A morning fire at the Day’s Inn in Chillicothe lead to the evacuation of 22 people Monday.

According to Chillicothe Fire Chief Darrell Wright a heater in a vacant room of the hotel located at 606 W. Business 36 caused the fire around 7 a.m.

“It got to going pretty good before anyone noticed it,” said Wright.

When fire crews arrived on scene they they had to evacuate 22 people in 16 occupied rooms.

No injuries were reported however, there was extensive damage to two of the rooms.

Wright said the room where the fire started had damage and the room below sustained water damage as well as damage to the ceiling.

The cause of the fire was believed to be a short in the heater.

“It’s a common occurrence in those types of heaters in the motels,” said Wright.

 

As the St. Joseph School District looks at operating in the red for the coming school year the board of education considers giving staff a 2-percent raise even with the .63 operating levy in question.

During Friday’s school board meeting board members looked at considering actions for the 2015-16 salary schedules.

However, after the release of audit findings from state Auditor Tom Schweich stating the district has “failed to establish adequate policies and procedures regarding stipends, does not maintain adequate documentation of the stipend amounts paid to employees, and the School Board does not approve most stipends given to employees” the school board is looking at the need to do away with stipends completely.

“All stipends will roll into one total compensation,” said Doug Flowers SJSD Dir. of Human Resources. “The stipends itself, I know it’s an ugly word.”

Board member Chris Danford quickly replied, “Yeah it’s hitting the audit pretty bad, like 40-million dollars bad.”

The board had previously voted to approve a 2-percent raise for staff members for the upcoming school year during a January board meeting.

“The board had originally adopted a budget for this school year that was a $3.7 million dollar deficit budget,” Beau Musser, SJSD Chief Finance Officer told the St. Joseph Post. “What that means is we went into this year expecting to spend $3.7 million dollars more then we were going to bring in in revenue. Since the adoption of that budget we lost revenue from the state of Missouri for summer school. So revenues have gone down and expenses have gone up.”

Board member Kappy Hodges suggested during the meeting that in light of recent audit findings and Commerce Bank terminating its purchasing card agreement that the board look at not giving the 2-percent raise this school year and just giving a step which also comes with a raise.

“I would like to suggest that we change how we did that and go with just the steps instead of the 2-percent raise going forward,” said Hodges. “I’m concerned because the audit calls into question our financial well-being especially for next year, and the possible loss of the levy and such and then we have Commerce Bank pulling the credit cards from us which just kind of illustrates just how grim things are looking.”

However, in order to reconsider the board would have to vote unanimously.

Board Member Dennis Snethen said he feels it’s important to give staff members the 2-percent raise and do what the board said it was going to do.

Musser said currently the St. Joseph School District has around $40-million dollars in reserves but is operating on a deficit on salary and benefits for the upcoming school year.

“The board asked me if we could afford this last month and I said yeah if you have a plan to increase taxes the problem is the opposite looks to be heading our way,” said Musser during the meeting.

If the district were to lose the .63 tax levy in August, Musser said that’s an additional loss of $6.5 million dollars.

“Simple math would be for the next school year we’re looking at a deficit budget that could exceed $10 million dollars annually,” he told the St. Joseph Post. “That’s problematic because at that point to bridge a $10 million dollar gap in our budget that would require an increase in one dollar in our local property tax rate which is significant again because the St. Joseph School District hasn’t increased our taxes at all in 10 years.”

The board decided Friday to have another work session in the next two weeks to address the salary schedules before an action is taken.

Flowers said the board needs to make a decision before April 15th so that salary schedules can be inputted into the system and all positions that require contracts can be finalized.

In an effort to raise funds for Special Olympics of Northwest Missouri two women are freezing on a rooftop.

Katie Lyle and KJO 105.5’s Aaryn Sommers camped out on top of Apple Market on Frederick and 36 Saturday trying to raise money for Special Olympic athetes.

“We will be up on the roof until $2500 is raised,” said Sommers. “Anyone who gives $10 or more receives a free T-shirt or hat.”

As of 2:30 p.m. they had already collected $1400.

(February 21, 2015)—During the executive closed session Friday night, February 20, 2015, the
Board of Education voted to initiate the process to terminate Dr. Fred Czerwonka,
Superintendent of Schools, pursuant to the terms of his employment contract. The vote was 6-0;
board member Dan Colgan was absent.
No other votes were taken. As this is a personnel matter, the board will have no further comment
at this time.

The St. Joseph School Board of Education met Friday afternoon to review a number of items stemming from the results of Tuesday’s audit findings.

In attendance were Board President Brad Haggard, Vice President Martin Rucker and board members Dennis Snethen, Chris Danford, Lori Prussman and Kappy Hodges.  Dan Colgan was absent.

The first item on Friday’s agenda, the issue of finding another Purchasing Card Service Provide after receiving notification Thursday of the pending termination of the district’s commercial card agreement between Commerce Bank and the district.

According to the St. Joseph School District, Commerce Bank gave the following reasons for cancellation:  “1) Current Year Deficit Budget, 2)Loss of $.63 levy, further exacerbating our deficit budget for the 15/16 School year, 3)Ongoing FBI Investigation, 4) General turmoil at the SJSD.”

“I feel like we’re going to have other banks wanting to offer that service to us,” said Beau Musser.  “I don’t necessarily have concerns about having to do a new credit card program.  The concern is that a local bank has decided they don’t want to do business with us because of our current financial condition.”

Musser said the district has issued requests for a new purchasing card system and expects responses due back next Friday.

The board also discussed salary schedules for the 2015-16 school year and the audit report findings.

Haggard said the board is going to work hard to resolve the audit findings and make those steps available for the public to have access to.

“People can see the recommendations, they can see progress on it,” said Haggard. “From here forward, everyone of our committee meetings, everyone of our board meetings we’re going to talk about updating progress on the audit findings.”

Haggard said all of that information will be made available online on the St. Joseph School District’s website for the public to access.

 

 

The St. Joseph School Board will meet Friday afternoon to consider a number of important issues including the withdrawal of banking services.

Commerce Bank issued a letter to the St. Joseph School District Thursday giving the district notice that it is terminating its Commercial Card Agreement between Commerce and the school district effective June 1, 2015.

According to information included in the St. Joseph School District agenda for Friday’s Board of Education Meeting the district received a phone call from Commerce Bank February 11th information the district of the plan to cancel the card program.  Originally the cancellation was to be effective 4/1/14, however that date has been pushed back to 6/1/2015.

According to the St. Joseph School District, Commerce Bank gave the following reasons for cancellation:  “1) Current Year Deficit Budget, 2)Loss of $.63 levy, further exacerbating our deficit budget for the 15/16 School year, 3)Ongoing FBI Investigation, 4) General turmoil at the SJSD.”

This follows Tuesday’s audit findings of “poor” given by State Auditor Tom Schweich.

The Board is also expected to review 2015-16 Salary Schedule Actions, and an audit review.

The meeting is scheduled for 3 p.m. and is open to the public.

JEFFERSON CITY – Another round of winter weather is expected to affect driving conditions in Missouri tonight and through Saturday. The mix of precipitation could include ice and snow for much of the state. Missouri Department of Transportation crews will be out in full force to treat roads during and after the storm. Motorists are advised to check road conditions before they travel and avoid travel if it all possible especially with potential icy conditions.

MoDOT adjusts its practices to deal differently with each storm and tries to return major roads to near-normal driving conditions as soon as possible after a storm’s end. Because MoDOT can’t possibly clear all 34,00 miles of state highways immediately after a snowstorm, the department has set priorities for which roads to clear first.

Roads with the highest traffic volumes are plowed or treated first. These roads include interstates and other heavily traveled state routes, which receive ongoing operations in a storm. Lettered and numbered routes with lower traffic volumes are plowed to allow for two-way traffic, with concentration on hills, curves, and intersections. Traffic on these roads may have more snow on them until the higher-volume roads are mostly clear.
As soon as possible after a storm ends, our goal is to return highest traveled routes to mostly clear conditions and to plow and treat the critical areas of hills, curves and intersections on all other routes.

Motorists who need to travel are advised to bring a cell phone and winter survival supplies. Current road conditions are posted on MoDOT’s Traveler Information Map at http://traveler.modot.org/map/.  The map is also available as an app on your mobile device.

St. Joseph Mayor Bill Falkner wants the community to look at moving forward in light of recent “poor” audit findings of the St. Joseph School District.

“We have a lot of good things going for this community but we can’t sit back and wait for things to happen. We have to keep pushing forward,” said Falkner. “We had disappointing news in the school board audit but if we use this in a very positive way to make the changes that need to be made I believe the school district will come out stronger then ever.”

That comes after State Auditor Tom Schweich released audit findings Tuesday that indicate the school district allegedly gave more than $25 million in unauthorized stipends to administrators since 2001 and possibly more than $40 million over the past 14 years.

“Let’s correct it, let’s move forward and not lose sight that there’s still teachers working very hard in the schools teaching our kids,” said Falkner. “That cannot go unnoticed.”

Mayor Falkner gave his annual State of the City address Friday morning during the St. Joseph Chamber of Commerce’s St. Joe Rising event with around 150 people in attendance.

Falkner told the St. Joseph Post there are a lot of things coming up for the City of St. Joseph.

“We’ve got a use tax coming up which is vital to get it passed anyway, but it will help fund street projects.  The council has made it pretty clear we’re wanting to use the additional funds from the use tax to do the streets,” said Falkner.

The use tax is up for vote on the April 7, 2015  ballot. St. Joseph residents will be asked to decide on a local use tax of 2.875% on out-of-state purchases with a 10-year sunset clause.

The ballot reads, “Shall the City of St. Joseph, Missouri, impose a local use tax on out-of-state purchases for a period of 10 years at the same rate as the local sales tax rate, currently Two and Eight Hundred Seventy-Five One Hundredths of One Percent (2.875%), in order to preserve existing general fund revenues and provide revenues for streets maintenance activities and to eliminate an inequity between in-state and out-of state businesses due to a recent Missouri Supreme Court decision, provided that if any local sales tax is reduced or raised by voter approval, the respective local use tax rate shall also be reduced or raised by the same action? A use tax return shall not be required to be filed by persons whose purchases from out-of-state vendors do not in total exceed Two Thousand Dollars ($2,000.00) in any calendar year.”

Falkner said it’s also important for people to realize that the city has to spend money on amenities like bike trails, hiking trails, and parks to attract businesses.

“We have to have a workforce here in order to attract businesses,” said Falkner. “You have to have people that want to live here and in order to do that you have to offer them something.”