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By DAVE DOMESCIK | Staff Writer

COLUMBIANA – The Shelby County Commission received a brief report from Shelby County Sheriff John Samaniego on the recent changes to various departments in Shelby County at a regularly scheduled meeting on Monday, Feb. 10.

In the past weeks and months, Shelby County has seen five police chiefs either resign or retire from their respective posts.

Several resolutions were passed during the meeting pertaining to infrastructure developments around Shelby County.

These resolutions included awarding bids for water fitting, concrete upgrades and AED equipment.

A board appointment to the Harrison Regional Library was also announced, and County Manager Chad Scroggins gave a report on various developments around Shelby County.

Scroggins shared that the Shelby County Planning Commission is actively looking for a new board member.

“We’re at a point right not where we’ve got to replace a board member,” Scroggins said. “We have one that, for health reasons, retired, and we have some volunteers for that slot to fill out that term.”

County Engineer David Willingham then gave more infrastructure-related updates, including an update on a rail crossing at County Road 433 in Chelsea.

This rail crossing has seen two accidents in the last three months, with both instances seeing cement trucks and trains colliding.

“We’ve had two crashes there at that crossing in October and January,” Willingham said. “In October, the truck hit the train. In January, the train hit the truck. There’s no lights, there’s no gates at that crossing. It’s a yield sign only.”

Willingham announced changes are being made to the rail crossing to prevent further accidents.

“We actually had a call last week with (Alabama Department of Transportation’s) rail crossing team and with CSX, and CSX is going to change that yield sign to a stop sign to give us some immediate relief there,” Willingham said. “We’re going to continue to work with them on assessing that, crossing and getting it hopefully moved up in the priority list for gates and signals in the future.”

Willingham also gave updates on Shelby County’s two Interstate 65 development projects, with the South project being awarded and a recommended bid for the North project.

Following Willingham’s comments, the floor was open to the commissioners for comments. Commissioner Robbie Hayes announced that the annual Chelsea Kiwanis Pancake Breakfast will be held on Saturday, Feb. 22 from 8 a.m. to noon.

Samaniego then announced the departure of five police chiefs within Shelby County.

The five departures included Chief Brad Flynn resigning from Helena PD, Pelham Chief Brent Sugg’s departure from the force, the retirement of Alabaster Police Chief Curtis Rigney, the retirement of University of Montevallo Police Chief Tim Alexander and the departure of Harpersville Chief T.E. Smith.

“Those changes are big,” Samaniego said. “So, we’re on board with all of them (the departments) to try to support them if we can.”

An update on the Shelby County Jail expansion project was also shared, with the project moving into the interior remodeling phase. The county’s landfill expansion project is also on schedule to be completed in April 2025.

For more information on the Shelby County Commission and its regularly scheduled meetings, visit Shelbyal.com/93/County-Commission.