County Council - Regular Meeting

Wouldn't want to get that over the air. [laughter] But the fact it's coming out in a movie now, you know a little bit more about it if you watch it. [clears throat] Wow, that's a delay. Hey, Dan when they come in.

Oh, breakfast. I had an interesting career job. You did. [laughter] You did. Never a dull moment. No, it was never a dull moment. I'm sure that gave into my poor health. Actually,

my smile. I've had six heart attacks. I got four stints. One st I've had three strokes. You know, I'm not happy about having to be here this morning.

Oh, I'm thrilled. I'm beyond happy. Exuberant. Yeah, that too. Exhilarated. But I think it's being grateful. It's being uh being secure with yourself. Yeah. You know what I mean? forget that I was important.

room today.

It's amazing what a difference yesterday conference day. Yeah, it's good day. Um Oh, you got We probably should

You have your stuff. Somebody does. I mean, I have one. I have an insert. Your numbers are so I pay $450 light bill. Geothermal. I'm always paranoid. We We have a generator. We have electric heat. And we have a wood stove. That's it. We got it all. Okay, we got it all. She insists on using wood stove, which is my job, I guess. Everybody ready?

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. Yeah. [clears throat and cough]

Um, everybody has the agenda. If we have any changes to the agenda, I did add a couple changes to yesterday. Um, Julie sent me a request for Kim Kim Robertson who wanted to be on commission for 2025 claim and was that I think so. We all signed and signed yesterday. Okay. So, scratch that. That's not on there. The only other thing I added in new business was the SBA internal controls standards discussion. Edward dealer mentioned yesterday. He might want to share some things about internal controls. So, I put I put him and Darren de people you speak louder. You speak pretty soft because I have a hard time hearing you.

Okay. Even with my hearing aids up. Okay. [clears throat] Anybody else have any changes? No. Motion to adopt the agenda. So move second. All in favor? I oppose. You want me to count you? I did not create this. So I don't know where this came from. Gary head. I said to you the info when you created the bullet points. This isn't my style. I don't know what that is. Um top numbers are out of here. Is that all that?

I don't know. But I will tell you that there's some um information in the middle of this that is uh private. Shouldn't be spoken out loud. That section right there. Oh, okay.

Somebody coming here. Thank you. You got one. You have Yes, we do. Actually, I should have a copy of what I put together to you guys by tomorrow afternoon.

Should be able to you're agreeing with it after we send it to you if you agree with be able to pass it on the regular meeting. Everybody good with that? I didn't catch it. Salary ordinance update. It'll be ready tomorrow afternoon.

Okay. Indiana update. Just backing up a second. Should we add that to our agenda? just go ahead and say let's add it to our next council agenda. Yeah, it's going to be I've got it under report so it'll show up. Okay. Until it's until it's resolved. Good deal. All right, Scott, do you have anything Indiana ROA?

Yeah, they've um so let's backtrack, get everybody caught up. Uh, I'm trying to um, so the CVCE has come before us a couple times and has approved I think it ended up being $3,000 $4,000 for um, the creation of a a basically an application of plan for the region. And the three, this is about the three region, the three counties, Owen, Monroe, and Brown. Uh, basically being a uh joining together. Uh, we're one of the last counties in the state that doesn't have access to US Department of Commerce funds for roads, public safety, the things that we need to do, essential government services. We don't we've not had access to those funds in the past. or one of very few counties that has not for whatever reason. And so Monroe, Owen, and Brown um are a contiguous region. Those three counties don't. They're with us, right? Where all three of us have not had access to this for whatever reason. Um and so CBC approved for up to 15 or 20 and it ended up only costing $4,000 to do probably over $120,000. It's not a study. It's like an application or plan to present as a region to the Department of Commerce for their consideration essentially to allow us to apply for those essential funds for a variety of projects that we will decide as a county. We will and and before we even get to that point, if they do approve us, that would come back to the county and the county could say yes or no. county or counties?

Counties. And but each county could say yes or no. Like every step in the process, we as a county have the ability to say, "Ah, no thanks. We we've got all our road money covered or we don't need any more of that the public safety funding or you know, which infrastructure is the other piece." And so um so that's in process. So the 4,000 has been provided uh and I think conveyed to ROI. ROI is the group out of Indie that or I'm sorry out of uh Bloomington that handles were a part of the ROI region regional opportunities initiatives. I know you guys have all heard this multiple times. We're already a part of that region and they have agreed to administer this regional application for us which is wonderful because Julia doesn't have to do it. um in its bureaucracy and administration and they have taken the burden off of our shoulders for that. So that's I'm very thankful for that. So they next steps are uh receive applications from uh organizations that would like to help us create that plan. And then lots of uh work to hear from local county stakeholders to create that plan. Kind of similar not dissimilar from what a comprehensive plan or a a um kind of the IU stuff. Uh that's just gathering good community input. So lots of actual community engagement will occur through that process and through that organization that that is chosen. Um and then we go from there. They create the plan. They submit to the feds. The feds say yes or no. Then it comes back to the counties and the counties say yes or no. And then if everyone agrees to do it,

then Brown County retains all rights to decide what if anything we ever apply for or do as a part of that project. So there's no um delegation of any county authority to anyone other than our own county itself. And so it's all all the authority there is a a group that will be created of an equal number of people from each county which is really good because Owen and Brown are very rural in nature. And so, you know, that that we know for years that Monroe and Bloomington, mainly Bloomington, has kind of been able to capitalize on a lot more of the funding that comes through the region and other things than we have, partially because they're just bigger, have more capability, have a lot more private capital to put towards projects and a lot more growth. Uh, but in this case, in this region, Owen and Brown will outnumber Monroe in terms of the representation on the board. And so we will have more of a rural kind of feel, I think, in general. And a lot of Monroe is is rural, actually, believe it or not. Um, and so anyway, that's that's kind of the the where things will go. This is a several month process. You're going to get real tired about hearing about it. There will be meetings stakeholder lots of indepth uh data analysis and composition for our county specifically as well as the region. Um so yeah, it's it's good to have access to public safety, roads, infrastructure, quality of life types of funds. And speaking of quality of life, you know, kind of going way back, the reason we're talking about this is a year or so ago, the council asked me to

pursue new revenue opportunities for the council that do not include taxing our residents. Okay? And so this is one of those opportunities for us to capture outside revenues of our county and we can and you may recall the other thing the council asked me to do was to secure inkeepers tax dollars which I have successfully done through the legislature last year. There's a great effort, a group of quality of life board members, very diverse group of individuals now working to figure out how to spend, invest, I should say, and leverage those dollars, probably 20 million over 20 years for the benefit of locals and our tourism economy. And so the beauty of that is now we have the ability to take these inkeepers tax dollars to benefit local projects and leverage those with if we decide to go forward this regional federal effort or roads, infrastructure, public safety, all that would benefit locals and our tourism economy. but matched with inkeepers dollars which we don't have to pay. So really good combination maximizing the leveraging of those funds. Um so good stuff. Is there time? Is there time on

the Ry? There is. Um, and it's lengthy and and I think um I mean when when are we going to end up having to [clears throat]

we put this on maybe the next agenda and I'll bring kind of a more detailed timeline of and I'll probably know more at the next meeting. We haven't had a meeting. We're waiting kind of to see how the, you know, uh, the plan moves forward. Um, and so hopefully by next meeting I'll have a better update on a timeline kind of next steps as far as immediate steps and and probably public engagement is going to be within, you know, three to five months, I would think, maybe sooner. But Scott, with without being superficial, what kind of projects are we discussing is specific type projects like locals? How how is that going to help locals? Well, roads, bridges, public safety, infrastructure.

County roads, city roads, I mean or is it

county count? Our roads, our infrastructure, our public safety, it could be equipment, it could be emergency communication improvements. We know, you know, with the recent tornado in the state park, there are and and in other parts of our county, there are gaps in our emergency communications facilities um could be invested in. you know, in some cases, um, infrastructure may be needed for, um, homes to be built or, um, a, um, you know, um, but there's a whole and here's the here's the thing. The projects that we can invest in aren't, you know, they are projects the county will choose. So, those projects may or may not exist right now. Uh but whatever project is applied for in those spaces, the county will choose whether it wants to do that. No one else.

So is it basically grants with with Yeah. Okay. So it's it's not like we get a lump sum of funds somewhere. It's all based on grant. So there would be outgoing money from us that we'd have to allocate to pay for these grants and maintain them. And the idea is the inkeeper tax money could be that match. So, but from what I'm understanding from the inkeepers tax, that would be related to tourism. Yeah, it so it depends on what it is, I guess. I mean, if it's if it's unrelated to tourism, then those couldn't be applied, but I think in most, you know, I would like to make the case that public safety and roads in in a lot of cases.

So, mostly we're depends. So, we're talking theoretically here for tourism or basically because that's the impression I'm getting. This is basically towards tourism from what you're saying. The the beauty of the match that we don't have to pay is coming from that inkeepers tax, right? And so if there are projects that would benefit locals and tourism, then that funding source could be used, right? We know that. And so that needs to be determined based on the project. We're talking theoretical here, so it's hard to, you know, capture everything. If there's a project nothing to do with tourism, then that match could come from private industry. I don't know.

Well, I think we do. I think we underplay our hand there. I mean, it's Well, I mean, tourism is an industry. Yeah. But, uh, we we also have, um, you know, a very large distillery on the hill over here, which is actually kind of a manufacturing site. So, I mean, we say we don't have industry, but there, you know, um, so anyway, we're talking theoretical, so it's hard to, right? Well, yeah, but in order to understand if I'm gonna vote for something, I want to know what it is other than just superficial Yeah. fluff to get something through. Some input from commissioner's office, it may help with some

of the speaking that this could do because you were public safety. This be something that we could utilize for the system. So would that be something that you could me give you an example and I just thought of one

um and again these are we don't know what we need to want to do until a project presents itself right and then that decision is made based on the merits of that project locally but here's an example from our past where we could have benefited from something like that in Helmsburg [sighs] the largest employer in the county had a building burned down. They wanted to replace the largest employment opportunity in our county, but had infrastructure problems. This grant could have provided funding to resolve those infrastructure problems, whether it be a water tank to increase pressure, uh infrastructure related to water utilities. My understanding was just as example, you know, water pressure was a problem. Fire protection was a problem, right? And that's a big project that we could not fund locally with taxpayer dollars. We just didn't have the money. So, we lost the largest employer in our county. Okay.

This grant could have provided funding to help us fix that problem and retain the largest employer in our county. as a just a one example that we know happened to us right in the past. This is a way for us to capture potentially millions of dollars for that type of activity that would help us in a case specific case like that. And so whether a tornado siren would have helped the problem or but you're you're talking about public safety and kind of related issues and and the answer is yes. if it helps us answer. Yes, we could. But I want to give that specific example because that hurt us badly in the county. We lost a made the largest employer in our county

because of the lack of these types of specific funds. So, right, great example. Yeah, you backing into the economic development district that was proposed back in 2024 and not supported by the commission. That's what you're referring to. No, this is totally different. Department of Commerce, are you not? It's totally different. Nothing to do with the EDA. This is a threecount region and it's totally new. And you guys can do that independent of the commissioner's office. Um I don't know. Yeah, I think it's going to require Well, then you might want to because you're not going to get support from what I've heard

deal with facts and evidence. I'm not hearing it here. Right. because because that's all true are idles without any in fact any evidence antidotes. So again, before we want to proceed any further than this, I suggest bring that up to the commissioners. We'll have the talk. Yeah, we we we will we absolutely will. It's it's just part it's it's still unfolding, developing, and we're still getting information.

And by the way, if you want to look at the ED, you want to look at the EDA, you want to look at Department of Commerce. Whole point of those f that federal money was for job creation, the infrastructure supports job creation. So if you're going to identify a priority for jobs, you better then you identify that for me. Take the data and tell me what you're going to improve in this. That's all. That's the evidence. It's it's going to depend on the terms of of the grants and everything that's available.

Well, supposedly these grants already out. There should be a plethora of examples of what other counties have done. I'd like to see those. I'd like to see the benefit they had on jobs. What kind of jobs? Didn't know we had a job crisis. last numbers I saw of your Marcus the economist we've done pretty good on the on the wage categories but hey that's just evidence so don't don't so again before we do this I think you better you better have that discussion in and with vaccinated yep we went on and we don't really have a a a jobs problem but we do have a work we have a what a workforce problem a workforce different discussion

yeah but it's it's all part of it and It's all going to be discussed and it's going forward. Wasn't that brought up by the previous commissioner? This is a new region in 2020. Okay. Totally different. 2020 where the ED concept was breathed to the commissioners. That's Owen. That's Monroe County. That was Brown County. It was pitched. I've got a post on it if you want. Oh, you're talking about the same project we're talking about, not a different project. The Econom Development District. That's what Yeah, we started these discussions. It seems Gosh, it it has been a couple years. We've been talking about this. Yeah, we're beginning at 26. Yeah, it was 24. That's the audio of the meeting. We started.

There was no support at the council at the time. There's no support at the commissioners at the time. It died until you brought it up. No, it it it has not died. It's the same project we're talking about now. We've been talking about it and working through it since that time. So if you're if you're referring to the same project we're talking about today, economic development district linked to the department of commerce development agency that's linked to job creation, the infrastructure that supports job creation. Let me see the let me see the business case. Yeah, the the council's been talking about it. The CBC has been talking about it. We've had presenters in multiple workshops and work sessions from the

You had two or three. We had the the speaker from Owens County back in 2024. I've got the audio. Nothing's changed. Yeah, we were here. We heard that. We participated in that. The council did and and here's where we are. So, so let me ask a question. Is this actually open up a new venue for money to flow into the area? Is that what the purpose of it would be? It's my impression. Yeah. All right. Okay. I talked with Antoine N who is the on the council in Owen County. He was the president of the IA or whatever. Yeah. Yeah. I talked to him Tuesday at the conference and he's still open to it. They have their concerns as we do about Bloomington being a bigger influence, but we both seem to say that well it's worth exploring.

So explore maybe it's an idea that was never killed off. It was just put on the it was put on the uh on the back for more more information. Huh. There was no Well, there was there was interest, but there were questions that didn't even get signed, right? There was a letter. There wasn't even a letter signed. It went forward, but kind of indicates what the interest sign was. Wasn't interest there was interest in more information on it for clarity. Yeah. And that's on our agenda in 2025 to commission. Never discuss. So you don't think percentage additional opportunities?

Don't know what your effort, don't know which program you're after, don't know what your goals are, don't know what your priorities are, don't know what the deliverables were from other counties that did this. Yeah. And that's what Scott's going to work on for the for the update for the next meeting. I'm just hearing plug. Yeah. That's Tim.

Yeah. What you're referring to, what you're wanting is what will occur moving forward if we actually look into what kinds of things would we invest. So that's that's the next step is to determine those kind of things. Now, we may get to the end of it say we don't need money for roads. We don't nobody wants any more jobs. We don't need any infrastructure improvements or anything. But if we get to that point, we'll get to that point. But I think it's public engagement that would get us to that point. And and and that's what would happen is public engagement, stakeholder engagement. Hey, you know, what kind of areas would we want to address? And and if it's none, it's done. And then we're done. All the buzz, Scott, but just get to the facts of it. That's that's where we're heading. That's what that's what we're working on. Yeah. Seen it.

Yep. You can't talk. Right. That's what we've got our updates for. Yeah. In the next meeting and the meeting after that if we don't have sufficient updates. Any more questions or comments? All right. We have our commissioner's budget changes.

[clears throat] I just refreshed the meeting we had with with Julian and Gator didn't take the the notes in our meeting discussed it with the auditor. So I was counting on you. So I'm kind of at a loss to what I guess I'm what questions you have. It's just a matter of actually approving what they've already talked to us about many times, right? Of change making the changes transfers.

Okay. To summarize, I guess what we're what we what we have is the total in your uh 30 102 professional legal. You are asking to have 51,000 total moved. No. Yes. That's what we got on the list. Is that our to Okay. So, we we you asked for 30, you gave us four, right? We asked the request of 26, right? Due to the itemized items on your sheet is where the additional 25 comes in. Look for a total of 51.

Okay guys, that issue that potential there was discussed in an executive session between between I was here as the commissioner rep and council discuss that potential. This has all been discussed. Well, this is this is clarifying it to make it happen today. So that's that's what we're that's what we're here for. At our last meeting, we just didn't have didn't have anything in front of us to look at and I don't want to vote on something that we don't have in front of us to look at. So this is clarifying to make sure we've got everything right and we're going to get it resolved for you today. That's that's the point. So 31005 attorney retainer you asked for 48,000. We agree with Yep. So that's her

professional services 3500. Um we asked for 67 you approved 27. Um again the explanation for that is in the bullet points on this and for a total of 60,000 that's um there's an additional 20 there for a total of 60. We approved 27 we requested 40 so that would make it 67 addition of 20,000

correct? So that would make that total 80 thou 87,000 and 3800 professional HR services. You asked for 9,000. 2,000 was approved. You're requesting 7,000 to be put back in additional 2,000 for a total of 9,000. That cover everything. I believe so. I don't I presented a lot to you guys. Okay. About our other funds. So yes,

this is just one fund. It didn't cover cover the corner office and that. So this isn't the presentation about corner office and the things that came into 1138. This is just a general fund. Okay. And my question to you is how how is this happening? Because is this would this be considered an additional appropriation? Is this something that has to be posted in the paper? What is what is our next step? If I'm already voting individually on these additional appropriations do not no longer have to go to the paper. Wait have anything to do with the paper anymore. Um and that was posted. That was that's a thing now.

It was posted in our conference this weekend too. I do policy in that. Has it has it been advertised to gateway? It was for our last meeting was for transfers. No, because we were talking about transferring monies out of one fund and fixing the other funds. So you don't have to actually post transfers. It's additional appropriations that you have to bring. But this is an additional there's additional the additionals I'm seeing now are would have to be put into gateway. Yes. and it hasn't been yet. Okay. I guess at this point we just vote to approve it. Then we'll put it into gateway and then at our next regular meeting

have any questions on So what's what's the total now? We changed one of the lines from 60 to 87. What's the total right there? 87 is isn't what we're funding. We're funding 60 of the 87. 27's already been So, it's still 120. There was just a total for those three items. Yeah. So, because there's an additional Oh, the the additional to me. Yeah. I'm not sure.

The additional is still 47,000, but what was approved was 27,000 instead of 20,000 on professional services. So, there was a 77,000 that was missing from this total on this page. So if you go over to your total the total will be 127,000 see that no 60 they add 60 when we meeting in here and sat right there and here three hours was $73,000 that did not approve for our budget her appropriations were correct. I don't know where you got this spell, but this Yeah. Where who who provided this? I got it from Teresa.

You got it from Teresa. This is the spreadsheet that I passed out to all of you here. So, commissioners gave us this and it's accurate Teresa or No. Yes. So, accurate numbers. We requested 73,000. in the interim of that meeting in January January or December um additional things have happened legally so itemized for you vaguely and that is where the additional column comes in for a grand total of 120,000 the additional

so the additional part I would feel like would not be a transfer it would be an additional appropriation. The additions would be additional appropriations. There's an a total but the requested would be transfers, right? Is that correct? Yeah. The total request previous plus the additional you got 7 73,000 is the request 47,000 total is the additional. So 73,000 would be transfers and then the 47,000 would be additionals.

Right. And I was looking back at the professional services line adding 87,000 that should yes 120,000 is what it is million that week and that was our operating reserve. This is this is a part of that this is different. economic development. I think that our budget was moved around. This was in [clears throat] that number but has nothing to do with your seven

legal service,000 today for the commissioners. Okay. Is are you there, Susan? She's there. We're having a couple. Yeah. I I did not hear the last about 3 minutes of conversation. Um so what I have in my notes is that the commissioners need an additional appropriation of approximately $120,000 in those three different lines. Yeah. Professional legal services, professional services, and professional HR services are what they're asking for. Additional

they're a different category. That's what this does. The request was the 73,000 to begin with. That was transfers out of the 2600 funds to shore up those funds. The additionals would be the 47,000 in those categories. Right. That's where it's going where you're but the additionals are different than the transfer. Generally that's those are the services you're going to appropriate the 20 the 4700.

So today Susan can we can we approve the request for the transfers and then uh approve the additionals at our next Monday meeting. Are are the transfers uh tell me what they're from. Are they from different funds or are they from different major budget classifications?

From the thou um general fund in their budget and it's the 2600 fund and they would use the money that's there to shore up the funds that were taken away from them. taken away from these funds. So you're saying the transfers just make them whole what they originally requested then we appropriate more for the for the 47 additional additional appropriations.

You mean because I never understood what Jackie was saying because she said if we did the transfers it would be a lot easier which I get that part. What I don't get is historically I thought that we were moving money from fund to fund we had to have permission from council. You do have to have permission from the council to do transfers, but you don't have to advertise it or put it into gateway. Additional or appropriations, you have to actually add to gateway. So, there's a big difference here, right, in the two things. So, you do have to approve it all.

Yeah, you have to approve it all. But what we can do today, Susan, is we can uh we can approve the request for the 73,000 in transfers and advertised to gateway and do the additional appropriation for 47,000 at our next Monday meeting. 47. It's going to be appropriated. Yeah. Yeah.

So, I think you can give your intent to do those things, right? Your additional appropriation is an appropriation. Julie will have to put that into gateway and yes, you do that at your next regular meeting. The transfer um typically is done by a resolution. Um so you can give your intent to do that today and then we can have the resolution prepared for your next Monday meeting as well.

Okay. So my next question to that is there was there were several items several funds that this happened to. We presented all that information to you. Where are you guys with all of that information? I've heard nothing back on any of that request. So, am I continuing to pursue this or I [clears throat]

You got to tell me what to do here. Yes. If it's something we need to do and we can't do it without knowing what we're doing. Okay. You're not over. You're not overre you're not overstepping. I want like I said, I want this resolved. Okay. That's what we're doing. I have you want to bring that up because I've been told that I come to you guys and I bring you a whole plethora of stuff and it's too much. So now I'm asking you how do you want this to do I need to represent this again for 1138? Would that be the best for you guys? Does it need to be dropped? Do I need to walk away? Do we just need to let the cards hold where they made this process? So we got the transfers together the new appropriation. We're done. You're going to vote on that next week, right?

Correct. The transfers you do now, the new appropriation you advertise your next meeting and we done finally with the commissioners. You're done with the 1000 the general fun and then we have to go to the 1138 and do the whole thing over again. Okay. Know where we're at. That's where we're at.

So I guess I'm requesting a vote then for what's presented on the sheet. Okay. Mo do we have a motion? Okay. What we're looking for is at our next meeting a resolution to do the transfer of 73,000 to make them whole on their request and an additional appropriation of 47,000 for the additional request to make these do what [laughter] Yes. Second. All in favor? Yes. [laughter]

The camera keeps just turning itself off. So, is that for the owl system? That is their advertisement. Of course, it's not a good one because it's Oh, wait. reset itself [clears throat] and I do not have the paper all so do I need to make a formal request to dive back into 1138 with you guys at another time or what do what is what is the total amount on that you have it in front of you

sir I have slept a lot since then and learned a lot since Are they not transfers or are there additionals to them now?

At this point, I don't I'm so confused. I Okay. [laughter]

Do we have any discussion on one for two positions? Mr. President, you want me to go into that one? Oh, sure. Seriously,

don't know if you brought your appointment list, but we had one, we have two positions on the redevelopment commission for the county that are open, one spoke to the council and read his letter to us at the last meeting. His name is James Norris. He has current president of supporting the helping veterans and families organization. He has 35 years of military service. He would welcome the opportunity to bring this experience for important work commission for Brown County. I'm just reading a little bit off his letter here. Uh if selected, I approach the responsibilities of this position with dedication, transparency, and a strong commitment to the residents of Brown County. The honor to assist the council in region in advance initiatives that support sustainable economic growth and long-term community well-being. Looking at his resume, it's quite impressive [clears throat] for the Indian National Guard. US I'm sorry US Army National Guard he was senior director of human resources roles he's had a master's degree and a bachelor's degree seems like a qualified candidate that would be looked this seen it before um he seems like a you know very good candidate local residential We've count tax survey.

We readvertis. Yes. Have we had heard anything? Nope. Davis who was our previous appointee didn't reply again. We ran into him a while back and he said his original interest if you may recall was in somewhere else. in a utility type of space. I think he has ended up on that committee utility committee and his comments to me was that's where he really wanted to be and he did not reapply. finger because of that is what I'm saying. So [clears throat] So we have two openings. So one can

Yeah. So that we can do this for repeat and continue advertise. So second motion second call. Yeah. Garrett. Yes. Scott. Yes. Gary. Yes. Patrick, yes. Joel, yes. Jim, yes.

Okay. Any other appointments? did not like the CDC in a library person. Julie, are are we correct? And still thinking we need to appoint as a council a person to the library board. I need to bring up my sheets because we were presenting a couple candidates to the last meeting and I know Dan was one of them, but I think they appointed Dan yesterday.

Did you? Oh, good. Okay. And then so Tim Kelly is the other one and the council in fact has an appointment responsibility there. He's an existing board member and would be good to us to appoint it. Put him in back in. Yeah. I accept a motion.

I move we appoint Tim Kelly to stay on public library board. four year term. He's interested in serving. He's done some really good work to oversee building projects for the library and save costs on that activity and maintenance. And he was a part of the solar project and showed me some electrical utility costs that the library has been able to save significant. It's like $20,000 a year in electrical cost because of this. Very skilled building really outanded.

You might want to wait till we find out if we actually if you actually do have a library candidate to to vote for. Okay. Let me see that for sure. [laughter] I talk to the same.

Hey, can you check to see if the council has a library appointment? Thank you. [clears throat] Yes. Okay. Library deal. Was that the gentleman you're speaking of that was in a library meeting that evening could attend? Yeah. Was interested had his letter in but could not attend. Yeah. So you held that Roman out instead. That's what I was thinking. Yeah. According to the list. Yes, you do. And it you appointed Tim Kelly last year. Okay. I move Tim Kelly appointed him the last time. Oh, last time. Yeah.

We appoint Tim Kelly to the library board. Thank you.

Darren, yes. Scott, yes. Gary, yes. Patrick, yes. Joel, yes. Jim, yes. Okay, we'll move on. Discussion on our CDC. Yeah, if you'd like [clears throat] a summary of kind of my thoughts on it or just go around the table. How you going to do that? Anybody's thoughts on it?

Yeah. I mean from my perspective all we have seven candidates [clears throat] they all do the job they've all got experience in utility space they're all interested in helping with responsibilities of the CNC which is the growth of the investment of 50 [laughter] um you know we're kind of at a transitional time with the CDC because we have this additional 3% inkeepers tax and it's being handled in a way that's new for the county and that new way is intended to benefit local. So, you know, through that filter, you know, if you look at the candidates, um, you know, and all seven can do job, but there are really there's four that I think would exceptionally well in this case under these circumstanc Oh, yeah. Those are Oh, Joel. Uh,

yeah. I mean, I really think I have some too. Do you? Yeah. Go ahead. Why don't you Yeah. No, I just had uh some Kevin. Yeah. And Andy. Yeah. And I pronounce her last name. Andrea, maybe. Andrea. Yeah. Yeah, those were three names I had just Did you have others? Jim Schulz would be another Jim Schultz is is currently on there. He's Yeah, he's pretty strong for it. Involved. They're all qualified then, right? It's just a matter of how many we picked. Three.

Three. Would you want to take them one by one, Mr. Yeah. Yeah, we can do that. I move we appoint Kevin Alt and Jim Schultz. You're good. Oh, is that two? Oh, okay. Uh, I move we appoint Kevin Alt. Motion. Second. Motion to second. All in favor? Hi. Hi. Hi. No,

I'm doing it. I need a roll call. No, you do a roll call, please. Darren, yes. Scott, yes. Gary, yes. Patrick, no. Joel, yes. Jim, yes. point. And Bartell's motion. I second. Motion to second. All in favor? Darren? Yes. What?

Yes. Terry? Yes. Patrick? Yes. Joan? Yes. Jim? Yes. Take another motion. Yes. I move we appoint Jim Schultz. [clears throat] Second. I'll second the motion. Second. D. Yes. Yes. Gary, yes.

Patrick, no.

Yes. Joel, yes.

That covers them all, right? So, that's three. Three. Okay. all of all of our appointments. So to the folk there were as I said all seven candidates were that was a it was an outstanding very good batch to choose from and I encourage them to [clears throat] apply next time. We we we have I said we have a very good batch of applicants for this. So

and then I mean the other thing is we need another RDC member. So if anybody out of that those additional four is interested in the RDC, we need a spot to fill there. Is there another spot we have? Is that it? I think that's it. Yeah.

Part of this premised that some people are now involved in newer ventures that weren't there a year ago. So we get broader participation apparently in this process. Yeah, there's some some overlap in in boards and we want more people, not less people. So, I believe we have had discussion on our meeting stuff, but I'm going to push that to the end because we have other stuff to other stuff to deal with. Um, continuing with our financial advisor, um, as Rey, we have any thoughts or discussions on that?

I do. I think [clears throat] they've done a good job. I think I think that if there's any controversy with them, it's it's been over the fact that it it comes from us, the council. That's that's where it comes from. That's just my opinion.

Yeah. That's why there was [clears throat] last year there was a a lack of communication process that wasn't well defined and for this year they have our information. They have structural structure for us. Um pretty much plugging in our our numbers with what they've already built for us. Um, I would hate to throw that away because last year was a bad year. Not necessarily their fault. Going forward, um, they're going to be more specifically involved, less involved overall. Um, there's some things that, you know, we're not we're not we don't necessarily need a monthly update from them. That was an additional cost that unless anybody objects um it's something that we I don't think we need. We don't need to spend money on.

We going to get it from Julie. Yeah, I was going to get that directly from Julie who's going to be working the jacking and it was it was kind of a redundant a redundancy that we didn't need to pay extra for and I don't think we need to pay extra for this year unless we get to a point where we need to and so we'll play that by year as long as everybody is we have consensus on going forward with so in the mixing fit in. Have we decided really two different approaches?

She's the one where rubber meets the road. It has to she knows how it has to fit in there. Yeah, we get information from Jackie that we so we get information from Rei that we won't get from Jackie. So that is also correct. Could you check with her? She's willing to be around this year or whatever involved. Yeah, we've already got it. Okay. Just want to make sure he and are you okay with Rei based on discussions with I really won't have a lot to do with

Right. And that's going going forward. Rei is not Rei is not going to be Rei is going to leave the auditor's office alone and Rei is just going to be our financial adviser and working with us only should we need them. Should we need them? That's the premise. and we and we will as we get into the budget process. They're going to put together some numbers for us and we're going to get numbers from Jackie from the audited office. So that's the question.

That's the question. What's everybody's thought on keeping REI for this year in a much more limited capacity? Yeah, speaking of limited, let's let's review a new contract from them that limits, you know, their it needs to have a ceiling and and detail well defined objectives and limits and expectations. Yep. [clears throat] Maybe we can review that at our next meeting before our next meeting. And the basis of the contract is pay as you go. I mean, that's a question.

There's no there's no retainer, I believe. I don't think it's a retainer. I think it's probably usually, you know, caps at, you know, 20 30,000 and they're doing budget development work, advising the council through that. That's what we did last year, but we didn't have any, we didn't have any guard rails for, right, trails or specifications for them to follow on last year. That was pretty much wide open. So, that would be that would be part of the stipulation of going forward this year with them. So that's you're talking about. Yeah.

We want to try to work on a contract with them for our next regular meeting as you go with stipulations starting over somebody else.

Yeah, that's I don't I don't want to I'm not anxious to start over with somebody else at the moment. Speaking of starting over something else, there is a uh Gary and Darren and I were at a legislative conference this week and and with Association of Indiana Counties, there is a new bill that would require us to rebid those financial services every two years, which you know, it makes sense. I mean, every year is probably a little much, but every couple years is a good time just to take a look. There's several qualified firms. So, we'll see if it passes, but um next year we may need to to reopen that up. Yeah, we'll probably have to re and if that passes, we'll have to revisit next year anyway.

Everybody good on that? Yep. Anybody opposed? No. [clears throat] Okay. All right. We'll have Rey our next meeting with a contractor an agreement. Oh yeah. You also mentioned in your statement you no more financials committee. Yeah. Financial committee. Yes. Did we officially dispand it? Clarify if that's necessary or what do we do?

What's everybody's thought on the on the financial committee? My opinion is we don't need it. We're a body of seven. There's no reason for seven of us to break down into a a group of three to cover to take care of what we all should be taking care of anyway. And a committee just leaves four people out of it. Then the committee has to come back and update the other four going over the same material with the same expense if Rey's involved as we spent with three people. I think the financial committee though the one benefit is that it it brought in the commissioner but we can if we decide I suppose we could make the financial committee the entire board was a commissioner if that's the way we want to go ahead with it.

Well, we'd like to work closer with the commissioners. Wouldn't we? I think we need to. They're a significant part of our need to know what they're doing. they need to know what we're doing. So, one thought is part of our part of our work session meeting would be the entire board, the entire council being the financial committee, bringing a commissioner in to discuss any

issues that need to be discussed as we would have been the financial committee. I think we make our our work session the place where the number one on the item on the agenda is always our budget work as a council and that is the first thing we do. It's the most important thing we do and only if we have time for additional things do we get past that budget item. U so we every meeting well there's always going to be important things to discuss along with the budget. So we can't say nothing if the budget takes a whole time we don't discuss anywhere else. There are other things that are going to have to be discussed but the budget should come first.

Yeah. The budget especially coming up to the budget process this year. So in those work sessions, you know, we get dragged into all different kinds of discussions that may or may not be critical, urgent or timely, but we know the budget is something that is top priority for the council and and should be on that agenda in my opinion first at every one of those meetings that we resolve any necessary items in that and discuss those items. elves. Would the would the commissioner's office be willing to do that without a committee just come into our work sessions and be ready to discuss the budget and budget items?

Yes. The missing piece has always been give me the one page on the status of our budget. That's it. You know, what are your goals? What are your projections over time? What are your strategies for addressing different issues? It's a one or two page. Okay. Um, I don't know why it's so damn difficult to get that through, but if we can get that onepage concept to say, are we on target or offt target? It's as simple as that. That's a question you need to answer. That's what I was hoping that finance committee would have done last year.

I presented that at our February commissioner meeting and said, "Hey, here's what we're doing and here's what we're going forward." Then boom, it dies. Um, so if we can reinvigorate that, if I got a a monthly report I can brief at my meeting, that's what we'll do. So, yes, more than support for that. Yeah, in terms of monthly reports, I mean, that's the other thing at that it'd be a great thing to do really every meeting, but at that work session reviewing that monthly report of, you know, uh, overdrawn accounts, and that's the information we're going to get from you, Rachel.

The fund report. I went through this with 3D a couple times. We still have not seen those reports every month. Um, you know, fund report and and and a couple others that we need to be reviewing really. That's what that's what we're dropping from Rei and we're going to get that directly from Julie. So there's there's no reason for Rey to I don't care who does it to provide that to us when Julie's got it. Somebody's got to do it, you know, because we think he should know that we u all the offices are now going to have they will be able to check on their own funds to make sure that they don't get in the red so that they can come in for additional appropriations and things to that effect.

Yeah, I'm glad we're putting that into play. Um, and so Julie, you're going to bring us those four monthly reports work session and we can count on that. We don't need to hire Rei to do that. Should have those reports built in, right? There's basic they have reports built in. Basic reports. Um, great. Does that is that what you were Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And Julie, can you add to the loud because he's working with us on the internal control program for the county and helpful? Ed, he'll it'll have to be here. This building that he can access it here when he's in the building. That he cannot access it outside of the building or take it with him. That's fine. Eric, are you okay with that? Yeah. Okay, good.

Absolutely. Good. Thank you [clears throat] for doing that. You mind for him? Yeah, you can do that today hopefully. Yeah. And do you mind telling the council kind of what your work looks like there? It' be helpful to I think there. Yeah. So, um, should I stand up here? Yeah, come on up. Tell us your name. We've got you on the budget next after the budget process, but since this is the plan, we'll move ahead and move you up now. So, go ahead. Go ahead. Really internal controls and then budget.

Yeah. So, what you're talking will flow into the budget process. So, um later today, tomorrow, uh, all the councilors and commissioners are going to receive two document. Uh the first document is a child controls and the second document is a are you on or not? It's on. There you go.

Okay. You'll receive two documents. They're both Word. I'm sorry, not Word. They're both Excel. If you need any help with Excel, just give me help. Um the first document is a 12-ear review of all of our supplemental audits. Okay. And and [clears throat] I'll make a point here. Everything I'm looking at is public information. So any you can look back. Um I have also added the links. So if you want to go back and look at every single audit Brown County's ever had, any entity, you can go look at that. Um but the reason I did an internal control, reason I reviewed the audit is to get a feel for where we have control weaknesses. And uh quite frankly, there's a lot. And the other piece, so what I did was I did a a matrix. It's not necessarily inclusive of all of our control weaknesses. Okay? But it's one as I went through and I said, "Okay, this is a good example. Don't listen to me. You can look at what the state said." Um you when they have a finding and it's really informative. Plus, there control document out there. I know Darren has one, but uh it's not the it's not the most fun reading. So the first Yeah. So the first thing you you you'll have out there is a control a review of internal controls. So after I did that, I got a good feel for what cycles we needed to address the it's all um but um it will help us in the budget process. So there's basically a fivemon um there's a fivemon gant chart scheduling out each of the set things that we need to work on. Uh I wanted to make sure that uh Julie was in uh was informed before I told anybody else. Um so that five month chart gets us uh

addressing the control if they'll periodically update you. If you want me to do the meeting, that's fine. That's fine. But I think these I understand that's like most of what I'm what I'm looking at and what I'm seeing. The second uh is a a gant chart that flows a gant chart that covers the controls and it then takes in May and it takes off on the budgeting process. One of the big concerns that I have is is that as we change auditors, whatever that be, right? You you don't start from scratch. You don't start with the problems that nobody's going to tell you are there until you get them. So, the budget process u document that I I had access to that was specifically about the proposal for um the timing of the budget for Brown County. And I also went into the state and I the documents I put uh I pulled this pretty much a timeline from the state and I put the two together and I sort of saw the three uh saw the three piece that's read the state and that's us uh and as the budget process progresses um want to make sure you hit it pieces. uh one of the biggest difficulties I think he had was uh whenever one starts a budget one does payrolls and salaries first before that. So we put that at the end which caused a lot of redo work, right? So you need to really push that up. And um the last thing I would say is just for information, I'll give you information on this gateway um is easily accessible. The formats aren't always the best. Um but for example, you can look at salaries for uh counties around us,

counties nearest, you can look at five years of our salaries. You can look at our income. need to look at Switzerland County headcount. I mean, you you really can do a lot of compare report. Um, and so in the budget and the in the initial um I've already done some of I know how to do it. I I'll share with you how many people in the department is in surrounding counties and how many people in each counties are our size. So, we just try to continue to uh to to send the information and as the reality kickoffs, I'm going to say that we probably should kick the budget off sometime in May when information is available. So, I don't know if there's any other questions you have on this. I know this is a huge indepth um we're talking once you see the first document, you'll go overboard. um which is what I did my first I first looked at the most recent one and I thought oh wow um and then I looked back a number of years and I said oh my went all the way back to 2012 and I said you know this is not a two versus three it's it's really kind of failure

so Ed to that point you've got with the internal controls policies and financial planning and and and things that are um the you know that need improvement. It's multiple departments, multiple elected officials, multiple entities. And so it's it's kind of comprehensive of of many, right? Um for example, one of the cycles is the dispersement cycle, right? Involves everybody. Payroll cycle involves everybody. Um and you know, you start the route with what's the policy mean and then check the policy against recent practice. So I hope I'm following your

Yeah. Yeah. I mean to to make these improvements that you're basically just summarizing for us out of these audits, it it's going to take kind of the whole team, right? To to implement and and no one entity can implement all these improvements. It's going to take multiple departments and elected officials and agency, you know, folks within our county with additional help to to kind of make all of those changes, right?

Yeah. We've talked about um actually the idea came up yesterday about possibly bringing some additional help in some financial expertise. Um now again this this could very easily spiral out of control. Um and we don't want that to happen. We want we want it to be nice and and and keep everything informed. And of course you're the central person that we have to keep in we have to pull in. So, uh, it it's going to take long and [clears throat] doable. It's very doable, but it's something if we don't do it now, every council and and every auditor and every treasur is going to have to go back and relearn everything. Um, once you put in a control plan and control policies, right? Obviously, you can change them, but you know, for now, this is how we do things, right? You don't like that go that you go and go going you know before the the body would be primarily the body you want to change. Yeah, go before the commissioners and change it. If not, this is how we do pay policy. No exception.

Right now, problem is we're all humans, so things change. But there is a change mechanism. It's not a it's not a um I don't like that, don't change it because that's causes chaos. It's kind of what we have. And a lot of these changes that you're referring to that are going to be kind of require everyone's participation are are also going to assist with bolstering our credit rating. Yeah.

Uh which they site the state board of accounts issues, lack of asset management plan and a financial policy as deficiencies. And so, you know, we're we're kind of killing two birds on stone there. And and but again, it's it's it's kind of the whole team. It's not we can't do it alone as a council. Commissioners can't do it alone. elected officials can't do it alone, but it's going to take kind of the whole group.

I've been struggling um with the structure of government versus the corporate world that I've lived in. And so in the corporate world that I lived in, there is a controller. Okay? and and that controller is somewhat considered that position, but yet that controller doesn't have the authority that a controller in industry does. So, a lot of what I did, and I I had a good time doing it. Um, a lot of what I did was go into a facility that was struggling, do what I've already done, take a look at the others, and say, "Here's a plan." then I would back off and then management would say, you know, can they do it? Can they fix it themselves? You know, what help do we need to give them? Or they would say, we need an individual. Um, and or they would say, we need a CFO, right? So, it it would become a a rather quick change. It would become a cyclical change, right? But it wouldn't be one where you had to pull three organizations or three group four control groups treasury. You you got to work with four organizations. And so if we don't have a good solid control plan, um it'll get out of control again.

So then the other thing I guess final thing would be um you're the work you're discussing is very valuable. appreciate your work on that. Um to get us kicked off in the right way here in in the first part of the year um is is is separate from really the kind of essential ongoing historical budgeting work that the council does, right? You what you you're doing internal control and such and and you're you're working with kind of folding that into our budget process, but the budget process continues. We have a financial advisor that that helps us with that. Ed is not, you know, getting involved in department budgets and that sort of thing. He's simply trying to pull together internal controls and kind of a timeline, give us some guidance on on how that works. So,

and pull historical data, right? Yeah. Yeah. You know, I I can make some conjectures about what I've looked at from the Brown County stamping point and five counties that are our size plus the two big ones, you know, and and kind of makes sense to I don't I'm vacasillating on the controls in a lot of budget areas. I just don't think we're aware of of of a good timing process to go through to make sure everybody's engaged. The other thing I'd say just out of our legislative conference yesterday, the county council association met at towards the end of the day and the cost of health insurance is astronomical

astronomical to counties and every county council person in that room's hair was on fire because of that just the cost of providing that to to to county employees. And so one of the things there's clearly energy in the council association for out of that conference is a new approach to securing health insurance at a much discounted rate. Governor Braun gave a presentation uh on Tuesday to the whole body and was [snorts] pounding on the need for uh a new approach for health care for local government which you know you know if local government is going to reduce costs. It's almost impossible for us to do that on the public safety side, but in the health care space, we have a huge opportunity to do that in a way that is more economical for our taxpayers and uh it appears there's a lot of uh interest in that at the council association. So, I I plan to be a a part of leading that effort with our council association and and uh look forward to finding new ways to to make that work. That is a huge area to look at and as we start to put together the budget timeline that needs to be a line item and it needs to be thoroughly looked at. Uh just to finish up uh so far everything I' I've done I I've taken maybe two hours of your time. Everything I've done is public information. Um and I don't know how familiar people are with the Indiana open door law. Um it really is surprisingly um transparent ba basically if I walk into her office and I say I want to see this receipt for this function. I want to see what the purchase order is

unless she has a really good reason she needs right and then yeah there's almost nothing this council does that isn't fully public. I mean I can't think of one thing right now I mean that wouldn't be so My concern is is you know obviously I'm running for a position but I'm just right now I just decided this this is way overdue. Yeah way. This addresses a lot of your concerns too. Jim I and I encourage you both those documents probably come out tomorrow.

You mentioned that your skill set just give your people don't Yeah. Real quick. Yeah. Um uh uh I I started off with a name here. Hey, let me help you. You're a certified public accountant. Okay, I think that's all we need to hear. Thank you. [laughter] That's very helpful. Thank you. [clears throat]

Program. Let me give you a little over 30 years military and civil service. This thing started from the feds due to waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement. So when you read the headlines uh repeatedly and the GL reports repeatedly uh government finally put in federal regulation to create this control program. The states had to go along with it kind of a watered down version for the state. I was doing the state program I they wouldn't they wouldn't turn to but the state focused on the finance internal controls is the entire operation of organization. It's to ensure the efficient and effective use of your tax dollars. So that's operational as well as finance. We tend to focus in the state at the finance side, which is fine. Uh but but there's not a whole lot of enforcement arms. They leave it up to the county to do it. Um the repeat findings within within the federal system would with point you to change in in personnel capabilities, competence. So it's a little bit um I think I did my I was a finance auditor. I did my term as an auditor in Department of Defense and was certified quality auditor. I think I did my first internal control review back in the early 90s and I ended up my career. I was program manager of internal controls other dizziness assigned for a director within department of defense. And so we went through every level of operations. So it's not only the finance side, it's the operationals and it's also part of performance review. So we reooked are we right size? Are we paying the right amount of money? Do we have right enough people? Performance review is part of the process. And so when I checked in the with the state officials uh and looked at how they were structured interesting um there's no from the state board of accounts there is no county in Indiana that has a county level management internal control program and when I did a Google search nationwide I didn't see any county level

management internal control program within the federal system every agency within mil military system every agency every department has a management control policy. So that's what we're going to do for the for the county. We'll have a county level policy outline. We'll start with an outline and start filling in the blanks. But you're looking at five to 10 years if we can sustain it. So it's not only finance, but it's operations. And yes, it include all our departments. Are we doing those things are absolutely critical in order to to meet our mission? Prevent mission failure. That's everybody. Are we efficiently and effectively using our tax dollars? That's everybody. And so the one piece I think that's unique at the county level, we got to involve the citizens in that because you got checks and balances in the federal system, you don't have it at a county level. It's really up to the voters. Uh they're your management that did your reporting on these things. And my last thing again on the on the federal side, we had to do an annual report that each major department head had to sign off that they reviewed the controls. They had their flowcharts. They had their checklist. They had their audits periodically throughout the year to validate. They had to sign a memo that said yes and yay barely. You know, we looked at internal controls and they're adequate or not adequate. Here's the problem. Here's how we're fixing it. That rolled up all the way up to Secretary of Defense. So, that's that work within that particular system. So, we just can do a kind of a minor version of that. It's not as elaborate. It's it's a lot more simple. We'll start off this year with maybe one or two prototypes in in a couple areas and then just build from there. Our challenge is to sustain and get people want that are dedicated to using the dollars the best that we can. So that's kind of where we're going. Again, want to deliver we'll have as a policy for internal control program. And I love the focus on the finance because that's the repeat findings that for any auditor, you know, it's fingernails on a chalkboard. It's just you just don't get a repeat finding without repercussions. So we'll fix that. And but it takes some time. It's a cultural change. Love to get the citizen involved. we can have a committee of the

citizens that'll get involved and help us all that we get students that will help develop it. That would be great. So that's where we're headed. So let me let me add a little bit more. Scott, one sure one question on your part and what is is how do we then present ourselves become from becoming as inefficient as the federal government? Yeah, [laughter] that's very good. Oh, and we're not inefficient. We won't talk about much process. No, we are. We are. But [laughter] but but [clears throat] they're not doing the best job. that they put these in place. So, how do we bypass that?

It kind of goes to one comment I was going to say on TINS. You know, the federal government, they have so much of an elaborate web of we don't need anything that elaborate, you know, simple something simple, easy to follow. So, [clears throat] uh one of the control cycles that most people don't think about when we talking about finance controls is the management cycle. So as as he said there should be a regular set of hey on the second half of the year we do a review of business and and we accountability.

Yeah. And so just to be clear, um I am inactive as a CBA because I 10 years ago didn't be anymore. I was CNA. I also have an ISO 9000 lead auditor and I also six sigma trained and I spent time um in the Toyota production system getting trained in that system. So, from an efficiency standpoint, um I I the funniest story is is uh I was in Japan, they always give you a nice go away dinner and they said, "What do you think of us?" And I said, "Well, uh well, be honest, you know." I said, "Well, I used to work with a bunch of old farmers and they never did anything they didn't need to do. They always did the things they did need to do. Everything they did was as simple as possible." And they were kind of laughed and I'm like, "Oh gez, you know, I'm going to have to run out of here." And they said, "No, no, look around. We're we're rice farmers. We just never forgot."

And and I think that's that's got to your question is a lot of these massive manufacturing companies that are extremely successful, they're an absolute pleasure because it everything is clear and everything is simple. That's the go that's the goal is clarity. What [clears throat] simplicity? What do we what do we need to do? How do we how do we need to do it? And what's the best way to get there? I asked Doug yesterday and I said, "So, do you know about section 23.74765?" And he sort of looked at it like, "Okay, we don't use that language." You know, let's let's talk about what what it really means and and how it affects you. Okay. Thank you. Thank you.

Yeah. Um, we want to discuss, we kind of we were discussing our uh continuing with our financial advisor and then we were going to go into continuing with our legal adviser. Do you want to brief discussion kind of evolved into our [laughter] discussion? Do we want to discuss uh financial our legal advisor now or after? See you after. Okay. Okay. Take it at 10 or so minute recess. Okay.

He's man. Gary sure didn't teach you how to use any of that. [laughter] Gary, you want to show him how to use that? Come on, Jeez. [laughter] Yeah. Okay. We are going to get back to our discussion with legal advisor. Um [clears throat] Susan has said she would be willing to step out of the meeting while we discuss this. Anybody's thoughts on that?

Yes, I think she does a pretty good job. The problem is again us. Do we want stu do we want Susan to stay? Yes. For this discussion? Well, I don't care either way. I mean, that's up to you and her matter. How thick her skin is. [laughter] She's an attorney. It's probably pretty thick. If she wishes to look like she stepped off camera, okay,

but again, I I feel as though we we've been whatever issues there's been, we've been been the issues. A lot of times I've dealt with attorneys a lot in my career. [clears throat] A lot of times we just don't pay attention to them when we should. And I think we've done that with most of our uh professionals that we hire. We hire them when we really don't pay attention to them. If we don't like what they say, we discount them. If we don't like what they say, we find somebody who might we might like what they say, even though it might not be the the best advice, but she has the background, the understanding, and I have no loyalty or anything, but um again, I just base that on 39 years working with attorneys. She seems open and above board and seems to do a good job. Yeah, I agree. She's got a lot of experience. What if we kind of similar to the financial side of things, you know, I think it whether the bill passes that requires a two-year kind of opening of our financial services or not, what if we just said, hey, every every two years as a council, we look reook at our financial and our legal services, kind of bid those as one,

and just just take a glance every couple years. And so maybe give it one more year. I don't know. What do you think? And then reook. I'm with it. Sounds reasonable.

Now, I do I do think we I do think we should also review her contract and the way that is build and what the cap is and what would trigger additional approval from the council kind of standard types of things. So, maybe we ask for a an updated contract. Um, and maybe we I mean the other thing is we we if I recall correctly, we we pay for travel time and maybe we ask for her to in her new contract propose maybe a more costefficient way for her to participate in our meetings. It probably cost us a few hundred bucks just for her to drive up here and back. And if there's a way for virtual participation in certain cases, maybe not others, you know, maybe we ask her to say, "Hey, here's how I would recommend." And then we go from there and talk about it from there. But that those are my thoughts.

Of course, virtual, I think that's okay sometimes. Um, you know what I do early in the mornings cuz we've met before, but I I I interact with a lot of school teachers and their biggest complaint is doing virtual stuff all of the time because they the kids don't learn anything. There are things that you miss when you do it virtual all the time. But I understand cost savings as well. Yeah, I I like the costsaving aspect of some virtual. I really like the approach. So, a good mix of the two. We can do some stuff we can do virtually. Some stuff I think we need to have physical presence.

And then the other thing, the only other thing um and this is kind of a want, but it would be nice to have an alternate contact within her firm. If we have a need and she is in the hospital or on vacation, that we have a second person that can be responsive to our immediate needs, whatever that may be. Sometimes we get ourselves into timeline issues and we need a a more timely kind of response if she's out of pocket. So maybe we ask her to suggest that as well in her contract. I've been really impressed with her ability to answer our questions. Yeah,

she she obviously she hadn't getting a book out. She she's got it on the top of her head and I've been impressed with the way she can take some of the BS that we throw out. There's sometimes a lack of respect there and I think that's a big deal on our part. Yeah. We need to clean that up. Yeah. Yeah. Especially among each other too, right? Shut up, Joel. Yeah. [laughter] Time to knock you out of that chair. [laughter] I'm glad you're rolling yourself. I am. This is a Marine talking to a What are you? An army gun? Oh, yeah. [laughter] No, [clears throat] I was army. You were army?

Yeah. Yeah. Marines were made to offend. No offense. Take it. Any other points from council? Yeah, she's got 20 years experience. It does come quick to her. Yeah,

it's helpful for us with our melee of things. I mean perhaps well perhaps I mean the council is okay with it. Darren and I work with Susan to kind of get her contract into place kind of taking into consideration what we've just said that we think would be workable for council and then bring that back at our next council meeting and present it to you for discussion. You do you think we should I think we should include every if there's an email email trail for it I think everybody should include it so they so we all see the points we all can have input and discussion on it

I would say that u with my 80 years experience you get what you pay for right just keep that in the back of your mind exactly so we need to pay her more money could That's why you're wealthy. It's coming out of your pocket, not my big guy. Pera had her hand raised. Point of question to say that commissioner's office working with Susan um because some of our stuff does overlap from time to time that she's been very easy to work with and thorough and we appreciate her too. So, just wanted to throw that in there.

All right. Well, there I mean we don't need seven people working on it, but if you and I kind of we can start emailing Shane if she wants to have a conversation, you know, you can be included in the email chain. If you have input, please provide that. But I mean, seems inefficient to ask all seven. I mean, it'd be a public meeting if we want to have a phone call with all seven people. Just seems kind of inefficient, but we did that. Kind of gather your input, talk with Susan if she has questions, bring back a written contract for your review. to each of you if you can draft it or you know edit the next meeting. That that seems to be a typical process unless there's some kind of objection to that. Jim's looking at me kind of funny, but he only

is that okay. Yeah. I have a question for the official or official order guy. Dwayne, do you have any input on all of us being in on an email on that? Great idea. Okay. rather than do some meetings. Second one from when I worked at General Motors, uh, one of our an investor bought into our firm was EDS, electronic data systems. That was H. Ross Perau. H Ross Perau ran for president.

He did. And when he was put on when he bought into General Motors, he was put on the board of director. I think his one of his opening statements was he said, "Well, at EDS or at GM, General Motors, pardon me." He said, "General Motors, when you see a snake, you form a committee on snakes." He said, "At EDS, when we see a snake, we kill it." And if you take that into context, less meetings gets more done. Yeah, I absolutely agree the emailing and then you guys got enough valuable time spent anyway.

All right. Thank you. Is that what we want to do going forward?

Okay. At this point, we are going to continue this year Susan Beavers as our legal council pending final contract for you obviously. Yeah. right or go forward in the process of finalizing a contract for this year. Okay, just a quick point. Um IU the sustaining hooser communities uh we have they are moving forward with their program for it and we have Yeah. Yeah. I I've indicated to her that you guys are done. Thank you. I I don't know if she sees it or not, but Okay.

Thank you.

Um I IU the SH SHC has some list listening sessions coming up the 12th of February at 6:30 at the Seasons Conference Center is open to the public looking for public input on the quality of life issues that we're dealing with. and it's it's a it's a good program to help us identify some of the problems that we need and and it gets uh student programs involved in helping it's a resource to us. Um what they are doing with their listening sessions is they're gathering public input um to get to get a pulse of the residents of Brown County as to what direction they want to move and and where we're going with it. So we have the first listening session the 12th of February, 6:30 at the Seasons Conference Center. There is a second one the 19th of February at 6:30m at Van Beern Elementary School. So I highly encourage

everybody to participate in those. My quality of life was doing really good and we got too little of snow the other day. I can't just improve. Thank you dear. [laughter] Okay. Um, we just put off our meeting structure. Correct. Yep. Okay. Any thoughts or discussions on that? Could you maybe just in interest of public understanding what you're talking about? Maybe just give a quick summary or bring Dwayne up to discuss that.

You still have that. Are you still looking at it or

Yeah, you're in the backyard. Okay, [laughter] Jack kind of broadsided me there. We kind of brief just for clarification to the mainly to the public and on on the way that the meetings are run. Uh we I'm speaking for we as the public were kind of lost or have been in the past. And I think with the new president and the new vice president, the new board and all, it' be a good time to at least look at your procedure that you run your meetings on. U and I'll be real brief. U I didn't know if you worked under bylaws in the past. I've heard from Diana Bill years ago that somewhere in the archives there was a set of bylaws, but nobody could find them. So I I don't know. sitting out here. I don't know how you operate. You use bylaws. You can use Robert's rules order, which is archaic. You know, it's built in 1890 something. Uh, but there's some very good points in within it. Uh, another thing is I looked around the room and I've never seen a mission statement. I've never seen it out of the commissioners. I've never seen it out of the council. I've never seen on anybody to actually what your true mission to us the public is so that we could kind of kind of work under that too. And then my [clears throat] last thing that I'll add and and Darren did hand me a nine page or so document here quite a bit of this but I think to make things easier for you guys in the future and [clears throat] commissioners and everybody is that to define what order you do work under I know Darren had

spoke that he wanted to work use some of Robert's some of Darren's rules of order. I guess you'd call it somebody other, but I think it needs to be defined as to who what part of the Robert's rules we're going to use if any that you're going to use or what bylaws or something. It would help in the future so that you don't get caught up contradicting yourself. And also the uh uh and and the commissioners have been good about it and and you guys as well as far as my appointee monthly meeting reports. I try to keep you guys informed of what my committee's doing and I think that's about the only committee that I've heard that reports you guys and I speak to you and then you speak to the commissioners. you appoint, but then it doesn't seem like your appointees hold up their end of the agreement in my estimation that you appoint them and then next year you say, "Oh yeah, who was on that board?" That's not good. And you should know who's on the board because they should be presenting you their findings whether well mine is monthly, some of them is fiscally, some of it's whatever. But I think you guys do the the fine t of swinging and and researching it, but then it's done till next year and you don't know what if I don't report. You don't have a clue what I'm doing. And I don't think that's fair to the board. I don't think it's fair to the appointees that I think there should be some more continuity there. I think that you [clears throat] board should reach out to your appointees and because we all have a president or whoever's in charge of that appointed board and they should report back to you as needed so that you can at least talk intelligently about what you've appointed. That's about all I got. But I would like I'd like to read

through this Darren and and then f define you know you said you were going to use some of Robert's rule. you thought kind of some of the points laid out in there on that. I think it needs to be my estimation is it needs to be laid out. We're using this this and this. Yeah, that's kind of what I did in going to use the other 400 pages. Just let us know what you are doing and it would it would help your meetings flow better, I think.

And what he's talking about the the the paper I gave him was the the write up that I sent to all of you also. So he's looking over that. I get a copy of this. I think it it'll help both of them our major boards. You know, you guys are our county. I mean, Whoa. [laughter] Get excited when somebody puts their arm around the commissioners too. Yeah. True. Can I just respond regarding the mission statement here?

The mission of the county council is really by statute and it's clear and Joel is running in his flyer one side listing every single point that what are the duties of the county council and that was clear as and that's from the state and that's telling each county and then you might still have a copy of that in the be nice if it was on the meeting room wall. But but I mean it's already established. They don't need to have another mission statute from the state of Indiana. Yes. The commissioners the same way. I believe so. Yes.

Yeah. The same statement and that's the foundation need for performance management missions and functions and you link that to what's provided the outputs the number the skills knowledge and ability you need to execute the mission. All that's performance management that that you do. But when you look at the mission state and you look at what's for the commissioners and the council, you've got the specified task they call specified things, but you also have an implied what do you have to do in order to do that one. So it's much broader than just saying, hey, here's my six things. There's probably about 50 things that you have to do in order to support that big vision. U again, that's all part of performance management. We've got that on our to-do list. Um,

so it will be posted somewhere for the public. Sure. I mean, if you look at other counties, they've done a pretty good job, I mean, of identifying what it is they do, and they even identify the outputs, which is pretty nice. How many deeds did we do? How many assessments did we do? How many this, how many that, all those kind of outputs. So, it's not like you reinvent the wheel, just cherry pick some of these other counties that are doing a pretty good job and just copy that. So, we can do that fairly quick. But that's each elected official but yet have a have a culture from the county saying hey that's an expectation we want to give to our to our six. So [snorts] yes

the association of counties also um have created um you know that we can put on our websites for our citizens what exactly comes out of each office and what the duties are and what's expected and timelines and things like that. So um wrote all that down so we can implement that too with these um the citizens. Yeah. To better help us on this. It would help in the clarity I think. Absolutely. And they did a couple videos. Were you guys there when they did that? Those videos. Who did? You guys the council at it was just at the legislative conference this week.

They brought this up. They showed example of the videos that they created Wednesday. Was that was that was that the morning class on Tuesday? Confused on on uh Yeah. Hope it was how to how to present uh orders and how to make amendments and amendments on the amendments and how to withdraw orders and and it'll really help too with the property um issues. It'll tell a citizen what office does what property and where they need to go and what they can expect from that department. So, it was it was pretty informative. I guess that covers it. I'll get a copy. I got a copy.

I'll get to that website, too. Thank you. Anybody else have anything? Means open up open. I think it's a good idea. Okay. They have their stuff. Okay. Y I'm Yeah. No. Yeah. Yeah. I want to Okay.

I want to do this. Bless you. There's two different [laughter]

got this one. Oh, we got two sheets now. Yeah, we're missing that secondary. Thank you. The same one like memoriz.

Well, there are two different ones, right? Yeah, there's two different ones. We need to sign. This is the appointment Wayne to the alcohol board. We need to sign. There's three lines. There's three lines here, too. Open the page. Flip it over. He's running. Put a couple more on back. Thank you. Where did my pen go? Did you steal my pen, Jen? No, I didn't steal your pen. [laughter] Medium. I will. No, it was a cheap one. I don't carry racing. You can't erase it. We picked it up. I'm pretty. Oh, here it is. I choose for you false. All right. Let the record knows to that. So yeah.

Well, I figured [laughter] I figured that Jim know what to do. What's that supposed to mean? No surprise. I was just testing it. He pass. Yeah. Oh god. Oh, wait a minute. Just sign Patrick. Yeah, right here. Bring those three lines. Yeah, those three lines. Okay. Did he bring us any free booths? [laughter] You guys are supposed to do that to me. [clears throat] Where's the Jim Beans? Is this right or is it two different? These are two different

the same thing we got before. Yeah, absolutely. Let me know. We got time. Just put it on the calendar. Yeah. Stick it on the calendar. It was approved. Yeah. Or you want me to sign with your pen? Bring one. Yeah. What do you want me to say? Uh, right there. The written. Oh, yeah. I got it. Jim Bob. Is it Jim or James? Neither. Jimmy. Hey, don't feel bad. I'm Jimmy Dean. Jimmy Dean. Yeah. I wonder how that came about. Mom was screwing Jimmy Dean soft. There you go. [laughter] She really

I think I need to go have a DNA test because I think it's probably my mom. You might be right. I don't know. I was going to say I want my pen back. You see it? [laughter] Yeah. So flip it over because you know why the word that makes me have abro thoughts thoughts. Aberant

we already did this [cough and clears throat] and today Mike's right hand. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's true. Oh, it does have immunity. pertain to 1138 which is our kin cap um fund. Um one of the good things that came out of the entertaining budget year that we had is that we were not utilizing cap the way we could end with the town financial did point that out with Jim. So in transferring things that were in the budget to 1138 was a good move. However, again, our intermediate lock communication, which you all are fixing up, we're moving forward. However, there were items in 1138 that were transferred that were not approved that were critical to the county. Um, one of those is the IT lease programs for 13,05 which is on this sheet right here. The one I cut in half. If you all could look at me please

because you don't seem to retain those a lot. So [laughter] we all have the right page. All right. So it lease agreements for um 135. if we have any questions on the severity and the need of that. Um, our IT director is present in the room and I'm sure he could elaborate. Very important. [laughter] Yeah. Make that more brief please. We have discuss anybody. [clears throat] We have discussed this at le gave you all the contracts information. Yes.

Um, so this again is a recap. I don't know if you want me to recreate the will because we can go dig all that up too. Um, the next item is for $50,000. It's computer equipment with it. I think the confusion in this why you guys did not, and this is just my opinion after investigating all of this, I think you didn't approve it because a lot of the departments did get new computers this year, this year being 25, but that's not everybody. And there's still this $50,000 is going to be an annual ongoing build so you don't have a surprise that oh something Help me Eric if I'm saying anything wrong

if I can jump in. Thank you. Uh $50,000 to fund an operation this size of you know computer gear over a year is is about half what we probably ought to be paying. You know I can do a lot with 50,000 but I got to have the 50,000. So this is just this is and maybe this is a part of your ongoing asset plan which council still needs to see right if you can give that to us it'd be helpful so we understand what you're planning and what these are but I think it's just an ongoing 50,000 years so you can replace servers computers projectors microphones just keep the county functioning right is that

yeah I mean servers probably not so much but but there's a whole lot of things that come out of that line beyond just getting replacement computers for people. Um but but you named a whole bunch of them there, right? Okay. Okay. Next item is IT security improvement. Again, this is a

Okay. So, what this is for is uh we have certain security systems in place throughout the county. Uh the sheriff's department takes care of their own, but but we're responsible for everything else. These are cameras. These are access control systems to swipe in and out of secured area of buildings. Uh this particular line item is not to buy new equipment. It's to service the equipment we already have. Uh security equipment tends to be fairly expensive. Um and by having a partner like we do have that comes on site and repairs the gear, we get several more years out of our capital investment on that security equipment. So, uh, that that's what this fund is all about. It's it's actually paying, uh, a guy to come and and work on our systems to to get more more life out of this the investment that we've already made.

Okay. So, for the missionar that that is um 785 that is very imperative to the budget. Um, not sure how you want to Juliet. This would be another Jackie transfer. I don't know. Yeah, we would basically we would have to actually remove the amount from the general fund from the 2600 fund, put it and then take it put it back into the actual general fund and then move it back into we have to sign anything if they approve.

Uh or should we This is another thing that I'm learning as we're doing all this stuff. Is this something where we wouldn't move the money over until we had that invoice? Or would that go back to Scott's request to let them know what fun life we're building because we want to build the computer equipment line. We can actually do e either way you want to do it. I mean, if we don't want to move the money until they use it or they have to use it and that would be okay as well. I mean, obviously you guys took it out of the budget for a reason. [clears throat]

So, that's why I'm saying we need to wait until those expenses come in like Jackie suggested doing with the other money in the health fund. Yeah. And is that that another avenue to look at? I mean, clean for the day. I would rather just be done and over. Me, too. That's how I look at it, too. You guys have your reasons. I don't know what they are. I would rather it be done and over not having that go back to this 100 mill. Well, part of the I mean part of the problem is that normally we would have done department head meetings and you would have described line by line exactly

three hours. Uh let me finish. Okay. Normally we would do department head meetings where we would go line by line and we would already understand kind of in that normal process of the budgeting. This wouldn't even be a discussion at this point, right? We would have heard that early on and so how do right I don't necessarily want to revisit that how how things fell apart. What I'm saying is going forward we're going to be addressing

this. That's that's my point is I know this is and and if you have I mean it's kind of thing is if if you have a document that has a projected ongoing $50,000 IT expense as a part of your plan for budgeting purposes give it to the council whether we asked for it or not. We don't even know it exists right and so we we've asked for that but you know provide that to us and then these questions become explained already. we don't have to ask them. But um you know, as far as the IT stuff, I think we we just get that out of the way. Those sound like things we need that probably tomorrow, right? And so let's get the IT stuff moving.

Yeah. That 135 is Yeah. Let's So um Isn't that Are you there, Susan? Yes, I apologize. I'm here. No, that's all right. Uh, these are these are the numbers that we tabled at the last meeting. Um, these are the transfers, correct? So, clarify. Go ahead. Yeah, quick question because I don't find it in the fund report. What's the 2600 fund?

It is the fund that they put the health money in. for the health fund. The commissioners themselves put that money in. It's line. It's an account line. It's an account line in the 1000 fund. The the county account line is 12600. Okay. So, we we're not taking out of that line for anything, right? We're we're leaving that as is so that if the commissioners need to pay for health insurance out of that, they pay for health insurance. Correct. We put they put more money into the economic development. We're leaving the money in the economic development to use for that

because once you once once we put it in there come back out. Yeah. So we're going to put that as a meeting. So what you can do is in order to balance this, you can do a reduction of appropriation in that 1260 line and you can uh so that way your your general fund spending comes down. These would be an additional appropriation out of your other fund, your cumap development fund.

So give you an additional drag.

It does. It does. And that would be for the um $78,500 for the IP items. So that will come at your next meeting. You already have one additional that you're bringing through. This will be another additional that you're bringing through. So they wouldn't vote on that today. It's a it's a next meeting. It was tabled it. It was tabled at our last meeting. Does not mean we get to vote on it this time. We're gonna table it for discussion for both on wanting you to table it. So I get it into gateway. Okay. Okay.

And have we been on the receiving end of this not coming into fruition a few times? Um are the commissioners supposed to be here at that meeting to answer more questions on this or well what do you need from the commissioner's office at that meeting? Do we need to attend council? Anybody want them there? I think it'd be good just to I mean I I said I don't want to I don't want to drag this out for you any more than it has been, but if if you if I'd like to be there to answer questions. I just want it to go away, right? I I do too. I do too. You do. Okay. I'm motivated for this to So, are we any more questions on that area?

I just have a technical question. When you say in lie of newspaper it goes in gateway. What if you walked out of your office and put it in gateway? Does that do anything for us right now or what is the significance and time frame of that? It still has to be correct. I think it does have to be 48 hours. 48 hours. Okay. And I'll check on that because I don't recall them giving us a time on that. Just as long as it goes into gateway. So I'll check on that. Okay. Let's let's do I mean at least the similar notice as if we were going into the paper. I mean, for the public's purposes, when we add expenses to taxpayers, we just need to give them amount of time to see that reflect and say something if they want to say something.

I'd rather give I'd rather give them too much time than not enough time. Yeah. So, full publication, but I did putting stuff in the paper. I'm finding because we're paying the auditor's bills on those, too. Um, is very expensive. We have $7,000. We requested nine. you guys didn't approve that. And I've already got thousands. I'm I've already spent my budget currently with her bills, my bills for public publications. So, just FYI, that on top on top of the gateway. Yeah, it's very expensive to put anything in the paper nowadays. It's

I think that's why they changed it and we just have to put it into gateways because it not only because the paper's only going out once a week. I think that we need to we they may have to bite the bullet and continue to do it because I don't you have to transition your populace. Your populace is used to looking at the paper for those items and it's a big change. So it's true. I agree with I think everybody said is correct. We just need to learn how to educate our populace on the new systems. But in doing so, you're going to I'm going to come to you for another appropriation for publication. We've already

And then the other So, ready to move on? Yes.

Okay. So, um, on this same sheet, that little half sheet I gave you, has the, um, you see a 4,000 series down here. This is all your items for the corner's office that were not approved. Um, so again, this is me coming into territory that's really not mine. Um, but it is hitting, it was supposed to hit the pen cap, which is um, I have spoken with your corner. Have you guys had any discussions with the corner on his needs? Because the last meeting we had that was the takeaway that the council was going to get with the corner of the new vehicle buildings and fixtures. We have a freezer problem. Are you guys aware of this? We have a freezer problem. The freezer is going to cost us $30,000. And right now we are freezing people. People.

So that's a hot item. that was taken out of his budget and he didn't even have enough. It's it's it's a new freezer. No, we used our old one from Okay. 2008. That's cool. 2008 model. Drop them in the shatter. It's a lifeless joke. And um it is creating some glad to say that is that I don't see 30,000 on here. That a new

Yeah, that would probably addition to the machinery. We're actually freezing everybody. [clears throat and cough] So let's add let's add uh 30,000 if that's a new How long has that been an issue? Okay. So, let's add 30,000 to furniture and fixtures probably. Let's go with the equip. Yeah, machinery. Oh, yeah. Equipment. Yeah, machinery and equipment. We just added to that. So,

40,000. He probably does need some kind of a shore up. I mean, that would just wipe that to Yeah, but we could come back and ask for additional. So, just make the make the machinery and equipment 30,000 instead of 105.

Yeah. Okay. Um the other issue with the corner's office is the vehicle purchase. Um currently what Mike is using is the an old transport van from the sheriff's department that they got rid of. So it is um causing problems because it's not a four-wheel drive vehicle. And in the Linario woods, we found out that the freezer was freezing, people. Um, we found out that Mike had to pull up at the top of a hill and go down almost a quarter of a mile down the drive to get the body and then had to get people to help him carry it all the way up just to transport it because he doesn't have a vehicle capable of reaching where we need him to reach in the county. So, I don't know what the answer is, but I would say he needs a 4x4 vehicle of some kind. Is it something that we already have currently in the county that can be moved around?

Also, I think that's a liability issue because if we're going to start desecating desecrating corpses, that could be an issue if some family got upset and and I'm very familiar with dead bodies. If you go freezing dead bodies, you cause a lot of issues. So, I would think we need I mean, that's just common sense. We need a we need a vehicle, period. That's just common sense. All right, let's add 50,000 there. What else? Um, no, 50,000 is already there. I mean, let's let's include that. Yeah. And then the other one is the furniture and fixtures, which with Julie that's kind of come into where that's a lot of room throughout the year.

And then the buildings. So again, I think maybe the buildings if you wanted to not approve something, the buildings is something that we could probably come back to you and say, "Hey, we have a water leak or you know, the door is busted. We need to fix it." But again, same as So do we know what that's for or is it just for generators. We all have so let's wait on that if it's not in there [clears throat] building there. Let's not put 11,000 in unless there's a reason. So there's no reason. Let's let's keep it out. I have a question. He's got

he's got generator apart from this. Can you get one for 50? Hold on. But I just heard what? D E S. Here it is. I spell it. Oh, I got

violent disrespect. Freezing it, causing cells to rupture. Okay. Uh Joel had a question. Yeah. Yeah. There's 50,000 down here for vehicle purchase. Yeah. Can you get a new vehicle that he a four-wheel drive suburban type is what he's going to have have to put for 50 grand? I don't think so. No. And he was he has been very um shy to bring all this up. He So I he says no, but that's what he asked for. Doesn't have to be a new vehicle. Get one coming off lease. It's not like there's

I don't think you have decked out totally either.

That's what we did. Getting people in and out. Smoke. That's That's his sells. Hey Patrick, did you hear that? Like the animal control truck. I I'm sorry. I did I didn't hear you. He's asking for a truck. He's asking for a truck with a cab on the back. A truck with a shell to put the put the bodies in the back, which is I I I I don't know about that. Well, it wouldn't be You'd still be on a stretcher.

I mean, I'm perceiving a four-wheel Bronco with a camper or something. What? You need a proper We Somebody just needs to look and see what a proper vehicle would be for that. And and the reason I say that is ju just I I can't answer that question, but I can say this. If if you're a family member and your your family member's body gets frozen and the cells rupture, the blood vessels rupture, the body is desecrated, correct? Or if you don't have the proper vehicle and and and and the body gets damaged in some way, it cannot be displayed for a funeral. Who's at fault for that? Not only is that a a reasonable statement, um that's a moral statement, treating a body with respect. So, I can't answer what kind of vehicle we need because I'm not a corner, but we would need a proper vehicle and someone to look and see what a proper vehicle for a corner would be.

I can tell you

I think we need to I don't know. Someone probably needs to look at the corner and see what the standard is. Can you talk to him? I don't know that I can talk to anybody can ask him what would be a standard vehicle skill that would people about getting 4x4 truck. He's had people from families like you just said, "I don't want my loved one in the back of a pickup truck." All right, let's do this. An issue from several years ago when it was

Let's uh let's do this. Let's leave the 11,000 for the buildings in there and he can use that if needed to bump that up to 60,000 plus for a vehicle if there's a Suburban that's needed or I mean he's got an adequate vehicle now. He's got a van and so maybe there's a four-wheel drive van that would be able to be purchased for that amount or less. So, um and to Tim's point, it can be used, you know, um he's he's got a vehicle now that's adequate, but let's let's make sure the new one he gets the next one is also adequate. Correct. Okay. Good answer, Scott. $93,250 is that would be the new request to hit coup.

So, in having said all of that, this is my question back to you all. Um, we just Okay. So, I had 152 250 for the request for the total hitting coupe cap. Um, and this is where my I don't know. I'm asking the question. Um, what does that do to our what we're allowed to spend during the year of our cash of these funds? I would guess is I mean is there enough catch is there catch reserve in Kum cap that we can get use or do we have to how do we actually yes

because I know there's cap reserved income cap which is why suggested this and make sure see what we have I didn't want to overextend us is what I'm saying request and then you guys get in trouble because we overextended something, right? And you're going to get with Teresa and Darren on that when you check it.

And the other this sheet here, this is just more of an itemized statement to show you guys what you moved into CAP. So this top column right here, the 60,850. This is the money that you took out of the other department budgets to advocate because again we found out that we weren't spending smartly and that this was a better place to spend money. So that's why I gave you that itemized list to show you what you moved from people's budgets into MCAT budget. It was the issue that they didn't know where to look for. Correct. They did not know where to look. They didn't know that their budget got it.

We just need to let them know I'm sure that we're looking for I think that Julie and you handled that problem when we met with every department, right? They wanted you guys to have the data. Yeah, we just gave the judge her numbers this morning. Okay. So, that's Kim Cap. That's all I have. So, do I need to come back then? what what you need to prepare myself to give you what you need for your next meeting. There's a couple things on here that are repeated on the two pages. Yes, they are. The subtotal of 785 for the IT. Yes. Is included in this.

These are two separate sheets. This is strictly just to show you the itemization. Okay. This this is the summary of what Yes. Okay. Now, if you go up to the top there, the 1138 for 152 250, which just got raised a little bit because of that 30 grand, but yes. Okay. And then the economic development 660500 economic development that is the um that is is that what was taken out of the health? Yeah. And it's staying where it is. Yep.

Is it I mean are you going to appropriate it to that? You're just leave it in the there. And so if we need it and then we appropriate the amount we need in it and we we appropriate every quarter. We will appropriate some fee if we need to appropriate because you did roll over almost a million dollars. So it can it'll it will sit there and that's the only thing that's cleaning and doing and when it does you need trans it needs to be appropriated from there maybe it's already appropriated sitting in there it's already been there you already budget it will be when she gets done with the year

instead of rolling it into the health will be put in there cannot come back out. It's only going to go in there as needed to go in. Yep. So that 660 is a part of the million you were asking about is what I'll say. Not right. So it's it's really not a million. It's a major problem. It's those were a question. You moved around over a million dollars and 660 of that was a question about how we should handle it and that has been resolved. Jackie that doesn't that's been resolved. Okay. It was just it's just going to sit there and do nothing. It's been resolved. Great.

So, it's still reserved. It's still in reserve. Yeah. It's just being monitored. And the has also been resolved. That was a question included in the million that has also been resolved. That's another 152,000. You know, we had 30. Yeah, there have been some changes to that. 750. Been some changes to that. So now we're up to that's 800 and some thousand. And really the only thing that's remaining out of the question about the million dollars uh we have also resolved through the IT department incre uh authorization. So really we we've resolved No, you haven't resolved it all. Uh what what else is left?

Public safety 70 that $15,000. Um, we have in our budget, the sheriff's department with the commissioners had the budget for the I lease and the I different things. Is that on here? I don't see it. Yeah, it's public safety. It's the 1170 that 15,000 at the top of the summer. It was It was for the It was for the database for the for the cameras. So what it is is it's the program that when you and Patrick Nland are probably correct me if I'm wrong. It's the system that when you go in you get fingerprinted and

I can actually address this because I directly on it. Uh I recorded the name of the product. Um a after that meeting which I was also present for uh we solicited some bids for from I record in a competing uh vendor and and I think the competing vendor is is going to probably be the way we want to go on that. Um I I don't Is it still if because when we had the last meeting they brought up that it was going to be $67,000 that we needed to pay in increments years. that nothing.

So, coming out of that meeting, my recollection was that uh you guys had asked us to look into whether we could get a discount if we pay for it up front, which we definitely can. Um, so it's definitely less than the 67,000, but it's going to be more than the 15. Definitely. Yeah. So, what we're seeing here just needs to be

digressing back for just a moment. Yeah. Um, under the [clears throat] American Mortuary folks, um, there are standards that that need to be met. Um, for corners, vans, they have to contain refrigerated compartments, uh, perhaps uh, well, it does say lift systems, 1,000 lbs, uh, evidence storage. But my point is this, without going through all of that, you can see by that little bit of detail I just gave you, you can't just put them in the back of an animal truck, so to speak.

Yeah. No. No, no. And I'm not attacking you. I'm not attacking you. I'm trying to give you ammunition as to what needs to be done. That that's all. I'm just giving you ammunition as what needs to be corrected. Period. So the 15,000 on the public safety and I'm remembering now that's the cameras and such that needs to be updated. That's this is not what you're asking for. They've got a lot more data information on it. Larry Curly baby created the spreadsheet. So that's not something that I want to ask for today.

So you you are so you're going to take that 15,000 off and ask for it at another.

Okay. But as far as the million we had lots of questions about all those issues have been resolved. It's all been resolved. There there are no issues there. I'm not going to know the outcome of everything until the auditor's office and everything. Normal capacity there. our meeting with Julie and I. There was one other item on line number 33,000. Highway asked for 60k. We gave them 100, but they only need 60.

The highway has said that they're going to try to figure their stuff out with the current funds and money they have. Keep it. Was that a gas line? Was that fuel? No, that is just so that fuel detail on that one. Um the spent a lot of time on that budget. I don't know why anybody changed it without talking to them. But

the um fuel stuff it's it is low amounts. So I knew it would be big. We're not going to have the data for a full year, right? We got to go through it. Um I will tell you that part of your professional services that we did approve um is because we do have issues with that fuel system. We're not we're income compliance but we have things we need to update. So that is creating some possible litigation things. So that is another item that is going to be brought up. Did that answer your million million dollar question? I

mean, it's more your you had the questions about the millions and I think we they've all been resolved and most of it was not an issue. It's just a clarification if I understood right.

I think we're good. Okay. So when we bring this back for our vote on our Monday meetings, uh we need to have the resolution with details and ready to vote on get this finally. I want to get the appropriation numbers. I can send them over to Okay. Yep. As much detail as reasonably possible. I'll send them to you, too.

Okay. All right. Thank you. Any council member business or concerns? Would you be willing to work with the coroner? I mean, yeah, I mean, yeah, I mean, I don't know about I mean, yeah, it's just a matter of complying with the standard that's already written. Well, yeah, but but there, as I point out, there are other standards other than just a four-wheel drive.

If you could just get that meet with him, get give him the details and what he's looking for so we can be in compliance. You're on vehicle. Just don't stay too long. Bring this up too on vehicles. We I sent an email around to all of you. I didn't get any responses from anybody, but planning and zoning also is down a vehicle and they they don't have a vehicle now to do it. The vehicle they were using was from a little vehicle from sheriff's department. I saw that email and highway responded said they had a vehicle that she suggested is a the reason why it's out there is because it's no good to any of us. So, it's that's not option that is. Okay. So, I think that's why you didn't see response is what the council thought there was.

Well, we all knew that that wasn't an option. That's why I didn't respond. No other vehicles available. No, we've been we went through the vehicles very intently this last year and audited our whole insurance system. So, we've got vehicles off and on the insurance and um there's no spares. We don't have any spares anywhere. Is there some kind of go to the capital asset plan? Is there a vehicle that needs to rotate off that could rotate there that needs to be replaced?

Maybe that's something that you should bring up with Brad. I'm not really sure. Brad and Paul probably know more about that than I would. I just know that I mean that's not my department. It's not that's not ours. Um I just know that that's a need over there. She brought it up to me. I threw it out to you guys, commissioners and highway and sheriff. But um the avalanche is in the options. Are they stuck now without a vehicle? Yes. Okay.

And the vehicle that Lonnie is using is the old animal control truck and we've had to sink a lot of cash into that which has actually hit the commissioner's budget because they didn't have all the cash and um we've got it running but it's not a long-term solution either. It's it's a band-aid. So, we do have speaking to you also, sir, and all of you. We do have a big vehicle. Not the sheriff's department, I think, is on a good road because now they're going to purchase vehicles and you budgeted for them to do so. So, they're on the right path, but the rest of the county vehicles need some attention. It's not it's not a front burner thing, but they kind of know it is because you got inspectors who can't get around. It sounds like we're now up to three vehicles that we need and we don't know what additional vehicles are going to be needed or nobody's looking at that or

it's a this is brand new information sir this is brand new safety happening okay the vehicle would they actually need do they take well again they they well here and Melissa will probably shoot me for saying this but we have a lot of jeeps over at the health department and the jeeps would be I more ideal because they [clears throat] got the Jeeps because they need a four-wheel drive to get back to the different locations when an emergency happened. This would be the same scenario that your inspectors and corner and everybody else still they need that type of vehicle. So, at least

and we do an audit of all the vehicles and try to shift some around. I'm not talking about the sheriff's department. So, if Brad's listening, that's not what I'm saying. [laughter] I'm just saying all the other county vehicles to see how we better utilize our assets. so that we don't have to spend the money. Yeah. Yeah. That's usually part of an asset management plan. All the equipment, vehicles is why I was asking which we're in the middle of. So, okay. That falls under the umbrella of the commissioners. New information, but I wanted to bring that.

Okay. Anybody else have anything? Anyone? Anyone any critique of the meeting? Motion to reserve. Good. The motion adjourns. Second. All in favor?