Residents who need assistance paying their water and sewer bill could soon receive some relief.

At its regular meeting held Monday, Nov. 24, the Eureka Springs City Council unanimously approved a new low-income assistance program that could help pay the bills of eligible residents up to three times a year and a $500 maximum total.

“We’re just kind of starting off with some baby steps,” said city finance director Michael Akins. “… An applicant must be a resident of the City of Eureka Springs to be eligible for the program. The water bill must be in the name of the applicant applying for assistance, and applications must be completed with all requested documentation and submitted to the public workers office to be considered for assistance.

“Eligible households may receive assistance up to three times a year until they reach the maximum benefit of $500.”

The benefit amount would be a minimum of $25 and would be based on household income.

“Most of the people will be on SNAP, Social Security or another program … ,” Akins said.

Initial funding for the program will be $50,000 placed into a reserve fund by the city, Akins said.

“Additional funding will be addressed as the need arises,” he added.

Akins said funds the city may earn if it sells a piece of property near Queen Anne could be used for the program. If that property isn’t sold, Akins requested that the council approve taking “at least” $50,000 a year from the city’s Franchise Fee fund to go toward the program.

“Franchise Fee is income; it’s not taxes, it’s income that the city receives for having other utilities in town, for having Cox Communications, for having SWEPCO,” Akins said, adding the city gets approximately $350,000 a year from the fees, which are primarily used as a rainy day type fund. “For having those we get a check every month … so, I would like to do the continued funding from that, since that’s income that we receive for utilities … turn it around and help our citizens pay for their water bill.”

Akins told the council he got the idea for a low-income assistance program after attending a picnic event in Tahlequah, Okla.

“A few months ago I got the pleasure of attending a picnic … that my niece had put together for domestic violence,” he said. “We were walking around looking at the booths.”

That’s where Akins found information about an assistance program that is offered for members of the Cherokee Nation. Akins talked to representatives and received information about their program that he’s used to model an example for Eureka Springs, he said.

“I know that we have talked a lot about water, about water increases and things like that here,” he said. “There’s a huge need that we have to help our low-income families that live in the City of Eureka Springs. The thing you try to balance is: How do we help the people without hurting the water department?

“First, people always say ‘well, just write their bill off,’ you know, or ‘just give them a credit.’ Well, that water costs us money to get there, so we still need to have that income from the water. So, I looked through it, I kind of put it to the side, wanted to think about it.”

Three “priority groups” will be the focus of the program, Akins explained.

“Households whose water and wastewater services have been disconnected, households with existing arrearages to prevent discontinuation of drinking water and wastewater services, and households that may need assistance paying for their current water bill,” he said.

Public works staff would conduct outreach activities, determine client eligibility and submit eligible applications to Akins for approval, council members were told.

“Once approved, the public works office staff will submit approved applications to the City of Eureka Springs accounting department to process the benefit payment to Eureka Springs Water and Sewer Department,” Akins said. “How it will work is that the city will actually pay the bill of the person that is applying for the benefit. So, it’s not going to take money from the water department. It’s going to have them continue on where they’re still making money, but it’s going to give assistance to our citizens.”

Council members raved over the idea of the program.

“… I have never been so proud sitting at this table listening to what came out of your mouth with this program,” council member David Avanzino said. “This is something that I talked to Simon (Wiley, the city’s public works director) about several months ago, but I didn’t have all my ducks in a row like you obviously have here, and this is phenomenal. I think this is a fantastic program. … I couldn’t be more supportive of this.”

Council member Steve Holifield agreed.

“I’m very supportive of this program, too,” he said. “I think it’s wonderful. This is the kind of thing I think our city should be doing.”

After a brief initial discussion, the council unanimously approved the first two readings of an ordinance to establish the program. The proposed ordinance likely will have its third and final reading during the next council meeting scheduled for Monday, Dec. 8.

TEMPORARY ENTERTA INMENT DISTRICT DISCUSSION The council tabled a proposal by council member Susane Gruning regarding possible additional steps for those groups applying to host temporary entertainment districts.

Ideas included requiring groups who are granted a temporary district to have owners of businesses with ABC licenses sign off saying they understand the dates of the district, the boundaries and whether they would participate.

Gruning’s proposal comes after she said businesses in recent districts said they weren’t aware that the event was taking place and didn’t get to benefit from being inside the districts.

Other businesses, meanwhile, may want to opt out from participating, Gruning said.

“I really like this idea because, like you, I’ve gotten a lot of phone calls from people who are like, ‘what’s going on … what is this temporary entertainment district about?’ ” Avanzino said. “They had no idea it was going on.

“I think what’s happening is we have organizations come in and say they want a TED, and bam, we give it to them, thinking they’re going to take it on themselves to notify everyone within this district what’s going on, and that’s simply not happening.”

Adding something to the current application was discussed, and in the end, the council decided to let city attorney Heather Owens review current policies in place, study Gruning’s proposal and come back to council at a future meeting.

NEIGHBORS VS. MEYER SPAT CONTINUES During public comments, resident Jim Marple continued to allege that he’s been harassed by council member Harry Meyer.

“Did y’all know that Harry Meyer tried to sabotage the sale of Lot 5 when I put it up for sale?” Marple told the council. “He told the buyers that came there that it had no available sewer connection, that if they bought the lot ….”

“Lie,” Meyer interrupted, saying it four times in a row before being asked to stop by Mayor Butch Berry.

“Mr. Meyer, please withhold your comments,” Berry said.

“He told my buyers that there would be no sewer connection,” Marple continued. “This involved the realtor, this involved code enforcement, and of course, me. I tried to assure the buyers that yes, there was sewer connection.”

Marple also disputed a recent claim by Meyer that Avanzino was having individuals attend council meetings to talk badly about him.

“My Meyer, you are the only one causing people to come here to talk about you,” Marple said. “Harry Meyer, you are the only one causing people to stand here at this podium in order to inform people of this town the neighbor and the man you really are. If you want people to stop coming here to talk about you, then how about just simply trying to be a decent human being?

“You also accused Virginia Seymour of calling the police on you for shooting and killing your pet dog, Daisy, in your front yard for all your neighbors to have to witness such an unpleasant thing. By now, everybody in town knows it was not Virginia Seymour who called the police on you. It was me. And that’s public record. But, that didn’t stop you from crossing the street to her house and shouting the F word at her. You then defamed her by calling her Miss Kravitz in the newspaper. … “He lied to the police. He lied to my buyers. He lies to the neighborhood about other people. He is unfit to be city councilman. He uses his position of city councilman to get away with not being arrested and not being prosecuted for the things that he does, like shooting off a gun and running over a 70-year-old woman and leaving the scene. He left her there. He left her there underneath his truck and just walked in his house, never bothered to ask her how she was. And we know it was intentional because he yelled out the window, ‘get out of my way.’ So it was definitely intentional. And I heard it.”

A special prosecutor was recently appointed to review the findings of an investigation into Seymour’s allegations regarding the July incident during which she said Meyer struck her with his truck. No charges have been filed as of Tuesday, Nov. 2.

“As usual, he doesn’t take any of this seriously,” Marple said of Meyer. “He is unapologetic for anything that he does.”

Meyer defended himself during council member comments.

“Well, it looks like Mr. Marple still doesn’t like me,” Meyer said. “It started when I informed the building inspector that Mr. Marple had a camper parked on the city street for two years, two years in violation of our city ordinance. … He’s finally cleaned his mess up on the street.

“He’s chastised my new tenant for parking on the street while he’s unloading his furniture to take down to his apartment.”

Meyer said he thinks Marple built too close to the street, and said he didn’t “run over” Seymour.

“He still thinks he can own the street,” the council member said. “He built his house within five feet of the city property, and if somebody parks there, even six inches, not even bothering his access to his property, he starts squawking “His only friend on the street happens to be the lady across the street who falsely accused me of running her over. I didn’t run the woman over, and she has been harassing me for almost a year. A neighbor down at the end of the street could hear her screaming at me from her house because I parked the wrong way and she didn’t like it.

“… It’s just gone too far. I’m just tired of them coming in here and accusing me. And he’s lied. I don’t even know who the people were that bought his lot. He lied about that. He just wanted to take the opportunity because he’s upset because my tenant now is parked on the street, and six feet of his pickup truck happens to be in front of Mr. Marple’s lot. That’s the reason he came. He dreamed up a whole new story. That’s all I gotta say.”