Knox City Council Reviews New Park Board Ordinance

Knox City Council #2
Back Row: Mayor Rick Chambers, Ed Blue, Clerk-Treasurer Jeff Houston, Greg Matt and Attorney David Matsey. Front Row: Linda Berndt, Jeff Berg and Ron Parker

The Knox City Council reviewed a new Park Board Ordinance at its meeting this week.

“This was brought about when we were doing our five year plan,” said Mayor Chambers. “Our five year plan was sent to OCRA for approval and they found that our original park plan was outdated by state statute. It had to be newer than what ours was so Dave [Matsey, City Attorney] has put together this ordinance and it is almost identical to the old one. There’s very little difference. It’s right out of the state statute books.”

The only changes in the new ordinance had to do with establishing a Capital Improvement Fund and language for accepting gift funds. The size of the Board would remain the same with four members appointed by the Mayor and one each by the Library Board and School Board.

Two questions came out of the discussion that delayed approval of the ordinance. One had to do with how long the Library Board and School Board member’s terms were, and the other was whether the Council needed to approve the acceptance of gift funds.

The ordinance will be revisited after research done on these two issues.