Council approves needed purchases

Yoakum City Council approved the purchase of several necessities when the council met Tuesday, Oct. 10.

One of the purchases included a new patrol vehicle costing $71,500 for the Yoakum Police Department. The need for a new vehicle comes after one of the vehicles was reported to have several deficiencies.

“We took that vehicle out of service because of front-end damages,” Officer Leroy Brooks said.“I took it upon myself to tell my officers that if they were driving that vehicle to not pursue, I considered that vehicle that dangerous. In my 26 years here, we’ve always made sure we had good running equipment.That particular vehicle has 82,165 miles on it and 8,689 hours on it and all of that is idle time.I’m afraid that if that vehicle goes on patrol, in a few months’ time, we’ll need a new engine.”

Council also purchased a new street sweeper costing $336,500 for the Street Department. The funds will be transferred from sanitation reserves in the budget to streets.

“The current street sweeper (the฀department) is using right now is about 19 years old and is in very poor condition,” City Clerk Theresa Bowe said.

Finally, council purchased new breathing apparatus equipment in the amount of $30,121 for the Fire Department.

“This is a mandatory exchange we have to do every year for the department to stay in compliance with the state,” Bowe said.

A new garbage truck replacing a 2007 Ford was in consideration in the amount of $226,000. Council is still looking for proposals from Texas Disposal Systems and will give an update on  this purchase in November.

Other items on the agenda included:

• A contract was awarded in the amount of $1.2 million for the Yoakum Water Well 6B Project through the Texas General Land Office

• Sweet Home Sand and Gravel submitted a bid of $17,855 towards the 2023-24 Ditch Cleaning Contract.

• A request from the Yoakum Area Chamber of Commerce was approved to authorize the Yoakum Royalty to host a community involvement project in the Downtown District. This will allow the use of sidewalk chalk art on Oct. 28th as part of a fund-raising event.

• Council appointed Wayne Rudolph to the Yoakum Oak Grove Cemetery Association Board of Directors. There are still two open slots on this committee.

• Results are still pending from the parks grant, which was submitted earlier this summer to improve Yoakum parks.

• A total of 11 junked vehicles were collected.