Board of Supervisors Agenda and Minutes - Regular Meeting

Good morning, everyone. It's 9 AM. I'll call the meeting of the Dallas County Board of Supervisors to order and ask if there's a motion to approve the agenda.

Move to approve the agenda.

Second. Is there any discussion? All in favor, say aye.

Aye.

Aye. Motion carries. We invite you to recite the Pledge of Allegiance with us.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America.

Is there anyone that would like to speak in open forum today? We'll move then to item five on the agenda, which is consideration of our consent agenda.

I move approval.

I'll second. Is there any discussion? All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Motion carries. Item six are the supervisor's minutes for March 31st. Second, is there any discussion? All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Motion carries. And item seven are the payroll change notices.

Good morning. First, we have a change in hours for an employee in our sheriff's office. Then we have an end of employment for an employee in our sheriff's office and the requisition to backfill that position. Then the last is a receiving file for conservation for a forest park museum engine.

All right, any questions for Beth?

No. I move to receive and file for conservation.

Second. Is there any discussion? Hearing none, all in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye. Motion carries.

I move to approve the other payroll change notices presented.

Second. Is there any discussion? All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Motion carries. Move now to item 8, 8A, secondary road admin addition. And we'll just go down the list here, okay?

Okay. Good morning. I'm here for the pay application review and submission. I'll provide a construction update on each of the three active projects we got going. So this is at a secondary roads project. Over the past month, mechanical system startups ongoing, nearly wrapped up. Same thing with fire alarm finalization, access control system startup. That would be card control for doors. Final painting wrapped up. finalizing millwork and casework installation. We've done the punch list over at the garage, working on corrections over there, air compressor startup, mechanical systems been started up and finalized. And then outside on the site, Dallas County is actually using their own secondary rows employees for all the paving prep and the concrete paving. So they're getting started, I believe, today. The weather's kind of thrown them a wrench over the past couple of months. At the moment, the engineering department is getting ready to move up there and start working in their new facility on April 20th. Furniture installation has also been ongoing and wrapping up this week as well. If you go to the second page, I'll just run you through a few progress pictures so everybody can see what the space looks like. So upper left-hand corner is their future training room. This room will be kind of lined with tables like the training rooms here in this building. Upper right-hand corner is the front hallway. You can see the display cases on the wall as well as the reception counter. Lower left-hand corner is the new garage, so where they're going to have the roadside vegetation management program as well as their signage trucks. And then on the lower right-hand side is a picture of the lab that's inside of that garage where they do concrete testing and other materials testing for their projects. So if you go back to the first page. Contingency and we'll pull up the log here in a minute. We're at 35% remaining on contingency and about 11% remaining on allowances Any questions on that project

Good morning. Christopher Orth with Farnsworth Group. We have payment application number 16 for Turner Construction for the secondary roads addition and garage project for work completed through March 31 in the amount of $212,699.93. Chad talked through the work this month, the big ticket items this month. Actually, there aren't really any big ticket items. Probably the bigger ones were electrical work and plumbing and mechanical getting wrapped up and some general requirements and some general trades work. So if you continue on, Melinda, onto the next page. Yeah, this is the contingency log. And we had several expenditures this month. including some additional wall cabinet installations, some demo of some existing cameras, hammer mill relocation generator replacement battery. It was a refurbished generator, as I recall. Some quadplex outlets were added. Some resilient base was added in the garage lab and the garage. Again, as Chad mentioned, we've still got a fairly healthy balance of about 69,000. Is that right? 89,000 sorry my screen is not crystal clear this morning and then on to the next page is the design allowance and we had one expenditure on this path which is at the bottom of this sheet and that was for some additional logo work that was done in the garage I think you saw that in that bottom left picture so they put up a painted Dallas County logo on the wall on each side of that lab which has a nice effect in there so We would recommend approval of this pay application number 16 for Turner Construction, as I mentioned earlier, in the amount of $212,699.93. Thank you. Any questions? Is there a motion?

I would move approval of the Turner pay application number 16 in the amount of $212,699.93. Second. Is there any discussion? All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye. Motion carries. Let's move to 8B.

OK, so this is a courthouse renovation project across the street. Over the past month since we last met and provided an update, the state and county successfully moved into the level one areas that were completed. So that's magistrate and bench trial. And then the clerk of court department also moved down to their new space on first floor. Then, completing that move allowed us to take possessions of Level 2 and 3 to start the next phase of the work. So, we've started demo on both Level 2 and 3. Level 3 is in a little bit of a holding pattern while we work through some additional structural that needs to happen up there. Level 2 is full speed ahead. They have started framing the new walls. We've been working on in-wall rough-in, overhead rough-in. and everything associated with that. Another kind of minor note, JCS did move over to their new space since I think we last met at the 1st of March, so they're now at 121 9th Street, which again allowed us to grab full possession of Level 2. Safety, everything's been going good. Contingencies at 95%, and allowances are at 86%. Second page has a few pictures. So the top two pictures are kind of the finished spaces on level one if you haven't seen them. Upper left-hand corner is the new bench trial courtroom, and the upper right-hand corner is the new magistrate courtroom. And then quite the difference as you look down to the pictures on the bottom. Lower left-hand corner is what level three looks like, fully gutted. You can see there's a demising wall in there that's structural that we're working on. And then on the lower right-hand corner is what level two looks like, gutted. So we've actually started framing new walls in that space at the moment. So any questions on the courthouse project?

Chad, are we still on schedule for this project?

So... We are. When we added the level two courtroom, we adjusted the schedule. Level two was originally going to turn over at the end of July. With what we've discovered on level three, we've shifted focus to level two. Level two is actually running ahead of schedule because we kind of sent the crews down there because that's where we're open. Level three is gonna be sliding back but level two slides up and it's all kind of contingent on Getting a resolution to the structural issues that we encountered again It's a 1902 courthouse there was If you know the courthouse, you know that they've kind of taken the attic space in level four and finished that into a courtroom. So there's some walls on level three that we need to demolish to be able to accomplish the full jury courtroom that right now we can't demolish because it's holding up the attic space. So as long as we get that figured out, and I know Farnsworth is working diligently on it, and we are able to do some stuff up on level three, we just can't really go gangbusters up there while we figure this out. So once we get the plan figured out, we can take a look and adjust and advise accordingly.

Thank you. Other questions?

I will offer that we had our structural engineer on site on Friday, and he needs to do some additional investigation because what he discovered was not what he was anticipating. And so there's some coordination that will occur the fifth judicial in terms of schedule to be able to get his eyes in particular above the ceiling on second floor to see how third floor is supported above. So we'll be continuing to work through that diligently, and we're trying to accomplish that as quickly as possible, but we have to work through some coordination with the fifth judicial.

Mr. Tietz, don't we have some plans that should show that?

Yes, but I think, I'm not sure, has your structural engineer

laid eyes on those? What's been shared with us has been shared with our structural engineer. But it's very diagrammatic, and it's not comprehensive. It almost looks like there was multiple changes done over time because there's different structural systems that are being utilized. There's some wood framing. There's some steel framing. There's round columns. There's square tube columns. I don't want to say a hodgepodge, but there's kind of a variety of different things which leads us to believe that they weren't all accomplished in the same time frame. And so again, he really needs to kind of put his eyes on everything. And it's limited in how he's able to accomplish that with the finished space below.

All right. Thank you.

We do have pay application number 12 for Turner Construction for work at the courthouse renovations, period ending March 31, 2026, in the amount of $311,159.42. We do have some stored materials for the rail, the style and rail wood doors are being stored by Keystone, the general trades contractor. This month the large ticket items are that general trades. They've accomplished a fair amount in addition to the stored material And then some electrical work with with tri-city electric was the other big ticket item on to the Contingency log we had just two items there some miscellaneous ceiling tile and drywall touch-ups as well as some additional cleaning work accomplished on first floor and then On the allowance, we don't have any expenditures this month for the allowance. So we would recommend approval of this pay application number 12 for Turner Construction in the amount of $311,159.42. Is there a motion? I now for an approval of Turner's pay application number 12

in the amount of $311,159.42.

Second. Is there any discussion? All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Motion carries. 8C.

Yep, so the last project to add at the sheriff's office is the evidence storage and firing range project. Over the past month, some high-level items we've been working on, the pre-engineered metal building, which is the evidence storage component of this project. The structure's been completed. All the exterior roof and sidewall panels are complete as well. We've also been working inside the PMB, the evidence storage building on the interior insulation and liner panels. That's around 85% complete. Big month for concrete. We poured all the interior slab on grades as well as the firing range roof. So that's a poured deck up on the firing range component. Brick veneer, if you haven't driven by, you've seen that that is rapidly progressing. It's around 95% complete. We just got a small section of Waynes Cote to run on the north side of the firing range. We've been working up on the roof on parapet roof blocking. We've installed the five exterior windows at the evidence storage building on the west side. We started framing inside of both the firing range and the evidence storage building. So metal stud framing is in progress at the moment. Interior CME walls are in progress at the moment. We've also started this week on the bulk of the overhead MEP systems and the firing range. And then in the electrical room, we've installed the main distribution panel tub and have poured the housekeeping pads. Safety's been going good out there, really kind of cranking up the hours with all the concrete pours over the past month. Financially, we're also sitting well with 82 percent remaining in contingency and 65 percent in the allowance. So if you go to page two, a couple Pictures of the progress out there. So upper left-hand corner is kind of close. It was really muddy on the day this picture was taken. But if you drive by, you'll notice the west wall has been washed and cleaned. The south wall that is right next to it hasn't been, so you can really see the contrast and what it's going to look like when it's done. The west brick veneer, upper right-hand side is inside the evidence storage building. There's a mezzanine that goes in here for evidence storage and kind of lock up bins. So the metal stud wall that will carry the joist tails is getting framed. You can see that in that picture. Lower left-hand side is inside of the firing range. This was shortly after we poured the concrete floor. So you can see kind of looking downrange. And then up on the roof, In the lower right-hand side, you can see the concrete roof, which will get a roof over it. That's going to be starting on the 13th. And then you can also see the screen walls framing, so mechanical units for the ventilation. Inside the range, you'll sit behind those screen walls to kind of keep them out of view from traffic on Highway 6. So, any questions? Did I get it all? Sheriff, happy?

Any questions?

All right, we are in receipt of pay application number 13 for the Dallas County Evidence Storage and Firing Range Project from Turner Construction for work completed through March 31, 2026, in the amount of $1,253,001.40. Significant stored materials this month were for ventilation equipment for the range, as well as some stored doors, frames, and hardware. as well as some electrical stored lights and video surveillance equipment. The big ticket items this month were Jensen Builders concrete and pre-engineered building scopes, the masonry scope, the Northwest Steel steel erection, and a little bit for modern piping, plumbing, and mechanical work. If we go on to the contingency log, we didn't have any items this month in the contingency log. And we also did not have any items in the allowance log. So no expenditures there. Again, we have reviewed and recommend approval of this pay application number 13 in the amount of $1,253,001.40. Mr. T, do you have any comments?

I've reviewed all three of these, and I'm good with all of them.

Any questions? Okay.

Second. Is there any discussion? All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Motion carries. Thank you.

Thank you. Item nine are certificates of appreciation. Let's see. Should we go down?

We just have... Well, you only have one employee here who's up here. Mr. T. You might not need to go down this mark.

Okay, just one's here. Well, we would like to recognize Mr. Tietz at this time for 10 years of service. Mr. Tietz, if you'd like to come over here. Sure. Get your certificate. And get your picture taken.

Missing Julia. We are missing Julia.

So I'd be in the middle like this.

Yeah, you'd get in the middle, right? Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you very much.

We'll also recognize Nathan Heath, the Sheriff's Office, for five years of service. We'll give him a round of applause. Marla Williams, the EMS Department, for five years of service. And Kurt Cable, conservation department director. Kurt's not with us either, for 10 years of service. And Brad Kinsey, for the secondary road department, with 20 years of service. We have item 10 will open up. It's a child abuse abuse prevention proclamation and

Good morning, we are here representing the Dallas County Children's Advocacy Council. We have a $90,000 grant through Iowa Health and Human Services to provide sexual abuse prevention services as well as home visitation services for Adair, Dallas, Madison, and Warren. I have a couple documents to share with you regarding activities for April, and if I can have you share those with the board, the documents. Tomorrow we're doing a Lunch and Learn in Winterset that Crisis Intervention Advocacy Center will be providing. We encourage you all to wear blue Friday for our Wear Blue Day. Tomorrow night we're doing a movie night. in Perry for families. And then we have a lot of other activities happening for April. One of the things I know that the board asked about last time is regarding the number of reports. So I wanted to share that with you. Since the fiscal year FY26, there has been 556 reports for Dallas County. 371 of those have been accepted, and of those 556 reports, 263 of them are child abuse reports, which is 66.73 acceptance rate. And I can email that to Melinda, and can you share that with them? Would that be great? Okay. So again, we're here asking for Wearing Blue, We also would like to put a sign on the courthouse yard with pinwheels that we usually put it facing in the corner Would that be north east corner? and Also the signing of the proclamation that is presented before you for April Very good.

Do you have any problems with the? Pinwheel on the courthouse one Nor do I so That's approved Any action on the proclamation?

Did you want to recognize the young ladies you brought with you?

So these are staff from Crisis Intervention and Acquisition Center. I have Taylor and Nancy.

Great. I would move to approve the proclamation here for health abuse prevention and authorize our chair to sign.

Second is there any discussion Keep up the good work. We appreciate your efforts. Thank you all in favor say aye aye motion carries We have a 930 timed item, so we're just gonna pause for another minute or so and And then I'll open up that item I

I hadn't forgotten.

The clock's not right. That was the clock I looked at. We actually have another two minutes.

That's right. Yeah.

It's 9.30. Is there a motion to open the public hearing on the first reading of the proposed changes to Chapter 45, zoning ordinance regarding accessory dwelling units? Second. Any discussion? The public hearing is now open. David, maybe you'd want to just do a little brief overview.

Sure, absolutely. All right, well, this will be a series of updates to the zoning code over the next six months or so. We're trying to play catch up from some of the legislative changes that have happened at the state, as well as some of the court actions that have occurred over the last few years. The code has not really been brought up to date to reflect those changes, so this is really the first of a series of updates that you'll be seeing over, again, the next six months. This one specifically is regarding accessory dwelling units, or ADUs. They had a lot of names over the years, the granny flats, mother-in-law quarters. They've had a lot of terms over the years, but we're calling them ADUs. July 2025, so last year, the state passed a legislation that requires every city and county in the state to allow at least one ADU on residential property. So it's codified at the state. Cities and counties now need to update their codes to reflect those changes to make sure that the public is aware that they are an option in the cities and counties. In general, again, 180 unit, they may be attached, they may be detached, they may be internal like in a basement or attic space or some other combination of. They've set, the state has set a size limit of 1,000 square feet or 50% of the primary home, whichever is greater. And zoning, Local zoning cannot impose stricter standards in a single family home. So we can't have unique setbacks. We can't require it to be plated in gold if the primary house is not plated in gold. So it can really look and act any way it wants. So with the local regulations, we have created a definition, and I will read that just for everybody so we know clearly what an ADU is. An ADU means an additional dwelling unit that has been added or created within an existing single-family dwelling or that is attached from or an existing single-family dwelling on the same parcel, track, or lot of single-family dwelling. A modular or manufactured home may be permitted as an accessory unit. So we've created the definition. We've allowed it in every residential district that allows a single-family home. You can see those laid out there. We have created some design standards that are allowed in the state code that's 180 you per you per lot so you have your primary dwelling and you have your secondary dwelling. They have to have safe access to public right away. The way the code is written they have to have they have to utilize the existing driveway on the property. They may get a second entrance if the county engineer proves that second entrance, but they do have to go off the existing driveway. excuse me they have to provide parking accommodations RVs travel trailers and containers are prohibited with the container you can't just go plop a container on the property and call it an ADU it does have some minimum standards to be a unit bathroom kitchen area so yes you can do a container but it does have to be modified quite heavily you just can't plop one on and put a comment and call it good building permits are required obviously, and followed by a certificate of occupancy. So with that building permit, obviously, we have to make sure the septic is designed in a manner to be able to accommodate, the septic is able to accommodate the additional bathroom. We have had two public comments come in. The first one is from George and Kathy Kurnitis. There you go. They're requesting the minimum square foot limits for the ADUB within the Dallas County Code so that it's an appealable through the variance process rather than just reference to the state code. Previously, in my previous life, by previous jurisdictions, if it was just referencing state code, it was not an appealable standard for variance. So they'd like to see the variance. They'd like to see the size limits put into the code, and I'll talk about that in a second. Then Duke Owsler is requesting that parcels 10 acres or greater be allowed a minimum of 1,500 square feet or 50 percent of the primary dwelling for lots over 10 acres. So, again, state says 1,000 or 50 percent. We could obviously be less restrictive, so he'd like to see 10 acres have that little bit of an exemption allowed. And I'll talk about George and Kathy's request here in a second. Planning and Zoning Commission, they did hear this on December 17th and they did recommend approval of the ordinance as presented to you today. So talking a little bit about size, what is highlighted on the screen is how the code reads today. Accessory drilling unit size shall be permitted in accordance with Iowa Section 33.1.301. That is a state code that references size limits. Again, based on my previous communities, when we referenced state code, it was no longer an appealable standard to the variance process, local variance process. So we put that in there to essentially prohibit the number of variances available for this relief for like a larger unit. What the folks are requesting is basically an option to appeal that mechanism. Um so essentially they're asking for option two in the code. Um is to actually codify the size limits into our code of not to exceed 1000 square feet or 50% of the primary residents. So they would be able if they had a If they had a 1,200 square foot accessory dwelling unit they wanted to bring in, they could go through the variance process through the zoning board of adjustment and have that case heard and either approved or denied through the board, through the zoning board. So that's essentially what the applicants are asking. What Duke is requesting, of course, is just focused solely on him, is keeping the small lots just prohibited from a larger accessory dwelling. but allowing the larger dwelling units for larger land pieces. Fair for one, not fair for the other sort of thing. But that's essentially what he was asking for. Or ultimately, we could create an appealable standard for all lots. Anything in the smaller lots, they can go through the variance process. And the larger lots get a little bit bigger house. And they could still appeal that for even a larger house. They wanted to go 2,000 square foot on a 10-acre lot. The final option is just prohibiting it to say you get 1,000 square feet. or 50% of the dwelling unit. And then if you want to go larger, you have to go through a conditional use rather than a variance process. It's not as high a threshold to jump over a variance. You have to get to jump a little bit more. There's more items to have to go through, a little harder case to prove a variance than would be a conditional use. So this allows the exception for anybody that wants to go larger than 1,000 square feet to have an appealable route through the county. None of these would come back to the Board of Supervisors. They would all end at the Board of Adjustment. I know I threw a lot at you there with that last little bit, but that's what the residents are, some of their concerns they've expressed about the ordinance as written.

You say it would or would not come back to the Board of Supervisors?

It would not. Just go to the Board of Adjustment? The conditional use or the variance would end at the Board of Adjustment.

Any other comments?

No.

All right. We are in public hearing. Are there public comments at this time? If so, would you please go to the podium, identify yourself, and limit your comments to three minutes.

Good morning. I'm Kathy Curtinitis. We have 11 acres in Dallas County, and we have a single-wide trailer that we want to use. We have a big house on the property, but we have a son with six children that's going to move in there. We don't want to live there with cleaning that house. It's too big. So we'll go in the single-wide, but the single-wide is small on the inside, small enough to meet the requirements under 1,000 feet. but the outside dimensions are like 40 feet over. And this is a kind of a standard single wide. So if you don't allow a variance or any way for us to use a single wide, you're going to be eliminating the possibility of that standard size single wide for anybody in the county. And the trailers, the mobile homes are allowed by the law that Governor Reynolds signed specifically for the housing shortage to be addressed and for families to be multi-generational on the same property. I really like what the other one said, where if you have over 10 acres, you should be able to have a little bit larger house as a secondary, the ADU. I think that the spirit of the law that Governor Reynolds and a bipartisan group, including the AARP and the Iowa Board of Realtors, pushed this legislation so that we could accommodate families living on the same property. And if we are very strictly limiting it to no appeals on that thousand foot limit, it's going to make it much more difficult, especially with the mobile homes or trailers. And I really like his idea of the 1,500 foot, as I said, for the larger acreage. I don't think it harms anything or... I don't see any downside for it at all. The septic field has to be accommodating to the number of bedrooms and, you know, everything would be just as normal. And also, they do allow for rentals on that, which we wouldn't be doing, but some people would. And, you know, 1,500 feet is not a, I mean, 100,000 feet is not very big. So it would be kind of nice to have a little bit of leeway on that, at least to have an appeal so you could get a variance. I think that's a really good idea for our county.

Okay, thank you. Are there other public comments? Brad, do you have any comments?

Yeah, I had a question or two maybe about this process at the start. So what is the process then to have these kinds of discussions to finally land on some ending guidelines?

Regarding these options? Yeah, we could get a couple of You can provide some direction today to go back, if you like one of these options, and have us explore it a little bit further. We could keep the public hearing open until next week, allow the discussion to continue, and we could refine whatever option you like, whether keep it as proposed or as recommended, or come back with one of those options that create the exceptions or conditional use or variance, whatever direction you want to go. If that's the case, I'd keep the public hearing open. to next meeting, again, to allow any additional public comment.

You had sent us some information earlier to read. And as I read it, it made sense to me to have the option open for people to request a variance with trailer home because there's some standard, I guess, or minimum size. That made sense to me to allow. that to be a part of the process. Today, as we're talking with acreages that are 10 acres or larger, my question there is, when the county's guidelines set out, that would be the minimum parcel size for whatever reason it was at the time. If we start subdividing now when we allow a 1,500-foot home, somebody's going to place that just the right spot so that they could subdivide another day. And then for all practical reasons, another day, it'll make sense to create that second parcel. Is that what we want to do?

It's an absolute potential, correct. Whether you want to open that door or not, that's a decision for you folks.

Well, the spirit and intent of this whole thing is to accommodate families. But we all know that people will move to use that system to their advantage. I'm just wondering about that. It will happen.

The request may come in, but that would be through the subdivision process. Then we'll have a new comprehensive plan, lots of new guidelines, hopefully providing some path for the board and staff to really review those subdivisions from 10 acres to, say, three three-acre lots approximately. Hopefully the comp plan will provide some guidance on where and when that should occur. and how it should occur. Because right now, yeah, somebody could come in, they'd have to rezone the process, they'd have to rezone the property, split the property, so it does go through review to the board, and we don't take a hard look at that if that's a reoccurring problem or occurrence, and we'd have to maybe readdress it some other way. It's kind of crystal, I don't have a crystal ball. I think it will happen, but I can't say it when or how often. And I should say, the 1,000 square feet, as I looked at it when I was with the city, the ordinance was definitely geared more to the cities than the counties necessarily. But the state put it on the counties as well. Really geared toward the cities, though, because you typically have smaller lots. so they put that cap on the size you know the average city lot is a quarter of an acre maybe a third if it's a little bit bigger than most traditional developments a thousand square foot detached accessory building that's a that's essentially a three-stall garage which will fill a traditional residential lot pretty pretty fast so i suspect that's where the thousand feet came from initially. They figured that would be most lots, not all lots, but most lots could accommodate that in traditional urban development. Again, the county, when we're talking one acre, three acre, 10 acres or more, it doesn't quite scale the same as a city. And again, as Samuel and I talked about this, you know, we're not necessarily married to the, I usually go most strict and then we start pulling back as we have discussions. There's no harm in allowing something bigger, especially on larger lots. But again, I usually just take the most strict and then kind of work our way back a little bit when I draft ordinances.

Can you explain, David, how this law applies to homeowner associations?

Yes. Homeowner associations can still prohibit accessory dwelling units if they desire. That would be through the HOA or whatever association they have. That would be theirs to enforce. If somebody did come to us, say, I want a building permit, we would issue it since we're not part of the HOA, but then the HOA would have to essentially fight that battle on their own to the court system. But they could prohibit it.

Are there other questions or comments? Go ahead to the podium, please.

I don't think my question is that important. Does it specify only one? Oh, Lance Farrell. Thank you. What if they have a 20-acre lot? Can they put five units on it?

Yeah, the state code is pretty clear. You're allowed one additional accessory unit in addition to the primary dwellings. You get one unit regardless of the size. So you get one accessory dwelling unit regardless of the size of the parcel. So if you wanted more units, then obviously you'd be into a multifamily district, which is another rezoning process, and again, that would be a whole other discussion.

Are there other questions? Your auditor.

Todd Hilbert, Dallas County Auditor. you know, not exceed 1,000 square feet or 50% of the primary residence square footage, what is the square footage determined? Is that your total finished square footage or the top level of the house?

That's a good question. I should have addressed that in my presentation. So we use the county assessor for their – we look at the county assessments, everything above grade that counts as the space. That's essentially how the assessor – sizes the property. So we work off of that for the 50% rule that they go. So you might have a first floor, second floor. Unfortunately, you do not get anything below grade. Now, if we had an earthen house, I don't know if Dallas County has many earthen houses, we'll cross that bridge when we get there.

Now, is that stated in the code or is that a county interpretation?

No, that's, I've interpreted this, I've interpreted that to use the assessor data, because that's the most standardized size we have. And the assessor typically goes grade and above. So I've just established what kind of they've done for their best practices will be how we interpret it.

Doesn't the assessor go by finished and unfinished?

We do the finish. So we don't count garage. So we just go on whatever the square footage of a finished space the assessor has is what we go by.

All right, so that could be above grade or below grade.

It depends on how they classify it, yes. Yeah. Now, the few calls we've had come in, we've realized, oh, some people have not gotten permits for some of the spaces they've actually done. So they can go and get the assessment updated, or we go off the square footage that they have provided by the assessor. So it's kind of a catch-22 on that.

All right, other questions?

I'm George Cartnitis. And one of the things that popped up when we submitted our questions and things, isn't it the outside of the building? So to me, it seems like there ought to be something standardized as far as measuring the outside of your house. And then where we brought up the subject of an appeal because of the trailer, or no, wasn't it the inside, it's the inside, the rooms, they're measuring on most things, they measure the rooms, which then if your wall has brick, insulation, and that, you've lost all that, you've got the inside measurements. But for the additional dwelling, they're measuring just the outside seams, so you're kind of comparing one thing that may not, be a good match is what I'm trying to say. So I don't know if that can be standardized. If it's written somewhere, he'll know better than I. But that thing kept popping back in my mind also, because we come up a little bit short by measuring the outside, but we're measuring the inside of our house, which is taking area away.

OK, thank you.

comments on that yeah no I again it's it's this is where the interpretation gets kind of kind of kind of honestly wonky the assessor they typically do it you know the inside rooms but then in the end what I've always been told is the square footage provided is the total square footage is considered the outside whether it's truly as the outside or not so again outside dimensions the easiest you don't get into debates of You don't get into debates of wall width or that's a furnace room. It's not usable. We shouldn't count that. It comes up a lot in the building code and what's occupiable space. So again, when we do it, it's just, it's just the easiest to try to take whatever outside dimension we can get, whether it be the assessor, the homeowner questions that they can come in and bring in their own measurements. Again, I always try to trust everybody. They bring in their own exterior measurements. We'll work off of that as well. So that's getting into how you, I don't want to say you want to codify everything, it's almost impossible, but it's setting a base policy how you're going to interpret the code going forward and try to establish best practices. Number one, try to be consistency, try to get the consistency so you don't have, you don't have while you work, it worked here for them but not for me, so you're just trying to do the exterior wall as best as possible just to stay consistent. Okay, thank you. Board member?

My name is Oliver Bardwell. I live in Clive. I was around when AF Americans for Prosperity was creating this and supporting it at the Capitol. And they're a pretty libertarian organization. So I think the spirit is it's your property. You should be able to accommodate your family or expand on things if you need to. I did have some questions of them, and one was the HOA and things like that. And I have a question. Restrictive covenants, do those affect this? I mean, if somebody puts in a land development and they have restrictive covenants for construction and outbuildings and things like that, will this supersede that?

Like the HOA, any restrictive covenants do trump anything that we do here. Again, there are private agreements between the developer and the builder or the future homeowner, so it's only enforceable if they choose to enforce it, but they might go above and beyond the county, so we would not... We're not part of that, so we can't enforce it, but we would issue the permit if they did come in, and then the HOA or the association or whatever, maybe you would have to, again, challenge that with the person billing it. And we don't keep those on file here that I'm aware of, covenants or HOA agreements. We don't, again, since we're not party to them, we don't enforce them, and they're too broad, just too broad for us to take on.

Are there other comments or questions?

Does the county now have any restrictions on a mobile home or a manufactured home?

Yeah.

Yeah, essentially, just so everyone is aware, they come essentially certified from the manufacturer. They're kind of stamped or approved. So we don't actually do any inspection on the actual building itself. So when they do bring them in, they do have to basically take the axle, take the wheels off. They do have to be permanently mounted to where they're placed. They become real property then. So it may be pier construction, maybe a foundation, but essentially they do get permanently, I say permanently, they essentially do get affixed to a foundation or pier system. And that's the only inspection that we do is to make sure that the foundation and piers are there. But the building itself is stamp certified done. If they want to do an addition to that, then we have to get involved. If they want to do a deck to it, we would be involved. But the home itself would be, we're not really involved in.

So post-free buildings, similarly, there are standards for those for residents?

Correct. Yep. A little higher than, you have ag use for those, commercial use has its own, and residential has its own standard. They're all kind of different.

This is thinking outside the box, maybe, that small buildings that are movable type of thing. I don't know what you would call those. But it's not advertised anymore, and I don't know what sizes those are.

Yeah, you have two different types of small buildings. You have the true ones that are still, they have axles and wheels. I mean, they're essentially a travel trailer. They're called tiny homes, but they're a travel trailer. They can be hooked up and moved. That would not be permitted for an accessory dwelling unit. And there are limits to how long you can have one on your property and actually stay on it, you know, live in it. Otherwise, you have to bring it up to building code, and you can't bring it up to building code. Then you have the second option, kind of one being craned in there. They're essentially your Turner office building, but they're fitted out for a home, and then they do get permanently mounted. They're about 300 square feet or less is what you see some of those homes, some of those small mobile ones and some of the craned-in ones. They get down to about 300 square feet, and they might be single or two-story or story-and-a-half type of homes.

Are there other questions, comments? Supervisor Golightly, anything else? I think I'd suggest that we keep this public hearing open another week. We'll let Chairman Helm return and be updated on this public hearing. If you could do that.

Absolutely.

and then we can pick it back up next week.

Yep, I will provide a little update on the options so you have them in front of you in the next staff report so you can have a little time to digest those as well.

So would there be a motion to do such?

Do we have a time?

I'll second the motion. Is there any discussion? All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye. Motion carries. Thank you for attending today's public hearing, and we will continue it until next week. Go back and pick up, open up item 11 on our agenda. It's the recorder's request to use recorder management funds for historical records projects.

Good morning.

Good morning.

Just to give you a little bit of a history, the recorder's office brings in, from our recording fees, we bring in one dollar of every document, and that dollar goes into a special bank account. that we keep that's called the Records Management Fund. When I came into office in 2023, after I got my feet on the ground a little bit, I found out that that account was not interest-bearing. And so I worked with the treasurer to move it to an interest-bearing account. And we've been growing that account the last three years. And it's come to the point we do have very lofty goals for our office and for the historical records. The account balance right now is 148,000 plus. So we've gotten, we've got some quotes from our recording vendor, Fiddler, that we would like to use some of that money for. And what that will do, it will basically, and Emily's our master on her historical records, so she's here for questions, but basically what it will do is split out all of our old books so it helps searchers when they're searching those records. They can go to an actual township or town subdivision within a town or they can actually will go one step further and when you search for an actual book and page it will take you to the actual book and page. Right now it takes you to Maybe the beginning of the book had three pages with really nothing on it, but right now those are counted as pages So say you want to go to 595 it might take you to 598 because those three pages took up space But if you want to actually go to the book page 595 this would take you there and This also sets us up for in the future, our ultimate goal in Dallas County is to have all of our old records searchable by name. So you could go back to the beginning of time in Dallas County, search someone's name, and it would come up with the deed from 1860 or whatever. So this kind of leads up to that end goal. And we do also have an option to split out the auditor index books in this also, if we want to do that so that all of those old books are taken care of. Um, I did put this as an action item, but then I've been talking to other County recorders and I've not found one that actually gets approval from their board to use that money. There's nothing in the code that says. that it has to be approved, I just have to use it for certain things. And I'm audited by the state auditor that way. So I don't know how you want to approach this. It's more of like a courtesy, hey, we'd like to use this money. We've deemed this a really good purpose and feel like the citizens of Dallas County would really benefit from it. So if we don't do the auditor index books, we would be using roughly $100,000 of that money. The auditor index books would be $9,600 additional. We also, Um, and visiting with other counties have found that they have these very large scanners. And so we found that we could buy one for maybe $6,000. We would like to do that because that would help when surveyors bring in large surveys and talking to the auditor's office. When we scan the small surveys that code says they have to bring in, when you zoom in on those, it's very hard to read the small print. So other counties have been using a large scanner. So I think it would really benefit a lot of people in Dallas County for us to have the capability to do that. It would also help if we could scan all the images I've been telling you are missing. from our previous scanning projects, we could scan those in ourselves then because we could take the large books apart and we could scan them in ourselves. So I think we'd get a lot of benefit out of that.

So would that expense come out of your recorders fund or out of your budget?

No, the recorders management fund, all of it.

All right, go ahead. You were going to say something.

No, so I just didn't know, do we have a county policy that I need approval to use the money? I've never asked for to use, you know, this amount of money out of it, or I'm just trying to be transparent also.

Those funds are non-budgetary funds. Right. And they are for the discretion of the elected official.

Okay.

I think the transparency is great, but you don't have to have them approve it.

I don't believe we've ever approved those expenditures in the past under that fund.

Okay.

I apologize for putting it on as an action item.

No, I think it's all a good idea. I encourage you to compare those with the auditor here if you haven't already.

Yes, we have started actually meeting with the auditor's office. We're going to do that periodically to make sure we're all on the same page, working towards the same goals.

He doesn't have discretionary funds.

Renee, I didn't catch when you, did you say how much was in the fund?

I was just looking, too. It's $148,000 roughly right now.

Yep, that's correct.

So with the interest, it grows quite a bit.

Very good. Thank you. Thank you for sharing that with the board, though. Item 12 is an update from our EMS department.

Yeah, we'll try that.

Little happy dance whenever that works. All right, so Kristen Brady, Dallas County EMS. You should have the financial reports in front of you. They were attached. Should be January and February's reports. And then I don't have a whole lot. I sort of did a summary of our first quarter trainings and calls for service, just real general overview of sort of the things that we've done. It's a very wide overview. We do a lot of things. But these were the highlights. We had our mini conference in March. February tends to be sort of the heart healthy month. And we do all of our sort of CPR AHA updates in the winter, January, February months. Got everybody recertified for PALS. And we did ACLS earlier. students have picked up. The number of students, 32 students, that's just February and March. In January, most of those slots were taken up with our new hires, which I think I spoke about in my last update. We had eight new hires, so they took up a lot of our third-person space to get them oriented, but we're back to hosting students nearly every day, and that will pick up as we get closer to graduation for them in the spring. More and more first responders are asking to do ride-alongs with us, which is great. It was one of the benefits of the affiliation that we accomplished in 2019 with all of our first responder services. So it's great to see more of them taking advantage of that opportunity. Total number of calls, 776. That doesn't include any event standbys and things like that. That is just calls for service. We did 63 transfers out of the Dallas County Hospital. That includes the emergent ones that go to a higher level of care, as well as back to nursing home.

Do you know the breakdown of those?

Not off the top of my head, but I can include that next time. It's main, I would say, I would say, yeah, I don't, we don't do a lot of back to nursing home because we only return to the nursing homes in Perry. But I can get that number, make sure to have it for next time. And then the incorporated versus unincorporated ratio. And that is also for the first quarter. And then calls to Granger is 38. And then those are just pictures from our mini-conference. We had probably close to 60 participants for that day. The morning is spent PowerPoint with instructors, and the afternoon is hands-on, smaller group skills trainings. Any questions about any of that? Anything you'd like me to expand on?

How many departments of the county were represented in that training?

Oh, I would say nearly all of them, in addition to outside departments as well. We had, I would say about, eight to 10 participants from outside the county or outside of our first responder groups.

Did you learn anything from that training?

We always learn things at training.

What did you learn from that training?

Well, let's see, well, I taught on sepsis, so there's, of course, lots to learn in that. We covered pediatric respiratory emergencies. We covered first responder compassion fatigue, which is something that has been a focus as of late. We also did a Pulsara update, which is a program that we use share, to give the hospitals the update that we're coming and things like that, so. Okay.

Let's see. I'm going to have a question on your receivables.

I got one more slide, one more thing. Sorry. RAGBRAI is coming. So, that's our update. My last update, sort of things that are coming up. We have the official route for RAGBRAI and it will be coming through Dallas County, the little northwestern corner of RAGBRAI and Perry will be a meeting town. We're just now starting the meetings and the coordination and the committees on managing that day and all of the extra people that would be coming through the county. But if you hadn't seen that, This is the official map. And so, something to look forward to on July 21st. Plan your vacation wisely. Okay. Financials. So, winding down with EMSMC. I did have a great conversation with Ben and had further conversations with them. They are assuring me that they are wound down and they are not sending follow-up bills and making things congested with the new billing company. They're a little more responsive than previously, but not as responsive for some things. But we're slowly but surely having fewer and fewer things that I need their information from, and it's getting better. So let's see. Yeah, so that's as far as the collections, I need to get a collections company hired. My question would be, do I need to put out an RFP for that? As far as I can tell, we don't currently use, there aren't any departments from my inquiry that use a collections company within the county. So I kind of need to start sort of fresh from that. get a contract and bring it to the attorney's office and do that. Currently, I have six accounts that are eligible for collections since July 1. So, not a terrible amount. They've been submitted to the Iowa Set-Off Program. That's the first step, so.

Okay.

I know. Talk about our procurement and how we would do an RFP to allow companies to do business with the county.

I'm sorry, what was the question?

Is there a question? Do we have a policy on how we solicit business? how others would solicit the county to do business with the county? Do we have any kind of standard policy? Such as, is the RFP required?

I would say for something that is going to be contracted like that, I would recommend that it is RFP'd. Do you want it to be open and fair and available to anybody?

So I take it that we need to put this on a future agenda to discuss going forward as well in broader terms in development policy.

I don't think that would hurt, yeah.

Yeah, I don't either.

Yeah.

So. Okay. Yeah, I'd be very supportive of an RFP process. Supervisor Golightly?

Okay.

So, create that. Okay.

Yes, please.

And then it's down to the attachments. Do you want me to pull them up? Sure.

With your attachment, was there anything that jumped out at you that you want to address with the board?

Not necessarily.

I think one that I would question you about is Molina Healthcare.

Where are you? Up here?

You know what's going on there.

That would be in connection with GMT Because they're their Medicaid So we get greater reimbursements Because we're part of the GMT program I'm looking at the timeliness of their payments. Oh, yes so Or lack thereof Are you referring, so we had the big jump, is that what caught your eye? Because we had, PCC discovered that EMSMC had incorrectly coded several claims, and so they resubmitted all at once.

That makes sense, though.

Yeah.

Supervisor Golightly, do you have any?

I had noticed the same thing. I was going to ask the question who that was. We know there's 30% of there. outstanding is over 90 days.

Yeah, and that is why part of one of the reasons that we moved away from that billing company and are grateful to be with the new billing company because they caught a lot of things. And that has been part of the wind down process is getting all of that information from EMSMC took much longer than it should have. which is why you're seeing that jump now. Should have seen it much sooner, but we didn't get the account receivable and aging reports from them in a timely manner.

I may have asked these questions before, but I don't remember. At what point is our policy at some point in time where we have our actual write-off, we take it off of the books, but it still may be collectible through collections at some point in time. So is there a separate?

Like once it's written off and sent to collections into the Iowa offset program, we don't have a policy for writing that off, no.

Yeah, that's my question. At what point in time, you know, we get, this goes to about 120 days or something.

Right.

You know, at some point in time, when do we quit putting in our information as far as having a value At some point in time, it would make sense that that gets set aside. It might still be an asset that somebody is trying to collect, but it's not a current activity.

Right. I mean, we could certainly create that policy. This is what has historically always been done. So I know that when it is sent to collections or the offset program, then it's still there until it gets collected, and that could be years.

Well, that's what I'm saying. Over years, that value just keeps growing, and we think, wow, there's a lot of money coming in here, but there's not.

Yeah, I guess I'm not sure what would be the best process for that. Because I know the Iowa set-off program, I can go into that, and there are debts in there from years and years ago. And then they can get paid. Someone has an eligible refund, and it could take six or seven, eight years for them to get an eligible refund that we can acquire. So I don't know the best answer for writing off that line. or just not report.

Doing that, wouldn't that help us? Maybe this is for a workshop on how to do all these things, but help us understand better what we're currently doing, what our normal routine activity is, and how do we manage that? And all these other things are a different thing.

We probably could use a workshop.

Yeah. I can invite a representative from PCC to come and help with that as well. We've talked about that before. We've just never really settled on a good timing to do that.

You may want to even look at, depending on balances, whether or not we need to get involved and start suing people, organizations.

Small claims.

Yeah, it has never really been tightly regulated in the past or really dug into, to be honest.

And depending on the time, statute of limitations will run, so some of those things will just have to be written off, depending on how old they are.

Unless we get a judgment.

Well, if you haven't filed a lawsuit, you can't get a judgment.

Exactly.

So if some of those are beyond that, then those would have to be written off. to kind of look at things.

All right, very good. Anything else, Brad? No. Kristen, anything else?

That covers it.

Thank you for your report.

Thank you.

Item 13 is to set time and date for public hearing on proposed fiscal year 27 county budget presentation. April 21st at 7 p.m. Do we need a motion? Please.

I'd offer a motion to set time and date for public hearing for the proposed fiscal year 27 county budget presentation for April 21 at 7 o'clock p.m. here in this room.

Second. Discussion? Hearing none, all in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye. Motion carries. Item 16 are board appointments. 16A is Resolution 2026-0044 for Planning and Zoning Commission. These are reappointments. Mr. Hockett, you have any comments you'd like to make? No. OK. These gentlemen have been serving, and I'm assuming they're doing a good job.

Yes, they're both doing an excellent job, and I'm glad they both wanted to go for another term.

Very good.

I move approval of resolution 2026-0044.

Second. Is there any discussion? All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye. Motion carries. I believe that takes us through our agenda rather than other.

I believe you missed item 14.

Did I miss one? I missed it because I crossed it off. All right, we'll go back, pick up item 14. It's a discussion action item on set time and date for a public hearing on proposed changes to chapter 45, zoning ordinance regarding elder, family, and group homes and family homes.

Melinda? April 21st at 9.30 a.m.

Sir motion Second is there any discussion? All in favor say aye aye motion carries Now open up item 17 other business I I have no other business.

Second. Is there any discussion? Hearing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. Motion carries. This meeting is adjourned. Thank you for your attendance today.