Quorum Court - Regular Meeting

Good evening. Will the Washington County Services Committee please come to order? Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Tonight we will have the prayer and the pledge led by Justice Limming. Justice Limming. Let's pray. Father, just want to say thank you for the many blessings that you give each and every one of us each and every day. Father, would be with our military and our law enforcement and all of our volunteers that take care of us and keep us safe.

Amen. Amen. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you, Justice Leming. Next on the agenda is item number three, the adoption of the one moment, please. Um motion adopt number three is the adoption of the agenda. I have Justice Massingale. Yeah. When we get to item five, I want to make an amendment. I mean, uh, eight. Sorry.

You're going to be amending the wording, correct? Correct. Okay. And specifically the words you're just going to be changing out just the word shall to should. Correct. Yes. Okay. And then I have Justice Dennis. Yes, ma'am. I'd like to make a motion that we have a 15minute discussion on wind turbines at the end of our regular meeting. At the end of the regular meeting or at item number nine. Pardon me. after. Yeah, after number nine. Number nine. Yeah, I don't see.

So, that would be item number nine. We're adding item number nine to the county services to discuss the wind turbines. Yes, ma'am. Thank you. I have Justice Limming. Are you your mic is on? Justice Mingale. Anything else? No, I'm sorry. No, that's fine. Now, do I have a motion to adopt? Oh, wait a minute. We need to um approve the the the amendments. Do I have a motion to approve the amendments to add to the agenda?

You want to do them each time? No.

Do I have a motion to ex to amend the agenda from Gary Ricker? I have a motion to amend. Second by Justice Dean. All in favor say I. All oppose. We have one No, no, no, no, no, no. Now, do I have a motion to adopt the agenda as amended? I have second a motion from Justice Ricker, second from Justice Dean to adopt the agenda. All in favor?

All opposed? Justice Limming. I was just wanting to make sure what I was understanding the amendment was to change that wording. That's all it was. That that's all adds and to change his correct. So we added two changing of the We're going to change his later. It will come up. I thought that had to be done when you bring the agenda up. Okay. Is everybody satisfied? Ready to go on with the meeting?

Great. Item number four, chairman's report. I'm going to be real quick. I have invited um the emergency management team, Amber Forin, to share with us later on during the meeting. The reason being when I was at uh in Washington DC during the NAO steering committee they were talking about emergency services and what commun mass communication system do you have in place for your county. It's only after a disaster and unfortunately the mystic camp disaster in Texas did they realize they had two communication systems and one of the systems I believe it was the Wii system was not communicating with the other one. I'll just say code red. Okay. It may have been another system. We had code red and they said, "Oh, that's excellent. You your county is great. Y'all are you're in good shape." But in evaluating those two systems, one from each county has different needs and so therefore the communication goes out differently and that's when they realized these two systems were not communicating with each other. When I got back, I um approached them about our code red. They go, "Yes, yes, yes, but we've updated it to something even better." And so that's what Miss Forens will be sharing with us. And I want to let you all know why it is a national concern and we don't want another mystic camp situation happening again. So all the counties are tightening up and and seeing what we have and are we communicating. Okay, moving on. We have the juvenile detention report by Mr. Tinsley. Good evening, sir.

Uh, good evening, Madam Chair. Uh, good evening to the county service committee members. I'd like to share with you all the juvenile detention center monthly report for April 2026. This report covers 28 days of data. In April, we had 25 intakes with the average length of stay being 14.31 days. Our average daily population came out to just over 10.68 residents. The most common charge for intakes was aggravated assault on a family or household member at three cases. Of the 25 intakes from Washington Madison counties, 13 were from division 8 and 12 intakes were from division three. Excuse me. Three intakes were also from Madison County. We also had six transports during the month of April. Five transfers were handled by the Washington County Juvenile Detention Center and one transport was handled by the Washington County Sheriff's Office. That concludes the 2026 report for April. Are there any questions that I can answer at this time?

Are there any questions for Director Tinsley at this time? Seeing none, have a great evening. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Item number Six on our agenda is the sheriff's office with Sheriff Cantrol. Good evening, sir. Good to see you. Oh, he turned it off.

Good evening, Madam Chair. So, you've got your report in front of you uh for the uh period March 16th through April 15th. Calls for service up a little bit. We've been seeing that uh increase a little bit uh throughout the year, but we're not alarmed by that. We know that more people are moving into the county and there will be more calls for service. Detention intakes uh are up a little bit uh over a the prior year. We sent more people to prison, but we still have a lot of people waiting to go to prison. You see our average daily uh population for state prisoners uh for the previous month was at two 206. Currently 198 uh waiting to go to prison. That wait time is about six months from the time someone's uh convicted uh till they get uh the bed opens up at at ADC. So a little quicker for folks going to community corrections, but to go to ADC is still about six month six-month wait time. Uh federal prisoners up just a little bit over a year ago. Uh I talked to one of the US marshalss uh last week and he he was talking about um their grand juries and he said in Texas they'll have five or six cases come before the grand jury. In Elo they'll have four or five cases. In Fort Smith they'll have seven or eight. In Fatville they had 20 cases come before the grand jury. So it just talks about our population growth. Uh these people that are in here on federal holes are people from our local area that have committed a federal crime or been charged uh by our local law enforcement officers with a federal crime. A lot of those are related to drug drugs and guns uh together. So uh that's that's our federal numbers are going to be up because of just our population increase and and the more grandeur indictments that they get.

Anyway, you can see the report there. Um we have uh currently 358 in pre-trial uh which is uh down from last year when we were up 500 or or higher. So glad to see that. Um let's see 309's. I'm trying to think of what JP Koger might ask. It might be better if you just ask him JP Koger. That way I won't ramble around and and we can get it down. Anyway, I'd be happy to answer any questions that anybody might have about our reporter, about what's going on down there at the sheriff's office.

Yes. Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes, Sheriff Cantrell. How about how many were sleeping on the floor last night? Sleeping on the floor. It's a pretty big number, but keep in mind that we lost 96 beds uh during our uh COVID mitigation remodel. So, let me pull that form here. Last night there were 170 uh sleeping without a without a bed. Okay. And how many of those were women and how many were uh No women. No women on the floor. All men. All All men. Okay. So our women our women population is down uh to well last night it was 89 females in jail. So that number is down 20 or 30 from what what we typically see our average.

Okay. Um, how how are you doing in hiring in enforcement and detention?

Uh, detention, we're still about 25 uh employees short. Uh, enforcement's pretty good. We're two people down in patrol. Um, and two down in our in our communications section. So, so pretty good pretty good in communications and enforcement. The jail still a challenge. You know, we we hire a lot of young people. they come to work and they work a few months and then they figure out that that's really not the job for them and so they move on to try to find that thing that is for them. But but we're we we've we've been uh very successful in uh getting some folks that are military either prior military or current uh active duty in the guarded reserves and you know they like that uh you know we're paramilitary they like the rank structure they like the chain of command they like that camaraderie working with a with a group of people so had good success uh with those folks you know the only issue is that you know one week in the month they're gone uh to training and then a couple weeks out of the summer. And then we've got a couple that are deployed right now, but we knew that going in that when we hired them that that was a an uh a possibility, but they're good employees and uh they like what we have to offer down there.

Okay. I was at the jail Saturday night and it looks like the construction is winding down. Is that true? Yes. We think uh by first part of July we should uh they should be finished and wrapped up and moved out and turn it over to us. Okay. Has there been any change on the part of the building that they weren't going to finish?

Uh nothing that I'm aware of. No, I think it's still uh as we discussed earlier, the unfinished portion still will remain unfinished. Uh and there's no water going to that side of the building in the sprinkler system. So there is no heat or air conditioning in that unfinished portion. It's just just a shell, but it is uh dry. And at some point if we come into windfall of cash, we can go in there and do something with that. Okay. Uh if you were going to estimate, would you say it's 50% that's not finished or uh yes, about half the building. Yeah.

Okay. Okay. Thank you. That's all I have. Appreciate it. I have um Justice Lines. Thank you, Chair. Sheriff, I understand I think we've um made some calls for zoning ordinance enforcement. Can you talk about that a little more?

Uh yes, sir. We've uh uh been working with SAM over at the planning department and uh have uh begun issuing citations for some of these that uh properties that are not in compliance. Uh so we've issued uh on the 16th and 17th of May of April, we went out and uh on those two days and issued seven citations uh to different businesses. And I don't have the names of the business. All I have is the address. But we went out on 17204 Highway 412, 4279 East Wyman Road, uh 6236 Weddington Drive, 3478 Howard Nickel. Uh no address but out on Kenneth Price Road to an auto garage issued citation there. Uh 6300 block of Wheeler Road and 21962 Vans Road. So we've issued citations and it'll take about 30 days for those to uh come through to court. Uh they'll go before a district judge and they'll at that time get to plead guilty or not guilty. If they plead not guilty, then there'll be a trial date set and after probably another 30 days, maybe 60 days. So, at that point, then the prosecutor will contact them and begin to talk about how they could come to a reasonable settlement. Um, we've talked about issuing multiple citations to these people, but the prosecutor said they will calculate the days they've been in violation whenever they get uh in front of the judge and whenever they actually have their time in court. So he said, "Yeah, we could go back out and issue more citations, but they're just going to stack it all into one case and then calculate the number of days they've been in violation as they prepare for the resolution of that case."

Good. Good. But but we're working closely with Sam. Thank you. you know, there there's a a portion of the ordinance that requires they receive a notice and then we can't issue a citation until 30 days have elapsed when they first receive the notice that they're in violation. So, Sam's been getting the notices and then letting us know that the 30 days has elapsed, they've not done anything, and then we'll go out and make contact and issue that citation. I have Justice Lemming. Thank you, chair. the uh whenever you do that citation for them things, don't they have to all your officers go to court with them tickets all the time? Yes.

So, so if you write more tickets, every ticket you write, you have to send a police officer to court to court with that. So, it ties up a lot of your people. Yeah. And it just it ties up resources in the court. The clerk's got to log all those in and and what's weird is they don't put all them in in one court. You might have a ticket over here, go plum to Lincoln or ticket over here, go plum to Elkins. Yeah. five different district courts, you know, in in the county. So, Fagatville, Springdale, Elkins, West Fork, and then the other rural areas. So, yeah, it's it's kind of crazy. Yeah, it depends on where this violation occurred at is where the ticket gets sent to that particular district court. How's your uh patrol cars coming in? Didn't Didn't we budget like 10 or 11?

10. We got 10. And they are on the ground waiting for the uh upfitting equipment that goes in them. They thought it would be in perhaps this week. So, we're actually taking them out to the uh company that does the striping and getting the striping package on. And so, we'll be ready for the upfitting whenever Superior Industries got or Superior Wheel, not Superior Wheel, Superior Automotive got the bid to outfit the cars. So, they got a they got an emergency department in there that we done our fire truck. They've done it for us and they they've got a facility up north of Springdale and that's all they do is emergency vehicle upfitting and do a really good job. How many you thinking we're going to have to look at next year?

Uh probably 10. I think you know we're back on our rotation now. We got through COVID and all that shutdown. So, you know, we typically try to roll through 10 a year. 10 10 a year. Yeah. Okay. Thank you, sir. I have changing glasses. Here we go. Justice Dennis. Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh, I normally won't ask you a question unless I I uh pre-ass it, but so I apologize about that. Where do where do all of our prisoners come from as far as location and otherwise the resting cities? Well, the vast majority come from Fatville and then and then Springdale. So, we need they're the population centers. Vast majority. What would that be?

Oh, I don't know a percentage. JP Dennis, I could probably get that percentage, but you know, I'd say it probably kind of goes close to the population that you know, whatever percentage fail has of the population, 100,000 people out of our 250 here in the county. So, whatever that percentage is and then Springdale is probably pretty close, right? So, how does how do some of the other counties fund the the uh sheriff's office? Otherwise, what I'm driving at is are we doing it the correct way or you know the I know that it came up a while back and the cities wanted time to budget, right?

And so I think that we need to be if we're going to do anything, we need to do it soon so they can budget accordingly. But a lot of counties have a daily housing fee. Uh but not very many counties have a maintenance and operation sales tax like Washington County has. So, uh, you know, but a lot of the counties do charge a daily housing fee for the municipal agencies. They charge it to the cities. Uhhuh. To the cities. Yes. Yeah. And that rate can vary can vary uh from $40 a day to some places to, you know, 70 or $80 a day down in Palasky County.

Do you have an opinion what we should do? Well, um obviously uh we're going to become uh we're not going to have enough jail sales tax at some point to operate the jail uh as as we keep moving forward just because primarily because labor costs are are going up. So, you know, if and and right now we have a interlocal agreement that all the cities sign that if the jail runs over uh what the revenue was to fund it that they will all pick up a per capita rate, you know, they'll based on the population of their city, they'll help pay that difference. And so far we haven't had to use that but but that is a agreement that's in place that all the cities are currently signed on but that's a yearly agreement that they have to sign. So but but the county carries them for a year. You know we won't we won't know till March of 27 how much if we went over how much we went over until they close out the books in March. uh and then we build the cities and so you know we've already paid the money and the county's already uh been out that and then then we collect it as a reimbursement.

Well, thank you very much. I mean like like if if we go over if we say we went over $250,000 then each like Fat would have to pay hundred,000, Springdale have to pay 80,000, Farmington have to pay whatever they're if they're at 10,000 they'd have to pay you know 10 you know right everybody have to pay $1 per person in their city and then the county would have to eat whatever we have 50 I mean what we got 44,000 maybe that live in the unincorporated areas that would be our responsibility to help pay for that overage but that's the way it's currently set Well, thank you very much. Yep. Appreciate it.

Does annexation affect the amount of revenue, sales tax revenue that we receive for the jail? You say, does annexation? Yes. Uh, you know, they they base that uh uh quarter the quarter cent comes to the county. We get that no matter how many people, no matter what the percentage is. Yeah. The county one cent sales tax is divided by population and that's changed every 10 years at the census. So you know at the next 10ear census they will census that that really Yeah. And our our county share has been going down. Yes. From 23 or 4%. It was 20 I think it was 24.7% in 2014.

Yeah. To now we're at what 16 or 17%. Yeah. We're at 16 something or another. Treasure Hill. Yeah. You know, the money hasn't the total dollars hasn't changed very much, but the percentage has gone down. So, so our everybody else is going up and ours is just holding flat. And I I encourage everybody to talk to your state reps and see if we can do something about that to either freeze it to where we can operate right and continue to receive revenues and not just you continue to just shrink. Yeah. You know, the county's got the county's got fixed expenses that that we have to provide. This courthouse being one of them, you know, we have to provide this no matter

how many people live where, you know, that's just one of the county's expenses. And uh right, but every time they annex that that goes into their population. So when you do the overall 10ear census, it counts against you. Right. And we're a lot of people don't want to be annexed, but they just do it anyway. I have Justice Lmie. No. Okay. Justice Brents.

Thank you, ma'am. Um, sheriff when I was uh when we had proposed and I don't remember who proposed it to raise the rate to charge the cities um and I went around talking to the cities in in my district and I never once got a um a comment about how bad of a raise it is. What I got was the timing of that. So, I think everybody realizes the cost of living goes up and I think, you know, as long as we don't get too extravagant, I I think we're in place to to raise that a little, you know, so that they can help your costs and keep your costs down,

right? So, uh, but I never ran across any mayor that said anything to me about um, uh, the amount. It was all about the timing, right? So, yeah, you know, we doing our budget in October or or passing in October on on these things and that's when they're doing theirs. So, it is the timing. I'm I'm sorry. Well, that's true. But you put together the budget like starting in July.

Yeah, we're putting ours together right now. Well, then I I would suggest that we maybe do a poll to find out uh from these cities how much is too much, you know, and try to get a friendly consensus on on uh raising that rate without um affecting their operation expenses. So, yes sir. That's what my suggestion would be. So, thank you, Justice Lines.

Thank you, chair. Um, I believe when that discussion came up that that ordinance was tabled this month as well. Oh, it's Well, I didn't I couldn't remember. So, it's supposed to be coming what? Back to the finance committee this month. It's supposed to be Justice Justice Living, you're not recognized at the moment. Your mic's not on for for discussion. Sorry. That's okay. I just that's all I want to say. We tabled it. I couldn't remember when. So, I was looking for somebody to tell me when it was supposed to be coming back. Thank you. Okay, Justice Limmy.

Yes, thank you. But yes, it was tabled for the May meeting and and that's what I was going to ask Lisa is who makes sure it gets back on the finance and budget. Will that be you? Okay. And and sheriff, tell me if I'm right or wrong, but the way I understand the way they come up with the number that cities pay is whenever the tax was passed, the city of Febel was paying you like 270 or $280,000 and in Washington County said, "Oh, we can't lose that." So they took that $280,000 that city of Febel was paying and they divided it up with 18 cities. Is that correct?

That's the way I understand it. Yes, sir. So, so basically this all the surrounding cities and everybody's only paying what FEL was paying. So they're making up that difference. That's that's the way I understand it. Yes, sir.

So they should have been paying what everybody was paying, not just Springdale have paying that much and Lincoln and Prairie Grove and Elkins and they all should have been paying the same amount they was paying whenever that as far as I'm concerned. I think that's where we having problems is the jail has got to maintain itself and it's got to grow with population. And it can't go backwards. The percentage can't go from 27 to 16. Go backwards when the jail is getting bigger and fuller all the time. So that's where I believe we got to come up with a number to get and I've talked to some of the cities and Lincoln says, "Heck no, we can't pay no more." And you talk to Fair Grove and we're out of our budget. Well, that's why we brought it up May so you can budget for the end of the year. You can put some money in there. And yeah, they're paying taxes. Yeah, they're paying already, but they're still not paying enough. None of us paying enough. You want to look at it that way. We got a monster down there we're trying to feed and it's hungry and we're going to have to feed it somehow

somewhere. So, okay. Thank you. There was a a meeting that we had when all the mayors showed up in protest and they were very hostile towards us as far as raising their rates because these smaller cities cannot afford um what they can afford or Springdale can afford and they were I'm gonna have Justice Pond talk about that. There you go,

Justice Pond. I I kind of understood some of those mayors might have misunderstood. They were looking at this new way of putting a fee on them as being over and above what they were already paying. In other words, they thought they were going to have to keep on paying what they've been paying. Plus, the party and and which not such a thing had been discussed at all and and I can see why they would be pretty iate over something like that, but I don't know where they got that idea.

I don't either. They were just very hostile. I've it was very very tense. So, um, we've already talked twice. You be you've already talked twice. So, I'm sorry. Is there any other questions for, um, Sheriff Cantrol regarding the report? Seeing there's none. Thank you, sir. Have a good evening. Oh, Gary Ricker, I'm I'm sorry I didn't see showed up. Sheriff, do you think a pdeium would work well on a daily rate? uh you know the predium is going to be harder to calculate uh just because you know we've got a we we can bill up until like on felonies we can bill up until the time that the formal charges are filed

typically which is Raymond's about 30 days so we can build for that but somebody's going to you know it's going to take a record keeper uh doing an awful lot of recordkeeping to make sure that that we're accurate with our billing uh the the per capita is just you know based on the population of your city everybody pays is something whatever the formula comes out whatever the formula comes out to be that we think we need to have to you know and is that part of the interlocal right now the agreement that's that's the interlocal so they either either pay the pdium or the pdium the daily rate or sign the interlocal and help pay the overage if if it goes over and everybody's signed up for the interlocal right now

the per capita is after the fact kind of it is year end whatever it whatever it amounted to their per capita that's where the formula comes up with an amount per capita the pdeium or daily rate is figured y monthly or what monthly on on on the usage okay that they use justice passing so I guess my question is are we talking that in May this interlocal agreement is coming up we're going to discuss changing it is that what we're talking about happening. You're saying yes. That that's my understanding.

Okay. Mr. One moment. Yes. It will go to budget and finance. We will have an opportunity to review it. Okay. Thank you. You're welcome. That's okay. Thank you, Sheriff. Have a great evening. Next on the agenda, we have Miss Amber Forin. And I'm so pleased that you're here this evening to talk about what we are doing with our emergency communication system. So, I wanted to say thank you guys for allowing us to come tonight or bring the mic closer to you. There you go. There we go. Can you hear me now?

We we had this conversation earlier today about the mic. So anyway, now that we have the mic uh working, thank you guys for allowing us to come and share about this tonight. Um obviously we're pretty excited about having Regroup for the county. As you all aware, we previously had Code Red. Um we didn't have any complaints with Code Red, but unfortunately they experienced a breach back in the fall and that changed a lot of the processes as far as what alerts you could receive, how you could receive them, and it went on from there. So that prompted us to start looking at some other options, what we could provide to the county. And certainly one of our biggest goals was to move from just covering the unincorporated area to instead covering the entire county. Um so that was a big goal for us along with continuing to receive weather alerts as we'd previously all come to know and learn with the system we had on coveret. So with regroup, uh we can now offer that to the entire county. Um we're not limited to just the unincorporated areas. So that was a big that was a big win for us. Um in addition to that we were looking at a lot of different language op options. Um as you all are aware we have the largest marshal position here in northwest Arkansas. We now have the ability to offer uh these alerts any messages we send out in addition to the weather alerts in Marshall. We can also offer that in um well over a hundred different language options. But for us, we were looking at four primary uh beyond Marshall was Hakachin, Burmese, and Mong. So, uh that's been very wellreceived and again a a big win for us and transitioning. It's been a seamless transition for us. We've um we stayed ahead of schedule. We were able to launch on April 1st. Uh we're very excited about that. You can go to the county website and enroll. So, we're trying to push that out on social media. um sharing that with our partners and any chance we get and then we

obviously have all of our county employees enrolled into the system. Um and that number just continues to go up again as as we get that word out there and can uh market that a little bit better and learn you know how we reach those populations even on the front end. Um certainly you know relying on you guys to also share that information is a big deal for us too. We've done a few different interviews with news stations so again you know going out media that way. um we see an uptick in numbers. I'm able to monitor that daily. And so it's it's encouraging to see that people they got used to a system. We have a new system. Uh you expect a little bit of lag, but it it is encouraging to see that going up. Um we do have a few questions that come up from time to time. We've been able to work through those. We have 247 uh support from Regroup, which is huge for me. Um I stay in contact with them weekly, if not daily. Um so it's going very well. I'm happy to answer any questions you guys may have.

Now, once again, these this is something that we want the public because they're watching it on YouTube, we want the public to sign up for this. Yes. Correct. Correct. And the best way for them to sign up for it is so they can visit the county website. Um on the main county page, there is a a block, if you will, at the very bottom of the page. They can sign up directly from the main page. They can also obviously find that um as they navigate through the system and go to the emergency management page. They could do it that way too. But this is something that they have to participate in. Correct. Yes.

So everybody here, you know, listen up and sign up for this mass communication update. We have um Justice Limming has a question. No, I don't have a question.

No, you made a statement. Amber, I just want to thank you for all of your hard work. These folks don't have a clue how much work you do and how much you've done. And I want to thank this horseshoe and I want to thank all of the citizens for Washington County for getting us the AIN radio system because that has led us to get more and more and more technology. That's allowed us to get up to date with all of our stuff. That's allowed the communications. You folks don't really realize I realize it because I've been in the fire service for 48 years. We started with CB radios and I know where we are today and it's we're we're in heaven compared to where we was. And there's a lot of counties that still does not have a win. They still do smoke signals and we're so far ahead in Washington County with these 18 volunteer fire departments and the way city of Springdale, the city of FEL, the way everybody works together. It is wonderful. and John Luther's office is I can pat him on the back a whole lot because y'all really do not realize I cannot sit here and talk enough. You don't realize what this group does for us. But Amber is very important. Now, I guarantee you go down there and talk to John or Kyle or Willie, they'll all say this is their right hand. And this gal is she is very much appreciated from all of us. But this group does a wonderful job. And like she's saying, you get on the county website and you scroll over to the right, go down to the bottom, click on to it, you can get signed up pretty quick and and it's it's a it's a nice system, which when I have a pager, mine gets off. I get, you know, alerts through the EMS system and all that. So, but the other system work it's but everybody needs to sign up for it. I'm going to pat you on the back all I can because we love you. You're doing a good job and we thank you.

I appreciate it. You're here. And the reason be is not everybody watches the news and has the national weather alerts. So they don't have the television on. A lot of people driving don't listen to the radio anymore. They have their own music. So if they get a message on their phone and it seems to be that it's the most important means of communication tool that we have to get it out there, they'll at least get the alert. And that's what we we want everybody to sign up for. I have um Justice Lopez.

Thank you, Chair uh Amber. Thank you again. I know that I extended thanks to everyone in the office, but I'd like to do it publicly. I'd like to thank you, Director Luther, Deputy Director Curry, um just being very responsive with me. I know this is something that you all were working on for a long time and I'm sure I came on just at the tail end there, but I I do appreciate all the efforts and how transparent uh you all were throughout the whole process with me. Um I I did I do have one question. Um when it when it goes on to when people sign up I and it asks for the address, how is that information held? That's just a question I've been that's been I've been asked for my constituents. I wanted to know if there was anything that you were aware of from regroup like how they make sure that information stays safe or they who do they share that information with if that's a if if you have that answer and if not I'm happy for you to get back to me at your earliest convenience

although I did a lot of the setup with this there are some things and the behind the scenes um certainly with cyber security it's a big conversation we have um like I said the driving force of even making the switch in the first place um was due to a cyber security attack. Um, so I don't want to I don't want to speak out of turn or anything, but it's something I can certainly get a more detailed and technical answer on. Uh, we did discuss that on the front end with all of the different uh vendors that we demoed. Um, and just, you know, validating some of that reassurance and how it's secured and you get a pretty generic answer as you would expect. Um, but I can certainly get additional information and more detailed. Thank you. You're welcome.

That's great. Do we have any other questions for Amber? Pass along our our respects and congratulations to you and your team for doing what you all do for us and keeping us safe. And with the bad weather still upon us, it's always nice to know that uh y'all are looking out after us. Yes, absolutely. I'll pass that along. Again, thank you all. And at any point if you have any questions or concerns that come up um whether it's on behalf of yourselves or uh your constituents, please don't hesitate to reach out to us. We're happy to answer any questions.

Thank you, Amber. Have a great evening. Moving on to the agenda, we have item number eight, a resolution requiring the Steuart family Christmas lights LLC and the Steuart Light family Stewart Light Stewart Family Fireworks LLC to cease operations immediately until granted at and approved. I know why. Reading with the wrong glasses. There we go. To cease operations immediately until granted an approved conditional use permit, large-scale development permit, and flood plane permit in accordance with ordinance 2025-044. This is Justice Massingill's sponsor. Go ahead, sir. Is this the right time to offer an amendment?

Correct. Excuse me.

So, I got a lot of feedback on the wording. This is just a resolution. So, it really has no authority unto itself. The authority is in the ordinance that we already have in place. Um, so in article one and article two, we use the word shall immediately cease operation and shall be fined. Uh, some of the feedback I got, I mean, that's we're there's no authority here. There's no um really teeth behind a resolution. So I want to offer that we change shall immediately to should cease operations and then article two shall be fined to should be fined.

Could you make a motion to amend article one and article two? Yes. I make a motion we amend article one article two from shall to should.

From shall to should. Correct. I have a motion by Justice Massingale to amend article one from shall immediately and article two shall be fined. I have a second by Justice Lopez. Is there any discussion? All in favor say it's on the changing from shelter. Okay. All in favor of the amendment to the language say I. I. All oppose say no.

The resolution has been amended to say shall should immediately cease article one article two should be fined each day. Is there any discussion? Now you need to make a motion to pass. No. Okay. To the full court in court. Correct. Would you turn? Yeah. Make that motion on the with your mic, please.

Okay. I would like to make a motion that we move this resolution to the full court court. I have a motion. Do I have a second?

I have a second by Justice Dennis. Is there any discussion? I have Justice Lions. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um I I still kind of stand where I did last month and that is appreciate the resolution, agree with the intent of the resolution, but I think we have an ordinance, our zoning ordinance takes care of these items. Uh I think we did get that initiated. It took some work to get it initiating and get it started which which has been done. They are now being fined daily. They've been cited. They will have to go to court and work through that process. Um so I I I I find it difficult to support this resolution when we we have the working means by which to do this within our current ordinances that we've initiated.

Thank you. Thank you. I have Justice Koger. Okay. I I'm not sure I heard everything that Justice Line said, but I wanted to verify. Excuse me. When Sheriff Canrell was speaking, he mentioned an address on Wyman Road. Was it this address that he was talking about? Okay. Um Okay, that's what I wanted to know. Thank you. I'm sorry. Okay, Justice Lming.

Thank you, Chair. Just I'd like to understand what they're ceasing. What what what are they doing? Do they they surely ain't got Christmas lights up going out there and is the fireworks happening? I mean, what what are they what's what are we stopping? I mean, I feel like we need to let people do what they want to on their property, but again, we've got problems with a lot of traffic jams and all that, but it can't be happening right now. Is that correct? So I can't answer that definitively. Okay. So we

from what I understand it's Christmas and it's this Christmas season, but now the Fourth of July is coming up. So I don't know what their activities are. Excuse me, at present. I couldn't definitively answer that question. Justice Leming. So to me, I need to I need to would it be good to talk to Brian or I mean because I don't think the county in countywide has got any ordinances against fireworks stands anywhere in the county. I know the cities has got their own ordinances and I know this is fixing to happen like you said this 4th of July is coming up. I would I would refer you to uh Director Atta. He would probably have more of the information on their activities. Okay.

Okay. I'll do some digging. Thank you. All right, Justice Lopez. Thank you, Chair. I I do want to I think reiterate uh the sentiments of Justice Lions. I feel as though the intent of this resolution was to add visibility to a problem that we we've been having. I think uh the body has kind of conceded that there is no teeth to what we are looking to impose here. But what we did was, you know, start that conversation and it seems that we got the ball rolling on what we we hope to achieve. Um, so I I I don't think it's necessary. I think it did what we hoped it would do. Um, those are just my two cents. Thank you, Chair.

Yes. Thank you. Um, Justice Bruns.

Thank you, Chair. Um, I find uh it kind of interesting that we have seen them operate in Washington County for a long time, you know. Um, I didn't know they did fireworks. That's first I knew about when JP Masciel told me that. I just didn't know they did that. Um, and I very seldom ever go out there because of the traffic. Um, but I find it very interesting as I look out among everybody that we see nobody for or against. You know, it it's I'd like to hear from the people that want to shut it down. I'd like to hear for the from the people that um want to keep it going and and figure out before we go to full quorum court to vote on yay or nay. I'd like to be able to hear what the arguments are because for the life of me I don't understand why do you need to mess with the flood plug? I mean that that doesn't make any sense to me. Uh well, it could be that they've got something in that flood plane that but nobody is here to tell us and nobody is here to explain the good or the bad. And so if they're not interested enough to come, what are we doing with this up here? you know, so I mean that's just my I I I just am not prepared to vote to support anything

at this point if we don't even have interest from the complaintants or the U proprietor. So anyway, that's mine. I have Justice Dean. Thank you, chair. Uh it was my understanding that they've applied for all their permits, the cup and everything. So I think at this point we should wait for that. Yeah. Yep. That's it. Okay. Thank you. Short and sweet. Justice Koger.

Uh I think Justice Mingo was for No. Are you Oh, okay. Okay. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, my concern is like this goes along with what JP Lines said uh that we've have the citation issue. I guess what I'm thinking about is are we opening like a Pandora's box where everybody in the county where there's all these people viol who are operating without a CUP, are they going to come to the court and want us to do a resolution like this? and why should we do that if we have the enforcement provision that we can carry out? That would be my stand on that. Thank you.

Thank you, Justice Koger. I have Justice Dennis.

Uh thank you, Madam Chair. U in in my memory, I remember several came and spoke to us about how many hours it took them to get home. two and three hours to drive a short distance that they would even go in the opposite direction and make a circle to come back in. So, we just heard also from our emergency system and as good as our emergency system is, they would not be able to get out there based on what we were told, based on the traffic on the road coming to a standstill. Uh so I think what we have is something that was nice and meant well turned into it's turned into a largecale situation otherwise it should have been treated as a largecale uh and gone before uh SAM or the planning commission should have gone through planning some time back and so I think we've been told I I knew a lot. I I took a trip out there and it's not a smallcale operation. It's a large scale operation. And so, uh, it's not that I'm opposed to anybody or anything. It's just a matter we have to make some rules about things and we need to start making rules about things before they come about. Otherwise, it looks like that we're singling someone out just because it came up. And it shouldn't be that way. We should have the same for anyone that's going to do the same thing. Got a friend out in Farmington. He had he was at Valley View and it it got to be a problem. The neighbors were kind about it. Uh they were very kind about it and they went just went along with it, but I mean it it jammed up the traffic and that was just a one house situation. And he finally said

enough's enough. I'm gonna take it to he took his to the Washington County Fairgrounds and has it there and because you know he recognized that he was he was creating a problem for all of his neighbors and I've talked to some of them out there and some of the neighbors that live there and yes they consider it a problem and so uh I don't think we need to bury our head in the sand. I think we need to be proactive and decide what we want to have happen in the county before it happens because it looks like that we're deciding everything that we do based on what's in front of us at the time and we should make some rules about uh some of these things before before they happen. So, uh I think

that's part of our zoning. I compliment you for bringing it forward and I know it's a resolution but uh it also lets people know that we're concerned about things like this. So thank you JP Massel Massenuel. I'll vote for it just in order for people to know that we care and think we ought to do something about it. It doesn't mean that anybody has to do something but at least lets them know that we're thinking that way. Thank you, Justice Pond.

Yes. Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh the one one of the questions that was asked is uh was the sheriff's department. We had a list from Jay of different places that they were addressing as far as this develop or planning office goes. Was was the was the Steuart family lights property was that one of the places that was served. Yes, sir. Okay. And the sheriff saying yes. The sheriff saying yes.

Okay. Uh I uh I've heard from a lot of people about this for a long time. It's in it's in my district and I like I said before I appreciate uh Justice Massing Gill bringing it forward. Uh, I was getting no nowhere with the the uh administration with the with the county judge on this. And I'm not talking about the our present county judge, but the one before him. And uh I think we lost one planning director over it. that would probably be be denied. But I think there was a lot of a lot of conflict there with the planning director that was trying to do his job keeping a record of all the complaints and and and I brought this up before when it you know starting about Thanksgiving and thereafter up until sometime after the first of the year people that live in that neighborhood have to plan on being home by about 3 in the afternoon if they don't want to wait in line for an hour to get to their own driveway. And people have to put up barricades at the end of their driveway after they get home to keep people from parking in their their driveway in their private driveway. All all kind of it's just

those people live in that area that's f that's rapidly becoming not rural, but they they're it's still it's supposed to be a rural area, but seasonally like we're talking about, it's not real. and it and it's a traffic like the things they're doing there and not necessarily the the fireworks stand but the light show. Yeah, I would I would say the fairgrounds could handle it, but that that little rural neighborhood there can handle that kind of traffic and the emergency situations and I brought it up before there's a lot of lot of tree old growth trees in that area. If you whenever you got that traffic jam coming from both directions, say say there is some kind of emergency out there and this just a two-lane road, there's no way helicopters can get in and out of there to save somebody. And we've had some in the past some elderly people that are no longer with us who their their children and grandchildren were concerned about. I it needed to be discussed and I appreciate you bringing it up. I have a question, Justice Bond. Refresh my memory. At any time was the road department brought in on this particular road since it is your district and was

there consideration the as far as I know the roads. I'm not sure the road department was, but the road department is under the direction of the county judge. Certainly, and a county judge was not going to do anything to hinder this uh this seasonal, if you will. That's because the laws were if it's seasonal once

like a Fourth of July stands, they're not required to get a C. and whether or not it's large scale. The last time I counted the number of semi van trailers that that they have on that property to store their their lights and their low their their blow up characters.

Yeah, the characters. There you go. And and we're talking Smurfs and Granches and whatever. Seven semirractor trailers last time I counted. There may be more of them than that. And I wouldn't be surprised if there's not another one or two, but that's how that's how rumors get started. It's It's pretty large scale and and probably it wouldn't bother me, but I get I get several calls on this and and it's it's not just the people in that neighborhood. There are other people that like to use that road that live way over on the other side of the mountain from me that uh that make complaints about not being able to use that particular route to to the city while this uh this this holiday season thing goes on. And they're they're They're not complaining because they want to drive through there and see the lights. Uh, but anyhow, I I I can't begin to tell you how much I appreciate you bringing it up. I I was not able to get anywhere with it, and we may not now, but at least we're talking. And I think perhaps in our zoning laws, we need to look at roads. They need to be included. A lot of times there's some venues or whatever businesses, but yet the roads are not feasible for that size business or

whatever. But we need to look at being responsible for the safety of our districts and the people that drive up and down those districts. It needs to be a collaborative effort while that operation's going on. And just for safety sake, you'd have to have a couple of extra lanes, one on either side. I think we need to start engaging conversation on how we can get this done before. That's just me. Okay. Appreciate it. Thank you.

Justice Madison, do you want to address something? It'd be your second time and the last time or do you want to close?

Okay, go ahead. Okay. Thank you, Justice Massingale.

Okay. Yeah, I just want to address a number of issues that were brought up. Um JP Koger mentioned something about it. Are we going to have more of these resolutions regarding other u non-compliance we call it? And one of my incentives here was not to pick on this particular business, but to kind of shine a light on the process that did not seem to be working. And I'm hoping that through this, and I think we've already seen some movement and citations being written. So, you know, that's what I'm hoping to accomplish here. uh not not to pick on a particular business, but to say, "Hey, this process isn't hasn't been working and let's let's fix it, you know." So, it was really to start a conversation and to kind of get the the ball rolling on fixing a process. Um, I think one thing that may be unique about this particular business, it's been going on a long time and we see a lot of businesses that start people's garages and when they first start off, they're not they're not a a problem. But if that business grows over the years, it gets bigger and bigger, at some point it crosses a line where it does become a nuisance to the neighbors and it does need to uh get a cup. And I think what we've seen with this particular business is significant amount of expansion in the last several years, which is a problem. when you don't have a cup, then there's nothing defining the limits or the constraints that you're you're allowed to operate under. Um, one one of the I want to address something that um JP said, we're we're not here to debate

the pros or cons of this business. That's the purpose of the cup. What we're saying is does this business require a CUP to continue to operate and what you know I think I feel like that's what this statement is. It's like yes you have crossed that boundary. You need a cup to continue to operate or else you know the consequences of the ordinance should be applied. Um and JP Leming you said something about what business you know I don't know what all businesses they have. That's really for them to come to the county and say, "Hey, this is a business as we're operating. You know, what you know, what do we need in terms of a C to operate this business?" I do know that I drove down that road uh late January, well past the Christmas light season, and there was a considerable number of lights still burning. So, and I think we heard from the neighbors that there's a lot of lights on year round. So, you know, it's not just during the Christmas that they're creating a disturbance. So, that is that's all the points I wanted to hit on. So, thank you.

I have justice lines. Oops. Excuse me. Just a moment, please. There you go. Thank you, chair. Again, appreciate JP Mingel bringing this. I think again to your points ear that you just made there. We've heard the frustrations of enforcement not being obviously executed, right? It's taken a while. We've been working a while, several of us, to try to come up with the process to make sure we're fair to the constituent that is not compliant with the ordinance by giving them notice, giving them a chance to come and and and make that right and move forward. And you know, that process requires a lot of different people to coordinate and make sure discussions. Uh unfortunately, a lot of that discussion has been done at at the worker levels uh with with little support from upper levels of the administration and it took us a while to get there. But I think we finally had broken it and we've gotten there as the sheriff kind of indicated earlier in his his comments um to get there that that we're there. We're moving forward. There's changes we need to make. Um we'll address those. Hopefully as we go through we'll be able to address those and and make updates not just to the ordinance but processes and that type of thing to make it better. But I think we we have made it we've at least initiated it. We we've gotten it started with at least I think three of them addresses he had I think is what he had on his list. Maybe there are one or two more. I don't remember. Um but again I I I hopefully we're there and we can continue to move it forward from this point. Thank you. I have Justice Limming.

Thank you, Chair. I've been on here going on this be six years and this has been a problem for six years. This problem needs to go away. It really does. And we've finally got stuff in order to Mr. Lines has made clear and the ordinance has made clear that fines are coming, things is going to change, and that's that's what needs to be happening. and and and we're in the right track. To say all to say this, it it is a nuisance out there. It I've been there. I've took my family out there and it is traffic is terrible. But this horseshoe, we have no power from day-to-day operations and and Mr. Pawns made comment for the last judges that leadership is not helped us. This leadership that the main guy is has still got the second guy that hadn't helped that line of duty. So, so we ain't going to go nowhere till we get the right leadership in the top to get us some help to get this thing stopped because I've talked to them and talked to him and but I think we're headed in the right direction and and uh it has become a nuisance. It really has. And you hate to just go out there and shut them down, but we ain't got no choice. I mean, because like you said, it's been broke over the threshold of a little business and a big business and it's got to change. There's more of those business across Washington County as well. So, and when you get into talking about the zoning and planning and you I've heard others say that we need to get a front of the horse before the cart gets here and and we do, but how far do you want to go with that once you start getting out over that getting a horse before the cart is I mean you get into planning a lot more and you get into more rule books and you get into more having to go out and issue permits and I mean if you're going to jump over into that big party. We're going to have to get real big into it to to have a

permitting system, to get permits for fireworks, to get permits for a flower shop, to get permits. I mean, so you're really going to have to think about that long and hard to how much rules we want to put on people. Do we want our rule people's cows to have dog tags and leashes and the dogs to be on chains? That's why we live in the rule because we don't want all them rules. But I understand the fact is when you bring problems out like this to the rule, you're gonna you're gonna have to fight all this to to to stop it. So I just I don't know how the best way to get there, but we're I think we're headed in the right direction. Thank you.

I have Justice Bruns.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Um you know, I have to admit I haven't been out there in several years and it sounds to me like that it's serious enough that we all need to take a ride out. But uh you know I I've been on this horseshoe for just a year and every quorum court meeting I harp and I harp to the point where the administration gets upset with me because I think we need somebody to do the enforcement. Now, you can say the county sheriff, I I'm just here to tell you that's not going to work cuz they're going to get busy and then things are going to happen. So, we need somebody dedicated. Uh and we really need to think about getting somebody hired and dedicated to do uh ordinance work. and and that's the only way we're going to get some of this stuff brought before us and have them um verify things are getting done. And if we expect the sheriff's office where the guy went out last night may not be the guy goes out the next night and he may, you know, that one guy may know the rules, the next guy may not, you know. So it it's not that they are not capable of doing it. It's just they have other duties that keep them just running crazy. Um so putting that burden on them I think is the wrong thing to do for this horseshoe. Um temporarily I don't think we have any choice. I I think we're kind of stuck. But uh so

enforcement is the first thing and and the other thing I have a hang up with is immediate shutdown. I mean who else have we immediately shut down uh to get a cup? And I understand that you know that u uh they've they've promised to get a cup. They've promised to do this. They promised to do that. Um, who's followed up on that? They are in the process. That's from director. They are now. Now. Yeah. As I get that. Yeah. Okay. Because they now hear we're talking about it.

That's right.

Okay. So, they're kind of scrambling. That's probably why they're not here tonight. Uh, I finally got that when y'all were talking, but that's probably why they're not here tonight. But um I I'm very I I do think it's it's a great great thing for us to talk about a resolution. I don't think the two points should be in this resolution. I think they ought to be uh left out and we work off the resolution. I have no problem with the rest of the resolution. Uh, but the two articles I do have a problem with because it insinuates power and we have no power of the resolution and it's basically like we're out here threatening them and I don't like that moment. Okay. Um, so I think what we ought to do, let's don't drop it. Let's pick it up and go with it. Let's get uh get this CUP to where it's it's going and and it gets to working for us and let's stay on top of and and uh if administration ain't going to solve it, Mr. Lming, then what we do is we do it ourselves. Okay.

All right. And that's what I think we need to do is uh so Mr. Pascal, I applaud you for bringing it and let's get it rolling. See what happens. Thank you. Um, Justice Wilson.

Thank you, Chair. I I really appreciate everybody's insight on this. I think it's been very helpful. Um, it has helped me think things through very well. Um I I would like to say that I'm inclined to vote to move this onward to our next meeting. Um but I'm also inclined if it's if it's in the quorum court to vote against it uh for some of the reasons that have been stated. I I I appreciate um JP Massingale because he brought this forward um and he stated clearly a few moments ago, you know, wanted to shine a bright light on this and and that needed to happen. Uh so I say I I would like to move it onward um to continue shining a light on it. Uh we it's been stated that the wheels are in motion right now. Well, let's just see if they keep turning the wheels. In the meantime, we can keep talking about it and give them a chance to come in here again at our quorum court meeting if they want to speak to it because we would like to hear from them, especially if they haven't let us know uh to this point. So, it may sound strange if I say I'm ready to vote for it tonight, but probably not vote for it in the end. I'm I'm just being transparent, but I think that we need to keep the the light shining on it, like Mr. Massing Hill said. And um but also, I I I don't know that we need to get in the business of setting a precedent of just having a resolution for specific businesses. I don't think any of us wants to go down that road, but uh we can sure keep the conversation going and um if anybody says we're being unfair with them, we're just saying, "Hey, we're giving you every chance that we possibly can to make this right." So, let's see if someone uh makes a step to to make it right. I'd look forward to seeing that. So, and having said that, I call the question. Darn, you stole her thunder, her one comment.

The question has been called, but we need public comment time. And there's one public comment. Oh, we need a vote on the call the question. All in favor to call the question say I.

All opposed. The eyes have it. Discussion is closed. Is there any public comment? I was received this. The Steuart family should take reservations so that a limited number of cars are on site and they should pay for police to direct the traffic and inforce the reservations. Just an idea. They should not hinder traffic or people's safety. By the way, Waterburger had a police directed traffic when they opened in in uh Fagatville. So that's just an idea from the public. Yeah. Is there any more public comment? Seeing that there's none, all in favor of the resolution being passed on to the quorum court, signify by raising your right hand and say I.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10. All oppose say no. One, two, three. The eyes have it. This will be passed on to the full quorum court for discussion. All right. And you should I mean I think well anyway it's over. Good job Justice Massingale. Item number nine, we have um discussion on wind turbines. Justice Robert Dennis, please.

So, it was going to be 9A following citizens comments. So, is citizen comments over? No, citizen comment. This is before that has to be. Well, so many times we could Turn on your mic again, please. There you go.

So many times we wait until something comes up and then we say, "Well, now we need to we need to issue a cup or we'll we need to decide about it." Uh wind turbines are going are coming one way or the other. And so I think we need to make our decision earlier where it doesn't look like we're just singling out a company and going against that company and bringing forth a lawsuit. I think we need to say this is what we think as a county what we should or should not do about this before it becomes uh an issue. And so yes, I'm I'm actually calling for some zoning on wind turbines. And I think we need to regulate it now and not later. And so I'd like to see us work on that. I I know that it's our hands are tied when we say let's work together, but you know, things that came to my mind was who should pay for the road expansions uh whenever there's wind turbines put in because you have to widen the roads, you have to strengthen the roads because the weight level that they can't make a curve on the narrow narrowess of our our our roads. So, who's going to pay for that? The property owner, the company that's putting them in, the county, and I don't think county taxpayers want to pay for it. And so, we need to decide some of those things before it comes. Uh, you know, what should the setbacks be for for from a county road or a wind turbine? What should the setbacks be from a person's an adjoining person's uh property? How how long how far should they set them back? If if a tower is 600 ft tall, you know, is it all right for it to fall and just land within 100 feet of your house or do you need to be

farther back than that? So, some of those things we need to decide before it gets here. Uh or we need to decide, do we even want them? And I know there's state laws that override us, but at the same time, if we don't start deciding what we want, we're going to be behind it. And there'll be leases done, and then we'll be lawsuits. And I think we ought to get the cart or get the horse in front of the cart, get this looked at, and decide what we want as a county before it happens. I know that we have the zoning laws and they still have to come before the court to get a C. They won't be able to um just like in other parts of of the county just negotiate with a single family farm or land owner and put up and that's where Washington County is unique. they still have to come and ask the court and if we decide we don't want an industrial um what plant or operations operating in Washington County that's for this court to decide but it is part of our um cup zoning process as far as specifics are concerned I would once again defer to director Atta and ask him what are the setbacks what are and how does that um apply to all businesses and and figure out the language there. But for right now, I know that our county is I believe a pace setter in saying no because you have to come before this court to get approval to put up a wind turbine. I have um

Well, thank you. I I wanted to kick the football off and so I've kicked it and so now Okay, now Justice Limid what we need to do. That's right. Justice Limming. Well, we could talk all night about this subject and thank you. Yeah, we're not going to. Thank Thank you, chair, for allowing me to talk. But, uh, the, uh, what happened over at Green Forest in that area over in that county,

the state of Arkansas really had nothing on the books. And Carol County, I think it's Carol County where it's Green Forest area, they had nothing. Their their county had nothing. You could put your driveways in. You could do whatever you wanted to because they had no rules, no regulations at all. And that's where Washington County is ahead of all of them because me and the county judge had this argument down in Lincoln when they were they had that meeting and they had nothing over there. So they did get the ball before they got the horse before the card over there on theirs. But Washington County, we're already protected even from the '08 rules and regulations. The that all has got to go through large scale development. And now that group has pushed all that. So when you ask for the height of the tower, it's 2500 foot. Now that's state law. There's there's a lot of laws and rules that's already been the group that was over there that went to Little Rock and been pushing all that has set all of that. And and over there when they built all the roads and everything, the company that put the wind turbines in done all the road work. The county paid nothing. the citizens, you know, they have to fight for the rideaways and all that, but the the wind turbine company that's looking at rez is looking at Cincinnati area, they're going to pay for all of that. But I think the interest in the wind turbines is already dying out in Washington County. I think they're looking at putting solar panels in now. and but they're the company that was doing a lot of that digging and they're right now they're kind of at slowed down pace because they're doing a wind study up high to get to any more information. So I don't think they've got as good as interest as they thought they had here. But Washington County has pretty much protected itself with our our planning that we've already have and the new planning that we got in order and we're ahead of the ball game. So, I don't think they can just come in here and push it down your throat. Now, if you'd have done the industrial

development and got that group on board, they could have went around a lot of regulations and a lot of rules and they could have pushed it down your throat. Exactly. And I think that's why Washington County was smart enough to push that back and Benton County's pushed it back and and I think I think everybody woke up to see what they was really trying to do in different areas and different things. But, uh, I think I think we're in good standings on the wind turbine to fight them and not have no problems. Me personally, I I believe. Thank you. Can we keep short comments to keep our to keep our our um,

uh, Justice Lopez? Yeah. Thank you, chair, everyone. And as much as I like to pontificate just like everyone else, you know, I I love to talk here. Um,

I just wanted to make sure that we we were pretty cautious about the fact that I I don't know that anyone on this horseshoe is an expert in these matters. And so it might not be the perfect time for us to give opinions on matters in which we probably have imperfect information on. We we should wait till we, you know, if we want to solicit some opinions, I think that's a good idea. I think the horseshoe should go and get some opinions from people who are informed on these topics. Um, and again, uh, that's my two cents. It's it's always best that we probably wait and have good information before we go and tell, uh, the public what we think about things that we might not know about. Thank you, chair. Thank you, Justice Dean.

Thank you, chair. Um, I go to Illinois quite a bit and they started doing those up there a long time ago. And uh, when I go now, most of them aren't even running. They're just there. They say that they cost more to run than they're worth. So, in my opinion, I wouldn't want them here at all because I think they're an eyesore. I think they're a nuisance and uh, a lot of trouble. They don't create jobs like they claim they were going to. Takes a crane operator and a couple laborers, iron workers to put them up. That's it. Once they're up, one guy services all of them. And uh they were starting to remove one of the propellers of the three to see if it would run more efficient, which I don't think it did. So I don't know. I'm I would be against.

Thank you, Justice Stafford. There you go.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, I have to agree with some of my colleagues who talked about how uh our existing uh what zoning we already have in our county and our CUP process does already protect us in ways unlike some other counties um that have had more controversy around this than us. And I think I think that the foresight of having that that on the books for the last 20 years um has really paid off and protected us in a lot of ways. And um you know, I went out to um one of those meetings uh out at the Cincinnati Fire Station last year and it was really interesting. I learned a lot out there. Um there were some folks there who were very against it. There were some folks there who were in favor of it. Um there were some land owners uh who were in favor of having them on their own land. And um ultimately it's not necessarily up, you know, if if a land if a private land owner wants to if our idea is that a private land owner has the right to do what they want on their own land um and is really in favor of having one of these on their own land following all the rules. I don't know that necessarily my opinion should trump theirs. Um you know, people have different opinions about how they look. Some people think it's an eyesore. heard other people who think they look really cool. Um, you know, so I don't think there's necessarily a a consensus uh opinion out there. Um, one thing I did learn at that meeting um about the setbacks, so they passed a state law in 2025 that regulates like a lot of this stuff in detail. And I think from what I remember is that the setback has to be like you have the base and then you have the the blades, right? So the blades stick up above the base. The setback has

to be three times the distance from the ground to the maximum height of the top of the blade uh to the next property line. So those things are really really tall. So you're talking they have to be on, you know, to have that much of a setback, they have to be on really big pieces of land just by default. So they've got to be, you know, the way the Arkansas legislature has put it, they've already got to be pretty far away from anything else. Um, but you know, I'll keep I'll keep learning. If there's another meeting, you know, I'll try to get to that, too. So, thanks.

Thank you, Justice Pond. Arkansas, the natural state. Some of y'all probably heard that before some place. Might have seen it on a license plate. uh thing I might want to mention I don't know maybe I don't get out much but just a very few days ago the first time I noticed on the trip from here to Branson or maybe it was coming back from Branson part of that pristine scenery which some people really, you know, might appreciate. I can kind of look the other direction when I'm driving through there. But, uh, there's windmills there now. You're not going to get from Branson back home without seeing them. And and like I said, this it's not not going to hurt me healthwise to look the other direction. But uh the other thing about that the environment when you're talking about how the the height the tower how tall that tower is. Imagine how deep into the ground they had to dig to build a foundation and anchor it a foundation. Okay. And they able to stabilize that thing. How big a hole they had to put in the ground in and pour concrete?

Okay. What What does that do to the groundwater? The car topography. I'm uh I'm not ready to I'm not Don Coyote. I'm not ready to go out and fight windmills, but uh I can I can see why it's disturbing to some some people. And is it what's it going to do? How is it going going to affect tourism? How will that affect tourism? It's already a big change when you're driving through what is it? Carol County. uh what what is it going to do for this part of Arkansas? Uh it's just a it's a question we should ask. And as far as property values, if you got a let's say the individual that signs that sign signs a contract and he's going to receive so much money a month or whatever per acre of his property to allow those tw those windmills to be there. What about the the neighboring property? Is he he he may not have a windmill, but he's still he's still got that to look at. And how does that affect his

I I'm I'm ready to Okay, I'll take it. One moment, please. Justice Koger, will you mic up, please? It's uh I'm Just one moment, please. There's a point of order. Thank Thank you, Madam Chair. My point of order is and maybe I misunderstood, but I thought we allotted 15 minutes and we're way over that. Okay. I was looking at my watch when you were Oh, I appreciate it. Okay. Thank you. End of discussion. Thank you. Moving next on

it. Do we have any public comment? Will you mic up, please, Austin? Thank you.

Good. All righty. Good evening. My name is Bryson Austin. I live in JP Washington's district. Um, and I I want to save you all some money. That's what I've come I've come to to give you. It's not You don't have to play the lottery. Um, you don't have to invest anything. You have to invest a little bit, but I come to save you money. So, um, the sheriff was discussing today about, uh, charging the cities more, and there is a bit of a a funding crisis going on surrounding, uh, the detention center, um, and everything bubbling up around the CRI, um, and auxiliary programs. Um, we spend about $90 a day incarcerating people in Washington County. Um, I think Brandon Carter and uh, Judge Taylor have gotten the pre-trial docket down quite a bit, but it's still several hundred people. Um, and a lot of that I go to bond hearings a lot. So, when they were here, it was much easier. I was across the street, but at the jail, if you go Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 8:30, um, a lot of times it's is Judge Jones. And there are a lot of people being held there. Um, again, not because they are, uh, deemed dangerous. They don't do assessments as to whether people are dangerous for the community. Um it is whether or not you can pay bail. Um there was a story out of Sebastian County a few years ago. Uh a gentleman went in with schizophrenia, had been um homeless uh and had a developmental disorder. Uh he was held there on a $1,000 bill. So his his family couldn't come up with a $100. He spent a year in that jail um and ended up starving and dying uh under the care of one of these these private um healthc care facilities that the judges or that um the sheriff's offices contract out to. Pre-trial services is a a a proven evidence-based way to save money. um if we were to give uh programming and the the the amount of

money that is necessary, so about $500,000 uh for about eight pre-trial service positions, those people would be case managers. So, one of the operations that we run is a bail fund. And out of that, we also get people to court. We've gotten about 60 people out of jail who couldn't afford to get out. We've gotten them to treatment. We've gotten them back to court. We've made about 200 um court appearances. That's saving the courts $200,000 in administrative costs. That's the kind of thing that we're in the business of is saving you money, but also makes making sure people get the justice they deserve. It is proven that if people can fight their cases from outside of the jail rather than inside, they're more more than likely not to go to jail. They're more than likely not to cost the taxpayers more money, sending them to prisons where they're not properly taken care of and where they're not rehabilitated. We want people to be rehabilitated. We don't want them to be necessarily punished. punishment is not is not our job and we don't feel like it is our job to take on. We want them to be re-entered members of society who can contribute. That is what pre-trial services starts. Um and I'd also like to say that we've spent over $20 million in the past few years not uh developing pre-trial services. And over that amount of time, the the budget for the jail, the budget for the sheriff's office have only gone up. We've only added positions. And while those are jobs added, I I will agree that is money back into our economy. That could be case workers for people. That could be social workers you're hiring from the university to stay here and to build into this community and to make sure that our our children and our taxpayers are okay. Um more information if you would like to reach out AJRC. Um we're always here. Uh thank you.

Thank you. Perfectly timed. Yes.

Good evening. Good evening. Will you please state your name? Kenneth Love it. And where you from?

Prickrow, Arkansas. Kind of intimate tonight. You know, real here close to y'all. I started coming because I had a problem. I'm a Washington County citizen and citizens in Washington County are exposed by these vapors from Eco Vista every day. ADQ is not doing anything. The governor of Arkansas is not doing anything. And I come to y'all to see if I could get something backing, understanding, help something. And I've sat here and listened tonight about a a resolution to fix an issue with Christmas lights and navigation and stuff. Mr. Wilson, Mr. JP Wilson has u in May or March talked about uh correcting, you know, a resolution to correct the attitudes of our our children. Um, but whenever I talk to y'all, everybody says we can't do nothing. But it seems like there's a double standard. You can do anything that you want to do if you write a resolution. I need y'all to consider understanding the issues that we're having out in Washington County because I wasn't a citizen of Tiny Town. And when I moved from Tiny Town to where I am now, my health is tremendously better. My thought process is clearer. My head's clear. It's not going to go away until somebody stands up and does something. And I hope it starts here with your resolution or whatever it is. I will gladly take it to the PC committee myself. But if the local people don't care, if y'all don't care, we're getting nowhere. It's a serious issue and until it's

addressed, there's people dying and you know, you can't see it. You don't see them drop dead every day, but they there's cancer out there. But whenever you go to the government, they do a cancer cluster study, but they don't can they don't check your area. They check 50,000 miles around you. It's a bunch of Houdini stuff. It's never going to catch it right like it should. We put these up here. If I wanted through these, I could make it in a second. Is this just trying to divide you from your people? What are they fair for? We need you people. We need a resolution. We need to talk to the governor. We need to talk to the PC. We need to talk to AD&. If y'all don't do it, I can't do it by myself. I talked to him for the past five years and it's still happening. Where do we go from here?

Thank you'all. Thank you. Is there any other public comment time? With that being said,