Atchison City honors long‑serving employees and pauses meeting after livestream outage

The Atchison City Commission presented the League of Kansas Municipalities 2024 city service awards to six municipal employees and briefly recessed after a livestream video outage.

Mayor (unnamed in the public transcript) opened the meeting and announced that the awards would be presented by City Manager Mark Westhoff. City Manager Mark Westhoff read the honorees and their years of service: Rodney Aversman, Fleet Superintendent, 25 years; Rodney Johnson, Solid Waste Operator, 25 years; Albert Kelly, Police Captain, 25 years; Patrick Weiser, Fire Chief, 25 years; Keith Sexton, Watershed Equipment Operator, 20 years; and Laura McNamee, Human Resources Director, 10 years. "We sincerely appreciate all of your hard work and efforts year after year to the city and residents of Atchison," Westhoff said while presenting certificates.

Commissioners and staff thanked the recipients and posed for a photograph with the commission after certificates were handed out. The mayor noted that the shortest tenure among awardees was ten years and the longest 25 years, calling the group "quite a record of service." The presentations were short and largely ceremonial; no formal policy actions were taken in connection with the awards.

During the meeting, City Manager Westhoff reported a problem with the livestream video feed, saying audio was working but the video was not. Westhoff said the chief was "looking into it" to see if the video could be restarted without a full system reset. To give staff a moment to try to restore the video, the mayor moved that the commission recess for five minutes. The motion was seconded, members responded "aye," and the mayor declared the motion carried.

The meeting was recessed while staff attempted to restore the livestream. No additional agenda items, votes on ordinances, or formal actions were recorded in the available transcript excerpt.