Village Council - Regular Meeting

thank you for being here tonight and we'll start with a prayer from pastor steve and other religions lord i thank you uh i thank you that you are part of our lives while i continue to pray for the village of pixarville that we have wisdom and guidance to follow you lord i pray that we realize the love and the grace and the forgiveness that you give each and every one of us continue to uh support our leaders continue to give them wisdom and guidance to guide the village We're in glory and honor to you. In Jesus' name, amen.

Oh man, I got all kinds of stuff in here. The first thing I was here about, probably have a couple copies of this even though you guys need it. There's 32 acres of ground on the kiddie farm that I'm trying to get annexed into the village limits. It's kind of a weird piece. The orange is the village limits and then this a parcel number, legal description, and a survey. Is that true? I don't really know what the next step is. I just brought this stuff and would like to ask if you guys would accept that ground in however the next, however it works, I don't know. I think Kent has done some farming in the past. Per the survey, it's kind of a discrepancy in my opinion, it says 40 acres similar scenario when i bought the hicksville golf course years ago the kind of the parcel said 60 acres a legal description when we got it all surveyed it was actually 68 acres and they told me that back in the old days when they used rocks and boulders and the accuracy of gps was and all that's how far off they were and i'm thinking maybe this might get So in the past, I annexed in the ground across the street from the high school, the lot. And then Diane Collins, when she was mayor, she reached out to me and went, oh, if I would annex in the shuffle worker property right next to the five acre mill, she was trying to get the five acre mill to come in. And I said, sure. And I never did anything. i never heard another thing i think i came to a city council meeting and that was about it i never in my life ever walked around and got signatures or petitions from any neighbors on the property which i'll do it if i have to if that's what i need to do then i'll do it as far as getting a survey with all the signatures on it i don't even know where to start to do that when i did the annexation before troy essex was a solicitor he made

48 or something just tell me what i need to do any surveyor can do a survey i got one annex annexation survey okay don't know what all lines to put on you okay but there should be some of the three county offices so so i use seth cole so just call seth and tell him i need an annexation survey i just kind of

Only $200 survey there. But he just needs to add lines to it. I could probably do that.

Signature lines for all the different offices. Okay.

Well, I can do that myself. What do you go through? I just need to know what lines need to be on there. I called John McCullough today from the township after I spoke to Mike. He told me to reach out to Mike Bailey. And Mike told me to reach out to Warren Slaughter. so i was i was told the first thing to initiate all this is i've got to come and basically ask you guys if you would accept it before i start i guess going and getting a survey with the signatures does that sound right carol okay so i guess i'm here tonight to ask you guys if you would accept whatever the acreage is i think it's 40.49 acres into the city limits Just a quick question, why do you want to get an accident? Because it gets the water in the sewer.

Without that, you get paid double water, double sewer. We tried to talk people in Haverdrag, in front of Haverdrag, to do that. They don't understand.

I don't know why you wouldn't do it. But they had to go around and get signatures. I think the reason... Would they have to go get signatures? Because there's like, I mean, there's about 40 of them and they all got to agree.

You can't have spaces in here. Right. Three houses don't want it. When the next one does, they have to have a certain percentage of people on the front neighbor drive would have to sign.

I wonder if that's what Avery's talking of, of me going to get signatures because I'm the only land holder. I'm just, you know, I'm, it's not like there's a whole bunch of us. It's just me. And I'm like, Hey guys, I'm here to take the 40 acres. I could easily see you need to go around if there was a, like a row of Hayward Drive, because you're not gonna skip. So, Hayward, I'll do whatever you tell me to do.

Okay, I'll look into it a little bit more, because, yeah, I'll find out what the petition for Cheryl is.

And I think Warren would give you some good advice on how that works. He's been our county engineer for a long time.

I spoke to Kent, and I think Kent was the village administrator at the time.

I didn't think, I don't want to make extra work for Cheryl, but just come up and pull the lead, pull up the shuffleboard and make

Can I do a public records request of how we did that?

Yes, you may.

Okay. Thank you. Appreciate that. So that's the first thing that I report. So I've got a question. annexed they never they never went in i was gonna say with the annexation i think you have to touch a property that touches you know what i actually ended up thinking is mark haber owned this small little sliver in between me and five acre mill and he never annexed so then the city couldn't force them into it i was just questioning because yeah No, they're not. Cali has told us it's still in the county.

That's why I was just asking. So the new drive for the school at 18, that's county, because that could be annexed in because Van Crest wasn't annexed in, but it still wouldn't have been annexed in, but the school's annexed in. So if there's an accident on the drive at 18, it's in the county. Yeah, you can't call a local PD. I see.

Like the whole school zone is in the county. I know with the Shuffenberger lot, I don't think Ms. Gifford She didn't allow to be annexed in, so they went around her and came back up and got my property here across from FWT and they were trying to get the next property to be a five acre mill, but it never happened. But my point of that was that I've done it twice and I don't ever remember going around getting signatures. It doesn't seem to be a very big deal. steps you need to do for annexation and i just text that to you it did like four different steps so maybe that'll help okay i've looked at all that i i've had multiple different ways to do it kent told me away cheryl said away avery said away i just need to know what way so that's it so if you can give me a shuffleberger thing then i'll try to figure out how to mirror basically. Good? Alright, next up, I got another paper. Is the property next to Charlie's, which I think Brian Demlin was in here a while ago about it, and I think you guys told me to get a survey, which I had the survey done, and I had a legal description written for the property, and I just want to know now what the next i was under 100 foot you guys were going to sign it over to me so i could have a parking lot on that side i i went to the um planning commission like i was asking they said yes they were for it spoke with corey corey and i was putting in the water Phil stationed down there and he was satisfied with the amount of ground. I was told the next step that I needed to do was get a legal survey of the 100 foot and get a legal description, which I have. And then I was told about somehow, I don't know how this all works, you guys sign it over to the CIC and the CIC can sign it over. But then also today on the phone, speaking with Mike, he said you guys could do a property split. So I don't know. I thought annexation was the same thing. I don't know what to do next. So that's a lot split. Lot split. That's what. So then they can do a lot of split and then get a deed transferred over to me for the longer they put.

So with the lot split, because I know there was questions about us having some stuff underneath the parking lot. Is it going to be written into it that we still have access to that?

We're not over at 100 feet. Okay. So we're good. Okay. Perfect. Okay, so then I guess the next thing would be who needs to take the next, push the ball to the next girl.

Because it's been through all the committees and channels. So I think it just needs the legal description and then the resolution for the law. Right, so there should be that.

Now, I did print these off for you.

Here is a full design of the property that we spoke of for a while.

I refer to it as a caduke farm.

Mike, how are you doing? Good. Good. Corey, Avery, Cheryl. Okay, I come in here a couple weeks ago, and we spoke about a TIF, and I was asking about a 30-year TIF, and if we did a 30-year TIF, we had to go through other channels. So after some phone conversations with Donnie Warner and Mike and Erica and some other people, because I had to come up with a whole master plan. And who knows, that's trying to project 30 years from now, but you still have to have a drawing to submit it for the TIF. So that's the 30 year projected drawing of what could happen on that property. I see some of you looking at it close and turning your paper and trying to figure out what's what. Maybe if I could get Cheryl's, them out on the Statecraft 2 area with a section of townhomes and basically a retirement area and more smaller lots and then bigger lots. So that's the master plan. Tomorrow I have a call with Donnie Warner at 2 o'clock, the attorney. The way I understand it now is you break it up into little grids. Is that what you understand, Mike, basically? districts all throughout there obviously you're never going to do this all at once you're going to do parcels and he's going to put grids on a piece of paper and when you get in that grid it triggers the time frame for the tiff so Yeah, that's not right. I couldn't get GPT to not know the hook to Westwood. Some of the stuff is not accurate. It's more or less just for a visual. Because if my architect would want $5,000 to do that in two hours, my kid tried to talk to Champ GPT and we couldn't get the whole 3D. I thought it was better than a Sharpie drawing coming in here. So some of these things are not right, like where it goes in the Westwood. I understand that. I was just trying to give you guys an overall. So I guess my... As I continue to work with Donnie Werner and spend money and time, is this something that the city looks like would be But it's hard for me to paint a picture so far out, but I have to show them something. So that's what this kind of is. So if the town thinks this is something that our community, it would go in our community, then this is what I'm having. I'm going to try to move over to.

Quick question. Yeah. You're worried. Is there like the tiny home development?

So down in Florida, they have these little cute. I almost call them cottages with front porches and stuff on them. Down there, they have carports on them. I don't want carports on them because I think the carports will turn into junk. Everybody will throw their junk in there. And I have storage behind Casa Grande and back behind the Chevy dealership. And I would like to sell those to... And as far as the tiny homes, I don't want it to turn into a junk trailer court either. So what I want to do is write an HOA for that whole area that's strict that you can't have trampolines. You can't have things sitting outside. Your car's got to be parked not on a street and a road.

all the way down the very bottom of south end here.

That would be your last, or the last section over the tiny home area would be the last section that you're going to do. I'm assuming you're going to start up top. I'm going to start up top. I'm going to start up top.

I would like to start up top, and I would like to start on both sections on the south side. And yes, I do own that section. And when it comes time to do that, I think what we need to do is sit down again as a council and make the HOA and the restrictions. Every house has to have a two-inch caliper, a hardwood tree. Every house has to have an evergreen one. I mean, I got so nitty-picky in Leo, it's the only way you can protect stuff. And especially if we do a product like the tiny homes, I don't want it to turn into a junk pit. So I want to work with Corey and the council and every house has to have a trim around the windows, got to have a porch on the front, got to have nice stuff, if that makes sense. So that would be it. My goal is obviously, I think you all know I'm up against time frame because there's a house going up right now. Dean Yoder just called me the other day and said to I can't start the water and sewer to go to that house until a tip is in place. So it's a real time change. It's going to be a stretch to even get it in place before I need to. Tomorrow I'll meet Madani. If we're all on board, I'm going to keep the ball rolling.

Yes, Edwin.

Looks like the boards and commissions have a public notice about all lots, but I believe

CLEARLY SURE. We want to try to do it where there's not an emergency again.

just a question i said this the last time should we pass this an emergency tonight to move forward with the others Final reading of ordinance 2026-07, designating CIC of defiance as the agent for the ability to fix, bill and authorizing and approving the execution of an agreement and plan of the industrial commercial distribution research

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

And then we have first reading on the resolution from 26-18 by caption only to enter agreement OCIC and Defiance County regarding transfer of real property and declaring an emergency.

I'll make a motion to sign the rules.

Second.

Roll call.

Edwin? Yes. Miller? Yes.

2026-18 by caption only to enter agreement with CIC of defiance regarding the transfer of real property. So moved.

I'll second.

Roll call. Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yes.

Yes. Yes.

First reading of resolution 2026-18. the CIC a defiance of county regarding transfer of real property and declaring it an emergency.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yes. Second final reading of resolution 2026-19 by caption only to enter agreement with the CICU Defiance Academy regarding the transfer of real property. Move. I'll second.

Roll call.

Pass it. Yes. Yes. Yes.

First reading of Resolution 2026-20, by Catherine Ornley, Submitted to the Electors of the Bill, to fix over the question of the rule of the $2 million tax levy for fire protection, emergency medical services, and the clarion in emergency. Can we make a motion to suspend the rules?

I'll second.

yes that's it yes miller yeah yes second final reading of resolution 2026-20 by caption only submitting to the electors of the village of hicksville the question of renewal of the two million dollar tax study for fire protection emergency medical services emergency second roll call yes miller

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

second final reading of resolution 2026-22 by caption only authorizing the village administrator to prepare and submit an application for membership in the ohio das cooperative purchasing program and acquiring emergency second roll call

uh has written one and we just have to double check to make sure that's going in place the jefferson holdings has been written approved by all of the attorneys involved avery and donnie and uh jefferson's attorney yeah yeah so i guess my question is now does the mayor have whoever the i think you're the signer on it and i'm also the signer on it right i got approval from my board last week that once the the village signed off

and then I could sign off. So I guess I want to make sure that the mayor has authorization to sign that development agreement so we can make sure we get the land transferred. Because you don't want to transfer the land without that agreement in place.

I just want to make sure everybody was okay with that.

And then with Mr. Keller, they're working on a big project right now. But once that gets done, which we're close to getting a resolution there, that's when they're going to start really getting active in the Hicksville. So we'll put that on.

to the tower. I had mentioned to Corey and I also mentioned it to Brian Keller and Michael Wall that if, and I did mention it to you too, if their excavators are out there and they're moving dirt and everything, I didn't know if they could work together with moving the road at the same time. So maybe that's another discussion.

I also would probably need to get an updated quote, but we are going for an OSIP grant for the state, which is Ohio Speculative Inventory Program. So maybe what I do is like also like we might be able to get an updated quote and submit that in conjunction with Keller. Okay. So I'll check on that. I'll get with Rick from SMTA. It's been a little while since we had an updated quote. That'd be perfect.

I appreciate it. Thank you very much. After that, we have department heads. Chief Denning?

The only thing I have is the insurance committee that we put together last year.

Uh, we had one council member on it and that council member is no longer here. So we need someone new appointed to it. We reached out to Ken. Uh, he said that, uh, probably the mayor would have to do that.

So that was offering. We haven't got a start of that last year.

Yeah. Yeah. I think they really had under him.

Just taking a look at different plans. I don't bore my kind of helps with. selection on that but if there was any other type of new plans out there if they were willing to look at some other options uh share all that too so um i mean if kent's okay with it the rest of you are okay with it no i wouldn't volunteer oh yeah i thought you volunteered IS THERE ANYBODY ELSE ON COUNCIL BESIDES CAMP? I MEAN, I'LL NEED TO BE AN EXPERT INSURANCE.

OKAY. BRING IT ON.

I don't have much myself. I do want to recognize since we're on HCV, all the

participation of last month we've had a couple big fires as you guys may all know um the support we got was just overwhelming it was great a lot of our team was there uh throughout that hot heat uh it still stayed live for seven hours and sit down on the main street was three hours 90 plus degrees the whole time uh we battled through it People came and dropped off cases of water and things like that. I just wanna appreciate my team and the surrounding people and their citizens who came and was willing to help and do. So I'm grateful for that. We just recently had a little car wash that was successful. That was great. a cornhole tournament next Saturday the 25th. All is welcome. It's supposed to be a big event. So we're looking forward to that. Outside of that, I don't have much. The department's still running. And so there is one gentleman who is here today, Mr. Owen Grimes. Stand up, Mr. Grimes. He applied to show interest to the department. He's a stepson of this gentleman here who's also part of our department. He's the name of Hitchfield. He just got out of the military, out of the Marine Corps, 23 years of age. He shows an interest in the department. He wants to serve the department kind of like how he served the United States. He just wants to do his part, pay back, and this is his way of helping back to the community. So with your guys' vote, I would like to

uh invited me to join the team uh as far as the HVAC department and other than that I don't have anything else just your blessing for that I appreciate all the work you've done all the time you've spent with the department not that helping citizens in different areas and again how can we say it out uh Mr is it Brian you said yeah I appreciate it with my recommendation is to bring in the fire department

Thank you for your service and your continued service to the department and everything. Chief Bruce, you up?

You ready?

Last week, last Monday, I was teaching a class over at Port County. And during this, during the council meeting, my phone started blowing up. You won't believe what they're saying. So, through the courtesy of Hicks TV, I went home and I watched it. There were some comments made that I'm going on a draft. First of all, when you're a brand new EMT, you don't get shoved out. We don't do that here. They may do that other places. We don't do that here. Rihanna is one of our new EMTs. She's had about two months of riding lessons, of training. Luckily at the end of this month, she is going to be released as a second. There was a comment made that if salaries were in place, that somebody could work 10 hours and we couldn't do anything about it. That I thought was a slam to me because I would do something about it. You ask us as department heads to run our departments. Let us run our departments. I can't tell you how disappointed I was in the fact that there's questions being made. When I sent out my email July 1st or July 2nd, I paid my phone bill and not one time did anybody ever call other than council member eggly. I have not seen anybody over there to ask me questions. I sent the mayor a text message last Monday night and I asked to speak with him. And I did on Tuesday. If you had questions, all you had to do was ask. I will be more than happy to tell you. And I understand that last week was the first time that we were able to get together. But a lot of stuff could have been rectified if somebody just would have said, hey, Bruce, can you explain a little bit more?

I was going to ask you at the meeting, but I didn't realize you weren't going to be here.

Well, I did.

If I call you, and then she calls you, and he calls you, and he calls you, and you tell everyone the story ten times, I mean, it's easier to bring you here and ask you the question in front of everyone. We just had the packet two days before that. Or the meeting before, I guess, when we got your thing saying you're going to go live August 5th. Right. And we had all sorts of questions. Right. I'm not going to sit there and ask you 10,000 and have everyone else. I'm just going to ask you in front of everyone.

Well, I had, I, and I will address that because I had asked if I, if I need to be here because I was like, okay, you know, I've got an opportunity to teach and I was told no.

We didn't know you weren't going to be here. Yeah. You didn't ask me. You didn't tell me.

No, I asked other people.

I assume you're going to be here. You're on the agenda.

I asked other people. you know hey do i need to be here because it's a you know it's whatever and i was told no you don't need to i'm like okay which is fine so over the court over the course of the past few years cheryl and i have had about eight hours a day, 12 hours per shift, that kind of thing. And if you go to most, and I will say most EMS fire agencies, they are 12 hour shifts. Some do 24s, a lot are now starting to do 48s. Okay, we can't do that next door because number one, we don't have their sleeping quarters for it. So the thought process was to go to 12 hour shifts so that way we could go from meeting six people per day to four people per day. I understand that there were some questions about the wage. So the thought process there was to put everybody on salary so that way the overtime would already be built into the wage. The way we figured it, and I used these numbers that I got from the fiscal officer, the way we figured it times 1.5 to come up with your time and a half. And then you took that and there was your salary for the 26 pay periods.

How long ago did you do that? Back in June. None of us have gotten any of those numbers yet. I can't even look at it and make an opinion on it or a judgment on it because we haven't been given any of the paperwork. I have not seen one financial number at all on salary, hourly, number of hours, cost of the village. We've asked for the numbers. We haven't seen anything. Why can't it be shared with us?

Finance only meant tonight.

Well, exactly. We're asking questions at the last meeting. We should be asking.

Well, but in all fairness, finance didn't get those numbers either.

You haven't yet?

No.

You still don't have them. They met tonight. Kind of hard to make a sound judgment call if you don't have any numbers in front of you.

He's not asking for that.

Well, it is.

That was requested.

How is it not?

A sound judgment call.

Going from an hourly position to a salary? We asked what the salary was going to be. Are you going to figure an overtime with that? Is it not? Is it going to be an exempt position, not exempt?

Yes.

And he said, you guys have been working on the numbers. You guys went over the numbers. We haven't seen any numbers. Okay.

So again, going from eight hours a day needing six people to four hours a day, you know, now we've got, now there's, you know, and I came to the finance meeting and council member Agwitty kind of informed me with what they, what had to be done, which I was not aware of that. SO THANK YOU FOR THAT. I WOULD LIKE TO PUBLICLY STATE TO COUNCILMEMBER EGLE, THANK YOU FOR THE KIND WORDS LAST WEEK. IT WAS GREATLY APPRECIATED. I STAND UP HERE ALMOST EVERY COUNCIL MEETING AND ASK. ANYBODY GOT ANY QUESTIONS? No, and I will say this, 99.9% of the time, we get along. I bring stuff to you guys, and you guys are like, deal with it. It's your department.

But we had a full-time EMT retired and we asked early, even like when Abby left and you said you weren't gonna fill them with full-time because your goal was to fill them with a lot of part-time people. So we brought on like 20 part-time people. That was, we let you run your department the way you thought was gonna be fit. You didn't fill a full-time position. And then you said we're going to fill it with part-time, a lot of part-time to eliminate the overtime. Every single time you've brought somebody to us saying you've interviewed them, they understand it's going to be weekends. They understand it's going to be nights. They understand it's going to be holidays. Yes, yes, yes. And then it's they don't want to work weekends. They don't want to work holidays. They don't want to work this. They don't want to work nights. That's what we ask when we improve them. I understand that. when you came on and you wanted to be the MSG and it was a salary position. And I said, right, an open session, you're dumb. You should be hourly. So you can get more money for more runs. And you said, it's not about the money. It's about the people. Well, and then a few months later, it's like, I'm not going to go on all these runs. I don't get paid any extra for them. So, all right, we're going to go down this road. Well, don't say that the last meeting we're bashing you when you're gone. Cause we did let you try to run your apartment in my opinion. Your plan was part-time people.

You're right. It was. And then all of a sudden, somewhere along the line, last week, we got compared to a bunch of kindergartners. I didn't call them kindergartners.

Yes, you did. Straight up.

No, I said it'd be like having kindergartners.

No, I listened to the video multiple times today.

Yes, you did. You owe every village employee an apology. BUT I DID NOT CALL THEM KINDERGARTEN.

YOUR REFERENCE WAS KINDERGARTEN.

THAT'S WHY I CAME TO THAT. I KNOW I SAID IT, BUT I MEANT IT'S LIKE HAVING KIDS TELL PARENTS, THAT'S PROBABLY HOW I SHOULD HAVE USED IT. SO I AM SORRY.

I DIDN'T MEAN YOUR KINDERGARTEN. SO YOU'RE RIGHT. YOU'RE RIGHT. YOU'RE RIGHT, ERIC. I DID SAY THAT. Today, I've had enough. I sent out a message, and I said, look, you're going to give me your availability, and I'm going to schedule you, and that's going to be that. And I've had mostly everybody has gotten back with me. There's a couple that haven't. My feeling is you either want to be here or you don't.

My concern was that some of them that work a lot of overtime and go on lots of runs, that if they give them a salary and it wasn't compensated for their overtime that they're used to now, they're going to lose money, and I don't want to lose any of it. Right, right. That's why we haven't seen the numbers that say, hey, you know, hey, you normally get $10,000 a year in overtime, but with this new salary, you're not going to get any overtime, and we're figuring in $6,000. So, like I say, I'm losing $4,000 a year.

So, I'll be honest with you, Eric. So, you might look for something different. Up until, I get... So anytime that there's overtime, I get hammered.

I'd rather pay overtime and have somebody show up to take care of somebody.

I don't disagree with you, but I get hammered. Because at the end of the day, I have to answer to not only him and you guys, like, why is there so much overtime?

because when he comes to my office and says Bruce you had you realize how much overtime you had yeah I do I remember the year before when I was on finance we looked at how much you spent for salaries and wages and we senior Nicole Vine was going up and we raised it up and we had said do you think this whatever number $350,000 will be enough to cover all that including overtime yes I don't and that's what we budgeted I get what you're saying I get what you're saying there's

ALL NEW DYNAMICS IN PLAY. NUMBER ONE, NUMBER ONE, WE ARE GOING FARTHER. YOU KNOW, I APPRECIATE THE FACT THAT YOU GUYS INCREASED THE MILEAGE RATE AND THE SIGN-OFF RATE. I APPRECIATE THAT. THAT'S WHAT WE STARTED READING TONIGHT. WE HAVEN'T PROVED THAT YET, HONESTLY. MAYBE I SHOULD HAVE WENT OFF. ERIC'S GOING TO GO, NO, NO. NO, I KNOW. But what I'm, and Tony last week said the exact same thing. I'd much rather pay the overtime and have somebody show up. I'm caught, and I told Mike this, I'm caught between two entities, just like Mark is, and just like Derek is, and just like Corey is. We're caught between two entities. The people that work with us, And the people that we work for. And that's you guys and all them. And all them out there, the 6,000 people that we cover, I guarantee they agree with you. We'll pay the overtime.

We just want somebody to show up. But if you have the overtime already figured in with their salary, they're not going to get paid any extra. So they can't. We haven't found that out yet.

So I asked Cheryl because I didn't understand the difference between exempt and non-exempt. So will you please describe that to me? I know what it is. I didn't. Does everyone else here know this? Because I was not aware that you could be salaried and still get overtime. I didn't know because I heard what I got here. Yeah, I was not aware of that. So there is opportunities.

Yes, there's also a threshold. so yes I understand what you're saying you know you didn't want to shortchange them but from what I'm looking at is we know like for the full-timers and I'll use Rebecca because she's sitting here we know Rebecca's salary each week sorry got built in four hours building overtime all right if she goes and she goes on two extra runs and has another four hours of extra overtime it is what it is we're paying that four hours it's not that she's losing it's just that now if she works 48 hours in one week we're paying eight hours overtime whereas in salary we're only paying hours one week, you got 48 to next. If you're on hourly, you're getting eight hours of overtime each week.

So Bruce, I would like you to explain to them as well. So now rather than needing six people, we would only need four. And the ultimate goal is to pull you off the truck.

Yes.

So you would not be included in that four. Right. Because I didn't understand that as well. So I wanted to make sure that everyone else here understood that you would not go on runs. The idea that you would still be needed but not necessarily work a shift. Is that the way that?

I would work a shift if nobody could pick up.

Okay.

Okay, you know. So, you know, I would still be over there. You know, I would still be doing administrative stuff, looking for grants, you know, doing the time cards, doing what I do now. But instead of getting, but instead of me having to jump on the ambulance, when the pager goes off, I would have two people there. So you're looking at going from, like I said, six people per day down to four people per day, right? Because you're, you know, some days you're gonna rely heavily on the part timers, which, you know, I've gotten, As of tonight, I've gotten firm commitments. You know, because everybody knows, you can ask how many times per week I send out messages, hey, we need, we need, we need. And I just got tired of it. I said, you're either going to commit or you're not going to be here. There is none of this, there is none of this, oh, well, I'm going to commit, but you're not going to be a t-shirt EMT If you want the t-shirt, you're going to work.

I know you said that you had some concerns that people were not going to want to, part-time people were not going to want to or have the ability to pick up 12-hour shifts. Are you considering breaking those down into two six-hour shifts to accommodate that? How will you get that?

I could. I could. I could. I mean, I will accommodate what I can. But again, I'm not, I don't, don't want to seem like i'm not going to accommodate but i also want to make sure that we are that you know like if ryan comes to me and says hey bruce i i can't do 12s i can do eights and a majority of everybody says hey look you know i understand that you want to go to 12s we can we will do eights but you've got coverage now okay it's still i i would still be like okay We'll continue at the 8th, but I'm coming off the truck. That was the whole goal.

I'm not good when it comes to, I know they've got basics, they've got advanced, they've got paramedic.

Are we able to bill for more if you're on the truck? Yes. Okay, so we're taking it all. We can do an IV. At one time we were looking to bring on a second paramedic.

It depends on the run. Yeah, it really depends. So let me tell you how Medi-Count works. So let's say that we have a run to Cheryl's house.

Oh, don't say that.

All right, we have a run to Cheryl's house. If we do very basic stuff, even if I'm on the truck, It's still a basic run. The only time it becomes an advanced run is if we do IVs, if we're doing cardiac rhythms, if we're doing that kind of stuff. So that's the thing. So yes, to Stacy's point, it does depend upon the run. God forbid, a cardiac arrest is $1,500. okay uh medical hasn't been billing a thousand which i'm going to talk to them about that but it should be 1500 bucks if it's just those two on a basic truck we know that the most that we're going to get that we can charge for is 800 plus the mileage so we can't i mean even if i got on their truck and the if they called me and said hey this lady's got severe toe pain

i'm not going to do anything even if i got on the truck it's not going it doesn't make it up just because i'm on the truck but bruce with with the calls that you're doing now um when those calls go out you got two basics or advanced and basic and you're it's not your shift How often are you getting called? Because until you get to the scene, you have no idea. I mean, they call 911 or tell them about symptoms, but then you get called out.

It really depends. Like, last week I got called out, like, twice. Some weeks I get called out every day. Some weeks I might not get called out at all. I mean, you know, it just depends. Depends on the call. I mean, you gotta understand that anything major that sounds major, like a car accident, a trauma, a cardiac issue, you know, anything like that, it's an automatic I'm going. I'm going no matter what. Somebody's having a seizure. If I don't have an advanced EMT on, then I'm going. Like Saturday night, we had the pile up out there on 49. I ended up going. Plus we had Sherwood over with their EMS. So we had three EMSs there. And then three nights earlier, or two nights earlier, I was with Rebecca and Felix on another call. So yes, it's very often that I do go. Aren't you going to have a couple more paramedics here if they pass your test? Well, we talked about that. So I will say that I got two paramedics getting ready to move back into town, but they're not, but they're, they're, they're, um, they told me point blank, look, we're not going to be on the schedule. We'll be there when we were there, you know, but we can't commit to anything because they already had full-time jobs. um so i'm going to say that i could maybe depend on them maybe 25 of time and that's not the same i guess now i got three people in the paramedic class and those three people i fully expect to leave why because everywhere else is starting started paying for a paramedic at 30 bucks an hour and we are at 23. So it makes zero sense to have a firefighter two and a paramedic sitting here for 23 bucks an hour when they can go when they can start out at 65. I think defiance is like 59 to 62 something like that. So that's, I mean, if you got, if you got more questions, I'm, I'm, I'm here.

Like I had mentioned last week, we've talked a lot. I've looked at Bruce, Bruce's schedule, spreadsheets. I've been sitting in his office. We talked an hour and a half last week. Uh, I know Cheryl long ago started work crunching numbers and I know you guys haven't seen solid numbers, but Cheryl was because of their budget, they're kind of They get their taxes, they get their call values from Medi-Count, and they get their contractual services from the townships. So Cheryl's always on top of where they're at, how they're at, what they're doing. We've talked about this a long time with numbers and scheduling and everything. Cheryl and Bruce have both worked diligently trying to figure out a way to cover schedules, but not below the payroll budget. All right, Kate.

So I'll give you, for instance, I know Cheryl said last week that my overtime went, didn't go gradual, it just fell off the cliff. And I'm happy, I'm proud of that. You can ask any of the full-timers how bad I harp on no overtime. unless it's an emergency call then yeah unfortunately this week and i gave her forewarning unfortunately this week not going to be the case you know but again i do get hit you know with hey you got to watch your overtime you got to watch your overtime because i don't want to come to you in november or have her come to you in november and go hey we got to do this and this like they have, like we have the past four years.

Their wages can be taken out of general fund. I know you don't like to do it, but their wages can be taken out of general fund. That's what I'm just saying. And the money that we get. Right. No, I. For those two. Right. A lot of general funds.

Right. Cheryl was discussing finance meeting about pulling him off the truck and then hiring two full-time people. Can the budget hold up? With salary.

The space they take up has to be somewhat. Well, they're full-time or they're volunteers. But full-time people we pay benefits on, so it's not apples to apples. Everybody gets PERS. Everybody has Medicare, no matter what. The only difference is insurance. And so some people don't take insurance. If they do, they do. We offer it.

So whether I stay at 8's or go to 12's, her recommendation was to hire two.

Do you have two people that are interested in it?

I've got two people that I can offer right now. Because when she brought this up, we did interview. And I pretty much told them, I said, nothing is set in stone. So trust me, you know, Councilor Kupeta-Kabosh did this real quick. You know, which, you know, that's you guys.

Well, legally, jobs have to be posted before they can be interviewed. I'd like to have that stated.

Not if they're coming laterally.

Oh, correct. Yes, correct. You're just like, well, you can't be holding legal interviews.

No, trust me, I do it legally. We've had that conversation before. Yeah, no. If I'm hiring with them, if I'm taking somebody from a part-timer to a full-time position, I do not have the posters. Now, if I was, if I was, if I didn't have anybody on the inside, I would, yeah, I would have to say it's gotta be posted.

Yes. If I can add something real quick though, Bruce, uh, w we were kind of getting into a timeframe with employment of EMTs hiring from outside of the village. Yes. Um, but we are, and I think all the EMTs who serve our department, both living in town and living out of town, uh, we were very blessed to have all environment because we didn't have a certain radius at all. on fire but i'm thankful for our entire emt department and and even the police is that matter too we have a nice influx of local residents that live in town can make those second runs can get called out even if they're not scheduled or anything if there are bigger events that are happening and you see them going to the scenes uh and being and helping each other my across the board so the the the 12 people that just came through the ems class

out of 12 uh nine are local okay and just if you don't remember i did get a grant for those we've already we've already put in for some reimbursement for for those for those people um unfortunately the grand people say oh it takes up to nine But I did submit all the, you know, and we've got two more people that I'm trying to, you know, get past their test. Because you have to pass the test and they have to be employed by your real age before they can be accepted. But I will say this, if I start losing people, I'm not going to have a choice. Any other questions? I'll move on. All right, so over the weekend, Drew Ward and I attended a tactical emergency casualty care class. I'd like to show you a video of it. I'm looking to actually bring that class here to town. It was hosted by the National Association of Emergency Medical Technicians. We did it up in Eden. Williams County invited us because there was a lot of running and squatting and other stuff involved. It lets you know how out of shape you really are. I don't want to hear it. Do you have a video? I do have a video, but I'd rather not play it. Were you running in it? If I was running? No, no, no.

I was not running. I was watching other people. Yeah, yeah. No, Bill, you can't have it.

I'm good.

Listen, I'm good. I can run.

I can run.

Bruce I appreciate your comments your input your honesty of your staff and your department and everybody involved I guess I will apologize I did not mean any offense the way I said I really did we were talking about gaps in the scheduling because people would not sign Should I use better words? No, I apologize. I'm trying to support you guys the best I can. Sorry for the offended people. You can yell at me or whatever.

I will say this, and I told Cheryl and Mike this. I've tried for the past two years

yeah you guys are very brutally honest with me sometimes i gotta be brutally honest back and i've mentioned in the past um you know to reach out here to the department heads you know sometimes we only get listening here but if you do have some questions and or comments or you know call uh while they're at work or um during your meetings and everything and committees and stuff that's what we're all here to work together

I will say, I talked to Cheryl three different times about this. I know, she told me. Yeah, and there again, I'll go back, I was financed. I was going to make the change of numbers. I'm not anti-making the change. I just wanted to make sure it was financed.

You know, Tony's first question, first question for me is, have you talked to Cheryl yet? I can hear it. And so I do. You know, I've talked to her before I even approach anything with you guys.

We appreciate that. Am I on?

I don't have anything.

No. Oh, Cheryl. Cheryl's supposed to answer. My fault.

But I did highlight, and you'll notice that we're still bringing in a little more than we're sending.

Thank you, sir.

Any questions for Cheryl with the financing? With that, support the fire department EMS with their cornhole tournament this coming Saturday. What time does that start? if you're not participating okay so if you're not signed up you can sign up before the event all right get them out there you go thank you for that and uh thank the beautification committee um the flowers in town even with all the drought They're out there watering them every night and taking care of them. I appreciate that. All the city workers, and please fire EMS with the heat. It is definitely unbearable out there sometimes, and you guys still do your job.