This past year has seen a lot of improvements and activity from the Henryetta city government.
That has ranged from a new roadway on Main Street to relocation of the fire department to the old armory building.
Mayor Bill Goodner took time to reflect on some of those accomplishments with the following report:
2014 was a busy and productive year for Henryetta. The city council, city manager, and all city employees have done their best to improve conditions in our city and I think it has made a difference. We've made progress but everyone recognizes that we still have a long way to go. Following is a summary of projects that were completed or initiated during the past 12 months:

roadwork
The water leak at 4th and Merrick was repaired. This had been an existing problem for more than 20 years. The repair has substantially decreased the amount of treated water that we lose to leaks.
The voters approved a penny sales tax renewal. The money was partially reallocated so there will be more flexibility in using it where it is most needed. In the past, much of the money was ear marked for specific purposes and could only be spent for that use. It put us in the position of frequently having excess money in one account and being under funded in another.  
City employees repaired the bridges at Robertson Highway and W. Corporation. In-house repair of these bridges saved taxpayers a considerable amount of money as compared to having to hire a commercial company to do this work.
A Request for Proposals  (RFP) was let and a company hired to brace the clarifier walls at the water treatment plant. Work should start within the next 6 weeks. We are engaged in a law suit to recover damages regarding engineering design errors with the water treatment plant. There is no estimate as to when a settlement might be reached.
Street overlay work was done on 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 9th, 11th, 17th , Leonard Lane, Cummings, and Mclaughlin.
ODOT overlaid  Main St.  from  8th to the I-40 exit ramp. This project was originally scheduled to go from the exit ramp to 17th St. Our city manager was instrumental in getting the project extended to 8th.
We conducted a surplus equipment auction. This provided 2 benefits: 1) We received money for sale of the equipment and 2)  we don't have the expense of maintaining equipment that we don't need.
The Fire Department has relocated to the old Armory building. We no longer have to contend with passing trains when responding to calls on the East and South sides of town.
The Fire Department recently had their Public Protection Classification (PPC) upgraded from 5 to 4. Following is a quote from the notification letter: “ISO's Public Protection Classification (PPC) plays an important role in the underwriting process at insurance companies. In fact, most U.S. insurers - including the largest ones- use PPC information as part of their decision making process when deciding what business to write, coverage to offer or prices to charge for personal or commercial property insurance". So, congratulations to Chief Bullard and the entire Fire Department for their outstanding efforts to make this upgrade happen.
Our treated water loss percentage has decreased from about 30% to less than 10%. This is a result of repairs to the 4th Street leak and the on-going efforts of city employees repairing other leaks and replacing obsolete water lines.
We approved the construction of a water splash pad for use by area children. There have been discussions about building additional pads in the future.
We purchased 2 new Trash trucks to replace aging vehicles that had become unreliable and expensive to maintain.
We approved the design and development of a City Website. It should be completed by late spring and will provide public access to city activities. For example, we will post our council meeting agendas, information about planned and unplanned utility outages, and other activities of interest.
The consent order was lifted for our waste water treatment operation. The issues were sanitary overflows that had occurred in the past. To correct this, we have installed new sewer lines, put in place new lift stations, replaced and repaired man holes, and purchased a new vacuum truck to clean and maintain sewer lines.
We have approved angle parking on 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th Streets from Broadway to Main and Trudgeon to Main. When completed, this will provide a significant increase in down town parking spaces.
We have approved the purchase of new street signs. Installation will start soon and the project should be completed by early spring.
State officials have completed an audit of the City. We expect the results to be available by mid-spring. The cost of this audit is near $60,000. We will discuss how to pay for this in an upcoming council meeting.
City officials have continued to increase their involvement and support of the annual Christmas Parade. We provided the Christmas trees, Santa, Christmas candy, and entered a float.
We approved raising utility rates. This was only the second increase in nine years and the added revenue was necessary to meet increased operating costs and to finance some of the city-wide improvements that everyone agrees are needed.