Community Center Receiving Makeover

The Burnet Community Center is receiving a makeover including new flooring, painting, wainscotting, and bathroom fixtures.  Crews have just about completed the floor preparation work and painting.  The work is expected to take approximately three months to complete.

City Fire Department Flushing Hydrants

As part of routine maintenance, the City of Burnet Fire Department began flushing fire hydrants on Monday.  Citizens could see some discoloration in the water, according to Fire Chief, Mark Ingram.  The flushing disturbs sediments that naturally occur in the pipe, which could affect the color of the water.  Citizens who notice a change should simply allow the faucet to flow for a few minutes until the water again runs clear.   

The City of Burnet, in accordance with the adopted Drought Contingency Plan, has implemented a Stage One drought contingency plan for the citizens of Burnet.  This is a voluntary conservation program whereby citizens can take measures to conserve water as summer approaches. 

The plan, adopted in 2000, offers three levels of drought condition or water emergency including Stage One-Voluntary Conservation, Stage Two-Moderate Drought Conditions and Stage Three-Severe Drought Conditions.  In the Stage One-Voluntary Conservation program citizens should limit the use of water to that amount absolutely necessary for health, business and outdoor water use. The program lists the following recommendations:

• All customers or persons who use the water utility of the city of Burnet will be asked to participate in the 5 Day Water Schedule for outdoor uses and only on designated water use days.  Outdoor uses include watering lawns, shrubs, and other types of outdoor vegetation, washing vehicles, boats and trailers, the use of landscape sprinkler systems and irrigation, recreational use of sprinklers and outdoor showers.

• All outdoor uses are discouraged between the hours of 11:00 a.m. and 7:00 p.m., except with a hand-held hose equipped with a positive shut-off nozzle, hand-held bucket or drip irrigation system.  This includes the washing of automobiles, trucks, trailers, and other types of mobile equipment.  This does not apply when conducted on the immediate premises of a commercial car wash or a commercial service station.

• The following uses of water are defined as “water waste” and are strongly discouraged:

• Allowing water to run off into a gutter, ditch, drain, or right of way

• Failing to repair a controllable leak

• Washing sidewalks, driveways, parking areas, tennis courts, patios or other paved areas, except to alleviate immediate health or fire hazards.

 Citizens are asked to consider following a schedule as indicated below for all outdoor, non-essential uses.   

• Monday - a street address that ends in 1 or 2

• Tuesday – a street address that ends in 3 or 4

• Wednesday - a street address that ends in 5 or 6

• Thursday – a street address that ends in 7 or 8

• Friday – a street address that ends in 9 or 0

 According to Steve Lance, City of Burnet Water/Wastewater Superintendent, this first stage is strictly voluntary and will remain in effect until September 30 unless extended or upgraded to a more restrictive level.

Online Payments and Account Information Now Available

The City now offers online account information and the ability to make payments for utility bills, airport leases and municipal court payments through the internet.  Citizens can set up a login account and access their utility bill or airport lease statement, view their current and past consumption and payment history, compare their current usage to prior years, and even make payments using a credit or debit card.

In addition, persons who have business with the Burnet Municipal Court can, in most cases, enter a plea and pay citations online using a credit or debit card.  There are some citations that cannot be paid online or that require the citizen to see the judge before payment can be made.

The online center can be obtained from the Home page, the Utilities page, the Airport page, and the Finance page of the web site by clicking on the ONLINE SERVICES link.  The utilities part of the payment options requires the citizen to create an account and to login but the municipal court side does not.  A small fee is charged for making online payments.

CLICK HERE for help using the online services.