Winfield council hears employee updates

By TRISHA PHELPS

Mt. Pleasant News

WINFIELD ? The Winfield City Council meeting Monday night was filled with updates and reports for the council members to hear.

The first update was from new city employee, Winfield Advocate Marcy Kinneberg.

?I am really excited to have Marcy (Kinneberg) on board,? said Mayor Chris Finnell. ?She is going to be able to help with a lot and chase down some of the things I kind of let fall to the back burner. I really look forward to that help.?

One of Kinneberg?s primary responsibilities include grant-writing for the city, something that since her Aug. 1 start date she has gotten quite the jump on.

?I started researching different grant opportunities and I found one that I am going to look further into,? said Kinneberg. ?I think this one would be a good opportunity and a good match for some of the projects we have talked about for here in town.?

The grant Kinneberg was talking about, noted Finnell, was one through Healthy Henry County Communities.

?Lindsay Remick (Wellness Coordinator for Henry County Health Center and a Winfield native) has a grant out there for healthy activities and there is one thing we can do and that is to get a kiosk for the volleyball park,? said Finnell. ?It would be kind of neat and it would be an actual structure with a map of Winfield.?

The next update came from the Crooked Creek Days committee chair Jennifer Huston.

?We haven?t had our (committee) meeting yet, but we obviously had Crooked Creek Days,? Huston said to the council to begin her update as she presented a rough estimate of her figures from the weekend celebration.

According to Huston, the committee sold 90 out of 110 t-shirts and 1,476 of the 1,500 buttons.

?We made 1,500 buttons and would have sold all of them had we picked up the extra buttons that were at the Beacon office before they closed,? said Huston.

Huston also noted the other fund-raising successes for the weekend such as the 50/50 raffles and the auction that was held.

?We still have some bills that are left to be paid, so I can?t say for sure bfore our committee meeting how much money we will have left after bills,? said Huston. ?It?s still pretty early for this update, but we do plan on donating ? like we do every year ? to a couple of local charities.?

Huston told the council there was a possibility of donating one large sum to one charity instead of dividing the amount to give to multiple local charities.

?We also have a committee member leaving and we have decided on a replacement for them,? said Huston. ?After our next meeting we might be one more member shy, which wouldn?t be a bad thing. So we will just have to wait and see,? concluded Huston.

The council also:

? Approved liquor licenses for Welcome Inn and Casey?s General Store.

? Approved the purchase of a laptop and software for the Winfield Advocate?s use.

? Discussed options on how to handle abandoned and dangerous buildings.

? Discussed the wellness challenge between Winfield and Columbus Junction and encouraged participants to increase their activity minutes in order to win the challenge.

The next Winfield City Council meeting will be Sept. 8 at 7 p.m. in city hall.