to operate.
Now that we have identified the problem, the operators are having a meter installed
like the one at the PRV station on Cedar Street. This meter will give a good
account of how much water is being used in Cabinet Heights.
Departments
The new doors have arrived for the Waste Water Treatment plant. I mentioned in
my report a few months back the doors needing replaced. They are rusted out and
cannot be secured.
The operators at the plant will remove the old doors and frames with the help of
some street crew personnel. Then the new doors can be installed. The operators
have been painting the inside of the office area and lab at the plant. They hope to
have it all painted before spring and then start on the outside of the buildings.
The street crews are working on decommissioning the old police cars in order to
have them sold. All the equipment has been removed and the door locks and
ignition keys need to be changed.
Green barriers like the ones at Fireman’s Park were brought to City Hall and
placed along areas where we have been having problems with people driving
through the lawn.
The MOOT permit for the Wayfinding signs has been finalized. The sign company
has been contacted and a revised list of signs submitted based on the requirements
from the state.
The “Welcome to Libby” sign plan was taken to Montana Machine in early
December. The permit for this sign will be secured in late March or early April.
The state requires the permit to be submitted 90 days prior to the signs being
installed. This date could change depending on when the sign are ready.
The updated Capital Improvement Plan (CIP) should be finished in late February
or early March. Most of the information has been added along with photos and
maps and should be ready for the printers later this month.
Jim Hammons