A road vacation took center stage at an intense meeting of the Oskaloosa City Council Monday evening.
The item on the agenda in question involves the vacation and sale of 2nd Avenue East between South 7th Street and South 8th Street to Central Reformed Church located at 815 2nd Avenue East in Oskaloosa. The church has submitted plans for an expansion, which would involve adding several parking lot space in spots of land that they already own either on that block or nearby. The church has seen a boom of growth in recent years, and is hoping to capitalize on that by expanding their church to give their congregation all the proper amenities, like a functional fellowship hall, which now has to be used for the large Sunday School program every Sunday.
The public hearing on this item sparked great debate from neighbors nearby who believe closing the road is a bad idea for many reasons and produced a petition with over 35 signatures. There were also plenty of people who spoke on behalf of the church and of the neighborhood from a business standpoint, which all were in favor of having the church remain in their current location, just expanding to fit its growing population.
The risk involved for the church, is that if this plan is nixed, they would have to look at moving to a new location, likely on the edge of town, like the Church of the Nazarene when they built their new facility.
After lengthy debate on the topic, and several views shared from the City Council and from the public, council member Doug Yates suggested they wait until later to vote, since he had told people that there would be three readings of this. Council member Aaron Ver Steeg was bothered that there was not three readings. After more discussion about when to pull the trigger and vote, the council decided by a 6-1 vote to push the item back to the July 20th meeting before making a decision so the rest of the public could have their say. Jason Van Zetten was the lone vote against that notion, saying the public deserved a vote that night.
In other business, the council unanimously approved another $50,000 going toward the Forest Cemetery Association. This helps their financial stability, on top of the $150,000 that have already been given the last couple of years.
The council also voted unanimously to pull the trigger on an agreement with RDG Planning and Design, who will complete a full design of the corridor on A Avenue and Market Street. This will cost $44,620 to complete, and then after that comes back to the council, they may start to implement parts of that design and create ordinances to keep the downtown area clean. This topic was discussed in full during an hour-long study session prior to the regular council meeting.
The next meeting of the Oskaloosa City Council is scheduled for Monday, July 6th, at 6 PM in the City Council Chambers in City Hall in Oskaloosa.
