After three months of trial, road grader districts in the northern part of Lyon County will go back to five districts instead of four.
Three months ago, Lyon County commissioners voted to combine five road grader districts into four. During Thursday morning’s action session, commissioners told County Engineer Chip Woods to return the districts to the original five. Woods said there is more road to travel in the area and it has cost the county more than 1,000 gallons of extra fuel in those three months for four graders to do the work of five. Woods said there also have been more complaints about roads in the area.
“In view of the reports we have, I’m still glad we tried it because there’s been discussion of it over the years,” said Lyon County Commissioner Bob Davis. “This was probably a bad place to try it because it’s so vast with a lot of miles. ... I pushed for it and I’ll be the first to admit it was a mistake.”
Woods did not support the change three months ago; however, he said everybody gave it their best shot.
The five districts will go back into effect Jan. 1.
In other business, commissioners heard the November end of the month report from Bobbie Agler of A&M Consultants. Agler said the county is in good shape with $12,056,000 unencumbered cash and revenues are still running higher than budgeted.
Agler said lower commodity prices could help make up for loss in revenue — as long as they stay low.
“It’s very positive that it’s going to be there as a possibility,” Agler said.
Agler said overtime is about 11.1 percent over last year’s figure, but it’s still below this year’s budgeted amount.
“I personally think when it comes to the budgeting process, a little more careful estimates were made this year...” Agler said. “I don’t view this as a negative, though.”
Commissioners also set a hearing date to republish the 2008 budget. The hearing will be at 10 a.m. Dec. 24. Funds that will be republished are road and bridge, community corrections adult, CERT grant, court trustee, JV community initiative, special road and bridge machinery, register of deeds tech, motor vehicle, noxious weeds equipment, special road and bridge, courthouse bonds, sales tax revenue, jail improvement, surplus sales tax and tort liability.
The commission approved rezoning the Apostolic Tabernacle Church site. The land will be rezoned from agriculture to commercial to allow a second sign on the church property.
Kevin Hanlin, Lyon County zoning assistant, said the item came with an approval recommendation from the Lyon County Planning and Appeals Board. The church, located at 1827 Road G, can only have one sign in an agricultural district. The church originally was allowed in an agricultural district by a previous board’s vote, Hanlin said. A general commercial zoning vote would allow them to have another sign. The church has one sign on the building but wants a ground sign. The ground sign cannot be more than 30 feet tall and cannot have chasing lights.