Commissioners - Regular Meeting

Okay, well.

You can if you want to.

Good afternoon, Commissioner Sammy Robinson. We are here with budget work session number four.

We've talked about this worksheet in the past and the expenditures are on this page and on the other page it shows you the revenue and the expenditures and what the levy looks like based on that. So just as a quick recap from where we were last time to where we are now. Originally we came in with total bills needed of 64.124 and currently after the adjustments you made to appropriations and to some of the transfers and reserves, as well as the effect it had on the NRP and the delinquency adjustments. We're now at 61.904, and our request went from 21,170,082 to 20,437,159. So with that, I'm going to turn it over to you and tell me what you want to see and what you want to talk about.

Well I appreciate you sending out the information on some of the appropriations and we just got some of that this morning so it's kind of hard to, I already had my spreadsheet so I kind of changed some of the numbers but I appreciate the information because you don't know some of the ramifications or what else entails in some of those numbers. You certainly made them a lot clearer. So I don't know how you want us to proceed with this. Do you want to just start again on our appropriations list?

If you want to go through the appropriations, unless there's anything else specific within the departmental budgets. that you have questions on or concerns. I did ask the department heads to be here. You can see a lot of them are here. So they would be able to answer questions the best for their departments.

And we appreciate you all coming again. And if you have any questions or any input or suggestions or whatever, we would appreciate the conversation. You know, I've had some conversations with a couple of department heads and it's like I wish we all could have these conversations, you know, and, you know, it makes things a lot more easy. But that being said, again, you know, with some of my comments the other day, I don't want you all to think that we're leaning towards anything with core services because I've always felt like we need to protect our core services and our our employees and everything. I just brought some of that up for conversation, again, just to sometimes you have to throw it out there to prompt conversation. So that's what my hope is. If you guys have any suggestions or comments, please, please give them to us because this isn't necessarily our budget. This is all of ours together, a collaborative effort.

I do have Travis Lilly, the appraiser, and Jackie Reisinger, the register of needs, are both at that CPM leadership class today and tomorrow. And so they did both write a letter supporting the COLA at the 2% and how much it means to our employees as far as morale. And I'm more than happy to read these letters to you. But, or if you want to talk about this more as we move on, I could read them at that time, but I just want you to know that they wanted to express their support for the COLA and the benefits that we have since they couldn't be here in person today.

Tammy, what sheet was it that was presented with the insurance information? I know that, did you give us an approximation or you hadn't still got it?

We don't have any kind of an estimate at this time. The only thing that we have is conversations with Bukiti and where they were seeing it, which is 30%.

I think I asked you that because I don't think I've heard that you specifically said the 30%, but anyway, we're not looking down that road. No.

And the thing is, is one of the options that they gave us is the potential that if food process that high, then we would have the ability to be looking at other agencies that would potentially compete and give us a better deal, even if it's a one-year deal and we go back to Blue Cross Blue Shield when things get more reasonable. So there may be some options. It's just that we want to brace that it could potentially go high. A couple of other things I do just want to mention because they might be important as we move through this. We talked about the PILT. I don't have that in our numbers right now. So if we wanted to increase that in our budget, Right now I have it at 20 for the flood control. If we increased it to 60, that would gain us 40,000 against our number. I know some of these don't seem that high, but I think at this point every dollar is going to count. Another thing that I want to share is that today we got a franchise fee check from Cox Communications, and it's from April 25 to March 2026, and we received $10,828. So I would feel comfortable putting in 10,000 for franchise fees going forward. That's something we had signed up in 25, but this was the first check we got. So we should get it every March going forward. One other thing I did speak with the treasurer and we talked about her transfer into the general fund and where her numbers estimating where her numbers are going to be with that $5 increase. And she and I both feel comfortable to increase what I have as estimate from 10,000 to 20,000. So that gives us another 10. So right there is 60,000 between the pill, the franchise fees and the motor vehicles transfer that I can add into revenue. And I feel confident that those are numbers we can meet. Um, I've given you information on rent for both building. And I, we've spoke a little bit about equipment and a couple of the departments rent for they rent out equipment, but they're not receiving any income for that. So that I don't know what that number would look like on the equipment side of it, but on the building, I did give you estimates based on fair market value and square footage that we could collect for extension slash fair senior citizen center, the DMV United Way and soil conservation. I also gave you administration fees and that was for our agency funds. And I based that off of what the expenditures were in 2025. And I also took what we received in expenditures through 2026 and what they've historically done. And those numbers are very similar between 25 and 26. So if you went with a 5%, you could get a capture around 50,000 in admin fees. And if you went with a 3%, The 3% would give you about $31,000, and a 1% would give you just over $10,000. So that's another way to capture revenue. One thing interesting to note with the DMV is the fact that we have some unfunded mandates from the state, and so them getting free rent doesn't make sense in my mind.

You guys may see that differently. The reason we do that is they were going to pull the DMV out of the county, right? And we weren't going to have an office for driver's license.

That's what I understood as well.

And so that's when they were going to move it and they were going to put it out by the Manhattan airport. But, you know, and that building was available and that, so that's why it was moved over there. But that being said, I do like the idea of even a conversation with the secretary of revenue with the fact that all of the things that we do that is unfunded, that could be a tradeoff in some way to go after. So I have a note on that information to have some conversations with the Department of Revenue.

And they may consider the airport, but they already have one on the east side of Manhattan. So I don't know why they would put a second one in over there. And then one last thing, just to note, you know, I've been out working on property insurance from what we are currently paying with K camp and estimates estimates based on that with what it was versus in a pool. And I do not have any numbers on that yet, but we are working on them. So there could be some savings with insurance, but I can't give you anything definitively at this point, but keep that in mind. So those are a couple of things that I came back with from our last session.

I was just looking at this appropriation thing, and I'm not sure if it's correct, because you don't have the historic society with anything that we would be giving. You just have the 5,000 from CBV. It's down below. Is it?

So if you go under Three Rivers, right under Fresh Start Emergency Shelter, the historical society is the 95. Thank you. This was one of your constituents, our taxpayers that came in and asked to have this separated between different funds. And so I did do that just so you could see it. You could see how much is coming from each fund. I also have the other worksheet as well, but for this purpose, understanding what's coming from economic development and what's coming from the general fund is important because it does affect that. The ones in orange, just as a reminder, those are the ones that we're looking at potentially with rent in mind. I also gave you some documentation that provides not only what we give them in rent, but it also outlines electric and gas, water and sewer, janitorial, building insurance, building repairs, pest control, And then this rent is calculated in there. So when you're looking at extension and the senior citizen center soil conservation, and then soil conservation is in with the DMV and United Way. When you look at that, you can see the total in-kind that we're giving beyond an actual cash appropriation. And then when you add in those appropriation numbers, you can see what they're coming to in total. so one of the options if you didn't want to actually charge the rent you could consider decreasing appropriations based on those numbers and you're just suggesting like with united way maybe we start collecting like this to come up with that i think they do pay they do they pay 3600 a year but if we did a fair market value rent at 14 annual

market value rent per square foot it would be fourteen thousand seven hundred so there would be eleven thousand one hundred that we're not capturing so i know that that'd be you know it'd be a hardship on all of these but at the end of the day um you know it shouldn't be necessarily up to us again to go through all of this when they need to do their well maybe we should maybe we could start at half of what the market value is this year and then tell them next year they'll be

Yeah.

Well, and that's your thing. I mean, you have a lot of options here, but these are the numbers I've provided you just to give you enough information to hopefully make some adjustments or changes based on, we've already told them there were going to be changes that were made, but these are just options that allow you to make those changes and you can explain it in black and white why you're making those changes. I also requested quite a bit of information from several of the appropriations. I passed that on to an email. A lot of the things I asked for was additional information on things that weren't clarified in their requests, like miscellaneous. I don't know what miscellaneous means to them. I don't know what other admin expenses means to them. So I asked those questions. I also asked what their cash balances were because they give us revenue and expenses, but nowhere do we know what they're carrying over each year. So do they have cash or is it really a dire straits where you absolutely have no wiggle room? Those are things that you need to know. In addition, looking at their wages, how did they adjust their wages? Those are things you need to understand and trying to think what else I asked them, but I did forward you all of that. so that you can look at it. I also took a couple of the entities who have services here in Riley County and in Pott County. I've showed you what each of them are asking for in the different counties. I've showed you what that equates to per capita and how much of a difference it is between the counties. And if that's a difference, maybe you consider adjusting your appropriation based on a more equal stance in what you pay. What else? I know I've given you a lot, but I think this is the only way you're going to be able to make your decisions is if you have a lot of this stuff in front of you to reason where you're going.

Tammy, did you say when you were talking about that additional revenue, that wasn't reflected in what we had from yesterday. That was just from then and right now. Right.

Those things that I just gave you, The $60,000 is not in the numbers I provided you. That's just me telling you these are things that after I've done more research, this is what I have available to move forward. And the franchise fee check came today. So that's just an extra add-on.

What are the department heads at? Because you mentioned maybe charging a fee for use of a room. You know, it wouldn't again be during day or night time or anything. It would just be a department or, well not a department, someone had needed to have a meeting room or something to charge something like that. Because just like at the health department, Charles is pursuing that now. You want to speak on that, Charles?

So what we're doing, we're actually trying to rent out some space. Once WIC left, we had, half the building that's opened up. So we're looking at agencies that do public health work that would like to rent out the area.

That's good. A couple I thought about was Troy's meeting space. There's some things we would need to do to make it more usable to people, but we could potentially do that and rent that space. And then Commissioner Tremont mentioned Gary's space and his conference room would be an option. Of course, ours and the chamber here would be an option when it's not being used with elections. So, I mean, we do have some capability there.

And it would all be up to you. I didn't want to infringe on your space or anything like Gary because it would be up to you however you wanted to to manage it or whatever else.

We do have people come in every once in a while, like State Farm Marshal's office has meetings there and that kind of stuff. Are we going to be charging them for it? Yeah. You know?

I mean, I think the state gives us so many unfunded mandates. I don't know that we should give the state a break on everything and then keep paying extra for their services. But that's my opinion from finance side.

That's a good question, Darian. That's what we need to think of them. both ways and how to do that. Once again, all this is just hopefully you all have ideas or comments because sitting here, it's a little overwhelming to be thinking about all of this. So we appreciate the comments.

Well, and equipment, if we're allowing our public to utilize equipment, I really believe that we should be charging rent for that as well. We shouldn't be just allowing them to take that equipment and use it for free. And I was just made aware that we have some departments that do have equipment that we do just let people use, take and use. So that would be something that we could potentially capture some additional revenue from, too.

What are the, or what is it that is being rented, I guess?

I think there's a fire skid and fire that I was told that you can rent or use for free. so in the fire department would be one area that we have that and i don't know if jeremy allows anybody to use anything at public works or noxious weed or anything noxious weed used to have a sprayer they longed out but we got rid of that yeah i think so but that would go to something right and fire would go to fire but still fire is over revenue neutral and that would give them some additional funds to bring back against that revenue neutral should we be ranting another thought that

came up yesterday is that um you know these repeat offenders and i don't know how many there are i you know gary this is with you again but you know when there's a fire out in the counties i think you've said before that they've had the same person you know burning and then you know it gets out of hand and you're called out there kind of like the security alarm deal you know if you your your alarm goes off once you kind of given a grace but if it goes off again you're charged $25 can the same theory be used with these people that are they're using our resources that your people and everything else if they have done it more than once can they not be charged for us going out there to to do that you know just just thought we don't have that many false alarms home well not false alarm I've heard they're the people that have

You know, they've been burning and it got out of hand and they were told. Yeah, we're going after them. We've been doing that this last year. Oh, okay.

It would be a crime. Fine, it doesn't come to us.

Well, not the people that, I mean, they're burning, you know, they might be burning and have the ability to burn on that particular day, but the bad judgment has led whatever they probably shouldn't have been even if the bernie ben was in place anyway i've heard there's been frequent flyers that have been uh the county has went out well i reported you guys on the first of the month that uh county counselor and i sent out

letters and out of four four people we sent to we were but we got money back for three that went back in the fire fund so okay i've reported you guys yeah first of the month i'll have to look at that i'll have to look at that i appreciate that that's just somebody had mentioned that yesterday i was like no that is a good idea like your sign board um and i know you use it for your purposes

But aren't there some outside people that want it for events or whatever?

My building? What sign board? We'd probably have somebody down there because of the equipment stuff we have in there that have access to the entire building.

What is it?

Can you talk about the sign board? That's the signage board. Oh, yeah.

He's not.

You're talking to different things. I'm sorry.

don't know if we can charge for that because that's homeland security money that we got that from i don't think we can charge an agency to use that in different departments it might be worth at least checking into and seeing for sure um one other thing you guys have on your hold list just as a reminder we do have the one department that has requested moving from 37 and a half to 40 hours a week and that equated to a 30,272 increase to the budget. So that is something else you do need to determine whether you're going to accept that change because it was after the presentation or whether it's something that you want to go back to flat where they were in the past.

Yeah, that is something we need to talk about. I kind of already gave you my opinion. I recall you saying that, but we didn't take any action on it necessarily. So at this time, if that's the appropriate time to go with this, whether we have to vote on it or just agree, I would say I agree, but I don't think now's the appropriate time to make that change. Commissioner Asher?

Well, I'd like it to stay at 37 and a half hours.

So that would also, so in addition to the $60,000 increase in revenue, if we decreased $30,272 in expenses, there's $100,000. So that's, there you go. There's four things that we can do right now. So there's a couple of decisions.

Refresh again on the if you charge rent, What would that equate to? On the rent, it would... And keep in mind, I kind of agree with... You could have my sheets look at it.

What are you inquiring about?

The rent.

So for the rent, the total between extension fair senior center soil conservation dmv and united way would equate to 189 525. and then your admin fees anywhere between 10 and 52 000 depending on what percentage one to five percent that you would put in place i think we should do that well we've talked about the five percent because we charge five percent on acorns we charge five percent on nrp so anything else that we do that equates to admin fees is a five percent so to remain consistent that's the reason i presented that first i think that's what we should go with for admin fees five percent i would be okay with that okay So I would put in, like I said, it's been about $52,025. That's what it would have pointed to. And approximately for 26, it looks like it'll be about $52,000. So you want me to put in $50,000 for that? Yes. OK. And then I will work with Betsy and write letters to let the agencies know that. And then the state agency, no, that's not, that's for rent. So, yeah, I will have Betsy, I'll work with Betsy on a letter to make sure that those entities are aware.

I'm good with rent.

I just don't want to start it out with a full amount, but letting them know. Yeah, I don't want to blindside them all at once.

I wouldn't have a problem with that now.

They haven't been paying any utilities.

They haven't been paying any... Senior Center does pay utilities, but they do not pay for the building repairs or the building insurance, but they do pay the utilities. but they also have 11,000 square feet. And when I calculated theirs, I did theirs based off of $7 per square foot because it was so large. The rest of them were based off of $14 per square foot.

Well, I think to be fair, I'm sure just go with $7. That's me.

$7 per foot? $7.

Okay, so just so you're aware, senior center at $7 a square foot for $11,000 would be $80,325 for them for rent. Just want to make sure that, I mean, I gave you the total of all of the entities, but because they have so much square footage at $7, that's what it is.

Yeah, because if we reduce their appropriations down, because I had put them down to 89, 675.

And that's your thing. I mean, that would be your option. you could take what I figured at 14 square foot or $14 a square foot and divide it in half for every one of the entities and just decrease their appropriation rather than to charge rent. So that's instead of the 190,000, you would have 80,000 that you can cut off appropriations.

But like soil conservation with their state maps that helps them, they can get,

They can only get 50. They're capped at 50 and they're already getting 50.

And they're carried over. They may have carried over.

There is carry over cash. I gave you those numbers as well as what cash is sitting out there. And they do have other sources of revenue beyond the appropriations, which I also provided you. i know you don't want to blindside them but in looking at all the numbers and looking at them a little more clearly they're not going to be broke if you adjust their appropriations if you cut it completely potentially yes that may be it's super detrimental but and i'm not standing up here trying to tell you that this is These are not worthy entities. They are. They all are worthy entities. But me standing here is going to defend the core services and the COLA and the employees before I defend any of their appropriations.

And I appreciate the information because that's exactly the direction I personally want to go to work with everyone else. So I appreciate you doing that. Because even with soil conservation, with their in-kind, with their utilities and their rent, you know, that's $35,000 and they were just requesting $30,000. So, you know, that's... Because I did reduce that down, actually, I had it down for $25,000 to give them $25,000 instead of that.

They're not charging that. Right.

Yeah, that's what I had.

Was that $14 or $7?

They were on a different equation. They're at $14 per square foot, and they had 2,250 square foot. So that equated out for their utilities and everything was $35, but the rent equated out to $35. with using that $14.22 per square foot.

If you go below $25,000, then the match that the state provides them would be affected. But as long as you kept them at $25,000, they're capped at $50,000.

And it's a two-to-one match. Yeah, I put them down to $25,000 because they'd be able to meet their match. You think about it, it just makes sense that they should be providing the building and paying utilities and stuff. It does, to me, make sense. And building maintenance. Yes.

Yeah. And Jeremy, they have actually done a lot of repairs on all the buildings. They've done roofs. They've done floors. They've done tile. A lot of different buildings have done a lot of work done on them. They did concrete out in front of the annex.

Yes, pest control.

I mean, that's everybody. Right. Janitorial.

So the difference with the senior citizens versus the building committee. Does the building committee have money?

Because they actually, like when we are doing the tile project, They paid a portion of some of the tile work. I don't know where the money comes from for that, but...

I don't know. They've always had a lot of money.

Is that a 4-H fundraising committee?

Is that what it is? They do fundraisers for a lot of that money, like soup suppers and chili bean dough and that kind of stuff.

I don't know if that's where all of it comes from, but part of it does.

That's why I asked whether Or do you split the rent? Because senior citizens, they rent that whole building.

Well, she broke it out, you know, with the one, you know, per square foot. She broke their, their roof broken out. So they're, you're, they're paying for the space they're utilizing. And then, you know, so yeah, I kind of looked at that too, but they broke it out per square foot. for the extension, just using 3,000, and the senior center, they 11,475, so that's... We got those mid-morning, so you probably didn't get some of that information. Yeah, I was trying to... I told her every time I was thinking I was leaving, I'd be getting my computer to see what else she would send to us.

So it was kind of quiet, and I'm not sure I heard. Was there one that you actually agreed on making an adjustment? And if you did, which one was that?

Well, on these, do we want to just look at each one of these that we've just talked about? Because on the... Yes, we did.

Soil conservation is 25 years.

Is that right? No.

Was there one before that that you spoke about that you said you would, I think Kathy had said and Trish had said you were okay with that?

I think we were talking about senior. Were we talking about senior center?

Senior center.

And what was that one you were looking at? Was the dollar amount for that one?

Yeah. You were trying to say that the reason it was seven was because of the large square footage, where the other ones don't have square footage.

Yes, because when we looked at that, of course, you can see if it's 80,000 at seven, then it's going to be 160,000, which is like their appropriation. So when I was working with Travis, we looked at that and we couldn't find any comparable, not an exact comparison for what would tell us what market value should be for that type of entity. And so we decreased it to seven. And then we also looked at what it would be at $5 per square foot, which is 57,375 as an option should you so choose to consider.

I took the $170,000 that they requested, and then I just took off the rent of $80,000, $325,000, which left them around $90,000. And then I thought that was a lot to cut, so I moved it up from the requested $170,000. I put down $100,000 because that's a big chunk. Again, we're in the position to do that, too. I mean, that's a lot. And if we could put these numbers down and we go back to the drawing board and see where we sit, it's not to say we can't say, OK, well, this is where we're at. Then we could re-look at some of those. Because we still have to wrestle with the EDC military affairs in the chamber as well. So that was with the senior center. And then with extension, they had 370 and then I took the rent off, which left them down to 328,000 or 329,000. So I put it at 330,000 for their request. Again, you know, Bumped it up by over $2,000.

What was that one?

Which one? That was for the extension.

So it would be $330 for the extension and you had the senior center at $90? $100, yes.

because you know that's also a give and take you know if you just use the rent and you look at the expenses and the rent and then we're just taking in consideration the rent i think that's you know i think that's fair under the circumstances commissioner asher yeah you're okay with those all right so we have extension senior citizen center and soil conservation so

We just want to look at that middle section and the general first, and that's the DMV.

We'll get with them or talk about that later, and also United Way for those that you gave us information on.

That would be additional revenue that we would collect, not an appropriation, but if we put that in place, yeah, you'll have additional revenue. Okay, so Three Rivers. You guys, it was requested at 15. It's at 10 with your changes. Do you want to make any additional adjustments to that one?

I left it at 10 because in 16, or 26, they had 16 and they requested 15. Everybody at 10?

Out of us? That's when I gave you some information based on per capita.

You know, with them knowing that we're probably going to go down. 80.

Big Lakes Development is at 80. I also gave you some information based on Clay, Riley, and Potts County as well and what they pay per capita of who they serve.

Yeah, and I had already lowered it down after I got your numbers, but I still went down to $75,000 from the $102,000 that they requested.

I have a 90 requested.

Yeah, but then we went down to 80. And she's saying take another 5. Maybe I think you need 70. Keith, Kathy? 70. Yeah.

I'm still trying to find your email.

Can you just forward it to me and I can print it?

So then we have the free fare, which was 18, and you changed it to 17.

Tammy, just one second. I just want to make sure that I understand because these Flint Hills things, I'm not by no means being critical of them. I just want to understand that. those that number like for the regional council because the other ones are pretty minute yes you know ten two thousand and thousand but um the the amount then that they requested the ten five how does that work population so that yeah for the region that's how it sounds okay okay i just wanted that that's how everybody does it like milford pays what their population is for action pays what their population is okay

are you guys at 17 with free fare yeah well any adjustments you know i'd said i had 15 15 17 commissioner giordano okay so what do i change it to 16.5 now i'll go with the 17th so leave it at 17. yes uh emergency shelter is at 40 and there was no change made to it at this point i moved it down to 35. i'd be all right because that's 10 off of their request so is that okay yeah yeah uh historical society you did already make one adjustment to it i don't know if you want to make any more or not everything cheaper down to it thanks

Because we were going to take some of it as CVB, is that right? Yeah, 90 and then 5 with CVB. Yeah, I had it down 95 without 90.

90 plus the historical from the CVB at 5, so 95 total. Okay. EMS, I... Was she asked to come?

Was Rose asked to come?

I just think she should be here. She was in the department head email that I sent out and asked her to please. I asked all department heads to come.

This is who's spending her money or giving her.

Well, you have a pretty good handle on her budget. She can.

She can. Yeah. I already adjusted the numbers on her budget. And I mean, she already has a line item that is not allocated that is over $200,000.

Still would be good for her to be in on the budget. Yes. Yeah. I don't know.

Yeah.

Well, she might be busy with that.

Yeah. Junction City EMS, I mean, I don't really know what we have for options on that. Area Agency on Aging, you have decreased at $3,577. I put them down to 20 from the...

The 25, well they requested, their 26 allotment was at 25,000. They requested 28,500 and I did 20,000.

You guys okay with that? Yep. Who was that again? Area Agency on Aging. Area Agency.

So I'm still not comfortable. I don't think that Gary County is very well served with that, but you know.

The juvenile detention agency, I did reach out to them as well. I forwarded you the emails and I am meeting with Angela on Friday to go through the numbers. I don't know if there's any leeway and what they have at this point, but I can bring that back. So maybe not, maybe not. She texted me because she was like, what, you know, whatever.

And I was like, just, I said, basically, we want to talk to you. Is there, do you want to, is there any, um, reductions you could see, you know, savings or whatever. So I said you might have that information together.

So do you want to leave that on hold until the next time we meet? Yes. I'm going to get some information for you. And then Fundamental Health, you have increased to $200,000. At Opera House, though, we did. Yeah, I haven't. It's up in the Section above, so I was just doing the general. Oh, okay.

I've got my spreadsheet from the other day.

Yeah. Okay, so fundamental health. So any changes, any additional changes with fundamental health?

No, they requested two, or they had 210, and they increased it to 319, too. And I put them down to 200,000.

And so no additional changes from what you had already done?

I don't think so.

We already did the Senior Center, Silver Herd Legislature. Are you okay with the Silver Herd Legislature? So conservation we already did and then you still have that membership which will affect your commission budget and 4525 is what that next level is and it said in the documentation that was for expanded visibility engagement opportunity and recognition is what that extra two thousand dollars would buy you i'm fine living at 25. all right so if you look at the economic development chamber of commerce you're still putting that on hold at this point i did give you some information on

um other counties and how much they pay towards that and uh yeah for pot pot kenny gives quite a bit 255 000 and and then riley went from 55 000 to 100 000 or what do you think they know that's the request that's the request that doesn't mean that's what they'll fund I just wondered why they were so low and then what prompted them to... Well, they didn't give that.

They haven't funded $100,000. That's just what the request is at this point. Likely, knowing Riley County, they'll go back down to $55,000. But right now, the request came in at $100,000.

I know, like Commissioner Thornburg had said the other day about the EDC, maybe just leaving them, but as we know, the expenses that were... been paid in the past were astronomical that I think we could still cut it down and be okay and I would be okay with that just as far as our budget because we've been saying this for years since I years about funding the EDC and nothing's ever been done about it and We want to make sure we give them the tools they need to be successful. But under the circumstances, I would be willing to leave the chamber and the MAC alone and reduce the EDC. And given it's a new structure, that they should then have that to know where they're going to be. I mean, they've got the past still to deal with, I understand that.

So how much would you reduce in there?

I'd be willing. 150 is what they've had. 165 and then we reduced down to 150. I said 130. And again, if everything is just looks rosy, then, you know, some of these changes can be made, but that's just my personal opinion that I don't think the money spent will be as large as what it's been in the past for sure. So, so one 30.

Okay. And

The MPO, regional council and leadership, you guys had decided those were at the level they need to be based on services that are provided in those programs?

Yeah. And that's based on population they need to get out of.

Right.

Which you hadn't made any changes, so you want to leave those where they're at, right? Yeah. Okay.

So military affairs is at 70.

And I know that they were, you know, both of those were in the red as currently stands. So, you know, again, not knowing if things were done right. The 70,000 seems like a lot for the military affairs to me. But until we get a true picture of how that was.

It was less than half of the payroll.

so um are you saying didn't you maybe just leave it as it is until you figure out what we're doing okay so i'm going to put hold beside it so we know to come back and then opera house you have them they requested 60 and you have them at 50 plus five coming out of the cbb at this time

I put them down to 47, and then the other five to come out of CBB, so that making it 52,000. We approved them for 55 and 26, and they requested 60, so I said 52.

So the 47 plus five from CBB?

Yes, yes.

Okay.

Okay, and Freedom Fest and Main Street are the two that come out of CBB in addition to the Historical Society and Opera House that you've designated. Are there any adjustments to either one of those two?

Freedom Fest is a wonderful thing for our community and everything that I don't necessarily have anything bad to say. I don't think our entire community feels the same way. And in saying that, we've also made cuts to a lot of these other entities. So I don't think it would be fair not to make an adjustment on there. So I went from 25,000 down to 20.

Like I said, I'm on Freedom Fest.

Yeah, I have a second 23.

Okay, I need at least two to say the same thing.

I have a 27 on Main Street.

you guys go on main street 27 or less i went 25 but i'd be willing to meet 27. which one main street i mean that's the same thing the same kind of mentality i think of our community i don't think they're on top of everyone's list in our community so i think again being fair to all these other ones i think we need to to reduce so what are we going to You want to go to 26?

We had 28 and they requested 30. Okay, and then Circle A Club and the Community Involvement Team, those are special alcohol. You did make an adjustment to the Circle A Club

Is there any additional changes you want to make on either of those?

I know that comes from special alcohol and both three of those, even though they come out of opioid special alcohol funds, I still go with I don't think it's fair to not leave. I think we need to make adjustments to those as well. So I went from to $7,500 from their requested $8,700 for the Circle A Club.

And 26, they did get $7,005, so that that's still higher than what they got last year.

OK, so that is true.

So yeah, 75.

And then the community involvement team.

Well, in 26 we heard 15.

Well, that's when we didn't know. And, you know, we just found out that that wasn't necessarily anything that the Attorney General didn't want to make a ruling on that. So it wasn't, I thought that those funds had to be used specifically for, you know, a certain thing for a statute, but they didn't want to make a ruling on it. So then that's why then they went back up to $25,000. Again, for my take, taken into consideration with making cuts, I put them at $23,000 because I do think $23,000 from the $25,000 requested I think it's, I've said before, with kids and stuff, I think it's a good thing, but just, I don't mind.

It's just so everybody gets.

Yeah, just so everybody gets.

And then library district, community corrections recovery court.

you and you didn't have communication back from her or somebody was going to see what that increase entailed and talk to donna it was the i looked it up before we opened the doors it was mostly the salaries and and enhancing their staff is what she had on her list i went from her the approved was uh in 26 with 120 they requested one 130, so I went with 118.

So you dropped it even from 26.

Well, that's what we, I was looking at 26 and reducing 26. That's what I was looking, my numbers came from, because I... Well, I was looking at 125.

Well, I was just going to...

125. Okay.

And then the recovery court.

Now, I wasn't sure on this one as well. That comes out of opioid.

I think that's the actual cost of behavior. For the attorney? Okay. That's what she's estimating? Yeah. Okay. She's not doing any extra than what it would cost to do.

Okay. So that's 25 cents.

to leave that one.

Yes, 26,000.

Okay, with the adjustments that you made, at least approximately, but if my math is all correct, Travis is not here to check me probably, 141,500 is the decrease to the general fund and 3,000 is the decrease to the CBB and the economic development is a $23,000 decrease. Now we know that you're still looking at the Mac inside economic development and the juvenile detention agency is still also on hold. So potentially there could be a little bit more adjusted, but that's where we're at right now. Did we, were we waiting on the Mac or I thought we were, well, you're, you said you're leaving it at 70 right now and you're going to come back and revisit it.

So give me that again. Give me those spreaders.

General fund with the changes you made, I have $141,500 as a decrease. And then whatever information you get from the detention agency, because that one's on hold, I still have it marked to look at. Economic development was a $23,000 decrease. And to revisit the MAC, CDB was a $3,000 decrease. And then there was a $2,500 decrease to the special alcohol and a $5,000 decrease to the library district and no change to the opioid funds.

All right. So explain to me, like CBB, that's not general fund money.

No, it's not.

That's not a levy.

But it's transient guest tax that you could potentially use elsewhere. Right.

But it's not a levy. No, it's not levy. Economic development is, general is. Right.

Special alcohol is money we get from the state, and library is their own district, like the fire is their own district.

So basically, you add up the $141,500 and the $23,000. Right. So $164,500 is what I have for the decrease to the levy.

you know upset some of these organizations but if you look at our appropriations compared to other counties we pay way more than the other counties do way way more yeah well and and just looking at can we provide our core services or do we give money to outside agencies that by statute we're not required to fund right and so in looking at that I mean, I truly believe that the core services is what we have to focus on first. And I would hope that the department heads that are here would agree with that statement.

When we did our survey, it was interesting because a lot of comments made and that's why I think you know you have to make your best decision to how it's fair for all because you know there would be some that just absolutely love freedom fest and then some that hate it and some that love the main street and they want the library but they don't want whatever so it's a give and take all the way down the line with all of those but I too know that a lot of people are not going to be very happy but the fact of the matter is people want their their property taxes cut and this is about the only avenue to do it.

Well, they want taxes cut, they want service. Yeah, yeah.

Does anybody have any comments about any of those that we've dealt with here on that? Mr. Olds.

Keep in mind that when you say that people cut property taxes, that won't be true of everything. It depends on their valuation. So if you say that, they're going to have the expectation that it's going to be cut when it doesn't happen. I don't know what your average increase was, but whoever's above that mean or average, their taxes are gone.

But one thing to note with that, because I did sit down and get the numbers worked up, and when you're looking at the valuation change and how new construction would be affected, I mean, and this is where we were today before we started any of these cuts, with the mills being 61.904 and us going from a 17,755,447 to the 20,437,159, which is a total change of 2.68 million. what's generated with existing properties based on what we're requesting is 738,948. So that's the additional on existing properties. When you look at new construction value and existing properties based on the value change. But when you look at the new construction, that new construction is going to capture 175,745. And that's on new construction, not the taxpayers that are already in place. So then our additional difference with just us increasing the mill is $1,767,018. So yes, the $1,767,018 is still an addition based on what we're requesting, but from the property increase, what is to be affected is $738,948.

You gave us that sheet too yesterday.

Right. And so that's, you know, those are the things that are important for people to understand and how the numbers work and the valuation increases. So your valuation increase isn't the full 2.6 million. The valuation increases just on the 768 or 738,000. And you know, when you're looking at taxes, nobody, is going they're going to say well i still don't like it and nobody does like it but i just like to have the numbers be accurate when we're looking at what the impact is and i did that these with the appraiser just so you're everybody's aware that he and i went through and made sure that we both agreed on the numbers that we calculated So that's the appropriations. And I will pull up this worksheet that affects the mills that are needed by departments. You may not want to look at it this way. I'm just giving it to you from another perspective, the revenue that's proposed in the departments that do capture revenue. So you can see which ones actually have some ability to offset their budget requests. And I think that's very important for taxpayers to understand that some of what these departments have actually bring in revenue back against those expenses. And so when you're looking at the mills needed, you're looking at what the net budget is against those departments. And so this is good information. If you have any specific questions, if you went back through the departments that any of them that have come today can answer for you, clarify, I'm sure they would be more than happy to do that for you.

I know we only kept that fee in the treasurer's office at $5. If it was $10, how much more of an increase would that be? If it was at $10, do you know? You can change it if you want, but it would be a cheaper cost. No, I know. I know. I just didn't know if we looked at that.

Well, what we looked at this morning, we were thinking around $26 additional. And so if you double that, it's 50-ish.

I think 10 more is reasonable. I think that's something we should discuss.

I don't know, Sherry, you could speak to it too, but on the other side of it, listen to other counties when we were going through this process and choosing five or ten dollars. I know when we were adding up the numbers, it was pretty substantial, 10, and I was one of the three counties that voted against it because I said, I'm not charging my people $10 when I could get by with a five. That being said, Sherry was interested in increasing it, but that's another area that she's going to hear a lot of things about people coming in and having to pay a fee to come into the office. they can't put a tag on how much it costs to listen to that every day because i know other counties that it's shawnee and a couple of those other bigger counties in johnson county and you know they're you have to pay they don't want public into their buildings so you know they want they and they start charging that fee and they've got quite a bit of uh push back from that because, you know, just the same thing. So that was, you know, a couple of years ago on the news all over the place, people were upset about, you know, having to pay them into their buildings and everybody gets charged instead of just the people that come into the office.

So that's where I was more apt to agree to it.

So I didn't think it was fair to charge because you took... Yeah, everybody should be charged the same. Yeah, I agree. We don't, the county does not have as many ways of revenue as, you know, say a city. Right. I mean, they're allowing us to do that.

Well, they're talking about, I don't know where that's at now, Sherry, but, you know, again, Kansas is one of the lowest states in the country. You know, what do they charge for titles now? It's $10,000. Okay, $10 compared to 18 and 35 that other states are charging. So again, if the state would allow $2. That was part of the legislation in there. You pay $12 in service fees and the county gets to keep $3.50 of that. Yeah, not a fair deal. That's why I wouldn't feel bad asking the secretary to maybe consider rent. We wouldn't want to jeopardize having that service leave our county. But on the other hand, it's conversation, I guess. They tried to get us to do the driver's license, but I don't think Jerry wants to do that.

I don't have enough room.

I don't have enough employees. And the fact that I just lost the new hire because we didn't pay enough. She took a higher paying job.

So no change right now, leave it where we have it?

I can't change it right now. My choice, if I was to change it, it'd have to be in December for next year.

Do you know, Sherry, if other counties, are they going to increase theirs? Is there a big conversation about?

There's still probably five that never, does not collect any at all. And there's most of them, there's a couple that are only collecting a dollar. And then there's a whole bunch of us that are collecting five. And the ones that went up to ten are the ones that were already collecting the five. So you see the makeup of that, the big set there. upper five you know it's just the bigger cities then it's medium cities and then smaller ones are going to charge a dollar and they're probably going to catch heck over the dollar because there's like county is one of them she's only charging a dollar yeah but they did some counties like us they're charging five i think raleigh county did go up to ten but they were already charging five i think yeah so i guess i was trying to move them in slowly and let them You have to get adjusted to the increase of five and then maybe change it later on. So it's an option. For sure.

So I understand it's going to last three years.

It is. And it'll go back in the three years, it'll go back down to the $5. Yeah. And then it goes back to, you know, talking about it at the...

you know, a new bill or something, a new statute.

Yeah, the way that I understood that, they went with three because, you know, they're talking too about doing away with the motor vehicle, so maybe in the interim period that that can all go away and they're going to fix it in the meantime it's going to go away.

They're supposed to be putting a group of treasurers and different people together to look at this over the next three years, so.

With the changes that we made to appropriations, the revenue, the decrease in the 37, back down to the 37 and a half hours league, and then putting in the admin fees, that's $304,500. So we're not quite at a mil. We're close to another mil that you've adjusted today. I still have the DMV and the United Way. If you captured that rent between those two at fair market value, that would be $35,700 just so you're aware because we didn't act on that today. But I will make these changes and I can bring back to you at the next work session unless there's something else that you guys want to talk about today.

That would be when you're talking appropriations, we're talking revenue.

on the rent we're not going to charge revenue you guys decrease their appropriations right so that then counts revenue because you just but it's a decrease but the revenue i'm talking about is the pilt that i'm going to adjust the franchise fees and their vehicle transfer okay so that's 60 and then the office change back is another 30 savings to a higher expense and then the admin fees are 50. that we'll put in as the budget appropriations change, the 164,500. Any other discussion? And also, when do you want to meet again? Are you going to be, I mean, because that's going to, you're going to decrease another 305,000 approximately. So are you good with that being given to the,

After all, that goes in 300,000 days.

Well, I mean, you didn't go the full amount of rent. And so not doing the full amount of rent is a little bit lower than that number.

But are you? Well, you went full amount on some and not others. Sorry, what? We didn't do any rent.

We just decreased. Right. You only decreased those three, the soil, the conservation, the extension.

But you used that calculation to do the decrease.

We used it, but you didn't use that amount. So you went lower. You didn't get, you didn't take the full amount of the rent off.

Okay. That's what it took, the whole entire, almost everything. Right.

And then the two you didn't act on,

they don't receive appropriations, the DMV and the United Way.

So it would just be a matter of whether you want to start charging rent to those two entities at the $14 per square foot basis. And then if there's any discussion on equipment that is being utilized and us not charging for, Is there, how do you want us to go forward with that? I don't know that we can capture and budget because I don't even know what that looks like, but.

What we have that would be suggested to Randall.

Well, Gary, you have something with the fire that somebody gets a water skid or something that they take and use from here?

Do you have more? Skid water.

I'm not an equipment person, but there's something with.

I don't think you should charge for that because if they don't use it, they'll grab you out there and put the fire out. Well, as long as nobody's using them for their businesses. That would be the thing that we need to make sure of.

You've got to sign out cheap.

I don't think, I mean, I think it's a great idea in theory as far as that, but there's no, I don't think, you know, it would be something regular that people would do, you know.

I don't know how you do budget.

Budget, yeah. I mean, it's a good idea. We can think about it.

That's, yeah.

And that's, I didn't even know about the senior center, but they'd be written, they'd be out all the time.

I think the revving of space makes more sense.

Well, Charles and I were talking the other day, and gosh, what a perfect place for somebody to set up shop, because that's, you've got the big conference room, and that WIC

office how many was there four uh there's four wick offices and two offices upstairs and if we had to we could potentially turn the other basement into more offices and we could also rent out the conference room as needed for different agencies i appreciate you being so uh receptive with that charles because we we were looking around the other day just peeking to see him yeah that you know you think that somebody you know might have just a little service of some sort that you know is it just for non-profits like i'm trying to keep it uh public health focused but if there's a non-profit that's wait public health covers a lot yeah so pretty much almost any non-profit would fall into it

Anything else?

I don't think I have anything else, so we just need to decide on another time.

I mean, I'm sitting here going, where else?

I know, well, yes.

I'm just going to beat my head against the wall.

Well, I mean, we've talked about other cuts that you can make on your transfers and such, but I've also explained in doing so, and that's coming back the next year and trying to reinstate them, just causing us to be in this exact spot where we are today.

You've got some plugged in, though. We have cut some of them. That's a little bit of where we're at right now. Right. otherwise i guess our only other is you know come back to the appropriations again but you know i don't i'm i'm not i'm all willing to cut these down um as much as we can but i'm not willing to put them in a place to you know for an unexpected like you said you included in their their letter but on that you know i just um you know they relied on it for ever so

anybody else have any suggestions i have a little bit of information that may be based off some discussion in your last meeting on bridges so we do currently have 65 bridges in gary county that are on mbi so a bridge is defined as anything with a deck length of over 20 feet so keep in mind that we have numerous drainage structures that are 20 feet or less probably around 80 of those that or old, number of our, you know, our average bridge age is 71 years old in Garrett County. So, you know, our overall bridge rating is rather low. So there are a lot of bridges in the future that are gonna need to be replaced at that. So that kind of is why we did make that adjustment, that special bridge fund there. And then I guess, secondly, I'd like to advocate on the COLA. You know, I think it's important that we, Keep up with the times to keep the morale up in our departments. We try to recruit talented individuals. In order to do that, we have to stay competitive in the market to do so. Kind of goes back to the old analogy, get what you pay for.

Yeah, we had a time playing catch up, as you know.

I know Tammy gave you some information based off of that CPI, and you're still behind that 408.

Tagging on that, if we don't continue to give cost of living adjustments, we're going to get farther and farther behind the market again, and then we'll find ourselves in five years having to spend millions to get us caught up, where we're not going to have any employees.

That's why I said that several years ago, then we had to play catch up, and you don't want to, in any of these, you don't want to go backwards, but

No, I appreciate that. It's tough, I know it is.

Again, I commend you for the job that you're doing. Tough decisions to be made. You think public works can do that help? They sure will.

Thank you. Jeremy, how many bridges are in Gary County?

65 are actually on the NBI.

People have asked, and I think I've asked.

Yeah, that's what you said, how many? And then 80 of the... There's around 80, a little over probably.

They're like mini bridges.

Yeah, so those would be your drainage culverts and things like that. You guys did approve one not too long ago on Davis Creek. That was about 23,000 first place. That would be one of those 120 feet. I mean, there's just a slew of those throughout the county that are We're not a big county. We're the smallest county in the state.

Yeah, in the state.

I'd also like to support Nicola, too, from our department as well.

Well, your department costs us the most. And you're not collecting in your rent on your space over there.

I know, I know. But I'd also like to say that we're doing a lot of

in conjunction with Jeremy's individuals, employees, we're doing a lot of internal maintenance ourselves because we understand the cost that we are to the city and to the county, the city and the taxpayers. So we take a lot of responsibilities on ourselves to help try to put that cost off for several more years. Anyone that comes into our facility can clearly see that we need a new building, but we also know that the taxpayers are not in a position to make that happen right now. We're doing everything we can to postpone this huge bomb and hopefully we can put it off for several more years. But I also like to note that we made a lot of cuts and a lot of sacrifices to our services that we provide to help get back some money from our budget. Our jail is working on a skeleton crew right now. And if I go any lower or make any more cuts to my sheriff's office, it would be a liability issue. down which will cost the taxpayers even more on the road so um i cut another position this year i think it was uh from 2024 we had 130 employees and um projected to go to 88 employees next year so i made many cuts to help uh kind of like more quality over quantity as germans said um we need experienced and knowledgeable people in our line of business. Otherwise, that turns into lawsuits, which costs us accounting millions of dollars. So I did prepare a letter as well. It sounds like Travis and Jackie did too. I also prepared one from my office to kind of help. I hope you guys read it and take it into consideration. If I can approach, I'll hand this to you, Chair.

Yeah, sure. Well, you know, just your coming in and support and us in making that decision, we appreciate that. And I know that whatever you were doing several months ago that you guys were working on, so I know that you guys have been doing a lot of internal work. And I don't think, you know, and I've always said, you know, been there, done that, so I understand the predicament. And, you know, I've always said I believe that you can do it. you've done your best to be frugal and taken the dollars into consideration. And, but, you know, it's just, again, um, we appreciate the support and the comments, um, you know, it's just all, and it's, it's nice to have you guys to hear, to see, you know, what the predicament, I wish everybody would come in and listen to the dilemma that we have in making that decision. But I know that, and I said it a million times, I'm not looking to, to, to, in fran john core services and that would be the very furthest thing and i think that we all feel that way and i think the community feels that way but you know that it's been a loud outcry every season on social media about you know cutting property taxes are too high and so and i think we're doing our due diligence and doing the best we can to look at every under every rock and everything else to cut services. And Tammy, I appreciate that all the paperwork you've been sending us, I think. But, you know, that's life.

What is that? on some of our can you get his factors to general fund bill increase but and the one that in your department revenues revenue sources decreased 659 000. what was that what's the reason

So for the projected one for this upcoming year, we were hoping, we were trying to be optimistic that we'd get a $120,000 grant to get a third SRO. So I went ahead and put that under because it's projected. We did not get that $120,000 grant. So that just wipes it out. And then we also made a readjustment on the jail dispatch contract. That's the biggest one. how that is set up and Tammy can explain this better is like that revenue comes from the city. We no longer receive that, but on the flip side of things are contractual for half a million gone wiped out. So that's, that's where it gets a little tricky. If you don't understand how the budget works, it's, it's very confusing because I had a contractual line item on my budget for half a million dollars. That's what we pay for dispatch services in return on the back end. It never came to my budget at 300 some thousand. that went straight into the general fund. We have a lot of revenue that goes into the general fund that you guys don't see in the budget. Hundreds of thousands of dollars that we don't get. I don't feel like we get accredited for it. We don't get credit for that. It's right in the general fund. It doesn't show up. So that's why revenue's down because I had to take that $300,000 off that went into the general fund. But I have to make sure you guys understand there's a half million dollars to be saved THERE'S A DEDUCTION. BUT OVERALL.

NEW SPEAKER I HAD TO READ IT. BUT YOU HAD A GOOD DESCRIPTION.

NEW SPEAKER IF YOU READ MY BUDGET PRESENTATION, IT DETAILS IT OUT VERY WELL THERE.

NEW SPEAKER YOU REALLY DID A GOOD JOB.

NEW SPEAKER ANY OTHER QUESTIONS? THANK YOU, GUYS.

NEW SPEAKER I'M SURPRISED AND DO THEY, I'M SORRY, HR DO Sheriff they fall under the same scale and everything now with whatever change that they made to their They're all It seems like that's quite a difference I'm surprised are you referring to my comparison? Yeah, that's because we're way behind Well, I'm not we've got everybody H or I think this I thought we got on her tag which I reviewed them.

That's where they fell

I thought the PD and the sheriff now were pretty, you know. The PD revisited that. They jumped way ahead of us because they used that against, yes. They got a union. Huh.

And that's the biggest thing I'm seeing right now is, I mean, we're fighting against somebody 50 feet across the road that makes that much more than we make in the law. I'm sure everyone here is probably having the same issue.

Yeah, no, I appreciate that. All that information is good to have.

And just for the public's clarification. Sheriff's Office has 83 in the general fund, and his other five are his VIN fund employees. So he has 88 total, but affecting the levy is the 83. So if there's any confusion as to what my note shows and what his number shows.

Mr. Olds? I just want to make a general comment. I think it's less applicable to Deer County than it is and it's true and it happens in the city, is you hear a lot of people who are complaining about property taxes. Well, if you look at like me, and I've said this before, whatever you raise property taxes to is okay with me. And there's 60%, at least the last thing I read, 60% in Gary County are non-owner occupied. So anybody who owns rental property, it should be okay with them in terms of property taxes on their rentals. Because it just means they bumped the rent. It's a year lag, but they still bumped the rent because unless you wanted to cut their margin, gosh, who would want to do that? But the big picture is, I think, the challenges you have, all the hundreds of challenges you have, because you have great staff and you want to take care of them, is the problem is if you continue to increase taxes, which you will because you have to, it's a matter of the percentage, how much can you increase it? you're going to end up doing when i say you a taxing authority what they're going to end up doing is they're going to squeeze the middle class out of their community because the upper class they're going to be able to pay it now it's all tied to the economy granted i mean if you've got a booming economy that's one thing we don't but you squeeze the middle class over time this isn't this is years and years and years not tomorrow And you also end up with more in the lower class, and they need more services. So it's a real difficult dynamic in the consideration of the fact that Tammy and other staff want to take care of the employees, which is reasonable. So you've got to continue to look at efficiencies in position and personnel. And when you have too much personnel, if you ever have too much personnel, you've got to figure out how to make it leaner. Otherwise, you've gotta raise taxes faster because you have to pay those people as competitively as you possibly can. So it's, good luck. It's a real dilemma for you, but for everyone who's in those positions.

Well, the only thing I could say to that is, as some of us age and retire, then you're gonna more than likely bring someone in at a lower rate. While today, yes, costs may increase some, as people move through their career and retire, you should see some adjustments bringing that back down. It's not always going to just continue to increase forever and ever because you have new employees that have to learn new skills. So, I mean, you might have some market studies that adjust it, but they're still not going to be getting paid what a seasoned employee is versus an entry level coming in. So that will help with that when you look at your taxes.

So long as you're not picking up additional personnel. We are definitely not picking up additional personnel.

I mean, you know, any of the department heads here can say, I mean, I think there's been 16 or 17 cut from the sheriff's office, at least that. Jeremy had six or eight. I mean, several cut from his. And that is actually you know he can't schedule his people for specific shifts where he has someone in charge because he doesn't have enough people to do that um health department has five employees that's it five employees i don't think gary county has been beyond as far beyond that's of course services as other counties in terms of what they fund yeah i was here in 2019 and i understand maybe

help me on the numbers, but what I was told before I came over here, we had over 120 employees. And now we're in the mid 80 range. So we're doing what we need to do for sure. And the population hasn't, population's not decreased. So we're trying to just provide better quality with the smaller amount. It's kind of like an attorney can tell you like you get a new skid loader operator, they're going to take three hours to do the job that a five year veteran will do in 30 minutes. And that's how it is with us too.

Well, I think just from 22, it's been about 17 that has decreased in addition to what started in 19. So, I mean, a lot of, I mean, we have definitely looked for efficiencies, even this brainstorming with the potential rent and admin fees. You know, those are all things that we're trying to do to help take the burden down as much as we possibly can. we will continue to look for efficiencies it's just that we're so limited in revenue streams and we've already made our budget so trim if you look at our three c's uh very few i i think only one department and i'm not trying to call jeremy out but our option is is if we don't fund that rock and that asphalt then he won't fix roads and then taxpayers are not happy because roads aren't fixed so we can certainly cut his budget but then we're going to have people, I think, and I could be wrong, but I think there will be a lot more people in your ear telling you why are you not fixing my road than if we increase the tax. So that's kind of where we are. We're to the point to where it's really difficult to find additional efficiencies.

I can give you a quick example on that because I ran the numbers. uh we're 22 a ton on rock and we're doing the application at 100 ton per mile we really we should be up around 120 but we did go from around 60 to that 100 which got us you know the increase that we got now if we don't do an increase for 2027 that will knock that number back to 90 ton per mile so you'll see that's 10 ton less per mile that we would be able to put on and you're going to see that affect the roadways pretty quickly

know tammy's mentioned to us about cip and vehicles and and such on trying to make some cuts and i would at least i would you know look into that if it was to mean that my employees get their

as we all know this affects that right well and even when you're looking at the facility funds you've seen the dollars i've given you the numbers of what we've spent over the past several years and that's that and my thinking is all deferred maintenance and if we just kept letting that go then imagine where we would be when you look at what happened with the hospital and so We've been very proactive since 2022 to try to take care of our buildings and minimize the impact on the taxpayers as we look at the future.

We're far enough into it now that with the appraiser and the health department with them leased purchase vehicles.

Yes. So they have 2028 is when Troy Charles and the appraisers. And so I think they were estimating around 7,600. I think that each one of them would be paid out. And so we have those in place holders for the 28 year on that non-funded list. So at that point in time, Travis made a good point that, you know, they're, I mean, they're still really in really good shape, so we shouldn't have high maintenance costs. but when we buy those out and that is also going to become our responsibility, but we think there will be several, several more years of use on those before we would have to do that. But we do have to buy the leases out. So.

So in general, I guess the question I'm asking, was it a good thing or not?

The lease?

It depends on who you talk to.

I'm not a fan of a lease. I think when you have to pay at the end or I'm just not a fan of the lease that you would have to really convince me to be a fan of a lease. And I think for Jeremy's, the only ones that may make sense are motor graders. And that's because you do it based on hours and then you can turn them over and get a new one. So you're basically renting them, not really leasing them. It's more a rental than a lease. But I know Travis likes the lease deal and it's worked for him because when he's turned him over, he's had value in him. And so that value comes back against the vehicle, which decreases what your next year's lease payments are until that value is used up. So, I mean, there's been some good things to him, but I mean, I don't know that we need to be driving brand new vehicles like that every two years or every three years either. And you can see they sit in the parking lot a lot, so they're getting wear and tear on them as well. So just depends on who you talk to. But we talked about it when I first came here and Corey and I and Jeremy, none of us were in favor of it. And for the Sheriff's Office, I don't think it makes sense at all. The sheriff may disagree with me, but in my mind, it doesn't make sense for the sheriff's office. So if anything, it makes the most sense for the appraiser, the three vehicles and Charles with one. And well, he actually had two, but now it's inherited.

I would assume that outright, um, because God forbid, because Lance is out in the field all day, every day and cross pastures and doing this and doing that, something were to happen and it's a leased vehicle. It's just more expensive. Um, I would feel less inclined to be so upset if we owned it and got a quarter panel locked off by a steer, you know, yeah, we'd have to fix it eventually, but, uh, I don't mind seeing him drive around in the vehicle.

It's got a dance on it, but you get deemed when you turn it back in at the end. So then you end up losing out on that. So I think there's people that works for. I think there's probably departments it works well for, but I'm not a fan of the lease personally.

Anything else? We still haven't come up with a date. We have to let her no by Monday, right?

So I mean, if you want more, if you want to do more, then we need to have another session this week and if you're okay with cutting that $304,000 off and giving her that as revenue neutral, I will do that as well.

Probably need to do that. I don't know. Well, I'd like to know where we're at or if we need to do some more changes.

Well, if you take off the 304 and we're at 20,437,159, it's going to be 20,133. So instead of 5.6 mils, it's probably going to be 4.8. above previous budget.

Well, we don't have to submit our budget until October.

No, we just have to show what it is going to be for the revenue neutral. Right.

And so it just depends on if you're comfortable with the number I'm going to give her or you think that you're going to have a million people come to you and say, what? And you want to go lower because whatever we give her is going to be the highest that you possibly can go. You can always go lower. and but i think if the people see it on a document they're going to think that that's your number and that's what you have to be prepared for if that's the case or they will or they'll call court and she'll be like call your commissioner i'll say it's an estimate it tells you that yeah and there's the budget hearing data information on there but it's yeah but yeah i mean you're still going to get the calls oh for sure and not just for you for township cemetery right school district so we can't just tell her we're going to be revenue neutral over with that number you have to give her an amount that you are not willing to go above and if this is your number I'm I'm I can give her that number but if you're not comfortable with this then we need to look at more adjustments yeah well that's it if you give her that number it then

and we're exceeding the revenue neutral rate, then we can still then continue to cut. So I think that's what we need to do, because I think we're comfortable at this point. But depending on what you come back with, then I still would still like to make some more cuts if we need to. Maybe we should meet on Friday.

I'm open Thursday afternoon. Voting starts tomorrow.

I could Thursday afternoon.

I can be here as well.

Well, yeah. You better be. I couldn't until 3.

Well, I used to make sure it would be better. So about 3 o'clock, would you be safe in saying 3 o'clock on Thursday?

Yeah. It probably won't be more than an hour.

Right, yeah. I think we've done the majority of it. I think we just need to look at some of those other ones that we were kind of up in the air about.

So Thursday at 3? Because we did do EDC, right?

Yeah.

We did cut them a little bit. You still have the Mac if you want to make any adjustments. You haven't at this point. And you also have the juvenile detention, which she's out Wednesday and Thursday, so I can't meet with her until Friday. So I mean, you would still potentially have some room on that one.

So Thursday at 3?

Yep. Okay. Is there anything that you need me to bring back besides the changes? Is there anything else you want me to go out and dig deep into? Who are we going to respond back to? None of them have responded back except soil conservation.

Well, are you going to try and get a hold of Secretary of Transportation's office.

They won't make any, I don't think at this point. I would need to talk to Betsy about writing, getting something written and whatever, but I don't think that the state's not going to make any. So we won't probably be able to put that in as a budget item. We can just work towards putting it in place. That's what I thought United Way and those two would probably be just for next year.

Because we

I mean, you could do United Way and let them know. They would have six months to adjust. But the DMV, I mean, we could work towards it. But if we don't know how that's all going to fall out, you may not want to put that revenue in.

Well, the DMV, they work on the state calendar, don't they? So they've already started their new year July 1st.

i mean not that those two are going to make any difference in revenue no but i mean to be consistent with all outside agencies using county buildings right that's it's more that principle behind it as well as collecting the revenue streams that we have available Anybody else have anything to say?

Thank you. Thank you for coming.

We appreciate it.

You wake up in the night and you think of anything great.

Justin.

You better put a little flashing sign after it says vacancy. Yeah. You just list that on the Airbnb.

Yeah. Oh, to do legislation, it might not be vacant for long. So we'll fill it pretty quickly.

Oh, no time. Wait, what's the legislation?

Thank you.