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VALLEY — A portion of the city-owned Burney property may be the location of a new business in Valley.

On Monday, the Valley City Council held the first reading of a proposed ordinance to sell a 4.689-acre site off Fob James Drive. The property fronts Fob James Drive on one side and has what will be Burney Road on the other side.

Burney Road is now under construction and will connect Fob James Drive with 55th Street. A new traffic signal will soon be going up at that intersection with Fob James.

In a unanimous vote, the council approved a first reading to sell the land to A Sharma PP LLC for $242,375.

The sale could be approved following a second reading of the ordinance at the next council meeting.

In other business involving land between Fob James and 55th, second readings were held for some proposed zoning changes. Included is a 3.81-acre site next to the Waffle House on Fob James, a 15-acre site that faces 55th Street and a 10.5-acre site at the junction of 55th and King Road.

The changes were approved in a unanimous vote. The site next to the Waffle House is now C-3, or Community Business District; the 15-acre site on 55th is now M-1, of Light Industrial District, and the land at the corner of 55th and King has been changed from R-5 to R-6, paving the way for a new apartment complex.

The new M-1 site off 55th will be a new home for two existing businesses, Brumfield Electric & Communications, Inc. (BEC) and Riggers, Fabricators and Millwrights, Inc. (RFM).

A public hearing was scheduled to receive public comment on the proposed changes. No one was there to express opposition, and the hearing was closed.

First readings for the three ordinances were held two weeks ago. They were approved following Monday’s second reading.

Another proposed ordinance that received a first reading two weeks ago was pulled and not acted on Monday. Planning & Development Director Travis Carter told the council that plans to develop the site were scrapped after soil testing results was not promising. It was for a 30-acre site on the east side of Highway 29.

The council approved a three-item consent agenda. One of the items involves window replacement at city hall, another permits travel advances to city officials who will be attending the May 11-14 Alabama League of Municipalities Conference in Tuscaloosa, and the third item imposes a lien on property that has been cleaned up in the Riverdale Subdivision.

New windows for city hall will be purchased from Freeman’s Custom Windows, Valley, for $14,950. Each city official going to Tuscaloosa will receive a $300 travel advance if they are traveling in their own vehicle and request the advance. They will not be reimbursed for mileage. The lien in the Riverdale Subdivision is for $519.85.

Two items were approved in the regular agenda. The Alabama State University Center for Leadership and Public Policy and Mayor Leonard Riley have been authorized to execute a contract to compile district maps based on census information.

Another resolution was approved that will allow city employees to convert their unused sick leave pay to retirement service credit. Mayor Riley said he was willing to do this on a six-month trial basis to see how it works out. If it’s not overly expensive, it could be extended longer than that.

The council approved a proclamation recognizing April as Sexual Assault Awareness Month. This recognizes the prevalence of sexual assault and seeks to educate individuals and communities in ways it can be prevented.

Sharon Stephens was appointed to the Valley Housing Authority Board of Commissioners.

Police Chief Mike Reynolds reported on three new vehicles Valley Police Department is expecting to arrive. One of them, Reynolds said, will be here very soon but the other two are being delayed by a problem in getting microchips.

Reynolds said he was pleased to have gotten a recent call from a city resident commending VPD officers for the professionalism and courtesy that had been shown them in a recent traffic stop.

“We appreciate that,” he said.

Valley Parks & Recreation Director Laurie Blount said she wanted to thank two groups of volunteers who had done great work in this past Saturday’s Valley Cleanup Day.

“One group was from the Shawmut Nazarene Church and the other was from the Verandas apartments,” she said.

The church group cleaned litter off the roads in Shawmut and the apartments group cleaned up along Fob James Drive.

“We are not getting the volunteers we have gotten in the past, but we’d like to continue Cleanup Day,” Blount said.

Blount said that Valley Parks & Recreation will have some youth going to a track meet in Phenix City and that swimming lessons would soon start at the Community Center pool. A youth baseball tournament will be taking place this weekend at the Sportsplex.

Public Works Director Patrick Bolt told the council that men in his department had recently taken a training course in trench safety and that a skid car class had been planned. Two men from the department had recently gone to Waco, Texas for training on how to operate a new street sweeper the city has purchased. The new sweeper should be in the city by late May.

“We also have a new mower coming soon,” he said.

Bolt said the turnout for electronic waste recycling was not as good as it has been in the past.

“We got 12 pallets and one load of trash to take to the landfill,” he said. “We got 53 pallets the first year we did this and 49 the next year.”

Every unwanted electrical item with a cord was accepted. These items will be going to a recycling center in Lawrenceville, Georgia.

“We did get two truckloads of old tires,” Bolt said.

“They won’t be going on the side of the road, and that’s good,” Mayor Riley said.

Bolt couldn’t resist joking a bit with the older members of the council. “In the first couple of years we did this, we got a lot of the console color TVs of your generation,” he kidded. “We are getting the smaller color TVs now. A lot of people are making use of the shredder truck.”

Council Member Jim Clark thanked all city departments for the work they have been doing in his district. He also thanked members of the Shawmut Nazarene Church for the work they did in Cleanup Day.

“I will be trying to get every church in my district to help out in next year’s Cleanup Day,” he said.