Residency ordinance relaxed for city employees

An ordinance that will change restrictions on residency requirements of city employees will soon go into effect.

The amended ordinance had a first reading at Tuesday's city commission meeting. The second and final reading will be at the next commission meeting on June 3.

The new ordinance would require all employees to live within Bourbon County. The current ordinance mandates that city workers must live within a five mile radius of the city limits.

Under the new guidelines, new employees are expected to establish residency no later than six months after they start the new position. Failure to meet the requirements shall be considered cause for dismissal.

Public safety employees must be able to report to their workplace within a 30 minute response time. That was an adequate amount of time according to the director of public safety's recommendation.

"The original thought was to expand the employee base and have more candidates for city jobs," City Manager Joe Turner said.

In December, the interim City Manager at the time, Bob Farmer, brought up the issue because the city at that time was facing a problem finding qualified people for skilled positions to work at the city. There were qualified people who applied for positions but they lived well outside the city limits and didn't want to move.

In other items at Tuesday's meeting, commissioners:

* Approved the rezoning of 213 Scott Ave. from central business district classification to a multi-family dwelling. According to the minutes from the Fort Scott Planning Commission meeting on May 5, USD 234 wants to use it for school purposes with no specific plans for the property yet.

* Approved a low bid of $1.75 million sent in by Kissick Construction Co. Inc. from Kansas City, Mo. The work will be for the Downtown StreetScape program that will involve infrastructure repairs to water lines and street lighting systems, side walks, benches and storm sewers. Work will start next month.

* Approved another application for the Fort Scott Downtown Facade Improvement grant for a building at 18 N. Main St. The applicant, Carol J. Cook, requested the work on the building that will include cleaning the exterior and repainting the front.