And good morning, good morning, good morning, and welcome, welcome and
welcome. Guess what, folks, idiots, time now for our city matters
right here on K one, the one you trust. Boy, I can
just get the TV to work here. There we go. It's so much
easier when this is radio. Said, I don't know what happened. Well,
what multi multimedia, multi platform information service, that's what the deal is.
Okay, there you go, there you go. It's a changing world.
You're changing with it, all righty. You didn't even know. I've
seen fire, but I've not seen a whole lot of rain. I hope
we get a little bit of rain. In fact, we're gonna talk about
both of those, but first we're gonna talk about free leaf collection. Let's
do that. There will be less things to catch on fire the next time.
Right, free leaf collection, you bet, well, that's coming up.
We might first mention the operation Cleanhouse was last weekend. Heard there was
a good participation on that, so we hope everyone got out and took advantage
of that. Had the setup down at the Phillips parking lot and the one
up at the Worceston County barn and Dewey and again I from what I've heard
so far, it was a good turnout and we're glad people took an advantage
of that. It's a once a year opportunity that's local partners here in town
support it and gives the citizens a way to dispose of unwanted chemicals and items
around the house that there's not other methods to dispose of them. This gives
them that opportunity to get out there and get rid of that stuff. So
that was a successful program, and look forward to it next year. And
so we got the leaf and grass collection coming up. It's scheduled for the
week of maybe eight through the twelve, so that's a couple of weeks out.
Yet they'll give you time to get out there in the yard and do
a little yard work. Gather up to your leaves and plan ahead, plan
ahead that yer get that thatch off your yard, and if you will,
gather that material up and bag it up and put it out with your polycart
within about five feet of it, give us a little room where we can
still pick up your polycart, not too close. Stack those bags up there
beside the curb. Again on your normal collection day of the week of mayby
eight through the twelfth and again we take leaves grass. It is yard collection,
it's not refuge collection. So we're not taking extra trash. We're taking
yard waste. We will take sticks and limbs. So if you bundle that
material up to sticks and limbs, cut them in links of four foot,
bundle them up in a little bunnles no more than fifty pounds, and you
can stick those out there again on the curb and there will be another truck
come by and he'll collect that material for you and gives you a good opportunity
to get rid of those things good. And we certainly appreciate you guys doing
this. I know that as we switched over to a polycart system, yardwaste
is one of the biggest challenges. What are we gonna do with yard waste?
What we're gonna do with it? So we decided that a couple of
times a year we would swing around and pick up yardwaste at no cost.
And so I know it's certainly an extra load on all of our sanitation guys
and perhaps some other departments if you don't have enough sanitation guys, but appreciate
them going out and doing that help help clean up our community. Yet we
offer that program a couple of times a year, spring and fall, so
there's a couple opportunities there for citizens to take advantage of that. Along with
that, we do have the coupon that you get annually. It comes in
your water bill. You could also use that for yard disposal. But again
that cupon comes in your water bill once a year. You can take that
cupon along with some identification and a current water bill out to the Osage Landfield
and they will recognize that and let you come in there with a load of
debris and you can take trash to that pick up or trailer load. It's
not for commercial use. It's not to tear down the house and take the
whole house out there. It is to clean up your yard, get rid
of that old couch, you get rid of the old hot water tank,
clean up the debris around your property, and you can take that out there.
So again, if you haven't got that in the mail, everyone should
have received that by now, and if you haven't, you can contact my
office or down at the building office and we can help you find out what
happened or get you another one because we do track those so we'll know if
you've used it. Or not. And along with that, you know,
it's the time of year when we're out in one. So with a lack
of rain this year, are mowing has been relatively slow. We did we
didn't kick off the program right normally by now lose the dust we are,
So we made a round or two and actually pulled off and went to do
some other work that we had still pending from the fall. So the crews
are out again mowing today, but on the right of ways. We anticipate
the rain and things will change, we hope. But the guys are out
mowing, that's right. We hope this week praying for rain. Absolutely.
We might also mention, which we've talked about it a little, with the
water issues we're having to drought, but we are prepping for the pools.
The decision hasn't actually been made yet. We'll wait and see what the water
does. But we're hopeful that the pools are open this year and we are
prepping those. The guys are working on those and hopefully it'll rain and things
will change and we'll it'll get those pools up and operating. We do have
the new water slides out there, so I know there's a lot of people
very exciting, excited to get out there and use those who are actually testing
one, you know, to make sure everything's you're ready to go. And
again we anticipate that hopefully we will get to open those and to everybody will
get to take advantage of that this year. Now, am I the only
person in this room that has actually gone down the water slides? I have
not been down the water slide? Terry, Nope, you're a bunch of
funny duddies. So you need to go down the steep one. It has
a little bit of freefall right in the middle, and if you're like me,
it takes everything you can do not to squeal like a little girl as
you can. You lease contact with slide for a second, feel like get
evil, awesome, absolutely fantasting, but they're great. So I'm with you,
Keith. I hope we're able to get that open and we certainly decision
hasn't been made yet at this point in time, we're proceeding with plans to
open it and if we get a little rain maybe we can do that.
We're hoping. Here's hoping that's right, So all right, Keith, anything
else, I think that kind of wraps it up for us. So again,
be ready for that leaf and grass collection, and we'll be by to
help you out. No special bags or anything, right, can no special
bags, just a regular refuge bagle work again, don't want it over fifty
pounds when you fill it up. But if you be any baggle or none
of them what they used to call bodybacks and then put them putting two hundred
pounds of shredded leaves in one of them. Those those you'll find still sitting
there when you come home, you probably will, all right, Keith,
I appreciate it, thank you. So we had invited the fire chief to
come and join us today, and as all good chiefs did, he delegated
this to his deputy chief. Welcome, well, thank you. I'm happy
to be here. And I don't know have we actually had you on the
radio yet, Oh sir, that's just my first. So this is your
official introduction to our radio listeners. So I want you to tell everybody a
little bit about yourself, name, how long you've been here, and what
your position is. By. My name is Jerry Barry. I'm the deputy
fire chief. I promoted in January of twenty twenty two. If I've been
with the fire department for twenty three years, so I'm not new to the
fire department, just new to the office. Yeah, that's right. So
so a new deputy chief. That's certainly not a new fire fighter. And
you spend here the whole fire career in Bartlesville, Yes, sir, yea.
That is not as not uncommon. It's one of the few professions that
that happens. Yeah, and it's a good place to work. I've enjoyed
my twenty three years. Well, we appreciate having you in that position.
I know that for a while, Chief Topping was a one man show.
He was I don't know how he did it, the chief, the deputy
chief of the firebarshals. So he appreciates having his full staff now, I
don't know how he did it. Well you, I think you and the
Chief got to ride around recently and helped to fight wildfires up. You've been
busy. I have been very busy. So, like Terry, the lack
of water has frustrated you as well. Yes, yeah, And I think
about Terry when we're spraying. You know, it's one hundreds of thousand gallons
of water, and he watches that. He watches the take levels drop and
I gotta get that from the lake to put it back in. So,
but the wildfires were I guess they were about three weeks sco Now. Yeah,
the worstman was March thirty first, and that was up kind oft to
the west of Circle Mountain, Gap Road, Hawking Road out there. It
covered covered quite a bit of space and we had what old departments were involved
in fighting those fires. We had eight of the local fire departments on the
Gap Road, h and Circle Mountain fire, Dewey and Copan had their own
fires going. You're right, so I think the uh hus see. I
brought some figures with me here. The the Gap Road fire and Circle Mountain
covered forty five hundred acres I think, and uh the North of Town Virginia
fire was fifteen hundred acres, Cotton Creek fire was four hundred and fifty acres,
and then Smith fireing Copan was two hundred and forty acres. Man,
we lost five hundred thousand dollars worth property, but we saved twenty two million
dollars. Yeah, and that's the exciting part. It is well and it
was so there was quite a few structures lost and they were actually quite a
few homes lost, but most of the homes were outside of town. Was
it was it ten homes, I think tens the count that I got,
And how many of those were actually inside city limits? Well, eight of
them were in the Gap Road Hawkins Road area, and then one up on
Circle Mountain, and then there was one in Copan Copan area. So we
actually had we'd lost nine right here in our area, but only one of
them was in city limits, right And honestly, there's a reason that only
one only lost one house at city limits, and it was due to a
program that the part of the Washing County Emergency Management, Barston Fire Department,
and I think it was the State of Oklahoma park In the Forestry had implemented,
yes, just probably six months before this while finished it. Yeah,
so the timing was great, but it essentially it was a type of mitigation.
You'd tell everybody a little bit about what they did up there, and
well, what good for us? The chief Chief Topping had been working with
the Forestry Department for several years and had made a deal with them where they
came in and thinned that brush and trees back like three hundred feet away from
any structure, so that when the fire got to it, it just kind
of went out. And if it didn't go out, it was easy to
put out. You could drive to it, you know, instead of being
an a tangled mass of black jacks and brush ground up everything. So,
yeah, all the fuel that would have existed in there, it went in
and ground all that up into the dirt essentially. Yep. It left most
of the trees, the larger trees. Yeah, it took out the small
ones, took up the red cedars, ground up a bunch of the stuff
that would have allowed the fire to climb and to spread. All right,
that's correct. All the ladder fuels, all the heavy ground fuels, they
took those out of there. And I think I know that the chief believes
that that probably saved about ten houses up on. Yeah, I think the
uh, I don't think there's any argument over that. Of course, there's
other agencies there that got between the houses and the fire, but yeah,
it took button. Yeah. Without Yeah, without that, it would have
been a mess. We probably would have certainly lost more houses. And you
would have even had I drove out and looked at this, you would have
even had an issue getting back there to be able to stop the five.
Yes, because without having that it cut a road in and did a bunch
of work back there. Yes, you guys could actually access it too.
Yeah, and you know, we've had several I mean, we have fires
out there quite often, it's a wild land area, but none like that
day, None that I can remember. And yeah, that's definitely while an
hour wind didn't help any Yeah, we Yeah, we had a sustained forty
mile an hour win and ten percent humidity and some wind gusts up in the
sixties. That's crazy, perfect conditions for a really bad fire day. Yes,
so it no loss of life, in my correct chief, no loss
of life. That was so that was important. There was some structures loss,
and you always have to see somebody lose their home, but ultimately but
they can be rebuilt. That's right. Ultimately there was no loss of life,
and it certainly could have been a lot worse and would have been I
think if we hadn't if we hadn't worked with forestry on that. Yeah,
so what forestry did. The Chief and I as we drove around a couple
of weeks ago looking at all of this, one of the comments he made
is is that a lot of the houses that didn't burn that were in those
hot areas, it's because they've done a lot of the same things that forestry
had done. So yes, sir. For homeowners, especially those along I
think the term is the wild land urban fire interface or whatever. There's something
some term to that, But basically, if if you're adjacent to a wild
land that is subject to fire, what should you be doing on your property
to help ensure that your house isn't one of these casualties. Well, if
you will create that green space between your structures and those wild lands, just
mitigating those ladder fuels and the ground fuels that spread it and making it available
for trucks to get into because in those areas it's hard for us to get
trucks in there, especially pumper trucks, because you know a lot of those
roads are one lane roads and there's no place to turn around. And so
it's just really important that they do all that firewise prep on their structures and
get the fuels back so that we've got time and just mowing the yard and
keeping it green. It makes a big difference, makes a huge difference.
And that doesn't mean you can't have any trees, no, I mean we
didn't. Honestly, there wasn't that many trees that burned in this It really
was mostly the brush and the grass. Well, And if you remove the
brush and the grass, that removes the fuels that will get the trees.
Are you going? And so as long as you keep that stuff down,
you can you can have trees, get rid of the sick trees, the
healthy trees. It takes a lot more heat to get those going. And
our red cedar population. Would you prefer to see them gone? I wish
they were all gone. They go up like a body out they do.
In fact, I've been a fireman for twenty three years and I stopped to
take some video and some cedars burning because it was that impressed it is.
It's incredible. They turned into a column of flame. Oh, it's it's
just crazy. So those certainly removing those and removing all of all of those
fuels trying to push it back. Don't have don't have dead brush and landscaping
up against the house. Right. It looks nice, you know, and
when the weather's right for it, right, But in the fire season,
why it's burn your house. You're gonna want to cut it and move it
back. Yes, firewood, split stacked, don't stack stacking against the house
now, and you can go as far as you want to go. There
is a Firewise program where they recommend and like a lot of gravel. If
you've got gardening, you know, on flower beds and things, to fill
that with gravel, you know, the decorative gravel. You can use and
stay away from the house. But it puts that barrier in there. And
then like we were saying, you know, keep your yard mode, get
rid of the dead stuff, don't stack firewood against the house, don't stack
trash against the house. A lot of it's just kind of common sense.
It's common sense. One of the things you said was interesting to me.
I hadn't really thought about it. Make sure that you all can get a
fire trunk basically that they can drive around your house and a place to turn
it around. Yeah, because if we can't get in there and turn it
around, we'll go in. We're not gonna go you don't you know a
little backup upper around quarters? Yeah? Yeah, those takes time. Confers
are expensive and the men that operate them, they're invaluable, it's right,
So we're not going to lose those people. And they have no time to
waste in those situations. Yeah, and when it fills with smoke and you
can't see, it's pretty scary. I had a minor experience of that myself.
It was during that fire. I was up driving around and I was
I was just looking for the fire, and it turns out I found that.
What happened, it got And you're right, it's a little scary.
It kind of blacks out. It's hard to see exactly what's going on and
see down the road, and you can't see rock schools. I can't see
the road all. Yeah. So and that's another thing people don't realize,
you know. They think they're going to run through that. And if you
get a good kit of that hot smoke in your eyes, they all shut
and they won't open back up. So I certainly don't envy your guys when
they're out there doing that kind of stuff. But I truly do appreciate them,
and I appreciate all of them. And this was different for me because
I was sitting instead of being out there fighting fire, I was sitting managing.
And I'm worried about those guys, right because you weren't there. Yeah,
I wasn't there to be able. You know, when I had a
crew and I could take care of me and my crew, I felt confident
you were in control. Hitting in that command van. Sitting up there and
I can't see what they're doing, I worried about It was a new experience.
It was a new experience. Well, I have a radio, and
so when things are like that are going on. I listened, and I'm
certainly not an expert, but I can tell you that it was the radio
traffic and the way that all of the firefighters and the command staff responded very
professional. It was very well organized. I realized it was probably did not
feel that way if you were on site, But to a observer who was
sitting on his patio not fearing fire, you guys were doing all of the
job so well. And I tell you, without the fire departments, we
would have lost a lot of houses on Circle Mountain. I mean that the
stuff that the forestry did defend those feels. It was key that because we
were just running out of resources. But those guys, every one of them,
all the departments that were there, they worked hard. Those guys were
tired. I talked to the chief at night, I said, is there
any thing I can do for you. Is there anything else I can get?
And he says, I have everything that's available. We are out of
resources. So thanks, but there's nothing you can do. And that is
a strange feeling. I bet a couple of our guys that I know really
well. We're up on Circle Mountain and they said, Jerry Hawk, can
you send me? And I said nothing. And that's a terrible feeling.
That's a bad feeling. Yeah. So, by the way, a good
job of continue that thing out west yesterday. That that was a smoky thing.
Yeah, I didn't have to get too involved in that. It was
mostly in the trees, and our battalion chief pretty well handled that. And
I know he relied heavily on Osa Hills Fire Department and the Bureau of Indian
Affairs came out. They had a bulldozer or two and they had some airplanes
dropping some retardant. That's all the planes. That was cool. Yeah,
that's cool. But they kept it mostly in the wild land. They did
good. Wow, well, chief, thank you. I've expressed my thanks
to everybody who was involved in that. I said, it wasn't just us.
There's a lot of fire departments, and I'm truly appreciate of them.
And so now if a homeowner has any questions about what they could do to
improve their their fire safety, what numbers should they call to you? They
could call the office. Just call our office PHONUS nine eight three three eight
four O nine eight. Okay, all right, well, I'm happy to
help them. I appreciate that. And unlike Terry lawds and you didn't give
my cell phone number to everybody to tell them to call me. He was
popular. I'm afraid to ask Terry that question because he doesn't always answer truthfully.
Chief. I don't know anything about fire protections, so I hope they
call the office, you know, call Yeah, I know, call the
chief. All right, well, thanks Chief, I appreciate it, and
hopefully thank you. Hopefully we will have to have you back in to talk
about wildfire. Next we're gonna talk about water and rain and praying for rain.
At this point in time, I thinks what we're really bad. Let
me let me slide over end over TV actually be in the TV screen.
You usually sit over there so they can't see him. I'm kind of I'm
a little concerned. What are you playing to fight for that spot? Yeah?
Yeah, it's husy race. Michael usually wins it too, he does.
He's bigger than you. Yeah, and fast, and there's no doubt
about bigger, faster, tougher, meaner. I mean, he's kind of
got everything on you. Thanks for starting my day out so great. You're
welcome. I'm sure, we're sure we'll end it by you giving myself phone.
Yeah, I was gonna say which Pike's number. Yeah, we'll get
to that. I had to get my shots at. Let's say that for
the end, all right, Terry, let's talk Let's talk water or black
water. Yes, Well, as of today, we are fifty seven percent
of the water remaining um, which is kind of the bad news, not
unexpected, but our weekly average consumption daily consumption did drop last week to four
point seven one in many gallons a day, so the good news. Week
prior we went up to five point three three, so it was a reduction.
So I'm I'm hopeful that people are taking this more seriously as far as
where we're at and kind of doing their part to restrict and conserved water.
Win win possible. And it's it is interesting because we've talked about it for
quite a while and we've asked for voluntary conservation, but they're you know,
one of the questions that I had on here is why would we increase water
rates? And it really is somewhat symbolic. It's not a huge amount of
money for anybody, but it is interesting when you increase water rates what the
consumption does. And once again we've seen that it is probably our most effective
method for reducing consumption. It is and it gets people's attention, like it
or not, and then people will become more aware of what they're doing and
how they're using water, and hopefully that correlates into a reduction of usage so
that we can conserve what we have. Because really you've got your us their
voluntary voluntary conservation was it. Did we see significant decreases? In fact,
did we see any decreases? We honestly saw none. It was less than
one percent, I think overall. Once we were doing the voluntary So then
we did move to a more restrictive state in the sense where it wasn't just
a voluntary conservation. We did restrict the outdoor uses of it to twice a
week's which this week we're starting phase three, which will go to once a
week outdoor water use. And then we did. Council adopted the emergency water
rates, which helped further, I guess, get people's attention to let them
know that this is a serious thing that we all have to really do do
our part to manage through it. But so starting this week, what bays
somebody wants. So if you are an even number house, then that's the
last number of your property address. You can water on Thursdays. Odd number
of properties can water on Friday. So just once a week, just once
a week. There's really no provisions for if someone's put in sod or anything
of that nature, and really it's simple. So we're hopeful that you can
keep your SAD alive with one day's watering if you plan to have sod put
in, which I would like to insert areas in my yard, but I'm
not going to at this point because I wouldn't be able to waters. Yeah,
it's it's probably not a good time to be aggressively putting in new landscaping
at this time, a SOD or anything that requires water and right as you
are going to be limited. Yeah, So the city follows these rules as
well as far as our crews and our projects, and we have shared that
with the state who is doing the bridge over the Kenny River there on Tuxedo,
to let them be aware of the outdoor water restrictions. Now, it
doesn't fall to if they're using water to wet down rock or different amenities that
they're using in the course construction. That's part of their job, and so
we don't we're not considering that an outdoor water use, even though it kind
of is is in the course of their their their work or their pointmage.
Yeah, but that's really the outdoor water use is really limited to your irrigation
of landscaping, gardens, lawns, those sorts of things. It's typically a
voluntary thing that we enter into because we want or hard to be green,
or we want to put in new sod and so there are it is possible
to reduce the amount that we use out there without huge repercussions. So we
talked about the restrictions outdoor watering. There's there's some degree of confusion in fact
in city Beat, the Kelly has attempted to clarify what that is. So
for outdoor watering, we're really talking about running an irrigation system. Doesn't matter
whether it's just a sprinkler or if it's an end ground system. How about
a hose If somebody's run a hose out and there they just got water running
on our trees out outdoor water and that's outdoor water. Is only once a
week that you could do that? Yeah, what about if some filled a
watering can while they were in their shower taking a shower and then took it
out and water their plants. Well, I think technically you would be okay
to do that. I would probably try to limit it to the day that
you're able to water outdoors or use water outdoors. But the truth is is
that we have to someonet catch you in the act of doing that, so
complaint or get a complaint, and it's unlikely that we're gonna catch you using
a water can with two or three plants outside that it's just kind of used
some common sense. So the intended is to prevent the thousand gallons per hour
of water use. If you have a water can and you're using sink water
that you say from doing dishes and to water your plants outdoors, rainbarrels have
at it. People that have rain barrels. Obviously that is not a use
of potable water. And we're not gonna. We're not going to regulate that.
So so those things we will have common sense as we do this.
I'm not aware of any widespread ticket writing. I don't know that we've written
any at this one time. But I'm just thankful you're not going into people's
showers. You and I boats. Not that I mind a company, but
I do mind the laughing. We're not ever gonna What happens in there stays
in there. Yeah, So if you want to do a rain barrel,
there is no restrictions against that. You just knock yourself out. We are
forecasted for rain this week, so it may be a good opportunity, a
good week to put one in. Yeah. So as and that's it that
this question came up about rain barrels, and actually was talking to the mayor
about it this morning. So that is that helps to gather water, It
helps to reduce the amount of water that you consume off the system, but
it also helps to reduce runoff, which ultimately typically gathers pollution and runs into
the stream. So there's a lot of advantages if you want to install a
rain barrel, the city would certainly encourage that. Yeah, absolutely would appreciate
your efforts. So we talked about our overall status, which was about fifty
seven Is that what you said? Seven percent? So that's all of our
water that we have available, what we started, what we would be if
it was awful. We are fifty seven percent of that, so we're almost
a half. Yep. That's why we're talking about this so much because and
there is also some misconception that people think of when we say fifty seven percent,
we're just talking about Hula. This is all of our water, which
includes Hula, Copan, our lake which is Hudson Lake, and then what
we have available on the Candy River as well. Yep. And I did
a quick check this morning and hopefully I got the numbers right. But Hula's
at forty three percent. UH is Copan full? No Copans in fifty six,
I believe, so it doesn't. I realized we talk a lot about
diverse fire or water suppli so that way have Hula and Copan and all of
those things, and those are important for long term water security. But ultimately
Copan is they it can suffer from a drought as well. So when you
have a widespread drought, it's going to affect both lakes. There is no
silver bullet here, which is why we're asking for conservation. How long assuming
we don't get ranked let's hope we get rained. But if we don't get
rain, about how long until we ask under fifty percent, which which basically
creates a state of emergency. Yeah, we anticipate that sometime in either late
May or early June with no rain. With no rain, it's coming.
It's coming fairly quickly. Yeah. When we talk about outdoor water and why
is that so important? What is our use in say the winter, versus
what we could expect to see during summer when people are doing a lot of
watering. Yeah, so we in the wintertime will use anywhere between four and
five million gallons a day. When we are using our irrigation systems or outdoor
watering, that will jump up to nine to twelve million gallons a day.
So we double, sometimes triple the amount of water that we consume with two
thirds of that going outside. So it's five to eight million gallons a date
difference. Yea, So it is a huge amount of water that's used for
irrigation. And again, normally we don't mind when we have plenty of water,
but in this instance, we are we are trying to reduce that so
Canny River pump station. We got a little bit of good news. We
got it, finally got a part. We didn't get the part we ordered,
but we made them go find a part that would work and wire it
in. Yeah, and so that's up and running. Yes, does that
change our available water supply? No, it doesn't change the overall percentages.
But what it does is that we can serve the entire need that we have
currently from the river. So we can turn off the lakes and run just
off the river and preserve those just as long as possible. But at some
point with the area lakes, if everything continues no rain, and then that
river wall will be unable to sustain our needs with it, so we would
have to turn to the lakes. But for now it can and so we'll
ride it as long as we can use it, as often as we can.
And if people aren't wa then we believe that we can serve all of
the domestic needs off of the river for the foreseeable future. Yes, that's
great news. All right, pray for rain. I don't know what else
to say. Tom, All right, thank you very much for joining us.
For city matters,