By Jennifer Stultz
Tri-County Tribune Editor
*From meeting minutes supplied by City Clerk Christy Gibson

The City of Greensburg council met for regular business December 2, 2024 with council president calling the meeting to order due to early absence of Mayor Matt Christenson.

Council present included Mark Trummel, Nathan Charlton, Haley Kern, Pam Reves, and Wayne Keeton. Administrator Stacy Barnes and City Clerk Christy Gibson were present.

There were no citizen comments offered a the beginning of the meeting and the council moved into the discussion of 2025 employee benefits after the arrival of Rhonda Fernandez, Professional Insurance Consultants. Fernandez reviewed employee insurance renewal options which included a Kansas Only Network (not recommended), the current BCBS plan which has significant premium increases planned, Aetna, and a KMIT coverage option that flows through BCBS. Fernandez said the KMIT coverage has a fixed rate rather than age based and for compared benefits, if not better benefits, would save the city and employees significantly in premiums.

She said the KMIT plan has four tiers of premiums (employee, employee + spouse, employee + child, and employee + family). “With the premiums not being age based this allows for more equally applied benefits across employees,” Frenandez said. “As the KMIT group grows, its credibility grows. There will be better concessions the closer this group gets to 500 participants.”

Keeton asked if the city offered an FSA plan. Barnes and Fernandez verified that this had been offered in years past but did not have a lot of participation. The FSA plan would allow for an untaxed payroll deduction into a health savings account. Keeton said she would like to see the city revisit the FSA option, noting that it comes at little cost to employees and little risk to the employer. Fernandez noted that funds contributed to an FSA can now be rolled over to the next year instead of the previous “use or loose” requirement. Fernandez said that the city would need to seed the fund with 3 months’ worth of funding for of whatever employees may use for the year. She will bring back FSA info to the December 16 council meeting.

Concerning an issue brought to a previous meeting, the council unanimously passed Ordinance #1125 repealing a prior Chapter II, Article 4 Pit Bull Dogs specification. Barnes said Ordinance 1125 would make official the changes to the Animal Control code that now would apply to pit bulls and pit bull mixes, to be handled like any other breed.

An extensive COLA discussion resulted in a Council consnsus to allow 2.4 percent for COLA to better take care of city employees. Barnes advised that she would prepare a resolution for the next meeting to reflect that change.

In other business, the council:

* heard Barnes report on a virtual meeting with KPP and USDA regarding a groundbreaking ceremony for the PACE solar project. Plans are being made to host the groundbreaking at the Greensburg location. Barnes will advise Council when a date has been selected and details are available.

* were updated on how Greensburg successfully hosted state football games and offered open houses at Big Well Museum, with credit to many local volunteers. Heather Bailey, Tourism Director, did a great job helping to promote what Greensburg has to offer visitors coming in for the games. Councilwoman Kern did a great job decorating hay bales for each team and contacting schools to come add to the decorating. She also worked the pass gate all day. Public Works employees Cale Thompson and Justin Claussen made wood backing for welcome banners and placed them along the highway. Chief Dennis Davis, Officers Matt Woods and Justin Moore assisted where needed. Gibson, Thompson and Barnes volunteered to assist in various capacities that day as well. Barnes recognized how great it was great to see so many people involved to make this weekend happen. She said she has heard some great feedback and hopes it was also successful for local businesses.

Kern said she too had heard very positive comments about the event. Trummel mentioned that Greensburg has the only 8-man regulation turf field in the State. Keeton asked if this will be an annual event. Barnes said the event retains its location annually unless there is a major issue or the location does not want to continue to host.