LINGLE – Mayor Micah Foster called the Lingle Town Council meeting to order at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, April 23. Present at the meeting were council members Shelly Duncan, Jeff Jerome, Kathy Wilhelm and Tabitha Lambert. Also present at the meeting were town treasurer clerk, Ritch Reyes, town supervisor, Logan Dailey, Endra Andrews police chief and Nakisha Garner, town clerk.

After the Pledge of Allegiance, a motion was made to accept the evening’s agenda. The motion was seconded and the agenda was adjusted to include unfinished business of approving a Wyoming Municipal Court Conference for the town clerk and under new business, the council added an Arbor Day Proclamation to the evening’s agenda. A software update on billing was also added under new business to the agenda.

Moving on to the approval of the April 9 meeting minutes, a motion was made by Wilhelm which was seconded. The motion carried by vote and the minutes were approved as presented. 

The council moved on to the public comment portion of the meeting where they heard from Wyoming Child and Family Development, represented by Jessica Rohrer and Deborah Grandy. 

“We are with Wyoming Child and Family Development and I am Jessica Rohrer. I am the director of RCIE and Safety. I was previously a center director at the Lincoln Infant Toddler Center,” Rohrer explained. 

“I’m Deb Brandy. I’m the director currently at TLC,” Grandy said.

“We provide early childhood services to Goshen County and nine other counties. We currently have 12 sites that we serve in Wyoming. We serve children birth to five. We are a free program that we provide for families. And in Goshen County, we are the CDC services. So, we provide all the disability and diagnostic testing for kids with disabilities. We do free screenings to get that early intervention for children,” Rohrer said. “We provide speech services, therapy, occupational therapy services. We have early Head Start and Head Start. And we also go into other childcares and other free schools that provide services to kiddos in those areas. We do serve outlying areas like Chugwater, La Grange. We have a Head Start or a home-based program in Crook and Western County. So, all of the outlining counties that have trouble getting into a center,” Rohrer stated.

“We provide all the screening services. We screened 140 children last year, January 1 to December 31 or 24. And of those, 60 children are currently receiving services. So, early intervention is just an investment in our future,” Grandy explained.

The council agreed to continue their $600 contribution to the center. A motion was made to donate $600, which was already budgeted to the center. The motion was seconded and carried by vote. 

Moving on to departmental reports, Andrews spoke to the council. 

Andrews reported she had attended the Lingle-Ft. Laramie High School career day and she had multidisciplinary team meetings and court visits to attend. 

In absence of Anna Barnes, town attorney, the council moved on to obtaining the town supervisor’s report. 

“There’s an Arbor Day Proclamation in front of you. I see that we added that to new business but Monday we will be doing our celebration for Arbor Day. Arbor Day is Friday. Then Monday we’ll be getting together with the school and planning at least three more trees. I’ll have to look. It might be two more, but we’ll be planting more trees with them,” Dailey explained to the council. “The proclamation is part of the requirement for Tree City.”

Dailey also noted his department had been cleaning out the pool and getting sprinklers started. He further explained he needed to repair at least one sprinkler. 

“Then the pool, we’re planning to have it open for the pool staff [on] May 21 and then I think they’re going to open the first part of June,” Dailey said. “We’re trading in our Walker mower. The right-side hydrostatic transmission is going out and I talked to Brown [Company] about it.” 

According to Dailey, considering the cost to repair the mower, a discussion ensued about trading the Walker mower to get two other mowers to replace it. 

“The total cost to us, after the trade is $8,900. We do have that money and then some in our budget from the sale of the equipment last year. So, we’re going to be getting two mowers for the price of one,” Dailey explained.

The council jumped ahead in the agenda to present and vote on the Arbor Day Proclamation. A motion was made to accept the proclamation which was quickly seconded. Foster read the proclamation and the document was signed. 

There was no Lingle Fire Department report provided at the meeting and the council moved on to the town’s administrative items from Reyes. 

“I’ve renewed our SAM or our system for award management annual registration. It’s been renewed and came back approved by the government,” Reyes said. “I created our report for ARPA COVID relief funds that were awarded in 2020 because even though we had expended those funds, we still have to submit an annual report. There was nothing to report because our funds have already been expended. Then, I submitted a progress report for the community center to the Wyoming Business Council,” Reyes said. “So, that is annual report that is finished.”

Next, the council moved on to unfinished business where they discussed Garner attending the Wyoming Municipal Court Conference. After a bit of discussion, the council voted to approve paying for Garners training. 

Under item eight of the agenda, the council agreed to amend ordinance number 373, re-enacting section 2-1A-3 of ordinance number 285, to increase the license fee for liquor licenses in the town from $900 to $950. A motion was made to accept the amended ordinance which was quickly seconded. The motion carried. 

Next the council moved on to new business where they discussed the approval of employee group health insurance renewal for the FY2026.

In discussion, Duncan stated she would like to further discuss the item and the council agreed to table the item for the next meeting. 

Next the council moved on to approving the town spring summer newsletter. During the discussion, a motion was made to move the September town council meetings to September 10 and 24 to avoid Labor Day, which carried by vote. 

Garner noted the tree board was also going to be including information in the newsletter.

Garner then spoke to the council on software for the town. 

“There are two proposals there. One proposal is for the cloud and that would take our software and put it so that it would be on both computers so that Ritch [Reyes] can access it on his computer as well as mine. It’s all on my hard drive. So, it’s my only computer,” Garner explained. 

The council requested Garner collect more information on the software. 

In council items for discussion, Duncan mentioned she would be participating in a financial literacy program on May 7 and she requested the council members to attend. 

With no further items to discuss, Foster asked for a motion to adjourn the meeting. The meeting was adjourned at 6:31 p.m. to reconvene May 14 at 6 p.m