Above, Williamsburg Police Officer Brandon White shops with two youngsters during the 2014 Shop With a Cop program. This year, the city will require parents or guardians of all those who benefit from the program to perfom some community service.
Participants in the Williamsburg Police Department’s Shop with a Cop program or their parents or guardians will be required to perform some kind of community service this year in order to take part in the program.
Williamsburg Mayor Roddy Harrison informed the city council about the change, which is part of his Community Reinvestment Program, during its monthly meeting Monday.
The program will require the children, if they are old enough, to perform eight hours of community service in order to take part.
If the children are too young, then the parents or guardians will be expected to perform the community service.
Harrison said there is a list of things that people can participate in to get community service credit and it isn’t just things like picking up trash along roadways or raking leaves at Briar Creek Park, but those are two options for people who are interested.
For instance, a single mother, who has had difficulty getting a job, could take a class that would prepare her for a job interview and how to write a resume, or a grandparent could take an art class through the Cooperative Extension Service.
Harrison said he has spoken with the school family resource centers, who nominate the children for participation in the program, and they are all on board.
"Are we going to lose some, yes," Harrison said. "We already have some, who refuse to work. There will be a lot who fall through the cracks this year."
Harrison said he decided to bring about the change because more people seem to be "expecting" something for nothing. He cited the instance of one family last year, who decided not to allow their children to take part in Shop with a Cop because they were going to have to stand in line at Wal-Mart to check out.
Harrison said the woman thought she and her children should have been moved ahead of other customers to the front of the line and left because of that.
"The hope is that children will see that mom, dad, maybe Aunt Betty or Uncle Fred had to do a little bit of work and I got to go shopping," Harrison said.
"I think it is a great idea. I feel like it could explode. I think that is a wonderful idea," noted Councilwoman Patty Faulkner.
City Attorney Greta Price noted that the city might actually see an increase from some people who didn’t want to participate before because they don’t want to accept charity and want to feel like they are earning something.
During its monthly meeting Monday, the council also discussed a need for city residents to be more aware about the antennas on their new water meters, of which 10 have already been broken including four in the past week.
Harrison said many of the antennas are being damaged when people mow their lawns too closely or clip the antennas with their weed eaters.
Harrison said the cost to replace the water meter antennas is about $140.
Councilmember Richard Foley asked if the city needed to look at charging local residents to replace the antennas.
Harrison said he is concentrating for now on making people more aware of the problem.
Harrison said that there are only about 13 water meters left in town that will need to be replaced as part of the city’s energy savings program.
Once installation of all the new water meters is complete, city officials anticipate seeing a revenue increase because of how inaccurate the old meters were.
Harrison said that it might take another six months to get all the kinks worked out.
After that, he said city officials would probably conduct a rate study to determine if the sewer rate should be increased because the expense to treat the sewage continues to rise.
"We maybe looking at a sewer rate increase," Harrison warned.
In addition, Harrison announced that he has been working with Williamsburg Police Chief Wayne Bird on an ordinance to regulate the use of mopeds in the city limits.
Harrison said there has been a series of accidents involving the machines and that several people have gotten injured on major roadways.
The proposed ordinance will probably be similar to the golf cart ordinance and will require the vehicles to be insured, licensed, have a licensed driver and will limit them to roadways where the speed limit is 25 mph or less.
Harrison said this is essentially every road in the city limits except US25W and Ky. 92.
Harrison added that the city would like to start offering golf cart rentals at the RV park, which is located adjacent to the waterpark.
Harrison said he hopes to eventually get a traffic light installed at the entrance to the waterpark on Ky. 92 and perhaps install a bicycle and golf cart lane leading from the waterpark to Wal-Mart so RV park visitors could drive the golf carts there to pick up supplies.
In other business, the council:
• Received an update on the planned Christmas Bazaar that will take place at the Williamsburg Tourism and Convention Center on Dec. 12 from 9 a.m. – 4 p.m.
The bazaar is for crafters, who make Christmas crafts. So far over 20 are scheduled to take part.
At 6 p.m. on Dec. 12, the annual Christmas parade will take place. It will be followed at 7 p.m. by the annual Christmas caroling in Bill Woods Park, the town ornament exchange and decorating of the town Christmas tree, which is also the memorial tree.
Harrison noted that people can place ornaments on the tree in honor of departed friends and relatives.
