In Split 3-2 Vote, Council OKs Variance For City Manager To Live Outside City Limits
Are we in or are we out? Of the city limits that is.
This was the question at the Sulphur City Council meeting Monday night.
Council members opened the action agenda portion of the meeting with a public hearing to discuss the recently updated and proposed City of Sulphur Zoning Ordinance and Map amendments. The recommended changes and updates were a result of countless hours by the Planning and Zoning Committee reviewing the old Ordinances and Maps.
City Manager Andy Freeman proposed tabling the hearing until a survey of boundaries could be done but Mayor Derrick Stone said since several people were in attendance for the hearing he thought they should continue with the hearing.
Several citizens requested to speak at the hearing regarding the confusion of whether their properties were actually all or partially in the city limits. One resident stated she had researched online and at the County Court House and could not find any filed documentation of the actual boundaries and annexations by the City of Sulphur.
Since the City of Sulphur has several boundary maps floating around, it appeared no one actually knows the legal boundary lines.
After a lengthly discussion, the hearing closed and council members took no action on the next agenda item on the proposed Zoning Ordinance and Maps as amended.
City Manager Andy Freeman then recommended to the council approve hiring a land surveyor to research documents and survey the boundaries and city limits of Sulphur.
The process could be lengthy and time consuming, and no idea of the cost to the City was known.
Since the project was not budgeted, members directed staff to see if bid request on the project would be possible or needed and an approximate cost.
Until then, the City will continue to use the maps and boundaries currently in place.
Members heard a request, via phone, from Melissa Alexander with the Rusty Nail Winery for an appeal regarding code enforcement violations. Alexander made a lengthy statement to members and asking for some leniency on taking down the remaining walls on the property. Members discussed the safety and health issues, and after reading the owners engineering reports, approved a 30-day window to get the walls removed.
A proposal by Parkhill Engineering for professional services for architectural and engineering services for the fire department sub-station that was lost in the tornado was denied by members.
Parkhill presented a $1.2 million proposal to rebuild the sub-station of which $184,900.00 of the price is engineering fees.
TheCityofSulphurhasreceived approximately $488,000.00 from FEMA for the project. The deadline to expend the FEMA funds on the project (unless and extension is requested and granted) is in March/April of 2026. If the extension is not granted and sub-station is not built, the City could possibly have to return the FEMA funds.
Council members convened into a brief executive session to discuss the recent arbitration hearing between the City of Sulphur and the Sulphur Professional Firefighters Association. Since no agenda item was included for the members to vote to return to regular meeting, Ward 1 CouncilmanAlan McKay did not attend the executive session after a search, read in part, “in Oklahoma a public body must vote to return to regular session and the minutes of the open meeting must show the motion and recorded vote to return to regular session.”
City Attorney Thomas Marcum told members they did not need an agenda item to return to regular session but you did need a vote to come out of executive session, however, no vote was recorded before continuing meeting.
Members took no action on the next agenda item to file an appeal of the firefighters arbitration decision because the 10-day appeal period had already passed.
Members then approved an amendment to increase the payroll amount for December 2025 by $30,000.00 to be used for back pay for the firemen from arbitration decision.
The contract for City Attorney Marcum was renewed for a 1-year term in a 3-2 vote by members at the same rate as the previous year.
Members also voted 3-2 on amending the city manager’s contract to grant a variance for him to reside outside the city limits. The issue garnished some discussion from the Mayor who had questioned and researched the action. Previously, it was determined that when the contract is awarded each year that it basically grants the variance even though the charter states differently.
Stone referred to the contract as an Ultra Vires contract, stating it lacks legal authority from the beginning and generally can’t be cured by ratification or simple changes. The research stated that trying to amend a void contract is like trying to fix something that never existed.
The City of Sulphur went to the voters in October to change the charter language regarding the manager residency but was strongly voted down by the citizens.
In other agenda action, members approved the following:
• adopting an ordinance amending the Open Records Act Policy and Procedures and setting the fees for record copying;
•approving the 2026 City of Sulphur and SMA Holiday schedule;
•approving the 2026 City of Sulphur Regular and SMA council meeting schedule;
•Resolution setting the annual salary for council members at 0;
•Resolution of the City of Sulphur to the Murray County Election Board calling the annual city election for Ward 1, ward 3 and Ward 5 council members;
•Resolution authorizing Oklahoma Municipal Assurance Group to distribute Workers Compensation Escrow funds to the City of Sulphur in the amount of $45,442.01;
•general agreement between the National Park Service and the City of Sulphur;
•bid for 10-3 yard Packmor style arm dumpsters in the amount of $6,450.00;
•change order No. 5 for Marsau Enterprises, Inc. to decrease the contract amount by $42251.00 on Wynnewood Avenue lead line project;
•final payment to Marsau Enterprisers, Inc. in the amount of $162,075.32 on the Wynnewood Avenue project;
•payments to $45,196.25, $20,615.75 and $16,356.75 to Myers Engineering for services on the Chickasaw Nation/OWRB project;
•payments of $19,356.00, $ 2,297.50, $ 22,291.75, $13,291.30 and $1,706.00 to MAPCO Services Inc. for storm debris removal monitoring;
•payments of $13,906.80 and $64,716.59 to MO equipment for storm debris removal; and
•payment of $11,069.80 for a lift cylinder mast for the sanitation truck.
Members took no action on a City of Sulphur credit card policy and bid request for the storm damage on 2014 Ford Explorer since no bids were received.
Members also took no action on the repair bid for the 2025 Freightliner trash truck because the bid came in at more than $38,000.00 and the original insurance estimate was $8,000.00. Staff will reach out to insurance company with the bid difference.
