MARFA — Marfa City Council met Tuesday to discuss the installation of a splash pad at Coffield Park and policies relating to meeting agenda procedure.

All council members were present. Parks Board President Michael Camacho approached council members for approval of the board’s chosen contractor, Yoseff Ben-Yehuda Construction, who will work with vendor VORTEX to install a new splash pad for Coffield Park. 

Camacho explained that the parks board wanted to keep the money local by hiring Ben-Yehuda, who also submitted the most affordable bid to complete the project and agreed to obtain a specific certification required by splash pad vendor VORTEX. The project is coming in at around $199,000, Camacho said, but the board had $250,000 budgeted to help cover any unforeseen expenses.

The target date for the new water recreation site to be completed is this coming September, but it will not open to the public until Spring of 2025, he said. The splash pad is likely to be installed in between the gazebo — which is currently undergoing an expansion — and the playground where the road used to be. The parks board plans to recapture the water used to operate the splash pad for irrigating the north side of the park. And plans are underway to hire a landscape architect to help further improve the park next budgetary cycle, Camacho said.

“The splash pad, not only is an amenity for the children and adults and whoever, but it’s also going to be the kickstarter for our irrigation program,” Camacho said. 

Council members showed enthusiasm for the project and voted unanimously to approve the hiring of Ben-Yehuda to carry out installation. 

Council members then discussed whether or not to amend a meeting policy relating to council member sponsorship — the process of a council member placing an item on the meeting agenda for discussion, sometimes on behalf of a citizen or group. Under the current policy, City Manager Mandy Roane, Mayor Manny Baeza and a single council member can place items on the meeting agenda. Council members considered requiring two council members to sponsor an item in order to get it on a meeting agenda.

The potential change was prompted by Councilmember Raul Lara, who said he thought requiring two council members to sponsor an agenda item would help council keep a “tighter agenda” and move on with “taking care of business.”  

Councilmember Travis Acreman took issue with the idea, stating he thought it would “add a threshold” for citizens looking to see items of concern discussed by council because they would have to find two council members to sponsor them, as opposed to only one. “I don’t see any reason to change things while adding a barrier for citizen engagement, we have so precious little of it as it is,” Acreman said. 

He asked why it was needed, and if the council was losing a significant amount of time dealing with sponsored items. Roane responded stating, “We did have a few items that died for lack of a second, died for lack of a motion,” and said it was not uncommon for cities to require two council members to sponsor an agenda item. 

Acreman expressed concerns about council members violating the Open Meetings Act by talking to one another about agenda items outside of council meetings. Roane said it would not be illegal for council members to approach one another about sponsoring an agenda item, they were just not able to talk in detail. 

To boot, she said, the city’s resolution that details meeting procedure was 17 years old and in need of an update to reflect how meetings were currently run. Councilmembers Eddie Pallarez and Mark Morrison were neutral on the issue, and in the end Morrison made the motion to update the resolution and add the two council member sponsorship requirement, subject to later approval by council with any other updates. Acreman was the only council member that opposed the vote.