Arriving in the midst of chaos and leaving after a pandemic is how City Manager Dave Slezickey described the service of Kingfisher Mayor Steve Richards and Commissioner Tammy Mueggenborg.

Both were honored Monday night as they stepped down after completing two terms of service.

Slezickey’s comments referred to the period of city government upheaval eight years ago when citizens circulated successful recall petitions that resulted in the election of Richards and Mueggenborg.

Both were re-elected to second terms, the maximum consecutive terms of office allowed by the city charter.

For Richards, his most recent tenure as mayor caps off 24 years of service to the city over the past 40 years, Slezickey noted.

Richards served two terms as city commissioner from 1989-97 and another two years from 2003-11, including a stint as interim mayor following the death of then mayor Richard Flood.

“I’m proud of these commissioners and so impressed with our city employees and department heads,” Richards said.

“I’m proud of the changes we’ve made and of the people involved.

“I especially want to recognize my wife (Myrna) who has been my rock and my strength.”

During his term of office, Richards has been named small city Mayor of the Year and Kingfisher’s Citizen of the Year.

Slezickey played a video honoring the retiring mayor and read a litany of the city’s accomplishments during the tenures of both Richards and Mueggenborg.

“Both Steve and Tammy have been assets to the city during their service,” Slezickey said.

City Attorney Jared Harrison administered the oath of office to newly-elected Mayor Roxie Alexander and Commissioner Kyle Mecklenburg, allowing Richards and Mueggenborg to be released from the meeting.

Filling the Vacancy

One of the first actions of the newly constituted board of commissioners was to decide how to fill the remaining eight months in the commissioner’s seat vacated by Alexander in her move to the mayor’s post.

Alexander, Mecklenburg and fellow commissioners Wendell Prim and Bill Tucker voted to fill the remainder of the term by appointment, which would still leave the appointee eligible to run for election for two more terms.

Any registered voter who resides within the city limits can submit a letter of interest for the vacant position through July 24 and commissioners will vote on the appointment at a special meeting later this month to allow the new commissioner to be seated at the regular August meeting.

Letters must be submitted in a sealed envelope and mailed or dropped off at City Hall, Slezickey said.

Letters of intent may not be submitted electronically, he said.

On Alexander’s recommendation, commissioners also voted unanimously to name Prim as vice mayor.

Still Strong Financially

Despite the twin calamities of the months’ long coronavirus shutdown and the oil price collapse, Kingfisher finished out its fiscal year still solidly in the black, City Treasurer Anita James reported to commissioners.

“On the city side, we ended the year with a gain of $243,000,” James said. “Our sales tax totals are hanging out at around 2017 amounts (before the recent boom in drilling in the STACK oil play).”

“We’re OK,” Slezickey said. “We don’t have the drilling we once had but we managed to get a lot done this year and still come out ahead.”

Slezickey said the “slimmed down” budget for 2021 approved last month by the city commission was based on a rolling five year sales tax average, subtracting out 2018 and 19, when oilfield activity boosted revenues to extraordinary levels.

“We fully expect revenue to come back up over the course of the year and when it does, we can amend our budget to account for that,” he said.

“This past year (2019-20) was a highly unusual fiscal year and the fact that we were able to end it and still post a gain is really encouraging,” he said.

New Police Station?

After some discussion, commissioners approved a committee to explore and possibly negotiate the purchase of the former Kingfisher County Department of Human Services building for a new police department.

The building, which is privately owned, is on the market after OKDHS closed Kingfisher and more than 30 other county offices last month.

Although the agenda allowed for discussing the possible purchase in a closed executive session, commissioners instead chose to hold the discussion in open session.

The 4,500-square-foot building, located just off South Main Street north of Payless Inn, is situated on a half-acre of land.

“It provides for our current needs plus room for expansion,” Slezickey said. “At some point, a separate building would have to be constructed for evidence storage, but that doesn’t have to happen right away.”

Slezickey said the city could buy the building for cash out of its general improvement fund.

The current police station was constructed in 1949 and at one time was the city’s public library before the current library was built.

The police force has outgrown the building and most officers are sharing offices and desks, Slezickey said.

“We have one table that is used for interviews, for sorting and bagging evidence and for eating our lunches,” Chief David Catron, who was present at the meeting, said.

“Lack of space is our biggest problem there, but there are other problems just because it’s such an old building.”

Slezickey said a new police department was not an immediate capital improvement priority, but the unexpected opportunity to buy a suitable building for much less than it would cost to build is worth investigating.

“We looked at the building and it’s structurally sound and has a lot of features that will work well as a police department,” Slezickey said.

Mecklenburg expressed some reservations about the location at the south edge of town and away from downtown.

“Location is not as material for a police department as it is for a fire department,” Slezickey said. “Most of the time, officers are out on patrol and visible to the community and it’s a location people are already familiar with if they need to come in and file a report.”

Commissioners appointed a committee consisting of Slezickey, Alexander and Mecklenburg to explore the possible purchase.

Sales Tax Election

Commissioners directed City Attorney Jared Harrison to prepare a resolution calling for the half-cent capital improvement sales tax vote on the November general election ballot.

The election had been scheduled for April, but when that election date was postponed to June 30, commissioners voted to rescind it until the economy had time to recover.