Council appoints new city clerk/treasurer

The Fallon City Council last week appointed Michael O’Neill as the new city clerk/treasurer during a special meeting. An airport taxi lines reconstruction contract and a summary of the May police report also received council approval.

The council confirmed Mayor Ken Tedford’s appointment of Michael O’Neill as the new city clerk/treasurer with an annual salary of $140,168. O’Neill succeeds Sean Richardson who recently left to take an executive position with CC Communications.

Tedford said O’Neill’s family moved to Fallon from Reno while he was in grade school and he subsequently graduated from Churchill County High School in 1993. He attended the University of Nevada, Reno where he earned a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration with a major in accounting.

O’Neill began his career in finance more than 25 years ago with Grant Thornton, LLP. He then assisted Intrawest Resorts, Inc. through navigating the Great Recession in the early 2000s as a development regional assistant controller.

While with Intrawest, O’Neill helped to establish Oasis Academy Charter School and served on the board of directors. He eventually left Intrawest to serve as the academy’s comptroller. After working at Oasis Academy for four years, O’Neill shifted to business analyst and then finance director at Banner Churchill Community Hospital. O’Neill joined the city of Fallon in July 2021 as deputy city clerk/treasurer.

O’Neill is married to Bree, an independent cosmetologist and coach for the Fallon Barracuda swim team. The couple are new “empty nesters” as their two children, Evelyn and Macray, are attending college this year. O’Neill volunteers on the Fallon Barracudas’ board of directors and as a coach with the Fallon Youth Football League.

In other action:

• At a regular meeting on Aug. 6, the council approved to finance $73,092.63 of a $1.2 million contract with A&K Earthmovers to complete the reconstruction of taxi lanes at the Fallon Municipal Airport. The remaining $1.1 million will be funded by the Federal Aviation Administration. At this time only the east portion of the taxi lanes project will be awarded until other funding becomes available.

• The council also approved an amendment to the Stampede Energy Exchange Services Agreement extending the agreement to Dec. 31, 2044. The amendment also modifies the value calculation for energy produced by the project to the on-peak/off-peak Stampede Generation LMP price from the California Independent System Operator and updates the contact information to the current agency representatives.

• Chief of Police Ron Wenger presented a summary of the Fallon Police Department’s monthly report for May. Officers responded to 762 total calls for service making 40 arrests, assisted with 12 traffic accidents and issued 159 traffic citations and warnings.

Special detail duty included officer attendance at a Cub Scout bicycle rodeo, an Armed Forces Day event and Churchill County High School graduation. Officers also provided an escort for the CCHS swim and track teams to state championship competition, traffic control for Oasis Academy walking field trip and collected donated cases of water from CVS Pharmacy.

• The Fallon Animal Shelter handled 84 animals from the county, 63 within the city and three from tribal land. Volunteers in Police Service donated 160 hours to the agency.