Senoia could soon have two new police officers, thanks to a federal matching grant.

Police chief Ben Thomas told the city council Monday night the city had been awarded a $168,000 COPS grant to fund two new officers for the community's police force. If the city accepts the grant, Thomas said the city would have to kick in $42,000 over three years as its matching part of the award.

Originally, the city was turned down for the funds, but Thomas learned late last week the government had found some additional monies and awarded the grant to the city.

In order to fund the garnt this year, Mayor Joan Trammell told the council the budget would have to be amended and asked council to give her time to find the funds. The council decided to vote on the grant at its March 1 meeting, which Thomas said would fall within the 45 day guideline of accepting the grant.

The chief also said that recipients of the COPS grant are usually looked upon favorably when applying for equipment grants. He added he already had the garnt application for equipment ready in case the city approved the grant.

In other news from Monday's meeting, the council:

· Delayed granting a sign permit to the Chapultepec Mexican restaurant on Ga. Highway 16. The restaurant has already erected a lighted sign, but public works administrator Leonard Thompson said he told the owner she would have to have a permit before it could be lit.

Many of the council members were unaware of the sign and said they would like to see the sign before it is lit. Planning commission chairman Darlene Stanley, who was in the audience, said she had seen the sign and was a little bit worried about it.

"When I saw it, I thought of Riverdale," she said.

· Heard a report from librarian Alice Jones about new hours at the library. Since she took office last year, Trammell has been a big proponent of having the library open on Saturday. Jones proposed closing the library on Wednesday and having it open from 9 a.m.-3 p.m. on Saturdays. Trammell said some of the hours would have to be adjusted during the week and asked Jones to bring a new proposal back to the council.

The council is looking at opening the library on Saturdays starting in April.

· Approved spending up to $2,000 for a new computer for city hall. The city recently spent nearly $17,000 to get all the computers year 2000 compatible. When the computers were made compatible, Trammell knew some glitches were going to occur and the slowness of one its computers is the first glitch.

The computer is compatible, but takes up to 20 minutes to load a program, said Trammell, which is not time efficient.