Board of Supervisors - Regular Meeting

Good morning, everybody. It's Tuesday, July 21st, 2026. My name is Don Swanker. I'm going to call the Jackson County Board of Supervisors meeting to order. To my left, I have Mike Steiners.

Good morning.

To my right, I have Nan Flegel. Good morning. Bjorn from IT. Lisa from the Auditor's Office. First up, we have is Visitors and Citizens. Is there anybody online or in the gallery that would like to address the board today? Hearing none. Online, we do have Michael Miller. Again, welcome. First up, we have Beth Gerlach, County Treasurer, to discuss about the semiannual report and publication.

I know it's tiny.

It's small and tight flowing.

And you need a new printer. No, this is how they always print, whether they have new prints or not. probably have a scan of copies, so yours are lighter than mine are.

You have the floor.

Okay. So starting with the first page, it's the semi-annual report for January through June of 2026. And you'll see, you know, the balance revenues total to be accounted for disbursements. And then the fund balance for June, that's the treasurer's fund balance. So the $14,627,267.89. And then auditor's warrants that were outstanding on that date were, oh my gosh, I should have brought my cheaters too.

341, 921, 46.

341, 341.

Mine says 341, 921, 46. All right.

And then the rest of it, it just gives you detailed breakdown on the revenue expenses. And those get omitted for the publication in the newspaper, but this front page as well will get submitted to the newspaper for publications. The next page there is my daily spreadsheet that I go through for balancing. And the three highlighted there are the numbers that we're going to be balancing to. So the cash in office at that point was 124. Oh, gosh. Oh, 30. Oh, 30. I need to go get my glasses. 24. oh that's what they are yeah that's fine i got another pair thank you oh shoot please they're stronger okay these aren't very strong okay now like the birds i didn't realize i needed them until somebody left these in the office and like what about it you have the door it's like oh yeah okay so that's the cash and office number and then Cash in banks, which would be what the bank statement shows us, $14,503,237.39. Total cash amount then, we've already seen that matching number there, the $14,627,267.88. So that is the green number we want to see on everything. Banking and investments balance sheet. This just goes over the register balances that I keep. All the money in the bank accounts that we have totals to 14,503,237.39. And then this spreadsheet is a month end spreadsheet that I do for the auditors. Cash balances. So again, it lists all of the banks that we have. funds in and the balance per bank would be the bank statement balance. Interest earned for that month is the next column. And then there are some that have outstanding checks and such that haven't been deposited or withdrawn from the bank yet. But you'll see the register balance does match that balance sheet of $14,503,237.39. And then including the total cash in office number, again, $124,030.50 would have been what we had in office on that date. And Treasurer's cash balance is $14,627,267.69. This is the breakdown spreadsheet for the semiannual report. So the first page is the treasurer's balance being balanced back to the auditor's balance. So it's going to show what the auditor's report shows, any warrants that were outstanding, and then what the treasurer's balance is. And you'll see on the next page that we did balance with the auditor balance. And then the outstanding warrants number is the same as the first page, the 341-921-46. And our total number here for cash is $14,627,267.89. The rest of this spreadsheet here just breaks all those numbers down further into detail. So again, that highlighted total cash and office number, the 124, 30, 50, total cash on hand in the banks, 14 million, 627, 267, 89, as accounted for. And then at the bottom, it takes into account the interest that we had earned at the end of the month and balances back to that 14 million, 503, 237, 39. And that's the page we'll need the signatures on. And the rest of this is just the rest of that spreadsheet broken down into even more detail. So the numbers from this sheet that we just went over are broken down even further. The first page just shows every dollar of actual cash in our office that is accounted for and the increments that we have them in. That's the grand total at the bottom. The customers who have paid in office but we hadn't received funds for for debit and credit cards are all listed here and total the $24,957.22. The next page is all of those that have paid online but we hadn't received funds for and that total is $45,263.50. So the grand total of debit credits and online payments was $70,320.72 that were receivable yet. And then the last couple pages is the bank accounts balances typed out here and the time certificate deposits as well. So we have four CDs totaling the $732,643.

Silly question. I know we have a slight amount of pennies on hand here. Do they still recognize your pennies or how we go forward with an audit?

Well, yeah, we're still using pennies. We give them back to people when they pay us in cash, as long as we have them. And yeah, so.

I mean, they're pretty much eliminated. I don't want to actually, the federal law says anymore, but.

Yeah, we do. I mean, we still have pennies. the $2, I think. Is that what it says? That would keep them involved.

So these balances on departments or funds, I should say, that is year-end? Yeah.

Okay. That's year-end.

Any other questions for Beth?

Comments, motions?

I would make a motion to approve the Treasurer's semi-annual report and publication as presented.

I would second that.

A motion by Mike seconded in to approve the treasurer semi-annual report and approve publication in the official newspaper. Any other discussion? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries.

I'm too young to be those dang things.

Obviously necessary, though.

Thank you.

Next up, we have Jaden Sheckle from the County Engineer's Office. Good morning. Good morning.

Our agenda is an insurance permit for Steve Sitko. It's on 188th Street, Farmers Creek Township, Section 4. distance checks and all that. It does have an existing culvert, and that was in good shape. It does have sufficient sight distance, so it meets all our requirements, so we recommend approval.

I'd make an motion to approve.

I would second. Got a motion by Ninh, second by Mike to approve entrance permit for Steve Sitko on 188th Street, All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed?

Motion carries. I can give a brief update on construction. The 362nd Avenue bridge replacement is complete and is open to traffic as of last Wednesday. The 458th Avenue bridge replacement project is also complete and open as of yesterday. Bernard Road overlay, they're still working on their side road. the concrete side road aprons, and we'll be working on granular shoulders. So we're still probably a few weeks out yet, depending on weather. They're going to be setting beams. The plan is either Thursday or Friday or both days of this week. They're going to start bringing in 120-foot-long concrete beams, and they're bringing in a third crane to help set them. So beams are expected to get set this week. Well, so... Marine claim. Two crews are at it. We've got some adequate moisture now, thanks to yesterday, because it was getting pretty dry again prior to that. But they're working over by the east of the Preston, by the Preston area, just east of Preston, and also somewhere east of Maquoketa here. But both two crews are going, so things are going well.

Ridge really looks nice, Don.

Turn out, I couldn't be happier with it to say it was four 50 that I looked at that one yesterday too.

Um, actually a couple of different speeds and it's, it's nice and smooth. Yeah.

Everybody knows is the low point in the bridge that drives it. There's they call it a dip in the road. It's like, yeah, that was by design. Uh, there was a reason for it, but you don't ever, you don't feel it. And, uh, it's all the road meets all the design criteria for a 69 hour speed through that bridge. So we had to turn out really nice.

Good. Have you, not to open a can of worms or whatever, but this speed limit change thing, have we figured out how we're progressing? Are you drafting an ordinance?

Working on a resolution to identify all the roads that would be affected by it, or the new law, to... bring forward to you for review and approval. But then say that passes or you guys approve it, the following steps would be, we would evaluate those roads. There'd be a list in the resolution of each road. We would then evaluate those roads each by each and determine whether they can be 60 or not. And if they can, we would change the signs appropriately. Or if not, okay, maybe we have to have an ordinance that keeps that 55 or what have you, but ultimately, I will bring a resolution forward here. I'm about halfway done with it, just double-checking some of the roads, but working with Clinton County to evaluate the horizontal curves. It's called a ball bank indicator to determine whether or not you need to put advisory speed plaques on curves to reduce the speed or maybe warrant chevrons. The device is called a ball bank indicator, apply for H-SIP projects, but obviously the new law change, they're spoken for and there's kind of an unknown for how long they'll be taken. So working with ClinKind's like, well, we just go together, just purchase one jointly because they'll need to evaluate their roads too. So then we just have one permanently too. So I'll likely be getting that jointly together here to start doing our road evaluations.

So I guess when you drive it down the road, of course, it changes a lot of things. Does it change, again, do you have to do a study or something to say where are our passing zones? How long are they? And they're going to change dramatically, I assume. So it's, again, it's an expense. We've got to repaint our lines. So that's part of it, too.

If they aren't, like, for the public's awareness, it's more than just changing the signs. Yeah. all the other things. It's your pavement markings for the no passing zones. The curves, as we mentioned, like, are they going to need chevrons, reduced speeds, clear zones, guardrails? Like, we have to evaluate all. Well, hidden driveway signs and stuff. Yes, hidden driveways. Because right now, you know, we generally go with a 500-foot sight distance. Don't know if 60, what that, maybe, I have to see how that affects. I don't run, haven't run that number yet. Right. Yes, like for driveways, like you said, we had driveway signs.

There's a whole... The rumble strips coming up to stop signs. It's just all of those things need to be reconsidered.

Things that nobody really cares about.

It was just the signs. I personally think it would be easier if we just said we're going to keep them all 55 because there's no expense with that. And it's a frivolous expense. I mean, again, like I say, they didn't think about this and are no passing zones because you know they have the appropriate you know distance to put it in there and so people are passing where they used to passing and now they can't I mean it's just and if there are any of the pavement markings that would have to be changed we can handle that next year when we get our new

completed this year yeah but you're going to spend x amount of time studying all this and uh for that part yeah but once we have i mean we have to study trails anyway based on the curves and all that so i mean when we do a segment of road we're going to study all the aspects of it so um passing zones, but we can handle that next year when we restripe. So I do expect some of our roads would be really no big hassle to have to change, but on the same token, there's going to be some that will be rather costly depending on site distances.

So I see that the Sheriff's Department did put out a statement on their Facebook page, and they have it on their website, you know, and I believe it said that the sign says that

from Maquoketa to Andrew, it said at 60, but from Bellevue to Andrew, it's still at 55.

State Highway 64 going east out of town is still 55 and 12 miles.

And I believe Highway 52 throughout Jackson County, to my knowledge, is still 55. The DOT is in the same boat, I guess, if you will. We're all in this together. So I'm sure the Highway 62 portion from Andrew to Bellevue, I would expect that would probably get changed when they do their resurfacing. That's the time to address that.

Well, Highway 52 south of Bellevue, you don't need to be going faster on that. No, no, no, no, no.

I do expect some of our rules to change. The timeline, I don't know. It's just pens how we evaluate. But, yes, the initial steps I'll bring with the resolution.

Maybe they'll recall this whole thing.

Well, until further notice, like the Sheriff's Department posted, we can also post it. I guess we don't have press today, but whatever it's posted, that's what it is. Correct.

be long until said otherwise. And we really won't probably be evaluating our roads until late fall, early winter. Once our office staff is done with construction projects, then I can get some time freedom.

Well, let's just, I would still think we need to proceed or look into a resolution or something that would be much easier for us to navigate.

Yeah, because what that resolution will say is, I don't have the exact verbiage in front of me, but something to the effect of that. until a traffic or engineering analysis or study can be performed. Jones County called prior to this being in effect, I think the week before the 4th of July. They are changing theirs to 60.

I've seen they had signs changed already yesterday.

So they let us know that if we were to need any 55 mile an hour signs, they would have some extra available signs. don't throw them away boys they're clinton county dubuque they're doing the same approach as us where they're going to do a study on their roads um lots of different terrains to our geography topographic features between those two counties but so the state passed this law is there some kind of time frame along with it or is it just we just it's six feet that's kind of the other hasn't been any uh guidance as far as it must be completed at this date whatever you get around the whatever district they're in, but asking what our approach is for regarding the new law. And I explained to them exactly. And they're like, okay, sounds good. So yeah, there's no definitive.

No thought out. Actually not.

Yeah, it's kind of, it covers before the horse, in my opinion. It's another one of those unfunded mandates. What do you mean it costs money? You know?

Yeah, it's price of them signs a little different.

So, and we've already, we're preparing. So as we take it, but we get signs, not only new signs we get ordered, but we get some signs refaced at prison and Anamosa. We're already just being proactive for the expectation that some will change as a sum of our speed, et cetera, to get refaced. We're refacing some. us having some roads to 60 with very minimal cost. Okay. But yeah, worry about it. I mean, I'll have forward resolution here in the next few weeks. Appreciate it.

Just curiosity, I know that 136 is not in Jackson County. On Monday, they're going to start doing something on 136?

So I do have a, there's a pre-con with the DOT tomorrow.

I'll know more of when they're going to come up 61 through Kokoda and then back down on, is that their... I know that we signed an agreement like a year ago.

I don't know if this is for that portion at all or not. Because the portion was when they were going to, I think, completely do a reconstructed portion of 136 from Delmar to 61. Is this the portion?

I assume so.

I'm going to change that.

It needs it.

Talking about bad roads.

It needs it all the way to Clinton almost.

I don't know if they changed their approach. But also, that pre-construction meeting is tomorrow. I'm going to attend virtually for it, so I'll know more details tomorrow. And I can email you and bring it forward to the next week's meeting to update on that. Yes, the meeting is tomorrow.

Well, thank you much, sir. Next up, we have Lisa with the Auditor's Office.

This morning I need a motion to approve the July 14, 2026 meeting and work session minutes as written by Auditor Smith and authorized publication in the official newspapers.

I'll move.

I'll second that.

Motion by Mike, second by Ninh to approve the July 14, 2026 meeting and work session minutes as written by Auditor Smith, authorized publication in official newspapers. Any other discussion? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries.

I received an email request from ECIA for a letter of support for RTA's Mobility Outreach, Visibility, and Education Initiative. I have prepared that letter of support for board review and signature. So if you agree with supporting them, I would ask for a motion to approve an authorized chair signature on a letter of support for RTA's Mobility Outreach, Visibility, Education, or the MOVE Initiative.

There was no changes from the email.

I've used, I plagiarized.

Yeah, okay. So that's still, now there are no changes since last week to that.

No. Okay. I'll make a motion to approve the letter of support.

I would second. Got a motion by then, second by Mike, to approve an authorized chair signature for a letter of support for the RTA's Mobility Outreach Visibility and Education Initiative. Any other discussion? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries.

And we also have prepared an agreement. It has gone to the Assistant County Attorney and he has approved it. But this is for the allocation to the Senior Center Citizen. So if you agree with this agreement, I would like to have a motion to approve and authorize signatures on the agreement between Jackson County and Jackson County Senior Citizen Center. Effective July 1st, 2026 and ending on June 30th, 2027 for fiscal year 2627.

So this is something that we're going to review now every year, correct?

Correct.

I would make that motion.

I would second that.

Got a motion by Mike, seconded by Nan to approve and authorize signatures on the agreement between the Jackson County and the Jackson County Senior Center, Senior Citizen Center, effective July 1st, 2026. 627 funds. Any other discussion? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries.

And just as a direction that I need or not, I guess, is we do have two contracts, two agreements that are expiring. How do you want to handle those moving forward? So we will have obviously the imaginative possibilities for Andrew Jackson Care and That is expiring, and the agreement with Haycap is expiring. How do you start that process?

The agreement with Interjection Care, that was a three-year agreement, and that's expiring when?

The end of the year.

End of fiscal year or end of calendar year?

I think we should send notice. I think we should send notice, yeah. We'd like to negotiate renewed terms.

Who do we send notice to? I mean.

Is Todd not still in charge or no?

No, he's up the chain quite a bit more than so.

That's why I wasn't sure how to do this.

Is Brian Maine still? He has.

I don't know. I can find that information. If you could do that. Are you on the HACAD board?

I am, but they're few and far between, and they're kind of.

Is it Jane Devereaux?

I don't know that they're really active. Would that be calling Ron L to find out?

Is it Jane Devereaux? Do I have that name correct? I don't know that. Okay, see, yeah, that's why. I mean, I wasn't really sure what.

terms you wanted or if you wanted to change the terms at all or what you were anticipating for fees or i mean obviously it doesn't have to be done today it doesn't have to be done which is it's on the horizon i would just say we need some open communication starting you know to contact whoever the ceo or whoever's in charge of that okay facility for them you know and i think we could get that from uh I mean, this guy, you know, who's in charge here? Jared could tell us who's in charge, where it needs to go to, and what their thoughts are. I mean, again, there's legislation that could be coming up that we may use another portion of that facility. Well, then we'd have to renegotiate, I assume. Right. So that all comes into play.

Okay. So why don't I just try and work on some contact information if you can get that and we'll see where this moves forward, but just, I want to be ahead of the game instead of behind.

Sounds good. The care facility was one or what was the other one?

Oh, that's down here though. Right. Yeah. Yeah. And honestly, whenever we have these meetings and they're mostly virtually for me out in Cedar Rapids, It seems like they talk a lot more about other counties than they talk about Jackson. So sometimes I wonder.

Okay. I'll just see what I can get done. Okay. That's all I have for the board.

Anything going on for senior center as far as the insurance claim with the backup?

For what? I had a phone call yesterday. I visited with someone. I sent all of them. I re-sent all of the bills in again that we had received. I think they're moving relatively fast. I know that Jeff went down there with And adjuster several people, I believe, and they're moving forward. I know that there's a concern with some damage to the building. And I think Jeff probably emailed you and I assume we're moving forward on it. So in case we would have a wind event that we don't want our building to further. So I don't know if that's something that if someone comes in and fixes that if the insurance company would pay the contractor or if they would have to, if we would have to pay it and get reimbursed. I told Jeff at this point, you know what, that's not what I want, but we also need to protect the building too. And we've had enough events here lately. So whatever it is, we're going to work with it. We're going to figure it out. We're going to get it done.

Good. Any other questions for Lisa? Any other comments, questions for the board?

Well, of course, you know, very unfortunately, we had another incident at the transfer station, as everybody probably well knows. I've received a couple calls, I should say. But again, it's very unfortunate. I don't know what all is in garbage nowadays, and it's hard to go through that with a strainer or a fine-tooth comb. So I don't understand, and there's proper investigations going on. that what may have been in there. There was many photos taken that evening and four different fire departments there. Again, they were assessing the scene and what really went on. There was not a lot of material on the floor. They expected two ton or less maybe on the floor, but again, it's enough to ignite. And again, it's not something we planned for, obviously, and it's very unfortunate that This could be a fluke who might not have a health fluke. We don't have one for 20 years, but that's where it's at.

And it boils down to personal responsibility. When you throw stuff away, there's a reason they say. Don't throw lithium batteries into the garbage. Lithium batteries, you know, paint cans need to be open. may need to be opened and dried, and there's certain rules because of this, and it gets harder and harder to maintain a service when we continue to have incidents like this.

Well, when you have material like that, too, things have changed since the past.

Just because you've always done it and got away doesn't mean it's appropriate.

You hear it all the time. Well, a battery exploded on an airplane. Geez. You know, they didn't hear it once. I heard it more than once or two times. They do it.

So is it closed? I'm not saying there was a battery, by the way. So is it closed? Is it open?

It's open. It's open. I come by this morning, and they are busy. So I stopped yesterday. Well, Frank was really diligent about calling the, if you will, the cities and whoever normal, what's going on okay we've got the utility people here and we turn on the breakers and there's some snap well that wall of course was was one wall didn't i want to call to west wall was damaged the point where i melted some wiring so they did trench in a new line around the around the scale around the scale and uh yeah they were up in business i don't know late yesterday afternoon or this morning for sure because it was busy i did talk to a couple private contractors and they were They weren't surprised, but they were happy that they really acted the way they did. We had to get the okay from the fire marshal. We had to get the okay from the insurance company before we could open.

Well, and that being said, you know, we talk about being careful what you throw away, but then it reminds me of the picture I think you sent out where somebody would chuck their lampshades and stuff in the recycle bin. You know, you take advantage of the services being provided, the services won't be provided anymore. There's been several incidences we've dealt with where not...

not what it's for so be diligent be respectful and we can continue things but you know we got to be careful it's like that's them with a few incidents that we see but we talk to the vendors that do that stuff you know we get chairs we get just you know throwing the wrong thing in your recycle bin can ruin that whole bin of recycles yeah so

That creates.

So, you know, again, like Don said, there's responsibility on everybody's part here, not just employees and dictators and are not dictators, but directors. Well, you know, somebody that's in charge of a department. I mean, it's not all on them either. It's not their fault either, but it's everybody's responsibility.

All right. Anything else for the board? Do you have any meetings? Yeah.

The thing I forwarded from the ports, the letter of support, did the attachment come through?

There was a financial ask in there, wasn't there?

Yeah. Okay, I'm just making sure you hear me.

Let me know. Yeah. Let's make a motion to adjourn. I would second that.

Got a motion by Mike, second by Nan to adjourn. Any other discussion? or from Perry's.