By Lucky Kidd
IOLA, Kan. — An Oct. 15 show cause hearing was set by the Iola City Council Monday for a house at 710 North Street for which Code Services Officer Gregg Hutton was ordered by Municipal Court to initiate condemnation proceedings on, in an unusual move on the court’s part.
Since 2017 there have been 34 violations issued on this property over a variety of issues including junk and trash, broken and missing windows, abandoned vehicles, and an offensive odor coming from trash and food items kept on the porch, and this is just outside.
Hutton told the Council he intends to secure a court order allowing him to do an interior inspection. The home was reported to be currently occupied, and there was a sewer line break recently.
The Council discussed and set for possible action at their Sept. 9 meeting a proposal to change traffic patterns on South Street between Madison and Broadway. The plan, intended to address safety issues on the Madison end of the block, is to make South Street one way south.
Parking spaces along the east side of South would be re-angled to allow parking to continue on that side of the street. Action on the change was deferred to their next meeting to allow input to be obtained from business owners in that area.
The Council authorized submission of a Game On-Community Places to Play Grant. This grant, if awarded, would be used to make improvements to the Davis Athletic Fields, the first phase of which would be to add lights to allow more play into the evening hours and move flag football there.
The second planned improvement is to add an irrigation system and an overseeding of the fields to provide a better playing surface. This grant is a 50/50 match, with an award range of between 50 and 100 thousand dollars. The application is due Sept. 5, and the city will know if it received the grant in November.
In other actions, the council approved a change in the start time for Municipal Court from 3 to 5 p.m., to accommodate the schedule of City Prosecutor Brandon Cameron who is likely to be elected Allen County Attorney in November. It also reset the Revenue Neutral Rate and budget hearings for Sept. 9. Those hearings were to have taken place Monday, but the legal notice of the hearing was not submitted in time to meet legal requirements.
