RIVERSIDE

Johnson County is dropping Riverside from its liaison list for 2023.

But the Riverside City Council likely won’t miss its neighbor to the north because a Johnson County Supervisor hasn’t attended a City Council session for an extended time, if ever.

In a way, it’s like that distant aunt who not only didn’t show up for Thanksgiving dinner, but it’s an aunt nobody really knew about.

“Honestly, I wasn’t aware we had a liaison assigned,” Riverside Mayor Allen Schneider told The News.

In fact, Johnson County Supervisor Lisa Green-Douglass, the 2022 liaison to Riverside and a North Liberty-area resident, says she has never been to a Riverside meeting.

“Riverside and Riverside City Council is in a different county, so I have never gone to those,” Green-Douglass said at the Board of Supervisors work session Dec. 7. “I kind of think, why do we even have it on there?”

So now, they don’t.

The Johnson County Board of Supervisors decided at its Dec. 7 work session to remove Riverside from its list of liaison assignments for 2023 and replace it with a liaison working with township clerks and trustees in rural Johnson County.

The Johnson County Supervisors, who will spend the rest of this month considering assignments for 2023, typically serve as liaisons to other communities in the county, including Hills and Lone Tree. Riverside is unique because the county line is a little more than a mile away from the central part of the city and many of its residents work in Iowa City or other places in Johnson County.

“I’ve never gone and I’ve never gotten a call from anyone there,” Green-Douglass said.

Schneider, who works in Iowa City himself, stands ready to work with Johnson County if a situation surfaces.

“It sounds like this decision won’t have much impact,” he said. “That being said, we’re always open to working with Johnson County if the need arises.”

Special Meeting

The Riverside City Council held a special meeting Dec. 8, mostly to discuss lining up temporary help for snow removal, if needed, this winter and also to go into closed session to interview a candidate for a maintenance position. The Council also went into closed session on Dec. 5 for the same reason.

The Council voted to offer a starting hourly rate of $22 an hour to the new maintenance worker and is expected to make an appointment at its next meeting Dec. 19.

The Council also agreed on an hourly rate of $15 an hour for a temporary worker in the winter who would move snow after large storms.