Scotty "Scrub" Miller, a Denver-area motorcycle stuntman, is set to perform long-distance jumps during the Thunder on the Street motorcycle rally in Pleasanton on June 3. (Screen capture/Scotty Scrub Miller Facebook page)
By Roger Sims, Journal staff
PLEASANTON – With Pleasanton’s motorcycle rally now less than a month away, Pleasanton Councilwoman Rochelle Schreckhise told her colleagues that she had received numerous calls about a stunt that will be performed during the June 3 event.
Her questions came during the city council’s regularly scheduled meeting on Monday, May 1.
The event calls for a motorcycle stunt man Scott “Scrub” Miller to jump his bike into the air and land on an air-filled cushion. (Photos and videos of Miller's jumps can be seen on Facebook by clicking here and on Instagram by clicking here.)
City Administrator Teresa Whitaker said the stunt will be set up north to south on Main Street. The jumper will take off near the Pleasanton Community Center and land on the cushion down the street near the bank building.
Whitaker assured the council that the stunt was safe as designed and that the performer would have concrete barriers along the sides of the street.
She said the performer regularly performed the jump at monster truck shows and had made it “thousands of times” without incident.
The Pleasanton rally, the third annual Thunder on The Street (TOTS) is slated for Saturday, June 3. Originally scheduled for the first time this year to be a three-day event, it has been scaled back to a single day.
Schreckhise also questioned if the city would be liable if an accident did happen.
Whitaker said the performer had his own insurance and that the city would be no more liable than in the case of a traffic accident.
City Attorney Burton Harding agreed with Whitaker’s take on the city’s liability.
The council retired behind closed doors for numerous executive sessions during the meeting, including a session on personnel matters, a session to consult with its attorney, and a session to discuss business trade secrets with Wayne Ellis, owner of Pleasanton-based Ellis Plumbing.
The subject of that meeting was not disclosed. Other decisions following executive sessions were the appointment of John Purvis as municipal judge and donating a surplus 2014 Ford Taurus police car to the city of Parker Police Department.
Following nearly an hour of the council going into and out of closed-door sessions, Councilman Jake Mattingley left the meeting, but not without taking a shot at what he called the display of negativity he sees in the city.
He pointed to a report on social media about an incident where a school bus carrying Jayhawk-Linn students had to brake quickly to avoid an accident. As a result of the driver’s maneuver, several students were tossed around but without serious injury.
He said that on the postings commenting on the incident, most of the people posting complimented the bus driver for quick reactions, however, he pointed out that if that incident would have happened in Pleasanton, the comments would likely have been negative.
“One of the biggest things we have to deal with here is the negativity of our community,” Mattingley said.
The council also approved paying city police Officer Charles Stokes $500 of the $1,000 signing bonus he is due plus a $1 an hour raise. Stokes recently graduated from the Kansas Law Enforcement Training Center.
With Stokes’ graduation, the city’s police department is fully staffed with a police chief and three officers.
Councilwoman Kim Herring asked that since they were now all on duty if they could increase the patrol around the schools during the morning rush. She said she had seen young, unaccompanied children walk down the middle of the street by the annex.
Police Chief Tristan Snyder said he had already talked about it with his officers, and he said they would concentrate on patrolling that area.
In other business, the council:
Learned that the city was having difficulty finding asphalt cold patch to repair the streets. City Public Works manager Joey Morrison said that no matter where he looked to find some, the city’s truck had to drive at least an hour one way to pick it up.
Learned that a dog that was impounded during an incident had tested negative for rabies. Mayor Mike Frisbie said that people in the dog owner’s neighborhood were afraid of what else the dog would do. However, Whitaker said that five city employees had been sent out to feed the dog and that it had been nothing but friendly toward them.
Learned that Morrison was about ready to start filling the municipal pool, which will open soon.
Approved by two votes with one abstention to pay the Pleasanton City Fire Department $1,000 to operate the fireworks display to celebrate Independence Day this year. Schreckhise abstained because her husband is a volunteer firefighter.
Learned that recently hired codes officer Candy Houtman began working this week and was already working on writing a citation.
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