Atlantic Mayor Dave Jones,Wednesday evening, issued a reminder to residents and business owners alike, about improper placement of signs on City right-of-ways and parking lots.

Jones said he’s spoken with Kris Erickson, City Code Enforcement Officer, and Chief of Police Dave Erickson, about persons who repeatedly place signs (such as garage sale yard sale and/or business sale) in parking lots and in the right-of-ways, on utility poles and street sign posts. He said as time allows, Police Officers will take the signs down and bring them to the Police Department. The owner of the sign or signs, will have to pay, in order to get them back. He hinted two businesses, one on each side of town, are among those who are repeat offenders, with regard to signs in parking areas.

In his report to the Council, City Administrator John Lund, said they are moving forward on plans for a mandatory City-wide garbage/refuse service. That includes integration of the two, existing private services. It will be a while though, before anything is set in stone on the matter. Lund said also, he’s anticipating a big deduction from the State in the form of the Local Option Sales Tax (or, LOST) receipts.
He said the numbers coming down from the State are “Very bad,” and that he may recommend a revised allocation resolution in December.

It all depends on how much the reconciliation check is. Right now, it appears as though the LOST funds will be anywhere from $10- to 20-thousand less than anticipated, or around $60,000 instead of $70-thousand. Lund said he intends to make sure the Community Promotion Commission and the Parks are getting the funds they were anticipating. Some the revenue from LOST to the Street Fund could be decreased to compensate for any shortage. That shouldn’t affect that particular fund, when money still needs to be drawn down from bond funding.

During the Council Committee reports, Councilman Dana Halder said the Atlantic Public Library’s Reading Garden Grand Opening will be Aug. 26th, from 10-a.m. until Noon. He said also there were seven applicants for the Library Director’s job. The applications came from included two local people, and others from Iowa, Illinois, Tennessee, and North Carolina. The search committee narrowed to three, the list of candidates to contact or interview.

Later in the meeting, Halder voiced his concerns about last weekend’s AtlanticFest, and kids riding bikes down the closed streets. He said they had two incidents with kids on bicycles. In one instance, a bike tipped over onto a show car. In another case, a pedestrian was nearly struck by a bike. Halder said 5-year old kids shouldn’t be riding bikes around cars that cost upwards to $100,000.