County Council - Regular Meeting

All right. Starting first with the meeting minutes from May 18th.

I looked over and I didn't see anything out of order.

I didn't either. Gabe, did you have anything?

We got a little issue here. Oh, okay. Okay. We do. Audio and video didn't come on to use it. There's always a way to stretch the meeting out, you know.

This was completely unintended as well.

We're good on YouTube. We can go. Okay.

All right, folks. Apologies for the technical difficulties. If you're listening at home, welcome to the June 1st, 2026 commissioners meeting. We've already announced title six forms are available. We've done the pledge and also the prayer. So let's go back and address the meeting minutes for May 18th.

I have to make a motion to accept the minutes. Second.

All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed. Motion carries. All right. Moving on to claims.

I only saw one thing. It was some of the highway department, but it looks like it was the outfitting of the new truck that they had gotten previously. Okay. I'm good with that.

All right. I'll make a motion that we approve claims. Second. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Those opposed? Moving to payroll. for the week of May 22nd, 2026 in the amount of $437,599.94. Do you guys have any questions?

I would make a motion to accept payroll claims.

The only thing I noted, Eric, it did look like you guys were having a little bit more overtime in the jail. All right. I'll second. Oh, okay. Gabe seconds. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Aye. Those opposed? Motion carries. All right. Up first, Eric Blodgett, Chief Deputy with the Sheriff's Department.

I'll do my best to keep it short.

The sheriff was very jealous of my turn for you guys with a short agenda. A short agenda, yeah. I presented the three-year contract for our guardian tracking system. It's a $17,700 a year contract. The guardian system is used to track all inmate movements, physical movements of them. It's an RFID system.

We have the wands where anytime we do a mil pass or med pass or move an inmate from one place in the jail to another, it's all done electronically through that guardian system.

This year, we're going to upgrade to their command cloud system. It offers more data tracking and ability to write reports and manage things. So it gives us another layer of accountability. What we have is working well for us now, but this is going to just increase our ability to do stuff. And this year's upgrade will also let us do facial recognition. So we'll be able to not just go by the RFID on a bracelet, but we'll also be able to scan a face just in case, you know, if we had some ice in the bracelet. So this first year, the first year total, $17,700 for the contract. It's a $2,500 upgrade. $3,990 training fees. We're going to pay all this out of our commissary account. It falls under the statute of allowable expenses under commissary. This is the system that we have had, so it's not a new system. We're not having to replace anything, just upgrade the software and then train them.

Does your renewal fee go up with the additional fees? Cloud-based?

I don't think so, Brian. I think it's the same fee that we've been paying. Same fee? We just have to pay for the upgrade. The upgrade, okay.

All right.

Seems like a good idea to have the facial recognition, having two.

Yeah, we're interested to see. They're going to come in and do three days of on-site training for us. We're interested to see how that rolls out. So all we've really done so far is seen some videos of it. Cool.

I mean, here before too long, you're going to have biometrics in there, and you aren't even going to need the sensors that are in some of the cells. It's all going to be there. I mean, if you guys recall, we'd done the contract in some of the padded cells to determine whether or not somebody is having some type of a medical incident. I shouldn't have said that out loud. That could have been my patented idea right there.

I know that we've gotten two medical alerts from those. Those are working well for us in there.

I would make a motion to accept the guardian system contract renewal.

I'll second that motion. All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed? Motion carries. Thank you.

Thanks, Eric.

up next we have justin wells with the highway department instead of tim orton tonight how we doing good yourself very good okay so um tim asked me to give you guys the update from the highway department so we've been prepping gravel roads that we're going to be scheduled to double chip still this year um sc is the contractor that got awarded all the county funded they have a projected start date of June 22nd and a completion date of July 9th.

How many miles that is, Justin? Does that say?

The CCMG application was about 82 miles and so half got awarded and half didn't. So I'm going to guess 40 miles Okay. The double chip seal, I'm not sure Tim did all that figuring.

All right.

So three weeks. That's pretty clear. Yeah. Okay. Weather permitting.

Yeah. I don't foresee them getting it done. I just, I don't see it getting done.

Last year they had gotten around really quick, but there was a point in the schedule in which they had had to, I think, leave the county and then come back at least to finish some of it. They did good work. They did. I had... A lot less discussions with folks about their work last year in 25 versus what I had had in 24.

So we had some dirt patch emulsion delivered last week. So we know SCs are out, but we're going to have the dirt patch route running their proposed route, patch holes ahead of them getting here. Bushwacker, it's been out intermittently. He's not been out every day in it.

He wasn't out today, but he'll be back in it tomorrow. So last week we got our paver going.

How's that going? Thursday.

So we paved a spot last Thursday that was scheduled to be like greater patched.

So we're just, the road was pretty, it was rough shape.

So we didn't think if we had to mill it all back up, like it was a good training spot. So we did that one on Thursday and they did one today kind of up by Lake Santee on 880 East. I didn't see that one today, but they said things went fairly smooth.

Good.

Still trying to work out, you know, the guys are trying to learn how to run the paver.

Yeah.

Moving forward, hopefully we'll be able to provide more.

Good deal. That's fantastic. Yep, that's great.

That's all I've got for you guys. All right. Thank you.

Thank you, Justin. All right, moving on to some fair business. We have a quote here from Ellis Tents and Events for the fair. Looks like the total for the tent rentals and the labor of setting them up and bringing the tents and then taking them back as well is $6,354. So we're looking at one, two, three, four, five, six tents it looks like. and then also rental of some fire equipment, fire extinguisher, no smoking sign, and then also some ballast, and then the labor and the shipping. They had that price, that $6,354, includes a substantial discount of $4,236 from their original quote of over $10,000. I know this is the same setup, too, that the fairs used the last several years.

That was my question. Are they changing, adding? Same.

Yeah, so I mean it's cattle barn, goat barn, track pagoda, one for the hogs, volunteer fire department tent. That's just a quote there. Another vendor fire department tent and then rabbit barn. So this is the quote that was sent by the fair committee over. Okay. Yep. So they would just like us to accept.

I would make a motion to approve the Ellis tents rental.

I'll second that.

All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed? Motion carries. And then we have another one here for clear sound for making sure everything's up and running for the headquarters building, the track. And then also the livestock barn, if I remember right. Let me see here. Trek, Headquarters, Gota. Okay, it doesn't have anything in here about livestock, but that is $2,307.68. And they've used Clear Sound as long as I've been involved on the fair.

I'll make a motion to approve a clear sound contract.

I'll second that.

All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed? Motion carries.

Christy, can you email me copies of those and we can get them moving on?

Thank you. All right, up next we have Rick Anderson from Verigy. Very good.

Rick Anderson with Vergy. A couple of folks here know me pretty well. I spent a couple years here, and Brian, I apologize. I met you at the county commissioner's show. It's only taken me six months to get here.

That's all right.

I normally get places a little bit quicker, but we've been really busy. That's good. A quick couple things. First of all, the utility situation in Indiana is pretty bad. We are a regulated utility state, so we have five options to buy from, not including the REMCs. Utility rate increases have been 66% over the past 10 years. SO WHAT WE TRY TO DO WITH THESE PROJECTS IS REALLY IMPACT YOUR UTILITIES AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE. SO THE FIRST PAGE THAT I GAVE YOU TALKS ABOUT GUARANTEED SAVINGS LEGISLATION IN THE STATE OF INDIANA. ALLOWS YOU GUYS TO GO OUT AND PROCURE THINGS VIA RFQ, RFP. A LITTLE BIT DIFFERENT THAN HIRING THE ARCHITECT ENGINEER, PUTTING PLANS AND SPECS OUT, TAKING LOW BID, HAVING CHANGE ORDERS, THAT WHOLE MESS. THESE PROJECTS ARE NO CHANGE ORDER PROJECTS. We had a project teed up with you guys. We were at the annex building, so we were going to do lighting, HVAC, and windows, obviously, over there, and couldn't get council to go forward, so. Thought I'd come back and chat with you guys. I've been back and forth to rip So there's you'll see a couple of case histories in there Ripley County and also the city of Shelbyville We've done these these projects. I've been back and forth through First down to Versailles quite a bit. So I check on the building periodically We've already we've already done all the design you know, we actually advertise to go forward with a project and So we've done a lot of work and spent a lot of money and everything else so far. So I wanted to come back, see if there was any opportunity to maybe, you know, these things are all about timing, seeing if there's maybe an opportunity to maybe resurrect the project.

Well, we are, that is on the horizon, the annex, to do some work to it. That's one of our long-range committee plans is to look into doing some work there. So I think the opportunity is there to at least bid and see where you're at on the project.

Well, typically the way this works is we come back to you with an assessment. So we go and do an assessment, look at the building, and come back with recommendations to you guys, which is what we've done before. Then you guys decide, hey, we'd like to move forward with something. So you guys would advertise with an RFQ. Right. That's what we actually did before. We were the only respondents. So it allows you guys – it's a better way to buy. I'm just telling you guys that if you hire an architect or engineer, they're going to charge you 50 grand or whatever to do all that work. Right. We don't charge for that. It's kind of a cost to do in business. And we've already done it. And I think we already had a pretty good idea of the windows and the type. And you guys were very positive about the design we came up with and everything else. So it would be pretty simple to get the thing going again. I mean, you'd have to re-advertise. Right. But I can give you the document to re-advertise so you don't even have to pay anybody to do that.

I know there has been work that's been done out there from when we had our prior discussions with HVAC, some of the lighting, some of the other just general maintenance work because at that point we didn't have maintenance staff and we do now. And so he's been able to really tackle a lot of the issues that were present at that point when you first came to Decatur County and 21 it was yeah 21 i think i know it was before it started before i was a commissioner um and then carried over and uh so a lot of that has a lot of those things that were initially in the project scope have been taken care of at this point correct

Yeah, so if it's just windows and some, I think there was some scaping on the outside of the building that needed some help. If it's just kind of what we call building envelope, absolutely.

That's more what we're looking at is the envelope versus the interior. Yeah, absolutely.

So happy to bring what we've already done for you. Happy to bring that back. If you've got some kind of a committee or something, happy to meet with whoever.

We do.

And see if that's, again, a lot of the work's done from that standpoint.

I think what I remember going through some information that has been passed down, it was in the neighborhood of a $2 million project.

And that was for windows, HVAC, lighting were the three major components of the project. So I'd like to say that costs have gone down. In the past couple years.

In the scope of that, was that replacing windows or was that taking windows out and having walls? A little bit of both. Okay.

Again, I can bring the design back from what we came up with because what we came up with you guys were pretty positive about.

I think it'd be, you know, I'd like to sit down with you and, you know, see the design that you have because that's kind of what we're, you know, our thought process is to eliminate windows. And any windows we put in would be the double triple pane whatever the energy efficient windows but it's got so much glass that it needs to be we're talking about that with the project is getting rid of you know a fair amount of glass yep yep yeah there there were if I remember right there were two separate designs

One was just replacing the glass, leaving the existing design, if you will. And then the other one was windows being replaced by walls. And I'm looking for it now. Some of the walls had windows at the top.

So happy to bring back what we came up with, and if you wanted to kind of hone in on one, we can kind of figure out. We had pricing and the whole bit, so. Okay.

We could do the long-range planning on the 19th, the 30th.

That's true, yeah. June 19th.

Day of the week is that?

Friday.

What time?

Three o'clock. Okay.

I'm not here, I'll have somebody here.

Yeah. And that's a, we have a meeting then. I mean, we do a long-range planning meeting. That would be a good, you know.

My development engineer, Mark Frost, Jeremy, I think you remember Mark. If I can't be here, I will have Mark, because he was the guy that really put all the design together.

Yeah, that would be great. Perfect.

And let's just see if, you know, if it's something that you guys want to move forward with.

Again, we can, again, a lot of the work's done, so.

Very good.

Thank you.

Thank you, Rick.

Appreciate your time.

Alright, up next we have a couple of use of facility requests. We have one here from the Friends of the Greensburg and Decatur County Animal Shelter for August 29, 2026 from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. They're requesting to use the county's parking lot that is adjacent to links It'll be used for parking for a jeep and motorcycle ride At the conclusion of their ride they will come back to links And so they want to have people be able to have parking there. I do see their certificate of liability insurance Chris Ramey was planning on being here today. He said that he had something come up, so if you guys had any questions, he wouldn't have an issue with us moving this to the next meeting. I don't see an issue with it. I don't have any questions. I'll make a motion to approve the use of facilities. I'll second that motion. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed? Motion carries. And then, Brian, do you want to talk about First Christian Church?

Yeah, and I had a letter, and I apologize. I had left it at home. But they are going to use a community building in September. I don't know if they've signed a contract yet or not. But they wanted to know about a discount, and then – You know, we've talked a little bit about this, about the 501c3s getting to 50%. And I mean, if they're 501c3, it's really no reason for them to come in front of us. They automatically get the 50% discount. So I'll share that with them and let them know that they're eligible for that discount. But that was really what it was. After getting the letter and thinking about it, I'm like, eh, we don't really need to discuss it.

Because they are eligible. That discount is written into the contract. The contract, right. It's if you or another organization are wanting an additional benefit more than the 50% discount, that's where you come to the commissioners.

Okay.

Yep. And if we need to make that more clear, we need to talk to our attorney.

I'm going to backtrack to the Lynx parking lot just because it just reminded me of something. I was up at Lynx talking to Cindy Pinson. She had stopped me and said that, I don't know, it was on Friday night, last Friday night, somebody was in the parking lot and they were facing west. They drove over the parking bump and hit the light there in front of Lynx and knocked it over and then hit two parked cars. So that was concerned. Pardon me?

The light post hit two cars or the person hit two cars?

Both. The person hit two cars and the light post fell on the cars. So she had mentioned to me, like, I'm concerned about this, people parking here and that happening. could we do something about some concrete barriers or something along the front of that? And I said, Cindy, I don't know. I would bring it up. I told her I would bring it up, but I'm not sure if that's something we want to do or not. And here's why I say that. You know, people, if they're parked right in front of her building, they could jump the curb and drive into her building. They could jump the curb anywhere. So I'm not sure. We can't put concrete barriers around the whole square to keep people from driving over those. This person happened to be intoxicated. It was 2 in the morning, 3 in the morning, something like that when he did this.

My thing is the parking is already so tight there that if we had to add ballards or whatever, we're going to lose two parking spots right off the bat. Because there's not the room to add.

But I'm not sure that's the right way to go. Right. One, it's not eye appealing to put concrete barriers all the way along that. Maybe if there was... Pardon me? Pillars. Pillars or concrete flower pots, I don't know. Something that's different. But then in that same discussion... She has a patio at the back of her business, and cars can park right up to that patio. And her concern was maybe we should put them back here as well. What if somebody jumps the curb and runs into the patio? But we can what if all day long. Somebody can jump the curb anywhere on the square and run into a building. Well, if you look at Carriage on the Square last year or two years ago, that did happen. It was a discussion point.

I'll think about it.

I said I would bring it up.

I will think about it.

It's our county parking lot, and that's why she's approaching us. She's concerned about that.

I'll give it some thought.

I don't know how much of an appetite I have. Same with me.

I understand the reasoning, but that's not something I... I'd be interested in doing.

That's all I have.

All right. The last bit of business that I have is that we will be posting for the highway department superintendent position. We'll try to get that out tomorrow, I think, or later this week at some point. And we'll leave it open for... at least two weeks, if not three weeks. So it'll be a vacant position that we would like to have filled.

I'd say leave it open for 30 days. 30 days? Sounds great. Yep.

Sounds great. All right. Anything else for you, gentlemen?

I do not.

Leigh Ann, do you have anything for communications? Good.

It's been a long day. It's going well.

Good.

We're excited.

Tomorrow we start training at 7 a.m. all day.

Is that Carl's job?

We're excited.

Very good.

And carpet, or not carpet, but our flooring and stuff is 98% steady. because we had some baseboard issues. I think we're going to have to call them again because I think they forgot about us. But other than that, it looks really good. You should stop in. I'll stop in.

You should stop in. I will.

And Charlie said that the painting is done. You've got touch-ups.

The surface areas are done. You've got touch-ups, though.

Awesome.

We're like, go do what you've got to do.

Yep. His plate's full. Mike, anything from EMA? Yep, stole that. Very good. How are things at our animal shelter?

Good.

All right.

Getting your feet on the ground and... Good.

Awesome.

All right, if there's nothing else, I'll entertain a motion to recess.

So moved.

All right, we are recessed.

Whoa, that's a record. Record.

Picked the right meeting, Justin.

Good work.

Now you can always tell Tim, like, I don't know what's so bad about it.

Yeah.