Labor Day holiday
City offices will be closed Monday, Sept. 4 for the Labor Day holiday, and the curbside trash pickup schedule will be altered. Trash normally picked up on Monday will be picked up Tuesday, Sept. 5. Trash normally picked up on Tuesday will be picked up Wednesday, Sept. 6. Thursday and Friday routes will run as usual.
Newton Public Library
In partnership with the Newton Area Chamber of Commerce, the Library hosted an after-hours event yesterday that provided tours of the new library site that is under construction. 50-60 people attended. The contractor, Dondlinger Construction, provided guided tours of the building shell. The library provided refreshments and rolled out their new logo with stickers and koozies. What a great opportunity to show off this new amenity and to engage our citizens, business leaders, and library patrons!
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Trails & Parks Map
The Newton Area Trails & Parks Map is now available! The map includes all the streets of Newton and North Newton as well as sidewalks, trails and more. The map also is available as a PDF on the Choose Newton website. The printed product folds down to credit card size with a hard cover, perfect to take along on a bike ride.
They are available for free at Newton City Hall, North Newton City Hall, the Newton Recreation Center, the Newton Area Chamber of Commerce, Kauffman Museum, Bethel College Thresher Shop, the Harvey County Historical Museum, the Harvey County Health Department, Newton Public Library, several businesses in downtown Newton, and the five hotels along I-135.
For those who want to have maps available for customers or in bulk, contact Toby Carrig at tcarrig@newtonkansas.com or by phone at 316-284-3642. Partial funding for the project came from a Kansas Tourism marketing grant.
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Building & Engineering
- QuikTrip construction continues to move forward and is on schedule, thanks to the dry weather.
- Fox Ridge residential development sewer phase 1 will begin construction next week; the contractor has already mobilized to the site.
- The City is receiving many calls regarding multiple utility companies working in various areas of town. These include Ideatek, AT&T, and Kansas Gas Service. If citizens have issues or concerns, they should call the Engineering Office for guidance. They can be reached at 316-284-6020, 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday through Friday.
- R. Michael Rhoades Wetlands Park: Final pieces of construction are planned for September: Concrete around signage kiosks, additional concrete path, boardwalk installations, solar lighting. The facility is not open to the public yet, but we anticipate a grand opening early this fall.
Street & Sanitation
- Crews finished night work this week on pavement markings in the downtown area and public parking lots.
- Utility cut repairs at 812 Logan, 432 W. Broadway, 10th & Berry, and various Ideatek locations.
- Bulky Item Tagging Program from Aug. 21-25: Our inspector tagged 27 locations. Twelve were charged the $20 fee, 14 were charged the $10 fee, and one inactive account was referred to the Environmental Control Officer.
- Next Friday (Sept. 8) at 11 a.m., new banners on pedestrian light poles will be unveiled at Depot Park. The Newton Chamber is organizing the event. Newton High School welding students made banner brackets, and Bethel College and others provided funding for the banners. Eventually each pedestrian light pole in the downtown area will have two banners celebrating Newton school pride.
Water/Wastewater
- Standby crew responded to nine after-hours calls this week.
- Lead and Copper Rule updates:
- We have received 2,437 plumbing surveys to date.
- Completed nine excavations and material inventories.
- Assisted 25 customers with completing their surveys.
- Total number of One-Call Locate tickets for Ideatek this week: 84.
- 45 of these were updated tickets.
- Repaired leaks in the 500 block of W. Broadway and 700 block of W. 10th.
- Worked several sewer calls; none of these turned out to be public main backups, all were on the private service side.
- Repaired damage caused by Ideatek contractors in the 300 block of W. 13th.
- Contractors hit a 6-inch water line near the First Street tank project.
- Completed some annual meter change-outs.
- Televised some storm sewers as part of our stormwater permit requirements.
- Wastewater Treatment Plant staff repaired a couple of water leaks in the Influent Pump station.
- Contractors completed the rehab of well #11 at Mission Water Plant. Staff is running tests on it to confirm.
Parks & Cemeteries
- Trimmed trees and removed small trees and shrubs growing up around the railing along the west side of the bike path.
- Sheared the vines and foreign growth from the fence on the west side of Greenwood Cemetery.
- Cleaned restrooms, picked up litter and dumped trash.
- Kept the splash park running.
- Mowed rights-of-way.
- Had one cemetery service this week and dug one for next week.
- Watered trees.
- Erected storage building at Restlawn Cemetery. We are still waiting for the garage doors to be installed.
Upcoming Events
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Ribbon-Cutting for School Pride Banners: Depot Park, Sept. 8, 11 a.m.
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Second Saturdays at Carriage Factory Art Gallery: Sept. 9, 10 a.m.–noon.
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Local Small Business Pop Up Shop: Sand Creek Event Center, Sept. 9, 10 a.m.–noon.
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Annual Newton Area Chamber of Commerce Banquet: The City is pleased to be a Platinum sponsor for the 102nd Annual Chamber Banquet on Sept. 21 at 6 p.m. at Meridian Center.
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United Way Annual Chili Cook-Off: Downtown Newton, Sept. 23, 11 a.m.–1:30 p.m.
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Blues, Brews & Barbecue: Athletic Park, Sept. 23, 4-11 p.m.
See all of the upcoming events at our Community Events listing on Choose-Newton.com.
Meetings & Reminders:
- Sept. 4 – City offices closed for Labor Day
- 7:30 a.m. Sept. 7 – City Commission agenda review
- 7 p.m. Sept. 12 – City Commission meeting
- 7:30 a.m. Sept. 21 – City Commission agenda review
- 7 p.m. Sept. 26 – City Commission meeting
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