Wellston’s Town Board held a special meeting on July 28 to discuss the cessation of a municipal sales tax and went into executive session to discuss the employment of seven city employees, including three from the fire department.
The Board voted to end the one-half percent sales tax, effective on Oct. 1. They also approved a revised one-half percent municipal sales tax ordinance on the regular municipal election ballot in November.
If the ordinance passes a vote of the people, it will become effective on April 1, 2027, through June 30, 2032.
During the discussion of the ordinance, city officials said after speaking with the Oklahoma Tax Commission, situations like this have happened often, but ceasing the tax is the best option. The town’s legal counsel said that he thinks the safest action was to terminate, saying, “It was brought to our attention; we realized that it’s expired. I think we should terminate it and then move forward, you know, if it’s passed. Put itonthevoteinNovember.”
After the executive session, the Board voted to accept the resignation of Treasurer Derek Woody, but took no action on Administrator Samantha Jordan, Fire Chief Todd Beesley, Assistant Fire Chief BenGillentine,DeputyFire Chief Brian Piatt, Streets Employee Terry Leslie and Streets Employee Chris Fitzwater.
“I was extremely overwhelmed with the community’s response to seeing that pretty much the entire command staff of the fire department had been placed on the agenda for executive session,” Fire Chief Todd Beesley said. “That doesn’t always mean bad things when that happens. But, it’s still good that the community stood behind their fire department, and we are grateful for that at the fire department.”
He added that what came out of that meeting was coming back together as a team and community and agreeing to work for the betterment of Wellston and the people they serve.
The Town of Wellston was contacted for an explanation as to why so many people were placed on the agenda for executive session.As of deadline on Tuesday, they had not responded.