GC council votes to close public buildings

GRUNDY CENTER- The COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak seems to be the only topic on anyone’s mind at the moment, and the Grundy Center city council discussed it at length before opting to close public buildings for everyone besides essential staff during Monday night’s regular meeting.

“With the situation we’re in and the severity that we’re in, we need to be flexible and work with all of our employees going forward to make sure it’s handled the best way possible,” Mayor Al Kiewiet said. “Are we overreacting? We’ll never know, but if we choose to not react and something happens, we’ll know we underreacted. And that’s not the situation we want to be in.”

All of the buildings (City Hall, Kling Memorial Library, Fire/Ambulance Station, Community Center and the Upper Elementary) except for the YMCA for child care purposes and Tri-County Headstart will be closed to the public except for essential use and/or by appointment. A motion to move forward with the plan, along with a separate motion to approve the emergency preparedness protocol as written, carried 4-0 (Amanda Grineski was absent).

“The whole goal is to keep people from being out in the public,” Kiewiet said.

A member of the ambulance crew also spoke to the council and noted that despite some complaints of a perceived overreaction, the new strand of coronavirus isn’t similar to a cold or influenza because a treatment has not yet been discovered.

“We’re not 100 percent sure what’s going to kill it,” she said.

The council held a public hearing on the city budget for fiscal year 2021 with the same property tax levy rate as last year, at $15.27634 per $1,000 of valuation. The council voted unanimously to adopt the budget as presented.

CPA Rachelle Thompson presented an audit report for FY2019. Councilman Dave Stefl said that he had heard a few public comments wondering whether the city needed a highly skilled paramedic doing billing work as the EMS director.