Harrington City Council talks news

The Harrington City Council met Feb. 12, with council member Justin Slack chairing the meeting. Present were council members Nathan Luck, Peter Davenport and Levi Schenk, Clerk Janice Cepeda, Maintenance Supervisor Scott McGowan, Treasurer Mike Cronrath, Casie Monge and visitors Denisa Holling, Dave Buddrius, Billie Herron, Carol, Lorraine Gilliland, Tim Tipton, Marge Womach, Jay Gossett, Jill Barth and Lincoln County Undersheriff Kelly Watkins. Cherie MacClellan’s resignation from the position of mayor pro tem and from the council was accepted. Luck was appointed mayor pro tem, Slack assuring him that he would only have to handle the signing of checks and take care of issues at hand and that Slack would take care of other issues. Slack tabled the appointment of anyone to the council, even though Buddrius and Holling, former applicants for council positions, were both present.

Casie Monge discussed her position with Harrington as Level II Contractor for the water treatment plant, who was hired by former mayor Dillon Haas in Sept. of 2017. Haas told her that he was behind on paperwork but never revealed to her that the city was on probation. After discussing the details of how the recent $5,000 fine had been reinstated, Monge said she would furnish the council with her emails with the DOE and show how the change to a new form resulted in her response getting to them late.

Slack told the council he wanted to discuss “fact-checking of newspaper articles.” When Womach asked which facts he took issue with, he retorted, “We are not going to discuss this here. I’ll meet with you one on one.” Womach replied, “I won’t meet with you alone anywhere.” Slack conceded that he did not take issue with the news in The Odessa Record about the actual meeting but thought other comments about what took place after the meeting were inaccurate. Slack said that it looks bad for a city employee (city librarian Marge Womach), to write an article that makes the city look bad. The clerk then said that former clerk Bunny Haugan used to proofread the articles and that was why Slack wanted Womach to allow a council member or the clerk to edit future articles. Womach responded that it was not true that Haugan had proofread the articles but rather had only provided accurate spelling of names from time to time. Slack’s request did not sit well with Womach.

Since the Harrington council meetings are recorded, Womach had requested a transcription of the Jan. 8 meeting. The clerk assured her that a transcription would be provided prior to the Feb. meeting. When that did not happen, Womach made inquiries into hiring a certified transcriptionist to do the work. Debate ensued regarding who would pay for the transcription work. The council declined to pay for it. The issue of a transcription of the meeting came about due to the number of errors in the minutes. One of the council members at the February meeting asked to have approval of the minutes tabled until the March 11 meeting, so that those errors could be corrected.

Cepeda offered to order a book requested by the Harrington Historical Preservation Commission using her Amazon.com credit card. When Slack asked her when she got the credit card, she replied, “When you told me to get one.” Slack appeared surprised and said he didn’t know she had done so. Cepeda repeated, “You said to get one.”

Councilman Davenport made a motion to compensate Haugan and McGowan for vacation time not taken last December. Slack told the council that if no one makes a second, the motion dies. After a minute of so of silence, Slack said, “Well, I guess the motion died.” A visitor then said the council cannot override the former mayor’s decision.