BESSEMER—The normally scheduled Monday night Bessemer City Council meeting was moved to Thursday night this week.
Gogebic County Sheriff Pete Matonich spoke to the council about approving his proposed 3-year police contract that included Wakefield.
Bessemer and Wakefield have been sharing services with the sheriff’s department since 2007.
The new contract is essentially the same as the current contract with a slight increase in cost per year, per city. Matonich said he kept costs as low as he possibly could.
The council approved the proposal and received necessary signatures. Matonich will present the proposal to the Wakefield council this upcoming Monday night.
Dan Matonich from the Hillcrest Cemetery in Bessemer presented the council with a few updates to the cemetery rules. Matonich said the rules should be looked at every few years.
For rule updates, Matonich proposed that the cemetery included omitting a few sections and adding new verbiage, as well as, adding the maximum amount of upright monuments and markers in maximum sizes.
Matonich’s reasoning is that it is becoming difficult when mowing the cemetery grounds due to excessive monuments and markers obstructing their path.
“The problem is that as the years go on, these markers are receiving a lot of decorations and the mowers are struggling to be able to manuver through,” Matonich stated.
The council appreciated the time and effort Matonich took on reading through the cemetery rules and proposed updates. The council approved all of his changes.
Council also accepted a resolution update for the Western U.P. Citizens on Wolf Management and an MDOT contract for the Moore Street project. The project is scheduled to begin June 1. An assessor’s contract with N. David Hardie was accepted as well.
The city manager Michael Uskiewicz said thank you to resident Kathy Whitburn for providing the city with the new banners to hang along US 2.
Whitburn’s banners were a donation and will be displayed on every pole from Memorial Day to Labor Day.