Letter from the Mayor: November 2023
Letter from the Mayor: November 2023
October 26, 2023
Each year, Nixa Public Schools and the Nixa Chamber of Commerce organize the State of the Community event. It’s an evening packed full of valuable information provided by school, city, county, and state leaders. Community leaders summarize what was accomplished throughout the year and share a look at what will be happening in the year ahead.
In that spirit and knowing not everyone in the community was able to attend the event, I want to share some of my thoughts which I spoke about at this year’s event, which was held on October 24th.
First, I want to thank the members of our community who supported our Nixa Police Department this year by showing up at the polls and voting to pass a dedicated sales tax for public safety. This additional tax revenue will fund more officer positions and the construction of a new police headquarters large enough to support the growing needs of our community. Our police department’s dedication to public safety and crime prevention helped Nixa be named among the top 5 safest cities in the state of Missouri this year.
Economic development is also very important. Attracting new commerce to Nixa while helping our current Nixa businesses is something that I am very passionate about. We were very excited to see 14 Mill Market open in town and the investment that the Callahan family made in our community is truly amazing. I’m also very excited to see more new businesses expanding into Nixa very soon and I’m looking forward to continuing our efforts to bring even more new and exciting things to Nixa.
Our public works people have been very busy this year with projects throughout the city. They have completed over 30 improvements to bring sections of sidewalks up to the latest ADA standards. They have also been working on the Cherry Street Stormwater project to ease flash flooding issues in an older part of town and they will continue to work on additional phases of this project in the next few years. We have also prioritized the addition of sidewalks along Cheyenne. Our Street Department applied for and won grant funding for 80 percent of the cost of this project to keep students safer when walking to and from Summit and High Pointe.
This was the second year for our Annual Nixa Multicultural Festival which was held in September. We are looking forward to growing this event each year. We also partnered with the school district and the Christian County Library to launch a new program called One Nixa, One Read in which we encouraged the community to read the same uplifting book together. I personally had a lot of fun being a part of this and am looking forward to expanding the program in 2024.
The 2024 budgeting process is almost complete and some of the bigger projects we are planning include: the addition of more trails at McCauley Park; installing a new, larger pavilion at Rotary Park; and upgrading our sewer infrastructure to unlock the potential for commercial development on the west side of town. We are also investing in burying more of our electric lines underground, especially in neighborhoods with frequent outages.
           One of the most important projects coming up in 2024 will be our Comprehensive Planning Process. This is the plan which influences future development decisions for our community through the year 2045. We will be needing a lot of community volunteers to participate in the creation of this plan. Stay tuned for more information about how you can be involved.
That covers some of the highlights, but if you’d like to see my full state of the community address, I encourage you to watch this video produced by Nixa Public Schools.
Sincerely,
Mayor Jarad Giddens
