By Marla Jones, Managing Editor • marla@southerntorch.com

RAINSVILLE, Ala. — The Rainsville City Council held their regularly scheduled meeting on November 18.  

The City of Rainsville recently held a public hearing concerning building inspections. At the hearing, a divide stemmed from whether or not a contractor would work directly through the City or that builders would continue to remain responsible for their own inspections, while only providing a copy of the inspection sheet to the City of Rainsville to obtain a Certificate of Occupancy.

At Monday’s meeting, Councilmember Marshall Stiefel reintroduced the implementation of a 3-phase inspection to be completed by a licensed inspector of their choosing before a Certificate of Occupancy is issued to a new structure.

"My main concern was that we didn’t create another City job that taxpayers would be responsible for paying for. This puts it back in builders’ hands, where it needs to be,” said Stiefel.

 Ordinance 11-18-2019 was passed by the Council, pending advertisement. Mayor Rodger Lingerfelt anticipated the new ordinance would begin implementation by the first of the new year.  

In other business the Council passed the following:

• Approved the repair of sidewalks to be ADA accessible at the City Park, in the amount of $5000.00 to Boozer Construction. 
• Ordered 100 garbage cans from Toter
• Announced that bids would be accepted for the removal of the old stage at the City Park (bids will be opened on December 2 at the Council meeting) 

The Rainsville Chamber of Commerce will help co-host the State of the City Address at Northeast Community College on December 4 beginning at 7:30am.  

The Rainsville Christmas Parade will be December 7 beginning at 11am. 

The next meeting of the Rainsville City Council will be held on December 2 at 5pm with a workshop beginning at 4:15pm.