Billings County Commission - Regular Meeting

Morning, we'll call the meeting to order. Stand and recite the pledge.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Morning everyone. This is the June 4th monthly meeting, Villanueva County Commission. We'll start out with approval of minutes of the last two meetings. Anyone have any questions, corrections? I guess corrections are omissions.

Steve? I actually forgot to read the last one from the specialty. Sorry. I just want to look at the end here. I'm good. I move to approve the minutes. Okay, we have a motion to approve the minutes.

Is there a second? I'll second. Second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Motion carries. We'll go to the agenda. Does anyone have any additions to the agenda? I have about three or four. the library park land exchange paper. Did we all receive that? Because that isn't on here, is it? Yep. The new one. We swapped that in and moved the other one down. Okay. So it's there. All right. So we don't have to have that. All right. Then we have the Freiburg property. Someone has requested to buy the land. So we'll discuss that. Fairfield land purchase is complete, but we'll discuss that. And mitigation hazard or multi-hazard mitigation plan. We said we were going to table that last month until this month. Any more additions to the agenda?

Yes, there was the two-story leases as well. Okay.

Anyone else down? Someone want to make a motion to accept the agenda as added to? So moved. I'll second. Motion is seconded. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Motion carries. Now we have a public comment period. Was there anyone that called in? Okay. We'll go to a report or do we want to do pat next department reports or um i guess we could just pat are you ready yeah i mean you're supposed to be a 10 after but we'll just do you your item first go from there thank you

I have ten pictures on there.

Okay. Did you want to state your concerns?

Yeah. As you can see on there, it says that it should have been paved from Sully Creek Bridge, where Boots' place is at now, beyond going east of our place. Hard surface. That's what I take as being blacktop, because he's also talking about... the rumble strips. Anyway, that's all water under the bridge. That bridge, or that road was built 43 years ago. And there's been very, very little, hardly any upkeep or whatever. And there's been a big change in the traffic out there. And I think it's time that get a few things done. What I would like to see is first I want that Y brought back to a T. It's 105 feet. There's some pictures up there and it shows how wide that is. I'd like 25 mile an hour speed limit. It's 35 out there now. I'd like 25. put some guardrails so they have to stay on the rope, you know, instead of dropping off at the Y or making it a Y. I guess that's kind of it, really, to be honest with you. It's just that I feel that Billings County is, for the last 43 years, they've kind of gotten away, gotten by on the cheap on that section of road. The dust, the speed. And that was, you know, when it was built, there wasn't that much traffic out there. Now there's a hundred percent, there's 200% more traffic out there than there ever was. And it's a, that, that is a, that whole deal with that Y and all that, that's a major detriment to our place. And when it was built, Right there, that picture right there, last winter, or two winters, winters ago, there was a car coming around there and of course it was way down in there and there was a woman driving it and she slipped down in there. and she just banged her end up in the creek. And that's how the whole creek bent. But that's a bad spot when they started it because of the section line and the creek and there was a big washout there. I mean, this was the best they could do. But that was a long time ago and the traffic was nothing like it is today. And I just think it's,

Time to give it a program So you're asking I gathered this right is the road is just too wide around that curve and Speed

and dust, yes, and what it is on that Y now is that they come and they'll be, oh they drop a gear and then pour the cobs to it, but if you make it a T and put guardrails in there, then they're going to have to, just like if they were in town or something, they're going to have to not come to a stop, but they're going to have to slow down to make the turn. But the way it is now, it's just kind of a bump in the road, really, you know, and it doesn't, I mean, now you're talking, there's old trucks out there that's triple axle trailer, or trucks, they got four or five axle trailers, and the stock trailer is now there. I don't know how long they are, but they got, a lot of them got triple axles on the stock trailers. and everybody's a ducking through there, and nobody slows down. Is there a stop sign on that? No, there's a yield sign. According to this thing, there should be three stop signs. Well, I know that ain't going to work, and one stop sign isn't going to work either. I have nothing against the yield sign. I just want it narrowed down. And then also, I would like to have some of that secondhand blacktop that's up at Hill's Pit. I'd like that put down on there.

Do we have any dust control there, Pat, at all? There's dust control both ways. Okay. Yeah, the curves are a hard one. We deal with that all over.

Yeah, I understand that.

I guess I got a question why there wouldn't be a stop sign there. Do you know why there wasn't? Is it? There was. There was and it was taken out? Yes. I'm sure there was a reason. I don't know what it is, but that does help. You know, as far as reconstructing it, I am not in favor of guardrails around that curve. Otherwise, you've got to do it to all of them. Guardrails are usually designed so you don't fall off and go into a ravine. You know, but you could still put up something, maybe some markers. I don't know. It's going to keep happening, I would presume, but it might help for a while. And we have to hold that shoulder in. Yeah, okay.

Slow it down.

In this case, do we own the easement or what is the case on the road? How much?

Could you speak up? I'm hard of hearing.

Based on this proposal of this road work, I was just wondering, do we have the easement or what do we have as... You have an easement. Did we own it or what?

And that's what I'm wondering. When that road was started out there, Jerry Redman come and wanted to change the road. And I said, sure, go right ahead. And then when they got to figuring it out, if they had stayed on the section line, they'd had to put two bridges in within 50 yards of each other to do it. And so he said, well, we're going to change the creek channel. I said, go ahead. I mean, I was all for this road, you know, this is a hell of a long time ago, not now. And anyways, they come out and then they, and this guy surveyed it or whatever you want to call it. And then, oh, We're going to change the crypt channel. Well, then we got to have an easement because the Corps of Engineers wouldn't allow them to change the crypt channel without an easement. I said, go ahead. I never fought with the county. I never fought with anybody. I was all for this road to begin with.

It's a...

If you're not out there, there's a washout at that time. There was a big washout and then the creek and then, of course, the section line. And they didn't want to fight with Lee and Hellickson over that. And it is still taking two bridges to get across the creek. So I didn't fight with anybody about it. I was all for it. But that was a long time ago when it wasn't near the traffic that there is out there now. And then this has turned into a major detriment. I mean, I don't have all the answers, but something's got to get done because as far as I'm concerned, Billings County's had, you know, 43 years of pretty cheap out there.

Not much done out there.

Not for the amount of traffic. And my deal on that guardrail, Jim, is to make them slow down, you know, because the stop sign ain't going to work. Hell, the yield sign won't hardly work. We've seen a number of times where, you know, dang near it hasn't happened. But that lady that almost ran down in the creek, she come within a foot of going over the side. But I mean if that had been a T, it probably wouldn't have happened. And here I think a couple, two or maybe three winters ago, one of them tanker trucks dropped his trailer down in there going turning east and took two wreckers from Dickinson to come out and pull him out of there. He was loaded at the time. And lucky he didn't tip it over, you know. But anyway, is there any chance of me getting that blacktop, some of that used blacktop?

Well, we're going to have to, you know, take this into consideration and get some study done on it. We're not going to make a decision today on it, but we're taking all your information and we'll have a study done on it. That way we can come up with a plan. It's got to be fair to all the corners and all the T's. to all the rest of the roads in the county.

I understand.

Similar case with your curvature is right out with the T is right at Freiburg. Tanker trucks go into the oil lock and that is the same situation there. That's sort of like his comment about making kind of all the same. I agree with that to have a uniform.

Well, I figured them guardrails, that's That's kind of like if you're driving in town, you've got to stop or at least slow down to turn the corner. That's my thinking behind it. I might be all wet on that one, but that's the way I'm looking at it. Because the way it is now, even if you cut it back to a T, they just keep... you know, crowding the edges. So you're right back in. And the thing that ticks me off is they come down, they're flying down, especially from the east. They come flying down from the east, drop one gear and pour the cobs to it, you know, and I'm dizzy. And we get dusted out there all the time.

So in this picture, where is the speed limit sign at going south?

There's signs all east, west, and south. And there's also signs, there's three signs on each coming in that way from the west, from the east, from the south, says no engine breaks.

I remember that.

And I have trouble with that too, but I've got most of them, not all of them, but I got most of them knocked off. But I still have trouble with that out there.

Okay.

Am I going to have any say on this, Dean?

Well, we're going to have to have our road superintendent get things going and maybe we're going to have to get engineered. I don't know. But we're going to have to look at it. We probably can get it slowed down to 25.

Well, I don't see why it could be 35 when it's 35 on the blacktop going out to the golf course.

It's 35 on all roads in Dillings County.

Oh, is it?

Yes. All roads are 35, right?

Am I saying that?

I agree.

So we can't... Is that River Road? Is that a county road? Yeah. That's got a 20 mile an hour speed limit on it.

Where? River Road.

Just over here.

Yeah.

going like the pats and stuff oh well i guess yeah i don't know why it's there well i don't either but i'm just saying i never knew that so it was 25 but now it's 20 so it must be a hell of a lot of traffic out there yeah so well I ain't real happy, so I'm just going to shut up.

No, that's good that you brought it to our attention. Thank you for that. Thank you for listening. We'll keep you posted. Okay, thanks. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, so we'll go into department head reports. Who wants to start today? All right. It's my monthly report.

Oh, Dean, can I just read it? This is just one little bit that we could find in our basement. There's got to be more of this in the courthouse someplace. Okay. Some kind of, you know, on that road.

All right. Yeah, we'll look up easements and everything.

Okay, thank you. All right. So we were up two calls from last May. So pretty average month, actually. One case that we did have, we had a guy that was setting fires actually two days in a row. So we were able to catch up with him and Jared helped us with that. And it's kind of spooky with the conditions before the rain came in. And so we were able to kind of put that together and at least get him off or out of the county or whatever before he set any more fires. I don't know if you guys have any questions about the report.

Do you feel that we're having enough of the road or the Overload contacts the guy that's getting paid under the road and bridge. Do you feel we're having enough exposure?

for justification that Yeah, I think like right now we've been today we got Noah who's hired Regarding that he's coming in. I've got two guys working the same ship to try and get more experience on that but we did have What did we have for contacts? So we had three, I believe that were, they looked obviously to be overloads.

They charged one.

I think we collected $1,248 on that. I'd like to do more, you know, but I just know responding to calls and things like that too, sometimes that intervenes with that. But when I can double the guys up, because it does take additional manpower to swing those scales and get them set up in a safe area. So, but yeah, we're going to continue to work on that.

And I guess, is there more than just weighing them? More so just gen, is there more to it than just... Oh, I mean, do you guys do any like DOT inspections or not? Like, is that part of just weighing more so or what?

Yeah, I mean, if we see overhives or whatever, we see some of those things. I mean, we try to look to see if there's a rig move coming in to be able to concentrate on those areas. But I mean, most of it, I mean, most of the damage comes from the overweights. Sure. So that's kind of what we concentrate on.

And the only reason I ask is just so we have plenty of clarification or justification for paying, you know, out of that.

Right. So, but yeah, and he's a fast learner. I think he's going to do well. But, you know, Frank was gone for a good portion of the winter or whatever, too. He came back here in March, so we didn't have a lot of time to kind of get him fully trained up. Okay, thank you. Yeah. As far as the event, we've been continuing with preparations for the A250. Last week we had another tabletop exercise in regards to disseminating information during critical incidents. Had a lot of our partners, the state, a lot of the local agencies, everybody participated in that. some of the entities the library was there the foundation was there so just trying to prepare for the event and being able to deal with any of those large issues that they come up so I think we're on track we completed the agreement with the food vendor for our first responder meals we got that done We secured first responder lodging in Medora, Bellfield, and Dickinson. We'll see a couple of vouchers that came through regarding that for the food contractor and for the lodging. Some of the motels, like Medora and Dickinson, didn't require basically a deposit, but the one in Bellfield did. We met with Mike Mosley, who's the jail administrator at the Southwest Multicorrectional Center, in regards to possibly an influx of arrestees during the event. He actually came out here to Medora and met with us, and I feel really comfortable and confident that if we do have to make several arrests or mass arrests, he'll be able to accommodate us. We also reached out to McKenzie County just for a contingency. And they said that they would also help if we do end up with anything like that as far as a protest or whatever. Hopefully we don't, but we need to plan for those things. So again, continuing with the logistics and operational planning. the last community meeting in regards to the event will be coming up here on june the 11th at 6 30 pm and that's going to be held at the old town hall here in medora i don't know if anybody has any questions on any of that okay thank you thank you dean

Good morning. Last couple weeks ago, we had a power outage generator that didn't start.

Had a service call. They came out Monday. um he worked on it all day and we did quite a bit of work to it so we should be okay now but it is at a warranty warranty expired in december thank you the fuel pressure was okay it had some electronic problems so that was fine um tomorrow we're going to be replacing that exterior sheriff's door it's rusted that'll be replaced That's about all I got.

Question on the generator. So was it every month it kicks in and runs? Once a week.

It exercises once a week.

And has it been? Or do we know that?

Yeah, it has. It failed, I'd say, probably two months ago. Just had an alarm in it, but it was cold. And it's been good since then. But then we did have a power outage, and it did start.

All the headaches we had into that and then still fail.

It's a much more modern system. There's a lot more to it. You know, the old ones that used to be mechanical switches seemed to work fine, but now we're having some trouble with it.

Okay. Thank you, Dale. Juliana, do you have anything?

No.

So the crews have been hauling on West River Road, 131st, 8th. They got the library trail and the Rumpfrider State Park done. And then 30th and Blading Roads is we've gotten rain. We've been working with some of the locals to figure out where the rain's at, being that it's so spotty, getting calls when they do have rain in corners of the county. Chips Hill project, they're going to start after the 4th now. They're not going to make it beforehand, so it'll be closer to the beginning of August, they were thinking, before they'd be able to start that. The Fairfield water tanks are up and running. We're getting the heaters ordered in the heat trays and those will come in and we'll get them installed and then insulate them to tanks. And been working with Pipers on getting the trucks to auction that we didn't trade in. So meeting with them today to go over that. bridge guardrail project just started. I started up on 123rd and started setting stuff at Frank's Creek and then south also. The gap road, just a little bit of an update on that. I selected a preliminary route and they've sent it over to the Forest Service to review. There is a lot we got to dodge around with archeological sites and historic sites and whatnot, but it looks like they picked a good route so far. And then there's the state park bill. We wrote that up and sent it to the state park for the Roughrider State Park and they sent back that they were only paying for materials and not labor. I was wanting some clarification on that, I guess.

Well, there was nothing in writing, I guess, that I can remember. Okay.

I guess if there is stuff of this nature in the future, probably need to bring it to the commission meeting beforehand or have them present it or have it in an email because they're fighting us on a $14,882 bill.

How much of it was the materials and how much of it was labor?

The materials was only $2,322 and the rest was labor.

Yeah, that isn't how it was, but it wasn't in writing, because I remember talking to, that guy's name is... Cody Schultz.

They sent an email back to us when we sent them the invoice, and it was not Cody that responded. They said $15,000, right?

They were going to pay? Yeah. Well, can we at least get the trucking, take your labor out of it and say, well, we have an expense of fuel and the truck maintenance. I mean, that's a load of crap.

I'll have to talk to Cody. Okay. Because that was... Because it came from you only.

It did, yes. We're getting pushback on it. We brought it in right under $15,000. So...

So going forward, they need to come present or request it? Or put it in an email or put it in writing? Put it in writing.

At least if we have it in writing, it's in an email chain. But this way, word of mouth, it's not working out. That is right. And then trucks, visited a few guys on trucks. I sent over the emails yesterday. looking for the reason we're pushing them for the 2027 years they're going to go up thirty thousand dollars um next year just due to the new emissions that are coming out and that's why we're these will be delivered in january next year so they'll be on january next year's budget but just getting them approved so we can move forward with them save some money that way

and you're ordering four four trucks total three automatics one manual your cost sheet isn't in this pile here is it that one that you uh the first one that was in the email i got to share it here because i didn't make copies

that first email is the one that we talked about I guess my comment is when you look at fiscally responsible I mean going with the cheaper of the western starts basically after buying three trucks you get one free and almost I mean we don't have historical data on the Kenworths yet to see what the real difference is on savings or maintenance but I mean that's why I guess my opinion why we should stay with the lower price of the Western Stars.

I guess I'm going to speak up a little bit. We have the data on the Western Stars and we see what we spent in the last how many years of the work being done on and the downtime of them. Even though we don't know about Kenworth, I mean, you can go back and look what we spent, and there's a lot of money in there. We didn't have one truck in there. We had up to four or five trucks parked at Wesley's, and not just one, two days. It's been weeks and sometimes months on these trucks. Yeah, there's probably $37,000, $32,691 difference on the automatics, 26 on the manual. But when you've got a downed truck and you spend that kind of money at Wesley's, it adds up. How long is the warranty on?

These are both quoted with five-year warranties. No, but they weren't before, right?

Well, last year's ones were. But, I mean, before that?

They were all, as far as I know, they came with a five-year warranty even back when, because when the 2020s started having problems, or the 2018s, We had some troubles and they were just outside of warranty to fix them back when I started. So I have gotten extended warranties on everything since I've been here.

And that's good. But the downtime really costs us a lot and you can't hardly measure it. But it's... They just don't step up their game on service, and I'm not for buying western sours right now. Until that gets proven to take care of it, then that's my reason.

Is the plan to trade trucks every five years once they're out of... Are they going to be kept for 10 or what?

I would like to start trading in five, six years just because of all the troubles we've had. If you look at the cost we've incurred in trucks that are 10 years old, the last three years of that they're in the shop a lot more and they're costing more and more money to the point where you're spending more you're not even getting your money out in a trade so we shouldn't have much major maintenance repair in five years whether it's a western star or a canvas correct but it also depends on how long they're going to work on them whether they're on warranty or not

well and that's are we cast in stone we're going to trade them that soon i'm going to say no because we got motor graders we got all kinds of equipment we need to flop out there's a lot of there's a lot of updates so i need to be popping out 15 16 trucks i don't know if it's going to happen And how I can say, fellows, is I would recommend whichever ones we go with, we get the same kind. Because I think you're going to have issues if you get two and two. You're just going up with the crew.

I don't care. Yeah, I'd like to stay with four of each, whatever brand. I was leaving that decision up to you guys.

Michael is going to be with the camera, so you guys handle all you want.

I mean, look at it. You can buy almost two pickups for the price of your saving running. It's not like it's a construction business. You've got to go, go, go. I mean, you guys have extra equipment, and there's not deadlines to meet for stuff.

How many pickups could we have bought spending the West season, the last five years?

Mm-hmm.

but if we're going to trade them then no problem it still boils down to though are they going to get them out whether it's a warranty item or a repair item i'd move we purchase western star trucks for western star trucks i think it should be however You said you wanted to do one manual and three automatics.

One manual, Western Star, and three automatics.

You know what I mean. Okay, we have a motion on the table. Is there a second? Is there a second? Motion dies of a lack of second. Is there any more discussion? I got one thing to add. Is there any way we can get some sort of a service agreement from either place?

I could visit with them. I haven't looked at that. You know, they both promised you the moon.

I mean in writing. Because all the counties Well, even construction people too, but I think government agencies should get, I know they do it with the fire department.

It hasn't worked out real hot in the past though either. They take them to certain places and they sit for two months.

So I think we should look into that maybe, but that's just my opinion. Because it is a savings, but to me it's not big enough for what we go through. So does someone, do we want to move forward or table it or what do we want to do?

I'll make a motion. We get one manual, three automatic from Kenworth.

Okay. We have a motion on the table.

Kenworth?

Kenworth, yes. Now he's got KW. I'll second the motion. Any more discussion on this matter? Are you going to look into service contracts with that? I think we should. I don't know if we want that in the motion or how we should do it or should we...

But when you say service contract, is that after the warranty or what? Or you mean priority for working on or what do you mean by that?

Either way, I guess. I don't know if it's out there. I don't even know if we can do it.

I think it's just something we should check into. It would help. I just don't feel we're going to trade these trucks in five years.

Okay, we'll just check into it then. Any more discussion? All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye. All those opposed say aye. Aye. Motion carries.

Okay. Any more, Pat? And then you got the two score releases. There's the...

JARED, IS EVERYTHING GOOD ON THESE? YEAH, I HAVE. HAVE YOU SEEN THEM?

THE THOMPSON ONE, YEAH. THE OTHER ONE, I DON'T REMEMBER ANYTHING ABOUT. OH, I MISSED IT. YEP. YEP, NO, WE'VE REVIEWED BOTH OF THESE, YEP. OKAY.

DO WE NEED A SEPARATE MOTION? someone want to make a motion on on the uh thompson ranch escorio lease first so i'll second the thompson ranch we have a motion and a second any more discussion yeah i'll sign it yep all in favor say aye aye aye motion carries I'm going to need a motion on the Steve Burian scurrial lease. I move to approve Steve Burian scurrial lease. We have a motion. Is there a second? I second. We have a second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Motion carries.

The only other thing I have to bring up is 135th. We're building it for pavement right now. Jensen's working on it. They have to wait on the railroad. They'll fire up around the 29th with the railroad players and they'll do their concrete stabilization at that time. With the asphalt plant going in north of Bellfield, I wonder if it would make sense to bid the asphalt for that road at this time. Have the engineer

Can we go backwards a little bit? You said the 29th of what month? Of June, of this month. And what's going to happen then?

They've got to finish up around the railroad. They're waiting. You have to schedule with the railroad to work in there right away. We had problems with this last year when we did the overlay and milling with the railroad timing.

So, Dean, is that some, is there going to be some How many days is it going to be?

That's up in Freiburg.

That's where it's going to be a lot of traffic through there too. Do you see anything there?

I'm sorry. I kind of missed what you were saying there. Sorry.

Well, he said they're going to do some work on the Freiburg railroad crossing on the 29th of June. Not the Freiburg. The rail facility. Oh, the rail facility. Okay. It's not through Freiburg. So then we've got two roads now.

Yeah.

All right. Just double-checking. Okay, so I'll go on to what you're...

I was just wondering if it makes sense to put pavement out for bids on that two-mile stretch. We're building it for pavement. it's had a year to settle with the culverts it would be time to pave it after they're done with the concrete stabilization and with the plant going in north of belfield would it make sense means there's going to be asphalt closer maybe we'd get better bids on it well i'm trying to get a explored i guess or get a bid on it

I mean, we were originally going to pave this, but it was going to be... Just another year later, right?

Or whatever? Well, we were planning on having it finished up and then things got late last year. Okay. So then we were planning on paving this year, but we had all the center line pipe installed so the ground had time to settle.

That way everything's set.

And then with the concrete stabilization, it would make sense to pave it this year or

perhaps early next year, but either way. But with that plan set up, it would probably be cheaper on our part if we did it this year.

That's what I'm thinking. That's why we discussed this year you might get a better bid. And I know it seems like the state projects are slow this year, yet you might get a decent bid with that as well.

I guess I just would pose if we get it a bid and we're like, ooh, do we really want to accept this? How bad does it look? Or not say bad look, but you say we re-bid it again. I mean, we obviously have the right to refuse the bid, but we just never have. I've never experienced that, I guess, as far as just... Yep, so yes, I can speak.

So what we'll do is... bid opening and we could do that now we can get you an engineer's estimate of what we think the low bid would be and if it's higher than that within reason you can reject that bid but you also don't want to just feel about contractor to see what it really costs uh we can yeah that's kind of what i was getting at you know if we think it's uh say 1.8 million dollars uh and the low bid comes at 1.9 it'd be hard to reject that bid because it's so close to what the estimate was. If it's much higher, then you can reject it, but you should be really comfortable allocating that budget number to that project.

Does that answer your question? Yes, the fact of what it is. If you're close to engineer's estimate, you should really consider taking it, not just feel out what it's going to cost.

Yes. So then my question would be, do we have that? Is this going to be this year? Is it going to be in this year's budget? Is there money there? Do we have to do something?

We might have to amend the budget, but it would be close. It would be close.

do you have what the estimate was you know what at one time i thought we were between 1.7 and 1.8 million we can revisit that number um you know well prices are higher so that's going to potentially inflate it a little bit uh but to pat's point if there's potentially two baby contractors in the area your your that number should be on the low end okay so but we can give you a uh

Can you have that by next month then or two months?

I would say really by the end of the week we can come up with a pretty good number for you guys.

Well, we don't need it. We're not going to call a special meeting or do we have to call it? Is it that big of a rush? I don't know. I don't think it's a rush. I don't know. I mean, they're going to be paving there on that site there for a year or two, aren't they? The one north of Balefield? Or how long is that project planned?

I don't know what it's for even. I don't either. I just seen they were putting in the facility.

because I should reach out to Wes, we should get a contact, or if you wanted to, to see where that project is really, that material is really going, because yeah, there's rumors of it for 85, but why would it be way down here, or what portion? So I guess, I should have done some homework when I mentioned it to you. That too. Yeah.

Well, I think we should just come back with some stuff for next month then. That way we can have more Answers, okay.

And then we do need a motion also to award the phase two.

Phase two of the walking path. Yeah, the DOT walking path. Wing construction was the only bidder with the state, the state bidded out. Yeah.

What was the amount? $2,097,928.04. And of that, our portion would be $400,074.88. That's with engineering or plus? That's without engineering.

That's just construction. The engineering was already done, right?

Or not.

No other engineering to do on it.

Right, because the first part was covered, but not the second part. Right. So we didn't get these numbers in our packet or nothing? Yeah. Are they? I never saw them.

It's a letter from the DOT and then it has been spinned.

Right here.

So this is going to be concrete all the way. So is it concrete all the way here, going up to it too? Yep. Okay. Who got awarded that, if I remember? Because it wasn't me.

It's the asphalt.

i kind of think the asphalt i thought that was asphalt no no you're talking the walking path right the walking path if this was bid this is the this is for the phase one not the phase two because this is the bid on it Because it says going across the bridge. Yeah, this is phase one. This is from Honduras up to Salt Creek. Right.

And we got the grant money. Yeah. And we already got the grant money, $175,000 to pay for the engineering of it.

Yeah, we did.

So we just have to make a motion today on if we're going to accept this bid. And this is the state has approved it? Yep.

Okay.

I moved to approve the bid from wind construction for East River Road. You call it shared use path or?

Pedestrian. Oh, okay.

I'll second the motion. Is there any more discussion? So we've got to let the state know that we're going to do this, it says here.

So I'll email them right after the meeting. They sent me an email asking when it was going to be approved.

because this is to be done this year right yeah yeah yeah i think i remember right last meeting gail said the bridge they weren't able to get it built this year so they might have to finish the bridge but they'll do the dirt work later in the year but the rest of the walk path will be built this year okay

Okay, if there's no more discussion, all those in favor say aye. Aye. Motion carries.

Jeremy, could you follow up quick?

Sure.

So just a couple real brief updates. Pat kind of explained a little bit of the schedule on 135th. Jensen Brothers have been coordinating with the railroad. They have a time set up for, I believe it's the week of June 29th, coordinate their work with railroads so they can, flaggers on site so they can complete the grading and the cementries stabilization. So that should be done middle of July with everything, but that week they should finish the grading work. A couple other things with that project, they're going to start the seeding and erosion control potentially later this week. That should take maybe about a week. So there's probably going to be two weeks where there's not a whole lot of activity until the end of June. So it might look a little weird, but it's going to have probably two weeks where nothing's going on. Then it's going to be one more week or so of work just to finish it. The other project on the vestige of the BC Bridge CONFIRMED THE OPENING OF JULY 17TH FOR THAT PROJECT. ONE THING I WOULD LIKE TO GET A MOTION ON, IF YOU WOULD BE WILLING TO, IS THERE'S FOUR CERTIFICATION LETTERS THAT THE DOT REQUIRES AS PART OF THEIR FEDERAL AID PROCESS. AND I'LL JUST GO THROUGH A SUMMARY OF THESE FOUR INDIVIDUALLY. A lot of these don't really apply, but they do need a return. The first one is the utility certification, and what the commission would be certifying is that there's no utility conflicts or that you're not asking for federal aid reimbursement for those. This project has no utility adjustments on it. The second one is the design certification. which says the project was bid according to all the engineering standards. Third one is that there's no work done within a railroad right-of-way. No railroad, so that's a good point. And the fourth one is that the right-of-way was acquired following the Uniform Act, which is a federal aid requirement, which we did. If that would be possible, I'd like to potentially get a motion and have the chairman sign these and we'll send these to the DOT.

What was the uniform?

What was the name? Uniform Act for the right-of-way acquisition.

Okay. Does someone want to make a motion pertaining to this? Subject? I'll make that motion. Two seconds. We have a motion and a second. Any more discussion? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Motion carries. All good? Thank you. Do you want them signed before you go?

Preferably, but I don't want to interrupt you so much.

Stacy, do you want to?

And there was one more responsible charge.

Oh yeah, you're right. What that means is he's the responsible in charge, so he's watching the engineer and keeping track of the project that it's built to the standards.

Okay. So there's five on that? There's actually five, yes. Okay, all right. Do you have that on your motion?

Do you want just to include that in the motion or make a separate motion?

Part of the same packet that you can, you can add it if there's no objection.

That's fine, yeah.

okay i'll get this go ahead john stacy so for today from the may 21st meeting we have three um applications The first two we've seen before, it's a renewal request from Arvid Hecker and then Albert and Anita Hecker for rig storage materials. And then Rudy Seminole had submitted a request for a temporary parking lot for buses during the opening of the library weekend. And then there was a zoning violation that would need a motion from the board. And so for Arvid Hecker's, This is a 2025 air photo, and for the most part, it's about the same size as what it has been in the past. The greatest area that the rig storage has ever taken up was the Red Daughter line. And so as far as I know, we haven't had any recent complaints on it. The rigs kind of slowly move out. Sometimes they move back in. But the use is still... needed and so they requested for another three years and the zoning board approved it with another three year explanation and then the Kessel one like the the Hecker and the Kessel application we've done is like one motion for both of them since they're the same use um the Kessel storage area has been reducing in size. Like they used to have a bunch of equipment parked along the roadway and that has been removed. And this one has gone down over the years. And so it's another, same regrets for the three year condition it used to have. bring it to storage equipment and make it for children. Does you guys have any questions on those? This has been a routine one for quite a few years now.

Where are the application numbers?

uh application numbers are 20 26 20 and 21. i moved approved applications 20 26 what 20 26 20 and 20 26 21. so that's both at the same time yeah

Okay, so we have a motion on the table. Is there a second? I second. We have a second. Any more discussion?

You're good, Stacey?

Yep, that's it. Okay, all those in favor say aye. Aye. Motion carries.

Okay, and then for Rudy's request, he has a bus company and the bus company that is doing the shuttle buses from Dickinson and the Freiburg area need a place to park their buses, which is about 50 buses or so during the opening weekend of the library. So Rudy was approached. He owns land, like his house is, you know, right south of the rail facility. And so this red circle is where they like, park the buses, that's where he was approached, but then an alternate location that he had mentioned during the meeting would be this old marathon parking lot. You know, it has fence, it has surfacing, that might be an option too for him, you know, since there is fencing and security, more security than an open area. So it's either going to be an open field or this fenced area, but they're right south of Freiburg. Just a part of 30 East Street. Could I make a comment, Stacy?

Yeah. Oh, yeah.

Can you stand up?

Just stand up. Just so we can hear you better. I want to make sure we don't interfere with the construction of that. It'll be from like the 28th of June to... July 8th, 7th, somewhere. Okay, yeah. But, you know, if they're going to be doing that work on the railroad, we want to make sure we take the right route into there.

Okay.

I know it's construction season, and they're still working on the 135th, so.

is that kind of the 29th just going to be a one day thing or more than that it'll be like eight days yeah i meant for the for the road work the railroad and the roadwork yeah i was going to say that the work within the railroad right away we're thinking might be three or four days i guess if i can ask a question are you okay with using the access like going to the south

And then to the west.

Yeah, we could go through Freiburg and right down 38th Street. That would be preferable, I guess. Yeah, instead of taking that road right along the railroad. Yes. Yeah, so I think both can coexist. It would just be easier to get buses going to the south or wherever.

For the existing parking lot, there's no need for zoning change there, right? Just kind of FYI?

No, it's basically, yeah, an FYI. Like, yeah, that marathon parking area, that was zoned industrial as part of the rail facility parcels. But it is a temporary use. Oh. Yeah. and i have talked america is there i know we approve is there do we need a motion here on this yeah it would be well I would still call it like a temporary use for bus parking during the weekend in the library. I mean, you're not gonna have bus parking all summer. Or do you need it? I mean, bus parking really technically isn't an industrial use either, so.

Well, you're talking a motion for the- Okay. what's with the bus parking oh but on the marathon side or well either one of the sites yeah the marathon site is the preferred one sure it's already zoned commercial industrial or industrial sorry yes i don't believe so that on the marathon that's the preferred well should we make a motion on the other one just for a backup for his for his sake

Just to make it, since we're this far away.

And then there's like the chain that was approved in zoning. It's here.

Okay, well then let's do that then. If someone wants to make a motion for that.

I move to approve the application. 2026 to 2027.

2026 to 2027 for bus parking.

Okay, we have a motion. Is there a second? No second. We have a second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Motion carries.

And then the dates, maybe July 8th. Those are, give or take a few days, it's not going to matter. okay and then when we were out assessing um we took a route and there was um we noticed that there was a garage that was built without a permit and looking at the air bonuses for about 2023 or so and the new garage was built in kind of the same location as the old garage that was on the property but it doesn't meet the 103 foot setback requirements from the center of a section line road and it's a 40 by 60 foot garage and it's approximately 70 feet from 28th street You know, if we were to ever improve this section line, like right now it only has the 33 feet of right of way, standard right of way on either side of the section line. Usually if we get right of way for county roads, for improved roads at 75 feet on either side of the section line. And so there is some issues with where this garage is located. Property zone residential. It's the red building right here. Like you have the manufactured home on the property and then there's a red. four-car garage right here about 70 feet or so from the center of 28th Street. So what's approved? with the variance to the 103 foot setback with a condition that if the county improves the road in the future and needs to acquire additional right of way from, and the county can't make the 70 foot distance work, that the landowner would be responsible for moving the project. Sometimes there's ways to go around with improvements for right-of-way and sometimes not. It all depends on the project. If it is, it's not a fault of the county, it's the fault of the landowner. but would you say in that case we probably wouldn't be able to acquire the land for it because you could but maybe not the full 75 feet you know or keep it maybe instead of 33 feet you know 50 feet sure that spot i mean it it all depends you know case by case and we don't know what kind of road you're going to need in the future right now it's just a basic section line road that was improved you know back when i mean it's not built a county

great work okay so all those i remember when we were at the zoning too it was just there probably is never going to be a road thing there happen but you just have to plan for the future so that's why it's like right now it's not an issue right So we're going to have to get a motion to get that in place. So it's there. Does everybody understand? Do we have a motion then to add this permit on 2026-25? Well, I'll make the motion. Is there a second?

I'll second it.

Second. Is there any more discussion? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Motion carries.

Okay, then there's another, we received a notice from the Bureau of Land Management that they're re-issuing or like renewing the process for updating the resource management plan. In 2004-2005 we were cooperating agencies with the BLM and then the plan got to close to the final stages of adoption but it was never adopted because the state of North Dakota challenged the RMP and so the BLM is now renewing that project for like having a another review with this input from the state and so they're restarting the process so it's good to keep the county as a cooperating agency like we were in the past and so they've given us an updated MOU and and right now like We don't have any surface acres of BLM. We just have forest service. But we do have BLM mineral acres. And it's mostly like the coal, like the checkerboard pattern of coal minerals in the eastern part of the county. So for the most part, we just monitor this project. The coal counties are most affected by the BLM's RMPs. But we still want to keep in the loop just so that If anything does come to affect the county, we can address that and be a cooperative agency.

This is just assigning people.

Yeah. And last time, this is our notice for being the cooperating agency, and so this is just the MAU for the town. So I'm the contact person, and then Marsha would be the backup contact person for receiving emails and whatnot. So this is the beginning of it.

So he just says . Yeah.

This is a . Yeah. So it's the same language as previous? Yeah.

That's okay.

Okay, I'll make a motion for you.

You have it, okay.

All right, so we'll need a motion for it to be the MOU with the Department of Interior.

I make the motion for MOU with the Department of Interior regarding environmental impact statement. Okay.

And then we had one ARW application for Jerry. It was an agricultural

And this was approved without any conditions, and Kevin Kessel was the one that dropped it off, but the approach would be the one that comes off of the corner of 134th There's that cemetery right here. Or is that an old school site? No, I think that's a cemetery.

And then it would go just to the... Just north of Kanske and north of B.J. O'Brien's there. Oh, there's a cemetery there, yeah. Yeah. I see. There is... They've been driving through the disk. There was kind of an approach, but not really been being so we needed to put a pipe in to make it work.

Approved ARW for Jerry Allen.

OK, we have a motion. Is there a second? OK.

There's a second. Any more discussion? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Motion carries.

And then I think my last slide on here, I have pictures of the Wallace request to purchase Watson Freiburg. And so I just have the images of this is where this is.

Well, we may as well get on that right away then, get going, because you have it there on your computer.

Yeah, I have it along this. Okay. Okay, so this is, okay.

Jared, though, he was going to make comments, too. He must have used it. Oh, there he comes. Okay.

Oh, okay, yeah. Okay, so you guys are familiar, like, where the parcel boundaries are in Freiburg. You kind of have to imagine that they're smudged a little bit to the north. and to the west a little bit but wallace has the parcels that are highlighted in orange he owns lots one and two and then the county owns lots three four and five and looking at the history on the lots it's like there are a lot of lots that were acquired through non-payment of taxes back in the 1940s in pryburg and then some of them went to private ownership and then These lots, like, one of the lots that the county still had, I think, might have been to the east on this block. Well, anyway, there was a swap between the county and Lowell's window back in the early 80s for the county swapped some old land for this one, because it worked out better for Lowell. And then... So the lots are 30 feet by 130 feet. And in his letter, he said that there was additional right away for it. And that's his reason for wanting these extra lots. But I told Wallace that there isn't any extra right away through those lots, like the, the Freiburg road for only like, we got additional right away to the north of Freiburg and to the south of Freiburg, but the road, through Freiburg through these old platted lots is like a regular city street. So Main Street has 80 feet of right-of-way, and then Bryan Avenue to the east and west has the 66 feet of right-of-way. And those lots are at the edge of the right-of-ways. That's where they begin. So there's no additional right-of-way taken out of these lots. That was a point of clarification. He didn't understand that. No, he didn't understand. And I explained that. And he has approached me with comments on wanting to buy this property. I mean, I think it was about three or four years ago is when he first came in. And now he's bringing it up again. But this time he's gone a little bit further to actually make a formal request. I've gone over like his property situation and the county's property a couple of times.

Yeah. So he has a formal request in writing and it's here somewhere, right?

I don't think I printed it because Jared had some comments on it.

Yeah, I know Jared has comments on it, but I just wanted to see.

I can print it off here.

Because he gave a request in writing. I asked him to do that.

His basic request was just to purchase all three lots at $1,000 each. I don't know what else. That was it, yeah? Yeah.

I guess, to me, the first question is, are we... I guess, is the county interested in selling, number one, and then we're going to have to follow some process, and you're going to explain that.

Real quick, Stacy. You said those three lots were from a swamp. Those were not tax sale...

No, well, that one time they were tax sale lots. I mean, it's kind of a messy history, but I do have the deeds. Okay. Okay, so auditor's tax deeds lot three was In 19, December 1939 and three. And then. Somebody. Okay, so they were acquired by tax thieves and then 1949 is when the county sold the property to Dan Cheadle. And then Dan Cheadle sold the property to Lowell and Margie Limbaugh. And then in 19... And then in 19... 80 is when laurel and margie deeded the land to billings county and the minutes have the legal descriptions on what they swapped okay but all three lots were conveyed at the same time yeah okay no yeah then that isn't an issue as long as there's other his chain of custody most recently was not from a tax sale no no and that was mentioned in the minutes like when jay was here um he had because it was there was one quick claim deed that was in the mix on those and so jay had them do a complete title search or a updated abstract and then the deed from limos to the county was a warranty i got you and then so the county's had it ever since sure Yeah, that's my answer. I don't remember exactly what was swapped, but it was like a comparable size property.

So are we in agreement to move forward and sell them, or do we want to keep them?

I was waiting for Jared. First, the county, you know, the discussion, you know, The steps involved require a resolution to list the property and to provide notice. The county cannot just sell outright pursuant to a request. First, you have to decide if the county wishes to part ways with that property, and then if that's an agreement to actually sell it, then it can be noticed for sealed bids alternatively you get a realtor involved but that seems unnecessary and probably expensive it would be helpful if there was a an actual valuation of the property you know if the property I mean as he proposed as a thousand dollars that happens to be the statutory threshold where the county cannot just do that do away with this so I don't know If that's fair market value is $1,000 per lot, it would have to go up on sealed bids and he may be the only one interested in it, in which case that's it. But you do have to open up to public auction or sealed bids. So basically you have to pass a resolution to put the land up for sale. And if you wish to do it by sealed bids, a timeline for doing that, but it has to be noticed, I believe two weeks.

in the in the newspaper you know for a public auction where we held so a few years ago the mother logs were sold on auction and i thought to the south I mean, we probably have record, but was it about the $10,000 range or $8,000?

I'd have to look. So just to have an idea on valuation. I haven't done sales from around there for a while, but yeah. I mean, some of them did sell for $30,000.

Yeah.

Yeah, I'd have to look at it.

Well, is there a provision that we have to get it evaluated or get it? No.

I based upon you know Steve's comments and Stacy's representations of the land is valued at least $1,000 you know per lot we still have to go through these steps the only reason it would have been beneficial had he gotten an evaluation you know of the if the lots are $200 apiece that you wouldn't need to do this according to statute but As it sits here today, the board would need to pass a resolution agreeing to sell it, and then the rest of the steps continue with notice requirement and sealed bids or public option.

Well, I guess that still comes down to our question. We do not use these lots for anything at this time, right? Not at this time, no. I mean, had they ever been used for storing equipment or doing something? Nothing that we know of? Okay.

And so... What is the zoning on Wallace's or nearby?

Well, that area of Freiburg, I'm pretty sure I have zoned as residential. Because there's an older house right to the east of there, and then Ben Croses is to the south. And one thing to check that I'm not really positive on is whether or not there was a mobile home on the property. That's...

it seemed like there was mobile homes along that eastern stretch of the freiburg road that way so there is a mobile home i think someone drove one in there not too many years ago yeah i don't think it's livable but someone drove one there and parked it so yeah I feel like it's on Wallace's. Oh, okay. But not in them. I don't know if they encroached. I don't know. Yeah, I don't know. On a good year, it's just even grass.

Well, I guess, you know, one thing is if we sold it, it would get on the tax rolls again. But that doesn't amount to much. Would it?

means we're working with Piper's on selling trucks would it make sense to just put this on Piper's auction and let them auction it off and we'd get a little more publicity they get out there a little better and then you might make a little more on it I don't know or do you do seal bids so Wallace has a better chance I don't if Wallace wanted it bad enough on

actual auction you'd be able to be top bidder So it can get done that way option yes So Stacey it says lots are 30 feet wide So you're going to have 90 feet 90 feet by 130 So it was just over a quarter of an acre in size thinking if we ever want to build something on there Let's just say a fire hole. That's pretty small lot to

And the lots are too small for, when you'd have to get Southwest water hookups to those lots in order to have like a home with water and sewer.

You could put a single wide trailer in there and put that vehicle on each. 30 feet, you couldn't even really do that. No.

That's true.

30 feet.

I mean, you'd have 30 feet by 390 feet, so you'd have to set up this. Mm-hmm.

He just wants it to, if he builds a home there, he just got more room for a garage and a home because what he has too doesn't amount to much either.

No, he's very limited with what he has right now. Like his lots are $35,000 too, so it's $68,000.

Would they be sold, if sold, as one or would they be sold individually?

I would sell them as a block, because that's how the county acquired them. As a block, okay. Yeah, a block three, four, five, just like if you were to sell city blocks. That's fairly common. Because otherwise you'd end up with three blocks individually. So the first thing we'd have to do is

I drew the resolution to do the sale, correct? Yes. Are there any objections to doing that? Someone want to make a motion then to move forward or do we want to get more in? There isn't really any more information that we need.

Not necessarily unless the board wants to consider selling it at a public auction as opposed to the sealed bid route. It's a reasonable suggestion from Patrick that it might bring more money in than the economy is getting something out of it. But that could be dicey getting that done in the next two months with a with pipers especially they might be already booked for quite a while and we can reject the bid if it's too low or can't that i'm not clear on usually it's just sell to the highest bidder so if you elect to sell it if there's only one bid that comes in

We don't have the right to put in there, the right to reject bids?

You could if you wanted a minimum bid, I suppose, yes.

Well, I guess then it would be do we want to get an appraisal or a valuation of it before we sell it?

I don't think that's, well, you could. I don't think that's necessary, though, if the threshold would be $1,000. As long as the board deems the offer sufficient, it's fine. But the valuation component only came in, I would agree that the land is, you know, it's not a $200 lot is what I'm getting at. So if $1,000 is what he thinks it's worth, it's probably worth all of that and then some. But that would just help establish whether the extra steps needed to be done, but he's already suggested that they're worth $1,000 each. So we have to put it up for public notice.

So you wanna do anything or we don't do anything? It doesn't matter.

Let's just say we get 5,000, 10,000. Well, okay. Was it worth selling? Should we keep it for whatever in the future? I mean, would we ever wanna put up a trailer house for an employee there or something? Or I guess, let's just say we get 10,000, well, was it worth getting rid of? Probably not in my opinion. But if we get 40, 50,000, well, maybe it was. But that's just some food for thought, I guess.

It is, it's some ideas, yeah.

I'm not big on selling it. I think it could be an option. Who knows what happens later on. We could still sell it later on. I didn't know we had it. I didn't either.

I've noticed that on Onyx a while ago. I always wondered the history of why we had that piece.

Okay, well I'm that way too. Let's just not sell it then. Okay? Sounds good. Move on to the next item. um you got are you done stacy then yeah all right thank you okay um looks like we go into n30 we're going to huh should we take a break sure all right This is mine?

Yep. It's the revenue, so it's not yours by the year, but it has the total at the bottom.

So that's the papers that I requested?

We'll call the meeting to order.

Back to order.

We're going to have the annual COLA and 2027 budget discussion, direction discussion.

In your packets, you have the CPIU for April over April. So historically I've always provided this to the Commission in June so that we can send this out to the department heads with the direction of the County Commission on cost of living increases and we can include that in the budget for July. The historical cost of living increases show from 2006 through 2026 what's been done each year. CPIU was at 3.8% April over April. And then I also provided you the salary information for all the employees across the county as well as the longevity. The department heads did not meet to come up with a recommendation at this point for cost of living increases. But if you want, I did do the 3.8% on that spreadsheet, but if you want me to print out something else with different percentages, we can do that as well.

This one is with 3.8? That is with the 3.8.

Oh. The blue.

Oh, here it is, the blue. Oh, sure. Okay. And you didn't send that out in the email, did you?

I sent just the general staff, but not the full employees. That has not been updated with new employees, not for the year yet.

So 3.8 is what national average is, or what is that?

The CPIU, so you have the sheet there. The cost of everything increased over the year, obviously. Generally speaking, over the past several years, the decision hasn't been made to go with exactly what CPIU was, but it's just a gauge of what things are going on. historically it's been across the board increase versus merit increases the county doesn't do you know performance evaluations and doesn't have a you know one HR person or anything like that so it's just a discussion for you

And so to get to the point of everything, we usually make a motion, is that right, in June? Correct. To get the ball rolling on the budget for, and this would be the first item so that all the departments could know where their employee additional.

Right. The cost of living not only affects the salaries, it affects the retirement rates as well, so that does do a little increase there as well.

We don't know what the health insurance rate will go up yet, do we? No. When is that?

It should be early June, but we have not received it yet. It was a 5.1% increase last year. I'm assuming it's going to be greater than that this year.

So when are you going to figure that in, too? I mean, in the way, I mean, overall picture.

I mean, I met with Marsh, and I figured out since I started here, and I didn't bring that sheet, but until they went up to $370-ish per month. the health insurance okay oh you got that so yeah from 22 to 25 or 26 we're going to go up $365 per family plan.

A month?

Per month, yeah. So that's $374,000 almost a year.

Say that again for whatever you said.

So in 22. Yeah, it was that. Yeah, so it went up to today's rate. So we went up $365 per month over the years. Over the five years, yeah.

Three or four years. Four years. This will be the fifth. Yeah. And that number has to be changed when we decide what it's going to be.

We won't decide what this number is for health insurance.

Well, no, but they will, I guess. Sure, okay. Because we know what's going to go up.

Yeah, single plan, well that was a hundred and fifty-ish. So half, yeah, three, well a little less than half I guess. I know dental, ten bucks only, but you go all the employees. Yeah.

I always look at the bottom line of the $152,000. Are we going to get, if that's what we choose, do we get that much more revenue every year or next year to pay for that? from oil and taxes.

The problem with this spreadsheet is that it has the road crew and the general fund employees together, so the revenues are very different for, obviously, road and bridge versus the general fund. That's right.

So really, that comes out of the Bank of Jones money. For the road and bridge. For the road and bridge, yeah.

And I did hand out the revenues and expenditures for the past five years. It does have the totals on there for every fund in the county. It doesn't break it down. Dean had asked for it to be the totals instead of the broken down from general fund and road and bridge fund separately. But I did provide that too in your emails.

And then the Bankhead Jones monies, they come here.

We got it May 30th last year. We have not received it yet this year. It keeps getting later and later.

On this spreadsheet of the general fund, this is what I had before from you. It goes back the last four or five years and how much we've dipped into the reserves versus expenditures and revenue. I wanted to look at that too, just a general breakdown of just that account. I don't know if it's easier to see than this other stuff, but for me it's easier on that.

Yeah, and there's different ways to look at it. Sure. You sent us that before.

Yeah, I had it with me. That's good.

Sorry. So, is there any more?

Where's our paper that we did before, other years? The five-year average, that's here somewhere, right?

Five-year average?

Well, this year... So it's been from two and a half, three, two and a half.

So does anyone have any comments on it?

One and a half percent. Over the years of insurance going up and our general fund going into the reserves all the time, we need to keep it low. We pay full family, all the benefits, all the holiday pay and everything. I like to keep it low. What percent did you say? 1.5. because you know you factor in overtime on any of that too you don't in four years we might really be struggling to keep everybody employed if we keep going to reserves we've added two positions since i've been here and that hasn't helped our numbers not saying it hasn't helped the county but when it comes to the numbers it hasn't helped

Well, my thoughts were around, because she'd sent this out, it was 2%. And comparing here, you know. And... Are we getting less oil revenue or is it staying steady?

It's going to go down.

That's our primary income.

Bankage owns for the road and bridge. I think it's probably going to be roughly about the same, but the state oil and gas And that can be changed every two years by the legislature. So that is what concerns me about the revenue to our general fund from the state, is that that can be changed by a bill.

Yeah, I could go up or down. Now with oil prices higher, it could increase a little bit if it stays there.

Yeah.

Because if you factor in another $200 for, let's just say, a month for health insurance, if it's a family, or $100 on an entire year, that's $1200. That's $100. And I don't think all the employees consider that as an end to their, oh, I didn't get a raise.

And you can also look at this, you know, if you make a motion now, I can at least send it out to the employees, however you guys decide to do your motion. But then after we receive the health insurance and things like that too, you could revisit that after the fact. Just because the only reason I want to start it here is because the conversations end up being, you know, protracted throughout meetings. And then at the end of the budget, we're trying to put something together with all the numbers and i want to make sure that they're correct numbers that you're receiving so we can still change it you're saying you can change it yes if say health insurance increases up to 15 or 20 or something like that then you know you need to revisit this that's you've got the preliminary has to be done by august 31st And then the final budget is October. So there is time. It's just a matter of we wanted to start the conversation somewhere here.

And you have in the past gave us of other counties and different areas and comparisons. From what I remember, we were always in the upper category. I just feel that our employees get paid well and I know that there needs to be an increase in standard living because the costs are there and we all know from the grocery store to fuel. Jim, do you have an idea?

Well, I have an idea. I just don't want to say it right now. i'd like to hear you know when when the other stuff comes in but being we can change it but i'm going to say 2.5 so I know every department gets paid good, and we're proud of it. Been on that side of the fence for a lot of years. But I guess whatever it is, I think it'll be appreciated from them. But we've got them on the backs, every department, for doing a good job for us. So I think whatever we decide on, I think it'll be accepted and move on.

Yeah, until we get our insurance premium Because that's about the only other thing that's going to change things, right? And then whatever the budget is, when do they hand in their preliminary

each department so they'll get it this week their their budget spreadsheet this week after this meeting and then it'll be due back before hopefully the week before the next commission meeting okay that'll be preliminary from everybody correct okay and then we could still change something then It's just harder once it starts to get spread out into different budgets, making sure that all the numbers are tracking properly.

Well, last year you kind of listed it as two and a half, and then the 5.5 insurance, and then the PERS, but that's good.

Yeah, and that was a special because the EMS crew went from the main side to the public safety side, so it increased their retirement benefits there.

So, I mean, that would be... continuing on. So basically we got the health insurance and then our standard living. We had a lot of variance all the way back to 2006. There's been a lot of up and down.

and when oil and gas was high they wanted to to bring some rates up there was some concern about losing employees to mckenzie county or you know stark county or things like that so they wanted to make sure that it was keeping the employees at roughly the same rate as some of those other counties. McKenzie County is hard to keep up with, though. They are way outside of the norm in our area.

I'd move to increase the cost of living to 1.5%. Okay.

All right, we have a motion. Is there a second? Is there a second? Okay, the motion dies for a lack of a second. I'm going to make a motion for 2.25. So do we have a second on that? Do we have a second on that?

I'll second it.

Okay, we have a second. Is there any more discussion? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. All those opposed say aye. Aye. Motion carries.

So, Mr. Chairman, if I could say something. I was just wondering what information she gave you guys, if that could be made public, like a copy of it.

It's open record, so I can prove anything.

Okay, so I'll make my request to get whatever you guys got.

All right, sounds good, thank you. So you have more budget direction?

If you guys had any general discussion before the budgets go out to the department heads on how you'd like to see it, what you'd like to see with the budgets, if you want quotes or things to be provided by departments on purchases for next year. Okay.

So it's just going to go out this week, next week, and then just basically like it's been, they turn in their budget with what they're needing or whatever for next year.

And it's always been just a flat dollar amount that they place in their budgets. But I'm just asking if you guys want additional information from departments if you want to give direction for that, if that's not what you want.

So if we wanted to ask for a 5% decrease in everybody's budget now at the time? Correct. I'd ask for that so we can maintain everybody here. OK. And I think commission could take a 10% cut to show that we are serious about this so we're not in such a predicament in X amount of years for whoever's sitting in these seats.

We have... In the past not taking anything, right?

It's just zero. I think we can cut it back to show them that they need to cut theirs back. Take away the Hulu TV and the needs versus wants that someone quotes. Let's start that. We can cut out the mileage to our meetings here. This is our place of work. We can cut way back.

I'm for doing a decrease. How many departments turned back money last year? That's pretty hard to figure out right now, but I know some did.

Right, they turn back their budget authority that they have, correct?

Right, they have to.

But it's still under general fund money.

So maybe we do need to say we want to, I don't know, do we make a motion to make it that, or do we... Oh, you're thinking about, because I'm for doing a decrease in the budget. Or at least try, I mean, so see where it goes. I don't see why we couldn't.

You're talking like the departments, each department trying to decrease and all that? Mm-hmm.

This is their expenditures. What is the total expenditures?

and then if there's you know on top of that if there's additional uh grants or things that they plan on on applying for for specific purchases that's where they can show that to the commission so that when they are budgeting you can see you know this is the purpose this is the grant or the funding source that i anticipate using for this purchase if the grant doesn't come through the purchase doesn't get made versus just a flat dollar amount that the general fund covers, if that makes sense.

Mr. Chairman, can I say something? So I believe I can only speak for my budget, but I believe I turned back $60,000 last year. Some years it's been over $100,000.

I think those numbers that we've submitted have been consistent.

If we don't need it, we don't buy it, in my opinion. i don't want to cut things back too much i can't project overtime some of those things it's really difficult because it's incident driven or it's an emergency or whatever but i don't think anybody's mismanaging their budgets or the spending so i guess

that's my that's my feeling and just to be clear that's not what i'm insinuating i'm saying you know that you guys need a clear direction on how you want the county budgeted we've been submitting the same process for decades i guess and for sure the last eight years when i've been here

yeah it's basically been you just turn your budget if we have questions or your budget is your budget so

I'd also like to make a comment that as elected officials, I take a lot of pride in my budget and managing the money as well. I turn back a lot of money as the clerk and the reporter to the county.

And so I would like to keep the process the same. If technology breaks down, you don't know that's going to happen in a year or something.

So our process is working very well in my opinion.

I guess all we can do is ask. Just, you know, watch.

I don't like to get into it, but you guys know your departments.

I don't, you know, but... I'm more worried about Steve taking away some of my salary.

I'll volunteer to take $5,000 out of my salary right today. We're fortunate for the health insurance and everything else that's provided, and I want to make sure this thing maintains the general fund the way it looks.

Well, I don't disagree. I'm just saying it was to happen. We take some of our commissioner's salary. Is it going to change what they're going to turn in and do? for that little bit we get. If we take any more, we'll pay the county to do this job. I don't think that's a starting point as far as I'm concerned. And yes, we need to start in a roundabout way watching what we're doing out there too.

And on the agenda, that wasn't necessarily for a motion or anything to be made, just a general discussion topic so people know what the expectations are for the county.

Well, I think that when we get our preliminary in, then we'll see what it is compared to last year, year before, and then if it's very high it's just my opinion like steve says well maybe we do need to make a cut and everybody's going to have to redo it but i think everybody comes in with their fair amount that they're using and and what they're needing and I don't think there's any overspending going on that I know of, but it is hard to get into everybody's budget. I think we each have our portfolio people, and we need to maybe visit with them, make sure. So that's kind of where I'm at. So is there any more discussion on this? Okay. We'll go to the next item. National Park Zeta Roosevelt Presidential Library Land Swap Discussion. We have a new A letter from the library, I think that's who it came from. Is that right? It's just a short paragraph stating, did you see it too? stating that we're basically just acknowledging that there's going to be a land swap in between the library and the park service. And I guess I think that's all we need to put into minutes. I don't think we need to put a motion. If that's okay, or do you think that needs to be a motion?

It was our understanding that I believe it needed to be a motion. But frankly, I think this is the first time that we're not legal attorneys that believe there was a motion.

So where did you- In order- Yeah, I would err on the side of a motion is required so that the board is in approval. There are federal statutes that reference and research prior to receiving the secretarial order frankly that order is a bit complex convoluted i don't know that it's immediately on point with what the the land swap purported to do but to the extent that it does cover it what the parties involved need from the board is a written expression of support by both the affected governor, the local county or county government equivalent would be required for the acquisition of land, water, or other interest in land. So the prior, the previous statute dealing with BLM transfers set forth you know quite a few things as far as what the what the county has to consider whether there's you know what the benefits are the taxes uh promoting you know x y and z here the secretarial order simply requests or requires rather a written expression of support prior and the federal statutes regarding BLM land transfers do not allow the county to object or reject proposal they are volunteer it's a voluntary transaction between you know two entities but for the parties to go forth the county just has to Effectively express support, but again, because it's a private transfer through voluntary means, I don't think the county has any grounds to reject or object to it.

Mr sir. I think we did run by the general counsel at interior that we do not oppose achieves their goals as well that goals achieved the Secretary told her secretary or or I think that is a meaningful difference difference from this group and that's how I believe the motion is written versus we wholeheartedly endorse its opposition to. So just sharing that context that we did run that by interior just for your awareness. that the Billings County Board of Commissioners has no objection. I believe our previous conversation is in support of it. So this is a reflection of some conversation.

I like this better.

Yeah.

Yeah, I had drafted a rather loose, generic letter to, well, somewhat somewhat geared towards, you know, Governor Armstrong's letter, because that touched on other things that the county has to consider and weigh in. But again, as Mr. Lauf indicated, this is what the county would need to do for the process to go forward. It doesn't show, you know, full support or otherwise that, you know, the parties are doing this voluntarily and it's a private transfer between those parties. So, the county can't stand in the way it either needs to express support for it or um or not but again i don't think the county has much of an option to just you know reject it or not express um to support can we stay in there remains neutral on this well in essence the way that that's drafted you know seems to suggest that but under the the secretarial order an expression of effectively support and sometimes you support things by not rejecting it you know so to your point you know i think that letter suggests more neutrality than anything um mr clem that was kind of the spirit we were trying to just remember trying to write this in and yet what you just said if we write that we are supporting it

So when everybody, all the constituents hit us up, we did support it. It's just the language is, but we did support it, you just stated. I would like it to remain neutral in that. I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but I wanna be neutral in that.

No, and that's recognized. strong public sentiment regarding anything that the park service or the library or others do kind of their own separate entity outside of the county and so the public again sentiment comes back to each of the commissioners and you all have to answer to the people you represent but to the extent that it's required for this to go forth

expression of support is required well because he just stated if we do this we're supporting it this is a going to be a support letter is because it meets their requirement I want to be neutral or we can acknowledge it's great for housing but I'm not going to say that's that's how I do sure it won't happen

at the current way so it which is absent let me say that is your right as a commissioner of course please hear me i've not seen anybody that but you just there will be ramifications of that and i'm not trying to push in perspective no i'm not going to change

Well, I just feel that this sentence here, it says that being here it resolved that Billings County Board of Commissioners has no objection to the proposed land exchange moving forward through the parties involved, so is there anything wrong with that? There's no The Commissioner has no objective to that.

The fact is, he stated, we do that, we're supporting it. It's stated on record right now that we're supporting it. But it also says that we have to say something. So we just do what we feel is right and we don't. Or I feel is right, I guess.

So is there a difference between no objection or being neutral? To me, there is.

I would be in support if you would say wants to remain neutral on this topic. It's not saying we don't want it to happen. It doesn't say we want it to happen.

Well, we haven't ran that language by interior. I have no idea if it goes one way or the other. I would say if we had that information before, we would have been happy to do that. But we are, I think, our third conversation on this, feeling needing a little resolve.

Did you want to say something?

Yes, just to echo what Mr. Locke just said, you know, with that trajectory, I can already tell you when I go back to leadership in Washington, D.C., we are going to be sent back here again to start over again, over that language. And also, I just want to add for some context from the National Park, if this does not go forward, you know, that lot has been sitting there in federal government hands forever. not serving any operational need and it would continue to be unutilized as we have no funding or no mechanism to do what the national park has always intended to do with that land, which is put housing there for our employees. But I've got no way to do that outside of this really creative public private partnership opportunity.

i think to your conversation on tax revenue earlier the other thing versus cutting is increasing the base and it's our attempt to hopefully do that with this location who's going to own the land once it gets transferred i guess you'd call it or or exchanged So the lot in holding at the park will go from TRPL to the National Park Service, and the in holding, excuse me, it's not necessarily an in holding, the land in town will go from National Park to TRPL Park. There's an inholding in the park that will be swapped for this location that I think it collects about $500 a year in property taxes for the county. So you'll lose $500 there. And then the land in the city will be transferred to the park, which has transferred to TRPL, which will instantly, because of its valuation, increase about $500 before even development. And then post-development of which, of course, the city and county would have weighing in authority before anything proceeds. Hopefully, there will be increasing further. but is it going to be called non-profit though or or then we won't get any taxes well you we have to pay about 250 000 a year in taxes as a non-profit on the hill yeah but you have to go through that process again here then yes sir okay which i you all have final authority can i clarify something sure like i sent you the letter from last week and stuff right and

a housing development would be 100% taxable. It wouldn't be like the payment and lose like we have on the Hill, because it's like everything is taxable unless explicitly exempt through the century code. And so, yeah, it would be a multimillion dollar development for housing if it's. the only thing would be it's like if if there was a truly like rented office space to the park then that would be exempt but if it's housing for the park that would be 100 and i just know we have no apologies

go ahead we have no plans developments or renderings architectural work or we haven't perceived about that financially until we have a certainty on land so there's no secret development or project but it is our intent probably the next i'm speculating here five to ten years to do something on that line it's our goal we would love to do that earlier but it's a significant financial investment and we would be after doing this going forth on largely putting that together and we would be taking a lot of input input from partners and friends and in particular the community

Well, if the letter states this would be a good access or a good asset for housing.

You're allowed to clear on that?

I'd be okay with those words, but I'm not going to say I support them.

So could you put that into a motion? I don't know how to...

Jerry, can you put some words together and relate to that to see what it would come to?

Yeah, I was looking at, again, I know we're not talking about BLM land transfers, but that federal statute has a list of considerations, which Governor Armstrong's letter touched on some of that stuff. My proposed language that I sent a couple weeks ago prior to the special kind of touched on some of those things if we want to weigh in on those things so the board is outwardly stating you know it's going to have this economic impact this you know housing initiative etc would that be more acceptable then again i guess i'm convicting myself because if we put that in then we are supporting it that's like talking yourself into it so yeah so i guess i'm contradicting my own self i guess thinking back to what you stated with basically with the letter then it is saying we are supporting it so it's the interpretation and all the technicality to it well based upon the the represented representations of the representatives in the room for the two sides um you know what they've stated is if if the county doesn't express support Uh, it's, it's a dead issue.

Um, I will, I will note the clarification. I do think from a public perception, not opposing is different than supporting.

And that, that is a Delta, uh, perception, but the, the idea is the secretary says we he's from North Dakota. I think everybody in this room is perhaps about him.

You know, his point is to try to get the feedback from the local governments to commissioner who could maybe add this, but not support it still overall the motion. You could put another whereas clause, which I know they're not whereas clauses, saying that you're in support of housing, and then you can still oppose it, and that's feedback that goes to the secretary.

I'm not being a great advocate for myself in saying that, but I'm trying to articulate honestly as I understand the situation to be.

And it is a secretarial order, so they can adjust and amend as they go, but this is how it is currently. And I can also say if we're only doing this for hearing feedback, the city and county that with our new influx of employees, most of our employees living out of the county and the tax base and benefits going to other locations is a frustration that we've heard from our partners here that you impact of this project or so and not the tax benefit. Um, so we are trying to be responsive, frankly, in a way that's not financially beneficial to us. We will make no money on this. We will lose money. Uh, but we want to be a good steward and good community citizen. And that's why we're putting significant investments worth it. Even just the legal process to do this is not without significant costs to the library. And my board, just frankly, my best friends here is very cognizant of those costs and is taking a very, I'd say investment in our partnership that doesn't change. how you all hear and see it, but I want to just represent the fact that we believe we're doing this in response to feedback, not proactively because it matters to us more exactly where our employees are. We want them to live here, but they still are our employees regardless, but the benefits currently are going to Stark County more than to Jones County.

I'm still on the side of saying no objection because basically if Joe is trading with Sam we don't have any say when they're going to trade and so I don't feel by us just if this is good enough to appease this resolution that the park and you guys have I don't have anything against saying that we are in no objection to the proposed land exchange. And if that's going to pass, I'm going to make that motion that we put that in the third paragraph.

The resolution 2026-14 would be the resolution number.

Because it's, I guess like he says, we're going toward housing, and if we want to add that into that sentence, maybe that would help.

I guess I just rebuttal back toward stating he says we're supporting it then and when that is stated then that's what all the calls that we've gotten was they're not in support or I had gotten don't me too so that's why so then we would be against uh housing too then that that's that what you're well yeah that's what it would mean yeah so

And I'm not against the housing thing, so.

No, I feel the housing's a good deal. I was trying to stay, like, state neutral. We couldn't. But it sounds like we kind of can. So I just want to make this clear.

But, Jim, can we stay neutral and submit that and let them try that?

We already know the answer. We'll be back here next month. This already pushed their boundaries significantly. well within your right though, obviously.

You have a question. While you're pondering it, can I weigh in on the federal statute that discusses land exchanges? Again, we're talking about two different things. This is federal statute versus a secretarial order which I don't know how to succinctly put it. It's not law, but it carries the force of law as a basically administrative order. In BLM land exchanges, there's a requirement for a determination of public interest. So the authorized officer or parties may complete an exchange only after a determination is made that the public interest will be well served. When considering the public interest, the authorized officer shall give full consideration to the opportunity to achieve better management of federal lands, to meet the needs of state and local residents and their economies, and to secure important objectives, including but not limited to protection of fish, wildlife, habitat, et cetera. So there's a lot of crossover, but that verbiage where there's a requirement that the public interest factors be weighed and determined, I think that it's fair to consider those things In retrospect of the board, even though it doesn't have that language in the secretarial order, that's already a federal guideline for local governments to consider. The determination of public interest is what the spirit of the secretarial order is in my opinion. there would have to be you know a basis you know for for the county to support it if you will um but again if individuals that that's what makes it difficult for the commissioners to advocate for those that speak to them but the the people that have objections to it should really be coming forward and stating their concerns and objections if it's you know and for what grounds but um i i don't have a vote or a say in it at all but i i will say that you know the pitch is made for better management of the land better residential housing opportunities for staffing etc those things you know including an increase in tax revenue because of the construction and you know zoning and and the like there is there is going to be a benefit to the county you know regardless if there's citizen objection between the parties involved so i think that's the scope of what the county has to consider is whether there's going to be an economic impact and whether the land exchange is going to suit the county better

Okay, so we have a motion on the table. So do we want to put the land exchange between the ARC and the library in the motion, right?

If you want to put that there.

Is that what has to happen here? It doesn't have to be in there?

It's resolution 2026-14 as written as you guys have it. Okay, well that's fine then.

However you want to do it. That's fine then. Thank you. So there is a motion. Is there a second?

I second it.

Okay, there is a second. Is there any more discussion? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. All those opposed say aye. Aye. Motion carries. Okay, so you have your writing. Good luck with that. Hopefully it works out and then we'll be done with this issue.

And then I'll have this printed by the end of the meeting.

I'll forward this to you after it's... We appreciate your working with us on this brand new complex issue.

Okay, we have a last exit emergency room discussion, so... There has been some discussion that the bill hasn't been paid. And so I now understand that we will go ahead.

Oh, sorry. Just with a thank you to Commissioner Haag, Commissioner Haag for sharing the feedback that we have not been, we've been delinked on our payment. We have issued our payments as of yesterday, I believe, just making that aware.

Hewlett-Packard asked me, he received $59,000.

Let's talk about this.

Let's make sure this is squared away. What's the total bills? What's going on? Let's make sure, let's not just...

The bill is between them and the Libachuks, not us.

Well, I know, but let's make sure everything is squared away and paid. Libachuk had this whole breakdown.

That was the portion that TRP always billed. It's a cost share between two parties.

Yeah, Ken and I have been talking about this issue. I haven't seen the full invoice to date, so we have not issued payment for our cost share of it. I have some questions, especially in the library and TRMF at this point in time.

Okay.

To Hugh's question, we have not paid whatever is the implied share of our half, as I haven't seen any of those.

Because as, you know, it was given out by Hugh that the county hired us, and he's got a quick explanation, so that's why I want us to discuss it to make sure everything's good, that he's not on the drive from last winter yet.

I talked to Hugh several times.

I have, too, and he texted me this morning that he got part of it. So... So it's not a kick it under the rug anymore.

We traditionally pay the part that we're invoiced for. And that's what we understood our component to be.

And it sounds like an invoice wasn't sent to the library or to the TMIF. And that will get done. So you probably will get it today, I'm sure. I don't know why you didn't get it.

Yeah.

I think there was a little bit of misunderstanding with when I had asked Hugh to split, because it did come here once, right? And I said, well, no, it needs to go to the two of you. And then I don't know why it didn't.

I think traditionally we would pay for the county is what we understood, but we did a different process where we're getting the direct data. That was an agreement request by the county.

Yes. Okay.

Okay, is there any more? Well, if it's going to be taken care of, that's fine.

Okay. Is there anything else? Did you have a report for your department report?

No, we're just getting ready for the primary election next Tuesday. We got all the election workers trained yesterday. Everybody showed up to training, which is always good. We'll be ready to go.

Did I miss any other report? I know the ambulance, they're gone. Oh, there you are.

I saw it, I don't care.

And then Kyle, he isn't here either yet, or he's gone, right? Chuckley? But he gave a witness report too. Does Jared have anything?

We've been... A lot is riding on the election of next week to determine how many more times in June we will all have to get together. The ballot measure is in flux only to the extent that I've been working with the Attorney General's office to try to navigate the what ifs. We'll know more by next Tuesday night or Wednesday, how that process will play itself out and what steps will need to be taken. I met with Marshall last week to start game planning on some of those things for contingencies if there is, depending on the results of the election, on the ballot measure anyways, but there could be a significant amount of work that will need to come from all of us sitting here at the table if the vote is to increase the number of commissioners the redistricting is going to be somewhat time consuming and it's still not clear even from the attorney general's office portfolio holders for the political subdivision for the counties as well as the secretary of state a lot of moving parts and i don't know what the hesitation is on giving us some clear guidance but one meeting with the hand with them we this will be two weeks ago yesterday before they dug into it too deep I think they're just kind of wanted to know if you know what the direction of the county is going to be and then they'll expend more resources to get us the answers that we need because I'm Confused by a lot of it and Marcia similarly having difficulties Interpreting statutes that even the AG's office can't give us clear answers on so one step at a time on that otherwise yeah, we're plenty busy with Criminal matters that have happened recently and some other things regarding social services is that liaison for social services that's been quite time-consuming in my end as well.

Okay, thank you. If there's nothing else, I'm going to make a motion to adjourn. And we have to be back by 1 o'clock. I'll make that motion. Second. Second. Meeting is adjourned. Thank you all.