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VALLEY — In its first meeting of the new year on Monday, the Valley City Council approved two ordinances, one to annex some property near Exit 77 on I-85 and another to extend a contract.

In both cases, the rules were suspended to adopt the ordinance after one reading.

The land being annexed is a 16-acre site directly across 55th Street from the former Burney site. The land had recently been purchased by the city.

The contract being extended is with the Bennet Group LLC, which intends to open a 56-unit senior housing complex near the junction of 55th Street and King Road. The approved ordinance extends a closing date to May 31, 2025 for the Bennet Group to make a non-refundable earnest payment of $5,000 and to slightly modify the current legal description to consider certain wetlands issues.

The council unanimously approved a four-item consent agenda that included two requests to permit the public consumption of alcohol on two city-owned properties and two determinations of public nuisances and authorizations to clean up the sites. The alcohol permits were for a wedding reception at the Lakeview Cabin on February 21st and 22nd and for ValleyFest 2025, which will be taking place on the parking lots outside Valley Sportsplex on Saturday and Sunday, May 23rd and 24th.

Code Enforcement Officer Adam Roberts showed the council video images of the two nuisance sites on the big-screen TVs inside the council chamber. Both abandoned dwellings were in states of major deteriorating with lots of rotten wood, broken windows and overgrown yards. One of the properties is on Spring Street and the other on Denna Drive. With the Monday approval by the council, the city’s code enforcement department is authorized to tear down the dilapidated structures and to clean up the sites. The cost of doing this can be placed as a lien on the property.

Mayor Leonard Riley said that the city has a current balance of approximately $390,000 in its Rebuild Alabama account and that none of that money has been spent thus far in road resurfacing in the city. Thus far, that spending has been covered by a bond issue.

City Clerk/Treasurer Cathy Snowden reported that the city has a current ending balance of more than $11.2 million.

Police Chief Mike Reynolds reviewed the trends that have been seen by his department from 2022 through 2024. The number of calls to the police station have dropped from 13,149 in 2022 to 11,554 and the number of traffic accidents have dropped from 391 in 2022 to 269 this past year.

Chief Reynolds credited the fewer calls and fewer accidents to having had more traffic stops and more citations and warnings. Those numbers have risen from having had 4,678 traffic stops in 2022 to 4,913 in 2023 and 5,234 in 2024. Warnings over that same period more than doubled from 1,028 in 2022 to 2,226 this past year. Citations went from 1,349 in 2022 to 1,704 in 2023 and 2.082 in 2024.

Arrests have been dropping. There were 1,535 in 2022, 1,519 the next year and 1,494 in 2024.

Mayor Riley asked Reynolds if traffic in and out of the new Chick-fil-A had been going smoothly. He said that it had. There had been some concern before the new restaurant opened about a larger amount of traffic leaving the restaurant and making the north-bound turn from 33rd Street onto Highway 29.

“We’ve only had a few accidents there and nothing major,” Chief Reynolds said.

Valley Parks and Recreation Director Laurie Blount told the council that the numbers were slightly down this year at the Christmas Merry Go Round. She attributed that to fewer days to ride and one day canceled due to rain. “We didn’t have a good calendar this year,” she said.

The year 2026 will mark 70 years for this treasured local holiday tradition.

Blount added that the indoor pool at Valley Community Center is presently closed and could be down for some time. “It’s 22 years old, and we are having trouble to find the parts we need to fix what’s wrong,” she said.

It may be necessary to do some digging underneath the pool to get to the problem.

At the present time, the Valley swim team has been practicing at a pool in LaGrange.

Council Member Jim Clark thanked everyone for their expressions of condolence following the death of his mother. She passed away the day after Christmas at 93 years of age. He congratulated fellow Council Member Henry Cooper on having recently had his 71st birthday. “You have a ways to go to catch up with me,” joked fellow Council Member Jimmy Gilson. “I’m 82.”