- We call this March 4th, 2025, the organization committee to order. Six o'clock, will everybody stand
- and we'll pray and we'll do the Pledge of Allegiance. Father, we thank you for this day. We thank you
- even for the rain, where it says make the rain fall on the just and the unjust. Just take it for granted
- it's gonna happen and you know what you're doing.
- We ask that you'd be here with us as lead guiding directors. We try to get through this and decide what,
- let the citizenry decide what's best. And we ask all this in Jesus' name, 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. All right, roll call. Andrew Henry, present. William Ellis, present.
- Kevin Ferris, present. Don Durnall, present. Jerry Sanders is absent. And we have an electronic policy
- for members who may be zooming in, correct? Will we vote on that after roll call? Yes. OK.
- With that, actually, I just got an email that Scott Reynolds is in the UK and not able to log in to
- Zoom. Do you know if it's region restricted? Or is there a different link than last week? Every link
- is going to be different. No problem. So I'll send him the new link. I haven't restricted it. OK.
- Where's the, where could I find that link? Okay. I'll work on that and start. Okay. The startup meeting
- with, has anybody got anything they'd wish to say or contribute? If not, we're gonna ask the subject
- committees to present.
- We have we have meeting minutes to approve and Approval of the minutes February 18th, 2026 realization
- committee meeting So moved Look, why don't we do it this way anybody opposed to raise your hand? Everybody
- Not opposed, raise your hand. Okay. So passes. Now public comment. Where's the electronic? Want to do
- that first? Yes, please. Electronic meeting policy? So I drafted a policy and sent it out, I think,
- on Monday. And this mirrors what the Planning Commission and the town council have in place, but it
- allows board members to participate electronically under certain conditions.
- and participate. Yes. So anybody want to make a motion to accept that policy? I will second that motion.
- All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. All opposed? So passes. Passes unanimous. Now public comment. Anybody
- want to say anything?
- if you'd just write your name and state it. Thanks for... my name's Phil Shanoff,
- We live over on Limestone Drive, my wife and I, Terry. We were here at the February 4th meeting,
- and it was, by the time everybody had spoken, it was pretty informative. We didn't make the last one,
- which was the 18th, I think. And yeah, February 4th, that's right. But since that time, we've had a
- chance to digest some of what
- we've heard and learned and spoke with folks. I'm going to kind of read this just because I'm not very
- good at this, but after listening to the presentation and the panel, actually the committee, it seems
- like most of this got started. If I'm saying things you already know, if you just be patient with me,
- it'll take long.
- It seems like the thing kind of got started when Ellisville's long-standing fire protection arrangement,
- where the fire department, Ellisville Fire Department, historically provided fire protection for both
- Richland and Bean Blossom townships, and Ellisville town, of course. And what it sounded, though, is
- that the Ellisville Fire Department made large capital investment in a new fire truck, among other things.
- based on the fire territory as they knew it at the time. And additionally, for whatever reason, Monroe
- County commissioners in Ellsfield Town are not continuing this fire protection agreement, as I understand
- it. I'm not intimate with it, but I do live here and try to pay attention to what's going on. Basically,
- leaving Ellsfield Town with debt.
- I guess a question is, if or can Ellsville town government and Monroe County government get together
- and agree upon a fire protection territory that satisfies Ellsville's fire department debt while continuing
- to provide fire protection services for both townships, Bean Blossom and Richland and the town,
- And, you know, if there's any intention of a working agreement, you know, perhaps a third-party arbitrator
- might be useful. I say that. Again, I'm not privileged to all of what you already know, so I have to
- just extract this from what I know. The other problem that we see that I saw or we saw, my wife and
- I, with the RE-ORG committee,
- It indicates there's a problem with the county planning and zoning. As I take it, the reordered panel
- thinks that Monroe County planning and zoning is just a little too slow for their purposes because they
- just can't get things done in a timely manner as they see it, they being Richmond Township and Ellisville Town.
- You know, currently the county has multiple in-place services for both Richland and Bean Blossom townships.
- The county I'm talking about, county government included planning and zoning along with the master plan
- for the entire county. You know, our concern is other than the planning and zoning, there are other
- important county services already in place and operating and paid for under current county taxation.
- I guess the question is, what happens to the sheriff protection that we have, road maintenance and repair,
- snow removal, waste recycling, stormwater management, and that includes culverts and bridges, if this
- reorganization occurs? I mean, Monroe County, I know ostensibly it might not seem like they do much,
- but if you don't have them, you might look a little different. So I just ask that you consider this.
- Will it become the responsibility of
- Ellitsville or Richland, the new governmental entity, I guess you'd call it. Ellitsville, I was looking
- at the maps and consists of about 20% of Richland Township, roughly 3,800 acres, round numbers, while
- the remaining of Richland Township consists of 30 square miles,
- which is about 19,000 acres. It's a lot of land, which is currently being served by the county. I guess
- the problems that we see, you know, if the merger occurs, will the Ellsfield town have to provide all
- the services already provided by Monroe County as currently taxed and paid for by the county? Now, Ellsfield
- could always, or Ritson Township, whatever this entity is newly referred to,
- hires more people and buys more equipment to provide duplicate services no longer available by the county.
- Ellesville and Richland Township residents and business taxes will go up. And certainly a lot more than
- 8 cents per hundred. Because it's new debt. We're not opposed to incremental growth. I don't want to
- be misunderstood here. And I understand what the
- committee's trying to do, and I'm open. But, you know, we're not opposed to incremental growth that
- consists of impartial planning and zoning. And I kind of mean that, impartial planning and zoning, which
- means you're looking at the whole picture. And for example, you know, well, you know, this keeps the
- special interest in the side deals from occurring and protecting residents and businesses.
- I mean, you buy a piece of land as a resident, you're there. I mean, and if you buy a piece of land
- as a business, you may or may not be there, but you got to live with it as a resident. So I'm really
- thinking more of a resident. Again, we're not opposed to uncontrolled. We are opposed to uncontrolled
- growth. There's only one example I can cite off the top here. My wife and I were driving
- eastbound towards Bloomington. And if I'm wrong about this, please someone correct me. But across from
- Arby's on northeast side of State Road 46, there's an area that was cleared and denuded of all vegetation.
- Also, we noted a new high rise building that was going up on a joining property just on the opposite
- side of that to the north and east of that again.
- And this consisted primarily of single-family dwelling units. So here, you got a single-family dwelling
- units, and you got high-rises going up right next to it. And we didn't see any green space in between.
- Now, I didn't investigate it close, but I didn't see really any drainage control. But I'm sure there
- was probably some there. So these are the things that we observed. I guess, in final, I'd like to just...
- I think the county probably does more than anybody really knows, but, and I'm not saying that they're
- not, can be a pain sometimes, but they do, you know, we gotta be part of some county. And this is our
- county. So I think if there's a way that to work together and get what you need out of it, and even
- the flexibility that folks want around here, I think it'd be useful. That's all I got.
- Yeah, I'm sorry. Yeah sure with the fire Situation. Yeah, that actually came up after we started this
- the reason we decided to pursue reorganization was the state has talked about streamlining government
- duplication of services and there was some from the township in the town and
- Richland Township and Ellisville has a 79-year history with fire protection. So that was a good blueprint
- for us. We were already kind of married, you know, there. And the county decided, while we're in the
- middle of pursuing this process, to take that away from us. They gave the intention that they wanted
- to do a fire district, which is different than a fire territory. Right now, we just have a contract.
- and what that would do when you're worried about increased taxes, with this plan, your taxes, it would
- increase taxes a lot more than what it would for, yeah, than reorganization, if they did a fire district,
- because they'd have to build a station, they would have to buy equipment, because right now Ellisville
- owns that. Same thing with the other services. Well, yes, and yes, and roads, I mean. Well, yeah, and
- all of us,
- we have these subcommittees, because they're addressing those particular things. The nice thing with
- roads, as an example, a lot of the road funding will just shift from the county to go to the town. So
- it's not like we're gonna have to spend a bunch more. But they have the equipment, the county has the
- equipment already in place. So I mean, I'm not being argumentative, but what I am,
- No, you're not. Not at all. No. And no, I get that. But an example during this winter.
- there is, I can't remember the name of the cul-de-sac. The county decided since the road was built 20
- years ago, not to their standards, and the developer who is either out of business or not responsive,
- they're no longer gonna plow that neighborhood. It's little things like that that we wanna get away
- from. Had Ellsville been plowing up until that time? No, no, no, this is the county, no, no,
- I'm not talking, the county, this is in Richland Township. No one's been plowing it, that's just it.
- We're not gonna let technicalities like that
- hurt our residents just because the developer. That's something that should have been addressed with
- the developer bond. But I'm talking about the mentality like that. When you come to planning. No, no,
- they, they had said that the road wasn't met to spec. So they're not doing anything with it. And that
- was a developer issue. But from what I understand, and all the investigation as a 20 year ago issue,
- they've been fighting. That's why you have developer bonds, you go in there, take the bond and fix it,
- you don't make the residents
- pay for those mistakes. When it comes to planning and zoning, it's not so much that their lacks are
- too strict. That's part of it, because it's like if you had 100 acres and you wanted to subdivide that
- three ways to your family, you could not, or you'd have to wait, is it 25 or 50 years to subdivide it
- again, something like that? I'm not- If you've got an existing track, you could subdivide it once. Right.
- Go ahead. Yeah, once. It's your land. And then there is a time, but I don't know what that time is.
- Yeah, exactly. It's either 25 or 50 years. So things like that, there's no rationale behind doing that.
- Well, there is to some extent. Right. But just because I don't really understand it at this point doesn't
- mean that we as a collective buy should understand it. No, but I can tell you who should understand
- it, and that's the property owners.
- When the people want to sell their property or do something with it, they should be ultimately the ones
- that make the decisions, not some government body that tells them what to do with their resources.
- To a point. Because that's why you have planning and zoning. Because you've got 13,000 people in this
- township. And that's about two people per acre. And you have a lot of people living next to each other.
- And I have no control over what a business does next to me.
- Don't get me wrong, I'm not anti-business, but it has to be considered what they're gonna be doing and
- what that's gonna do to that. Yes, and it absolutely, in our current UDO, it absolutely is. And in the
- plan that we're talking about, if it's currently agricultural, unless that person wants to rezone it,
- I don't know the particulars, but we're gonna have two different, a rural and, we'll hear the presentation
- or talk about it tonight, a rural and an urban area. So those things,
- Are you going to honor the existing county? I mean, some parts of the existing county zoning and planning.
- That's my question. Oh, I'm sure we would, because some of it doesn't really conflict with what we got.
- Yeah. The western part of the township is the best land in the county, without a doubt. And I don't
- know, we moved here 47 years ago. And, you know, part of the reason we moved here was because we like the area.
- And I was commuting the whole time. And the thing is is that we just liked the area. And people lived
- here and worked here. Bloomington, Crane, and all that. So it was a choice. So I would hate for that
- choice to be. There's other people that I know feel similar to me. Again, I don't want to...
- step on what you're trying to do. But I just want to thought out. No, these are real concerns and this
- process is that we're doing this is to think up. So we make sure those things are addressed. And it's
- not that this happens and then we say, what do we do? We don't want that to happen. The county does a ton.
- And we, like on the parks, we're still gonna work with the county on that. I forgot about the parks,
- but you're right. I mean, that's a fine park over there. Yeah, the county is still gonna handle those
- parks. We're working that out. We've met with county streets to see what we can do. Sheriff protection,
- since the sheriff is, they're still gonna respond to calls when it comes to Richland because they're
- still part of Monroe County.
- But this plan will get three months. I mean, that's that's part of the point, but I don't know how,
- you know, I guess what I hate to see is I hate to see that an adversary relationship between Ellisville
- or Richmond government and the county government. That's that's something you don't want to have. We
- hate to see it too. And it comes and goes because people get elected. Right. And what we want to make
- sure is we're protecting Richland Township residents and town of Ellisville residents under this new
- thing from those frictions, because
- You know, government bodies are going to have disagreements, but you should not get caught in the crossfire.
- And we're trying to make sure that does not happen. And Ellisville has been when you come to when you
- talk about the growth and that we have had a record number.
- say in the last five to 10 years of voluntary annexations where people say, I want to come into Ellisville
- because we want to get away from taking two years to go through the planning commission. And there's
- no shortage of growth that I can see from no, but there is no, there is in Richland Township in Ellisville.
- No, it's like a tale of two cities. A matter of fact, the growth in Monroe County has been driven by
- the growth in Ellisville.
- So the southeast part of the county mainly towards with the old GE because that's part of the township,
- right? Yes. I mean, look how long that's taken to get going. I mean, I mean, that was just, I mean,
- that's a big job. It is. But I always use this as an example. Harmon farms from the moment it got annexed
- into, uh, they're going to have a house available this April. And the developer said that would not
- happen under the county. There's no way.
- Yeah, for sale, but I'm talking about as they can move in in April. Because what we understand is that
- there's a housing shortage in Monroe County, in the country. And part of that housing shortage is not
- telling people you can't sell your land and build homes. Part of that housing shortage alleviation,
- especially for jobs. If we want people to have high paying jobs here, we have to have housing for it.
- Doesn't mean you're gonna see a ton of apartments or anything like that. It's gonna be planned.
- It's going to be the benefit of the community. It's not just going to be a bunch of sprawl. I don't
- think any of us envision that. But it comes to a point in time where there are some issues that have
- to be addressed in Monroe County. I think what I'd hate to see is along those lines is that just as
- they drive up Ronald Reagan and look at all the distribution houses or units, those things are huge.
- It's just like Keagy only bigger and there's probably
- From that stretch from Interstate 70 all the way up to the 600 Road, which is right up before you get
- to Brownsburg, there must be 25 of them, and they're just huge. And they just take over the area. And
- that's business,
- You know, there's been an awful lot of building with that stuff, and I'm not sure how sustained that's
- gonna be either. There's limits to talking. And ultimately, at the end of the day, if you hear the plan
- and don't like the plan, the nice thing about this is it won't be forced on you. You can always vote
- no, so. Yeah, well, I've rambled enough. That's okay, thank you so much. Thanks. Thanks for your time.
- If I may, I can ask you a couple of questions. Oh yeah, Jeff, sorry. Okay, well, first of all,
- I said Jeff, I meant Mike. I'll take this.
- So we have talked to the county highway. And so we went through the process of what we're trying to
- do. And so it's a bit complex because one thing leads to another and there are several other things
- related that you take into account. So when it comes to the roads though, it's pretty simple. We will
- take on another 80 or 90 miles of road, it's true. And when we talk to the county about it,
- They weren't exactly happy that we might be doing this, but at the end of the day, they said, well,
- because we talked about maybe even allowing the revenue to stream to them sometime into the future and
- work out a detail where as they, through attrition, grow down a little, we could grow up and maybe work
- together. I mean, their contribution to the maintenance and repair? Yeah, yeah.
- But at the end of the day, they said, we have 788 miles of road after that. And they had plenty to do.
- And they're always needing more help. And they thought the best way to go about it is to just let it
- switch and let the revenue follow whoever is going to take care of it. And so we went through the process.
- We constantly are working with the county
- as roads change who owns them or who's responsible for them, we work out details so that we're efficient
- about who's plowing the road. And so I live in a county too, so. You're up in Bean Blossom, aren't you?
- Yeah, I'm in Bean Blossom, but you're right, the county does a really good job, and we acknowledge that.
- But we have talked to them, we've talked to the sheriff about police protection,
- And we're assured that, you know, the Ellisville is in the county and as they go about their business
- now, protecting us all, that's not going to change. And so some of these things have been talked about
- and worked out. And to William's point, the town is growing and it's annexing all around where you live.
- And as it grows, decisions are made.
- And as a person that is adjacent to that growth, you have no say what goes on in Ellisville.
- And one of the, I think, positives about this, we all know the town's going to keep growing. People
- that want to do things with their land and be able to do it and make money on it and not have to wait
- to develop it or whatever they want to do with it, divide it up amongst their family, they annex into
- Ellisville.
- The growth is going to be there. One of the things for you is if you are part of the reorganization,
- you will have representation in the future. There's so many people that don't even realize they're either
- in or outside the town, especially as close proximity as you are where you live. And so as we move forward,
- if you want a positive, the positive would be you would have a say
- in how things go in the future. So some of those concerns you have as a Richland Township person, now
- you just have to watch the growth around you and have no say voting-wise. I mean, we take into consideration
- neighbors even if they're not in Elso, but that's one of the main components of this that has what I
- think is a positive. So anyway. That's a good point.
- The one thing I heard, I'm glad you spoke with the Rhodes people, because it's a big item. I mean, I
- didn't realize. We talked to parks, we talked to everybody, and so we have reached out. Yeah, I'm happy
- with Monroe County roads. I mean, it's not perfect, but nothing is. It should be. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- For this meeting, we have a whole bunch of subcommittee reports, and these are all available, unedited,
- straight from the subcommittees, all on our website. You can see exactly what they've written up.
- about parks, rec, roads, everything, because we want to talk to every agency, every department we're
- going to be working with and get the real detailed information of exactly what reorganization would
- mean. And that's a lot of what tonight's meeting is going to be about is about the details in those
- plans. So a lot of your questions are going to be addressed directly. I think I've used enough time.
- Thank you, Phil. Unless somebody else has got something else. No problem. Thanks, everybody. Thanks,
- Phil. Anybody else?
- Okay, then let's move on and let's start the subcommittee reports. Would anybody like to volunteer,
- be number one? Sandy Hash, step on up. Yeah, and I wanted to start off for the people here to tell them
- that if you go to the Ellisville website and just type in the search reports,
- All of our reports are right there together, all the subcommittee reports, you just click on them and
- you can see them. Well, I couldn't remember that. No, I'm just saying, so we've got them both, so no
- matter which way they go. Okay. Now, you have our subcommittee report.
- and I hope you've all had time to review it. And I don't know how much you want me to say or if you
- want me to field questions. Why don't you give us a general overview of it for everybody that's not
- seen it and for everybody that's gonna be watching this tomorrow or the day after on Cats or they're
- looking at it. You don't have to read the whole thing, per se, but give a general overview. Okay. And
- what you think are the high points. Well, I might read the paragraph on the findings. There you go.
- And I might shake a little, because I'm a little nervous. So if my voice shakes it, just bear with me.
- This plan anticipates that the property tax rates for the police, cumulative fire building and equipment,
- cumulative capital development, and the existing debt service will be applied exclusively to the properties
- within the current boundaries of the town of Ellitsville. Conversely, tax rates for the town administration
- park recreation and fire will be levied across all properties in the consolidated area. The township
- assistance tax rate will apply to the properties situated in Richland, in Ellisville, Richland and Richland.
- Taxing districts will, no, rate is allocated to those properties. Funding for other services will primarily
- derive from local income tax, service charges, wheel tax
- gas revenues. Okay, now I'm gonna try to do my chart. I am so shaken, I can't believe it. Okay, on the
- page two, at the top of the page, it just reiterates what I just read, that the police, fire cum, cumulative
- capital, and the debt service will all remain in the urban town, current town,
- And the general fund administration planning, fire, park and rec, street maintenance and town, but not
- street maintenance, township assistance will all be in the whole consolidated area. So we have a section
- there that tells the increases from the 26th budget at the bottom of the page and the additions for
- the new budget and
- It is an increase, but the total budget for 26 is $8,433,232, and that includes the township's budget.
- And it'll go up to $11,326,182. Then on page three, we talk about the tax rates
- how they'll be increased and there's actually dollar amounts assigned to it, maybe. So, but when you
- compare between the 26 certified property tax levies and rates with the projections after the reorganization,
- the impact on the property tax bills is expected to be
- 6.9% for Richland Township, 4.1% for Ellisville, Richland, 3.4% for Ellisville, Bean Blossom. And I
- think the difference in that is they have their own township tax so that we aren't involved with them
- on the township part in Bean Blossom. A $300,000 home in Richland
- Township is expected to see a hundred and seventy three dollar tax increase while the same value home
- in Ellisville will not really have any change because in Ellisville the tax rate is Substantially higher
- than the tax rate in the county. So the people in Ellisville will hit the circuit breakers At 300,000
- so they won't see any increase in taxes. It'll be dispersed among the properties and
- that don't hit the circuit breaker, and if you hit the circuit breaker, that revenue's just lost. There's
- no way to make it up later. Okay, so the tax rate currently for the town proper is .6160, and it will
- increase to .7023, which is about .054, I think,
- difference and then the The property tax for the township is currently point one six four four and It'll
- increase to point two seven eight. Oh And I also asked Baker Tilly to oh I guess I should talk about
- the conclusion. I
- Reorganization gives the town several cost control tools such as structured service expansion, a broader
- tax base, coordinated planning for land use and economic growth, community cohesion, protection of township
- fire services from county takeover and a differential to annexation by other municipalities. The single
- budget process also simplifies and makes financial matters more transparent for the taxpayers.
- The finance subcommittee has determined that the proposed merger presents long-term financial advantages
- contingent upon a carefully managed and transparent transition process. We advise proceeding with the
- merger in accordance with the specified financial plan and ongoing oversight mechanisms. So I asked
- Baker-Tilley to make a comment
- a comparison chart because the three things that are on the line is the possibility that the township
- could be taken by the county and put in the fire district. It's a possibility. So we wanted to look
- at how that would affect the tax base. Did you guys get this little comparison chart? It just came to
- us yesterday, so.
- Well, could we please make at least them a copy and a few extras maybe. So maybe we should talk questions
- while she's making copies. It would be easier for you if you have a copy of this. Does anybody have
- any comments on the board? Well, if you want to read through that chart just to tell the people,
- like what, a $200,000, a $300,000 home? On this chart? I want to go back to our report too. I omitted
- the police, I mean,
- street department in the in the relocate re merger what it reorganized plan. I know mergers not the
- n word. The street department would be fully funded with wheel wheel tax and the MVH revenues and you
- know gas tax and all that. So there will be no tax rate for the street department so they can serve
- Ellitsville and the outskirt area and with that additional road mileage, then we'll collect more money
- and it'll cover the expense of the street department. So that's good to know. That's a neutral effect.
- Okay, now William, what did you want me to do? Let the public know kind of different scenarios on the
- chart, like a tax in the Richland Township, what a $200,000 homestead property
- Approximately their taxes from one year to the next would increase We have both yeah, so just just read
- to the just the dollars just the dollars Yeah, the difference from one year to the next with
- the reorganization fire territory and fire district, okay so with the reorganization the
- It's not on the screen. Yeah, that's... We just got it. This is what she didn't have loaded. This is
- my little summary short sheet, and we just got it yesterday finalized. She went to make a few copies.
- And hot off the press for everybody. Okay, so our three choices are the reorganization. Let's just start
- there. Well, I want to say the three choices.
- and the fire territory and then Monroe District fire. So if the district would take us over for fire
- protection, it won't affect the town of Ellisville's rate because it would just be the township. And
- let's see. The cost for a $200,000 property in Richland Township
- They didn't give us a dollar rate for the district, did they? Yeah, it's the very last column, change
- from baseline. Okay. Do you see it? We used to have that old projector here that you could lay a paper
- down and everybody could see it. Sandy, did you find it? Yes.
- Okay, so with the reorganization, a $200,000 house in Richland Township would increase by $105 a year.
- And a $300,000 house would increase by $173 a year.
- Then with the fire territory, a $200,000 house would go up by 120, and a 300 would go by 198,
- increase by 198. And then with the fire district, which is our most expensive choice, and we don't know
- exactly what it would cost for Richland, so we used what,
- the rate they gave for being blossom. And that would increase a $200,000 home in Richland Township by
- $332 and a $300,000 home by $494. So why I asked for this chart, I wanted an easy reference for you
- to see the difference of the three plans. So you can see the reorganization is by far the cheapest plan
- in Richland Township.
- for the town of Ellisville. Sandy, could you hold on one second? Yes, sir. It's people, people, it's
- super distracting, especially up here for everybody that's talking in the public. Everybody's gonna
- have their chance to talk, but for the sake of everybody on the board and the other people in the audience,
- and especially whoever's at the podium speaking, if you wanna talk, that's fine. Could you go to the
- back and talk, okay? Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.
- So in town, for the reorganization, a $200,000 home would increase by $72, and for a $300,000, it would
- hit the circuit breaker, so there'd be no increase. On the fire territory, for a $200,000, it would
- be a $72 increase, and for a $300,000, zero. For the district,
- In town, it would be a $72 increase for the $200,000 home, and again, a zero increase for the $300,000
- home. Is that right, because the district is so involved? Sorry, yeah, I think you're right.
- That's a mistake. Yeah, I think it's zero. Okay, you're right. That should be zero. The district can't
- take the town. I'm sorry about that. That was on the chart, and I just read it. Oh, hey, no problem.
- Thank you. On your point that Richland's township residents are exposed to roughly triple the amount
- of tax increase if a fire district is enacted versus reorganization, was the point of the chart? Yes.
- Okay, thank you. Does anybody in the public have anything they'd like to ask Sandy while she's up here
- to clarify anything? Is it pretty clear to everybody? Go ahead. Do you stand by?
- Oh, don't make it. Okay, go ahead. You don't need to stand up. It's okay, you don't have to stand,
- they say. Yeah, my question relates to the sort of the structure of the tax, taxation, because after
- 2027, is it, or beginning in 2028, there's the prospect of an income tax that can be added, or that's
- an alternative. You're talking about local income tax?
- I'm talking about SB1, yes. Yeah, and most likely, it'll be in 2029, and the local income tax is to
- replace revenue from property tax. Right, yeah. So, but I would personally like to see some comparisons,
- particularly in terms of projected financial implications that involve more than simply a property tax,
- because we're not only on...
- built only on property tax under SB 1, and we don't have the choice to change that, I presume. I don't
- think those numbers are even available yet, are they? This takes into account, you know, Secretary's
- report takes into account the other revenues that the town gets. I mean, we get the local income tax,
- and we currently get excise tax,
- cigarette tax and gas Yeah, right, but I as I understand it and again, my name is Jim Perry The question
- is the sort of the taxes the tax will fall on people according To the tax structure and under which
- though for which they're responsible whatever that is and and if it's if there's a service shift to
- a partial income tax and our
- A city clerk will or town clerk will clarify that for us. The simplest way to answer this is Senate
- Enrolled Act 1 did change how local income tax is going to be structured. They did have an amendment,
- so it will not happen for us. We'll have to adopt. The town council will be the ones that actually adopt
- it if the reorganization passes, right? Right.
- The estimates that we used used the least amount of revenue that we would anticipate to receive based
- off of Senate Enrolled Act 1's current low. Now, the percentages have changed, and I haven't been able
- to finalize the bill or look through it. We're having our legislative update in a few weeks. But that
- is something we did estimate in there. We estimated very conservatively because we can't tell what the
- new town council is gonna do.
- My point is that we ought to be sort of structuring the sort of that the tax project or the projections
- of income according to the new structure which includes the local income tax and We also had sort of
- the concern about raises for city staff or town staff, right? What do you mean by concerns?
- Well, we're did we have raises for town staff this lot past year? Yes, we included a 4% raise based
- on we've went with it will go without raises for two years prior. So a lot of your questions are going
- to be answered on the financial impact study that's going to come. This is not financial impact. Well,
- so once the
- plan and correct me if I'm wrong on this but once the plan is composed right there has to be a financial
- impact study done and that is a huge report that is going to be compiled based off of all the things
- down in the report and I think what you're asking for is going to have to be in that report okay okay
- and that was that was my only point is this sort of available there's a lot of projections that won't
- be available
- We don't know what the state's gonna do in 2029, especially. But we do know, we do have some understanding
- of what the expectations are for sort of revenues needed by the town and township. Correct, and as Noel
- said, that's already paid. And then on that, we need to sort of adjust our sort of taxing authorities
- and taxing structure and the property tax rate and the income tax rate, et cetera.
- Right. Subcommittee came to this. These numbers. We took the budgets from the township from every department
- in the town with increases in capital needs and personnel needs. And these numbers reflect that. But
- my point is that if we sort of shift from from the property tax to some
- combination of property and income tax That will sort of change the numbers Won't change the tax rates?
- Won't change the property tax rates? No, these numbers include all of the revenues that the town receives
- and will receive But I'm not talking about revenues. I'm talking about tax rates that generate the revenues
- That is still to be seen
- The numbers in this report are for the 2027 budget Yeah, I would like to see us look a little bit further
- ahead in terms of sort of informing the public about the decisions that have to be made in terms of
- sort of approval of a merger or
- Reorganization at this time Jim that's too far in the future and relies on too many other factors that
- we have no control over our insight But if you can bring that to the table bring that to the okay If
- this is reorganized if this passes that Though though that question about I think you're asking what
- will be the income tax impact to is that what you're right? I
- Well, I mean, part of the sort of the revenue stream is a function of the property tax plus the income
- tax. As I've said, that's already factored in. But those budgets, when they're made for those years
- that you're talking about, you will have a council representing the entire, you know, town, former township
- in town, be able to address and make sure those concerns are addressed. Because we can't make policy
- or even suggestions for a council in 28 or 29.
- Also, so I mean but you will have that representation. You've got William. You've got an opinion on
- that though. Don't you what's that about? What what your preference would be in in what way? Well, I
- mean look at the the township the town's tax rates over the last ten years. I never look at rate
- I look at what the increase is in actual dollars, because I've said somebody, people have heard it,
- when you go pay your mortgage or pay a bill, you don't pay by rate, you pay by dollars. So I try to
- focus on a budget that has the least impact from what you pay this year to what you pay next year. And
- that's not gonna change if I'm still on the council. So I guess what I'm saying is that the income tax
- information that we have, I mean, yes,
- it's gonna supplement some of the property taxes, but that's already factored into this. And if you're
- wondering how much your income tax is gonna increase, the whole system's being- I'm not worried about
- my income tax increase. Okay, then if you're worried about the property taxes, that if anything,
- I can't see, there would be no, since they took the most conservative value that's out there, there's
- nowhere to go but down. I mean, am I kind of a safe to assume that Sandy and Noel? Yeah, as we grow.
- Because it's not uncommon, for instance, for projections, for predictions on sort of future allocations
- to have sort of a best-case scenario and a worst-case scenario. We actually have that if we don't reorganize.
- That's the one constant. So we have those projections of what are going to happen if we don't reorganize.
- With the income tax and how that
- I mean, well, that's I I think we did because if we if we if we run the status quo The projection was
- that we would Run into the red and and there'd be reduction in service. Yeah, but that's not what he's
- asking Well, one thing has to do with yeah. Well, yes, but I guess what I'm saying is that we this is from our
- what I've understood from what the subcommittees presented, the worst case scenario for income
- tax collection, right? This is if we adopt the lowest that we allow, so. This is our third revision
- on our report. The police were all in town and the police were spread out everywhere. They had no cume fire.
- Right. And as far as the state, the after the tax rates established and if the organization takes place,
- then we're locked into the state growth backport. So we can't grade. According for the property tax.
- For the property tax. Not the income tax. Not the income tax. Okay, I think that I sort of, the point
- I wanted to raise was sort of whether we can sort of factor in both the,
- both the property tax Provisions of SP one as well as the income tax provisions and you're saying no
- No, they have factored that in Right Sandy and Noel that has been factored in Set for 2027 because we
- know that right or the local income tax is a revenue that was included to get so that's in the projections For 27
- That's we're only doing for 2027 for the the year that so that clarifies But for someone who doesn't
- pay a lot of attention to the numbers that's me I Think this is a very clear chart
- And when I read the report, I thought it was really, I understood it. My question is, whenever we talk
- about something, can we clarify what's in our jurisdiction and what is left to the netherworld of higher
- government to do? Because some, like state income tax, that's not ever, ever,
- going to be a total in our purview, that kind of a thing. And I think sometimes we get caught up in,
- well, what's this going to be like if we do it? I think we also need to look at not only what it will
- look like if we don't do it, but what's out of our control no matter which way we go? And I think that's
- something maybe I'd like to focus on a little.
- I think it's wonderful that we know that there are so many questions that we don't have answers to yet.
- People tell me that it's because it doesn't look like you know what you're doing. I keep trying to tell
- them it's because those answers aren't available yet. And it has nothing to do with competency or lack
- of information. It has to do with lack of information available.
- And on the flip side, if we had all those answers, then the same people would be saying, we already
- made the decision, and we're not taking public input, so. Yes. I was trying not to say that.
- I'll say it. Better you. Anybody else have anything? Scott, he had some questions, I thought, that he
- emailed us. I'm sorry.
- It actually is an issue that was just mentioned, actually, the question about...
- on budgets numerous times and we just got those totals directly from the supervisors. So I can't answer,
- maybe public safety or the individual supervisors could be better at answering your questions. I don't
- know about staffing, the increases on staffing and that type of thing, but maybe that will be in the
- public assistance report. Public, pardon? And the police is only, I think you asked
- You understood that the police is only in the urban area, but your question to me was, will they still
- go out and cover the township? Is that what I heard? Well, the tax levies and the rates kind of dictated
- some of this to us.
- and it was much more cost efficient for Ellisville to continue paying for the police 100%. Noel.
- If I may, the intent to get the tax levy where it was manageable to meet all of the needs dictated putting
- the police only in the urban area. Obviously, as we grow, the tax districts can change. We can expand
- it out more.
- where it's at some point in 20, maybe however long, it's all one district and it's not just urban and
- rural. But in order for the numbers to work with the budget to keep the tax rate as low as we possibly
- could, that was the best option. And to be clear, we're just talking about who's paying for it. They
- would still be controlled. The whole township will be police. Yes, because that's what we do now.
- but they'll just be dispatched closer. That makes sense to everybody. Scott, does that answer your question?
- Yes, I appreciate that information. Sorry, I didn't have the right answer. Anything else on the Finance
- Committee? No, thank you very much. Great job, Sandy. Well, I also, the township did not have a subcommittee.
- So one of the township workers, Bobbi, was on our finance committee, and she worked really closely with
- us to help cover a budget for the township. And on our report, it says that on page two, the township
- will have $530,000. So in your information, there's a breakdown on the budget that covers the $530,000.
- I don't know, I mean, I've got a long sheet here that I really don't wanna read. So hopefully you guys
- have looked it over and I wanna answer questions, but I wanna say the township trustee will become a
- department head over public assistance. Public assistance will still be housed in the township office.
- That supervisor will be with their employees.
- so they can take care of everything that department needs. And they have a food pantry and they do a
- lot of, public assistance helps people in need when they hit a crisis. So do you have any questions
- about public assistance? Because I can get my cohort up here to answer questions if you do. I don't
- believe so. I didn't have any questions, but it's obvious that public assistance is a critically important
- part of the work
- of the township and making sure that that's maintained properly, staffed properly, funded and clearly
- available to all the residents of Christian Township is very important. So I appreciated the thoroughness
- of that additional report on the township. Thank you, Bobby, for that. And that does cover, like I said,
- the supervisor and the office manager, the caseworker and a part-time pantry person.
- So the caseworker is the investigator? Yeah. Okay. And it moves one of the account and deputy trustee
- role, which are two part-time positions into one, into the clerk treasurer's office, because it deals
- with budget. And that's on the final recommendation that I have on the screen. Okay. Again, good job.
- I want to remind everyone that all these subcommittee reports in full detail are available for download.
- You can get them at ellitsvillerichlandinfo.org or off the town website. Ellitsville Richland is just
- linking to the town website. So if you want to read all the detail of every single thing that
- the subcommittees have submitted and have as much time as you want to pour over it and formulate questions,
- it's all there. Please do check it out. Okay, the next subcommittee.
- All right, good evening everyone. I'm Anne McComb and I'm gonna be reviewing the planning and zoning
- subcommittee report. So overview of the administration and planning and zoning functions. So the subcommittee
- recommends that all of the planning and land use functions that typically happen are gonna continue
- to be administered under the current leadership of the planning director.
- And then we also are recommending hiring of at least one additional professional to support Denise in
- her office and all the activities that she's gonna have to do as a result of Additional work with the
- reorganized town Then under plan Commission and board of zoning appeals. So the subcommittee understands
- that the state of Indiana is gonna set the final
- legislative voting districts and that they will also have requirements in terms of additional Additional
- seats that could be added but if possible the subcommittee recommends adding two additional seats to
- the Plan Commission and two additional seats to the Board of Zoning Appeals And then again under the
- state law, they're going to determine how those voting districts are reorganized and if possible as
- much geographic representation across
- The newly reorganized jurisdiction is what we're recommending for those two additional seats that are
- gonna go on the Plan Commission and the Board of Zoning Appeals. We want that to reflect the geographic
- diversity of the newly reorganized town and make sure that it has representation from both the town
- district and the rural district.
- So that brings us then to the town and rural district So the subcommittee is recommending the establishment
- of two districts within the reorganized town. So a town district in a rural district All the property
- currently within the corporate boundaries of the town of Ellisville On the date that this is effective
- that will all be classified as part of the town district And then any property that's located outside
- of the town boundaries but within Richland Township that will be classified as part of the rural district and
- And right now we are not making any recommendations to reclassify property currently within the town
- boundaries as part of the rural district then For the the UDO and transition of current developments
- so for any developments that are
- actively being worked on that have been approved under the Monroe County Unified Development Ordinance.
- Our recommendation is that that proceeds as is right now under the approvals and standards that were
- in place at the time that that all got started. If any of those in progress developments need to see
- material modifications, at that point then everything would come under the newly reorganized UDO.
- And then any new development applications that are submitted after the effective date of the
- newly reorganized town Then that would all be governed by the town of Ellisville UDO. So that's how
- we're recommending Handling transitioning existing developments from Monroe County to the newly reorganized
- town All right
- And then we also provide in our subcommittee report recommendations in terms of when a property would
- move from the rural district into the town district. So there's a list there of about six different
- items that might trigger that movement from rural to town. But that should be adopted by an ordinance
- and formal review process as
- things already established now with the current town and annexations. Then for the comprehensive plan
- update. So this was a bigger section for us. This is where we felt like we had a lot of input from the
- public and individuals who are in the development community in Monroe County. So we are recommending that
- The town undertake a comprehensive review an amendment of the comprehensive plan and then the UDO So
- that way everything is clear consistent and aligned with Should the reorganization get approved? So
- we're recommending that some of these updates and Denise has already Got this on her radar. She's already
- planning on this a lot of these updates to the UDO be
- The work start now, it get ready so that way if reorganization is approved in November, all of the updates
- to the UDO are ready to go on the effective date as well so that we're not behind, lagging behind, and
- trying to catch up on that. One specific thing that our subcommittee report does
- that's a lot more specific than the rest of the report is recommendations about updates to the UDO regarding
- wastewater service, the wastewater service requirements. So this is something that we heard from the
- public and as subcommittee members in our various professional roles during the day that we hear a lot.
- So we wanted to be sure that there was a lot of, that the updates happened to the current UDO to make
- that extra clear and specific to
- provide everyone that's in the development community consistency and an understanding of what
- the expectations will be moving forward. So that kind of is a big broad overview of the planning and
- zoning subcommittee report. We obviously are recommending reorganization because we feel like it will
- help unify the planning and land use authority. And we also feel that it is going to help with
- Ensuring development decisions that affect residents of Elksville and the town and the township are
- going to be overseen by a single local authority And that that local authority is going to be directly
- Accountable to the voters of the reorganized town And we also think that this is going to provide a
- lot of administrative efficiency Eliminate some duplication and provide greater clarity and predictability
- for not only residents but also developers moving forward so
- Any questions for me? Great job. Thank you. Anybody got any questions? Planning and zoning. It's everyone's
- favorite topic. Everyone loves planning and zoning. Scott? It's my favorite. Scott, did you? Go ahead.
- Oh, did you want me to ask a couple questions? Yeah.
- I understand your question. Is that what you addressed already? I believe so, but we can go ahead. Reiterate.
- Yeah, we can. We can reiterate it. Yeah, so we are recommending that within the the expansion of the
- two additional seats for the Plan Commission in the boarding Board of Zoning Appeals.
- So from what we understand as we've discussed this with Denise and then the lawyers, and she's discussed
- some of this with the lawyers as well. From what we understand, the state of Indiana determines the
- final legislative voting districts. And so our recommendation is that the state of Indiana takes a look
- at, and I believe they will even restrict how many people can be on the Board of Zoning Appeals. I believe
- it's possible that we might not be able to add any additional seats.
- So we're deferring to whatever the state of Indiana says is required by law for the number of seats
- and then we're also deferring to the state of Indiana based off of the legislative voting districts,
- but our recommendation is that Both of those commissions under the newly reorganized town be reworked
- through a process, it's not gonna happen overnight, be reworked so that way there's a geographical
- representation and also a district representation so that there's a town district, individuals who represent
- the town district and then individuals who represent the rural district as well. Based on population.
- Yeah, based on population.
- Scott it was my understanding you were wondering your concern was if there is an expansion how that
- expansion is chosen because the expansion could be chosen from current town residents as opposed to
- township residents was that more who would decide
- Yeah, I think from our understanding a lot of that's gonna depend on the state To what extent we can
- it's obviously written into the subcommittee report and we hope that that will roll up into the broader
- reorganization report for that body to be
- To have specific seats or specific representation based off of town district rural district and then
- you know Geograph geography as a whole. Yeah, you know I was talking I'm gonna make the first comment.
- Okay, I Was talking with some folks this this afternoon and this is gonna happen more and more and more
- and more and more Everybody's gonna be coming to everybody that sits up here and also the subcommittee
- members and even you folks that have
- showing your face now. And people are gonna be coming and asking you questions, and some people are
- gonna try to make it about taxes. Some people are gonna try to make it about land use. Some people,
- whatever. We don't want Alexville to change. We don't want the township to change. However, governance,
- okay, how we're governed. And as I'm talking with these folks and telling them my ideas and my thoughts,
- she kept coming to my mind.
- Okay, that is the future of Ellisville right there. It's her generation. She's got a five-year-old in
- school. She's unbelievably intelligent. I had a chance to work with her on the Planning and Zoning Committee.
- In my opinion, it's not about taxes, although if you look at it from a tax viewpoint, I think this is
- the better solution. It's not about land use, although if you look at it, and nobody's got more skin
- in the game than I do,
- Okay, when it comes to the land use, I've got a lot of land in the township. It's not about that. It's
- about what does the future, when we sit down and we give up the ghost, what does the future of Ellisville
- look like for the next generation coming behind us? And if you look at the census, do you know what
- the average age is of the folks in the area?
- It's 35 years old. Now, you're not 35 years old, but the, and I'm not gonna ask you. She's got a five
- year, let's just put it that, she's got a five year old. We'd have to shut down the meeting if you did
- that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. She could tell me, but then she'd have to kill me. But it's the
- truth. That's the future of Ellitsville. And then her son coming through the school system, that's the
- future of Ellitsville. If you wanna know the best reason
- For reorganization, you're looking at it right there. She's the poster person. She should be on that
- poster that we put in people's yards.
- I don't think anybody wants my face. No, no. I'm super, super impressed with you. I know the job you
- did. I know how much work you put into this. You've got a full-time job on top of everything else that
- you do, as does everybody on all the subcommittees. We're impressed with all of you. So much talent
- in a little bitty, tiny pool. But that's the reason we want to see reorganization done, is for that
- generation and then the generation she's bringing up and then her grandkids, not us.
- We're old folks, we're dying out. Well said, Kevin, but Darla, Eric, it's a great question. There is
- a process to ensure that representation is spread out geographically and by population that says the
- town as it is now will not control the new town as it's going to be. And correct me if I'm wrong, they take,
- They take the boards apart and put them back together again. Is that correct? Well, um, first governance
- because I want to ask a question about a hot topic right now. I just finished this. So, um, first I
- want to say, I think everybody did a marvelous job on their reports and I liked everything about them.
- The graphics, the charts, everything. Um,
- I don't know that Mr. Cook and I have really had a chance to digest them. We will go through
- them cross-reference with the Indiana code to see what can and can't be done. But to answer the question
- about representation, I think as part of your reorganization plan, you can make an effort or state that
- when it comes to the boards,
- composition of both the Board of Zoning Appeals and the Planning Commission, you can make an effort
- to pull people from different parts of the counties. So that it's not just the way it has been with
- everybody being appointed from Ellitsville. You don't want that, obviously, if you have a reorganization.
- So you can make a requirement that the people on the boards come from different corners of the county.
- So. Corners of the township. Yeah, that's what I meant, sorry. So that's how you get your,
- representation from, that's how the township gives their voice. So that everybody gets represented.
- Yes. Yeah. So town representation, theoretically, it's almost 50-50. There's a little bit more people
- in the township. So the representation should, half of it be represented by the town and half of it
- be represented by the township, theoretically.
- And what Anne said is we don't know for sure based on the state review whether we have the ability to
- add seats to balance that quickly and immediately. It may take a little bit of time to get it balanced
- the way we want, but certainly I'm in favor of there being as equal representation as possible geographically
- and demographically because the people who will make the best decisions about the usage of the land
- are the people who care about it most, who are closest do it physically. Yeah, and you know, the planning
- and zoning's already in place for the town.
- and that works really well, okay? But it's outside the town in the township that the dissatisfaction
- lies with how we're governed, okay, in the township. So that's what we would like to see changed. Does
- that make sense? Anybody else got anything they wanna say? Great job, great job. Thank you. Thank you.
- The South Committee would just also like to thank Denise for all of her help and expertise. Oh, absolutely.
- Fantastic to work with. Absolutely.
- Next. Somebody. Parkes, yes. I'm Jim Perry, and I'm with the Parks Recreation, and as I like to point out,
- cemeteries. Green spaces, all green spaces. All together, green. We hope green spaces. Until recently,
- they were white. Our committee is pretty simple. Yeah, I got too close. First of all, we don't spend
- a lot of money on parks, recreation, and cemeteries.
- Township has some responsibility, and I think I don't have the numbers in front of me. I think it was
- $10,900 for two cemeteries that have been abandoned in the township. And at least our expert,
- Valerie Dewar, tells me that the responsibility for cemeteries becomes a public responsibility. One,
- if the cemetery's abandoned, and two, it's on public land.
- and I assume that that probably requires the cemetery to deed the land to the Township or the other
- entity now the one uncertainty we have that that I have is whether That there's a prospect of that Responsive
- might fall to the town If there were an abandoned cemetery in the town, but there are I think there
- are only two cemeteries in the town and they're both Connected to
- churches or religious institutions. They have private boards, okay. So we have the numbers in the report
- for both what we spend on parks and recreation in the town as well as in the township. They're nominal
- numbers. The reality is that we're moving slowly
- to elevate the activity of parks and recreation. And there has been some... excuse me, I got something
- stuck in my throat and I don't have any water here. Thanks. Yeah, okay, good, thank you. Seldom happens,
- but it did tonight.
- for a recreation director or somebody part-time to play that role, but they're really relatively little.
- There's little staffing, so there's very little dollar outlays. Now, in the report, we talk about sort
- of the range of park spaces, and they belong not only to the town and the township, but also the county
- and other entities like the...
- I'm trying to think of the The trail system yes the trails and some of that is county some of it's also
- related to And I have my report on the phone here, so that's slowing me down a little bit Be great to
- have a hard copy This is the
- limitations of not having a good printer at home. My wife manages the printing, and I don't have access.
- It's not working at the moment. So we try to inventory in the report, in the subcommittee to report
- parks, recreation assets, events,
- And there are a variety of events that might be considered parks recreation, like the Monroe County
- Fall Festival in September, Alexville Summer Concert Series, the Indiana Limestone Symposium. We even
- included the Hilly 100 in there, although I don't know who manages the Hilly 100. I think it's probably
- a non-profit that is more, or that
- is more inclusive than the town and township territories. Now, we were given five questions from the
- committee to answer, and we tried to answer those five questions in a relatively short text. Will the
- Parks Board continue to oversee these services?
- The answer is I think yes, although we suggest an error and I was not aware that we were reorganized
- or that the last subcommittee reports indicated a sort of a restructuring of the fiscal responsibility
- for parks recreation between the town and township. But I think that's consistent with our recommendation and that
- In our recommendation, we suggest that we maintain, since there is statutory authority in the state
- of Indiana for parks boards, and the town has a park board, but there's not a similar entity in the
- township, that if we were to reorganize, that we would sort of redefine that entity to cover both the
- town and the township territory.
- There are presently five members on the Parks Board, and in our report, we say we recommend maintenance
- of the same number of members and criteria for the membership, two of whom would be sponsored by the
- town executive, two by the township executive, and the fifth appointed from the Richland Bean Blossom
- School Corporation Board of Directors, and that's now Jimmy Durnell. Jimmy is the chair of the Parks
- Board. Do I have that right, Jimmy? Yeah, okay.
- So we're conceiving of the same structure, but the territories would have to shift. Another question
- that we were given is, how will the budget change, if at all, for parks and recreation? We
- say the subcommittee does not envision any immediate budget changes. Now, one of our members,
- Paula Anderson, Paula's not here, though. I think Paula's gonna be watching us on CATS, on the Community
- Action or Community Television.
- The Paula has some expertise in this area, and she suggested we develop a master plan somewhere five
- years down the pike, and that is another... but we also suggest that the budgets for the two jurisdictions
- now total $126,000, which is sort of a minimal fiscal impact, and that we could sort of easily carry
- over, and I think the last subcommittee
- address the financing of that budgetary outlay. How many cemeteries are in Richland Township?
- We say 17, but nine of these cemeteries are abandoned, and seven of the abandoned cemeteries are on
- private land, which shields the township from any responsibility for them. But there is some obligation
- or some responsibility for the maintenance of the two that are on public land in Houston.
- Houston Town Cemetery and the Vernal Mayfield Cemetery, of which I know their names on the report here,
- but I know nothing about them. I couldn't tell you where they were, but they're somewhere in the township,
- and Dawn, you probably know where that is, I suspect. I actually do not. Oh, you don't? Okay.
- What are the costs for cemetery maintenance? 10,900 cemetery maintenance, and we have that number in
- there. And then, we also suggest some future ideas for parks and recreation in the town and township,
- in part because it's an underdeveloped area activity. And we suggest better promotion of programs and
- assets. You know, one of the things as we came together, we realized there are lots of assets, and there
- are lots of programs
- but people may not sort of connect with them. And to be honest, they don't necessarily attach themselves
- to the town or township, but they may be county, they may be a different jurisdiction. And so, I think
- we sort of need some entity, though, that provides better promotion of the programs and assets. We also have...
- a second-point emphasis on cooperation, cooperative activity, and collaboration, in part because I think
- the township, for instance, now has the ball fields, but the ball fields are leased or, you know, they're
- shared. And so, who the... and the town and the ball fields are located in Alexville, but they're owned
- by the township, and there's some responsibility for the town and the township
- between the two, between the ball fields and the facilities of the ball fields. So I think that's sort
- of an indication, again, of the collaborative activity that is ongoing that we need to be mindful of,
- particularly in an area where, historically, there's been a sort of a significant role for nonprofits,
- and we do suggest also that there be the development of a sort of a nonprofit foundation
- To provide funding and some of the some of these activities have been funded by Nonprofits in the in
- the vicinity, but we've not sort of emphasized that or the funding sources significantly And then the
- third general point was expansion. Well, that's I already said that expansion of involvement of nonprofits and
- Paula has some other ideas in that area, but we have both the sort of the core report, which is about
- four or five pages, and then we've got a lot of other additional materials that sort of are intended
- to elaborate if somebody wants to look for further elaboration, and we may in the next iteration of
- this, depending on the committee's preference,
- try to sort of develop a closer correspondence between the two by one, citing the other one, but not
- necessarily incorporating it so that somebody who wants to go to the subcommittee report can read four
- pages and come away with sort of our general set of recommendations. That's it. Thank you, Jim. After
- reading the report, especially the addendum at the end, I learned a whole bunch about the parks and
- organizations in our area that I had not known. And I have kids, we go to parks. I hadn't either.
- Any questions for Jim? Thanks for the water. You're very welcome. Thank you for the report. Yeah, you
- did a great job. We definitely want to thank everybody that participated in the subcommittees. Yeah,
- a lot of work. Yes. In a short period of time. I particularly appreciated
- how much effort was clearly given to making the reports intelligible, making them not just technical,
- not just a bunch of data, but actually interpreting it, framing the main questions, and giving clear
- recommendations. And in other cases saying, there are two possible options here or there, and we are
- not going to make a recommendation about this, but this is what you need to know to understand the options.
- So I found them overall very intelligible. I was concerned that I was going to slog through a lot of
- just technical data, and I was
- very pleased to read much clearer subcommittee reports than I expected even. Simplified. Scott, do you
- have any questions for Jim? No. No. Okay. Okay. The next subcommittee. I'm going to start picking people.
- I know you.
- Zach Michael with the Public Safety Subcommittee. I'll let Calvin introduce himself when he's ready.
- Two presenters on this, neither one of us wanted to pretend we knew what we needed to know to present
- for the other person. So I hope that's okay with you guys. On the police side, we started off just kind
- of comparing the area we're responsible for now and what that will look like if the reorganization happens.
- And I'm not gonna go through the entire report. You have it if you have questions.
- certainly let me know, but I just wanted to point out a few things. Quick comparison between the two
- entities. There's 35.4 square miles in Richland Township, 7.33 in town of Ellitsville. So that's pretty
- big difference for us. That's about a 382% increase in the area that we'll be responsible for in terms
- of patrol. Population wise, fortunately a much smaller increase
- So we're going from almost 7,000 residents to a little over 15. And this is all according to the 2024
- American Community Survey. So that increase is about 126% for us. So just to give you an idea of what
- our increases will look like. And to answer the question that I'm hearing a lot, and I'm not sure where
- the confusion comes from, so you'll hear it here first, folks.
- ellisville police department if if reorganization happens will be responsible for policing the entire
- township the town of ellisville and the township so that that's that that is a definite we had a very
- the top three at our department the top three at the sheriff's office we had a very productive conversation
- about a month ago chief i think it was and and they will continue the sheriff's office will continue
- to back us up just as they do now it's a very
- a good relationship we have with them. So we see no changes in that whatsoever. And I think there's
- very intelligent individual that has been in my ear. And I think he definitely hit the nail on the head
- when he said overall in this county, staffing is not gonna change. Sheriff's office isn't gonna lay
- anybody off. Bloomington PD is not gonna lay anybody off. If this happens for us, we're not gonna lay
- anybody off. In fact, we're adding people.
- So everybody works really well together in the law enforcement community, that will continue. So if
- something major happens here and we need help, we know we're gonna get it. And rest assured that the
- township, the population of the township will be well protected. We are immediately calling for or asking
- for, I guess, the recommendation is an additional three officers for the department.
- And we're basing this all on averages. So unlike the fire department and the fire service in general,
- we don't have a known standard. There's not a developed standard in this country, right? So we work
- off of averages and the average currently in the United States is 2.4 officers per 1,000 residents.
- In the Midwest, it's a little bit lower because obviously in different regions of the country you have
- differences, so it's a lot lower out west, but in the Midwest it's 2.2. Currently, the town of Ellisville,
- we sit at 2.5, which is really great. Now, if reorganization happens, that obviously is going to lower,
- but I did want to point out that currently the county, the sheriff's office, they sit at .81 officers
- per 1,000 residents.
- So with the three additional officers that, if reorganization happens, that we would gain would put
- us at, I think it's 1.13 per 1,000 residents. So it's going up, the average is going up, which is a
- good thing. So that's the immediate recommendation. We put in there some five to seven year planning.
- As we know, the township, the reorganized town, if this happens, will continue to grow economically.
- and population will probably grow with housing and such. So we put some long-term recommendations in
- there. You can see those, I'm happy to talk about those, but I think the focus is right now, how do
- we make this happen and what do we need for 2027? So three is what we're recommending. We are looking
- forward to this, should it be, or I guess I should say when it is hopefully approved.
- And yeah, we look forward to it. So happy to answer questions on the police side. If you don't have
- any, then I'll turn it over to Calvin. Does anybody in the public have anything they'd like to ask?
- I think Sandy addressed a lot of it as far as the funding for the three additional officers. That's
- all in place. Nobody? Yeah, pointing out to the public that
- this reorganization isn't going to dramatically change the rate of calls for service in any meaningful
- way likely because it's the same people in the same area with the same basic needs, the same traffic
- patterns, the same everything on January 1, it's not going to suddenly be an entirely different thing.
- And it's not just Ellisville and it's not just the county, the police in the township. I mean, I've
- rode along at least twice with, uh, Bloomington's police department.
- in the township, where they've helped cover it, three times, three times where they've helped cover
- the township. So like you say, everybody works real close together, great police departments, everybody's
- serviced. Bloomington does have a section in the township, which I know that's been discussed before,
- and that was not included in anything we did on the public safety side. But yeah, I mean, obviously
- there are some very big overlaps in
- how they get from point A to point B puts them in the township. So they're patrolling in the township.
- So all that's gonna continue. None of that will change. And then even when, if we really, really need
- it, state police has responded to this. And I'm glad you guys have a very good working relationship
- with that, because this would not work without it. Matter of fact, I don't think policing or even fire
- protection would work if there weren't cooperation.
- Thanks, Zach. Yeah, I'll turn it over to Calvin. Hello, I'm Calvin Poole and with the subcommittee and
- I worked on the fireside of the committee report. And essentially for the Ellisville Fire Department,
- we are currently the provider of fire rescue and first responder, first medical first response services for
- town of Ellisville as well as Richmond Township. So we're currently providing that service and we have
- since about 1947. So we're we're operating out of two stations one in the township one in the town and
- so you know the the quick summary of the thing is that if this consolidation was to go through tomorrow
- we would be able to continue with services as we are currently providing them.
- The biggest part of the report is to just make the committee and any future governing entity aware of
- some of the future challenges and some of the future issues that we are looking at that would require
- some growth of the fire department. I'll skip through some of the history stuff on here,
- For instance, we are seeing continued growth in demand for calls for service in our response area. And
- as the chart showing there that's up on your screen now is in the last five years, we have seen approximately
- about a 102% increase in calls for service. So just increased requests for medical services, increased
- responses across the board.
- we don't really predict that to go in a downward direction. The other piece of the puzzle is that we
- do have two stations, two crews that respond to calls, and that on occasion that we do have what we
- classify as overlapping calls, where there's more than one call occurring in our response area that
- requires both stations to be out and addressing calls. And in tracking those,
- In 2024, we showed that we had 530 occasions where we had both stations committed on calls. And in 2025,
- that number was 546. So just a point to be aware of on that. Additionally, as far as overall activity
- in the Ellisville and Richland Township area, we are one of the busier areas. Our two stations,
- are the number two and number three responding companies when you look at the county as a whole, including
- Bloomington City, as that chart shows. So we do have a lot of call volume and we do, as I said earlier,
- we are expecting those numbers to not go in a downward direction, but only increase as development continues
- and we gain more population in our area.
- The current operating budget for 2026 is about $3.4 million. I believe the current proposal for 2027
- is around 3.8. The biggest increases in that are regarding some obligations, some legal obligations
- for increased contributions to retirement funding.
- some natural increases in expenditures, and also a request for three additional personnel. And that
- kind of gets us into our future challenges. If the budget for 2027 is approved, we would go from where
- we currently are in staffing of having a total of six personnel on duty at one time,
- three at our station 71 in Ellisville and three at our station 81 in the township. And an additional
- three personnel, if approved in 27, would bring that up to having four at one station and three at the
- other. What we're trying to do is work toward getting back up to the national minimum standard for staffing
- of an engine company. And that is four on each engine company.
- So like I said, granted, if we do get that increase in 27, the next immediate need is additional three
- personnel at some point down the road to try to get us to that staffing level of four personnel at each
- station for a response. Another staffing need that's been identified is an eventual need for adding
- a shift supervisor.
- and that would be one additional person on each shift that would be able to oversee major incidents
- and take on many of the administrative functions of supervising the on duty shift personnel and freeing
- those tasks up from the administrative staff where they can focus on other projects. The other item
- as far as future challenges is
- The maintenance of fleet, obviously fire trucks are not small vehicles and they don't come with a small
- price tag either. So we currently have one new pumper that's currently ordered and we have a ladder
- truck that has also been ordered. One of them should be due at some point this year and the ladder truck,
- I believe,
- We're looking at 2027 for that one. But in addition to that, the entire fleet eventually goes through
- a replacement schedule. And we are fortunate enough that we do have some national standards on that
- that recommend what that replacement schedule should look like in some general terms. Ideally, your
- frontline life of
- your primary trucks like the engines should be about a 15-year lifespan. Then they spend some time as
- a reserve truck where they can be stood up and used as needed, like if the primary truck goes down for
- maintenance. And then around the 20-year mark, that's when we're looking at trying to replace apparatus
- and retire those older trucks out of the fleet.
- The chart that's on there, it shows what the current age of the fleet and how those dates are kind of
- staggered currently from when they were acquired originally. And we would just encourage that the need
- for fleet replacement continue to be addressed so that we don't end up with a backlog where you have
- multiple apparatus that are in need of replacement at one time and we can continue to kind of stair
- step our way through them one at a time.
- Last item that we wanted to make sure that the the group was aware of as far as future needs is the
- possibility of having a third station brought online at some point down the road now the Harmon farm,
- I'm sorry. I jumped ahead a little bit there's two items as far as talking about stations currently the
- the current township station, we performed a study back in 2024 about the possibility of replacing that
- station and changing its location. And through that study in conjunction with the township, a location
- was determined off of Vernal Pike and Harkstray. We were able to actually acquire land there at no cost
- to the town or the township.
- and we do have a plan for a new station that can go in that space. That location would better locate
- the township station to have better coverage of the township instead of being kind of in the far southeast
- corner of the township right now. It would be a little more centrally located and give us a
- better overlapping coverage. The plans for that are,
- currently on hold because of all the different variables involved in this process. I believe the township
- had identified funds that they could move forward with that if all things being equal, but with the
- current discussions over what the future governance of the area is gonna look like, that's kind of on
- pause right now. The, as I,
- prematurely mentioned, a third station is kind of on the radar for future. Harmon Farms development
- out here on the west side of town, as a part of their development, they set aside land for a future
- fire station. This isn't something that's gonna happen tomorrow. As all of you know, funding for public
- safety is kind of on the backend. You get the development, you start getting the tax revenue in,
- And then once you have those funds built up, then you start bringing up your resources to cover those
- areas. And we understand that. But with development on the west side of town and with the potential
- for other future developments throughout the town and township, we do expect demand for services to
- increase. We do expect that
- the instances of overlapping calls will probably increase as well and that we will eventually have a
- need for a third station to maintain good coverage and consistent coverage. The location and kind of
- being up in the northwest portion of the response area would also kind of give us a good coverage that
- would kind of seal up some of the gaps that are left between the two stations.
- And I believe there are some figures, there are some illustrations a little bit further in the document
- that kind of go through that. And specifically the last one kind of puts together all three of those
- where the blue area is showing the relocated township station and what its coverage area would look
- like. And you have kind of the
- brown area there, that's the current town station, station 71, and then the future site up in the northwest
- corner that would kind of fill in some of the gaps that we have in that far western side. And that would
- give us a good footprint of coverage and response to the entire area. And like I said, this is kind
- of a roadmap discussion, not necessarily immediate needs. Like I said at the beginning,
- We have been the provider of services for the town and township for many, many years and we are taking
- care of that community now and can continue through whatever becomes of this if we are, we end up with
- a governance that keeps us in that area. Any questions for me? Any questions?
- in the southeast part of the township, is that? What about? There's a station down in the south, there's
- a township there that's stationed in the southeast part of the township there. What's planned on the
- other? That's the station that we're currently looking to relocate and place at the Varla and Harstow
- locations.
- And like I said, a couple of reasons for that. The station you're referring to was built in 1971. It
- was originally designed for one person to be in there. And we're trying to staff four people now. So
- it's a little tight. And as far as response for the entire township, its position
- kind of puts us on some long runs getting across to more western and central areas of the township.
- So the idea would be that we would no longer be in that station, but relocate to the new location. Anything
- else? Anyone else? Just to be clear, these needs that you outlined, whether this happens or what, they
- still need to be done.
- Yes, and like I said, yeah, what I was hoping that we would all understand from this is that, yeah,
- these are kind of just roadmap issues that we're projecting for the fire department as a whole, not
- consolidation issues. Like I said, if we consolidated tomorrow, we could continue to provide protection
- at the same level we are right now to the community the next day under a new governance.
- These are all things that regardless of the future governance picture of this area would need to be
- addressed for fire service protection. Do you want to comment on anything about fire territory? I don't
- think that would, for this committee. Thank you. All right. Do you want to talk about the planning part?
- If you want to, I can at the minute.
- We were tasked with coordinating a little bit with the planning department. So I believe the planning
- department kind of got split between two subcommittees a little bit because public safety planning,
- there's an aspect of planning like through inspection services that does fall under public safety. And
- essentially what we were looking at was
- with input from the planning department was that obviously there'll be an expectation that there's gonna
- be more plan reviews, more inspections to do over a much larger territory and a much larger space and
- with growing development that increases that volume as well so that they were gonna be looking for an
- additional employee to help with that workload. And that's, you got anything to add to that? And that's
- what we got.
- Good job. Mr. Patton. Kevin Patton, fire chief with the town of Ellsville. Not gonna take up any time
- here, but I know there's a lot of questions with the fire district, the fire territory, where it stands,
- all this, the pros and cons. I'm gonna be back over there, so when the meeting's finished, if anybody
- has any questions, I'm happy to hang around and answer them. That way I don't take up any of your time.
- Thank you, thank you.
- So I think we've got finance left. Local governance. I'm elected by virtue of no one else being able
- to be here. So I will be very quick though, because luckily for us, we have very limited options on
- what we're allowed to do. So let me pull up the report really quick so everyone online can see.
- I apologize. I need to sit here so that I can read off my papers and move the screen at the same time
- So really quick the I'm just gonna read the executive summary We reviewed current governing structure
- of the town of Ellisville and Richland Township and the transition needs that would result if reorganization
- takes effect we find that the reorganization between the town of Ellisville and Richland Township is
- recommended and
- And this report will present two governance options for the reorganization board's review and determination.
- We wanted to present multiple options to ensure that the representation for Richland's township was
- considered. That was one of the main things when we were having our discussions, that we wanted to make
- sure that Richland township having a greater population than the town of Ellisville was able to have
- maximum representation on the transition board. With that being said, we will go to a side by side comparison
- of the board's considerations. So option one has it at seven members with five districts and two at
- large. And for the board's knowledge, we currently call them wards. The recommendation is to transition
- wards to districts.
- since that's what the county uses for everything else in the city. It just makes it a little bit easier
- for the public to know where to go for districts. The at-large seats, we are recommending that we take
- two from the Township Trustee Board that will be elected this year to take office January 1st of 2027
- for option one.
- And so then those at large seats will serve their full four year cycle. So the term will end December
- 31st of 2030. We don't have any temporary transitional seats in option one. You'll see that in option
- two. And so the board size beginning in 2028 for the transition year will be seven members. And the
- offices that are elected in 2026
- for wards four and five that will become districts four and five, stay their entire four year term.
- So for the 2027 ballot, you'll have districts one, two, three, and the clerk treasurer. So you'll have
- those members that will stay on during the transition year to be reelected or to be elected new positions for 2028.
- So the next at-large election will be in 2030, and the first full election realignment, where the potential
- for every new person to be on the board will be in the 2031 cycle. So that's option one. So option two,
- and to be fair, we kind of asked the legal team pretty late in the game, because we were still kind
- of trying to figure out what would maximize
- the Richland Township representation to make sure that they had a good representation on the board.
- So we're not 100% sure how a nine member board would work because the knowns would be that we could
- take at least three members from the Township Trustee Board because we know that those will be elected.
- The unknown would be because the intent of the Township Trustee
- um, subcommittee was to take the elected township trustee person who would be in office January 1st
- of 27 and transition them to the director of public assistance. So the laws have changed somewhat. We
- were told with special elections, so we were not 100% sure. So I hope with board discussion and legal
- that that could be figured out if that's the option that the reorganization board chooses to go in.
- And that's pretty much it. The only difference between option one and option two is that instead of
- a transition year of seven members, it's nine members. And then on option two, if that's the option
- chosen in 2028, it would go back to seven members for the full board. Correct. Because the maps, which
- you'll be having a presentation next
- I'm guessing for the maps. We'll need to discuss meeting weekly. You'll see the districts and he's got
- several maps. I have a preview of them, but he's going to be doing a full presentation of that. Let's
- not look at that now. So moving from the wards to the districts. Only the name changes. Only the name
- changes, so the wards stay the same. So 46 corridor, that's still a district. Well, I think Mr. Sheldon's gonna
- give a presentation next week on. So they'll have to expand based on population, but that's covered
- in code. Like that's not something that is just arbitrarily decided upon, thankfully for us. So it goes
- based, there's several factors, population, all sorts of things. But eventually all the districts will
- change from what they are now. Yes, they will have to change to incorporate the newly available areas
- for people to be on boards.
- So those running in 2027 would run under the new districts. Correct, and the clip treasure, yes. So
- anyone in the township for my position, for example, anyone in the township can run for that. So when
- you say 2027, is that? To take office January 1st of 2028. 2028, so that's a November election. Well,
- yes, mm-hmm, yeah. So you have the primary and the general, yeah. So everything pretty much runs
- That is quote until 2027 reorganization takes place. Yes. So the two members that are currently up for
- election this year in words, four and five would become district four and five and they would maintain
- their four year term. And then the three positions in the clerk treasure next year, like I'm up for
- election next year. So I have to run next year. So anybody in the township can run for clerk treasure.
- So that's all under option number one. Yes, well it's option one and two because the voting area is
- gonna be all one instead of Richland Township and the town of Ellsville. Okay. It'll be easier to see
- when Mr. Shelton presents the maps. It'll be a lot easier to see because he'll have an overlay of what
- the current districts are, or wards, and then what the new proposed ones, and you guys will have a lot
- of discussion about that. And that criteria was determined by- State, code.
- based on population. Yes, there's a lot of variables. I can't speak to everything, but luckily for us,
- we didn't have to learn any of that, so I'm happy about that. On the districts, from what I've understood,
- they're interchangeable. Wards is an older term.
- would we be changing who's eligible to vote? In other words, would, so district one would still be at
- large. I mean, you have to live in the area, but everybody in the township votes for it. So on option
- one and option two, the permanent board would have two at large members and that it would be township
- wide. And then you would have five people that have to live in their specific district.
- but they're voted on by everyone in the township. It's the same as we do the current town council now
- and the township trustee board. Yeah. And now you'd have to have a separate election for each district.
- That would be expensive. That'd be expensive. Well, not really. I mean, cause it could cost the same,
- but it would cause sense and putting everybody through all that. I just don't know if some of the districts
- have enough registered voters. I mean,
- to do that, I mean, but I will tell you the county does that effectively. So does the city of Bloomington.
- So parity would be equal from district to district, correct? Population wise. Population wise, yes.
- I think there's some very, what is the variance? Can't be more than 10% or something like that for state
- code. That sounds right, William. Okay. And again, we did not feel comfortable making a recommendation
- for the board to, we thought that these were the two best options to ensure that there was maximized
- township representation. Any questions from the public? That's a biggie. I do have one more question.
- Go ahead. What is your recommendation for township trustee? Would it still be an elected position, but
- employed by the town? I mean, the recommendation,
- And I can only speak for me personally, we did talk about if the option one was chosen, then both of
- the other members of the subcommittee are very comfortable with that. It would be the township trustee
- that is elected this year to take office of January 1st of 2027 would become the director of public
- assistance. Because you would have two at large members or two
- Yeah, two at-large members from the Township Trustee Board. And that to be determined, again,
- by the board, if it's the two highest vote-getters, or if the Township Trustee Board makes
- that recommendation. Right, but again, would that position be elected? The Director of Public Assistance?
- Right. No, it would be a town employee. Because I know by code, with reorganization, you can still,
- they can still elect a Township Trustee, they just work for the town, just like you would.
- Theoretically, there's no township. Well, no, but. Making that person the director of public assistance,
- I mean, it would just be. The director of public assistance would be appointed by the council under,
- I mean, obviously we did not do enough research because we did not realize that the township trustee
- could still be an elected position. We were working off the assumption that that position would become
- then appointed by the new town council.
- So we have some clarification still to pursue on this question. And the governance committee has no
- issue as this committee makes that determination? We were just presenting options and the main purpose
- for our scope was to ensure that the board had continuous service and that the representation from the
- township was adequate. Okay.
- For lack of a better word, the township trustees not sitting on council. No, okay. But you would have
- two township board members from the township board sitting on council in both of these options. Well,
- when you say two from the township. Because it would come from the board. The current, it would come
- from for that first
- The newly elected board. The newly elected board. Yes, yes, yes. Transitional. Transitional. The interim
- government. Yeah, that's a better term. And the districts will change with the maps, and so that'll
- open it up to more township residents also for one, two, and three that have to run in 2027. As it should,
- because there's more people. And theoretically, we could end up running against each other, current
- council members.
- That'd be slick, I'd like to see that. Yeah. Yeah. Anybody else have any questions? Good job.
- Thank you, thank you, thank you. I know that was a tough one. Mike, you want to do streets and sewers
- and water? No, I don't. We really haven't.
- had any direct contact as far as utilities. I think that's what you meant. And currently, the township's
- served by four different water companies. And also, there's two different sewer organizations, Eastern
- Richmond Sewer Corporation, which is a rural sewer system that feeds into the Ellesville system. We
- do their billing, and we treat their sewer.
- The wastewater, we have a relationship with Eastern Richland. We've been talking to them about all this.
- Van Buren Water is one of the water companies that serves the southern portion of the township. And
- so I'm gonna go to their meeting next Thursday and let them make sure they understand what's going on.
- And Beanblast and Patrick Bird on the west side
- They serve water into Ellisville, and as we grow, there'll be more of their system in our town. So there's
- been a lot of questions. Will we change who provides our sewer or our water? No, it's not possible
- economically, and it's not anything we need to concern ourselves with. We are all working together pretty good now.
- mantra is we work together so we can be in line when there's economic opportunities to serve. And so
- we don't care who serves just as long as it supports what we're trying to do in our community. So,
- I mean, that's the long and the short of it, so. Darla and Eric, for the main report, do we need, we
- need to include though what Mike just said or something, correct?
- that has to be addressed. There will be some language in there about that. I guess one of the questions
- that I'd have is if this happens, if reorganization happens, and development takes place outside, in
- what's now the township, who determines who services what? Well, when it comes to water, I mean,
- The water system is already in place. It's pretty much in place when it comes to wastewater. We're working
- through a five, 10, and a 20-year plan currently about how we expand our sewer system. We are currently
- working with the Aviation Board, Monroe County Aviation Board, to perhaps serve their area of the sewer
- that had some difficulties getting
- city of Bloomington to acknowledge that they need it and say they'd serve it so they're really looking
- to us to work with them so we've already come up with a plan and we've already made an informal commitment
- and it has to do with economic development on their properties at 400 acres they'd like to develop and
- so we have the ability as you know we're a small community but we
- We're not just a maintenance utility, we're a construction utility too. So we have the ability to act
- fast and to expand our system as needed in a short amount of time. I mean, always finance has something
- to do with it, but that always works itself out. So 2016, when we had to do another secondary water
- line into Ellisville, the town of Ellisville,
- did the work in-house, saved a lot of money and it went a lot quicker. There was no change orders and
- a lot of hoops we didn't have to jump through because we did it ourselves. So we're in a position planning
- wise and to be able to project, we're in a good position where we can react to current needs and future
- needs. Feel real strong about that too.
- Can we get some type of report though to put on the website for the public to look at? Because there's
- an expectation of that. Same with roads and streets. I don't see Kip here. We'll throw one together
- tomorrow. Well, I mean, yeah, I can put something together, but I'm not sure what you would want because
- our reaction would be to where the need is. We don't have the ability to just populate
- the whole township with sewer tomorrow. I guess that it would be, how do you address the growth? Like
- Kevin said, who determines who gets it? If it's already kind of decided areas, put that in there. But
- like stormwater fees, how are they collected? Well, the stormwater fees will change from the county
- to the county. And just like we,
- I had a question today, we annexed some new property and they said, well, will they have the Elixir
- of stormwater fees? And the answer is yes. They're not gonna have wastewater because they wanna act
- now. It's a small minor subdivision and they ask if they could use septic. So we're very adaptable and
- we're flexible about how we go about our business. To put that into a plan would dictate that we say
- things that would change tomorrow
- depending on the circumstances. Well, I, good example though. Yeah. I know the funding switches from
- the County to us, but collection, you know, what's our method for collection? The County's building
- property taxes. And we'll be billing like it's our stormwater fees or our stormwater fees now are on
- our water survey or on our water bill. Cause some people don't.
- perhaps who are. But for those that don't have any. They'll just receive a bill. I mean, right now that's
- our plan. Okay. But monthly, then just like. Yeah. Okay. Anybody else have any questions? I've got a
- question that has to do with planning. Okay. The TIF district. How's that shakeout?
- If reorganization takes place, that money's gonna be collected the same. That have just recently been
- established by the town? No, I'm talking about the Westside TIF. I don't think that changes the TIF.
- So the monies that come into that stays, of course, in that district, but that's, who would govern that?
- Would that be the county still governing that, or would they? The county doesn't govern it now. Yeah,
- they do. The Westside?
- Yeah, the West Side TIF is county. Oh, I thought you were talking about the West Side. No, no, no, he's
- not talking about R. Oh, okay. He's talking about... Yeah, where GE used to be and Cook and everybody.
- Right, that's the counties. Nothing changes. Nothing changes, so that money still comes in the same,
- still goes into the county coffers and for infrastructure in that TIF. It will change when the TIF expires,
- though. Correct. And what about if the TIF expanded?
- That's beyond what I could tell you right now at this meeting. My understanding from being on the RDC,
- TIFFs can't really expand. They have to redo the TIFF to add up. No, that's correct. So if they did
- that, I don't think they could. That would be us. Different organization passed. Yeah. I don't know
- if there'd be any way to do that because they would be expanding to another municipality.
- Probably true, but I'd want to look at the statute. Again, I'm not an attorney. I'm not trying to act
- like one. This is just my thought process on it. Come on up, please. Hi. Kathy Weller. I live in the
- township. First of all, I wanted to thank the committee and all the subcommittees for all the work you've
- done. A lot of clarification is going on this evening. I see you put in a lot of maps and charts like
- I asked for last time.
- So that's very helpful. My question, maybe you were gonna address it at the end of the meeting, but
- where do we go from here? What's the schedule of your consideration, public comments, the vote? Could
- you go over that timeline for the process from this point on? We need to meet. So now the board takes
- all the subcommittees recommendations. They put that in a form that
- they can live with and then hand off to the lawyers. Yeah, but I think to address this real quick,
- I'll say. It's too early for public comment because you haven't come up with a final draft yet. And
- so what is the approximate timeline for that when it will be available for public comment? I think we
- need to make a decision right now on whether we meet weekly. I keep bringing this up, so I think now's
- the time that we need to start meeting weekly.
- And I'll make that motion that we move to weekly meetings. Okay. I will second. Okay. And the purpose
- of moving to weekly meetings would be because we now have to synthesize all this subcommittee material.
- There are a number of additional questions that it raises because a lot of these things have overlapping
- implications, but the subcommittee reports are not themselves binding.
- We don't have to find a way to make every single puzzle piece fit. You have to take the recommendations
- from each one and find a balance to craft a proposal that we as a board feel meets the goals and needs
- of the community. Obviously, we're gonna try to have that draft done as soon as possible, as soon as
- we can get remaining questions answered. Darla, I believe we had an April 1st deadline to submit a draft.
- April 1st is when Baker-Tilley wants the draft, and then,
- Hopefully the reorganization plan will be finalized within a month or so after that, and then the public
- hearings will take place into May 1st of June. Okay, thank you. Noel, yes. On our website under
- reorganization, there is a Baker-Tilley presentation on there called Proposed Governmental Reorganization,
- and on page three, it has the reorganization rough
- It doesn't have exact dates, but it lays everything out from start to January, start to finish, January
- 1st of 2027. Awesome. Well, if you meet, I guess you're going to meet every week now, is that that's
- going to be open to the public? We moved in Saturday. We're not going out yet. But yes. OK,
- I'll go wait. So still stick with the Wednesdays, 6 o'clock? Yes. Yes. OK. For some meetings, that will
- mean we have a hard stop at 6.50.
- on certain dates. So it won't be necessarily as long an open-ended meeting as this. It will have to
- be a little bit more concise, but. We just have two of those, just March 11th and March 25th. Great.
- Donna, I know those dates by heart. And I don't think there'll be quorum the 18th to have a meeting.
- Hopefully there will be, but we'll see. Okay. Darla, would there be any problem if we did not have quorum
- of just having
- a working session or some kind of public meeting on that date to receive questions and feedback from
- the public rather than initially saying we're going to have a meeting this date and then yanking that
- meeting. I think if it's advertised as a work session, that's okay, but you won't be able to vote or
- make any decisions at that meeting. So I won't be able to make a motion and force that meeting every
- other day. Daily meetings. Daily meetings, yes.
- For the March 18th where we're concerned because right because of because of various travel plans enough
- board members may be absent that we might not have a form but the motion is to move to weekly meetings
- on Wednesdays at 6 p.m. Moved by William seconded by me. Are we ready to call the roll? Yep. Starting
- next week. I vote yes. William. Yes. Yes. Yes. Dawn. Yes.
- Thank you, motion passes. Well, I think Scott. Oh, Scott. Scott. We adopted an electronic policy, Scott.
- Yes, great. Thank you very much. Scott, do you have any additional questions or anything? Nothing that
- I need to ask right now. No, thank you for checking. Okay. And to address the broader question,
- when's a good the public comment all of it all now and I mean so all the public input on this the draft
- of most of these subcommittees are on the website if there's a concern don't hesitate bring it up to
- us now yeah any questions you have Kathy the sooner we know them the more thought we can give them and
- the more time we could spend tracking them down
- Awesome and our email addresses are all on the website at what's over from info dot org I think I just
- need a clarification more than anything, but you're talking about the stormwater Now we pay that on
- it on our tax receipts property tax receipts twice a year and
- We don't pay that again on our water bill, do we? No, if you're in a county... You know what I'm saying?
- Yeah, if you're in a county, we're not billing you right now. Okay, okay. Yeah, I mean... Okay. I figured
- so, but... We try to pay attention, but the individuals really pay attention so that if it ever happens,
- we know about it immediately. But with reorganization, you have to pay the bill and not have it on your
- property taxes. Right. That would be a change, yeah. You have to go and cycle it. Yeah, I was, yeah.
- And the other thing, and you don't have to get into this, maybe I'll talk about this another time, but
- just real quick while you're talking about that work with airport for sewage, what watercourse would
- you discharge your fluid into down there? Oh, it'd be pumped back down at the wastewater plant.
- You would? You'd pump it? Yes. Okay. You got that capacity? And I'll say this to you, but for everybody,
- I was planning on calling you and saying I could go into length about
- the overall plans as it relates to reorganization and at Elstil in general. And so it's worth, I think
- it's worth the conversation to hear our plans for the future. So I'd be glad to come see you. I usually
- bring this great big map that's getting pretty ratting out because I've opened it up so much. And it
- gives you a real good 30,000 view of how all this relates.
- So be glad to be glad to come see you. Thank you. Thank you. And especially if you can get some of your
- neighbors at the same time. Well, it's always a struggle. But OK, you did answer my question as far
- as as far as you know, the pumping. Yeah, as far as you know. No, I know it'll be. Yeah, we already
- have a plan costs and route everything.
- Good answer, thanks a lot. That's it. Anybody else from the public? Nope, anybody from the board? So
- next Wednesday at six o'clock? Yes, and there's a hard stop at 6.50 because we have the third and final
- public hearing on the fire protection territory. Okay, hard stop at 6.50. Ladies and gentlemen, that
- adjourns the meeting. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Thank you, everyone.