Votes at a glance: Denton council approves multiple agreements, contract awards and tax‑exemptions

The Denton City Council approved a range of consent‑agenda items and contracts after consideration at the Jan. 14 meeting. Items of interest included hotel‑tax agreements, a local historic property tax exemption, and utility and procurement contract awards.

Key approvals (consent and individual votes):
- Hotel‑tax agreements: Council approved funding agreements using FY2025 hotel‑tax revenue for the Kiwanis Club of Denton breakfast event and for the Denton Community Market’s 2025 operations. A council amendment requested the Denton Community Market’s FY2025 funding be tied to operations within the downtown Denton area; councilmembers debated and later rejected constraining the funding geographically for future years but approved the FY2025 agreement.
- Historic preservation tax exemption: The council approved a partial tax exemption for a property designated a local historic landmark at 1526 Willowwood Street after staff confirmed qualifying expenditures of at least $10,000 for exterior and stormwater repairs.
- Transformer procurement: The council approved a contract award to WEG Transformers USA LLC (via a competitive RFP) for substation power transformers needed in the electric capital improvement plan. Staff noted lead times for new transformers remain long (bids included two‑ to four‑year delivery windows) and asked council to continue federal advocacy to shorten delivery times.
- Contract extensions and procurements: The council approved the contract extension for Sun Mount Paving (subject of separate council concern during discussion) and awarded a city warehouse communications inventory contract to Argent Associates Inc. (procurement items reflect staff explanation of bid alternates and line‑item evaluations).

Council also took action on other items on the regular agenda separately, including direction to return with an ordinance on airport rates and fees (see separate article) and approval of a draft charter amendment special election call (two‑thirds vote required) to place proposed municipal charter language changes on a special election ballot concurrent with the May 3 municipal election.