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Council debates shifting right-of-way maintenance to city amid cost and authority concerns

McAlester City Council · January 28, 2026
AI-Generated Content: All content on this page was generated by AI to highlight key points from the meeting. For complete details and context, we recommend watching the full video. so we can fix them.

Summary

Councilors debated a proposal to have the city maintain rights-of-way and alleys rather than property owners, with concerns about budget, staff capacity and overlap with existing code enforcement; no ordinance was adopted and council asked staff to identify public-safety priorities.

Councilors spent an extended portion of the meeting debating whether the city should resume responsibility for mowing and maintaining rights-of-way and alleys that have long been the property owners’ responsibility. A councilor said many neighbors in their ward, including elderly and low-income residents, cannot manage the upkeep and urged the city to take responsibility in cases of need. The proposal under discussion was framed as a direction to the city attorney to draft an ordinance making the city responsible for certain rights-of-way tasks.

Opponents and staff raised practical and legal concerns.…

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