How Sikeston's annual report reveals a year of challenges and triumphs in 2024

SIKESTON — The City of Sikeston recently released its annual report, and there were many new developments in 2024.

City of Sikeston Communication Manager David Jenkins, who wrote the report, said 2024 was a busy year for Sikeston.

Jenkins said the annual report includes reports from each department head in the city.

According to Jenkins, all the departments will come up with what they have done over the last year and they submit their reports.

Then, Jenkins goes through them and puts them all into magazine form in the report.

One of the big things that happened in 2024, according to Jenkins was the eclipse. Sikeston was in the line of totality for the April 8, 2024, total solar eclipse.

“The eclipse brought a lot of visitors to town,” Jenkins said. “It gave the city some great publicity. People came from all over and a lot of the people that came really enjoyed their stay here.”

Jenkins said they had a lot of things going on for the eclipse.

“It was beautiful weather that day, and it ended up being the perfect day to highlight the community,” Jenkins said. “We got a lot of compliments about Sikeston during the eclipse.”

Another highlight from 2024 was the tornado that struck the town in May, said Jenkins.

On May 26, shortly after 7 a.m., Sikeston was hit by an EF-3 Tornado that started around Butler Street and continued through Garwood.

The community development team went into action with other emergency services to help the citizens of Sikeston.

“The tornado was a huge thing that impacted a lot of people, a lot of businesses,” Jenkins said. “It took a lot of clean up which we are still working on.

Jenkins continued: “Despite the tragedy, it also brought the community together; there were neighbors helping neighbors; a lot of people came together to try and help those that were in need. While it was a tragic time, it was also a nice time to see the community come together.”

Also, the Sikeston Department of Public Safety provided information on traffic stops, citations, warnings, arrests, guns, methamphetamine, marijuana and other incidents.

In 2024, Sikeston DPS had almost as twice as many calls as the year of 2023, resulting in a total calls being 62,719.

Other calls in 2024, were 12,394 for 911 calls, 38,669 for admin calls, 11,656 for outbound calls, 30,279 for incidents created, 3,692 calls for patrol division, 981 calls for fire division, 5,190 calls for South Scott, and 262 calls for Morehouse Fire Department.

Also in 2024, Sikeston P.A.W.S. provided information for the annual report. In 2024, there were 25, animal related citations, 154 dog intakes, 49 cat intakes, 32 adopted dogs, 22 adopted cats, 54 dog owner redemptions and 1 cat owner redemption.

Another big highlight according to Jenkins, in 2024 was Sikeston being named the Most Neighborly City in 2024.

Jenkins said the 2024 Leadership Sikeston class decided to hold a Good Neighbor Week for their class project.

According to Jenkins, as part of the project, Leadership Sikeston decided to focus on different things each day that would be beneficial to the community while helping the community become better neighbors.

After Good Neighbor Week was held, the Missouri Good Neighbor Organization named Sikeston the Most Neighborly City in Missouri in 2024 for a population of 15,000 to 30,000.

According to Jenkins, the purpose of the annual report is to highlight over what all the city has done over the past year and to be transparent with the community.

“It let’s people know what there tax money is going toward,” Jenkins said. “We want to be transparent because we don’t want the citizens to think we are hiding anything. We are letting them know how their tax money is being used.

Jenkins continued: “If you want to know everything that happened in Sikeston in 2024, all you have to do is look at the annual report.”