City gets LMA nod; purchase of post office is finalized

Franklin City Council convened Tuesday at City Hall for their regular monthly meeting.
Franklin Mayor Eugene Foulcard displayed an awarded plaque from Louisiana Municipal Association citing Honorable Mention to Franklin in the 2018 Community Achievement Award Competition.
“We recently won this award, at the LMA conference back in early August for Christmas Under the Lampposts” Foulcard said.
“We submitted a video in this category, and we came out Second in the state. Though, I did not mind coming in Second in the state to Patterson.”
Foulcard further announced in his executive report having signed final purchase documents last week to secure the right for the city to purchase the old post office on Willow Street.
“We have some tenants who are interested in moving in to the post office,” Foulcard said, “so we do have a game plan.”
“We do have some maintenance issues that we have to address with the HVAC, electrical concerns, and computer and telephone lines. But, we certainly have a game plan. I just have to sit down with our numbers guy, and we can rock n’ roll from there.”
In other news, Willie Rack and Glen Maze were approved appointments to the Civil Service Board for terms of three years.
An ordinance was introduced to grant and assign to Atmos Energy Corporation franchise and rights to conduct business in Franklin for the purpose of installing, removing, operating, maintaining and repairing the gas lines it will utilize to sell natural gas in the city.
Two resolutions were approved to lease-purchase certain equipment through lease-purchase agreements with Bancorpsouth Equipment Finance. Though, it was never made clear what type of equipment would stand as the commodity of the lease-purchase.
Announcements were:
—Franklin City-Wide Clean-Up will take place Sept. 14 from 8 a.m. to 9:30 a.m. at Brown Shopping Center parking lot.
—Student Tuition Assistance and Revenue Trust Seminar will be held Sept. 8 at 6 p.m. at City Park Recreation Center. The seminar will consist of “an innovative college savings plan designed to help families contend with the growing costs of educating their children after high school.”
—Financial Aid Seminar will take place Sept. 25 at 6 p.m. at Broussard-Harris Recreation Center, where the Louisiana Office of Student Financial Assistance will present information about FAFSA and TOPS.