- good evening everybody and welcome to the county council meeting for Tuesday October 14th 2025 the time
- is now five oh four and for the record we have all seven council members present looks like we have
- a quorum and we will go ahead and get started so um next up is the pledge of allegiance so all those
- who are able to stand please stand while we recite the pledge of allegiance
- of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible,
- with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. OK. Next up, we have the adoption of tonight's agenda.
- Is there anybody that would like to make changes for tonight's
- agenda. Yes, Councilor Henry. Madam President, thank you. I'd like to amend the agenda to move the item
- 10A consent agenda item for the health department into ongoing business. So it'd be no change in the
- order, but it would just remove it from consent agenda into ongoing business. Okay. Second. And I thought
- somebody would do that because if you didn't, I would. All right. Are there any other changes that council
- members would like to make for tonight's agenda? And again,
- Oh yes, Councilor Hawk. Yes, this has to do with the highway. It is a transfer, category transfer. It's
- a pretty simple situation and I would like to have that put in place right after our consent agenda
- because then there's no point in her hanging around for all the rest of this. I didn't speak with her
- about it, I just thought we've
- We've done this more than once. We keep saying we're not going to do it anymore. OK. So looks like there
- is item E that you're speaking of. Is that right, Councillor Hawke? Right. OK. OK. So the idea is to
- put it basically right where we moved it or removed
- the health department, is that what you're saying? Right, right after we've done the consent agenda.
- Okay. Because I think she'll want to be here to present it, but not here until 11 o'clock at night.
- I don't think we will be here until 11 o'clock. Okay. All right. So we got the two items.
- And again, the council staff get the changes that we are making to tonight's agenda. Yes, I'm going
- to restate that we're going to move item 10A, the health department consent agenda item to ongoing business.
- So it will become there. And then we've got item 12E will immediately follow the health department consent
- agenda item. OK.
- Okay. All right. So are there any other changes that any council member would like to make to tonight's
- agenda? No. Okay. All right. So all those in favor of adopting tonight's agenda as amended signify by
- saying aye. Aye. All those opposed same sign. All right. Motion carries. Yes. I just want to reiterate that, um,
- Even though item 12E says a category transfer, it is technically not a category transfer. It is an in-house
- transfer, because it is over time, a personnel line moving into a personnel line. So I just wanted to
- make that clear, even though the agenda has stated it incorrectly. OK. OK. I appreciate that.
- Thank you. There's been a little bit of confusion with that new over time kind of procedure that we're
- going through. OK. All right. And we are learning as we go. All right.
- Thank you for that. And next up is public comment. So if you would like to make public comment on items
- not on tonight's agenda, again, this is time for public to make comment on items not on tonight's agenda.
- You can do so by doing one or two ways. You can either come here in the NaTU Hill Room and come to the
- lectern here, sign in, state your name for the record, and you'll have up to three minutes. Or you can
- raise your hand via Teams.
- So I'll look around to see if anybody here is ready to make public comment on items not on the agenda
- and seeing just stairs. I'll look to the teams and seeing none because everybody wants to get to the
- business at hand. OK, we will move forward. All right.
- So next up is department updates. These are also for items not on the agenda, but this is a way for
- departments to tell us and the rest of the public what is happening in their department. And if you
- have an update that you would like to bring forward, again, you can come to the lecture here in the
- NatU Hill Room. You'll have up to 10 minutes, or you can raise your hand via Teams.
- everybody's so excited about our agenda tonight, nobody's moving. Okay, all right, and seeing none.
- All right, so it's the moment we've all been waiting for, which is why I got dressed up. So tonight,
- we got everybody all dressed up, everybody looks so nice. We're all ready, even Councilor Hock has her
- hot glasses on, so I know she is writing.
- all right tonight is the second reading and the adoption of the 2026 budget for the whoops just get
- him back no no i'm right okay and scene uh tonight is the second reading adoption of the 2026 budget
- for the Monroe fire protection district waste reduction district
- and the Monroe County government. I have asked all council members to again assist with the reading
- of these ordinances just like we did a few weeks ago. Before we get into the reading of the adoption
- of tonight's agenda, as we've done so, I'm going to look to the auditor one last time to give an update.
- So Ms. Gregory, please take it away.
- Good evening, Council. I'm excited to give you this update. The values in the budget documents have
- been adjusted to account for changes made at the most recent meeting and anticipated bond revenue. Please
- note that some of the budgeted expenses for 26 were moved to 25, resulting in an inflated 2025 budget
- and deflated 2026 budget. As a result of the changes, our 2026 budget no longer reflects a deficit.
- Despite not having a deficit budget in 2026, we recommend
- that cash reserves are closely monitored as additional appropriations are requested in 2026 and beyond.
- Looking specifically at the levy fund deficits, we have a much smaller surplus of $401,240. The cash
- balances must be closely monitored in these funds specifically moving forward. So just to give you the
- simple calculation numbers,
- We have now a surplus, a simplified 2026 surplus amount of $2,364,060. So I want to applaud you for
- your work on this. It's very exciting that we've gotten to this point. Thank you. Thank you. OK. Does
- anybody have any questions for the auditor? I already saw Councilor Hawke's hand, so I'll just kind
- of go down the solitary council line. So I'll start with Councilor Hawke.
- Okay, could you go back and say we have a surplus of what? How much? $2,364,060. And is that just in
- the frozen levy? No, that's the simple calculation, which includes everything. Now the number I gave
- you for the for the levy, and that's not just the frozen levy, it's all of the levy funds, is $401,240.
- but I think that sometimes could give the wrong impression because you might have a CUME fund that has
- a higher balance to carry forward surplus. That's not unusual to see that. So we wouldn't want to give
- the wrong impression that we're sitting here with lots of cash because we can't move those dollars around.
- they adjust the thought. I may respond. We've been trying to stay consistent with the way we've been
- presenting this information to you as well as to the public. So I'm happy to answer any specific questions,
- but the four B's have been available. You all have them, which gives the fund by fund breakdown. We
- can display them for the public. They will be submitted tonight after this meeting and will be available
- for the public at that point.
- Additionally, anytime anything is requested of my team and the council team, we provide that readily.
- One of the funds that we were looking at really closely was in the deep dive calculations. And I don't
- know if you have that document able to project onto the screen so that the public can can see this as
- well, because sometimes things get lost in translation. We're talking about a lot of big numbers. And
- so while while that's being put on the screen, can you tell us how healthy the general fund is in terms
- of its for be calculations?
- Sure. I know Carly had the deep dive calculation ready to go here, but she's pulling up the 4B for us.
- Pardon? Yeah. The deep dive calculation is up there, and that does show... Yeah, if you can scroll over
- to the... Yeah, that shows the same information, but I prefer the root document. So either one is fine
- with us, though. Yeah. What I'm mostly concerned about, one, is transparency so that everyone can see it.
- that the change in that number from a negative seven million dollars to what it is now. Yes so under
- deficit per fund they're highlighted in the brighter pink you'll see for the general fund we now have
- a surplus of nine hundred and fifty five thousand two hundred seventy seven dollars and that's the result
- of moving some things to edit but regardless it's it's a good good change.
- tremendous change. That's almost $8 million movement. That's really fantastic, in my opinion. And we
- do see some of those other funds are in the negative, but the bottom line there is what you were referring
- to earlier in terms of where we are in the black at this point. Yes. All right. Thank you so much.
- Thank you. Before I circle back to Council Hawk, I'm going to look over here and see if anybody had
- any questions or comments for Ms. Gregory? No? OK. Council Hawk?
- Right. And I do appreciate the fact that the auditor mentioned that one of the reasons why that's correct
- is because we originally had the full appropriation put in place for self-insurance. And if you'll remember,
- they came and got an additional appropriation, so it wouldn't look like they were so bad for next year.
- But we still spent our cash, and that budget was supposed to be really
- for next year, so I don't want us to think we're rolling in. I'm just being extra cautious, I think,
- as you all know. So, I mean, because it's money, it isn't like if we cut our spending, we moved money
- around. Yes, Councillor Iverson. And to that point, the number on the screen, the bottom line that I
- think the Auditor's Office has put in bold is less than half a million dollars.
- We are not swimming in cash. We are, we still need to be cautious and thank you Councilmember Hawk for
- pointing that out. I appreciate the numbers and I very pessimistically watched for numbers and then,
- much like anything else I'm.
- pleasantly surprised when the numbers show that we're still in there and fighting. I just want to reiterate
- something I've said because of the changes that we have and changes that we will have and on and on
- not to be Nostradamus here but we're going to be doing all this over and over and over and over just
- like every other locality and playing it safe and I think that that kind of stunned feeling that everybody
- has and fatigue
- is partially for what we've been through in the last six weeks along with department heads,
- elected officials, and everybody else. OK. And just as before, I just want to say thank you to the auditor
- and her staff, especially Carly, for helping us along with showing us for the past eight weeks
- And yes, it has been eight weeks, because we've all been counting this particular spreadsheet. So we
- just thank you. Appreciate that. Madam President? Yes. I would like to send a special thank you to our
- sheriff and the jail staff, because that's really what saved our bacon. We moved it from the jail general,
- and we put it down into the jail income tax, which was originally we thought we were saving it back
- for the construction.
- But because they allowed that and didn't do a lot of pushback, that was a considerable amount of money.
- Even the medical contract alone was like $1,600,000 something. And then we moved several employees down
- there. So we started out at less than $500,000. Now I don't have memorized how much it is. But it saved us what?
- over $2 million. When I say it saved us, we still spent local tax dollars. We just moved it over there,
- rather than trying to pay for it in county general. And also too, the probation office came in with
- a clutch from the Indiana Supreme Court getting those dollars out too. So yeah, definitely
- I want to give credit where credit is well earned and due tonight. So more of that I'm sure will come.
- But if we don't have any other thing else for the auditor, we will go ahead and move forward.
- Councilor Decker next we will go to the second reading or approval of ordinance 2025-34 which is the
- waste reduction district 2026 budget so I've asked Councilor Decker to read that again and everybody
- hold your horses and Councilor Decker will take it away thank you all right ordinance number 2020 pardon
- me 2025-34
- be it ordained by the Monroe County Council that for the expenses of Monroe County solid waste management
- district for the year ending December 31st 2026 the sums herein specified are hereby appropriated in
- order to set apart out of the several funds here in named and for the purposes herein specified subject
- to the laws governing the same such sums here in appropriated shall be held to include all expenditures
- authorized to be made during
- the year unless otherwise expressly stipulated and provided for by law. In addition, for the purposes
- of raising revenue to meet the necessary expenses of Monroe County Solid Waste Management District,
- the property tax levies and property tax rates as herein specified are included herein. Budget Form
- 4B for all funds must be completed and submitted in the manner prescribed by the Department of Local
- Government Finance. This
- disordnance shall be in full force and effect from and after its passage and approval by the Monroe
- County Council in fund code 1215 non-reverting capital projects adopted budget zero dollars adopted
- tax levy zero dollars for an adopted tax rate of zero point zero zero zero zero in fund eight to
- one zero special solid waste management adopted budget three million two hundred fifty four thousand
- six hundred twenty dollars adopted tax levy two million three hundred fifty five thousand eight hundred
- forty eight dollars for an adopted tax rate of zero point zero two four eight in fun eight two eight
- three solid waste district debt service
- Adopted budget, $308,445 for an adopted tax levy of $217,259 for an adopted tax rate of 0.0023. For
- a total adopted budget of $3,563,065.
- with an adopted tax levy of $2,573,107 for an adopted tax rate of 0.0271. Council, I move to approve
- ordinance 2025-34, the Waste Reduction District's 2026 budget.
- All right, we got a motion and a second. Is there any final comment from council members related to
- this budget? Looking to my left. Looking to my right. All right. And seeing none, if you public, if
- the public rather has public comment on this item, please come forward to the lectern here than at you
- whole room, or you can raise your hand via teams. And seeing none.
- May we please have a roll call vote. Councillor Iverson? Yes. Councillor Decker? Yes. Councillor Feidl?
- Yes. Councillor Wilts? Yes. Councillor Henry? Yes. Councillor Hawke? Yes. Councillor Crosley? Yes. Motion
- passes unanimous 7-0. Thank you and next up is Councillor Wilts and she will do the reading of the Monroe
- Fire Protection District 2026 budget.
- number 2025-35 be it ordained by the Monroe County Council that for the expenses of the Monroe Fire
- Protection District for the year ending December 31 2026 the sums herein specified are hereby appropriated
- and ordered set apart out of the several funds here and named and for the purposes herein specified
- subject to the laws governing the same
- Such sums herein appropriated shall be held to include all expenditures authorized to be made during
- the year unless otherwise expressly stipulated and provided for by law. In addition, for the purposes
- of raising revenue to meet the necessary expenses of Monroe Fire Protection District, the property tax
- levies and property tax rates as herein specified are included herein. Budget form 4B for all funds
- must be completed and submitted in the manner prescribed by the Department
- local government finance this ordinance shall be in full force and effect from and after its passage
- and approval by the Monroe County Council fund code zero zero six one rainy day adopted budget one million
- seven hundred thousand with adopted tax levy and adopted tax rate of zero fund eight six zero three
- special fire general
- seventeen million six hundred ninety eight thousand one hundred fifty five dollars adopted tax levy
- nine million seven hundred ninety thousand three hundred sixty nine dollars adopted tax rate zero point
- two five seven seven fund eight six nine one special cum fire
- adopted budget one million four hundred one thousand nine hundred thirty two dollars adopted tax levy
- one million three hundred four thousand seventy seven dollars with an adopted tax rate of zero point
- zero three three three a total of adopted budget of twenty million eight hundred thousand eighty seven
- dollars and adopted tax levy eleven million
- $94,446 in an adopted tax rate of 0.2910. Council, I move to approve ordinance 2025-35, the Monroe Fire
- Protection District's 2026 budget. Second. All right, we got a motion and a second. Is there any further
- questions or comments from council members related to this budget?
- looking to the left. Yes, Councillor Decker. I don't have a question, just a comment. I didn't get a
- chance when the chief and the team were in here earlier presenting this, but I appreciate very much
- what this department does. I appreciate very much the level of contact that they have around the community
- and wherever you go, you see those trucks and I appreciate that this is a thing that did not exist years ago.
- but a county with needs where residents expect that, they get that. And I, everywhere we go, we see
- that symbol on those doors and in these townships. And I think that is absolutely huge. And it gives
- me a lot of hope for not only the future on what they do, but how the county and its partners do things
- together in a community that's got a lot of needs. Thank you. Yes, Councillor Hock. Yes, since I,
- No, Claire critics no longer in my district, when it was I used to get a lot of questions and I would
- shoot those questions over and try to get them answers. It's not my district now so I suppose Peters
- getting those questions.
- but what I would want to say that they're always very helpful to try to help us understand it and I'm
- going to say again which I say every year at this time I would really love it if they would have their
- meetings here in the courthouse because they represent so much of Monroe County people and they don't always
- They don't always follow what's going on with the budget, because, you know, it's televised it's like
- part of YouTube or something. But I think the public expects to see those meetings here.
- I say this every year, so that's my thing. And they have so much to be proud of that it would be wonderful
- for them to come here so the public can see everything that they're doing. Not everybody's on Facebook
- watching all the places they are all of the time. Of course I am, but I don't know what the rest of
- the world's doing.
- All right. Yes. Well, as promised, I'm going to speak for about an hour on this fund. So here we go.
- I'm just kidding. Thank you. So you're watching.
- really appreciate everything that you and the team are doing. And to piggyback a little bit on the public
- dimension of this, your social media is really good when we're looking to see what exactly is happening
- with the fire protection district. You guys are doing a great job. And we just we're thankful for everything
- you're doing out in the community, whether it's out at the airport or it's one of the stations. It's
- just really great. It's it's wonderful to see such a healthy budget. And we're looking forward to working
- with you in the next year. Thank you.
- Anybody else? All right. And just as a plug, because it's in my district and my neighborhood, shout
- out to Station 22. All right. That is said, now it's public comment time. If you have public comment
- on this item, you can come forward to the lectern here in the NatU Hill Room, or you can raise your
- hand via Teams.
- Seeing none, maybe please have a roll call vote. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Councilor Henry? Yes. Councilor
- Crosley? Yes. Councilor Iverson? Yes. Councilor Hawke? Yes. Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor Decker?
- Yes. Motion passes unanimous 7-0. All right, thank you. Next up is item eight, which is the Monroe County
- government's 2026 budget and I have to ask Councilor Henry to do the honors and read.
- Thank you, Madam President, in the matter of ordinance number 2025-36. Be it ordained by the Monroe
- County Council that for the expenses of Monroe County for the year ending December 31st, 2026, the sums
- Heron specified are hereby appropriated in order to set apart out of the several funds Heron names for
- the purposes Heron specified, subject to the laws governing the same. Such sums Heron appropriated shall
- be held to include all expenditures authorized to be made during the year unless otherwise expressly
- stipulated and provided for by law. In addition, for the purposes of raising revenue to meet the necessary
- expenses of Monroe County, the property tax levies and property tax rates, as Herron specified, are
- included herein. Budget Form 4-B for all funds must be completed and submitted in the manner prescribed
- by the Departments of Local Government Finance. This ordinance shall be in full force and effect from
- and after its passage and approval by the Monroe County Council.
- in fund code zero zero six one rainy day the adopted budget is three million dollars the adopted tax
- levy is zero dollars the adopted tax rate is zero point zero zero in fund code zero one zero one general
- the adopted budget is fifty one million ninety thousand one hundred eighty seven dollars the adopted
- tax levy is thirty two
- million six hundred thousand and eighty six dollars for the adopted tax rate of zero point two nine
- four zero for fund code zero one zero two election registration the adopted budget is one million four
- hundred and twenty thousand four hundred fourteen dollars the adopted tax levy is two hundred eighty
- five thousand dollars the adopted tax rate is zero point zero zero two six for fund code
- zero one twenty four twenty fifteen reassessment the adopted budget is nine hundred fifty one thousand
- two hundred fifteen dollars the adopted tax levy is eight hundred ten thousand dollars for the adopted
- tax rate of zero point zero zero seven three in funds code zero one eight zero debt service the adopted
- budget is eight million
- five hundred two thousand dollars the adopted tax levy is eight million seven hundred seventy four thousand
- and fifty seven dollars and the adopted tax rate is zero point zero seven nine one in fund code zero
- two zero three self insurance the adopted budget is eleven million three hundred and five thousand and
- five hundred dollars the adopted tax levy is zero dollars the adopted tax rate is zero point zero zero
- in fund code 0254 local income tax. The adopted budget is $4,513,361. The adopted tax levy is $0.00.
- The adopted tax rate is 0.00.
- In Fund Code 0256, Public Safety Local Income Tax, the adopted budget is $4,734,977. The adopted tax
- levy is $0.00. The adopted tax rate is 0.00.
- In Fund Code 0616 Convention and Visitors Bureau, the adopted budget is $3,216,600. The adopted tax
- levy is $0.00. The adopted tax rate is 0.00. In Fund Code 0702 Highway,
- The adopted budget is $6,854,119. The adopted tax levy is $0.00. The adopted tax rate is 0.00.
- Fund code 0703 Highway special. The adopted budget is zero dollars. The adopted tax levy is zero dollars.
- The adopted tax rate is zero point zero zero. And funds code 0706 local road and streets. The adopted
- budget is one million five hundred fifty five thousand and six dollars. The adopted tax levy is zero
- dollars. The adopted tax rate is zero point zero zero. And funds code 0790 cumulative bridge. The adopted budget
- is $1,352,168. The adopted tax levy is $2,362,187 for an adopted tax rate of 0.0213. In Fund Code 0792,
- County Major Bridge, the adopted budget is $3,660,059.
- The adopted tax levy is three million six hundred ninety two thousand nine hundred ninety six dollars
- for an adopted tax rate of zero point zero three three three. And funds code zero one sorry and fund
- code zero eight zero one health the adopted budget is seven hundred seventeen
- thousand and seventy seven dollars the adopted tax levy is three hundred fifty thousand dollars the
- adopted tax rate is zero point zero zero three two in fund code one three one zero park non-reverting
- capital the adopted budget is one hundred thousand dollars the adopted tax levy is zero dollars the
- adopted tax rate is zero point zero zero
- In Fund Code 2102, Aviation Airport, the adopted budget is $1,456,130. The adopted tax levy is $790,000.
- The adopted tax rate is 0.0071. In Fund Code 2391, Cumulative Capital Development, the adopted budget
- is $3,878,280.
- The adopted tax levy is $3,692,996. The adopted tax rate is 0.0333. In Fund Code 2402 Economic Development,
- the adopted budget is $4,667,719. The adopted tax levy is $0.00. The adopted tax rate is 0.00. For a total of
- $112,974,815 in the adopted budget, the adopted tax levy at $53,357,322, and the total adopted tax rate
- of 0.4812. For Home Rule funds not reviewed by DLGF, Fund Code 9500, Fund Name, Extradition, and Sheriff's
- Assistance, the adopted budget is $0. And for Fund Code 9589, Curry Profile TIF,
- The amount is $25,689. Sorry. Did I miss a page? Oh, I skipped. You printed on the back. Yeah. I thought
- this looked like saving paper. Yeah. Save the trees, Peter.
- In fund code nine five zero one surveyors corner perpetuation. Yeah, there's a lot to do the budget
- of one hundred thousand and forty nine dollars in fund code nine five zero two local public health services
- one one six one the opted budget of two million five hundred two million and five hundred sixty six
- dollars in fund code nine five zero three Monroe County nine one one fund the amount of
- adopted budget of $622,294. In fund code 9504, Monroe County Convention Center debt, the adopted budget
- amount of $0. In fund code 9505, auditors and eligible deductions, the amount of $347,103. In fund code
- 9507, community corrections fees, 1-1-2-2,
- the amount of $275,846. In fund code 9508, user fee jury pay, the amount of $36,500. In fund code 9509,
- user fees juvenile probation, the amount of $7,079. In fund code 9510, user fees adult probation, the
- amount of $110,288.
- In fund code 9511, user fees, project income, job, the amount of $0. In fund code 9512, supplemental
- PD services, the amount of $925,636. In fund code 9513, clerk's record perpetuation, the amount of $151,026.
- funds code nine five one four user fees diversion prosecution the amount of one hundred two thousand
- four hundred eleven dollars and fund code nine five one five user fee courts alcohol drug
- the amount of two hundred sixty six thousand six hundred thirty dollars in fund code nine five one six
- local health maintenance the amount of sixty five thousand seven hundred thirteen dollars in fund code
- nine five one seven emergency planning right to know the amount of twenty five thousand nine hundred
- fifty dollars in fund code nine five one nine misdemeanor community corrections the amount of corrections
- the amount of one hundred and twenty eight thousand five hundred
- And fund code 9521 alternative dispute resolution the amount of $17,700 in fund code 9522 sales disclosure
- county share the amount of $66,114 in fund code 9523 convention visitors capital improvement and maintenance
- the amount of $100,000.
- In fund code 9524, county offenders transportation, the amount of $2,500. In fund code 9525, local health
- department trust accounts, the amount of $61,121. In fund code 9526, user fees, problem solving courts,
- $22,544. In fund code 9527, West Side Economic Development, Richland Township TIF, the amount of $2,235,287.
- In Fund Code 9528, 46 Corridor Economic Development, Bloomington Township, TIFF, the amount of $503,201.
- In Fund Code 9529, Fullerton Pike Economic Development, TIFF, the amount of $133,000. In Fund Code 9530,
- Platte Book, $500. In Fund Code 9531, Convention Center Operating, the amount of $531,300, $531,300.
- In fund code 9532, user fees cable franchise, the amount of $535,226. In fund code 9535, PSAP interlocal,
- the amount of $2,781,462. In fund code 9543, public health emergency fund, the amount of $20,000. In
- the fund account of 9544, identification security protection, the amount of $18,000.
- Code 9548, park non-reverting operating, the amount of $300,000. In Fund Code 9551, recorder's record
- perpetuation, the amount of $357,714. In Fund Code 9552, stormwater management, the amount of $2,390,283.
- in funds code nine five five nine county elected officials training the amounts of eighteen thousand
- dollars and funds code nine five eight zero lit corrections rehab facilities two million three hundred
- sixty four sorry two hundred sorry two million six hundred thirty four thousand four hundred six dollars
- in fund code nine five eight eight federal award title ivd the amount of fifty eight thousand one hundred
- thirty two dollars and in the fund code
- 9589 curry profile tiff $25,689 for a total of $17,977,770 Council I move to approve ordinance 2025-36
- the Monroe County government's 2026 budget second
- All right, we got a motion in a second and I know we'll have some comment on this one. So I'm a look
- over here. Councilor Hawk, you're up to start out with. I just wanted to call the public's attention
- to the fact that the adopted tax levy for general this year is thirty two million six hundred thousand
- eighty six dollars. And for this year, twenty twenty five, it was 17 million something.
- So that's a huge, huge difference. Now, I expect that we have to make sure that we're getting it high
- enough so that we don't make a mistake again. But nevertheless, I think we should recognize that even
- though we move money around and even though we're getting in more money from our property tax levy for general,
- because the state suggestion put that 3.8 back there for next year and yes we're going to give you 1.04
- we're going to get that four percent growth factor oh we we still had to move money around just try
- to make that work so we're really spending spending and i'm just i'm not finding fault with anyone i'm
- just saying thank you for
- for being a part of, because we're all gonna have to try to get this under control next year. But what
- I would like to know, and I should have had this, I don't have a printer at home where I would print
- it off. What is the tax rate for general this year for 2025?
- that's something I'd asked for. If you remember, I said, you know, I think at the state, they'd said
- when we read this off, we're supposed to look at what is this year and what it's changing to for what
- we're voting on. I didn't get that. Did anyone else get it? I didn't. I'll give the auditor a chance
- to respond to that. Councilor Hawk and all councilors, you all have access to Gateway, but I'm happy
- to read that off right now for you for 2025. We need to see it.
- in front of us, yes. Yeah, she said, or she's doing it. Actually, Carly is going to project it. I'm
- just pulling it up so I can see it as well. And I'm assuming you want the, do you want the ordinance
- or the 4B for 2025 for general fund? I want to see, yeah, I just want to see for 2025,
- We know that the revenue for 2025 was like 17 million, something like that for general. But what was
- the rate? Carly, the 4B. The adopted rate was point.
- It was 0.2071. It was 0.2071. And is that after the state changed the number back down to 17? The state
- didn't change the number.
- the adopted amount approved by the council. Okay the 17. When you approve the ordinance. Okay. It was
- on the 4B. So it was what what was that rate? 0.0 no what? 0.2071. And then do you have a number for
- the total of the adopted tax rate for all those tax levy funds?
- like right now it's showing 0.4812, so. We can go back to the 2025 ordinance. And the total rate adopted,
- reviewed and approved was 0.3705.
- 0.3705. So we can see what the increase went from 0.3705 to 0.4812. Now, a lot of that, I would think,
- would be having to do with that high debt service, which is included in those numbers, correct? Yes,
- and that is adjusted by the DLGF once the bond closes, if it closes, otherwise,
- It will be adjusted one way or another. They'll either adjust it down to what is actually approved and
- the correct rate associated, or it will be completely removed if it's not approved. And even though
- this is like a six-year bond, we budget it as though we're going to pay it in one year. That's very
- confusing to me, and I don't know whether we talked about that earlier.
- Not that I'm going to vote for a $6 million bond, but if I was, does that mean the way the rate is set
- up looks like we're supposed to be paying it back in one year? It does look like that, but this is how
- the DLGF has us budget this. So this has been going on for the 30 years, I guess you've been on council.
- So we can have a discussion with the DLGF about that, but this is the way it works. Right.
- I'm just saying, I think it's confusing, probably confusing to you as well.
- want to see if anybody else had yes council Henry thank you madam president and I presume my colleagues
- tasked me with reading that out and hope that I wouldn't talk anymore for a while but I'm just warming
- up thank you I wanted to start I think and focus my comments about all the the votes tonight on this
- particular item and offer first gratitude I didn't get a chance to say that when we had the auditors
- report but it is gratitude for the work of your office to get us where we are and identifying
- where we need to go. I wanna thank my colleagues for entertaining an idea of using the edit to help
- us get there. I know that we had a few weeks of discussion on the use of that fund, but it's abundantly
- clear that the accumulation of those tax dollars need to flow back into the community. It's hard to
- sit on years of that kind of money and not put it to work for the community, and we just put it to work
- for the community in this budget, so I think that's important to say. I'm also reminded that the champion
- of that edit some years ago across the way in City Hall
- would call what we're doing here counter-cyclical economics. It's where we spend money in a downturn
- to really stabilize and protect our workforce and protect the investments in the county. That's kind
- of the point of why this fund was set or this tax was passed by the certified shares years ago. So who
- would have thought a few years later we'd be putting this to work in the same way? If he's watching,
- he knows who he is. But in any case, that's the good news. I mean, in a time of downturn, our workforce
- still has jobs. On January 1st, we are not riffing people.
- we've seen in other county governments, we've been able to provide our benefits still under this budget.
- We've been able to get to a place where as long as we protect what we've done here through hiring freezes
- and scrutinizing over time and thinking through our PAC process, we'll maintain that.
- budget moving through. But what's at risk for us moving forward is the death by 1,000 cuts and the requests
- that come once we've tried to hold the line and what potentially waits for us next October. And my fear
- about next October is real. I brought that up during the process and I had some ideas about how to do
- that now. And it really comes from a place of being, I still think, the only person up here that has
- been a county employee. And so when I look at county employees and talk to them as one that used to
- be one 18 years ago,
- And had a department head that told me my job was only as good as my grants and actually helped me find
- my next job while I was working for him. And that our benefits back then were not as great as they are
- now. And maybe to get a little too personal to be accounting employee with a master's degree in one
- hand and taking my check to a payday lender and the other to make rent.
- I am acutely aware of how some of our county employees feel and are trying to survive in our economy
- here. I think we did a good job maintaining and holding that line here, but I am incredibly fearful
- about what next year brings if we don't hold to being very careful with our dollars to understand that
- as the circuit breakers kick in on the taxes that we will collect next year that might actually eat
- into the MLGQ that we expect, and that it's going to get harder and harder to hold the line here in
- our county government
- to fund these services. But the good news is we still have the programs. Potholes are still going to
- get filled. The doors will still be open. That's a lot to be proud of in this budget. And I think as
- we look down the line again at the forecast for 26, the impact of
- frankly, Trumpflation on our projects. And as we see corrections hopefully come from the State House
- to fix the overreach of SB1 and the impact and damage it's done to municipal governments, I think we
- are in a good place. And I thank my colleagues for getting us there tonight. Thank you, Madam President.
- Thank you. Yes, Councilor Iverson. Well, thank you, Madam President. Thank you for allowing me to speak
- about this 2026 budget.
- I am going to be supporting this budget because it benefits residents of Monroe County and our over
- 750 county employees. Now while some have described to this year's processes lacking control, I respectfully
- disagree. What we've seen here is not incompetence, but humility, collaboration, honest acknowledgement
- of our failures and strident efforts to adapt.
- We move forward not with misplaced certainty, but with curiosity and care, determined to fulfill the
- trust residents have placed in us. And as a public servant, I say with humility that this budget is
- not perfect. We asked our department heads to do much more with much fewer resources. Then in addition,
- we made significant cuts that were painful.
- And our actions slowed the growth of the budget from the previous year from 10% to 5%. And that's a
- lot of change to process in just one year. But these tough choices didn't happen in a vacuum. They were
- necessitated by circumstances largely beyond our control. And I think it bears to understand this budget.
- We have to first understand the extraordinary challenges we faced in getting to tonight's vote.
- In January 2025 actions by the Department of Government Efficiency or DOGE led to increased unemployment
- all across our region and a significant reduction in grants awarded to Monroe County. In February, one
- month later, we learned of a $3.8 million reduction in revenue due to a local error.
- And then on April 14th, 2025, Governor Braun signed legislation implementing immediate cuts to local
- government, public safety, fire protection, counties, cities, libraries. Governor Braun ensured that
- his action, with his action, the county governments across this state are now struggling to pass budgets
- and provide the services that we all depend on as we're grappling with significantly fewer resources.
- In May, Council President
- Excuse me, Council President Crossley sent her leadership letter, setting an earlier budget process
- and building in a three percent cost of living adjustment for employees, a commitment that we have been
- determined to keep. From May through August of this year, council liaisons met with department heads
- and elected officials to review budgets line by line with a before submission. This is complicated,
- detailed work.
- And then from August to tonight, this council met weekly. Rising to these challenges could only happen
- if we did not work alone. Please note that over the last two months of budget hearings, each one of
- these seven members on this dais made significant contributions to reducing the debt. We worked alongside
- you, taking robust public comment, and we heard you through emails, phone calls, text messages,
- And it was only through this teamwork that we rose to meet these challenges for the residents of Monroe
- County. And I argue that we did this in three important ways. First, we maintained our integrity. We
- promised a 3% cost of living adjustment. And thanks to President Crossley's leadership, we delivered.
- As Democrat, healthcare is important. We promised to cover medical expenses for our employees.
- a $3 million additional appropriation in 2025, and then an $11.3 million budgeted in 2026. In terms
- of healthcare, we delivered. We promised to preserve personnel lines, and we kept that promise too.
- We know that keeping your job means freedom and security for your household. Second, we demonstrated
- resilience
- by adhering to local government finance best practices. We maintained a robust and intact rainy day
- fund, ensuring that we have a strong bank account for emergencies. Our fund balances meet minimum
- requirements, ensuring that we can meet our payroll obligations. And as you saw earlier tonight, we
- achieved positive 4Bs in our levy funds, showing that our inflows exceed our outflows. And of course,
- these aren't just numbers.
- These are the foundations of fiscal stability that we're going to need in the future, just like Councilmember
- Henry was talking about. Third, and most importantly, we budgeted our values. This budget reflects our
- commitment to wages and compensation for our employees. It reflects our commitment to climate resilience,
- and it funds important restorative justice and mercy initiatives like pre-trial services and more. So, yes.
- Some have called this process incompetent, but I see something completely different. I see a council
- faced with unprecedented challenges when we're tackling them with honesty, humility, and determination.
- Madam President, this budget keeps promises. It maintains fiscal responsibility and stands as a true
- reflection of this community's values. And that is why I am proud to cast my vote in support of this
- 2026 budget
- confident that this course strengthens Monroe County now and for the future. Thank you. Okay,
- Pastor Iverson. All right. Thank you. All right. Looking over here to my left to see if anybody has
- anything else to say. I can't compete. Drop the mic. Okay.
- I actually had a question. We'll go ask your question. What's your question? It was about the debt service
- line. And I was hoping that our auditor staff, without being put on the spot too much, could talk to
- us about the debt service. You mentioned that DLGF requires that we reported a certain way.
- and also that it's subject to change based on what debt we approve. Could you put some specifics to
- that with the numbers in front of us? I just feel like that's something that's murky for a lot of people.
- Sure. Yeah, yeah. Okay, Carly's gonna pull up that 4B for us and projects. Okay, so the way the debt
- service works is
- We typically advertise an amount much higher than we anticipate actually following through with.
- So that year, that number was $8.5 million. So I've not heard any discussion over $6 million, and I'm
- not sure where we'll land. However, just for consistency and transparency purposes, I kept it as it
- was, not to muddy the waters. So that is what I put on your ordinance for approval. However,
- that doesn't mean that we're stuck because there is still a second reading and potentially adoption
- of that happening. I believe it's the next item on your agenda. So the way that works, the DLGF requires
- that, which there's then a rate associated in levy applied just as if it were going to go through. Then
- in the background, once and if we close on this debt, if it's approved by all parties involved,
- The DLGF then requires that we provide the closing documentation to them. They then input the debt schedule
- and all the things in Gateway for the public to view and also for us to follow for future budgets. And
- it will be adjusted down before we get our 1782 notice back. So at that point, it will reflect the actual
- debt that we're engaged with. Is that a good explanation?
- That's a fantastic explanation, thank you. And to follow up, the adopted levy then is higher than what
- we're budgeting because the budgeted amount is just for this year's bonding, right? That's exactly it.
- So then when we have, because we haven't closed on this, we don't have any of the necessary information
- to actually put it in to our,
- budget forms accurately. So that is why it is done this way. So they'll adjust it down to follow the
- actual debt schedule. So obviously we're not gonna be paying eight and a half million dollars in one
- year. There will be a six year cycle if that is the route we go this year for the debt. And so could
- someone then assume that the difference between the 8,500,000 and the 8,700,000
- Is the amount required to service our existing bonds from? Years on up through now. I apologize. I wasn't
- clear on that. Yes. Yes, there is December a final payment I believe and then it will just be the new
- annual geo bond that we typically Proceed with. All right. Thank you. I appreciate that Yes counselor
- I don't have anything officially prepared, mostly because this budget has been the hardest thing that
- I have ever watched in my time on the council. And I would throw that in with the balance of last year's
- prolonged discussions that we had around the correctional lit when I was sitting in Council President
- Crosley's chair. This has been a very difficult process. And as I mentioned earlier, we will
- muddy through this like we just did and we've reached success today on these numbers hard though it
- may be and then we will move on to continue to implement it with things that will be very difficult
- for people that will begin immediately on hiring freeze implementation and what that means and we will
- literally narrate what those values are out as we head and barrel towards the next budget which pretty
- much begins immediately
- One thing that's not lost on me is that local government is still a place where the public has access
- to people. Sometimes I see things on social media that would tell you otherwise, but I honestly, the
- longer I watch, the more I think we're all spending a lot, way too much time.
- on social media and I'm not sure it's all healthy, but that's my old man comment. But one thing that
- I would just make the remark is we continue to work through this mud ball. We are mandated by law to
- have this budget done by October 29th. We will do it tonight. If I'm reading this room fairly well,
- we will have it done tonight and we'll comply with the law. But I would note the contrast that we see
- is examples out there, right? We have a federal government,
- where the US House is literally not in session. I don't know when they do go back into session for our
- Congresswoman or others, but there's that. Apparently, I don't know. I don't think they know. The second
- contrast that I would have to that is that our federal folks won't get paychecks. Some of them will, I guess.
- because you can move money around at the federal level, but you can't hear. I mean, if you think about
- the stipulations on our requirements on how we do things, it is so hard. One of the things I said to
- Councilor Wilts as the Councilor Henry was graciously reading these budget lines is it's like the weirdest
- checkbook you ever see because it shows you
- this thing it uses first antiquated phrasing like levies and just like for those who've gone through
- abatement terms like remonstrance very old English but what it doesn't show you is where
- grant dollars come in and then this comes from dollars you have existing and then when you layer over
- that the complications on what you can use with money you actually have from your taxpayers and when
- so you can have an edit fund but when when can you use it when does that sunset and the general assembly
- can literally go into session tomorrow and they can change those rules for themselves they can change
- actually they can change your congressional district so they can do literally anything
- And I sometimes get frustrated in local government when it's made out that we're the problem with that,
- as we muddy through it. But we have not gone the way of cutting people, not yet. I mean, God forbid,
- we have been able to preserve, pay for those people. And God forbid that changes, but that's a reality.
- And most of all, as taxpayers know, we still have services.
- And I don't know that every local government entity is going to be able to keep singing that tune for
- much longer. So I'd love to see for the state to make processes easier by which you can use your money
- the way that you intend to when you need to and trust local officials who can easily be defeated or
- stopped in a grocery store to say, Trent, get your head out of here. You know what? That's where available.
- But they're not here, and I am. But I appreciate everybody's hobbling through this. This was the hardest
- thing that I have ever seen us have to go through since 2019. And I hope it's the last of the hard bit.
- If I'm reading the tea leaves right, it's not. And if anybody could clarify any of that, I think it
- would make sense to a lot of people. All right. Thanks. OK. Yeah.
- basically said everything that needed to be said, except the only thing that I would just add is this
- is the groundwork for what we need to do for the next couple of years. So I think what we have done
- in terms of our foundation of having those hard conversations, pushing back on departments, maybe so.
- Maybe we can push back a little bit more on some folks. But this is where we are. But this is, again,
- as we talked about in our last week's special session, that this is
- we have to look forward to for 26 and beyond so I won't hold you there because Astor Iverson did it
- all so all right that being said it's okay there's public comment on this item you can come forward
- to the lectern here in the NatU Hill room or you can raise your hand via Teams you'll have up to three
- minutes and I already see a hand
- raise via Teams before I go to the lectern here. So again, if you are on Teams, unmute yourself, state
- your name for the record, and you'll have up to three minutes. Jeff McKim, former member of this August
- body. Thank you, Council, and to the auditors as well for your hard work on this year's budget.
- You've made some difficult choices, and I especially appreciate the steps you took on the personnel
- side, reducing overtime and imposing a hiring freeze. Those were meaningful decisions that begin to
- address the real drivers of the county's deficit. Ultimately, as you've already acknowledged, the budget
- has been balanced, but largely by moving expenses into the economic development and jail local income
- tax funds, funds that have been informally allocated to the Justice Complex project.
- While I don't think that using available funds to meet present needs is wrong, in fact, I support you
- in using these funds. The costs you've shifted are mostly ongoing. That means that the council will
- need to show leadership in developing a plan to downsize and phase the justice complex project appropriately,
- leadership that I'm confident we will see. And it also means that addressing the underlying imbalance
- maybe could become even more urgent over the next year.
- Looking forward, I hope the council will continue to right-size the personnel expenses by doing three
- things to address the drivers of the structural deficit. Number one, hold firm on the hiring freeze.
- Number two, work aggressively with the commissioners to bend the cost curve on employee healthcare.
- And three, and I know you don't wanna do this, reduce the 3% cost of living adjustment to a more affordable level.
- 3% is higher than what any other public sector employer in this region is offering. Monroe County simply
- isn't in a position to lead the market right now. This is something that can still be trimmed yet today
- and easily restored later, except for elected officials, if revenues or expenditures turn out better
- than expected.
- I understand the concern that a 3% COLA has already been promised to employees, but the president's
- budget letter is not and has never been a promise. Some of the new council members may not understand
- that. It is just guidance to department heads on how to submit their budgets based on what we know at
- the time of the letter. The final adopted budget always changes as the fiscal picture becomes clearer,
- exactly how it should.
- Thank you again for your commitment to this process and for the careful work you've done under very
- adverse circumstances. I hope you'll take these opportunities to ensure the 2026 budget sets the county
- on a sustainable path. And thank you very much for all your time and expertise. All right, thank you.
- And then again, if there's anybody that is on
- teams I would like to make comment again you can raise your hand and TSD can we make sure that we have
- the three minute timer it wasn't on this last time here so next up we'll come here to the Netnew Hill
- room and again state your name for the record you have up to three minutes Jeff Cockrell and I won't
- take three minutes I can assure you I just want to say that this is I've worked for the county for a
- long time this is probably one of the toughest budget years that I've ever seen but we had a lot of
- you know, and a lot of things that you guys had to deal with. I think I've told some of you this privately,
- but I think I should tell all of you publicly. You know, one of the reasons I've worked for the county
- so long is not because I agree with our elected officials all the time. It's because I always think
- that they're doing what they think is right. And I think that's what you're doing here tonight. And
- I want you to know that I see that and I appreciate it. Thank you. All right. Appreciate that. Thank you.
- Anybody else that would like to make public comment on this item? Seeing none, may we please have a
- roll call vote. Councilor Hawk? No. Councilor Crosley? Yes. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Councilor Wilts? Yes.
- Councilor Henry? Yes. Councilor Decker? Yes.
- yes motion passes six one okay thank you next up is item number nine which is the approval of ordinance
- 2025-37 the Monroe County 2026 salary ordinance and yours truly will read that right about now whereas
- Whereas the Indiana Legislator adopted Indiana Code 36-2-3, which established the Monroe County Council
- as the governing fiscal body of Monroe County, and whereas Indiana Code 36-2-5-3 grants Monroe County
- Council the power to, one, fix the number of officers, deputies, and other employees, two, describe
- and classify positions and services,
- three adopt schedules of compensation and four hire a contract with persons to assist in the development
- of schedules of compensation. Whereas the Monroe County Council wishes to establish a salary schedule
- and compensation policies now be ordained by the Monroe County Council of Indiana that this ordinance affixes
- the salary for elected officials of the county for the period of January 1st, 2026 to December 31st,
- 2026, whose salary is comprised of funds payable from any county fund or budget as provided by Indiana
- Code 36-2-5. These salaries are hereby solidly fixed.
- and follows the maximum level of salary as shown on the elected official salary compensation grid. All
- payments made pursuant to this ordinance are contingent upon the strict compliance with and adherence
- to the benefit compensation fiscally related and state
- and federally mandated requirements of the Monroe County personnel policy handbook. It is the intent
- of the county council that this language will encourage compliance with personnel policies which may
- have a fiscal impact on Monroe County government.
- For elected officials, time worked on or after January 1st, 2026 and prior to midnight, December 31st,
- 2026 shall be calculated and paid within the parameters of the salary ordinance and personnel policy
- handbook, regardless of when the payment is issued.
- The county auditors shall not issue pay warrants for pay that exceeds the authorized amount specified
- in the salary ordinance. The salary amounts listed are in an annual appropriation amount. Calculation
- of the biweekly salary rate may result in a slight variation and will not be adjusted at year end.
- elected official base rate schedule.
- to establish a more equitable system of setting salaries for Monroe County elected officials not set
- by the state the county council has established within the annual salary ordinance a base rate for elected
- officials with a schedule amount of amounts to be applied the base rate schedule is outlined in section
- one of the elected official salary grid for elected officials whose salaries set by the state the state
- mandated salaries are amended annually on July 1st the share of physics
- excluded from the base rate schedule as his or her salary paid is pursuant to Indiana Code 36-2-13-2.5
- or Indiana Code 36-2-13-2.8.
- It is the intent and direction of Monroe County Council that all salaries paid by the County Council
- which are tied or related to the Monroe County Sheriff as it is mandated by the state of Indiana shall
- be automatically amended at the same time as the state mandated salaries on July 1st. The County Council
- recognizes that this is an exception to the general rule for county set salaries which are generally
- modified on January 1st.
- additional information regardless of payments or certifications, supplementals, and or per diems is
- outlined in section two of the elected official salary grid. Presented to the Monroe County Council
- read in full for the first time on the 30th day of September 2025 and presented to the Monroe County
- Council read in full for a second time and adopted pursuant to Indiana code on the 14th day of October 2025.
- Council, I move to approve ordinance 2025-37A, the 2026 salary ordinance for the elected officials.
- Second. All right. We got a motion and a second. And is there any other further comment from council
- on this item? Seeing none. All right. If we have public comment on this item, you can come forward to
- the lectern here in the Natt U Hill room, or you can raise your hand via Teams.
- Seeing none, may we please have a roll call vote? Councilor Decker? Yes. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Councilor
- Iverson? Yes. Councilor Crosley? Yes. Councilor Henry? Yes. Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor Hawk? No.
- Motion passes 6-1. Okay. Next up is item B, which is the Monroe County Government Employee Salary Ordinance,
- and Councilor Feidl will read this ordinance in its entirety.
- Thank you. And ordinance adopting Monroe County Indiana salary schedule policies for county employees
- ordinance 2025 dash 37 be whereas the Indiana legislature
- Legislature adopted Indiana Code 36-2-3, which established the Monroe County Council as the governing
- fiscal body of Monroe County, and whereas Indiana Code 36-2-5-3 grants the Monroe County Council the
- power to, one, fix the number of officers, deputies, and other employees, two, describe and classify
- positions and services,
- Three, adopt schedules of compensation, and four, hire or contract with persons to assist in the development
- of schedules of compensation. Whereas the Monroe County Council wishes to establish salary schedule
- and compensation policies. Be it ordained by the Monroe County Council of Indiana that this ordinance
- affixes the number and salary of employees of the county from the period of January 1, 2026
- to December 31, 2026, including all officers, deputies, assistants, and other employees whose salary
- is comprised of funds payable from any county fund or budget as provided by Indiana code 36-2-5. This
- compensation is limited by the following lines and maximum levels of salary shown on the salary compensation grids.
- All payments made pursuant to this ordinance are contingent upon the strict compliance with an adherence
- to the benefit salary, fiscally related, and state and federally mandated requirements of the Monroe
- County Personnel Policy Handbook. It is the intent of the county council that this language will encourage
- compliance with personnel policies which may have a fiscal impact on Monroe County government.
- Any Monroe County employee including those employees under a contractual agreement or whose salaries
- are determined by a state prescribed rule order guideline or mandate shall not receive compensation
- above the salary grids outlined within this ordinance. The county auditor shall not issue pay warrants
- for any payment that exceeds the authorized amount specified in the salary ordinance.
- The annual salary amounts are listed as approximate annual appropriation amount. The calculation of
- the annual appropriation amount may result in a slight variation and will not be adjusted at year end.
- Salaries paid on or after January 1, 2026 and prior to midnight, December 31st, 2026, shall be calculated
- and paid within the parameters of this salary ordinance and the personnel policy handbook, regardless
- of when the work is performed. Specifically, this salary ordinance is applicable to dates encompassed
- within claim one, as outlined in the 2026 pay schedule. Monroe County personnel policy handbook.
- Any item not covered with the salary ordinance shall be governed by the Monroe County personnel policy
- handbook. Job description classification definitions. Beginning calendar year 2022, council approved
- using the updated classifications and levels from Monroe County government job descriptions. Compensation
- levels have been updated using alphanumeric letters A through E.
- The listing of all classifications is outlined in Section A of the ordinance notes. Full-time hire date
- compensation step increase schedule. Employees will attain a new salary step increase level on the first
- day of the pay period, which includes the anniversary of their most recent full-time hire date. The
- salary step increase schedule is outlined in Section B of the ordinance notes.
- The salary step increase level given to other county employees will not be given to jail slash correctional
- center employees covered by the collective bargaining agreement. Knowledge skills and abilities KSA
- compensation procedures employees who have gone through the review process and approved
- to receive a knowledge skills and abilities, KSA status may receive compensation at either the three
- or eight year level based on the salary grid applicable to the assigned job description classification
- and level and approved KSA status will remain with the original requesting department for the determined
- period of time.
- Departments may request an employee's KSA status be transferred when an applicable position becomes
- vacant within their department. An employee's KSA status does not automatically transfer with the employee
- and is subject to review. An employee's approved KSA status only adjusts the salary base rate for that employee.
- and employees approved KSA status is not included in the years of service pertaining to longevity and
- or vacation calculations. A listing of approved KSA hires with term dates is outlined in section C of
- the ordinance notes. Longevity scale, employees who have an official hire date and have begun work with
- the Monroe County government prior to November 1st, 2023,
- shall receive a longevity payment for a complete and uninterrupted years of service. The payments will
- continue until either there is a break in the employee's service or the employee ends employment with
- the county. Any employee who has an official hire date and begun work on or after November 1st, 2023
- is ineligible to receive longevity payments. To determine longevity,
- The effective date for longevity is the employees most full, excuse me, most recent full time hire date
- of employment with the county. All records must be verified by the employee services department that
- involve any type of interrupted service. Longevity pay for eligible employees is based on a schedule
- outlined in section D of the ordinance notes of complete and uninterrupted years of service. A break
- in service will resort
- in, excuse me, will result in the loss of longevity pay if the rehire date is on or after November 1st,
- 2023. To be eligible for a longevity payout, an employee must still be employed on the day after his
- or her anniversary date. Elected officials do not receive county longevity pay. Employees whose salaries
- are determined by a state prescribed rule, order, guidelines, or mandated do not receive county longevity pay.
- Probation officers would be an exception to this rule and would receive longevity. The annual longevity
- payment given to other county employees will not be given to jail slash correctional center employees
- covered by the collective bargaining agreement as longevity is provided for by the consideration of
- the collective bargaining agreement. Prior years of service credit. Beginning January 1, 2017, county
- council approved allowing complete years
- only of prior years of service per each term of full-time Monroe County government employment be applied
- when calculating the rehire of an employee's salary step increase. Months of service, which are less
- than one full year, shall not be counted nor combined to achieve a complete year of service. For example,
- an employee who worked for one year and three months shall be credited with one year of service.
- For probation officers who have transferred from other county positions, the start date for probational
- salary increases will be governed by the start date certified by the state for that employee's position
- as a probation officer. For a probation officer who has prior years of service either in other counties
- or states, he or she will receive credit for said time as determined by the state for that employee's
- position as a probation officer.
- Said start dates and prior years of service will be verified by the probation department documented
- in the probation officer's personnel records and will be tracked by both probation and the council office.
- The council administrator and personnel administrator, excuse me, must verify all prior Monroe County
- government service with employee personnel records and or with a PERF report before being applied to
- the returning employee salary.
- The council administrator will notify the elected official slash department head if the prior service
- credit total has been verified and granted. The council administrator will maintain a spreadsheet of
- employees with confirmed prior service credit for future use. Any additional information and or explanation
- of Monroe County government salary schedule and compensation policies is included in this salary ordinance
- for the purpose of clarification and transparency.
- section ordinance notes. Monroe County Council policy regarding salaries tied to state mandated salaries.
- Annual salaries for the Monroe County Chief Deputy Public Defender and Monroe Circuit Court Commissioner
- are all tied and or related to the salaries mandated by the state of Indiana for the Monroe County
- excuse me, for the Monroe Circuit Court judges, Monroe County Prosecutor and or Monroe County Chief
- Deputy Prosecutor. The state mandated salaries are amended annually on July 1st. It is the intent and
- direction of the Monroe County Council that all salaries paid by the Monroe County Council, which are
- tied and or related to the above mentioned salaries mandated by the state of Indiana, shall be automatically amended
- at the same time as the state mandated salaries. The Monroe County Council recognizes that this is an
- exception to the general rule for county set salaries, which are generally modified on January 1st.
- Additional detail, including defense services standards, parenthesis, standard G, close parenthesis,
- Supreme Court compensation information, Indiana Code 33-39-6
- six dash five and indiana code 36-2-3-17 are incorporated by reference. Monroe county use services bureau
- do the requirements established by indiana administrative code for personnel employed at a child caring
- institution
- The Binkley House manager, the prevention coordinator and counselors employed at the Monroe County Youth
- Services Bureau will be compensated at a minimum of the one year salary for the Pat C classifications.
- This compensation level meets the current minimum requirements for exempt employees pursuant to the
- Fair Labor Standards Act.
- The starting annual salary level for these positions shall be reviewed annually to ensure ongoing compliance
- with state and federal law and adjusted when necessary. Council, I move to approve ordinance 2025-37B,
- the 2026 salary ordinance for the Monroe County employees. Second. All right, we got a motion and a
- second. Is there any final questions or comments from council related to this item?
- I'm looking to my left. I'm looking to my right. Seeing none. Okay. So if there's public comment that
- would like to take us up on our offer on this, you can make public comment on this item. You can come
- forward to the lectern here in the NYE Hill Room, or you can raise your hand via Teams. And seeing none,
- maybe please have a roll call vote. Councilor Henry? Yes.
- Councillor Crosley? Yes. Councillor Iverson? Yes. Councillor Wilz? Yes. Councillor Feidl? Yes. Councillor
- Decker? Yes. Motion passes 6-1. Okay, Council I'm gonna ask for a quick recess here so if we can take
- five minutes to take a quick recess that would be greatly helpful so if we can come back about six
- to be able to come back and ready to go at 6 36. That would be helpful. So thank you. Okay, we're going
- to go ahead and get started. And I'm not going to use my mom voice because I'm starting to lose my voice.
- So if I can kindly have the attention of the folks here in the night, you heal room as we start. Thank
- you very much. All right.
- Council, as a reminder, this item was, well, let me back up before I read this. We are now going to
- tackle the health department's request from fund 1159 here. This was the consent agenda item. As a reminder,
- this item was tabled from the September 23rd meeting. Council, I move to approve the health department's
- request in fund 1159-0000 health fund for a category transfer of $500,000 from the supplies category
- to the capital category.
- and simultaneously create a count line for 0001 equipment in the capital category. Second. All right.
- We got a motion and a second. Um, and yeah, I guess we have the health department here. If you want
- to go ahead and come on up.
- This agenda item is related to COVID vaccine administration funds. And our request is to move these
- to be able to purchase a mobile unit to provide health services in the community. We could potentially
- also use it to purchase a vehicle that could be used by public health nurses for services out in the
- community as well.
- I'm gonna look over here and somewhere right, because I know y'all got some questions. Yes, Councilor
- Henry. Thank you, thank you Madam President. And Lori, I apologize I couldn't get to you in a meeting
- before today. I know we've been playing some phone tag. I had just two questions left from the last
- time we publicly talked about this. I think we still need answered for me to understand things. So I
- could use some help from the auditor's office as I ask these. So last time this came up and it was during
- the budgeting itself, I had asked if,
- If this these proceeds are actually real dollars cash on and hand or if they had already been expended.
- Have we verified if this money exists like is cash on hand and I have you worked with the auditors to
- figure out if this money actually exists or we've expended it already.
- So we did look into this and Lori provided a very helpful spreadsheet for us to review. It does look
- like there were receipts that were deposited into the fund and then there were some expenditures, but
- the balance of the quote unquote cash that's in there that's also commingled with other dollars in the
- fund does check out. We can't
- audit against expenditures that may or may not be on the document provided. But everything did seem
- to check out whenever we reviewed it. Maybe a follow up to this then. What is that dollar amount with
- the co-mingled and what we're drawing on? What is the current? I don't have that in front of me, but
- I can pull it up if you give me a moment. That would be helpful while I ask the second question. And
- maybe the second question was I asked last time if we'd figured out if the funds were
- Given as a reimbursement for things the county did during the covert response period for past work during
- covert to have we verified that I mean the funding came in at a very specific dollar amount I just want
- to know if we've reimbursed the things that we were expecting to reimburse that proceeds to be do we
- know that.
- So my understanding of the funding is that in the thick of COVID, the Indiana Department of Health was
- helping local health departments with a third party billing system for insurance reimbursements. So
- they were kind of assisting with that. So this money is essentially to be treated similar to our other
- vaccine revenue that we received through Vaxcare. So there were two different billing systems that were
- being used
- So one prior to me, well, this was all of this was kind of occurring before I was in the position. And
- so this is essentially like vaccine reimbursement. So like what we received for Vax care. That's the
- best way I think that I can explain it. Okay. So I guess the question back would be, I don't know if
- the auditors office can help with this then is that,
- I presume we had expenses during COVID that the county incurred to do vaccinations or COVID related
- things. If the funds came in for the purpose of reimbursing county coffers, are we assured that we've
- actually done that with this
- these proceeds first before we free them up for additional things because my concern would be spending
- it on something and then finding out that you know we could have reimbursed the county dollars that
- we use during the pandemic period. And I guess that's what I'm drilling into still that I just don't
- have clarity on still yet. Does that make sense. Maybe I'll point the auditors table first.
- It's very unclear. It's very uncommon that we would receive reimbursement dollars that tell us not to
- reimburse our expenses, but give a list of what they recommend we spend the money on in the future.
- That's an uncommon situation that we find ourselves in, especially when the department is directed to
- commingle those dollars with other funding and not put it in a special grant fund.
- Our recommendation would be to have further communications with the agency who issued the payment if
- there are questions about what the objective of the letter was. I got one more and I'll let it go. So
- do we have any document, like anything on letterhead explaining what Carly just said that actually says
- that? So I have this same letter from Dr. Box that kind of outlines that this funding and
- provides guidance for local health departments. And so I believe that that was in the packet the last
- time, perhaps. So that's the letter that I have. I have spoken with someone from, or not spoken, but
- communicated through email with someone from State Board of Accounts who just assured that these dollars
- are to remain in the local health fund.
- And thanks for that. It's I'll just say I'm not against the project. I just want to make sure that if
- we have an opportunity to put money back in county coffers first before we commit to new programs, that's
- what we're doing. We just went through an hour or two, almost two hours of an hour and a half of trying
- to balance this budget and look ahead. So it really is about just making sure that money goes where
- it needs to go first. And once we've cleared that hurdle and we have that assurance, it makes sense.
- But at this point, I just need to see a little more on it. Thank you, Madam President.
- Yes, I thank you both for taking the time to be here tonight. I'm going to get into kind of the nuts
- and bolts of the actual project. And the first question is going to be you sent five quotes on the vehicle
- that you're going you're looking to purchase with these dollars. Have you is there any one of those
- quotes you've settled on or have others fallen off that you're getting closer to knowing which one you're
- going to be using?
- No, we haven't really made any final determinations. I think we're really kind of waiting to see about
- the funding. Okay. My second question is, I know there was some sticking points in terms of where to
- park this mobile unit. Are you any closer to resolution on that issue?
- So I've been in communication with Ivy Tech about storing the unit there, and also have been talking
- about collaborating with them on outreach services with their students and at the campus there. So those
- are ongoing discussions. OK. And then my final question is, you also sent some potential service volume
- estimates. Has anything changed since you sent those over? I mean, it hasn't been that long, but I just
- want to make sure that we know that
- This is going to be utilized fairly heavily, right?
- Yes that's really our goal and our intention so we worked with each division in the health department
- kind of collecting information on how they wanted to use the unit to provide services so really the
- idea is that they would be able to schedule outreach activities broken up within the different services
- that the health department provides and have scheduled outreach activities on an ongoing monthly basis
- so you know the employees are really excited
- about this thought of an opportunity to be able to engage with the public in this way. And it's not
- just tuberculosis testing or STI testing, but it's also things like wellness, lead screening, lactation
- visits, clinical or physician visits. It's going to be fairly broad across the spectrum of public health
- care, right?
- Yes, and we'd really like to increase vaccination. So that is a board priority. Another board priority
- right now is addressing chronic disease. So really being able to get out in the community and offer
- those free chronic disease screenings. So, you know, blood pressure monitoring. Do you have a physician?
- Can we refer you to a physician? Do you have a monitor at home that you can, you know, routinely check
- your blood pressure? And then also being able to provide those supplies.
- and for some of that ongoing chronic disease prevention and assistance. Great. And the last thing I'll
- note is that, Council, you all just gotten an email with some of the figures that I was looking at.
- I'm sorry I didn't get those out earlier. That's my fault. Thank you. Yes, Council. So I didn't read
- the email yet. If it's in there, I apologize. But I'm interested to know about how many hours this will
- provide service to the public.
- Is there any way to predict something like that? Sure.
- estimates that we were looking at is two days a week. So that could be for up to four hours.
- So half days, two to four hours, two days a week. So that's kind of what we were looking at to start
- with. But I think it's also going to take really evaluating the low resource areas within our community
- that we can consistently provide the services, how well we're getting response from the community and
- what areas that we, what new areas we need to reach out to as well.
- Councilor Williams. May I add to that? Sure. So the other piece of it is that IDOH is really interested
- currently at rural healthcare and expanding that. And that has not been an easy focus for us. We don't
- know how much of our community cannot reach the areas where we have people available to them.
- So this is going to be an ongoing experiment in how we can reach out throughout the county into our
- rural areas, how we may even be coordinating with other counties that remains to be seen, as well as
- the next piece, which will be what we have in terms of public health nurses and their ability
- and availability to indeed
- to help us expand our healthcare throughout the county. Yes, now Councilor Woods. Okay, and that actually
- gets right into the question I had, which is, it's clear that you're putting this into a line that is
- the one-time purchase of the vehicle. Do you anticipate needing
- ongoing support to staff and run the program? So above and beyond our current health department staff,
- if we bring the nursing services in-house, then those would also be providing the services, but we would
- really also be looking to collaborate with entities such as Ivy Tech to be able to collaboratively work
- on providing some of these services as well.
- There's one other piece and that is when indeed there are health emergencies, this would be a mobile
- unit that we can take to the site so that we can serve the people who are affected by any kind of health
- emergency. Thank you very much for bringing this in. I actually have several questions.
- this because I try to get my head around it first is it does this change anything with staffing does
- getting this change anything with staffing where we could expect to be back here with ongoing expenses
- related to now I now I need driver acts or now I need
- nurse be or or what have you do you see any changes to staffing that might come beyond the cost to this
- um sorry so if i can just kind of make sure that i under heard understand the question so are you referring
- to personnel costs above and beyond what we already have or just on
- going supply service costs. Well, it supplies too. I mean, really, like once you get a vehicle, it starts
- depreciating in value, then you got to do repairs and all that. So I guess, where will we pay for, where
- is there any budgeting around that we should anticipate around supply needs, repair needs, additional
- staff, because
- We decide that we don't wanna just do two hours. We love this and that's always how these things start,
- which this is a good thing. It's just, we gotta figure out how to make sure that we're paying for it.
- What are your thoughts on that?
- So, you know, as far as personnel, I wouldn't really anticipate, especially at the beginning and the
- startup of this, of needing this huge increase in volume with personnel. As far as ongoing costs for
- services, so maintenance, fuel, supplies, so I spent some time at Vandenberg Health Department, and
- above and beyond, funding that they receive for fees for services, so they do a lot of billing,
- and so they have fees coming in that help provide funding for the ongoing costs but they can also budget
- in and some of their grant funds and vaccine reimbursement so there's really a couple of different ways
- that we could look at supporting the ongoing costs for this for this unit. Would you all agree to finding
- A, not coming back and asking for additional personnel for another two years on this at least,
- and then B, figuring out those ongoing costs somewhere that's not hitting us in another pocket.
- But I mean, I don't mean to be Scrooge on this because I think it's good, but I got to ask that because
- next budget I'll be up you know why over that. Yeah no definitely I really feel like some of our vax
- care revenue that we have will really be able to help sustain some of these ongoing costs. I do anticipate
- that next year we will begin receiving our grant funding for immunizations again which we will also
- be able to help support some of these ongoing costs. But if you look at other health departments and
- how they're providing some of these same services out in the community
- They're basically taking their supplies that they already have in house, just putting them in the unit
- or wherever they're going and then doing it. I think the biggest question will be, does our volume increase?
- And if it does, how much? Let me ask you this. Just help me understand. Are you thinking like,
- And this may be in the packet, and I've not seen it right yet. Are you thinking like a reasonable van,
- a My Man Mitch type RV, kind of a big thing? Or what do you envision for this looking like? So definitely
- something that does not require a CDL. So I sent some photos. I think Peter should, Councilor Iverson
- should have those.
- I guess I don't know how else to explain it, basically like a large van. Okay, that helps me. Here's
- the last thing and it's just a comment if I can. Here's my worry. I'm gonna be real honest with you.
- We have 3 million it seems like in this community not for profits doing great things. We have all these
- things that are happening all the time. In fact, Commissioner Thomas, council member Wilts and I have
- served on Monroe County Health Equity Council on and off for years as you have you. And here's my concern.
- We have programs people never know about. The old BIM, now Health Net. Folks that don't necessarily
- take advantage of things that we have. I worry sincerely, and I don't mean this is a fault to anyone.
- I worry sincerely it's yet another piece of equipment that starts to literally dry rot.
- and it shows up in a parking space in Steinsville and no one in town knows about it or something like
- that. When we do have needs, I just worry about connecting those dots. How can we connect those dots
- if this moves forward so that it's something reasonable that makes people see something good happening
- and they're getting the care, they're getting things they need they wouldn't otherwise get, and it's
- not just something that makes people like me in the sports jacket feel good for voting for. How do we
- cross that bridge to get that done?
- Well, you know, I think that's a really great point. I think that we, you know, would really need to
- take some some time and put in some effort around essentially like a campaign. So how are we going to,
- you know, communicate, get this information out, get buy in from the community members really be able
- to to know where these
- where there's excitement in some of the greatest needs. We do have an individual who does a really excellent
- job getting out external communication. So I think it would also be working with that individual about
- what are different ways that we can promote these services just to make sure that people are aware.
- I'm hoping, Councilman, that we get the message out through our township trustees.
- through our churches and throughout the community, through any services that are already taking care
- of many of the folks, whether it's area 10 agency on aging, there are so many agencies, you're correct.
- And my hope is that we create a giant coalition so that we know where the greatest needs are and we can help
- support those needs in the community. Yes, Councillor Hawke. Yes, I really think it's responsible thing
- for the county council to ask for before we would do anything with this. It's something I would call
- it a business plan. This is like this part of the plan is going to cost this much and so forth, but
- the whole plan together.
- Let us see the whole plan. I don't wanna see bits and pieces because that doesn't tell the whole story.
- It's like, this is what it's gonna cost you to put a roof on the house, but we haven't paid for the
- foundation yet or something. So I wanna see the whole plan with dollars put together to it. That's what
- we would hopefully require any county department to do if they wanted to start a whole new program.
- And this is like this whole new program.
- but to throw a half a million dollars at it when we don't have a plan in place, it is not what I think
- we should do. And hopefully that's not what you're asking us to do, but it's sort of, that's what it
- looks like. So that's my two cents worth. Councilor Henry. Thank you, Madam President. I know we will
- take some public comment on this too, but yeah, as I've heard it talked out, we've, to Councilor,
- Hock and Councilor Deckard's point. It's the vehicle. There's a promotional campaign. The maintenance
- that Councilor Wilts brought up. There's the staffing plan, the gas. And I guess another question would
- really be to find out if we use this fund for the vehicle, can we use this fund to
- do some of that stuff related to the vehicle or to, yeah, I mean, where's that resource coming from?
- So I'd echo all that sentiment to say that I think where I'm seeing this going, and I, of course, want
- to hear public comment, is it would make sense, I think, to table this, to get that business plan and
- those letters from the state to really figure out if this money is expended and to bring all that back
- and that we can evaluate it at that point. I'm not making that motion now because I want to hear from
- the public, but I think that's where I would
- feel comfortable tonight after all this. I have a timing question because this has been foisted on us
- by the cancellation of a 60-year contract and by statute we have to offer these services and we need
- to have this up and running by January 1st. Is that correct? Nursing services. Nursing services. So I guess
- One of my questions to you then is we've had other departments purchase similar vehicles and had a long
- wait time to get that vehicle. Are you hearing from any of the one, two, three, four vendors that you're
- talking to? Is it available now to purchase or is it going to be six months? What's the timing on this?
- So I have another employee who's really been working on collecting that information with the vendor.
- So I could check with that employee to see for a status update on that. I don't know that information
- today to tell you. Sure. Well, OK. Yeah, so I have to say I was. The dinging I was feeling
- I was not leaning toward being in favor of this. I was actually a little concerned because of some of
- the questions that were raised last meeting, especially around if it's COVID-19 money, why is it not
- just reimbursing our expenses? But I think the letter that you shared with council
- and it's been, I think it was right the next day or that night after our meeting, really cleared up
- some of that for me. And I know we didn't see a lot of the information that Councilor Iverson was just
- talking about, but it's been forwarded to us now just a few minutes ago. And just glancing through that,
- I really appreciate seeing the,
- the detail that you do have here around the goals, objectives, and you've included the target population
- and then kind of the different types of services and what your expected volume is. I appreciate the
- concerns about ongoing costs. It sounds to me as though when asked questions about that,
- your intent is we're gonna be providing services either within the health department or on this vehicle
- and we have to provide these services regardless. So I actually have flipped and I'm in favor of going
- forth with this. I think we haven't asked other departments to present business plans around
- their programming. Not that that isn't a good idea
- I'm just saying I'm not ready to hold this particular project to that level. So I just wanted to kind
- of clarify where I'm coming from. Okay. Yes, counselor. Hello, I wonder if it might be pertinent to
- think about asking if it goes to send in a six month evaluation or something like that of where where
- what happened the first six months.
- Absolutely, and you know we're collecting all of that data we collect data on our services on an ongoing
- monthly basis that's all submitted to the Indiana Department of Health, the Board of Health receives
- monthly reports and we do an annual report. So the difference with this is that we'll really be able
- to see how services are being provided
- in-house within the department compared to out in the community and that will also help us to better
- evaluate how you know the the community is best responding to the services that we do have available
- and we can also you know use that information to kind of guide future strategic decisions. Okay all
- right um seeing no other further comments from council
- I'll go to public comment. If you have public comment on this item, you can come forward to the come
- forward to the lectern here in the night you hill room or you can raise your hand via teams. And seeing
- none. Yes, counselor Henry. Thank you, Madam President, I'd like to make a motion to table this item
- until the October 28 meeting of the county council to
- Get a little more information from the state and understand the business plan for the long-term maintenance
- and operations of the vehicle. Second. All right. We got a motion and a second. Is there any other further
- discussion on this item or?
- Yes, I would just say the reason again for my amendment is while I appreciate Councilor Wilson's comment
- that we haven't required this level of scrutiny before, I think after the passage of our budget tonight,
- that is the level we're going to be heading for not only this, but other programs in the county. And
- I really appreciate the depth that my fellow counselors went into. It is not an interrogation. We just
- want to make sure 100% where we're heading with the dollars. And again, my two questions, I think if
- we can get some, I mean, I appreciate the letter that was sent a few years ago that described the funding purpose.
- but absolute clarity from IDOH about the use of the funds would help me move on with this. Thank you.
- All right. And I am definitely in favor of table on this because I will tell you, again, as we just
- discussed, going through all the things that we've gone through with budget, I think for me, it is the
- question of sustainability. It sounds like it's a really good idea. However,
- I'm a concern that if we get this up and going, how to sustain this with all the other costs. So I'm
- definitely in favor of tabling this until we can get a little bit more information that makes me comfortable.
- All right, any other further questions or comments? And seeing none, all those in favor of tabling this
- item until October 2020,
- Excuse me. All those in favor of table in this item to October 28th meeting signify by saying aye. Aye.
- All those opposed, same sign. Aye. Can we have a roll call vote? I'll request for a roll call vote.
- Councilor Wilz? No. No. Okay. Councilor Henry? Yes. Councilor Decker? Yes. Councilor Iverson?
- Councillor Crossley? Yes. Councillor Hawke? Yes. Councillor Feidl? Yes. Motion passes 5-2. Thank you.
- So next up, we're going to go back to 12A or 12E, sorry, since we pulled that and then we'll get back
- into the ongoing business and the health department and we'll come back.
- Next up is item 12. Council, I move to open for discussion and possible approval of the highway department's
- request and fund 1135-0000 cumulative bridge for an in-house transfer of $2,375 from account line 17101
- overtime to account line 13314 bridge crew foreman.
- As an overtime appropriation, transfers must have prior council approval as established by resolution
- 2025-41. All right, Ms. Ritch. I'm happy to answer any questions. It's just transferring into the account
- line. We had to pay years of service that were missed from the employee in this position. So we paid
- that at the beginning of the year. So it made the employee line run short.
- So is there any questions from council on this side? Yes, Councilor Williams. Sorry. It looks as though,
- I mean, if I'm reading what I have here, it looks as though you have plenty of money in the overtime
- line. You're not really expecting to expend that. We hope not.
- It's really the only yeah, it was the best place for us to take it from. So I think we'll be OK. OK,
- all right. And if it's snow, it comes out of a different budget anyway. Oh, really? Yeah, it comes out
- of MVH because that's a snow removal. So any overtime if we have something like that would come out
- of a different budget. All right. Are there any other questions or comments? OK, all right.
- If there's any public comment on this item, you can come forward to the lectern here in the Nightingale
- Room, or you can raise your hand via Teams. And seeing none, may we please have a roll call vote? Councilor
- Hawk? Yes. Councilor Crossley? Yes. Councilor Iverson? Yes. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Councilor Decker?
- Yes. Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor Henry? Yes. Motion passes 7-0. Okay, thank you.
- All right. Next up, and I'm going to ask just as a play way, um, voices out in the auditorium here in
- the Nattie Hillrone can very much be heard out this way. So it's a little distracted. Um, so I just
- wanted to point that out there. So, all right. Next up, we're going to go back to ongoing business and
- that starts with the health department.
- Council, as a reminder, this item was tabled from the September 23rd council meeting. Council, I move
- to open for discussion and possible approval of the health department's request to create one new position
- and revise three current job descriptions. Second. All right, Miss Kelly.
- So this request is in relation to the nursing services that we will need to be providing starting January
- 1st. So as we are aware, the nursing services have been provided historically over the past several
- years through IU Health. So these services are going to be ideally being transferred back in-house within
- the health department. And the Board of Health recently met job descriptions
- One job description was created for a new position and then job revisions were completed on existing
- current health department positions just to make sure that we would have coverage to provide all of
- the legally mandated services and services required under Health First Indiana. And by Indiana code,
- we must fill these positions and therefore it does not fall under your hiring freeze.
- Tom Syverson. So usually, a request like this would go to the personal administration committee. But
- because of the PACPAS, it's coming here. And part of the urgency, of course, is what Dr. Ryderban just
- talked about in terms of the passing. Now, if a department requests these things, they must fill out
- what's called a WIS questionnaire.
- which helps us, our office, make sure that the request dovetails with what WIS is going to ask. And
- we also ask for red line job descriptions. And if it's the health board, we ask that the board votes
- on it. So all those documents are in today's packet. So in terms of the nuts and bolts, it's all there
- in today's packet. You can find it on our website. So I thought I'd start the conversation off by getting
- kind of some of those technicalities out of the way.
- Yes, Council Henry. Thank you. And I do just have a series of questions again. All this is about putting
- this into the public space. So we take conversations that happen in meetings into the public view when
- we're talking about this. First, I actually got it. I didn't plan on asking this, but I kind of have
- to at this point. I disagree with your assumption that it's a must and that this is exempt.
- The reason why is that the department contracted for 60 years out of the health department to provide
- the service. So I think we need to start on a platform of how do we solve the problem rather than immediately
- assuming the only solution is to bring the nurses in house. And the department, if I remember right,
- was found in 1965. I don't think they've ever been in house if it's been a 60-year contract. My math
- might be wrong today, but I want to start with that. So let's try to bring it back to where it needs to be.
- This is the first question I have. In the statement you provided on September 23rd, which is in the
- packet, there's a comment made here about reaching out. There were no other community providers with
- whom we could contract to have both the medical and epidemiological capacity needed. Can you walk me
- through your survey of the community, what partners you talked to, and what the market survey was to
- try to contract this with a different entity? You were turned down by everybody?
- Help me walk through what you were looking at. I believe that you are referring to the agenda that was
- submitted by the board chair. Yeah. So I'm not sure that I would feel comfortable speaking on that.
- OK, so we don't have a concrete market survey of if there was a other provider we could contract to.
- Like we couldn't bid it out to some other hospital provider in Indiana. Well, we have a.
- health provider that serves most of this county and practically everyone in it. They have pulled out
- of the agreement. So that leaves us at something of a deficit, especially since that health care provider
- is now expanding their community health care across the region.
- We know that we're not going to contract with them again. When we look to providers, I've just spent
- last month and this month at health administrator and health officer meetings with IDOH. There aren't
- a lot of nurses hanging out waiting to do public health. To do public health as a nurse,
- First of all, it's becoming a nurse, but none of them are actually trained in public health.
- So from day one, they're going to need to be trained by IDOH and they have regional people who are assigned
- to simply train nurses who come into the positions to do the work that has to be done.
- It's the work itself that is mandated. When we asked very specifically to one of the TB specialists
- in the state at IDOH, she said, the reason you want an RN in that position is that the individual needs
- to be able to clinically evaluate any one of the patients that they encounter for a communicable disease, that
- your average person on the street is not going to be able to do that. To track the actual diseases,
- we can use people who are not nurses. And that would be really helpful to do that sort of semi
- epidemiological piece. But we do need the nurses to vaccinate. We need the nurses to evaluate. We need
- the nurses to help provide
- actual care, particularly to the TB patients because they are administered medications that has to be
- witnessed either visually in person or online to make sure that's done. And when we looked at, and Lori
- has some of those numbers for you, to hiring nurses,
- Even on a temporary basis, the cost is twice what it would cost per day for a nurse that we hire. And
- that person would not really be motivated to learn and do the things that are obligated of a public
- health nurse.
- I don't know if that's even begun to answer your question. Well, I mean, yes and no. I mean, because
- if someone's contracted to do the work of a public health nurse, health nurse, they deliver the contract.
- So they're motivated by the contract to do that. I appreciate the walkthrough of what what that looks
- like. I guess the second question is, you know, we already do a regional approach with public health
- in the county anyway. You have funding, for example, we've talked about this and having a multi county
- approach. Can you walk us through why we can't
- have the regional public health nurse approach anymore? I mean, if IU health is moving toward a regional
- model and we already do regional things, I'm just trying to understand in the conversation with IU health,
- why we couldn't or why we can't have a regional public health nurse model. And my follow up to that,
- if you want to take this on to is what do other counties that are smaller than us do now to provide
- this service? So I hope it sort of helps me understand that. A nurse.
- and they are trained to be a public health nurse. That's what happens in the small counties. Some of
- them share a nurse if they're small enough. They will share one across county, but the public health
- departments have public health nurses. They are not regional. Now it may be that in the future IDOH
- moves to that kind of model
- But there was no indication whatsoever in any of the conversations that there is any move at this time
- to create large regions that share a public health nurse. What happens after January 1st if we don't
- meet the deadline? Because if honestly, and I think maybe others will talk about this, as you know,
- the hiring process takes some time. It is mid to late October.
- We've had a hard time filling other positions in the department. If one January hits, what happens to
- the county? I'm hoping that our county attorney will address that. Molly, I can re-ask. So my question
- was, if we somehow blow the deadline for providing public health nurse coverage for the county under
- Indiana code, what's the liability? What does that really do? I don't have an answer to that.
- conversation that needs to be had with IDOH. I think we should have ongoing conversations with IDOH
- where we're at in the process. I think the process is a little bit more in depth than the health department
- approves the job descriptions and then council decides whether they want to allow the hiring of such
- and then the hiring process begins. Because what will happen is these job descriptions will have to
- go to WIS.
- I did have a conversation with WIS who thinks they could have a turnaround of two weeks from the date
- they receive it. But then after WIS returns it, it comes back to council, which will have a conversation
- on classification.
- after all of that, the hiring process begins. So I do think we're on a very tight timeline, and I do
- think it's worth having a conversation with IDOH as to what happens. I have two more, and I'll relinquish
- my time back. So what is the overall business plan for the other stuff? We've just had this conversation
- about the truck, right? So it's the employees. IU operated the Miller building, or the Miller Drive facility.
- What, help us understand the wraparound cost of hiring nurses. Where do they work? What equipment do
- they use? What supplies are they consuming? What is the wraparound of this? What does that look like?
- Sure, so estimates and of course these are salary estimates based upon if there was the health services
- director at a Pat D and three Pat C nurses. So those,
- Total salary, mileage, cell phone, it's around $335,000 for the year. So going off of operating costs,
- service costs, supplies, roughly $16,200. So part of that information was collected through IU Health,
- so what they would budget for supplies.
- Some of that funding is already in our 2026 budget for the health director and for the behavioral health
- and wellness coordinator. The school health liaison is still being funded through a grant. So one of
- the nurse positions that would take on those school health services would still remain under the school
- grant funding. So essentially we would be looking at one new position and the costs for that. Okay,
- last question is,
- This was initially presented. We were talking about three positions. Now we're up to four. For those
- that are being reclassified, have we worked out, well, first of all, is there anyone employed in the
- positions that are being reclassified? And secondly, has that been worked out with ESD in terms of what
- that means for those individuals? So the position is vacant. So the health director position is already
- approved position and the behavioral health and wellness in those positions. And the school liaison
- are vacant. Thank you, Madam President.
- So I want to piggyback on that last line of questioning in terms of in the original Council agenda request
- of 923 you were asking for just three to two updated job descriptions in a new position and in tonight's
- Agenda we have one new position and revisions to three currents. So why do we go from two to three? I
- sure um and that is because I thought that it was going to be really important that the health services
- director who is going to be presumably responsible for all of these additional services that we update
- that job description to clearly outline the additional duties and responsibilities for all of these
- services and also overseeing that within the positions that this that position would be managing and
- I'm not a lawyer. I don't have statute memorized. Does the statute provide clarity on how many positions
- we need to have here? No, not to my knowledge. So I recently went out and spent some time at Du Bois
- County. They have six full time nurses. So it really just varies. But essentially, I went and spent
- about half a day at the IU health clinic to to
- really see how these services are being provided see the model and the coverage and I really feel confident
- that we would have good cross coverage in providing these services with three nurses. Our current our
- current public health nursing is three full-time equivalents at Miller Drive so we're simply modeling it
- on what we already have that is very effective in taking care of the population and doing outreach.
- Thank you, Dr. Reiterven. And so that model that you just described of three nurses is we're asking
- to have an additional person that's focused on communicable diseases be hired. And why is that new position
- necessary?
- probably the largest concern that we have is the communicable disease we have ongoing patients who are
- under under care for latent tuberculosis and so active tuberculosis yes so both and so really having
- one position that's dedicated and providing that continual ongoing care is really just gonna I mean it's
- it's really necessary and then having the additional support staff to be able to assist with the communicable
- disease. So I do have a list of all of the communicable diseases. So local health departments, I'm happy
- to share this with you all as well. So I mean, basically everything that's not vaccine preventable falls
- on local health departments. And that's again, I think if we're talking about contracting services versus
- having county employees,
- That's not my decision to make. I'm just kind of in limbo waiting for decision makers to make decisions
- so that I know how to move forward and making sure that these services are provided. But for example, so
- All of these have to be reported to local health departments. If you can just envision, if we are using
- contracts, the challenge is that it might create with, are we receiving all of the information? Are
- we up to date with the case management, with the treatment that's being provided? Just to give you something
- else to think about and consider. Sure. Here's my concern.
- I am a little concerned that or a lot concerned that the hiring freeze that we just put in place does
- in capture this request. And so the other concern that I have, I mean, so I guess my question is if
- we don't have that communicable disease specialist, can the other public health nurses
- report on that long list of communicable diseases, can that work be done by these three nurses? What
- three nurses? The proposed? The amended job descriptions. Yes, they would be trained. The amended job
- descriptions. That's great. Councilor Wolk? I just want to clarify that I understood that. So you asked, could
- the existing employees whose job descriptions? The positions that are being edited, but there are no
- people in those. We have no RNs. So three vacancies. Ah, OK. All right, so you are splitting hairs about
- creating a new position versus updating the existing? Updating a job description and whether or not
- updating a job description falls under our hiring freeze.
- If it does not, then we can update these job descriptions, have three public health nurses in place.
- But if it does fall within the hiring freeze, then we're. But we would have to hire them. Yeah. So anyway
- you look at it, if we are we would have to make an exception. Yes, that is true. OK. And one more question, if I may.
- The way the process has worked, and Councilor Iverson explained this kind of at the beginning of this
- item with the whole send it away to get it, you know, blah, blah, approved. But we do not classify the
- positions. So we don't say that the nurse is a Pat D and these other people are a Pat C. We can't put
- that, I mean, and that's just the way we operate.
- I'd love to blow up the system at some point, but that's not on the agenda. So I just want to make it
- really clear that there's a distinct possibility that if this was done, that it would come back and
- be classified differently. Can things move forward in your mind if that happened? I mean, because you
- did put the classification in there, and I'm just wondering what
- That was to try to give us an estimate again. So if we're looking about costs and there's been all this
- attention on costs, what's it going to cost? So I mean, if we're looking at you have a manager and then
- you have the three under there, the behavioral health and wellness coordinator is currently classified
- as a PATC. So it seemed like, well, it would make sense that
- perhaps these could all be pat C's and kind of structure our anticipated budget off of that. No,
- it wasn't, that was just simply to try to create like, what do we think our costs are gonna be? I'm
- gonna go to Ms. Turner-King, because I know she had her hand up.
- I think thinking about this, you are technically dealing with a WISPOS and hiring freeze. So you would
- have to make an exemption to send the job descriptions to WISPOS, and that exemption is from the WISPOS.
- And then after the classifications come back, you would have to make an exemption to the hiring freeze
- to allow the health department to hire that position. So it's kind of a two-part thing. Okay. Yes, Councilor Hawk.
- Okay, so I really am trying to follow along here, but it seems to me the choice is we either provide
- positions either already available, whatever, or we find somebody, a group that we can contract with.
- And that seems to me a better way than, oh, this person we hired is now going to leave because they're
- moving them.
- Timbuktu, so then we have to go through all that. If it's with a contract, they have to figure out who's
- going to be putting in place, and they're in charge of doing it. And then if something goes wrong, it's
- their problem, rather than us trying to reinvent the wheel here to make this work.
- And I would like to get a price on a contract. Just throw that out there. Let's see what kind of contract
- we can get. I haven't heard. I mean, I'm just saying I think a contract might work better, but we don't
- know until we've tried that. And the other thing is if you get to the point where you decide you want
- to do it in-house, because that's what it's sounding like if we send it to us, I suppose.
- We should find out what the other counties that are using such a program, what their classifications
- are, because that's what Wes does. Wes is going to find out from the other counties. And so we're going
- to go send this off and wait for Wes and whatever, then come back and say this county and this county
- did that. Well, we can make a phone call and find that out ourselves. Just saying. We've got to start
- looking at how we can save money
- where we can, which is still be efficient. And I want to make the point that we've been talking about
- whether a contract or the positions before us is like a zero sum game. It's mutually exclusive and it's
- not there. There's a very real possibility. I think that was articulated earlier that even if we approve
- this tonight, we still won't have it in place in time.
- There is a world where we approve this and we'll need some sort of contract in place to get us through
- a couple months before people can be hired. And I'll even add, history has taught us, particularly when
- we're hiring public health professionals, it's really hard to hire people when WIS comes back, as Councilor
- Wilts said, with a lower classification than what the market can bear.
- It's really hard to hire people. And we just went through that with the DIS positions, right? Actually,
- you've got a couple vacancies where we just can't hire people. So I think this conversation can really
- be aided by thinking about things a little more holistically. If I could speak to the contract side.
- So I think that it's really important to also recognize and realize that even if you are contracting
- these services out, they are being performed under Monroe County government. The work that is being
- done is under the Monroe County health officer. So we are still legally responsible for all of these
- services. It's under the health department. So it's not as simple as
- you know, finding an entity and here you just, you know, go do these services and then we're kind of
- hands off. We're still responsible for making sure that all of these services are being provided, that
- the communicable diseases are being addressed in a timely manner, and that we are getting reports on
- that. Yeah. Yes, counselor. Yeah, thank you for that. And I think, I think just maybe, I know we're
- circling around two ideas here,
- Yeah, we had the contract. They operated out of the Miller Drive building. You could go and supervise
- it. They reported to you with data coming in. That's a brick and mortar space. The proposal we have
- now is, I think if I got to glue the two together, it sounds like four hires in a mobile unit. Or is
- it four hires operating where?
- Where's the new clinic? Because it's not Miller Drive. So where are we doing the work? The health department,
- so the old employee clinic space, employee wellness clinic space. Which is parking problematic, but
- all things considered. I mean, Miller Drive had a parking lot, right? OK.
- The last piece is about the contract. And the variable that's interesting, too, is if we did issue a
- contract, there's nothing to prevent us from going contract to hire. I mean, we could issue a short
- contract, and those people may very well be offered jobs if we figure this out, or if we decide the
- contracting relationship makes sense. I guess, again, the challenge is I think that I'm looking at this
- time crunch and thinking, while we're sorting things out with WIS and all this, we could put an RFP
- out on the street for 30 days. It could very well be that document IU delivered for years plus
- variables about where that work occurs, right? If someone bites on the contract, it buys us time while
- we figure this out. We could look at a contract, a higher scenario on a short contract, but I think
- to Councilor Hawk's point, I mean, the company that bids and wins provides the answer that we're looking
- for and hopefully the solution that works. There's other instruments available to us than trying to
- build something and like literally building a plan while it's taking off today because I appreciate
- we've been put in a constraint by IU health against state code. I, we gotta look at all the options.
- That's just my point there. Thanks. You're welcome. Councilor Decker. I also kind of wonder if it's
- a both and exploration simply to get to meet the, because it must be provided by law.
- Right to become to be compliant. One thing that I as we continue to talk about this. I want to make
- sure of this will be the most public facing entity that would be under the health division to me. Right.
- If you think about it for years, everybody know new where to go or
- they at least know IU Health, and you can wander in there, even when it was Bloomington Hospital, you
- could wander in there, not know anything, and eventually they'll get you to the right place. I know
- I've done it a few times through emergency services, but theoretically, they would get you somewhere
- to the right place. I would want to, similar to previous comments that I made here, one of the things
- I wanna make sure is that we've got some good metrics
- facing this operation that guarantees it is available to the public and that people are not getting
- poor, getting turned away. The office is open to all those things. And I know that doesn't solve any
- of this, but all of this is mootive. Again, we establish something or have an office and nobody knows
- what, where it actually is, what it does, what you can get, et cetera. So I continue to think about
- that. It's got to actually meet with people, have those things done, et cetera.
- I'm gonna, Ms. Turner-Keene. Because it's come up a couple times, I will provide that when I called
- WIS today to talk about what the timeline would be in returning amendments of job descriptions, they
- did volunteer that they have classified similar positions for other counties. They mentioned Johnson
- County has a public nurse director who provides nursing services, has a nursing degree, but then oversees
- all of the other nurses
- and they didn't really allude to how many. So I do think WIS has comparable data that I can easily ask
- them to provide if that's something that would be helpful. Might be helpful if we get a hold of Johnson
- County and get some information from them direct. I can call Johnson County. Councilor Wilts. I'm not
- sure WIS given our past conversations would be wanting to share their
- information directly. But I mean, either way. In the past, they've shared shared classification levels
- and comparable salaries. Oh, have they? Yeah. Yeah, that would be they shared that information today.
- Yeah. I see.
- exactly. But it sounds like we're talking about more than even just two options. There are a lot of
- different ways this could look. And, you know, my experience, which is very limited with health care,
- staffing, or employment, you can contract to have specific
- credentialed employees working in your department for you in a supervisory structure that's embedded
- so that you are able to be responsible. I mean, you're mandated to be, but you want to be able to be.
- And so that can work. My experience is that that's done when it's very difficult to hire directly because
- it can be costly.
- Um, but I think it warrants some exploration. And if we're, you know, we're, I appreciate that we are
- blowing up all aspects of the problem. I love to explode problems myself, but in, in interest of efficiency,
- if they've already established where they're going to be providing these services and they know when
- they have to do it, let's take some things.
- as given, building usage is not our purview. And it sounds like that's been discussed and decided. But
- I do think we should take a quick look at our options for employee staffing contracts versus whatever
- Johnson County's pay structure might be for similar positions.
- and compare the two. And maybe that's something that the members of the health board could work with
- some liaisons just to kind of quickly get some information together so that we can move quickly if and
- when we need to, because the big difference between these positions and others is that mandated service.
- So I don't necessarily want to just arbitrarily approve
- new positions, I want to find another way to do it. But I'm very, like I said, my experiences with that
- is that it's desperate times when you're contracting out that kind of thing. And the jail does it. The
- jail contracts out, you know, positions that are embedded. Their healthcare contract does that, and
- they're responsible, mandated to have these people in there. So it's not as though it's unprecedented.
- but I do know that it's often done when you can't find anybody, and so they're managing the recruitment
- with some other incentives. So that's my two cents. That's a good point. Yes, Councilor. Madam President,
- I'd like to make a motion. Yes. I move to send these four positions to Wagner, Erwin, and Shealy.
- Uh, and at the same time, uh, ask that, uh, the health department, uh, issue a request for proposals,
- uh, that done by the time that, you know, these positions come back. Second. All right. We got a motion
- in a second. Is there any other further discussion or questions or comments? Yes. Council. I just want
- to explain why I made that motion again. I have.
- a lot of concern. We are not going to get these positions back before January 1st. I want to have something
- in place. It just this process takes so long. We've been through it before. I'm really nervous and I
- want to have this backup in place. Any other further questions, comments? Yeah, so would you clarify
- the second half?
- I got the first part, the four positions to wish and what was the second half? And that a request for
- proposal, we ask that a request for proposal be issued and that that be done by the time these WIS positions
- come back to us. Thank you. Is our current agreement with WIS, do we, how much is this gonna cost us?
- is my question. We don't know. Because didn't we have up to a certain amount, but we don't have an idea
- of where we are on that? We have barely spent anything this year. Yeah. And it's an hourly rate, depending
- on who is working on it. So whoever they assign to it has a certain hourly rate. So I don't know who
- they're going to assign. We didn't pay for a baseline service. We did it like that. Correct. Got it.
- okay so that will cost us a chunk of change we don't know what and then the rfp i mean that's that's
- fine i i don't do does the health board issue rfps is that a thing so i made my motion really carefully
- this body doesn't tell the health board what to do
- And so I would assume that that would either come, I actually don't know, it would either come from,
- and Jeffrey Cockles is standing right here, the health department or the health board. Yes. I would
- just say I wouldn't use the term RFP. RFP is a kind of term of art in that process. It's not a one week,
- two week process. And also what you're talking about are professional services. You might not want,
- the ability to enter into the work in the resume of the people who are going to do the work matter.
- So I think what you'd want to do is reach out to different vendors. Quotes, it's a professional service,
- so you don't have to go through those kind of formal processes. And you might actually be able to get
- responses back in less than six weeks. Because you've got a notice process and all that when you're
- talking about a formal RFP, which isn't required when you're dealing with professional services.
- Thank you, Mr. Cockerly.
- All right. So I have been reaching out to organizations that can provide contract nurses. So one of
- the organizations that I just heard back from yesterday, so their hourly rate is $78 per hour for this
- RN position. I think the challenge with this are those short-term contracts. So if we're looking at
- 13 weeks, so a nurse to fill a 13-week contract,
- That time is all going to be spent essentially with training and getting them up to speed and getting
- them access to all of the systems that they need access to. And then what happens after that 13 weeks
- if that person does not decide that they want to resign that contract and stay within that position.
- So are we talking about using a staffing agency to contract these positions?
- As author of the motion, I would say at this point, it is October 14th. We need to find whoever can
- have public health nursing services ready to go on January 1st. That's who you're getting quotes from.
- I mean, so. So, I mean, can the county council provide a list of those organizations who we would be
- contacting because
- I mean, I'm not. I think we're making this harder than it needs to be. I mean, if we just put it out
- there to the public, this is the service that we need. We were doing it under contract. There might
- be a group of nurses or whatever who would like to provide the service.
- It just, and it would be ready so much quicker. And yes, they might not stay forever, but if you've
- got a contract for longer than a month, they're gonna stay longer than a month, or they'd be breaking
- the contract. And I would suspect that our legal department would assist in helping figure out what
- the contract would say. I see this, whatever. And,
- and just throw it out there. It isn't like we have to do some kind of legal process. Find out where
- we are. It might not get anybody to come back and answer. But we could go through the whole West process
- and put out a salary and not get any answers either. We've done that before. OK. So do you need to,
- from what Mr. Cottonball said, do you need to amend your motion? I will amend it.
- My motion. Thank you, Madam President. So instead of using RFP language, we will use what was required
- or advised, which is that we will ask for quotes to be gathered. Accept the friendly amendment. OK.
- Is there any other final question? Because we still got other things that we need to move on to on the
- agenda here. OK, I'm just going to say that I'm not going to support this because of the WISP part,
- but I would support asking them to look for quotes, contracts, whatever. So if we split it, then my
- vote will be different than if we keep it together. Absolutely accurate. I would like to make, if it's
- remain I'd like to make an amendment to the motion I would like to amend the WIS language to instead
- be instruct legal through miss Turner King to follow up with appropriate counties as deemed necessary
- that allows her to do exploration on the Johnson County information
- and then come back with that on our own end and gets us out of WIS issues at the time being. Any other
- final discussion on this? Now what is the motion? Well, to clarify, I thought the motion was to send
- the job descriptions to WIS. So is the amendment to not send the job descriptions to WIS?
- Yes, Councilor. The amendment is to not send it to WIS and it further, it's essentially asking you to
- talk to Johnson County or whoever you think. The second part, it doesn't change, is that this, whatever
- the quote, so that we're running that simultaneously. Right. Hold on. So I'm gonna go to Councilor Hawkins
- and I'm gonna go to Councilor Iverson.
- yes i like the amendment uh by councilmember dickard and appreciate councilmember wilson chiming in
- on that that makes us three of us all right irison i just a point of clarity that this is a new motion
- uh on my motion so we really need to vote on councilmember's motion okay got it all right so ring is
- back in is everybody mr jr are you clear with what
- was being said. I think so. It's to not send the job descriptions to WISC for me to explore with other
- counties what they do and then to have to request the health department get quotes from other vendors.
- Correct. So that's the motion. My concern is if we do not send job descriptions to WISC and we like
- what the other counties are doing, like if come back and Johnson County's system makes sense,
- We will eventually have to have job descriptions, which requires sending something to WIS. OK. OK.
- All right. So if there is any public comment on this item, you can come forward to the lectern here
- in the NatU Hill Room or raise your hand via Teams. And seeing none, maybe please have a look.
- Can I ask you, are we voting on an amendment
- that Councilmember Deckard put out and then we'll follow up with the original motion because original
- motion is still in force. So right now we're voting on just on the amendment. Correct, yes. So can we
- please have a roll call vote? Councilor Deckard? Yes. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Councilor Iverson? No. Councilor
- Crosley? Yes. Councilor Hawk? Yes. Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor Henry?
- Yes. Motion passes six one. Okay, and now coming back to the overall conversation here. Yeah, this is
- essentially Councilmember Decker's motion. So there's really nothing else that needs to be said because
- I did not table some table till two weeks from now. Okay.
- move that we table this item to october 28th second all right we got a motion and a second to table
- this item until we can get more information is there any other final discussion on this council hawke
- hopefully that won't slow the health department down or whoever is going to go forward to see if they can get
- information on a contract. Hopefully, it won't slow down. Molly, for getting whatever information, that
- doesn't cost anything. See what we can get for more information for us by the 28th. Yeah, I just want
- to make sure that this item in some form is on our agenda for the 28th. And I feel like this is the
- most efficient way to do that. That's all. Yeah, let's not sit on our hands during that time. Let's
- get some of this work done. Yeah. OK.
- So can we please have a roll call vote on table in this item? Oh, okay. Okay. Councilor Crosley. Yes.
- Councilor Iverson. No. Councilor Decker. Yes. Councilor Feidl. Yes. Councilor Wilts. Yes. Councilor
- Hawk. Yes. Councilor Henry. Yes. Motion passes 6-1. Okay, and then that's it. Thank you.
- All right, next up is item B, which is from the Board of Commissioners. Council, as a reminder, the
- first reading of these ordinances took place at the September 23rd council meeting.
- Council, I move to approve ordinance 2025-13, ordinance authorizing the issuance of general obligation
- bonds and ordinance 2025-31, and ordinance appropriating the general obligation bond projects, which
- include but are not limited to design plans for improvements at the Monroe County Airport. Number two,
- remodeling of the showers building, primarily for renovations for voter and election services.
- Number three, vehicles. Number four, improvements of the Youth Services Bureau, Monroe County Nature
- Preserve Courthouse,
- house ground and emergency management building five body cameras six non-lethal force equipment for
- the sheriff's department seven airport furniture tools and equipment number eight emergency management
- sirens and equipment and all related improvements and the incidental expenses in connection with these
- projects okay all right we got a motion and a second
- We have Commissioner Julie Thomas here, welcome. Hello, good evening. Your voice sounds like it's been
- through budget season. We are here to discuss the general obligation bond. There is an updated Exhibit
- A, which was not in your packet, but was approved by the commissioners at our previous meeting.
- and they have a copy of that. I just read it. Yeah it is on your table now. But I didn't I and maybe
- I we've been here a while but I didn't hear street sweeper highway vehicles and equipment computers
- and computer equipment. Did you read those? I didn't. No because they were not included in the motion
- because we didn't get this until afterwards. All right let me read out a new motion.
- Council, I move to approve ordinance 2025-30, an ordinance authorizing issuance of general obligation
- bonds, an ordinance 2025-31, an ordinance approving the general obligation bond projects, which include
- but are not limited to the following county public improvement projects. Fees associated with issuance
- of bonds, design plans for improvements at the Monroe County Airport, remodeling of the showers building
- primarily for renovations for voter and election services, vehicles, street sweeper, highway vehicles
- and equipment,
- and computer equipment, facility improvements at the Youth Services Bureau, Monroe County Nature Preserve,
- courthouse, grounds, body cameras, non-lethal forest equipment for the sheriff's department, airport
- furniture, tools and equipment, and emergency management sirens and equipment, and all related improvements
- and the incidental expenses in connection with these projects. That's it. Okay. Proceed. Thank you.
- Thank you so much.
- So we'll be brief since this is the second time we're discussing this. Mr. Cockrell's here to answer
- questions. I'm here, but most importantly, the relevant department heads are standing by physically
- here or via Teams. And I would add that we also have the bond council.
- available if you have questions about that and and i you know talking with uh some of the sheriff's
- department staff i i kind of want to make sure it's clarified for you guys in the public when we say
- body cameras and non-lethal force equipment non-lethal force equipment is basically anything that the
- equipment they sheriffs can use department can use other than
- things for lethal force. So we're not authorizing that, but any other type of equipment would be included
- in that. And the reason I say that is because body cameras are in there as well. I mean, clearly some
- of the non-lethal force is going to be tasers, but between the body cameras and what we're intending
- to spend that portion on include some of the car electronic equipment,
- that they utilize, which the contract is through the same vendor as we use body cameras through. So
- I just wanted to kind of clarify that and make sure you guys understood that. Yes, Councillor Hawke.
- Yes, I'd like to see a breakdown and maybe you've seen it and I'm just not seeing it. The dollar amount
- for these separate things. I remember seeing something on there though, another document.
- that had that was covering um the at the park is that park that is that still in there yes nature preserve
- yes okay i mean i'm just looking at let's say if we said we didn't want to do six million let's say
- if we said we want to do what we've done in the past do three million that doesn't mean you've
- I think you have to keep the amount under five million something. It goes out over six years. Then we
- can do another one next year for another three million. Correct or not? I think you have the option
- to go lower than the six million that was advertised, but not higher. Well, that's my point. I'm just
- trying to figure out. I want to absolutely support law enforcement and public safety, so I need a dollar
- amount on that.
- and see where we go from there. But I'm particularly interested in the first sentence that says the
- projects include that are not limited to. And so that's where I come into question because we know that
- we're being asked to spend dollars at our next meeting
- for the jail project and it does make me wonder, if there's dollars left over in some other bond, are
- they gonna throw that in there too? And so it makes me suspect when we're passing this, if we're not
- specific about which things would be included with a dollar amount next to it. That's just my thoughts
- on it. So I would like to have a dollar amount
- for our law enforcement to begin with. So there is an Excel sheet that I think Angie Purdy sent. Four
- days ago. Okay. So there's an email from Ms. Purdy.
- 25 geo bonds something something list estimates correct and it does have the breakdown that councillor
- hawk is looking for right that's still if that's still yeah if that's still accurate could somebody
- who's logged in maybe share that when was it sent four days ago is what councillor harrison said friday
- Go to council office. It went to council members. I'll send it to you right now. Okay.
- So while they're doing that, can I ask a question? Thank you. Given that this is coming up as a, oh,
- let's break this down and look at all the pieces parts, which is dangerous territory. How does that
- work, Mr. Cockrell? Like if we say,
- we don't want XYZ projects, can we take that out? Can we slice and dice this thing? I mean,
- is that realistic? I think you would look at the project list and you would remove whatever item you
- want from the project list. And I would assume there would be a potentially a corresponding reduction
- in the amount of the bond. Right. So I think I think that's possible. Yeah.
- Oh, pending bond council saying that I'm not crazy. Okay. And so here we are. And do we have somebody
- from bond council that would like to speak to this? Um, his name's Dennis and if you guys could make
- it so that he can raise his hands raised. So you should be able to unmute here and then you'll be able to.
- answer the question can you can you hear me yes okay thank you yeah I would agree with what mr. Cockrell
- just said you can certainly amend the project description and do a corresponding reduction of the dollar amount
- As Mr. Cockrell stated before, the one thing we can't do is go a higher amount without doing
- a re-advertising. And I would propose if you do want to amend the description, you just make the motion
- to amend and you amend the exhibit A to the ordinance where the description is contained. Thank you.
- All right. Councilor Henry.
- Yeah, thank you for a bond council being here as well. So just some questions as we revisit this again.
- My first is, as we've just went through a pretty tight discussion of our budget for 2026 and there's
- a lot of concern about we're reporting resources in the county. I do have some specific questions about
- the proposed projects about what is absolutely necessary for functions in the county versus things that
- would be nice to have this year or maybe in subsequent years.
- The gift of the nature park to the county, as it was initially presented, had a trust attached to it
- for initial maintenance or work to help us get where we need to go. And it's been, I think, the story
- up here over the past few months that the park is kind of the gift that keeps on giving. We've put an
- investment into some initial work there and now we're seeing a bond asking for $950,000 to do work in
- a nature preserve. And I appreciate that, as it's been mentioned before, some of that investment is about
- maintenance and getting ahead of invasive species and other things. But the challenge I have is in the
- climate we're now operating in, to borrow money with interest to begin work on something that was a
- gift to the county that is now, it's kind of like getting a gift with your grandma's car and now you
- have to do repairs on it. It was a nice gift and then there's work involved in this. Is trying to understand
- at what point we have this project down to a point where we can say, look,
- 950,000 this year, as we've just discussed, we could potentially see another bond next year,
- the next year, the next year to bring a park online that was a gift. And I think that Councillor Deckard's
- point earlier about the abundance of nonprofit organizations in the community to do things in this space,
- like Nature Conservancy and like Sycamore and so many others. Walk me through the absolute need for
- this part of the bond right now versus
- what not doing looks like and trying to accept the gift and get back to it when our fiscal situation
- gets under control here. I'm just trying to understand this piece. And I would think, I think
- John Robertson's on the line from the Parks Department. And so I assume that question should be directed at him.
- Is he online? Yeah, I don't see him. Well, I guess while we're waiting on that, I have maybe a separate
- question to go into. Go for it. We had asked for, and I appreciate the effort made to create an account
- line to address current maintenance conditions in the current justice building. I think the line item
- is 270,000. I got to say, I took a tour of the building last Monday on the civilian side of things.
- And I'm concerned about the maintenance as is right now.
- We have situations where the air filters and the current structure are being being a staff is just simply
- told staff to hit the red light and turn it back to green on the UV filters. That's my understanding.
- Some of those filters have not been changed in a while. I can write my name in the windows, you know,
- in terms of the cleanliness of the space. If we're going to put 270,000 more into this, what is the
- exact project plan on burning down on the building to make sure that we are putting money into it to
- maintain the day to day
- Space because I got to tell you I mean I am concerned about what I saw I mean if that was a public restroom
- at a. fast food establishment i'd have some questions, but this is a serious question if we're going
- to put money into this. I don't think there's really a way to shade it, I mean.
- I mean, I'm happy to start putting photos online here if we need to look at what I saw, but I need some
- answers on this if we're gonna put additional 270 in and what the current maintenance, what we think
- that 270 is gonna buy us this year. So thanks for answering that.
- I can tell you that a chunk of that 270 will go towards the HVAC system. We're currently expanding.
- We're in the middle, well, we're at the front end of a large controls project. We were required to install
- new software to control all the HVAC system throughout the building. And with that, you have to have
- new hardware at all the devices. And it's kind of,
- We're starting in the clerk's office. That's going to be 25 grand. I'll be able to soon take that number
- and figure out what it's going to take to do the rest of the building. So I don't know exactly how much
- of that 270 is going towards that project, but it'll be a fair amount. Madam President, my last comment
- is a comment I shared with
- It moves through county legal and I know it hit bond council, but I still think in some ways we've been
- talking past each other about the current bonds that are being held by the commission over an 11 year
- period that add up to about 5.9 million and stuff. And then to add a $6 million addition to
- that dollar amount. And then as we've now heard, we could be revisiting $6 million bonds every year,
- which from, you know, the time of, you know, again, honoring Councillor Hawke's time on council, we've
- gone from once upon a time a $1 or $2 million bond per year to now a whole lot more money that's being
- moved through bonds, which, of course, we're paying premium on, you know, with on the market.
- I really am this is more of a commentary but I will say like I appreciate the comments I got back from
- bond council has said to bake in requirements on the commissioners to provide project plans, including
- a 3060 90 day spend down, and why some of these bonds have been sitting open for 11 years.
- We need accountability on this. And so if it cannot be baked into the bond ordinance to get reporting
- back to this body at a routine manner on how we're using these dollars, I hope fellow counselors will
- consider a separate resolution that really starts to spend the money we have. I appreciate that I've
- heard comments that this is the way things are done here, or maybe that historically we've done these
- things, but Madam President, I got a reminder of my Grace Hopper on that one.
- You know, the most damaging phrase in the language is it's always been done that way. And I really want
- to see some changes in the accountability on the dollars here as we start to see a much larger bucket
- of money move through general obligation bonds and to make sure we're doing this right. So that's more
- commentary than a piece of, I think, the current piece of paper in front of us. But I do think we need
- some resolutions to start tightening down the accountability on these. That's what I have for now. Yeah.
- Thank you. Before I go to Councilor Hawk, I kind of want to piggyback on
- what was just said, because a couple of things, exhibit A that's being presented to us does not have
- the current justice center listed in here. And we just heard, which is interesting, because I remember
- a couple of weeks ago, I was kind of questioning and going back and forth and asking the questions about
- the HVAC. Now it sounds like there is work with HVAC, so I'm not crazy.
- appreciate that because for a while I had to go back and figure out what was what was happening in my
- mind so from what you just said now we are doing the HVAC system and we're starting with the clerks
- is that correct or clerks office it's correct but this has been going on for a while this has been an
- ongoing project it it started with I think it was last winter to be honest we were we began working
- on the controls, and it was the intake air into the building, conditioning the intake air into the building.
- I don't know if you guys recall that the clerk's office had to close for a little while last winter,
- and that's where we began, and it's been ongoing since then. Okay, so I guess, again, was I not very
- clear in my question that I was asking last time, because I guess,
- the very question that you answered is something that I was asking early on. And so now I feel like
- I've been a little gaslit here because I just felt like I was asking that question specifically to the
- conversations that we were having back in August when we had that conversation where employees were
- asking about the HVAC system. So that's number one. And two, can we
- I personally would feel more comfortable in making sure that we get this in exhibit A so that we know
- for sure and that folks know that this is still an ongoing work in progress. Yes. Yeah. I think I thought
- when we were talking about this before concerning HVAC that we were speaking about going into the system
- and looking for mold and that type of thing. Yeah.
- Okay. Yeah, and it's just to be clear as well, this isn't replacing the HVAC system. Right. Yeah,
- very clear. And we've also recently approved a contract with VET Environmental to be paid from other
- funds, meaning county general and cumulative capital, I believe, actually, for mold remediation services, testing,
- and ongoing work for the justice building. So that's already been done outside of the bond. So that's
- not in here. So I just want to be clear for the public and for employees that we're not replacing the
- HVAC system because that would be a multi, I don't know, million dollar process. We are continuing to
- service and work through the issues that are there and we have
- we are tackling the mold issue directly through other means. So this is not an all encompassing item
- on this bond. Does that help? It does and it doesn't because there was an email that I felt like I saw
- with Ms. Purdy saying that there was supposed to be some bond coverage when it came to the justice building.
- language was and I'm trying to pull it up here like the justice building maintenance and repair and
- there was a comment that was made because there was some funding or something that we slashed I shouldn't
- say slash but something that we reduced a line that made and y'all help me out if I'm like missing something here that
- There was a comment that was made in an email that basically stated that there was supposed to be a
- justice center, a maintenance and repair line for bond. But then on top of that was like something to
- the effect of we had to do it this way because council reduced the line that you just mentioned. So
- I just want to make sure
- that we are making sure that we have this in the language to make sure that it is being taken care of,
- because we can say that we're covering it through other things. But if that is something that's being
- told to us personally as a council member, I really would feel comfortable with the proven something
- like this that has that specific language in there. And then the other thing that I wanted to say to
- kind of piggyback on what Council Henry was saying,
- We literally just went through eight weeks. A lot of blood, sweat, and tears and some lost voice of
- going through with budget. And I think right now, for me personally, and I mentioned this early on when
- we were looking at what we could do in terms of reducing, if we're not ready yet for the nature preserve
- or if that is not a necessity that is needed right now, it is my hope and my wish
- that we can reduce or take out rather this nature preserve want, I should say, because we have other
- prior needs. And to me, it just feels kind of like it's a great idea and it's a great project. And I
- know folks out here have a lot of things to say about it. But to me personally, we're not there yet.
- And I don't think that I'm in favor of having that in there. So that's my two cents.
- and I'll go to Councilor Decker. Thank you very much. I appreciate every one of the comments. And I
- guess my question is, I have an exhibit list from Angie Purdy on 1010. It lists Justice Building, an
- amount of $270,000 in this bond. And then when I look at exhibit A, I don't see that there. Can I make
- an amendment to add the words Justice Building to this exhibit?
- I move, council, that the word justice building, two words, justice building, be added to Exhibit A
- in the record. Second. All right. And if I could maybe. Yes. See if I can clarify that statement a little
- bit by thinking, my thought is you're probably intending it's where it says facility improvements at
- the US Youth Service Bureau, adding after the word bureau and
- Charlotte T's at Love Justice Center. That's fine. And then I'd like to talk on it for a second if I
- can. Let's just get it in there, and let's not have any confusion on it. We have an exhibit from Angie
- Purdy. It shows it on there. It's either in there or it's not in there. Let's get it in exhibit A. And
- the second thing I'd say on this, I mean, people are watching this. The second thing I would say on this
- And by the way, we should do it even if people aren't watching. We've got in there a nature preserve
- dog park. And I have a cat. I like people who like dogs. I've just never had that many successfully.
- But at the end of the day, I am queasy. That being in there.
- And this amount not being in there or that amount being there for 130,000 with those justice building
- considerations, because I think that we sometimes with these old buildings, which we have chosen to
- keep that as a community value, we get down the line and we discover more things need more money than
- we think. My recommendation, I will not offer the motion here while I've got one sitting would be that that
- If you're going to cool it on anything, you cool it down on that dog park. We'll be out one for a bit.
- But you know what? We didn't have one last year in that area. And we reallocate those dollars in the
- bond to that, to Justice Building in case or as needed, because I just have a sneaky suspicion about
- this one. And so just as a reminder, there is a motion in second to add that language in there.
- so we need to handle the motion first to include that language. Is there any other further discussion
- on Councilor Deckard's motion? Okay. All those in favor of adding the language for the Justice Center
- building and repair maintenance line into exhibit A signify by saying aye. Aye. All those opposed, same sign.
- Okay, motion carries now, coming back overall, and Council Henry. Thank you. Okay, I'd like to go to
- a different place in the proposed breakdown, and it's the Commissioner's Line 1.5 million for early
- voting and voter registration. So it's early voting and voter registration together, but those are kind
- of separate things too. So I have first, my question is, what is the current timeline for completing
- the early voter, voting and voter reg project at Showers? What's our timeline?
- Construction November through January. So we will have it finished by the 2026 primary season. Yes.
- Okay. Is it true that casa is taking occupancy of the current building at Johnson.
- at some point, and is it after the January completion date or what? What is the who's moving in and
- out? I guess it's my question. I guess I don't know if they're moving in. We did look at the space with
- them. They're in an evaluation process on finding out where they are going to go next. And we indicated
- that, you know. That that certainly wouldn't be available till after the
- current election worked out, but if we didn't want them not to be able to look at it and then do an
- evaluation, see if that's something they wanted to do, I don't know if it is or not. Okay, this kind
- of goes back to my previous comment about why we really need to understand project timelines. I think
- Councilor Crossley pointed out even with the HVAC discussion that if we recall the sequence here, it
- was only until after we had asked that a justice building line item be added
- that we brought back this conversation, and we've now learned this HVAC work going on, but that was
- not included in the initial draft of this ordinance. And then we have the revelation that a project
- is going on. Similarly on this, and I appreciate that January
- seems to be the date we get it done. And there's some, I guess, the funding that comes in afterwards.
- What is the contingency plan if there is an overrun, which then directly starts affecting where voters
- would go to register, candidates would go to file? My heartburn is there is an absolute drop dead for
- where we're doing this. I mean, it's kind of a must be done by the beginning of the election season.
- This isn't something that can push off. And we have people going to one location for half of the
- the primary and other location for the other primary. You follow where I'm saying this. This one feels
- incredibly time sensitive and I'm just concerned about the project plan to get it done. Okay, so originally
- I kind of viewed this as two phases. Early voting being the top priority and in my mind that's not much
- different than having early voting at Napa. Voters registration is still at Johnson. So I thought worst
- case scenario, we get early voting done. It's complete and if
- Uh, if a voter's registration has to stay at Johnson until after the elections, we finish it, get, move
- them over there. Okay. That's fair. I mean, I, I hear that logic. I mean, at the same time, like voters
- were registered before the election. And so like my, my mind goes differently on that because I mean,
- yeah, April is when we have to start the early voting January to April. Yeah. People are trying to find
- where to do their, I would hate to be
- in a project plan that starts to, and I'm not gonna say, let's just say voters get confused about where
- to go. I'm not gonna use big words like, yeah, I'm not gonna say it. You follow what I'm saying though?
- This one's incredibly sensitive as opposed to, yeah. I think we would be able to determine if we'd be
- in a situation to where, hey, we're not gonna get the voter's registration office piece complete, but
- we're gonna get early voting complete. And in my mind, that's no different than the way it's been the
- last two years, I think.
- with NAPA rovers registration, it's the same difference.
- except there's not the opportunity that we would have been moving voter reg to Napa in the middle of
- the primary is my point. I mean, so I guess to me, and this is me micromanaging, I'm fine to say it.
- I mean, this is why we need to understand the project plans. So if that all holds, great. But that's
- a very small one compared to why haven't we spent a bond that's been sitting in an account for 11 years.
- But that's, I think, why we have to get these project plans before so we understand
- what those investments are, but I appreciate that piece. I don't have any other questions about the
- clerk's line, I'm good. Okay, thank you. I'm gonna go to Councilor Wilton, then I'll pop back to Councilor
- Haug. Yes, thank you. You're welcome. I had something to say. Regarding the parks, because that's the
- one that I know more about, I agree that if you're putting things
- aside from this list that the dog park would likely be one of them. I do think that we would want to
- check in with our one attorney who's not here tonight because there are some stipulations for timing
- and use of property. I mean, it's passive recreation that's mandated.
- but I don't know if the timeline, we have some legal obligations regarding that property. We can't just
- like hang out with it. So I would be hesitant to completely remove the main line for the nature preserve
- without a contingency plan. That said, I've said a couple of different times in a couple of different
- venues that I think
- this park could be included in some of the plans for food and beverage dollars along with the quarry
- park plans. And that would make a lot of sense and ease our debt burden. So I can't do that. I mean,
- that's something that the commissioners put the plan together and the Fabtech then needs to consider.
- But that's the kind of thing
- that would make sense to me. And all of that said, I know that doesn't solve any problems. But I can
- see lots of places here like courthouse lawn sprinkler system that perhaps isn't something that we have
- to have this year. I hesitate to cut out entirely things that affect public safety, things that
- effect emergency management, although I hope to goodness in the exhibit, it doesn't say and other stuff
- like it does on this list. Siren and other stuff is what it says. So hopefully it's a little bit more
- sirens and equipment. OK, yes, that's better. So I'm not suggesting that, but perhaps perhaps
- Like I said, the courthouse lawn sprinkler system is not something that we have to have, right? It's
- a want to have. It would be lovely to have. I think there's some other things on the list as well. Those
- are my comments. All right. Council Hawk, the floor is yours. Yes, I would thank you for looking through
- this and if we've been really involved in seeing what the community is worried about.
- And that's what's going to happen in the justice building. Because we know we're going to be in that
- justice building. We're not moving out tomorrow. We're not moving out next year or the year thereafter
- or the year thereafter. I would say we're doing good to get out of there in four or five years. And
- when I hear from the commissioner that, well, we don't really know what HVAC would cost and maybe a
- million dollars. Why don't we have an amount?
- Because if that's where the problem is, if it's not gonna hold out for another four or five years, we
- need to do something about it now. Because if that building is gonna go kaboom in five years, we don't
- wanna put it in in four years and have it only last a year. I mean, at least let us know what the problems
- could be. And it seems like it's all around that HVAC system.
- What is the HVAC system? I think the HVAC system was put in in like 13 or 14, 2013, 2014. So it's not
- terribly old. The HVAC system's not. OK. So we need an expert looking at that to say what corrections
- need to be made with that. Get a whole brand new set of eyes. Looking at an HVAC expert to say, this
- is what you need to do to stop all these problems.
- I think that's one of our higher obligations because we actually have people in that facility. We're
- not just talking about the courts. We're talking about the people in the jail system, whatever. And
- so I would think that would be top priority. Now, as far as some of these other things, like what are
- the facility improvements that the Youth Services Bureau are you suggesting?
- There's several. It needs a new sanitizer. Half the building is on old door hardware that doesn't match
- the door hardware from the new construction. We'd like to update that. Plus, it's beginning to break
- down. We want to add some security hardware to the three of the entrances, which will include electronic
- locks, proximity readers. That's it.
- okay you have a price tag on that yeah it was right around 50 000 okay well i don't think we ought to
- include that here because remember the legislation says that the dollars uh can be used for operations
- and maintenance so what you're talking about is maintenance so we could do those uh projects out of
- that fund and and we've been talking about expanding uh
- you know and putting back a portion of that to make them whole again because we took out part of that
- revenue but there's absolutely unless there's something that's going to fall apart tomorrow that we
- need to just go ahead and fix now but but 50,000 I think we ought to just budget it out of their revenue
- we we cannot build on to that building with those that revenue but we can
- It's for the maintenance, the operations and maintenance of a juvenile facility. And so that sounds
- like maintenance so far. It's all I'm hearing. But if we wanted to add on and make it bigger and more
- beds or whatever, we cannot do it with that fund. It has to be bonded for. I'd like to remove that off
- of there. Not that I don't want it done, but
- you know, we can find another way to do it. Also having to do with the emergency management sirens.
- Is that could that be included in their budget because their reimbursement is like a certain dollar
- amount for everything they spend or something? What's the rule on that? She she's online if you'd like
- to speak to to Jamie.
- Jamie's online, if we could promote her, please. And I will just say that I've talked to Jamie and the
- reimbursement is only for salaries. It's not for any equipment or anything like that. OK, thank you.
- That was my question. And who are the vehicles for? I just see vehicles. Well, you know, that might
- be, who knows? Two for the building department, two for the maintenance department.
- And then you also have the street sweeper, some of the highway vehicles. I don't monitor the highway
- vehicles. Lisa Ridges online. We have trucks, parking lot, sidewalk repair at highway as part of it.
- So vehicles fall into multiple categories from street sweeper under stormwater, under highway trucks,
- And then under our office, four trucks, which are just general pickup trucks for building department
- and maintenance. Ms. Ridge actually is unmuted and she's online and can speak to this. Yeah, sorry.
- So yeah, the trucks is actually, we have nine salt spreaders and that number with stands.
- for the winter season. We do have a pickup truck for replacement. We have a John Deere mower for replacement
- that's 13 years old. The parking lot repairs is for the highway garage where people fuel up and such,
- fixing some drainage there. And then the sidewalk repair is going above and beyond of what we already
- spend. I think we have budgeted 150,000.
- for sidewalk repair, and that's just helping improve for pedestrian traffic. At the highway garage?
- Not at the highway garage. No, that sidewalk repair is actually on Kings Road. There you go. I'm gonna
- go, I saw Councilor Henry had your hand up. Let's do some work, let's start making some amendments.
- Let me start with Madam President, I have an amendment to the exhibit A to strike Monroe County Nature
- Preserve and to reduce the parks line items, Nature Preserve $775,000 and Nature Preserve Dog Park $130,000
- from the bond. Second.
- so there's a motion and a second is there any other first further discussion counselor hog better hand
- up and then i'll go to council iverson that was to remove that from the list yes and the and the line
- items yes so just to clarify both line items yes thank you okay councilor i really wish someone from
- the parks department
- was online here. We asked this question when they were here last time. And I asked a lot of questions
- about this park, because I was really excited, because it's a county park in my district. Or it might
- be in your district. It's on the edge. All right, it's on yours. All right, fine. But it's an Eastside
- Park. This is fantastic. I'm really excited about this. And I was asking all these questions. They said,
- oh, well, we have a plan. There's a plan. Phil's part of their master plan that they've had for years.
- So it's really exciting. But there's no one here to talk about it.
- I know a little bit, but I know it a little bit to be dangerous, so I don't know a lot. But I believe
- that it was broken up into two different pieces for a purpose. I think the dog park was one purpose.
- I think that 700,000 figure was basically for the equipment necessary to operate or to keep the park
- in good shape, right? So it is a maintenance equipment type of thing and probably a building that houses
- those pieces of equipment.
- I'm pretty sure that's what that funding is for. I think it's the initial parking lot too, because you
- have to be able to access the park. Can you pull your mic over? I believe this also included the initial
- parking lot, which is not anything fancy, but you have to have a place to land people when they arrive.
- And we are under an obligation to make this park publicly available.
- It's, you know, we're not doing gold tap faucets and a palace here. This is all very, very minimal stuff,
- but it is an investment. And there's also going to have to be some money invested in securing the two
- homes that are currently on the property, securing, removing, moving,
- whatever happens to them, we don't know that yet, but that is not gonna be free. And even if you say,
- well, just build a fence around it, don't demolish them, well, that fence costs money too. And that's
- an insurance issue and a liability issue for the county. So there are other expenses. So to that point,
- and to kind of pick up where Councilor Wilts was saying, would there be an appetite, Commissioner Thomas,
- use nature preserve or those two items as a food and beverage tax um you know we we've done it with
- karst this is another park we're saying that you know this is a good idea however i'm looking at this geobahn
- this list that's in front of us, and I'm going, what is a need versus what is a want or what could wait
- until another couple of years? So if we strike this from the GO bond, is there an appetite for you all
- to put that in for food and beverage? I think we could. I think it limits what can happen with the Cory
- Park project and delay things, and that's a decision, and that's fine. I don't know if we could split
- the difference.
- We could work a little deal here. We could split it. I think we could manage that. And in fact, we do
- have another food and beverage meeting coming up and I could bring a revised plan to them as long as
- I can get it in front of the board for a vote first. So I'd be happy to split the difference. But I
- think this is, I know there were some things in the plan that are not
- now items for the park as well. And I know that that involves the trees and some of the plantings and
- the invasives and things that can be left as is for now. So I don't have that detailed information in
- front of me and I really did think somebody from parks would be here. So I don't know if you want to,
- can we postpone this till the 20th? I don't.
- I guess I would. Dennis, Mr. Otten, I guess what is the timeline where this has to be approved by? Is
- it tonight or could this be back to the council on the 28th with some of these questions resolved? Can
- you all hear me? Yes. Okay, yes, there is time if the council desires
- I think you indicated the next meeting is October 28th. Yes. Yeah, that would certainly work. Our issue,
- I think we all know is that these funds have to be issued by the end of the year, but pushing this two
- weeks is not going to be anything that's gonna prevent us from doing that. Okay, yes, Councilor. I just
- wanted to speak on the amendment and why I made it. So it's to, we have discussed,
- There may be other funding streams to do this. Food and BEV tax has already been collected. We're not
- paying a premium to put a bond on the market plus interest to take that money and put it into the park.
- And I gotta say, I don't wanna keep beating this drum, but we just heard an enumerated list of project
- tasks about what apparently needs to happen, and that's not in these documents. When we go from everything,
- and we have heard about the parking landing spot, I've heard that before, but securing the houses is
- a new thing that has been said in this room, and this is what I mean by
- what are we buying in particular and checking down on the list and I got to tell you it is a place where
- if we've just wrestled for eight weeks or the budget we barely kept things together with with moving
- funds around and and I hear things like we're obligated to do this we have to do that I mean this is
- the the chess moves that continue to put this council in place where we're only left with
- choice. I'm saying there's another choice here tonight, and we have to go a different direction. Whatever
- is minimally required by yet another legal agreement that we have to meet, if we can put it in the food
- and beverage tax, makes sense. But to sit up here and have two line items become a dozen in the course
- of a discussion is frustrating. So better to zero out, find a different home for this resource,
- I understand the idea of let's table it and have two weeks of discovery and bring it back and let's
- try to build this out. I hear that's what we just had with the bond council. I'm a no on this because
- it needs to move into a fund that we're not paying a premium for these dollars if it is that important.
- It is abundantly clear to me the dollars are elsewhere in this county, food and bed, or even repurposing
- the 5.9 million in bonds that are already sitting in the council or the commission coffers. Thank you,
- Madam President.
- So is there any other further discussion on this? I don't know when you're going to take public comment
- on this now because one of the questions I was going to have, I know when the commissioners went to
- the food and beverage tax committee, they indicated to that committee that we'd already had plans for
- where we're going to take care of this nature preserve. That's what was told to the committee.
- Yes, I watched it. I think I'd have something better to do. And we already had that covered. Well, do
- we not have to, they have to go to ask to spend the money. But then Food and Beverage Tax Committee
- can no longer stop them. They have to go ask. But they do have to come back to us for the appropriation.
- So has there been some sort of overall appropriation I've missed and they can just do it? Because I
- think that they need to work with the council. And if we think a nature preserve should, if we're required
- to do that nature preserve, some portion of it, when we accepted it, then that needs to be done with
- food and beverage tax money because that query parks not going anyplace. That query has been there forever
- and it's not moving.
- Yes, I appreciate a counselor Henry's motion. Because I think that, first of all, I have serious discomfort
- around our lack of detail on these two line items, the nature preserve and the dog park. But I do believe
- that we need to hear from parks, what it is we are
- the basic requirements that have been agreed to or the other requirements that we have to consider about
- reducing that line. I'd like to see that all come down quite a bit. I don't know that it's to the level
- that Councilor Henry's offered, but I think that to me would indicate that we need this entire item
- to come back as bond council said in two weeks and we're better informed. One thing the council does
- not do very well
- is slug through things that have not been well vetted out outside with whatever dangling details there
- are. And I think for this item alone, there's things that have to be still figured out. I do want to
- know, there are things in here that people cannot live without.
- that were moved out of the budget and into this and things like things that were not responsibilities
- that counties had years ago which I brought this up numerous times like body cameras that are now it's
- an expectation by everyone that you have that DR libertarian green and the guy that doesn't give a you
- know what down the street they want that body cam and so that's something that we have to pay for I
- also it would be interested to know on detail how much
- we're getting with this emergency management line. I'm very worried that we are maybe because sometimes
- council can be, don't spend money, don't spend money, be cautious with money that we might be nickel
- and diming sirens. Does that need to come up slightly in some of these other things that may be not
- essential come down. So to me, we need,
- We need the two weeks to get that concretely and we come back. I'm happy that we added the justice building
- in here though, today to amendment A. Okay, so again, we got the motion that Councilor Henry made and
- I'll open it up to public. Excuse me. I'm so choked up on all of this. All right, so if you have public
- comment on this item,
- You can come forward to the lectern here and then at U-Hill. Actually, let me rephrase. If you have
- public comment on the motion that was made to remove this from or the nature preserve out of the geobahn,
- you could come forward to the lectern here in the night U-Hill room or you can raise your hand via Teams.
- And I already see a hand raised via Teams. You'll have up to three minutes so you can state your name
- for the record and you'll have up to three minutes.
- Hi Council, Eric Spoonmore, Greater Bloomington Chamber of Commerce. Just wanted to say, I think this
- is a really good amendment. I appreciate Mr. Henry bringing it forward. I also appreciate the great
- discussion that you all have been having tonight. These are the really hard questions that we need the
- County Council to be asking on a regular basis. So please continue to do this. It is great to see the value
- that the council is adding to taxpayers through this type of examination of issues. I got to say, Nature
- Preserve, Nixit, Dog Park, Nixit, we have real human beings that are suffering in the jail, in the justice
- building. We had an entire legal community
- in Monroe County that was disrupted multiple days because of the issues that we're facing in that building.
- These are human beings. They're not dogs. I'm a Boston Terrier owner. I love dogs more than anybody,
- but I can tell you my dog is not going to care one bit whether or not there's a dog park out there at
- this new nature preserve or not that's funded by this bond. What we want to see though is we want to
- see human beings being taken care of through taxpayer dollars. And so I appreciate
- Mr. Henry's suggestions. I appreciate Mr. Deckard's suggestions and really from everybody that we've
- heard tonight. I think, you know, it's really astounding that the justice building and all the issues
- that we've been facing with that over the last month or so, two months, well, actually when I was on
- council, we were dealing with the same issues 10 years ago and we still have not been able to resolve
- them. And so for this to not even be included in the initial
- iteration of the bond and it took the council to suggest it to get put in there, I think is astounding.
- And so please continue to insist that we get these repairs done to the Justice Building. Human beings
- and our people there need this help and let's make sure that we get that repaired. We don't need to
- worry about dog parks. The Nature Preserve can wait.
- I voted to purchase when I was on the county council voted to purchase the land for the quarry park.
- We're still waiting on that to happen. So we can wait for the nature preserve as well, too. Thank you
- very much. Appreciate your work tonight. Have a good evening. Thank you. All right. Is there anybody
- here in the night that would like to speak to the amendment? Again, you could come forward to the lectern
- or you can raise your hand via teams.
- done. Maybe please have a roll call vote. Okay, so this is the amendment to remove the nature preserve
- amount and the nature preserve dog park. What's the total on that, please? The total is $905,000.
- for both things. First combined. Councillor Wills. Yes. Councillor Henry. Yes. Councillor Hawk. Yes.
- Councillor Crossley. Yes. Councillor Iverson.
- Councilor Decker. Yes. Fiddle is not present and so the motion passes 6-0. Okay, thank you. I guess
- my question, yes, Mr. Cockrell. I guess I want to be clear when you guys made that vote, what I interpreted
- B is that on Exhibit A, description of projects, the Nature County, like Monroe County Nature Preserve
- is removed from the Project Lutz description.
- and the budget has been adjusted accordingly. So, Ms. Turner King, I have a quick question for you.
- Would it be a time that, well, I guess, if we have this come up in the next couple of weeks, is there,
- would it be, could we, I guess, make a motion to add those two things back into food and beverage pending
- review from Fabtechs?
- I think it would be reviewed by FabTAC and then inclusion and approval by commissioners and their plan.
- Okay. And I think we could add it to FabTAC. We budgeted FabTAC, correct? We have a FabTAC meeting on
- October the 31st. Okay. Point of information, Madam President. Yeah, so point of information, I got
- it here and then I'm gonna go to Councilor Wilts, yes. What is the current balance in the food and bev?
- Do we have that, Michelle?
- 2,471,055. Thank you. And then how much of that is obligated by the current proposed plan or approved
- plan? 1.6. So there's only, there's not enough to cover the whole thing. Is that what I'm hearing? So
- we'd have to set in a new plan, which we can do. OK. Yeah. Right now, right here.
- of course yeah i appreciate you considering it i really do miss turner king did you need to add anything
- else before i go to counselor decker in consultation with the auditor i believe we would just do an
- additional next year out of fabtech instead of amending the budget that you just passed okay oh yeah
- because we don't want to do that okay please go now what about yeah counselor decker and then i'll go
- to council hawk now
- I just want to kind of in light of things I know that bottom council said that we have a wee bit more
- time and there's two years where I would kind of focus in on that wee bit of time if I could with that
- with the change under Councillor Henry I would recommend that we just make sure that that item that
- we added to exhibit a
- for the justice building that the amount that we have in the description by Angie Purdy is correct.
- I believe I looked at it was 270. Let's make sure that that would be right in these two weeks. And the
- other thing I would say is that for emergency management, I want to make sure that that request for
- sirens and equipment reflects what
- they need and it's not just a piecemeal smaller amount that they did because that is something that
- as we think about June next year, June seems to be our storm witching hour. I think communities that
- are nickel and diming this and doing other things to me this is where a bond can can move a little bit
- quicker and so that would need to come up into some of this space. I'm all about
- having the bond not cost the taxpayers more. But I also know that if we get something wrong around emergency
- management, we will pay for it forever. And so if there's something that we could do a little bit of
- here more than what they've got, I'd recommend that along with that justice building at that cost, maybe
- needs to come a little higher from what Miss Angie already said. So and with that, I would table this
- to our October 20th meeting. Wait, wait, wait. We have people here wanting to speak to it. Well,
- that's fine. But I still think there's things to be said. I will second the motion. I hear them out.
- I will second the motion. If they disagree with it, they're welcome to say as well. OK. All right. So
- we got a motion and a second to table this information. And so OK. Well, hold on for just a second.
- So is there any other further discussion? Council Hawk, it sounds like you have. We have people here
- from the jail, been standing there waiting to comment, waiting their turn, and we need to give them
- an opportunity to speak. I can't believe we wouldn't. I know you want to. I withdraw on motion,
- Council Hawk, in the spirit of open transparency. I'll bring it back shortly.
- So we will proceed. Okay. All right. So we have a motion withdrawn and I think we'll look to back to
- public comment here in the NatU Hill room. If you have public comment, please come forward to the lectern.
- You'll have up to three minutes to speak. Is there anybody that wishes to speak to this evening?
- falls in the category of public comment. I thought I was understanding you were looking for more specific
- information on some of these requests. So I'll get to it as quickly as I can. But what what I noticed
- in the in the budget in the sheriff and I've talked about this extensively was things that we know are
- coming that we can remove from the general fund as as expenses if we can.
- that are necessary, and we know there are going to be expenses as they come up in the future. So we
- went through the things that we were looking at here in our facility. And all the things we looked at
- had really basically three basic tenants to them. That's ensuring the public safety, reduction of liability,
- and assuring accountability. So on the body cams, right now all of our officers has body cams both in
- the field and
- in the jail there's a bank of those not each officer has their body cams but it's really important to
- note that our contract with axon uh from what i understand and jeff you correct me if wrong is ending
- so we we've got to renew that contract so what what they did is we looked at all of our needs there
- and we're able to bundle some things and if we bundle that it's going to save us about five hundred
- sixty three thousand dollars over the course of five years so what that bundle includes is uh updated
- body cameras for
- the merit deputies on patrol. It includes body cams for the jail. It includes in-car video cameras for
- the merit deputies. And I don't know if you guys have ever watched body camera footage where you see
- the guy's hands running up and their cameras get knocked off. And it gives you a very distorted view
- sometimes of what happens. Those in-car cameras are stable and the police officers are trained
- point that car in the direction of whatever situation you're going to be looking at and it gives a whole
- lot bigger broader picture of that so that would be included in this in this contract. Also our non-lethal
- force equipment is about to be not supported anymore so this would include non-lethal force equipment for
- some for in the jail and some for in on the field the tasers is basically what we're talking about so
- we're getting close to really not being able to have the ones that we have even supported or repaired
- us as time goes on so the issue with that though is uh that i think that total contract is about 1.9
- million so it's uh if if you look at it i think i've got the notes here on the quote it's i'm trying to hurry
- For 2026, that's $286,000. And in the following remaining five years, it's going to be $425,000 per
- year in each respective bond. So I just want to make sure that everybody's clear. It's not a one-time
- bond thing. This is a five-year every year. So that was the main reason I want to come up here so everybody's
- clear that this will
- This contract will be paid in a bond until the time to renew the contract five years from now. So it's
- a lot of money, a lot of very, very technical equipment. The next thing we had on there is our transport
- vans. We have two, one has 136,000 miles on it, one has 117,000 miles on it.
- uh they are we're starting to have maintenance issue with with those vehicles they are they are big
- expenses i don't particularly have a quote on it uh i estimated that those two vehicles now this would
- be a one-time expense it'd be around 180 000 i can get quotes uh just didn't have time to get those
- in before tonight's meeting but one of the things that sends chills up your spine if you're on a prisoner
- transport if your vehicle breaks down it's a very very unsettling
- thing to have happen to you. And it has happened in places I've been before. So those are expenses that
- are going to come. It's a vehicle. It's going to wear out. They get driven daily. So those are coming
- at us. The next thing is our body scanner in the facility, where every inmate that comes in that facility
- is scanned with the body scanner to see if they have any type of contraband on them or anything. That
- was purchased in 2018.
- So that technology, as you know, improves. And we have a maintenance on that agreement. I don't think
- it costs us, I think, $10,000 a year. So the rough estimate on that, and I can get you a more specific
- quote, is somewhere between $150,000 to $180,000. Again, that would be a one-time purchase. And that
- piece of equipment would be transferable to a new facility. It's not like they build them in a facility there.
- So let's see here. Make sure I'm not missing anything because I'm trying to hurry. So Kyle is going
- to talk to you a little bit about this other thing that he's asking for is the Guardian Pro ID. Kyle,
- if you want to throw in on that. The Guardian RFID program is a system used for tracking. We primarily
- use it for audits. Like for instance, if
- We do an inmate count where we're checking each individual and their sales conditions, everything, how
- they're doing. We then leave that and we, we log it on a, it's on a word document as of now, a lot of
- places you just, they just write it into a log book. And over time, those things get hard to track,
- obviously. So this specifically, when an inmate leaves to a church library lunch,
- recreation, all things that are required to have at certain dates at certain times throughout each day.
- This logs that movement throughout the facility. What happens is the Indiana County jail standards require
- a grievance system. And every day we feel grievances for things from inmates in the facility that we
- have to follow up on and verify. And we go through, we check our logs, we check our videos, we check
- our body cams, we do all those things. And it takes hours and hours and hours.
- because just like anything else, people can say whatever they want. We have to verify that. What this
- would allow us to do is go back and see when that person went to recreation, their wristband was scanned
- and it showed where they went. And when they came back and we can show that they got their one hour
- per day that they're mandated to have. This is a system that most jails have moved to. Obviously, this
- is not something we had here because you guys moved to Spillman.
- number of years ago. And that's kind of encompassed all of emergency services. So that's not something
- the jail has been able to utilize because it was stuck in Spillman. This will integrate with Spillman.
- And if we move into a new facility at some point and have a new system, this will integrate with that
- system as well. Last thing I'd like to say in closing there that
- You know as we look at the things that we're talking for what we're trying to demonstrate is that For
- example for the cameras, I don't I don't think an agency in this in the current modern area can operate
- without body cameras or in-car cameras The things that document what occurs out there. It's so volatile
- we're questioned and the liability of not having that there far exceeds the
- the cost of having them. I know it's a big bill. The scanner. That is one of the biggest things that
- we have to our advantage of preventing a death in our facility, where you can detect contraband before
- it gets in there to the extent that you can. It's almost impossible to detect it sometimes. So I know
- I didn't want to start any controversy by coming up here and talking, but I noticed that one of the
- things we were looking at were looking for specifics. So what we will do, we will go get additional
- quotes on the things that I'm estimating today and have those prepared for you at the next meeting.
- Councilor Decker. Thank you very much for that. And I want to be clear on something, my impatience
- on all this is not any of those items. I want you to have those items. I want to be clear on that. I
- don't want anyone to take that otherwise. My impatience on this is I don't think that there's
- much controversy around it. Although the more you talk, here's what I'm worried about. When I look at
- the list that Angie has sent to us, I don't see what you're talking about. And so when I talk, so all
- that scanner, I don't know if that's TSD Sheriff,
- 440 for body cameras and tasers, times five years. I see 500,000 for laptops, LEO. My point earlier
- is that we need two weeks to make sure they get what they need, that all those other things I went on
- about earlier, that that's where it needs to be. The justice building is where it needs to be because
- some of those things you described, I'm not seeing them here and I want to make sure we're not screwing this up.
- and and i'm not putting that on anyone but that's what you said i'm not necessarily seeing now i might
- not be looking at it right but i have a question no this is this is information i didn't have so i don't
- know it's not on the list it's not in the it's not on the budget list which means it's not accounted
- for so we're going to have to sit down with um miss purdy with the sheriff's department um
- commander givens and and we're going to figure this out because this is we have on the list what we
- have on the list and you see it.
- were describing, I mean, I want to make sure the first things you listed were on the list,
- the body cams, the non-lethal laptops, that kind of stuff. But then you did mention a couple of other
- things that you were still getting quotes for, I think. I mean, I might have not gotten everything.
- Are those intended for this year's bond?
- Well, I can't answer that question. I just know that those are things that have some urgency for our
- agency, whether they're on next year's bond, this year's bond. OK, I thought that's kind of we've had
- discussions about them. Matter of fact, Jeff and I talked earlier today and I don't I don't know how
- they categorize these things. You know, whether it's in vehicles and I be honest with that, didn't pay
- a whole lot of attention to that list.
- I just know that those are the things that we felt a bond would support. And give me some latitude that
- I don't know a whole lot about this fiscal stuff. I just know what we need, and I know what is approaching
- our agency. And the sheriff asked me specifically to look into these things with Kyle and bring them
- to your attention tonight. That's the reason we've been sitting here
- to make sure that you knew specifically what we were talking about. Appreciate that. Commissioner Thomas,
- if you want to add anything else? Yeah, I think we need to have a chat because we didn't have
- that information. And because Angie's on vacation, it may be that some of this information has already
- been given to Ms. Purdy and she planned on using cumulative capital for it because that sometimes is
- what we use first. So let's revisit, please.
- Are we still able to discuss the bond or are we? So yeah, so we're still in discussion. But again, it
- sounds like there are more questions than answers right now. And so I guess I would advise us to think
- about tabling this information. We've heard from everybody now.
- I'm just gonna do it. All right, Council, I move that we table this item until our October 28th meeting.
- Second. All right, we got a motion and a second. Any further discussion on this item? All right, all
- those in favor of tabling this until October 28th, signify by saying aye. Aye. All those opposed,
- same sign. All right, motion carries. So this will come back to
- our October 28th meeting. All right. Next up. We own something on this agenda here. 12 a which, okay.
- So yeah, we are on new business.
- Council I move to open for discussion and possible approval of the Treasurer's Request and Fund 1000-0003
- County General Treasurer to fill a part-time cashier position during the temporary hiring freeze established
- by Resolution 2025-42. I see the auditor has a hand up, but I don't see the Treasurer online or
- in person here, so. Yes, if I may, I am ready to cover this item for the treasurer. She had a family
- emergency, unfortunately, and I'm prepared to cover for her, if I may. The only, I guess I'm going to
- look to council to see what y'all think about this because personally, and this is no offense, like,
- I would because this is the first one to kind of come through with iron freeze. I think it would be
- ideal for us to have that. We understand things happen, of course, and I hope everything is OK. But
- I think it would be wise to have the actual department head or the elected here given that information.
- Again, not saying anything bad about the auditor. I think it just would be a preference. So look into
- council. I'll go to Iverson and then I'll go to Henry. I completely agree. This is the first test of
- the temporary hiring freeze and I've got a lot of questions and I'm sure everyone else does too. And
- I think those are, again, no offense to our auditor, but I think the department requesting this should
- be here to answer those questions.
- I would only add one line to say as I feel that since we passed a budget tonight that it is a new day
- since that passage and we are trying out some things here in terms of the level of accountability and
- and and working through these things for the first time in our new kind of model so yeah I echo all
- that okay anybody else wants to add anything else okay
- Councilor Anderson. Council, I move to table this item to our October 28th meeting. Second. Okay. Any
- other further discussion about tabling this? Again, I think it's just the preference for us to have
- the department head selected here for this type of discussion. All right. So seeing none, all those
- in favor of tabling
- the item A until October 28th, signify by saying aye. Aye. All those opposed, same sign. Oh, she carries.
- All right, next up is item B from the legal department. Council, I move to approve resolution 2025-39,
- the renewal of the interlocal cooperation agreement between the city of Bloomington and Monroe County
- regarding building code authority. Second. All right. Mr. Cockrell. Yes, and I.
- express a day of showing that I thought this might be a late meeting so I would cover this item for
- him. This is interlocal we've had it in a substantially the same form since 1995 whenever do we do an
- interlocal with the city of Bloomington we have two courses once the executive sign it we could either
- go to our respective fiscal bodies and have them approve it or we could send it to the Attorney General
- our preference is always to bring this to the the County Council.
- This has been approved by both the mayor's office and the county commissioners. Again, I think it runs
- through April of next year. So if you guys have any questions, I'm more than happy to answer them. Otherwise,
- I think it's pretty straightforward. I'm going to look over here to my right to see if anybody has any
- questions or comments on this item. No. OK. All right.
- Nope, seeing none. All right, anybody that has public comment on this item, please come here in the
- night, you know, Roman, speak your piece or you can raise your hand via Teams. And seeing none, may
- we please have a roll call vote. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Councilor Henry? Yes. Councilor Hawk? Yes. Councilor
- Crossley? Yes. Councilor Iverson? Yes.
- Councilor Decker? Yes. Councilor Wilts is not currently present so the motion passes 6-0. All right
- next up is item C. Council I move to approve resolution 2025-37 requesting a distribution of funds to
- be used for the preservation of the county's historic structures. Second. All right Mr. Cockrell. Yes
- and hopefully this will this will be a fairly simple one when we
- redid this building and we built the justice building there's extra funds that went into a community
- foundation account that can be used for the maintenance and repair of historic structures within the
- county this is a request for the amount of money in that fund that we can request I believe the next
- item is going to be an appropriation request that will express
- how I think the plan is to spend them, but this is just the request to say, hey, community foundation,
- give us the money you're holding for us. Okay. Anybody have any questions on this item to my left and
- to my right? All right. Um, if you have public comment, you can make your public comment. You're in
- the net, you know, where you can raise your hand via teams.
- and seeing none, maybe please have a roll call vote. Councilor Wilz? Pass. Councilor Henry? Yes. Councilor
- Crosley? Yes. Councilor Iverson? Yes. Councilor Decker? Yes. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Motion passes five one one.
- 501. 501. Beg your pardon, 501. Okay. Okay, 501. All right. Thank you for that. And next up is item
- D. Council, I move to approve the Commissioner's request and fund 4904-0000 Mineral County Building
- Preservation slash Bloomington Foundation for an additional appropriation of $158,801.91 in the services
- category. Second.
- Hello, I think the goal here is to move these dollars around so that we can fund some projects here
- on the courthouse grounds, the courthouse steps, the sidewalks, and then replace the Peace Memorial
- Hand and some new handrails. Any questions or comments to my right on this item? Nope, seeing, shaking hands.
- I see a hand raised. It was a hand for the hand, and that's all it was. OK, any other? All right,
- seeing none. If there is public comment on this item, you can come forward here in the Net You Who room
- if you're still here to want to talk about anything else. You have up to three minutes or you can raise
- your hand via Teams. And seeing none, maybe please have a roll call vote.
- Councillor Crossley? Yes. Councillor Decker? Yes. Councillor Wilks? Yes. Councillor Henry? Yes. Councillor
- Iverson? Yes. Councillor Feinhold? Yes. Motion passes 6-0. Okay and so that is all of the business that
- is on the agenda.
- We have no other presentations, no other county council business. So we are up to item 15, which is
- council liaison updates and comments. Keep it brief y'all. And I'm gonna look to my left and see if
- anybody has any updates or comments that they would like to make. I just want to wait till next time.
- Okay. I just want to say thanks to our president and our pro tem for getting us through
- tonight alone was more than I had my entire years president's council. And we've got strong leaders
- that do that. And gosh knows we all have tempers and fly off the handle and they have to listen to every
- bit of that crap. And I'm grateful to all of them and their vision for it. So we get through to another
- day. So thank you. Appreciate that. Thank you. Looking down to my left or my the left, my right. What's
- the best that can happen? That's all I'm going to say. OK.
- I'll just say two brief things. And just because it is more updates. First is, I just want to thank
- the election supervisor, Kylie. She's always Ferris to me or more Moreland Ferris yeah for sharing them
- in our county vote center plan with the Secretary of State at the field hearings.
- for consideration. And so the good news, at least that I have so far, is that the good work that was
- done to try to move us to a vote center county is now in the hands of the Secretary of State, hopefully.
- it informs the state level decision to move the other counties there. There are now 70 counties that
- are, as of this week, that are using vote centers. We're not one of them. I want to thank Kylie for
- her work in forwarding that case. And then secondly, for those that would like a freeware version of
- my emergency management course at IU, I'll be on noon edition on Friday with Dan Combs talking about
- the tornadoes. So I know that was of interest this evening. So tune in and hear me opine with CARP about,
- well, CARP about carping about
- tornadoes. That's it, Madam President. Thanks. Thank you. I would say more, but I sound like Jim Carrey's
- character from In Living Color. So I'm not going to say anything else except for I appreciate the hard
- work and dedication that each
- all seven of us have in making this 2026 budget work. Again, many thanks to the auditor's office,
- our staff, Kim and Lehua, and Ms. Turner King that is in the building right now. Other than that, oh,
- hey, you are waving at me. Hey. And I'm so glad to see your smiling face here back with us again.
- Go Hoosiers, number three, and we are adjourned. Thank you.