First Day on the Job: Jansen Village Board Faces Backlog

The new Jansen Village Board of Trustees faced numerous matters as board members held the first meeting since four of five board members resigned in May of this year.While most village business was on hold until after the special election that elected the replacement board members, both village maintenance operator Ron Duensing and water operator Mathias Wendeln continued working despite knowing they would not be paid again until late July.Village Attorney Gregory Kratz gave an update to the board. He explained why no bills or payroll could be paid prior to the special election because, although there was still one member on the board, “The problem is that we didn't have two people to sign the checks. State law requires that there be two signatures on every check from the village.”The inability to pay bills was especially problematic for SENDD (Southeast Nebraska Development District). Kratz said, “One of the big issues that we had come up is the SENDD payments for the owner occupied rehabilitation grants that we got. The resignations really came at a bad time. If they were, you know, a week later, we could have issued out all the checks, and it would have been fine.”Kratz explained, “The federal regulations for those grants restrict the funds being in our account to five days. So the problem was, is that those funds, those expenditures were approved, I think in April's meeting, and then the funds were deposited right before we lost our quorum. So they were in the bank account. And we kind of broke the regulation regarding those grants, with money being in there for five days.”Kratz added, “SENDD was not too pleased with the village and I was able to kind of calm them down a little bit. I think they were getting a lot of pressure from the contractors.”Therefore, one of the first orders of business for the new board was the payment of bills and payroll, which was approved by the board. Correction: There were some typographical errors in Wednesday's Jansen Village Board story on page 2. Carol Ellis received 41 votes, not 43. Vern Niemand received 30 votes, not 13. Niemand's term ends in 2024. The terms of Ellis, Jared Russell and Tony Eyer end 2026.

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