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On Wednesday, September 25^th deputies from the Dent County Sheriff’s Office with assistance from the Missouri State Highway Patrol and South Central Drug Task Force executed a search warrant in the 1800 block of Highway CC. During the search warrant a large scale Marijuana “grow” was located on the property. This included approximately 23 live Marijuana plants, over 20 pots with Marijuana plant remains and numerous items of drug paraphernalia. The “grow” contained approximately $5,000 worth of equipment used for the cultivation of the Marijuana.  Also located on the property were over 100 prescription pills, all identified as controlled substances.  Arrested was 40-year old Ryan M Parker of Salem.  Parker is currently being held on 10 Felony charges ranging from producing a controlled substance to Possession of a controlled substance.  Parker’s bond has been set at $50,000 cash or surety. 

The Salem Board of Aldermen held a special meeting at the city administration offices Thursday morning at 8:30. City Administrator Clayton Lucas discussed the police car bids that were approved Monday night. He indicated that he made a mistake giving the bid from C&E of $23,986 for the V-8 engines. That was the price for the vehicles with V-6 engines, not for V-8 engines. He said that actual bid was $24,804 and that is an increase of $818 per vehicle. Even though that bid was higher than the Low Fusz price of $23,642, the price still fell with the 5% allowable difference for local bidders coming in at 4.6%. The board approved the purchase of the five vehicles by a 3-1 vote with Alderman Kenny Nash voting against. The cars will be paid for in three budget years and the cost with all the police equipment and interest will total about $159,000. Four of the cars will be purchased out of the capital improvement budget and one out of the police department budget. Lucas handed out a list of the streets the city would like to asphalt that he will be getting bids on. The board then went into closed session to discuss personnel at 8:45 and came back into open session at 9:55. At that time, the board approved an offer by a 3-1 vote with Alderman Nash being the lone vote against extending the contract of City Administrator Clayton Lucas beyond his current contract that would expire on September 30^th, 2015. Attorney William Camm Seay presented the offer on behalf of the board and it included an additional two years on his current contract, an additional one-week of vacation, one week of administrative leave, not to modify his insurance until the board can review it for everyone and provide six months severance pay if fired without cause. The meeting was then adjourned. 

The Dent County Commissioner met Thursday morning for their regular meeting at the Dent County Courthouse. In the road report, District One Commissioner Dennis Purcell reported that grading would be done on Dent County Roads 6190, 6200 and 6240 with materials being added and grading being done on county road 6500. Purcell stated that a crossover pipe is  being installed and materials are being added on Dent County Road 6230, and brush is being cut on county road 2470. Commissioner Gary Larson from District 2 reported that grading is going to be done on county roads 2330 and 4260 while materials would be added and grading would be done on Dent County Road 4290. Materials will also be added to county roads 2150 and 2340, a crew will be working on a pipe on Dent County Road 2260, and holes will be patched on county road 3223 which is a chip and seal road. Larson also said that one man will be screening rock and that welding repairs are being made to brush cutter #4. Presiding Commissioner Darrell Skiles said he and Salem Mayor Gary Brown attended a meeting Tuesday in Rolla with Senator Robert Ross along with many other representatives to discuss Solid Waste Management Districts and the positive impact they have in making the public aware of waste conservation and recycling through education. They are against the withholding of any funding by DNR to local solid waste districts as local people know what best to do in their area. Skiles was then in Columbia Wednesday to meet with Senator Schaeffer concerning his legislation to eliminate the Solid Waste Management Districts and just let DNR distribute funds the best they see fit to reduce solid waste. Skiles said that Schaeffer indicated that his legislation would provide another source of funds for DNR, but Skiles felt that the senator didn’t really understand what the solid waste management districts actually do. Although Schaeffer didn’t feel his legislation had enough support, Skiles says this issue is probably not going away. At the meeting, the commissioners also approved hiring Great Rivers Engineering to so the engineering work on the new bridge to be built on Dent County Road 3210 also known as the Hospital Road. Great Rivers will get started with the paperwork to be submitted to MoDOT and then to the federal government in order to get the BRO funds. The next meeting of the Dent County Commissioners will be Monday morning at 9:00 at the courthouse and the meeting is open to the public.

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