Dave Casotti, Boone Mayor, May 05, 2026

Our guest on our program today we've got Mayor Dave Cassotti joining us. Good to have you back there. Good to be back thanks Jim. So maybe move that mic a little closer to you. Sorry about that. Nope that's okay because you might throw things around. Who knows? I'm trying not to. Well how much more could you find out about community development block rats? Oh boy. There's a lot of stuff with those isn't there? A ton yes. So last night Moon City Council meeting we did have a number of different things that were going on. I'm going to go right to Holly Stecker right away. She started it out. Yep. She talked a little bit about the downtown Boone. I kind of reviewed that and talked about grants that are coming up and things like that. Again really looking to I think bring more assistance to those that would like to open up a business. Right yeah and there's yes like said there's like four different grants that you can apply for and and get some get a business going and get your storefront looking good and and these are these are city grants. I mean you know the majority of them obviously Main Street has their grant program too but that's that's pretty competitive. Yeah yep it is. That's again she did have that presentation a little bit about what's been what had been going on here in the past quarter but I did why she did want to point out that some recognition coming up for George Eckstein that's going to be through Main Street. Yep be down in Des Moines and George will get recognized for all his work especially with the arch but overall with his with his support and volunteerism so it's great to see done a lot done a lot of that too. Let's talk a little bit about the part that was dropped from your agenda and then come up during some of the public comment time yep and it's relatively new some people if they follow along on social media probably no more or have heard things about it but there's an issue with some feral cats down on the south side of town. Yeah and it's we've got somebody who's been trying to take care of them or do something but getting them yeah and it's got an issue with private property anyway police are involved too they they're well aware of what's happening. Yep it's yeah there's a bunch of cats back there and it's it's uh I don't know. Well you guys just really hadn't really heard much about it until the last week or so. I had heard something through my cousin because she's kind of a cat well animal advocate and she contacted me and then the person from APE contacted me and they're trying they're getting they're working on in conjunction with the Humane Society doing a TNR which is a trap neuter spade and release program at least to cut back on the population so because it sounds like I can't remember the number of cats that are back there now it's like 18 or something like that and then a bunch of them are going to have babies soon and that's that's a lot more cats a ton more cats so you know feel bad for them and you know it was nice this gentleman that stepped forward that he's taking care of them it's nice humane thing that he's doing but we do need to need to cut back on that population and get things kind of under control so. And for people that know about trap neuter release and I mean it's something that's been available the problem is is it costs. It does yep there's a cost involved and APE is applying for a grant to help out with the cost for that so then they'll help out do a bunch of that and hopefully we can get it under control it's turning into almost worse than the deer population. Well and the part about it is if they if they people will say well just trap them and move them and well then others come and fill their space yep that's why they want to release them back where they were because then they will gradually not have more cats. Right and it's yeah it was a very long it's a lot of cats and it was a long discussion. No easy answer is it? No and I mean it like I said it's it's something you know I've got cats so I understand the whole issue other than I don't have that many and it's we want to we want to take care of it so. Well we at least at this point in time it is a work in progress. Yep. Cities aware police department is involved with and working with both humane society and APE and we'll see what happens with it but again that part of it is people have property too down there and they you know they don't want people coming on their property. Right yeah deals with private property and business property and there's a yeah there's a lot to it but it'll get taken care of it's just gonna take a little bit of time so. The downside is yes when you start a process like this it is slow. Yeah it's not a quick process. It doesn't get done in a hurry. Kind of like codification. Did you read through that list? I did but. That's okay I'm not gonna ask you. I had a headache before and it made it even worse so. The city does have a codification process going on with simmering quarry and they had prepared several questions about different ordinances and things they had found and basically this is just a streamline get rid of old ordinances find out where their conflicts. Bottom line was they presented information staff reviewed it you had department heads reviewing it yep and then the bottom line is the final decision needs to be made by the council because it is they are the ordinances. Yeah they got a chance to review it and everybody was pretty happy with being able to move forward. Yeah there weren't a ton of big changes there were some typos in it that small things and there were some other things but yeah nothing super super big or major and any big changes of course will come up basically with an ordinance right you'll have to go through that whole thing so yeah but it's you're not the only one doing it the county's been talking about it mattered but I think they put out their RFPs for proposal to do codification I think everybody kind of does it especially when you get to the end of the legislative session of what's going to be the new right what are the new laws yeah well one thing we know that they did to have a little discussion but no change is going to be made holding special meetings you did have one a couple weeks ago they came up but then there was an issue about do we have this do we charge and you already charge for special meetings right there's a yeah there's a $300 charge for the person that needs to have this or request the special meeting and yeah and that was that was partially my bad I felt bad for the business owner and it was a quick turnaround and we did it on a Friday at five o'clock granted it was only about a five-minute meeting if that but you needed to get something done they needed something right they needed something done but that that drew the ire of a couple of council people about doing it on a Friday at five o'clock and having to do it at all yeah I won't go into details but so we're just looking at maybe changing that possibly the fee change possibly could be a seven-day waiting period before we have a special meeting stuff we've got to work through so it doesn't happen a lot you don't have a lot I was gonna say yeah this is your first one it is yeah yep they said not you know it means it's my first one and I haven't been here that long they said it only happens once a year maybe once every other year it's yeah it doesn't happen a lot there may be some where you have to do it right which is that's a little more planned and organized when you have to have a special right but yeah outside this one was a little over and above and outside of it yep well we did have a couple of other things that came up economic development they did bring forward a couple of recommended well things that they have approved for downtown incentive funds so we're gonna have a couple of projects that'll be going on here yep and that's still using those dollars yeah green and red or black yeah logo yeah the logo I and I you know my question was is it what's the kind of cost more I always fair did cost more for the color than black but it's the same price so they voted to go with with the color for now and this is fades quickly then we go with with black but this is for what will be the new water tower handcock the handcock drive extension out there and yeah the question was well do you want to have a logo on there and if so then do you want color or what do you want to do so anyway those aren't cheap just to put the logo on I mean and it's invisibility was part of it it's you know with the cottage cheese tower out there might block one of the logo so I spend the money to put it there but we'll have one it's just how many and which sides we put it on well it's one of those things where the proximity yet you do want to you want people to be able to see right coming into boon yep that's what's going on there what before you even got here we did have a roofing project going on at the water plant wastewater plant finally got that done that was about seems like it was a year and a half ago it probably was yeah catching up on that finally getting that taken care of which was one of those projects even even before daisy decided to come to town the city already knew they had to do some roof repair work out there so yeah and again not inexpensive no nothing is anymore but that's a problem like that's a little bit bigger so yeah and let's see I know oh we got a couple of new employees at public works yeah so he's kind of filling out some of his staff there too quick little story that was kind of cool because the two guys that retired graduated with me in high school the two guys were hiring I coached in football so there you go there are still in there so yep that graduated with you in high school what does that tell you I'm getting old well we did have a couple other things that have been happening as well Mike Cornelis he did let the council know that park board working on that 10-year plan and hope to be able to bring it to the council here by the end of the by the end of the month and we'll see and once again then it'll be in your hands you'll be able to take a look at doing some you know start to figure it into your plans what's going on which by the way let's talk a little bit about that I know that Andre did give you a little bit of a list from the property tax impacts potentially from the legislative action but it's early on it really don't know all of the particulars but it just the overall kind of a brief summary of what you might be looking at right and it's well I'm just gonna say it's not we thought it could be a little more drastic as far as what it's going to affect the city and what you know our you know tax income and again that's one of those balances where I would love to see everyone pay less property tax but we have to realize that the less property tax we take in the last money we have to take care of all of our things that we're you know biggest share biggest share of your your expenses have to do with personnel right yep it's a big big cost police department fire department right now parks they would love to have more people yep and again those are some of the challenges that are out there and do you how do you get more part-time people if you have you know if you have an opportunity that's the big thing it is it's a balancing act well on police we already know civil service commission's got a meeting this week yep and they're going to start the process of looking to fill some vacancies in the in the police department yeah and some transition that's happening there yep interview some candidates so we mentioned that last time what the chief said in the nine years he's been the chief he's only had the full staff nine months right out of those yeah that's that's crazy to think about but yeah things happen it happens too it does uh some of the other things that came up well speaking of staff we did have a resignation um Nate Osmondson our rec director had indicated that he had a full-time offer from the guard and was one of those uh couldn't turn that one down right that was yeah I congratulate him on that that's a that's a nice you know offer for him and um he said something he said he couldn't turn down so one of those where he actually I don't think really pursued it they pursued him right that makes it even better for him so yeah so we got that uh again that announcement came out and then the question for the council was from Andrea was do we look to fill that position do we wait what was the council's preference and basically because it was so relatively soon they hadn't had much time to think about it it's just within the last week or so yeah so we've got to we've got to take some time and mold that one over and see how how uh how you can go forward we already had one resident that got up and said thanks so you need to have that but uh we'll see it's still some of the things that he had started you're going to continue correct the council wanted to continue doing some making those services or opportunities available to people yeah I think it's the dancing one yeah the dancing one I think Saturday mornings or something and they'll continue to do that up at city hall so we'll have there there'll be people helping out with that yeah we do know that mayor's not going to dance with his foot foot in that walking booth there no it's going to be a while before I dance again so so we do know that the work is going to be moving forward now on some of these big grants the community development block grants uh the north transmission main the new well that needs to be constructed uh I think uh earlier there was an indication we're going to try to secure some grant money for the water tower project uh there are some there's substantial and definitely could help reduce some of the cost right that would be that'll be that'll be huge the big thing is getting those done uh you did have and this is one where we see it and again city's eligible we got what a half a dozen or so properties that could use some rehabilitation work and the thing is uh we got a grant grant available that can do roofing right uh that doesn't happen very often no and that that'll be a huge thing because we talked about this before too even with the downtown grant um you know we're working on the facades well that's great but the roof is the main thing that so with housing that's you know my shop that I rebuilt that reason I had to rebuild it was because the roof went bad so roofs are the most important thing basically on a on a structure so once that goes the rest of it's going to go so it's great to be able to do that for now this is a grant you could get you just shy of about 200 000 but uh you are going to work with simmering quarry on this and and uh the city's been pretty successful with uh block grants with that yeah so that'll that will go forward and want to point out there's already I think identified a half a dozen half a dozen people that are eligible and will be participating in this I think that's already pretty well I know everybody's going what I didn't have a chance to apply well I might have to do a whole another round right we'll see what we can get get accomplished yeah okay uh some of the other things that came up what else did we have in there oh the uh insurance this is one of the benefits uh again packages they kind of ran through some of that information but uh pretty nominal increase in premium on your health insurance and and again some of the other benefits that are available to employees uh able to really with the funding streams that you're using and the way you're doing it uh not going to really have to pick up any additional all right so you're going to be able to move some money back and forth out of the different account lines and and have that all covered that's pretty good that's really good so we got that happening what other things uh did we have there he's looking at his list well you were the ordinance and this one generated some discussion but this one was from before we talked about it the arts advisory board oh yeah and the intent is still have it but it won't be in an ordinance yeah and it won't be its own board with that it's going to work through the economic development committee just because of the way the state came in and and you know they're doing a lot of different things where they'll come in and say you shouldn't do it this way or even though everybody pretty much did but now they're saying we probably shouldn't do it this way and it has to do with some grants and how you spend money and there's a lot to it but so we aren't going to completely get rid of the arts it's just going to be underneath a different it like I said it'll be under economic development probably have the same people involved and and we'll still look at doing projects so so I know at what you at one time you were all set you had a list of a number of people that were willing to serve on it you got a couple of council people that are interested in being involved yeah and so we'll just see what kind of structure they set up work in progress right now yeah yeah we were all ready to pull the trigger and I was going to point those folks and then all of a sudden that came up so we'll we just kind of moved it shifted it over but it's it'll still happen it's just like I said it'll be structured a little different we'll make it work yeah council did have a closed session meetings and again a couple were personnel related closed session one partial potential sale of property so also closed and otherwise keep going so yeah I have some committee meetings that'll be telling I think the one change that came that police chief john we both mentioned was the fair parade initially had planned to have it on Wednesday of the of the fair and moved it moved it back to Thursday so yeah because they said that they're going to start the fair on Wednesday now yeah so yeah but now they're still going to keep the her move it change it back or whatever but yeah the parade will be on Thursday the fair starts Wednesday parade is on Thursday so we'll we'll keep tabs when we get closer to that yeah night's on the green coming up postpone from last week I know they talked about it you had a couple of people involved with that and but warmer it'll be warmer it'll be warmer and bring the kids especially little kids yours are all older now yeah well and that's what I was going to say I was going to be there be able to be there for the first one on this past Friday well so I had planned to go to Kansas City to see my new grandson and now we're going next weekend so I won't get to be you won't get to be there either uh it's going to be downtown and uh some street closures in conjunction with that as well so yeah kind of the normal going for you appreciate you taking time to come and visit with us thank you Jim another council meeting coming up here yet this month and this will have a budget amendment for the current fiscal year budget which typical for the city and uh and then a couple of committee meetings that we're going to be having going on as well so yeah just keep things rolling along we try and there'll be more again you guys are going to learn more about what that property tax impacts could be and there'll be more information that'll be coming out on that as well hopefully hopefully it's minimal but yeah we'll find that out so Dave Cassati Mayor Boone our guest on our program today thank you Jim