McLennan County — Residents of Mart flooded the McLennan County commissioners meeting Tuesday asking for the county's support getting new roads.
They said their cries for help were stalled after precinct two commissioner Lester Gibson stopped coming to meetings altogether.
"If it were not for the mysterious missing case of the commissioner of Precinct 2, we would not be here taking up valuable time with an issue that should have been resolved years ago," Mart resident Kollin Behrghundi said.
County commissioners said they don't want to see Mart residents punished because of Gibson's absence. So, they made a plan to enter an interlocal agreement to do something about the horrible street conditions. Along with an engineer Mart mayor pro tem Henry Witt told the court to fix the streets, they have to fix the water lines that run underneath them. He said he asked for the interlocal agreement with commissioners because the project has been stalled due to the absence of county commissioner Lester Gibson.
"Unfortunately we don't have a county commissioner right now who is active so we had to take this route,” Witt said. “We are very happy that we got the support of the county to enter an interlocal agreement to help us fix our streets.”
Gibson was not present at Tuesday's meeting. His assistant Patricia Chisolm-Miller said he had the flu, and spoke on his behalf. Chisolm-Miller said Gibson has never stalled. She said in 2017 he offered to help repair the roads with an In-kind agreement, meaning the county would pay for labor, equipment, and, materials.
"His assumption is that the mayor would relay that to the city council. So, we're unclear with the miscommunication,” Chisolm-Miller said. "There was never a point where commissioner Gibson was not committed to the United States Department of Agriculture water improvement project.."
The commissioners said their next step is to put a resolution on the next meeting agenda to support Mart and their efforts to improve street infrastructure.
Gibson missed the last 20 county commissioner meetings. Chisolm-Miller said she has been advised by his attorney to not say why.