Mayor grateful for support after wife’s death

Waterloo Mayor Tom Smith, still grieving over the Christmas Eve death of this wife to cancer, offered a tearful message of thanks to the community for its outpouring of support for his family at this difficult time.

Funeral services for Patricia M. Smith, 67, took place Dec. 29-30 in Waterloo.  

“We live in a wonderful city,” Smith said while sobbing at the end of Monday’s city council meeting. “And the support that they have shown my family, my girls and I, in the last 90 days and the change in my life has been unreal. From bringing me food and calls and flowers, and just letters of support and phone calls, have been amazing from the citizens of Waterloo. 

“My heart is broken with her death,” he concluded. “Thank you for everything.”

During the public input portion of the meeting, Front Street resident Pete Barnes asked the council to consider allowing the use of golf carts and utility terrain vehicles on city roadways.

He said communities such as Mascoutah and Millstadt allow it, as well as University City, Shrewsbury and Dogtown in St. Louis.

Barnes said that with golf courses in and near town, there are residents who own golf carts. 

In addition to the environmental benefits, there’s additional revenue to be made by the city in the form of application and inspection fees by becoming a golf cart and UTV friendly community, he said.

Barnes said issues of safety and other potential hang-ups could be discussed and worked out between city and police officials to make it a positive situation overall.

“I do believe that, overall, it would benefit our city and benefit the people of the city,” Barnes told the council while requesting that the matter be taken up at the committee level.

Mayor Smith said the issue could be looked into again, but there has not been much of a push by aldermen to change existing city code on this matter in recent years.

Barnes told the Republic-Times on Tuesday that he plans to continue his efforts in the coming months.

“I’m going to push this pretty hard,” he said.

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Corey Saathoff

Corey is the editor of the Republic-Times. He has worked at the newspaper since 2004, and currently resides in Columbia. He is also the principal singer-songwriter and plays guitar in St. Louis area country-rock band The Trophy Mules.
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