Board of Supervisors - Regular Meeting

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good afternoon everyone it's wonderful to have you with us this afternoon I would like to formally call the meeting of the board supervisors to order today July 21st 2026 at 3 p.m. we have this afternoon our invocation being delivered by mr. Jamison and Pledge of Allegiance by mr. Meredith so if everyone would please stand let's pray

Dear Lord, we come to you this evening, Lord, with a thankful heart. Thank you for all the many blessings you've given us, Lord. We thank you for the rain we've gotten and everything, Lord, that you've given us. We're just so thankful for it. We ask that you go with us now, Lord. Give us wisdom. Give us discernment. And we just ask, Lord, that you be in control. Everything said and done will be to your glory. In Christ's name, amen.

Amen.

Okay, thank you all very much. The next item on our agenda is one of the things we very much enjoy every month. It's getting the opportunity to recognize special people and special programs. I'm going to turn this over to Mr. Sandy as we look to recognize our aging services. Mr. Sandy. Oh, I can do that now. Yeah, thank you. Okay, so let me back up before we do the recognition. We need to deal with the approval of the agenda. Are there any items that any of you gentlemen would like to add to the agenda? Any concerns about the agenda?

Yes, Madam Chair. If possible, I'd like to reconsider a motion from the last meeting in regards to Board of Supervisors rules and procedures. I'd like to discuss that just a little more. I've got some more information, if possible.

OK. All right.

And second, I would ask to add a closed session. I've got a couple of personal items I'd like to discuss in closed session, if that's possible too, please.

OK. So the rules, Mr. Gwynn, you may have to help me with this. Are you looking to get some changes, Mr. Meredith, to the rules, or you just want to discuss them generally?

I just want to elaborate a little bit more on the motion we put through last meeting. I just want to reconsider it with some more information and discuss a little bit more. And I was on a prevailing vote. I was going to ask. I learned that from last time. But I'd just like to discuss that just a little bit more, if that's OK. That's fine.

And Mr. Gwynn, with regard to closed session, that's not been advertised. What is your opinion on that?

Well, it's not just my opinion. The statute changed on July 1st. It said you can't add anything to the agenda.

You can't add anything to the agenda?

No, unless it has a time, unless it's under a time crunch or it's not.

I was not aware of that.

Yeah. We saw it coming. Okay. And it hit. And people are getting kind of taken aback by it. Okay. Let me study it again and see if I can figure out a way to get it done.

So are you telling us not to add anything to the agenda today?

I don't think that the rules and everything are a problem. It's in the bylaws. It's a substantive. issue that I'm concerned with. And I think that FOIA votes generally, I mean, closed meeting votes generally are the types of things I wanted to avoid in that structure. So, um, you can come hold to that and let me get back to you before the meeting's over and we, we can add the close, you know, if the statute will allow us and the board is comfortable with that, then we can add the closed meeting. If it's, if the statute doesn't allow us, we can't do it anymore.

And so you're comfortable with moving ahead with Mr. Meredith's initial request on the discussion on policies. Mr. Meredith, would you be willing to discuss that under other matters, or would you like that to be moved up further on the agenda?

In regards to the?

The policies.

I mean, it's wherever you want to fit it in. It shouldn't take that long. OK. And then I guess my other concern is, and I'm going to ask for policies, legal advice. Is it possible in the future that we leave closed meeting sessions on the agenda? And when we get to that point, we could easily state we have no matters for closed session. So then I've seen other organizations do that. So if something does come up in the meantime, we got it in there. But it doesn't mean we have to go to closed session. Is that correct?

Sure. I mean, you have to consider anything in your agenda accordingly.

Go ahead. I'm sorry.

From a policy standpoint, legal policy standpoint, whatever, I've always been a little less than comfortable with having on closed meetings that we may not have. I think that we really probably shouldn't do it that way. I mean, technically, if you're going to put in the... in your agenda what the closed meeting is going to be about, which is kind of what you're required to do. It's kind of hard to do that and not, you know, I've got one client that just said contracts or personnel, and I'm like, yeah, I don't, you know, you're going to need a statute and this, that, and the other. So I'm a little concerned about that part of it.

Is it possible, if this closed session is not to be added tonight, can we add it to the work session Thursday? Yes.

Yes.

So either way, I'll leave that up to you all.

We just need to adjust accordingly with respect to the new laws.

OK. That's fine.

And I would maybe ask, Mr. Meredith, if maybe we can cover those rules under your section under Other matters by supervisors? Are you comfortable with that?

Yes, I am.

Okay. Let's do that.

Okay.

Okay. All right. Is there anything else, any discussion regarding the agenda, any proposed changes? Okay. I'll entertain a motion to approve the agenda with the amendment asked for and requested by Mr. Meredith.

I'll make a motion.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Second, Mr. Tatum.

Madam Chair, the only amendment he's proposing is for Thursday, so that wouldn't go under.

No, he's wanting to talk about the policies.

That's fine, but that's under his other matter.

That's what we're doing. Okay. That would be the amendment. If we were to list it under other matters, like under other matters we've got legislative priorities listed. Okay. So where we have an acknowledgment of specific things. I got you. Okay. I got you. All right. So all those in favor of approving the agenda with the amendment, please say aye. Aye.

Aye. Aye. Aye.

All those opposed, like sign. And that carries unanimously. Thank you, gentlemen. Mr. Mayor, to thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. Hopefully, Mr. Gwinn, if you'll let us know where we stand with closed session as we move throughout the evening, that would be helpful. OK, now we're going to get to the fun stuff. Mr. Sandy.

Thank you, Madam Chair. We do have one recognition I wanted to do today and just recognize some of our folks in the Office of Aging Services. I have a few things I just wanted to read about it and just some information for folks. the public and folks that may not even know about the ESSIG Recreation Center. So if you indulge me just a couple minutes, I'll read that. So we do have some exciting news regarding the ESSIG Recreation Center and the Office of Aging Services. The ESSIG Recreation Center has been selected as a recipient of the Alzheimer's Association Partners in Progress Award. This award recognizes organizations that advance the association's mission through meaningful partnerships, community engagement, and support for individuals and families affected by Alzheimer's disease. The Essex Center was recognized for its commitment to providing programs, outreach, education, and connections to valuable resources for those living with Alzheimer's and their caregivers. These efforts have helped increase awareness while improving access to services throughout Franklin County. So I'd like to especially recognize Paul Chapman, our Parks and Rec Director, as well as Marsha Cramlett and Flo Brown, who really work hard at the Essex Center every day. If you've been there, you'll see them all the time. Their dedication, compassion, and hard work played a significant role in earning this recognition, and I think that they all deserve a great deal of credit for this accomplishment. This award is also a reminder of the tremendous impact that our Aging Services Office has on our community every day. So just a few figures I wanted to give you about the Essex Center. Last year alone, the Essex Recreation Center offered 268 high-quality activities and programs for older adults, representing a 14% increase over the previous year. Those programs reached 8,690 participants, which was an 11% increase. helping older adults remain active, engaged, healthy, and connected. In addition, the senior transportation program provided 3,086 medical and essential transportation trips. That was a 9% increase from the previous year, and those services help seniors maintain access to health care and other critical services. Overall, the Essex Center welcomed 49,283 visitors last year. which was a 7% increase, demonstrating both the growing demand for the services provided there and the important role that the center plays in enhancing the quality of life for Franklin County residents. So, Madam Chair, if you would join me down front, I'd like to congratulate Marcia and Flo and the entire Aging Services team on this very important recognition and accomplishment.

Ladies, we would like to present you with an acknowledgement.

It's the Alzheimer's Association Partners in Progress Award presented to Franklin County Parks and Recreation and Office on Aging 2025-2026. We congratulate you. You make us so proud. And our seniors and everybody that participates at the Essex Center benefits from you being there. And we thank you for that. Okay, ladies, thank you for being with us today. Paul, thank you for your leadership over at the Essex Center. It is kind of a hidden gem in the county, but word is getting out with increased participation, and that's exactly what we want to see. We want to make sure we're benefiting seniors and all those other participants across the entire county. So thank you for that. Okay, next on the agenda is our consent agenda. Gentlemen, is there anything listed on the consent agenda that you would like to pull for further discussion or questions?

Just a couple questions real quick, please. Under Attachment 1.

Mm-hmm.

It talks about a budget here.

Mr. Meredith, I may interrupt you. I'm sorry.

I got carried away. I apologize.

No, no, you're fine.

I don't want to pull it. I just think it's just a quick question. Can we, if it's just a quick question, that's all I need.

I think that's fine. I just didn't know if you wanted to pull it.

No, no, no, Madam Chair. I'm sorry. So under Amendment 1, it talks about a budget here, the budget. Is there a budget, or will this make sure it does come back to us before any budget or amounts are approved? Or is that up to Mr. Sandy to what's his budget? I just see the word budget, and I don't know.

I'm sure that Mr. Sandy could probably address it more thoroughly than I, but this is very routine. Mr. Sandy?

Yeah, you're talking about number one on the consent agenda, the resolution for locally administered projects? Yes, sir. Yeah, so this is a standard agreement that VDOT requires for any projects that The county would administer the construction aspect of it. And this just reaffirms that the county is committed to paying the local share that's required. So this specific resolution is not for one project specifically. It's a resolution that we'll use for any projects with VDOT that we locally administer those projects.

So our share will come before us, correct? Correct. So for each individual?

Correct.

OK. I wanted to make sure I didn't open the checkbook there. That's a good question. And number five, Smith Farm Agriculture Lease. This is just for an RFP. So that'll come back to us on how we would actually propose this or the use of it. Is that correct?

Yes.

OK. And last thing is, I know the minutes are associated with this. I was noticing in the minutes, when it gets to discussions, it just says discussion was had. And I know in the past, like if supervisor so-and-so raised this concern or this question, there was something in there as a blurb to note. Is that something we could get added to these? Because I've marked seven here that there was a discussion, but it doesn't really And we've done that in the past. Supervisor Meredith asked about Bob Abad's response. I just think that goes a long way in our minutes.

Yeah, Mr. Meredith, I think that's a good point. I know that minutes take on different forms throughout things that I've done, and I'm sure you all as well. I think if it's the will of the board to have more specificity with regard to who's saying what, but keep it on a high level without getting into the weeds.

Yes, more of a highlight. Right. I apologize, Supervisor James, but I know with his dog party discussion, Supervisor James wanted a roll call. And I respect that. But that kind of lets people know or even helps me remember what was our discussions pertaining to that.

So is there any concern about us going with a little more specificity in our minutes? Yes. Anybody object? Okay. Ms. Samantha, if you would help us with that. And I'm happy to help you with that as we work to try to engage that piece. Mr. Sandy, do you have any remarks? Are you okay?

No, I think that's the will of the board.

Okay.

And I'll be more than happy tonight sometime to, I'll show you why I got marked, just, and I'll be more than happy too to help out. Yes.

Thank you for that, Mr. Meredith.

Thank you. And that's all I have. I'll be quiet now.

No, you're fine. No, that's, those are great points. Anything else that you all would like to discuss or pull? Okay. Hearing none, I will entertain a motion to approve the consent agenda as submitted.

I'll make a motion.

Mr. Meredith in second, Mr. Jamison. And we will have a roll call vote. Madam Clerk? Supervisor Mitchell?

Yes.

Supervisor Carter? Yes. Supervisor Meredith? Yes. Supervisor Quinn? Yes. Supervisor Tatum? Yes. Supervisor Jamison? Yes. And Chair Smith?

Okay, thank you gentlemen very much for those considerations. We are going to move now to our VDOT report. We have Mr. Casella with us and Ms. Lewis. Hello, welcome. We're so glad to see you guys. I know you've been busy. That's been obvious. We have been busy. As you travel the roads in the county.

A lot of activity on 220, for sure. It's always a pleasure to be here. All right, so we'll do our monthly road report. Looking at the activities for the previous 30 days, I'll just highlight there's two pipe replacement projects that we've completed. One of them is on Route 756, Old Forge Road, and the other's on Route 739, Bethlehem Road. And then moving ahead to the next 60 days, of course we're doing our ordinary maintenance. We're starting our second round of mowing on our primary routes. That'll begin next week. So we have a Route 693 green level. We have that project scheduled, and it should be completed. Actually, we already completed that one, 715. So that's a good. And then we've got Route 736 madcap, which we just started yesterday. So that road's closed, and we'll have that in place. It should be open by August 21st, if not sooner, hopefully, if the weather cooperates. And then we have on Route 40, we have some paving operations basically from Route 757 to Route 748. 757 is Skillet Road, and the other, 748 is Ferrum School Road. Moving on to the second page is a long list of surface treatment schedules that are all complete, so lots of activity there, all done. Going on to the third page, we have a couple of development items there, a lot of activity with utility permits, as we mention every month about the fiber projects that are all throughout the county. We have two completed safety studies, one on Route 122 at Route 1235 Lake Mount Drive. We've removed a watch for turning vehicle sign and replaced it with a sign that's side road left, so it kind of looks like a sideways T. and so we've done that and then also on route 671 golden view road and route 826 golden view we did a study and there were no recommended changes but we do note that there are chevrons in place already with rumble strips in the area so no changes on that Dropping down to our project status, Route 220 and 619 Grassy Hill, the contractor had a pre-construction meeting. They received a notice to proceed, so they'll begin soon on that, and I believe that's night work. We have 220 and NAF Road will be, bids were received on June 24th, and anticipated construction to begin this fall. Route 122 and 636, we still have that scheduled for mid-27. And then the 40 bridge replacement project, still for late summer of 27. And then on our final page, I'll just highlight a couple of things. Second bullet, Route 220 and 635 Bomber Mill. You'll notice the barrier wall has been installed, and they're actively working on that one. And then, of course, at 220 and 619, we did a traffic shift last night. They're working on the signals today. A lot of activity in that area today. So we'll be glad when that one's opened, and I know all the traffic will be too. Then on 220 at the Summit View Business Park, they're continuing to do the fiber that's in the median, and then the poles will be coming soon thereafter. And we have a couple of rural rustics, which we're actively working on, Route 657 Red Valley and also Route 635 Dobella. With that, that concludes our report, and I'll be happy to try to answer any questions you all have.

Thank you, Brian. Any of the supervisors have any questions? Mr. Tatum.

Brian, I just had one citizen call me this past week with some traffic concerns of people speeding, reckless driving on Ingramville Road in Ferrum. And I think the speed limit through there is where it's unposted is 55. Could we get that checked and see if We need to lower that. I've asked the sheriff to have a little extra patrol and make sure that people are adhering to the safe speed. But can we check and see if maybe we need to lower that?

Yeah, because I don't recall us having looked at that at any time recent. So we'll take a look at that, make sure we haven't. And then, of course, we'll get our traffic engineering folks to review it. Thank you. Yes, sir.

OK, Mr. Tatum, is that satisfying? OK, anyone else have any questions for Brian, inquiries, concerns? Brian, I just want a quick question on the Summit View polls going up and the flashing. So are they going to be in flash for a very long period of time, or what is the plan?

So what I recall is they'll be in flash until a signal is warranted. So I'm not sure what that date is projected out.

Are you all planning to do incremental speed checks? I mean, is it going to be you all will check it once a year? I mean, because I know a traffic study is a big deal. So are you all just going to use it on an observation mode to trigger a traffic study or what are you thinking about that?

So, Mr. Sandy, you might be able to help me out. You've been involved in that discussion a little probably more than I have, to be honest with you. But I know we were doing a flashing just to make folks aware of the intersections. And then at some time in the future when the signal's warranted, they would be with a regular traffic signal and it's a two-phase type signal they've got the median crossovers already constructed so that it'll operate such that you'll come out of the northern entrance to be able to go north or and then you come out of the southern entrance and you can go south and then you'll be able to turn if you're northbound into the southern entrance so those will be the movements but as far as when this signal was warranted that's going to depend on the development of

Sure, I understand. Mr. Sandy, did you have anything you'd like to add?

Yeah, and the conversations have been with VDOT at the district office as to when and how those counts would be determined. You know, we've diverted traffic from Brick Church Road and other roads, and as we add businesses to Summit View coming online, we don't have a definitive answer on how often those counts will be done, but I think the intention would be that there would be some tube counts that would be placed there in the park to kind of monitor the traffic flow. Good, good. To meet those thresholds that Brian mentioned as far as the signal warrants.

Because with traditional medicinals opening up relatively soon, I think this fall perhaps, that's going to start to drive traffic just on their own merit and any other businesses that come to the park. So thank you. I know when people see flashing lights, it's what do you do? And I mean, am I correct in just making sure the public understands that it's caution. It's caution. Just use caution. Yes, ma'am. And there are no rules set fast. You would just do as you normally drive, but it's just cautionary.

It's just an awareness.

Okay. All right. Well, that's all I have. Brian, I think you're good to go.

All right.

And I very much appreciate you being here. Lisa, thank you for being here. We appreciate it. OK, moving right along, I would like to invite Mr. Carter to come to the podium to discuss the monthly finance report and state budget updates. Good afternoon, Mr. Carter.

Afternoon, Madam Chair, members of the board. So I got to lift this back up. All right, I'm going to be looking down at this for a little bit. So our finance report for the month, so this is our June 30th preliminary report. There will be 60 days' worth of year-end adjustments that come in just as invoices come in, revenues come in for the next 60 days. So these are not the final audited numbers. But so far, preliminarily, it's a strong fiscal year-end. So we would expect 100% roughly of revenues and expenditures at this point, pending some of those adjustments. One of the things that we will point out, so if you look at the total revenue, we're at about 105% of budget. The biggest driver of that is general property taxes. And the reason that is so much higher than the budget is there are two things that happen in the year. One being, if you remember, the additional MVP money that came in that we did not budget for. Now that we have a baseline, we did incorporate that into the current year budget. But the other is the timing difference and the change in the real estate tax rate. So we set tax rates on calendar year but budget on a fiscal year. So the change that the board made in that did incorporate some in that June payment. And so some of those items are a little bit higher that were unbudgeted revenues. And so typically what we benchmark is 3% for our revenue projections within 3%. So if you remove those items, we would have met our benchmark for the year as far as revenue projections. So one of the items that are a little bit lower charges for services, that is the biggest drivers to why that's not meeting budget is EMS billing revenue. It was just softer than we anticipated with the change in billing rates. And so that has tended to fluctuate, but it has been on an upward trend. So unfortunately, it looks like we're not going to meet budget there. And that's why you see that negative $316,000. The rest of the categories, your revenue for money and property, that was interest. So interest rate dropped a little bit lower than we thought during the year. So we're going to be about $100,000 less than we projected yesterday. And then your federal and state are typically reimbursement-based, and so you'll see some offsets on the expenditure side as to why that's a little bit lower. So for expenditures, we're at roughly 95% of budget for the general fund. We still have invoices that will come in. Keep in mind this is as of June 30th, a very preliminary snapshot. We hold the year open for 45 days, so that number will trend closer to budget by the time those are paid. Some of that does incorporate budget that was reclaimed from the repayment from the school system as well that was unbudgeted and unintended to be spent. So I want to point that out as well. One thing we will note for you, we have more detail later on the school revenue. So we were still short. We'll have more detail on projections looking a lot better. But on the expenditure side, at the bottom of the page, I want to point out that there's an over budget of $435,000 right now, preliminarily at the end of June. And there will be more invoices to pay. So what we will have is there will need to be an appropriation item at a future meeting that we will need to do because And some of that, the next 45 days or so, will determine how much that may need to be local, if state and federal money come in as anticipated. But for the sake of not overspending appropriation, we would like to handle that at the August or September meeting and an item we would bring back to the board. But I wanted to point that out for you, more detail to follow in Ms. Shalva's report and our projections for this point. Just graphically showing you the revenues, nothing particular. The reason we're a little bit lower this month compared to last year is because, if you remember, we extended the real estate collection date because of a software issue. And so because of that timing, we had more collections in May this year than we did last year. And so you see that fluctuation on the revenue chart.

Is the software issue under control?

It is. There was not an issue this year. But last year it was, and we had to extend that due date. The board did.

I recall. Thank you.

So revenues, just categorically breaking that down for you. You can see the difference in your property taxes year over year. That is those. One-time items we more mentioned because of the timing, not necessarily a grand influx more than we anticipated. We'll break down a little bit of that. Your other local taxes and your state revenue are roughly equivalent. There's a few hundred thousand dollars difference, but there's not a lot of change year over year. Real estate tax, so this is one of them that is driving the property taxes. So you see about two and a half million year over year increase. While we're still – we will run some reports from the treasurer's office to make sure we have how much of that was contributed to the first half of the real estate. There will be some prepayments. We'll adjust. But roughly, the majority of that, probably roughly $2 million, is related to the change in the real estate tax rate. So without that, out of $48 million, we were within $500,000 on a collection, so a very small percentage. Personal property tax is – as far as budget is about a hundred and seven percent of budget we had a good year but it's down compared year over year and so if you remember that's the offset for the MVP tax revenue so we knew we would lose some on our local personal property assessment we would gain it on the state collection and so we probably were more conservative than we needed to be on what we would lose on the personal property collection and so But as far as actuals coming in, it's relatively the same on personal property year over year, not a lot of change, and it definitely is 7% above budget, so not concerned there. Local sales tax, 2.8%, relatively what we would see with inflation right now, nothing concerning. Had a good collection period for June. Of course, that's two months behind, so that would have been April. Meals tax, similar. You can see it is almost 102% of budget that we would anticipate small growth over prior year, about 4.5%. You can kind of see the monthly. So monitoring meals and occupancy especially because of the drought conditions at the lake area. And so we have not seen to this point an impact in tax collections. So, of course, June collections would typically be May activity, and so we'll continue to monitor. Same with occupancy, so we had a good June for this fiscal year, where you compare the prior two, up 11% year over year, but about 109% of budget. So all of these are ticking in above our budget, which is conservatively where we like to see when we're planning for a fiscal year. General fund expenditures, roughly the same. Graphically, you can see June spend was about the same for the month. Categorically, basically, you can see your two categories that typically are the largest are the ones where you see the fluctuation the most, your function of public safety and health and welfare. And so some of that is normal inflationary pressures. There really isn't a lot of expenditure, new programs being added into these areas. Health and welfare will break that so that social services, the operational, is up a little bit. Would anticipate that with normal operational increases, pay increases, things along that nature, just normal operations. One of the items I'll point out is programs is down year over year, and that is contributing to, if you remember, state and federal revenue on your summaries page was below budget. And the reason for that is we see some spend that is below year over year on the programs. And so because state and federal is heavily reimbursed out of their social services programs, you see a corresponding decrease in revenue collected as well. CSA is increasing. That's anticipated. We're still monitoring. It could very well be a year where we do exceed the appropriated budget, so we may have to pull money up from reserves to cover that. We've had several. Some of it is the timing and the age of children in care. They're just reaching a point where they're in an independent living stage or a group home where it's just very expensive, and there's not a lot of other options for them as they're aging through.

Brian, if I can interrupt for just a moment. Yes, ma'am. Would it be possible, and I don't want to create a lot of work. I think the board may be interested and they can reaffirm or not. Could we possibly quarterly get a closer look at what's going on with CSA in terms of the census there because I'm monitoring this from a legislative perspective as well with the caps going on now at the state level and I'd really like to get a handle for us as a board on the real appropriate advocacy for these numbers and the continuation and escalation. I know Mr. Meredith It represents us on CPMT. Mr. Meredith, do you have any thoughts about maybe getting a quarterly report on CSA? Okay.

I think that would be a good idea, just so we can all see what we got there. And I think it would also help that position that we've asked about, too. Yes. And just show all the work that's going in there. So, yes, I think it would be beneficial to the board.

Okay, very good. Brian, if that's not – I don't want to create a lot of work, but I know that you all do a lot of monthly tracking anyway. I'm hoping it's just a stroke of maybe doing – gathering quarterly data. Do you find that overwhelming? No.

I don't think so. I think we would have it. Are you wanting just our program or would you be wanting pure comparisons? The reason I ask that is some of the timing based on the state reporting may dictate how relevant it will be.

Yeah. I would leave that to your judgment.

Certainly. Yeah. We track this as far as we have a dashboard, various things in our CPMT meetings. Of course, you're well aware. And so I think most of that data is tracked anyway. And so we can certainly provide. Would you want that as a separate agenda item or part of this report?

It can just be part of this report. Okay. If that's at the will of the board and discretion of the board. Okay. Very good. Thank you, Brian. Okay.

Yes, ma'am. All right. So for our fund balances and reserves, if you remember, we keep this up monthly. So if you remember, we mentioned last month, of course, we were spending it down. We were only about $9 million over our required local minimum. And so we mentioned at the time, real estate tax collections will likely swing that, and it did. And so you can see with our fund balances, roughly $52 million at the end of June. And so the end of that When you back out our 20% policy minimum and certain restricted funds that are listed there, we're about just under $25 million in unsigned fund balance. And so what you will notice on this as we trend is our fiscal operation is based on property tax collections, and so it will increase around June and December, and then you will spend it down later. we go throughout for operations for the year so this is a high peak point December will be the same and then it will be spent down as we go throughout the year okay we'll make the same point on the the reserves capital reserve is basically obligated for the emergency shelter grant at the middle school and we have that 250,000 left still in budget stabilization So economic budget update and state budget update. Probably should have put state in there. So June criteria was 3.5% growth in CPI inflation year over year. That is, the core inflation was 2.6%. And so it really is... Energy that is, for the most part, driving inflation at this point. If you strip out that with geopolitical events, it is roughly 2.6%, which is much closer to that 2% benchmark rate that the Federal Reserve is intending. So hopefully we will see relief in that at some point. Unemployment rate relatively unchanged, 4.2% for June. Federal Reserve met in June. They left their benchmark rate the same. Similar situation, there was some tamed inflation growth, but also concern for those same events. Unemployment and jobs were relatively strong, considering no significant job losses, so they left that rate the same. Next committee meeting is the end of the month, and so that'll be their next. There's not a lot of chatter about the Federal Reserve making any adjustments to this point, to that rate at the July meeting either. So we do have a state budget. It did happen. We're all thrilled about that. It was last minute. The governor finally signed it on June 29th. And so because of that, of course, it's created some challenges for us. And so have a little bit more detail under the state budget update section after the normal report to bring to the board, just offer some feedback. But the main impact is the cost of living increases they they change some items on us that were not anticipated And so we'll talk about that Due to miss Smith's point as so the the budget pressures and the unfunded mandates I left this in here for one more cycle We'll probably take it out now But just as we just kind of finish up one budget process start in a new fiscal year wanted to remind you of either budget pressures that are coming or that we will have to absorb this year and We've talked about many of these, but the CSA and the private days of the state is continuing with those caps, but pushing down a larger local cost. One of the things that is not in here, well, it is in here, the community-based services match rate did not put a figure to that, but the latest estimate was that it was going to go up significantly. Right now, we pay roughly about 15% in local match rate. We're going to go up to about 25% or 27%, and so that has an impact to the budget. That was a state change. We have no say in the matter, but... What you will know that the overall gross expenditures will not change for CSA But the local share will and so that that will change revenue projections we are fortunate that the state agreed to share the snap administrative costs that was pushed down from the federal government for this year and And so that's subject to change in any future state budget year where the localities may have to pick up a portion of that. There will be additional Medicaid costs that would hit us for the fiscal year 2028 as we look into next year's budget process. And so that's more administration of the program. And so we'll certainly share that later. The paid family leave did pass. It is a delayed implementation. It really won't impact us. It shouldn't this fiscal year. But that is going to be a new payroll tax, and so that will be an employee and employer tax in order to fund that leave program. So that will be something that will be a budgetary pressure for us in future fiscal years. Minimum wage did pass, so it will go up to $13.75 January 1st. We counted for that in the budget. And then it will go to $15 January 1st, 2028. That will be where there will be a compression impact on the county. Collective bargaining was not approved for this year. And so I think we as localities are thankful for that. I think FACO's position, and I won't speak for the county, but I think I support it, is that really that should be a locality by locality decision, not a statewide mandate. Collective bargaining will significantly increase costs for every locality if it is mandated. And so we're thankful that that was delayed.

We're going to hold our breath, Brian, on that. I don't think it's a done deal.

I hope not. I mean, most estimates are that increases locality costs 15% to 20% in your personnel, and that's a significant change for localities. school update and so again Ms. Schauver has in more detail what I really wanted to just highlight is a couple things so state revenue is better still not projected to meet budget sales tax revenue and federal revenue are looking better we did have to transfer 100 of the local transfer and so we're continuing to work with Ms. Schauver and Ms. Owens and the school staff to complete revenue analysis as I mentioned earlier we're likely going to need a supplemental appropriation so we'll bring some proposed actions for that and then we will have to look at where the year ends and cash position as we work with the auditors on what that looks like for the end of the year from a standpoint of a transfer or an inter fund loan some of those items that we will continue to look at that's likely August probably realistically a September item will bring to the board and then mention that with the fiscal year 2026 preparation in the earlier remarks So Madam Chair, that's the finance report. Any questions?

Any questions, gentlemen? Mr. Meredith?

Mr. Carter first. Thank you for getting back on him questions. I had on the line items. I really do appreciate that Yes, um on the revenue. I know you're showing 105 percent 65 How much of that is going to actually have to be carried over to next year? I know a lot of that's based off the real estate Increase tax increase. Yes. So what are you estimating there out of that pot to have to go? towards next year's budget

to help fund next year's budget? Yes.

Because I would assume the $0.03 raise help us make our budget for next year, but we're already receiving some of them revenues.

Right. Well, it depends. And so for next fiscal year's budget, we anticipated the rate would stay the same for the December and the June 2027 collection. So if that rate does stay the same, we will not need any of this money to help cover next year's budget. If it does not stay the same, we will need some to offset. I think the main portion for us is going to be, if this holds, and I don't see any reason for a major fluctuation, is that we do need to restore some reserves that we have depleted funding capital the last couple of years. But that's really, Mr. Meredith, right now the only thing I would say probably would be a priority. All right. Thank you, sir. Yes, sir. Thank you.

Anyone else have questions for Brian?

Brian, could you elaborate on a couple of those reserves that we've depleted?

budget stabilization reserve and the capital reserve in particular. They were both roughly a million dollars each that we wanted to. And we also had to, we pulled down fund balance, unassigned fund balance slightly last year with the transfer of the school system. So I would want to keep some of that to bump that unassigned fund balance back up, which is helpful for our, of course, our bond ratings.

And I think the board has indicated we want to be intentional about building the capital reserve. So we'll continue to watch that and monitor that with your guidance as we move through the year. Yes, ma'am.

I think that would be the intent. It provides flexibility to move revenue or reserves as needed, especially as we get ready to proceed with planning for large capital projects in the next year.

So, Brian, are you going to be dependent upon just monitoring the capital reserve as it relates to the funding that the board is allocating for the school buses coming to a total of a million dollars? Is that going to set as an itemization under the capital piece, or is it going to be a separate reserve?

It is under the county capital at this time.

Okay.

And so the direction from the, and this is historical practice, has been that we would transfer that later in the fiscal year. And so we have, the schools have ordered the school buses, and so they provided the documentation for that. So really once they arrive and those funds are needing to be dispersed, We'll be ready to transfer that money. But that would be monitored on the county side until that time occurs.

And so same process I'm gathering for equipment, fire apparatus, and so forth, the allocation that the board has made for the new fiscal year that we're currently setting in.

Yes. The million dollars, give or take. So that money is part of the local transfer. And so the county does transfer those funds over to the capital fund. But that is part of what is monitored by staff on purchases.

Okay. Are they line item managed?

Yes. Okay. Yes. So anything, especially to the cost of a fire apparatus, will have to come to the board for approval anyway because of the dollar amount.

Sure.

But, yes, we do monitor periodically, some monthly, some more quarterly. But if we have questions as staff, we follow up with the appropriate department on particular projects like that. Thank you, Brian.

Yes, ma'am. Okay. Proceed, sir.

Okay, so then it's still in your printout that you have in front of you. We have a couple of slides after to talk about the state budget update. And so really what we're talking about is compensation. I alluded to that a little bit before. And so this is an informational item. for the board, no particular action needed, but need to make you aware of it for the sake of what the state passed. So we budgeted a 3% cost of living increase in the budget that started July 1st. At the time, that was the higher end of what was in the General Assembly. So the House had a 2% increase in their budget, and the Senate had a 3% increase. Well, what was ultimately passed and signed by the governor had a 3.5% increase for state employees and state-supported local, and then a 4% increase for school employees. Typically, your SOQ, not all school employees. So because of the lateness of the budget, this 3.5% is not effective until August 1st for reimbursement on those state-supported local positions that we would mention. And so I mentioned the 3%. So roughly, we talked to the schools a little bit about it. They will be receiving revenue estimates from the Department of Education. likely that's going to have to be an item that we bring back for what could be a supplemental appropriation of state revenue, and then ultimately offset that in personnel lines. And so I'm not sure if it would be a 4% across the board. That's probably a future school request. I know they're trying to implement their year three of their pay plan, so it could be a combination, but Essentially the overall average would have to be 4% based on the language that I'm aware of for the school employees So for County employees just wanted to provide the board information So the extra half of a percent if we make it effective August 1st would require a net additional local cost of roughly $133,000 for the rest of the fiscal year if we want to add that so I want to just move to the next slide and So what we would recommend is if we're going to adjust the COLA to match the state rate, which historically we have tried to do, so we can, one, take advantage of all the state money that is available to us, but also we do not like subsets of employees having different raises. So we would recommend that if we're going to do it, it's applied evenly. And that $133,000 is all county employees. If we pivot or only look at state-supported positions, that would be a different number. Really at this point we can forego that extra half of a percent and stick with the three percent We could request action to be brought forward for the the August meeting for an appropriation and approval to be effective August 1st for the addition half of a percent to get us to three and a half percent Or we could provide it at a later date I know we were going to do a mid-year look for certain other requests positions to be added back or otherwise and so Right now, those are possible actions. I don't think we as staff have necessarily a recommendation as to what we would prefer. But I do think whatever the board's desire would be, we would prefer it's consistent across all employees. So I wanted to bring that to the board. That's really the update. You will likely hear from the school system asking for an amendment on that because

of that four percent and so we wanted to bring to you also the the county side on the extra half a percent for three and a half mr mitchell brian so that puts three and a half percent at soq state supported employees so the hundred and thirty thousand dollars you're talking about right is that to bring up other county employees equal at the three and a half percent to match what the state is doing for soq

So the SOQ would be 4% for the school positions.

I'm talking about for the county positions.

Okay. Yeah, so state-supported, local, there would bring... Yes, that $133,000 would be all employees, full-time employees, well, regular part-time too, would be at 3.5%. So it would be state-supported, it would... state-supported local, and it would also be employees within those constitutional offices that are not part of the comp board, that are 100% local funded, it would bring them up to 3.5% as well.

So are the state-supported employees going to get the 3.5% regardless of what, regardless if we add that half percent or not, are the state-supported employees going to get the 3.5%?

It's going to vary because that 3.5% is based on the comp board approved salary, possibly not the salary that the county pays them. We supplement several positions. But there will be several positions that are eligible for more than the 3% that the county is providing because the state will reimburse it through the compensation board. And that really is a state function, and the constitutionals would, as long as we pay that, they would be able to draw down that reimbursement. So you would have a position where certain employees could, not saying for certain they would, but they could get a higher raise than others. And that's not the county's doing. That is just based on how the compensation board funding and that structural system works.

Explain that could to me. I'm not quite getting that.

So the way the compensation board works is it has a list of positions. And each constitutional office assigns a position in that role under the comp board system. And they assign it a salary. But that is the comp board approved salary. We pay our employees more than several comp board approved salaries. Comp board just consistently historically lags what market rate really is. It's just not funded enough. And so my point is, What the comp board is going to say is with a 3.5% raise, if your salary was $50,000 and we add 3.5% to that, but you're already paying more than that, we're still as a locality supplementing you that 3.5% raise. So you can ask for that in reimbursement. Because as long as we pay more than the comp board salary is, we can request reimbursement on that. And so that is what I'm attempting to say. Because we supplement salaries more than the comp board pays, they could have a 3.5% applied and still be less than what the county already supplements.

I got you.

Sorry.

I mean, I got you, but I've been here going on five years, and I still don't understand how the comp board works.

It's very confusing, and it's not the easiest system to manage.

Thank you.

Yes, sir.

Thanks.

So with that, I certainly don't need an answer today, Madam Chair, but wanted to bring that for the board. But we would like feedback as staff if this is an item the board wants to act on in August, if we can prepare information to bring back.

Well, Ron, if we could just take a quick pause. I would ask my colleagues, does anyone want to weigh in?

Yes, I do. Mr. Carter, I think it looks like the state may have fixed the issue that you and I discussed just a week before last when I explained my displeasure and the reason I voted against the the bonus for County employees is because I don't like percentage bonuses because you know that bonus is a one-time deal and when you do percentages you have people that are you know making $80,000 getting a higher bonus than people, and it's a one time, and I've always felt that bonuses should be equal, like what the state recommended for the school employees was an equal bonus. So it looks like that they come back with a raise, a cost of living raise, took care of that discussion that you and I were having. For me personally, I think we need to step up and do the 3.5% for all of our employees because they're feeding their families, they're serving the community, they're serving the county, and our county employees are our best asset we've got going, and we need to take care of them.

thank you Mister Tatum anyone else wish to chime in Mister Mitchell I'm not a fan of across the board bonuses but I will support this three and a half yes okay Mister Carter do you have any I will support this I agree with Tim I've never

I've been a fan of bonuses because if you get, I don't know, $600, basically you're taxed $300, so you get $300. And it's a one-time deal. This is ongoing.

Right, right.

I would support it.

Mr. Jamison, do you have anything?

I'll support the three and a half.

Okay. Mr. Quinn?

I would support the three and a half on August 1st.

OK. Mr. Merida.

Yes. I was supported, and I got one question, Mr. Carter. Knowing with the minimum wage going up, by us doing this now, that may help us narrow a little bit of a gap when that other stuff kicks in, as you were talking about the domino effect. So it's kind of being proactive if we do this, in a sense, too. Is that what would be correct?

It will help because that 3.5% is, when we're looking at market and state funded, that's going to be something, if we don't do it now, we'll have to catch up. We're looking at next year's budget, and we're talking minimum wage and compression. And so the way the state approved it, it was 3.5% in both years of their biennium budget. So we're going to have another 3.5% benchmark we're looking for when we're dealing with next year's budget as well.

That's what I was thinking of my mental bias as we move.

So yes, I'm in support So Brian you're hearing unanimous support Do you want or wish to wait until August? Do we need specific language to act on this? Would you prefer that we defer to August on this or what is your pleasure? I

So I did not prepare a possible motion. We can certainly wordsmith one if we would like. So it's really if the board here in the board consensus, I mean, I'm fine to move forward today if the board would like to make a motion. If not, we can certainly bring back language. And I think this could just be a consent agenda item at the August meeting. And that's Still enough time for us to make that effective with the August payroll.

Do you know of any statutory language that would need to be in a motion per se?

Madam Chair, just off of what Jim was saying earlier, I think it would be wise for this to be a consent agenda item next month. Yes.

Yeah. And that was the intent, was this was more informational for the board, just didn't want to surprise you.

Yeah, so I think fair enough that, Mr. Meredith?

I was just confirming with Jim, but is this a possibility if they have the motion ready Thursday at a work session? Could we?

We usually don't take action at work session.

I understand, but I mean it's.

If it's a. I'll leave that up to y'all.

I just. Sure. Since it's just we've discussed it, it's a simple thing. I know August 1st is when you was hoping and we won't meet until mid-August. just throwing something out there and just wanted to confirm the possibility.

So, Brian, you view this as being time sensitive for August 1st?

Well, since we will not pay till the end of August, it's fine for regular board action at your August meeting.

Okay, so I think you can just move forward with the understanding that the board's in unanimous position on this. And if you want to put it on the consent agenda, I mean, Nick and I will work with the leadership team on that for the August agenda. But to Mr. Mayor's point, if there was some sense of urgency, we could provide an urgent manner for action on Thursday if we

had to but it's not typically our practice no and for the sake of that it's not urgent if we could approve at the august meeting the august payroll be at the end of the month and realistically that would be when we'd be eligible for reimbursement so we're fine to delay till august okay thank you gentlemen i think this is a very very good move to support our employees and i'm very pleased

thank you madam chair that's all I have yes sir thank you Brian okay we're gonna move now to Ms. Chauver's report in school finance report good afternoon Ms. Chauver it's a pleasure to see you again thank you it's nice to be here this afternoon I don't need to touch anything right it'll appear on its own it'll just be magic

Thank you so much. Good afternoon, Madam Chair and members of the Board of Supervisors. It's nice to be with you today. And my presentation will sort of follow suit after Mr. Carter's, where we're going to remind you that it does take a while to get everything completely buttoned up for the fiscal year that ended June 30th. But happy to present results to you today, including the physical results through June 30th, as well as our projections for how the fiscal year will go. wrap up for the school division once all entries are in the format of the report is exactly the same as you've seen the last couple of months so i won't review that major categories of both revenues expenditures and then data across the columns of the report so this first column Warner's not going to want to point today. Okay. The first column of numbers is literally like stop the clock, midnight June 30th. What do we have in terms of total revenues and total expenditures? And so you can see that we've got more expenditures at that point in time than revenues. Thank you. uh to the tune of about 2.7 million here okay um the next column is is our current budget and then the next the percent of budget recognized through june and so what i'll point out here is that um basically just a little bit short on the revenue side and that's mainly because there are a number of accruals of revenue still to be made before we close the books Expenditures pretty much fully spin out in total. That one typically will run a little bit more along the calendar clock. Some accruals, but not as many. The projected column continues to be the one that really gets all of our focus. And so for this report, this presentation today, that column is literally the June column plus the estimate of the accruals still to be booked when accountants do all of their end of year journal entries. On the revenue side of the house, we're expecting around $2,250,000 of accruals using round numbers. On the expenditure side, we're expecting to pick up about $450,000 of additional expenditure from those accruals. And as Mr. Carter pointed out in his presentation, I mean, it does take time. It's really all based on what has happened by June 30th, and sometimes we don't have the data to know about that until we get vendor invoices, until we can scrub the revenues and really know what happened subsequent to year end. So it really does take the months of July and August to do that. And then these columns on the far right are really gonna give you the analytics, if you will, that help give you information as leaders and decision makers about those results and how things landed. So once we build in that roughly $2,240,000 in revenue accruals, you'll see we're just like dead on. I mean, just a little bit over the revenue estimate, but 0% because that estimate's so large at $99 million. So revenues pretty much come right in. Mr. Carter mentioned earlier that the state funding is under the estimate a little bit. It's actually a little better than we thought it was going to be last month, but still under the estimate that was adopted. The sales tax has done well and is over. It's actually up about 6% compared to last year. And you can see 3% over the adopted budget, or the current budget. And then positives in a couple of other areas as well. Then on the expenditure side, we are currently looking at overexpending that appropriation by around $975,000. That's 1% in the aggregate. And then what I'll point out to you is that, as we've seen throughout the spring season, each month as we've come to you, some of these categories are over and some of them are under. Instruction, for example, is over $1.5 million, a small percentage, but since it's such a large category, the dollars are pretty large. I also want to just walk through the history briefly of currently we're looking at a $971,000 deficit for the year. And I will remind you that last month we were looking at about $1.2 million. And it has improved. Every month that we've done this exercise, that deficit has gotten better. It has improved. It's become a smaller deficit. You'll notice here on this bottom line item contingency a $100,000 projection. Of course, we have a zero through June. We have $100,000. The group of us that have been working on this each month talked about whether we wanted to have a contingency there or not. leave it alone and I think somewhat somewhat symbolically but again just to remind all of us there are some unknowns we've done our best to make these projections but keeping that hundred thousand dollar cushion if you will in there you know we hope that this number will get even better as we close the books but we wanted to keep just a little bit of contingency in there. And I think that wraps up the remarks that I wanted to make. I think similar to what Mr. Carter said, you'll have a meeting August 18th. I think that would be awfully tight for us to really try to give you a final, final. Your next meeting after that will be middle of September the 15th. And I think that's probably a good goal for us to have this final meeting. product for you. It will still be unaudited because the audit won't take place until October, but it will be a more finalized projection from staff than what we show you today. So a lot of efforts gone into this. I want to thank the finance team at the county as well as the finance folks, Dr. Sears and his team at the school division. We've all worked together a lot, been hunkered down quite a bit, and it's a good partnership. And so we continue to learn and work together to bring you this information.

I'll open it up for any questions. Thank you, Ms. Shaw. Are there any questions for Ann?

Ann, you mentioned that each month it is in praise. What's causing that, you think?

A couple of things. I think that there's been a great and tremendous effort on the federal side to make sure that all of the requests are being put in in order to make sure to maximize that federal funding that's typically on a reimbursement basis. I think the strong sales tax that I mentioned has aided the performance. Earlier in the process, we had a lower sales tax projection than what we've ended up with here. And then I think there's been some improvement on the expenditure side. I think construction has come in lower than what was expected at one point in time as well. And just sort of overall, I would say the fine-tuning of the ability to make projections. And with fewer months uncertain, we've been able to, I guess, have... We've probably been able to have less need for ultra-conservatism as we've had more months continue to get processed and less months uncertain, if that makes sense.

Okay. Thank you. Mr. Carter.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Ann, could you talk a little bit about, I've lost my place here, the school food services, that figure. Are they going to be able to recoup that, or what do you know about that?

I think I'd like to defer to Dr. Sears to address that, and he can join me if he would like.

Okay, that's fine.

Or Ms. Wright-Lawson may want to respond to that. I mean, it's obviously over budget for the year.

I'll wait until Dr. Sears. Yeah, sure, that's fine.

Yeah, we'll wait for Dr. Sears to come up next, Ann. Mike, did you have any other questions? No. Any other questions from supervisors? Okay. We thank you very much, Ann. Thank you so much. You're always very thorough. You give a good explanation for things that are complex. OK. At this point, I will ask Dr. Sears if you would come forward, sir, and deliver the school finance report, revised CIP, and looking at the approval of the funding for the A&E services. So welcome, Dr. Sears.

Thank you.

Madam Chair, members of the board, and Mr. Sandy, thank you for allowing me to speak here today. There are a few items that I would like to address this month, including the FY26 budget information that was presented here today, the still fluctuating FY27 budget, engineering work for the three elementary HVAC projects, the one cent sales tax referendum, and information that might help us paint a clearer picture about how we got to this point with our FY25 and FY26 budget. First, let's discuss the FY26 budget projections. Once again, I'm happy to see that the projected deficit this month is less than it was last month. I'm still not happy that it's a deficit, but the deficit has consistently trended down since we started this process. It is also worth noting that the projected deficit is now in the same neighborhood as the funding that was taken out of this year's budget to help offset the FY27 or FY25 deficit. So it's reasonable to assume that we might would have been okay with FY26 had we not been having to correct the FY25 deficit as well. It would have been close and it might still have been a deficit, but it would have been very close if we weren't trying to cover what occurred in the FY25. In regard to the FY27 budget, much still depends on where things land with FY26. The final state budget did appropriate an additional $300,000, but all of that increase is tied to giving a 4% average raise to our employees. The budget that we approved gave a step increase for all employees, which is a 2.5%. So we're currently working to determine how a partial implementation of phase three could get us to an average 4% raise so we'll be eligible for the full state supplement. If we aren't able to give an average 4% raise, then we look at losing about $400,000 in state funding. The options we are exploring are giving an additional step to everyone who was at least one step behind or giving an additional step to those who are three or four steps behind. And once we know what the solid number was for FY26, what we're gonna have to cover out of the savings from the position cuts next year, we'll have a better handle on what funding we'll have available next year to apply toward those additional steps. I have notified our faculty and staff that it will likely be September before we have an answer on the partial implementation of phase three through meetings with Brian and county staff. We'll probably have a decent idea by mid-August, but in order to get things finalized, September is a safer timeline. In regard to the architectural and engineering contract, I have consulted with the school board attorney, and the contract that we have in place with RRMM is... Allowable for us to proceed with doing the engineering work if that is how the Board of Supervisors would like for us to proceed he said that stages changes in the state law and the existing contract are They meet all the requirements for them to be able to do the work and those estimates or those cost projections were presented to the board at a previous meeting and If it's the intent to do another RFP for engineering services for these projects, we would probably need to adjust the timeline because it's not likely that we could do all three projects next summer. So I would ask for some direction today on how you would like for us to proceed with that, if you would like for us to proceed with securing the work through RRMM or to do the work necessary to put it out for RFP, which will take a few months and that will kick everything, kick the timeline down a few months. It still might be possible to do a project next summer. if we put the design work out for an RFP, but I don't know that we could get all the designs for all three schools and do the bidding process and have the work done next summer.

Dr. Sears, what do you estimate the cost of the A&E services for the three schools?

I think it was around, let's see, I've got that here. It was 800 and some thousand, I believe. $871,250 was the engineering work for all three schools.

Is that through RRMM?

Yes, that was through RRMM, through the existing contract.

You can go ahead, Dr. Sears.

Now that the one cent sales tax has been approved to be on the ballot in November, we probably need to move quickly to establish a series of town hall meetings and informational campaign in order to present our needs and answer questions from the public. I think that we all recognize it's not going to be an easy sell this fall, given everything that's been going on with our regular operating budget and what seems to be a growing distrust between the public and our local government officials. It's going to be critical that we work together to explain why this is needed, how it actually helps our citizens share school capital costs with the many tourists who visit our county, as opposed to them paying for everything through increased property taxes, and why doing it now as opposed to waiting a few years down the line will help us maintain facilities on par with our neighbors. As we know, most of our neighbors have already updated their CTE facilities. They've got brand new facilities in Roanoke City and Roanoke County, and and they are top of the line. So in the quality of the quality of instruction here is beyond compare, but the quality of facilities we are lagging far behind our neighbors. So I would probably need to get with Steve and we just start working on how we can work together to communicate those needs and figure out a plan for that. Finally, I would like to share with the board what we've been able to determine about how we got to the point on the FY25 deficit and why we feel better about things going into FY27. Mrs. Wright Lawson and Mr. Terry have been looking back through the financial records for the last few years, and this is what was determined. And I've asked Mrs. Wright Lawson to join me here in case there are any questions. During FY24, the school division was receiving funding from several grant sources, including ESSER, which was the federal COVID money, school construction grants, the SCAP, and an all-in grant to assist with reducing learning loss from the COVID shutdown, implementing the Virginia Literacy Act, and improving attendance. The all-in grant was unusual in that it was money received in advance with the expectation that it'd be spent over a three-year period. Most grants require that expenditures be made up front and then the funds are reimbursed later. Since we did not have a separate fund for grant activity, all of these grant revenues were commingled with the general fund resources. We received $2,445,000 that year for the all-in grant and expended $289,778. That means we should have had $2,155,000 and some change to be carried forward for FY25 and FY26. The end of the year revenue picture became clouded by the fact that the auditors recorded adjusting revenue entries for the school construction grant to our general operating fund, fund 16, while recording the project expenditures to the capital fund, fund 17. In hindsight, the advanced receipt of the VLA funds, the all-in funding, and the incorrect posting by the auditors masked what was actually a spending deficit for FY24, but didn't manifest itself as an actual operating deficit until FY25. The all-in expenditures for FY25 were approximately 1.4 million, and for FY26 were approximately 600,000. It's probably not a coincidence that last year's deficit and this year's expected deficit fell and will fall near those amounts. Since the island funds and incorrectly posted school construction funds were causing things to look like we had a healthy budget surplus, steps were not taken to deal with the budget shortfalls that were occurring in FY24. Now folks might ask why these expenditures came to a head during FY24. I believe that the reason is during the pandemic, Franklin County Public Schools lost approximately 500 students from its total enrollment. Because there was so much ESSER money rolling in that could be utilized for a number of operational expenses, adjustments were not made to staffing that corresponded to the dramatic enrollment loss. This was not unusual as nobody was cutting jobs during COVID. However, most school divisions were not losing as high of a percentage of their students as did Franklin County. FY24 was the last year for using ESSER funds, and all that we had remaining that year were tied up with the middle school HVAC project. So in the 2023-2024 school year, we were paying more employees to teach 6,100 kids than we were paying to teach 6,600 before the COVID shutdown. We had also implemented phase one of the compensation study that year, which meant we were paying higher salaries for those employees. Even though we closed two schools and made significant personnel cuts for FY25, they were not enough to cover the loss of state funding due to the increase in the LCI and cover the areas where we were over budget in FY24 that had yet to be detected because of the all-in funding and the incorrect grant fund adjustment made by the auditor. I have to be honest and say that ever since coming to Franklin County, it has felt more like I'm having to liquidate an excellent school division instead of being able to focus on improving instruction and trying to make life better for the students and families that we serve. We've not been at a very good place for the last few years, but our teachers and support staff have continued to do an amazing job as they've watched coworkers leave without being replaced. seeing their class sizes increase and worry continuously about whether or not their salaries will keep up with inflation. I was doing a rough estimate today, and I think in three years we have cut about 15% of our full-time staff from the school division. I'm a little more optimistic going into FY27 that we've got the budget issues to a point that they are manageable, but only time will tell the level of impact all of the cuts we've had to make will have on student achievement. Folks should probably be prepared to see some dips in the data as we work through these changes, but I'm confident that we'll be able to get things back on an upward trajectory before too long. Our teachers are incredibly good, and I have no doubt they will adapt and overcome any challenges that are put before them. Thank you again for allowing me to speak today, and we'd be happy to answer anyone's questions.

Thank you, Dr. Sears. I'll open up the floor for questions, concerns. Mr. Quinn, go ahead.

So, Dr. Sears, back to the A&E services. I think you're asking us to take an action tonight. And as I think about it, you know, naturally we would like both the A&E services as well as the construction work to all be put out to competitive bid. However, as I think about this, at least we're making a first really big step, which is planning to bid out the construction work. And I think that there's some risk in not doing all three schools next year. So the first is that all of a sudden, next May, one of the schools becomes an emergency, like it did this year with Lee Wade, and we suddenly have to make a big financial commitment without it being competitively bid. I also think that there is a chance that by 2020, putting all three schools on the RFP that there'll be a significant savings there as opposed to just doing one. So just in general, for the benefit of the board, I would support doing the A&E services as you're proposing with that company that you have in line.

Thank you. And just to clarify the point that was they did they were hired through the RFP process to do engineering services as needed. So it's not that we're bypassing that process. It was done and it is in accordance with the law and we have a five year contract with them that was brought in through the RFP process.

Well, and I think that the cost for those three schools is likely to be in the $8 to $10 million range. So the $800,000 for the A&E services seems in line, to me, with the total construction costs for the three schools.

Yes, and something I didn't mention here but I think is on your agenda, we also would ask that you approve the updated CIP plan that was presented last month. That will help us if we apply for any school construction grants. We need to have that approved. It doesn't necessarily have to be this month. But either this month or next month, we would ask that the Board of Supervisors approve that updated CIP so we can check that box if we do have the ability and the opportunity to apply for any construction grants.

Mr. Quinn, are you good?

I'm done.

Thank you. Mr. Meriden.

Dr. Sears, first, I know y'all have put a lot of work in this, and it's looking better. So thank you for that. I got two quick questions. I know you talked about the revenue, and I want to set all that to a side. Last month, the budget, I'm going to use instruction, administration, and food services. The budget going until this year, the school board and your staff said we would need 69, might as well say 70 million for instruction. But yet at the end of the year, you're 71,400,000. You're almost 1.5 over. And that wasn't fully staffed. I still have a concern with how... when you're projecting, and we go through the same thing with Mr. Carter, I would ask this exact same question, is what changed from the beginning of the year saying this is what we would need to fill those three categories, and then at the end of the year, how we get so far with the budget? And you may not be able to answer that now. That's a question I would love an answer for, because that's a little concerning as we move forward, unless y'all have an answer for that.

I do not, but Ms. Wright Lawson might be able to address it to a degree. If you're not ready, like I said, just.

Now the instruction piece I will have to look further into.

Okay.

Can you speak into the microphone? Thank you. All right.

No, that's okay.

Thank you. Instruction piece I will have to look into a little deeper to be able to answer. School nutrition, I can't answer part of it. We did have a budget adjustment due to some, the funding that we were using to pay back to the county. School nutrition also has increased food prices. Prices have gone up quite a bit. We all see it in our personal groceries that we buy at our homes. And that has a big part to play in it also.

Okay. Well, if you can look in that instruction and admin attendance and health, because that's what I'm saying. That's my concern. I'm glad everything's working good. And my second question is, I think last month you said all employees were, nobody was behind more than four steps. And I know some employees have been there 25 years. It's had seven pay freezes. So my concern, or I'm just interested in, let's say you have an employee that's on step 19 that's four steps behind. And if you're able to do some of phase three to get them to step 20. So correct me, I think it's a $3,000 to $4,000 difference between step 19, step 20. So I'm going to use $3,000 to be safe. That's $12,000 that that teacher missed out on, because they should have been on step 20, let's say, four years ago. Have you all thought about how you may compensate these teachers who they're at the top of their pay scale, but they've missed their top pay scale for four years? And like I said, that's $12,000, $12,000, $15,000

how will we or y'all looking to get that back for them or compensate them for it i do not think there is the possibility of being able to go back and do the back pay for those teachers who've been behind you know our goal is to try to get them up to where they should be on the salary scale we've got a 20-step salary scale for our teachers So once we get them to the top of the scale, they do get a 1% cost of living raise every year after that. But our objective is to get everyone to the top of the scale. We could not go back, and I wish we could. It would be wonderful if we could. But I don't think there would be any financial way we could go back and pay folks for all the steps that they have missed over all of these years.

But it's not my decision. I'm just thinking out loud, and it gets me in trouble.

Well, and Mr. Meredith, I would just add to that. Through the talks we've had about over the last few years trying to get there, that point has been brought up many times. And it's been said many times that there is no way financially we could ever do that.

And that's fine.

I just want to let you know that that has been brought up. And I've heard it addressed multiple times. It would just be impossible to address that.

Well, I don't know if that's been addressed to those teachers. I mean, we have a lot of conversations here. And I'm not saying those conversations happen. I don't know if the staff is ever like, hey, sorry. Or is it possible instead of the 1%, I'm just throwing out here, You say, hey, let's do a 3% if we can. I don't know the numbers. But I just think sometimes I'd be a hard discussion to have a teacher who's been there and been dedicated to our school system and say, sorry, but you have, let's say, somebody that's at step 16. All of a sudden, you jump them up to step 20. Well, then all of a sudden, they're getting their full amount. So that's just my concern. And I appreciate all these talks and stuff. But it seems like if we could think outside the box some way, somehow, we're not going to match what they've missed out on. But if we could get a little bit back to them, I might say a lot to them to say thank you for your dedication and being loyal to our students of Franklin County. And I know y'all are doing everything you can, but I just was curious if there was any ideas or things doing that. Thank you. That's all.

Questions? Mr. Carter.

Yes.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Dr. Sears, I'd like to go back to my question to Ann Shauver about the school food services, the 573,000. It's a 16% negative. Are you going to be able to recover that, or where does that stand? Can you enlighten a little bit about that? Is that part of the 518? That's right.

Yeah, I'll let Ms. Wright Lawson explain that more, but that has to do with the FY25 deficit as well, and those funds could not be posted back to last year and were in this year's budget.

As part of working with school nutrition, we look at it to see what we've expended versus our federal reimbursements. And so in the end, we true it up, use the a la carte money to make it whole. And so we did that, but we didn't do it in a timely fashion. So part of the money that we gave back to the county was the $518,000 that we used last year to do that. It was a budget adjustment on to the county funding side so that we could pay it back to the county through the allocation and not taking that amount of money. And it also decreased the school food services budget by that amount. So they had actually would be just a little bit over their budget if they still had that amount in there. And with the increased food cost, they would still be slightly over. But they have already recouped that money.

I see. And I have one more question, if I can, Madam Chair. Of course. For the upcoming school year, what are you looking at as far as ADM? Are you projecting a loss, or what do you think that's going to look like?

Yes, the budget was built on a loss of I think about 130 some, 135, 137. I don't remember the exact number, but we always build our budget on what the state projects. And typically, it's pretty close. This past year, it We lost more than what was projected, which is one of the reasons why we see a decrease in state funding. I think that ended up costing us about 200 and some thousand from this year's budget because the enrollment loss was greater than what was projected. But usually it's in line. It's within single digits of what the state is projecting.

So you typically go by the state figures when you all budget that? Yes.

Okay. Don't you have to turn in your ADM at the end of March every year, your projections?

Yes, we do. That's the number that counts for the end of the year funding and all the adjustments. We have to turn in the September 30th numbers and that dictates what our state funding is until the end of the year. And then the March numbers are when they make all of their adjustments. And usually we see a loss of students between September and March.

Okay, thank you, Dr. Sears. Mr. Jamison, did you have some comments?

Yes, Dr. Sears, what year was it you said you lost 500 students? Was that COVID?

Between the 2019-2020, I said 1920 this morning and threw everybody for a loop. Yeah, 2019-2020 school year and the 2023-2024 school year. We were down, it wasn't quite 500, but it was like 470 some.

How does that compare to the ADM this year? I mean, 500, what was the total ADM then? More additional, that's what I'm asking.

It went from being around 6,600 to 6,100 during that time. So now we're somewhere around 55? I think it's 57-something. I think it's 57.

I believe it's fifty seven something for this coming budget it's a you know it's um what about fourteen thousand we're losing per student on that per year roughly between local and state yes yes have you we keep losing every year I mean this goes back two decades you see any fix for this I mean Yeah, it's a national issue. I don't see no improvement going forward with the record we've got the history of.

I mean, it's a national issue and it's a state issue. The steep decline during COVID, I think we saw that with the homeschool numbers doubling during that time. That's really the only anomaly. The drops that we're experiencing every year are pretty much in line with what everybody around us also seems to be experiencing, except maybe the city school divisions that tend to hold steady better than the rural school divisions. We've got a lower birth rate, there are more options. I do think that what we saw in FY25 with the budget hitting us the way it did, We were first in line because of the increase in LCI. I think we saw it more this year with other school divisions because of the fact that all the ESSER money is now gone. The enrollment loss is starting to hit people harder now. And anybody who didn't make some pretty tough decisions and the budget cuts, the position cuts like the ones that we are making for next year, got hit a little harder with their budget this year than what they were anticipating, and that's why so many divisions were having to hold meetings. Even in our region, other divisions are in a similar situation to us and having to cut positions like we are having to cut positions. I think we're going to continue to see this as enrollment declines throughout the country. I read an article today, and I don't know, I can't remember the publication that presented it, but they're anticipating with the federal legislation that gives people a tax break for donating to private school scholarships they're expecting that that's going the states that adopt that are going to see even a larger impact on their school enrollment because more scholarships are going to be available for students to attend private school and that will have a then even a greater negative impact on public school enrollment

We got nine thousand, just under ten thousand I guess, excuse me, under a thousand homeschoolers. As far as private schools here in the county, how much enrollment have we got there? We got Christian Heritage, Wendover Lake, I think the German Baptist have started. Do you have any idea of the handle on that, the population between all of them?

No, I do not know how many of those are Franklin County kids and how many come from other areas, or how many of those might have left us to go to homeschool and then transferred to private school. I expect there are some of those, but our number of homeschool students, you're right, is slightly under 1,000 this year, and that seems to be holding steady. We haven't seen a huge increase. or a huge decrease in that since coming out of COVID a couple of years ago. That number has stayed within 10 or 20 of where it is currently.

With the loss, you know, ADM loss, like I said, over two decades, and I don't see nothing, and what I'm hearing from you, I don't see no great increase where we're going to get a bunch of students back in. This don't look good for the school system. I mean, in five, ten years, where are we going to be at?

We're going to have to have a conversation about shutting another elementary school.

Is that on the table now?

That's been on the table since we shut the last two. And we've said, you know, we probably got five, hopefully ten years before we have to have that conversation again. But, yeah, I mean, it's not sustainable to employ the same number of people and keep the same number of buildings operational if you're losing, you know, more than 100 students a year. Basically every three years you're losing the equivalent of another elementary school. So you have to make those adjustments and those need to be conversations that we have as a community. How are we going to plan for that and how are we going to adapt as if enrollment loss continues on its current trajectory? Thank you. You're welcome.

Dr. Sears, to piggyback on that, Mr. Jamison, if I may, that decline is really what it is. The numbers were very telling. I think on the flip side of that, my thinking goes to the strategic thinking and planning that you all are doing with a primary focus on trying to regain adding students to your census versus continuing to lose. I mean, is that part of your discussion from a strategic standpoint to gain some students back in versus continuing to close schools?

We have tried to increase options to partner with homeschool families. I think we probably do more than anyone around us to offer part-time enrollment for homeschool families. If their students, homeschool students want to come in and take a CTE class, we just require that they take a core subject class as well. We've created our own virtual academy to partner with our homeschool families, and we've been keeping between 50 and 60 students enrolled in that program. That allows them to take their classes from home virtually, but also to still be a student at Franklin County High School or Benjamin Franklin Middle School and participate in all the school events and play sports. The numbers weren't what we had hoped it would be. We were hoping we would have about 100 students stay in that regularly, but it has held steady between 50 and 60 since we implemented it.

Are you able to draw ADM monies for those students that are on that model program?

Yes, we do. We get the full state funding for them.

OK. The only other question I had, Dr. Sears, moving back to the renovation of the other three schools. Staying with RHMM, am I getting that right? RRMM. RR, OK. Staying with that, we'll have to discuss that as an action item, of course. Do you see the potential for all three schools to be completed if that is what we were to go with today?

Yes, I think if our goal is to get all three schools done next summer, that's the only option we have to make that happen.

And you have reaffirmed the use of that contract from a legal perspective?

Yes.

And you're confident in that opinion? Yes. Okay. Okay. So you're looking for the action item. What would you like the board to consider in terms of a formal action item?

would be, I guess, approval for the funding to engage RRMM in the engineering and design for the three elementary school HVAC projects for Rocky Mount Elementary, Callaway Elementary, and Snow Creek Elementary.

OK. OK. So I'll open the floor up for any discussion on this potential action item. Mr. Jamison.

Dr. Seegers, can, when RRMM does this, Can they break those schools out individually and give us three prices or three designs or whatever in case we don't have funding, whatever? Yes.

I think the designs would have to be done individually, and then we could decide how we want to bid out those projects after we have the design work done.

And I know you've got to look in the crystal ball, I guess, for the question I'm asking, but you were talking about still on a chopping block. I know Callaway was one of them, or any of the three on the list of the closing.

You know, I think we would go back and study all of the schools before we would have that conversation, but Callaway and Snow Creek were two that were in the conversation when we had to close Burnt Chimney and Henry Elementary two years ago. think they would certainly have to be studied again but I also think we would need to look you know enrollment has shifted in different places and the facility needs change every year all of those were taken into consideration when we looked at it two years ago so we I don't want to say that it would definitely be one of those two I would say we will go back and look at all of our elementary schools if we have to close another one and try to come up with the one that probably has the most facility needs, a low population, and the attendance zones can be divided evenly, and those students received in schools that have the capacity to take them.

We definitely, in my opinion, we definitely need to have some sort of idea before we go investing in up fits and all that on a school that could possibly be closed in a couple years after that.

That's a valid point.

Are you planning on doing that?

I think those are unfair questions to ask. I said a crystal ball. Yeah. But we're talking hypotheticals five to ten years down the road. Maybe. We can't ask him if he's. We don't know that. It is a hypothetical. And to ask him if he's planning to do that is an unfair question to ask him at the podium today.

Well, now I think we're three years into it, so now we're talking two to seven years down the line from having to have that conversation. But I've had the same thoughts myself. But the need is great at those schools. And until we decide to close them.

And that's my point. Yeah. I don't want to throw good money down a hole. But we can't make decisions on these things play in hypothetical situations.

No, and I think that that's just the context of the discussion.

I understand, but I don't think the schools nor us are at a place today that we can say on what's going to happen there. Nobody knows. I hope next year that enrollment just picks up and everything's back and merry. I'm hopeful, but I just don't think that's a fair question.

Dr. Sears, let me ask you this, kind of flip it around a little bit. With the cuts that you've made and put into place for the current 2026-2027 budget year, are you confident now that you guys are in a fairly commensurate position with your revenues versus expenditure projections. Are you in a more commensurate place with regard to, I don't know how to state the question properly, with regard to running the schools, paying the teachers, with the cuts that you've made that leave you in a fairly equitable position?

I'm comfortable that right now we have a little bit of money to work with to try to do something additional with compensation or address whatever other budget priorities the school board would like for us to address. I'm not confident saying what that amount is yet until we finish the... But based on the projections and the cuts that we've made, we have cut more than enough to cover the projected deficit. So I think there will be money to address some of those priorities. I just don't know how much or which priorities in the end the board will want to move forward with.

Sure, I understand that. I think we're all erring on the optimistic side, you know, in terms of righting the ship, if you will, moving forward and wishing that all of the incremental steps and strategies that have been put into place will put you and your staff in a more stable position of trying to operate without these ancillary worries that have been plaguing you guys for the last few years. And that's my hope for you guys, is that you find yourselves in that role.

Yes, that's my hope, too. Nobody wants a repeat of these past six months.

So, gentlemen, is there anyone that would like to make a motion?

I was just working on that, Madam Chair. So the motion needs to state that what was the dollar amount on the A&E services?

I think it's $875,000.

871-250.

Okay.

So 871-250 through A-A-M-M? R-R-M-M. R-R-M-M. Did I get A for that? And in that motion, can that also include the updated CIP? No. So they need a separate motion for that.

I think we'll defer that to the August meeting to get that approval.

All right. I have one more question before I offer this motion, Brian. Where we, so we just decided we were going to up the half a percent for county employees on the pay. And that's outside of a budget that we have already approved. Where are you planning on getting that money?

You mean on the county side for the county? Yes. Please. Let's address that after we address the schools. All right.

Well, my question's going to be if the state's doing the same thing for 4% on them, I want to know what the dollar amount is for theirs as well. However, I can do that after we offer this motion. I'll offer the motion. I make a motion that we approve the $871,250 for A&E services through RRMM. Second.

Who was the second? I'm sorry. Mr. Quinn, thank you. We'll do a roll call vote. Madam Clerk, if you would.

Supervisor Carter? Yes. Supervisor Tatum? Yes. Supervisor Quinn?

Yes.

Supervisor Jamison?

Yes.

Supervisor Mitchell? Yes. Supervisor Meredith? Yes. And Chair Smith? Yes.

Now for my follow-up question. Brian, where are you putting that money coming from?

He was waiting for you. I know he was. He was waiting for me.

Just waiting my turn. So just to be clear, we're talking about the $133,000 for the extra half a percent. Yes. Realistically, just with our typical conservative budgeting, I would say that could be covered through vacancy savings. If you look at where our budget, we spent 95% of the budget at this fiscal year. we're likely okay to absorb that through vacancy savings. If you remember, we have a personnel reserve in the adopted budget that the board, and that's always, that reserve is to cover anticipated being staffed 100% in every department for the entire year. We do that intentionally for unknowns like this. So Mr. Mitchell, I think for 133,000, that likely can be covered from that personnel reserve because we'll realize vacancy savings during the year.

Dr. Sears, do you have the information today like what Brian provided us on what It's gonna, did the state change yours on the 4%?

Yes, we were planning on a 3% average in our budget, and yeah, they upped it to 4%, and we're working, we are trying to handle ours through step increases. We know that a step increase for all employees is just a shade under $2 million, but we're looking to see how a partial implementation of phase three, for example, let's say everybody who was a step behind We can give an additional step this year. That would get us to a 4% average across the board and make us eligible for the state funding.

I would just be interested in seeing the same numbers like what Brian gave us and what the change was when the state changed that, the difference in what you had budgeted for and what it is now.

Yeah, I think it was around a little over a million dollars, wasn't it, for I believe is the number that we can, just a very preliminary number we were working on for conversational purposes. I think it was close to 1.1 million with 300,000 coming from the state and us needing about 700 and some thousand from local dollars. If you could get all that under a microscope for next month, I would appreciate that. Okay.

Yeah, just so you know, Dr. Sears, we'll talk about our legislative agenda later. But we are finding it tougher and tougher every year for the state. And we acknowledge the fact that they want us to take care of our folks. But with the constitutionals, they want us to give constitutional you know, matching monies, but then the rest of our employees are left.

Yeah.

And it puts an undue burden really on the localities throughout the Commonwealth under how that, you know, ends up coming down to the local level. It's another unfunded mandate at the end of the day.

It really is.

But we all want to do the right thing. That's the thing. We all want to take care of our people.

Yeah, if they're going to do it, they need to do it earlier in the legislative process and not throw it on us after budgets have already been approved.

On June 29th, yeah, yeah. So, okay, any other questions for Dr. Sears? Dr. Sears, we very much appreciate you guys being here, and we're very pleased to hear the progress that you're making with the financial team. I think, you know, I've sat in on one of those meetings, and... It seems like, you know, the schools and the county teams are, you guys are working very productively together, and I think it's in the results, and we very much appreciate that.

Thank you. It's been a good and educational process.

Good, good. Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Okay, gentlemen, we are due to take a 10-minute break. We can make it a five-minute break and stay more so on schedule if that's okay with everyone. Okay, we'll take a five-minute break. Okay, we're ready to reconvene. Thank everyone for your patience. The next item on our agenda is to hear from our sheriff, Mr. Bill Overton, on two matters. Sheriff, we're honored to have you with us this evening.

Madam Chairman, thank you so much. Board of Supervisors, it's a pleasure to be back here with you all. And thank you all so much for making time for us to discuss two requests that I'm bringing to you today and for your consideration. And I'm hopefully anticipating your approval on both of these matters. The first one that not in any particular order, other than the fact I see it popped up on the screen, is our alert system notification in our school division. In all of our elementary schools, and our high school and middle school. This may be better noted to us if we talk about it saying it is an active shooter alert system, and that's exactly what it is. That's the full intent. To give you a little bit of background, in 2012, 1999 is when the Columbine shooting occurred in Colorado, 1999. Long time ago. 13 students were killed. Then we fast forward. 2007, Virginia Tech, 32 students killed there in that tragic event there right here at home. 2012, I took office. January 2012, that end of that year, we had the Sandy Hook shooting, which was tragic in its own right because it was an attack at an elementary school. And that was just a horrific horrible event. So you can imagine at that particular time not only law enforcement but local government school divisions were dealing with this would appear to be somewhat of an epidemic because from 2013 to 2018 there was noted of 140 school shootings. We don't hear much about them unless there's multiple deaths. There was a school shooting in Texas in March of this year and a teacher was shot and killed in school, during school, and the student took their own life. So after 2012, the Sandy Hook, we started looking at how do we protect our schools. School division was very cooperative in working with us and At that particular time, there were talk about more cameras and how do we stop this? How do we eliminate the threat as best we can? So fast forward moving up to around 2015, 2016, we started hearing of technology where there would be an alert system on school computers or access for teachers at their computer at their desk. Whereas if there was an active shooter, it would allow them to be able to hit a button on the computer and that information would directly go to a 911 center that there was an active shooter in that school. Even gave the ability, as technology was, to have communication as to where the shooter was or the movement, possibly, of that shooter. I mean, if you remember back, this was all new in the fact of how we handle it. Totally different in 2018 of how we would find ourselves moving into a school setting versus what the protocol was in 1999 when the Columbine shooting occurred. It was more of a perimeter security and then waiting for forces to develop to go in and find the perpetrators. Now, it is one of essence of arrive as quickly as we can. Do not wait for backup. You're ending their schools. And of course, with your all support, we have school resource deputies in our schools. Knowing that we cannot stand here and say we could stop a school shooting. That's not the reason that deputies in those schools. If it does happen, if we can stop it before or when the introduction of a threat happens, but how we can mitigate the loss of life, the quickest response we can to stop the threat as quickly as we can. So I say those things just to let you know we approached the board once we decided we wanted one of these alert systems. We thought it would be good. We worked through the school's division. The board of supervisors at that time, and I'm not saying begrudging them for it, but they decided not to pursue the cost associated with that purchase. It was about $20,000. Thankfully enough, we had a private donor, after hearing the information and reading the newspaper and how all of this unfolded, contacted us and said they would donate the $20,000 to cover the system. And we purchased what was then noted as CopSync, and it was introduced into our school division. The system worked well for us. Like everything else, technology continues to develop and move faster. We kept the system for several years, and then that system ended up being purchased by another company called Entrato. And Entrato, although there was a lot of other good systems out there, better systems if you sat down and saw what they could do, the different features they had, but we stayed with the Entrato around about the same price range. I think it got up to be about $30,000, $35,000 of what we were paying. So we were happy with it. The school division seemed to be good with it. When I say happy with it, when we would test and do the things that we did to make sure everything was functional, operational, things were working okay with it. Then the advances came to where we could put the apps, instead of on the computer, we could put them on an app on a phone. And that was a game changer because we were finding that through IT putting the system on this particular computer, if it's a laptop, a lot of times that teacher may have a class in a different part of the school and would take their laptop. So if they were to hit their alert, it would be alerting us to where the classroom was assigned for that computer, which that would have been time delayed, would it not, if we were looking at a large school instead of going to where that computer was. So this was a game changer for us. But then, not only our school division, but there was a big talk about, I don't want to put that on mine, they're going to track me. No, there was geofencing technology and all put into this system where it would not track out for teachers taking these devices home or wherever they lived. It was the perimeter of that school is what we were looking to do. So I say that because not only our school division, but we did not get the total commitment that we were hoping as far as the coverage. Well, that changed. And why did it change? In April of 2025, we had a 17-year-old who bought a loaded weapon to our high school. We were able to apprehend that student and find the weapon before any tragic event could happen. The only thing I can tell you after we collected all the data from his home, from search warrants, to his home, his writings, the firearms that were located in that home. We sent all that information to the behavioral unit at FBI in Quantico, and they responded back by saying, this fully meets all of the criteria of the shooters that we have tracked that you could have easily had an active shooter at your school with mass casualties. So that was in April of 2025. And we had a meeting with the school as we were talking about this event, what went right, what went wrong, and the communication piece. We learned that there was a low number of teachers who had the apps on their cell phones. And I want to thank the school division, because after we had that meeting, they made their IT department, Tim Morrison, Dr. Nestor, Dr. Sears, they made a concerted effort to speak more greatly of the importance in trying to eliminate any fears that they may have, and they did a wonderful job. October that year, this young man that made a horrible decision that day will spend five years in the penitentiary. As a 17-year-old, he was convicted as an adult. But the school division, through their efforts, we saw those numbers from going from maybe half upwards of almost 90 to 91 or 2% had put that on their phones. So we were very grateful knowing that is what we needed, the quicker alert system we can do. Fast forward, that was the end of 2025. Now here we are in 2026. With the information pieces are needed, it was brought to our attention. We would have brought this to you all and dealt with the county and the budgetary process if we had known this and had no idea this. But it was brought to our attention because a new law was changed in Virginia. A new law came about because of another shooting that occurred at Marjorie Taylor Douglas School in Florida, which didn't say that the state had to, didn't mandate them to put alert systems in their school, but highly recommended it, and we believe probably at some point in time it will be that it's mandatory that they do that. But when they were checking a little bit more, we found out that Entrato was going to dissolved their portion of their company that dealt with these alert systems. And that information, we only found that late May when that information was found out. We immediately put a committee together, school division, Franklin, the sheriff's office, trying to look at what products are out there. We have three products. If the discussion, I know you all, time is of essence. She has a PowerPoint. I hope you all, do they have the PowerPoint presentation? You have the PowerPoint presentation. But if there's questions, they did a study and came back understanding that probably one of the other vendors had a magnificent product. But as you can tell by the numbers, it was very, very, very expensive. All three products met the needs, certainly, of what we were hoping to do. Certainly met the needs of the Entrato system that we were using. So the recommendation came back. that we were to present to you all today in requesting to enter a contract with the Raptor system, which I think through your information there you have as well, Roanoke City, Salem, Roanoke County are utilizing that same system now and we've got really good reviews from them as it is to the product and their experience in using it. I'm going to let Ms. Cunningham, she's the manager of our 911 center, was on this to help me with any questions you may have as to their processes that they may have done during that time of trying to find those particular, the best recommendation to make to you all today.

Brian, is today the first time I've seen this information is when I sat down with the dais today. I just want to make sure I didn't get an email or something. My internet has been out for four days. So is today the first day we've gotten this?

Today is the first day that the board has seen this, yes. We've been working with the sheriff's office over the last several days, but presentation and some of these documents occurred over the last couple days. Yes.

I will say this, too, because probably one of the questions you all had was a concern of ours. Certainly, it was dumped in on us very quick. They first told us that we will give you notification, and it looks like it will be the end of the year. This was in May. And then very quickly it turned in, no, it's going to be much quicker than that, that we would end service August 31st. It's my understanding, if I'm wrong, please correct me, that even though they will not provide service, the system is still in place and could be utilized for us for a period of time. We would hope it would not be a lengthy period of time, but there would not be any service or any support from Entrato to run that system. So there, in essence, if we were to have a major event and something happened tragically, we would have to answer while we were relying on a system that was not supported. A recent test was done back in March, and the system was still running adequately to our needs, what we were hoping it would do.

So, Sheriff, is the bottom line that these are wearable alert systems? Does that look bottom line?

Well, that is what we do like about this Raptor that Entrato did not offer. Instead of having to carry their phone around or if a teacher had questions about that, this would be an alert system that is attached to their lanyard, their identification cards, which everybody's required to wear. that would have the microchip or whatever that you could activate the alert system by pressing the button on that lanyard on the identification card.

So is this something that teachers and school staff will have, or is this something your people will have?

the school staff would have, but our people have access to any alert goes out, whether they're off, whether they're mowing their grass. We had an incident, and I thought it was a prime example of how the system worked. It was an accidental alert, but it came in from Henry Elementary School, and one of my members was mowing their grass and got the alert and was there within about two minutes. They were off, but they got the alert on their phone and they responded immediately. Isn't that what we're supposed to do? Respond immediately. Stop the threat as quickly as we can. I know it's substantial money. It's more than what we have been paying. I want to say two things, too, and I checked on this the other day. There's always been a lot of talk, and there has been a lot of funds put in cameras. Your 911 center, the 911 center of Franklin County, we monitor those cameras in our school divisions and are able to watch and see, which is another added presence of eyes and ears to provide information to responders who are responding where a perpetrator may be moving in that school or if they see something that doesn't look right to even get there before something happens. So the cameras are serving a purpose But this is, aside from that, is that an immediate threat. Only, not to be pushed for anything other than the fact, shots fired in a building, something, they've seen a weapon on someone, that is of an emergency call that we're responding as we have at 1033, which is light siren and full out, everybody going to get there.

So is this taking the place of CopSync?

CopSync was bought out by Entrato. Entrato is now going out. They're stopping. They're still in existence. I don't know. They do communication pieces.

Are you still paying for them?

We finished out, I guess, yes. As of June, we would have to start a new payment plan to them as of July 1st, yes. And we have not.

Did you budget for it?

We did budget for the Entrato, yes. And that's another discussion we could have at a later date, work session, whatever. Yes, it is alert system that operates out of our division, but it's an alert system specifically for the schools within the county. That gets into the budgetary thing, whose line items, who should be covering this. Good topic of discussion.

Yeah.

I haven't seen the dollar total for this

Yeah, there it is.

Yeah, I'll let Ms. Cundiff speak regarding those options.

So you do have two options here with Raptor. Option A gives us strobe lights at the high school and the middle school. And when we talk about the high school, that's all buildings on campus, including the west campus. And the middle school is all buildings on campus plus the Giroux Center. One thing that the committee really liked about the strobe lights is students move in and out of those buildings continuously. The PA system does not pick up at your softball fields, your football fields and in the parking lots. But those strobe lights are an indicator to tell the students with different colors what they need to do. Do they need to shelter in place? Do they need to go to the closest room? What do they need to do? So that is the difference between option A that the committee likes of the 123, and that does include the setup, the implementation, and the first year. And then annually after that is $63,000. And then option B, of course, is no strobe lights, just the implementation and the alert button.

So, Bill, just to clarify, I'm not sure if I'm understanding all of this. The budget amount that you have, and I agree with you on the work session piece, what you've got budgeted, would it begin to take into consideration the cost of this proposal?

No.

I didn't think so. Okay. All right. Are you ready for any questions or do you have?

No, I think we're ready for any questions. Okay. That's where we're at with the request. And yes.

Thank you. Thank you. So I'll open up the floor to my colleagues for questions, comments. Mr. Jamison.

Cheryl, how long has Raptor been in business? I mean, technology change.

So Lynchburg City Schools has had Raptor for over 15 years. So we know at least they've been in business for over 15. The school system currently use Raptor technology for their student check-in and check-out purposes. So this is not a new vendor to the county nor the school system because they're currently using it. It's just an added application. For Raptor, it's on a yearly basis. Yes, sir.

Questions, concerns, questions? Mr. Quinn.

No, sir. For Raptor, it's $123,230, and that includes the implementation plus the first year. Annually after that is $63,000.

What's the first year again?

$123,230. That includes everything for the first year.

Oh, that includes the annual expense also for the first year?

Yes, sir.

And secondly, how long, if you resubscribe to the existing service, how long could you use that for before maybe it's lights out or they don't support it anymore? Is there an end of life that's been announced for that system?

The problem lies, and it's not always technical or equipment, but every time we do an audit and a test of our system, there's new things we learn and there's little caveats that need to be looked into. Some of it can be technology technique or tech technique. Technical, from the fact of the software itself, we continue to know communication and how that works is always an issue that we always address. So no major issues, but who knows with what we may could run into. And certainly it's our intent. We want these things running just as smooth and adequate as we know they are able to do. That's why we do several tests during the year.

So gentlemen, what is your inclination? I'm wondering, I'll throw a couple options out. Would you like a work session discussion on this? This is new stuff that we're seeing for the first time. Whether you have an immediate reaction today, positive or negative, or what are your wishes? Mr. Tatum.

Do we have time for a work session?

So, Sheriff, you're... Madam Chair, may I speak to that? Of course. So, when we demoed this product, well, all three products, they all gave us a 30-day contingency. With Raptor, they did give us an extension for the 30 days. So, instead of June 30th, it's July 30th. If we do not sign before July 30th, it will go up in price by $28,350 because they gave a discount for implementation.

That's a tough position to put us in. It truly is. We're not, I don't think we would argue the merit, of course.

Please understand, this is all, we were hit with all this too. Understood, Sheriff. We're just trying to continue to do what we're tasked to do. Of course. Unfortunately, there's expenditures to these things.

Yes, sir.

Very costly expenditures.

So, Mr. Jamison, pardon me. Go ahead.

No. This system right now is strictly for the high school and the campus there, right? There's no elementary school? All elementaries. All elementaries. All elementaries. Yes, sir. Thank you. The price increase, does that include, is that the first year? Or is that increase?

You're talking about the 5% annual increase? Are you referring to the 5% annual increase?

Yes. No, the increase if we hold off.

That's a one-time fee.

One-time fee.

I think it's a sales pitch for them to kind of get the implementation part done. And so they give you that discount. The $28,350. $28,000. That's the discount that they gave as part of the.

I think it's designed that way for local government.

You think?

Mm-hmm.

So gentlemen, Mr. Meredith.

So with the old system, we didn't have a line budget for that to maintain. How much was that costing us a year with this old system?

It was $12,600 annual cost for Entrada.

Say it again, I'm sorry.

$12,600.

So gentlemen, I'm sitting here thinking, trying to digest this as quickly as you've had to digest it, Sheriff, and your staff. Would you all want to bring this to work session on this Thursday? We have a light agenda for Thursday. We've got two items scheduled. Would it make you more comfortable to defer to Thursday, where the Sheriff and his staff could give us a more deliberate presentation and we can have discussion on it?

or do you have a strong impression about this one way or the other tonight i'm i'm gonna say i if we can wait to the end just give us a little time to research but also i think we need to figure out where this is going to come from you know we're talking big budget increase so i think that'll be give mr carter a chance to you know we're talking two days but that would be my recommendation is just if we could wait till thursday give us a little time to digest this and Find us money.

I agree, and I think the schools need to have a part of this.

I'm sorry, Mr.

Wait till Thursday.

Is everybody in concurrence to add this to Thursday? And Sheriff, what I would ask, you've done an excellent job. This PowerPoint looks like it's packed with really good information. If there is a way to present this of how we currently operate within our schools, and to include the school resource officers, and what CopSync did, what it's no longer doing, And what is this added layer or additional layer of protection? Is there a gap that this fills? I mean, can you kind of lay a continual amount for us where we get a good idea of the gaps in security, what we need to fill, cost projections, if we're not under any pressure to make a decision? We'll just put that to the side. But do you get what I'm saying?

I understand completely.

I think I would really like to see this methodically laid out for the board so that we feel like we're walking with you through it and the decisions that you've made to bring this to us. Are you available Thursday?

I would be glad to do that. You're available? Yes.

Okay. All right. Let's do that then if that's amenable to you guys. Okay. Okay. All right. You have one more item, sir.

I do have one other thing. Thank you very much. The next thing that I want to bring to your attention is mental health. Another issue that is real has a tremendous impact on not only the Commonwealth, the nation, but certainly right here in Franklin County as well. I'm trying to think right off the top of my head here how mental health, if you remember back, 2013, they seem like many, many, many moons ago. We're talking, what, 18 years or so ago? when delegate, our senator, Crady's son, who had a mental health crisis event and ended up taking his own life. And it was one of the first times that I can remember that the state really delved into mental health. I think it was one of those things, there were probably many committees that spoke about it, talked about it, studies done on it, but they were realizing there were many breakdowns within the system. as far as the time it took to get evaluations and proper evaluations and the ECOs and TDOs of law enforcement picking those individuals up. So then you fast forward to 2018 and there was a man by the name of Marcus David Peters who was a biology teacher in Richmond and he had a mental health crisis. Was out on Interstate 95, unclothed, naked, throwing things at vehicles. Was encountered by the Richmond police. Testimony was that he had made an overt charge at one of the police officers. He was killed. And through that, legislation continued to move as it related to this incident. There was quite a bit of movement across the state in regard to mental health and how it was treated, how many people were incarcerated that were not criminals but had mental health issues. And then they did an exorbitant look at the mental health facilities in the states, which are woefully unable to meet the needs and the staffing is woefully unavailable to do that. So much so that it affected law enforcement, but we were having to sit with patients for hours and hours and hours and days and days and days upon time before they would find bedding space to maneuver and do the things to get the adequate help that these individuals needed. So recently, they certainly have passed the Marcus Alert System Act. Prior to our current governor, Governor Youngkin tried to and did a yeoman's work in addressing a lot of the mental health issues. Two things that he did was they formed what is called a CTAC Center, which is a Crisis Incident Team Assessment Center. We're part of the Piedmont Mental Health, so this center is located in Henry County. Patrick, Henry, Martinsville, and Franklin County are part of that CTAC Center. And what they did was trying to alleviate a space in place to bring mental health patients that could be evaluated, and if there was a time delay, it could be done in this type setting versus in a corrections facility or at the hospitals to get folks out of the hospitals. They were just so overcrowded with it. Even so, they had grant funding for localities to provide people to work in this CTAC center. We applied for and are currently operating under a state grant that provided for an individual from our corrections facility to shift work in that CTAC center in Henry County. Been doing that for several years. So most recently, what has come out is also that grew from that is they now have provided funding for private businesses to transport, which has helped tremendously from our manpower as well. We still have to do quite a few transport, but the funding and the hiring of these private sector transport organizations has helped tremendously. What I'm here for today is there's two... models that the state is requiring all law enforcement to adhere to in dealing with crisis intervention. One, be trained in crisis intervention, that your people are trained. to handle these situations. And two is one of the models is the fact that we would handle it somewhat like we're doing now, meaning if we get an ECO or a TDO, meaning someone's come in, a family member's come in and got a paper for an individual person, we would go out and locate that person, pick them up, bring them in. If they needed medical attention at the hospital and then have them evaluated, we're with them from the time we pick them up. And then we do the transport or we pass it off if available to the private business to do the transport. The other model would be, and this is the model the state is pushing, and they have seen, they've had a pilot program across the state for the past five years and they have seen tremendous success, is where you will pair a law enforcement person with a clinician from the behavioral unit of Piedmont. And they would work as a team responsible for going out on these particular calls and serving the papers, whatever they needed to be done, at what time they're not. there's not a crisis event taking place or we do not have a paper to pick someone up, they can do follow-up work on clients that are currently working through Piedmont Mental Health, checking on them, making sure they're taking their meds, they have the things that they need to have themselves in a good place. The reason I chose to go with that particular model is If we stay with the old model, we're not going to send a clinician out to do this and not have their back. So I'm going to have my people tied up either way. So what the state is saying they will do is we will provide grant funding for a law enforcement officer. And that's what the request is today, that you all allow. There's no matching fund. Right now, it's only for a year. Certainly if it was to fold in a year, I think with attrition, we could move that person pretty quickly right back into our organization. But I do believe with what we see with mental health, with the homeless and the issues that are going on across our country, this program is gonna expand and probably get bigger, not smaller or go away. So the request today is for us to allow us to proceed with the grant to hire someone to work, Through this Marcus Alert system with the clinician that would work out of our office Henry County has decided to do the very same thing Patrick County is too small. They're not required to do it because of their population and Martinsville City has decided they were going to do the DSS where an officer just responds to help the clinician which is much easier than because their land, the territory they cover is much smaller than the amount of geographically how much we have to cover. So that's where we are. A little bit of a nutshell, trying to bring that to your attention. I know here again, this is kind of thrown on you, but again, there's no new monies, and I'm happy to answer any questions I can. And hopefully, I've got Ms. Elena Wimmer. the head of the Marcus Alert system coordinator and works out of Henry County. And certainly she can probably answer a whole lot more questions I can to some of that regard as far as the grant is concerned.

Thank you. Welcome. Are there questions from supervisors? Mr. Quinn.

I'll start. So just to be clear, Sheriff, what you're looking to do is move to this new system where there's a deputy and a clinician. So it's a two-person team that's showing up, right? Correct. For a response. And the person that you're proposing to hire, that's not the clinician or the deputy. It's a person that would oversee the whole program and implementation of the program?

No, no. The person we're looking to hire would be the deputy. Right. that will work with the clinician. They're doing the process now of getting ready to hire clinicians. And their hopes is what, by September 1st?

We're more or less looking at October 1st. But to also answer your question, I am the Marcus Alert CIT coordinator. I am over the program. So I am coordinating with law enforcement in Franklin, Henry, Patrick, and Martinsville City to create this program.

But the one person you'd hire, say it's 40 hours a week, it's not 24-7 coverage, right? It's just 40 hours a week where you have that person?

That's correct. And we would certainly have to follow the other model if we had something in that particular time frame. But we have studied the data and the history of when it looks like most of the calls that we have, most of the papers, I know that can change, but historically this is what we're kind of looking at. So it could be somewhat of a power shift, a day and evening type thing.

So if the call came in during the 40 hours, then it's the deputy and a clinician. If it's outside of that 40 hours, then it's just the deputy?

Yes. But then when they came back the next day, then they would immediately be following up with that. The good thing about this, by having a clinician there, they're evaluating the situation and that person when they get on scene. As to, is this probably something we could allocate or defer to other resources for that individual? Or, yes, this person is in service and needs now, and we would probably need to issue the paperwork to do that. Okay. Thank you.

Thank you. Questions? Concerns?

What action is needed from the board since there's no matching money?

Well, I think that's a great question, Mr. Tatum, if I may. Sheriff, this is a one-year grant, and the grant itself covers the salary and benefits of a full-time deputy.

Correct.

I'm assuming, correct? And so at the end of the first year, has there been any indication that grant funding would continue, or is it just restricted to the first year? If you could speak in the microphone, please. Thank you.

Yes, ma'am. So as Sheriff had said, this this program has been piloted for the last five years in bigger regions throughout Virginia, and they have continued to fund these programs since 2021 when the first implementation came into fruition and I believe that that was in Richmond Virginia so we don't have any reason to believe that the funding would not continue so in the web grant it does say that it is contingent on funding like it will be approved each year a physical year but as of right now we do not have any reason to believe that the funding will cease

But I think I was just quickly perusing the slides. It looks like there's an MOU in play that would start to lay out the parameters that you would agree upon on an annual basis.

Yes, ma'am.

Correct? So there's no local money you're asking for today. Now, I always worry with grants, not just this one, but grants in general, especially when it's on the programmatic side, that we start a program and we start serving, and then for whatever reason, the grant runs out and then it's incumbent upon the locality to fund it to keep it going. Sheriff, are you prepared within your budget to take on that amount Should the grant not be available?

I am not. And if that would be the case, we would just have to revert back to the old model of doing it that we've been doing for in years.

Has Piedmont indicated, I know they've got crisis management services. Do crisis management services come into play at all with the clinician side? Because I know that the state, at the state level, taxpayers are paying for that as well. So are we looking at redundancy in terms of tasks to manage these populations? Has anybody been asking about service redundancy?

I don't think there was any redundancy because all of these start in a systematic way, meaning a loved one, a family member comes in and inquiring, unfortunately to them, they're lost. We need help. Where do we go? And then we start trying to put them in the right places. And if that ends up where they've appeared before a magistrate and a magistrate issues a temporary custody order or emergency custody, then we go out and serve those papers.

So this would apply to TDOs? I mean, a real-time TDO, would they be intervening on a situation like that?

Like I said before, the good thing about this paperwork is, and you please help me, Elaine, once they go out, again, when we go out, we're certainly looking for the crisis trying to, as best we can to, calm the situation, whatever it may be. Or if there's criminal activity that's occurred, we're going to make an arrest immediately and detain, whatever it may be. But having a clinician there, we believe is going to bring that essence of they're immediately starting to evaluate the actions, how they present themselves, how they're answering. and then make it a determination, where does this fall on the spectrum of help? Is it something that's needed immediately? Can we come back tomorrow and put up, you know, if they've got, if they're at their home or whatever, and then start deferring possible treatment options, or yes, that person needs to be taken in now to the CTAC Center for further evaluation, and then maybe a commitment to a facility.

Okay, thank you. Questions, comments from supervisors? Are you ready? Mr. Carter, I'm sorry, did you have something?

No, I'm fine with this. It's not going to cost us any money. I say we move forward with it.

I would interject. I think there is a slide that does talk about some county responsibilities. Okay.

think if I understand correctly it pays for the position and the benefits but there are some added yeah this slide so as the sheriff said there would be providing space within the sheriff's office for the clinician I don't believe that they would be building an office it's just that they would provide provisions of an office space so that's not a cost currently that's going to accrue. Radio communications, that's something that they also already have, if I am correct. Motor vehicle is something that they will use out of their current fleet. So that's not going to be an added cost as of now. Law enforcement equipment is also going to be all equipment that is had and not purchased. And then, so realistically, the cost of the telemetry Telecommunications training associated with Marcus alert example of overtime Miss Melissa conduct and I have spoken and all efforts will be made to have these trainings within their daily schedule Trying to reduce overtime if overtime is necessary. It will come out of the current budget So that is no additional cost as well so

This is new stuff for us this afternoon as well. Do you all wish to taking action on this this evening, or do you want to defer this to Thursday as well to give you some time? There are no numbers put on this slide for a local share of covering expenses. And for myself, I would want to know what we're signing up for with specificity. And we don't have that in this. So what are your feelings, supervisors, as to what you would like to do? Mr. Tatum.

I'm prepared to vote right now because all this requirement on the county are things, equipment and everything, the sheriff's going to have already on hand in stock. So we already have it.

So all these things are already, you can cover all these things in your budget now?

Yes, we're very fortunate. We've identified an individual who's got more than 10 years experience we think will be a good person to do this. course, you know, when you partner with someone as intimately as this will be, I'm praying that it's a good partnership. They've graciously invited us to be part of their interview process because when you need to do something to a law enforcement, it's a whole different realm. And certainly the training aspect is going to be more so from the clinician than it is from our people. In case there was an event that something drastically went wrong and the deputy was injured and how this person could protect themselves from being injured and the radio usage, tourniquet uses of anything of that that safety measure, overtime. My gosh, I think we're that's not an issue. Overtime is a problem we're spending now on the hours we're putting in, we're hoping overtime is going to go down. That's my prayer. Right, right.

And we are also prepared to do the training for the law enforcement officer for the mental health aspect. That training will come at no cost to the law enforcement officers.

We're not providing a car for the clinician. There's no expense. The only expense from us would be office space and for the deputy that would be there. Again, we've got the vehicle already, uniforms. He's already trained in critical incident training, so he doesn't have to go back through that.

So we would be asked to execute an MOU with an approval of this, is that correct?

And it's possible. I could come up in a year's time and say, we don't want to be part of this again. It's not working, or here are the measurements that we've seen that has worked, hasn't worked. There needs to be a different model. And I think we'll be meeting regularly during the year to talk about these incidents as they occur to see if we are being successful in what we're trying to do.

So Mr. Sandy and Mr. Gwen, have either of you had an opportunity to review the proposed MOU? No?

I have not, Brian. Have you?

I've seen the MOU. Would I say I've reviewed it in detail? No. I think the main thing here is that I think it's a valid program. And I know there have been updates to the board previously over the years about Marcus Alert. But now we're to the point of we're adding a position. And typically, when we add a position to the budget, the board has to approve that because that's a new FTE, whether it's grant funded or otherwise. For us, I think it was more this was the informational to the board, and we're now at this step. Where is the comfort level? But the MOU is mostly between, and correct me if I'm wrong, but the sheriff's office and Piedmont Community Services and the coordination of those services.

Yes. OK. Given what Brian just said, are you all wanting to kind of get some feedback from the board on where we are this evening? And I guess to the discretion of my colleagues, Mr. Tatum, you would be OK moving forward? Yes. What about the rest of you all? Do you all want to move forward, or do you wish to defer?

Madam Chair, I'd go forward with it.

Mr. Quinn? OK. Mr. Jamison?

Seems like a win-win.

And Mr. Carter? OK, so I would need a motion on the floor to approve of, I guess, supporting. Sheriff, you may have to help me with this, supporting of The first year grant for the Marcus alert system, right? and I guess the county is a Co-partner I Guess I mean this stuff is just new in front of us this evening But I understand the funding has been approved in the current budget as of July the 1st.

Yes, I The funding has been approved to the amount of $94,000 per fiscal year to be disseminated monthly to the Sheriff's Office for funding of this position.

Oh. OK. You didn't tell me that. Okay, so I would entertain a motion from someone that would be willing to provide that motion.

So moved.

Can you say what the motion is? Yes.

I make a motion that we approve the grant position and the agreement with the Sheriff's Office and Piedmont Community Services for the amount of $94,000 that the grant will encompass. Second.

OK, very good. Madam Clerk, if you would be so kind to do a roll call vote.

Supervisor Meredith? Yes. Supervisor Quinn? Yes. Supervisor Tatum? Yes. Supervisor Carter? Yes. Supervisor Jamison? Yes. Supervisor Mitchell? Yes. And Chair Smith?

Yes. OK, Sheriff. Thank you all so much. I think that concludes that. And we will hopefully, well, we will look forward to seeing you on Thursday. And we appreciate your time. Thank you very much. OK, gentlemen, it is 10 till 6. We've got a couple options here before us if you want to take a quick break before 6. Or we can keep moving and move right into the evening session with dealing with the county administrator's report, county attorney's report, and then other matters by supervisors. Kim.

Madam Chair, if possible, I would like to cover the other matters by supervisors before we break, if possible, because as time goes, I may have to leave to go to work.

That's a great point. Sure. And Mr. Sandy, Mr. Gwynn, I don't know if you all have extensive reports or not. Mr. Sandy, would you be okay deferring?

Yeah, that's fine. Short report.

Mr. Gwynn? Yes, I am. OK, very good. So based on that, let's go ahead and jump ahead to other matters by supervisors, if that's at your discretion, of course. And I will start over here to my left, Mr. Jamison.

We got, I think it was July 2nd, myself and my car went down to the tea factory. I'd just like to say I was blown away. It's a really nice place. I think we all, we may have an opportunity to visit again. But they're getting ready to start, I think, in September, I believe, production. And anybody that's able to be, needs to look at this. They got machines, two machines in there. It's a packaging machine, right? That's what they called it. They came from Italy. Two and a half million dollars each, these two machines. They're connecting them up and they're getting ready to run some product through it, you know, for testing and all like that. So if you ever have an opportunity, that would be a good thing. Second thing was... I figured we kept the sheriff here long enough and I didn't see an opportunity to break his stride but I've had some inquiries on the flock cameras and I would like to see on the sheriff's report monthly maybe a printout of how they've been used as far as what good they're doing how they're helping how many times a month and all that if that would be possible for

OK. I don't know if the sheriff is still here. I think he left. Mr. Sandy, would you be willing to convey that request? I think that's a good idea, Mr. Jamieson. Does everybody else concur with that? OK. Mr. Jamieson, did you have anything further?

That's all.

Mr. Tatum.

Okay. I'll try to make this as quickly as I can. I just reminisced on the other day, and I looked at a calendar and figured out that I'll soon be celebrating 40 years of service with the county. And 40 years ago, or almost 40 years ago, when Sheriff Quincy Overton said, hired me as a deputy. He took me into his office on the first day and I'll never forget it. He told me, he said, Tim, he said, we work for the citizens of Franklin County. And he said, don't ever forget that we work for the citizens of Franklin County. And I've kind of carried that same ideology not only as a sheriff's deputy serving in Franklin County, but also in this seat on the Board of Supervisors, that I work for the citizens of Franklin County. And just last week, we went to a VACO conference down at Patrick and Henry Community College, and I had the opportunity to talk to some General Assembly members that were there, and they gave me some disturbing news that really bothered me. And that disturbing news was that the General Assembly has been tossing around the idea of removing local controls as it pertains to data centers and solar farms. And that really bothered me, because if that happens, then they're going to sit in Richmond and force them down our throat. And what Delegate Phillips suggested, he told me, he said, Tim, the only thing I can tell you is the counties need to get together. And they need to try to preempt this action, if they can, by having a clear policy in place. A little over a month ago, we received an email from a lady that was concerned about data centers. And she's been to several of our meetings. And she made some suggestions of some possible policies that we could possibly look at as far as pertaining to data centers. you know, like power usage and water usage and whatnot. But I think that if we sit back and do nothing, we don't plan. You know the old saying, if you fail to plan, you plan to fail. If we sit back and do nothing and let the General Assembly take away our local control, then we deserve what we get. Our friends in Henry County... Our friends in Henry County have advertised, and they're getting ready to have a work session to devise a policy and put together a robust policy that may help, it may not. We don't know what it links the General Assembly and what Richmond's gonna do on us, but it's at least putting forth an effort to serve the people that we work for, and that's these people out here. I'm asking that we schedule a work session soon to start seriously considering, taking consideration of policies that we already have in place in our zoning ordinances and whatever. We need a policy that is countywide that protects not just the zoned areas in the county, but the area I represent, which happens to be non-zoned, and it really bothers me to think that we have no protections there. I'm not saying I want zoning in the Blue Ridge District. Nobody heard me say that. I didn't say I want zoning in the Blue Ridge District. The people in my district have historically said we do not want zoning. But with that, we lose the protection that could be afforded against some of these data centers and solar farms. We need to work. to put together a policy and a plan that gives us a leg to stand on. Like I said, we don't know what Richmond's going to do, but we need to, we can't just sit on our thumbs. We need to work toward putting together a plan to do something to protect ourselves. Okay, I'm trying. I'm getting a little hoarse, but. We need to work on this. We need to have citizen input, because after all, that's who it's affecting. And they need to have some input on it. We need to have meetings like we did before. And folks, if you see an advertisement in the paper that there's going to be a town hall in reference to planning at the local school or something, go. Please, we want to hear from you. That's where we have the meetings. Unfortunately, we had a meeting in Ferrum a couple of years ago, and 12 people showed up. So watch. This is something we need to do. We can't keep sitting on our hands and hope that it gets better. And that's all I'm going to say on that. The next thing, I agree with Marshall. We need a report from the sheriff on these flock cameras. I know flock cameras are a great tool for law enforcement to be used if they're used properly. Back in 2015, I'm sure all of you remember that horrendous murder, double murder down at Bridgewater Plaza. That man was found, the shooter was found on I-66 going into D.C. by a flock camera. He did take his own life, but he was located by a flock camera. What concerns me is I recently found out that the companies that sell and install and service these flock cameras in many states are selling the information that they're bringing in, car information. And that concerns me. So I'd like to find out are the flock cameras in the county being used by a company to gather data that they're selling? I'm not okay with that.

Yes.

But I want to know for sure. And if that's the case, we need to make some changes. But that's all I have. Thank you, Madam Chair. And I do want to see us move forward with this. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Tate. I'm so noted. And I think I've been really, it's been on my short list that we have a work session to look at. I've noticed with some of the other localities that I've looked at, they're starting to adopt some guidelines, some restrictions, and so forth. And we need to take a look at those things. Our job is to protect our citizenry. And I think we would be remiss Go ahead.

Just one other thing I just wanted to reiterate. I work for the citizens of Franklin County, and they have been very loud and vocal on their wishes on data centers and solar farms. So I'm saying pretty clear right now I'm a no vote on any data centers. Thank you. With that said, the General Assembly might not give us options. The General Assembly may take that away from us, but we still need to take a stand.

OK, thank you, Tim. Thank you. Mr. Carter.

Well, that's a tough act to follow. I want to echo a lot of what Tim said, but I want to talk to the board tonight a little bit about hydrology. Before I was elected on this board, I worked with a group called Preserve Franklin County, and it was concerning the Mountain Valley Pipeline, which cut our county in half. And I'm sure everyone on this board is aware that probably 90% of the county, our water comes from wells, groundwater, spring water. Water is our most valuable natural resource, and we need to protect that. I would like for staff to get West Virginia Water Authority to come over here and speak to us about the Roanoke River watershed in Smith Mountain Lake. This new data center they're proposing in Botetourt County's thousands and thousands of gallons of water. Everything in the Roanoke Valley feeds into the Roanoke River. 70% of the water in Smith Mountain Lake comes from that Roanoke Valley watershed. Franklin County only provides roughly 30% to Blackwater and Gills Creek. We need to find out what's happening upstream because it's going to affect us downstream. So my request is to get West Virginia Water Authority over here to give us a report on this. And I want to know what they're going to draw out and how it's going to affect downstream.

And Mr. Carter, the regional authorities, the PDCs are, especially Roanoke and Allegheny, are addressing this as well. Oh, good. So it's on the regional radar and local radar. So I think that's very good. Mr. Sandy's making note of the requests that you gentlemen are making, and I think that they're definitely in order. OK. Did you have anything else?

No, ma'am. That's all I had tonight.

Mr. Mitchell? Laurie, I just wanted to respond to Mike. So we're in the process of trying to put together some facts around data centers. Yeah, I'm sorry. And Steve Sandy and I met with Mike McAvoy. He's the director of Western Virginia Water Authority to see if he could put together a white paper around water usage for the data centers. Mike has a lot of experience with data centers up in Northern Virginia, a lot of experience with water usage by data centers. He delivered a draft copy of the white paper last week, but it didn't have enough local information, so I sent it back to him for some revisions, but I think he's in a very good position now to deliver on what you're asking for, and he's the right person.

Does anybody on staff aware that you're doing that, Dan?

Steve and I met with Mike McAvoy. So both Steve and I met with him, and it was at that meeting that Mike agreed to put together this white paper for us.

Okay, thank you very much. Okay, very good. Okay, Mr. Mitchell, nothing? Mr. Quinn, did you have anything under other matters, sir?

I have no other matters.

Thank you. Mr. Meredith?

Yes, Madam Chair. I got a couple things I'm going to add. But first thing, I want to reconsider a motion from our last session, which pertained to the rules and procedures of the five-minute speaking rule to three minutes. Since then, I've had a town hall. There was citizens from six of the seven districts who attended that town hall. It was very relaxed. We had good conversations. One thing I learned from that is some people had no problem asking their questions and running people, and some people I gave note cards to, and they wrote their questions down, and I took those up. And that's a less intimidating place than coming up here in front of a couple hundred people and speaking. So with that in mind, I think it's very important if we did the five-minute rule where one person could speak for four or five people, and I have no problem on a sign-up sheet, those four or five people put their name with who's speaking with them. But I also believe in leading, you lead by what you do. And we're here to be leaders of this county. And not too long ago, there was a report sent out, a joint statement about some questions. So we sit here and say we want to hear from every citizen, but we sent out a statement over data centers that they didn't hear from every board member. It was a joint statement. So I'm kind of, I understand how sometimes it's convenient, and this is the joint statement that was released from the county, and it does say the board, the board, the board, but yet,

You knew.

We knew.

I made a round of phone calls.

And I got this five minutes before it hit the website. Five minutes. So what I'm just saying is I have no problem if we do something like this. But I don't think we need to really consider for the people who may not be comfortable speaking in front of a crowd like this, if they want to have somebody to speak for them, like in this situation, that would cut down on our time. So I think there are situations where one person can make a statement, and yes, you're correct. But I'm just going to leave it what we said there. But I just think that's why I want to reconsider this motion, that instead of five people speaking three minutes on one subject, one person does five minutes. It gets the point across in a quicker fashion. So I want to make a motion, or if there's any more discussions. But I'm willing to actually make another motion with that information on this procedure we voted on. So I'm going to leave it open for any more comments or discussion of the points I brought up about speaking in public.

Thank you, Mr. Meredith. Mr. Gwynn, are we, my assumption is we're within the parameters for reconsideration given that Mr. Meredith was part of the affirming side. Yes. Okay. Are there any questions, comments? Mr. Tatum.

Yes. I actually had notes written down the same thing to bring up. I spoke with a lady after last month's meeting, and I never – It never dawned on me. My thinking was like what you mentioned. You wanted to hear from everybody. But there was a lady, she came to me, she said, Tim, she said, I understand what you said, but I do not feel comfortable with speaking in front of a crowd. And to me, that really hit me. I was being very nearsighted and narrow-minded. in my vote to vote to to take away her voice and that's what i was technically doing because she didn't feel comfortable she wouldn't come forward and she lacked she missed out on an opportunity to speak so if she can have someone to represent her her wishes then you make the motion i'll second any other comments thoughts

I would be fine with having a discussion about that to hear everybody's side of it.

Okay.

I know we can't have it tonight. Do you want to defer? I would defer to Thursday's work session to discuss it.

Speak up. There's already a motion on the floor. Speak in the microphone, please.

Please, ladies and gentlemen, please be respectful. I don't believe there's a motion. I'm sorry this is all we have. I apologize. And we've got more people than we're supposed to have in this room to begin with, which I'm glad you're here. But it's a good thing. Sir, we are still in the middle of a Board of Supervisors general meeting. This is not yet time for public comment. And I just have got to make sure we're adhering to our board policies. Mr. Meredith, are you making a motion?

Yes, I'd like to make a motion.

Make your motion, please.

I make a motion to deny the amendment to the Board of Supervisors rules and procedures as presented by staff. Second.

OK. We will do a roll call vote on this, Madam Clerk, if you would be so kind.

Supervisor Quinn?

Yes.

Supervisor Tatum? Yes. Supervisor Meredith? Yes. Supervisor Jamison? Yes. Supervisor Mitchell? Yes. Supervisor Carter? Yes. And Chair Smith? Yes. Okay. Mr. Meredith, does that suffice?

Yes, I got a couple more things real quick for other matters. Okay. Real quick. I would like to ask staff, I know, Mr. Sander, we've talked about this before, work session in the future, but we discussed about building permits with towns that were probably not compensated the right way. I would like to see us look at that. Also, these partnerships with Blue Ridge Region and stuff, you know, what are we paying for them and what's our return? I think as a board we should be looking at that too. You know, we better do something in-house. Also, I've talked to Mr. Carter where we're a regional administrator of certain programs, money. And I don't think our staff's being compensated for any admin for that, which I think if it's taking time for our staff, we need to look at that or let another county do it if it's not going to affect our funding, you know, as dispersing money in a region program. Last two things. You know, the work session, I'll leave this up to staff. I think until we get video and sound working in the room, I mean, maybe we should be having them in here until we get that fixed i know i mentioned that about two months ago and was working on the quality of stuff but i just think that would be another option and my last thing and i had this written down before mr supervisor tatum spoke but i did have something about data centers on where we need to have a work session we need to put something in place until zoning and ordinance is done We need stipulations. I've talked to several of the citizens. You know, we've talked about closed-loop systems which would not use, you know, the water of these others or generate their own power or light pollution and sound. But whatever we do, we need to probably act quicker. And I would like to see if it's an SUP or however we work, it's in the county. I think that would ease a lot of people's minds as we work through this, and I think it would be beneficial to us as a county knowing what these are the guidelines we will not accept, no less, that would be detrimental to our county. We would not let any industry come in here and do it. So that's all I'm going to say on that since you did such a well job covering it, and that's all. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Madam Chair. As a follow-up to Mike's comments, I was at the planning and zoning meeting, the last meeting, and someone probably from this group brought up they thought maybe they should put the zoning planning rewrite on the back burner and address the data center issue now. I think we need to get something in place ASAP.

Yeah, I think I've talked to several of you. I think we're at a point that we need to bring some experts in that are objective to educate us on the pros and the cons and what they are as it relates to Franklin County. I don't care what's going on anywhere else.

I would recommend Jim Huxley with VACO.

Yeah, that would be good. That would be good. But I do think that if we become informed.

Excuse me, Mike. Will you repeat that, please?

I think we should contact, I serve on a committee called Energy and Agriculture with VACO, and there's a lot of information that's full of people from Loudoun County, so I'm well-versed in data centers, but I think we could get some information from VACO and possibly Jim Hutzler.

Yeah, and I'm looking, from my perspective, I'm looking for some objective. I mean, we saw with the utility solar farms, we were getting studies. But when you looked at who authored some of those studies, they were solar companies. So let's get some objective, informed data and research given to us. in a work session, which is what I was going to talk to Steve about this week now that he's back, so that we can begin to think about hearing the objective data, the objective research, and then look at it as it relates to what we feel reflects the needs of our citizens and our businesses here in Franklin County.

Madam Chair, I know at our last VACO meeting, regional meeting, they had some excellent speakers there to it. That might be a good place to start.

I'm sorry, I couldn't hear what you said.

We had some Bay Coast speakers on data centers and everything. I think that'd be a good place to start and get some information too, along with Mike's suggestion.

I do too, yeah. Okay, Mr. Taylor.

Madam Chair, when we talk about getting an objective opinion on it, I think the main opinion that we need to make sure we take consider of is these people out here. Thank you.

I think we have all said that, Mr. Tatum. You did it. Yes, I did. OK. So gentlemen, with other matters, You didn't have anything, correct? Have we exhausted the round, Mr. Jamison? OK. The only thing that I had, you have copies of our draft legislative agenda for 2026, 2027. And what I would like to ask you, and I've been in communication with each of you, to make a determination if you wanted to add anything or if you disagreed with anything that was on the draft documents. And so I would like to ask you this evening if you have If you have anything that you want to be more specifically addressed, I would defer decision on this and ask you for August. If you seem to be in concurrence with the document as it was submitted to you, we could certainly go about approving that document tonight. But it's at your pleasure as to where you want to do this. Not doing it any later than August would allow us to set our meeting times with our legislators in September before they get wrapped up with submitting bills and so forth before they go into session. So we're trying to get in front of that. each and every year. And we're having some success. And I think that it's a very good thing that we've taken a proactive role. So is there anything that, tell me what your pleasure is with regard to waiting until August or whether you're ready to do something this evening. Mr. Quinn.

I'd be willing to approve it tonight.

Okay. Anyone else? You ready? Mr. Jamison.

Yes, ma'am. Pause for a year. Pause for a year. Mr. Carter. Pause for a minute.

Yes, I'm fine with that. And we're going to do the card? Yes.

OK. Yeah, I gave you the priorities, which is what we presented at the Region 10 VACO meeting. And then the back document is the one or two, three pages that gave background that we can discuss with the legislators. But we'll have that one card that lists our priorities. Mr. Mitchell, are you OK? OK, so what I would like to ask for is there a motion to approve the 2027 legislative agenda as it's been presented.

I'll make a motion to approve the legislative agenda as presented.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

Madam Clerk, would you please do a roll call? Supervisor Jamison?

Yes.

Supervisor Mitchell? Yes. Supervisor Carter? Yes. Supervisor Meredith?

Yes.

Supervisor Quinn? Yes. Supervisor Tatum? Yes. And Chair Smith?

Yes. Thank you. Thank you, gentlemen, for your consideration. Mr. Sandy, I'm going to bounce back to you for your report. I caught you off guard. I know. We're juggling here a little bit. I apologize.