Hancock County Council Budget, Efficiency and Revenue Committee and Council - Regular Meeting

12 is economic development. It's good. Then the lit special purpose keeps building up. And 1122 is a community corrections proh project fund and it's healthy. And the two uh funds 1135 and 38 bridge fund and the KUM capital is the one that we're using a lot of and there's economic development 5% nothing there. 1159 is a health fund. Looks good. And then their uh First Indiana fund got pretty good balance. Lit public safety 1170 looks good. And then 1186 is rainy day. It hasn't changed. Anybody has questions or comments, just chime in. second page. Um, uh, 1213 is, uh, CASSA and they're solvent. 1222 is the E911. Um, and it is being drained. That's why we uh, increased their um, percent of uh, income tax. Then the 1233 34 and 35 lits. The the two correctionals, one is the capital and one is the um operating and the operating is the 1234. And you see it is being drained down. Um which and we may have to um take some action there. And the lit uh PAP

is uh has been drained down, but it will probably be better next year because it'll get more of the income tax. Then the two opioid funds, you notice that money keeps coming in there. Um drug court 251 is solvent. H3 259 the behavioral court solvent and the 4616 is the um big tiff the oldest tiff. This shows good balance and you go down through the bonds. Uh the 21 bond we this still shows a heavy balance but apparently it's allocated for someplace or planned for someplace. And the 24 and 28 are uh well the west tiff is the other big tiff that's adjacent to the uh current the original tiff getting a lot of funds in it. Then 28 and uh 4634 are the two newer tiffs. the GDI tiff and then the 46 [Music] 38 is a is the 25 2025 geo bond the proceeds of it and there uh Mary assures us that she has taken care of all of the distributions that were supposed to happen. Thank you. 4700 is the self insurance liability and the 4908 or the EDA payments that shows the 150 that went out that gets reimbursed from RDC.

Page four13 jury pay fund. We just have a lot of trials. So we we have have we taken care of that now? The the they still have uh trials going on. So we'll be paying those claims up till the end of the year. So we're going to wait until the final jury list has been submitted before we make that hole. So that's one thing we need to give you the authority to do that at the end of the year, don't we?

Yes. And we'll have a resolution next week that you'll adopt. Good. Um, somebody asked a question about how much pay the jurors get. Trying to remember. My wife got a check. I think it was 85 bucks. I think it was 85 bucks a day. A day. How much? How much did you say? 85, I think. Okay. I thought it'd gone up a little bit, but not a day. Yeah, it used to be 25. member that went up quite a bit. I'm just not sure of the new rate. Not either.

Uh then the 5901 and O2 are the health claims funds. And I don't know, we're probably going to end the year, aren't we? Probably without going negative in the uh fund 5901. I would hope so, but I'm not going to promise that. I would like to see us. No guarantees, but they're they're way ahead of schedule. Uh, in insurance committees, we're doing it's doing a lot lot better with the changes we made. I'd like to see us be able to put that 500,000 back in that we had to take out. That would be great if we could do that.

Yeah. Well, we we had we we have said at the end of the year, whatever balances if there is a balance, that balance would go into the because we'll start off with zero, then back into the reserve fund. Yeah. If there's a balance, it it should move back. Yeah. Right.

Uh page five 7201 is food and beverage. You'll notice that's back up because dollars went back in. Thank you, Mary. And page six, the CARES Act and the ARPA. ARPA is down to about zero. So the the car's act that's a health department and apparently that can just go on and on. Any questions

on Mary on fund 6203 lit property tax relief? What is it that comes out of that routinely? that is that fund is used during settlement and that's part of the property tax relief that goes to every parcel in the county. So that balance when it shows the date spann expenditure that's only twice a year when property taxes are paid that that expenditure hits correct. that. Um, I got a question on 9200. Very last one. What's that? No, that fund has been around longer than me. What fund did you say, Kent?

9200. The very, very last one on the last page. What What does it say it is? It says it's a TIFF RDC federal reimbursement for $18,000. And it looks like it just sits there. Yeah. Oh, I don't know. I just assumed it was uh reimbursement from the federal government for u road work that we've done. That's that's what I believe too. Well, Mary and I both probably needs to be moved into probably have to ask Gary what Yeah. I don't know if we could move it, but I think we could definitely spend it next year. If it's been there all year, I'm sure he could use it sitting there. Yeah. On on some road in the tiff.

Yeah. Is reimbursement. clean up. Robin, do you have a question or comment? Um, on the opioid, Mary, have we been getting those deposits regularly like we're supposed to? Once a year. We have been getting them once a year.

Good. The sheriff recently forwarded me back when the first trunch of opioid came out a couple years ago, there was a 15-year payout schedule that showed after the first year getting Hancock County getting something between like 65 and 90,000 a year. There were a lot of other settlements after that that were doowled out, not so much upfront. And so it's not consistent each year, but now that number is closer to $250,000 a year, which we sort of expected that it wouldn't be as much as they were thinking.

No, it's more. It's more than we thought originally because there were additional settlements that happened. So the sheriff saw recently and forwarded to me the updated spreadsheet from the state and it shows Hancock County getting on average something closer to 250,000 a year. This year it was 290.

Any other questions or comments? Um Brad, do you want to address commissary? Good morning. Good morning.

So, so in July some statutory changes took place um with commissary reporting. It used to be twice a year. Um they changed it to quarterly, so it's four times a year now. Um and so it's technically due October 15th, January 15th, April 15th, and July 15th. So, I'm running a little bit behind on providing it to you. Um, but this would be for July through September. And I just need to probably just get it documented that I'm reporting it. So, it's in the minutes. Um, because state board of accounts is really kind of looking into commissaries and things like that. So, I just want to make sure that if they come out do an audit that they can see that we're doing our quarterly thing because the statute didn't change much. But um I want to make sure that what it did do that we're doing so they don't have any problems with what we're doing. So I just want to provide this to you. This is the report um for July through September. Um like I said, I'm I'm a little behind. It was supposed to be October the 15th. Um I should have had it here probably the 1st of November, the first meeting November. Um but we were behind. So this is the report. Is there any questions? I mean, I don't have to go through all the numbers if you don't want them. Um, I just need to make sure that I'm here doing what I need to do. So,

I know Brad, what where does the balance go? Is that handled through the treasury or treasure? No. So, everything stays with the sheriff in the commissary. So, it's it's I mean, it's not a it's not a fund that goes through the treasur or anything like that. It's just in a it's a banking account that we have commissary account banking. I mean, are you drawing interest on it? Um, I don't know if this one's an interest This one's not an interest bearing account. No, not to say we can't do that. I think we can. I think state war account says you can do that, but we just have not done that. So, maybe that's something we need to look into as well. Pretty good amount of money.

It is. It is. And we utilize it. I mean, I look at it to me as kind of the sheriff's office rainy day fund a little bit. Um, because there's a lot of things that we take out of that that provides me not not to have to come and do additional appropriations, you know, cuz I know we don't like those if we don't have to do those. Um, and so I I do a lot of stuff throughout the jail and programs and stuff like that and I take it out of the commissary so I don't have to come and do those things. And then obviously you know that I come every once in a while and ask the council to approve something that we agree upon that we can utilize it out of. So I pretty much covered about everything I can think of that we can utilize it for. So Well, it's a good deal if it saves the county taxpayers money.

Yeah. Because the stuff that you purchase with it, you'd have to use tax dollars for Yeah. Even though it's held with the sheriff. I mean, we take care of it. The sheriff's take care of the commissary. state board of accounts still considers it county money and so it's still considered that no matter what we just have the opportunity to take care of it so and we we try to utilize it for you know I'm going to use some of it to buy some stuff for the new facility as well so I just it's not on this one but we just bought two new canines um and that was roughly $40,000 for those two and so they're in they're not in this report they'll be in the January report so yeah and you don't want to open yourself up anytime for you know criticism

no absolutely Uh, and so that's why I want to make sure because this is the one big thing that for whatever reason, I don't know why it's so complicated that sheriffs end up having some sort of complications about. And so I don't want to get in that boat for any reason. So I want to make sure that we're all on the same page. That's all I got. So well, do we need to uh pass on it or something? The only thing I needed to No, we don't need any kind of resolutions or anything. It just needs to be documented in the minutes. Be in the minutes that that the report was provided. Yeah. Okay. All right. Appreciate it. Thank you.

Uh next up is um Greg, if you're you've been through hell on wheels and ready. So, I'm going to give you an updated package from um kind of similar to what I did before, but Jim has been calling me, beating me up a little bit and saying, "Could you add this? Could you add this? Could you add this?" In a nice way, of course. Of course. And you know, as nice as you want to go,

you're going to bring out the We're having serious presentation. What are they doing? So, and and I appreciate the whiteboard. Thank you very much. Now, we just need to erase it while I have the correct Jim can use his shirt. I was going to say that's final argument here. Right. Right. So, hard to please audience. You're sitting so far away. So, SB1 is kind of like my road trip here. started out started out really good

and then the deeper we got into middle of Indianapolis which that wouldn't have worked either but more I got down into uh downtown Indianapolis it got a little bit more muddy and that's exactly what's happening with is some people are saying did you think about this fire territory maybe covering two areas did you think about this township might be putting its fire money in its general money. Did you think about the county might need a little room to do something in the future? Oh my gosh. You know, all those things are now starting to come out. And I wore what I wore today just so you know one thing. Nothing in SP1 is black or white. Okay? It's gray. Okay? And so, you know, sorry, you know, I craft

black and white. That's what we do as I deal in black and white. I know a black magic marker and a white board, right? So, Jim De because he's an engineer. Now, anybody else an engineer? No. No. And so, I know Robin gave up her engineering license a long time ago. Yeah. But trash and but tra and SB1 go together. So, you're a trash engineer. So, let's go through and start. Jim wanted me to and Jim, we ran all these percentages, but if you want me to answer questions, right, go ahead.

Well, what what I what I was trying to get at is um where kind of the start of where do we start out with income tax today? How much income tax do we actually use? So that if we know how much we use now, then we can determine how much we need under the new rules. Taking into account that we're going to lose property tax, we'll have to fill in some income tax due to the loss in property taxes if we want to make ourselves whole. Just that and just trying to come up with that simple part of it has been difficult. So I challenge Greg to come up with that

for us. So we know we're today what equivalent income tax total would we have to have in order to accomplish all of the things that we're doing so that we know then under the new rules how much do we need to put for us to make ourselves whole. at and George there's probably an extra copy if you want that is

library special lit is that's because we reduce I want to remind everybody that 10 will not fund the annual needs of the library. We reduced it from 15 basis points to 10 to draw down the balance. Okay. So it doesn't fund the library. The break even is seven. So this is where we are currently. This is what we kind of started on when we were talking um you and Gemini.

Well, just you mentioned the library. Okay. Could you just put the library? Actually the actual usage is about what 13 basis points 14. We got break even at 17. Okay. But that's including Kadget though. Yes. So some of that's Kadget, some of it's coming from two different places, not one. Correct. And I'll go there. So Okay.

So yes. So if we want to if we want to note that let me know if I'm not doing good on my closing. Um, if we want to go there, the library is funded out of here and out of here technically 15 here and we're calculating about 06 and we've even gotten it down if we use total current income for 2026, it's really 17 added up, but this is about 21 right now. And and if you you know

but we don't use the 15 though the actual what we actually use today is like 13 probably plus or minus a little bit. Yeah. We'll say that every 10 years about we have reduced that rate because we're building up more than they use. Right. So the balance that's in there how long will it last before? Um well at the at the let me simply answer it probably one year if it was drawn down totally.

Okay if we zeroed it out one year. If we don't zero it out and we keep it at 0 10 I I'm thinking two three years. Um but you ask a complex question again. It's not black and it's not white. Okay. Why is it not? Because we don't know what the growth quotient will be by the state. It could be zero, I keep telling you, or it could be three or four%. But but the balance that's in there now, we're planning on absorbing it over time, not pulling it out and doing something else with I'd like to say we're annually reviewing the absorption rate. Okay. Okay. But but

and we've lowered this rate for now to 010 for absorb to start absorption. Correct. Okay. But the actual use of income tax today by the by the two libraries is about 19 basis points. 17 19 right in that range. So So in the future No. Okay. Okay. If we have to raise income taxes. Okay. Okay. Can we steal the money? Not steal but take the money out of Cadet that we're using on the library and raise the library tax.

So we if if you if we're going to springboard then we need to springboard to SB. Okay. Because between now and SB1 it just hit it just hit me that that if we're if we're taking it out of something we need that other money for. You know what I'm saying? If I'm going to raise income taxes on people, I want a good good thing to raise it with. And the library is easier to raise it with than it is other issues. But but I think what we have to do is we have to get to when we have SB1. Okay. All right. Yeah, that's what I would think because if if it truly did come into effect in 28

um you know SB1 or it comes into effect in 29 if it gets one year we're under a new regime and that's where I'm trying to get them. Okay. But following through we ought to next I think try to come up with the equivalent income tax that we actually used on the libraries one. How about the rest of it so that we come up with it in the future here? No. Right now. Well, okay. So, these are the ones we have right now, but we don't use 1%. Correct. Okay. So, go to your page. Okay. Go to your

We're not going to let you get there on your own. Yeah. Page three. Yeah. He he he's I I didn't know the judge gets to ask questions. Did I know? I guess I didn't go back to your Okay, go back to go to page three. And what Jim is getting at is now what we did, this is remodeled from what you had before. the old cadet coming to Hancock County, we're getting 26% of the total. That's what we calculated. Yeah. And it's on right here. Yep. From that to the total,

26%. So, Jim, when we were talking 40% or something like that, that was the error in our numbers because Kadget, old Kadget is is really divided up by a lot of people, right? You see schools, you see everybody in there. I still thought we were about 40%, but Well, there's the answer.

Yep. Not true. So, and on public safety, we're closer to the 48. We're at 38 and uh economic development 39. Remember, both of those are kind of slightly ch changed. Um and then peaceapp and that. So overall effective we've got 38.19%. Okay. So now I didn't take do it. You see that on the far right hand everybody? Yeah.

Okay. So effectively of all the 62 million that comes in we have about 38.1. Okay. Okay. This is based upon 26 distribution which is already certified. Okay. So our our total income tax usage currently is 38.19 plus 19. Right.

Okay. or now in and we did the the effective break even and back to page five. This column I put over here, okay, is under kind of SB1 now. Okay. So, but yes, so 38 + 19 is where we are today. 38% right of the total rate. Yeah. So we want we want to right or 38 and and remember PTRC is not in the 38%.

So the 40% of Kadget was pretty close then it's 38% then that right? No no Kadget is a lot all of them.

Yes. That was that was grand total. Kadget was 26. So this was this is let's just do this was 26 okay% the next one was 38 public safety this one is.3 that's only a little bit of difference in the calculation this is 100% okay this is not a revenue source is there is 100% RC is 39. Yeah, I'm okay. Right. PA is public safety

100%. Is 100%. I didn't get P here. Um, what's the PS up there in the second one? PS at public safety 38%. That's public safety. Yeah. Okay. It's column two.

Oh, Pep's not up there. public safety in in PAP are the total of 26. So uh the p then we get is so this public safety in we get roughly 100 100% of the of the E911 money but of the actual public safety we only get 38%. So in the next version I'll I'll break that out by itself. Okay.

Go ahead, Jim. You're thinking Well, aren't we using apples and oranges, though? Looking at the library rate over here. That's That's so many basis points. You're talking percent over here. Oh, correct. I'm staying here with the these are the tax rates and these are percentages of what you get of catch. Okay. So this is percentage of what you get of catching. Right. Right. So you get 26% of catching. 1% is the rate.

So technically you you're you're doing it 26% of 1%. Right. Basically. Yeah. and say that's what our percentage of the totals. We did that the other day and what we take in and actually use is basically 24 million.

Yes. So if we what we did then with the 24 million is if you go back to um okay if you go back to page six okay this is where we said going forward under SB1 okay if you're trying to get 23 million or 24 million. She rounded it up. Everybody see the 239 11. Um then what we need is 65. And so we got to collapse some of this. We got to collapse all this and go to 65 not including delay. Now, keep in mind that did not that did not ptrc. Remember how PTRC uh works and Robin knows this pretty well. Robin, and I'm not going to put you on the spot, but I'm going to put you on the spot. Okay.

Okay. When we collect prop property tax replacement credit, it doesn't really go in as a revenue source to the general fund. Right. Right. It is basically a credit on the tax bill. Yes.

So we don't count that as revenue coming in and therefore that's why you do not see it on page six. Okay. So that's really not a revenue source. You're giving that and if you recall I told you you're giving that as a credit to the homeowners, homestead credits. It used to be all property one, two, and three. It was brought all the way down to homestead. I don't think Mary we do apartments.

No, we don't. And key just for note, that's fun 620. That's what I was that's why I got curious about it. Okay. And so when we bring that in Kent to our overall revenue, it's not in there. Okay. It's not really in there. Okay. So segregated in a separate fund. Doesn't go into the general fund. Doesn't pay operating expenses. Okay. Now, one of the things so I'll pause there. Okay. So just forget all that stuff. And if if we're looking at that for the record,

if if we're trying to get to what equivalent uh uh number of basis points in income tax we are currently using uh it's uh 0.84 because it's 65 + 19. Is that right? Yes. Okay. So to do what we are doing now under the new rules, we would need 84 B. Correct. Okay. Uh but I mean

and now how he did that okay because you guys weren't privy to what we did in the other room is we took this 65 and we said if the library needs to break even over here at.19 we take 65 and.19 and what do we get? We get 84. How much are we going to get? Pardon? I mean we got to have that much today. So, I'm assuming you're going to estimate what we're going to need in 2028. So, I'm going to answer that really easy. Oh, hell yes. You're gonna Yes. Okay.

Uh because that is just what we need to replace what we already use in income tax. But if we have to use more income tax to replace lost property tax, stay tuned. Don't go there yet. Okay. Because because I'm going to build, you know, I'm going to build that argument. Yes. Okay. So, remember the overall cap closing argument. That's too many. Yeah. Remember we have a cap going too slow. 1.2%. Okay.

Okay. Now, if you want to go there, okay, go to the very back new and improved very back page. Okay. Page 13. Lucky page 13. Guess why I made it 13. Okay. Bad news bears. Okay. So, number number one, Jim wanted me to kind of take in and I came up with five things that could be impactful in the future. But before I even go there, Jim asked the question the other day is, "Wait a minute. What if I wanted to continue property tax replacement?" Well, then you're Jim, you're going to have to go over here and you're going to have to add it to your 84. Okay? And guess what? You're getting there pretty quick because that's under the 1.2. So what most people are saying ah let me do a big think about this you know I can't draw enough question marks if want to do this in the future okay and keep in mind the state's offering all that you know lower assessed value net assessed value and credits the 1000 and so that's supposed to help the mun the homeowner pay less taxes. The ones that are kind of underneath the cap, you know, if you're if you're above the cap, who cares? You're not going to get you'll get less, but you really won't. The credit will impact lesser of 10%. 300. But so they're giving property tax replacement credit. So we have to add this. Now go where you wanted to go. Let's look at page 13. Jim said, "Well, what if what if we do commit lit going forward to sewer

projects from SRF that we've been working on, you know, behind the scenes with a certain utility." Okay, but keep in mind SRF, by the way, for people that don't know, state revolving fund. This wasn't proposed to be a like the jail bond, a public bond. It was a go. It was going through as a one first time ever a county and we've been trying we've been structuring this with SRF state revolving fund. First time ever having a county borrow and a REMC do the work and do the the development of the sewer. Okay. And they are very interested in trying it. And the government subsidized rate is like 3%. maybe even zero or two depending on what the future. So, but that's a little ways out. Mental health funding 2.5 million. Jim, I looked at it again and I'm I'm thinking the two 2 million was too low.

So, if you look here then these are the incremental ads that we could you haven't chose to do these but you could have these. Okay. Next one is estimated revenue lost from the new homestead credit. That's the one that I showed you in your sustainability is lost revenue that Mary we will have substantially less revenue coming in in 2026. So when we get that nice 1782 and it says 20 million that's the gross number. It's usually about 18 million or something you know relative you know. So, so they show and which is still to me bad. It's bad management because every county or anybody any new city clerk or anybody would see the 20 million and think they're going to get 20 million. So, not only are you not going to get to 20 million because of the lost revenue, you know, if people don't pay, if if things like that, you know, if quite frankly, there's been more of that, you know, and so they might get that eventually, but that will that will impact.

Why do sounds like that's going to happen. This is actually going to happen. No doubt about it. So that adds to So we really ought to start looking at that 65 as 68 at a minimum just for these this 003 of lost.

Yeah. And I'm not done. If you look at number five, the estimated lost interest in supplemental lip of $4 million, that's a split of about uh two million in interest income or two and a half in interest income. Keep in mind we had over the last two years record interest income. It's in your sustainability. My bet is it is going down. It's just a matter of time. Yeah.

Okay. And the supplemental lid your pennies from heaven Kent it's I think it's pretty certain that once we get to a real time income and a real time rate we won't have supplemental anymore. And that's about one and a half million. So these are to me this is I see a potential real loss 0.11. Right. Then Jim asked me to put in we agreed on 150 million of a you know a justice center. Not that you're approving it. Not that it will happen tomorrow but maybe over the next five years and it would take 21 to that

150. Yeah. And and that's I'm I'm doing a 225 in Can can I ask but that's with a but we don't do a J we're okay. So the revenue that we use for interest income is did you calculate it going up over the next few years? No. And the sustainability is going down. Okay. So you're not just basing less interest rate. you're basing less income to have in there for interest rate. Okay, that's my that was my question. Yeah.

And and in the sustainability, we got it kind of tracking down fairly slowly because I heard you, you know, you know, we've seen the CD rates and the investment rates not going down as quick as one thought, but you know, 26 and 27 will be telling. Yeah, they'll go down some, but what's going to hurt that is is there's not going to be much enough money put into it as we've been putting into it. Yeah, we're going to be using it before it gets to that point. So, worstc case scenario here, you've got another you've got 84 25 plus another 50. What's the 25?

The 25 property tax replacement decide to do PTRC. Oh, but but since they're applying the new homestead credit, the default belief is not that we will apply PTRC. That's what we're thinking at this point in time. And no one is talking about doing that. But even if you leave PTRC out of it at 0.84 plus the 0.5, assuming you want to do all this, you're already over 1.2. Correct. There is no and that's the brilliance of the legislature to get us to not overspend and overt tax our constituents. Yeah.

And that was brilliant. And and our best goal is to be under 1.2 because over the years you're going to have to climb probably to that 1.2 not assuming that the legislature will raise that rate. Well, and and this doesn't assume that you're going to give any of your hardworking employees a notice down here a a raise, you know, because if you're trying to do if the salary committee comes back at 3%.

And I I'm going to say, uh, you're not going to let me raise the rate. So, here's our only saving grace in Hancock County. Adjusted gross income growing at 5 to 6% per year. AGI. So, remember AGI in the future. Okay. What AGI is is Jim's tax returns, Keely's, and Robinson. I'm sure those add up to really high numbers, but especially mine. We're we're retired from the state and the county. So we're just

adjusted gross income if you employ every right then our pot grows 5% if we do not change the rate. So residential growth will be important. Residential growth will be important because there's more income more income taxpayers res. So, let's let's let's be very very specific. A house will not be valuable. I I want a $100,000 house with a million dollar earner in it. Yeah. You want a million dollar house with a million dollar ear

because a $100,000 house doesn't cost much to take care of, you know, and you know, we probably get that car out pretty quick. And but uh a million dollar income. So, you want you want good housing and you want really rich people, okay? And that is the playbook that 92 counties are going to go after. Okay? And so the more people in the seat of the home, the more adjusted gross income uh we will have and the more that percentage the saving grace for Hendricks, Hancock, Hamilton, probably a little bit of boom. Shel's not doing too bad and and those is going to be what is this going to grow because That's how you're going to give Mary a raise.

Okay, Mary, I'm sorry I'm picking on you, but I'm trying to be But if we look at if we look for you, he's fighting for now. Unless unless you win your election and it's totally over. But I think maybe the most important thing then is if we go back to page 13 and we scratch sewer, we don't do any sewer, we don't do any mental health funding, we don't do any new justice center, and all we leave there is basically the lost income replacement of 0.03 and 0.11. If you give the library.19 and they're included in our cap, we're already at 1.17 of our 1.2. So we're already there.

Yeah, we're there. and and key what we kind of told you and Rhonda told you I think SB2 is to a theater near you right okay and what we might have is the pressures out there cities are not working at 1.2 counties you know we're hearing everybody say well counties got plenty of room you know counties do well if they take the 1.2 two down to one and raise the city and proportionally dis disproportionately change it, you know, and it's because of income. They'll say,

then we may be at a revised cap sooner than you think. Yeah. Um Rhonda was sharing with us the AIM is lobbying to get the counties lower than 1.2 and raise the cities. Okay. That's and that's why you don't want to live in a city. So this is you you want to be that million million dollar earner living in the county house. Yeah. In the county county house of retirement. Yeah. That's actually what Jim's response doing when it came up. He goes, "Is there any room out in Spring Lake?" There is. There's There's plenty of layering. Just you might have some remostrators to get you. We'll

help. And the total that we come up with is going to be compared with the total that other counties come up with. And there's competition between where high earners live. They know we're at 1.94 now. And Hamilton County, last time I checked, was one. That's why that's why a lot of them live there. All 92 of them. Um, so it does matter. And so I kind of knew this road map and I that's why I guess I've always said whatever you do with the uh library, you probably want to get it out of this. Okay?

Because that was to me Mr. Obvious, right? And so you know if they if somebody wants to allege it's in there now, I don't care. It it should not be in here now. Now what I also told Jim is the real risk we also run is if they did put it within this oh man

and you're the only one out of 92 counties when I am the SNP analyst and I ask you what your room is under your cap and you discount your cap to 105 or one you know I had recommended 20 basis points then you're going to be an outlier and your peer group, you're going to score less than your peer group. Remember, they have a formula and that formula is going to add up to a lower number. So, I'm telling you, you you know, I think that strategy means your bond rating could be at risk on a parody group analysis.

So, how do we how do we get the library figure out of our figure? Okay, we got a resolution here coming down the lobby for a different If Rhonda's there, she's back there. Jump up here. Hang. Just hang. All the judges are done for a second. Second chair. Yeah. What this resolution does and you're like, I'm going to see it on Wednesday.

The last paragraph, it asks the commissioners to direct our uh lobbyists to try and get that out from under. Basically, we're not setting any rates for the library or anything. It's just try and get it shifted out from under our rate. Rhonda, do you agree with that? Are you there? Okay.

Did you get a chance to look at this? Well, we don't have to worry about any other county lobbying for the same thing because nobody else has it. So, we don't have any we don't have a spoiler. Everything we've ever lobbied for, other counties come in and try to spoil it, right? At least we don't have

that. That is a concern that's been raised by our local official, our local um legislator that um well, if we're discussing trying to take additional funds um to help the libraries, whether or not that would be viewed as opening Pandora's box, you know, for additional libraries to come forward at the legislature and try to get similar legislation passed. Well, I don't know why any legislation would want this. Any other county would want to add their library into their cap because it's going to keep us from being able to pay our bills,

right? So, I I don't like to have things sprung on me all of a sudden, but we didn't get it till yesterday. We didn't need till Monday. And

we tried to come up with some arguments about why this would be reasonable. Now, um I did meet with Chairman Thompson, Ways and Means Committee Chair on November 17th. Um he was inclined to keep it under the county cap because he said, "You have plenty of capacity." And I think we're trying to show that we don't have plenty of capacity in this resolution. And then there's reasons why we need to save capacity because uh Greg made a very good point yesterday in that it looks better to our in the financial markets and it could help our um credit rating and our in the bond market when we have extra capacity there that could be used and so we don't really want to use up all that capacity. So what this resolution does is kind of walks through all those steps of the reasoning why we think it should be take it just be clarified that it should be outside of the county rate and um pretty much keeping the status quo then

all right so it says 0.15 which I'm fine with but I just want to notice it note there else it says 0.15 the other thing is um I guess you took me off the council so my name's not there it should be on I think it's on the last page No, on my version it's you're the very last because you're a W. So you'll be the last person to sign. She wouldn't do that. Well, she do it on purpose to me. Yeah, I can give you this copied. Yeah, I have one where you're questions. Does anybody have I'd already asked Ronda the questions that I had about it. Does anyone

I I got a Okay. So, how do the other counties then pay for their library? Through their cadget different tax. Well, libraries and all the all other counties get property tax. So, it's on property tax. It's not in their It's not in their income tax. No, no, they get a little bit of income tax um like casual. So, so can practically speaking, all 91 counties are property tax based library. Okay. There are some that receive the P the cadget, the old cadget. Yeah. That would come in that way, but it's pretty immaterial. Okay. We're pretty much the only ones that do it that way, right? Mhm.

Yes. I was trying to figure out if if we if they do uh if they do grant us that we can keep that outside of the cap if that gives us some advantage over other counties which would force them to think not to do it. See what I'm saying? So because they're going to get cut on their property taxes. Um right. Um that's maybe discussion number two for maybe next year. Okay.

Um if you look at a way to increase the rate because I know the libraries have both asked for 02 or 0.25 to kind of get them out of the situation that all other libraries are in right now. Um and that's not included in this resolution, but that's a discussion to be had in the future. Remember, we have two years to try to fix problems before sea 1 really goes into effect starting January 1, 2028. I think one of the most cuz, you know, I'm not a fan of of trying to have the capacity for future councils to tax our residents more income tax than anywhere else in the state. But I think the argument that um kind of moves me on that is because we're the only one, you know, cities and towns in our case don't absorb any of that loss capacity because we are the only one in the state doing it this way. So whereas everywhere else it's it's kind of proportionate what's happening in our case 100% of it comes out of our our bucket

and and so I don't want to put anything on top honestly I would like to see it prorrated come out of the cap of everybody else you know and then it's only a port you know it's only 38% out of our cap and then we wouldn't even have to be over but since it all comes out of the county's cap there's not enough room for us to individually sacrifice all of it and none of the cities in town sacrifice any of their cap. Right. That's a that's a good argument though for us that and that argument I did put a whereas clause about that argument. If you're looking at it live in a city or town and those cities and towns can get their 2% they're not paying for worry about a dollar. If you're a taxpayer you are paying for it. Yes.

Because a county resident even when you're in a city both tax. So if you're when you look at it from the taxpayers's point of view, it is fair. But for the cities, when you're thinking county budget versus city budget, that was a city Greenfield was a city library at one point. And so then that does become an unfair for the county to have to pay and not the cities to have anything taken out of theirs. So, it would make sense in fairness of for all if it would just be a rate on top and then we don't have to have that argument.

And not that it even ends up on top. It's just when you go bond, you're not telling S&P that you're at your max capacity because you've absorbed all of it out of your your rate. Well, with Greg's numbers up there, even if you take the 0.19 out, um 3456, we're at 1.4 and our cap is 1.2. So, we're already 2 over. That's if you take the library out, we're already 0.2 over. And what you're saying, the only way we can make that 02 up is bring people in that are going to pay more income tax. We can't even raise to get that money because we're above our cap.

Right. So then and I mean that's just rough math. I don't know if is right or not, but that sounds like to me. So, the difference between 02 and point 4, but it because I I don't have any faith in the legislature granting us anything. We've never been able to do much. But Kent, remember um you are the only one that funds your library this way, but there are special purpose lits about 18 to 20 of them, which they already said those are those are still outside the 1.2.

Oh, okay. Okay. So, it's not a minority of one. Okay. They I mean Rush County has60 for their jail. It'd kill them. They'd go back to the poor and I know because I'm their financial advisor. They go to the poor house if you tried to put 600 within the 1.2, you know. Uh so there was already a whole list that they said we understand those were pre-existing and to do anything else would be a problem. So, so why not just argue have them clarify that this is a special purpose lit.

That's I think Ronda is talking about doing what you do. That's what you have to do. And even though they want in and we I was suggesting in total the.20 Ronda I think is suggesting the 0.15 but I was all or nothing at this point in time. Start there and if you have to back up, back up. Yeah. Does that make sense? Because that was a question. Yeah. I mean, they wanted not to exceed 0.25 even though they don't need all that right now, which I had expressed since we last visited this. I'm not really in favor individually of of getting it in writing that they have that much open ongoing,

but it it would still be our decision. the the point two it would be annually but don't forget that a few years from now most of us won't be sitting yeah be totally different people and then point 2 is still leaves a little room but you're still then going to the legislature not only asking that your 0.15 be kept separate since we're different but now you're asking them to not only keep it outside the cap but also raise it. So then the question becomes, do you want to just start by saying, "Hey, let's look at what we already have.

Not change the numbers, but just clarify that we were always special and it doesn't get included." Or do you go in and say, "Hey, we've always been special. We don't want it included and we want it to be higher." Exactly. And that's a tougher question she's asking today. I'm fine. I'm fine.

That's a tougher. So keep in mind I also s suggested that if we would get it at at let's say 0.20 and I'm the one that suggested the 0.25 just looking 15 years out out out. was like, "Okay, there's probably going to be a couple new buildings." And so, let's at least suggest that to you all and you all decide obviously, but what we're saying is if it is a special purpose, it will be mandated that it be in a special fund, okay? And only used for this purpose and it will be annually reviewed by the county council. Again, those are all givens. And I I would just note too that in your current language, the ordinance is a May provision. So by funding our libraries with income taxes, that's something you have done by ordinance. It it's a May provision that allows the county council to do this, which you did back in 1999, and that's the way it's been ever since. But if you decide to repeal that ordinance, they just go back on property taxes again. and that's in your hands. That's not a legislative change. That's via ordinance.

So, I think the simplest thing is to keep it simple and just try to do what you're what you wrote up here to do. I think I I can just tell you achievable wise, I'm even wondering if this will play this session because Thompson said he he knows this whole thing is like Greg said, Senate Bill Two and all the changes. This is a moving playing field. You may just say, "Wait a minute. We're not going to make any changes like that yet." We basically have two sessions though to try to change this, right? And this would be first step just let's get the Senate enrolled act one kink worked out and then let's move forward from there. Easiest thing to get done.

And also remember, I mean, I've done this for 20 plus years, okay? I I always like to go once and let him give me a hell no and then I like to say, "Well, you gave me a hell no last week. Can I get a gas this week? Yeah. Yeah. So, I got real quick on your list of things that's going to cause us to go over, you listed a sewer project. Yeah. Okay. Um why and it's a tiff district. What? Where

the sewer project is a tiff district. Well, why why isn't paying for the sewer project? Why why is it going to come out of income tax? I believe what we were looking at with Ninstar is number one not in tiff areas. So it was sewer areas outside the tiff and or could be supported interving, but what we're saying is we're going to have to have an absolute dedicated source. So Jim, am I am I I I thought Ninstar had un unsured areas non-tiff.

Uh Charlottesville is what you're talking about. Is that what it's for? I think it's all tiff. You're talking about where there's already sewer or where there would be sewer in the future? Future future. Because I know their territory starts at 6 East going eastward. And that's obviously not a tip, right? And this would even be new territory if we do. is Maxwell North. Oh, Maxwell is in. But yes, it is. Yeah, Maxwell. And And even if I mean one tiff can borrow from another tiff.

Okay. We're talking about one tiff can borrow from another tiff. It doesn't have to come through income tax or one tiff can help another tiff. So if if this sewer project is in a tiff, then I don't know why we would need to include it in our income. So, so I I I recently did an SRF tiff and they were like, "That's fine, but you know, we don't we want to have a backup to it and if we can't provide sewer revenues as a backup to it, we might need some other source." So again, Ken, this was thinking two, three years down the road,

right? And it may have to have a dedication of an income tax to back up the sewer or the tiff if the tiff's not efficient sufficient to build the houses that Scott was talking about to put high income earners in to raise the right. So, we're we're looking out there, you challenge me, to kind of look in the future and say, when I'm looking at at 2028, our tiff budgets look totally different than 2027. Absolutely. Should be scratch. Well, just go get it changed. Make a phone call.

Make a phone call. If if we want those high incomes coming in, we've got to have some sewers in the county. Yeah. Cuz those people, they want sewers. You have to have amenities like a grocery store. I mean, we don't have any of this crap. We're not You want Whole Foods, don't you? I want something besides a income tax out there will be 1.2% lower than it will in if you want high earners to live in the community, you have to have amenities for them to live in the community. We have squat. Okay. That's why we're getting low income earners, not high income earners. What's this resolution? Could we pass this resolution?

Uh the resolution number would be 2025-12-1. I'll make a motion to approve resolution number 2025-12-1 clarifying uh legislation be pursued during the 2026 Indiana legisl legislative session. Yeah. Is there a second? I'll second it. Been moved and seconded that we pass resolution 2025-12-1. All those in favor say I. I. opposed. Passes. I actually have a clean copy with everybody. Okay.

With a line for everybody. He's going to I thought vote no. Yeah, he wants to know anyway. So, just turn him over. He's the only person. He's the only person willing to vote no. So, very interesting. We'll just let him. Thanks for your work on this, Rhonda. Back to the numbers. Okay. back to green. Okay.

Well, I'm kind of at a pause point here. I'm waiting for the judge to issue another or question because, you know, so what we said was to recap, we said where we're at, where we're going here, and where we're going here. And I think you can erase that PTRC. Yeah. I don't think we're into that right now. Is that agreeable? That's my recommendation at this point. Scott. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. And remember,

remember I put the timeline in here and I said January of 2027 as it stands now, you will start this debate, the great debate. Okay. And if it's any indication, you know, we how long did our I don't think we ever got approved and they are giving page. They're g It's really funny because DLG is giving denials but not approvals for what? Yeah, they don't actually approve for the Oh,

they'll be they only tell you if they don't if they don't like something, but they never we did put in a final version. They never said this is approved and they got 90 days, I guess, plus to tell you they don't like it. Yeah. So, they pushed that off. But the 90 days becomes almost uh 182 days. So the the current system will not work period down there. Okay? Because if we started in January, passed our ordinance in February, we might hear by 2028 if if it's good. Actually, we won't hear under current regime. We wouldn't hear it's good. We would just hear it's bad.

Bad. So back back to your final numbers with the library in there, we're at 84. And then if we're looking at all is up to to uh uh 50, we're over the 1.2. Now take the 19 out. Okay. Put the 50 in and we're under the resolution that you passed. Was it at 0.15 or 2?

Okay. So So then what's out so far is 0.15. So we still have some billion to catch it which means levy that rate and I think our legislators are going to have a tough time getting a hold of this with the library. Yeah, the libraries are here obviously. Hopefully they'll be able to educate too. Okay. And and maybe we have to do this with them. Yeah. Mary and I know that but we're still over the 1.2 even at that rate if we were to do all

plus the.15. Yeah. And remember, you've got a you know what happens if AGI goes to 1% because of a slick cyclical downturn and Robin and company come back with a need for 5% because uh you know to keep employees and or I don't even care if it's employees. What if group health insurance has been going astronomically? Oh yeah. Yeah. Okay. If that goes up 10%, what the heck what are we going to do? Well, that's why we have a big food and beverage. We cover it for a year or two. We make cuts. Balances do what we have to do.

You make cuts and you drain your food and beverage down to nothing. Yeah. I mean, your point is incomes can go up. 2009, income tax payers can go up and the AGI we collect income tax on can still go down. More people can move in. Everybody can get a raise and that income tax number can still drop just based on health insurance. And what all we always told you in the budget process and the sustainability in the growth factors there's uncontrollable growth factors

property insurance group health insurance. You may say, "Well, we can change the plan." You've already tried that and there's, you know, medical at the jail. You know, I'm finding 63,000 are costing double. You know, I laughed at Typican New County. They took 25,000 out of their uh autopsy line and I said, "Since when are you going to have less people dying?" And they were like, "Oh, why' we do that?" Yeah. And I said, "You shouldn't." cost more. And so, you know, so those are those I can sit here and go across this entire room with uncontrollable expenses

that you you know that probation again coming back to a theater near us. Yeah. The user fees aren't keeping up. Okay. So, you know, and Brad lost his revenue. Have we ever gotten any revenue from the state for level sixes yet? This year we we are starting to get monthly um amounts coming in. How much we get? Um I think they're roughly about 90,000. I can't remember a million, but we're not going to be back. Well, and I think they started EDA. Yeah, we have anywhere. I got a question that

Well, we kind of took it into account. It's only because I I don't really understand the property tax portion of of this scenario. Okay. Because the of Senate Bill one, yeah, this is all income tax. Yes. But but when you talk about the property tax side, we do geo bonds every year and we've done that to to maintain rates. Okay. Mhm.

Because if we and to fix things and keep things like they're supposed to be and it maintains our rate. Okay. If not, then our rate falls. So, when they screw with the property taxes, is it going to be beneficial for us to continue the geo bond scenario or not beneficial to us because it changes the rate down and they're wanting to cut the rates anyway.

Okay. So, let me answer your question. It's not black and it's not. Okay, here's how. If our tax rate gets to three 3%. Everybody's at their cap. You issue a deal bond that cost $500,000. The $500,000 is going to create circuit breaker down the food chain all the way. Okay. So, I'm thinking the geo scenario going forward is gonna go away is going to go away and you're probably going to go back to which we didn't even account for here or go supported by lit paid by

kind of like you showed the justice center the hypothetical justice center rate. There you go.

And they're going to let us do that because one time they didn't want to do that. not yet. But what I just saw was we we were trying to do Hendricks Countyy's $50 million 20 million bond issue for Run Parkway. There were more schools than ever before in the market and they were running towards the tax rate again, you know. So Jeff's going to hear this at time, you know, and they're going to be livid again because there were people doing geos for no dirt reason and you know, here we go again. And so that's why I'm saying can't it's not black and white because we got to between now and 3% there's some room. Okay. But it the game may get changed again and remember that's why we're doing three and a half or five and a half year uh geo and things like that. But I think a strategy if you have to have an annual it's going to be managing it through your lit.

Okay. So you need uh room within our 1.2 to do that. Bingo. Seems like the HEDC needs to focus their energy on certain attracting certain job types. There's no border wall. Well, we're we're not Hamilton now. Not getting anything from that. I mean, seriously. Okay. You know, we might have to build a road. Let's We might have to do it ourselves. Build a really good road out of my county right now. No. Okay,

somebody might live in Timbuktu and say, "I want to work in in Hancock County." That AGI doesn't count. But if they're like, "Oh my god, it's going to take me an hour. Maybe I should just stay in Hancock County." Greg, I think we're brain dead. Oh, okay. I'm good. We can keep going. This is when the judge pulls out what? You're fine. The judge, it's a recess. It's a reset. Sorry. And I can't yield it to anybody. No, I'll tell you how strange I am. I'm really enjoying this. This is where I lived for a long time. I know this is fun. Thank you. Yeah. No, it was some wrap up. We weren't to the wrap. Wrap up is

conclusion. Number one, you know, the resolution gets run and I have some movement forward, but the the answer is stay tuned because what I will do, what we'll do, this will be your I'm going to break out PAP a little bit better in here and this will become SP1. Your next version will be SB2 coming to a theater near you that we'll start working on this year. Is the rumor that in this session starting now that this will all change substantially?

I'm not thinking that. I'm thinking it will be tweak number one to tweak number 864

and and they'll just keep tweaking it because I have heard them say, "Oh my god, we didn't think about that. Oh my god, we didn't think about what they're doing is they're running these. It's the same thing as one, two, three." Okay. Where do you think one, two, three circuit breaker came from? It was a hell of a headlight. Okay. There wasn't a lot of mathematical calculations to it. Okay. So, so they ran their big databases. Okay. And they said, "Okay, here's what we can do." And they ran them backwards, forwards, and sideways. But the database is only as good as the data in the base. Yeah.

Guess what? I didn't say what happens when Buck Creek has a has this area, but it helps over here in this area and it may help over in this area and oh my god, you know, you know how we going to fund these towns. The big issue in here too is the wrap-up is that some of these towns are not going to get enough money under the 005 split and you all do not want to be town board camp presidents. I'm telling you, you know who will be running your towns, right, Robin? Yes. Um, my husband, they asked him to be the president next year, and he said, "No,

he's too a city. That's a city town." Yeah, me too. He married me. So, so they'll tweak it until they end up with what they had before SV1. They may Yeah. Right now, it's kind of like, you know, maybe the old system didn't work so bad.

Yeah. They took the they took the link out of it that run's back there, but they took the link out of there. The the prime objective was let's not take these and spread them based upon these wacky property tax levies. That is what this page is all about. This 38% is taking property tax levies and dividing all the income taxes up. They're like that was the main objective which sounds probably not bad.

Well, wasn't their other objective? I think what Rhonda was saying uh was is to force I think the thought is at the state level that there's too much spending. There's inefficient spending at the local level and they want to try and force some uh more efficient use of taxpayer dollars at the local level which kind of means merging things, consolidating things like fire. That may that may be the opposite though.

When you merge, you may be spending that's my opinion. when you merge fires, you're going to spend twice to do what you're doing now. But but see where I disagree is we know that the C Hancock County Council has been very very frugal for a very very very long time on their budgets. Now they start looking at all these other people that technically aren't and they throw you all in the same basket. I think that's unfair. But certainly the world is not fair, right? No, it's not. You know, it it's funny because it seems like

the whole point is to save people more property tax, which in theory sounds good. I'm on board with that. But when you think about the deficit moving to income tax, that's on every dollar. There's no standard deductions on that, right, CPA? So, if you're a $40,000 dual income household that doesn't own your home, your property tax did not just go down and your income tax just went up. So people who don't own if you live in a city

and low income earners are paying more after SB1 and then high income earners if you had a $300,000 house and you get $300 off your taxes and you and your income tax goes up 1%. You're paying four times more income tax than you saved on your property tax. So I'm trying to figure out where the sweet spot is of who actually gets up. Well, if you're But if you're capped and you're capped plus, you'll never see the reduction, right? If your property taxes have been capped for 10 years, this this is just like the caps and you get a reduction%

a year. No, it's got to go below the cap. You got to you got to drop below the cap for you to see anything. So, the people that are capped and what everybody's capped at, but what 35% of the of the county? I mean, 65 70% of the people are capped. So, so they're not going to unless it drops below what their cap is, they're not going to see anything. And there's no savings on the 2 and 3% properties. So, not that they would pass it along, but there's no savings for landlords to pass along in rents either. So, I'm not sure who benefits the most, but I think it's a really specific segment of the population.

It is. It's you own and you don't make much money. My closing comment says I ought to create I ought to live in a pup tent and not work too hard because I'm just going to pay state federal everybody more local income taxes. So it's why would I work more harder every quarter when I send in estimated taxes I have that conversation with myself. I'll leave it at that pub tent with uh not much work. Do do we need a break before? Sure. 10 minutes. Library is up. 10 minutes. Do you want 10 minutes for the library and or not the library? The

fairgrounds. Fair. Do it. Fairboard is next. I'm good. Okay. I'm good. Fairboard, please. Good morning. Good morning. Morning. I do have uh some papers for you.

I may be a familiar face and Holly because we've been here multiple times. Um Holly serves as our president of the A association and I am currently serving as a vice president. We came to you about this process started about a year ago. Yeah. I can give you enough. Um and the reason we it started is because we were needing to find a way to um find some money to fix our block bathrooms because of a tile breaking between the city sewer and that facility. and that prompted a lot of conversation. Um, what we have passed out to you is what we have done with the first million that you gave us and we were told that once that million was spent that we needed to come back and request the other 500 that had been um approved by you on February 12th of this year. um probably a lot of information, but we want you to realize that we look at this as a team effort and that we want you to see that you're getting a return on your dollars that you're investing with us. So, some of the things that we have been able to do with those dollars, which we have been able to do more than we originally came for because of projects we got into, some didn't take as much money. We had people that stepped up and could provide us services at a discounted rate or we were able to find uh the materials at a much um reduced cost than we originally thought, but we were able to fix the um bathrooms. That was our original intent. We also were able to do the infrastructure that we needed to update the cattle and swine wash racks. We poured the encroachments going to the

restrooms of our new West Commons building. We upgraded asphalt and what that helped with was drainage that um we have a problem with the pavement that was poured before we ever came on the board is higher than the exhibit hall and if we have a torrential rain it floods the exhibit hall. So we thought this was a more costefficient way of helping to solve that problem. Um, we also were able to invest in four new air conditioners uh for the exhibit hall. We are still working on safety and security issues, but we were able to do several of those upkeeps. And we were able to install a marquee sign along Apple Street that ours had uh totally broke. And we were able to refresh the food court roof so it looks better. So far, that amount comes to $979,984. The remaining money, we would like to be able to see if we can um go ahead and use that towards the other $500, $500,000 of the projects that we have identified. On that first page, we have given you some of the pictures so you can see the upgrade. Um, one of the things we also bought were new bleachers for the show arena. U, we did that for multiple reasons. One, for a safety factor. The ones that we had did not have handrails or steps. Um, several of us that use the facility on a multiple basis could see somebody eventually is going to go tumbling down and we'd we'd lose a lot more than, you know, being able to install new bleachers. We just had our first event using those this

past weekend and the comment was made by several people was how bright now the show arena looks and it looks clean and new and um the impression is is one that we were going for. Um it'll be used this weekend for our Christmas at the fair event. So we feel like that was a good investment. What we would like to do with the the remaining 500,000 of the forgivable loan is finish the restrooms in the West Commons building. We have been delayed with that because of the city lift station and all the problems that they have had with that. They've had to come back in and dig back up. And so our north side has almost been inusable for quite some time. Um we have to work around the the trenching and all of that. Um, we still would like to upgrade the cattle and swine barn roofs. Um, we've taken a hard look at what that would incorporate and there's some other things that we need to do in order to get to the roofs, but we have an estimate on that of being 250,000. We are in the process of getting more quotes um because there's lots of ideas how to make that better. th those two buildings, the cattle barn was built in 1956 and the swine barn in 1957. So those structures were built properly when they were built and we just now to get need to do some upkeep to make them last a little longer. We need to do some things to the exhibit hall. Um, one of those we need to refresh the exterior, but we also need to do some corrections inside and the interior. Um, the floor, and for those of you who don't know, that was the

original show arena. Um, they showed in that from about 1962 until the new one was built in 1972. So, um, has several chips and cracks in the floor. If you're holding a meeting, it's not that is non-livestock or non-4 related. That's been a comment that's made. Wish we could do something with the floor. So, we would like to paint that with epoxy and seal it so it lasts a little longer. Um, you can see the other things that we would like to do with that. And we do have quotes to uh fix the floor, epoxy it, the walls, the kitchen floor, and that would come up currently at $73,000. So that is what our vision is for the extra $500, the remaining $500,000. Excuse me, I've got a frog in my throat. Do you have anything you want to add or the rest of the proposal that I have given you are um what we envision for phases two and three. U we told you we would come back to you with those. Um and we would like to refresh the exterior of the exhibit hall and possibly lengthen it. And we would also like to upgrade the bowl. Um we've had different ones request that but there's just it's in major need of upgrading. And then in 27 for phase three u we envision uh building a new building where the current food court sits. So we are welcome to answer any questions. Um I don't know if you know this off the top of your head or if we got to call in. Rob is back up. How many um rentals

or events or days of use or all that did the fairgrounds have this year or is projected for next year? Rob's we are probably at what 75% on weekends. Yeah,

we're trying to upgrade this the all the things that we've asked for is to try to meet some of those rental needs during the week. Um, we feel like those are opportunities that'll increase our cash flow, but we also want to become self- sustaining and in order to do that, we've got to be able to rent the buildings we have. Um, we feel like so far everything we have done is a return on your investment. Um we are booking more and more livestock and overnight shows that will you know going to the um hotels and food and beverage. We hope we can can trace that but we'd also like to be able to provide a facility that there could be possibly small business corporate trainings and that would help fulfill that middle of the week. Um, I'm going to kill you on the tourism board.

Uhhuh. Um, not this money because we've already kind of set this in motion. This money is already set and everything, but are they going to continue to get additional funds and stuff from the tourism board? Um, I know we're getting another new hotel and some of them came online this year, so that that income should increase. Is is is that going to help in the future with some of the future projects or

So the and I've only been on the um HCTI board since I think March, so I haven't been there all that long yet. Uh but my uh understanding of it is the fairgrounds has to come apply for a grant like anyone else comes and applies for a grant each year. So to say that they're guaranteed the funds, you know how that goes. Any given board could say, you know, this year we don't want to fund that. I don't believe I'm not at all the perception that that's their intention. Um, you know, I have taken the temperature occasionally on what the uh what the will is to do more than the status quo with the fairgrounds. And some of the not to speak for the group as a whole, but some of the indication I've been giving is is that um tourism is intended to, you know, create, enhance or promote activities or events that create tourism. So making capital investments, especially substantial ones, is not something I would expect tourism to do. Now, if if the fairground says, "Hey, we have this new building and we'd like an extra $25,000 this year to market and promote and build a brochure and send it out. You know, I'm making this up, but to help them generate more interest in their facilities, tourism does have money that they could spend that on.

Okay. I may not totally agree with that. That that um enhancing the buildings doesn't increase the tourism. I see. I know what you're saying. But money is fungeable. I mean, if if if their advertising budgets were taken care of, then the money they were spend on advertising could be moved into capital. Go ahead, Greg. Remember, two new hotels that are coming are paying off the developer bond on conference center, right? And so the inkeeper tax goes to that. Yes. Only on that hotel.

Only on those. There's another there's another hotel in Greenfield being built. That one's not bonded against that would that will net revenue to tourism when it Well, there's another fair Marriott going in in Greenfield, right? Spring Hill Street, right? But the one out there gateway is that's captured already. The first one and the second one. Okay. Also,

I asked Bridget a few months ago how many room how many hotel rooms we had in present and it was under 700 in the county. Um, as Greg mentioned, one of those big hotels is not for a long time going to net anything to the bottom line because of paying off the convention center. But in town in Greenfield, that is not the case. Those will net positive when they're online and create substantially more rooms. But it doesn't air does Airbnb Airbnb as well and that's in been an increase over the last few years because we didn't have Airbnb when we set up tax.

Yes. And I wish I was better prepared to answer the question. We talked recently about how much a month Airbnb makes up of the take and um it used to be nothing and now it's it's notable. Okay. I only reason I was talking about tourism too is because Okay. So we we're we're granting these projects as they come as we can. Okay. Correct.

Um and but we also see future projects and if there is monies to be captured uh now with ideas that you already have then you can speed up the future projects too. I me personally that not enough tourism dollars goes to the fairgrounds and not in comparison to the amount of tourism in the county. What it what goes cuz we we've all done the the phones where the majority of the people coming from out of county come to. We track that. We do all that and 68 I think the last we can figure out 68 or 70% come to the fairgrounds but they're not getting 68 or 70% of the of the tourism funds. Well, something else you need to think about though, and Debbie can speak to this, and I'm not saying it's right-sized, you know, that's a matter of individual opinion, and I'm obviously a fan of improving the fairgrounds,

but individual events that are taking place at the fairgrounds, apply for money, and come separately from the fairgrounds themselves. So, like Debbie is a leader in the sheep show, right? And so, she comes and applies for money to promote and enhance the sheep show. So there is more money that goes to what's happening there than what you see as a direct payment to them. Not to say that there's not room for more. Right. Right. Yeah. And also I probably should have said this in the beginning. We're not just relying on on what we've presented to you. We are in the process of come trying to come up with a major fundraising campaign that will help us buy pins,

new pens, tables, chairs, all those things that always have seem like they break at the wrong time. Um I've applied for a couple of grants. Um so far those have been denied because it doesn't fit specific, but I'm still looking. We are also um we have talked to tourism. tour tourism has identified us as the number one um you know contributor with the hotels. I will tell you at the event that um Key is talking about we had 800 head of sheep from 15 different states for 4 days of you know hotel space and we didn't have enough. We had people had to go to Indianapolis because our event hit the same weekend as um a race over at Newcastle in the Brickyard.

So the addition of a new hotel will You're also a generator of food and beverage. Correct. Everybody who comes into the for all this, they have to eat somewhere. And so you're also generating food and we're taking a lot of this out of food and beverage. you know, you're it's not a no ways near an even even thing, but you're also generating income with with those with those people also. And our food and beverage, I mean, I think I'm funding it myself. I I paid I paid $28 for two kids meals at Culver's the other day. Oh my gosh. Just two just two grandkids meals. 28 bucks. I mean, that our food and beverage must be getting ready to explode.

Over two million. They're charging twice what they did a couple years ago. So, okay, with everything that I've, you know, we've presented you, we wanted to be upfront so you know what where our vision was that we're no longer just going to try to maintain. We're going to try to improve, right, and and generate those dollars that'll help us be self-sufficient and and be the place people look forward to coming to in Hancock County for a big event. And then I think we all win just as you've talked about with the inkeepers tax and the food and beverage tax.

I have a clarifying question for Greg. Greg, refresh my memory. So this first investment was done on a forgivable loan with the understanding that future investments would be out to bid out to public bid. Well, they would be they would be under general obligation bonds in the future, which would require them per bond council to be a public bid. Okay. And and in this most recent geo bond that just sold at market was the fairgrounds in that one million for 1 million,

right? And that was to reimburse the funds that we had already used, not in addition to originally we were going to put a million and a half in there, but the commissioners said they needed the money for buildings. So it's and so at this point they've got call it $20,000 left in that million. If we look at new projects, food and beverage has been reimbursed from the last geo bond sale. So if if we were to say, okay, the next half million go, where does that leave us? It's

Yeah, it it leaves us tapping food and beverage and being restrictive with food and beverage in 26 somewhat. Unless we find another place. Okay. Restrictive in food and beverage. How? That we're not going to have a $2 million balance. Well, a million million and a half. We're not going to We're only going to have a million and a half dollar balance. What's our 26 appropriation first and then we go to our fund report that I think it's over. Yeah. But appropriation wise. Yeah. But we don't it's overrunning us. We'll talk cash. You know what I mean? a little bit right now. Yeah.

And then because of what you just said, I would think we would do it again from food and beverage with the uh stipulation that we'll replace it uh from uh the next GEO bond. Or maybe we can take it from the 25 GO bond if we can talk the commissioners into not spending three and a half million on the buildings. Or we could

we have to remember what he just spoke about an hour ago, which is geo bonds may not be an option in a couple years or in a few years. It it's questionable. Well, I I would I would say if we were going to take it from

future GEO bonds, if we end up doing that, okay, we we have the 500,000 to fulfill the the original grant or whatever the original, we have that already in food and beverage and we could spend that today and then this portion would be done. But if we're going to go into future bonds with then why not I mean if if we're going to talk about that next year then why aren't we talking about a million to go to the to phase two instead of phase one and I think I would go one step further Kent I think what you need to look at is how do we find 26 and 27 and be done

right right because I think, you know, we may be having limited off bites of the apple in the future, right? And you know, in Hendricks County, I'm reauthorizing their tax rate to rebuild their their fairgrounds. You know, it's it's almost does it just need to be a bun for the fairgrounds or do we put it in? But you got probably you you probably need to put 26 and 27 together. Well, and here I hate to go out on a totally different branch, but we had a conversation here recently about economic development funds. Yes.

Are any of our economic development funds eligible to be used on fairgrounds improvements? Scott, well, I think that that is broad enough. The term economic development is broad enough and I was, you know, I looked at that and going to report to you guys. I think because it's not defined specifically home rule is going to apply. So it's going to be construed in a more liberal manner as opposed to strict. So certainly tourism is economic development. Yeah,

it comes within those opaces. So uh to answer this question, yes and also to answer the previous question, I believe that that's exactly what we canect

because we have the data at tourism to show how many people come from out of town that go to the fairgrounds that drive back to their hotel. We can tell where they came from, where if they went to a restaurant before or after. And the tourism long before I was involved had a study done of some sort that used data to hypothesize uh how much economic total benefit there is from each visitor by the time they go out to eat five times and they stay three nights in the hotel and blah blah blah. And I don't have any of that. It was before my time. But they have some data on hypothetically what each visitor is worth. And so I think there's probably plenty of financials to back up that economic development does occur from

asking second what what instead of food and beverage or see economic development. Yeah.

Keep in mind that you know this is something for us to kind of think about in 26. If we floated a fairgrounds bond by itself, okay, and we said it's a geo bond, you could annually appropriate enough food and beverage year to make the payment so it isn't on the property tax role and you can leverage the food food and beverage over the next 10 15 years. But you think that a bond specific to the fairgrounds

is is all the same in every way to issuing a geo bond or if geo bonds as was said get tighter does issuing a bond specific to the fairgrounds have we've got other needs. Don't don't forget we're financing the uh radios. That's about 800,000 a year. We're also financing now the sheriff's cars about 6 or 800,000 a year. And so there's um money that we have kind of in our minds earmarked for Right. Right. which may become

right next now. No, in the future 28 28 or 29. But I I we're talking I agree that if we if we go ahead and and grant the rest of this project, which we've already, you know, agreed to once

and then say that that is capable of being if we need it, reimbursed on the next GEO bond and but then when we talk about the next GEO bond, I think in the mix we need to talk about phase two and three and then then we can determine because That's that's a six or eight month or 6 months from now conversation, but um they need the funds now to complete the rest of the thing before next summer. So, um so I think it would be a a geo just the process that we're going through right now that we've started. Right. Is what you're saying,

right? I I mean if if there needs to be a motion made, I would move that we approve the 500,000 out of food and beverage with the oposes that it would and on the next geo bonnet we we'd have to do a thumbs up and advertise. Oh, we have to advertise and we have to pass a resolution here for 26 because this would be 26. Yes, we've uh Oh, yeah. We're going to have 750,000 in the miscellaney. Huh? In the miscellaneation. Yes. Appropriation. So, we got 2.1 in. Okay. We got 750 in appropriation. Okay.

So, in 2026, January 5th or whatever the first meeting, we we would not have to do an additional out of food and beverage at this point time. We would be able to do that. Now I you if you are doing a you with me? Yes, I'm with you. I was wondering if we should if we should do an additional appropriation for it and then grant it in January or Well, the window for additional appropriations for practical purposes, okay? Because you got to advertise it and things like that, right?

So that window is closed. That window's closed. So we move over to 2026. We don't need an additional yet. You can work on that later if you need it. Once you use the 750, then I would highly recommend you approve the reimbursement resolution that Ice Miller has done before. Okay. At that same time, because these are hard serve hard materials, so you want that reimbursement resolution from the federal government standpoint that you did it all with the intent

from day one. So Scott Scott could bring the reimbursement resolution to a January meeting and we can pass that before you at the same time. Yeah. Okay. That should be your to align those together. Okay. That I just pay the 500,000 from food and beverage and we'll reimburse ourselves from the next Well, I think you don't agree to pay the 500 from thou from food and beverage until you've voted on your reimbursement resolution. Right. You have to address the resol. Yeah. Do that first. I don't think you're doing a vote to

You don't do a vote today. Doing a thumbs up and that's what you'll do in January. Yeah. Well, you do it in January or you do it January. You can't have the resolution by next week, right? No, it's January because we're tell and then and then they would come back. I think the real question is also how to handle the phase two and phase three. You got to start working on that. That's why I know you got to start working on it. You got to figure it out. the others start the inputs for another

because remember everybody capital will conver on the council level whether you want to do it that way and where you want to put it in. Do you want to absorb it within the next deal or have it stand alone or whatever? And and do we want to include 26 and 27? Closer we get to 28 or 29. I I would get yours somewhat out of Okay. Yeah. Do you have questions for us based on that conversation?

It's going to be January before we can grant it because we don't have the resolution. because I know that we the process that we went through we didn't get the actual dollars of the million right until April. So what is this process? We have the money appropriated now. Yes. It' be January. It would be January. So we would have a check in January to be able to go along as a resolution and a motion. As long as everything passes. Yes. Okay. That's Yeah. the 500,000 and with the same reporting requirements of the past. Does that run on the claim schedule? So, if we hit this in one of the January meetings, then does it fall to a claim schedule for getting paid or is it one off?

I can pay it whenever. Okay. So by the end of the month safely they will have they can if we vote to approve it in January they can then we'll we'll we'll do a additional appropriation to put more money in the fund after we do that in January because it only month of 2026 would initial discussions begin about another geo bond March capital improvement plan. So that discussion will continue right after I wouldn't be surprised if 2026 isn't our last one unless legislature changes and it'll be on January.

So we do need to fix what we can and get it over with. Going to have a a major change in the amount of people that's on the council too next couple years. Debbie, any other input? Do you have any other questions for us? We appreciate the support that you're giving us because we've investment in the community. I think you've done everything we've asked you to do. You know what I mean?

And um I like the idea that you come back and tell us what's happening and and this and that and and nobody's scared to come back and be rejected again. Okay? Because that's not the purpose. the purpose. I we said it earlier, if we don't have amenities, if we don't if we don't keep up with something in our county, we can't we can't bring the people in that we need for the tax base. And so,

yeah, the fairgrounds just went too long with no annual investment made in the maintenance and upkeep because everybody thought forever it'll move, it'll move, it'll move. And you you compound 10, 15, 20 years of of no funding real. Worst thing that happened was when they when they give up their tax rate. That was the worst thing that happened when they give up their tax rate because it was so small. And Jim might have been on the board back then. I don't know. It was like 40 years ago. But if they wouldn't have given their tax up No, no, I wasn't. But I was when my father and Walt was on the board and they did it because the county asked.

I know. I understand they were they were being good stewards, but then later on nobody wants to reciprocate. We would have taken it away in 2010. Believe me, you might have because when you were looking for a loan to make payroll. Yeah. And we weren't too. Thank you very much for Thank you for coming hearing our issues and supporting us and um know what else we need to do. Thank you. Yeah. Come uh in January we the conversation will continue. Yeah. We'll do they need to come take Do they need to be here? No, but if they want to be in the audience it's fine. 10 minute break. Thank you very much.

the battles at night after all that. Is Tammy gone? Gone. She had to leave. Okay. So, we're all here. Okay. Ta Kum and Church of God. Right. Titha Kum. Kum first. If you want to do any intro, I do it. Okay. Morning. Good morning. Go together.

Yeah. Uh well, you guys can come up. And I did want to make mention of the council just for clarity because I've had to dig to keep track of what's happening with the um opioid thing. You remember that we the state said there was a $500,000 match opportunity. The county sent a letter of intent to the state. Uh, Bill Spalding confirmed for me on Monday afternoon that they only received one application for that because of all the strings that were attached that were going to disqualify the church in Tithaum. They only received one application. It was from Aspire um who is partnering with Progress House now and um and so that is their only one to consider. the commissioners will decide whether or not they are going to apply to the state with that application. So 500 of the 1.1 million that's in opioid balances right now is currently earmarked for that unless the commissioners decide not to move forward. So that leaves 600 left presently up for discussion. Want to make sure everybody I don't think everybody had that information. I had to to really bug people along the way to keep up with it. So,

and the 500 could not be used for what we're talking about today. If the commissioners move forward with accepting Aspire's application, 500 of the 1.1 is spoken. Okay. Okay. And then if the state if they do move forward and apply to the state, but the state does not award them the match, the application was written as such as that entity is not guaranteed the county's 500,000 if the state doesn't match it and it would be back on the table. Can you clarify for me who Aspire is just real quick?

Yes. So, Aspire is a health entity much like you know Hancock Health or something and um Progress has partnered with them years ago for sustainability honestly financial sustainability and they have kind of incorporated Aspire into their uh recovery house programming and so Aspire is also now our community behavioral mental health facility. Remember we were giving 400 some thousand a year to Galahghue. Galahue left. Aspire is our new uh what is it? Balah whatever the acronym is

our new and they have applied for the 500 and asked the county to submit a 500k match app for them to build men's recovery housing. And so that leaves us with what's left there for now. and uh Titha Kum and the church both came I believe it was in March or April to talk about the the need and they both did not qualify or apply for that 500k opportunity and so they're both back today to revisit it. Yes. So I appreciate you guys letting us come back this morning. Of course you know me and I want you to I want to introduce Amy to you. Amy, can you say

Sure. Uh my name is Amy Bur, executive director for partnership, 20 years in the market rate housing sector and thenship for affordable housing. build affordable housing throughout Indiana. And then we also do some gifting and [Music] now build anything strictly for men or for women with state funds. Um so or up and also so we're gonna

Yeah. So Titha that's why we came this morning is to our grant is asking for 250,000. we have some uh funding in the bank and also with uh Amy coming alongside of us if we could get the 250,000 to then secure either something to rehab or build on that we would begin the process of doing that for our women to transition. It's the next step of success uh for our ladies and also in turn it's successful to the organization itself because it helps us be sustainable with funding for um the funds that the ladies pay for their rent and um be able to you know move forward in and looking that and it also helps us to be able to graduate them and help them get out a little bit faster than two years from the house. So that's why we came this morning and um we wanted just to um we're thankful that you guys would allow this process and we just are asking would you see the next step for us uh for the 250,000

if I can I think so there's a long application that you all have but yes at for this sort of secondary transition we're talking about transition to they're working. I know sometimes they're working and going to school. They're visiting with their kids again. So, they're the grocery store. They're contributing to the local economy. They're actually paying a portion of this rent. It's just that with either a felony or credit issues.

So, one, it's a financial issue, but two, they have these that have to burn on So providing them helping to provide them something where they're paying rent or helping utilities like I said they're going through they're going through all of the motions of living before they can transition into something. Uh Linda what what's the the total cost of of what you're talking about? Well I I came up with 750,000. Yeah. So what's the two I guess how much help was the 250 other than

well at least it would get us to be say that we have a match uh for other grant opportunities like Okra had a a um a grant for exactly 750,000 but we had to have a match from the county or the the city that we were in and that was not done a while back so we didn't have time to uh apply for that grant with our grant writer and so we had to let that um grant go. So, I think that 250 just puts us on the map to be able to tell other people we have this from the county. We can match this. We can we would also match

match. And so, we're we're just trying to put the the money together so then we can go out and really do something. Yeah. that ochre grant had this had Titha Kung made this request and it been approved even 30 days prior there'd be an application going in this week for $750,000 to okra that is specifically to build transitional housing. Yeah.

But when they come out with these grants I mean hey guess what this thing's coming due in six weeks. Well that's not enough time to get through government from scratch. and government has to not only say there's opioid dollars in it, but they also have to put their name on the application as con, you know, applying on behalf of basically. And so there's just no time without any aotment for them to apply for anything that comes up from a state agency.

How how many how many people are going to be in each house? Like you know, right now I think it's like like nine in your home house. Is this just a single family house? Is this a duplex? And then where's it going to be located? Well, we we don't have the property yet. Okay. So, we're still looking and we've looked at several, but also several have been bought from after we've looked at them. I mean, they go quickly, but also so two of our girls just transitioned out. They had to rent something together uh to be able to afford it. And then also, you know, I go and meet with those landlords and kind of put my name out there like that they're, you know, they're able to pay this. So, it was $1,400 for a two and a halfbedroom with a loft. And so, they get their kids every weekend. So, they're just transitioning back into be the mother. So, um it could be two people into an apartment, but we hope that it goes to one and they are able to get their kids in there or they could share. They could share. It could be two. No more than two. They're not going to leave a nine bed home where they've lived communally for with nine people to go live back in three and four people home. You know, they want to transition.

I meant like the house would be a duplex or Oh, yeah. We hope. Okay. That's what I'm trying to some duplexes and tries, but I mean ideally units and they're close to the house. They've got this sense of there. No, they have the same. Um, so we want to try to keep that sense of community. And are most of these in Greenfield that you're looking at or Yes, in Greenfield. Okay. Because that's where they're working.

And so, um, and you know, they're if they can stay where they're working and their kids are able then to come here, then it's good. And we're not they're not shipping back out to um areas where they came from. The majority of our, you know, people and the ask for 250. I mean, when they came earlier this year, they were asking substantially more. There's not a magic number on it, right? The more money you have, the more units you can take down is just the way it's going to pencil out. And so, as much as they could use a dozen units, it's hard to come up with all that money at once. So, can they can they get six units and then, you know, a few years from now, can they use those rents to purchase additional units? But I think one of the most important things that I would mention and again for the record for the teenth time I am a volunteer board member and current board chair of Tithkum. I'll recuse myself from any votes even though I drive no personal benefit and any allocation to real estate causes me a lot of extra volunteer hours. But I think some of you were here on this board back when Tithkum was founded and you remember uh making an initial investment and all the effort that went into creating Tithaum and you guys know I'm a numbers person and what it all comes down to after three years on the board is that if you want Tithaum to be sustainable long term, one of two things has to happen. You have to have what we have now, which is about 10 people every year working around the clock week after week on a volunteer basis, killing themselves to raise nearly a quarter million dollars a year from undetermined sources on a ongoing basis. Or you need to build in recurrent revenue streams to the program that at least partially sustain it and lower that fundraising obligation on the volunteer board. And the only ways that I've been able to deduce they can do that is to have

something like a thrift store kind of like the Hope House does or to have apartment housing that women can transition to as the next step and they still pay rent and that rent as long as TK doesn't have a mortgage is positive cash flow to help sustain the program they already have. So this is as much about building sustainability into Titha Kum's program and as an entity it's half that and it's half solving for what is currently the biggest issue which is people are staying up to two years because they can't afford to leave.

You know I don't I don't think there's I don't think any of us going to have an issue. The question is going to be we have sounds like $600,000 to use to the best of our ability and wisely of this funds from the federal government. And so there's a couple options, I guess. And so you have to figure out what's where best to allocate it, I guess.

Yes. Yeah. And I invited the church or the sheriff to invite the church back today to give you an update on their request because they were in the same same boat as Letha. They came, they said they wanted to build something. Everybody said, "Let's see this state match thing." It didn't get followed. Well, you find out way down the line that neither of these projects qualify for that. we've already earmarked money for it and have a different applicant for it that wasn't part of the original discussion. And so now we're back kind of at square one in April. Kristen, I can't see pastor, do you guys want to comment on your project as well and where you stand today? And

well, uh, we're about $135 in the church itself invested in it. Uh, purchased a property. Uh, we've got our prints. Matter of fact, I brought a set of those with me. We're show already. We already own the property. Um I know that, you know, the 250,000 you talked about what was remaining. Uh 250,000 would be ginormous for us forward. Uh we went ahead and relooked duplexes and we are building a duplex and we're we're housing eight men uh with happening um for transitional housing. And again, uh, as they have already said, housing in Greenfield is at a premium. Uh, when men come out, they don't have they don't have hygiene products. They don't have clothes. They don't have food. Uh, some of them don't even have a job by the time that they are released. And it's not everyone that we're looking at. It's the ones that's gone through the programs that the sheriff makes available for them uh to help them with opioid and alcohol addiction. um those are the ones that are going to be presented to us. Uh and then housing those eight men. Uh there is a a minimal charge per month and that's how we're trying to sustain it. The same situation that uh Linda is working striving toward having duplexes or triplexes uh so it couldn't become self- sustaining. We're launching from the launchpad with that in mind. But it's such a minimal amount. We're talking $375 a month um for for a room. Um you know that's that's extremely uh palable if I could use that terminology for for the

$375 a month per person

uh for the room itself. So uh we're we're looking at sponsors to sponsor someone when they first come out because they have nothing. it could take up to a month for they get their first paycheck. Uh so and we're trying to keep that even at a minimum. So our desire is just capital launch funds. $250,000 would catapult us forward huge um in what we need. We looked re went went back looked at some duplex plans and got a material list and was able to do one a little less expensive than the original plans that we were looking at. Um kind of hearing through the graveine some adjustments that were having to be made because of uh that 500,000 having to be set aside for the match funds. Um and so we asked ourselves, okay, what can we do? Um it was fairly substantial uh on the material list itself. We are trying our best to try to get a meeting uh with AF A FA Willham u largest general contractor here in in Indiana to see if they would partner with us. Uh maybe some volunteers that would come and assist in the facility as far as building and construction uh the electrical and things that needs to be accomplished and done. um if they jump on board, I mean, that's just a no-brainer for us. That's that's going to again set things forward uh pretty quick. But I mean, man, just a a thumbs up today launches this thing.

So, what what kind of total do you need? Just curious. Um for us to furnish the home, the 250,000 won't complete it. Um, we're probably going to be pushing three, three and a quarter uh total to furnish it. Um, it would do construction. 250,000 will build the facility. So almost we're dealing with right now the the uh city sewer because we are in the county. We're on septic systems. Yeah. Uh we have to facilitate a brand new septic system. So, what we're doing is we're talking to your guys, the city's

U septic folks, and they're open to us doing grinder pumps and and tapping, being able to to go ahead and tap in, but we right around 35,000 was the last quote that they had done. Um, so there's going to be a little fluctuation there. Uh, so another and there's, you know, if both of these projects obviously cost more than 250 a piece. I think everybody's trying to play well together and make everybody's projects possible by asking for 250, but they obviously need more and could do more and create worse. Wait, we've got it.

We got million food and beverage if you're looking simple math in the opioid money at 1.1. Is that right? Well, subtract 500k. So then we have six. Why Why would we keep any in it? I wouldn't keep any in it myself. So that's three and three. Yeah. So why wouldn't we give them each three? We don't have a five other projects up here that's going to benefit to this level. We I supported Titha Kum from the start. Jim and I Yes.

dug money out of everything to get get money from the start. I'm and and I agree that we don't have a men's thing and it's you know that project is important also. So I mean for me it's simple math. Why would we keep money in there? We take the you're going to get another quarter million a year give or take on. Right. So why don't we get rid of what we got so it goes to work instead of it just sitting in the county coffers. I think we had an open do we have an open application process on this? It's well you and Tammy were supposed to be on a And we did. We met once. Yeah. That I didn't think I ever met. No, we did. We met once. And then I harassed Bill Spalding to keep me in the No. Oh, very nice.

We are not opposed to a piece. Am I correct, Linda? Correct. Say no. I actually think though that that one of the big builders that we've spent 30 to50 million with over the last few years should partner with with somebody too. Absolutely. Who we built a new jail and we spent millions and millions and are you talking about Aspire? No, I'm talking about builder.

I'm talking about FA will or construction companies all all of these people took us for millions. RQAW I mean you know and and I'm I'm not a I I think you guys should should tap into that. Absolutely. Hey, Hancock County's been really good for you people and and why aren't you doing more to help the community and that was one of the avenues that we were going with Wilhelm because one of our our board members um does work with Wilhelm and has you know if you want to go back 30 years 1986 FA Wilhelm built the first factory in in Greenfield it was called IP. Yes.

Okay. So, they've been taking a lot of money from Hanok County for a lot of years.

Absolutely. And that's definitely an angle that we're working uh Mr. Fix and we appreciate that. I want to go back to Mr. Shelby's question of, you know, where are we? What is our plan? So, we have blueprints here. Um we've we've revisited numbers based on, you know, um not getting the the first round of funds and and kind of, you know, going back and having to rework. We have submitted the application. Um Anthony Scott um submitted that application. We have formed the 501c3. Um we have we've started accepting funds um from our congregation as well as minimal as they are. Um you know to try and get that seed money. We have the rental property that we've already placed a family in that are in a contract with us for a minimum of a year.

The property is within um two years of being paid off now. Um and that rental money is going to pay for the property. So, if we could get this capital investment from this grant application, whatever we want to call this, from these from you, from this board committee, um, we have everything and we've made the movement. It's not just a vision anymore. We're there. We just need that capital investment to be and honestly, we need it to be able to get more money. And I'm sure, you know, they can they can attest to that as well.

When you people see that it's real, that's when they're willing to give you more money. Do we do we need a commissioner's approval? Uh, yeah, I think you would. Not on opioid funds. That was on ARPA. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. My concern would I I can't imagine they wouldn't be on board. Well, I mean, but it might just be something that you might

Well, let me tell you the only thing that that bothers me about that is that nothing said it's the ARPA money specifically said it was board of commissioners planning. Opioid money does not. And the only thing that bothers me about that is that back in March and April when we talked about this, we formed a committee that was supposed to explore all our options and create processes and project it all over town and get every possible application in the county. and none of that happened. And now the applications don't go to the committee because there wasn't enough time left in the window. So there's only they were due Monday and the commissioners immediately had to turn them over and then the commissioners will vote on those applications which there was only one without ever bringing it back before council and getting our opinion and that was never the way any of that was supposed to work. And honestly, I should have sat on the committee because I'm the most familiar with this and I tried to stay away from it because I am the most familiar with it. And in turn, we've ended up with a process where nobody knew about it. The sh I called the sheriff. There was a 30-day application window with the county. And I called the sheriff weekend and despite being at all this these meetings, he had absolutely no idea the application was open

in a 30-day window. So, I told him, "Get with the church." So turning this into well we need other permission. I don't agree with that at all given the way it's gone. So I think we've done enough due diligence for the community on the on the projects. I mean I don't that was six months ago that we started the process or longer and if we don't have more people it's it's too late now. You know I mean I think we've done our due diligence as a courtesy we ought to do that but I I have a question. I know about Titha Kum's management and longevity, but um uh Scott, could you kind of fill us in? You are the minister. I'm the pastor. Yes,

the pastor. So, sorry, that was my main thing. Threw me off. I'm in the Methodist church and I know we turn the pastors about every five years. So, what what's the what's the setup of the church of God with with the church of God? um they don't they don't they don't relocate. It's literally up to the pastor uh on relocation and he has to go ahead and ask concerning that and put his name out right for an overseer is how the our setup to look for the possibility of a relocation for him within the state.

I've been in Indiana all my life. I've never lived anywhere else. I've never pastored anywhere else and I've been pastoring for 35 years. I have been at the Greenfield Church for the last eight years. I will retire from here. Yes. Our home is in Hancock County. I live out off 500. I'm glad the Church of God does that because I left the Methodist church because every five years they shifted a new person in. Here we go. And I was like, "He'll take you to your church." Kids and stuff and they go, "Who's this new person?" and all this. I said, "Come on to our We're not doing that no more. We're not shifting every every two or three years. That's ridiculous. We'll have to uh we'll have to vet you." But

well, you you you develop a relationship. I'm just concerned that and Methodist served there. I can tell you I have attended that church um since I was born. I was dedicated. Uh my grandmother and my great aunt were the founding fathers of that church. Um and you're only 20. Exactly. Exactly. So only 20 years. Um no, so I have been attending that church um for 43 years. Um probably in my younger years, just a a little bit of backsliding that happened, but I am uh you know, I'm a tithing member that has been there. My family is as well. Um my brother is um he's a associate pastor. Yeah.

Um at the church. My father is an elder. Um so either way I can tell you I I can count on one hand how many pastors I've had at that church. Can I ask you, did I read it right in your application? It sounds like you guys are going to have a nonprofit entity separate from the church. So the church is going to own the asset3 is going to city going to manage and do the operation

and then you're going to get a level one DMHA certification. Yes. So my point I guess is just even if the pastor did change every 5 years, you have a nonprofit, you have a nonprofit board and you have a certification to be audited on annually and that will be a functioning entity of its own essentially. And our board requirements for that 501c3 are 51% uh member church member seated. Um, we have and we we're asking for one seat to be fulfilled by the sheriff himself or herself where I don't know the rules. Sorry for what sheriff requirements are. Um, and then um obviously other community members and at this time our board is only church members. Well, yeah, you're way early in the game. I would like to make a motion that we not only agree to the 300,000 for each of these projects, we also agree to the Aspire so that the commissioners and them can go on with their trying to get their match and that covers the whole the whole fund. And um because I think um we do want the commissioners to agree to it too. We don't want them to come back and say, "No, this is the worst thing that ever happened." I mean, they're not going to do that. But we we we want to agree to and they need uh I don't know if they need our approval or not to go on with Aspire, but uh we could agree to that at the same time.

Well, could we vote on this and make it contingent on approval of by the commissioners so we could go ahead and get it going? Yeah. And they have a meeting next week. Next week? No, it's two weeks. It's two weeks. Well, they have a meeting in two weeks. So, but c can we do that, Scott? You can. You want to formalize that motion? I'm that's that was my motion to um um agree to give out of the opioid money 300,000 to Elite the Kum 300,000 um to the Church of God for their project and then the 500,000 for the Aspire um for the Aspire project to be matched by

to be matched by the state and then um and then have contingent that the the commissioners also u agree to the same at their next meeting. Second that been moved and seconded that uh that's what we do as as articulated by Is it okay if I make a comment before we vote? Second. I just want to make a comment for the general public because they're watching us now that this is not taxpayer money. Well, it's federal. Yeah. Well, yeah, but it's opioid set. No, it's an opioid settlement. It came from the court, not tax because they were sued. Got it.

So, it's not taxpayer money any way, shape, or form. This is just separate the motions just in case. So, something doesn't work. That's probably a good idea. Okay. Well, okay. So, I'll make I don't think it's going to be any uh I I'll make the first motion that we allow uh Titha $300,000 out of the opioid money. And the same stipulation applies that the commissioners agreed to it at their next meeting. And then so I need a second for that motion. What's the financial second it Robin? Oh, is there a financial problem? Okay.

Well, so so there's there's 1 million99. Yeah. So you technically are obligating more money than you have. You're short $145. Okay. Do you want to say with excess to be compensated through food and beverage if we're short a few dollars? Yeah. So, it it's really obligate more. I think we're have key donate $5. I will I can donate each organization 150 if it half of what's in there. Got to obligate only what you got. Okay, that's fine. Um then we we we've got to split the

ease of clarity. Let them have the $300,000. I'll do the $140 short. Okay. All right. All right. So my motion still stands with the 300,000 for Tita Kum out of the opioid fun that with the commissioners the stipulation of the commissioners. Is there a second? Robin, we did that. Okay. been moved and seconded that we um allocate uh 300,000 from the opioid settlement money for uh Titha Kum uh with the understanding that the uh commissioners uh agree. All those in favor say I. I. All those opposed abstain abstain. Okay. Now my second motion what's the you get the exact number.

Uh the second motion is for the church of God. I need the exact number though. 299, um 855,000. Can I make a suggestion? Do you want to do something like 299 and then and a,000 out of food and beverage and just Yeah, that's fine. I I'll I'll make my motion is $299,000 um out of the opioid funds and $1,000 out of food and beverage for the um for the Church of God project um contingent with the uh stipulation for the commissioners at the next meeting. 1,000 coming in 2026.

Okay. We don't have enough money now. We have $700,000 in there. Yeah. We still have roughly 200,000 in food and beverage. Yeah. Yes. So, it's to be paid now. There a second. Second. Been moved and seconded that we do that. All those in favor say I. I. I. All those opposed. Okay. Now, do we need to make theire So, the third motion is to um is for the $500,000 out of the opioid money to be granted for the Aspire project. um in contingent that they do get their match from the state and that the commissioners agree to it at their next meeting.

Second been moved and seconded by Robin. Y that we do that. All those in favor say I. I. I. Thank you everybody. Thank you. Thank you Miss

Oh. Oh, no worries, honey. Can I ask you a quick question? It's not related to this, but um are you the Church of God that used to be on Broadway? No, I didn't think so. Out there. Yeah, I thought so, but I was just checking. I live across from that church. I'd hug you if you weren't if there wasn't so much table between us. Just stick around. Sitting there for months and months waiting for another application. Uh old business. Well, you can always take the applications for next year, too. Yes, we got more.

Uh, this is the um HDC budget for 24 and 25. And I'll just point out it's for you to take and peruse. Mary for your request. No. Oh, and we might want to pass one down for Tammy. Oh, I will. Yeah, you took Mary's candy to you. Oh, okay. Huh. And Mary's was different. No. No, it's the same one. Not candy. Candy. You didn't give Mary.

Yes, I did. Oh, I didn't give Mary to her. I say the right Mary. I was thinking that Mary. I was wondering why. I can send one to Tammy. She'll want to see this. I'm willing to go as to where we're at. Can you do me a favor? Yes. And just know there will be quarterly financial report every with the auditor's office, but they can help you get acclimated to that. Okay. Thank you for what you're doing. Yeah. Thank you. Perfect.

So, I'll just I'll just leave that with you, but I'll point out that one, there's no 26 budget here. Uh, but because it's not approved yet by the um HDC, uh, but you can add 3 and a.5% to the salaries and that's basically what the 26 budget will be. Also in 24, look down at the bottom and it says funding to the CDC of a 100,000. That was uh excess monies that uh they had. CDC is the community development corporation. Uh this was developed uh created by the CEOs of the Greenfield Banking Company, Ninstar and um uh regional hospital uh to be um kind of a guiding uh group uh in the county for economic development. They have no money. So the uh HDC gave them the 100,000 uh to help go after the ready grants uh that um the ready grants had to have a a recip a a unit of government not of government but in the county to uh uh go after the grant. So CDC was the only uh unit in the county to do that with. They had no uh uh staff. So HDC was the um operating group that went after the ready group, the ready money uh which resulted in I'm

not sure how much I don't remember right now but 1.4 4 million of it uh was uh given by HEDC to the uh school to buy the land. I think the ready grant paid for the first property and I think that helped pay for the second property. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. For we paid for the 100,000 that allowed them to do the grant, right? Pardon me. Yeah. We paid for the hundred,000 and allowed them to do the grant. Freddy grant. Yeah. But that I mean that came out of the 600 and some thousand we give them that year.

Yeah. Yeah. Yep. But that's not an ongoing thing.

No, that was a one-time thing. Uh there's u if you talk to those people including uh Randy u there's kind of a long-term um vision that the CDC would be um an operating unit for uh economic economic development. For example, uh when we uh put the old jail up for bid, one of the um ideas at that time was if we got no private um people to buy that um building that we might give it to the CDC and let them do the best thing for it. So, when we're talking about moving the um uh justice system from downtown Greenfield to the farm, questions have come up as to what are we going to do with the courthouse, for example. And one of the options we probably have is to have the CDC take it over and do something with it, get it off our hands. We wouldn't have any choices what they're going to do with it, right?

What decade is that going to be out of our hands like that? What decade is that going to be? Who knows? Okay. But you have to be will be around by then. Infrastructure, we won't either,

you know, to do things and that's okay where that's coming from. So for 25 if you look at the 25 budget down there the net income uh projected is about 140,000. So I am saying that if if we want money if we need money for the um uh getting up and going of the uh school whatever you call it now amplify

amplify that uh I would think HDC would be able to contribute some cash now and probably in the future. So second page if you want to see the revenues I I attached it. It's a regurgitation of the 25 budget but it include the uh revenue so you see where revenues come from. You said did you say what their balance sheet looks like presently? What's the

uh Nobody asked for the balance sheet. I would have but I've got it someplace. I'll be glad to bring it in. So it other fees [Applause] 5% of eight is the fire and then 2025 saying 490,000 but in 2025 it's actually 732,000. Oh, that's what it's been. Well, I mean that was the numbers we got the other day. It was 732,000. Yeah, that was over several years. No, next year's it's projected at 600 some thousand 641,000 or something like that somewhere here or maybe

I can't remember what number five let's see what's Mary what's the fund number that cash flows that 5% fee I think it's 490 No it's not 4908 um here

cuz if this is based off of 490 450 is what was um this show is 24 I think I wonder I think these are paid maybe a year 732 is what this shows for 25 Right. And they're basing their numbers off of 490 in their budget. So where's the extra-

which is 450 for the year before? I think I think these numbers I think probably HDC actually gets the money a year after this is my guess. Okay. Okay. So the 26 budget would show income of 730 732. That's fund 1149. Oh. Oh yeah, there's 400 here.

So yeah, this only shows 400,000 coming in here to date as of is that through November 30th? Y and so what does that mean? Where's the other 330? Uh, probably with settlement, which is which was just approved yesterday. So, okay, that will probably be distributed within the next two weeks. Now, if it was 400,000 in the first settlement of the year, why would the second settlement not be 400,000? It Well, it probably be less. That's the

It might be a little bit less. Um, but Nicole would really be the one to answer that and she's actually curious if we're paying if we're if we're 2025 pay 2024. Those calculations are uniform all year. The assessed value is uniform for the full calendar year. So why the spring and fall installments are different? I guess it depends on if they pay. Sometimes some of them will pay the whole thing like in the spring or whatever. So you get less in the fall. I got you always. So I'm looking at an email from your question. They'll be in. So she thinks it will be 732,000. Okay. For the for 24 pay 25.

Okay.

Okay. So, oh, well, I'm not clear on all the numbers yet, but if if they're if their budget is 534,000 or 535,000 and our income or or their their draw is 732,000. plus their income that they're getting from everybody else. Then there's more money than the 138,000. Just remember this is a budget,

okay? Not actual, okay? So I mean if the income is more than 673,000 then the net income down there will be will reflect that. Yeah. Well it's going to be because they're accounting for 490 and if it's 732 that's 242,000. So then so then the the number here goes to 380,000. So then we ought to ask for 200,000 for the school

or 380,000 or 300. But you got to ask for it. Yes. By the way, I talked to Michelle M. McConnell who is uh the uh fundraiser for the school. Yes. And um I recommended that she talk to HDC. Nobody has. Okay. So,

well, I didn't I I didn't bring it up to the board until we vetted it here. You know what I mean? I didn't I didn't bring it up to the Amplify board because I wanted to vet it through here first to make sure that that I wasn't speaking on my own. Um but and I know Michelle had talked to Walmart, you know, we've been through Walmart and they talked to Walmart again. Um, and then I don't know if you got the recent email. She did get to talk to somebody from Bentonville, but it's about a $20,000 I think thing at this point. Um, so I told her we would continue to to um to have conversations with

Is that a year or a one time thing? I figured I was hopeful. Now, Walmart, but we're not turning down $20,000, believe me. I know. Yeah. But now Walmart was in discussions. We had on the tax abatement side was I think offering like $100,000. We haven't seen that come through yet. The the Buck Creek Township Fire Department has asked them also has talked with Walmart and and I think the grants they're talking about are $20,000, but we we haven't seen we haven't seen that come through yet. But we haven't vetted this other Walmart thing yet either. So,

well, Robert and I had met with Walmart and that's what said. I mean, it it's positive that they're it's positive that we're getting positive from them. Okay. Cuz I'm I'm not going to say anything bad about anybody that's willing to to donate um additional funds. Sure. But we just still need I think the conversation still needs to continue. But all right. Um, so you asked for it, so there I appreciate that. That might circumvent us from having to try to change the law. You know what I mean?

Oh, yeah. Because the changing the the rule might not be as easy or take longer, but I'm not against doing that if we have to, right? Um, yeah, I guess it's the will of So, like let's say Amplify wants to make an official ask. I'm assuming HDC doesn't have a standard process and form for that. So, Amplify just gets on the agenda of an HDC board meeting much like you would here or how does that work? Just ask us. Would they have to go to what is it executive? That'd be nice for him to do that. Yeah,

that'd be nice. Yeah. The next board meeting is uh December, it's the third Wednesday. You've already approved your 2026 budget at the HDC or that'll happen at that meeting? Yeah. And I I I I think that amplified president is going to caucus for council seat.

Mary Zerbach for district one. Okay, great information. I move we approve the minutes from the last board meeting. Second. All those in favor? I I opposed. Pass. Mary, you may have or two.

Okay. Last item I've got is just a couple of auditor action items. So, Galahghue is no longer our mentor mental health provider. um they they did finally return half of the money from what we'd originally paid them earlier this year, which in turn Aspire has been waiting on since July. So, we received the money last Monday and then Aspire sent us the invoice. We were actually able to get that advertised um for a public hearing next week. So we advertised it last Wednesday. So that gives us our 10 days. We would like to get this 2025 money back out to Aspire in calendar year 2025. Um instead of paying it next year and be late. Um there was an issue years ago when we did not pay the mental health on time.

We got So we we thought it would be good to go ahead and do that in the same calendar year and just get that money back out to them. So, where is it appropriated to be extended? Um, it is back in the commissioner's budget or it will be next week if you approve it at your council meeting. So, it's it it's it'll come in already appropriated or you have to advertise that? No, we had to we advertised it last Wednesday in order to meet the 10day deadline for next week. So, next week we'll hold a public hearing and if you approve that, then I will get it appropriated and Amber can cut a check to Aspire before the end of the year. So, no action for us today.

No, I just wanted to give you a heads up that that would be coming next week. And um we had pretty much determined that that would be your your stance would be to Yes. get that money back out in 2025 since since that's when it was meant to be spent. Okay. Okay, so just a heads up on that. And then the last thing, um, we need a budget transfer approval for CASA. They have a shortfall in their case manager line, which is a part-time employee line. They are asking to transfer some money from a supply line to the case manager line so they can make their payroll on Friday.

And that was motion that was for $1,4582. And that's going to cover them till the end of the year. No, I think that'll cover them through this payroll and then we're going to have to try to figure out how we're going to pay this employee for the last pay of the year. And why are they short? I think he's just worked a lot of hours. Um Kasa has had a lot of cases this year. And what is the just structurally, you know, with any other departments? I mean, do they have plenty of room in their other budget line items without?

They do. I think it'll just need an approval from you next week because it's going to be from a different category. Okay. Again, I think the justice system has just been real active this year. Busy courts. Well, I'll make a motion to approve the budget transfer request for CASA from supplies to case manager for $1,458.28. I'll second it. It's been moved and seconded that we do that. All those in favor say I. I. Opposed? Passed. Anything else, Mary? Nope. That was all I had.

There there is apparently, according to Mary, a um scheduled combined meeting on December 30th. I know I'm not going to be in the state. Would would would anyone like to uh make a comment on that uh to the commissioners maybe to cancel the DO? What's the content supposed to be at this point? I'm I'm not sure what's on the agenda. They were discussing cancelling it, too. They were. Yeah, they were.

I I probably won't be in attendance either. It's just not gonna that's really a tough date for people to go. Yeah. So, do we have what's that look like to communicate that we would prefer another time? I mean, is there 2028? We don't have any pressure, you know, issues pressing us for the 30th. I can definitely pass that along. Thank you,

Jim. Just one last comment on the capital improvement plan. We should get that totally vetted by second quarter of next year because third quarter we would want to issue the geo bond because what we found out this year is fourth quarter did not work out real well. You were early fourth quarter but we we have been receiving anything I told you don't do it between Thanksgiving and Christmas. That has really hold true. there are maybe not even berstors anymore. So why wouldn't we do it earlier?

We would. That's what I'm saying. So get but last time it took a little time to vet the capital improvement plan. So let's make our final deadline no later than the second quarter, end of second quarter. So we can issue in the third quarter and we would be doing documents to get there. Why wouldn't we put it on the agenda for January? U I wholeheartedly believe you should but you know you you got to have a team you got to have commissioners and counsel right so the radios is a big part of that is that was that a multi-year thing or is it end at this geo bond that we've already had

it's it's forever okay is those radios have John told us a life of uh I don't know, eight years, 10 years, something like that. So, he split up the county total radios into years, replacing them in sections, and it's about $800,000 per year forever. Oh, yeah. But these bonds are going to go away because they ain't pay 4%. Craig's the one that passed SB1 and and maybe our program for financing the radios will go away. Okay, we may not.

Honestly, if the idea was out there when we when we agreed to do that, part of that notion was if we do this, we won't do all these oneoff requests, right? We're absorbing this 800,000 year expense as a whole and that's our contribution to the system and don't come ask for more. But obviously, nobody correlates that. They still come ask for more. I don't know that within a couple years anyone will appreciate that they're not paying for their radios anymore and that we absorbed it for them. And well, I tried to get a motion that and we wouldn't pass it that u if we did that for the county

that they shouldn't they wouldn't we wouldn't listen to any. Yeah. My advice is don't take on multi-year liabilities, right? It's bad for your balance sheet. That's coming next year. Well, this program is one of those I think that has been really successful in that every in the county, every um you know, policeman, every fireman. I say we go as long as we can. I mean, it's a good program.

It's one It's one of those deals we go as long as we can. Well, another thing about those is is we've set them up like people do to replace so many each year. That doesn't mean that they completely stopped working. It means you're staying ahead of, you know, declining equipment use. But at any given year, if we were in a real tremendous situation, there's just no replacement of radios, right? No. And we we worked for the last 10 or 15 years catching up on vehicles, all those things. So if the if if the world falls apart in 2028 or 2029, then some of those things will just have to go on hold until something else changes. Wait for something. Scott will still be here, but I

move we adjourn. I'll second. Thanks again, Jim, for the turkey.