The City of Pampa city commissioners met on Monday evening for a regularly-scheduled meeting over Zoom. The meeting is available to be viewed on YouTube at https://bit.ly/2KHnxDJ.
During the meeting, the city commissioners elected to extend the disaster declaration until May 11.
However, after Texas governor Greg Abbott put his plan for re-opening Texas into place, the City is awaiting what that means for Pampa.
Mayor Brad Pingel asked city attorney Bryan Guymon for clarification on Governor Abbott’s orders.
“This is a developing situation as the governor just had a press conference,” Guymon said. “We haven’t seen the governor’s order so we don’t know what exactly it says.
“The press is reporting that the stay-at-home order is lifted with restrictions and only some of the businesses, movie theaters and malls, can open at 25 percent capacity.”
Guymon said even if the City did extend the order to May 11 or May 27, the governor can supercede the City.
Guymon said the City could extend the order but to await the governor’s orders for May 1.
“When the governor’s order supercedes the applicable provision, that would control,” Guymon said. “It’s getting the correct word out that we don’t know what his (Abbot’s) says, yet.”
Commissioner Matt Rains said it’s important to get the right message out and letting the public know it’s extended, but the City is awaiting the clarity from the governor’s office.
Commissioner Gary Winton said extending the declaration to May 27 is too far considering Pampa’s economy.
“Our economy wasn’t that great to begin with and it can’t really sustain another month of what we’re going through,” Winton said. “For the virus sake we probably do need another month. But our economy can’t go another month. It’s tapped out, as it is.”
Commissioner Karen McLain said she was ready to end the order on Monday but the City obviously can’t ignore the governor’s orders.
McLain made the motion to amend the original resolution to May 11. Which carried unanimously.
The resolution, now extending the declaration to May 11, also passed. But this is all with the caveat the city will review the governor’s orders and fall in line with their requirements.
The commissioners also approved the following items:
• Minutes of the April 6, 2020 Special Commission Meeting as presented.
• Adoption of Resolution No. R20-012, a Resolution by the City Commission selecting Parkhill, Smith & Cooper as the engineering firm for the Pampa Downtown Revitalization Program.
• Adoption of Ordinance No. 1731, an Ordinance by the City Commission amending the Code of Ordinance, Chapter 13, Section 13.02.042 concerning security deposits and residency verification for City of Pampa water services.
• Approval of Ordinance No. 1732 authorizing the issuance of “City of Pampa, Texas Combination Tax and Limited Pledge Revenue Certificates of Obligation, Series 2020” and other matters incident and related there to
• Approving the List of Disbursements dated March 2020.
