Commissioners Court - Regular Meeting

Good morning, everyone. It is Tuesday, the 12th day of May, 2026, at 9.01 a.m. And this regularly called session of the Kendall County Commission Court is now called to order. We're going to start with Roll. Commissioner McCall.

Present.

Commissioner Friesian. Present. Commissioner Chapman. Here. Commissioner Carpenter. Here. And I'm present as well. So we have a quorum consisting of all five members of the court. Next up, I'll hand it over to my colleagues. Commissioner McCall and Weijan for announcements regarding our pledge and prayer.

Good morning, everyone. I wanted to welcome Rob O'Connell. He's going to open us in prayer.

Let us pray. Lord, Father, you have surrounded us with spirits. Some we see have bodies. Some we don't have not. Some spirits charm us, some alarm us, some ought to but don't. Spirits of glory, spirits of pride, spirits of some nature we can't describe. Some spirits attract us, others we shun. Some your word teaches us from whom to run. So many spirits, Lord, even well up within us. How can we know which one next may deceive us? If we can scarce trust Not by power, not by might, but by my spirit, says the Lord of hosts. Spirit of our Lord Jesus, Messiah, guide our court. Guide our deliberations with your spirit of candor, salted with respect for God and each other. Guide us to good outcomes with your spirit of wisdom, moved by fear and trembling because we are accountable to your court of eternal outcomes. Direct our hearts to kindness at every turn. And when you come to hear our case, we too may learn the kindness of the Lord endures forever. And should things not turn out exactly as we hope, satisfy us with the hope that your mercies are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness. Amen.

This time I'd like to welcome Sophia Barter, who's going to lead us in the pledges. Sophia is a senior at Champion High School, and she will be graduating, going to Sam Houston University. You'll be a Bearcat. We wish you all the best.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic

Next up, declaration of conflict of interest. Ladies, anything from you? Gentlemen, anything from you? Nothing from me. Next up, comments from the bench. Would you start us, please?

Again, I wanted to welcome everyone this morning. I know we all, I'm sure, celebrated a wonderful Mother's Day yesterday. I'm very grateful for my mom. She just turned 80, going through a few health issues, but very grateful that she's here. Also, on the 26th, we have our next Commissioner's Court meeting. We will have tech stop presenting, and that is in response to the resolution that we passed last court, April 28th. That's all I have.

Thank you, Commissioner Wheaton.

Thank you, Judge. Good morning, everyone. Just wanted to thank the O'Connells. Rob was just here leading us in prayer for organizing last week's National Day of Prayer. It was a very lovely, meaningful day. Appreciate everybody who helped with that. And then just a reminder that we do have the Republican runoff coming up. Early voting starts next Monday, runs through Friday, election days on the 26th. Lots of important races on that ballot. So make sure that you do your civic duty and vote.

And the election day is a Tuesday. The Monday is a holiday.

Correct. And we have court on Tuesday as well.

Correct. Okay. Thank you. Commissioner Chapman.

Yes. Thank you, Judge. It's been a great pleasure this morning to announce my resignation as health sanitarian. And I would like to introduce our newest employee to Kendall County. Arturo, would you come on up? Arturo Jaime is coming to us from, he was with the Texas Health Department and stationed up in Wichita Falls. I can't imagine why he wanted to leave Wichita Falls, but originally he is from Laredo and has family around in this area and wanted to get back closer to family. So I think he will be a great asset to the county. And his first day was yesterday. He is now drinking from a fire hydrant and got everything thrown right on top of his plate. But that's all right. I think he can handle it. So you have not met the court. These will be your bosses coming up until you get an actual boss. And we welcome you and look forward to working with you for years to come. HE'S REPLACING DAVID. SO HE'S OUR NEW DAVID. WE REALLY APPRECIATE YOU COMING AND STARTING.

WE'VE BEEN HAVING A TEAM UP AND COMMISSIONER CHAPMAN HAS TAKEN taken over that office for the past couple months. So we appreciate all your efforts and keeping it afloat. So thank you for all that you've done and look forward to working with you, sir.

Thank you, sir.

Would you like to say anything? Because the floor is yours, not to put you on the spot. That's great to hear. Thank you, sir. Wonderful. Welcome again. Commissioner Carpenter?

I was over getting a coffee yesterday. I noticed the Jeep that belongs to the health department was moved to a different location. I thought, I wonder who's driving the Jeep around. Because it would be fun to mess with some of the business owners, you know, walking in with the health department. But I'm glad that he's here, and thank you, Commissioner Chapman, also McCall, and for stepping up. I only manned the office a couple times, answered the phone, never played any tricks on anyone, which is my normal way of doing things. But I also wanted to say congratulations to Comfort High School Bobcats. They went district by district. We got to our area game when we lost on Saturday. and right now our community needs lots of prayers, so just keep our community in your prayers, and we need to seek God right now for our council on Jesus' name.

Thank you. Only announcement I have is if behind you on the back wall, Maxi Zinsmeister made that probably 15, 16 months ago. We finally got it power-coded. We got a... light screen put behind it so it lights up but it's a great addition to the court it kind of brings the room together so we wanted to just bring your attention to it that that was something donated by one of our citizens and a lot of effort went into it and it we appreciate things like that can we do it do a showing of it okay i've had troubles reaching it from here so melissa you want to go manually does it have different colors it does It just doesn't, I'm slightly out of range back here.

Lieutenant Clearner, can you turn the light down?

It works.

Yeah, it looks really good with the lights, but.

Maybe it needs a warm-up. So anyways. Well, it's very cool. Yeah. It'll be cool once it's working. Call Cousin Eddie. All right. So with that, we'll move to accounts payable claims. This is a consideration of possible action on approval of accounts payable claims for purchases, services, and vendors. Corinna, can you just give us a quick summary?

Yes, actually, I do have a change. I'm pulling two invoices, actually, because we paid those. They were just resubmitted to one of our JPs, and they resubmitted for payments, but it was after we had, after the deadline to turn in our report. So, on page 10, Ebensberger Fisher Funeral Home, there's two charges for $450. Both of those invoices and requisitions were paid at the April 14th. So that brings our total, I'm removing those two of $900, that brings our total today, Judge and Commissioners, to $288,812.93. 93? 98? Yeah, 93. 288, 812. 288, 812, 93. Yes, ma'am. Okay.

At this time, I'll consider a motion as to the approval of the accounts payable claims for purchase services and vendors.

Judge, I move to approve accounts payable claims for purchase services and vendors in the total amount of $288,812.93. We have a motion made by Commissioner Wieschen.

Do I have a second? Second. Seconded by Commissioner McCall. Any further discussion? If not, Paula, could you please call the vote? I.

Commissioner Wieschen. I.

Hi. Thanks, Corinna.

Hi.

Hi. Motion carries 5-0, and we can sign them. Yes, please.

Not well, sorry. You.

Okay, next up, we have a consideration possible action regarding Proclamation P-20260512-1 as Community Action Month in Kendall County in recognition of the hard work and dedication of all the Kendall County Community Action Agencies. This proclamation reads as follows. proclaiming May 2026 as Community Action Month in Kendall County, whereas the Community Council of South Texas was established as a community action agency on May 11th, 1965, and whereas the services area encompasses the greater south, central, and west Texas counties of Atascos, Abindera, Bee, Rooster, Crane, Comal, Culbertson, Dimmitt, Edwards, Rio, Gillespie, Guadalupe, Hudspeth, Jeff Davis, Carnes, Kerr, Kendall, Kinney, LaSalle, Live Oak, Maverick, Medina, McCullen, Pecos, Presidio, Real, Terrell, Uvalde, Valverde, Wilson, and Zavala, and Community Action has made essential contributions to individuals and families across this nation by creating economic opportunities and strengthening communities. And whereas Community Action is a robust state and local force connecting people to life-changing services, and creating pathways to prosperity in 99% of all American counties. And whereas community action builds and promotes economic stability as an essential aspect of enabling and enhancing stronger communities and stable homes, and whereas community action promotes community-wide solutions to challenges throughout our cities, suburbs, and rural areas, and whereas community action delivers innovative services and supports and creates greater opportunities for families and children to succeed, And whereas community action insists on community participation and involvement, ensuring that all sectors of our community have a voice and will be heard. And whereas community action is celebrating 61 years of innovation, impact, and providing proven results for Americans. Now, therefore, I, Shane Stolarzik, County Judge of Kendall County, do hereby proclaim May 2026 as Community Action Month in recognition of the hard work and dedication of all Kendall County community action agencies. Do we have anyone from the council here with us today? Would you mind coming up, sir? And you can introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about why this is important to recognize. My name is Dan Montano.

Thank you for the recognition. I'm really honored to represent the community council.

Do you have a sit down so the people online can see who he is?

Thank you. Yeah, we forgot. We have a pretty robust online following.

Yes, sir. Better to have the mic. Can you hear me? Yes, sir. Thank you. So, like I was saying, my name is Dan Montiano. I'm the Community Council of South Central Texas representative. I personally oversee the veterans program within the Community Council of South Central Texas. Even though the Community Council represents organization has been around for, you know, 60 years. Uh, our veterans program has only been around for about four. And this year we were able to assist about 181 veterans, um, within the community. And we look forward to, uh, assisting more veterans in the community as a whole, uh, this year. Great. Thank you for having us.

Um, at this time I moved to, um, proclaim, uh, the month of, let's see, about this, May 2026 as Community Action Month in recognition of the hard work and dedication of all Kendall County Community Action agencies pursuant to Proclamation P-2026-0512-1. Do I have a second? Second. Motion by the judge, seconded by Commissioner Chapman. Any further discussion? Paula, could you please call the vote?

Thank you, Paul.

Aye. Aye.

Aye.

Aye. Aye. Motion carries 5-0. Sir, we'll get you a...

Yes, sir. Thank you. Appreciate it. Thank you all.

Thank you.

Next up, consideration of possible action regarding Proclamation P-2026-0512-2 and proclaiming the week of May 10th through 16th as National Prevention Week in Kendall County. So do we have anyone mind coming on up and introducing yourselves and discussing what the significance of National Prevention Week is for our citizens?

Thank you, George. Well, my name is Philip Taylor. And I work for the Hill Country Council on Alcohol and Drug Abuse, and I serve as the Kendall County Community Coalition Coordinator. And I'm here today alongside of our coalition members and supporters of prevention across Kendall County. Through our coalition, we work closely with local partners, including law enforcement, Hill Country Family Services, Drug Free Comfort, the Kendall County Behavioral Health Advisory Coalition, and many others that I don't have time to work together with us to strengthen prevention areas within our county here in Kendall County. And together we're focused on reducing substance use among youth and limiting access to things like prescription medications that can be misused. Prevention is most effective when it's a shared community effort. And we're grateful to stand with so many dedicated partners committed to keeping our youth safe and healthy. Thank you, sir.

And so the requested proclamation reads as follows. Whereas the health, safety and well-being of the residents of Kendall County are vital to the strength and future of our community. And whereas National Prevention Week is an annual observance dedicated to increasing public awareness and fostering action around substance misuse prevention, mental health promotion, and the importance of building strong, supportive communities. And whereas prevention is the most effective when individuals, families, schools, businesses, faith communities, and local organizations work together to create environments that support healthy choices and reduce risk factors for substance misuse, and related challenges. And whereas Kendall County recognizes the essential role of prevention professionals, educators, health care providers, first responders, and community partners who work tirelessly to support youth, strengthen families, and promote resilience. And whereas investing in prevention not only saves lives, but also strengthens the social and economic fabric of our county by reducing long-term health costs, improving educational outcomes, and fostering a safer, healthier community for all. And whereas National Prevention Week provides an opportunity for all residents to learn more about prevention strategies, participation in community events, and reaffirm our shared commitment to supporting healthy lifestyles and positive development for people of all ages. Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Commissioner's Court of Kendall County does hereby claim May 10th through the 16th, 2026 as National Prevention Week in Kendall County and encourages all residents to join the activities, conversations, and initiatives provided to promote wellness, rent substance misuse, and strengthens our community. And with that, I move to proclaim May 10th through the 16th as National Prevention Week in Kendall County, pursuant to Proclamation P-2026-0512-2. Do I have a second? Second. Motion by the judge, seconded by Commissioner McCall. Is there any further discussion? If not, Paula, would you please call the vote?

Commissioner McCall?

Aye. Aye.

Aye. Aye. Aye. Motion carries 5-0.

Thank you all for coming. Appreciate it. Thank you. You're on a lot of different topics, aren't you?

Moving along, next we are going to receive a presentation from the Kendall County Women's Shelter. So who do we have presenting today?

Welcome.

Thank you. Good morning. Good morning. I'm Allison Peterson and I am the new Executive Director of the Kendall County Women's Shelter as of March.

Congratulations to your new position.

Thank you. I often joke that they have sent you the worst public speaker, and not because I am bad at public speaking, but because I'm a crier. So I'm just thankful for the opportunity to come and meet y'all and to speak on behalf of Kendall County Women's Shelter. See, I'm already crying. And, you know, I'm so honored to be here and to be in this position. So thank you. Thank you.

And it looks like you have a little presentation for us.

I do.

Do you like the slides?

I do. So obviously, you all are familiar with Kendall County Women's Shelter. Our mission is we're dedicated to providing comprehensive support, resources, and shelter for survivors and their pets, while also raising awareness about the impact and origins of domestic violence. Our vision is to provide an environment for individuals and families experiencing domestic abuse, offering them shelter, support, and resources to break the cycle. We believe in the inherent strength and resilience of every individual, and we are committed to fostering a community where awareness, respect, and compassion prevail. Collectively, we will provide a brighter future for individuals and families free from fear, violence, full of possibility and potential. So this is our staff. On our administrative side, we have all new staff. So that is myself as executive director, Jamie Randolph as office administrator, and Christina Williams as grant manager. Cindy Holder is our shelter director. Anna Smalley is our assistant shelter director. And Laura Simmental is our thrift store director. Both those ladies have been with us for quite a few years. But I wanted you to see our faces and know who we are. Who we serve. During fiscal year 2025, with a dedicated staff of eight at the shelter, Kendall County Women's Shelter served 56 adult caregivers, 107 children and 12 pets through residential services, and an additional 59 individuals through non-residential support, such as crisis management, legal advocacy, counseling, and child care. Those served reflected diverse backgrounds with 32% identifying as Hispanic, 28% African American, 27% white, and 2% other multiracial. While serving Kendall County remains our priority, many local survivors rely on our non-residential services due to existing support networks. All services are provided at no cost with shared goals of empowering survivors, strengthening families, and creating pathways to safe, independent futures. 58% of our non-residential clients come from Kendall County. Among shelter residents, 54 came from Bexar County with others from surrounding areas. This reflects a common need for survivors to seek safety beyond their immediate community. I know you all asked about funding. Your funding that we received the other day was an incredible gift and it's greatly appreciated. Funding will be used towards the greatest immediate needs of the shelter and those we serve. We also receive additional grant funding. Kendall County Women's Shelter solicits grants from VOCA and HHSC, which are both restricted funds used towards the operation of the shelter and the needs of those we serve. We also solicit other community grants such as Kronkowski, HEB, and James Avery as just a few examples to support specific projects and general needs. And I posted some pictures of community engagement. My previous experience, I've operated on a national level. I am from Bernie. So it's been fun to really reintegrate back into my community and work with other nonprofits. We've worked with Hill Country Family Services, Love Kendall County Kids. I'm kind of making my way through the community and creating those relationships. So it's been fun so far. We have a lot of incredible volunteers. You can see we get farm fresh eggs for our clients. And we've had painting redone with Easter baskets. Lots of different opportunities for our community to step up and help. And then my last one was just a thank you to you guys for your continued support and your recognition of how important our mission is. And it means a lot.

Thank you. Any questions for me, ladies?

No, thank you for what you do in the community and for stepping up to take this role. Absolutely.

Thanks for coming in. We appreciate all you do. And I was just looking at your 990 filings and your up-to-date. So thanks for taking care of all that. Yes, ma'am. And keeping your nonprofit status. Yes, ma'am.

All right. Anything from you, gentlemen? Thank you. All right. Thanks for coming in.

Thank you.

All right. Next up, we have a consideration of possible action regarding Order O-2026-0428-1 regarding the burn ban. Brady, are you here? As a reminder, the burn ban has been off. And I imagine after today's report, it shall likely remain off. Is that a fair assessment, Brady? Yes, sir. Can you walk us just a quick summary of what the latest is with the weather?

I was able to get some numbers yesterday. Excuse me for using my phone. This is what the fire chiefs are reporting. They got a half inch. This is from not last night, night before last when we had the high winds and everything that came through. About a half inch in Candelia. Same in Comfort. About a quarter of an inch in Berghain and just below that in Waring and Sisterdale. Alamo Springs didn't see much at all, about a tenth of an inch. And then Burney looks like had just below half of an inch. So we saw that. We did see it countywide to help continue the recommendation of the burn ban being off. The burn index sits at 282 right now. We are still seeing a couple of fires here and there, but not as often. Again, all of those have been from control burns that have creeped away when they've been unattended or left. So other than that, that's where we're at. No changes in the burn banner recommended today.

Okay, it looks like just Friday is going to be a red flag warning. Do you agree with that?

It is. The wind is going to be up, but it's not going to be the entire day. We're going to see a wind shift. I believe it's that afternoon, if I'm not mistaken.

It would gust as high as 20 miles per hour on Friday. It says Friday night, 25 miles per hour, just generally Friday.

For it to be a red flag, the sustained winds have to be over 23. So it may not actually trigger a red flag, but it is still a... It would be more of a no burn day by recommendation. And we generally don't have issues with that, with people doing it when the winds are really high like that.

Okay. So in light of the most recent report from the fire departments and the weather, is there any objection to keeping the burn ban off? Anything, ladies? Nothing? All right. Thanks, Brady. Thank you all. Thank you. All right. Next up, we're shifting to public comments. We're going to begin with Ms. Miller. I think this is your first time here, Ms. Miller. So if you turn to the right, you'll see the little timer on the clock, the big screen. That'll start once you start reading. All right. Your countdown will begin. And then once it goes off, just succinctly wrap up, please.

Thank you so much for allowing me to come and speak today. I was nervous about coming here today because I have seen recently that anyone who tries to speak up and have things investigated are shut down or threatened. But today, this morning, in fact, I saw a quote that came from one of you. It says, our citizens must know the truth. I've lived in this county for 35 years. My husband and I have volunteered extensively in this community through family services, the schools, our church, the fire department, and other organizations. We have a servant's heart. We love Bernie. We love its citizens. And what I am seeing from our elected officials is heartbreaking and morally wrong. I believe the public has a right to expect transparency and accountability, and ethical conduct from its elected officials and public employees, even ones I voted for. When questions arise regarding a personal relationship between an elected official and an individual later hired into public position, it is appropriate for the citizens to ask whether all hiring procedures and disclosures, disclosure requirements, and ethics policies were properly followed. This concern is not about private lives, but about maintaining public trust and ensuring that the government positions are filled fairly, objectively, and without preferential treatment or the appearance of a conflict of interest, which I think you all answered for earlier today. I respectfully request a clarification regarding the hiring process and applicable ethics standards, and whether any safeguards were in place to prevent potential conflicts of interest. You can ignore what I've said today, but I hope deep down in your conscious and hopefully in your moral compass, it will direct you to speak up, to fix this, and to step down if you know you are not deserving the trust the citizens have given you. I know many of you, and I know you're good people. I know good people make mistakes. I ask that you reread the prayer that every one of you bowed your heads and said amen to today. I think you have a copy of it. I think all of you need to reread it and look at it, and I ask you to do the right thing.

Thank you, Ms. Miller. Next up, Ms. McCarthy.

Hello, my name is Wanda McCarthy, and I wanted to thank the court and tell you how honored I was to serve as an appointee by my commissioner, Andrew Weeson, on the Prop A committee and reaffirm the success that this court did in putting together a beautiful park that will come to support all of our citizens. And thank Andrew for all her additional work to make sure it came for this court to make the right decision and approve that last week. I'm so excited that we have a park in Precinct 2, and I just wanted to say thank you to all of you.

Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Riley.

Good morning, commissioners.

Good morning.

I'm Brian Riley. I live in Precinct 3. I'm the fire chief in Sisterdale. I saw on the agenda that there was an item about coordinating with STRAC and some of that stuff, and I just wanted to add some background to some of that maybe, because I don't know where that conversation is going to go, so I figured I'd highlight a couple of things. I agree completely that the court needs eye-level, quantitative, qualitative reporting to help make informed decisions on how best to assist the public safety agencies in the county. It's hard to do that when you're flying blind. So I agree with that. I think the contracted agencies need to be accountable to the taxpayers. Taxpayers give the fire departments in this county a lot more money than a lot of fire departments get from a lot of counties. Um, I think that we have a burden and obligation to the taxpayer to be reporting back what our activities are. I don't mean social media. I mean, actual numbers on what we're doing and, and that we are earning the dollars that they are putting into our general funds for us to operate. Um, we've done, we've, we used to have some reporting. We've done some of this in the past, uh, I have an existing agreement personally with the county, a nondisclosure or a confidentiality agreement specifically to help with reporting that we talked about a few years ago. And it got mixed with other priorities and hasn't happened. So I wanted to sort of renew some of that and make an offer to help with the fire marshal's office. Local government code specifies the fire marshal is the person to coordinate fire activities. And in the past, the fire marshal has been the one to report department activities to the court. So I'm suggesting that the burden to do this reporting should fall to the departments, not to the fire marshal. We're getting a lot of money, and I feel like we should be at least reporting that back in return. So we can work with the fire marshal's office and STRAC to figure out how to create a uniform reporting template that all the departments use. and then automate that so that it's delivered automatically to the fire marshal's office. We would have an obligation to get our runs in there, our incident reports in, and then to validate that we didn't mess up a date. You can end up with 600 hours on a lift assist if you make a mistake on a date, and it shows up real quick when you look at the report. So it's up to us to go in, validate the accuracy of those reports, and then make sure that they're sent to the fire marshal, and then he can roll them together and bring them up to you. So I'm aware that's, It's been a couple of years since you've had a regular reporting cadence on some of that, and I'd like to help resolve some of that. We have a way forward, and I can help with that.

Thank you, Brian. Yep. Thank you. Thanks. All right. So next up, we have consideration and action on renewing the Department of State Health Services Grant Agreement Contract Number HHS00144. 1-4-0-0-0-0-3 under the Center for Health Emergency Preparedness and Response Grant Program. Brady, would you mind? This is a standard contract, and has it gone through General Counsel?

I believe this one has gone through General Counsel. It's the POD grant.

Yes, I've reviewed this contract. It's Amendment No. 3. It's a renewal. it does set forth the scope of the requirements of the counties required to meet in order to obtain these funds. Brady, did you want to go through?

Sure. I just wanted to make sure that y'all, I got some of the, we've gone back and forth on a lot of stuff lately. So this grant, what it is is a longstanding grant that this County has had for 10 plus years. Um, Jeff got it started, um, several, several years ago. And, um, It's on a five-year basis with an option for renewal annually. I don't know if I said that correctly. And this is just the annual renewal for it. Basically, it's over the point of dispensary. Should we have a health emergency in this county, we have the means of coordinating and the stuff necessary.

Are there any questions for Brady before we entertain a motion on this item? If not, I'll entertain a motion as to agenda item 12.

I'd like to make a motion to renew the Department of State Health Services grant agreement contract number HHS0014400003 under the Center for Health Emergency Preparedness and Response Grant Program.

Thank you, Commissioner Chapman. Is there a second? A second. Motion made by Commissioner Chapman, second by Commissioner Carpenter. Any further discussion? If not, Paula, could you please call the vote, please?

Commissioner McCall? Aye. Commissioner Lee? Aye. Commissioner Chapman?

Aye.

Commissioner Carpenter?

Aye.

Judge DeLarza?

Aye. Motion carries five to zero. Just... We'll get you that after. I just want Jen to double check the signatures. It's a pretty lengthy details. Yes. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Brian. Next up, consideration of possible action authorizing that the previously approved conservation easement payments be made to the respective title companies to be held in escrow until their respective closing dates. Mr. Busby, I'll hand it over to you first, and then I've got some questions for General Counsel.

Okay. I provided you with a list of 13 different conservation easements which you have previously approved and authorized in payments that are listed. What we're asking for is that you... authorized that those payments be made into escrow prior to they're actually being closed in order that we can be in compliance with the bond terminology.

Do we have we checked with the bond company to make sure that the proposed procedure meets legal standards because I have just some concerns. But I'll start with Corinna and then Jen.

So I do have several comments, Judge and Commissioners. I have had several conversations with both the financial advisors for the bond which is Samco Capital Markets and Norton Rose Fulbright, which were the attorneys that helped do the bond, as well as I've done two arbitrage calculations with a third-party company since the bond to ensure. So that is because it is a non-taxable bond. Therefore, the county can only earn so much interest and spend the interest because this was a bond that was voted on. And because of our status as a government, you are allowed to recoup the money, the issuance cost of a bond, and so much interest. And so we have done that twice. So we are calculating that we keep up with that in our office and we are in good standings there because my job is to make sure that I don't allow the commissioner's court to spend all of the interest we've earned. If some of it has to go back at the end of the life of the bond, the other thing we have to do is spend so much of the money. I believe that we are okay with what we have spent so far. We have spent about 14 and a half million of the 20 million initial bonds so far, thanks to the, the special call meeting last week when y'all did approve a little over $11 million for the Guadalupe Ranch property. So I feel comfortable there. I do not feel comfortable or I'm not going to approve a claim, let me say, without an invoice. I can't approve a claim for all these closing costs without invoices on each specific of those. So I would say right now you can't Um, approve that because y'all have to be satisfied to pay a claim. And so does the County auditor and we would need proper invoices, um, for, for every one of those. If, if that's something that the court wants to do there, there would be a lot that we have to do. And I, I'm, I'm, that's not something that I can legally. just to prove.

Yeah. Cause that's where I was going is I think there needs to be individualized contracts for each of these. So you have a payment record. We just can't throw money into one group. That's what I'm, if I'm maybe I'm misunderstanding what the plan is.

I had a really good visit with Mr. Busby on Friday and we talked about, um, the payments that had been made so far and then these outstanding easements that have yet to be granted and recorded. I also spoke with our, the biggest, um, Conservancy that's involved in those on the list the majority I think only one of the items on the list is with a different group and I think we'll find a solution and I agree that there needs to be a contract document where promises are made mutual promises and We will be able to I think accomplish that pretty quickly I'm Reviewing what documents exist and working with them to draft new ones. I think we will have an item on for the 26th But I don't know according to my conversation with Corinna yesterday whether we need to be too concerned about having everything on the claims list that day. Do you know, Crenna? Oh, to pay everything?

About $5.5 million. No, you don't have to pay all of it within 36 months. But you do have to pay so much of it down. And that's what I've been in contact with both SAMCO and the Bond Council. And one of the things, because y'all have approved... these potential properties, that is part of our documentation that we are moving forward and that we are spending all of the funds. And so that is part of what, if anything came into question that y'all have already approved those, we have the dates and the dates of those commissioners court. And so I do believe that we are, we are good right now with that. If y'all, if y'all choose to move forward with it, two things, one agendas are due. at noon on Monday. So I would have to have all these invoices probably by Friday at noon in order to get them because it takes us about two hours from the last entry that we do to put together that actual document that we put in the packet for y'all to approve because I've already approved all the claims once they come here. So we would have to have invoices for all of these like in the next two and a half days in order to get these on the next commissioner's court because our agendas are due next Monday because of the holiday the following week in the 72 hours.

But that doesn't sound like it's an issue because of our prior court votes, correct?

If Crenna is comfortable and has spoken with bond counsel and they're comfortable with the action the court's already taken to satisfy that requirement, then I don't see any reason to be in a hurry. I think we'll find a solution on the contract issue and on making the remaining payments. But thankfully, Corinna makes it sound like we don't have that hard deadline. So if the court would allow us a little bit more time to work with the conservancy and get those documents in order, I'd really appreciate that.

I fully support that. Does anyone have any objections to allowing Rusty to work with General Counsel Jen to find a solution that works for everybody to meet Corinna's invoice requirements and protect us all. All right. Just one more question.

So on the arbitrage matter, what do we have to send back?

So we do have a little bit that we would have to send back at the end of the life of the bond payments, and so that would happen later. But I did a calculation in – November a year ago because one of the things remember when we did it is that we talked about not really selling all 20 million because once you sell it that the clock ticks but but the court chose to go ahead and do the full 20 million so with that the clock started as soon as we received the the funding um and so that was a concern with with me and as well as the with Simcoe Capital Markets the financial advisors that we that we used for the bond But in one of those, the interest was increasing, and I knew we were not going to be allowed to spend all that interest based on the rules of a bond. So I did an arbitrage calculation with a third-party company in November, and then we recently did it again because we stopped interest. We pulled them from an interest-bearing account because we had already exceeded the amount that we were going to be allowed to spend. So one of the things I had the county treasurer do is change those accounts because they are required to be separate. And I looked at all of our bonds, not just this one. and we removed the interest from those accounts, so therefore we had them recalculated last month, and the arbitrage amount that we would have to pay back actually lessened because we are spending more money, and we stopped paying the interest, and so one of the calculations that they used back in the November was the assumption that we were going to continue to earn interest, but We didn't. So we'll have to refund anything that we are not allowed to keep legally.

So we're allowed to earn some interest, but it can't be more than the yield of the bond itself in the market.

Correct. And then a small percentage on top of that. And that's why you use a third party. You don't use your financial advisors to do it. The bond council doesn't seek somebody for you. You use somebody totally third party to do that, to keep it all independent. And so I did. And that company is from... not even from Texas. This is their specialty that they do. So we did that. So while y'all have approved to move forward with all payments, we bring them to court on a claims. That's the transparency of it. We posted on the county website prior to commissioner's court. We have them here for anybody to ask me questions if they need to. So right now I would say I'm not I cannot put all those on a claims list and feel comfortable that I'm going to cut a check for that amount when we have no invoices for any of those. All y'all have done is approved a not to exceed for these properties or a certain amount. That is not the same as an invoice. That is a not to exceed cost. That's not giving somebody money to put in an account where they can then start earning interest on bond money that the citizens voted for that y'all control. But that's my stance from the financial side.

And I think that's a good idea. And all I was asking is that we get the approval to pay it into escrow if the conservation easement has not closed so that we could be timely.

So it sounds like we're all on the same page, the right mechanism legally. So we'll give you all a couple more until the next court, and hopefully we can come up with a solution that works for everybody.

And I'll reach back out to both bond counsel and the financial group and then get with Jen here in the next day or so just to get my updated information. I will not be at the next commissioner's court. I will not be here. I'll be out of town. But I'll have that information so Jen will have it. And if there's anything we have to do, we'll make sure those things are on the agenda. But the last time I talked to them, they felt like, based on what I had told them, that we were good.

Sounds good. All right. Thank you all. Thank you, Ms. Mosby. Thank you, Ms. Mosby. Next up is consent agenda. We got four items on consent agenda today. Consideration of possible action for the minutes for April 24th, 2026 special called meeting and the April 28th, 2026 regular meeting. B, consideration of possible action on the approval of amending the FY2026 budget through regular budget adjustments. C, consideration of possible action on accepting the list of donations received in April 2026 on behalf of Kendall County per local government code 81.032. And lastly, presentation of sales tax report. I'll entertain a motion as to the approval of the consent agenda item at this time.

Judge, I'd like to make a motion to approve the consent agenda items A through D for May the 12th of 2026.

Motion made by Commissioner Chapman, seconded by Commissioner Carpenter. Thank you, sir. Any further discussion? There being none, Paula, could you please call the vote, please?

Aye. Aye.

Aye.

Aye. Aye.

Motion carries 5-0. Next up, contracts. Consideration of possible action to approve the second amendment to the Adler Road interlocal agreement with the City of Birmingham. Commissioner Chapman? So,

Judge, as everybody knows, the city is working on the two low-water crossings on Adler Road, Curry Creek, and No Name Creek. The first thing that happened is they ran into an old hand dug well on Curry Creek that they had to deal with. That slowed things down. The next thing was that there was an extended period of time for negotiations for the easements to get into the property at No Name Creek. The well, I'm sorry, was at Curry Creek. At any rate, the original contract said that they must be through by July 1st. And if you've been down Attler Road, obviously they're probably not going to make that. These were ARPA funds. The court at the time put this restriction in to guarantee that we had the project finished by the end of this year. that should not be a problem, but we do need to give the city an extension so that they can actually go through. They should be able to finish them this summer well in advance of the needed time to expend all of the funds, which is the end of this December 31st of this year. And so with that being said, we came up with an extension a second amendment to this. We made the first amendment. If you all recall, this court approved whenever they were not able to do the old San Antonio Road project, and we extended all of the monies to Adler Road. So it is moving now. They actually have both of the crossings in progress right now. Anybody that travels Adler Road is quite aware of that situation, but the end result, whenever we are through, it will give a better solution for the Sheriff's Department. Both of these are 100-year culverts that they're putting in, so the chances of them being shut down are pretty slim. It's going to be a major flood if this, if they were to shut down now. But at any rate... We need to go ahead and approve this so that they can get these projects finished and then move on to their next stage, which is an improvement on Adler Road itself.

Okay.

One sec. So we'll turn to Corinna in a minute. I'll entertain your motion at this time. Okay.

Judge, I'd like to make motion to approve the Second Amendment to the Adler Road Interlocal agreement with the City of Bernie. Okay.

Motion be by Commissioner Chapman, second by the judge. Corinna, could you please, are there any auditor-type hang-ups do you see with this extension?

No, I would just like to know, this is the $1.5 million that the Commissioner's Court did approve to transfer the ARPA funds to, this was not interest, this was the actual part of the $9.2 million ARPA funds, not the interest that y'all are allowed to use for general government services. We did Give that to the city of Bernie. So I just would like to know what the extended deadline is. If it's not July 1st, what that extended deadline is in your agreement, just so that if there's any funds that the county does have to recover for the agreement, we wouldn't have to have time to recover those funds and expend those funds by December 31st, 2026. And that does include making room for commissioner's court. for claims and all those things. So I was just curious of what that deadline is.

Commissioner Chapman, I believe the, and I'm looking here now, I believe the actual date is, uh, uh,

September? September 4, 2026. They've got to give, if at any time the city engineer determines in writing that the project is reasonably likely to fail to achieve substantial completion by September 4, 2026, or final acceptance by October 1, 2026, the city manager shall provide notice to the county judge within five business days of such termination.

So I think... We still have several votes. Yes. And in front of the December 31st deadline, which we could get the money back, and there is even of an unlikely event that there was some kind of a disaster, the way the Second Amendment is written, they still have to meet the deadline, even if it's a disaster of some kind.

Correct, because we have to meet the deadline with the U.S. Treasury. Yes. We can't.

So I think we'll know at the latest October 1st.

I just was curious of the date so that I can mark that down. Thank you.

Okay.

Gentlemen, what I'm seeing in the agenda packet is the second amendment. Is that the amendment you're talking about today or is this a third amendment? I think they both were. Is it a second amendment?

This is the second amendment.

Okay. The second amendment document that I see doesn't have a new deadline in it. Am I not looking at the correct document? September 4th.

I don't know.

October 1st. This is not what I had emailed to me. Final acceptance right here. That's fine. Where's the date?

Terms of agreement.

It just wasn't what I had. Thank you.

Any questions from our court members? Ladies, gentlemen?

Just a comment. I did talk with Mr. Thatcher, and he felt sure that they would be finished with the project by the end of August, so should be in plenty of time.

Okay. With that, Paula, do your thing.

Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye.

is your problem? Aye. Aye. Motion carries 5-0. Next up, discussion regarding the county's agreement with South Texas Regional Advisory Council, otherwise known as DRAC, related to the image trend software and possible action to designate members of the court to serve as liaisons with the VFDs to communicate, clarify, and coordinate efforts. Before we begin with the court, Mr. White?

Okay. Thank you, sir.

All right. Uh, so Mr. Chapman, I'll hand it over to you.

So the, uh, we have been working on a strike contract now for months as a court remembers. We talked about this during budget, prove this during budget. We're down now to the time. What, uh, What we're looking for is just for any of the questions that the different fire departments would have, we need two members of the court to answer those questions. What STRAC can do is once we get the contract signed and this in, would be to, they will design a report based on our input, based on the fire department's input, and this report then will go out Once it's designed, the report will go out to whoever we designate as the people to receive it, the fire departments, the members of Commissioner's Court. It will be an automatic. Every month, it just goes out. Now, at some point in time, times change. We can tweak it as we need to. But with this report, this is the information the court has been asking for. We're able to get it. now with the help of STRAC. And yes, Chief Riley, he had offered his services some time ago and to help develop this report. And whatever happened, it just never came about. But this finally, whenever we decided to have the EMS department go into this same strike program. This way, everybody is under the same umbrella. All the information can be written up and sent out automatically. I think it's a good thing. And I would ask that the court appoint Commissioner Carpenter and myself as the two, since we cover 95% of the fire departments in the county.

So before we get into details, entertain your motion at this time.

Judge, I'd like to make a motion regarding the county's agreement to the Southwest Texas Regional Advisory Council strike related to the image trend software and possible action to designate Commissioner Chapman and Commissioner Carpenter of the court to serve as liaisons with volunteer fire departments, communicate, clarify, and coordinate efforts.

Yep. Okay. Actually, this must, all right. Thank you for pointing that out. This is only discussion item after all, so we cannot take official action, but I don't think there'd be any objection.

It does say impossible action to designate.

Oh, there it is mixed in. Okay. All right. So are you all comfortable moving forward?

Because I don't memorialize the appointment.

Yeah. Okay. Will you second that motion? I'll second. Okay. Motion made by Commissioner Chapman, second by Commissioner Carpenter. We'll open up the discussion. I'm good with that. So that's all my comments. Anything from you ladies? I have some questions. Are you? No question.

So did we determine that with Matthew Grove, our previous general counsel, that the county was not able to hold the license for image wear or image trend for the volunteer fire departments. Does anybody recall that?

It wasn't a matter of we could not hold the license. We can. In fact, STRAC recommended that we stay with the policy that we had before, which was an umbrella, basically, with the county being the umbrella and then each of the fire departments being as a... part of that umbrella.

And I think that got cleared up when we did the addition of EMS to this, that that was all laid out in the new, excuse me.

When we bring the new contract to you, it will be the county with seven agencies. So the county will be the entity that carries the contract and then seven agencies under the county will pay the fees for each agency. So will each volunteer fire department have its own license? It can, each department could have its own agreement. STRAT does more than one thing. So first of all, I'm, I want to make sure we make that clear. This is just for one part of our work that we can do with STRAC. It's just for ImageTrend, just for one little thing. And each entity can have its own contracts. But under ImageTrend, the county is going to be paying a fee that will include the fees for each of the seven agencies that the seven agencies won't have to pay.

That's fine. My question is, will each of the agencies hold its own license? Because you've got to have logins. verification credentials.

That's why we need the two designees so we can get to the nuts and bolts of this agreement and make sure that we've looked at every little detail and that we have everything ready to come to court. I know that there already have been discussions about who will have access and who will be able to delegate access to the individual members of the departments. The departments will choose who within their department will have access.

So, and I would just ask that you as the court designees include the fire marshal, And the volunteer fire departments, because I've gotten calls from several volunteer fire department leadership asking about this and making sure that they control their data, that no one edits their data, that the data is shared. I mean, obviously we want to have shared data.

There are different types of access. There's read-only access and there's edit and review access. So we would definitely be addressing that within the body of the contract. And the whole reason we brought this to you is so we can work directly with those VFDs to make sure the contract meets everybody's expectations before we bring it to the court.

All right. With that, Paula, could you please call the vote?

Aye. Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Motion carries 5-0. All right. And last one on our open session before we, it's consideration possible action on a request for relief from section 5.2.8.1, table 5-1, Kennell County Development Rules as amended August 31st, 2023, reducing interior side setbacks to 10 feet for closed subdivision X16 Spanish Pass. Before we begin, I'm going to give public comments to Mr. McMaster. Thank you.

My name is Darryl McMaster. I lived in this county 30 years. I'm a builder. I've been a builder for 50 years. 20 years ago, we started building houses that run 100% off the environment. A number of you have seen some of our houses firsthand and the importance that we are facing as a county dealing with future growth and development in the county. What we think this building is doing is we believe in leading by example. And that's what I think this project does by being able to generate all of its own water through rainwater, all of its own power through solar. We're basically leading and giving an example to future development so that if someone wants to come into the county, we can say, hey, look, there's an opportunity. We would like you to invest in the county. We would like you that your development doesn't take from us, but can be added to this. And I think that's really what this project's doing. The setbacks that we're looking for here are a little bit of change. We ran some numbers. I don't know if you guys were able to see those numbers. The amount of, it's over a million and a half gallons of water we will save just by that additional square footage in the solar generation of power. And then rainwater is another 200,000 gallons. So we're talking close to 1.5 million gallons of water is what this is going to do for us. And we just think that

personal opinion is that we need to lead by example and i think this is a project that can do that okay uh clay forester county engineer's office so um the proposed development um is going to take one tract and subdivided into three separate tracks with uh privately maintained public access Meeting county standards the the scope of the request for relief is to remove to reduce the interior setback land lines from 25 feet to 10 feet. All of the exterior setbacks will remain the same. And as Mr. McMaster said, the site is relying or proposed to be relying on rainwater harvesting in its totality with the exception of fire water that will use the existing well for emergency water only to fill the fire suppression tank. Also, the property is not proposed to be utilizing water publicly available electricity, it's going to be using solar power. The request for relief is, as you all have seen before, predicated on meeting four primary criteria. In your packet are the applicant's justification for the four criteria, as well as the county engineer's office's recommendations regarding each criteria. and an overall recommendation. So I will just summarize on that that the county engineer's office finds that two of the criteria appear to be met, but two of the criteria do not appear to be met, primarily because there is no, you know, this development It does not rely in our finding, rely on the request for relief in order to advance the development. The reliance on solar power is not because there is no electrical power available. The property is capable of pursuing a public water system and relying on the well that's on the property. Those have not been proven to be legitimate hardships that preclude the development from being a possibility. So in general, the county district office does not find that all criteria for the request for relief are met, and therefore we cannot recommend it for approval. Okay.

Open it up to questions.

Ladies?

I have a question on criteria one in the backups. You mentioned the side setbacks, but this is an interior setback. Is that under the same rule?

Yes, ma'am, because by creation of the three new lots, it will create these two more property lines that require the side setbacks. Okay.

Gentlemen, anything from you?

So this hasn't been built yet. So this would be built, and any potential tenant or property someone purchasing the property would already be aware that it has interior setbacks of 10 feet. It's not like you're doing it to existing people.

Is that correct?

And so you said how many, 1.5 million gallons a year?

That we'd be able to save in water by the additional solar that the 15 feet of the interior setbacks are generating. So being able to take that 15 feet from the interiors which is basically only three sides, is the generation of the electricity that would be saved and the amount of rainwater that would be able to be harvested. And that's what we're looking at is being able to save water. That's the main concern.

So that's about 4.6 acre feet a year. You put that into acre feet. So you're driving that particular design to maximize the water savings.

That's exactly right. We're just trying to maximize the water savings. The additional, that's on the interior side of those lots.

Okay, that's all I have. Thank you.

Gentlemen, anything from you?

No. I've seen your work and very impressive. And the dependence on electricity, if people could do what you're doing all over it would actually reduce the need for the grid as far as power goes. And this is something I stand behind and support. Plus, Spanish Pass, we need to take as much water off of that area as possible because it floods, and that's a bad area. So I think what you're doing in harvesting water, that's cool. I've seen all your stuff, and everything that you've done is amazing.

I have one more question. Does this meet the, with this design, is fire, it meets the fire requirements? Just want to make sure.

yes the the most stringent setback between buildings in the fire code i believe is residence or where you have a overnight dwelling and those minimum setbacks or or i shouldn't say setbacks the minimum spacing between two buildings is 20 feet what we're asking for is 10 feet on each side so we would still meet that that even if we built residential If this development failed and someone put residential, which is one of the most stringent, these setbacks would still satisfy the fire code.

I want to add something as well. The house that I went and looked at, there was a well, but the house was completely dependent on rainwater down to the landscaping. Even the power was solar. It would only kick over and use... the grid if it needed it and only if it needed it. Otherwise, how often would you say that that house that you showed some of us on the court would depend on the well water or groundwater?

Well, basically they drill the well for an emergency backup. A lot of times that was our 133rd house that we have that runs just on rainwater alone. These are people that were a lot of times people are nervous about rainwater. It's the, what happens if it doesn't rain? What do I do? They were concerned that in the future that Kendall County is going to stop issuing well permits. So that's why they drilled the well. They got said, Hey, look in the future, what happens here? I'd rather have a well now, even though I'm not using it, I'd rather have it. But yeah, that house runs, including the landscaping and the swimming pool. Not my favorite thing. They all run on that rainwater.

And I've seen your work. This has nothing to do with your work. It's amazing. But part of the criteria is that part of the reason you want this is for financial flexibility. Because you'd say it right here that why you want it is to make sure the seller has ability to sell future lots with flexibility. So part of the criteria are we cannot consider financial implications as part of our criteria. And so, again, I'm not. treating you different than anyone else. I follow the criteria strictly. And if we don't meet all the criteria, I just can't vote in favor of variances. And I have a track record of doing that regardless of how good the project is. You have to look at all of it because it creates a slippery slope of making exceptions for you and not someone else based on variance on the rules. So it's not about the quality. I know your quality of work is very impressive. So none about that. It's about the rules. So that's just where I stand. So with that, I'll entertain a motion at this time.

Yeah, as far as our criteria, there's something called common sense that has to be brought into these situations. And in this situation, common sense trumps rules that make it impossible for someone to actually do something good. When I was building one of my offices on Main Street, I put LED lights up back in 20 – when was that? I immediately received a letter from the city of Bernie stating, you need to remove all your LED lights and put halogen back up there. We went back to the city. That phone call was made to the city manager at that moment and said, you guys need to update your rules because LEDs use way less electricity than other types of bulbs. And so I do think, I don't believe anyone on this court wants high-development think we've proven that. But I do believe the variance process is the only way at which an individual can do something in even small businesses and still function, yet keep our rules difficult for larger developments. I think that this is a rightful thing to be doing. So with that, Judge, I move that we approve the request for relief from Section 5.2.8.1, Table 5-1, Kendall County Development Rules, as amended August 31, 2023, reducing interior site setbacks to 10 feet for proposed subdivision at 16 Spanish Pass.

Okay, motion made by Commissioner Carpenter, seconded by?

Second.

Commissioner McCall.

Can you please include in your motion whether the criteria are met? You need to make findings regarding whether the county's criteria have been satisfied.

We've never done that before on any of these other... That's part of the findings.

We have done it before. If you don't want to include that in your motion, you don't have to. That's just my advice.

I don't want to. Okay. So motion made by Commissioner Carpenter, seconded by Commissioner McCall. Looks like you have a comment.

No, I have a question to General Counsel. Do we have the legal authority to grant this request for relief?

You have the legal authority to do what you would like to do. This set of criteria was created by the court and put into the development rules, and it's always your prerogative to make the decision that the court wants to make. The reason I ask that you make your findings in the motion is because the rules do require that you find that the criteria have been met in order to grant a variance. If you choose not to make that part of your motion, that's also your prerogative. It's just my advice that you do so because our rules require that you find that those have been met.

So just to confirm, we do have a legal authority to grant this request for relief?

Whether you can is definitely a legal question, and whether you should is a question for the court. I'm saying that you don't have to follow your own rules, but it's up to the court to decide whether you should.

So I'm going to ask just a very straightforward one. I said yes. It's just up to you to decide whether you should follow your rules or not. Do we have authority to grant the relief? I'm not talking about rules. Do we have the authority under Texas statute? Under your rules, no.

We don't have authority? Not under your rules. Your rules require that the criteria be met. And I ask that you include the finding that they've been met because that's the rule that the court has created for itself. However, can the court not follow its own rules? If the court chooses to, the court may not follow its own rules.

I think that's very interesting semantics.

Didn't get a clear answer. It's what's called a variance. That's why we're doing the variance.

If you don't want to, and we can change the criteria in your development rules. That's up to you too. If you want to change the criteria in the future, which we've talked about.

There's ongoing discussion on this topic. If we want to ensure that...

I think we're getting off the topic of this issue is not about changing the development rules at this point. It's about do we grant this variance?

It's about what the requirements are for you to grant a variance.

Right. But whether we change them down the road, I don't think that's relevant. We're getting off point here. I think we just focused. The court can vote how it chooses to.

I was just asking that you include your findings because that is what the rules require. But if you don't want to, that's also okay.

Okay. We have a motion that's been seconded. Paula, please call the vote.

Commissioner McCall. Aye. Commissioner Leeson. Aye. Commissioner Chapman.

Nay.

Commissioner Farberton.

Aye. No motion carries 3 to 2 with commissioners from precincts. 1, 2 and 4 in favor and Mr. Precinct 3 and the judge opposed.

Thank you thank you thank you claim mask on question is is the problem the project itself or just the setbacks in the variance? Does that make sense? I mean, I'm not sure we can, if there was no, if, if the 10 feet or what we're asking for, if it was 25, is it the problem with the project or is it just the problem with the variance?

I think I can answer it. It's the rules. It's just enforcement rules. Your project has what you're doing. Everyone supports rainwater catchment. It's not about that. It's about the specific, what our rules say and how to get a variance and see elements. That's the issue. So it has nothing to do with the quality of your project at all. So there's nothing. This is an internal rule procedure issue. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you. Okay. We are going to take a five-minute recess until 1026 for a restroom break, and then we're going to conclude with our closed session. We are concluding our open portion of today's session. Actually, we'll recess until 1027, but it's 1022 a.m., and we're concluding our open portion.

All right.

So we are resuming our open portion of today's meeting. Agenda item 23, consideration of possible action to approve the engagement of law offices of Ryan Henry PLLC. to serve as outside counsel to assist Kendall County with litigation, including Sutherland-Kendall County LLC versus Kendall County and Waring Land Investments LLC versus Kendall County. Will I move to approve the engagement of Law Offices of Ryan Henry to serve as outside counsel to assist Kendall County with litigation, including Sutherland-Kendall County versus Kendall County and Waring Land Investments versus Kendall County? Do I have a second? Second. Motion by the judge, second by Commissioner Chapman. Any further discussion?

I just want to make a comment that this is necessary because prior outside counsel was leaving his firm and no one else at his firm was able to take the cases, and that's why we sought replacement outside counsel. Okay. I just have a question if you don't mind.

So, General Counsel, would you confirm this law firm has no conflict of interest with this county?

That's correct. Ryan Henry's office ran a conflicts check prior to sending us the engagement letter.

Okay. Thank you. Thanks. All right. And with that, Paula, could you please call the vote?

Aye.

Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye.

Motion carries 5-0. Next up, designate a corporate representative for Waring Land Investments LLC, Kendall County, cause number 23-063, pending in the 451st Judicial District Court of Kendall County. Will I move to designate Mary Ellen Schooley, the county engineer, to serve as the corporate representative for Waring Land Investments LLC versus Kendall County, cause number 23-063, pending in the 451st Judicial District Court of Kendall County. Do I have a second? Second. Motion made by the judge, seconded by Commissioner McCall. Any further discussion? There being none, could you please call the vote?

Commissioner McCall? Aye. Commissioner Whedon? Aye. Commissioner Carver? Aye. Judge DeLarza?

Aye. Motion carries 5-0. And lastly, number 25, consideration of possible action regarding matters discussed in closed session. I move, pursuant to the discussion of agenda item... 20, an executive. I move to limit video slash security access for the county moving forward to law enforcement only. Effective today, May 12, 2026. Do I have a second? Second. Motion made by the judge. Seconded by Commissioner Wieschen. Any further discussion? There being none, Paula, could you please call the final vote for today?

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