Josh Pyle, who has previously served as a field appraiser for Webster County, was approved by the supervisors as deputy assessor. The recommendation for Pyle’s hiring was made by Webster County Assessor Angie Vinson. Pyle began his full-time role Tuesday and will be paid $70,871 annually.

The supervisors also approved a contract with L. Thies LLC, of Odebolt, for $349,595.50 for the Meier Marsh Restoration Project. The project is a wetland and oxbow project and is fully reimbursed by the State of Iowa.

Meier Marsh is near the border of Webster and Calhoun counties.

“We held a reconstruction meeting yesterday, so now it’s just a matter of moving forward and signing the contract,” said Matt Cosgrove, Webster County Conservation director. “This project can get started this week depending on how much water is actually out there because it is a wetland and oxbow project.”

The supervisors approved the purchase of two Ford Police Interceptor Explorers from Fort Dodge Ford Lincoln Toyota in the amount of $48,920 each. The bids are State of Iowa vehicle bid prices and were already budgeted into the Webster County Sheriff’s new vehicle budget.

The supervisors also approved vacating multiple abandoned roads in Burnside. According to Webster County Engineer Jamie Johll, these are platted roads that were never built. Vacated roads include “the abandoned road of 40 feet in width currently known as 303rd Street that adjoins Lot 1, Block 2, the abandoned unnamed road of varying width lying north and west of Lots 7-12, Block 2, the abandoned unnamed road of 66 feet in width that adjoins Lots 23-24, Block 3, and the abandoned unnamed road of 66 feet in width that adjoins Lots 13-22, Block 3, in Burnside.”

Johll also asked the supervisors to approve an agreement with the Iowa Department of Transportation for a joint application to the Competitive Highway Grant Program. The supervisors approved the agreement that will allow two bridge projects to be bundled with a DOT project for the grant application. According to Johll, the program prioritizes bundled projects. If accepted by the CHBP program, each project would still be itemized out individually, but submitted as one grant.

A cooling unit was approved for the phone/lock room at the Webster County Courthouse. The supervisors approved the low bid of $5,952 from Moeller Furnace & Air, of Fort Dodge.

The supervisors also approved an upgrade with Aureon to increase the county’s internet bandwidth from 200 MB to 500 MB for an additional cost per month of $16.

Supervisor Bob Thode also thanked county staff for helping with multiple projects

“I want to put a special thank you out to many employees in this building who stepped up to help this past week,” said Thode. “Through the weather issues last week, we had an elevator go out, air conditioners go out, water leaking from roofs in two buildings. Everybody has really stepped up to help and done a great job to help get things looked at and fixed. I want to personally thank everyone that stepped up and helped me to get this taken care of.”