The Athens City Council featured a representative from each district during its meeting Sept. 14. This was the first meeting since October 2019 in which each district had a representative present. Pictured from left are Council members Chris Seibert of District 1, Harold Wales of District 2, Frank Travis of District 3, Dana Henry of District 4, Wayne Harper of District 5 and Mayor Ronnie Marks.

Two separate crews of Athens city employees had requests to purchase new equipment granted during the meeting of the City Council on Sept. 14. The meeting marked the first time in nearly a year that all five districts had a representative on the Council.

The cemetery, parks and recreation department requested a new utility vehicle, while Athens Fire & Rescue asked for a new, updated model of a vehicle extrication tool.

Bert Bradford, the city’s director of cemetery, parks and recreation, requested the Council accept the low bid on a Jacobsen XD turf truck. Councilman Harold Wales asked Bradford for clarification on why his department needed another utility vehicle when they have others already.

Bradford said his staff are currently using smaller utility vehicles to move dirt after digging graves at Roselawn Cemetery, but the vehicles are too small and not powerful enough to handle the job. He said the graves were too close together to get larger vehicles into the necessary spaces, and there were issues with vehicles carving ruts into the grass of the cemetery that would have to be repaired later.

Wales thanked Bradford for the clarification on the matter, and the Council voted unanimously to make the purchase as part of the consent agenda.

James Hand, the city’s interim fire chief, requested the updated vehicle extrication tool in order to increase his department’s ability to extract drivers from larger vehicles after wrecks, especially truckers.

Hand was unable to attend the meeting due to a death investigation involving a pedestrian who was struck and killed by a vehicle, so Battalion Chief Torrey Downs spoke on behalf of the department. Downs said the request was made in order to put an updated extrication tool on Engine No. 3, which covers the southern side of the city, including U.S. 31.

Downs said there are a number of high-speed collisions and wrecks involving larger trucks in that area. The extrication tool currently used on Engine No. 3 is hydraulic and an older model. The new requested model is battery-powered, stronger and more mobile.

City Clerk Annette Threet said the purchase would be made using funds left over from the 2019 capital appropriation. The cost for the device is $30,051.

The Council voted unanimously to fund Hand’s request for the device.