The Record Newspapers - Hometown News For Orange County, Texas

It was business as usual as Orange County Commissioners met Monday afternoon.

First on the agenda was to file into the minutes a direct deposit from the State Comptroller of Public Accounts in the amount of $323,520. These funds represent the one half cent sales and use allocation for the month of July. The money was credited to the general operating fund for the county.

Approved by commissioners was to pay the bills presented to them. They were $91,568 to the Orange County Appraisal District from the general fund to pay for the fourth quarter funding. In addition, $6,177 and a bill $24,995 was paid to Maverick Communications from the general fund for the county portion for the Shelter of Last Resort.

Precinct 4 Commissioner Jody Crump asked county department heads to watch their spending.

‘It’s tight,” he said.

Orange County Judge Carl Thibodeaux asked Jeff Kelley, of Orange County Emergency Management, if he had anything such as a burn ban to report. Kelley responded by telling the court, a burn ban was not necessary although the KDBI stats are “creeping up.”

Before adjourning, three different departments entered a report on their latest happenings. A representative from MIS department submitted a brief statement regarding their various trainings they had attended in addition to the various projects they were working on or completed.

Mark Wimberly of the Maintenance Department also updated commissioners on the various happenings within his department.

Finally, Patrick Beebe, of the Mosquito Control Department gave a report on the activities of his department. He said they number of service requests received by his office had totaled 11 in July and dropped to four in August. The service request received are investigated to determine the need for an area treatment.

Beebe also stated they did participate in surveillance activities on adult mosquitoes to determine the landing counts in the field. Activity of the adult mosquitoes varied according to the location. Some activity levels where high compared to others who had a low or moderate activity.

However, there is no mosquito disease activity found during the periods checked, according to Beebe.

In July there were 123 ground treatments which covered 112,964 acres while in August there were 108 ground treatments yielding a total of 95,891 acres treated.

In addition, there were aerial treatments as well. There were 10 aerial treatments in July which covered 25,000 acres. In August there were 10,240 acres treated during four aerial treatments.

Beebe added, they increased the number of treatments in September. There have been 24 to date, he said.