The Voice of the Community Since 1909, Serving Moorcroft and Pine Haven, Wyoming
The Voice of the Community Since 1909, Serving Moorcroft and Pine Haven, Wyoming
Eleventh hour invoice problem solved by council
Moorcroft is being compelled by USDA to approve and pay outstanding bills of approximately $167,849 in total for lagoon design by HDR Engineering. These must be paid before the town is allowed to conduct the third and final reading of the ordinance that allows the town to use sewer revenues as partial payment of loans for the lagoon project.
These outstanding invoices are refundable. However, the town has hesitated to pay due to financial considerations.
Barbara Bonds, the town’s bonding attorney, had spoken with Lorraine Werner, USDA Community Programs Director/Acting Housing Program Director and in turn explained to Clerk/Treasurer Cheryl Schneider and HDR’s Heath Turbiville the previously unknown problem. The payment of said bills must be approved by both the town and Rural Development.
Rural Development will roll this design loan into the project loan they already have in place for the project, and will be the second approval necessary for payment in the future.
Turbiville expounded on the new state of affairs: “Normally, the invoices aren’t getting approved by the council until they’re on the bill list and they can’t get on the bill list because you haven’t had the funds available to pay them. So technically, you haven’t approved them yet. So moving forward, you will need our invoices in the same manner you do the contractors’ at the council meeting when we submit them so they can be passed on to Rural Development. ”
With the contractor preparing to be onsite in September, the governing body questioned the short notice as the town has been holding these invoices for some time.
“We’ve sat through conference calls where it sounded like everything’s a go,” said Schneider, “and we’ve not heard anything about this until just recently.”
Turbiville noted, too, the USDA’s lack of answer: “They haven’t been very responsive in telling [us] everything that needs to be done in order to get it finalized.” However, this lack of informative contact does not change the matter at hand.
The domino effect is in play here: the contractor plans to be onsite in September, but the entire funding for the project is on hold until the third reading releases revenues for said project and Turbiville expressed HDR’s reluctance to have work begin without the funding in place. The third reading cannot be accomplished before the outstanding invoices are approved by the town and Rural Development so time has become an issue.
Mayor Dick Claar summed the situation up: “If this contractor starts to mobilize, he needs to know it’s a go.” Councilman Dale Petersen agreed, saying, “We don’t want to do anything on our parts that will cause an issue.”
The council approved paying the $167,849 and will conduct a special meeting for the third reading of the ordinance when Rural Development also approves the funds, ensuring the project start date will not be affected.
Schneider advised the body that this would be the procedure for all of the billing from HDR in the future per USDA and Rural Development requirements.
