County Commission Agendas - Regular Meeting

the May 11th, 206 condition meeting. Thanks for everybody being here. We don't have much on our business tonight other than this, but we do have several items in the workshop. Uh at this time, I'd like to ask Willis. I am on county administrative call establish. Commissioner Glowing present. Commissioner Kmer present. Commissioner Buckner present. Commissioner McBride present. We do have a one will please stand for invitation. Mr.

Let's pray together. God our father in heaven, we we call upon you to continue to bless this county as you have so bountifully. We're thankful for that. We're thankful for the people that live in this county. God, we have so many freedoms that we're we sometimes we take for granted in this country. And we pray, God, that we'll never take them for granted. We'll never take your blessings for granted. But we're thankful for them. We pray you'll continue to watch over us all. Be with us and guide us. Be with this country as we are engaged in foreign conflicts. We pray that you'll be with the men and women in the armed services and other services that are protecting us each and every day. Be with them and keep them safe and out of harm's way. do with other families as they're uh away from. Watch over us, God, and guide us every day. Christ's name. Amen.

Amen. Amen.

Blue flagges to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. in your packet is the agenda for tonight's meeting. Uh we will add two additions to uh to the agenda. Uh item 7E1 improvements to county roads 96 55 and 133. And item 11, executive session to discuss the name and character. Uh that do I have a motion to approve the agenda?

Motion. Have a second. Second. Second. All in favor say I.

Motion carries. I don't think we have well we don't have any awards or presentations tonight. No public comment. Uh so we'll move directly into the new business portion to the agenda. The item we have in new business is the minutes for the April 13th 26th meeting at Wolf Station. Uh those minutes are in your packet. I'll give you a moment to uh review those. Do I have a motion to adopt the minutes for the April 13, 2026 meeting and work session?

I'll make the motion. We have a motion to have a second. Second. We have a second. Uh any questions, discussion? If not, all in favor say I. Motion carries. Thank you. Next item on we will move into the work session and the first item on the agenda is update on high medical center and stat pool. R Bailey you're here tonight press and we want to thank you for always volunteering to come see us and support her and give us an update. Thank you.

So this week is National Healthcare Week. We're celebrating all of our employees throughout the system. really um very thankful for them and we've got a lot of fun things planned for this week. As far as our business office update with them moving, um there's still no set date for that move to Arab. Of course, I know you all know the Crestwood purchase is complete. Um everything is flowing as well as could be expected and actually doing really well. Um we do share a couple of employees with Crestwood and that that won't change at all. Our recruitment continues for OBGYNS, pediatricians, orthopedics, and ENTs. Our wound clinic has officially moved to the fifth floor in the hospital. So, it's a part of the Highland Surgical Services Clinic to make it um easier for patients to navigate. The rural hospital investment program, we have received our funding for that and we'll be building out a mimography suite inside the hospital. We've not ever had that at the hospital. It'll be a 3D mamogram. very nice facility for the women in our community. We um have begun our new generator project at Cumberland Care Center and it's a $630,000 project. Uh Leaprog, as you all know, is a hot topic and we'll submit ours this month. The Aigilon security cameras that have the facial recognition is currently being installed. We have a new pediatric nurse practitioner who um is very very well accepted by the community, has done pediatrics for a long time. We're excited to have her. The Highlands Primary Care Clinic is moving next door to the ped pediatricians clinic. Um that will just help with the flow of patients. We can care for adults and children at the same time. And um the last update is that we received a grant for a network update where um we have a lot of dead spots in the hospital for Wi-Fi. And this network update will will provide a way for us to not have any dead spots. So on the way to having

that concludes my report unless you have questions. Okay. Any any questions? Thanks for having me. Thank you again. Thanks very much and uh thanks for the great work you're doing to support the people of Jackson County. Thank you so much. Thank you for your support. Uh the next item on the agenda is an update uh from parks director, director Parish. We've got several events going on uh here in the near term. And so Doug, if you will just give us an update.

Sure. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and commissioners. Uh we got a couple of big events coming up. One, the first one is this Saturday. It's our 25th annual catfish festival, and that'll start at 8:00 a.m. at the park. Uh we could have as many as 50 vendors. Uh, it's a free event. There's it's free to get in. It's free parking. We'll have a fishing area with fish all captured for the little kids to catch some good fish. And Captain D's will be doing catfish plates. Those are, I think, going to be the same as last year. They'll be $12. And there'll be a car show. They expect over a hundred cars. And they have some really good cars at the car show. So, if you're interested in that, that's a good good place to see a lot of good cars. Um, there'll be live music and there will also be a kitty area. It's free to the kids. There'll be pony rides. There's a little train that the kids can ride around in those little cars. So, there'll be lots to do for the whole family.

Okay. Any questions? Now, Doug, I know you you guys do this every year. Really really appreciate it. So, thanks. And then you got another event coming up soon. I guess it's time.

Yes. June 20th, we're going to do our inaugural paddle event. This is in kind of conjunction with Tennessee Riverline and the Rivertowns. Uh, you know, we're hosting one fleet of the Tennessee Riverline kayak fleets. And it's a it's a trailer with 16 boats. It's got life jackets and paddles and everything. And the purpose of that is to get people out on the water that don't have the equipment. They don't have the means to do that. So, we're we're uh kind of co-sponsoring this with some other river towns and borrowing their kayak plates. Also, uh we started off with a sign up of we kept it at 50 people and that very quickly filled up. So, we went and found one more fleet, so we upped it to 70 and that filled up. So, we're trying to get another fleet and if we do, we'll we'll bump that registration open up again. Uh but this is a free event. Uh, it's a beginner friendly paddle. You know, it's going to be on the from the park. We're going to leave from County Park, going paddle down to City Park, turn around, come back to County Park. Uh, it's going to be smooth water, open water, no current. So, it'll be an easy event for a beginner. And we're going to have a lot of experienced paddlers there. We're going to have uh the certified instructors and rescue people. We'll have the health health folks will be there, the EMTs, rescue squad, sheriff will be there. He he'll have his boat out. We'll have boats to kind of accompany the C paddlers as they go down and come back. And when we get back to the park, we're going to have uh free food and refreshments. That's going to be furnished by KC's Barbecue and Coca-Cola. And there's also going to be live music sponsored by KC's Barbecue. So when everybody comes back into the park, they can get their boats out of the water, go down to KC's, pick up their food, and sit around, listen to music, hang out the rest of the day,

however long they want to. And uh we expect probably 70 to 100 people that day. And that's June the 20th. We're going to start at 9:00. Any comment? No. Outstanding. Um, you know, I I was actually thinking today how wonderful the park is and how, you know, hosting events there is only only going to benefit both ways, the community and and the park. So, thank you for your willingness to do that. Absolutely. Before you leave, just can you give us an update on the park store and how this

Oh, yes. Uh, we did get our new boat rental business uh going. They started officially April 15th, ready to rent boats on May 1st. They've already rented some boats a couple times. Um, uh, Island's Boat Rental is the name of the company and we have, uh, linked them onto our page and they've linked us as well on theirs and we we hope to have a a great business relationship with them and them bring more people into the parks. We've already st started taking calls at the office. People want to rent a boat, rent a kayak. They're also uh they now have a golf cart in place, so they can also rent golf carts. And they they also rent kayaks, canoes, that kind of thing. So they they will probably be out at the catfish festival and in our paddle event doing a little advertising around with crowd so folks will get to know that they're there.

Lastly, cabin rentals. Uh how's that going this this year? I know uh year before last we really were down because of the eel grass. So you may have tied ill grass into this and yeah give us an update. Yeah I just I just took a look and uh through the end of March at six month mark we had already rented 60% of our budget on Kevin. So it's better definitely better. And we've got a a really good week coming up in June. We've got six cabins rented for five days. It's It's pretty good stretch there. That'll be a pretty good week. So, it's looking good on that.

I know the chamber uh Rick with through TVA and stuff they give out schedules where the going to be and does he keep you informed in that Rick? Not that I've seen. That area around the campground's all great. It's all clear. No problems. We've had no complaints, no issues. I've seen just a few handfuls float up along the bank, but we've had no choked out basis this year at all. The schedule I saw that he put out online did not include it up in this area. So, I just wondered if that was coming. We don't have any need yet. We're we're clear.

Yeah. Steven called me TVA the guy that's responsible for uh TVA spraying and for the the harvesting and they have started with our harvesters now in the area and we have positioned a a rolloff u dumpster at sportsman's landing so that they they can use that to uh take the grass out out on lake so harvesting has started And I think that has been a big contributor to the fact that we in much better shape now. Yeah. On the grass and Yeah. No, no news is good news on the ill grass and I haven't heard any I haven't had any calls on that yet.

Okay. Hopefully that continues. Well, Doug, thanks very much. Thank you. Next item. Uh we had talked uh couple meetings ago about landscape and tree services and uh the commission asked director again to try to get some additional votes uh particularly from if we could from Jackson County though I know that's been difficult so giving up.

It has been it's been pretty tough. I have a lot of interest in cutting the trees if we need limbs cut. But to do this part of the work is a full exam on the trees including getting us a database so that we can keep up with the trees and what maintenance we've been done on them and and the process that we need to go through to try to keep them in the best help we can. Uh very little interest in that. I did reach out there there's there's nobody local that that wanted to do that again. far as if we get through this part and we say we have issues uh we we don't have to go back with this company to cut them. This is this is a separate service that they provide but we can definitely there's definitely plenty of local interest in in competing for you know putting in quotes for for for any work that we need done on that side of things. over this. Are you you recommending maybe a tree assessment done by this company maybe? Yes, sir. Supply.

Yes, sir. That would that would open us up to more more things that are available for for uh people to do in the county. Okay. Any questions on on this? Um also, uh we were looking at the areas that that we have water service of that.

Uh as far as the u the grass fertilization process, I reached out to several local people. U I was supposed to get some quotes in. I did not receive those quotes. I know one for sure thought for sure was going to put in the C CTC landscaping because they offer service very similar. Most of our local folks they they do most of their fertilization in early spring and late fall and it's not a not a month by month service unless you're calling them out there to do that stuff.

But I did reach out. I did try to get more floats in. Just didn't get out today. So a lot of times comments where we are with it. I guess the question is given what we have now investigating in trying to establish the lawn of the courthouse and trying to keep that in good shape to me seems to be very much. And uh we have had some difficulties with trees around the courthouse and getting aged and said before we've had a couple limbs fall we've had to deal with that. So the question for us, do we think it's worth having an assessment done trees and understanding what we can do to clean them up somewhat and extend the life of the trees? Let me ask I would offer putting this on the new business agenda for I I would propose just the risk assessment on the trees and then after that go back to locals to see if we can help and then true green for the tree.

Any concerns with that? If you get if you get other quotes in in the meantime, then you can put those with it. Yes. And I will reach back to other ones that said they were going to get quotes, try to push it along, see if they can get them to give them an opportunity to do it. I think it'd be fairly appropriate. Let's hear the three risk assessment before we even think about them going maintain. So, we'll put this on business. Okay. Thanks. Uh next item on the work session is public licensing requirement we have. So

yes, this is the three-year renewal for the licensing on the phone system network. You guys thankfully allowed me to purchase with article funds three years ago, but that has rolled back around those licensing. I'll add that this system has made being a solo IT guy much easier and whether I'm at home, wherever I'm at, I can get to anything that anybody needs pretty quickly. So, I appreciate that. This this company, the quote you have in front of you is a state bid list quote. Same the same licensing we bought three years.

Is this I'm going to ask you because I'm not familiar with it. this is a state requirement that we do this or is this for the company to make sure that we're maintaining it's not for the company we're purchasing through it's for the equipment we have purchased to allow it to be accessible to me and and them keeping on the cloud and they keep it updated okay it's okay any questions one thing we need to do before we put this we need to come back in another work session we need to look where we get the proper place for funding for this. And I think we may have to make a budget amendment to cover this.

I talked with Michelle about this uh here before the meeting and as three years come rolling back through my brain. I remembered discussing this with the previous county administrator as well as the revenue commissioner and that's where previous licensing had been taken out for network equipment. that but I I don't know that that has been added in this fiscal year budget. So we we just need to look at bring that back because I think we will need we will need to amend the budget to make sure we have sufficient funds here. Okay.

All right. So we'll do another work session and uh get information for that. That's um the next item on is the item we added and that's improvements to count those 96 255 and 133. Let me let me start off by turning it over to Commissioner G. Um over the last uh several months I've been working in conjunction with CT Cumberland who is a general contractor for the Google expansion in Bridgeport. And they had uh come to me with their traffic uh plan on getting folks in and out of their facilities that they're expanding on up there and working in conjunction with ALD DOT. I met with our county engineer. We went rode the roads and we went and had a meeting with him one time. But uh I got a green light from today that uh uh city of Cumberland and Google wish to uh do a complete u overlay on County Road 96 to prepare that road from Steam Plant Road out to their gate at the railroad tracks uh at their expense using contract forces from from them. uh they want to stripe County Road 255 with center stripe at at their expense contract forces uh by them and then make some improvements on uh County Road 133 uh around the access point of steam plant road and and a little area there that where they'll have some construction traffic come through. So they uh they approached me uh with this. We we worked on a plan for it. But I told them the county really didn't have that and they they come forward with they said they'll provide their their funding for that and use contract forces and we'll get with the county engineer to come up with a permitting process and a plan for that and uh get it before the commission to seek approval for them to begin construction at their expense on those roads.

Well, not just checking with you given the county roads I think it would be appropriate to have an agreement be signed with this company. Absolutely. Okay. They're going to be working on public roads and we'll need to Okay. Have agreement. So, Jonathan, if we can get you to work with agreements and have that ready, just bring it back to the commission. Sure. Okay. Anything else?

No, I I appreciate their uh their willingness to uh work with the county and invest in our infrastructure around their facilities and their willingness to uh help the uh the local communities around them. It's great uh great thing. They approached me early on this and uh we've we've been working on this for a few months now and finally today and they said uh they want to they want to move forward with it because you know at the peak of of this uh their expansion they should have up to 4,000 people coming in and out of their facility every day. This is another update regarding Google that has nothing to do with the roads, but I did get a call today from site manager. Um, they have agreed uh to support the HVAC upgrade at the uh Bryant Community Center, which is our council of aging. So, they will work with dad u to work through him given support to our council of aging. So a caveat on that that that was a Google had come forward with a project they wanted to do in in the in the Jackson area up there. So we we submitted that uh for HVAC for that sher center there. Then when the the U HVAC companies that gave him bid said their electric service wasn't uh comparable and sufficient enough to handle that C I took that to CT Cumberland and uh that's the contractor the general contractor that's doing their their work up there and you know they've already made significant u community investments. They just u did some demo work at the VW American Legion building in Scottsboro. they build a new basketball court fort for the city of Bridgeport and they said they want to continue to doing community projects throughout the time they're going to be there for the next three to five years. So I told them about the need on that

and they said they provide uh the electrical work and the electric service uh for this uh to be upgraded on that building to accommodate this HVAC system. Thank for that as well. Thank you. Uh that's the last item we have work session. So with that we'll move to reports from staff county administrator county uh we now move with comments from the commission and commission

as always thank you to our employees for all the hard work dedication to our county. great things happening in their county. I want thank everyone that's doing all the work boots on the ground. Um this shall be safe and have a have a great rest of the week. District three commission.

Uh yes, I want to add to everything Commissioner McBride shared. I want to thank our our our directors, supervisors for being here, giving us updates. Appreciate that. Thank you for the work you're doing. Um, it's it's a good opportunity to hear from y'all and I know the citizens want to hear that. We want to thank Miss Connie Spears for joining us tonight. It's it's nice to see people who who don't live here but are interested in our area. Well, thank you for for showing up and sharing sharing your concerns and we appreciate that. It's all for me. District two, Commissioner Kenn some s all the folks gave updates. We always good to hear information. Sometimes we don't get it like we like it. So it's always good to have it in front of our face and send it to us forward and good to hear all the progress that Chris is making up his way.

And district one commissioner go. Well, I'd just like to thank the employees and and the directors and all the department heads for the work they do. We couldn't do what we do without without each of you and keeping the county going. And I just like to say it's been a honor and privilege to serve with you guys the past three years and it's hard to believe time to do it again as is as is before us. So, it's been a privilege to serve with you. I've worked with a a great bunch of uh gentlemen and I'm hoping to be able to uh work with you again. Uh continue with the work that we've uh we've we've got going and and do more for the community. Thank you.

So I thanks for the comments and I'd just like to remind everybody that election is on the 19th May. This is our primary election. Very important for Jackson County and the state. But I'd also like to thank the uh the citizens of Jackson County that are volunteering uh on the 19th to uh work at our polls. Without their volunteerism, it we would not be able to conduct elections. So really say thank you to them and they've been going through a series of training exercises and uh so we thank our probate judge and probate judges staff for what they're doing to make sure we're ready for that. Uh that's uh next meeting date was will be May the 26th. Um that is due to the holiday the Monday. Uh so that will be a Tuesday. Uh we do need to go into an executive session for to express good name and character. And so that be a motion to go into executive session.

Motion motion have a second. I second that. All in favor say I. I. Closure carries. And then face