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Revenues had a positive gain this month. This is the first time in several months we were in the black.  But we will not meet our revenue predictions for the year.  We suffered some financial setback due to several factors. One was the economy, the cut in our aid to subdivision monies and also people spending less decreases our local option sales tax.  The changes in our police dept, the cost of uniforms and the change to a more effective force that handles more than traffic has an adjustment period to go through.  The settlement of a costly lawsuit reduced some of our contingency money.  I am looking into several areas to increase revenue for the town.  It is hard to impose anything new because of the financial outlook this year.  I feel that we need to watch spending as much as possible, but there are still some things that must be addressed.  We will continue to work on grants and Terri and Shane have done a good job with this.  I wish that the water and sewer referendum had passed because this is a project that could have been listed on the infrastructure grant and a good part of this project if not all could have been paid for by the stimulus package.  Sooner or later water and sewer will come to Cottageville, and the cost only gets higher.  We did get several projects listed on the package and I will keep you posted on those developments.  I will continue to support business development because local option sales taxes provide such a large part of our revenue, and we do not have personal property taxes in place at this time.  That is why water and sewer in some form is so important to every citizen in this town.  Along those lines I will say this, a restaurant wanted to come to Cottageville a few weeks ago.  The water restrictions are so hard that they will probably go somewhere else, but that’s right we already have one restaurant.

We will be approaching county council tomorrow night on the increased jurisdiction for our police department. This will allow us to bring the cases through our court for the calls that we have been answering and turning over to the county.  Mutual aid is expensive and the town pays for all of the expense.  We perform mutual aid on almost a daily basis.  Increased jurisdiction will also provide safety for our citizens who are outside of our town limits.  Several items will have to be worked out, but this would be a great help to our town and the response time in the county.

I will be asking council, after executive session tonight, to approve renovation to the old school cafeteria to be used as a council chambers/court room.  We must get court off of this main road because of the limited parking.  There is no place to park, and safety is an issue.  In inclement weather people need to get out of the rain. These renovations will cost approx. $13,000, but I feel that this will provide safety for our employees and the start of the use of the old school facility.  If council approves this motion, we will be as cost effective as possible.  Anyone who would like to volunteer to do anything is welcomed.  We need things as simple as cleaning and picking up trash.  At the completion of this facility, I would like to dedicate this building to an individual or group of people, male or female that gave something back to the town.  I would request people to think of that person and make a recommendation to the town clerk in the form of a letter.

The town has been approached by several people wanting to use certain portions of the old school facility.  We will be looking at each of those to see what is best for the town.  People are thinking and some good ideas are out there to benefit of all of us.

I do want to thank all of the employees this month.  Things have been busy and I am impressed by their work. Terri has been working on our new business license ordinance, Dawn fought the battle of computer problems for about two weeks and the Officers have put in some interesting days to say the least.

Thank you all.
George M. White
Mayor of Cottageville