News

Clarendon College Regents approved an $8.9 million budget for Fiscal Year 2012 during their regular meeting Thursday, August 18.

The overall budget includes a previously approved increase in tuition and deals with about $400,000 of lost funding from state budget cuts, college officials say.

CC Dean of Administrative Services Annette Ferguson said the college will lose more than $100,000 in revenue from the state cutting funds to classes in prisons in Childress and Pampa but said CC hopes to make up that loss with a new nursing program in Childress.

The college is also bearing a greater share of the cost for employee health benefits and is paying a new one percent surcharge fee to participate in the state’s retirement program.

CC President Phil Shirley said the budget reflects the fact that state funding for higher education continues to wane, shifting the cost of education more to the student.

College employees won’t be getting a raise in the new budget, but Shirley said the college will pay a $400 stipend to employees on December 15.

“We wanted to do something to show we appreciate them by some monetary means,” the president said. “We wish it could be more.”

To support the new budget, the Clarendon College District is proposing adopting the effective tax rate of $0.2221 per $100 valuation, which would bring in the same local tax revenue as last year of approximately $400,000. The current tax rate is $0.2219. Regents will consider and adopt a tax rate next month.

No one attended a public budget hearing held immediately prior to the board meeting.
In other college business, Regents acknowledged the resignations of baseball coach Mike Silva and library director Reagan Silva; approved the hiring of cashier Sharon Jones; and acknowledged the assignment of new duties to faculty members Melissa McCoy as division director and Dr. Robert Taylor as administrative assistant to the Dean of Institutional Research. The board also voted to extend the bank depository contract with Herring Bank by two years.

A group of Hedley citizens want to legalize the sale of alcoholic beverages in that city as a way to bring more business to town.

Tonja Ruthardt, owner of Uncle Bob’s convenience store, published notice of her application for a local option petition in this week’s Enterprise and plans to circulate a petition this week calling for the legalized sale of alcoholic beverages and mixed drinks in Hedley.

The application has been signed by Ruthardt and nine other Hedley citizens.

“I know some people are against it, and I don’t mean any disrespect or want to cause any hurt feelings,” Ruthardt said, “but our town needs the money and I need the business.”

If the petition and later election are successful, Ruthardt said she wants to sell beer and possibly wine in her store to keep more business in Hedley.

“People are going to drink,” she said. “Now they are going to Estelline or Howardwick. Why not have it here?”

Hedley Mayor Dusty Wilkinson says he has mixed feelings on the issue but he looks at it from a revenue standpoint.

“We’re losing a lot of money now,” Wilkinson said. “We’re down 20 percent in our water revenue with the current drought restrictions, and it’s only going to get worse.”

The latest figures from State Comptroller Susan Combs also show Hedley is losing sales tax revenue, seeing its August allocation drop more than 15 percent and being down more than 13 percent for the calendar year-to-date.

“The city could use the money from alcohol sales,” the mayor said. “We’re trying not to raise utilities or taxes. We’ve got a big portion of people here on fixed incomes and Social Security. A small increase in utilities could mean a meal for them.”

Ruthardt says 35 percent of the people in Hedley who voted in the last governor’s election must sign the petition in order to call an election, and she believes she will have no trouble gathering the signatures.

The Clarendon Board of Aldermen took no action on the topic of restricting private water wells inside the city limits when they met last Tuesday, August 9.

About a dozen citizens were in attendance after word spread about the agenda item, which City Administrator Lambert Little said was not intended to be taken as a ban on water wells.

“I didn’t mean to cause this much consternation,” Little told the board, noting that he really had three concerns about water wells.

Safety was the administrator’s first concern. He said the city needed to be sure that there was no cross connections between private wells and the public water system. His second concern was the city’s ability to pay its responsibilities to Greenbelt Water Authority if everyone in town went to private wells. And he said infrastructure was his third concern, expressing his thoughts that everyone should pay at least a minimum water charge to the city for infrastructure and fire protection.

The board generally agreed with the first point that private wells did not need to be cross connected with the city water system, but Alderman Tommy Hill seemed to speak for the majority of the board in thinking that the second point would never be an issue.

“There are probably only five to ten people that can realistically afford to drill a well; and if the loss of five or ten accounts is a big deal to the city, then we have bigger financial problems,” Hill said.

Little asked the board if the city could at least explore permits or some method to keep up with wells, but board members including Hill said they believed the groundwater district already has rules for that.

In other water related news, the board approved a resolution stating the city’s intent to supply the volunteer fire department with adequate water for fire protection regardless of water restrictions or allotments in the drought contingency plan.

Aldermen also discussed bulk water sales prices. Little said he felt it was unfair to ask citizens to reduce their water usage but continue to sell bulk water for $4 per 1,000 gallons. Aldermen approved a motion to increase the price of bulk water to $10 per 1,000 gallons.

And in other business, the board approved contributing $3,500 to the Les Beaux Arts Festival from the city’s Motel Bed Tax Fund.