County Council - Regular Meeting

Oh yeah. To me, it's coffee. I do like the taste of it. I like Tim Hortons. You know, everybody talks about that. I don't know that I've ever had it. Yeah. But he's a Canadian anyway. He's a kook. I don't know that. Good coffee, though. So, what do you buy for coffee? I buy Tim Hortons. Tim Hortons. roast my hours. No, it's Canadian. But you can buy it at Walmart. You can probably get it at I don't want any socialist coffee. That be socialist. They had them here in the States for a long time, but people didn't recognize their coffee. I need to go just buy Tim Hortons in Canada was like Starbucks here. They were everywhere. They still are. And I like Dunkin Donut. I like

Christy always bought French roast. I I like French roast. I like fresh roast. Yeah, that's it works. But I'm a connoisseur because I'm a home roaster. Oh, do you crush your own bean? I've done that probably 20 years. So, you do your own bean thing? Yes. Really? Yeah. It only takes about 10 minutes and I have coffee from every place in the planet. Every place. Wonderful. Yeah. Does electric or manual or? It's a hot air electric. Yeah. Has to do it. Not really. Yeah. But that's why you're drinking, you know, Starbucks out of a can. [laughter] buttering. I wouldn't [laughter]

actually [laughter] [snorts] I remember him too. And it's like a stick and a half force. I need yours. Okay. Yeah. I got an epic pin in the car. You're good. Yes. And I know how to administer. What's the union or something? Stick him in the eye with that EP pin. Is he better than he ever did? Do you know I calculated, you know, they got all this thing about the, you know, the Trump administration blowing up the boats. Yeah, I'm all for it.

I'm too guess what? When you calculate when you calculate the number of people that die from fentanyl overdoses every year and translate that into commercial flame uh flights or plane flights, do you know it's two a day? would crash. Really? Yeah. Wow. If you had two commercial flights crashing every day, everybody would go blizzard, wouldn't it? Oh, they go crazy. Oh, they'd go down. Yes. It's all a matter of perspective. Methanol or not? Methanol. Well, outside.

I was when I was in the Navy, I was on a United Airlines jet that caught on fire. The galley caught on fire. We landed Indianapolis here. Yeah. That's when I learned to speak up. It was an old 727 stretch and the and the the galley was in the center and I'm coming home for the holidays, you know, and I noticed smoke coming out of the kitchen. I didn't want to be stupid, you know. I don't want to say that. And I noticed flames start barking. So when the flight attendant walked by, really? I said, "Ma'am," and and she Yeah. I said, "Is that supposed to be doing that?" And when she turned around and screamed and looked at this, I knew it wasn't supposed to be [laughter] the scream that that plane started filling up with smoke so fast and they couldn't drop the oxygen. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Poof.

Could knock windows out. It suck you right on out. Yes. And back then they had flight engineers. There were three of them. Okay. And And so he come back with an extinguisher and put it out. But the g back then they serve meals and the grease and calling We had a grease fire. A kitchen fire. Yeah. Had a kitchen fire in a stupid airplane. But it made me think, made me think after that, there's nowhere to go, Jim. You just got to sit there and look really stupid because you can't do nothing without a fire extinguisher. I'm glad they had one up front. Yeah. Know the plane at 30,000 ft. That mean, but it was weird seeing all those fire trucks lined up along the runway Indianapolis International. You ever watch those shows on Smithsonian channel about the plane? Just Yeah. Those are I like those shows. Those are interesting. Good.

Yeah. mornings. Yeah, we're late. We're late for building here for hours. Important issue. Should we abbreviate our meeting so that people can Can I just be outside? Why are they saying no? Probably. What's that? No bathroom. No water. Oh, where you live?

Here. Oh, here. Oh, here for anybody. I was all right till you told me that. Yeah, same here. Now you're drinking coffee. What's up with that? Your coffee cup. Somebody [laughter] ought to allocate funds to get that fixed. It breaks every year. Same place. Oh, that's right. We can start saying Merry Christmas. Another Culver alum. What can I say? Really? There's nowhere to go. Library. Library. We're going to stop in about an hour. Yes, I was. Yeah. So, was he went to Culver military? No kidding. That's in Plymouth. Did you go to Culver and Joel? Really? I wanted to go there as a kid. Lake Max. Yeah. Love Max. I was in the sea scouts. We'd go up there sailboating and all that.

I was in a community corrections facility. Well, juvenile. Well, our scout our our our our scout master should have been in one cuz typical scout master did his typical thing. Oh, gross. Oh, come on. Oh, that's just so disgusting. Lake Mexico. Oh, now you can stop. Just take those people back. I guess

morning you said Thanksgiving or I guess you happy holidays and merry Christmas. Merry Christmas. Yep. You happy holiday. [laughter] Okay. Call the meeting to order. Say the pledge of allegiance. Happy holiday 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.

Start with the important things. The bathrooms are closed. So here's Gary's got for you. So we're going to a 20 minute break midway library or the whiskey center. [clears throat] I don't know. Whatever. Library. You can go to my house, but it's a $5 search charge. [laughter] A cleaning fee. All right. Let's get out of here.

So, we got our first $3600 invoice. What's this for? I'm sorry. This is the attorney that we have to brought. Okay. I just wanted

I wasn't sure. Thank you. We are also we are allowed to vote at this meeting. The 26 meetings the executive the work sessions will be votable. How much did he put in the legal for next year's 42,000 42,000 42 grand. Okay. 42, but I think we Somebody changed it. [laughter] But I thought we also put some additional. So, I'm hoping this was the only time I have to move forward to ask for an additional appropriation to cover this. Right. What's the ally rate? I was just curious.

Rate, do you know? Uh, 350. Okay. Just curious. The new election board members are here requesting support. Good. Why don't you [clears throat] introduce yourselves as long as you're here? Stand up and let us know what your names are. Kathy Short. Kathy Short. Lisa Hall's husband. [laughter] Yeah, we know who you are. It's Lisa Hall. Oh yeah, we're we're the new members of the board and we need some help on defending this case. Like to get value as quickly as possible. Okay. But it takes a lawyer.

We're both lawyers, by [clears throat] the way. And we don't know how to handle takes a special religious lawyers, lawyers. [laughter] Yes. Yes. Okay. We've got Karen Kirby's husband over here. There you go. [laughter] That got to do with anything. Come on. How you guys are known? Normally she sits in the back and takes notes on all you guys, but that's why we had to clarify who you were here.

All right. Okay. So, this is an ordinance additional appropriation ordinance 2025 number 12-04-0000 council [clears throat] bill 18. [snorts] Whereas it has been determined that it is not necessary to appropriate more money than was appropriated in the annual budget. Now therefore, section one, be it resolved by the Brown County by the county council of Brown County, Indiana, that for the expenses of the taxing unit, the following additional sums of money are hereby appropriated [snorts] out of the funds named and for purposes specified subject to the laws governing the same. General fund 1,000 line 30,000 other services charges $3,600 total is $3,600. Any discussion on that?

Yeah, Jim, you said I think I recall what' you say 42,000 next year. That's more than normal, right? Or is that I think what I did is I I backed into it. In other words, you know, I I don't know what I'd have to go get my calculator, but but I basically said, okay, let's say it takes X amount of months. You got so many billable hours per month at X is how I came up with the 42K. And I think we also put some money in our fund for like because we here to address if you want me to try. I just wonder if if we get can get any of the money back. Well, let's do this. How many hours? What's that total bill for

because that's general fund. No, but it's $6,90, right? The total invoice is she total billable hours of 17.40. Okay. Okay. So, we get 17.40 at 350 bucks an hour, right? Yeah. So, it's $6,90. So, if I take if I take 42K, right, divide that by 350 bucks, that's 120 hours is what we've got budgeted in there at 350 an hour. So, she's already used up 17 and a half hours. So, we'll see. I guess my point is if we don't spend that

is out the general fund. Remind me the 42 for next year. It just goes back in. But I mean, yeah, we're going to get that back, right? I'll give it back to you, Scott. [laughter] It's not like it can go on a cruise or anything with it. [clears throat] So, merry Christmas to me. Let's hope we get some money back. All right. Any other discussion? Take a motion. A motion to approve the ordinance. Second and second, Sandy. Jim. Uh, yes.

Joel, yes. Patrick, yes. Judy, yes. Since we're in it, I guess we have to. Scott, yes. Gary, yes. Yes. This is an motion to suspend the rules requiring a second meeting for reading ordinance require. Thank you. Title sufficient this time. We need a second on the just Okay. All in favor say I.

I. Jim, yes. Joel, yes. Patrick, yes. Judy, yes. Scott, yes. Gary, yes. Darren, yes. Okay. Only commission. Addictional appropriation ordinance 2025 number 12-04-0000. Council bill number 18 for other services and charges to the clerk. Make a motion to approve council bill 18 as 18. What is this?

Second. Anyone? Yeah, I'll second. Jim, yes. Joel, yes. Patrick, yes. Judy, yes. Scott, yes. Yes. Yes. [snorts] [clears throat]

Yes. Thank you very much. You all [snorts] have a lovely day. Merry Christmas. [clears throat] Guys, do a good job out there this time. Okay. [snorts] Lisa, I said hi. [laughter] That's Kindle Market this weekend. Okay.

Oh, yeah. All right. whistlebls ago and then this is so it's not changed it's the same thing but I'll go over it [snorts] um these are reflections of what ready financial or ready financial found that Julia and I went over list by list. Um these are to combine to close some funds to transfer to [snorts] make some funds in the positive so then we can close them. So these are all um editing purposes for um accounts that have been just let to go in in dormant state. So um the first one is um fund 414 which is the health support clinic reimbursement fund. It has $8,1959 in it. And uh recently in this last year you as the council helped the uh health department re reenact the 416 health support clinic fund. This is where um we had the HVAC systems and those items um taken out of to [snorts] uh fix the support clinic. Um we would like to take that money and put it in the active fund of 416. So then we can close out the old fund of 414. And the second thing is there's city readiness money 802 for $62 80 for uh $3,1346. [snorts]

Um and the actual city readiness fund that we use currently is 9118. So I would like to transfer those funds into the active fund and close the old funds out. Then um the next one is 80 8106 public health coordinator uh federal grant. There's 286 in it. And currently the fund that we use is 9119 public health coordinator. So we want to transfer that money into the public health coordinator fund and close that fund out. Then on fund 1159, health department, uh we need an appropriation for $23.26 or $23,2641, [laughter]

sorry. Um and move it to the immunization fund and then we want to that'll make that fund um a zero balance because it's in currently in the negative. And then we want to close that out. And then fund 1159, health department appropriation of $53,59962 to be moved to fund 9114, healthbased fed grant. And the reasoning for this is the money has been receded in the 1159 fund, but it has been taken out of the 914 fund um for the last two years. So, I need that's got that fund um in a negative balance of about $70,000. So, there's $25,000 that's going into it this year that we got from the grant. And then I want to take this money and add to that money and zero that out. So, we no longer have that. And that correction is made. And then the last item is fund balance $1160 in the amount of $45,161 1662 cents um a payroll of $8,438 for cash carryover from 24 to 25. So what they have allowed us to do, HFI has allowed us to take funds that we carried over from 24 to 25 and carry them over one more year to 26 because of the way that they've reduced our funds. So we went from $334,000 [clears throat] to receiving $91,000 for next year. And that is going to pay for um our payroll line that we have for the um environmental specialist.

So that is what we're going to do is instead of keeping that money, remember when we talked about using it for buying a Jeep and doing all that stuff? Well, we didn't do anything with it. So, we're they're going to allow us to allocate it, but I have to get you guys to vote it in today and then I have to do a carryover sheet through the state of Indiana and put it on red cap and give you and say that I have the okay. So, in order to make that happen, that's it. Last one you said was being carried over to cover salaries and Yes. Yep. Is any of that going to remain just a carryover or is it all going to be No, it all.

Isn't that Melissa for those two folks who received one of the certifications also get an increase in pay this year because they have done all their certifications and everything that is required and has had their which I put in your packets when I asked for budget. It's not what you need currently, but um they have everything that they need to do to roll out. So we do have one that's person that's in planning to retire next year. Um so that will go down. Uh so we will in 27 we only have three. Um and so

that's that's the plan. These people are here to learn the jobs. They're being crossrained. They can not only do septic, but they can also do food. And now we're going to pool and spa inspections that starts in January. So they had to get all those certifications in order to be ready to roll out and training on the job training.

Remind me, how much are the spa inspections? Is there another fee for that? Yeah, it's um it varies amongst how many that they have and I think it's like $200 uh for the one to four and then it jumps again to six and it goes up to a total of $1,200 for 14 and above. But that means that we have to go and inspect their sheets. We have to manage their water. We have to keep track of everything that they do monthly because they have to do a monthly send off for the state. Um, it's quite a lengthy process. Actually, I think I probably better go get my certification because there's a lot more rules and spells than what we do. So,

and [clears throat] Susan, I assume you either wrote this or reviewed it. Are [snorts] you okay with what you're seeing here? And whenever we're ready, I didn't write a chance to see it. That's that's the notice that was sitting in the paper. I mean [snorts] that's [clears throat] it though and we're good. We take a look at that. Everything [clears throat] on the front page that's all just housekeeping clean up. That's where Jim and myself and Rey got together. Actually Jim got a bunch of stuff together with Rei on um all the clean up that needs to be done with some of the funds. Some of those funds had been there since like when I was there back in like 2003. Exactly.

Yeah. You're talking about the meeting with Caitlyn Schaefer. Yeah. With Caitlyn. [clears throat and cough] And the these were items that we were seeing when we were doing pulling reports and going over everything Dr. Conway and I had been doing the year before. So this was not a surprise. Some of the things that they did suggest us to move were biohazard. We cannot touch those. Some federal grant monies we they just have to sit there now. Hopefully we never need to use [snorts] them, but if we do need to use them, they're there and you guys would just reenact them and use. Wait, you good? Yeah. I mean, so generally, right, these

transfers from her grant funds require more work from you all. The the carryover is a carryover, doesn't require anything special from you guys. um the 1159 fund, those two like what what Melissa said was on on the larger of those two that was already budgeted for. So you've already appropriated it. It's not an additional appropriation that you're doing right now. And then the smaller of the two is that already appropriated as well or is that So I mean so they've been appropriated but they were in an earlier years so they have fallen down into the cash balance. That's why I'm asking for appropriations. Oh the these weren't appropriated in your budget. Not this year. No. Okay. [clears throat]

Yes. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, Julie provided the notice. Um I don't know why Cindy at at um sends me some stuff that's not I have two different [clears throat] addresses. Okay. We need to fix that. Yeah. Because like the Perita one, right? I got that notice from Cindy and so I created the additional appropriation on this. Um, so I I mean we can have the public hearing today on it, which is what this is, and then we can appropriate it on Monday night. Okay. Is that [clears throat] fine with you? Thank you. Yeah. All right. Y

uh do we need to open a public hearing or No, there's no You say public hearing, right? I mean, that's technically what an additional appropriation is. That's why you give the notices. So yeah, you can you can open it. You can ask if anybody else has anything to say. We'll open the public hearing on the motion for that. Nope. No motion. We'll need a motion. Close it. Anyone have anything to say? Close the [clears throat] public hearing. Seeing none. Second. All in favor? I I. Do you want me here on Monday or two? And I know you'd like to be here, but [laughter]

I can be here on the air. All right. Wonderful. Hey, when you get a chance, you should come over. Give us a couple more weeks, but pay a visit. It's amazing. And what's truly amazing is I had an employee that could not quit coughing for almost a year. Oh, your mold remediation. Yeah. And now that we have had this done, we just all of us were talking yesterday that no one has had that call noticeable improvement in that air quality. Amazing. And it's beautiful. So

it's always nice that people at the health department [laughter] really bad shape. Obesity [laughter] rates our world.

All right, Jim. Oh, yes. Sure. Joel, yes. Patrick, yes. Judy, yes. Scott, yes. Gary, yes. Darren, yes. Well, that's a motion to close the hearing. And then, so we need to advertise at our next meeting. You've already advertised for today. You don't have to advertise anything else. Today we're notifying [snorts] that we're going to make Monday at our next Monday meeting [clears throat] an additional appropriation ordinance just like what you did for today. Great.

Yeah, we got two more items on the second page of that handout. One is the commission $200 from 4103 one of these. You got one. That's okay. Sandy has hers right here. I'm going to lean over.

Okay. 103.09,000 0 request 32 325 4103.02717.0000 000 to 4103 [clears throat] 0271600 0. There we go.

What is it? I don't know. Do you know what this is? No. Theres is at a conference. It's not my understanding. Is this a cell phone thing? How may we table it? Oh, the cell phone's the next one. Power table it. Yeah. Okay. [clears throat] Vote on that. Yes. Um I mean it looks like Are you playing with these? Right. your $325 is just a transfer within the same budget classification.

Right. Like that. It doesn't even have to come in front of you. Julie can just do it in her office. Right. Right. The first thing, the $200 looks to be in an additional, but I don't know what fund 4103 is. parts and [snorts] Yeah. Hey, I got a question for you. The money that you wanted $200. $200. Those boys down there, they're growing boys. They're hungry. They get nourishment. [laughter]

Make your teeth green. Yeah. I wouldn't say what it's for. That's [snorts] Yeah, you got it. I would hope so. 103. Actually, it's requested 325716, [laughter]

which I can do anyway, but they want to know what what Well, that's a good question cuz I don't have my computer up there with me. [laughter] You know what?

I got to go get new ones. 3.0. I thought you were going to stack. [laughter] Yes. [laughter]

and I advertise. I know what parks and rec [clears throat] we don't really need them to do anything. I can still transfer that money, so it's not a big deal. I'll find I'll send him a notice once I figure it out. Council lady, [snorts]

I'll have to explain this later. [sighs] Okay. All right. So, park, let's just move to parks and wreck. Leave a B. Yeah. [snorts] Girls Teresa. All right. See you later. Okay. So, what? Okay. So, there's no nothing to do on it. No, there's nothing you have to do on it. Okay. Thanks. What was the 200? I mean, was that It's coming out of the one fund to go into the other fund, too. They're both going transfers. It's coming from actually have to go downstairs and do that. So, let me just send it to you once I get it.

Okay. Together. These are actually line item transfers. Yeah. They're just line item transfers. We have nothing to do with that. You know, it's coming from both of those going into that. Yeah. Yeah. It's just parks and Rick. This is the monopole cell tower pole issue [clears throat] transfer would be worth 30,3334 the money that actually got put into the general fund because they were not aware that they didn't ask for a well it was originally set up but was the wrong fund type.

Correct. It's fun to fund 1320.06501. That's non-re. Yeah, the new fund is not

can I can I interject here real briefly? Yeah. First of all, I want to clear clear a couple things up here. Um, I am, and I'm not I'm not I'm [clears throat] not bringing this up to try to cause problems. Uh, it may appear that way, but it's actually not the case. Um, the reason I'm bringing it up is that last month's special session, I handed every one of you an email from Lori Rogers. Okay? And the email had in it the based on state board of accounts the process the statutory process and and so all I'm doing is you know trying to be the compliance manager if you will right to make sure [snorts] that we're in compliance with the state board of accounts and state statute. And the reason I'm kind of focused on that, made it a priority is because of the state board of accounts recent audit and then the two, you know, our credit rating drop from a double A minus down to a single A. And to me, you know, I kind of take issue with that. And part of the reason for that credit rating drop is these these state board of accounts derogatory reports that they audits that they do. And so I reached out to Lori Rogers because you know you've got meeting minutes, we have ordinances and we have resolutions. And [clears throat] Susan, you can, you know, if I say anything out of line, you can correct me. Uh, I don't believe a meeting minutes should supersede an ordinance andor a resolution. And to based off my limited

knowledge, a resolution is really applicable for administrative type requests. So, additional appropriations, a resolution would be required. Correct. You could do additionals by resolution. Yes.

Yeah. Okay. However, you know, this this money in the general fund is to the tune of I think a little over 30 grand and the county has been receiving $1,000 a month from this monopole company that the commissioners approved, which, you know, made sense. So, that would to me indicate that the decision to get into the lease agreement with the cell tower company was actually 30 months plus back, right? And the correct way to manage something like this is when the commissioners, the previous administration made the decision to have that cell tower installed on parks and wreck. And in addition to that, when they made the decision, the way I understand it is that then the parks and wreck would have complete unilateral discretionary authority to spend the $12,000 a year however they deem necessary. [snorts] The way I understand it based on Lori Rogers is that at that time the commissioners should have created an ordinance and in that ordinance they then instructed the auditor to establish a non-reverting 4,000 home rule fund. And then at the same time in that same ordinance put the language in the ordinance that spoke specifically that the parks and wreck would have 100% discretionary authority to spend the money. they would have been past that had it recorded and then I don't know how this works but I'm assuming once that ordinance would have been recorded then that would have been cross referenced with that fund number so that 10 years down the road if there's any disagreement on who can do what with what they can always revert back to the ordinance pull it and it clearly explains why it was established when it was established how the money can be

used So that that step in the process was overlooked. And so instead, what happened is that there wasn't a fund. And so then the auditor's office had been receiving $1,000 a month checks for 30 plus months and they've just taken those checks and they've dumped it into the general fund. And then 30 months later, the parks and recck director comes back to the council and says, "Hey, by the way, you know, you all need to pass a resolution doing the appropriation out of the general fund in this fund." And so I don't have a problem with doing the resolution and moving the money where the challenge comes in. as far as I'm concerned, we are not in compliance with state statutes the secretary of or that the Indiana State Board of Accounts because one of the areas that I'm kind of hung up on and I've done an AI search don't know whether it's accurate or not but you know earlier this year you know we all got a questionnaire from the state board of accounts on fraud. So the question I ask AI is, does an auditor, a county auditor in the state of Indiana have the unilateral discretionary authority to just create a fund out of the blue on their own? And to date, you [clears throat] know, the answer to that question is no. Now, I don't have anything to support that other than the AI search. But when I think about that, I think, well, that makes sense because if an auditor had the complete discretionary authority to just arbitrarily create a fund, that could open up Pandora's doorbox for fraud.

Can hold on a second. So, you're saying an auditor created a fund in our Is that what you're saying? Well, my question is is does the Indiana County auditor have per state statute per state statute have the unilateral discretionary authority on their own without anything from any no public hearing? No, to create a fund and just go into the system, create a fund. No, I didn't think so. No. Well, that'd be

and I'm just asking this. So, I'm throwing this out because it's, you know, for example, you know, I just had to complete 24 hours worth of CE credits. All right? And one of the courses I had to take was anti-money laundering. Okay? And the other one was ethics. So, I'm over here studying anti-moneyaundering and at the same time I'm going, you know, you know, could I create a fund and then create maybe two or three funds. So, Jim, I mean, the answer is no, obviously. And then I don't think that's what happened here. here. I mean, well, there So, what are we Well, no, I don't think a fund's been created. It's just been going in the general fund, right? No, there was a fund created. They they told us they needed a fund to put this money in.

Now, without a state telling us what fund to put it in, the fund gets created. What they didn't tell us what it had, it needed to be a nonappropriate, you know, non-reverting. Non-reverting. Thank you. Yeah. [clears throat] What they didn't tell us was that. So then the fund got created and it was not a non-reverting fund. So when the money So each year when the money went in at the end of the year it automatically goes back to the general fund. So you charge and said what do we do with this money? They said create a fund or how' that work

now we that worked from parks and reccks telling us they got this money this needs to go into a fund this how that works. But but who gave the auditor's office the instruction to create the fund? I just said that parks parks and rack. Okay. And they send the they send the information to us and then we do it. Right. But I You're saying that may not be closer. No, it it it a fund, you know, based on the email that I received from Lor Rogers is to be recreated by an ordinance because you have to have, you know, public hearings and it needs to be in public that this decision is being made to create a fund.

We always had to come before council to ask for a new fund.

Yeah. Well, I'm just talking I'm just I'm just talk I'm what I'm bringing up is that this issue of creating a fund right and to create a fund in spec in this specific let me give you an example this and the reason I this issue is this is the second time this issue's come up because the other issue was the sock factory money okay because that that was not you is not in compliance with at all. So it it it and so now all of a sudden we find ourselves again basically in a similar situation is the sock factory money you know and you know and just to restate what I've already restated is that the commissioners because the commissioners the previous administration the commissioners are the one that negotiated the contract with the cell phone company. The commissioners at that time should have created an ordinance, right? And in that ordinance, then they were instructed per the [clears throat] ordinance, the auditor's office to create the 4,000 series fund. And in addition to that, that ordinance would have had specific language on it on what the money can be used for and what it can uh be used for.

And they would have come before us. No, we wouldn't had anything to do with it. No, we wouldn't had anything to do with it. It's like, yeah, just like council would have created the bond, the non-reverting bond. Huh? Council would council would have created. Well, according to Lori Rogers, and I've got the email here. I can we can read the email if you want. You know, I mean, I had I'm just going by what Lori Rogers. Your understanding of protocol would be what would have been I I think we need to have state board of accounts come in here and we need to start asking him point blank questions. That's a wonderful That's a wonder that's a I do. I agree with you wholeheartedly. protocol is present is because if they're going to hold us

responsible for created a non-revering fund within that ordinance creating a non-reving fund you would have stated whether it needs appropriation from council or not. So it could be that even if they have this money in the fund, they still have to come to council to appropriate the money. Or it could be that they could spend without appropriation from county council. And then included in that ordinance would also be here are the uses for this fund. Here's the things we're going to spend the money on. But that was not done. We understand. Factory. Now you're saying the commissioners want no more than that specifically even though they wrote the contract. Right. They just write the contract. We create the where the money goes. Right.

I would like to enter into the record this email from Lori Rogers. So I'm going to read this email if you don't mind just so I can go on record. Uh the email was from Lorie Rogers. It was dated 10:2125 at 12:04. Ricky Hoffer was CCed along with Stacy Burns. The subject matter is creating new funds. The state board of accounts is frequently asked if the county can establish a new fund for a particular purpose or function. Indiana code 361-3 is entitled home rule. Indiana code 3613-2 states the policy of the state is to grant units all the powers that they need for the effective operation of government as to local affairs. Other sections of the statute restate this pre premise in various terms. IC 36136 states in part A, if there is a constitutional or statutory provision requiring a specific manner for exercising a power, a unit wanting to exercise the power must do so in this manner. Section B. If there is no constitutional or statutory provision requiring a specific manner for exercising a power, a unit wanting to exercise the power must either one, if the unit is a county or municipality, adopt an ordinance prescribing a specific manner for exercising the power. If the unit is a township, adopt a resolution prescribing a specific manner for exercising the power. or three, comply with statutory provision permitting a specific manner for exercising a counter power.

C an ordinance under subsection B1 must be adopted as follows in a municipality by the legislative body of the municipality in a county subject to IC code 36-2-3.5 or IC code 3631 by the legislative body of the county. Number three, in any other county by the executive of the county. Our position is the powers granted by various statutes authorize the board of county commissioners to create by ordinance as many funds as necessary to operate their particular county. However, an ordinance may not be used in attempt to circumvent statutory provisions, including the provisions of IC 36-2-5-2 requiring appropriations by the county fiscal body prior to dispersements of monies. The enabling ordinance should provide various types of information. Number one, the ordinance should clearly indicate the type or types of revenue that is to go into the new fund. Number two, the ordinance should list the purpose or purposes for which expenditures can be made for the new fund. Number three, the ordinance should establish the life of the new fund and indicate if the fund balance is non-reverting at year end or perpetual until terminated either by the terms of the current ordinances or if another subsequent ordinance must be enacted. Number four, the ordinance should provide guidance as to the disposition of the fund balances on termination of the fund and the ordinance should include any other terms or conditions the attorney representing the county deems necessary. An ordinance is not necessary when a fund is created by statute unless the statute states an ordinance is required. The state board of accounts prescribes the use of fund accounting to provide accountability for

government activities and financial status. This means the individual funds are used to segregate financial activity based on sources and uses. Permanent transfer of money from one fund to another clouds the transparency provided by fund accounting and should be infrequent such as when specific authorized by statute. Instead of transferring money from one fund to another, the appropriation should be transferred to the fund that has available money. This way, the use of the money in a fund remains transparent. I hope this helps. If you need more, let us know. Lori Rogers. So, there you go. That's why I'm bringing this up. And that was handed all out to you at the last special.

The board of councils will also tell you contact your attorney and see what they say. They're not going to give you There's like millions of IC codes on this particular budget. Yeah. Millions. Right here. We've never been written up for the council creating an fund specifying uses specifying whether it requires appropriation or not. So, how do we want to move forward? We I've not been written up for that either. So, only thing comes to mind is that lady in Illinois got off the 57 million. [laughter] I guess I think that

it never hurts for the commissioners to or for them to state how it should be spent. You know, you know, with parks and rec, can you spend it on anything that [snorts] you want to spend it on? You know, I think this is just me personally that, you know, maybe there needs to be some sort of guidelines set up by the commission on how that [snorts] money could be spent effectively. Uh, not that parks and rec wouldn't, but you never know. Um, that's my thought on the whole thing. I think that's a good idea. Um, us having an ordinance or resolution that we're doing what we're doing isn't going to hurt.

So, I mean, the sock factory is a bigger issue and that's a mess that's dragged on for years, [clears throat] right? Because it wasn't done years, right? And to me, it's this is real simple. It's just you draft the ordinance, the commissioners pass it. And and the key well, the key piece to the ordinance to me is what what I'm really trying to solve for,

you know, next year's an election year. Cath could have four brand new people on it. You may have a new commissioner. People are going to change. And seven or eight, nine years down the road, they get into chaos about, well, what are you spending that money on? I know you can't [cough] hear that and [clears throat] you get and this would alleviate any confusion in the future by future administrations on what this this revenue from the from the cell tower company on how what they can spend it on and what they can't. So I you know because here's the ordinance that spells it out.

Yeah. And it's recorded and then like Julie because this is this is an educational question on my end. If there's an ordinance passed that create and you create a 4,000 series fund and then the ordinance gets recorded, is there anything in the system that you know somebody comes in a new commissioner or council member six years down the road says what's this fund for? And you go well here this is fun and then you can go to the recorder's office and cross reference the fund with the recorder so the recorder can immediately pull that document out. Yeah, there is. Is there there is especially if they recorded in the minutes that is document number 2024 or blah blah blah blah then they can go in there and they can

but I don't want to have to go through the minutes. I just want to say okay this is fund number blah and they can also look it up number if you go find the the first ordinance anything that would come in afterwards would be referenced you go to the fund in the system and say this is the ordinance the date and you go to the recorder and say hey pull this ordinance and such and such a date. So you're not trying to, you know, have to do an enormous amount of research trying to figure, you know, whereas minutes you'd have to go back through, you know, that would take forever. Have to go back. Yeah. Right. Right. Right. Okay. So approaches parks comes to you, you create a fund and it goes like that, right? Do we want to change that?

That wasn't just parks and recck that did that. That was also commissioners. Not commissioners do something. the other commissioners because they were the ones who actually approved parks and recre because of the contract they entered into all of it. So they then worked with you to set up the fund to manage the monies. No, we set they just tell us to set one up. They told you to nothing formal ordinance. They tell parks and wreck to get us to set to set. No, there's no ordinance or anything like that. Commissioners were headed. It's in the court somewhere. What? It's in the minutes somewhere [snorts] back. in the minutes. So what anything that was said or done will be in the minutes.

Do we need or want to change that approach? And let's say look at the stock. I mean if is that in we this is no big issue but the stock factory became a big issue. So that's yeah it's been a lot huge but it would prevent more issues like the stock factory. It's just because it's really to me this is really simple or you know commit because here commissioners would there been any way that the commissioners would have known it was supposed to be a non-reverting fund too. I mean if they didn't have paperwork which parks rex has all the paperwork if everyone filled it out. Somebody made an assumption.

Yeah. Right. Yeah. And and and to me, this issue is just is we have an opportunity here, right, to say, okay, what can we learn from this because this right here really then gets into a bigger issue of the lack of internal controls, right? And if you look at the what's been written up, the SBA, it is it's an everending ongoing internal. Well, it's an opportunity to learn and it's pretty simple. P commissioners draft the ordinance, they pass it. We had nothing to do with it. Bada bing, that's done. It's recorded. We then pass the resolution doing the appropriation over and then it's over. It's done. Does it sound reasonable, Susan? Sure.

[laughter] And the only thing I would ask the county is that as we go forward that you know how do we implement internal controls so that next time something like this comes up you know here's step one step two step three that we have a policy on it that this is what is required to be done because it's not this is not all for writing a lot more policy. [laughter] Yeah as well. Yeah, but that's that's that's I can sit here and say that it would fall unfortunately. [clears throat] It will fall back on the auditor to say we have a policy. Here's the policy that you need to follow. Hand them a sheet set up. Can you write up some goes along with this?

Right. Well, but I to me that is the commissioners, the council and the auditor and all three [clears throat] need to be agreement on the policy and just then you have to and then the biggest issue is you can do we do policies and then if you get the state board of you know some of that stuff comes in and they tell you what fund to create. Well, that's okay. They tell you because that's by state. Yeah, exactly. Non-negotiable. Those are going to be done like they say. Right. And not to change the subject, but just, you know, so everybody, you know, it's in it's in the back of my head.

You know, we passed the budget and the general fund is only in the black uh by $176,000. So, so you know, we have a budget surplus for 26 of 176K for the general fund. However, the commissioners, we're going to have to do another appropriation to reappropriate the 130 grand that we took out of the budget for the HSA account. So, that's going to drop it down to 46K, right? And going forward, the big thing, the only reason we've got $176,000 in surplus for the general fund for 2026 is that we as a council moved all the line items out of the general fund for parks and wreck into the CDC budget. Now, what I don't know is [laughter] what's going to happen with the state board of accounts. Um, I just got a message because Mary Smith is listening in and this is what I said. What I said because things are documented by

um 2024 document numbers in the recorder's office being your former recorder. She said uh software does not have a place to record funds. We only index by names and ordinance number. Okay. So, okay. Wherever the original document ends up, auditor's office might most likely would need to keep track of what hand what ordinance handles what fund. Thanks. Oh, okay. [clears throat] That clears that up. She said she apologizes. They're five minutes behind one. So that when we put it into the book where all the ordinances are at the building, we we write what ordinance it is. Then we'll write what reference number. [cough and clears throat] So then you can go over there and get the reference number. Got it. That's what

So you can cross reference very quickly. Pull the ordinance. Boom. So, you're going to write a policy on that, Julie, and you can bring it to our next work session. We'll discuss it briefly and say policy. We we don't discuss anything briefly. [clears throat] We don't discuss anything briefly. [laughter] Hey, we don't discuss anything briefly. [laughter] You're getting the picture, right? Again, I apologize. I'm just trying I'm not trying to be difficult. I'm just trying to Okay. We're good. [laughter] We're good. That was very helpful.

So So this item though, we're just going to have to deal with this way and then take it. So do we do ordinance to address this? It would be an additional appropriation or I think the ordinance is fine because this just handles the additional appropriation. Yeah. an issue is is you know I mean the council [clears throat] can do an additional appropriation right now and get it over with but we haven't advertised for it yet. Oh, haven't we? Oh, okay. Yes, we have. That's the advertisement. I mean this is for public hearing but like I don't have an additional appropriation ordinance to to give to you to like

Oh, I thought that's No, that's the notice of those notice to taxpayers. This is I don't even know where those health departmentage have to occur at your Monday night meeting. Oh yeah. Yeah. Okay. So you just have to write it up. It has been advertised. Talk to it. Okay. Right. [laughter] Are you done yet? Yeah.

All right. So that one's still Monday. [cough and clears throat] We don't have a meeting this Monday. The next Monday. The next Monday. Do we have opioid money to jail service coordinator? Is that the subject of interest here? And what is the status of that? We need to act on that. Well, they're going to use that for to shore up that. I understand. Sorry. So that may fall under the ring situation. It does. So it's going to go off into that.

They need an ordinance to move that opioid money to the that line the line. You don't need ordinance for the opioid money. You need to vote on it. Be appropriation, wouldn't it? Out of the opioid to a payline. It depends on what the ordinance establish. [snorts] So, do we need to have that in place by Monday night? Okay. Yeah. Because what we're talking about here is just simply Julie, is there enough opioid money to to cover her salary for next year? Just for one year, that helps the general fund. It does. Yeah. Just for the year.

Opioid money is decreasing every year. Yeah. But we got enough to cover her for next year. Yeah. That's a good thing. It is. It is. Yeah. So, that needs to be done. Yeah. Yeah. So, we need to It's like the tribal money we have without 100 grand in there, but and we can use it on anything. But with tribal money, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's another form of ARPA funds. We have 50,000. So, we could use that for matching for grants. We have 100 grand in that fund. We could isolate that for grant matching. Yeah, we could. I think could we can use them on anything any multiple purpose. Yep.

And I would be in favor of isolating it and protecting it for somebody is protecting it. Well, spending it someplace else. So, uh we need a vote Susan for the opioid money to be applied to jail. Oh, so what do we need to do on that? So, I mean it's it's really just going to be the question. We got to find how you establish a fund, see if there needs to be an appropriation out of it or if it can be spent by technically commissioners without appropriation. Um, so I mean I I I don't know how to answer your question right now because I don't know how your thumb is set up. Okay. So how do we move it forward

set up for the restricted fund restricted rate and then we have a nonrestricted I'll get with How many funds do you have? How that was set up? I have all kinds of funds. Let me see. [laughter] That's funny. $487. [clears throat and laughter] Oxy. Yeah, back from a few years ago. Yeah, it was. So, I guess that would run out. Yeah. decrease the

you guys will take care of that by Monday then Monday meeting that's not an appropriation for 2025 January [clears throat] January go into January

council bill 14 the WH designation I know we status of that is sort of there but we need to do something. Well, so sorry. Yeah. Okay. Um, you know, when when Kent Irwin and Lorie Cellin were here and and gave their presentation at the beginning of October, they said the next step in the process was to adopt the process. And that's what council bill 14 is. It's adopting the process. only. So, right, no other changes right now. Thank you. So, it's not documenting the It's not a mandatory implementation,

right? Okay. I need It's documenting the process. That's fine. Yeah. Yeah. And we got the process provided in our hands. We possess the process and all. Oh, that's the stuff that you got. But I mean the how you I don't think I can process that. That's the factory. You're supposed to take money and pass it on. Yeah. So, is he holding stuff up there,

Orvis? [laughter] Not to cause a problem again. Oh, sure. [laughter] Uh, and then can we refer to this using Wagner when it's Julie's language which I because I think this is important. They refer to this as the factory evaluation system.

Correct. And what I don't know but I believe to be true is this factory evaluation system is a system that's that's got enormous amount of precedence throughout the entire country. Yes. And then when we adopt this factory evaluation system, you know, we don't because there's adopting it and saying, "Okay, here's our new approach going forward." And then there's the actual implementation of the factory evaluation system. Correct? Yes. Okay. So if in our language because I think language is important, this is the factor evaluation system,

right? based upon their expertise and all of those fees is the way I understand. No, it's not us. It's very Yeah, because I think Susan, I'm not that you're going to, you know, because we're getting into, you know, I don't know if it'd be a department of labor. You're getting into the department. I don't know if it be the Department of Labor or what federal department you're getting into, but this factory valuation system is a very objective, fair-minded, takes subjective biases out of the system because you're scoring the position, not the person. Right. Based upon risks and their job.

Yeah. Which which takes an enormous amount of liability off of the county and it puts it over onto the system, right? Yeah. Okay. That's the way I thought you didn't hand that pile. Sorry. Well, I just keep it in order. Thank you, Joel. No, I have Sorry. I know you were just dying to get this stuff. I was multiple paint staples. Staples. You're not going to leave this.

One more. There's two. Three. Three. Sorry. [clears throat] There's three. We have three. I guess. Yes. Oh, wait a minute. Here's an extra. One was stuck to the staple. stuff a different percentage. She's going to explain that. You're going to need another one of these. Can I take these home? Sure. And I put a black circle there. I use them for targets.

Well, and they're also good for getting parts. If you would like to approve the process at your Monday night meeting that this is how moving forward you're going to evaluate positions, we can do that. Just because we're not implementing it yet doesn't mean that it's not the process that's going to be used. Yeah. So, I'm in favor of that. Me, too. Yeah. I'll support that. It's reasonable. [cough and clears throat] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, cuz we didn't spend the 50 grand to do this just for, you know, willy-nilly. Yeah, we want to do that Monday night, not tonight. No, I'm not coming in here next Monday. It's a week from [laughter] It's a week from Monday. Keep Why not now? I ain't going to be here. I don't know.

Why not now, Susan? You can. I mean, you you guys if it's unanimous, correct? Why would we just do it now? I will. I'll make the motion that we uh approve the factory evaluation system presented by WHIS that that gives them the process gives them gives us their process on um going forward with um rating jobs and that type of thing. We'll put an effective date on that. Is that 426 or starting 27? It's January 1. Would it be cleaner if we just did January 1? January 1. Okay. Of 20. That'd be clean. 26. That's right. Okay. Right. Yep. We like it.

And I'm just going to add that takes the burden off of us as council trying to say, "Oh, this position and that position rate, this position is going to rate higher because of this." We don't know those factors, but there are factors out there that are being weighted and used to rate those positions differently and it takes the burden off of that. Well, to me, what it does in addition to that would be it reduces our liability, right? Yeah. Well, it does more than that. I mean, it t it it it it takes it uses expertise of a a a group of people who do this for a living and know what they're doing instead of us

trying to just throw something together. It also takes the department head or an employee of calling up Lori, which they will be forbidden to do, and say, "Make my salary $10,000 higher." put in there whatever you want but right yeah because we know that those types of things have happened we establish a system that is fair somebody from doing something I think she's I think she I think she's not going to talk to them is what she has told us in our meeting if they call she's going to from what she told me she's going to not talk to them

and that's and that's and that's based on we as council having the authority to talk to her and the payment for them is coming from council budget So, we're not going to allow anybody just to call up and bill change change their job description because they want to they want more money. She she reiterated that she will not be talking to them. Second who talking about second W the woman just to clarify that is instituting this starting January 1st of 26. Yes, we are taking this yes Patrick. Yes, Judy. Yes, Scott. Yes,

yes, yes. That was easy. We should also celebrate this as a first. [laughter]

A change. And I want to app I I want to say thank you for putting up with us for the extra time the other day and listening to our thoughts and taking this in and out and all that. Thank you. We bored the poor guy to death. He loves this stuff though. This he dreams of this stuff. I mean we were always Hey Scott, hang on a minute. He doesn't do anything. Reagan has to do it all.

It's poor Reagan's one. Yeah, give credit to Reagan on this. Um, first of all, I apologize for how small this is. It's a lot of information. The staple portion, obviously, we're not going to go through my by line. I just want to let you guys know how we came up with, you know, our increases and our assumptions um for this analysis. Uh so initially we were asked to do a comparison to the internal base and the external midpoint. Now during our meeting on Tuesday, we didn't even get into the external midpoint. Um it's a rather large increase. Um so we don't have that currently today. I can send it to you guys. Um you'll see the numbers for 26 and 27 currently. Um, but just really quickly on the stapled portion, what we ended up doing, um, the green highlights all the way down towards the middle of the page. That's the adopted budget. And, um, we compared that. We use Jim's spreadsheet. So, um, once again, I can't get any credit for even the right side or the left side. It's

more blame in that case, the credit. [laughter] That's Jim. Yeah.

It's currently in the adopted budget. Um so any comparisons uh any increases to that based off of you know the adopted so we took the internal base amounts from the WIS study and then we had to add back in longevity after that um and what you'll see in the first set of the blue internal waste plus longevity of the variance from adopted. So clearly that's just if there's any variances whether or not it was the same or an increase or a decrease. But then we had a discussion on Tuesday where if anybody was over the internal base, we weren't going to decrease their their salaries. So then that's what the next uh u the middle blue there. The higher of internal base were current. So [snorts] anybody that was already above it, they're staying there. And then we brought up anybody that um was below the internal base. So we have to do another column there. Um and this is broken out into the first few pages are the general fund and then the other.

And then for 2027, um we ended up doing a variance there. Also, we we discussed doing a 3% increase, but if an employee is already over internal base, they don't get a 3% increase until people that are at the internal base, that 3% catches up with, you know, those employees. Um, that's how we ended up doing 2027. You say that one more time. [snorts] So,

just the 27, how you calculate that? So, hypothetically, you have an employee that's 40 grand and 50 grand. The internal base is 45. You're bringing that employee up to 45. They get a 3% increase, but that 3% increase still doesn't reach the 50 grand. So, they're still not they don't the other employee that's above it doesn't get that increase until that base would reach because otherwise you're just you're just putting that person out moving everybody up the same. So what what we've got is this line that we're trying to get to right now. People are at who are at that line at the internal base. They do not go up until everybody else catches up to them and then everybody goes up. That's a good [laughter]

Because I like to think of it as you're trueing it up. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. Getting everybody in a fair position and saying nice to accelerate those real low you can accelerate them. I mean you're doing that to all the people below but we'll be able to we may be able to analyze it and see what we can do about that. Susan has kind of worked on that. That's going to be her portion. [laughter] All right. Yeah. Thank you. Keep going.

Um so that's that's how we came up with the numbers that then you'll see on the two summary se sheets. They're very identical. The top left corner in case you got mixed up. Um we'll start with the 2026 funding projections and then I can walk through um some of the other adjustments. So, we have the 2026 adopted budget column, but that carries over. And then we had a meeting. It wasn't Tuesday, was ago,

10 days ago. Um, [clears throat] there were some commissioner adjustments um that they wanted back into the budget that was cut. [snorts] And I went ahead and listed those down below in the box on the left. This was just the increase. So, these were were cut during the budget [snorts] process. I know HSA county share with one of them that was discussed. Um, but you can see that $262,315 matches up down here in in that box. And then there was also some vaccine where it was cut and it was $200, but that was in economic development. So, we have added those back in in this analysis um to get to a revised budget, which is the last column there. And then this middle green section is where we have it linked up to that staple sheet for the general fund. So, we pulled that for the general fund. We went ahead and added a couple columns for FICA and PER. Um, which I gave percentages there because Go ahead.

Well, J, real quick. I saw on the FICA like on the on the total 2025 compensation, for example. You you show FICA as compensation if I'm reading that right. It just seems we we don't we don't that's that's just we just left that on there. Jim just wanted to include everything there. We don't include [clears throat] in our like that adopted compensation, you know. Gotcha. Thank you. Okay.

So, we went ahead uh included per as well. Um and carried that over. You can see then you know that this is similar to the format you guys you know saw when we were doing 2026 budget. Um we have projected revenues. Then we have projected unused. Um, which the only thing that changed there is we did put an unused appropriation amount in general. Um, and if you look on the bottom box to the right, um, the EMA administrator, you guys have decided not fill that. Well, that budget's still in there, so we know that's not going to be spent. And then the probation department their their entire salary was in the adopted budget but a portion of that is being paid from somewhere else. So we know like those won't be spent. That's all that we use for unused appropriations. We're assuming you know 100% outside of that to you know to be conservative just like we were uh during the budget process. Um that gets us to a projected surplus deficit um which is a deficit ofund uh a little over 123,000 just for the general fund and you can you know work your way way down. Um, another thing that is a little concerning, um, you know, any,

sorry, if you back up, you're when you say that the you're talking about the general fund 123,000 that's based on an increase to the internal base and salary like this. Yeah, that is not so we had we had a surplus during the last, you know, budget adoption um that amount. What really contributes to that is um we have these commissioner budget updates in there. So that's 262,000 that was added prior. I know that Jim referenced that we were in the black by like 170 some thousand. Well, we add back in the commissioners and then we add also in a little over 105,000. So the internal base calculation is the 105,000 after you fight it. Uh factor in 5. Now our study only looked at you know salaries and salary increases apply to that also. So, a combination of commissioner budget updates and this salary study factors is why we're now seeing, you know, a deficit of 123,000.

And that's a the salary piece is a hypothetical, right? It's a it's a it's an example, right? We haven't actually implemented that increase. Yeah. This is just the looking at this west internal base.

Can let's back up here a minute. Um, [clears throat] and I just for clarification sakes, the November 17th report that I have from Reed Financial because the 2026 budget was approved and the 44 was submitted November the four 1st for the deadline 782's already been signed off. So, as far as the 2026 budget is concerned, that was voted on, approved. Uh, But now I have a report here showing that 2026 commissioner budget adjustments per Brown County meeting on 11:24. So on the internal base WIS December 4th report right here, this one

correct on the left hand side at the bottom. Explain this to me. What am I looking at here? Those line items. Um those are line items that that were cut. I know I understood it and it's all right. So we had that meeting they were requesting them back. So we are simply obviously that would have to be something that then the council will have to additional approve. We just showing hypothetically hypothetical if that is approved. Yeah. [snorts] So to enact any of these changes is going to require an additional appropriation. Correct. Thank [clears throat] you. That's all I needed. But this is a total comprehensive view of the entire thing.

Yeah, there were some things cut in there that were like, did we approve that to be cut? You know, was it, you know, those kinds of things. So,

yeah. And while we're on that subject, let's address this here real quick. Um they were cuz on on Reed's notes, you know, right over here, um and I'll just, you know, is it shows the uh changes per Jim Kemp phone call on September 11th, 2025. September 11th, September 11th. And those are changes to the uh detention placement, personnel services, professional services litigation out of the general fund in the commissioner's budget. On September the 11th, Gary Hwitt and Kevin Patrick were in my office. And Gary Hwitt and Kevin Patrick and Jim [clears throat] Kemp all discussed these four changes.

They might have discussed them, but did they vote on them in their meetings? Did we vote on our meetings? That's my question. You voted to approve the budget. You got a copy of the budget. Okay. But I don't recall us Well, let me ask you a question.

I mean, I'm not trying to pick fight. I'm just saying I don't recall specific Well, let me finish. [snorts] I don't recall us specifically being told that we were going to and and if I missed that part of it, just [clears throat] tell me. Um, but I don't specifically, you know, one of the things was let's just cut the um cleaning grant. How do you cleaning money? How do we cut cleaning money out of an office building? We don't. You know, that was one of the things that I was told. I mean, and let me just say this, [laughter] what I was, you know, the commissioners have their budget, highway, everybody's got their their own budgets, right? But we as a council, we don't have one budget. We have 30

budgets. And correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought that our primary responsibility is to make sure that each and every year we have a budget surplus. It is and I don't disagree with that. However, during our budget hearings, I feel that that's when those discussions should happen of we don't need X amount. And this gets back to what we have talked about before is they come before us. Yes, maybe we don't need 30,000. Maybe we only need 25. Let's cut five out. To me, that's where those things happen.

But when you have a $42,000 increase in the unexpected increase for the the uh board of elections, I understand you're running a deficit. you know, where do you find the money to know that you've got a $42,000 expense and and you know, and how do you make those decisions to say, "I've got a $42,000 expense in the election board. Where do I find the money to be able to cover this?" I understand. Knowing that you can go in and make adjustments that Gary, you and Kevin Patrick agreed to.

Discuss. No, we agreed to. We you guys agreed you gave me the go-ahhead to contact Rei to make the adjustments in the budget because this also falls back into the same issue with regards to to Scott you brought up during this process the council's budget and my qu my understanding is on the council's form one that was submitted to the auditor's office was actually prepared by Julie Ree was it not? That's correct. So the council didn't even do their own form one. No, the auditor did it. Okay. So I We should have Well, we didn't do it.

All right. We didn't do it with

And so you I mean I'm not going to disagree with what your position is because you're right, you know, but an issue is what we're trying to solve for is to make sure that we are running budget surpluses, not budget deficits. Because if we continue to run budget deficits, you are going to burn down your reserves. That's just all there is to it. And that's where we're headed. And so it's now the other thing of it is is it a crisis? No, it's not. I took, you know, there was conversations about them going in the commissioners, you know, getting rid of HSA. They changed their mind and didn't get rid of it. Is that a problem? I took it out of the budget is no. All we got to do now is do an additional appropriation

and pay that money. But what we have to track as we move forward this year is every time there is an additional appropriation, you better pay attention to how much red ink are you writing. And and I'll just I agree. Well, and I'll finish with this and I the reason I'm primarily focusing on the general fund is keep in mind the general fund is responsible for 66% of the overall labor cost in Brown County. So it bears the big burden for labor cost. So need more money. My concern is our discussion does not qualify as a council decision. Right. Or and voted up on.

Correct. [clears throat] Right.

So you we could have said yeah okay put these to read and they explored but that still does not make the decision factor. No, but also let me finish with this is that those decisions, those changes were made in the budget, the 26 budget and each and every one of you received [clears throat] the the budget book number four that had those changes in there and they were all notated. So each and every one of you had the budget book and you could have gone through the buddy's budget book and you would have clearly saw that those changes were made and then we could have discussed it. And the problem was the liaison approach between us and the commissioners was not closed looped as far as we maybe we didn't define it clear clearly enough but should have been gone through somehow Tim didn't post that we weren't aware

yeah somehow either Kevin didn't convey it or we didn't enough probably wouldn't convey that so something well there's room for improvement for you for everyone for 2026 obviously I know Well, let me I mean I think I mean Judy to your point I mean that just looking at okay so we have an issue with communicate internal communication. So how do we fix that? I did see some of these items taken out most I think but some of them are not self-explanatory. They're it's I don't know what they are. It's just professional services but you know what's the context? Why what was the discussion? So one of the solutions to that problem of internal communications just make our finance committee meetings public.

That's fine. So Judy can listen, I can listen, Joel can listen, you know, Patrick can listen and we can understand. Kevin can listen, Tim can listen. Tim's in the meetings, but uh and so the second thing I think we need to talk about at our maybe our next meeting is committee assignments to things like the finance committee.

Um and so and then the 2026 budget process, making sure the same Uh some people anticipated these mistakes in the budget process, others didn't. But we hopefully can learn from those and improve immediately because uh it does not surprise me how this happened, you know, so and and so I want it to be fixed immediately. And so I think we need committee assignments. We need the 2026 budget, you know, our next year's budget process starts now. and we debree from those mistakes, make the corrections and move forward.

I agree. This is this is one of the down and I've brought this up several times when we talk about a committee for this, a committee for that, a committee for that. That takes four of the council members out of the discussion, which is why I don't like which is what I thought the day [clears throat] meetings were for. So we didn't have to rely on committees. the entire council could be brought up to speed on everything we're doing, right? Eliminate the committees because then the committees then have to come back and relay to the rest of the council. If council already knows, then we can save that time of a committee relaying it to council when council has already been involved in all of the thought process. Council is not the only people that needs to know this. Well, I know that's what I'm saying.

If we set up a committee for every decision that has to be made, there's a lot of people getting left out of Well, the most important people that need to understand what we're doing is the people whose money we are spending. Yeah, absolutely. The taxpayers. There's 15,500 out there. You know, they matter. I would like to rely less on committees and on our Thursday work session. No, I like that. And I would but sometimes we'll need commit but then they got to [laughter] come in and explain these things in detail to have communication effective. [clears throat and cough] Yeah. Putting three people in charge of the entire council's budget those five hours of discussion to bring capital license what we're trying to do here. But that so some communities may

right but yeah that was an effect you know and I've heard I heard that was a very very good effective meeting for the for the WIS study. Yeah, right. It's just I'm think you're talking about the finance committ. I'm not saying eliminate committees. I'm just saying reduce reduce our dependence on committees and actually these issues dur during our work sessions and also so I mean I was going to say make the finance committee meetings public or make the entire council the finance committee and we in our work sessions spend significant time in public meetings discussing the budget like we should. Yeah. of a two. Um,

but on on on this last year, we we had a lot going on. I mean, the WIS study, we're completely changing, you know, the the the the structure of the payroll, you know, so there was a lot going on. We're always going to have stuff like that. But two, I think department head engagement and communication in those budget work sessions or finance committee meetings, whatever we decide to do, are imperative.

It's imperative. Let's start in January rotating through three department heads a month and getting, you know, engaging them. Jerry, also on that point with department head engagements because they're going to help us straighten a lot of this out, right? They see all of these problems that are coming to us with additional appropriations 8 months, 30 months later. These are department heads finding these things, digging them out. They understand their budgets and they'll understand them a lot more if we actually provide the budget monthly data and access to them for their review every month or more frequently. And I don't think that's been happening. I think the budget itself may be delayed in getting to them. Uh we've got to improve that for 26.

Question. Do the department heads have access to LA where they can go in and pull up Oh, that's a good question. And look at their budgets, look at their line items. We talked about that yesterday. I'm going to get a hold of Laauo to see if that's possible, but then I want it. I want to get reports to each and every department head. Yeah. Well, my question is is that I would think that LAO ought to have the ability to have read only to where the department heads can I can just give them access to the reports and I'm the one that gives them the access to where they could go in and re and they can look at their whole budget to know where they are here today. Very funny because that's exactly what we were talking about yesterday.

But as of so no, so they're operating in the blind and they have no idea where they are. Unless they physically come to your house. We used to get them years ago. Yeah. We there rock. I mean this and I would say I mean it's not my decision who to hire you know the software platforms. We paid a lot of money for that software and it's been updated recently and if we can't share budget information with the department maybe we need to do another part of the benefit. The other one I used to get a monthly how many people you can use which is what we liked about it. We used to get them monthly. Now the office had to print them out. We didn't have

a minute. I'm not talk so clear. I'm not Jul I'm not talking about the honors of having to print off reams of this. No. No. Not now. Not in this day. Unless unless that's easier way to do. I'm just simply asking that the sheriff, somebody in the sheriff's department could go in personally that that each person needs to have the reports to their at their fingertips where the auditor's office does not have to be responsible for calling them and saying, "Hey, not in this day and age. You're in red. You need to fix this. Not this day." Yeah. Okay. Good. So, you guys are working on that. Yes. Used to they had to print it out for us monthly and and that kind of thing. But now this day and age, they ought to be able to

be able to get it on their phone. Print it out. So I'm just going to I just want to check with LA and make sure there's no additional fees and and then as far as I've talked with Eric and get him to put it on each department head and elected officials computer. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. And if it's I mean it can also if it's I mean based on what I recall us paying for the system, it should be pretty usable by our department heads. If it's not and it's clunky [clears throat] and it's they're they and then maybe we do print off a monthly boom like we do thing that they'll have access to is the reports for their own I mean to the reports where they can go in and look at their own budgets. Yeah.

And we will show them how to do that. It's not that hard. Okay. It's pretty pretty easy. They can go in and go [clears throat] through reports and then they just go to their own like funds or whatever and then print out if they want to print it out. Not that they don't hide them as long as they know where they're at. Yeah, I think did you [clears throat] want to say something? Yeah, I'm just gonna say that's one of the things that we I looked at about itself and it seems to be a state of Indiana center

and quite often when you put it in a reporting system, the first group gets trained, they move on and the second and third group don't have a clue. So there's in my past I've I've seen where the software company will come in and do a one-day education process to come and bring them. I'm sure they will. I'm sure we're already paying for it. Oh yeah, I'm sure we've already paid for it multiple times. Yeah. Will come in and do that kind of thing. What is the licensing fee of that for a year as well? You know, off the top of your right now it's 42,000. That's a lot of that's a lot of money. None of them are cheap.

Did we solve all your problems? Sorry. [clears throat] Time stra bathroom break is about time. So, we got to take a break here. Go ahead. Go ahead. Go ahead. Darren was checking if the water is flowing because they're covering up the hole over there.

I don't think so cuz the dig back to this report still on the 20 26 projection. Um you can see obviously this isn't all of your guys's beach box clearly but you know your main ones um [clears throat] collectively you can see that there's still you know surplus 356,000 but that takes to into account very specific where Jerry sorry so the surplus def 26 26 all the way at the very bottom collectively between all these you can see there's still you know surplus But there's

there's big surpluses in certain funds that are more restricted in their use. Um so you can see that you know the convention fund there's a bigger surplus there but there's only so much that you can shift over there. Um if you if that was even something that was agreed upon. So, what I ended up doing uh was at the very bottom little box here,

these funds have a little bit more flexibility in a roundabout way. Um, even you know, even health, I mean, you can move property taxes. Um, but I took those surplus deficits. Um, and the total there was still, you know, a deficit of 116,000. Um the two big, you know, concerns would be general fund and then we discussed this on Tuesday. Um there's a it's listed as Brown County 911 grant, but my understanding from that it's not a grant, but that's a fund that needs to be cleaned up anyways. Um but it's a uh because of the I mean it has a negative cash balance even. But moving forward, you know, if the revenues, you know, aren't supporting that budget, you know, then that's going to have to be, you know, funded from somewhere else also, which is most likely going to be the general fund. So that's included in this, you know, little box there at the bottom. So overall, you know, after, you know, including the internal base and assuming the budget changes and the the commissioner's uh changes, um there is a deficit currently. Now, opioid we only we were able to find I think it was the state attorney general office that had projections and of course they're like these are subject to change and obviously um they're kind of all over the place, but we put those in there. Now, in this surplus deficit, I really wanted to show that ongoing. I understand that there's cash balances in there. So, you could use, you know, some of that cash, you know, on hand um to help, you know, with the 2026. So, if you use more of the cash on hand, you could potentially, you know, balance things out in 2026. Um but then when we get into 2027 it like you take away

these you know one time you know revenues coming in. I know that the travel money that you guys can use for potentially [snorts] pull for grants but and another thing I do want to point out that I included in here was Riverbo and I know that was another one where you guys potentially um talked about using it for grants. So but so if you take that out obviously it's going to look you know a little bit worse. Um so that's how 26 looks going into 27. I have a question before you go to 27 and I'm looking at the the box that shows the total of uh let's let's just look at the I just want to look at the general fund.

Uh the report I'm looking at is the internal base which shows a deficit of a 123 237. Now that deficit of 123 237 January yeah at the top just go across the top look at the general fund you're showing a deficit and I'm assuming that deficit what I'm looking at here is this is if we implement the factor valuation internal basis so in other words we true everything up right correct

all right now to get at that 123 23 37 number. I'm assuming you're using the 176 that was forecasted to be left over on the budget that we adopted. The surplus cash

the surplus and then and my question is this is that is that 123 237 does [snorts] that include the 262 315? So we go ahead in 26 do an additional appropriations reappropriate that money back into the commissioner's budget. And so even if we reappropriate that money and we implement the the factor evaluation system with the internal true up thing we're only projected to be in the whole 123 237. That's a lot less than I expected. Yeah, that's pretty good actually.

Keep in mind um I mean, we talked about it making appropriations. This assumes that, you know, outside of, you know, cleaning up the commissioners, obviously that offer additional um but any, you know, departments that come in and ask for an additional, it's just going to raise that deficit, raise that deficit. So, we'll just have to watch, right? your terms.

So, right, if you really wanted to move in this direction, you would have to tell all elected officials and department heads, you cannot have an additional appropriation next year because we're trying to get your employees something right as a result of our west study. I like telling them that anyway. Yeah, me too. Me, too. The thing is we can't just tell them that and halfway through the year say okay we get here's the addition I think the message is if it's not an emergency we can't afford it or you know it's not a we have to we say no additional appropriations then appropriations find it somewhere in your budget and cut that expens

I agree with everything everybody said and the only thing I would add to it is we need to explain the why and they probably ought to be looking at this report right here so that they understand why it and and walk them through it so they understand how to comprehend this report. Once they can comprehend and realize that this just not us over here going, "Hey, you know, and that the outcome of this is what they've been asking for for a [clears throat] long time." Yeah. And better understandable compensation for employees what they've been asking for. Huh. It's not going to satisfy. Well, no.

No. Nobody's not everybody's going to be happy because everybody wants more money. Got to do what we got to do more money. [clears throat] We don't want more. Jerry also, you know, looking at the numbers, this is what we can do right [clears throat] now. So, he's got a caveat, I think. Yeah. Before we get too ahead of ourselves, I do want to show you 2027. Well, that's just before we get there. We're on 26. [clears throat] Um, this also assumes a certain level of unspent funding 25 and we're talking about encumbrances material policy and Susan.

So any any of those incumbrances that you're um because this is a snapshot of 2026 assumes those budget amounts those revenues. So, an easier way to look at it, any of those incumbrances that are coming in um for the 26 budget in revenues, it doesn't affect it, but it's going to decrease cash projected cash balance because I still like cuz those incumbrances, it's 25 spending. I don't want to look at it at 26 versus revenues. But yes, any of those incumbrances, yeah, it's going to eat into the cash. Now

on the report it it hypothetically say this is exactly how we turn out for 26. Now on the annual report you would see a cash spend down of more than that, right? But it's because coming over. But we just like to keep 26 revenues and 26 expenditures just because it's important to see like, okay, are we going to have an operating deficit that's going to continue? And we just pray that catch up [clears throat] or is this is this bud is this deficit number based on us spending 100% of the 25? This is 26. Well, no. Well, we'll have [cough and clears throat] 25. Correct. Well, this isn't a cash. This isn't cash. It's budgeted.

I know, but I'm saying if we if we roll over the cash from 25 into 26, we could wipe out this deficit with cash. It's not No, I don't know. I I'm Yeah, I'm confusing. It's not contemplated here. cash flow, Julie. Yeah. Okay. And then we work and then we on next year's budget process, we've got to get our budget to 90% of the 25 budget. So, we actually have to make cuts.

Darren, I think you and I are talking about the projected cash balance line and you're and Jerry's talking about the operating fund balance. I'm looking at 26 projected surplus deficit. See, that's not a cat. That's And but I know you know what I mean. As I said, I'm combining two different things. We're trying to catch it up here. Yeah, you're right, Julie. Yes, affect that cash balance. Yeah. Yeah. I'm assuming that you're going to become before the council to do some additional appropriations to clean up negative balances. Is that true?

I don't have a choice. Uh we have a the prosecutor I know. No, I know. We've talked about this in the past, you and I to discuss this. I'm assuming that's [clears throat] and it issued. What we don't know is exactly how because you got we had 148,000 in additional appropriations for the commissioners. Yeah. Just recently. And then you're going to have another amount coming in. [snorts] And so that's the only reason I want to bring that up. Keep in mind that's coming. Yeah. So, I don't know. Right. Right. I mean, we had a conversation about the prosecutor's 80 something,000. It's 87 grand, is it? Yes. 80 I think it's 83. Is it 83? Okay.

Um where he need he sent in this uh request to give his people bonuses. We can't do that. Right. Let's I think let's let's hear from him. Let's let's wait to look into that. We're not I mean he's got where where where are we putting the responsibility on him at cuz he has to have some kind of responsibility for his own budget. I I agree. When you when you take a grant, it is that department's responsibility. What makes it where's his responsibility?

When you take on a grant, let me finish. When you take on a grant, it is that department head's responsibility to stay on it. And if that money is not being reimbursed by the state, or if it is being reimbursed by the state, it is up to that department head to make sure that that money is going back in there to reimburse it. It is not up to county council, in my opinion, to go, "Oh, you're not doing your thing here. You need to be We're not here to monitor them." It is up to that department head to stay on top of their own grants and make sure that if it's a reimbursement to do it. That's just my view. What if that I mean, we just heard the department heads aren't getting any budget updates, but this has went on before.

So, how are they doing? They don't see their budget or revenues. They get they get information from the state. take a break. You get a you get them what their budget is off [laughter] budget reports. It's kind of hard to manage [clears throat] it. What's the main visible sounds like? I mean, which is shocking. You better [laughter and clears throat] hustle. You might be able to get one. Oh, I'm sure it has. Do you think that should be happening though?

They should be staying on Why come to us? Well, I'm just saying if Department had the best explanation for what happened with that because Okay. Well, that would be good to hear. Did not keep up with the matches what he was supposed to match. That's how come it got into that kind of a problem. It's not up to the auditor or us to keep up with that. It's up to the department head. I'm not sure. I just think we need to make sure head understand the issue here is he's trying to give people bonuses with money. You think he should be swinging towards that?

Let's be here. It's

Jerry, you want to go to 2027 sheet here? That's IV. I'm good.

Back on the council. Take my No, I've always promised you mine. [laughter] Go ahead, Jerry. Let's do the 2027.

This is what we're looking at.

2027 funding. I'm just kidding. Listen up for the 2027 budget. uh the green part uh which is the salary part um I explained that earlier but as far as the salaries like if you're at the maral base you get a 3% increase but if you're already over it you don't. So that's the green card and background and uh per now for supplies, other services and charges when um we were talking on Tuesday. Um we did a a 3% increase on on those budget categories. Capital is is tricky. We just kept it the same. Um I will I know that Tim's work has been working diligently on on the capital. Um we really need to build that into the financial plan. because there's things that you guys, you know, need to plan for. And then even outside of that, we can do this. And and this is one of the changes. So I I can explain that we took out the uh the 500,000 of the public safety for the the contract u for 27 because my understanding it was once every 10 years. Is that correct?

911. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, we did take that out, but as far as that goes, um, the public safety out has a surplus of, you know, 25 grand, but a substantial amount of cash is being spent down in 26. Well, 2027, your your cash even after a surplus is 285,000. Well, you need to start planning to build that cash up. So, also,

yeah, two things, Jerry, on that. Would you [clears throat] one would you recommend we create eight a mechanism to do a cumulative capital fund to prepare for the 10year half million plus 911 fund so we don't repeat the mistake we did this year kind of feel the surprise pain of a half million dollar contract and two Jim didn't our credit rating get dinged because we don't have a capital asset plan as well that was a factor

was a factor so what do you think do I mean we can build it in and I mean if you wanted to create some other fund um and you know earark you know a portion that comes out and funnels into that fund in anticipation to make sure that you know oh we you know which you guys hopefully you know wouldn't you know forget but there's you got bunch of cash public safety and it's like oh let's spend this and then all of a sudden when that contract pops up, it may be safer to plan it that way. If not, um, we would build it into into your financial plan and cuz yeah, I mean, that hit, but yeah, it may be I don't want to go down the the rabbit hole of creating funds, you know, and uses figured it out.

That that would be a good example of of utilizing that, so to speak. Well, and so simplest path here, maybe keeping it simple for us, some baby steps first. Let's budget for a 10-year half million dollar plus expenditure 911 out of that fund. Let's just budget for it minimum. And if we feel like after that, we need to create a fund and do a cumulative capital non-reverting fund. Let's do that. We already had that. It's for No, this is for 911 purposes only. CUP. Well, no. got I don't know that we put money in here. Yeah, that gets complicated. But yeah, I like to use the This is like an escrow account. Yeah, there's something like that is what it is. Yeah, right.

But if we budget for it, that accounts for it every year. We're doing 50,000 or whatever that is. Yeah. Adjusted for inflation. No, what I'm saying is we are cap we [clears throat] are spending we have some recurring budget items that come out of take it. We need to figure out a way to get out of the smart and use cap for its intended purpose. Your IT department is basically working out of cap. Yeah, I know. That's what I'm saying. We we have expenses out of capital. Shouldn't be expenses out of figure non capital. You mean capital for capital annual recurring cost

operational? QAP is supposed to be our capital investment savings account to cover stuff like 911 contract. Well, but isn't this other 911 fund for the 911? Like isn't that where we trying to Right. But we can kind of unpeel the onion if we start like budgeting. We have to clean up some of the some of the clutter to make to make stuff easier manage with the

well we're trying to eliminate future emergencies in advance for future e it's like JC stuff capital asset planning I mean

it's so see any assumptions. I think that was pretty much it. Um and then you can see in the purple column the surplus deficit that we've been focusing on. Um it's, you know, almost 390 grand. I was talking to Scott a little bit during the break. Um what really factors into that is S enrolled act one. So some of the you know the deductions and a big thing is credits um there's additional credits that taxpayers receive that's starting in 26. So you do see like we have it factored into the financial plan but that grows more. We did you know an analysis for you guys. So that eats up a lot of you know your property tax growth over over that year. So that's why

that's reflect you said that's reflected in the 20s. Yeah, it is reflected in in the 26 projections, but it's not as large. It grows into into 2027, right? But um that's all subject to any tweak they do this. Well, they could always make changes, but those changes that I'm talking about there starting immediately in 26. So, and then they're being phased in, but the credits, you know, start off immediately. Um,

so I mean I'm not qu I'm just I'm for clarification the 27 the 27 projected deficit is based on as it is right now. [snorts] Correct. Okay. But yeah so we're not taking into account any of the tweaks or changes that are inevitable in this session.

Correct. I would think that if anything it would be more on the income tax side that they didn't change which that's not effective currently until 2028. Um, you know, about that that is something and I know I've said it before, but it needs to be set [snorts] because you guys have options, but obviously it's a balance of, you know, how under the current structure, you know, taxpayers are paying, you know, x amount for property taxes, x amount for income taxes under this new change and depending on where what rates you guys want to implement because you'll have to do it in 27 or 28. how does that affect you know those taxpayers also and we can do different scenarios. Um you guys do have options but obviously you want to be cognizant of what that's going to do to taxpayers as well.

Um and there are rumblings of that potential like some of the income tax structures um potentially changing whether or not it's rates or whether or not it's you know pushed back you know a year or two. Um, but the way it sits currently, if there are no changes, um, you guys will have to make those decisions in 2027, um, for 2028. Just as a note to the council, you may recall as I was advocating for inkeepers tax to be used for public safety as the council wanted

this particularly on the Senate side, but I think on both sides, they were it was pretty clear they wanted us to increase income taxes to provide additional funding for public safety if it was needed. And so it was very specifically stated by them, max out your income tax. Yeah, it was pretty clear to me. Pissed me off. Yeah, it was rough. Well, say that's reasonable, but not here and here. And so we're And so Jerry's pointing out when he says options, we have options. What you're actually saying is we could increase taxes. And and I've kind of explained to Jerry, my thought on the council is that's not something we want to do. That's not an option. And so we've got to kind of plan within that reality and then hope we can make it work

because we're already at the top on the income tax. So 2.55. Now, what we did learn in in in these hearings and in exploring further when they said we want you to max it out is we're 2.55% income tax, but that includes a 0.5% property tax offset. And so we actually have another 0.5. And they can go up to 2.9 now, I think. And so it gets complicated, but I'm just giving you that like they if they're going to make a change, I agree with Jerry. It's like they're going to want us to do more on the income tax side,

right? But what what what I don't know is when do I start feeling the pain of the referendum for the school corporation, number one, and number two, when's the additional pain going to incur with the new football field that's going in. So, you know, the county is one thing, but don't forget the schools over here taking 60% of the property tax. So, I anyway, I agree with you. I am here. I'm right [laughter] here. Cut your expenses. Sorry. Yeah. Yeah.

So, yes, 2027 on the property tax side, the changes from Senate Real Act One are that's why we're seeing, you know, even more of a projected 2027. So, uh, same thing we did for 2026 there at the bottom. We, you know, looked at, you know, the funds we're trying to have some flexibility between, um, obviously some level, you know, drastically. health also health has property tax revenue coming in it so hit it as well and then there's still the you know the Brown County 911 grant ongoing deficit um where you know that's going to have to be you know swallowed up somewhere that deficit um so overall the I deficit didn't look too bad in 26 but in 27 you know it's just over 468 So, I'm over here thinking, and what I'm thinking is for 2026 that basically we could give the commissioners all their money that we took out, [clears throat] only be 123 grand in the red on the general fund. And y'all could implement the uh the uh true up the new

whistle. And is that is that is my is that assumption correct? My concern is moving forward in into I understand that. That's I understand that. I think that there's a couple of things to consider then with that. Um, you know, Jerry put you in at a 3% raise then in 27. Um, which could result anywhere from 175,000, right? It could be 75 to $100,000 every percent.

Right. So if you want to do WIS light and potentially look at a 2% raise to try to again catch those people up if they're if they're not met up with the um people that are over the internal base right now. Yeah. Could the process the the the process over the next 27, 28, 29 is what the objective is is to get the fees system and move it gradually as you can cash flow it to where you're the full median external

all those. Yeah, you're going to have to kind of ratchet it because then I think when I hear, you know, we are at the max levy and have been and so are all 91 other counties. Everybody's at the max levy. So the only thing every huh property tax, correct? Right. And so the only increase you're going to get on property taxes is this 4% growth quotient. That's it.

So because you can ask for $10 million more, but they ain't going to give it to you because you're already at the max levy. All right. So, what you have to kind of monitor is we got to pay a real close attention to these miscellaneous revenues in the general fund and really stay on top of those and then try to gradually stair step it up to the point. Yeah. And it and it may be in that in and in and taking that approach because that would be an approach. It may be those that are already kind of at the top end of the scale may not see much whereas because what we're trying to do is really true up the bottom. Exactly. Yeah. We're not going to make everybody happy.

Yeah. Everybody's going to be happy. So to that point, Jim, I mean, if we we're we're trying to accelerate that true up. And again, in my mind, I I think the sheriff, a couple other department heads have talked about some some very low paid individual positions that [clears throat] are in our government, right? Compared to some that are close to the top, but these very low that are probably not at a sustainable wage, probably their cooks. If we could Yeah. Like some of the jailers and stuff. Um if we what if we look at that bottom 50% and we say hey you know they are the most in need and and we we kind of try to get them up to par quicker well

at least up to par with the top 50% that's under you know see what I'm trying to say here focus where the problem is the most acute because people are struggling like you look at some of these wages well when you got payra eights pay grade nines come on I mean it's good lord you know and and the other thing that Jerry did not put into any of his numbers. It's what Greg last year would call your pennies from heaven, your lit supplemental, right? You never know if you're going to get that. So, that's not included in any of these projections, which is why I don't want it included any to help you

counting on it. you know, if you do get it in 26, reserve that for pay raises in 27 to help you hit maybe your 2% or maybe your 3%. And Jerry, that that is a that local income tax supplemental distribution from the state to the county is based on whether or not the income within our county and all of our county residents is above what is predicted by the state or below what is predicted. That's the 15% fund that payable says 15%. So if that that balance that the state keeps the trust account [snorts] balance is over 15% then they'll give you a one time distribution. So I mean Jim on the economic front right I mean so it's kind of an economic you know there's an indicator there like the economy is good we may get more if the economy is not great we may not get as much of the supplemental right and so I think

yeah and I think the assumption going forward in the next you know next two or three years next year you know I'm you could say the market's overvalued now you could make the argument the market's overvalued but if you look at all the stuff the current administration is doing. And when that stuff begins to kick in and the amount of money that they got capital that's pouring into this country, u then the wage base, we we want to lift the wage base to offset the inflation that we've had over the last four or five years. So that so that would help us from a revenue standpoint two year two year three kind of we'll see

you should see an increase in revenues which will help our income tax and which then to me to tie it down if that income tax then does come up right because the wages are rising then what's it called what's this what's the term non-farm income no no no [laughter] that'd be me nonfarm no the this the the the department of revenue hangs on a 15%. Yeah. Yeah. And so what hap just so that this educational so so if you're in a rising labor cost are rising which means we're collecting more income tax right

then that affects that subpole that they've been hanging on to and then that's when they cut the check back to the county for the excess. That's how that works. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Another pennies from Evan Constant [cough] big variable we have is our 4700 fund. I'm just curious how that would play into this new [snorts] I just Jerry and I just talked about that and because we pulled 700 grand out additional out of the economic development fund. Okay. And so he's got in 27 I didn't mean to talk over you. No, you know, you're fine.

Okay. It on the 1112 economic development in 27 we've got the same funding for the 4700 account into that economic what's a million1 total and and we're still you know we're not burning down the reserves completely. Jim, what's a million one? It's we're pulling keep in mind you know we've got what is it 2.7 million 2.8 8 million for group medical for 2026. Budgeted. Yeah, I know it's budgeted, but we're not going to spend all that. I hope not. I hope not. You don't spend all kind of claims you're getting at the end of the year. Yeah, I I think we will have we [laughter] we are at Yeah, I know. We knocked on. We could potentially

Let's not count on Let's not count on 56. Was it 56? I think you said something like that. Yeah. Yes. That's great. Yeah. So we don't know if in this December it's really

the only thing I guard because keep in mind I guard everybody on the previous you know life before 2023 when I first got here reading looked at me and said go do a deep dive on group medical because that's our biggest risk as a county. So, I went in and did my deep dive. And it was during that deep dive that I discovered what had happened is the council had been running five to six 700,000 negative carryover balances. So, they did they wouldn't go in [laughter] and pull the money out to true that up to get it back to zero. So, necessarily we just continued to run negative balances.

And so, so we had to go in. So we went in and then the only thing that bailed us out in 23 was somehow from heaven. We had most student bucks, [cough and clears throat] right? And it bailed us out. And so the only thing I ask going forward if we do run into reserves in the black and the 4700 let's please not underfund group medical for the next year because you got too much in reserves. Yeah. Please don't do that. Cuz on the flip side of the coin, also keep in mind the rainy day the rainy day is still sitting at 278,000.

And to me, you know, for me, as far as priorities are concerned, you know, it's it's it's get us back to AAA rating. Try to keep our expenses at, you know, at, you know, based try to keep the county's expenses in line with the consumer price index. Okay? Build our cash reserves. get ourselves to the point to where we don't have to use the credit card for for capital improvements and then be in a position let's stabilize the tax rates where we're not there's no pressure for us to increase taxes and I think if we do that then when we talk about you know let's you know serve the people well the definition of serving the people is making sure that there's a high probability that their county taxes and the expenses are going to stabilize and there's no surprises, right? Because

with with the bond though, one thing to think about is think of the expenses we have at the jail. Oh, I'm okay with that. Yeah, I'm okay with that. If we eliminated the bond all together, we're not going to be able to eliminate it all together. All of that expense from the bond, they would go into this and we'd be if we had four, five, six million in a rainy day fund, we could do it. Well, let's get Jerry back on track. We got to get out of here at noon. Yeah. Yeah. Another [clears throat] 26.

Yeah, we were told that would be a go. [clears throat]

You can't see. So that's [clears throat] [snorts] being discussed. Right. It makes sense from the fraud avoidance issue. Think of other counties and what have happened. Somebody owns a piece of property, sells it to the county. I think it's to avoid that. We got a buddy in the county to give us half a million bucks. [laughter] So, [clears throat] so [snorts]

yeah to two I mean Susan's point like we don't have supplemental in there. we can make adjustments. Um if you guys as far as our assumptions on salary increases or you know the supplies [laughter] [cough and clears throat] if if you if you do implement this you know for you know 2026 I think 26 you know it should be pretty good because you'll be able to use you know cash things like that but going in to 2027 I as long as there's an understanding that other areas outside of pay might need to be cleaned up and then on top of that which is maybe even more important is department heads understanding that and I'm not saying that this is what they do but [cough] come back because that that changes these projections drastically.

Well, Jerry, on that point, just to reiterate, the way we help the department heads plan for their budget is to inform them of the bud, their budget, and educate them on that, provide that information so that we don't end up with a, oh, I didn't know this was happening kind of situation. And so we've got to shore up that reporting to both department heads edic and the council so that [snorts] we can all kind of see hopefully this is coming way further in advance you know just like don't get me wrong there's going to be addition I mean departments are going to there's going to be something that happens that is not under the control so I'm not saying that I just want everybody to understand that the assumptions that we have in our projections could change depending on the amount of additions and things that pop up which that may be the case even if we weren't looking at this salary study. I mean so

so is this kind of like we've got we want to be able to give everybody a little bigger slice of the pie and but we got to find more money so we can buy some more pie because we don't have enough pie. So because it's if we talk about just using the metaphor of pie, if you got x amount of people and everybody gets, you know, a pie definitely typically what divided up in eight slices, right? Everybody gets an eight slice. But Jim, there the council said we're not interested in making the pie bigger. Well, so how do you do that?

Well, then the other not everybody's going to get piece of pie. Maybe maybe the other the other issue, you know, and I'll get shot, criticized, gaslight, and stonewall over this next statement is, you know, if you've only got so much pie and you want enough people to make sure they get their fair slice of the pie, then you're going to have to limit yourself to how many people are there to eat at the table. Okay? And it's to me to me that's just my own personal level. You know what I mean? There's so much pie. Get some people some more pie. And if we don't have enough don't have enough money to buy more pie, then we're going to have to reduce the amount of people that don't

doesn't get it. If they don't get any pie, right? Yeah. And then the last the only other question I've got to add that I'm is Julie when I think you know and then first of all you guys I want to thank all the work that you've done. You guys done a fabulous job. Thank you very much Jay for the work that you've done. Same thing for you Susan. Um But now if y'all decide to implement this true up approach for 2026, how difficult is that going to be for Kim to implement this? Cuz that appear for me I definitely going to be time consuming. Yeah. Um she's she's probably going to have a few late nights and a few weekends.

That's going to be a big hurdle. Did you say Kim our our our benefit? Yeah. Yeah. It is going to be quite a challenge. Oh yeah. Because you got to get and then other thing too just so [laughter] [clears throat] stipens are gone if we do this. Correct. Correct. Let clear that up. Let her explain this. Let's get Jerry back on track. I was going to say I mean if you want to flip to that Excel spreadsheet that you have up there, you can. [clears throat] PDF or the Excel PDF would be great. He's getting

hungry, right? I mean, there are some things obviously to clean up like I need a resolution number in here, but like you can kind of scroll on down just a little bit. And this is so Yeah, this is really Can you speak up just a little? Yeah. because of all that noise out there. All that noise out there. This is important you guys. Yeah. Sorry.

So, this is kind of your whisk like proposal, right? This is moving everybody's description and pay grades instead of your one through 32, right? Putting them in as a comma a or c a pat or c a check things like that. Right? So kind of implementing that WHIS um factor evaluation system, right? And so any person moving into these positions or new hires would fall under these classifications with that pay grade that you see there, right? Um but then we I do go ahead and detail underneath of this because if I like you said if they are already above that amount in what they are making with the county you guys have said we do not want to reduce someone's salary that is not the goal here. Um and so they have stayed in their place, right? So we've made some some kind of exceptions through here in that and that's where we get to again trying to get everybody into that classification up to the highest level of pay that's in there. And so the person if they're at the highest level, they may be sticking at their pay rate for a couple of years because technically according to whiz, they're overpaid for that position right now. Now, nobody thinks they're overpaid, and I'm not saying anybody is overpaid, but that's just what our independent person has suggested

compared with other counties and municipalities. People who are on the low end of the scale, right? Um, and so like I'm trying to think what more it it does with light does get rid of stipens, right? because that's really throwing you guys off a lot except for merit deputies, jailers, and dispatchers because and statemandated. What you have said [clears throat]

state we've said yes. Let her finish. She's going to get into that said in your meetings is that those stipens are dependent upon the doc holds. Yeah. And so they got they we need to keep those DOC holds in order to be able to pay for those stipens. And so and if they don't if that money quits coming in that goes away. Okay. [laughter] I knew that was going to Do you realize we have nothing documented on that at all in in the minutes? No, we don't. We talked about it in our in our minutes.

Okay, Judy. What I'm talking about is specifically documented a document that spells that whole DOC thing out. If it's in our minutes and recorded, that's a legal document. Julie, I'm Judy. Sorry. Wait a minute. Judy. [laughter] Judy. Stay with me. Oh my god. I'm talking about specifically. Okay. Do you know I'm going to jump in because it's in this proposed salary ordinance. It states it in here. Okay. spells out. This will be a document. So, if you scroll down Yeah, I haven't had time to look at it.

Yeah, I know because it was late last night. If you scroll down to these um jail, sheriff, whatever comes close, dispatch. [cough] Going to be a [clears throat] statement here. Go on down. Siphons for dispatch employees are contingent upon Department of Corrections holds that are housed at the Brown County Jail. Jim, can you add a detail and get that back to Susan because I know you [laughter] is that enough detail for you? I'm assuming the sol Yeah. This just didn't exist until you created it. Okay. So, you're happy with this? So, we detailed that with [clears throat] employees, with the sheriff employees, with the jail employees. So, that that way, right, it is documented, right? It doesn't technically say how much though. I mean, Jim, are you okay with that or Well, the stipens are spelled out.

Yeah. Are they down there? I don't They there that's so I would scroll on down to the page 47 which gets she explains it. She explains it. It is data on the right side of the spreadsheet. Um and so those are the stipens that were in place for this year right um and it's spelled that way so it is detailed for 911 and jail and sheriffs Susan. Yes. just between you and everybody that's on the YouTube [laughter] world. I'm getting cursed. I expected doll.

Yeah. And Judy, my my objection to first of all, the challenge with it is that we don't have anything in writing. The county council does not have a policy has never had a policy on stipens. Number one. Number two, you know, do stipens ever expire? Number three. Will you let her finish? [laughter]

If you let me finish so I can transitions back. Okay. Because this is a complicated issue. All right. Is that the the the the So there's no policy on stipens when they exist, when they don't. Number two is that the challenge with the stipen issue is that once you give an employee this pay and they get used to getting that pay every two weeks and that's what they're basing their livelihood off of and then all of a sudden you know last year we waited forever before we got any sort of reimbursement from the doc. We'll just assume that will probably be the same thing going forward too. Well, and so the challenge with it is is that the reality of it is is the county council I'm in there's no way in the world I would ever want to go back and take this income away from that employee period because they're used to we gave it to him right at the tune of $183,000 a year at issue. The thing that I took issue with is that there was never any specific written documented formula of how they arrived at the individual. Each individual was going to receive. Okay? There was no formula. There was no nothing. It just says here this person gets this amount. This person gets this amount. This person gets this amount. And that's not in writing. And then the other thing that we don't have in place is there's nothing that spells out that how often that we as a council should review where we are from a cash flow standpoint on on receivables from the DOC, you know. So when I say documentation, that's the level of documentation I'm talking about. I'm not talking about, you know, some motion or something that they've made in the minutes, but to where a document that you can literally go back to and it spells everything out line by line of the line. So there's no confusion. There's no misunderstandings and you don't run create more problems for yourself in the future. We did get the chart and the breakdown from sheriff

[snorts] on that. Correct. Has that been entered as they didn't give us the breakdown. They just gave us the amounts. Yeah, they didn't give us they gave us the amounts. We had the we had the we had the summary from the sheriff presented to us. Yeah. So what is represented here? That would be probably with the um minutes that was taken and we did vote to adopt that at one point. So we have that document. Where is that document with the I don't know if they recorded it at all. Okay. So we we have documentation on it. I don't know if it's spell out how they're doing how they're calculating

because I don't remember calculating any of the I just remember it saying this is what we are going to get from this person from this amount right I don't remember them actually going through and giving a [clears throat] um they didn't and and Julie just to reinforce it earlier this year I was first quarter second quarter

uh for goodness sakes I spent every bit of four or five hours in your office with Heather Ford before she went to the treasures. And we literally sat there that day and Heather and I had to go through every pay period, every pay period, pay period by per period to back in to calculate to figure out where we were with regards to how much additional stipens we've given above and beyond. And and it was it was a lot of work. Well, I know she has worked on some stip stuff too here. So, I think so this Look at this document.

This number represents not longevity but does it represent stipens you can follow only it. So what is on the screen is a result of your WIS study that [snorts] classification study where they detailed out base salary longevity stipens total compensation. So you know [snorts] um this positional so far right I'm trying to do some some quick math here right like for example you know what would be your

read the numbers to me I'll add them up for you or yeah cooks at the jail they're a sixle right um which is just under $37,000 in a base salary with their longevity and siphons total actually without longevity with their segment total compensation was was just under $41,000. This puts them at an LTC1 puts them at $41,600 without longevity including a 2% increase or 3% increase. No, no, no, no increase. That's in terms of a salary. This is this is trying to get everybody to this internal base. That's where this is. So this is the whisk concept that we're seeing in Jerry's thing.

Yeah. Yes. Whis light right here. Jerry used these. This is not what we approved in the budget. No salary. Right. Right. Right. So this is not what we approved in the budget. No. No. You're not going with this. You haven't approved a salary ordinance for next year. what they put in their budgets were what they paid this year because that's what they were instructed to do. Correct. Right. That's what you took everybody down. [cough and clears throat]

So, taking into account what you approved in your budget and potentially looking at light, that's where Jerry's calculations, what he just went through. All of that together is where we get to correct. Well, I'm numbers. Do they represent stipens? Do they represent stipens in there? Well, for that example for the Yes. We're we're moving that person to a pay grade and a salary that gets them what their base pay was in 25 plus what their stipen was. So, how do we we don't have a stipen anymore for them? It's rolled in.

Stipen goes into their pay. It goes into Well, for this example, we would have to talk to the sheriff because this is in the jail, right? This person's in the jail. Their stipen is the DOC stipen. [clears throat] Wasn't that the discussion? If that goes away, then we have to carry it and be responsible. We never talked about you going to carry it. We never said we were going to carry it. But the thing of it is if you put that in their pay, you're going to have to carry it. And it won't have anything to do with the DOC money. Jim's bumping pop over here. We better And everyone's hungry. Jim is hungry. He's already said that twice. No, I'm having fun. He's He's eating brownies. I'm having fun. Julie, uh DOC money. U What doc comes in twice a year?

It goes into a fund, right? Okay. What fund does the DOC money go into? A DOC fund. We made one. Pretty much. Yes. [laughter] All right. It is actually fun. Okay. What can we can and can it drops into the general fund? I think it goes into a DOC revenue line. So it goes into the general fund, right? Like let's clear that into your general fund, but a DOC revenue line so she can track the revenue coming. But it's still in the general fund. Okay. All right. Revenue part of this. So hey, so Julie and Susan and Jerry the experts. Okay. I'm just, you know, I'm a surf. I'm a peasant. So as a peasant,

you don't know what you don't know. That's right. Don't know what I know. He's consciously well unconsciously incompetent. Thank you. Right. So that DOC money when we get that reimbured re reimbursed reimbursed goes into the general fund. You track it through the line item. Yeah. Right. So the issue is really is whether or not the jail continues to try to maintain that revenue source. Yep. That's the issue. That is the issue. That is really the issue. That is the big issue. Okay. So, as I sit here and all I'm doing is thinking out loud is if that's the issue, then boy, I'd really love to get rid of the stipens completely all the way across the board. How do you keep

We all do. Well, that's a separate issue. That's a separate issue. Why you can't get rid of them? This is a carrot. Well, count a minute. Hang on a minute. Are we going to take that away from him? What's the probability of us sitting up going, "That's the carrot. We ain't giving you that. 83 anymore. Forget it's not up to the sheriff had an agreement that he would I understand doc and get that revenue that revenue. Hold on. Let me finish that. Hold on. Let me I'm getting to that. Darren's on your too. [laughter] No, I'm not. I'm trying to explain something. Sure. These are good. So, we have we have that money coming in. That money is to be used for stipens for the deputies to bring them up. [clears throat] If that goes away,

that stipen goes away. The agreement. It was the agreement when we establish because we can't afford it. We don't go away. I don't I don't Oh, I see what you're saying. You're saying what you're saying do not house doc. Yeah. That puts us deeper in the red because then they back off and don't want to do the occupancy rate on jail. Well, which means that stipen goes away because that stipen is it's no different than if you hire people with a grant and a grant goes away and county council says, "Well, when the grant goes away, Joe Blow goes away." It's been said for years now.

So, let me ask you a question. How do you put the heat on the on the sheriff to keep the occupancy rate up in the jail to keep the DOC money? The answer is if it goes if if if you won't have any employees, you won't have any money. All right. He won't have any employees. I'm just I'm just saying it out loud. That was the whole That's the carrot. All right. That was part of the agreement from the beginning. But you I agree too. You won't have any employees. Yeah. Your people. That's correct. That's that's an So that but that's the carrot to keep that going. It is an issue. But if you put it into the pay then you're you're risking the I mean he's just he could just say

let me ask let me ask another question. Can the council go in and take money out of another fund that goes to the sheriff's department and take it away to reimburse us and stick it in the general fund to offset the fact that his occupancy rates dropped. Can you unilaterally do that? The answer is no. Can we legally anyway do it? [laughter] No. I mean again because that would be a threat, right? New dolls will be coming out, right? coming out. You know, um there there are user fee funds. I'm you know, your reporter pays most of her budget out of record perpetual. I understand that, right? She's supposed to,

right?

Fantastic job for the county. Um there are other use agency funds that [clears throat] maybe there needs to be discussion with elected officials and department heads about hey we're really trying here. Can you help us by shifting some things over to your user fee funds? Right? Not saying that it has to be that way forever, but maybe to get through these growing pains here of trying to get people in the right salaries, you know, that's a conversation that you have, right? Um, but it it's conversation. Um, it's not this is our heavy hammer and what we're going to do because there are particular uses for some of those user refunds, right? So, some things can't be whatever. Right. Right. And and those elected officials and department heads know their user fees and what they can use those monies on.

That was the discussion we had. We said if you want to raise their salaries, go earn it basically for for the sheriff's department jailer. Right. We don't have the money. Go ear. unless we gave them the opportunity and then says, "Okay, if you want to go do it, go do it." But some of that they have no control over. The question on this then was sometimes they don't have control over. That's right. Sometimes DOC says, "We're coming in, we're spending too much money. We're going to grab every every prisoner in here and take them back to a DOC facility."

But there again, if we're upping everybody and and this whistle was done to give them a reasonable amount of pay, the best that we can. So if quote if the stipens went away and you took the money away, if I'm if I'm understanding correctly, Brad's already losing two more deputies in the very near future for better pay. So if we can't give a reasonable pay and we can't say, "Well, crime is less. That means nothing. Go ahead and stay here in Brown County." You're going to lose your employees. I was under the understanding and maybe I was the only one that we would institute this stipen and then eventually we would absorb that just like everybody else. Maybe I maybe

there was talk of if we can get public safety money from the state for the park and that would go to replace the do but if you go if we get extra money extra compensation from the state to cover our emergency services that we use for the park that was that was a conversation wind keepers tax neither one work gate fee is reasonable for maybe next year. So now, yeah, this year we're looking to see what we can get through legislature. What I think

so the agreement was we are going to try to get compensation from the state for our public safety that we use on half of our property that we can't tax,

right? The state is going to try, we we're trying to get some kind of compensation to the tune of a4 million dollars to help us offset our public safety expenses. What we did in the meantime was Brad found sheriff found revenue [clears throat and cough] from from housing doc that gave us what 184,000 a year whatever it was. So we said whatever money you bring in from that, we will use that to divide up among the the the sheriff's department employees to bring them up to a higher rate higher wage.

If that DOC money goes away, we do not have it in the general fund to cover it. So if the DOC revenue goes away, those stipens go away because we don't have the money for it. So there we then we have another unless we can get something from the state to help us compensate them based on having to have such a having to maintain our level of emergency services because we have two million extra people in the park. Yeah. So that that was the agreement. And just remember as a side note that [clears throat] jail deputies and dispatch

there are 43 47 people depending on what day of the month it is. It's going to fluctuate but that is the single largest expense in the county for personnel expenses period. I mean hands down it's it's expensive. I would like to hear your thoughts. Yeah. Yeah. Please. cuz I got to go. I got Well, I I wanted to clarify one thing, too. I'm not picking on the prosecutor. I'm not either. I just think that everybody needs to help be held the same standards and not just, you know, having had to manage grants,

I know what is required and the reporting that goes back and forth and it was on my head. wasn't wasn't on the audience. No. Yep. Go ahead. Sorry. So, I mean I think by Scott

by Scott this will eventually roll into right is holding DOC prisoners will be the norm. Right. Before 2025 this was not the norm. So holding DOC prisoners will be down. And is there fluctuation in that? Yes. But unless Brown County elects a jerk of a sheriff, I think any incoming sheriff is going to maintain only guilty prisoners. And so I do think eventually these these stipens that that you're seeing still in 26 to be paid to these people because of EOC I do think eventually you're going to be able to absorb those into your base pay

eventually. Do I think it happens in 26 or 27? Probably not. Like we have to get through there. Um but again just you know if it is the expectation that DOC holds will continue and you know it it's choose your people wisely but in the in the salary have we have we specifically um stated the amount of the study I'm showing you that right now it is in data it is there this is how you

it's in data to the side. So if you want a separate agreement with the sheriff that says these are the exact rights I agree I think we do need to show that that's fine yeah it's fair and the one that she's just there save money so at least for a year or two we may need to show the stipens until we can supplement in some other form yeah something else one step we have taken is to put parks into CBC so we have maybe a little more money to be available. Did you want to say something? I don't know.

No, no. I'm just to answer the question. It's 180,000. Yeah. 183 actually. So that's that's the risk, right? And what I was thinking is you might want to think about doing an options and exposures list because you're talking about the 911. If you have an option and exposures at the this process, then you'll be looking at it every month. That option hasn't happened. That exposure hasn't happened. So, that this is a key one, right? Um and and I'm going to go back since I I was involved a long time ago when the jail was built. Buck sold the size of the jail on housing DOC. So, that was always the intent. We didn't need that big of a jail.

You're exactly right. Really? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. You're exactly right. Tada. Tada. Now, and that was my my comment and and I I absolutely love our sheriff's department. I love everybody in that department. Me, too. But, you know, you talk about it in seven. So, why haven't we been housing them until now? Well, the problem if if if I only have to watch three people and now I have to watch five, right? What am I going to do? It's just human nature, right? Right. So I think I think what what what the proposal is is to keep this out there so people know from months it came and then once they get used to the fact that that was always the plan Yeah.

then then integrate it back in. You know it was always the plan. It was always it was Yeah. Yeah. Can't we literate those rooms for overnight short-term stay and put inkeepers tax on? I [laughter] I didn't want to I didn't want to tear it down the old I figured we could run out and the old jail. Do are we going to need a vote before I leave? No, I think that I think that we have very good support like unless and I don't want to take a vote but Scott,

right? I know. So, so you will have two options. Um, if you want to implement WIS light, right, and I know you guys want to look at it still because it was a a moving target for quite a while. Um, and I would suggest your list of places that you are the council contact for, go have a chat with people, right? Um but if we want to implement WIS light because it is obtained from the current pay that we see for people and that and that the auditor's office is paying on payroll it would we would have to approve it unanimously at your Monday night.

No I actually right now I mean I you know looking at the math you know I'm okay We kept no cola for 25 or excuse me for 26, right? And one of the logic or the reason behind that is that what we did is we were able to capture that amount of money that we would have spent in 26 on cola. Well, an issue is is well, we didn't spend that. Well, okay, because we didn't spend that. Now, had we have done 3% cola, but we didn't do it. And so, that places us in a position to implement the the fees light,

right? Is what it allows us to do. Yeah. Okay. And an issue to me is the timing of it. making sure that Julie and Kim and have time to kind of do the prepare work to to get work with you to figure out how much time is that going to take to try to get that implemented when the I think the I don't want to the implementation is really critical and so to me making a decision now is we're I think we all probably I'm going to assume we all probably agree this is where we want to get to the fees light and an issue is how soon can we get there

and how do we how do we implement it? What's that process look like and be very thorough and make sure we don't make any mistakes blah blah blah. I think we could change the pay and go forward that way and then during uh you know not we could we don't actually have to go in and like you know to get the other implic implemented as long as the pay is correct we can get we can take our time get it correct get it all in there implemented after that so because I'm over here thinking that you have to go in and like do all this data entry and change everything and just

you will have to do data entry, but I going in to change the pay will be the major thing and then we can go back in change all get all the pay. So to me I I would look for a recommendation from the auditor's office on what the timing would be good to how how do we implement this approach this new approach. Yep. She's already aware that if it goes into effect then we will be working right. So, so once you guys have kind of thrown the green light and said, "Hey, we're ready. We're we're locked and loaded, ready to implement this." Then we can then simply Right. That's good to hear. You're ready to go January one. Correct. Basically, yeah. You hear that, Jim? January 1. She said January.

We know what's going to have to happen. What about Well, if if that's true, then do we we don't have this is an ordinance. This is the new salary ordinance. You still need a little bit of time because we paid you to do a 2025 salary or earn. Now, we're paying you to do a 2026 new one. Brand new revamped one. She's got it done. So, right. Yeah. I have two versions going. I know you got two versions. And so the reality is is you you're going to need a little bit more time to polish up the the fees version, right? I there there are still a couple of questions that I have on on my spreadsheet. Right.

Okay. Okay. And so how soon then would you be prepared to to to for us to be able to pass this ordinance? If you say yes, you want to hear it on December 15th, it will be ready on December 15th. So you're going to have it ready? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, there we did all that this week actually. Do we just absorb them? No. Go away except for Except for DLC. The sheriff except for the sheriff. Everybody else goes away. But I'm But the sheriff still stays. Yes. Yeah. Sheriff has to stay. Have the stipen the existing siphons for other employees? [cough] [clears throat]

That's what I'm going to confirm. Right. What has calculated here is I do think they use that to calculate the internal base. I think they did because I think I asked him that question. I think that's what they're into so that nobody

nobody loses a stipen and has a decrease. and understand there are certain ones that will stay in and I wouldn't necessarily call them stipens but like in your assessor's office, you know, based upon the level of certification, they get a supplement in pay. But if the if it's a level three, they, you know, get $1,500, but then if that person leaves the county and somebody else comes in without that level of certification, they don't get that. So base pay is base pay, but those certifications are separate and are in addition to any base pay, right? Yeah, the certification certifications are different. They're not what we did with what like take the assessor's office for example.

We gave them we gave each employee $1,000 stipen because they got rid of a $30,000 a year program and took that upon themselves. Right. So because of that reduction, we're like, okay, we can we'll bump you a thousand. So that stipen rolls into their base and going forward that pay will work its way up to the baseline of the fs across the will be like a real business kind of really I appreciate you letting me one more strip club

is is you're standardizing our employees with all of the other county employees Because up till now, okay, a employees wage has been dependent on how well that employee can negotiate with their boss and with everybody else. So if somebody's really good at lobbying about [laughter] how important they are and and and gets to the right people, I know I [snorts] know you wouldn't be influenced, but you know, gets to the right people, all of a sudden I'm making $10,000 more doing less of a job, right,

than somebody else. And and you know, I made a comment and I used the word toxic. I I've felt for a long time, this office has to be terrible to work in. Yeah. And then what happens with on that then is the other employees say, "Well, they got more." So you got this constant conflict and you have nothing concrete you can go back to and say, "Crect. That's what we're trying to fix. This is a new foundation, right? This is a new foundation. It's the fairest method possible."

And if you and if you feel that that you're not qualified, you know, that you're not getting treated fairly, make the argument of, "Oh, how come you're different than any other cand?" Well, except Jerry thinks we're gonna be bankrupt in 27. I think necessarily say that I know I'm just I'm not a little bit tired. I'm just saying we are pushing ourselves into a little bit of problem [cough] to be and that's projections based on if we make no changes.

I thought you guys were working on a deal where we could issue treasury debt. [laughter] You get your customers. Get your money down. Get your buy in from your elected officials this year to help. Yeah. Just to nip this in the bud. I I'll go out on a limb here. I'll support the 15th. Okay. If that's you know I don't know where I don't know where Scott is. Where I mean would you support it? Well, yeah. We were on a Judy is going to We already discussed that. Are you guys You guys support it. The two outliers where we were wondering about you and wondering about Scott. I'll support it. We got the four votes.

The question we got to do it that day. Yeah. So, so you'll have it prepared and then it's just just the educational some of these ordinances. So, you bring that on the 15th. You have the first streeting. We vote. It's got to be unanimous. We have to vote unanimous. You support it. Oh, we do. Otherwise, we're trying. Yeah, the risk program to make everybody fair. That's how that works. It really does. The best we can do today was advertising. This got so confusing. But I was at the meeting to do this. Five of you here. Pass it on first reading and we could pass it as amended on second reading. I'd rather go ahead because there are going to be some amendments.

So we could pass it on first reading now. You you technically can. Why don't we do that? Because Scott and Judy have had the So then you'd have to have four people go against it on the 15th. Correct. So if we can pass it, why don't we just do it now so we're missing two? We're missing two council members. Yeah, but they were at the meeting with they were part of the committee. Yeah, we can take care of it on the All right. I think totally got to be unanimous. Are you saying no? I mean, if we don't, I mean, we could two days later have a special session. Yeah, but okay. The odds are I mean, the way it sits now.

The issue is is why not lay the groundwork now to get it passed on the 15th rather than say, "Okay, we didn't get the unanimous on the 15th. We got to now meet before the 1st or whatever." It's been in the past because of optics, I guess. Because what's optics? where we we have two. I don't Well, just like you just said, there's enough of you sitting here right now to where if you needed to do a second meeting, you could do a second meeting. Let's vote. Make a motion. I would get it amended, have it good and ready to go on the 15th. Do a vote on the 15th.

Right now, we're looking like we've got the unanimous unanimous vote to do the second reading on the 15th. If we don't have a unanimous vote on the 15th, we have to do a second reading. We could set up a special session two days later, come in here and make a second vote on it. That's what I'm just saying. But why do you know where it's going to go? Transparenc ethically, I think we should say that solution is a valid solution. I agree it is. I agree it is. I don't ethic ethically. I would like to do I would like to do it more [cough] and [clears throat] simpler. Okay. Where there's no question.

All right. No question. Yes. I love you to death. I really do. I really understand where you're coming from, brother. I really do. I appreciate it. Got all the empathy in the world. But I'm like, we've talked about this, right? I think we've thoroughly vetted it. So therefore, I'd like to make a motion a motion that we pass this proposed ordinance. We already we already we already established I second. Correct. I basically what you're saying is do a first reading right now. Yeah. Yeah. And I second amend it. Yeah. Yeah. Right. We can put that in the motion. I don't like it. I don't know. But so I'm going to make a motion and then

I second Gary and I got a second there. All right. So you're making a motion to to just actually you got to read the ordinance. You got to read the ordinance. I know. And I don't know the ordinance. Do I need to redo my motion? Because I've never made a motion before. And the ordinance number uh 2025. Well, it says 2026 here. But yeah, but that's for 2026. Your ordinance number for this year. Ordinance number 2025. 2025 and since we're doing your first reading today will be today [clears throat] be 12-124 uh 001

we already have 0000

ordinance number 2025-12-04-001 therefore be it or Brown County it's Brown County salary ordinance 2026 therefore be it ordained that the Brown County Council hereby adopts the job classification for all classified positions in the county employment and fix the compensation of all officers, deputies, and other employees of Brown County, Indiana as per applicable step increases for the calendar year 2026. Regular full-time county employees are considered to be subject to the Federal Fair Labor Standards Act unless otherwise hearing is excluded or exempt. The county council was deemed inappropriate to award additional compensation to certain employees and elected officials. Longevity bonus in courts of the resolution number. Anything yet to be determined?

Resolution. like to have this button up better. We can do that. I thought you said we needed to button up our breast procedure. [laughter] Never mind.

I'll continue reading until we get the resolution number amending and clarifying employee longevity bonus adopted by December 19th, 2016. and amended is resolution number 6, 2021-11-15-002 and November 15, 2021. That get us to where we need to be. Employees, you got the resolution number. No. No. So far, nobody's been able to send it to me.

All right. Employees receiving longevity pay will be paid $100 for each year of completed service with Brown County as of January 1 of each calendar year. The employees that are eligible are full-time and permanent part-time employees and full-time elected officials except council, the commissioners, the sheriff, the matron, and merit officers. The pay grade annual salary is calculated on 2080 normal hour year. Part-time hourly rate is not to exceed $16 per hour at the distribution of the elected official or department head as set out by approval of the Brown County Council in June 2022. Emergency call out pay shall be awarded awarded administered as set out in exhibit A attached here too. All new employees may be hired at 90% of salary for the position held for the first 90 days of employment at the discretion of the department head or elected official. All payments made pursuant to this ordinance are contingent upon the strict compliance with an adherence to salary administration benefit fiscally related state and federalmandated requirements of the Brown County personnel policy handbook. It is the intent of the county council that it its language will encourage compliance with personnel policy which may have a fiscal impact on county government. The county auditors responsible for auditing all claims [clears throat] against the county to ensure that they are in proper form are duly authenticated as required by law are in accordance with contract or statutory authority and are correct. County auditor shall not issue warrants of compensation that are not supported by the terms and conditions specified in the seller ordinance. Positions labeled as excluded slashelected excluded slashchief deputy slashexcluded are exempt are not entitled to and shall not receive overtime compensation or compens compensatory time off. Refer to exhibit B for a full list of positions that are excluded or exempt. Overtime

pay shall be paid as detailed in the Brown County Personnel Policy Handbook. Holiday pay shall be paid as detailed in the Brown County Personnel Policy Handbook. Compensation is established for the job classifications identified by the Brown County Council. Any existing employee that transfers into any of these job classifications shall receive the compensation identified below. And any newly hired employee filling any of these job classifications shall receive the compensation identified below. The salaries identified are internal midpoint salaries if the current employee serving in certain job classifications receive more than the internal midpoint is the intent of the Brown County Council to maintain their pay at that level until all positions that classification meet that pay. Any difference in pay between employees in the same job classification is a result of different job duties being performed. Is that it?

Yeah. I mean, you don't have to go through and read [snorts] line by line everybody's right all of those things. Again, that next section is here's our internal midpoint, right? But yet, we do go in and detail in every office or every position whether they're at that internal midpoint or whether they're above that. And that's the difference in job duties then between employees until we get everybody up to that level. So we have read it. We have made the motion. We want to take a vote. Patrick was the your second. Yes. Yes. I Yes. [snorts] Joel. Yes. Patrick.

Yes. Gary. Yes. Darren. No. That's okay. Appreciate it. That's four to three. Well, this but now this means on the 15th we don't have to have a unanimous vote. Yeah, we're going to pass it on the 15th. Yeah. All right. I'm not I didn't want to do the vote today. Won't push the vote. No, that's

all right. Anything else? Motion to adjurnn. Can we go? I hope so. Motion to adjurnn. Second. Patrick's like, "You get me out of here." [laughter] Okay.

It's my you, Jim. Well played. [laughter] You got stuff. T.