Until late Friday evening trying to clear the roads.
So they used over three hundred tons of salt and sand mixture just trying to clear the streets. They initially they concentrated on plowing and sanding the arterial streets and then they transitioned into the residential streets. And we had crews working Tuesday night on removing the snow from the downtown Business.
District area as well.
They even they worked until Friday evening removing the snow from the business district because as I was leaving, I seen them loading up snow and hauling it off, and so they worked really hard. We even had a water utilities crew that came and helped the Public Works group with that effort. So I do have to also give a special shout out to our solid waste crew because they were able to service all of their routes and areas.
All of the customers got service.
Those are some people with cold hands, man. Yes, yeah, I gotta tell you it was.
It was freezing and they were out there and good work.
They get home to their wives going hey honey, feel this.
Yeah, yeah, boy.
So I also want to get a special shout out to the rest of the city employees that work rain or shine, like police and fire and dispatch, they still.
Have to answer the call.
And I've got Chief Ickleberry here with me today, and so this isn't really the topic that he is here to talk about, but I thought we would take an opportunity to talk about Operation Slick Streets.
Okay, we had to implement that last week.
So Chief, what is Operation slick Streets and what does it mean to the general public.
Well, the general public, it means that police officer probably will not be coming out to take a report unless it's an injury accident. We typically go into Operation Slick Streets when fifty percent of our patrol units are tied up on accidents. I must say, with that being said, last week, believe it or not, on days like today, we have crashes. Last week we had two accidents the whole time.
That's amazing.
That's amazing, and so we're very thankful for our citizens for really paying attention to stay home and staying off the streets and really taking it serious. They did a great job and we applauded in for that. And to have two minor accidents is americle in itself.
Maybe we're getting used to this. I hope we're not getting very used to it, but maybe we are.
Okay, Well, great, So you know, we have set up some special council meetings or council meeting workshops if you will, on some of the hot topics that the community has identified as hot topics. Anyways, and so we had one last month and then so this month we are having one tonight at five point thirty and we are having the meeting on flock camera utilization. We'll also cover council
meeting rules during that meeting. These are held in the first floor conference room because there's no action to be taken. This is just a discussion. It's meant to be in formal so that the council members can sit down and discuss these hot topics. And so tonight's is flock cameras. So, Chief, I've got you here to talk about flock safety. What is flock safety and what can you tell.
Us about it?
Well, I'll tell you flock safety is for us in law enforcement, it's a new tool that we're able to utilize, not in the way a lot of people think we utilize it, but the way its utilizes. We have over five hundred miles of roadway and borders of Oklahoma, and of those five hundred miles the roadway, we have ten cameras positioned throughout the exterior part of the city trying to catch traffic coming into our city, just taking pictures of vehicle tags and running them through a database for
wanted vehicles. Basically those tags get hit on an alert system from men CIC National Information Systems of DC. Those basically if they get hit for some major crimes such as a homicide, kidnap child, then it alerts and we send an offstar to that area try to find that vehicle. We actually have to search for the vehicle. It's not like they stop at the camera and we can drive to the camera and find the suspect. We have to actually look for the suspect. There's a lot of bad
information out there. I expect us to have several people at the forum tonight or at the workshop tonight that will that are worried about Big Brother watching you. This is not a monitoring system, This is not a tracking system. This is a system to take pictures of vehicle tags and plain view and to help try to further our investigations. Similar to fingerprints and DNA This is another tool. The standalone idea that the camera is going to catch a crime,
it's not accurate. We cannot search people, we cannot search objects.
We can search vehicles.
So we searched vehicle by tags, vehicle by the color of description, and that's it. And once we do that, if it comes back on a hit, then then we go. We tried to find that vehicle and these cameras since we've had them in September, we got them in September. Since we've had them, we've had several good catches with them.
And it's a network system that covers five thousand cities in the United States, and we can partner up with the cities in our area to have things entered into the computer system so that we can try to locate things. And we had two homicide suspects. One of them was located in which Tall, Kansas. Their vehicle passed the camera there.
With the further investigation, we found out where he went in which daw Kansas, which Tall Police Department went to the suspects location, founding where its vehicle was parked, founding and arrested. The same thing happened in off of Field, Kansas. Another homicide suspect found to have entered their city. Coff Field ped went and looking for him and found him in their city. We had a young man that was kidnapped out of the backseat of his mother's car.
That was.
The suspect. Vehicle was entered into the NCIC and he was located by Claire Moore because of flocked cameras, unhurt, unharmed, and returned to his mother. The suspect was taken to jail. We had a Hispanic mail that was trying to make it back to Mexico with his stepdaughter. He had kidnapped and uh Lo and behold that child was pregnant with his child, and we recovered them in Larido, Texas a stone store from the border. They were trying to get the man was trying to get bus tickets into Mexico
take that child into Mexico. Border Patrol in the Larado Police Department assistants assistant this on that and we're able to recover him. And he was recently in the news Tulsa Federal Cord being charged with those crimes.
So great, great recovery.
People don't like us to talk about those stories because they're the ones that say, Okay, we need those cameras, but we do need those cameras for that reason, and that's what they're used for period, it's criminal activity.
So you guys covered this.
Was it January sixteenth when you had your forum for flock Safety?
Yes, and so walks to who did you have president to speak at that?
I know that you had the d DA Will Drake was there to speak on the legalities of it.
We had Fluck Safety actually there, Yes.
Man, we had Flocked Safety there in prison. Our command staff was present and Captain Elkins, who has been heading up this project. And we also had Jason Wye from Palm Tulsa Homicide present. Most people know him from the first forty eight he's been investigating several homicides in Tulsa and he presented some cases that actually involved the Bortlesville, Oklahoma where they were able to make a case on some homicide suspects in Tulsa that came fled to Bortlesville.
So again, getting those bad apples out of our community is what we're trying to do and to reduce the crime in our city. And at that form, it was to inform people of what flock actually does and left the hypotheticals out of it, basically.
Just sticking to the facts and explaining how they benefit the community. So that was a good form, I thought, where you got a lot of information out of it.
Yes, there was another form put on by I think the local GEPPA. The forum on held the Wesleyan Church and I had a Saber representity stay representative speak about FLOCK. He's against FLOCK. Oddly enough, he didn't use any information from our system. He didn't use any argument about our system. So WIX left us say, and we're doing pretty good since we're part of his argument. So we feel like he actually confirmed what we're trying to do here. He
maybe didn't think he did, but he does. He did because he didn't talk against anything that we've done so far, and we took that as an acknowledgment of good job, and we'll continue to look at that way.
So again, the council will have a workshop this evening at five point thirty in the first floor conference room. There is a capacity there, you know, an occupancy level that we can't exceed. So if we reach that then we have an overflow room, which is council chambers. People are welcome to attend. There will be no action taken, it's just a discussion. So if you want to hear more about flock safety this evening, it's a good time to get some more information on it.
That We've got some other.
Hot topic items coming up, and so March we'll be discussing the strategic Plan. That's March twenty fourth, April twenty eighth will be discussing the annual budget, and then May nineteenth we'll be discussing the Comprehensive Plan and capital elections. So more to come on those hot topic items. So
next up, I've got Larry Curtis. He's our Community Development director and we just recently took RFQs for price filled and so I invited him here to discuss the process for the proposals, what we received, what we were looking for, and who we selected and why.
So good morning, good morning, everybody, So excited to say that we have selected a council to action last Friday and has selected a group to move forward with management
of our wonderful price fields. The process for RFQs, and for those who don't know what an RFQ is as request for qualifications is a process that is put in place to allow for individuals, agencies, corporations, things along those lines to submit proposals of their qualifications to run in this case price Fields or if this was an engineering firm or an architecture firm, they submit their qualifications to say how they are best suited in order to run
that organization or that project. As such, we received five submittals for this over a month period, and for those were local, one of those was from out of state, and really good proposals that were submitted by all and we're very much grateful for all them for submitting. And so through that process there were a number of items that were listed within the RFQ that we had inquired
about and asked them that they submit upon. And so as a part of that, there is there was an ad hoc committee that was created that had two council members on it. It had the mayor and then it had a counselor k Patrick on that as well, and then individuals from staff were also part of that of course city manager as well. And so out of that a scoring system was created, a matrix that was created
by the Community Development Office and submitted out. Whenever we got all five of those middles in, we smitted that out to all members of the ad hoc Committee for them to review along with the scoreesheet for them to review and score and to provide any comments on that. And so they smitted that back in and then the matrix was formed to calculate that and ranked them accordingly.
And then the ad hoc Committee came together and reviewed those scores and those comments and theyde much discussion and deliberation on that, and so I think it was through the scoring process was able to whittle that down to two proposals that are qualifications that were submitted and out of that the committee debated back and forth, had really great discussion on that, and out of that Arrowhead was selected, which is a local group that is made up of
some notable citizens that have come together within Bartlesviild but also have experience in sports and you know, football, softball, baseball, all those areas and have experience and running those types of organizations that will have great experience in leading our youth baseball program at price Field.
And so.
The recommendation from the committee was provided to City Council and City Council had their meeting last Friday to ensure that you know, baseball season's coming up really really quickly, and so we wanted to make sure that we had an organization in place that could provide everything set up in time for the season, and we were able to set forth and be able to move forward with that group. And so counsel had a very good discussion about that.
Lots of information was provided by the city manager in regards to the contract and the agreement, and then there was a good discussion amongst the council members on ensuring that the process that went through was good and justified and that the organization that was selected was a good one. And so I know that leadership from Arahead was there to answer any questions that council had and went through
that process. And so I know that they took action on Friday and approved that and with that agreement, they immediately Era immediately took action that afternoon and start getting everything ready. I know they're getting their website set up and working with other individuals to ensure that there's a smooth and easy transition over to the new system. From a staff standpoint, we couldn't be more excited, just because we know that we're going to have a good season
moving forward. Our maintenance team is going to the park's division is going to be doing a great job of assisting them through that process. It is a three year long agreement, and of course there's a review process every
single year. There are you know, details that are listed within the contract to ensure that protections are in place for both the city and the public and so those items that might be of interest that we included with the agreement that the city would be assisting with spring and fertilizing for the next three years, maintenance repairs of all plumbing and fixtures that was standard that we had over the you know, with the previous contract, as well,
maintenance of the irrigation system for three years. And the city will waive the requirement that ERA had provide capital improvements to the facility for the first two years to ensure that the organizations gets well established and that they're well in their way and that they have developed a really good process for our youth baseball program and that our kids are out there and enjoying it as much
as possible. In addition to the city will maintain the playground and the pf SC all three years, and that the city degrees to make repairs and the rooms to the facilities, including repairs of safety netting outfield, all the general stuff that we generally would do anyway, but that way we can ensure that they are all doing a great job with the process moving forward. So it's really exciting, you know it was it was exciting to really have
that many individuals interested in managing our fields. I think we had about three or four last go around. It was exciting to have five this go around. And you know, it truly is a testament to Bartlesviielle when we have four local groups that are wanting to move forward to help locally, that's amazing. Again, you don't really see that in a lot in communities, and it's it's just a testament to Bartlesfield that we have that happening.
Here, that kind of support and interest. Absolutely.
So it's my understanding that the registration for the spring season will begin today yep. So to register or for more information, you can email Arrowhead s G nine one eight at.
Gmail dot com.
And with that, Larry, I have you I've seen in city and if anybody hasn't subscribed to city Beat, now it's a good time to do that. So if you go to City Cityofbartlesville dot org. You can put in your name and your email address and you can get city, city business, city information emailed directly to you every week.
But in that this week we talked about the sidewalk program.
Yeah, you know, the Cydebrock program is going on. So city council approte is a part of their budget this past year. Some cast sharing opportunities that we have for sidewalks that are in front of citizens' homes. And so with that, citizens can go to our website and submit a request to do a cross sharing program. I think it's, depending on the situation, up to fifty percent of that
cost sharing possibility. So they'll submit those requests through that program and then that'll be reviewed by I believe the Traffic Committee and if not, by our city engineer, and then that determination will then move forward and the process will move forward with that, and it's really exciting. It's going to be nice to be able to assist our citizens with that. In addition that they also help us identify.
You know, our guys are always on the ground as well, but you know, there are times that we just may not know that there's a repair that needs to be done, and so being able to work with our citizens to get that alleviated is the best.
Way to go about that.
In addition to that, we'd also have another thing that's going on is our incubation program, which is happening down at Centennial Park. And for those who don't know where that is, it's downtown the corner of Dewey and Frank Phillips. People may see like an old building there, but it's
not that old. It's actually built in nineteen or in nineteen in the early two thousands underneath Foe of Beeman and so it is or a five hundred square foot building that can be utilized for an incubation program that'll help with small businesses. And to find out more about that, if they go to the City of Barsol website or city be they can find out more about that and be able to apply for that program as well. But it's a six month process, or it's a six month
rental opportunity for utilizing that. There is no costitz and other than utilizing the space with electricity, they have to pay for that portion as well. But we're really excited to have all those opportunities.
What's going on in your department?
Oh?
Yeah, we stay busy YEP.
So next up, I wanted to one of the departments that when Mike had promoted me to assistant city manager, he split the departments and one of the departments that fell under me was the airport.
And so I've spent a lot of time getting to know the.
Airport, and Mike Richardson are airport directors here to talk about the airport.
We've got.
There's a lot of history there at the airport, and so I thought it would be fun to hear about the history.
Of the airport.
Thanks Lauren. It's really incredible when I've started taking a deeper look. I've been there thirty five thirty six years. A lot of the modern history, more modern history, but what I didn't realize was some of the very early aviation history. I knew the airport went way back, but I had no idea how far back to the very early days of aviation. When it was in fledgling. Billy Parker was hired by Frank Phillips and the airport. He
needed a place to conduct his aviation activities. He realized that the market was there for his petroleum products and aviation fuel, and he went out and hired Billy Parker to if not the very first corporate flight department, one of the very first, and they needed a place to conduct air and autical activities, so they acquired land west of town where the airport is now. The original airport terminal building is actually the original cottage style gas station
prototype out at woollar Rock now in the entryway. That building was actually relocated from the airport to Woollarock in about one I think it was actually picked up. A moving company named Wolf was able to board it up and they shrink wrapped it. Just an amazing feat. They tried to move it once before and the contractor thought it the building would fall apart. This contractor was able
to do it. They had the expertise and they moved this building to bull Rock and it was restored and it's there on display now where folks can see it a lot more than they went at the airport. They built Hangar four, which is the hangar next to it, and that was the home of the very first corporate flight department. A little bit about this would have been in the early twenties and barnstorming was a big deal.
Aviation was still new, There was no FA there was no regulation, they were building building aircraft, and many of these guys were barnstormers, and the barnstormer came in. They would literally fly these rural communities and they would do tricks and loops and barrel rolls, and they would go buy people's barns in these communities and people say, what is that? What's going on? And then their town would meet and the town would almost shut down to go
view these circuses that these barnstormers put on. It was pretty amazing. The JN four Jenny biplane back in the day cost the government about five thousand dollars to build. And after the war was over, we came into the war in nineteen seventeen. Had ended in nineteen eighteen World War One, and a little known fact is that the
JN four. There was the Dewey Airplane Company in Dewey, Oklahoma, started by Jacob or Joe Bartles, and they actually had a government contract to build twelve of those aircraft in Dewey and what was I believe the airfield at that time was at the old fairgrounds where the where their fairgrounds are now and built twelve I believe j N four's and a lot of those pilots would buy those after the war, they surplussed them and they could buy them for like fifty dollars, and so many of the
pilots that flew in the war would fly these aircraft and do their born storming and go across the country making a meager living that way.
That's very interesting.
Yeah, these aircraft needed fuel and Frank Phillips knew an opportunity when he saw it, and the aviation as a
whole market, he would grow his product line. The barnstorming air came to an end basically when the Department of Commerce pass a law, The Contract air Mail Act was passed and then the Department of Commerce took over and they were licensing planes and pilots and regulating and due to many accidents and high profile fatalities that were happening in the roaring twenties, let's see, Wiley Post came into the picture. Our Goebel as you well, the Traveler six thousand,
Frank Phillip sponsored to do the Dull air races. Frank was a bit of a marketing genius back in the day to utilize aviation and these characters in aviation to promote his products and sponsoring our Goobel on the Traveler six thousand to fly from Oakland, California to Honolulu was a way to promote their products. He actually won the race. It was an ill fated race. A lot of folks parish in the ocean. Charles Limberg actually turned out of the race because he said, you know, I can't miss Europe,
I might miss Hawaii. They would navigate by the stars at night. I mean, it was a very fledgling early days of aviation. I read we're also Frank early days of Phillips Petroleum. When Frank would fly in the corporate aircraft, be at a Ford tri motor, the very i think the very first mono coupe. They wouldn't fly at night. They would fly during the day, they would land and then he would take the rail by night because you just did not have the instrumentation to navigate. That was very,
very interesting. Another interesting fact about the airport was that the UH there was an aircraft actually manufactured at Martlesville by the Star Aircraft Company and it was a Cavalier and they did they made I think six models, the A through the F between nineteen twenty eight and nineteen thirty. It was kind of an entry level aircraft for a
working man's airplane, if you will, somewhat affordable. Another little known fact about the Bartlesville airport as between nineteen forty nine and nineteen seventy four, Bartlesville had commercial air service the Continental The Continental Airlines operated the DC threes and Central Airlines operated the Conveyor two forty and the Frontier Lines I believe the Conveyor five eighty. The two forty names were simple back then two forty was a two
engine forty passengers. So it's pretty remarkable for the time. I have read that there was this many as ten flights a day. They went to destinations like Kansas City, Tulsa, Oklahoma City, Great ben Kansas, Dallas was quite a thing, and that went to about nineteen seventy four. All these During this time, Phillips had just a plethora of corporate aircraft.
They're basically a history of aircraft on a corporate history of corporate aviation on the field there and just absolutely remarkable history.
It was booming at the time and so we were at the time a lot of cool things going on at the airport.
Now we've got the.
New taxi lane we've got the new hangar, We've got some development coming out.
There, so we did get it booming again.
Yep, there were HC.
Price was in Hangar five City Services when R eight, all the big old majors locally, we're based at the airport at one time, and I think we're about to run out of time, but just about.
But where can we find out more.
When?
Yeah, where can we find out more history? Contact the the me at the airport.
Look if you want more information, the Bartlesville Area History Museum. And wool Rock of course has his home of the Traveler six thousand. That our goble Flue in Hawaii. But there's several great find.
A way to put some information out there on it too as well.
Thank you for that, Sarah, Like what is she talking about?
That?
Sarah gave had a real nice article on the airport in October twenty two. It's worth read and MB monthly.
Alrighty, everybody, thank you for being on board.
Dignity, compassion, excellence, stuff in your home. Crematory Bartlesville, no on in.
Barnstock, k tell in Bartlesville, K two twenty seventy Q Bartlesville, K two thirty six C T podka sponsored by Progressive Insurance. I'm Steve Kaif there's word Grammy Winnings, ROBERTA. Flack has died. Killing Me Softly was one of two number one hits she had in successive years in the early nineteen seventies, So the first time ever I Saw Your Face was the other the first ever both songs Grammy Winners. Her publicists says ROBERTA. Flack had als she was eighty eight.
Attorneys for federal workers say in an updated lawsuit filed today in California that Elon Musk violated the law this weekend, demanding that employees explain their accomplishments a risk being fired. CBS is Natalie Bryant.
The President's own newly confirmed FBI Director, Kash Patel, as well as a Department of Defense and the State Department hewling employees not to respond to that email listing five or so accomplishments over the past week. Some labor employment attorneys have also said that those emails may not even be legal. So already, heading into this new week, we are seeing a notable pushback by some of these departments.
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