Veterans Advisory Council - Regular Meeting

Alright. We'll call to order. Barring any objections, let's go ahead and do the pledge of allegiance, please. Fantastic. I believe we have a quorum. We have, I think a full house here for voting members, so that's fantastic. Let's get into approval of the agenda. Do I have a motion to approve tonight's, tonight's agenda

so move

fantastic do I have a second all those in fair actually any discussion about the agenda hearing no discussion all those in favor say aye aye any opposed Fantastic. Under old business. The only item under old business is approval of the previous meetings minutes. I know those were sent out electronically. Do I have a motion to accept the previous meetings minutes?

I move to accept the meetings the previous meeting's minutes.

Fantastic. Do I

have a second?

Second. Any discussion? Thank you. I do appreciate you sending out the the minutes. It always reminds me of of of the meeting. It's I always forget some meetings and when you go through the minutes, can actually sit there and realize, oh, we actually did talk about that.

Mhmm. And I did sort

of last minute add some old business. I didn't know if you wanted to revisit that.

Sure. Definitely. Thank you. Okay. All those in favor of the motion to approve the previous meeting minutes, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Fantastic.

Sorry. Thought we'd already done this.

No worries. No worries. So last last month, Garth and I talked about the executive committee that in the bylaws, there is an additional spot that that I asked for for volunteers. I'm I'm more than happy to to talk to anybody about wanting to come on to the executive committee. I see it as, like, a not necessarily a steering committee, but more as, like, a help Mikaela and help us prepare for the meeting tonight by just kind of pre thinking through some things.

I don't necessarily wanna say, hey, raise your hand if you're interested. Just hit me up, after the meeting. Talk to me offline. Send me an email, postcard, text message, Pigeon, however you wanna get in touch with me, I have all those on my LinkedIn, especially the carrier pigeon. It's a pay for service, though. It costs about $2

to me.

It doesn't cost you any money. It costs me money, so use it wisely. Strategic plan. Do you mind going over that a little bit? I know we just we don't necessarily have too much going there. I know I just put you on the spot. Yeah. But we talked we talked about it at our at our impromptu executive committee meeting. Your your expertise and strategic planning is the reason I'm looking at you because I can barely plan next week.

We did. And last meeting, you shared the goals that you had that are actually out on the table right now. So what I was planning to do is do a little bit of line of efforts and some strategic goals to go along with those or some strategic goals to go along with the lines of effort. I haven't finished that yet. I've had a little bit of concern at work going on right now. So, focus has been a little elsewhere right now, but I will I will have that. But I did, last time talk about asking for volunteers if they wanted to help

out or not. If you don't want

to volunteer, it's fine. I'm still happy to to move forward with what I'm doing. I'd just bring it to you all for your suggestions ahead of time and stuff like that.

Yeah. Definitely. And this isn't like we're not gonna come to this committee and decree is It's the more of a how do we just approach this stuff in a more strategic long term goal of saying, hey, this is where we think Frederick County veterans are in ten, fifteen years. Any comments, questions about any of those old business items? Fantastic.

I'll move on to chair comments. I I love this story. I'm gonna read this story then I'll after I read this story, I'll explain why I wanted to read it. Some of you have probably heard this before, some of you maybe have never heard it in your life and you'll your mind will be opened exactly like mine was when I was maybe like five or six years old and I read it the first time. I just never never never hit me to think about it that way, but there was an important job to be done and everybody was sure that somebody would do it.

Anybody could have done it, but nobody did it. Somebody got angry about that because it was everybody's job. Everybody thought that anybody could do it but nobody realized that everybody wouldn't do it. It ended up that everybody blamed somebody when nobody did what anybody could have done. If you really think about that, I wanna apply that to why we're here.

When you think about veterans of Frederick County, it's anybody could help vets in Frederick County. Somebody has to. You know, I think all the people that are here tonight, you're you're that somebody. Right? So let's let's really think about being that somebody because everybody could be doing this, but not everybody does. Somebody has to, and we really don't want nobody to do it. So that's that's my comments for that. Yeah. We have no presentations, but we do wanna go on to public comment.

My name is Julianne Clappert. I am with the District eleven Regional Veterans Treatment Court that is comprised of Washington and Frederick Counties. A little bit of a miscommunication. I know I was supposed to be presenting tonight, but we actually pushed that out to next month. But what I explained to Mikaela is we're in need of mentors. I have a good solid four mentors. However, we could always use more, especially because it does get them a little bit to get training in, to come into the court, actually see how the dockets run, kinda

get their feet wet a little bit.

Not to mention, I would love for them to be able to actually be sitting with other mentors and see what they're doing actually in the courtroom setting and then talking with some of the mentors a little bit beforehand so that they understand a little bit better what is expected of them. So to be a mentor, you just have to be a veteran. You have to be within good standing of the law. When it comes to any prior criminal convictions or must appear traffic citations, we'll look at that on a case by case basis. But it does not disqualify anybody from being a mentor simply for the fact of from a peer standpoint, a recovery standpoint.

It's always good to have those people on staff simply because somebody in recovery is going to be able to steer somebody who is going through recovery much better than somebody who can't empathize or sympathize with it. So as of right now, we do have one track, the Veterans Treatment Court. We are looking probably to be adding a second track so that we can be bringing in participants that maybe this is their first justice involvement. That gives us the opportunity to intervene very early so that we can cut down on recidivism and basically just connect them to services as early as possible. So I will be back next month, obviously, to go over all the nitty gritty details of what the program actually goes through.

We are one of only several regional veterans treatment courts in the entire state. And there's only two of them that are actually funded by the Maryland state judiciary, obviously us being one of them. So we do rely on community partners, service providers, and just volunteers. I have been absolutely amazed at the amount of people and veterans that have stepped forward, raised their hands. We've got clinicians.

We've got Army JAG. We've got several different mentors that have come forward just to volunteer their time. But the mentor aspect of it is what sets aside veterans treatment courts from all other problem solving courts. Other problem solving courts in Maryland do usually have peers, but we are the only ones that actually utilize a mentor standpoint. So just keep that in mind. So if anybody is interested, I'll pass you guys around these flyers. Take one. Anybody can contact me at that number. Best way usually to get in contact with me is through email. That's simply because since I am regional, I am between Frederick County, Washington County, some days teleworking.

Not to mention, I'm usually out in the community doing a lot of stuff and basically just communicating with our service providers and our community partners on what we can be doing better.

Typically, what's the time commitment to be a mentor?

I would usually say about six months.

We do ask that they come to court. Court is on Tuesdays at 02:30PM. We have room on the docket every Tuesday to do it. However, what we are doing right now is we are having them come back to court as the judge sees deemed fit. So sometimes that's going to be every week.

Sometimes that's going be every other week. So we do understand that some mentors are not going be able to make it to every single court docket. And in that case, we do have a few people that we know are usually going to be there. We do have them stand in. But their duties and responsibilities are really just going be to guide them in the right direction, help them navigate VA benefits, financial issues, to just be there while they're standing before the judge.

A lot of people forget how intimidating that can be. And to basically just be there whenever they need that little bit of extra support And what differs from the mentors compared to the rest of the Veterans Treatment Court team is it's a completely confidential relationship. That is the one place that the veteran can go and basically say, I'm thinking about using. I'm having issues with sobriety. My marriage is in crisis. And they don't have to worry that it is not the mentor's job to come back and run back to the Veterans Treatment Court team and report on them. The only thing that remains, obviously, I think without saying, the only time they

can break confidentiality is if

they threat to hurt themselves or threaten to hurt somebody else or if they have hurt themselves or hurt somebody else.

Good. You

very much. See you guys next time.

Thank you. Thank you. Great.

Good evening. This my name is Bill Murphy, and I'm the executive director of Friends of Deceived Veterans of Carroll County. This is my assistant, Nancy Field, the assistant director. And I came to you about a year and a half ago with Charles Wheatley, my mentor, and he's a was a retired lawyer and was inter he was an international lawyer. And, sadly, December 2, he passed away from pancreatic cancer.

So the one thing of Charles Wheatley that I could say, he he was a veteran supporter wholeheartedly, you know, and I was with him for close to fifteen years. I've learned so much from him. But the one thing that he was concerned about, k, was the Veterans Treatment Court. And, unfortunately, he didn't live to see the the fruits of what he talked about for many, many years. That is for the veterans to get a square deal.

And when they come up, before minor offense, not any felonies or anything like that, but they wouldn't get a fair treatment because of civilian judges and everything. So thanks thank god for the effort. We we've been working on this, with Charles Wheatley for over three years. And, judge Leonardo, Dean Dean Leonardo over in, Carroll County, He he was in favor of it. Also with Jim Dewey, he was the sheriff's he's our sheriff over in Carroll County and also Haven Shoemaker.

So I'm proud to report to you that we now have also, as the young lady who said a little bit ago, that we have a active Veterans Treatment Court. Mhmm. And I personally know some of the people that are going to it. It's all confidentiality, as the young lady said before me. But it's working out very, very well. So we're this is just part of what we do with VEDFront with our organization. We're going into our eighth year now that we've been doing this. It's free transportation for veterans in Carroll County. And we also go and bring them out to Fort Detrickia in Frederick. And we'll go as far away as Martinsburg.

We'll take PTSD patients down to Martinsburg, West Virginia. And it's working out very well because what we want to do is see if we could in the treatment court also to get the veteran and to give him a hand up, not a hand down. And that's what we do. We provide everything that we can to help our veterans. So we have four vans. And we go as far away as like Washington DC. We'll take our heart patients down there for different heart procedures. We'll go over to Pennsylvania. We cover Adams in York County. So we'll go as far as up at Lepidin, Pennsylvania there with our vans.

And we're a free organization, five zero one c three nonprofit. So one of the things that we do that nobody else does is that once the veteran dies, we take care of the spouse, the living spouse, after his death. And we've been asked also before the person, the veteran gets cremated, we'll take the veteran, the spouse, over to the funeral parlor if they would like to see their husband for the last time. So these are the types of things that we're doing. We've been very blessed because we and myself, I'm a 35 year old recovering alcoholic myself.

So I'm very, very blessed to be here. And this Saturday, I'm gonna be celebrating my eightieth birthday. So I'm very blessed for everything. Thank you very much. And God bless you guys, the good work that you're doing here at the Frederick Advisory Council. Nancy, you wanna say anything?

No. I'm really proud of the fact that we do support. A lot of people don't understand when they read oh, they can hear me. You can all hear me. Right? Thanks. Now one of the things is Bill emphasized that we do continue to care as far as the spouse. Everybody looks at that band that says friends of disabled American vets. Right? A disability can be mental, and it can be physical.

And we get plenty that it's a combination there of both. Judgments aside, the most ignored group in my heart has been saying is the veterans. And so for the fact that we do carry the spouse because as far as we're concerned, that veteran served, so did that spouse. They were home raising the children, doing their business, taking care of the family. So it's really, really important that we continue that type of care. Real proud of that part. And let everybody looks at it and says disabled. Here's my running joke. Anybody had a colonoscopy? After your first bottle, what are you? Drop the hat. Disabled.

And one last thought about that one. One last

thing I

I forgot to mention, I do have tickets here for the World of Possibilities Disabilities Expo here. It's gonna be here held here in Frederick on May 17 from one to 3PM, eleven to 3PM. So it's gonna be at the Clarion Inn in Frederick Event Center in Frederick, Maryland. So anybody wants a ticket, come see me.

Could you say the name of that again?

It's called the World of Possibilities Disabilities Expo.

Okay. Thank you. You're welcome.

Well, since this

is public

comment on Stan Seidel, I'm part of the Frederick County Community Veterans Engagement Board. I would love to see more of you coming to our meetings. They are the first Tuesday of the month. They're both virtual and in person. The upcoming meeting, we're going to be talking about employment and training opportunities. We have an individual from Goodwill, from the State Department of Labor, as well as the Homeless and Federal Education Program. Employment is going to become more important as we're witnessing a number of things occurring. So again, I challenge you to come out. It's virtually. You don't have to leave your office.

It's an app and our meetings are just an hour. So we look forward to seeing it.

Thanks. Stan, can I ask you a question? So with the employment and and and reintegration and all that, do you is there any focus on the elder veteran who does not know computers?

Again, I'm not gonna speak for anybody but mom, but I know Goodwill does

it. Mhmm.

And I know some of the other agencies have a l older worker programs.

No. And that and it's not just, you know, the workers. I I understand all that, but it's we're we're and I and I I saw this firsthand through United Way when we handed out the Chromebooks is a lot of the elders came. They didn't have all they have is their phone, and you can't do things on your phone, fill out applications and that. But but they didn't know how to do computers or how to do things like that and that's a to me that's a gap.

It is a gap and again some of the workforce systems are addressing it. I don't want to say it's been a long time since I've been working at the local level but I know some of them do do that. And I just found out recently that we're going to actually have in Howard County, well that's Howard County seminars for federal workers who have been laid off as well as federal contractors. And it's going to be a three hour workshop. So at least we're starting to think about what's going to happen in the state and how we're gonna be impacted. So I think that's important also. We need to be aware of that.

Yes.

When you mentioned goodwill, are you talking about the goodwill of Monocacy Valley that's associated with Platoon twenty two?

Correct.

Excellent place

excellent place

you ever walked in there it will floor you I I was amazed that we got a tour and You know saw some people that actually were recipients And they literally walked them through learning how to do computer skills, learning how how do you even use a darn cell phone? You know? It's amazing. It's absolutely amazing. I was really, really astonished about the care.

And, yeah, I met some people that were actual recipients because I work with another organization that works with severe PTSD. And, matter of fact, we had two recipients from platoon twenty two or incorporated with them, and they were fresh off the battlefield. And

they're

like, okay. They got their PTSD to deal with. Right. And now they gotta get a job. And they're, like, looking at each other. And it was a husband and wife. And it was amazing because, Bob, like I said, I wear it's called SHU, Safe Haven Equine Warriors. And that couple came in bickering, left holding hands. That was awesome.

So, again, my purpose is to invite you to Tuesday, March 4. We start at nine. It could be virtual. I think Mikaela can send out the information to everybody here.

Yeah.

But I personally like to go in person because it's an opportunity to meet I I made a decision. When people do a presentation, I will talk with them after the presentation so I get to understand where they're coming from. And I tell you right now, I do five different cooperatives, and I do that every time. I pick somebody out new just to find out a little bit more about what they're occurring. So again, my challenge is for you to come in.

Mhmm.

I have to take leave

to do it. I work during the days I can't. Where I work, I don't really get a good reception, so attending virtually doesn't happen either. So but I will I will make an effort to get out to one

of them.

Forward to it.

Hi. My name is Paula. I've never been here before, so thank you all so much. I met Mikayla this morning at platoon twenty two. Woah. Yes. So I work at Walter Reed, National Military Medical Center and Uniformed Services University, medical school for the military. I'm here because we do research on PTSD for veterans treatment. Yes. And we are going to start doing it at Platoon twenty two in one of their offices.

And our research study primarily focuses on a new intervention for PTSD. The work that's out there now isn't quite cutting it for the people. We want to add another frontline treatment, so research is required to do that. So we are doing it's called three MDR. It involves walking on a treadmill, very low pace at any age as long as you're physically able to do so.

We incorporate pictures of the traumatic memories and music of the traumatic memories into it. And what we're doing is talking through the trauma in a way that's very different from what's been published and what's really been done. It's trying to access different parts of the brain, get veterans service members who have PTSD activated in a in a very different way. We were published already in National Geographic last year, actually, for this, and so we're really excited to be able to do it for this community. Right now, we're just waiting on our equipment to be shipped over to platoon twenty two, but are gonna be enrolling in this for the next two years.

Veterans will have veterans, active duty, and dependents are also eligible. We've opened it up as well to civilians. So first responders is a great opportunity as well, primarily focusing on our military. They

can come

to do the study if they're eligible for PTSD at Walter Reed or at platoon twenty two over the next several years. Years. Recruiting is two years, but the course of the study will be for at least five more years. So I just wanted to share that that's an opportunity. It's voluntary. Veterans are compensated for doing

the

assessments. The treatments are six to ten, one hour at most. And we're very flexible. And I'm happy to talk about details of it. I have flyers for anybody interested. And we recruit it between 22 every week.

So thank you.

And how can we contact you?

I have business cards here. I have also the flyers with the email on it. So many different avenues. But primarily, phone and email are going

be best.

Do you and when you mentioned because you work with platoon twenty two to house this, and it's Walter Reed. Yes.

So the study is funded through a program that works at Walter Reed. Okay. And our primary site is at Walter Reed. Okay. We want just send yeah. It's in Bethesda now. Oh, yeah. Bethesda. It's a pain to get there, so we wanted to offer it

to a peer placement. Okay. Well, I

the reason I'm kind of, like

I said, that's kind of like hedgehog thing that I focus in on as an PTSD. Mhmm. Trust me. Nothing's more fun than having a live suicide to deal with. And, yes, I can claim four in twenty twenty four, and all four of them are all still living. And it was no fun. Yeah. But I tried to seek certain information. My brother coordinates through he does team river run, and I don't know if you know anything about them. It's basically, they go canoeing and kayaking.

Oh, that's awesome. And they take them literally. They've gone into Walter Reed, missing legs, arms, feet, or whatever, their mind, and they take them out on the water. Mhmm. Yeah. You've got some really heavy duty PTSD. Yes. And we were my brother was kind of bouncing off ideas of places where we could get information on kind of how you know, the how to, what to look out for, certain things that well, you know, big red flags. What in that program is something that was geared to I guess you could technically call me a caretaker in that case. Do they have anything for that?

So what we so basically how the the intervention works is someone who either thinks they have PTSD so we have two studies that are testing the same therapy. One study, you have to meet diagnostic criteria for PTSD, and the other, don't. You just have to have pretty good symptoms. So we didn't want to eliminate people who didn't check every single box. Okay.

So if a caregiver, for example, feels that they have gone through a traumatic experience and are dealing with the symptoms of PTSD, we could potentially enroll them in the study, and they would provide images that represent whatever that traumatic experience is. And we use those images as a form of exposure therapy, which is how trauma therapy is typically done to go through that trauma. Right. So varying degrees of intensity in the images, music that maybe is associated with the person that you're caring for. We also include positive images and positive music to kind of help change the perspective and bring them down because you can get extremely activated and very stressed in a session.

So that's how we would do it. It's very the reason it's so special is because it's so customizable to the individual. It's not a manualized therapy that is, you know, is so generic to everybody. It's extremely unique to the person's experiences. Okay. So any it's really good for anybody. We just really focus on military. But caregivers No. No. No.

Are Well, I mean, when I say caregivers, I'm just saying any type because I was seeking I ended up with SHU, Safe Haven, Iguan Warriors. Mhmm. Force therapy is amazing. Well, thank you.

Go ahead. Yeah. I was just gonna say thank you very much. I think we'd like to invite you to come back to do maybe a a full presentation.

Oh, sure. Yeah.

I can

show you what it looked

like and give examples,

because it's a little hard to just talk about it.

It's really I wish I would.

It's great. I'm happy to do that. No. That's good. Yeah.

Anyone else for public comment?

Staff report, please.

Yes. Okay. So the first item I

was gonna talk about was our upcoming veteran appreciation day. So I just wanted to up update everyone. So the county executive had tentatively accepted. Unfortunately, we do conflict with the block party. So Isabella Bravo is gonna attend again this year, and then the county executive will be at the block party.

And then so last last month, we talked about doing the meeting at the event. So I spoke with video services. The county does have the capability to film remotely. However, it is quite a burden in, like, man hours and stuff, and so we will need to submit a formal request and sort of give a justification. So I just wanted to double check with you that you do want me to submit a formal request. We'll just have to write up something and ask.

Do we do we we

have a a minimum requirement of a certain number of recordings, not a maximum, or do we have to not to not to say I don't love the idea of them not being there.

I'm not sure I

understand what you're trying say.

Do we

have to report?

No. No. And it's it's I kinda got the sense that, you know, because it's on a Saturday and they don't really pay overtime and other commissions have asked for things like this and and have not gotten approved Sure. It's I wouldn't get your hopes up. Right. So we can ask. I'll definitely like, I'm I'm willing to write it up and submit it. I'm just I'm not sure that because it's burdensome for them to to remotely record and broadcast and, you know, it's cause it's man hours. So just wanted to but I did ask.

Not to not to make it harder for us or easier. I mean

We can still have the meeting. We still can't it

can't be recorded.

And we could

put it on Does the county have any issues with, like, a Facebook Live on our page?

I can find out.

Then maybe we kinda

Like, just have somebody

Two birds with one stone. And Okay.

Then we've

got something on Mhmm. Facebook of us being out there. Real good.

I don't I don't think we should put anybody out. Okay.

Personally, I don't think

Just thinking of it in a different direction. I mean, setting aside recording the meeting, it would be good to have a video put together of the event itself. Yeah. Know, can go on, you know, FCGD FCGTV Mhmm. You know, periodically. And whether it's a video of stills or, you know, that's something that also captures maybe some of the, you know, some of the particular speakers or, you know, I mean, video is always better than stills. You know, it's gonna be a very large dynamic in that. So

So we're working right now on I don't know if you guys remember the promo video they did for last for for the 2024 event. We're working on updating that for this year's event. So and then are you kind of talking about filming the 2025 event and then kind of showing it on Yeah. Showing what the event was. Okay. Yeah.

What day is that, by the way? Because I'm pretty sure I did get something on Facebook. Okay. We just put out

the save the date. So the event is Saturday. You did. Yeah. It's Saturday, July 19.

Yep. Okay.

Then we haven't opened up vendor registration yet, but that will be opening up pretty soon. Okay. So if you're on our distro list or our Facebook, you'll just keep an eye out for that. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Okay. So that's that.

There it is.

Ta da. Yes. Yes. Thought so. I was like Wait a minute. This sounds and I just asked her, and I'm like Yeah. I know why I sent this to

So we changed the theme slightly from last year. So this year, we were going with bridges, and I don't know if you guys recognize that bridge. Does anybody recognize the bridge?

It's in Frederick. Very good.

He's good.

I thought

that and then I was like, maybe I'm second guessing myself. It looks

like one of the characters.

Right? I was like, Oh, maybe it's not.

It does

look like the one on Carole Creezy. So the theme is bridging communities through gratitude. And Mhmm. Personally, I was really kind of inspired lately about the you know, talking about the transition and, you know, especially after we talked with Reforge, you know, he's really emphasizing, you know, when you transitioning from the military to the civilian world and you lose that sense of community and purpose and and trying to fit in, you know, fit in and kind of expecting civilians expecting military to fit in rather than vice versa. And so, you know and we kinda talked about yeah.

So so we're going with that, and, we're hoping to highlight county services a bit more and kinda highlight what the division of aging can do, you know, not just with veterans, but also with, you know, with our other programs like state health insurance, Maryland Access Point, and the Scott Key Center, and caregiver support program also. Lots of those good programs. Obviously, we're hoping to grow with the different vendors. We have a little bit more space this year, so we think we can have 70. Joy and I walk the space.

We might even be able to get more than that, so we'll we'll see. Yeah. So and then as you can see, Frederick Health is giving us the space, which we talked about before. WFMD, we're getting the same marketing grant, Radio for a Cause. And then new this year, the Frederick News Post gave us that. And I think I explained last time about how they're going to start the digital email ads. We'll start now, and then, the the print ads will start in April. And they'll they'll start out just, like, two by three and then progressively get bigger. So, yeah. Does anybody have any, like, questions or anything specifically about the event?

I think this is fantastic. It's last year was a awesome day. Mhmm. I've I'm already seeing that this time, it'll be even better.

Yeah. Mhmm.

So, I know Warrior Canine Connection has already committed to do their workshop again. We're hoping to do the veteran benefits again. The vet center called. He's gonna request their mobile unit. I'm gonna follow-up with VA. Because last year, they told me they would like to participate again next year. I just need to reconfirm that nothing's changed, and who knows? Everything's changing. Right? So, hopefully, the VA mobile unit will still be there.

Division of aging, we've talked about having our different programs each present, you know, on Medicaid, Medicare, the different Maryland access point programs, etcetera, etcetera. So if anybody has any ideas about workshops and stuff like that, you know, we can talk about that.

I want I wanted to do a workshop on resume writing and interviewing.

Just was like, we should have some sort of job.

You had to hand it there?

Yeah. I got just we're from Carroll County. So and we're doing our I think it's our third veteran celebration. It's gonna be at May 4. So if anybody would like to come over here, it's eleven to two and at the Farm Museum. And and I think we're looking at all what we have to offer the last couple of years. It was really great, and we have people there that'll do the benefits. They've had program with the American Legion, disabled American veterans, and also with the county. So we get that. There's a lot of veterans out there that never applied for compensation and pension, and they really deserve it.

Kayla. Yes. Maybe someone from treasury to talk about the the different veteran property tax credits.

Oh, yeah. Alright. Perhaps

we can have a class on computers and telephone usage for seniors and

veterans. Okay.

Introducing AI would be a stretch too far.

I'd like

to help with that. Well,

like one thing Paula and I talked about is if they come and do a resource table, maybe they can bring some of their equipment and actually have maybe some more of the resource tables actually have like an interactive type of experience. And Joy has already reached out to Parks and Rec, and so we're hoping that Parks and Rec might have more of a, like, physical activity. You know, because we noticed last year, you know, we had that little coloring activity for the kids, but some kids somewhere found some ball and just as kids do, you know, they started kicking the ball around. So we, you know, we're gonna look for some more outdoor activities. Pickleball courts. Pickleball. Yeah.

Well, set up a pickleball net.

Did I miss the part

where there was crayons?

Yes. We well, we will get you some crayons. Even like a four square

or something like that. I won't do

that in

crayons too much. Environment carry away.

Will the veterans court also be there to talk about

the program?

Recruit maybe?

It's something I can definitely talk about. Since we do work with the Maryland stage this year, they do have parameters on what we can do as far as promotion, press, things like that. Platoon twenty two is on our team. Mhmm. So they have the ability to also work on our behalf through certain ways, but we can definitely find that out.

Mhmm. Yeah.

So we we didn't charge government organizations, and we're not planning to charge government. And I know the county state's attorney's office was there last year, so I don't know if that helps. But you may not you may have different rules.

But I'll I'll speak to your question.

Yeah. We had we had county divisions there last year with their information. Like like, we had transit and I mean, so I don't know if that

hi. Welcome.

One second.

What other changes are we making this year that I haven't mentioned?

We the media outlet for it would definitely be a lot bigger. Katie's Katie's here. So she's been working a lot in conjunction with Mikayla on getting that information out to younger veterans, as well as our traditional media with newspaper, radio for older veterans, and just kind of trying to spread it across and make it, somewhat, as the poster shows, multigenerational. So trying to, again, continue that thought of bridging. It's about not only bringing veteran programs to veterans, but it's about teaching veterans about community programs that are available to them, whether they're governmental programs, through Frederick County or Frederick City or the state, but also nonprofits and those other kind of programs that we utilize when people call into the office to help lead people to services, to help them maintain the community.

That's the whole goal is helping whomever we may be working with maintain in the community whatever the program may be needed. So it's definitely a bridging day of working with families, maybe active duty military, as well as our retired military civilian spouses, same kind of idea.

Is WFM going to be just advertising, or will they be on-site?

Yeah. Yeah. Same as last year.

Yeah. Both.

Yeah. So I think it's so they'll do the radio spots. Like I said, the radio for a cause where they promoted it, and then they'll be on-site. Because last year, Cruz and Chris was there for WFMD, and he walked around and sort of interviewed. And he interviewed, I've I've forgotten his name. The the the World War two veteran that

was there last year. Yeah.

Mhmm. But then he was also there there in his for his personal business, which is cruise and entertainment. And he had that the DJ booth set up outside, so we had some music. So he's so as far as I understand, all that will be the same this year. So and then Frederick News Post is what will be one of our vendors as well.

I I just saw Teddy walk in, and he reminded me, perhaps we can advertise safe rides or rides for good. A lot of veterans don't have transportation to get to this the Veterans Appreciation Day, and we can advertise that and get them rides to the events and from the event.

Yeah. Last year, we had talked about the possibility of talking to some of the senior center or not senior centers. Sorry. The care homes and things and seeing if they their event coordinators would maybe bus in some of their residents. And I think just in all the chaos or whatever, just never really materialized. But maybe that's something we can

So what I'm told on that aspect of caregivers is that they actually have to hire somebody to come out and be with them. Oh, okay. So that's kind of, like, why they don't bust those people out to Ambets or anymore to to the events. Oh. It's because they can't afford to have the caregiver be with them at the same time.

Gotcha. Okay. Yeah. Okay.

And I'm sorry. You mentioned something about because I'm familiar with even though we're Carroll County, I know that the Frederick excuse my wait. I know Frederick County, Baltimore City, and I wanna say Baltimore County does a two one one. That's their rideshare. Yep. Do I do know that they have to go through actually, it's the Department of Aging. That would be a good coordination in order to to either get a ride set up and or also another avenue for people to, you know, get welcomed in. Hi. Come join us. That kind of thing.

Yeah. We can we can set there. We have ours is through 21211 coordinated with United Way, coordinated with with Wayne at SOS Safe Ride or Carroll County if you

have

a way of that program. Just we need to advertise it so they know so those veterans know and that that is available to them.

And I can also talk with transit. Maybe they can tell me what the bus route numbers would be. Yeah. If if

It doesn't should be. It's on our bus route.

Okay. Alright.

Okay. Can say something? Just following up with this young lady, which she said over. I was I was on the Carroll County Veterans Advisory Council for six years. And one of the things that we've been doing the last two years is, I think, our third veteran celebration. We were trying to get the younger people, the younger veterans because it's very, very difficult because they're very busy a lot of time. They get a lot of things going on. And I think it was pretty successful the last couple years of of doing that Mhmm. And to try to get the the young younger veterans, especially with the family atmosphere Mhmm. When we do it like ours on May 4. It's a Saturday.

Mhmm. Okay. Thank you. Well Okay.

Oh, another thing we wanna try and improve on this year is more signage, more directional signs. And then we've talked about maybe, actually because last year, we made the decision not to print out little, like, maps and schedule pro like, program of events, but I think we might do that this year. I think the venue this year is gonna be a lot less confusing than last year's venue, but so but we might still do that just so people have something that they can they because I know we got feedback from vendors like, oh, well, you know, we people didn't come back to the backspace. And so we wanna make sure that we're getting a good flow of traffic and everyone gets visited. I was just gonna say, maybe add a QR code Okay.

Somewhere as well so that maybe if they don't have a paper copy, they could also just have it on their phone too.

Right. Yeah.

Just a thought.

I mean, we did that last year because I had everything on the website, but maybe we just didn't have enough of it or maybe it wasn't big enough for the

art just wasn't here for the schedule of events today or something.

Yeah. I guess it just didn't. It didn't land. But I

think I think the I think this location is is more visible and it's a higher traffic and there's Chick fil A there for all

the little kids and like,

you know what I mean?

Like they're passing lots of stuff. So I think that it'll I think some of it will may take care of itself as well, if that makes sense. Alright.

Cool. Okay.

Alright. So the grants, don't really I'm not really prepared to discuss that right now, so I think we're gonna delay that for another time. So I did wanna update on the VAC members. So we have quite a few vacancies. We do now have the lady who has replaced, Joyce Grossnikkel, and I have a meeting set up with her either this week or next week.

I apologize. I can't remember. So I'm gonna talk to her about going through the formal process to replace Carlos and Nan and then maybe even get a VA person in here. We'll see. And then I believe I know one of the board members who took the Maryland Open Meetings Act training has left. Has anyone else on the board done it?

I took that. Yeah. I believe okay. Yeah.

And so we have two members that have taken it. So we do do we need another person? Okay. So we're good. Alright. Okay.

The main one is you keeping us honest.

Yeah. Yes.

I have taken it twice, but I I have to take it every year, which is good because it's a lot to I still every once in a while, I have to email our attorney liaison, make sure I'm not

walking the line. Okay.

Are we ready for new business?

Any of those emails include my name? Hopefully not. All the time.

Constantly. It's a problem. Okay.

So our new business. Okay. So I'd like to invite the Division of Aging Director, Carolyn True. And are you guys presenting at the same time? No. Okay. So this is Carolyn True. She's our division director. She's going to come up and talk to you about county veteran service officer. Is that right? No.

I was gonna do

that. Oh, I'm so sorry. Come on up

and talk about whatever she wants

to talk

about. Well,

I don't know what's going on.

Good evening, everybody. I'm really true

division director with the division of Ageeken Independence. And I want to first of all thank you all for your service here with this Veterans Advisory Council because what you do is going to make a tremendous difference for all of the veterans and their families in Frederick County. As far as the Veterans Service Officer is concerned, I understand from Mikayla that there's only two people in Frederick County who are certified to be able to offer benefit assistance for veterans. And one of the things that I would like to see the division sponsor is helping Michaela become certified as a VSO. So, we are looking into that process right now to see what it will take, what we need to do, what kind of training we would need to be able to provide to Mikayla so that she can become a veteran service officer.

Because I see that as a gap. If there's only two people right now in Frederick County that are certified to offer that kind of assistance, I think it's incumbent upon the division, and what we are doing as a division to assist more veterans obtain the benefits that they may be qualified for. So, we're looking into that. I believe that there is a grant opportunity that we might be able to apply for so that we could get the training covered by the grant. But we're going to be doing a bit more research on that just to make sure that we have all our I's dotted and our T's crossed so that we can make this happen going forward. So that's the goal.

So if there aren't grants, if there is a grant and it's short funding or whatever, we could also ask the veteran service organizations if they would donate to them.

We could do that. I'd also kind of like to take a look at what the division's budget is to see if we can do that on our own, if there isn't a grant to cover it. Because I think it's important that we make this happen. So certainly asking for donations is a good thing to do. But I'd also like to see if the division budget can cover it if there's not a grant available. But good suggestion. Other questions?

I think that's fantastic. Truthfully, there's I don't know that there'll ever be enough certified service officers. There's a lot of people out there that are always willing to help. You know, I'll I'll talk to a vet and help them navigate through the the process, but they're the one submitting it. When they're certified, that's the person that's actually submitted it.

There's a whole power of attorney process that they have to go through because that ultimately, if that certified person falsifies records or incorrectly puts information in there, it's not on the veteran. It's on the person that put it in there. So interestingly enough, while that is all scary suing language, it's important for the veteran to have someone that knows the process and isn't just a buddy that's sitting next to them telling them, hey, submit this, click that, do this, because then it's on the veteran if it's wrong.

You're right. And there is a process, that is certainly something that we want to be able to follow. The other thing that I think is a gap that we can fill is that we would have the ability, and I don't know if other veteran service officers in the county have this ability, but we would have the ability to do home visits. And I think that is what would set us apart a bit because we we would have that ability because there are homebound veterans who can't come to, you know, Tawney Avenue or can't come to the other locations where the veteran service officers are located. So we have the opportunity to go to them.

So I'm sorry.

Go ahead. Go ahead.

I I I don't know much about the VSOs. You're traveling somewhere to get trained or is there a way that we can bring somebody here to train multiple?

I know for the VFW, VFW conducts a training in Annapolis for the entire country and each state only has two slots and we have three service officers in the state of Maryland and so they have to like each year only two of them can go get recertified in person but there once you're certain at least now I'm speaking from the VFW but it's apparently it's the same process that every other certified person has to go through and I'll connect you with Daniel Rodriguez again. The

the way that we are looking into doing it is I would be what's called a county veteran service officer. So there's an association. It's National Association of County Veterans Service Office.

Because I

talked to the the Maryland Department of Veterans and Military Families. And so this is what they recommended that I do. And so it's an online training. It's a week long course that I would do through them. And so I would get my accreditation through them. And it's an it's an annual membership to be part of this national association. And then each year, I would renew with my continuing, you know, my CEUs through them. And then I would be able to similar to what the state VSOs and the VFW volunteers do, would be able to submit directly to the VA and and do sort of that, you know, records management.

That's fantastic. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

So and

there's not not every state has County veteran service officers you know but it's a growing sort of I want to call it a movement. I know Carroll County is one of the counties that has these county veteran service officers, Anne Arundel. I don't know that there's many counties in Maryland. So we'll be one of the pioneers. Yeah. It'll it'll be very exciting. So hopefully, this is this will be, you know, a growing trend.

Yeah. That's the plan.

Yeah. Yeah. That's fantastic.

Thank you. Can I add? I wanna add that and I've told this before we're just so thankful to be under your division and and what you bring to to this council and for the veterans.

Well, is really nice of you to say. Thank you. We are delighted as a division that the Veterans Advisory Council is a part of the division of aging and independence. I think it it makes sense. It's a good fit. And I really appreciate the opportunity to work with the VAC and to have the veteran perspective as a part of the division.

We appreciate it. Thank you.

Thanks for covering on that.

Do you have a question?

Yeah. Just wanted to follow-up with Carolyn's remarks there. As far as like in Carol, Kenny, they

had four

veteran service ops. I think right now, it's three. That's very important what you said about going into the home because there's a lot of veterans that don't have the transportation.

Like, in

Carroll County, we have 25% of the population that are 65 years old.

Mhmm. And

Carroll County is doing a great job. And if you look at every month, they would give us records of how many of how many appointments that they had, how many people got the pension and compensation grants, you know, from the government and all that. And when you can put it down, you can see how it grows every month, and it's it's it's in the hundreds of millions of dollars. You

know? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It is. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. Okay. Joy? It's your turn. It's your turn. Yeah. Appreciate

it. So thank you for having me back again this month. Yeah. It is really exciting that the VAC is located in in our division, and I'm very excited to be working with Mikayla. We've begun working very closely together in these two arenas for our veterans event in July.

Very excited about that as we collaborate and try to build this. And each year, our goal is to build it better because if you build it, they will come. I mean, that's that's the philosophy. So we are meeting, somewhat daily, sometimes daily. But with with the VSO, the with the county VSO program, I'm also very excited because, I've worked with veterans, in my capacity for over ten years, and this has been a really bad sore spot, getting veterans the assistance and linking them to what they're entitled to, what they should be receiving, and many times often so needed and sometimes too late.

So our goal is to work together, to make this happen for Mikayla and not only to make it happen this year, but to make it sustainable. I've talked to Mikayla about that. We want things yes. We wanna introduce them, but we don't wanna introduce them then pull them away. Mhmm.

So we wanna make this sustainable if it's through, hopefully, the maybe the division's budget or whatever realm that is, that it is sustainable moving forward. The course for Makayla is slated to begin in April. We're still working because with the program comes the need to utilize comp you know, computer knowledge and those kinds of things. So we have to work with county IIT to make sure whatever platform is chosen that they are involved in that decision and that it works within, you know, the county platform and security and all of those those things that are so, so important, in our world today. So we're hoping at our goal is by November, and I know it sounds like so far away, but there is a process.

You know? If it was easy, everybody be doing it, and that's not happening. So there is a process. Our goal is by November 2025, this will be up and running in our county, and it may well be much sooner than that. But we're trying to scope out, all the different requirements and things.

We're gonna we're gonna be, you know, kind of easy on ourselves and say by November that this will be up and running, and we will be able to assist veterans. And our goal in the beginning is to keep to keep that poke more narrow and to be really reaching out and concentrating on those older veterans who are in the community, who lack the resources to access transportation or whatever that might be. So we are targeting those veterans most vulnerable. So thank you again. And I can't say enough of the support we've received from Carolyn and our different ventures as we move forward. So, we're glad to be here and always happy to assist any way we can. So thank you.

Fantastic. Any other new business?

No? Any

anybody have any announcements? Any thoughts, comments, questions? Carrier pigeons that they received while we were here?

I'll just add, in the advent of a federal government shutdown or lapse in government funding after the February 14, do we want to think about linking anything on the Frederick County homepage? I know that we've talked about contractors and federal employees that perhaps are out of work, but veterans impacted by a lapse of federal government fifteen fifteen March onwards, whether it be if the VA is closed, if there should be an impact to VA medical payments or even military pensions, if there should be a lapse, Just making sure that people understand what local resources might be available. I think that we should be perhaps forward leaning just in case there's a lapse in

You're saying just, like, put some sort of, like, informational statement or announcement up on the website and social media? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Let me just double check that it that's okay, and then we I'll look into that.

So if all of a sudden

the VA in Martinsburg perhaps is closed starting on March 0.

Fifteenth

or people aren't receiving their their

Yeah.

VA medical payments Yeah. For example. I just think that we should think about being more proactive

Yeah.

In that case.

Yeah. I would probably just need to send that up the chain because Frederick County has, like, their communications department. We do have, like, this news flash capability, and I know they send out things like that. So let me just look into that and see how

that works.

And Van Hollen has a lot of information on his site as well. Okay. So in the sense of even if it's just directing people

to that. And then one thing we can do is, like, I can make sure, like, in that month's newsletter to highlight, like you said, resources, make sure I like, that can be that month's resource highlight for that. Okay.

This isn't necessarily I mean, it's VAC related, but sort of tangentially. But if anybody wants to stick around for a couple of minutes, I know that coming

from

the university, we'd love to hear we know that there are things happening. We've heard from different organizations, but just more collectively trying to support. But then also we are trying to seek out if there's any gaps that we can assist federal workers. And we have students that are federal workers and getting their education paid for through the VA benefits for education. So there are kind of, right now, several students that are at a complete loss of what to do. So if anybody wants to stick around, I'd love to hear how

all the different

events around Frederick can be connected or just pulled together a little bit more cohesively, and then also try to identify any gaps that there might be. So it's not just for veterans, but veterans are really affected because of where their funding and monies are coming from.

Yes, sir. Just as a reminder, since this would be, I think, maybe the day before our March meeting, but the public hearing on the back membership bill is going to be 07:00 on March 18. We introduced the bill last night, which starts the formal clock, and the public hearing is mid March there. I I mean, if anybody would would like to speak to it, please do. I mean, I think this is gonna go through pretty easily.

I'm not

concerned about it, but that's what it is.

But it's March 18 at what time? 07:00. Where?

In the big room on right room building.

Anybody else? Alright. Mhmm.

Our next meeting is March 19. Do I have a motion to adjourn? Thank you.

Are always Just

a second.

I was basing it strictly off of the base, not so much the entire compensation. I had a question for you. We're we're just adjusting the gross pay. Everything else, like the, like, for example, for the county executive, the health insurance, dental insurance, and retirement, that's for all county employees. So we don't control that at all. We're talking strictly about the gross pay Mhmm. Is what we're talking about. Okay. Just wanted to get clarification.

Not in scope.

Right. The benefits are the benefits. If you're a full time county employee, you get them. Otherwise, you don't. So I did a couple of bits of analysis. I looked at the CPI for the last several years overall. This is from the Bureau of Labor and Statistics. Just to kind of read this from 2021, this is, again, the numbers you the snapshot is taken in December. Each year is what becomes the number for the year. So for December 2021, it was 4.7% increase from the previous year.

December 2022, it went up 8% year over year. December 2023, it went up 4.7% and December 2024, it went up 3.2%. Again, this is overall, pretty consistent what we probably saw out there each individually. There was a big pent up demand during the pandemic, so the numbers did go up. So I did a kind of a little bit of analysis.

I said based off of kind of the overall CPI, there's a little tool they have out on the website. I'm like, let me just do let's just figure out kind of the quick and dirty and also do another bit of analysis. So the US department the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, the CPI inflation indicator, calculator. If I put in the base for the county executive, I'll start with county exec and then do county council. County executive, the January has gone up 21% in aggregate.

Annualized, it's about 5.2% per year. If you go from that original one, which puts the number for at January, thousand two hundred ninety three thousand two and ninety four thousand if you round up. For County Council, dollars 35,000 base, again, same number, goes up about 21%, 5.2% annualized, goes up to 42,228. That's probably a little on the high side because, again, these are government employees only. So there is a sub sector, within the CPI that is only for government employees.

This is particular index. This is the CPU u rs. This is consumer price index retroactive series using current. So basically, this is for government employees, is the actual category. This is the government workers. This has also increased, over that period of time. Doing a little bit of a quick and dirty math as well. Same thing. That number is, instead of the 21%, has actually gone up 18% over that same four year period, that we're talking about annualized at 4.5%. My again, the numbers I came up with for county executive would be one sixty one six six zero.

And then for county council, the new number would be forty one three hundred. And that's just basically keeping them whole based off of the index that is used by government workers in total nationally. Right? Again and we know that, you know, Maryland is the cost of living here is already adjusted. I assume that the base already accounted for that. So I'm not sure if I would recommend making any additional adjustments to that based off of the market based adjustments. But I think this is a good starting point in kind of comparing these numbers to what other corresponding counties have gone up or they're paying.

I have a question? I noticed last time the recommendations was to give a 2% raise each year for the CPI, either the CPI or whatever is greater. Did that happen? Or it was a

flat Okay. And you're saying it's better just to just set the number and let it go because we really can't control each year, right?

Believe I would defer the county attorney on that because there was some question state law dictates on what elected officials can get as a raise Okay. Through a period.

There there was discussion last time the compensation review question met on tying it to see the CPI. The concern is that if the CPI drops, you can't, at any point, reduce the salary. Gotcha. So we would have to take into account that. And I think that there just wasn't predictability when the last compensation review commission considered tying it Okay. To a metric because the commission has to meet every four years to make a determination. So I believe the last commission just said, you know, if we're gonna be revisiting this anyways, why would we tie it to a metric? Because it's tied to when a new council comes in

Gotcha. Okay.

And executive. Okay.

I just have a question. If it was not CPI but just a flat percent, say 1%, could you would that be acceptable or not?

There's no provision that I'm aware of. So it could be a simple percentage.

Well, indeed, it was two percent, right, is what happened last No.

It did not. They answered it. They didn't.

It was just a flat increase.

I beg your pardon. You said flat. I thought you meant No.

No. One time for both county executive. Gotcha.

So they've made the same amount each year for the last four years? Correct.

Okay. That helps. And keep in mind, this is numbers as of December. So by the time this is implemented, this will be for fiscal year starting 07/01/2026. Correct?

It will take effect

With the next Okay. So

It doesn't impact the council that Okay. Okay. You're gonna say executive. It takes effect in December of the next election, December 2026.

Gotcha. So we're we're basically looking ahead. We're trying to look into crystal ball to December 2026. Yeah. That that doesn't I mean, that's also a good point why I again, I hesitate to just, do you I mean, one to 2% is normally, 3% is a normal inflation rate, but we cannot anticipate what's gonna happen in the future.

Mhmm. And that's why I was like, I mean, if we can base it off, if this is justifiable, you can look at hard data and say this is a number we can calculate as opposed to being like, you know, let's pick a number. But I'd like to hear some discussion as far as what thoughts are, as far as, you know, do we think this is fair? Do we think again, we know the council member positions are technically part time. Insert joke here. We know they work much harder than that. So but I'm just saying we know and then the county council is the county executive is a full time position. Yeah.

I think your data is certainly a good starting point, but I had a question. I hope I'm not getting ahead of us in any way, but I wondered maybe historical perspective or what have you that has this commission considered before not just giving an increase to their existing salaries, but as you just alluded to, is there a need to do this to crank it up, to reflect what how the job has changed for them, albeit part time for council members or full time plus for the head of the council. So just wonder if consideration has been given to that in recent years.

You're talking barely was additional work as you're talking about as far

as has the job become more? Is that what you're gonna Yes. The job's Responsibility. Responsibility.

Gotcha.

Yeah. Measured not just by time, but what they have to put into it judgment wise and and all, and their decision making capabilities.

Those were some notes that I had jotted down as well. It was just, you know, taking the opportunity to find out, you know, how their job has changed, like scope of responsibilities, any particular demands that, you know, that they're faced with, even though, you know, the council is part time.

It's not like you're it's not like you're doing a, you know, hourly job per se. And but the other side of that coin, I think, is to make it attractive and justifiable to people that we wanna run to help lead our county.

Yeah.

Is there any way that that their time is tracked? I mean, do county employees fill in time sheets?

What I was just gonna offer because the last time the councilor or the, commission had done this as well. County employees every couple of years have to do a questionnaire on what your job is, what has changed, and fill it. You could we could work with you, mister chairman, the other members, do some questionnaire that everybody is comfortable with, send it to the executive as well. It's council council members based off what the county employees have been requested on. Like, you've taken office, I mean, president Keeganeer and council member Donald would be they've been here all ten years, so they can say what it was when they first started and versus now and give you guys some more quantifiable information to look at to see if whether they say no, it's the same, whether it's more I can attest it's been a lot more, but I wouldn't put words in their mouth.

Let them give you guys the information.

I do have

some notes, but they'll probably come up.

And with that, I did want to add one thing. Under the charter, the county executive is prohibited from having outside employment. Council members are allowed to be fully employed. I mean, that's always been in consideration as well. So just something that for the background for your minds. Mr.

Van Rack?

Does the charter specify that the council members are considered part time? I mean, is that clearly stated in the language in the charter? And I know I've looked at it, but I don't recall at the moment what's there.

And I don't have a good

way to pull it up because my phone is not gonna let me do that in any meaningful sense while I'm sitting here in

this room. Say not being a lawyer at the Holiday Inn Express. I rule

out That might be

something specific to the charter.

Okay. So the the idea that the council members are part time is an understanding rather than specified in the I think

as it's what mister attorney said, it's implied in the fact that they are permitted to hold another employment. Most of the council members do have other full time jobs. The council is only required to meet once a week on Tuesday evening. So outside of outside of regular employment, whereas the county executive is not permitted to hold out.

It is which is a, I mean, a totally fair consideration. I just there are I know there are municipal charters that are very clear in their specification that these officials are considered part time and these officials are considered full time. And that's a like, you have to take that in consideration when evaluating compensation. We don't have to here. So I just wanted to make sure that we're, like, laying out sort of the the ground rules.

Kind of a following up to that as far as it's not explicitly stated, but I deal a lot with, like, compensation in my position, my daytime job. And if you are an hourly employee, you're not you're you're not eligible for benefits. That's really designation. So if you are a full time, you're eligible for benefits. If you're not, you basically aren't. So it's like that's kind of reinforcing the fact that they're not full time employees because they have to get are not even eligible to get county benefits based off of their position. You could also make that.

Sorry. Didn't mean

to interrupt you. I was

just going to interject that one of my other areas of expertise is benefits. So some organizations do provide benefits for those that work at least Sometimes it's twenty most of them, it's twenty hours a week, and they're eligible for benefits whether they're hourly or salary. Sometimes you have salaried part time individuals. So it just depends. But Okay.

Fair enough.

You know, it could be twenty

or thirty hours a week at least.

And the county does do that for some of our part time one. However, miss Kelly, the legal side, the charter actually prohibits fringe benefits for Florida. The council.

Yes. Yes. Except except for the okay. Like the County executive is.

County executive is allowed to have benefits, but the council is not. The only thing is you saw they have what what is required with law of, like, workers' compensation and Social Security. Yeah.

And but she is full time. The CE is full time. Right? So she

And part of it, the charter, it doesn't give her things, but and her responsibilities delineated. The council is just the lawmaking body. The county executive is what we call the administration. They're in charge of every day with I think it's over 3,000 employees now, all the regulations, all the inspections, overseeing all that staff, all the different departments that were the council. Actually, there's a provision in the charter that prohibits them from what's called a noninterference clause.

They're not even allowed to go to a county employee and say, can you look at this? Or, like, they can make the request to the county executive or staff. Could we look into it? But they can't give that direction where they clearly, they being the county employees work under the direction of the county executive.

Mhmm. Thank you for that.

Yeah. Definitely. I like the idea of the questionnaire. I think that's a really good idea. Depending on how we do for time tonight. I mean, do you know how long it was before, mister Journey? How

I believe I think it was just one page with, like, four or five.

It's very basic. Four or five questions.

Very basic. And then it was just led up to you guys to decide if it was enough information or if you wanted to send back more. I don't recall a second round was requested. I think it would give you all enough information to be able to glean from that and move forward.

Okay. I might suggest we start the survey right now.

I I think that's a fantastic idea. We should

add to it.

I I let do we have a do we need a motion to start this, or how does that work? I mean, because, again,

I think generally the consensus of the group, you all come up with something and Okay. Can move forward with it.

Who wants to shoot? Anybody have a good suggestion for a first question?

Or general? Is it possible to pull up the last one that was done as a starting point by change?

Right offhand, probably not in the next few

minutes. So in addition to the hours spent at county council meetings, what other duties do you undertake as a member of the county council? For instance, membership in Mako, other conferences, professional organizations, etcetera, etcetera.

Yeah. Because is it every county council is it there's a liaison to different groups, right?

Yeah. So I personally have a lot of insight into this because I've worked around county government since a long time now. But I think that it would be illuminating for the whole commission to get a sense of, like, what that time commitment is because it's

a lot. So in addition to the I'm just trying to kind of paraphrase this. In addition to the hours spent at meetings, what other

activities Specifically at at Oh, sorry. Council meetings. County sorry. Very good. County council meetings. Because, like, liaisons to commissions would be something separate. And there's all kinds of ancillary things that go beyond the hour x number of hours a week at county council meetings. In addition to the hour I'm just

trying to just capture. We can kind word it out. In addition to the hours spent at county council meetings, what other meetings do you attend in an official capacity?

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's a nice short way

to put it. Okay.

Yeah. Think you could even just

say on an an average week, what are the hours spent as performing the elected official duties?

That's a good No. Because I think we should separate out, like, time spent for, like, addressing constituent concerns and things like that because that's mean, it's an important part of the duties, but it's also separate thing. You know, the time you spend on the phone talking to a constituent who's like, hey. I need a pothole filled in front of my house, or I need a stop sign put up or whatever. That's a different kind of thing than going and representing the county as a, you know, as a member of the county council.

But also, I think they I mean, I've seen they attend events where there may be an opening of a store. Mean, they do a lot of that's another piece, too. Would be the meetings. It would be the constituency work. But it would also be these community

Community activities.

Community activities that they're going to.

So meetings, constituent services, associations, liaisons. What other kind of categories? Consentative services kind of covers. Yeah. It does.

So it's not too much of a burden to the elected officials. What if we just stated something simple and asked them to provide as much detail as they prefer to They for them, I don't know that they keep track of time as

to I'm just because we wanna standardize it somewhat, though. Because we don't want to I mean,

we don't

want it to be, like, a free form essay because, again, then we gotta we gotta review essays. And And we can give them framework, it might be I should say

shorten and include. Okay.

And the consistency, making sure that everyone's answering the same

Yeah.

Same way or the same addressing the same buckets in how they spend their time.

Well, you could say in a given week how many hours do you spend on each one of those. It's just hours. I mean

Or a percentage.

Yeah. Or a percentage.

In average because, like, you know, during budget time, you're gonna spend a whole lot more hours in meetings. You know, budget hearings run six, seven hours. And then sometimes I've seen county council meetings that get wrapped up in forty five minutes, you know, rarely, but they occur.

Yeah. So depending on what's happening during the year, like, again, like you said, budget season that could go longer versus, a time of year where maybe it's the summer, there's it's more you know, we have more downtime or something. And it would be if we had some big you know, the themes kind of bucket, the themes where they might spend their time.

So maybe if we put in, like, the meetings we kind of put in there in parentheses, please include annual processes as well. So This

really just boils down to so if

you think

of part time, so a meeting, let's say it's two hours

for a council meeting. I'll be sure.

No. Mean, two say two and half hours is probably a good average.

But what I'm thinking is how many more hours that week do you spend on county council? That's really what we're getting at, is how much time each week. They probably don't even have to break it down for all the different things. It could be just a simple question. In addition to the county council meetings, how much more time do you spend? If it looks like sixty hours a week, right? Or someone may say it's twenty hours. To me, twenty hours is part time. But if it's forty hours or fifty hours, to me that's getting up there but on average. I mean, I don't know. We could break it down to them, but I mean, really we just care about how much time they're spending. Really, that's what we're getting down to.

I mean, much time they're spending and how much time they used to spend because we wanna use it as a data point. So it's like I mean, like, certain counsel, This is McKay's first term. Right? No. His second. This is his second. So so McKay will be Is

it only his second? I thought it was just okay.

This is second. So he'll have he'll have a a pretty good, you know Six years. Right. Correct. And they can provide I'm trying to think who else. That's it. Right?

Keegan Air.

Yeah. Keegan Air for me. But but but Young and Nat And are Carter Carter. And Carter. Those are those three are new. Okay. So it's like, how much are you spending and how much did you spend Yeah. When you I mean, let's use kind of points in time also. Maybe three years ago. Is that right? Or four years ago? And eight we'll ask four in eight years. Maybe two two years ago, four years ago, eight years ago. That will at least give because that will kind of break them down. Right? The newer people will we can answer the two year one. Mhmm. And then councilman McKay can answer the four year one or and two year. And then Keegan Air and Donald can do kind of all three. That will give us at least something.

And with his legislators, they're kind of float because it also depends how much time you put in the job. There are some that, I mean, there's community meetings. There's something literally you go to every night. There are some members that do engage in four or five meetings a week. Some just because a family business connect that can only do two or three. So you will see some play. Someone may say an extra thirty hours. Someone may say an extra fifty. Don't discount someone that they're

Right. Right.

Putting it. It's what you put in.

Mhmm. Would you call it so the work that they do outside, research. Like, because there's there's work they have to do as well too as far as reading, getting familiar. I mean, they don't just walk in the meeting like, hey. I haven't looked at this thing in a week. So what would you what what do you what's the name for that? What's that called? Homework? I don't know what it's

I would just put meeting prep. I mean, the meeting prep for next week's agenda package alone is about that thick. And that's just one week. We could put that

as another category. Meeting prep.

Okay. Maybe council meeting prep to be more precise.

Counsel meeting prep.

Okay. So what buckets do you have?

Okay. So the buckets and I just thought of another one, the budget hearings. They just did those. They just went around the county too, so budget hearings.

So Well, there's a lot of research that goes into understanding the budget and into understanding proposed legislation and Right. All kinds of other stuff that isn't really covered under any of those categories real solidly.

Okay. So the categories I have are, county council meetings, include in parentheses, please include annual processes, constituent services, associations slash liaisons, And you can say say, for example, so let's I forgot. Met Maryland Association of

MACO MACO. WASHCON. There's there's

some Yep. County council meet the meeting prep

Mhmm.

And then budget hearings. Because I think that's kind of a big it's own separate when they go or budget here budget here, listening. I mean, don't know what you wanna call it. How often they do listening tours? Is that only during for the budget?

For the budget, the county executive sets us up around the county Town halls. Town halls. Thank you.

That's it.

But the council members, particularly the lovely the at large members, go to all of them because they represent the district and then others inside the district for the individual members.

Okay. I'll use town halls. That's that's pretty cover encompassing And for then we'll put that in just and then we'll say how much you spend at each, and then we'll kind of break it out to say how much did you spend on this two years ago? How much did you spend on this two years ago? How much time did you spend on this four years ago? How much you spent eight years ago? How much do you spend today?

Yeah. And I'm sorry. I may have missed this. Do many of them do individual speaking engagements?

They're in by group. Yeah. Are quite voluminous.

A lot of them also spend time in Annapolis during session. They'll go and testify before committees. They'll go and testify just before the the, like, the delegation on bills that are, you know, just county bills, like liquor board bills and things like that.

But, you know, the

when I was working in Annapolis, there was a council member around about twice a week. So

I'm gonna

say associations, liaisons, legislative hearings. Yeah. Is that a Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, you know, they're in official capacity.

Right. Right.

Not just there to hang out.

Right. Right. Right. They're not just there for the free booze. Okay. Legislative hearings. Okay? But we'll put that kind of in that same kind of it's official capacity, but it's not. Anything else that you guys can think of would be a good thing to add?

You mean a separate survey question

or Yeah. It's not a survey question. Something else you think that might be interesting.

I would ask them if they would consider an appropriate pay

for what they do. Can we do that?

Well, commission, you guys would come for the reasons.

I say that, you know, as an elected official, realistically, the pay is not something that they're striving for. I mean you're going to find without a doubt that I think they're not part time. Right, right. Right. They have two full time jobs. Just for those that they were

What do you think would be a fair compensate is ask that question?

Yeah. Or you could

I don't know if it would be a fair compensation or an

income Compensated fairly Fairly. For the way to

put it.

Yeah. Okay. Yeah. That's fine. It's It

seems like less of a kind of begging the question.

Yeah. Commiserate. $1,000,000.

Well, with

the work. And noting that they can't approve their own pay raise. Mhmm. So they hopefully give an honest answer. Were you gonna say something?

Yeah. You are fairly compensated. Is that

I mean at

least I you know I can almost say that you know they understand the county government and the constraints financially and their position within that that are making the decisions and just say, you know, more than just fairly, would like to see yeah. Quantify.

Okay. So maybe

Do you think you're this are you overpaid?

Do you think you're fairly compensated? And then

Or should there be an increase? You know?

You could say, if so, why? If not, why? Go that tree.

There you go.

Go that little branch thing.

If so, why or

why or why not? Whatever.

Why or why not?

There you go. I like that. But I like being direct about that. Why not?

Well, mean, the couple of council members have actually said that they don't believe that they should be compensated any more than they are. There's a couple two or three that voted against the increase and ran. And so they're covered under that. So they were not in favor of having the compensation increase four years ago.

And

that's, I guess, that's what I'm kind of after because without a doubt, they don't make the money that they deserve. County executive and county council.

It's clear there.

I think one right now has said reasons. They would not vote One for an

of the two who voted against them is

no longer on the council.

Okay. I think one current one has said they're not going to vote for an increase.

Well, know Steve McKay and Brad Young both said as far as the compensation they don't feel the accounting council should. They don't need it. They don't want it.

But I mean that's also speaking to their own individual situation.

Oh absolutely. No. I guess I don't think that they're the only ones that look at their position and say that they should be compensated for what they do.

Right.

Because again with it there's no one here that would disagree

with that. I was thinking more to the point that Randy was making as far as like attracting the people also because a lot of times it's again, we're not necessarily it's not supposed to be a full time job, but also we don't want to exclude people because I mean, it's the whole thing about how, you know, every member of congress or senate is technically a multimillionaire because you have to be in order to even get to that level. So it's like we do we don't wanna be like that where we're excluding somebody just because you happen to have a job that only pays you x versus x times two. You know? It's just I mean, that's that's what I was kinda thinking about. I understand what you're saying as far as it's fiscal responsibility. They know how the sausage is made. But I I mean, I think by putting it to kind of open ended, it allows them to say, okay. Let me tell you why.

No. That I agree with that.

I agree. If I if I can. So this is one of the things that on the the the city's component, the the charter review component in the city where we talked about compensation, one of the things we talked about and and sort of articulated very clearly is that there's a huge opportunity cost when you take public office. And at the local level, I mean, multimillionaires are not running for city council or county council. That's that's just not a thing.

If you if you have that kind of money, you run for congress. That's where you that's your starting point. So if you're running for county council, like, the whole process of running and the process of holding the office limits your ability to do other things in a very real and significant way. And if you look at the work that most of the people on the council do, they they a lot of them are self employed. They they have a great deal of flexibility.

They typically have extremely substantial incomes within that that that realm because because of the burden that that office imposes. So ensuring that the office compensates people adequately makes it possible for a lot more people to look at running for office because they could look at it and go, yeah. I can do this and still do this other thing, and that that remains financially feasible instead of looking at it and going, you know, I have a plumbing business, and if I become a county council member, I can't be a plumber anymore.

I think it was Council Member DeLaughter who said basically he was not able to he could not bid on contracts because of his particular job. It was very limiting to him.

And partly because a lot of partly because in his case, so many of the contracts that he would otherwise have bid on, there was county money involved, and he had to had to excuse himself from those. I mean, he I don't know that he, like I don't know that was, like, a a thing that was you know, he didn't really set out for that to create that situation. It was just sort of a, like, now I'm stuck. You know, I can't I can't, like, bid on contracts where there's county money involved, so I'm limiting myself in all kinds of other ways. It created a different kind of hardship for him, but also a very real hardship.

He could have gone bankrupt because he decided to serve a public office. And we want to avoid imposing that burden on people. I was thinking of

this another way. You you don't don't want wanna set it up so that only those who can afford to be altruistic can run.

That's exactly what we want to avoid is that

To the extent we can. I'm not gonna pay them $300.

No. No. But it shouldn't be it shouldn't

be a little more reflective of that.

It shouldn't be something that's only open to the wealthy. Yeah. Like, I always use, like, the example of my next door neighbor is a roofer, and my goal on the on the city, you know, the city process was to make it feasible for him to run for city council. And, you know, we got there. We got to the point where it's like, he could do this job. He could afford to run at the compensation we were offering and, you know, and still keep his current his current job and so forth. So, I think that's sort of like possibly a guiding principle is like making sure that the office remains open to as many people as possible.

Well, I think

there's we need to make a distinction between county executive and county council because, as counsel has said, the county council can have other jobs. So it's not necessarily the wealthy. I mean, I don't know that you can name any one of the current members that would qualify as wealthy. I don't know that for a fact. But I think the county council is different.

The county executive, yes, because that's a full time job. It's a full time job. Can see that compensation being closer to what market value is. The county council, I think, is different in that at least that I believe that the county council members that have been in place and and elected since the charter are qualified. I mean, I don't think that you've excluded or have not had quality people in there.

And it's limited. If this was 1,000 employees that we were looking at, yes, you'd have to open it up so that more people could qualify. But mean, we're talking about the small group that want to run, that know that the pay is not going to be compensated, but they're doing it for a different reason as to public service. And I think to try to compensate them on top of that is not the best message for a government position with the constituents. It's kind of like, again, the county council, they deserve it, but not in this position.

And they've chosen that. They've chosen to run and know that what the pay is. I don't think that there is a need to overly compensate to try to attract more. I just don't see that that's an issue.

I mean, I don't think it's overly compensating to say that we're going to pay you fairly for the amount of effort that you put forward. Yeah.

I think that's why with our effort in the survey, we want to try to get a realistic picture of how much time they do. They use They do. But to be more reflective, but not necessarily to be able to replace their other job.

No. And that shouldn't be the purpose. Yeah.

Keep also in mind, we're living in very strange times. I mean, last five years have been seeing tremendous change in the balance of labor and cost and inflation. So it's like, this is not going to be something that's going to happen every four years. Because this is the because I mean, I work in finance. If I had to do this every if it was this much craziness, I could not do my job. So I mean, we might have to just it's one of those things like we have to look at all the things, look at weigh all these things. Again, I don't think we should necessarily treat. I agree we don't need a county exec and county council. We can treat them separately. They don't need to be the same, but we have to still treat them fairly.

We still have to say, okay, this has to be done where we can't just be like, well, just because you said you don't want it, while it's interesting about who's in there, I'm interested. They're going to be termed these people are going to be termed out in the next cycle or two. So it's like we gotta be thinking of the next folks who wanna run for office because this will be in place for four years. So this is not gonna get revisited until 2029. Mhmm. And that's a long time to kinda say, okay. We're gonna leave that thing flat for eight years. That's a long time.