T-Mobile Gets Approval For Residential Tower in St. Peters

T-Mobile struck out with the St. Peters Planning and Zoning Commission, but connected with the Board of Aldermen.

By a 5-3 vote, the Board of Aldermen voted to allow T-Mobile access to city property at 200 Universal Drive during Thursday's Board meeting. The area in Ward 4, near a city-owned water tower, is mostly residential. Ward 4 Aldermen Patrick Barclay and Don Aytes joined Jerry Hollingsworth, Ward 2, in voting against the lease agreement.

Aytes spoke out against the proposal at the meeting. He objected to putting a tower in a neighborhood and said he couldn't support the issue. Barclay and Hollingworth agreed.

 of this year with a proposal to move into the residential area and occupy a location near the water tower on city property. The Commission—where Hollingsworth serves are the Board's representative—balked at the idea of building a tower at the proposed location.

For the new few months, T-Mobile and Planning and Zoning went back and forth on the issue. Planning and Zoning proposed using a pre-approved so-called pocket park on the corner of Spencer and Willott Roads. T-Mobile wasn't in favor of this location and said the 200 Universal Drive position was more desirable.

After two meetings with the Commission, T-Mobile was denied at meeting No. 3., the Commission voted to recommend a denial to the Board of Aldermen.

Despite the recommendation, the Board approved a lease agreement "to work together to achieve mutual goals" between the city and T-Mobile.

Water Sharing Agreement Nearing Renewal

Back in 1985 the city of St. Peters joined up with St. Charles to purchase water from the city of St. Louis. With growing communities, the two cities joined up with St. Louis to have two sources of water for residents.

The original agreement called for a 20-year deal with a 10-year option. In 2005, after the first 20 years had gone by, all groups involved exercised the option. Now 26 years into the agreement, a new deal is being discussed.

Transportation and Development Services Group Manager Russ Batzel informed the Board during Thursday's work session that discussion is underway to create a new working agreement. St. Charles has already been given permission to move forward and Batzel wanted to make sure St. Peters could get in on the agreement.

St. Louis, St. Peters and St. Charles all have preliminarily agreed to a new 30-year deal with four 10-year options. The St. Louis water commission has requested just two changes from the original agreement. The first is a monthly bill instead of quarterly and the second gives the commission permission to up the maximum water level per day if need. The agreement allows the St. Peters and St. Charles to get up to 31 million gallons a day. Currently the two use about 17 or 18 million.

The Board will vote on the proposed agreement at the Dec. 15, meeting.

Board Discusses New Ticketing System

St. Peters police could soon have a high-tech way to dispatch tickets.

During Thursday's work session, the Board heard a proposal to purchase new ticketing software. In the budget for this year, the city set aside $167,000 to purchase an electronic ticketing service.

Police would be able to swipe a driver's license in the car on a new device. Thedevice would print out a ticket and information from the license would be automatically downloaded into the court software. The process would eliminate some paperwork procedures for police officers.

After researching the project, the city found a vendor where it could purchase everything for $140,000 with $20,000 in maintenance fees—under the proposed budget. The Board raised no objections to the proposal and will vote on the ticketing system at the Dec. 15 meeting. Once purchased, the device could be in service as early as January 2012.