With six members present at a specially called meeting Saturday morning, the Ironton City Council passed an ordinance allowing the repair of one of the city’s storm drains.

“I’m very pleased that we had enough members here to take care of important city business,” Mayor Rich Blankenship said.

The storm drain, located at Eighth and Ashtabula streets, collapsed about two weeks ago. Blankenship received an estimate of $125,000 for the work by Southern Ohio Trenching. The ordinance also declared the situation an emergency, which allowed the city to have the work done without accepting bids, a process that could have taken up to eight weeks. Blankenship said without the fix, the entire south end of town is at risk for flooding.

The ordinance was heard first at Thursday’s regular meeting. With four of the seven council members in attendance for the regular meeting, council was two members shy of the six required to suspend the regular meeting rules, give it second and third reading and vote on it.

Two special meetings were called to consider the repair and two other ordinances.

Councilman Bob Cleary was absent from Saturday’s meeting and was among three members absent Thursday along with Councilwoman Beth Rist and Councilman Frank Murphy.

Cleary called The Tribune Friday and said he was out of town and would not be able to make Saturday’s either. He added that he supports having the repair made and would have been at the meeting if he were in town.

In other business, the Ironton City Council also:

• Passed an ordinance authorizing the mayor to sign an agreement between the city and Red Oak Consulting for a financial feasibility study. The contract for professional services is not to exceed $25,000 to provide a financial feasibility study required for municipal bonds for the sewer-relining project. The cost of the study will be divided between the wastewater and storm water funds.

• Passed an ordinance amending the annual operating budget for 2011.