Ahlschlager Sworn In
Clarence Ahlschlager Jr. officially joined the Schulenburg City Council at their meeting Monday night, Nov. 16. He replaces Place 4 Councilman Geoffrey Schiftli, who lost reelection by a vote of 528-337.
Pct 4 Justice of the Peace Dan Mueller administered the oaths of office to Ahlschlager and the two other councilmen who were re-elected unopposed: Larry Veselka and Ben Herzik.
After the formalities, Council voted down a proposal from Veselka to offer City-paid vision and dental benefits to employees. City Administrator Tami Walker originally proposed the new benefits at a meeting on Sept 8. The City did not budget any funds for employee pay raises next year. Around the same time, Fayette County Commissioners Court decided to extend dental and vision coverage to employees in lieu of raises.
Walker proposed doing the same for City of Schulenburg employees as a way of keeping City benefits competitive with the County and other similar employers. At the Sept 8 meeting, former Councilman Schiffli argued against the new benefits.
“I like the idea of doing this eventually” Schiffli said at the time. “But I want to take a bigger look at benefits. With what’s going on with COVID, a lot of companies are contracting, a lot of pay cuts, people aren’t getting cost-of-living raises and stuff like that. From a financial standpoint, I think it would not be prudent to take on additional costs here.”
Veselka made a motion at that meeting to provide the new benefits, but it failed for lack of a second.
Veselka said he requested the item to be placed on Monday night’s meeting agenda for reconsideration.
“I know the last time we tabled it, and I didn’t want to let it just carry over to next year,” Veselka said. “We’ve got some good employees and I’d like to keep them. If we lose them, its always hard to get somebody back We didn’t give them a raise this year. I know the County and several other cities around do offer dental and vision.”
Veselka said dental and vision benefits would only cost half as much as a cost-of-living wage increase for all employees. Under Veselka’s proposal, the City would pay the cost for employee dental and vision coverage. Employees would pay the cost of adding spouses or children to their plan.
At Monday’s meeting, Councilwoman Wendy Fietsam said she would not support the proposal at this time.
“We raised taxes this year, our City office is still not open and we’re getting a lot of complaints,” Fietsam said. “Not that our employees don’t deserve it, they for sure do.”
Veselka made the motion to offer employees dental and vision coverage. Ahlschlager seconded the motion. It failed by 3-2 vote, with Councilmembers Chip Bubela, Fietsam and Herzik voting against it.
After the vote, Bubela asked Walker to conduct a survey to determine how many employees would enroll in dental and vision insurance.
“I think it would be a great thing to offer all that with our health insurance,” Herzik said.
“We just need to make sure we budget for it,” Fietsam said.
Walker said the City was expecting a nine percent increase to the cost of employee health insurance this year when Council set the budget However, that increase never came. After the budget was set, the City’s insurance provider submitted their rates for next year which included no cost increase.
“The numbers are actually inflated in our insurance line item in the budget,” Walker told the Record after the meeting.
Walker said the City could use those excess funds to pay for the benefits. At the time when Council set the budget, however, there were no plans to use those funds for dental or vision benefits.
Council discussed new artwork for the water tower along Interstate 10. Council had previously budgeted $25,000 for the artwork. The water tower is currently undergoing routine maintenance and repainting by Industrial
“We all agreed that we want the tower to say Schulenburg Halfway to Everywhere,”’ City Administrator Tami Walker said.
Walker submitted an estimate from artist Rolf Goetzinger, who painted the eyecatching water tower along Interstate 10 in Katy, which features a flock of geese taking off in flight Goetzinger submitted an estimate of $29,500 for a design that Council ultimately turned down Monday night
Instead, Walker proposed contracting with Schulenburg Printing to design the artwork. The City would then pay Viking to paint it on the tower. Council unanimously authorized Walker to proceed with that plan.
In related news, Walker said the City is in negotiations to place a “Welcome to Schulenburg” sign at the future Texan convenience store, which will be built on the old Frank’s Restaurant property at the corner of Interstate 10 and US 77. Walker said she has been in talks with Schulenburg Economic Development Corporation to help pay for the entrance.
“We want it to be really nice, maybe something that says `Welcome to Schulenburg’ with a couple of flag poles,” Walker said.